Guild Wars 2

What tips do you veteran warriors have when going against another one? I think banner shoutbows offer the best team support so I get a sense of relief when there’s one on the team (I solo queue ranked)

When I’m on my warrior, the fights usually take place on a point and seem to take forever if neither of us get any assistance.

Would appreciate the skill rotations and other strategies you guys execute against another warrior.

thanks

Shoutbow vs Shoutbow is an endless fight, unless one of you makes some big mistakes.There isn’t much you can do. Ask you team for help or continue stalling, depending on what is best in that situation.

Watch for when they switch to Longbow and use Combustive Shot. You want to save your weapon swap to proc Sigil of Doom for that moment.

I suppose you mean shoutbow against shoutbow, right? There’s no way the fight could go at a fast pace: each build mainly deals damage through conditions, and has good survivability and condition cleansing.

As for any fight, I suppose that the key to winning such duels firstly is to optimize your attack patterns:

• Spam level 3 Combustive Shots, as often as possible (also cleanses conditions),
• Use Bow #5 wisely. Bait with stow. Shoot after dodges. Immobilize on fire.
• Use Bow #2 on melee, so that all 3 arrows reach the target.
• Switch weapons regularly, to optimize your sigils rotation.
• Optimize Geomancy, by switching to the bow when you’re close to the target.
• Optimize Intelligence, making sure Sword #3 hits (prepare with an immobilization if possible). You can also Bow #3, and switch while the arrow is mid-air to benefit from the Intelligence stacks.
• Optimize your projectile finishers when possible, i.e. Bow #4 and Bow #5 on Combustive Shot (usually not a problem if you spam the fire field).
• Build might consistently, by blasting your fire fields, making sure the blast skills also do damage to the opponent.
• Be aggressive. Use the sword AA when your other skills are on CD, not only you’ll do damage, but that’ll help trigger Geomancy efficiently when you’ll switch back to the bow.

Then, you need to optimize your defense patterns:

• Don’t stay on your enemy Combustive Shot, this is the fastest way to die. If you’re defending a node, then let the decap happen rather than having your health halved in a matter of seconds.
• Get familiar with the animation for Bow #5, then dodge it (or better: reflect it).
• Cleanse when you’re poisoned, don’t wait. Cleanse damaging conditions regularly.
• Don’t spam warhorn skills or shouts, if possible use them primarily for their original purpose, not their condition cleansing or health support.

What I also often do, in any duel, is to count seconds. This not only helps me keep a cool mind during the fight, but also helps unconsciously register the enemy cooldowns, so that I can prepare for incoming skills. Since you’re a shoutbow yourself, you’re pretty familiar with the opponent’s skills and cooldowns already.

A shoutbow really shines in group fight. It’s a good build to duel, but not the best build (anything with control would be better in my opinion). If you find yourself dueling as a shoutbow, then you team may have issues with their rotations (you should rather be supporting a team mate somewhere, providing might, cleansing and healing).

I have limited experience with shoutbow, because I don’t like its gameplay, so consider these suggestions with caution! HTH anyway.

My tip, very simple but very effective—

Use combustive shot and then wait for them to kite a bit after the damage, then make sure you have a full F1 bow then switch to melee weapon and chop them whilst they’re tanking your perfectly placed fire field

take a hammer. shoutbow only has one stunbreak. give him a sit down.

+1 guys, thanks for sharing your expertise.

Yes I’m referring to shoutbow vs shoutbow. The fights never seem to end for me but I’ll try what you’ve suggested.

choovanski.5462:

take a hammer. shoutbow only has one stunbreak. give him a sit down.

Hello.

Yes the hammer cc chains are still a pain to go against. Before the popularity of the current shoutbow build, the last time I had fun with my warrior was with 100blades in 10v10 hotjoin zergs in 2012. I didn’t participate in the hambow bandwagon before the adrenaline nerf so I’m totally noob on what the hammer build is.

You seem to know a lot about warriors and pvp in general according to your forum posts. How many warrior builds do you currently run ATM in pvp? What was the standard hambow build and is it still effective?

Vapour.7348:

choovanski.5462:

take a hammer. shoutbow only has one stunbreak. give him a sit down.

Hello.

Yes the hammer cc chains are still a pain to go against. Before the popularity of the current shoutbow build, the last time I had fun with my warrior was with 100blades in 10v10 hotjoin zergs in 2012. I didn’t participate in the hambow bandwagon before the adrenaline nerf so I’m totally noob on what the hammer build is.

You seem to know a lot about warriors and pvp in general according to your forum posts. How many warrior builds do you currently run ATM in pvp? What was the standard hambow build and is it still effective?

at the current point in time not having one player on your team playing a shout build with soldiers runes is stupid. the group condition clear is just too important for teamfights. currently the meta favors warrior as their shouts have AOE heals instead of more condi clear and boons (guardian) or perma regn (ranger).

so, as a warrior you have to choose if you want to play the support bunker for teamfights or not. i run full healing shouts with sw/sh hammer and the valkyries amulet (imo better than cele if you dont use bow). it has many of the benefits of both shoutbow and hambow, and could also have the fire field but i choose against bow for numerous reasons. i run other warrior builds and play with others who run zerk ham GS to great effect, however with the current traits bunker is your best choice imo. with the new traits warrior bunkers will get significantly stronger, and it looks like zerker warrior will have a chance to be meta.

the old hambow build has problems when played in one of it’s two configurations. see, hambow has been run as either zerk or soldiers, zerker for more pressure or soldiers to become a bunker of sorts. it is here that the problem arises, when run as a bunker hambow has hardly any team support at all, only might and warbanner. this is why the build has fallen out of favour, bunkers should have support because they are designed to teamfight and support increases the survivability of both the bunker and their team. warriors hammer allows you to peel (using cc to keep enemies off allies), and this is a must if you are teamfighting, but it’s not enough for a dedicated bunker to just have peels they need strong AOE support also.

now that’s not to say don’t run hambow, just that it should be run with a more offensive amulet or as the teams off-bunker (back up bunker, perhaps to hold home). it’s a strong build with lots of personal survivability. traits wise it runs 00626 with three stances as utilities, and the normal HS warbanner combo warriors use nearly always in pvp. depending on the amulet taken (something like barbarians would not need these, but soldiers would) intelligence sigils will be used. the traits it runs are straightforward, either being warrior staples (dogged march, CI, WS, burst mastery, destruction of the empowered) or taken to improve the hammer (merciless hammer, leg specialist).

i would suggest using both hammer and shouts if you want to bunk, especially with the new traits. i have theorycrafted a seriously disgusting warrior bunker for the new traits that i think has a high chance of making meta. base 2k power + aoe 370 power and 150 condition damage is pretty ruthless.

^ Appreciate all this warrior wisdom, choovanski

Vapour.7348:

^ Appreciate all this warrior wisdom, choovanski

always happy to give it out homes