Guild Wars 2

So the most effective build I have right now is a dire interrupt/trap condi build:

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vZAQNAoaVn8lCtNhlOB2OB8PhFZCTbPNFCAzdwRYK0bLco+QA-TFzCQBI7BA8C9BeSlgmoErgnAAAcIAcgSwJcEAW2+D+QdHDYiLLKPIEgi1A-w

I have good burst damage but little in the way of condi duration. I’ve been looking at replacing the trinkets with trailblazers to improve the build, has anyone experimented with this and is it worth the silly amount of gold it will cost?

Wtf is this kitten?

Amaranthe.3578:

Wtf is this kitten?

Thanks for the constructive and immensely helpful comment.

I use TB weapons. I’ve found that the returns on condition duration can be deceptive. The reason is that the longer the condition lasts the greater chance the condition will be cleansed. In a pure DPS sense at a certain point you are better off adding pure condition damage or alternatively buffing another stat. TB is certainly worth it for the weapons. Playing around with it in the build editor should give you an idea of what you are giving up.

On your build — one issue I can see is that there is really no “hybrid” statistics built into it but you have chosen Pul. Impact which relies on power/precision/fero and not condition damage/duration. Another issue is that you drop trap on heal but your heal is channelled. This means that someone can interrupt you and reduce your healing significantly. Otherwise I suppose dropping a smoke field and then healing would usually be acceptable.

A huge issue I can see with this build is the lack of any condition clears. You have to be close to drop your traps and can expect to get hit with a lot of conditions. This makes the build very niche against non-condition users. As per above, getting EA might be a solid choice for you.

Ultimately, your build has good interrupt/condition dealing synergy. Where it doesn’t is in the area of utilities. You can consistently rely on HS to interrupt. I assume you are using scorp wire to pull people into your trap(s). This is good but I feel that the wire won’t be as helpful as taking Impairing Daggers and having to work a little harder to land your traps.

saerni.2584:

I use TB weapons. I’ve found that the returns on condition duration can be deceptive. The reason is that the longer the condition lasts the greater chance the condition will be cleansed. In a pure DPS sense at a certain point you are better off adding pure condition damage or alternatively buffing another stat. TB is certainly worth it for the weapons. Playing around with it in the build editor should give you an idea of what you are giving up.

On your build — one issue I can see is that there is really no “hybrid” statistics built into it but you have chosen Pul. Impact which relies on power/precision/fero and not condition damage/duration. Another issue is that you drop trap on heal but your heal is channelled. This means that someone can interrupt you and reduce your healing significantly. Otherwise I suppose dropping a smoke field and then healing would usually be acceptable.

A huge issue I can see with this build is the lack of any condition clears. You have to be close to drop your traps and can expect to get hit with a lot of conditions. This makes the build very niche against non-condition users. As per above, getting EA might be a solid choice for you.

Ultimately, your build has good interrupt/condition dealing synergy. Where it doesn’t is in the area of utilities. You can consistently rely on HS to interrupt. I assume you are using scorp wire to pull people into your trap(s). This is good but I feel that the wire won’t be as helpful as taking Impairing Daggers and having to work a little harder to land your traps.

Cool, I’ll give TB weapons a try then.

Interestingly, pulmonary impact only relies on power, and with no power investment at all it hits for 1.7k, which when you add the draining sigil is around 2.7k per interrupt. Not too shabby imo. I do agree that escapist’s absolution is generally a better choice though.

I’m using channeled vigor offensively actually, if you start the heal then cancel the cast with sheath weapons it still places the trap, putting your heal on a 3-4s cd instead of the full cd. This means I can heal>steal>cancel>needle trap on every other heal for a better chance at landing both traps, and you can let the heal complete for the extra dodges when the traps are on cooldown. Just using the heal while in stealth reduces the risk significantly as well.

And yes, impairing daggers does work better, I just had fun pulling my dragonhunter friend into traps last time we had a free for all in the guild arena ^^ I often use shadow refuge as well, casting that then placing traps is a good way to kill people that try to knock you out of stealth. Shadow trap is also a good choice, allowing you to get close to 3k condi damage with the might from traps.

It’s an unconventional build but it’s rather effective, given a certain playstyle.

Interesting about PI…I like the idea of pulling a DH off traps and into yours. Given your experience with the build how have you handled conditions put on you? It seems a solid condi burst would down you.

saerni.2584:

Interesting about PI…I like the idea of pulling a DH off traps and into yours. Given your experience with the build how have you handled conditions put on you? It seems a solid condi burst would down you.

It honestly depends who hits first, the burst on this is pretty serious. a lot of condi builds don’t have much cleanse themselves, so as long as you get the opener you’re likely to win. The other thing to consider is that traps have no physical damage, meaning you can get your traps and an interrupt in before you leave stealth if you’re quick.

Condi chronomancers and necros are normally the difficult ones to fight, chrono because of the silly amount of invuln they have (although traps are unblockable, just wait til they use their shield before trapping), and necros will one shot you if they transfer your condis back to you. Trapping while maintaining stealth is advisable there, saving the interrupts for when they’re low and trying to heal. EA is pretty much required as you say though, I was mostly experimenting with PI to see what it did in a non power build.

In general, the things that I struggle with are those that heal to full after cleansing, so druids and some dragonhunters. That’s more of an issue with thief lacking real sustain in comparison to those classes though.

Edit: I realise you probably know a lot of that stuff, just wanted to make my reasoning explicit ^^

Just a personal opinion , but I do not think there enough sources of poison to make potent poison worthwhile in that build. Impairing daggers would certainly change that and there some ability from the dagger auto attack chain dependent on how much you use that , but I would go Improv.

While the reset of skills with improv not as good with the added physical traits , it my opinion that with a double steal of things like fear or other stolen skills with interrupts and that chance your traps or tricks reset , you can generate more interrupts overall and do more condition damage overall from the pressure strike. A double fear is very useful against Necroes and can put you in the drivers seat for much of the encounter.

In your own build you have a wide variety of skill types so odds are very good one will reset from cooldown each and every steal. (added to that since the heal can reset with improv you get another trap)

As to your GM traits in the trickery line. I did try your own selections in an interrupt pressure strike build. I actually found I was better off traiting SOH over BA. The reason for this is you can generate both confusion and torment while wearing perplexity runes with that interrupt off steal and that lower steal coooldown fuels a bit more endurance along with faster resets using improv.

I generally find steal one of the better ways of getting an interrupt. I also found that QP worked very well here as you can weapon swap every 10 seconds and the INI this generates can lead to more damage via extra INI then can those stacks of confusion from BA. This of course predicated on style of play and how many times you swap but if you incoporate a swap often style with QP and geomancy you can really boost damage.

if only i knew what is trailblazer anyway, when i read this all i can think of is a thief enjoying his 420

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vZAQNAoaVn8lCtNhlOB2OB8PhFZCTbPNFCAebhD1HauDOCThA-T1yCQB+QdGk9AAmwRAAAHCguZCyTqEUwTAoiQFV+BBlgLb/h2pPgUAQssC-w i would run this ^^ mix of dire and trailblazer to hit 99% con dur to 2 main sources make confusion have 100% uptime if they can not clear it