Guild Wars 2

For some time, I’ve been playing around a different power/condition damage build. With the upcoming buffs to Mantra of Resolve and Concentration, I try to make my utilities more supportive. I’ve also been curious about Celestial stats and see if I can make an alternative (since it takes a while to make Celestial gear). I wanted to see if I can make a build that provides damage (direct and conditional) while providing some support (not just heals) to others.

10/30/20/0/10

I was inspired by Keenlam’s clone spammer and a few phantasm dps builds that I wanted to see if I can incorporate parts of each into this build. The illusions help improve my damage output while giving me more defense. I like Signet of Inspiration and “buffed” Mantra of Resolve to provide group support. The stunbreaker listed is Signet of Midnight BUT Mantra of Concentration can be an alternative (I’m still trying both out to see which is better or if they’re equal).

Scepter/Sword provides a nice mix of power/condition damage while making plenty of clones, in addition to Deceptive Evasion. I went with Staff as the second weapon to provide some defense and mobility, but I think greatsword would work as a offensive alternative. I did thought about Sword/Pistol as well, which may also work.

I figured I try posting a build idea and asking for opinion/feedback to see what you all think. It seems to be going fine in PvE, but I haven’t tried dungeons (at least, not until the AoE mantra buff takes in effect in October).

Hey Phloww my advice is relatively straigtforward. Gear wise as a hybrid you’re probably solid offensively, maybe just a tad squishy but not overly so.

Trait wise, I’d take Chaotic Dampening over iDefense, even though it was bugged fix, the staff cooldowns and toughness are so much more helpful than extra situational facetanking strength. You’ll be able to phase retreat away from enemies more often, which is a better way to nullify damage. Other than that I’d just suggest taking more mantras if you go 30 in dueling for them. Why take signet of midnight when you can get a stunbreak through mantra of concentration? For your traits its a far superior setup, and even without traits, blink outclasses that signet imo. Also I’d even suggest the mantra heal to frontload your DPS even more. Besides that it might be cool seeing if you can take the healing mantra trait by giving something up, especially if you do invest more heavily in mantras (like a 0/30/20/20/0 build or something like that). Especially since the trats you tookfrom domination/illusions aren’t the best. Like I’d take phantasm damage over signet CDs, and Compounding Power is actually fine, but it may allow for more utility if you went into inspiration, just a thought.

Thanks Nearlight,

When you put it that way with Chaotic Dampening vs. iDefense, it makes sense, so I’ll take your advice on that. Though if I choose greatsword or sword/x, I’ll probably keep it iDefense.

I did debate between Signet of Midnight and Mantra of Concentration; the signet gives a little extra boon and AoE blind, yet the mantra gives AoE stability (once patch occurs), so I may end up going for the mantra in the end. I figured 1-2 mantras are fine to have instead of a full mantra build (which I didn’t want to go with). I’m not sure about Restorative Mantra would be much help since with 20 Inspiration and the gear, it’ll just give me roughly 300 healing power, but I may try your idea of 0/30/20/20/0 to see if it fares better (Maybe go with scepter/sword + sword/focus for that). I also wanted to deal damage while juggling my illusions, so Compounding Power and Empowering Mantras would help boost me. Also, I do enjoy Blink, even when not traited at all and I kinda miss having it sometimes whenever it’s not in my bar.

Reason I took Signet Mastery is mainly to use Signet of Inspiration, but I do agree that Empowering Illusions would help with my, er, phantasm dps, so I’ll take up your suggestion on that. Blade Training was also another trait I thought of, but I wasn’t sure if it’d be better than the ones selected.

With your thoughts and suggestions, I think this is what may look like:

10/30/20/0/10 (I may replace Blink with Signet of Inspiration when in party.)

Thank you for a lot of suggestions and help!^^

Sorry for double posting. I know I’m mainly PvE/dungeons and very, very little in WvW. There are times that I do have to enter WvW, mainly badges of honor. I wanted to at least make it okay around, whether I’m roaming around or in a zerg. I figured something like this may help me out there:

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fgQQJArclwzipHSTlGbNJiJFBHyhqA2RqgqV6BudhyGA-jkEBIhBEnJZUFAEBKjJfApPJKHSjtMsIasqaA6FYKYRWHLpWdAGzwmzoG0IW0QOEYSBcx0I-w

I’m not sure if I should keep Sigil of Accuracy or try Sigil of Force. Is 45% crit chance okay to have? I didn’t have a secondary weapon selected because staff, greatsword, sword/x can all work with this.

I’m enjoying this build a lot lately and first time utilizing a couple mantras. I noticed that the WvW infusions are better than PvE (by 1 point), so I may as well go and get those instead.

Note: Depending if Empowered Mantras is gonna be changed or not (since it’s the odd-ball among the mantra traits), I may end up using Mantra Mastery or Protected Mantras instead.

Edit: Messed up the link formatting. ><;