Guild Wars 2

A little disclaimer: All I’m planning to do with this char is overland PvE. No PvP, WvW or dungeons. Probably. I just want to get everyone’s opinion on rune sets so I suck a bit less.

Anyway, I really can’t decide which runes to use here. My options are:

Afflicted: Adds duration to both primary conditions (bleed and poison), but the 6 effect looks… dreadful.
Undead: 6 effect should be very useful, since I’m wearing Rabid from head to toe, but no duration bonus means my bleeds will not stack all that much.
Krait: Longer bleeds are good, and the 6 effect will be useful as I run Entangle with its relatively quick recharge, but no support for poison.
Orr and Nightmare: Not worth the consideration. I can’t really get them as I don’t do dungeons, and while I do dump extra runes from salvaging into the MF, I only managed to get one Nightmare rune so far.
Other runes look even less useful to me.

I’m leaning towards Undead, any insight? TIA.

Overland PvE, go for power imho. Conditions are too slow.

In short, go zerker.

Go krait. Think of the duration as a damage bonus. “Bleeds do 40% more damage etc”

Undead cannot compete vs krait on the damage front.

I assume RP type play a little so maybe Trapper Runes?
Condi Dmg, +10% condi duration, 3sec superspeed/stealth after using trap.
Flame Trap/ Spike Trap

Krait is strong set obviously

Rune of the Madking
It may be power but it still has +40% bleed and when using entangle it will Hunter’s Call onto 3 targets within 900ish range. Since it hits a lot and you are using precision in your build it will trigger Sharpened Edges trait a lot on those 3 foes.
BLEED APOCALYPSE whenever you entangle.
Oh and it looks really cool too ;-)
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Hunter%27s_Call
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Sharpened_Edges

You may think yourself “Im the ultimate pve bleeder!” but really with objects and even some boss mechanics with objects needing to be destroyed, having zero power in your build will make you wanna beat head against wall so in my opinion madking runes would be the best option.

Don’t make the mistake of thinking shortbow cannot benefit from something other than condi dmg btw ;-)

Oh another thing

Since you overworld PVEing you ultimate goal may be to go for:
Sinister gear set: Condi Damage, Precision, Power

It swaps toughness for power. I think you can handle full glass in pve ;-)

Yeah, I would definetly be using Sinister if you are set on condi. I would also highly recommend using Strength/Air Sigils on your SB with Aristocracy Runes on the armor.

Thank you for your feedback, it’s appreciated.

I was thinking of sinister, and I could easily pull it off on the account of not actually getting into melee all that much… BUT the inscription/insignia recipes are account bound, and Silverwastes bore me to tears. The idea of farming for 800 crests… ugh. Maybe someday.

Also, I can’t get Aristocracy runes because I don’t do dungeons. Guess I’ll try Krait then.

Thanks again!

One complete round of Silverwaiste events (mainly, the breach – 5 underground bosses) then vinewrath (3 end bosses), gives about 200 crests. That’s only 4 runs. Honestly not that hard. Just look in ‘LFG’ for ‘50% SW’ (means you skip the first and slower part of it).

Ps If you sometimes pvp (can even be hotjoin) and especially if you the daily pvp’s every day, then you can get pretty fast up in the reward tracks, in wich there is one for Caudecus manner. Ultimate reward is armor part, wich in return can be (use Black lion salvage kit) salvaged to get the Rune for sure.

I use Krait runes and really have alot of fun with them. Go full Rabid and slowly swap in Sinister as you feel more comfortable. Earth and Air sigils work great. If you have the money, you can swap Air for Torment.

Rabid/Sinister work great in Silverwastes, by the way. Many of the enemies are weak to conditions. Use Poison Master and SW/T to get your poison and Fire ticks in there.

Archon.6480:

Rabid/Sinister work great in Silverwastes, by the way. Many of the enemies are weak to conditions. Use Poison Master and SW/T to get your poison and Fire ticks in there.

Yeah, s/t is my second set. Quick Serpent’s Strike, then immobilize with Entangle, then Bonfire and disengage from melee. Not sure how efficient this is, but immensely satisfying.

OGDeadHead.8326:

Overland PvE, go for power imho. Conditions are too slow.

In short, go zerker.

Post patch, some condition classes may actually be viable in PVE now!
Stacking in poison and burning would bring alot of classes back alive. Maybe Sun Spirit has some uses too. I think spirit’s condition damage should work like Thief’s venom, that it scales on ranger’s own condition damage on all the targets benefit from the spirits. That’d make condition ranger much more viable.

to prepair for the newer HoT stacking condis I’d go with Mad King runes Power/condi increased condi durations and bleeds + the 40% duration foods and Sharpening stones , and this will work 20% longer bleeds on the Shortbow it’ll be slow at first for about 10seconds but will quickly Ramp up the bleeds after about 8stacks and Sharpen edges kicks in.

the 6th slot on mad kings rune activates summoned hawks just like Hunters call just make sure you have Line of sight when using your entangle to make sure the Hunters call does not get obstructed.

those hits from the rune count as Hunters call and your traited Bleeds on keen edge can cause it to stack more bleeds.

6,6,6,0,0 (HoT traits) , Or 2,6,6,0,0 (current traits) with a mix of Carrion/Zerker gear maybe a little Rampager gear .

though you won’t need 100% zerk gear because of the 6 in skirmishing.

Zenos Osgorma.2936:

to prepair for the newer HoT stacking condis I’d go with Mad King runes Power/condi increased condi durations and bleeds + the 40% duration foods and Sharpening stones , and this will work 20% longer bleeds on the Shortbow it’ll be slow at first for about 10seconds but will quickly Ramp up the bleeds after about 8stacks and Sharpen edges kicks in.

the 6th slot on mad kings rune activates summoned hawks just like Hunters call just make sure you have Line of sight when using your entangle to make sure the Hunters call does not get obstructed.

those hits from the rune count as Hunters call and your traited Bleeds on keen edge can cause it to stack more bleeds.

6,6,6,0,0 (HoT traits) , Or 2,6,6,0,0 (current traits) with a mix of Carrion/Zerker gear maybe a little Rampager gear .

though you won’t need 100% zerk gear because of the 6 in skirmishing.

Great idea!

Aristocracy is not bad to get, you can have the set in a week, its not hard to do. I always buy the 180 token armor and salvage it with a BL kit instead of just the rune for 120 tokens, 60 tokens for an exotic salvage is worth it to me.

The toss up between Mad King and Aristocracy would be a kittene for me, the condi burst every 48s is pretty nice, but a constant 450 to 750 power and condition damage from might is hard to pass up. Throw a corruption sigil on your swap weapon set and you can hit 2700+ condition damage and 2500+ power, that is pretty mind blowing damage. With traps thrown in for good measure, ferocity doesn’t matter. Sinister/Aristocracy all the way. Axe/Torch is the better set for it though