Guild Wars 2

I’ve been testing this skill out in dungeons. Combined with other venoms (immobilize, chill, weakness), it is very helpful at controlling or disabling enemy units. More importantly, I wanted to discuss its effects.

The recent change to Basilisk Venom was definitely a buff as far as PvE usage is concerned (as far as I know, no bosses break stun). However, to make the most use of it, in PvE or PvP, you have to time every attack properly, because the effect, unlike certain conditions, will not stack for duration. It simply gets overwritten. Example: If 5 targets attack at the exact same time with Basilisk Venom, the enemy will not be turned into stone for 7.5 seconds – the enemy will be turned into stone for 1.5 seconds.

If you spaced the attacks out, then you would get the maximum duration, which is potentially 15 seconds. This has been noted in the past: https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/thief/PvE-Healing-Support-Thief

Getting that 15 seconds, however, would require massive coordination.

I’ve been hearing rumours that Basilisk Venom tends to bypass Unstoppable / Defiant, or in other words it will always work on an opponent. Can you confirm / deny?

It works on all bosses in dungeons, so yes it can bypass those.

The change to Basilisk venom was a buff in both PvE and PvP.

My biggest concern other than what you mentioned about massive coordination (which is, definitely, a big hurdle) is that it also requires a substantial amount of time in which a portion of the party is not attacking whatsoever. If you could pull it off in PvP, that’s definitely going to be a big thing! However, given the monstrous amount of hitpoints most things have in dungeons, do you think it’s actually worth the effort?

My experiences thus far have been that leaving it to chance has largely been ‘good enough’. I’ve seen roughly 5-7 seconds of Basilisk Venom simply from folks having dodged or using a slow-hitting attack at just the right times (and, thus, refraining from attacking for a couple seconds). Naturally, this is unpredictable. But at the same time, my instincts would have me believe that in PvE you’re just best off trying to unload on stuff as much as possible!

Still, I’m glad that people have read and taken note of the things mentioned in that post!

Blazer Hellsing.9184:

The change to Basilisk venom was a buff in both PvE and PvP.

Nerf in pvp unfortunately.

Nerf in pvp I’d have to agree, but that is coming on the heels of the buff it received after having been a 3-second channeled cast before (correct me if I’m wrong, but imo almost completely unusable).

If it weren’t for the fact it can stun the unstunnable (yes, shameless Whispers reference), it’d be useless in PvE, for all it’s PvP goodness.

I posted a similar arguement in another thread, but here goes.
I think it’s dumb in PvE. I’d rather it retain it’s current strengths, except for one thing, recharge time, and instead gain the ability to cast instantly. Yes this puts it into a category of awesomeness that is Moa Morph, but with a much shorter duration, it REALLY ought to be instantly cast!

But as for the fact one stun overwrites the other, that’s fine in my opinion. If it were set to increase the duration of the condition it would, unfortunately, turn into a speed-clear player’s dream, to keep that dungeon boss stunned for 15 seconds per thief in the group (15×5 = 75 seconds with a group of 5 thieves… otherwise known as permanent stun, otherwise known as invulnerability party, aka Shadowform in GW1). That would definitely not be cool. Instead, simply have the skill recharge changed to reflect it’s usefulness, so that it’s still a useful spike skill, but one that you can only pull off once in awhile, rather than once every capture point in PvP.