Guild Wars 2

Alright, in the very much existing chance that Flesh Worm will become not as usable as most people desire it to be – what do you want to run as an Alternative Stunbreak? Of course, none will teleport you out of combat giving you room to breathe, but it can be useful for others to state your preferences.

Well of Power – Already used by many players, and rightfully so. The stunbreaks usually comes with Vigor, Protection and Aegis since the three conditions (Bleed, Vulnerability and Burning) are quite apparent in the meta. That is, if you stay inside the well of course. The drawback of this particular one however is that it apparently does not protect you from being launched (Or at least, this was so last time I used it)
Cooldown untraited: 50s

Plague Signet – Which some people have discussed over the past few days. Suffers from some typical “issues” which makes it sometimes a bit undesirable (Much like Arcane Thievery), but is extremely potent if you want both a Stunbreak and an offhand that does not have a Condi-Transfer.
Cooldown untraited: 60s

Spectral Armour – That thing that makes you want to get hit – comes with free Protection, and synergizes well in a Spectral build with both S-Walk and S-Armour. Drawback of that being that it might need the Spectral Traits to peform to it’s best, which some builds do not allow you to – however, neither do both of the other two stunbreaks.
Cooldown untraited: 50s

Personally – I think I will play around with WoP, since it fancies me the most if I can get the full benefit off… We might even see a significant change to the stability it (is supposed) to grant with the upcomming Stability change.

Imo there is no reason to take Plague Signet over Well of Power, so it basically comes down to WoP vs Spec Armor. Personally I’d take both of them over SWalk and Wurm even now.

GoogleBrandon.5073:

Well of Power – Already used by many players, and rightfully so. The stunbreaks usually comes with Vigor, Protection and Aegis since the three conditions (Bleed, Vulnerability and Burning) are quite apparent in the meta. That is, if you stay inside the well of course.

Whoever stands in the well at the moment it is cast gets the cleansing buff for the full duration even if they step out of the well. Only if you walk in later you get a 1 sec buff per pulse.

Also, chilled also turns into vigor as well and I believe it has a higher cleansing priority than bleeding.

flow.6043:

Whoever stands in the well at the moment it is cast gets the cleansing buff for the full duration even if they step out of the well. Only if you walk in later you get a 1 sec buff per pulse.

Also, chilled also turns into vigor as well and I believe it has a higher cleansing priority than bleeding.

Oooh, that is something I did not know, and is actually quite good
It is what I get from playing War and Ele again for some time :P

Means I can with some minor communication let my mates get the full benefit – I am quite convinced personally

(Also, S-Walk kind of helps me get over the loss of Traveler Runes which I used for so darn long :< )

I’d take SA to replace it. Nothing against WoP, but SA better replaces Wurm for a personal defense, since it brings damage taken to 33% when you pop it and go into DS, which allows you to get out of a bad situation. Plague signet and WoP don’t fit the “general” stun break/defensive CD nearly as well, unless you specifically need defense from conditions (in which case WoP > PS). Also WoP doesn’t work in quite as many situations, as having a cast time means there are some times where you are CCed but can’t cast it.

Spectral Armor is just so much better than the other options in realistic situations.

L Step.8659:

Spectral Armor is just so much better than the other options in realistic situations.

Realistic situations?

Bhawb.7408:

I’d take SA to replace it. Nothing against WoP, but SA better replaces Wurm for a personal defense, since it brings damage taken to 33% when you pop it and go into DS, which allows you to get out of a bad situation.

It really comes down to how much life force you already have, or if you have decent lf regeneration besides SA.
Other than that I’d argue that WoP has the potential for avoiding a lot more damage than just 33% direct dmg. After all it can give protection as well, maybe some regeneration, extra dodges through vigor, several blocks if you stand in fire fields, or even some blindness if you blast WoP with Purtid Mark. Maybe you get to cleanse confusion, or immobilized which would’ve made you take some follow-up attacks if you were forced to stand in the same spot. So a lot of ways to avoid some hits entirely rather than just a part of it.

I’d have to go with SA, on a condimancer, because that extra LF is awesome.
On power I’d go WoP. Flow did a good job explaining how useful it can be above. (power already has enough LF IMO)

But if I know I’m going up against a hammer warrior = SA, and a condi ranger (for example) = WoP.

Cba to quote, but I just meant the amount of focus you will take from good teams, it’s the only stun break that’ll be useful to you, Flow.

If someone is trying to load up a condi necro with condis then you don’t even need plague signet, and Well of Power is just…slow to pulse and not useful enough imo in most fight encounters you’ll have in pvp. And if you’re forcing yourself to stand in a well in most necro builds, you’re basically asking to die limiting yourself to that range.

L Step.8659:

Cba to quote, but I just meant the amount of focus you will take from good teams, it’s the only stun break that’ll be useful to you, Flow.

Like I said, depends on the amount of life force you have.

L Step.8659:

If someone is trying to load up a condi necro with condis then you don’t even need plague signet, and Well of Power is just…slow to pulse and not useful enough with a huge cool down in most fight encounters you’ll have in pvp. And if you’re forcing yourself to stand in a well in most necro builds, you’re basically asking to die limiting yourself to that range.

1. You can’t have too many cleanses.
2. The cooldown is exactly the same as Spectral Armor.
3. If you stand in WoP when it’s cast you’ll get the cleansing buff for its full duration even if you step out.
4. I guess we’ll see how they adapt the change to stability for WoP, but in its current form I sometimes use that 1 sec of stability to avoid stuns entirely, especially when I’m about to get focused in team fights.

flow.6043:

L Step.8659:

Cba to quote, but I just meant the amount of focus you will take from good teams, it’s the only stun break that’ll be useful to you, Flow.

Like I said, depends on the amount of life force you have.

L Step.8659:

If someone is trying to load up a condi necro with condis then you don’t even need plague signet, and Well of Power is just…slow to pulse and not useful enough with a huge cool down in most fight encounters you’ll have in pvp. And if you’re forcing yourself to stand in a well in most necro builds, you’re basically asking to die limiting yourself to that range.

1. You can’t have too many cleanses.
2. The cooldown is exactly the same as Spectral Armor.
3. If you stand in WoP when it’s cast you’ll get the cleansing buff for its full duration even if you step out.
4. I guess we’ll see how they adapt the change to stability for WoP, but in its current form I sometimes use that 1 sec of stability to avoid stuns entirely, especially when I’m about to get focused in team fights.

1. Yes you can, condi builds aren’t crazy in the Meta right now. (And if you’re running a condi build you’ll be fine against every other; also lots of eles and shoutbows are running around for cleanse in teamfights as well)
2. The cooldown is too huge for the benefit it gives (but that’s my opinion so I edited out, I still think it should be closer to 30-35, and all wells need to be lower in general.)
3. I did not know this
4. It’s not an instant cast stun break though, I feel like spectral armor would save you in a situation you’re getting stunned in anyways as there’s probably going to be more direct than condi damage and you’ll be able to use DS longer to facetank or put the pressure back on them.

Just in general, spectral armor gives you one of the best boons we can have and increased lifeforce generation, and that is just so much more valuable to me than converting a few condis into boons. I honestly can’t imagine a build I’d use it on, I’d rather have SA/SW as my stun breakers.

L Step.8659:

1. Yes you can, condi builds aren’t crazy in the Meta right now. (And if you’re running a condi build you’ll be fine against every other; also lots of eles and shoutbows are running around for cleanse in teamfights as well)

You don’t need condi builds to eat a lot of conditions. Those eles and shotbows have a lot of aoe burning (among other condis) which you either have to take or you’re forced out of a capture point.
So in that case, if I start out with a decent amount of life force and generally have good lf regen, and then have to decide between protection or pulsing aegis then the choice is obvious: Well of Power, please and thank you.

L Step.8659:

It’s not an instant cast stun break though

The stunbreak is instant, the well has a cast time.

L Step.8659:

that is just so much more valuable to me than converting a few condis into boons.

I’ll just refer you to my earlier post, you’re clearly underrating the utility WoP can provide, not just for yourself but your allies as well.

WOP is amazing. having vigor on a necro is pretty cool and it works for condi necros just as good as power.

The last point Flow made ^ is an important one. Not only does it break stun and convert condis into boons, but it also works on allies. In a team fight, this can be the difference of your Ele not having to swap to Water for a cleanse, instead allowing them to maintain pressure or to keep that Engi from having to destroy his turret or for that Thief so they don’t have to camp stealth as long to clear condis. These things can matter in a team fight, the additional Boons they get as a bonus can completely change the tide of a team fight, especially when a lot of condis are dumped on you at the start of the fight.

As for ‘too many condi clears, having a close fight and then dying after b/c of condis still ticking is the worst. Do you burn CC and hope someone else isn’t immediately on their way to steal the node b/c we rely on our transfers so much? I like being able to convert those into Boons quickly and be on my way to +1 another fight (and not be stuck in combat speed with our crap mobility) This leaves my heal intact and let’s me natural regen and be on my way to the next fight. Granted I don’t play at the highest levels, so I can’t say this is the way to play 100% but I can say that I love WoP and think it is greatly unappreciated and overlooked. I’d be lying though if I said that that auto-proc on Spectral Armor hasn’t served me well also.

Looks like i was right and people misinterpreted the blink changes. ;>

It looks like a QoL fix to prevent wasting your blinks when it would fail to teleport.

Can someone who can get in game at the moment confirm?

spoj.9672:

Looks like i was right and people misinterpreted the blink changes. ;>

It looks like a QoL fix to prevent wasting your blinks when it would fail to teleport.

Can someone who can get in game at the moment confirm?

/Fifteentears Q.Q

Plot twist: It actually checks the path requirement on both intial wurm cast AND teleport.

E: can’t actually reproduce the teleport path requirement for some reason.

Targuil.3741:

Plot twist: It actually checks the path requirement on both intial wurm cast AND teleport.

Worst. Nightmare. Yet.

Yup, path checking is done both on cast and sacrifice.

This patch was not kind to Necros at all.

Malchior.1928:

Targuil.3741:

Plot twist: It actually checks the path requirement on both intial wurm cast AND teleport.

Worst. Nightmare. Yet.

Hold the phone, the teleport check only happened once in pve, tested it later in spvp and it worked as before. Casting check however is a serious constraint. All in all this does us nothing good and will only restrict our wurm placement regardless when we want to activate it.

Targuil.3741:

Malchior.1928:

Targuil.3741:

Plot twist: It actually checks the path requirement on both intial wurm cast AND teleport.

Worst. Nightmare. Yet.

Hold the phone, the teleport check only happened once in pve, tested it later in spvp and it worked as before. Casting check however is a serious constraint. All in all this does us nothing good and will only restrict our wurm placement regardless when we want to activate it.

it’s worse the worm still breaks if you activate it wrongly.

Perhaps now would be the time to ask ANet to make Necrotic Traversal a true teleport, since the Flesh Wurm cast check means you have to be able to walk to the location.

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

Perhaps now would be the time to ask ANet to make Necrotic Traversal a true teleport, since the Flesh Wurm cast check means you have to be able to walk to the location.

This. So much this.

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

Perhaps now would be the time to ask ANet to make Necrotic Traversal a true teleport, since the Flesh Wurm cast check means you have to be able to walk to the location.

+1, this is a really good idea. Increase the range on the actual Traversal to 5,000 (portal range), keep the on-cast check at 1200, and decrease cast time to 1/2s or 3/4s

Dont forget spectral walk… doubles as a swiftness buff when you dont have it otherwise, but if you do then its great as a stun break and for juking/jumping.