Guild Wars 2

Please forgive me, but I am fairly new to playing a warrior. I came up with the following build based mostly around Distracting Strikes and constantly trying to keep confusion on my enemies.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fIAQNApeSjkOpuxO2OMxBC0jrAmqYe8DxTEVh5A-jUDBYMCi0yQ0AA0HgJQFRjtIKaVRBpMKs6FYqTAKXRW9KpecBTGAmxA-w

It’s a M/Sh – H build using mostly Physical abilities as well.

Distracting Strikes – Apply 4 stacks of confusion for 8 seconds when you interrupt a foe (stacks intensity).

Skull Crack – 9 second cool down
Pommel Bash – 12 second cool down
Shield Bash – 20 second cool down
Kick – 16 second cool down
Bull’s Charge and Stomp for extra chances to interrupt and swapping to Hammer for possibly more interrupts if need be.

I know it would have issues with being kited. Bull’s charge, Shield Bash and/or Earthshaker would help close the distance. And hopefully all the interrupts will help slow them down.

Overall stats aren’t too bad..

Attack 3363
Armor 3354
Health 22272
Crit 31%
Condition Duration 44%

Again, I am not too familiar with playing a warrior (only lvl 41 at the moment), so I am just wondering if I am heading down the wrong path. Seems that the lockdown skills would be the distraction and most players wont realize that it’s confusion that is killing them.

I once played against a Sword/Shield + Longbow condi build (using Bulls Charge) using this trait. I absolutely got destroyed by it and he proceeded to kill a ranger + ele in 1v2 afterwards with ease.

I play a mesmer, though, so that means my condi remove is kitten.

Confusion does very low damage, unless you are specced completely for condition damage. With 0 condition damage, each stack only does 65 damage, so those 4 stacks only add up to 260 damage when they attack…less than retaliation at 916 (base) power. None of your other attacks will be doing any condition damage, so it would be worthless to spec for it.

Distracting strikes is one of the most worthless traits for warriors. It is a condition damage trait in a power-based trait line. It’s a Master level trait too, so you’re wasting 20 pts just to get it. Also, the condition damage based weapons for warrior (sword and longbow) have no way of interrupting an enemy. You would have to rely entirely on utilities.

The trait should be completely reworked, or discarded entirely. I like the idea of giving warriors a way to apply confusion, but it needs to be in the Arms line, and needs to work off a mechanic other than stun. Maybe immobilize would trigger it instead of interrupt.

Bear on the job.6273:

Confusion does very low damage, unless you are specced completely for condition damage. With 0 condition damage, each stack only does 65 damage, so those 4 stacks only add up to 260 damage when they attack…less than retaliation at 916 (base) power. None of your other attacks will be doing any condition damage, so it would be worthless to spec for it.

Distracting strikes is one of the most worthless traits for warriors. It is a condition damage trait in a power-based trait line. It’s a Master level trait too, so you’re wasting 20 pts just to get it. Also, the condition damage based weapons for warrior (sword and longbow) have no way of interrupting an enemy. You would have to rely entirely on utilities.

The trait should be completely reworked, or discarded entirely. I like the idea of giving warriors a way to apply confusion, but it needs to be in the Arms line, and needs to work off a mechanic other than stun. Maybe immobilize would trigger it instead of interrupt.

I’m championing Distracting Strikes changed to ‘Corroding Strikes’:
Applies 4 stacks of Vulnerability for 8 seconds on interrupt.

Defektive.7283:

Bear on the job.6273:

Confusion does very low damage, unless you are specced completely for condition damage. With 0 condition damage, each stack only does 65 damage, so those 4 stacks only add up to 260 damage when they attack…less than retaliation at 916 (base) power. None of your other attacks will be doing any condition damage, so it would be worthless to spec for it.

Distracting strikes is one of the most worthless traits for warriors. It is a condition damage trait in a power-based trait line. It’s a Master level trait too, so you’re wasting 20 pts just to get it. Also, the condition damage based weapons for warrior (sword and longbow) have no way of interrupting an enemy. You would have to rely entirely on utilities.

The trait should be completely reworked, or discarded entirely. I like the idea of giving warriors a way to apply confusion, but it needs to be in the Arms line, and needs to work off a mechanic other than stun. Maybe immobilize would trigger it instead of interrupt.

I’m championing Distracting Strikes changed to ‘Corroding Strikes’:
Applies 4 stacks of Vulnerability for 8 seconds on interrupt.

Please, no my troll condition warrior needs confusion. My warrior currently inflicts every single damage condition to players and this needs to stay and also it kicks kitten .

8s stacks of confusion on immobilize would be quite OP considering how easy it is for a warrior to apply cripple + Leg Specialist.

I was messing around with a similar build today… 30/10/30/0/0. Rabid ammy, Runes of the Pack (ikr??), sword/shield, mace/sword. Distracting strikes was nice, but it was so much fun having a build where you’re in their face with decent melee dps/control, and conditions are just appearing on them as if by magic.

You can actualy go for an Hybrid build with Rampager gear and get good results out of it if you use Sword&Shield / Rifle + Kick. You can also replace the Rifle with a Longbow, you loose an interupt but get better support skills, self buff abilities and fire condition damage instead.

Using it on a Mace is more of a waste sinds it is a power Weapon and the Stun abilities are lasting for too long, loosing too much of its effectiveness. While Sword&Shield gives a good versatility between Damage, Mobility, Control and Defense and with a couple of physical utilities makes this trait totaly worth if you are good at interupting other players or ennemies in PvE.

It won’t be as powerfull as a Confusion Mesmer or Engineer condition stacker, but it can become a nightmare against people with low condition removal sinds it has a pretty solid duration and can be coupled on top of your high bleeds intensity and fire duration skills.

Thank you everyone for your replies. Very much appreciated.

I’ve used distracting strikes with a mace/shield + longbow build. It is a fun build to mess around with, it can beat many builds and classes, but it is far from the most effective build.

If you don’t have bleeds, poisons, weakness, immobilizes, burns supplementing the confusion, it can be easily cleared. You are also easily kited. You need decent condition damage for it to be effective. And it is easily countered if the opponent isn’t spamming skills like crazy.

I find it works best in a hybrid type build, but this build tends to be a bit squishier. Going full condition with this build relies too much on pindown and actually going into melee range and interrupting. You need power to accompany it. You can stun the person with 1 adrenaline bar, the stun only lasts for 1 second so you can get the intended effect you want from this build.

Overall I consider it more of a pseudo-troll build, because any "real" build could easily destroy it.