[WvW] GS vs Hammer
I love the hammer. I feel like my character is swinging a heavy maul in combat; I don’t feel the respective same way when I use the greatsword. I also love the fact that when things go right I can keep up perpetual protection and retaliation. I also love the near-spamable blast finisher of #2.
That being said, the few fights I’ve been in WvW everyone seems to wait until I’m in the animation of the 3rd auto-attack to interrupt me. I have difficulty getting the third attack off because of the longish charge time. This results in my character being significantly less effective/useful when I can’t keep protection and retaliation up on myself, let alone everyone else.
In PvE, I love rockin’ the hammer. I can front-line nearly any mob, meta-event or otherwise.
I don’t PvP, so I can’t comment to that. I speculate I’d have even more of the difficulties with interruptions than I do in WvW.
Atm I don’t really use either GS or Hammer. I’m finding the Scepter/Torch a lot of fun.
Oh, and don’t forget the blast-finisher #2 can close the gap a bit. It’s just not nearly as effective doing so as the GS.
~J
if you run it with a meditation build its great.
The build is rather supportive but maintains good damage making it great for front line use.
For the last utility you can use stand your ground for stability & retal (plus condi coversion if traited), purging flames for a fire field & condi removal, wall of reflection or contemplation of purity.
For the 2 traits in honor you can use pure of heart, superior aria or protective reviver.
For the 2 empty traits you can grab master of consecrations, consecrated ground or firey wrath.
The build can also be quite good with a great sword as your secondary, just port in put up ring of warding then swap to GS for symbol of wrath & whirling wrath.