Guild Wars 2

So i’m worried about the future of druid in raids. Seems right now only 1 ranger is needed and that’s the healing druid. Condi has decent dps but is outclassed by engi and power has crap dmg and might as well not exist. But it feels like healing druid might become less and less necessary as people get more familiar with mechanics. GoL is nice but once the healing is no longer needed what happens to the druid in raids? CA nerfs hurt non staff builds badly and staff is mediocre for anything but force generation.

Has anyone considered a condi tank druid with something like apothecary gear. You fill a triple role with good condi dps while also tanking and healing and providing buffs which frees up room for more dps players too. CA generation is slow though. Is it viable?

Do you think the future of druid secure? Will the current pure heal druid always have a place?

I was looking into it, but here are the reasons why I don’t think druid tank will work, part of it is from Brazil’s guilds Vale Guardian Kill and from my own.
1. druid dps doesn’t matter – it just doesn’t, you really only need 8 dps that actually know how to do their job to clear the entire raid. your job is to keep them all alive.
2. for condi to work well you need A/T and although you can generate AF from regen you won’t be able to enter CAF often enough to keep your group up. If the druid is going to tank you’d probably have to still bring a healer
3. Healing will always be needed in the raids, there are certain points where you take consistent unavoidable damage. It won’t be enough to down everyone but i’ve seen a few raid wipes just from people not hitting the circles twice because someone downed.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vNAQJATWnUqAlsitqAOrAEtgFGBD+peVzqPPhhVqjpA8tCAZMXDvmA-TBiXAB1oE8I1fAY/BEUeInSM7uEAqoLI0nAApA8bvF-e

this is most likely how i’m going to gear my druid, I’ve been working on an engi for raiding and that was going to be my raid toon only. I think I may make my ranger my raid toon and craft exotics for PvE. it seems like everyone wants ppl in ascended for raiding.

So the issue is really that anets broken AF mechanics pigeonhole druid into a pure staff healing build with no dps. The one day we had when natural healing and regen worked nicely would have enabled druid to run a dps build while also generating enough CA to heal properly. I know the dps is not needed, but it is frustrating that it isn’t even an option and completely exlcudes anything else from raids.

There are already groups clearing the vale guard without a healing druid. Not sure about the other bosses.

Haven’t tried it, but wouldn’t a pure zerk dps ranger with lots of immob be helpful in a raid? With CA as a backup heal if things get dicy?
I saw that some of the mechanics would be perfect for the amount of immob a ranger could put out, and I don’t think ranger dps is that much lower is it?

As a DPS role, not the heal spot, btw.

DPS ranger with CA as backup, can’t see why that shouldn’t work, in addition to the “traditional” healing druid.

I actually have a question about heals. On a specialized build, do you think Rev heals better or Druids? I’ve heard mixed things about both and I’m not sure which I should take into HoT raids / dungeons.

Rev heals well and so does Ele but I think, even though we’re not as bursty as we could be, we provide more on-demand burst healing than any class. Also by not tying things to boons like regen we can heal in CAF and still provide regen to compliment that healing. I really think some synergy needs to be found with using regen and AF heals.

Raids definitely need to be tuned to incentivize more than 2 non-DPS builds, regardless of whether that helps druids or not.

I agree that this will become more of an issue as time goes on, particularly since we’ve already seen 9 DPS group clear with a druid tank.

to be fair this is only the first raid wing and I would hope that the level of difficulty increases as we go further.

Lamuness.3570:

I actually have a question about heals. On a specialized build, do you think Rev heals better or Druids? I’ve heard mixed things about both and I’m not sure which I should take into HoT raids / dungeons.

Now, this is from purely self calculation methods I’ve done for myself, but without going too much into it(you can really test it yourself with pvp npc’s etc), a Ventari herald/rev has about 75% of the healing capability of Druid in a lengthy battle. This is the case with either zerk or cleric gears. I think most will agree to this number if they did some theory craft/testing themselves. I’m not gonna bother bringing up my numbers but feel free to disprove me if you have your own calculations.

The only reason I would choose ventari herald over druid is that the herald does 100% dps all the time. Druid does near 0(pets and such) and then dps mode for 10sec. Grace of land helps make up for that but I would honestly choose to retain personal dps and have a reliable healing all the time, where as Druid is at best 5sec burst healing to 15sec continuous healing then 10sec regular dps mode. Burst or not, Druid’s healing to me is rather unreliable. But hey, imo and all that.

As shown from reddit posts, a healer is indeed needed but healing gear is not. This means the healer can take dps/condi gears so their dps does matter.
There’s also the question of not being able to charge AF fast enough which makes me want herald more than druid. A large proportion of AF generation now comes from your regen ticking on allies. If anyone else have regen output, then your reliable AF generation from regen is seriously kitten.

Druid’s healing is unmatched, that’s for sure. If it was completely 100% reliable. But it is locked behind a rather silly gating mechanism that if you fail to meet it(and I personally have experienced it in Raids I’ve participated in as Druid), then you can’t do any of that healing in the most optimal matter.

My point is, a ventari herald is more reliable than Druid. Atleast, in my honest opinion but many people in game whom I shared this with agreed for the most part so I know I’m not alone in this. 75% healing capability but it’s on 100% of the time and you get to do 100% dps all the time. Herald with s/? don’t need to use any other skills anyway because their autoattack does the best dps. So you can devote all your energy gen to ventari tablet skills and still have 100% dps. Easy play method too, unlike Druid where I’m dps’ing and suddenly in a healing mode then back.

Honestly if Druid’s AF force was reverted to prepatch or Anet rids the entire AF mechanism, it would probably better but even then you can’t go wrong with a ventari herald healer, if not better to go with.

Even if heal wasnt that nesesary, i dont think any party would reject a free 35% dmg buff to half the raid

I agree with @kevvy, i play both classes: a herald with clerics and a druid.
Herald/ventari actually can bring abour the 75% of the Druid healing to game, but also can bring: instant condition cleanses + projectile shielding.

The DPS don’t need to suffer you still can help your team in the heat of the battle, even if you play with staff you’ll do at least double DPS than the Druid’s staff does and bring as much heals as the druid’s staff do.

So yeah, there is no reason to use the druid in raids, a tempest or ventari can heal enough good to make it not needed as i foresaw after the BWE3.

Based on healing is good but only healing is bad. More than that if they keep nerfing the class because Anet doesn’t know how to handle a class that is supposed to be healing around.

Prophet.1584:

this is most likely how i’m going to gear my druid, I’ve been working on an engi for raiding and that was going to be my raid toon only. I think I may make my ranger my raid toon and craft exotics for PvE. it seems like everyone wants ppl in ascended for raiding.

Interesting point – but they will never know one is wearing what level of gear.

I think most people try and gear accordingly especially for more formal raids though and see the point you are raising.

anduriell.6280:

I agree with @kevvy, i play both classes: a herald with clerics and a druid.
Herald/ventari actually can bring abour the 75% of the Druid healing to game, but also can bring: instant condition cleanses + projectile shielding.

The DPS don’t need to suffer you still can help your team in the heat of the battle, even if you play with staff you’ll do at least double DPS than the Druid’s staff does and bring as much heals as the druid’s staff do.

So yeah, there is no reason to use the druid in raids, a tempest or ventari can heal enough good to make it not needed as i foresaw after the BWE3.

Based on healing is good but only healing is bad. More than that if they keep nerfing the class because Anet doesn’t know how to handle a class that is supposed to be healing around.

Good luck controling the tablet with a radius of 240 around to heal a raid that spreads and moves a lot, moving a lot yourself to dodge the blue warp aoes that appear at sword/staff range while keeping optimal dps at the same time

just going to say my guild finished the first boss vale , phase 2 of the raid and the chase to the final boss with a Druid/healer tank and me as a viper poison master druid .

LB , S+D , spotter / sun spirit/ vipers nest / knock back glyph , druid traits , Druids clarity/natural stride for vale/chase and Celestal shadow for the ruins control in part 2 after vale and ancient seeds.

i gained enough AF to use CA form when it was needed for support pop in Spam heals / luna blast to support on fire fields.

we cleared the vale with around -45seconds remaining , and after that dual druids one full heal/tank one , condi/support (full condi) was very viable to cover two healing locations in the ruins control portion.

so from my experience , you don’t need a DnT build and running two druids or 1x druid , 1x ranger with sun spirit(DnT’s build) or something similar / a poison master build is very effective past the Vale first boss and viable against the Vale.

we did this with sun spirit even though it was bugged , though on the sub phases against the red Vale guardain , it worked still we had a condi necro , reaper ? and me dps condi viper druid with S+D using luna impact to burst the break bar in two hits that triggers ancient seeds for a very quick finish, the sun spirit in this case worked as it reached its limit of necro+reaper+ranger+pet and +1 additon.

Just make sure to plant the sun spirit next to the pillar or close near the edge , so no random clones steal buffs.

i used a Varient of my Poison master druid which can be found in the builds thread by Heimskarl Ashfiend.9582 , i changed things to be more damage focused.

though of course this build requires smart use and not using CA every time it is available , do not stay in CA form use a skill or two , trigger celestial shadow drop out and carry on, staying in CA form is a huge Dps loss though you can still swap pets to reapply 4-5k poisons from the pet to maintain some dps vs the vale.

the only time i would entre CA form is when the Red orbs get too close glyph is on cooldown or the Green role group take some sub damage and need a quick heal to tide themselfs over untill back in range of the main healer.

Druid will be used as healer/tank for raids (healer mostly) and ranger can fill the condi role (engi does have greater dps but from my experiences, rangers can get their rotation off a lot easier).

Tora.7214:

Good luck controling the tablet with a radius of 240 around to heal a raid that spreads and moves a lot, moving a lot yourself to dodge the blue warp aoes that appear at sword/staff range while keeping optimal dps at the same time

CA heals are 120,180, 360 and 240 respectively. The longer you stay in CA the less effective overall radii. And unlike Druid, the revenant can move freely and dps while just aiming #6 for placement and use #8 for bursts. Druid’s #4 in CA form is the most effective healing but requires proper positioning of the Druid. Good luck trying to use #1 or #2 effectively, because as you said, everyone is constantly moving around.

The revenant can keep the tablet on the boss or on you and others can know to move in when they have low hp, unlike druid where your allies wouldn’t know whether to move towards you or elsewhere and generally you would have to move towards them for #4. The tablet’s #6 is a quick movement for the tablet so moving it around is very effortless and is a big visual cue for both you and your teammates. Oh and when traited, it puts out 2-3sec of protection(3 with herald) around it.

Not trying to completely dismiss Druid’s healing, I’m just saying either methods are very viable but ideally I would argue that the tablet revenant provides better overall effectiveness of the healing role. Tomatoes and Tomahtoes I suppose so in the end those that like Druids will take Druids and others for others etc.

I personally had no issue keeping teammates up with my Druid, they only downed if they wandered off too far away. Just wanted to say the revenant is a very good alternative healing role… if not better

When talking about Glint/Ventari, keep in mind that any good Revenant has to rotate Legends. You won’t be camping Ventari, most likely, because you want to spread offensive boons + extremaly potent beefed Regeneration and Protection. You also want to maintain Invoking Harmony buff (20% healing increase for 10s after swapping Legends) and probably Shrouding Mists (25% more healing if above 51 Energy). And quite possibly keep yourself above 75% hp if you choose trait that increases healing by 20% in that state. Then you have weapon skills – Shield heal, Staff #4, Staff auto.

But I believe that since we’re talking about the future, a lot about Revenant and Herald will be changing. Some changes might be huge and I expect such changes for Ventari and Salvation traitline. There may be new gearsets. Anything with Healing + Boon Duration is incredibly potent on Ventari Herald. If such stat combo would be released not accompanied by Toughness, expect Revenant to stand tall. Even now, when you push it, you can achieve 900+ Regeneration ticks with all the outgoing healing increases and that’s just simple Regen.

I’d like to hear your opinions on going into a raid as a dps ranger, be it power or condi, and pick druid traitline over <that-other-traitline>, primarily to help boost your groups damage through grace of the land (CA #3 & #4 first of all) and glyph of empowerment and secondarily as a support healer, do you think you would sacrifice too much by not picking that other traitline you’d normally choose over druid? Also you get another blast finsiher that you may not normally have access to as a dps ranger (CA #3).

OGDeadHead.8326:

I’d like to hear your opinions on going into a raid as a dps ranger, be it power or condi, and pick druid traitline over <that-other-traitline>, primarily to help boost your groups damage through grace of the land (CA #3 & #4 first of all) and glyph of empowerment and secondarily as a support healer, do you think you would sacrifice too much by not picking that other traitline you’d normally choose over druid? Also you get another blast finsiher that you may not normally have access to as a dps ranger (CA #3).

Can’t say for power because I haven’t run one. Power DPS is so outclassed I don’t see a point. I have however been the A/T condi ranger in the vale guard fight because we needed condi. In short it does work. Are you better served with a triple set of sinister engi? I don’t know.

What condi druid brings:

Good condition damage.
Spotter.
Sun Spirit.
Glyph of Empowerment (13%/3%).
Fire fields
Some healing.
GoL.

Obviously GoL is nice. CA generation is slower on condi because you have no staff, but you can still sometimes generate it fast enough to beat the cooldown if all you do is pop 4 in melee and then leave right away which gives a much better GoL uptime for other melee. I don’t think GoL uptime is nearly what many people think it is/make it out to be and there’s no way a single druid can maintain it all the time especially if they are running circles. Remember you need 5 stacks for the 15%/15%. CA 4 is the only effective way to stack it, and that’s a melee skill. CA 1 could be good but it is so kitten clumsy.

My main issues are with the red split. pet dmg is largely negated, and you also have very little CC (CA 3 is it unless you use entangle). when you’re on a condi team with 2 condi necros as i was… it hurts. You also have less people to buff.

This is why I wondered about running an apothecary druid that tanks, heals, and does dps at the same time. CA generation is slower for sure, but i feel like the healing portion of druid will be less necessary as time goes on, at least for vale guardian.

OGDeadHead.8326:

I’d like to hear your opinions on going into a raid as a dps ranger, be it power or condi, and pick druid traitline over <that-other-traitline>, primarily to help boost your groups damage through grace of the land (CA #3 & #4 first of all) and glyph of empowerment and secondarily as a support healer, do you think you would sacrifice too much by not picking that other traitline you’d normally choose over druid? Also you get another blast finsiher that you may not normally have access to as a dps ranger (CA #3).

The easiest thing to drop out of either DPS build would be BM/NM. Power ranger is dependent on MM and Skirm, Condi ranger is dependent on Skirm and gains dps from WS.

without running staff you may not always have that blast finisher available and you’d be less able to buff your team with GoL. I’d rather take BM over druid in a dps setup and use the shout trait to spam regen. just my opinion.

Prophet.1584:

I’d rather take BM over druid in a dps setup and use the shout trait to spam regen. just my opinion.

Having Glyph of Empowerment boosts damage by 5% for 5 people (overall).
Nature Magic is by far better than BM. It boosts your pet’s might to 25 constantly (pet DPS goes up by roughly 30%) and you get constant 6-10% dps bonus from boons that are constantly stacked in raids.

If you want to help with heals as a DPS spec – simply put down healing spring. CAF will fill in seconds, you can pop CAF > #4 > keep DPSing. It gives 5 people straight 15% dps for 8 seconds and you can keep going.

Druid has a very potential perspective. Even in raids where people are smart enough to do their job instead of asking healers to cover up their mistakes.
As a berserker DPS booster if nothing else. No one will let themselves slip that 30% damage boost for so many people.

Tora.7214:

anduriell.6280:

I agree with @kevvy, i play both classes: a herald with clerics and a druid.
Herald/ventari actually can bring abour the 75% of the Druid healing to game, but also can bring: instant condition cleanses + projectile shielding.

The DPS don’t need to suffer you still can help your team in the heat of the battle, even if you play with staff you’ll do at least double DPS than the Druid’s staff does and bring as much heals as the druid’s staff do.

So yeah, there is no reason to use the druid in raids, a tempest or ventari can heal enough good to make it not needed as i foresaw after the BWE3.

Based on healing is good but only healing is bad. More than that if they keep nerfing the class because Anet doesn’t know how to handle a class that is supposed to be healing around.

Good luck controling the tablet with a radius of 240 around to heal a raid that spreads and moves a lot, moving a lot yourself to dodge the blue warp aoes that appear at sword/staff range while keeping optimal dps at the same time

Actually is pretty easy and fun. But that could be because i use the m.m.o.7 mouse that allows me to use the all the skills without taking my eyes off the screen. Still hate that the mouse pointer disappear when you right click but well…
Also i use the hammer when i don’t want to be running all around. Just have to remember to cast the burst heal every 2 second.

You should try herald, it is better heal than the druid in Ventari and better support in glint. And your DPS does not suffer at all.
Only problem i see right now is that you have to go power based build, i couldn’t make yet a condition/hibrid based for the maze that it is amazing with all those fire fields and continuous poison+torment.

vespers.1759:

OGDeadHead.8326:

I’d like to hear your opinions on going into a raid as a dps ranger, be it power or condi, and pick druid traitline over <that-other-traitline>, primarily to help boost your groups damage through grace of the land (CA #3 & #4 first of all) and glyph of empowerment and secondarily as a support healer, do you think you would sacrifice too much by not picking that other traitline you’d normally choose over druid? Also you get another blast finsiher that you may not normally have access to as a dps ranger (CA #3).

Can’t say for power because I haven’t run one. Power DPS is so outclassed I don’t see a point. I have however been the A/T condi ranger in the vale guard fight because we needed condi. In short it does work. Are you better served with a triple set of sinister engi? I don’t know.

What condi druid brings:

Good condition damage.
Spotter.
Sun Spirit.
Glyph of Empowerment (13%/3%).
Fire fields
Some healing.
GoL.

Obviously GoL is nice. CA generation is slower on condi because you have no staff, but you can still sometimes generate it fast enough to beat the cooldown if all you do is pop 4 in melee and then leave right away which gives a much better GoL uptime for other melee. I don’t think GoL uptime is nearly what many people think it is/make it out to be and there’s no way a single druid can maintain it all the time especially if they are running circles. Remember you need 5 stacks for the 15%/15%. CA 4 is the only effective way to stack it, and that’s a melee skill. CA 1 could be good but it is so kitten clumsy.

My main issues are with the red split. pet dmg is largely negated, and you also have very little CC (CA 3 is it unless you use entangle). when you’re on a condi team with 2 condi necros as i was… it hurts. You also have less people to buff.

This is why I wondered about running an apothecary druid that tanks, heals, and does dps at the same time. CA generation is slower for sure, but i feel like the healing portion of druid will be less necessary as time goes on, at least for vale guardian.

and for my example that is why we had two druids one with GoL full tank/healer and me with Condi/celestial shadow+ancient seeds using LB+S/D using the Rapid application of RF>barrage with quickdraw is a defo dps increase over Staff , if you go this route , Sb is meh its too situational (most of the time you can’t even get to a flank)

this is a different Version of what you suggested , though it still brings sun spirit and the other Frost which frees up a spare Utilitiy slot for a Viper nest or Spike Trap meaning two more CC’s (pbs and KD).

though for one druid to take both sun and Frost , just hurts its personal dps too much so its better to use two Rangers or druid+ranger , or even Druid/tank , druid/dps for CA support like i did.

in my opinion as long as you beat Vale under the timer before it Enrages you’ve done a good enough job , and the Druid tank/healer +druid dps/support really helps after the first boss, throw in a decent chronomancer with some quickness buffs watch those bleeds/poisons/burns fly off the charts.