Guild Wars 2

As a preface, this build is designed for the current meta in competitive 5v5 tPvP.

TL;WR: This is a bunker build with perma aoe regen, vigor and swiftness, 3.1k armor, 1.5k healing power, up to 12x condi clear, 1 full condi clear, 21k health, 4 knock backs and can go toe-to-toe with meta bunker builds.
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Trait Distribution is as follows:
15/0/20/30/5
Taking: restorative strength, vigorous return, last stand, inspiring banners, quick breathing and inspiring battle standard.

Weapons:
Mace/Warhorn, Rifle
Energy/superior life, energy

Utilities:
Mending, Shake It Off, Banner Of Tactics, Signet of Stamina, Rampage

Amulet and Runes:
Clerics, Mercy
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Build Discussion:

For this build, banners are under appreciated, even when traited. Thanks to inspiring battle standard they give everyone near you perma regeneration and it stacks considerably. In addition it provides you with a 1k aoe heal every 10 seconds, those five points picked up in the discipline line mean that you can repetitively pick up and drop the banner to rapidly gain full adrenaline, which synergises with Adrenal Health, is a nice addition to regen’s heal over time. And then there is adrenaline to endurance regen from the strength tree, but we’ll get there. To top it off adept trait on the banner cd gives you a 100% uptime on the banner and all the bonuses it gives you (Side note: Fast Hands is a trait that is counter intuitive to pick up when banner swapping as it resets your internal weapon swap cd).

Quick breathing on Charge is another under appreciated part of this build. In addition to perma aoe swiftness, the condi clears are phenomenal. Popping Charge in battle before using other aoe condi removal is key to survival.

A quick note on dodging: Quick Breathing will give also give you perma vigor via Call to Arms which is nice(and more condi clear), but in addition to this you have two sigils of energy on your weapons and due to the 15 points in strength that let you pick up Building Momentum, you should use your burst skill on mace as often as possible, regardless of adrenaline it gives you half an endurance bar, and then instantly refilling it with weapon swaps, mainly on the banner and then I would start talking about Adrenal Health so the synergy comes full circle. And not that your a DPS class, but having Reckless Dodge at the end of your myriad of them doesn’t hurt, just dont be reckless with when you use them.

When picking up these traits listed so far you also gain three minor traits that are a nice resurrection bonus in addition to your Runes of Mercy, and the vit and boon duration are key pickups.

In the Defense tree, in addition to Adrenal Health, Last Stand is a last resort in the event you aren’t able to predict a CC. 90% of them are adequately telegraphed and take practice to block, dodge or interrupt, but this trait covers that other 10%, and the last second stability is a moment of relaxation when someone is trying to de-bunk you.

The extra healing power and toughness are welcomed with open arms, but spiked armor, defy pain and armored attack just don’t outweigh the synergy that investing the 10 points else where that could top off this tree provide for the build. But Vigorous Return is picked up for key play in those team fights when it counts, and having Thick Skin doesn’t hurt.

Basic Weapon Application: Mace/Warhorn is outstanding at countering meta builds. The main idea is to keep auto attacking, dodging and keeping vigor up until your weapon swap pops. These two things will perma weakness up on your target which counters their would be perma vigor. The middle three skills are purely situational. I only use Counter Blow to block key knock backs so that they are still set on full cd (interrupting does not set most cc skills on full cd), and then use Pommel Bash as needed to interrupt the rest of them. Charge is used to remove the additional CCs and gain condi removal as needed, but I try not to waste it on things such as 1s of burning or cripple when on point. Try not to use this in succession with a heal as it would be a waste of Restorative Strength. Speaking of the strength tree, on weapon swap that 15% condi duration when auto attacking with rifle 8 stacks of bleeds and instinct will make them blow a condi removal. But I usually use a basic weapon swap rotation just as internal weaponswap cd is coming off and making sure the enemy doesn’t have stability, I start with a skull crack into a weaponswap to rifle butting them off point and aimed shot to delay them getting back, immediately after this I start banner swapping to regain full adrenaline, by the time you do this, dodge an incoming cc or squeeze in a Compassionate Banner, weapon swap is back up and you get to start all over again! This is only a basic rotation, but it’s a good place to start.

Basic Utility Application:
I always have the banner out for pregame buffs, personally I start stacking regen immedately with Compassionate Banner, then use Call to Arms followed by Charge and Inspire. For the rest of the utilities I try not to blow them in succession. You have up to 5 condi clears on warhorn, so I use those first. I find regen and Adrenal Health can out heal basic condi application, so don’t rush to clear them. For basic use I use mending as soon as I hit a threshold where I get the full heal and clear up to 5 conditions, save Shake it Off as a stun break and look at the condi removal as a side bonus unless you have an unusually high stack of bleeds or long burning duration which is usually kept at bay by the warhorn, then when condis come in really heavy, Signet of Stamina’s active does wonders to your survivability.

Basic Elite Application: When used right, I have found Rampage is the most powerful debunking skill in the game. Just make sure if your fighting another bunker, you make them blow their stability early by poking at them with your rifle butt or your team’s CCs. I find positioning around the environment is key to using Rampage or any other CC. I usually start with a Dash or Kick for initial CC off point as Stomp is too easy to dodge on its own, but follow stop up with an immediate Throw Boulder to keep them down once I get them there. If they pop stability after a CC, I wait and don’t use 2-5 until they are off stability and unleash in full force. The fact that this is on a high cooldown isn’t much of an issue, as playing Rampage well for 20 seconds is more then enough to neut a bunker and even full cap when well played, you’ll want the survivability of your other weapon sets back as soon as you achieve this. Side note: in clutch team fights, you can use Rampage for the quick CC unload and use the massive stability uptime for clutch resses and stomps.

What this build can do:
Give meta bunker builds a run for their money, de-bunk those builds, offer teamfight support, condi cleanse, great mobility, team healing, more dodges then you will ever need, and much, much more!

What this build requires:
Waiting and reacting to CC, knowing other classes and proper positioning on point when not roaming, you won’t be dealing much DPS, but thats the nature of the beast in this case.

Please note that this build is successful when paired with a complementary play style. Traits and gear alone will not produce success!
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TL;DR: Personally I have had great success with this build and have decided to share it after many people have asked me to share it and are always interested in build diversity in tPvP. If you value the current leaderboards for a frame of reference, this has been run with success against full premades made up on the top half of the leaderboards, but my results aside, I recommend giving it a shot.

I am aware the things a warrior can struggle with as a bunker, I’m looking for feedback including improvements, variations, questions and comments. I am always open to all feed back! Build diversity can be a good thing.

Just please be constructive, lets foster a positive community.

Thank you,
and as always,
GLHF

So… your basicly a Guardian with less group buffs, way way less damage, less healing, less damage reduction, less condition removal?

Do you have any recordings of you playing the build?

I honestly find that if you run lyssa runes + SoR reduction, while taking mending + restorative strength, and Shake it off you’ll have all the condition removal you need. The warhorn condition → boon looks good on paper but the boons converted are very short. I rather run a shield for times you get caught and shield bash for an interrupt.
Having high vigor doesn’t do us alot of good compared to other classes where they get protection or heals, instead being high on melee threaten might be better for bunkering.

Warrior is underdog, but rifle warrior is a joke. Is this “worst build” competition??

Or have you ever played tournament with team (how many win/lose, which team comp?).

Yeah, sorry OP. This build just doesn’t cut it for a bunker. So far this is the best bunker/1v1 build I’ve seen for warrior, it still isnt even that good against multiple players. Bunker warrior is just bad. Period.

I basically cringed the whole way reading the trait/utility choices.
Got any recordings? I’m honestly intrigued to see this thing in action.

A couple of things though, since you’re familiar with the current meta, aren’t you afraid of S/D thief at all and getting your 180s CD stability ripped? What support do you bring to midfights except the banner regen? What makes you better than a guardian for bunkering? Guardian for example gives AoE regen/protection/stability/helps with ranged and melee CC/aegis/burst heals/cleansing 2 conditions per shout (turns one into a boon) and 3 from virtue/denies rezzing and stomps with sanctuary or shield of absorption. I can’t see the use for this build.

Homebunkering maybe, but not as a midbunker and if homebunker, can you 1v1 aswell as a BM ranger?

From playing a healing regen bunker warrior. I say staying a bit glass cannon with defense runes is the best way to support the team even though they’re babysitting us. As long you have CC skill slots you’re helping the team a bit more only if the opponent doesn’t have stability up.

Warriors cannot bunker because they don’t have any access to good healing, good condition removal without sacrificing everything, and protection. Protection is pretty much an extra set of armor, the reason guardians have it so easy is because they can get the damage reduction signet AND protection, meaning they have more then double the damage reduction we have from just toughness.

Not to mention they have innate condition removal, and much much better healing abilities. There thresh-hold is also lower, so they’re heals mean more.

Would you rather have.
1000 healing per second, 80% damage reduction, 10k Hp, the ability to remove a condition every 3-5 seconds.

or

250 healing per second, 35% damage reduction, 18k Hp, the ability to remove a condition every 20-30 seconds.

Its pretty obvious the awnser, many just do not see just how bad it is.

What warriors need.
1 A massive healing increase.
2 More healing traits.
3 Access to more damage reduction.
4 More more more condition removal, or conversion.

Daecollo.9578:

So… your basicly a Guardian with less group buffs, way way less damage, less healing, less damage reduction, less condition removal?

Yes, he’s play a Warrior.

Rimshot

My question is why banner of tactics don’t you rather have more power or crit or even toughness?

Daecollo.9578:

Warriors cannot bunker because they don’t have any access to good healing, good condition removal without sacrificing everything, and protection. Protection is pretty much an extra set of armor, the reason guardians have it so easy is because they can get the damage reduction signet AND protection, meaning they have more then double the damage reduction we have from just toughness.

Not to mention they have innate condition removal, and much much better healing abilities. There thresh-hold is also lower, so they’re heals mean more.

Would you rather have.
1000 healing per second, 80% damage reduction, 10k Hp, the ability to remove a condition every 3-5 seconds.

or

250 healing per second, 35% damage reduction, 18k Hp, the ability to remove a condition every 20-30 seconds.

Its pretty obvious the awnser, many just do not see just how bad it is.

What warriors need.
1 A massive healing increase.
2 More healing traits.
3 Access to more damage reduction.
4 More more more condition removal, or conversion.

Math really isn’t your strength isn’t it?

So let’s assume the same equipment.
Warrior is in your words at 35% reduction, guardian with protection at 80%.
So here is the calculation of what protection does when taking your numbers:
The final damage the guardian takes is 0.2 or 20%, x is the amount protection reduces the damage:

• 0.2 = 1*(1-0.35)*(1-x)
• 0.2 = (1-0.35)*(1-x)
• 0.2 / (1-0.35) = 1-x
• 0.307 = 1-x
• -0.693 = -x
• 0.693 = x

Protection reduces the damage by 69.3% instead of 33% in that case.

Should I start calculating the condi remove per second? That number is wrong aswell.
Or heal per second? It is also wrong.

Don’t get me wrong, I agree with warrior needing better heals, but throwing out wrong numbers isn’t the way to argue for that.

Ebel.2650:

My question is why banner of tactics don’t you rather have more power or crit or even toughness?

Mostly because more healing regeneration ticks + 10% boon duration, but unfortunately it’s not worth to have on slot skills bar. Compassionate banner heal skill is useless and not every player will pick it up for that benefit. That’s just common knowledge.

My problem with this build is that I don’t think many TPvP teams would actually want a bunker warrior. That role is already fulfilled by Guardians, Rangers, or Eles. Every team that I group with wants me on DPS because in a team fight we can simply destroy a single target or even multiple with a Bow. I don’t think warrior can EVER be as good a bunker as say a guardian and I don’t think ANet wants them to be. I’m also not big on having to rely on a banner for my regen considering in team fights someone may end up picking it up instead of stomping.

Even if I’m not running DPS I’ll probably be rocking big CC to once again win those big team fights. While I’d like warrior to have more sustain we do manage to shine in team fights so rather than trying to do another classes role I’d rather stick with what we’re good at.

BurrTheKing.8571:

I don’t think ANet wants them to be. I’m also not big on having to rely on a banner for my regen considering in team fights someone may end up picking it up instead of stomping

Then they should remove shout heals, regen or anything that benefits healing for them along with the skill Banner of Tactics.

If you’re going to argue why I suggested Banner of Tactics to be removed is that if Anet view for warriors is not meant to bunker. Then I suggest they tweak healing stat to condition duration increase by 10%.

Brutalistik.6473:

BurrTheKing.8571:

I don’t think ANet wants them to be. I’m also not big on having to rely on a banner for my regen considering in team fights someone may end up picking it up instead of stomping

Then they should remove shout heals, regen or anything that benefits healing for them along with the skill Banner of Tactics.

If you’re going to argue why I suggested Banner of Tactics to be removed is that if Anet view for warriors is not meant to bunker. Then I suggest they tweak healing stat to condition duration increase by 10%.

That’s support NOT bunkering. Bunkering requires Protection, spammable blocks, regen, aegis, or big heals. Guess what warrior lacks in any major capacity? All of these. The regen from banner is NOWHERE near as good as what a ranger has. If you can’t hold off 2 people for a long duration you aren’t a bunker, you are a tough warrior that deals less DPS than a bunkering guardian. You serve no role that another class can’t preform better. Heal shouts and banners are a WvW/PvE thing, they aren’t of much use in TPvP currently. Why have a tough warrior when a ranger can deal more damage while still having more survivability.

That’s why I always still with DPS because that’s the one thing warriors bring to the table, the ability to quickly take out important targets in a team fight or maybe provide constant CC but like I said most teams would prefer DPS. Thieves are annoying in normal hotjoin PvP but in TPvP against good players they’re pretty easy to counter 1v1 and at the most they can be an annoyance with constant stealth and blind. This spec is fairly worthless in TPvP though because being stealthed doesn’t cap points but a DPS warrior does.

I’d love for ANet to give us more options but currently we only fit the role of DPS and roaming, but we’re really good at it.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fIAQJARTjgOxu1QyQMRCEjiiAIOKAQmQpoNqjUBxA-ToAg0CnI4SxljLDXSus1MIY9B

That build allows you to spike down an unaware foe and the bow can be used to keep people rushing a point off it while you cap with skills like Pin Down or using Combustion Shot to force them to fight on a highly damaging AoE that covers most capture points completely. This build fills a role, a warrior trying to bunker does not because Guardians, Engis, Rangers, and Eles simply do it better.

BurrTheKing.8571:

Brutalistik.6473:

BurrTheKing.8571:

I don’t think ANet wants them to be. I’m also not big on having to rely on a banner for my regen considering in team fights someone may end up picking it up instead of stomping

Then they should remove shout heals, regen or anything that benefits healing for them along with the skill Banner of Tactics.

If you’re going to argue why I suggested Banner of Tactics to be removed is that if Anet view for warriors is not meant to bunker. Then I suggest they tweak healing stat to condition duration increase by 10%.

That’s support NOT bunkering. Bunkering requires Protection, spammable blocks, regen, aegis, or big heals. Guess what warrior lacks in any major capacity? All of these. The regen from banner is NOWHERE near as good as what a ranger has. If you can’t hold off 2 people for a long duration you aren’t a bunker, you are a tough warrior that deals less DPS than a bunkering guardian. You serve no role that another class can’t preform better. Heal shouts and banners are a WvW/PvE thing, they aren’t of much use in TPvP currently. Why have a tough warrior when a ranger can deal more damage while still having more survivability.

That’s why I always still with DPS because that’s the one thing warriors bring to the table, the ability to quickly take out important targets in a team fight or maybe provide constant CC but like I said most teams would prefer DPS. Thieves are annoying in normal hotjoin PvP but in TPvP against good players they’re pretty easy to counter 1v1 and at the most they can be an annoyance with constant stealth and blind. This spec is fairly worthless in TPvP though because being stealthed doesn’t cap points but a DPS warrior does.

I’d love for ANet to give us more options but currently we only fit the role of DPS and roaming, but we’re really good at it.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fIAQJARTjgOxu1QyQMRCEjiiAIOKAQmQpoNqjUBxA-ToAg0CnI4SxljLDXSus1MIY9B

That build allows you to spike down an unaware foe and the bow can be used to keep people rushing a point off it while you cap with skills like Pin Down or using Combustion Shot to force them to fight on a highly damaging AoE that covers most capture points completely. This build fills a role, a warrior trying to bunker does not because Guardians, Engis, Rangers, and Eles simply do it better.

Trust me I know where you’re coming from with warriors aren’t bunkers even though they can be if they were given better regen, heals, condition removals and traits. I’ve been through it all as a bunker regen support warrior. It’s not fun and the only bunker class you can actually go against on a 1 vs 1 are guardians, eles, warriors and possibly condi bunker thieves, but it is still not enough when they all except thief can do it better.

P. S I have defeated 2 guardians with that underpowered bunker build (through luck of course).

I wouldn’t considered the bunker / support build being viable in WvW/PvE either because it just doesn’t function well in those two fields. I’m pretty sure Anet is aware of that.

Warriors has the potential to be a bunker / support build to compete with guardian and elementalists if Anet wants warrior to be that. Otherwise they’re nothing more than thieves in heavy armor with decent CC if they can live long enough.

Daecollo.9578:

Warriors cannot bunker because they don’t have any access to good healing, good condition removal without sacrificing everything, and protection. Protection is pretty much an extra set of armor, the reason guardians have it so easy is because they can get the damage reduction signet AND protection, meaning they have more then double the damage reduction we have from just toughness.

Not to mention they have innate condition removal, and much much better healing abilities. There thresh-hold is also lower, so they’re heals mean more.

Would you rather have.
1000 healing per second, 80% damage reduction, 10k Hp, the ability to remove a condition every 3-5 seconds.

or

250 healing per second, 35% damage reduction, 18k Hp, the ability to remove a condition every 20-30 seconds.

Its pretty obvious the awnser, many just do not see just how bad it is.

What warriors need.
1 A massive healing increase.
2 More healing traits.
3 Access to more damage reduction.
4 More more more condition removal, or conversion.

I agree with 1 and 4

I’d love to see:

• More Dodging
• More Gap Closers
• More Interupts

shimzor.6057:

Daecollo.9578:

Warriors cannot bunker because they don’t have any access to good healing, good condition removal without sacrificing everything, and protection. Protection is pretty much an extra set of armor, the reason guardians have it so easy is because they can get the damage reduction signet AND protection, meaning they have more then double the damage reduction we have from just toughness.

Not to mention they have innate condition removal, and much much better healing abilities. There thresh-hold is also lower, so they’re heals mean more.

Would you rather have.
1000 healing per second, 80% damage reduction, 10k Hp, the ability to remove a condition every 3-5 seconds.

or

250 healing per second, 35% damage reduction, 18k Hp, the ability to remove a condition every 20-30 seconds.

Its pretty obvious the awnser, many just do not see just how bad it is.

What warriors need.
1 A massive healing increase.
2 More healing traits.
3 Access to more damage reduction.
4 More more more condition removal, or conversion.

I agree with 1 and 4

I’d love to see:

• More Dodging
• More Gap Closers
• More Interupts

I don’t really think the game NEEDS more bunkers, what it needs is a class that is between a thief and guardian, tough but not as tough as a guardian, and deals good damage but not as much as a thief. Currently warriors often have to play like thieves but without stealth. Having higher toughness counts for nothing without protection and all those other buffs. I don’t want those as a warrior but having perks that help remove conditions or adding new effect to adrenaline (different effect for each bar and maybe a F1-3 option to choose how many bars you use) that keeps warrior unique and not just imitating what another class does.