Guild Wars 2

Since conditions are a very popular thing right now I’ve decided to give it a whirl. I’m use to commanding big groups rather than roam in a party but I’ve wanted a change of pace for a while. However, this is very new to me so I’m a little hazy on what balance to look for.

http://intothemists.com/calc/?build=-s;4NKFM0g4NL-60;9;5TJ-J;127048;259-U;0GT;1ytbUytbUp-k01-qYx;1V3W8XDYI3P4W54w0Uk0R;9;9;9FFFF;9;9;7V6F7b

Here is the general gist of the build. Couple of decisions I’d love some help with

1. Rune set
I’m really torn between Lyssa or perplexity. How good is the application of confusion on perplexity and does it outweigh the condition removal and boon application on elite use from Lyssa?

2. Weapon sigils
I’m usually useless at sigil decisions are I always want them all. Sw/sw is pretty much sorted however longbow I’m still torn on. Any thoughts on either would be great.

3. Utilities
Namely bulls charge. I’m a big fan of zerker stance however I like the idea of having a gap closing stun for landing F1 sword and other various skills to put pressure on.

Thanks for reading and any advice on anything would be greatly appreciated.

Copy/pasted from the thread right below yours

Dire. The only benefit you get from rabid is a 3 sec bleed. Thats not worth 6k health. Not to mention with dire you get 30% crit chance, 40% with a sword, and 60% with fury.
Here is a sample of what you should aim for
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/external?l=http%3A%2F%2Fgw2skills.net%2Feditor%2F%3FfIMQNAT8cjkOpwFPCPMxBCkCsUlzjkMFyrUMH7A-j0BBINCy0CQUHBOTtIasVTFRjVJjIqWpETKAIWDA-w
3.4k armor, 25k health, 30% crit chance, and 2k condi dmg is such a beast. You can easily get bleed ticks of 3k+, and burn, and torment for 1k+

Your build has WAY to much precision that you get absolutely no benefit from, other than a 33% chance to trigger a 3 sec bleed

To the person above me crit chance is nearly pointless on a condition build.

I ran condition war for awhile and I ran into a couple issues that are little known or not discussed also that under water combat is impossible.

Clearing soft CC isn’t really a big deal until you run into CC spamers or larger groups who keep chaining cripple, immobilize, chill on you and it comes from multiple sources then no mater if you clear it or not it just get reapplied you get shut down then bursted down. Why This is an issue is cuz Condi War is an Attrition build and you win fights by out lasting and dealing steady but slower damage. If you get shut down you lose the attrition battle.

The solution I found was runes of Antitoxin + leek soup. Then the issue I ran into was my condition duration wasn’t long enough Dire+Antitoxin+leek soup. Is the fix.

The solution I found to condition duration not long enough after using leek soup was 20 points in Strength for 20% duration + Deep cuts for 70% Bleeds.

The solution I found to mobility since I put 20 in str was pick up Physical utility training and put Bull charge on my bar+Warrior Sprint+Signet mastery for faster CD of Signet of rage. Sword Leep + bulls charge = 1800 Range escape. Plenty of mobility now.

Solution I found to stun breaks and condi clearing since were using signet mastery is Signet of stamina which clears all conditions and gives you more endurance and dolyack signet. If you don’t need big condi clears becasue you have Regen+antitoxen+leek soup then more endurance equals longer staying power to help you win Attrition wars.

Here is the build.

The 20 in strength may sound pointless. But there is a good reason why is it is 20% Condition duration. 20%+50%from deep cuts = 70% Bleeding duration

70% is the magical number its pretty much nessacary if any of your opponents are on lemongrass+ negative condition runes.

Last little Nuance that I encountered that nobody really talks about is the Reposte + Reflect projectiles trait combo. Do not use it on a condition build. Why becasue then a ranged attack is not counted as a block. Since you are not longer blocking you are reflecting. Why this matters is then if you are in melee range and block a projectile the skill will not use Reposte and hit the target with the bleed. It will just keep blocking.

This is the final Condition build I came up with after running into and trouble shooting all of the many problems that nobody talks about on condi war

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fIAQNAT8cjkOxuBPGPMRCEkCNsKMK+Bi4UIJUKsj5A-jECBoOCy0Cwk0BKTqIas12FRjV3ATxiIq2joIa1yAssGA-w

Conditions are capped on 25 stacks…

I’ve seen the copy/paste answer and it’s not what I was asking. I was asking for feedback. Utilities aren’t great in experience now. So will be opting for zerker stance, endure pain and dolyak signet as I’ve found that spike builds are useless after the first hot, however that first hit usually had me so low I struggled. Endure pain nullified spikes easily and allow me full pressure.

Perplexity runes would be a waste with your build. You can barely trigger the 6pc bonus and with the 4pc bonus alone wont cut it.
I would either go for lyssa/melandru runes for a more defensive or antipoison/undead for a more offensive setup.
Your critchance is already high enough, dire gear will help you a lot more compared to rabid.
As for utilities I generally prefer running dolyak+berserkers stance+balanced stance. I rarely find endure pain to be useful.
Weapon Sigils: As it is at the moment they are completely messed up, once they get patch they seem fine to me (I’d generally lean towards having the energy sigil proc at the moment than having poison or extra torment; you don’t really need endure pain if you know what skills to dodge or outplay).

Perplexity.
20-15-20-0-15-Distracting strikes is essential.

You can run sword/shield-longbow or sword/shield-mace/mace

The interrupt confusion cooldown on perplexity doesn’t exist on distracting strikes. Equip stomp as a utility stun break.

For large groups it will lose relevancy. As a roamer I use this and very effectively handle 2 vs 1 situations. The confusion just eventually adds up. With sigils of doom and torment and corruption the additional conditions just prove too much. When i used it in dungeons and fractals it also proved far better than I thought it would be, but still took a distant second to crit dmg great sword.

@OP: A few things I’d change.

1. is that you seem to be putting some points in doing “power” damage… Which is pointless. You have very little power and no crit damage. Don’t bother. Personally I’d remove 20 of the 30 points you have in arms. Consider the following.

• You lose some crit chance, but you get more bursts – burst mastery allows you to chain 2 bursts together (one lvl 3 and one lvl 1) which not only gives you more damage and utility, but also allows you to remove 4 conditions instantly. It allows you to, for example, pin down > burst > switch to sword > Leap in> burst. It’s an insane amount of condition damage, conditions removed for you, and a lot of immobilizing your target (which hurts any char outside of a warrior a lot).
• You also get Leg Specialist. I consider LS one of the most underrated traits in the game for sword. Not only does it make it easier to stick to a target, but it makes Savage Leap > Burst an easy and practically unavoidable combo. Given how difficult Sword’s burst can be to land (due to the delayed startup) and how much condi pressure it puts when it lands, I find this trait mandatory for sword.
• Also switched missile deflection for dogged march simply because I think it has more synergy in WvW with both condi reduction foods and runes of melandru.

For #2 I’d switch sigil of energy for sigil of earth/torment on bow. When 2 handed weapons have 2 sigils then by all means add that in, but before that it’s just too useful to have condition on auto-attack, regardless of how short the duration is. It adds another condition to the bow which in turn means more pressure and more damage.

1. Rune choice. I don’t personally like Runes of Lyssa on warrior. I think the Elite is far too useful to hold back JUST for the condi removal. On top of that you have very reliable condi removal with CI + burst mastery and bow and sword. Bow doesn’t need to hit anything to trigger CI, and Sword has a very easy time sticking to any target (and landing burst with leg specialist). I think Signet of Rage is something you wanna have up while fighting as much as possible, not holding on to it for that one cleanse you might need… Additionally sometimes, especially in WvW, you simply need the banner! Which kittens with runes of Lyssa royally… In short, I wouldn’t use them.

Instead I’ll give you what I consider the two better choices: Runes of the Undead or Runes of Melandru. Runes of the Undead will give you the highest condi damage (especially as a warrior with very high toughness) and so are naturally more offensive choices, while Runes of Melandru are the more defensive option. They synergize very, very, well with Dogged March and condi duration reduction food.

In sPvP I run my warrior with Runes of Undead. In WvW on the other hand, I tend to gravitate towards Runes of Melandru. Both are good.

And for #4, to answer your last question, Bull’s Charge is a peculiar creature. I don’t run it in sPvP on my condi warrior since I find sticking to targets easy enough with this build… However I have a very hard time removing it from my skill bar in WvW simply because of the burst of mobility it gives me. It’s a very quick dash that, with mobile strikes, breaks immobilizes… That alone makes it golden. Together with any other mobility skill (savage leap, rush…) it gives you an unparalleled burst of mobility that makes you very difficult to catch or run away from. It has saved me from many zergs and allowed me to catch many runners.

These days I find that I simply don’t roam without it (regardless of build), while I often switch it out for something else (balanced stance for more stability, zerker stance for condi immunity, signet of stamina for condi cleansing and mini-vigor…) if I’m sticking to a zerg.

Cheers. And goodluck.

CntrlAltDefeat.1465:

Perplexity.
20-15-20-0-15-Distracting strikes is essential.

Wrong.

Distracting strikes is one of the worst traits in the game. Running it is the equivalent of saying “I don’t know how to play this game”. So… No.

Thanks for the amazing feedback!

I’ll give leg specialist a shot, I totally forgot about that trait since it had a cooldown applied.
I’ll probably stick with undead runes as it’s giving a huge boost to my damage while I try to figure out trinkets.
I’m finding I don’t need dogged march, I also find that having middle deflection on sword 5 is a huge, huge opener to ranged classes and pits massive pressure on them from the get go. It’s also a very good way of stoping ranged damage when running.

Bulls charge I would love to take, however I need more practice with high spike thieves before I swap out a stance. So possibly in the future I’ll take it as I LOVE the skill and can open up good opportunities for placing conditions. Chances are I’ll probably swap out undead runes for melandru runes once I have trinkets in place.

Another question. I see lots of people saying the bleed from arms is only 3 seconds, yet I know it scales with condition duration. It’s at 5 seconds for me without trinkets or proper sigils yet, so is some precision worth it for that extra free stack?

@proxy damage. If i don’t know what I am doing, why I am still winning 2 vs 1 roaming. I guess it must be the gods smiling on me. Play how you want, but drop the ego on thinking you know better on someone else’s play style. The proof is always in the pudding. 16 stacks of confusion doing 5k+ damage per skill use, torment, poison, 10+ stacks of bleeds and fire aura can’t be wrong. Those numbers are far from useless. The 20% on hit from perplexity, 10 seconds confusion on interrupt on 8 second cooldown+ 3 stack confusion on interrupt with no cool down just isn’t wrong. It maybe not your playstyle, just the same as I think your build is pedestrian. The 1 second immobile from leg spec doesn’t even stack with flurry. It has already expired by the time flurry cast is achieved. therefore it is a wasted 10 points that does not serve any greater purpose. With healing signet currently what it is and 20 points in toughness/healing for cleansing, 3 seconds of dogged march is also defunct. Deflect missiles has it purposes, or shield recharge. 3 seconds regen is the equiv of every tenth drip from the tap, you’ll get an extra drip. If 410 (500 including adrenal health)every second is not enough regen for you, then maybe it is fair to say, you need a very forgiving build in order to survive. This is a very fair comment to make. The more regen you trait makes your build more forgiving and tolerant of ignorant or unskillful dodges. However being i don’t know anything..who am I to say.

Naturally the proof is in the pudding. I don’t currently have the hard drive space for frapping out a vid, so the OP can search “warrior perlexity build” or “highly defensive sword/longbow warrior condi” each has it strengths. One is very forgiving, the other has a lot of free give away’s in terms of what happens simply by you being hit.

PS warrior bow attacks do not cause conditions. Unless you are in a fire field, then you have 20% projectile chance. However, you knowing what is best obviously know this. I am sure you’ll correct your post, as it was misleading to simply frame ‘conditions on auto attack are just too handy. ’ When you meant to say, ’20% chance to have 1 second conditions on auto attack when standing in a fire field that optimally you didn’t drop until it was phase 3 adrenaline.’ I almost could be forgiven with a statement like that that maybe the person making it didn’t know anything about the game. But obviously you do. You seem to know best.

Perplexity. See what you think. Check the build..oh look, distracting strikes..who would have thought…my goodness…oh dear, the nerf to perplexity doesn’t matter when you have distracting strikes..so this video being pre nerf, still plays exactly the same.

warrior sword/longbow-undead runes…you judge which one is more effective. The poster is not very interesting to watch, but they are thorough I guess. They too mention longbow 20% of conditions on auto in fire field.

What utilities do you use? Stomp, dolyak and bulls charge I would assume?

I try to avoid breaking down posts, instead I prefer to answer to the full cohesive point of the post, but this is such a garbled mess I honestly can’t.

CntrlAltDefeat.1465:

@proxy damage. If i don’t know what I am doing, why I am still winning 2 vs 1 roaming. I guess it must be the gods smiling on me.

OMG HOW CAN I A 1 VS 8 AND MULTIPLE 1 vs 3S! Because the “average player” is really, really, bad. Such as, for example, using distracting strikes…

OMG UPSCALED LVL 20 THIEF IS OP AND THE NEW META!

Or…OR… OOOOOOR… Most people are kinda bad. Maybe. Especially the ones being shown in cherry picked highlight reels. Maybe.

CntrlAltDefeat.1465:

Play how you want, but drop the ego on thinking you know better on someone else’s play style. The proof is always in the pudding. 16 stacks of confusion doing 5k+ damage per skill use, torment, poison, 10+ stacks of bleeds and fire aura can’t be wrong. Those numbers are far from useless. The 20% on hit from perplexity, 10 seconds confusion on interrupt on 8 second cooldown+ 3 stack confusion on interrupt with no cool down just isn’t wrong.

That’s the problem… It is. Here’s the thing, 16 stacks of confusion sound great, until you understand the opportunity cost of those 16 stacks of confusion…

• First Distracting Strikes is a Major Master trait from the Strength tree. The Strength tree not being particularly hot right now for Warriors in PvP (there are more important traits) means that one trait is costing you 20 trait points. 20. Trait. Points. It better be worth its weight in gold…

• Second the activation condition for Distracting Strikes is interruption. In a game with no cast bars, quick skill cast times, and where most disables are slower than most other skills interruptions are extremely unreliable. In most cases you can’t simply react to a skill because its actually just as fast if not faster than your interrupt! Even if you removed human reaction time (approximately 0.2 seconds on average) from the equation. But hey, at least Warrior has plenty of hard CC right…?

• …Except they don’t. Not on condition builds. And therein lies the crux of the matter. All Warrior condition weapons have soft CC (cripples/immobilizes) and all Warrior control weapons with multiple hard CCs (Hammer/Mace) are purely power weapons with no conditions whatsoever. There are no condition off-hands, which leaves you a SINGLE stun option for a condition build – Shield Bash – A single stun on a 25 (20 if traited) cooldown. That’s 1 chance every 20-25 seconds to get 4 stacks of confusion. You can raise that a bit by including Bull’s Charge , seeing as Bull’s Charge is also a useful mobility skill in WvW, which gives you another chance every 40 seconds. That’s it. Sacrifice any more utility skills and you’re gimping yourself to the point of suicide.

• So, best case scenario, you essentially got 3 chances every 40 seconds to apply the confusion stacks IF they cause interruptions. And for that you’re sacrificing 20 trait points, your runes, one utility skill – you’re forced to take Bull’s Chage, and off-hand sword. Totally worth it…

CntrlAltDefeat.1465:

It maybe not your playstyle, just the same as I think your build is pedestrian. The 1 second immobile from leg spec doesn’t even stack with flurry. It has already expired by the time flurry cast is achieved. therefore it is a wasted 10 points that does not serve any greater purpose.

That’s because you’re ignorant – accidentally or willfully I can’t say. I wrote right in front of that why LS is there. It’s not there to stack with Flurry. Flurry doesn’t need stacking. Its immobilize is long enough to deliver itself.

The problem is that Flurry is an immobile channel (meaning it’s cancelled if you move) and has a hefty 1/2 sec cast time, meaning that anyone moving away from you when you cast it will almost inevitably be out of your range when the skill triggers. That’s what LS is there for. Savage Leap gives you a guarantee cripple, which, instead, gives you a guaranteed Immobilize for 1 seconds. This guarantees a Flurry hit since the target can’t even dodge out of range (immobilize prevents dodges, unlike cripple). That’s what LS does. Essentially guarantees a Flurry every 8 seconds.

Kinda good on a condition build…

1/2

CntrlAltDefeat.1465:

With healing signet currently what it is and 20 points in toughness/healing for cleansing, 3 seconds of dogged march is also defunct. Deflect missiles has it purposes, or shield recharge. 3 seconds regen is the equiv of every tenth drip from the tap, you’ll get an extra drip. If 410 (500 including adrenal health)every second is not enough regen for you, then maybe it is fair to say, you need a very forgiving build in order to survive. This is a very fair comment to make. The more regen you trait makes your build more forgiving and tolerant of ignorant or unskillful dodges. However being i don’t know anything..who am I to say.

You really don’t… Who the hell takes Dogged March for the 3 second regen…? It’s low activation, pathetic duration, and it’s not like Warrior benefits from Healing power enough to sacrifice other stats for it… Even if it did, it’s a low activation 3 second regen!

Dogged March is used because it stacks with condi. duration reduction food (such as Lemongrass ) and Runes of Melandru. Together it means you’re practically invulnerable to movement impairing conditions.

Given that most of the Warrior’s condi removal comes from Cleaning Ire, and that most of that, except for longbow, requires you sticking to your target, having movement impairing conditions wash away is a little tiny bit important!

The more you know…

CntrlAltDefeat.1465:

Naturally the proof is in the pudding. I don’t currently have the hard drive space for frapping out a vid, so the OP can search “warrior perlexity build” or “highly defensive sword/longbow warrior condi” each has it strengths. One is very forgiving, the other has a lot of free give away’s in terms of what happens simply by you being hit.

Yes… You keep using that sentence… Yet, I wonder which of the builds is more used in high rank competitive play actually winning anything… I bet Distracting strikes is very used in tournament pla-… oh wait!

CntrlAltDefeat.1465:

PS warrior bow attacks do not cause conditions. Unless you are in a fire field, then you have 20% projectile chance. However, you knowing what is best obviously know this. I am sure you’ll correct your post, as it was misleading to simply frame ‘conditions on auto attack are just too handy. ’ When you meant to say, ’20% chance to have 1 second conditions on auto attack when standing in a fire field that optimally you didn’t drop until it was phase 3 adrenaline.’ I almost could be forgiven with a statement like that that maybe the person making it didn’t know anything about the game. But obviously you do. You seem to know best.

Yeah, if ONLY there was a way to add condition damage to your auto-attacks ! If only…

And if only 2 of the Longbow’s skills were guaranteed projectile combo finishers and one was a guaranteed blast finisher (on top of your auto-attack having the standard 20% chance of course)…

And if only the Longbow already had 3 condition skills… Such as AoE burns and instant 5 stacks of bleed…

And if only, if only, you didn’t waste 20 trait points on that useless waste of time that is Distracting Strikes and instead, maybe, maxed out the Discipline tree and got Burst Mastery… If, maybe, that gave you a full level 3 Combustive Shot roughly every 7 seconds – which, as you obviously know, means a giant AoE heavy burn, a giant fire combo field, and 3 conditions removed every 7 seconds… Cause that would give you a (slightly less then) 7 second cooldown on a 4 second duration skill, which kinda means… little math… carry the one… roughly over 57% upkeep on your AoE burn and fire combo field…

If only you put all of that together… That would be pretty neat!

If only…

But I’m sure your extremely conditional, low application and reapplication rate, confusion stacks are better men. Stick to your guns. Stay the course!

Oh why even bother, I just realized you don’t even take Mobile Strikes… in WvW…

I’ve been trying to put a Distracting Strikes/Perplexity/High Control build together for my newish warrior. And having read Cntrl’s post I was enthusiastic, having come up with something very similar myself. But having read Proxy’s rebuttal (and laughing a lot) I’m reconsidering.

I can’t see calling Distracting Strikes terrible when it’s basically the equivalent of the most OP runeset in the game without an ICD. Seems kinda strong, especially on a profession with so many interrupt skills. And coupled with Perplexity 6/6 it’s 4-8 stacks of confusion per interrupt.

And while it’s true that perfectly timed interrupts are hard in GW2, what with slower cast times on them than the skills you want to interrupt, Proxy said it himself that there are a lot of average or worse players in WvW. Which means it should be pretty easy to “guess” when you’ll need to throw an interrupt out.

I dunno…I’m a novice WvWer myself. But I’m trying to learn as much as I can. Is there a way to build a condition warrior with both Distracting Strikes for high condition application, as well as using the other “traditional” condition skills? Sword is a condition offhand btw, dishing out torment and potentially bleeding. Could a M/Sw + LB with Bull’s Charge work?

Yeah nice dissing guys, much afford, i liked it.

3 question to @ProxyDamage:

1. If debating between melandru and undead y not take antitoxin runes? it the new melandru rune for cond builds.

2. if u take melandru + food + dodged march for 98% reduction on immoblize do u still find ‘mobile strikes’ that mandatory? I don’t wvw much thats I am asking.

3. if ‘mobile strikes’ is’nt mandatory won’t you find going 30 in discipline a bit wasted? as the CD on burst is very fine on 8.5 sec as well and all that crit dmg just goes to waste on full cond build. not there is much to do about it.. coz we can’t get all these trait together with furios (30 arms)

“Could a M/Sw + LB with Bull’s Charge work?”
Used with reflect trait It’s one the most OP build I’ve seen in PVP, so yeah it works.
But I don’t like it much for 2 reasons:
1. no mobility , and that’s always bad in wvw.
2. You are very depending on people attacking you, most dmg is from confusion and reflect
So u might not die but if some1 don’t wanna fight you he could very easily just disengage

Seras.5702:

cut for size

The problem is the activation condition doesn’t synergise well with the Warrior’s weapon sets.

See condition Mesmers and Engineers, the more common users of those runes, still have plenty of access to dazes/stuns in their normal condition builds to make it work. Most mesmer weapon sets have dazes, one of their shatters has daze, and they can sub in a utility skill at least for an extra stun/daze. Engineers already usually care some hard CC on them, and can easily sub 1 kit for some extra without much worry. Neither sacrifices anything significant for it. They just have hard CC as part of their “package”.

Warriors do not.

As I mentioned in the other post although warriors have a bucket load of hard CC it’s all in power weapons. Mace and Hammer have the most interruption potential for the warrior and, while it is quite good, it’s all on weapons that benefit absolutely 0 from conditions. Neither weapon has a single condition between them. Running Mace with Off-hand sword…. It gives you that, but at the cost of any mobility. Keep in mind Mace has 0 mobility… It’s usually combod with the GS because of that (and because lvl 3 burst = HB). Just doesn’t seem worth it.

This leaves you in an awkward position where there is no good choice for that trait. You pay too much for it for a far too unreliable pay off.

I mean, try it if you want. If you catch an opponent unaware and the stars align and it all lands perfectly it’s pretty funny, but don’t expect to get good results consistently…

Eiland.1405:

Yeah nice dissing guys, much afford, i liked it.

3 question to @ProxyDamage:

1. If debating between melandru and undead y not take antitoxin runes? it the new melandru rune for cond builds.

2. if u take melandru + food + dodged march for 98% reduction on immoblize do u still find ‘mobile strikes’ that mandatory? I don’t wvw much thats I am asking.

3. if ‘mobile strikes’ is’nt mandatory won’t you find going 30 in discipline a bit wasted? as the CD on burst is very fine on 8.5 sec as well and all that crit dmg just goes to waste on full cond build. not there is much to do about it.. coz we can’t get all these trait together with furios (30 arms)

1. Forgot about those entirely. Not a bad option to be fair. A middle ground between Undead and Melandru. Not as good defensively as Melandru (no stun duration reduction, less condi. dur. reduction, no toughness), but carries a bit extra punch with condition damage (albeit less than Undead’s) which Melandru lacks.
2. In that case, not mandatory. No. Immobilizes will pretty much wash off you anyways. That said, I usually don’t bother with food (and when I do it’s not always Lemongrass for a variety of reasons) so… Yeah. I just like the consistency of having that “anti-immobilize” on demand regardless of my food. But if you’re running the whole thing, yeah, you can skip MS.
3. In that specific situation it’s questionable, but I like to keep it. Simply put on my condi. build I abuse bursts a LOT. Flurry puts a massive amount of pressure on an opponent while also keeping them from running away, and Combustive Shot is just so very, very, good… at everything… ever. As I explained above. Additionally I like to be able to “double burst”. Because of the way Burst Mastery works (you don’t spend less you just get “refunded”) this means that you can use a level 3 burst, and then immediately switch and use a lvl 1. It’s very useful to be to, for example, clean an extra condition while immobilizing someone in your lvl 3 Combustive Shot and applying some extra bleeds… But it’s debatable if, as previously mentioned, you stack condi duration reduction. Still wouldn’t waste those points on Distracting Strikes though.

Seras.5702:

I can’t see calling Distracting Strikes terrible when it’s basically the equivalent of the most OP runeset in the game without an ICD. Seems kinda strong, especially on a profession with so many interrupt skills. And coupled with Perplexity 6/6 it’s 4-8 stacks of confusion per interrupt.

The trait itself is great, of course. The problem is that you have to spend 20 points to get it, which could be better invested from a pure condition build perspective. Now, an interrupt-based gameplay is just that – a particular gameplay. Coupled with condition damage, not only it is viable, but also lots of fun to play. As for it being as efficient as a pure condition build, people’s mileages vary.

It has been said that condition warriors are too much subject to condition cleansing, and that the profitability of Distracting Strikes (DS) would thus be questionable. Having played pure condition and confusion/condition (with DS), I do find that pure condition is more efficient, but that interrupting comes more often than expected when you try it, and that the resulting confusion can be used to great advantage, even against skilled players.

Seras.5702:

I dunno…I’m a novice WvWer myself. But I’m trying to learn as much as I can. Is there a way to build a condition warrior with both Distracting Strikes for high condition application, as well as using the other “traditional” condition skills? Sword is a condition offhand btw, dishing out torment and potentially bleeding. Could a M/Sw + LB with Bull’s Charge work?

Mace does have interrupts, and coupled with projectile reflection and Guardian Runes, its block becomes interesting too. However, that is the extent to which it can be leveraged in a confusion build, so is in my view insufficient, as you lack any useful autoattack.

I have recently tried the rifle as well in a DS confusion build, with interesting results, but the 20 points invested in Strength somehow look a bit too detrimental for the rest of the build (Sw/X + Rifle works nicely in a pure condition build, though).

Why rifle? It’s most definitely a power weapon, while LB has bleeds and burning and blind. Not to mention a much better burst ability than rifle in WvW.

Seras.5702:

Why rifle? It’s most definitely a power weapon, while LB has bleeds and burning and blind. Not to mention a much better burst ability than rifle in WvW.

Rifle can actually be pretty interesting in a condition build. Consider the following roaming build (exotic only and affordable food, to remain fair – better stats coming with higher investment):

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fIAQNBMhRak0p4tFy6hJOggUohVx5RSEgLRShYwGA-jUCBINCi0CAUFQUHg5QFRjt2uIasaGYqUER1+AFRrWIAFzBA-w

General stats (with no stack nor might):

• 3.3k armor,
• 20k health,
• 1.6k condition damage,
• 51% critical chance,
• good condition resilience.

Basic analysis:

• #1 inflicts bleed. For a simple autoattack, this is simply great.
• #2 inflicts cripple. We also equip “Leg Specialist”, so as to immobilize our opponents, as well as “Furious”, to gain fury on immobilization. This also works well with sword #2.
• #3 hits for about 2.5k, and has 5 shots, which all can crit and thus trigger additional effects.
• #4 inflicts vulnerability. Not useful for us condition warriors, but very useful for out mates.
• #5 pushes opponents back, giving an interrupt. I recently bumped two guys over a cliff using it (but admittedly that was situational).
• #F1… is unfortunately not very useful, except that it keeps stealthed opponents in check.

Now, for the bonus:

• The rifle is traited to pierce. This means that #1, #2, #3 and #4 can hit and put conditions up to 5 people, like an 1200-ranged AoE. When you face many guys, this becomes excellent.
• We have permanent Fury (unless debuffed), which gives around 70% critical chance – which could be further enhanced, for instance changing food. This means that we have around 20% chance to get two more bleed stacks, 55% to get only one and 25% to get none – for each #1, #2, #3 and #4, using “Precise Strikes” and “Sigil of Earth” (with a 2s cooldown). Note that #3 fires 5 rounds, so the sigil of earth has virtually 100% chance to trigger, if not in a previous cooldown.

Finally, we have the usual benefits of a sword and traited warhorn, as well as “Dogged March” and “Cleansing Ire”. My current experiments with the build have been very satisfying so far, and I am firmly convinced of its potential.

Its trolling potential should not be underestimated, either. Recently, I fought a guardian with it. I started by #1, then #2, then #1 again until the guy came near. Then #5 (which gave me a happy interrupt with confusion, as I play with perplexity runes), then #2 again, then #1 again. He came near again and I used fear, then resumed the firing. He started to pull back (with half his life remaining), and I intended to pursue him using the sword, but some of his mates came up, and I had to flee.

Rifle isnt a good condition weapon becasue its only means of apply conditions is AA and AA is too slow to stack more than 2-3 stacks of bleeds at a time. Which wont be enough bleed stacks to be effective.

Hi,

Warlord.9074:

Rifle isnt a good condition weapon becasue its only means of apply conditions is AA and AA is too slow to stack more than 2-3 stacks of bleeds at a time. Which wont be enough bleed stacks to be effective.

The point being: what is “enough bleed stacks”? You have to take into account the number of stacks, the duration of the bleed, as well as the dispel strategy of your opponent, right?

In the build I have provided, the AA can maintain about 13 stacks of bleed, with a steady ramp-up of 10 seconds, so in the end something like 1.6k damage per second (exotic gear/trinkets only, without might or corruption stacks, reaching 6 stacks in about 4s). Granted, this is not as lethal as the sword AA – but to me, the fact that it is ranged (possibly hitting more than in melee) and that it can pierce (up to 5 targets) definitely makes it a valuable AA.

As for the rest: comparing the rifle to the longbow is more difficult. Both can immobilize, the rifle can bleed more than the longbow, it can put vulnerability and push back, but has no burning nor blind. It has no AoE nor blasts, but it can pierce (which is like a linear, not radial, AoE). The lack of burning is definitely an issue, but the rifle has other strengths, that may (or not) compensate for it.

I’m not advocating that the rifle is better than the longbow (I like both very much), but I am a bit surprised that one can so easily dismiss what looks to me a very decent condition weapon. I can perfectly understand, however, that the idea may not appeal to fellow condition warriors. At first, I was myself reticent when a friend of mine suggested I try the rifle; trying it though, I ended quite convinced of its potential.

I would assume it’s because of cleansing ire that rifle isn’t superior to longbow. Having an AoE field that 100% lands and cleanses, which is never affected by blind is a key thing. Rifle is avoidable and is also affected by blind, therefore not giving a reliable condition cleanse

Elegie.3620:

• #F1… is unfortunately not very useful, except that it keeps stealthed opponents in check.

How does that work?

If they stealth while your channeling it tracks them, if I remember correctly?

KarlusDavius.1024:

If they stealth while your channeling it tracks them, if I remember correctly?

Yes. Any channel is maintained through stealth so long as the target remains valid (in range, in LoS…etc).

Although the reason rifle isn’t currently used is partially because of Longbow’s synergy with Cleansing Ire and partly…. That… well… Longbow is just better. At almost everything. It has better condition application because of far more burn, spike bleed, and fire combo field. It has more direct damage because of a much more controllable burst (#3 is ridiculous with power). It helps you keep people in place since the massive immobilize in almost every situation barring other warriors beats the rifle’s cripple. And on top of everything it has a LOT more AoE whereas rifle is almost exclusively single target.

Rifle has decent burst through their rapid fire skill, but the rifle’s main point is kill shot. Unfortunately while killshot does have a ridiculously high damage spike it’s also an extremely vulnerable and telegraphed, so it’s relatively easy to avoid. Whereas Longbow’s #3 still delivers a very painful blow while being much easier to land (pretty much guaranteed unless they instantly clear the #5 and roll) and being a large AoE that’s also a blast finisher.

ProxyDamage.9826:

@OP: A few things I’d change.

1. is that you seem to be putting some points in doing “power” damage… Which is pointless. You have very little power and no crit damage. Don’t bother. Personally I’d remove 20 of the 30 points you have in arms. Consider the following.

• You lose some crit chance, but you get more bursts – burst mastery allows you to chain 2 bursts together (one lvl 3 and one lvl 1) which not only gives you more damage and utility, but also allows you to remove 4 conditions instantly. It allows you to, for example, pin down > burst > switch to sword > Leap in> burst. It’s an insane amount of condition damage, conditions removed for you, and a lot of immobilizing your target (which hurts any char outside of a warrior a lot).
• You also get Leg Specialist. I consider LS one of the most underrated traits in the game for sword. Not only does it make it easier to stick to a target, but it makes Savage Leap > Burst an easy and practically unavoidable combo. Given how difficult Sword’s burst can be to land (due to the delayed startup) and how much condi pressure it puts when it lands, I find this trait mandatory for sword.
• Also switched missile deflection for dogged march simply because I think it has more synergy in WvW with both condi reduction foods and runes of melandru.

For #2 I’d switch sigil of energy for sigil of earth/torment on bow. When 2 handed weapons have 2 sigils then by all means add that in, but before that it’s just too useful to have condition on auto-attack, regardless of how short the duration is. It adds another condition to the bow which in turn means more pressure and more damage.

1. Rune choice. I don’t personally like Runes of Lyssa on warrior. I think the Elite is far too useful to hold back JUST for the condi removal. On top of that you have very reliable condi removal with CI + burst mastery and bow and sword. Bow doesn’t need to hit anything to trigger CI, and Sword has a very easy time sticking to any target (and landing burst with leg specialist). I think Signet of Rage is something you wanna have up while fighting as much as possible, not holding on to it for that one cleanse you might need… Additionally sometimes, especially in WvW, you simply need the banner! Which kittens with runes of Lyssa royally… In short, I wouldn’t use them.

Instead I’ll give you what I consider the two better choices: Runes of the Undead or Runes of Melandru. Runes of the Undead will give you the highest condi damage (especially as a warrior with very high toughness) and so are naturally more offensive choices, while Runes of Melandru are the more defensive option. They synergize very, very, well with Dogged March and condi duration reduction food.

In sPvP I run my warrior with Runes of Undead. In WvW on the other hand, I tend to gravitate towards Runes of Melandru. Both are good.

And for #4, to answer your last question, Bull’s Charge is a peculiar creature. I don’t run it in sPvP on my condi warrior since I find sticking to targets easy enough with this build… However I have a very hard time removing it from my skill bar in WvW simply because of the burst of mobility it gives me. It’s a very quick dash that, with mobile strikes, breaks immobilizes… That alone makes it golden. Together with any other mobility skill (savage leap, rush…) it gives you an unparalleled burst of mobility that makes you very difficult to catch or run away from. It has saved me from many zergs and allowed me to catch many runners.

These days I find that I simply don’t roam without it (regardless of build), while I often switch it out for something else (balanced stance for more stability, zerker stance for condi immunity, signet of stamina for condi cleansing and mini-vigor…) if I’m sticking to a zerg.

Cheers. And goodluck.

CntrlAltDefeat.1465:

Perplexity.
20-15-20-0-15-Distracting strikes is essential.

Wrong.

Distracting strikes is one of the worst traits in the game. Running it is the equivalent of saying “I don’t know how to play this game”. So… No.

Link to build doesn’t work

Warhorn is a nice weapon as is shield. For a condi build though I don’t know how you could not include Torment with offhand sword

Forzani.2584:

Link to build doesn’t work

It’s working fine for me. Try copy pasting? Keep in mind I only did the traits, so everything else IS blank.

In case it doesn’t work for you for some reason: 0/10/20/10/30

• nothing
• III
• II / IX
• I
• VI / X / XI

ProxyDamage.9826:

Forzani.2584:

Link to build doesn’t work

It’s working fine for me. Try copy pasting? Keep in mind I only did the traits, so everything else IS blank.

In case it doesn’t work for you for some reason: 0/10/20/10/30

• nothing
• III
• II / IX
• I
• VI / X / XI

Gotch. Just saw blank on first page and didn’t go to trait page

Elegie.3620:

In the build I have provided, the AA can maintain about 13 stacks of bleed, with a steady ramp-up of 10 seconds, so in the end something like 1.6k damage per second

If you’re autoattacking with rifle for 10 seconds you’re probably already dead.

@seras there is a Ma/Sw + Sw/Sh condi build that uses distracting strikes. It might seem dumb without burning, but on those 2 weapon sets to have 3 blocks that will block multiple attacks. Guardian runes give a 1sec burn whenever you block. Its an interesting one, and its very effective as well. No one seems to run it tho

Carpboy.7145:

@seras there is a Ma/Sw + Sw/Sh condi build that uses distracting strikes. It might seem dumb without burning, but on those 2 weapon sets to have 3 blocks that will block multiple attacks. Guardian runes give a 1sec burn whenever you block. Its an interesting one, and its very effective as well. No one seems to run it tho

That’s what bothers me. I play this game a lot (according to my wife at least) but not nearly as much as some. I like experimenting and swapping builds often. I just don’t want to catch heat from elitist players that kick players for running axe oh and then see me running some experimental build and kick me because I’m not running the meta and I should go pro or go home.

The forums are a great place to have these discussions, but I don’t think you should ever kick a person simply for not running the meta, unless you organized a group specifically for speed clearing. I like learning from pros and will take any advice that’s given.

Hi,

Seras.5702:

If you’re autoattacking with rifle for 10 seconds you’re probably already dead.

I’m not sure about what point you’re trying to make, here. I’m pretty sure that you do not believe that anyone would play using AA only, right? (unless maybe the PVE boys in the Edges of the Mists!)

If you’re saying that no one would do AA only, but would rather mix in other skills (such as cripple/immobilize and push back), and that the resulting ramp-up to 13 bleeds is probably higher than 10 seconds, then you’re right – but this applies to all weapons, not only the rifle, and dangerous condition damage comes way before 13 bleeds anyway.

When you face a longbow condition warrior that manages to pin you down, do you dispel at once, or do you wait a bit? Now, suppose you face a rifle condition warrior that immobilizes you from even further, then simply AA you (4s is enough to reach the same damage level as “Pin Down”) – when would you start to dispel? In the end, which one would do more damage?

I don’t think it’s worth continuing the discussion over the rifle, and I am sorry to have brought it up. Initially, I presented it because the rifle is IMHO a decent condition weapon, and that rifle #5, offering an additional interrupt, would prove useful in a confusion-on-interrupt build.

It is a decent condition weapon on its own. But it’s synergy isn’t as good as longbow, which is a shame