Guild Wars 2

Given that the Revenant gains a large amount of crit chance from the Roiling Mists trait, and being able to keep up 100% fury, the “slot everything with berserker” mentality is wasted, because you simply do not need that much crit chance, especially in a group setting.

So what gear pieces should be slotted to make up for it? Valkyrie and Cavalier?

I don’t understand. Are you saying the optimal zerker will not be a zerker?

But yes, a lot of people will be using Valkyrie.

I personally will be going for 95-100% crit chance just because it feels nice critting every single time you do anything. I’ll probably be sacrificing a bit of ferocity for it though.

Pretty much, the optimal zerker build won’t be using full set of berserker gear, because there’s not really any need to in a group setting, so i was wondering what other gear piece players were gravitating more towards, i can’t decide if Vitality or Toughness is more important.

Cavalier has toughness as primary stat, so you can exclude it from a ‘zerker’ build.

I’m aiming for 45% crit chance (45 + 40 (Roiling Mist) + 8 (Warrior Banner) + 7 (Ranger Spotter), so I’ll have Valkyrie Helm, and Zerk+Valk Amulet and Accessories.
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vlQQNAsemnvN2gS6JvQRVlbossyPU4V5IKYs8ElFNFidMppNtDIANwugJshA-ThSBABU8AAsUNAKV9xMlgRcIAuSpBWKzwTfAP7PAwZAIAACAZ0GNpAiYMA-e

In terms of raw, physical DPS it’ll likely continue to be Berserker. The Berserker Meta largely revolved around dodging/avoiding damage entirely rather than mitigating it at all. Cavalier would reduce your over all Power (since Toughness is primary stat) and while Valkyrie would be nice the extra HP is pretty pointless in areas like high end fractals with massive damage with no Toughness to mitigate it.

The real question is what will the new meta actually shake out as? If they increase Toughness on mobs that favors Condition based damage not power based. How would increased Precision work on mobs? Does that mean you need to play perfectly or go down? What if avoiding certain mechanics was impossible? Then there’s Raids which are an entirely other beast. They’ve stated that there’s going to be encounters where you want a tank to sit there and tank something and Revenant, through Jalis, has some amazing tanking tools. Time really going to be the real tell on this.

I’m personally leaning towards something like this for dungeons & fractals (if dungeons are still worth the time/money after HoT launches)

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vlAQJAcinvN2gS6JvQRZlbosryPUYV5IKYs8ElFNFitMppNtLIANwugJshA-TRSBABU8EAsUVFa2fgS1KuSZAWK9WUJIe6CA4QAAA-e

80% crit chance, with the additional crit thrown in from a warriors banner (as i’m normally always grouped with one) works well for me i think.

And the following for PvE content
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vlAQJApnnvN2gS6JvQRZlbosryPUYV5IKYs8ElFUlhNpmiKNgDSwO92nH-TxhAABLt/A0nAgE1Dcq6PSqEEgHAgYK/AA-e

Swapping out the second weapon for either a Staff or Hammer, depending on the encounter, even though pretty much every other weapon bar Mace will suck in this build.

At most you end up with 104% crit chance with all available buffs. Once you lose spotter or the warrior’s banner, then you’re under 100%.

Is full berserker optimal? Yes and no. No if you can GUARANTEE a ranger AND a warrior in your group at all times. Yes if you can’t.

Most likely scenario: full berserker being optimal still. Remember, raids can be split into subgroups, so at times it may be more beneficial to split you away from a ranger and/or a warrior as those two might fulfill a role in a boss fight better than a revenant. As the two bosses we’ve seen so far have had mechanics to split groups.

Now, outside of raiding, yes still a better option. (Maybe not in the new open world areas.) We can’t guarantee a warrior running banners or a ranger running spotter (Yes that happens, and yes I do level 50 fracs almost everyday).

The only time I’d suggest against zerker as a general rule of thumb (not for specific instances like certain boss mechanics needing condtions or tanks) is in the new Maguuma jungle areas. If mobs are going back to BWE2 difficult or above (as we’ve not seen all mobs) it might be more optimal to wear Knight’s armor instead for survivability.

Fade.1743:

At most you end up with 104% crit chance with all available buffs. Once you lose spotter or the warrior’s banner, then you’re under 100%.

Is full berserker optimal? Yes and no. No if you can GUARANTEE a ranger AND a warrior in your group at all times. Yes if you can’t.

But you don’t have to aim for 100% in a solo situation, because no other class can have 2760 power AND have 100% crit chance. (unless the warrior uses more signets than usual)

FLiP.7680:

Fade.1743:

At most you end up with 104% crit chance with all available buffs. Once you lose spotter or the warrior’s banner, then you’re under 100%.

Is full berserker optimal? Yes and no. No if you can GUARANTEE a ranger AND a warrior in your group at all times. Yes if you can’t.

But you don’t have to aim for 100% in a solo situation, because no other class can have 2760 power AND have 100% crit chance. (unless the warrior uses more signets than usual)

The part you quoted only pertains to group situations. I gave my advice for solo situations below it.

However here’s a more detailed explanation as to why I say Knight armor is better for survivability than Valk. So toughness protects against direct damage while vitality protects against conditions. While Revenants are weak to conditions, most mobs do not apply enough long lasting conditions to make a revenant really sweat. Most mobs (so far) just do a burst of short conditions. A well timed infusion of light will protect against those.

Most of the time, I noticed direct damage was doing more to me than condition (at least in a much broader sense). Increasing the health bar sounds like a good idea, but then your lifesteal heals for less as a percentage. So to be effective with all your benefits, you need to decrease incoming damage without decreasing the value of your heals and lifesteal, thus toughness outshines vitality.

So you might ask why Knight’s instead of Cavaliers. It comes down to critting more often for less or critting less often for more. I prefer the latter as I plan on running a strength rune in my offhand to give myself more might. (At this point I also plan on running rage runes so I don’t need the extra ferocity.)

Again, all of that pertains to the open world. Optimal in that situation is pretty much based around surviving and tagging mobs as opposed to killing them as possible (though this could fold into the first part).

Only part I’m flip-floppin on is Strength Runes vs Rage Runes.

I like Rage Runes. Right setup I’m at 250% crit damage and 2500 power. However on the flipside the Strength Runes passively add 45% Might duration on top of 15% from Herald which means +60% Might duration which is quite a bit where as the Fury duration seems wasted with Perma Fury. That’s on top of the fact that in a Strength setup I’m at 2700 Power and still 238% crit damage.

Kodiak.3281:

Only part I’m flip-floppin on is Strength Runes vs Rage Runes.

I like Rage Runes. Right setup I’m at 250% crit damage and 2500 power. However on the flipside the Strength Runes passively add 45% Might duration on top of 15% from Herald which means +60% Might duration which is quite a bit where as the Fury duration seems wasted with Perma Fury. That’s on top of the fact that in a Strength setup I’m at 2700 Power and still 238% crit damage.

My opinion: If you’re going to only share 1 set of Ascended gear between a warrior and a revenant, go strength. If you individualize sets per character (and even per build), go rage.

Really the difference in an “optimal” group will be minimal. So I take it from the optimal gold cost (as I am pretty poor and just have 1 set of strength runes). Hence, I’ll probably run rage on my rev until I have a full ascended set. Rage is so dirt cheap.

Perma-fury is easy to maintain even with strength runes. (Tried this in the beta.) With Strength runes, a raid group could put you in your own subgroup (or a smaller subgroup with people who can generate a good amount of might on their own). So, I mean, both are pretty equal and would only be a rounding error off in terms of damage.

For launch, I’d go with Rage and move to strength rather than the other way around, cheaper on your wallet.

I hate sharing gear. All 16 of my dudes have their own Exotic or Ascended set. That said they’re not all tip-top either and I’ll probably use Rage Runes for my Revenant alts and keep the Strength ones in the Ascended gear on my Revenant Main.

Run something like this swapping in Zerker for Cavalier when doing something “srs.”

In BWE3 I ran Valk armor and Zerk weapons/jewelry. It seems like a pretty solid balance for PVE which is what I do. Solid dps between glint/shiro. Boons galor, good health pool I think around 20k. I did runes of rage it was all I had ready. worked great, not the best of best but I felt quite solid and switched between staff / sword/shield /hammer for world bosses.

Right now I am working on a tanky/support with some heals armor. I have nomads ready I am just unsure of what runes work best for a Reverent. With Glint’s boons and facet of nature I am not sure if I want runes that give boon duration and add might/regen/fury.

What do you think the effective dps will be in raid /dungeon environment? Anyone crunch numbers yet?

So running a basic, upkeep Glint/Herald so fury/might/boon duration facet upkeep and swapping regen/swiftness facet (probably with Sword mainhand) and a Superior Sigil of Strength, you’ll likely already have max capped Might without too much trouble.

100% crit with Rolling Mists from a Berserker (with mixed Assassin) gear plus consumables (boon duration) will probably yield highest DPS output with Scholar runes but there are comparable with Runes of Rage/Strength/Pack for a cheaper consumables approach.

The larger discussion is whether that’s good enough for all content in HoT/certain mobs have unbelievable burst attacks or just swarm you. That’s why other sources of healing/blocking become critical.

An option for PvE is above plus run Staff and mob dancing to pick up healing orbs and pick up Tranquil Benediction to have good DPS with high value of sustain. You also gain the lovely 25 might stack burst of Surge of the Mists that also comes with an evade (probably only good use of energy unless going total defensive). However, you lose some quick-to-mob mobility that Sword, offhand Axe or that Assassin legend has (which is also potentially better for general travel/exploration).

Don’t discount Hammer, it does it well, time and time again as the HoT mobs are much more melee unfriendly so that’s another option and puts the other players (hah) more in the risky area.

Yeah, I still think Zerker is going to be the best for Revenant. Mostly because of the ferocity on top of almost getting to 100% crit chance.

A lot of people are missing how tanky you can be with the Retribution trait line. It feels like I’m wearing Valkyrie already when I equip that trait line alone