Guild Wars 2

CI = Chaotic Interruption ( Interrupted foes are Immobilized + Blind/Cripple/Chill)

CD = Chaotic Dampening ( Gain toughness with staff equipped & reduce cooldowns by 20%)

A lot of people who spectate my weird 0/4/6/4/0 build often ask me why I choose Chaotic Interruption despite not necessarily considering it a lockdown build. I’ve fallen into the habit of almost always traiting CI whenever I grab Staff and Focus because in my opinion it offers a better benefit to both weapons.

CHAOS STORM
The majority of staff’s damage comes from iWarlock (4k+ dmg) , second to that is Chaos Storm (3k+ dmg). Both these skills are difficult to land on mobile opponents … or anything that has legs and a brain, really. Chaotic Interruption works very well with Chaos Storm for trapping people in it’s radius when it interrupts. Since c-storm also has a chance to proc chill, CI helps really dampen an opponent’s mobility.

iWARLOCK
… Which is why I summon Chaos Storm before I summon iWarlock. iWarlock does 10% more damage for every condition on the opponent, but also has the curse of barely ever being able to strike any enemy that has the ability to.. hell, wiggle. Not only does CI’s immobilize make it easier to for Warlock to hit, but since CI drops an instant two conditions on the opponent, it already guarantees an extra 20% damage boost.

TEMPORAL CURTAIN
This is the same reason I use CI with Focus. Temporal Curtain is an excellent CC ability, not only does it cripple but after being cast, the magic rupture lingers for about five seconds. This is very dangerous for the opponent! Many people like to cast curtain and pull instantly, but this is predictable and easy to avoid. Temporal Curtain is one of the best “mindgame” skills we have: letting it linger usually forces an opponent to waste one or both of their dodges and makes them extremely uncomfortable with using any skills with longer cast times. It’s almost always better to summon the curtain and not immediately pull. This also gives you access to a cripple field and a LIGHT combo field.

iWARDEN
But you can do all that without CI. Dealing damage iWarden is the real reason you want to use CI with Focus. A proper (summon curtain > summon warden > pull curtain before warden is fully summoned) combo can land a couple of iWarden’s 12 hits, but landing an interrupt before summoning -combined with swords Illusionary Leap- can immobilize an opponent long enough for nearly all of Warden’s attacks to hit, while at the same time giving you an opening for a blurred frenzy or full sword autoattack from inside the Phantasm (and thus safe from projectiles)

These are just a couple examples of why I enjoy using CI even when I’m not running Mantra of Distraction or Halting Strike. Saving people from Stomps/Preventing rezzes and random immobilizes are all well and good in teamfights too, has anyone else come up with other creative ways of using this excellent trait?

Chaos Archangel.5071:

TEMPORAL CURTAIN
This is the same reason I use CI with Focus. Temporal Curtain is an excellent CC ability, not only does it cripple but after being cast, the magic rupture lingers for about five seconds. This is very dangerous for the opponent! Many people like to cast curtain and pull instantly, but this is predictable and easy to avoid. Temporal Curtain is one of the best “mindgame” skills we have: letting it linger usually forces an opponent to waste one or both of their dodges and makes them extremely uncomfortable with using any skills with longer cast times. It’s almost always better to summon the curtain and not immediately pull. This also gives you access to a cripple field and a LIGHT combo field.

iWARDEN
But you can do all that without CI. Dealing damage iWarden is the real reason you want to use CI with Focus. A proper (summon curtain > summon warden > pull curtain before warden is fully summoned) combo can land a couple of iWarden’s 12 hits, but landing an interrupt before summoning -combined with swords Illusionary Leap- can immobilize an opponent long enough for nearly all of Warden’s attacks to hit, while at the same time giving you an opening for a blurred frenzy or full sword autoattack from inside the Phantasm (and thus safe from projectiles)

These are just a couple examples of why I enjoy using CI even when I’m not running Mantra of Distraction or Halting Strike. Saving people from Stomps/Preventing rezzes and random immobilizes are all well and good in teamfights too, has anyone else come up with other creative ways of using this excellent trait?

I use pretty much all the focus specific tips you give in my chaotic perdition build here (with video), especially the waiting to pull trick: Chaotic Perdition

It’s a decent soloq/WvW roaming build, but I’ve temporarily shelved it due to iWarden still being so buggy, with even more reflect bugs post-patch.

For serious lockdown builds that take staff, I just can’t see not using CD for chaos storm cooldown reduction, but it’s so tempting. I’ve also been theory-crafting interrupt builds lately, purposefully not taking BI just to see what opens up, and there is quite a bit. More to come on that xD.

Darn it Chaos, your always one step ahead of me. I finally got some GW2 game time in yesterday, since the big April patch. I was trying to re-create my “Eccho-Rupt” build with the changes. And sure enough, what I came up with was staff, sword/focus and CI.

Since the “Eccho-rupt” name was kind of misleading. I thought I’d name it “Harmonious Interruptions”. Since it uses "Harmonious Mantra’s and “Chaotic Interruptions”. (0,6,6,2,0) Here’s a link: http://tinyurl.com/lwzu9b9

I have a gaming laptop and have been waiting for Nvidia to enable Shadowplay on mobile GPU’s. They recently did and I tried capturing some video with it, but it causes INCREDIBLE lag in GW2. Basically, it causes missed keystrokes. I can pound on keys and nothing happens, then about the fifth time it registers. When I get back home from work tonight I’ll make a separate thread on the build. And I might have another tool to capture some gameplay. Have to test it, first.

EDIT: had to fix link.

Heh. Smells like my old Perplexity condirupt. 0/4/6/0/4, Staff/Sword/Focus, MoD on bar.
Needless to say, it can definitely break fools down. As can the 0/4/6/4/0 spec.

Got bored of my necro and went back to my main mesmer. I wanted to try something new. I’ve been using 6/2/6/0/0, GS or S/F and Staff in WvW, especially in EotM. I was broken over choosing CD or CI or BI and went with CI after many zerg fights.

Since I’m more power oriented build, having people immobilized is awesome. While staying in Chaos Storm, they get Halting Strike + Illusion of Vulnerability + Dazzling + Wastrel’s Punishment + Confounding Suggestion + Bountiful Interruption (Buff for me !) and Sigil of Impact + Sigil of Paralyzation. To sum it up, it’s a huge mess of CC. If they are not dead, they end up with lots of vulnerability.

iWave is good now if I get to interrupt people. It’s easier, like you said, to land phantasm on people after they have the immobilize from CI.

I was running Rune of Mesmer, but felt my mesmer was crippling behind and since I don’t think the % dazing will make much difference because I have Confounding Suggestion, I went with Centaur runes.

I just wish Chaos Storm was on a shorter cooldown though.

Chaos Storm alone gets so much better with CI, it easily outweighs the 20% cooldown reduction (anyway, you can have both if you skip on BI, and I say CI is better than BI for sure).

Recently I dropped a CI-traited Chaos Storm on the enemy zerg while they were stacking might. Right before our zerg hit ’em. Holy crap, the fight was over before it even began. They had no condi-cleansing water fields because all was full of fire combo-fields, half of their zerg was stuck in place because of CI interrupts. Our zerg simply roflstomped them. Stacking corpses instead of stacking might.

Another great, great use of a CI Chaos Storm is when they try to rezz someone. Drop a Chaos Storm on the place and you are guaranteed to cause some nasty interrupts. Usually your teammates will drop additional damage on the spot, so when the dust settles you’ll see about three corpses instead of one lying around.

As allways good work. +1

I think not enough people take CD because they think BI is too good or something. I used CD in a recent GS/Staff lockdown build and it was glorious. Every time I ended my GS rotations Chaos Storm was either off cd or close to it. Also the amount of kiting I could do against thieves was hilarious. I only wish I could have traited illusionists celerity to make it even more troll.

@SlimChance: You have Mender’s Purity AND Harmonious Mantras and aren’t running the mantra heal? Blasphemy! (Solid looking build otherwise though)

@Raunchy: You’re right, Chaotic Dampening is reallllyy good for Chaos Storm, but I choose BI because it gives me more of a benefit for multiple skills. Since I usually grab a Focus, BI can easily proc me 10+ stacks of might plus some useful boons like Protection/Fury/Vigor, and as a result it’s too hard for me to drop that just to put Chaos Storm on a lower cooldown. While it also affects the other skills, I don’t think the reduction is profound enough to really warrant the change besides C-storm.

I have to say, i was a bit skeptical about this but i thought wtf, ill give it a try in hotjoins and OMG it was hilarious watching ppl melting inside c-storm. Halting strike+BI+CI makes a really fun combo. I didnt gave it to much try but so far it was really fun. Specially watching that couple of thieves melting in secs without me realising what happened and how i did it (i was so focused in staying alive i didnt noticed the halting strike dmg + all the might stacks :P)

Only diference is i used pistol instead of focus for a more reliable phantasm. Err well, maybe theres more diferences i didnt read the whole build, just the main idea and just put those traits in the 2/6/6 setup i had….

Dang now i wanna try more interrupt builds and i cant even memorize how my own skill looks :P

You sure somebody else wasn’t hitting them too? I find it hard to believe that CS was melting anyone.

Neurophen.9738:

You sure somebody else wasn’t hitting them too? I find it hard to believe that CS was melting anyone.

Tbh i also find it hard to believe. Granted they werent the best thieves and im almost sure they were glass cannons but i was alone.

Of course it wasnt CS alone, i didnt cast CS and watched. I used other skills but still, they went down in no time wich normally doesnt happen since they run away like the “bravest of braves” they are :P

The usual scenario (for me at least) is you cast chaos storm and ppl dodge out of it and just wait that 1s daze (wich like half allready went by). Now they get the normal CS effect + 2k dmg (or 4k if im lucky and they get interrupted twice), get inmo+ chill, cripple or blind wich gives enough time to hit them with iWarlock or Duelist. Ohh i also get some nice might stacks and other random boon.

So CS killed them alone? Nopes but CS made a huge mess of CC that allowed me to kill them easy, something i wasnt able to do before. Maybe i was extremly lucky with rng and they sucked badly or never expected that, idk.

I know i should try it more but so far its a lot more promissing than I inatially thought about those traits.

CS is defiantly a strong skill and it does cause havok in a team fight. I have seen the CI procs trap careless players in an ele’s aoe field which in combination does melt faces

Things I see differently:

The main damage source with staff is burning, even ifyou do not have additional condition damage. Staff clones do a lot of damage due to burning applied by winds of chaos. Staff clones are very dangerous and totally under apprechiated.

CD is good because reduced cd on phase retreat helps a lot, it works as a leap finisher and you do want as many of those as you can get, in group fights produceing more combo effects is what makes you win eventually.

@SlimChance: You have Mender’s Purity AND Harmonious Mantras and aren’t running the mantra heal? Blasphemy! (Solid looking build otherwise though)

:) Yeah, I figured you’d probably catch that. I have a love/hate relationship with Mantra of Resolve. I’ll equip it and it everything is good. Then there will be that one time where the engagement goes long, or the fights get chained together, and there was no break or lull to charge MoR and I find myself without a heal at all. And it ends badly. At least with Mirror or Ether Feast, you know there will be a heal coming if you just can out last the cooldown. With MoResolve, no charge=no heal.

In WvW, its always there with my Centaur Runes. In SPvP, it depends if I’m on my game and feeling good.

@Dess & Neuro: Don’t forget that Halting Strike can also proc your runes such as Fire/Air. There are a lot of subtle but interesting interactions going on with BI+CI+Halting Strike+ Chaos Storm when you land an interrupt:

- Chaos Storm’s damage increases per interrupt, when all six hits land it’s usually around 3k+ damage
- Halting Strike, with two interrupts, is around 3.5k+ damage, also boosted by might stacks.
- Fire/Air sigils for more damage.

So one chaos storm and a bit of RNG favor really can cause quite a bit of damage. And that’s not even considering the potential for iwarlock, autoattacks, shatters, blurred frenzy ect. that could be in the mix.

@SlimChance: Then it brings to question if Harmonious is really necessary for only one mantra. I really feel Deceptive Evasion would help the build run more smoothly, with the extra clones adding to your damage/defense/interrupt-potential. While the extra mantra daze is helpful, DE and staff offers you stronger chain-dazing potential.

@Bazzoong: I feel there’s a couple problems with that logic:

Staff clones are definitely the most damaging clones, and Winds of Chaos DOES do a bit of damage, but the main damage source from staff will almost always be from iWarlock and Chaos Storm (unless a condition build). The burning is a 1/3 chance and staff auto does nearly no damage to any competent Engineer/Guardian/Warrior/Necro/Elementalist/Ranger/Mesmer/Thief/Quaggan/Skritt, all whom which have some way to deal with the minor condition damage.

Even if Winds of Chaos was buffed to be more damaging, Chaotic Dampening isn’t making that big of a difference for it. Phase Retreat goes from 10s to 8s with Dampening, which is nearly irrelevant since you’re likely to weapon swap before it cools down either way; Dampening is more useful for Warlock/C-Storm/C-Armor.

In a group fight, coordination and smart play (or overwhelming numbers) is what makes you win eventually. Individual LEAP finishers don’t produce that much of a dynamic effect the way BLAST finishers do, and even then mainhand sword offers the better leap.