Guild Wars 2

I main warrior.

I run full zerk everything with scholar runes. Also have a ascended GS.

I basically copied Nike’s build from here: http://www.guildwars2guru.com/topic/83915-axemace-dps-build-for-dungeons-and-fractals-101513/

So, GS with sigil of bloodlust. Have one axe with sigil of force and one with sigil of night, mace has Sigil of battle. For melee I use GS-A/M.

In dungeons I always use consumables. Typically, potent potions (inquest, flame legion,…..) or Superior Sharpening stones if no potion applies. I also use dragon breath buns as the cheap alternative that was suggested.

So, I am watching some of the DnT duo/solo runs in fractals and I am seeing them hitting the molten creature in dredge fractal with 100b for 80k or so on final shot. Then talking to a guildie who tells me he hits the Mark-T in CoE for 60k on the final swipe at times.

My question is, I have never hit anything over 35k with the final swipe of 100b, so what am I doing wrong? I’ve run a lot of dungeons, fractals and open world content and can’t get higher than that in any group. Typically, I hit in the mid-20’s or so. How are you guys hitting so hard? It doesn’t seem like I can change anything in my build to get more DPS.

The most important part to maximizing your DPS in a dungeon…

is finding a good group to play with.

You need a group providing lots of vuln, might, fury, and special bonuses (such as Banners, Trait Stat Bonuses, Frost Spirit) to get those sorts of numbers.

(Teamwork is OP, please nerf)

You’re watching vids of organized runs. There is usually 25 bloodlust stacks, 25 mights stacks, 25 vuln stacks, fury, strength and discipline banners, possibly frost spirit and spotter.

TIP: Get rid of the bloodlust on your greatsword. Make yourself a GS with Night sigil and one with force, or a few with enemy specific sigils. Make an axe and mace with bloodlust on each. You’ll stack twice as fast, then swap in your dps axe/mace after you max stacks.

@Neko: I realize teamwork is key. I am in a small guild that doesn’t dungeon much anymore. That is why I mostly PUG.

@laharl: The video in question was a duo run, both warriors and I think they had strength and disc banners down. Surely, they were maxed on might and bloodlust (not sure on vuln or fury).

I just have a hard time believing that I am not doing something wrong or that there isn’t more I could do. I have been in groups with multiple warriors where several banners were down, I was maxed on might and bloodlust. How could the extra few bonuses double(or even quadruple) my damage from 35k (keep in mind that was the most I have ever seen, typically it’s in the mid-20’s) to 75-80k?

First, do you have proper Warrior-DPS rotations? You want to maximize the amount of Vuln you output with Axe/X and GS. This is hugely important. Nike has a post on it.

Having 25 vuln, and then both banners plus 25 might and Fury uptime, can drastically change DPS.

Also, keep in mind that enemies have varying armor. Some mobs have especially low or high armor.

Odds are they had high might, high vuln, fury and banners. 75-80k hits is pretty high, so they must’ve been pretty buffed. They may have more ascended than you, their scholar runes were possibly proccing where maybe yours don’t as much. They have the extra 10% from their gs since yours is equipped with bloodlust. There’s a good number of modifiers they probably have over you.

Edit – And like Neko said, always use proper rotations. That is very important for dps output.

Edit 2 – I just noticed you said you mostly pug. You will never see those kind of numbers in a pug.

Assuming you mean the final boss in the dredge fractal, when he’kitten by the buckets the damage you do to him increases dramatically. As for the final swipe, it’s not 60K in one hit, it’s cumulative from all the other hits on hundred blades. So he’s doing 60K total.

Personally I’ve never hit 40K, but my guild doesn’t do the perfect organization stuff because we’re not that skilled. The highest I’ve gotten is 37K I believe

@laharl: I usually start with axe 2/4 then GS 2(3 as well if on a wall) then GS 111 for the vuln and use eviscerate when possible. Obviously things change sometimes depending on the fight, like a/m 5 is good for knockdown.

@Grog: That clears things up for me. For some reason I always thought that when you see the GS numbers that was each swing, but makes more sense that it is a total cumulative damage. Duh!! (on my part)

EDIT: Thanks for all the input so far guys. I feel better knowing I am at least doing all I can short of getting into organized groups, other than maybe having the perfect DPS rotation and maybe some sigils in the wrong spots.

cranked.3812:

@laharl: I usually start with axe 2/4 then GS 2(3 as well if on a wall) then GS 111 for the vuln and use eviscerate when possible. Obviously things change sometimes depending on the fight, like a/m 5 is good for knockdown.

@Grog: That clears things up for me. For some reason I always thought that when you see the GS numbers that was each swing, but makes more sense that it is a total cumulative damage. Duh!! (on my part)

EDIT: Thanks for all the input so far guys. I feel better knowing I am at least doing all I can short of getting into organized groups, other than maybe having the perfect DPS rotation and maybe some sigils in the wrong spots.

don’t use eviscerate on cd. only use it at the end of the boss. also when in melee range on your gs set, hit rush (gs5) after 100blades (gs2) as it does loads of damage, then ww through (gs3) and hit weapon swap to cancel the ww and then hit cyclone (axe2) for vuln as per norm. also, if your team isn’t counting defiant stacks and you can spam mace5 whenever you want, then do it when in melee range because it does double damage and is a dps boost. remember to not interrupt your axe chain as well, because the last hit does double damage.

likely those guys where using 30 20 0 0 30 wich btway is prety much the maximum DPS spec (altrought 30 25 0 0 25 also might do it) Doing 35 with HB is cool but it makes the warrior so glassy nearly anything can kill it. A full damaging warrior like that wont stay alive long in most end game dungeon but again i might be totaly wrong. I just think having at least 0 0 15 0 0 is important in order to keep minimum survivability standards

I always try to eviscerate if I know I am going to be healing soon.

I’d rather put sigil of Bloodlust in another weapon and use a Sigil of air or Sigil of fire in the main Greatsword.

So you fill up the bloodlust stacks and switch weapon and get 30% chance to hit with lightning/fire in a critical hit (much more DPS). You don’t lose stacks when switch weapons

Running as full berserker I also would go with Ruby as runes instead of Scholar, but if you can mantain your HP intact (congratulations) keep the scholar

if u can keep your hp above 90% 25% of the time for scholar its better than ruby orbs

lightening/fire have a 5second cool down and dost hit very much

but yeah blood-lust on gs is not a good choice unless you plan to have more than 1 gs

Zantmar.5406:

if u can keep your hp above 90% 25% of the time for scholar its better than ruby orbs

lightening/fire have a 5second cool down and dost hit very much

but yeah blood-lust on gs is not a good choice unless you plan to have more than 1 gs

I didn’t know about the CD (came back to gw2 few weeks ago), last year the lightning strike was like a commom hit triggering in almost every hit, lol

@kyubi eithr a troll or dosnt know wtf hes talkin about. everythin he lists is wrong

anyway..first off are u using exact Nikes build, all the right traitlines? its important because that is max DPS with GS+ A/X build. Next thing you want to make sure is to carry Disc/Str banner whenever possible, always run FGJ and SoR to maximize ur DPS (can switch out to BS for some tough content). Also BL is a very bad choice for your main GS, switch it to Night which is best if your doing dungs.. with the exception of daytime dungs like Arah you can use dung-specific sigil OR force (dosnt rly matter). because if your goal to stack BL u can use the sigils on dual-wielding sets (Axe/X) to proc 2x stacks. next thing u should follow is Shisehise advice except I would add do NOT use GS autoattack at all, axe autoattack is waay better (main reason for axe set too..) If u dont use axe autoattack and only switch to Axe/X to stack vuln than your defeat half hte purpose. Also biggest advice to NOT use evis until the very end..when ufight at zero adren you lose out 15% dmg which is a huge deal. if u have a problem like me of usin evis a lot get Surge to instantly regain adren. If ufollow the above tips u should be hitting mid-30s consistently at least.. not mid-20s. With a good gorup I hit 50k+ HB on alpha and 100k HB on Malrona when poisoned.

@nagr:

I always have SoR, FGJ and at least one banner. Almost impossible to PUG a dungeon and not have at least one other warrior, so I usually don’t have two banners.

I will switch out the BL on the GS and thanks for the good info on DPS rotation. I do follow Nike’s build exactly 30/25/0/0/15, except I run warrior’s sprint instead of signet mastery, but that won’t affect DPS other than being able to use SoR a little less. Yes, I hate running slow….. =)

Why not use GS auto attack? It adds, I believe, 10s of vuln on the first 2 hits.

axe auto is always superior to GS auto, especially if you dont interrupt the axe auto chain. besides with trait Rending Strikes your axe auto also adds vuln. so with crrect rotation a/m including an autoattk chain you can quickly stack ~10 stacks of vuln. If you have at least one other person in ur group who knows how to stack vuln youll alrdy have max stack. also remember that with Fast Hands u should try to always wep swap soon as its rdy. With GS all u rly need is 2 3 5, then swap to get your axe rotation in. Though 1 or 2 hits with GS auto isnt going to kill your dps overmuch, long as you dont camp it.

I do feel Sprint can be useful especialy if your using BS instead of SoR, however with war mobility being how it is (GS/sword) I feel you wont rly need it. Besides, Signet Mastery means faster CD on SoR, so you have swiftness/might more often. also Sprint dosnt stack with swiftness. so whenever you have swiftness it replaces (overrides) Sprint, so its only useful 50% of the time with SoR. Then again.. dosnt rly matter what u get for this traitline. There is a slight dps boost with sig mastery though, if your not alrdy at max might stack I mean.