Guild Wars 2

In GW2, Melee > Ranged damage as a general rule, I knew that at launch, and I get the risk-reward factor.

Where do axes fit in? I know they ricochet, but I almost consider them melee, with the shotgun bleed, the chill-weakness combo with your pet (you get more benefit from time the closer you are), and the vuln stacks on Whirl, buuuut…I see where it’s ranged, too, with the projectile block (I keep hearing reflect, but whirl BLOCKS, right? I’ve never seen it reflect) and…well, ranged attitude of the set. Also the traits for Skirmishing cover bows and axes, while sword and GS are in Wilderness.

So as far as damage goes, where do Axes fit? Less than shortbow? More? More, but only if you can ricochet?

And with a condition style, is the axe just filler for the torch and cat and chill, or do the bleeds really hit hard, especially considering it spreads across multiple targets (at less stacks the less axes hit)?

I really love the axe in dungeons, but sometimes the Min/Maxers make snide comments about how I should be using shortbow. I’d love to just know how the weapon stands and what, precisely, you use it for, no matter what format you play in.

Also, include any criticisms or suggestions you have about the weapon. The only thing that comes to mind for me is a KD or daze on Path of Scar’s return hit.

Trait-less, the main-hand axe seems like a good weapon when compared to the shortbow. It gets a bouncing projectile which can compete with the shortbows single-target damage, a fan of bleeds, and a skill that causes frost and weakness.

However when traits start getting factored in, it becomes easily out-classed. Due to piercing arrows the bouncing projectile no longer has as much of an advantage. If you can line up just 2 enemies you are out-damaging the axe by a good amount.

I believe the problem lies with the only axe trait, which gives a lousy 10% more critical damage. If it had something on-par with the usefulness of piercing arrows, like perhaps the third bounce splintering and doing AoE damage and maybe 1 stack of bleeding for 5 seconds, it could become a great weapon.

For the off-hand axe, path of scars seems fine but whirling defense could use some improvements. Its root leaves you too vulnerable to AoE and melee attacks, making you not want to use it offensively, and if you use it strictly to block projectiles at a range its not going to be very helpful, not to mention your still rooted and vulnerable to AoE. They either need to remove its root or make it block all incoming attacks.

Axe can do more single target dmg than the shortbow. It is extremely situational though.

You have to have 2 targets. The axe hits the first target, bounces to the second, and bounces back to the first. You hit the first target twice for every attack.

Again, this is extremely situational

From a pvp standpoint, the axe bursts bleeds onto a target better (shortbow has that flanking requirement). You have the potential to put 5 bleeds on a single target at a time, with a fairly low cooldown, long duration, and the ability to chill the enemy while your pet weakens them and attacks them for damage because they can’t kite when chilled.

Combine that with an offhand torch and you can get some serious condition pressure going on an enemy.

PsionicDingo.2065:

and the vuln stacks on Whirl, buuuut…I see where it’s ranged, too, with the projectile block (I keep hearing reflect, but whirl BLOCKS, right? I’ve never seen it reflect)

Take it to Southsun Cove and let some little Karkas kill themselves

jcbroe.4329:

From a pvp standpoint, the axe bursts bleeds onto a target better (shortbow has that flanking requirement). You have the potential to put 5 bleeds on a single target at a time, with a fairly low cooldown, long duration, and the ability to chill the enemy while your pet weakens them and attacks them for damage because they can’t kite when chilled.

Combine that with an offhand torch and you can get some serious condition pressure going on an enemy.

Combine it with a dagger on a BM build and laugh a horrible crooked and evil laugh as your opponent -tries- to kite your pet, key word is tries.

Axe 5 reflects projectiles, fyi.

OGDeadHead.8326:

Axe 5 reflects projectiles, fyi.

lol tooltip has been wrong since alpha… shows how accurate those things are xD

Durzlla.6295:

jcbroe.4329:

From a pvp standpoint, the axe bursts bleeds onto a target better (shortbow has that flanking requirement). You have the potential to put 5 bleeds on a single target at a time, with a fairly low cooldown, long duration, and the ability to chill the enemy while your pet weakens them and attacks them for damage because they can’t kite when chilled.

Combine that with an offhand torch and you can get some serious condition pressure going on an enemy.

Combine it with a dagger on a BM build and laugh a horrible crooked and evil laugh as your opponent -tries- to kite your pet, key word is tries.

Exactly lol. In pvp though I go axe torch with offhand training to go full condi damage on one set and evades on the others, so one set I force them off the point with torch 5 and condi them down, the switch to sword dagger to cripple them and evade until my pet kills.

Either way works haha.

Axe is worthless in PvE. You only take it for chill and splitblade in pvp plus offhand capacity.

Ricochet is absolutely terrible damage. I’d call it the lowest DPS auto in the game. Even when it bounces it does horrible damage.

Durzlla.6295:

OGDeadHead.8326:

Axe 5 reflects projectiles, fyi.

lol tooltip has been wrong since alpha… shows how accurate those things are xD

It’s so hard to tell for me because I tend to only OH axe in dungeons for those whirls = whirling in a combo field for benefits while scraping up the pack of melee mobs for the Vuln stacks.

Thanks for the clarification. I remember on my mesmer the phantom ranger did, so that does make sense!

Bri.8354:

Trait-less, the main-hand axe seems like a good weapon when compared to the shortbow. It gets a bouncing projectile which can compete with the shortbows single-target damage, a fan of bleeds, and a skill that causes frost and weakness.

However when traits start getting factored in, it becomes easily out-classed. Due to piercing arrows the bouncing projectile no longer has as much of an advantage. If you can line up just 2 enemies you are out-damaging the axe by a good amount.

I believe the problem lies with the only axe trait, which gives a lousy 10% more critical damage. If it had something on-par with the usefulness of piercing arrows, like perhaps the third bounce splintering and doing AoE damage and maybe 1 stack of bleeding for 5 seconds, it could become a great weapon.

For the off-hand axe, path of scars seems fine but whirling defense could use some improvements. Its root leaves you too vulnerable to AoE and melee attacks, making you not want to use it offensively, and if you use it strictly to block projectiles at a range its not going to be very helpful, not to mention your still rooted and vulnerable to AoE. They either need to remove its root or make it block all incoming attacks.

Yeah, I’d agree with the Axe trait. It needs something. I’ll try piercing arrows in dungeons this week; I try to avoid shortbow because I find it mindnumbing, and longbow is pretty situational.

The axe is the go to ranged weapon of choice for melee rangers and some beast masters. Like you said ricochet allows it to hit multiple targets without traits. When are you gonna be hiding at range? When there’s a boss or when there’s a group too big to take on in melee safely. Some bosses have multiple targets, which I’m fairly certain the axe can bounce between, but also the weakness/chill is just amazing for improving survivability, but ALSO bosses tend to be large, so you don’t need to get into melee to hit them with splitblade’s full spread.

As a greatsword focused ranger, I simply adore the mainhand axe as my secondary weapon.

Great to hear, HotHit. I try to work Axe/Torch or Axe/Axe into my Greatsword dungeon build, too.

My biggest concern in dungeons is how the axe stacks up to the shortbow if it comes down to a single target. For me, shortbow and axe have the same risks with shotgunning their conditions, but since Axe has an offhand, I feel a little more versatile with what I can do, especially with weakness/chill. Perhaps that balances out any damage advantage the bows have?

Also, what stats best serve axes? Conditions? Or crit, as it’s own trait suggests.

Not much to talk about with axes, they are crap in open world PvE and dungeons.

They are by far the worst ranger weapon for PvE, much too situational to be of much use, even more so in a dungeon.

As for the worst DPS auto-attack weapon in the game??
Guardian scepter wins that one …

PsionicDingo.2065:

Also, what stats best serve axes? Conditions? Or crit, as it’s own trait suggests.

It’s not exactly the axe specifically, but have a preference for physical damage over condition based. I’ve found splitblade still has enough oomph to justify using it, even if you’re not using conditions, but if you are, you’re kinda stuck with having to rely on hitting it every 6 or so seconds. That’s not to say axe and torch isn’t a thing, but burning’s a bit of a nuisance since only one person can deal their damage with burning at a time and a burning focused ranger (torch + sun spirit), guardian (I’m pretty sure they can anyway) or elementalist (thinking about fire attunement) can quite easily make someone burn permanently.

Warhorn works nicely as a secondary, especially in dungeons. The might is a bit lacking, but the fury is huge and the swiftness is extremely helpful. I think with birds you can get infinite party wide swiftness and infinite party wide fury with a red moa. With a high physical damage investment that’s a huge bonus and you’ll also be able to do a ton of damage with the bird swarm.

Off-hand axe I feel is also a physical damage focused weapon as the boomerang is a pure damage skill and whirling defence applies vulnerability which is useless for a condition build.

Vulnerability is not useless for a condition build.

• Condition damage benefits from the +x% damage a target suffers from x stacks of vulnerability
• Vulnerability can be wiped instead of your other conditions

Sebrent.3625:

Vulnerability is not useless for a condition build.

• Condition damage benefits from the +x% damage a target suffers from x stacks of vulnerability

Huh… Gonna go test that, right now, on the heavy golem. I’d always thought it was % armour reduction.

EDIT: 30 in wilderness survival, PvP carrion amulet and jewel (1279 condition damage), my bleeds were doing 106 damage per tick. Using hunter’s shot I was able to apply 10 stacks of vulnerability instantly.

Maul -> hunter’s shot, 106 damage per tick.

Okay, so my first theory is correct, vulnerability does not affect bleeds applied beforehand (bleeding damage is based on the situation when it was applied). But that proves nothing so…

Hunter’s shot -> Maul, 106 damage per tick.

Yep. There was an anomaly where I could get the bleeding damage to reach 107 per tick, but that was caused by applying a lot of bleed stacks, not vulnerability.

Just to be sure it isn’t completely broken, I tested slash, slice and power stab, with and without hunter’s shot’s vulnerability (ignoring crits).

Damage per hit without vulnerability ~380 and ~450.
Damage per hit with vulnerability ~430 and ~490.
So… Vulnerability isn’t broken.

Here’s an added bonus for you, condition damage isn’t affected by % damage increases either.

HotHit.6783:

Here’s an added bonus for you, condition damage isn’t affected by % damage increases either.

It’s also not affected by silly things like protection, Barkskin, and other % damage reductions xD.