Guild Wars 2

Just a quick question to all those pistol lovers out there… What makes you choose pistol over offhand sword(more damage cuz of counter), Torch (stealth), or Focus (awesomness)?

Duelist – counter thief, bleed with trait.
Interrupt – stop heals, counter thief burst.

In my experience, pistol is broadly strong in small-scale engagements down to one on one encounters. The method of damage application is split in a useful way and there is likewise never really a situation where a hard stun is not a good thing to have.

Offsword shines as a dueling weapon, particularly if you are bent towards interrupts, burst damage and illusions. Defensively it scales quite well too. Torch takes a similar balance between defensive and offensive skills.

Focus fills a partly similar role to pistol, it also has some very strong and favorable match-ups against enemies that can really put the pressure on a Mesmer but it is more difficult to use well and has something of an infinite ceiling. If you can meet that ceiling then I personally think focus is almost a must-have.

Phantasms bleed on crit, no need to get to their target before attacking (so it’s more reliable and has higher survivability). Magic bullet is a nice cc and less telegraphed than into the void. Can be traited for 1200 range (less walking and more pew pew).

I think for damage, you have to look at your assumptions about what’s really going to happen in the fight. In my build, I expect the duelist to do 4000 – 5000 if all 8 shots hit. Then I expect about 2000 more damage from 6 bleed stacks (approx. 75% crit chance) if the stacks are allowed to go to completion. The swordsman can exceed this over time, but you have to assume that both of them last for the same duration. I find the duelist (especially traited) can stand outside of a lot of the AOE.

Magic bullet is nice for me because (again traited), it has a long range (so you can stop runners). It bounces between targets (so, I think… it can hit a stealthed target).

Basically, my build is designed for fighting from range, so pistol seems like the best choice. (And would probably be the better choice than scepter if it ever became a main-hand option.)

iDuelist compared to…

iSwordsman
-Utilizes sharper images better
-Isn’t vulnerable to cleave or aoe as often
-Doesn’t move around a lot so is often ignored
-Failed crit is less devastating since it’s multi-hit

iMage
-Lower CD
-More damage

iWarden
-Lower CD
-Not broken

Magic bullet feels hard to compare to the other non-phantasm skills. One thing I can say is that for me it feels like it’s a more reliable interrupt than riposte or temporal curtain. (Illusionary riposte has shorter range and sometimes blocks unintentionally. Temporal curtain has that 1 second delay.)

Great Question!

Gererally I’d never say that I take a weapon over another one in every build. But the great things about Pistol in gereral are:

iDuelist

• better with sharper images (already mentioned)
• more hits with the chance to crit (already mentioned)
• can be summoned outside of the capture point to have a reliable dmgsource (enemy would have to leave the point)
• not as weak against aegis/blind as swordman/mage which would just miss (i also use it to clean aegis to land a harder shatter sometimes)
• good against skills that block a fix number of hits (like guards shield of wrath)

Magic Bullet

• Good option to chase with 900-1200 range stun
• good skill to combine with blurred frenzy or confusing images (stun=no dodge)
• reliable interrupt

Magic Bullet

• Much shorted channel time than Sword #4

A ranged intereupt is of huge value in many situations, and the iDuelist is often a great asset because if its range. Often it wont get destroyed like other phantasms and you can get 2 sometimes all 3 out at the same time.

Also simply being ranged means it hits more often, unlike swordsman who I found spent a lot of time running around and very little time hitting.

If you are using the healing signet (which I’m trying hard to make work), you can get a very nice burst with duelist – heal – duelist (especially if you put out one other phantasm).

I mostly bring pistol in situations where I know I can safely park duelists some distance from the fight. The Abom in Arah p2 is a good example: a good group keeps him from moving very much, so you can drop duelists out of range and they will deal lots of nice damage, while a warden pretty much dies immediately in melee and swordsmen can get unlucky and hit as well. The on-demand stun from 5 is useful to prevent the Abom from getting enraged as well.

If a fight doesn’t demand reflects, pulls, or AoE, I will often swap out the focus for the pistol just for the extra damage as well.

I recently pulled out a pistol for an encounter with a particular perplexity thief, which was the first time I’d used pistol since sometime after release. Over all this time I ran scepter/torch + staff initially, then changed to scepter/torch + sword/focus. So it was quite rare, and almost a little random. Right tool for the job is all I can say (thanks to iWarden being broken, cheers Anet).

Ross Biddle.2367:

I recently pulled out a pistol for an encounter with a particular perplexity thief, which was the first time I’d used pistol since sometime after release. Over all this time I ran scepter/torch + staff initially, then changed to scepter/torch + sword/focus. So it was quite rare, and almost a little random. Right tool for the job is all I can say (thanks to iWarden being broken, cheers Anet).

Dear God, that fight looked so unfun. Well played though.

I like pistol in solo or small group roaming. Anything more than 3v3 or 4v4 and it loses a lot of value, but in small fights the phantasm is probably our best hybrid weapon skill across all weapons. It works quite well in a power or hybrid PU build as well (see Blackdevil’s build). That ranged stun can win fights for you.

What “Me Games Ma.8426” said.

Plus the advantage that iDuelist dmg is channeled.

So if your target go stealth the damage has a big chance of keep connecting.

Also you can track were your target is moving.

Jambas.6204:

What “Me Games Ma.8426” said.

Plus the advantage that iDuelist dmg is channeled.

So if your target go stealth the damage has a big chance of keep connecting.

Also you can track were your target is moving.

i try to compare iduelist vs iswordman statistical, objective

i duelist pros,
1) advantage of being channel skill, as tracking invis foe and
2) 4x 5x better to remove as aegis, shield of wrath, arcane shield etc..
3) 4x 5x better change to trigger critical change
4) %15 more damage for single attack
5) %87 to %150 more attack range than 480 isword max range
6) have %60 more combo finisher (proj vs leap didint compare them individually)
7) can be effected from phantasmal haste however swordman not (wiki correct?)
8) higher % of being more safe positioned

Cons,

1. % of posibility of being interuptted
2. %61 lower attack frequency
3. %40 less dps from swordman
4. -300 to 0 less skill cast range
5. with 2.15sec channel time more change to being obstructed
6. harder trait acces as being in master tier not as adept for Swordman + swordman has better quality aka can be effected as for 1st hand as well,
   -and sacrificing X which is required for most builds
7. easier access to reduce phantasmal damage
8. can not evade as swordman,

thats it for now..
u can correct me if i ve mistake

example if would have duel(1v1) vs thief so i would prefer sword for offhand..

Ross Biddle.2367:

I recently pulled out a pistol for an encounter with a particular perplexity thief, which was the first time I’d used pistol since sometime after release. Over all this time I ran scepter/torch + staff initially, then changed to scepter/torch + sword/focus. So it was quite rare, and almost a little random. Right tool for the job is all I can say (thanks to iWarden being broken, cheers Anet).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a9BceGSMbEQ

Nice video Ross. Do you think you would have won/easier/harder if you used focus? Is focus better vs thieves?

I almost never use pistol over focus unless i really need the hard stun.

trooper.2650:

Ross Biddle.2367:

I recently pulled out a pistol for an encounter with a particular perplexity thief, which was the first time I’d used pistol since sometime after release. Over all this time I ran scepter/torch + staff initially, then changed to scepter/torch + sword/focus. So it was quite rare, and almost a little random. Right tool for the job is all I can say (thanks to iWarden being broken, cheers Anet).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a9BceGSMbEQ

Nice video Ross. Do you think you would have won/easier/harder if you used focus? Is focus better vs thieves?

If the iWarden was stationary and attacked on cast like it used to, It would have provided a lot of controll over the fight. Unfortunately with it bugged you can no longer rely on it to be there to destroy those projectiles, and to offer area control. The trouble with high stealth, mobile thieves and the new, bugged iWarden is that he spends all of his time chasing the target. The thief kites, the iWarden chases, the thief goes into stealth and repositions. When he comes out of stealth the iWarden chases again, never coming into contact with the thief, and never starting his attack. So you suddenly lose his damage, his area denial, his projectile destruction, and the ability to cleanse conditions with him. The thief relies on ranged to make himself effective, but ranged targets are the very targets the iWarden is now struggling with. The irony runs deep because vs a strong or tanky melee opponent, iWarden can quickly be cleaved to death by AA’s.

So due to the change, and the bugs, I couldnt use what would have otherwise been an as, or more powerful option. Thus the pistol offered some reliability where the focus could not.

Vs a melee based thief you’ll get much different results (though you can see where it stills truggles to find its target), as you can buddy up with your iWarden to force the bugs into submission, which is the same as if the iWarden were a stationary phantasm anyway.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zmfdj4KucfE&noredirect=1

Another example
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2GTnTnbQYYw

As many people said:
- High bleeding (With bleeding trait and Fury trait)
- Very well and fast stun saved me alot

Since I am running condition build in WvW I dont take the other offhands because:
-OH Sword: Focussed on spike damage, which doesn’t fit my build.

-Torch: Too long cooldown on The Prestige. I can lower it with the trait because it doesn’t fit my build (I do not use domination trait line). The Phantasmal Mage has way too short confusion, compared to the bleeding I can do with the Duelist. Next to that Duelist has more raw damage as a bonus, and the retaliation isn’t important for me because I am trying that enemies can’t even hit me.

- Focus: Does not work in WvW for me. The Curtain has a very nice pull, but the Phantasmal Warden is stationary which makes it way too easy to avoid. Next to that the warden has a way too long cooldown (on attacking) making it not worth it compared to the pistol.

A lot of good stuff here, thanks guys. I haven’t gotten to fish through all the responses yet but I see some things definitely worth putting into the guide.

Couple other things that you might want to add

The duelist has a kind of nice pause after you cast and before it shoots. So if you’re starting a fight, you can put out the duelist and swap weapon sets before it starts the fight (and you don’t get the cooldown for weapon swapping). You can do this with lots of phantasms, but, especially if you’re traited for range, you often will not get attacked when you’re putting down the duelist. So it’s just a touch easier to stay out of combat and get the second phantasm up and still be able to swap back.

On the pure fun side, you can really see the health bar drop if the duelist unloads and all the bullets crit. Since I often play with scepter – pistol, I will frequently put out the duelist and then start confusing images. If all of that hits, it can be several thousand damage in about three seconds.