Guild Wars 2

I usually roll with mace/shield x longbow, and I am traited accordingly (20% cool down reduction on both). But lately I’m finding the extra defense from the shield somewhat unnecessary, so I’ve started to try out the greatsword which everyone rants and raves about. And to be honest the damage increase really isn’t that spectacular, the only thing making it remotely worthwhile is Hundred Blades, which is pretty well useless on mobile enemies. So I was just wondering was there some GS defining trait that I need to invest in which turns it into the rapetrain that everyone seems to think it is or is it just obsolete on a build that’s put a singular point into defense?

I think it works pretty well, if you want stable DPS increase you should look into mainhand axe+offhand mace.
But if you put 20 in strength. 25 in arms as well as 10 in discipline, you are able to pick-up traits that are very good for greatsword. I’m talking about traits that are working off high adrenaline as well as greatsword-specific traits.
I build my greatsword focused on insane precision(aka 100% critical chance) and I’m pretty happy with it(All I play is warrior. I even do math for my warrior, hehe)

Nice thing about GS also is superior mobility, specially with the trait “break immobilise on movement skill”.

Depends what you play anyway, pve, pvp, wvw, instances, different weapons, different strengths.

10 points in Tactics, getting Leg specialist, your bladetrail now apply 1 sec immobilize on each swing, good luck!

Hundred blades isn’t too bad, it just requires you to bring some CC to the table with your dps, or have a friend doing it for you. A point blank bladetrail with leg specialist usually does the job. The rest of the abilities are amazing for mobility and still have good damage.

Hundreds Blades is “not” the defining feature of the Greatsword; Whirlwind is.

This ability is simply amazing. You dodge while performing it, you get great mobility and if you do it against a wall with an enemy nearby you will do much more burst damage than Hundred Blades ever could*

*does not do as much total damage, but if you hit the same enemy within one spin you rack up damage way faster than Hundred Blades.

^ GS is definitely better off used in that manner. A sword/warhorn build combined with GS spinning around brings good dps/debuffs and buffs for a whole team in WvW. Still have that strong 1v1 dmg and really slippery. (don’t get sucked into HB spam, works great in PvE, but in all other places, people are picking up the hint to dodge your HB and just hit you from the back while your doing it)

The reason you are not seeing great results is that you are probably not fully geared/specc’d for it.
First things first. You need to understand what the Greatsword is all about.
1) mobility
2) burst

Whirlwind and Rush are extremely good at keeping you mobile.
I personally use rush as both a gap closer and my escape ability. Whirlwind is my gap closer and follow up after 100blade.
Bladetrail is excellent damage.

Spec: There are many different variations of the GS spec, but I personally go for a immobilize, perma fury build.
20 Strength 30 Arms 10 tactics 10 discipline
Strength gets you :
Death from Above (one my personal favorites for WvWvW, as it has no target limit and does massive amounts of damage, especially if you"slide" down onto people inflicting multiple ticks on targets for 2-4k each while knocking them back) and Slashing power
Arms gets you
Rending Strikes-33% chance of vulnerability on target, stack of 10 gets you 10% dmg
Forceful Greatsword- 20% reduced cooldowns and Might on crits? awesome
Oppurtunist- fury on immobilize? Hell yeah
Tactics gets you
Leg Specialist: 1sec immobilize on cripple
Discipline gets you
Warrior’s Sprint ( you can get whatever you want here, Sometimes I go for signet mastery, or Thrill of the Kill)

Gear for me is 5/6 Knights 1/6 Berserkers armor, Ruby Berserker amulet, Emerald Knight’s accessaries, and Invader’s Rings with Rubys
Rune set is Superior Rune of Rage
Primary weapon: GS w/ Superior sigil of Fire
2ndary weapon: Hammer w/ Superior sigil of Fire

Slot Skills: Mending, Dolyak Signet, Endure Pain, <Open*>, Signet of Rage

*I slot skill based on the situation:
Keep Defence/Ledges: Fear Me
Solo: Frenzy or Pain Inverter(asuran Racial)
Group: Radiation Field(asuran Racial: allows for blast finishers)

Why I like this spec and gear loadout:
1) Immobilize on demand with Bladetrail (which hits twice, once going through and once on the way back. So you get 2seconds of immobilize and two instances of fury
2) with a crit rate of around 87% with fury up I crit pretty much every strike anywhere from 4k on high toughness targets to 15k on lowbies/squishies
3)Rush is on such a low cooldown that you can do a full GS rotation, swap to Hammer, use the burst ability and follow up with the cripple, aoe knockback, and the single Knockdown and swap back to GS to either do another rotation or GTFO.
4) allows for kiting of different targets that either are beating you or multiple opponents.

Cons:
Middle ground: Not Super Glass cannon, but not super durable either. In WvW realize that you WILL have to do a lot of running in and out of skirmishes of 6+ people, especially if you are focused.
Long Duration Immobilizes tend to screw you in a bad way if you are caught in a throng of enemies.
Lack of Ranged: I do carry both a LB and a rifle in my bags for keep sieges, but I rarely carry in openfield. I find that Rush allows me to close the gap enough to not really be a issue personally. I also like the Control that Hammer allows for.

Greatsword is the everyman’s weapon; anyone can use it. Doesn’t mean everyone can use it effectively. If you venture 20 points into your first two trait trees, you can pick up traits focused around the GS. Also, slapping a sigil of strength on your GS and focusing on critical hits/critical damage can really up your damage. Whirling Blade is your strongest hitting attack when your enemy is up against a wall, and Hundred Blades is your spam whenever off cooldown.

Greatsword is probably our hardest hitting melee weapon, when spec’d and geared for it correctly.

I used Greatsword for a while, but I’m enjoying hammer paired with axe/mace better. Heavy control build with knockdowns (3 of them if you use bull’s charge), a pushback, vulnerability and weakness. It’s pretty nice, and the hammer F1 skill provides a bit of mobility and stun.

Hi,

im running a GS trait build at the moment, and mobs and enemies +3 levels higher dont even scratch anything off my HP.

heres the build:

http://en.gw2codex.com/build/3779-mouse-s-leveling-guide

Normal mobs is nothing to brag about, really.

Dolan.3071:

longbow

Can’t believe anyone is taking this thread seriously.

Awesome mobility+ 2 root breaks,awesome dps and awesome 3 sec root+ the cripple on target(s) in a piercing straight line if specced right(basicly you can root an entire zerg if they stack together).Greatsword not that great ?Sorry for my english :p

Although Hundred Blades has high damage when fully channeled, it’s not why I use greatsword. You seldom get to complete the full 100B channel in PvP anyways, so that’s not really what makes greatsword shine, contrary to popular belief.

Greatsword offers mobility, which Warriors are starved for. You need mobility to accomplish anything as a Warrior, and greatsword supplies that with two movement skills that also double up as strong damage attacks.