Guild Wars 2

I run a shout build and was wondering what other warriors use for healing other than the signet? I always thought the signet was the best heal but maybe not anymore?

I prefer healing surge the signet only gives more healing if you stack healing power which i would honestly not recommend as going for dmg gear with no healing power in a shout heals build slightly reduces your healing while giving you massive dmg potential to assist the group by keeping the mobs dead while still providing the shout buffs and most of the shout heals.

Luckily I have 2 sets of armor for my main so I’ll experiment a bit as well!

Taking signet over anything else is only justified really by stacking regen sources. Which means atleast the 15 points in defense for adrenal health and 30 points in tactics for Inspiring Battle Standard. And like Honsu said, it’s made better when you stack healing power.

Otherwise you’re better off with mending or healing surge. They’re pretty interchangeably useful.

Healing surge is great for adrenaline hungry builds. It’s really great for running a ranged weapon set on switch because when you’re low on HP you pull out and heal and lay down combustive shot or kill shot. Or if you’re using a high CC build where you need to use either earthshaker or skull crack.

Mending is great if you need condition removal. Paired with restorative strength you can clear a whole stack of conditions. If you’re using a soldier rune set(which if you’re running a healing shout build, you SHOULD be using soldier’s) mending is kinda redundant and not quite as useful, unless you need a ridiculous amount of condition removal.

If you’re playing solo, maybe mending. In a group, you’re probably going to want to run healing surge. Though running signet can work if you’re running a tank build with high regen.

Angriff.1935:

Taking signet over anything else is only justified really by stacking regen sources. Which means atleast the 15 points in defense for adrenal health and 30 points in tactics for Inspiring Battle Standard.

This makes no sense. Healing is only good if you have more healing?

Yaki.9563:

Angriff.1935:

Taking signet over anything else is only justified really by stacking regen sources. Which means atleast the 15 points in defense for adrenal health and 30 points in tactics for Inspiring Battle Standard.

This makes no sense. Healing is only good if you have more healing?

It makes perfect sense. You are only using healing signet if you plan on not actually clicking it for the heal. The signet is for the passive regeneration. The base regeneration is not very high…and definitely not enough to deal with spike damage. You have to supplement it with adrenal health, healing shouts, healing banners, and +healing on gear to make it a viable heal option. This build is a very low DPS build, but it has pretty high survivability. You have to skip all the damage dealing trait lines and go for defense and tactics.

With all that said, I still think a direct heal like healing surge is better because it gives you significant, on demand, burst healing. Healing signet is only good while leveling at low levels as it is enough at those levels to overcome most incoming damage. It fails at this task at higher levels unless you supplement it with all of the above options.

I agree completly with ODB the idea is that 1 good burst heal> a single regen source of comprable hps but when you build a strong regen build… I used to run a setup with 1900 tough and about 700 hps by stacking regen sources like regen signet and perma regen banners it was a potent example of when regen stacking becomes impressive

Stacking 5 bad things don’t make them all good. If you think healing signet regen is worthless, it doesn’t become better just because you have other equally bad sources of regen in addition.

You can argue that it’s not worth it, or that it’s only worth it if you have high toughness but it makes no logical sense to say it’s only worth it if you have other regen in addition. In fact, it probably becomes less worthwhile as you stack regen because it has a lower effect on your total healing.

Healing is not always better when having higher healing power. Every healing skill is unique and have different scaling with healing power so you should check out them from wiki to see which will benefit you the most.

Regen is scailing with heal pretty well, which makes it usefull with +healing, adrenal health and dolyak’s will not scale with +healing at all so keep that in mind. I don’t remember if shouts scale with +healing or not but that can be easily tested in the mists.

When deciding to go for passive regen or burst heal it really depends on your role, playstyle and spec. Burst heals are really good for burst builds as you can quickly heal up and burst again. I prefer regen with tanky warr since regen becomes better the longer the fights last. You should figure out what kind of heal your build needs ( burst or regen ) and then decide which heal to use. Mending for burst heal and condition removal, adrenal for more adrenaline and a big heal ( scales well with adrenal using builds ) and the signet is your only option if you want more passive regen.

Note that regen is also more usefull when encountering some random damage and pokes you get from aoe attacks targeted to an ally next to you. (mostly rifle warrior in wvw)

DarnDevil IV.2143:

Regen is scailing with heal pretty well, which makes it usefull with +healing, adrenal health and dolyak’s will not scale with +healing at all so keep that in mind. I don’t remember if shouts scale with +healing or not but that can be easily tested in the mists.

IMO, healing power scales horribly with the regen on SoH. The wiki indicates that on SoH, the return on healing power with the regen is only 3.3%. In other words, for every 100 points spent in healing power, you gain 3.3 points of return in health. If you max out healing power (full Cleric’s gear, 30 pts in Defense, and a Sigil of Life), you’re looking at about 1553 healing power worth….. 51 additional points of health on the regen. That is a HUGE sacrifice in damage output for such a small amount of additional health regen. Focusing on precision/critical chance and using food that steals life on crit would be a far more effective source of healing and the additional critical chance will dramatically increase damage output.

The wiki indicates that healing shouts have an effective return of 80% on healing power, so far greater return on investment in healing power. IMO, it still isn’t worth gearing for additional healing power beyond what you get when spending points in the Defense line

Besides the scaling of the heals, you should also consider whether you are playing wvw/spvp or open pve/dungeons.
On the one hand, in pvp a regen build seems inferior to a shout, healing surge whatever build, because of the high damage you often suffer within a few seconds. A pure regeneration build can not heal for that much over a short time.
On the other hand, in pve monsters tend to attack slower and with a steady amount of damage. Furthermore, dungeon bosses need quite some time to be killed, which makes regeneration way more useful than a direct healing build.

This is just my opinion, playing nearly only dungeons and running around with a regeneration build.
I get about 220 (Healing signet)+120 (Adrenalin health) + 180 (Regen. boon) + 88 (Mango pie) which sums up to nearly 600 HP/s with 390 Healing Power (traits + banner).

It depends. If you’re stacking Regeneration from Banner’s and Adrenal Health, Healing Signet is the way to go in my opinion. If you’re not really using your Adrenaline skills, Healing Surge. If you use your Adrenaline skills frequently and aren’t stacking regeneration effects, use Mending.

Sorry to bring this up, but it really depends on your role. I play WvW, I used to run a tanky build which had moderate DPS but not enough to solo people. I was great in zergs, great at tanking for the team and reviving people.

I had full knights armour, runes of soldier (with shouts obviously) and full clerics jewelry. I was healing for about 230 per tick from just the signet and the shouts were nearly 2K.

The most entertaining thing about this build was my practical immunity to condition damage. When attacking keeps, when others would dogge the red AOE ring in the arrow carts, I would stand in them and type in /dance to kitten the enemy off and keep their target focused on me, I would not take any damage until the eles and rangers started shooting me, the bleeds were simply not enough.

Also in big zerg fights with lots of random conditions coming from everywhere, the only conditions I had to worry about were crippled and immobilized and that’s all I would use my shouts for (and to heal of course).

It would literally take 6 stacks of bleed for me to start receiving any damage at all in most cases, and that would be very little. I have a theif alt who I WvW with and applying bleeds to warriors with the signet is almost worthless.

TL:DR

Healing signet for me because bleeding, poison and burning just makes me more angry, although I’ve switched to surge now!

Mending FTW! My shout warrior eats conditions for breakfast!

mending or healing surge.
I’m not really considering healing signet. Even if you consider that you do not stay on 100% at all times, the healing is still much worse than healing surge. How the hell is that good, especially considering that surge can be used to restore adrenaline?
Actually, now let’s leave that aside. Signet gives you 200 HP/S. Using active is not considered, because well, that’s kinda foolish? healing power does not help the solution at all – HS and mending scale 1:1 while signet scales as HPx0.033, which means 30 seconds to take the same effect as others(same as healing surge, worse than mending)
200 health per second.
Versus 5560 on-demand(you can use full potential instead of only when you are not full, note that.) that clears 2 conditions as well every 25 seconds.
Mending heals more. While clearing conditions just as well.
Healing surge heals more, but it’s kinda kinky… The healing is around same on S1 adrenaline( a bit in favor of signet, 5840 VS 6000, and don’t give me your arguments how you are not going to use it right off the CD, because same goes for signet which doesn’t give full efficiency when you are full), higher on S2 and S3 but lower on S0.
Well, it is also an adrenaline replenisher. You can efficiently use it as a superior heal, or you can use it as a slightly weaker heal that helps you to regenerate adrenaline.
Now, given how amazing healing surge and mending are, signet stands no chance. Want more healing? You choose between mending and healing surge. Yes, even despite signet only does healing while surge and mending give other benefits.
TL:DR
Signet: 200 HP/S – passive. 166 HP/S – active
Mending: 222.4 HP/S.
Healing Surge:
S0: 174 2/3 HP/S
S1: 196 HP/S
S2: 228 HP/S
S3: 281 1/3 HP/S
Healing Power works in favor of Mending while being same for signet and surge.
Burst healing – Healing Surge is the winner.
Sustained healing – Healing Surge is the winner.
Adrenaline Hunger – Healing Surge is the winner.
In need of conditional removal – Mending is the winner.
Want to be a noob – Healing Signet is the winner.
Note: the fact that surge and mending require a 1s casttime is not a counterargument.
It’s very minor to be one.

Healing Surge is my favourite.

Healing Signet starts out really great, but it rapidly loses ground due to bad scaling as you level up.

Evalia.7103:

…[Mending] clears 2 conditions as well every 25 seconds.

I don’t disagree that Mending CAN remove 2 conditions every 25 seconds, but if used as a condition removal technique, then you could potentially be wasting the healing aspect of the skill, and put yourself in a position where you’re waiting 25 seconds for another desperately needed heal. To me, the condition removal should be viewed as a bonus and not so much as a hard condition removal skill every 25 seconds. So, give credit to it’s additional ability, but I think you’re giving it too much credit, per se.

Evalia.7103:

Signet: 200 HP/S – passive. 166 HP/S – active

So, based on your math I assume you are using the base cooldown times for the Healing Signet. That’s fine, it isn’t inaccurate, but to be fair, at least include both sets of numbers. With the reduction in cooldown, the Healing Signet’s ‘active’ heal becomes 207 (a ~25% increase); that certainly looks a lot better than 166, and gets close to matching Mending, though, yes without condition removal.

There is also an aspect of the math you didn’t touch on in your post. Assume you have two warriors equally configured, except one has Healing Signet and the other Mending. As they begin to battle and take damage, one is receiving a passive gain of health. Assuming each are taking the same damage, thus for every second the fight continues, the warrior with Healing Signet will be up at least 200 health points. So, 10 seconds into a fight, the Healing Signet warrior has a minimum 2000 more health points left. If they were to both then activate a healing, they would be both be sitting back at roughly the same health. So, long story short, the rate of taking damage and the intervals of necessity to activate a healing skill will play into which is the better option; Healing Signet could prevent you from needing to heal. It’s all situational.

Evalia.7103:

Want to be a noob – Healing Signet is the winner.

Sigh…

I am amazed at the complete blindness to so many people on this forum / in this game. People who absolutely refuse to believe, consider, accept that not everyone plays in the exact same situations as everyone else, or values the same abilities as everyone else.

For me, and the content I normally do, I do not need additional condition removal. In general PvE roaming, conditions are a joke, so who cares. In those situations, Shake it Off is enough for me to clear a nagging condition keeping me in ‘combat’ and keeping my movement speed down. In dungeons, one of my guild mates runs a Shouts/Altruistic Healing guardian build. As such, he’s the Dyson of team condition removal vacuums. I just don’t care about conditions when he is around, so Mending doesn’t really bring anything to the table for me.

For me, and my current GS build, my goal is the maximum critical chance possible, for both damage increases as well as more effective healing from Omnomberry Pies. Since I traited 30 points into the Arms line, I take Deep Strikes for the added precision from inactive Signets. I then dedicate one slot for Signet of Fury to remain inactive as well. Between those two Signets and the trait, I gain 170 precision worth ~8% critical chance. With my critical damage rating, that 8% critical chance equates to a 8% average base damage increase; the Healing Signet worth ~2% of that. 2% Damage isn’t huge by any means, but its worth more to me than being able to shed two conditions I rarely ever have or even worry about.

Does this mean I always run Healing Signet? Of course not… I am perfectly aware that the utility slots can be changed at will. FGJ and SoR are generally permanent fixtures in my utility slots, but the other two are dependent on the situation.

I’m a shout warrior (with full knights gear) and since I always WvW I use mending.
I absolutely love the condition removal (since I already heal with shouts).
In total I have Mending (cures 2 + heals), Shake it off (cures 2 or 3, never really checked), and For Great Justice (1), all on short cooldowns Then as my lest utility I have Endure Pain for those “Oh shi-” moments where you need to escape.

phantomFury.9168:

BLAHBLAHBLAHBLAHBLAH I DIDNT READ YOUR POST I JUST WANT TO WRITE SOMETHING
(gag on you)

Let’s begin the criticism.
I’ve read your text twice through and used search on it with key words “Healing Surge”.
It didn’t find any. You compared mending to healing signet, found out that situationally signet may heal more. Then you put down argument about active if traited but contradicted yourself by getting 9% crit chance instead in the same spot.
So…. You are constantly on high adrenaline. And you don’t want condition removal.
Well, it seems that you are still not aware about existense of following healing spell for warriors which you completely trampled and skipped over in my text:
Healing Surge.
I’m pretty sure I even put down how much healing it gives… compared to signet.
How about you go check that out? I would be very grateful.
Oh ~ and if you don’t mind and you play on europe server, we could meet each other in PvP. I give free education lessons for warriors.

Causic.3798:

I’m a shout warrior (with full knights gear) and since I always WvW I use mending.
I absolutely love the condition removal (since I already heal with shouts).
In total I have Mending (cures 2 + heals), Shake it off (cures 2 or 3, never really checked), and For Great Justice (1), all on short cooldowns Then as my lest utility I have Endure Pain for those “Oh shi-” moments where you need to escape.

Have you tried out Fear Me? It’s a pretty agressive shout.
It’s versatility is amazing to no end, really. Even so i’m not always using it due to it’s high cooldown(only drawback).
Also, Shake it Off is a stun breaker plus condition removal. It only removes one condition(but for everyone around you as well, plus up to 2 with soldier runes – I still find it pretty overhyped because of other great abilities)

Evalia.7103:

phantomFury.9168:

BLAHBLAHBLAHBLAHBLAH I DIDNT READ YOUR POST I JUST WANT TO WRITE SOMETHING
(gag on you)

No, I actually did read your entire post. I have no issues with your points, except your apparent unwillingness to consider anyone else’s playstyle, situations, etc and why one healing skill may be better than another.

Evalia.7103:

Want healing? Get HEALING SURGE

So, did you read my post? Newsflash… Most of the time, I don’t need healing. Omnoberry Pies do a perfectly fine job of keeping my health up. So, for me, placing Healing Surge on my utility slot is a wasting a utility slot because I will never use it. (EDIT: For my current build.)

Isn’t there another popular trait in the same spot that gives you 9% crit chance?

I am assuming you refer to a full adrenaline bar mixed with Heightened Focus. I am quite aware of that. But again, you have once again seem to fail to consider any counter argument. I only trait 10 points deep into the Discipline line. Part of my build is a focus on boon duration. So, with only 10 points in Discipline, I take the Signet cooldown reduction for 100% uptime on Signet of Rage boons. Could I pull 10 points out of Arms and instead put them in Discipline? Obviously yes. However, then I would lose 180 Precision (~8-9% critical chance, lose the 10% damage bonus on bleeding foes, would gain 9% critical chance from a full Adrenaline bar, and 10% critical damage. Bottom line, it would be about a zero sum game.

Evalia.7103:

Are you stupid or something?

Clearly. I’ve presented perfectly logical reasons why Healing Surge is not of any value to me and why in some situations Mending’s condition removal is not of any value to me, but sure, that makes me ‘stupid’. EDIT: I do concede I didn’t specifically mention Healing Surge in my previous post, but was certainly thinking it in my head when discussing Omnomberry Pies; my fault.

Evalia.7103:

but mending is hurr durr for removing conditions.

What was that about reading someone’s post? I don’t need to worry about condition removal

Evalia.7103:

Go compare it to healing surge and puff if you really want it.

Healing Surge is a great healing skill, I never said it wasn’t. I never once said in any absolute term, one skill was better than another. On another of my builds (a 0/0/30/30/10, using Hammer and Axe/Shield) I normally take Healing Surge because I want easy quick access to Adrenaline as well as an amazing heal.

I simply presented a case, that for one of my setups, play style, and party dynamics, how Healing Surge and Mending don’t offer me the value that Healing Signet does. Since I don’t tend to need either condition removal or burst healing, I might as well take the passive healing and precision, though insignificant it is, over two skills that will be ignored 90%+ of my time playing.

EDIT – The 9% critical chance to which I referred in my previous post was NOT from Heightened focus. Instead it was the combination of the Deep Strikes trait (in Arms), plus having Healing Signet and Signet of Fury on my utility bar. In total, that is worth 170 Precision or roughly 8% critical chance. I never said I got 9% from Heightened Focus.

Evalia.7103:

Causic.3798:

I’m a shout warrior (with full knights gear) and since I always WvW I use mending.
I absolutely love the condition removal (since I already heal with shouts).
In total I have Mending (cures 2 + heals), Shake it off (cures 2 or 3, never really checked), and For Great Justice (1), all on short cooldowns Then as my lest utility I have Endure Pain for those “Oh shi-” moments where you need to escape.

Have you tried out Fear Me? It’s a pretty agressive shout.
It’s versatility is amazing to no end, really. Even so i’m not always using it due to it’s high cooldown(only drawback).
Also, Shake it Off is a stun breaker plus condition removal. It only removes one condition(but for everyone around you as well, plus up to 2 with soldier runes – I still find it pretty overhyped because of other great abilities)

Yeah I use to have Fear Me, but since its also a shout I would end up using it to heal and not for the fear (which is bad since it has such a terrible cooldown) :P Or I would use it when I was about to die in a zerg and fear away all the enemies close by but the long range ones would still get me. My usual WvW strategy is to run into the enemy group (or zerg), attack away (while using shouts/mending to cure off conditions), and then when I use up my utilities I’ll use Endure Pain and Whirlwind Attack and Rush to safety till the cool downs are over So Endure Pain saves my life quite often :P

I don’t even.
Somebody just exchanged a healing spell for 2% crit chance in front of my eyes.
Well, why not, go ahead. Now I just have to think of a place where I will never ever need burst healing, and it’s just fine! Can’t think of one except open world PvE, though.
Don’t forget that you put it instead of more vulnerability that would kinda give the same damage.. Signet of fury is a lame choice of utility anyway because the second you compare it to a banner of discipline(90 precision versus 90 precision and 10% crit damage AOE with pickup for swiftness,fury, and dash, is this real?), you’ve got to realize how cheesy it is unless you aim for active of it – which you don’t.
Now, there are superior alternatives in a way to signet of fury and signet of might – banner of discipline and for great justice. They are a bit different, yes, but they are still better. It only leads me off to question why would somebody still use that. I don’t need to prove to you that 90 precision and 10% critical damage, as well as extra swiftness and fury, all AOE, then dash on top of that and double burst finisher are better than 90 precision, now do I?

Evalia.7103:

I don’t even.
Somebody just exchanged a healing spell for 2% crit chance in front of my eyes.

Once again, close minded and utterly incapable or unwilling to consider anyone else’s build, configuration, play style, and/or situation. Yes, I did make that change, because I’ve said numerous times, the frequency that I need a big heal is very low. So, I may as well make that trade. I am turning a slot on my utility bar from doing nothing for me most of the time (but yes, could do a LOT for me when and if needed) into something that gives me an acknowledged small increase to damage and health regeneration. That’s a choice I made completely aware of the positives and negatives regarding that choice. You think it’s idiotic because you keep making assumptions, and poor ones at that, about my build.

Therefore, since you keep making poor assumptions about MY build, I’ll lay out the basics.

Traits: 10/30/0/20/10; taking Berserker’s Power, Deep Strike, Rending Strike, Forceful Greatsword, Empowered, Lung Capacity, and Signet Mastery. Primary weapon is Greatsword, no surprise with secondary being situation dependent. Utility slots are HS, FGJ, SiO, SoF, SoR; FGJ & SoR are kept on permanent cooldown. As needed, I’ll adjust them, same thing with the traits.

Evalia.7103:

Signet of fury is a lame choice of utility anyway because the second you compare it to a banner of discipline(90 precision versus 90 precision and 10% crit damage AOE with pickup for swiftness,fury, and dash, is this real?), you’ve got to realize how cheesy it is unless you aim for active of it – which you don’t.

Again, you made assumptions about my build and play style. I am fully aware of Banner of Discipline, I just prefer not to use banners as I’m constantly mobile & partially because I am lazy, I can admit it. I don’t want to have to keep picking up a banner & carrying it with me. Further, I don’t need additional Swiftness & Fury; already have permanent Fury & Swiftness is at 45s on a 48s cooldown with this build. If my party is that desperate for Swiftness, I could throw on a Warhorn in my secondary weapon set and grant 15s of swiftness on a 20s cooldown, and cure some conditions to boot!

Oh, and to be exceedingly technical about it, passively, Signet of Fury would be worth 130 Precision with Deep Strikes.

Evalia.7103:

I don’t need to prove to you that 90 precision and 10% critical damage, as well as extra swiftness and fury, all AOE, then dash on top of that and double burst finisher are better than 90 precision, now do I?

If you want me to change MY build you do. My preference is to not run banners. As I already mentioned, the Fury and Swiftness of the Banner don’t provide me anything, I’ve already got them. From a team perspective, my typical guild dungeon party has 2-3 warriors also running FGJ and SoR, so no issues with Fury uptime, and generally, neither would anyone else in my party as I apply 12s of Fury on a 20s cooldown plus at least 8 seconds from any other FGJ. Dash doesn’t seem like anything special, I already have Rush on the Greatsword, which I believe has longer range and better damage. So, whats left? 10% Critical Damage and Blast Finishers. Maybe that’s enough for you, but not for me. The Critical Damage would be passive, if I am in the AoE, the blast finisher would require explicitly activating it. With 2-3 warriors, we don’t have lots of fields available, so that is minimal appeal.

The mistake you keep making, is to compare, in a vacuum, two skills with nary a thought about my build. Yes, in that vacuum the skills you advocate are generally better than the skills I am using. Yet, I keep providing you reasons for why those particular skills don’t mesh well with the particulars of my build, my personal preferences, typical play style, and/or area of play. Why are you so resistant to simply consider that your approach isn’t everyone else’s approach?

At the end of the day, I made the decision to run Signet of Fury as my *_baseline*_ utility for this slot. I change it up as needed based on the utility provided by particular skills (e.g., if I need stability). I did the same process with my healing skill. The benefits of Healing Surge over Healing Signet aren’t worth the slot on my utility bar in this build. It is in other setups.

Why is this so difficult for you to understand?

You just keep proving yourself how narrow your build is.
It’s pointless defending something that way. Maybe it’s better 1 in 1000 cases, but you say about team groups! There won’t be a case in which it would be better if I consider 5 man group.
You should start doing math and check out how much actually AOE benefits to your team. You valued 130 precision over 90 precision plus 10% critical damage plus a trait to apply vulnerability stacks. It is your choice, I can’t argue about it. But your team would be grateful, as your total output would be just 450 precision, 50% critical damage and 3-4 extra vulnerability stacks on that boss compared to 130 precision from sigil. It’s also probably a lie that everyone in your party can keep up swiftness. I would never believe that, so stop telling me it’s useless.
I’m running a similar build, but I’m just referring to it as your build, upgraded. I would’ve run similar utilities if I would be bad at math, I guess.
Just to clear up, signet of fury versus banner of discipline.

Comparing the healing numbers like was done earlier in the thread is misleading, because it makes an assumption which is almost never true: you will use your healing skill on cooldown 100% of the time. If that is the case, Healing Signet is the worst choice. But I’m certain that most fights don’t involve heal ability spam, so the regen effect is providing healing on top of what you get when you activate the ability as needed while the other two skills are doing absolutely nothing. I bet if you looked at the total healing done by each ability over an average fight, Healing Signet would easily be well ahead of the others.

For me? Healing Surge. Simply because the best crowd control is death and adrenaline skills are actually that good at setting up kills. When I use a Tank build, I don’t use Mending. I use Signet of Stamina and Warhorn cleanse.

Cleansing poison before using Healing Surge is usually much better survivability than Mending.

Evalia.7103:

You should start doing math…

Let’s remember this statement…

Evalia.7103:

You valued 130 precision over 90 precision plus 10% critical damage plus a trait to apply vulnerability stacks. It is your choice, I can’t argue about it. But your team would be grateful, as your total output would be just 450 precision, 50% critical damage and 3-4 extra vulnerability stacks on that boss compared to 130 precision from sigil.

I am confused by your comment on the extra vulnerability; are you referring perhaps to Rending Strikes? Maybe I am missing something? I specifically stated I took Rending Strikes… did you not read my post or do you not know what the trait Rending Strikes is? (Here’s a hint… it applies vulnerability) I never said I took Deep Strikes in lieu of Rending Strikes; I take both.

Any ways, I believe with the numbers you gave, you’re either purposely dumbing this down to make your argument look stronger or you don’t understand the math. The implication from your statement would lead some to believe me placing a Banner of Discipline would increase the party critical damage by 50%. Well, certainly who wouldn’t take 50% more critical damage; this guy must be nuts! Just… no. The math behind what effect banner would do per party member is complicated as it would depend on their current critical chance and critical damage prior to the bonus of 90 Precision and 10% Critical Bonus. The damage increase is quite good in certain situations, I don’t dispute that.

Evalia.7103:

It’s also probably a lie that everyone in your party can keep up swiftness. I would never believe that, so stop telling me it’s useless.

What was that I said about being close minded? But hey, you mix closed mindedness with poor reading comprehension. Never said my whole party has permanent Swiftness; please read my post. I certainly do have 45s of swiftness on a 48s cooldown. Here, I’ll do the math for you:

• 20 Points in Tactics for 20% Boon Duration
• 2x Runes of Water for 15% Boon Duration
• 2x Runes of Monk for 15% Boon Duration
• 20% + 15% + 15% = 50% Boon duration bonus.
• 30s default swiftness duration on Signet of Rage; 30 * 1.5 = 45s.
• Signet Mastery, 20% reduction in Signet cooldown; 60s default cooldown on SoR * .8 = 48s

45s of Swiftness on a 48s cooldown FOR ME. I guess if we want be overly technical, the cast time of SoR would make an effective cool down of 49s.

For my party, if needed:

• 50% Boon Duration
• 10s default Swiftness duration on Warhorn * 1.5 = 15s
• Default cooldown on Warhorn is 20s

So, 15s of Swiftness on a 20s cooldown for the party if they need it. Now, yes, with my current boon duration, I could give 15s of Swiftness on a 15s cooldown, but I’d have to run around with the Banner in my hand.

I specifically know one other warrior who I frequently run with has an identical boon duration and Signet Mastery trait, so he has the same 45s swiftness on 48 second cooldown from SoR.

In sum:

• Fury from the Banner isn’t needed
• Swiftness from the Banner isn’t needed for myself, and I have other ways to apply party swiftness if they need it, but do acknowledge it would have higher uptime
• Banner’s Sprint seems trumped by Greatsword’s Rush
• Blast finisher requires a field… and to stop attacking with a weapon, move to a banner, pick it up, smash it, and re-start attacking with weapon. Sure, if we bring along a profession with plenty of fields, it might be worth it.
• 10% Critical Damage… the only thing going for the Banner (for me) and output highly dependent on other builds, but yes, it would be stronger than my selection of the Signet of Fury

Evalia.7103:

I would’ve run similar utilities if I would be bad at math, I guess.

So says the person with basic reading comprehension problems. I never said math was the sole reason I selected the Signet over the Banner. A good chunk of it is personal preference and not liking the play style of banners. My argument is that most of the benefits of the banner you keep touting are largely negated by other aspects of my build and dynamics of my parties. So, the only bonus of any significance is the critical damage bonus. What I am saying is that the math of the delta between the two isn’t enough for me to change my play stlye. I tried banners previously and it just wasn’t for me. That decision with full awareness with what I am giving up.

Never once have I suggested my selections on my utility bar were optimal for everyone. My goal was to merely point out that it is quite narrow, to use your description, to insist that your way is best and anything else is idiotic, again your word.

Just a quick hypothetical for the individuals who think that the healing signet is worthless. Let’s say you are in a prolonged WvW situation. The healing signet is doing it’s job by providing constant hps. You start to get some heavier damage and get stun locked. The hps that the healing signet provided at the beginning of the fight left you enough hp to to survive the burst while being stunned/knocked down. The healing from the burst heals would ultimately be ineffective while stunned. It happens enough that it should be factored into your calculations.

IMO, mending is the best healing skill.

Almost everything in dungeons give conditions and usually to the point where you need to heal and remove a condition at the same time.

Evalia.7103:

You just keep proving yourself how narrow your build is.
It’s pointless defending something that way.

Hey everyone! I’m running a Hammer/GS build which I currently find entertaining in PvAll-You-People!

Screw me, right?

I always find it entertaining how the 733tz PvPers put themselves on pedestals as if this game somehow makes them worth more than others :P

No disrespect to the good PvPers that simply give advice when asked.

I almost exclusively run with mending. Honestly, when you compare the ammount healed, the cooldown, and the 2 condition removal it’s one of the best heals in the game for all around effectiveness.

It’s funny how a simple question like which of the 3 healing skills to use can make ppl so emotional. O.o

I don’t think running a healing signet is stupid. Running a healing signet and not beign aware of bursts is stupid.
I think all of the 3 are good, none of them is bad. I’ve had really good experiences with each of them and I think warrior has one of the best sets of heling skills in the game.

Just to point out the good part of hs:
I dueled in pvp another warrior while I was using axe and shield with hs (other utilities were FGJ, SIO and SoS) and he was using gs with mending or surge. He spotted me first so with frenzy + bulls charge and I was able shook it off and dodge out with 2/3 hp left. After that I over damaged him in dps and managed to get him down to 1/3 health while I was at a little bit under 1/2 health. Then when he tried to heal I stunned him and threw an evi and gg I won.

The lesson is that with hs you can focus more on dodging ( which works really well with strength trait line and SoS) and damaging your opponent as you don’t have to stop attacking to heal yourself. Also it is not vulnerable for interrupts.

Countering is the name of the game as well as knowing your weaknesses. My build was very weak to condition damage at the start so I changed endure pain for SIO and changed to soldier runes. The key is to find the best heal for YOUR BUILD and YOUR PLAYSTYLE. I often change the healing skill when I feel something else to be better for a situation. Like in dungeons if I am playing with staff ele and gs guardian I propably don’t need so much condition removals so I would change mending to hs or as. (I prefer using hs with the build I play anyway but that is my play style)

Examples of what healing skills I would use with ‘common’ builds:

For KS build – as (ks is wvw focused spec)
For banner build – hs in pve, mending or as in pvp/wvw
For GS build – mending or as (need cond. remove or not)
For shout build – hs in pve, mending in pvp/wvw
For axe/sword + shield build – hs/mending/as, whatever feels the best

For wvw if I go melee for zerg vs zerg, I take burst heal in any case so I can get more health when I get up from downed or after retreating a bit so I can get back in the fight faster. In zerg vs zerg it is all about the spike damage.

to sum it up:
hs, + “no need to heal”, – avoiding bursts is the key

as, + really big heal with low healing power, – pretty long cooldown and vulnerable for poison

mending, +can get some unwanted confitions off of you while regaining health, -somewhat decent heal and for it to really work I usually pick 10 points in strength to remove some more conditions on heal, mending is propably the ‘for every situation’ heal