Guild Wars 2

(I’m sorry if this is suppose to be somewhere else, I was going to put it into that build sticky thread but it looked like a place to show your build rather than ask for advice. But apologies if this is not the right place)

G’day Forum,

I’ve been mulling over a few things and I think I’ll get some external opinion to help me decides. I’m a Charr Warrior. I play mostly dungeon and group events in PvE. I’m seeking for this character to be able to do damage that’s effective but still able to stay up in the fights. I hate chill (seriously hate that condition).

The Build:

- Greatsword / Rife
- Healing Surge + For Great Justice + On My Mark + Shake it off + Signet of Rage
- 20 Arms (Rending Strikes + Forceful Greatswords)
- 20 Defence (Vigorous Return + Last Stand)
- 30 Tactics (Empowered + Lung Capacity + Vigorous Shouts)
- Power: 916 / Precision 1116 / Toughness 1116 / Vitality 1216 / Armor: 2327 / HP: 221372
( http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fIAQJARUncOk8YUQOPwEZAApwrsOKoip0jyQLNA )

The Theory:

I’m going with 6 runes of soldier because I find chill/cripple are two things that I absolutely hate as a warrior, and the soldier rune tier 6 ability is the best way to remove it (I wish Mobile Strikes did, but alas).

I ran the Sonic Boon for a while, however I really didn’t like the low toughness, and even though I read the maths on the internet and looked into EHP, but in game, I just found myself never standing for long on that build. It could be because of the way I play, but the point is I needed to change.

The 20 points in Arms is fairly standard for Greatsword so I’ll leave it there.

The 20 points in Defence because I seriously noticed it increasing my survivability by a lot (could be in my head if maths is against it or whatever, but I do live more). The healing (however small) bonus goes well with the Vigorous Shouts. I use [Vigorous Return] because I like being able to get a 2nd wind after going down and jumping straight back into the fight. I find that in dungeons and big events you’ll be going into fight for your life as a melee no matter what you build or use. [Last Stand] has a pretty big cool down, however I don’t know how many times it saved my life.

The 30 points in Tactics is basically straight from Sonic Boon and I use them as such. With the soldier runes they work perfectly. Though I’d love to be selfish and make the passive trait points all about my character instead of reviving bonuses but oh well, it’s good to have them there in dungeons.

Survival: So my survival strategy is straightforward. Keep adrenalin up for H.Surge while shouts provide a pretty decent micro heal (especially with 20 in defence). Condition should not be a issue due to high health pool and Soldier Rune removal + SIO.

Offensive: Spamming FGJ is there, also the Signet of Fury is helpful. Empowered will give me a good attack boost (especially if I’m with a guardian or mes). On my mark will allow me to dish out more damage.

The Query:

- So I’m about to get a set of exotics armor (again) and I’m torn between [Knight – Toughness / Power + Precision] or [Soldier – Power / Toughness + Vitality] stat armor sets. I’d put the soldier runes in which ever I get, just unsure which set would work better with this build, or should I alter build to better match a set?

- I know putting 50 points into defence/tactics must kitten my DPS quite a bit. And I understand if I wanted to be solid I should just play guardian and just make my warrior a damage character, and I honestly tried the glass cannon thing but just found that outside of CoF it didn’t work too well (not saying it couldn’t, just saying didn’t for me). I’d love to have [Berserker’s Power] in there as well as [Slashing Power], I also hated giving up [Signet Mastery] cause I love popping Signet of Rage. But do I have enough (even if it’s barely) damage in this build? Is the opportunity cost of my damage sacrifice too great?

- What would you suggest as an alternative?

Thus here it is. With the core being, I’d want to use the Soldier Rune Shout Removal ability and would like to be able to stay up in a fight without going to a support warrior role. I understand what I’m asking is broad and could all come down to preference and “what you want to play”. But I’m just here seeking for some experience and advice from people who’s most likely been down this road already.

Honestly, this is an excellent learning build. Sure you don’t deal terrific damage but you will stay ALIVE, dead Warriors don’t learn. I started off as a PVT Soldier Runes Warrior but after a while you realise that you’re just not taking any damage, you start learning the vital timing of dodge rolls and blocks and before you know it you’re barely getting grazed.
My mindset changed when I saw a half knights/zerker warrior obliterate mobs twice as fast as I did whilst taking equal amounts of damage as myself. So slowly I started swapping gear towards a more DPS based role until I found a balance I was happy with.
I’ve since ditched Soldier runes and changed to banner healing (ultimately heals for more.) This freed up a utility slot which I often change between each battle, freedom you don’t get when you’re trying to use it for condition removing and healing. For example using Signet of Stamina for the Archdiviner, if you accidentally step on an AoE it’s very unlikely to have all 3 shouts ready. Having that condition wipe for when you NEED it is a lot better than using your utilities passively and hoping they line up with conditions/damage taken. Bolas for the Mossman, it’s the little things like that that will get you much further than a shout.

My advice: Never go full PVT, a warrior through whatever means should be critical hitting on each strike. It is well known that we can still take hits whilst doing this. On the other hand I’ve never been a fan of full knights either, not enough power, too much precision. Once you’ve secured at least 85% critical chance (in combat) then any extra points in precision is ultimately wasted. Most finished builds have a balance between two or three different armour sets (unless they are a super l33t CoF1 farmer, or are genuinely VERY good at the game to go full berserkers for every first encounter.)

Regarding your hatred of Chill, having a warhorn nearby can be helpful if you’re expecting it. #4 skill wipes all movement impairing conditions and possibly reverse another condition if properly traited. Mainhand axe goes well with this because of its insane auto attack damage.

That was very helpful. Thank you.

For both PVE and WvW I highly recomend using the bow. Im running more or less the Sonic Boon build with a zerker bow/rune of fire. Combustive Shot/Arcing Arrow combo is just too good to pass up.

This is comming from a warrior who used the rifle for a long time always thinking the bow sucked, until I bought one for farming cursed shore, now I use it more then the Twilight it helped farm.

Its great for farming, does a ton of damage to packs of mobs or enemys in WvW (much better then the rifle) and has an awesome ranged immobalize. Dual shot makes up for its low rate of fire by providing 2 chances to crit per shot, helping you get that rune to proc.

I don’t bother playing it as a cond damage weapon as your #1 and #3 are where all your damage really come from, as opposed to the rifle where your #1 is cond dmg based.

In dungeons the bow quickly eliminates packs of weaker enemies from range, spiders in AC? No problem. HotW boss has adds? No problem.

Ive run around defending in WvW with a full zerker set and hit 5K aoe crits from the top of the wall plus some significant burn damage. Very fun to shoot the combo at downed people as there is always someone trying to res them. Just watch the loot bags come rolling in.

As for gear, half knight half zerker is a good starting point.

I primarily run zerker with the exception of knights helm/chest/pants (bad %crit dmg modifiers per stats lost) and then I run the all stat (celestial?) trinkets. My weapon is PTV, but thats not going to change. This gives a good balance of vitality from spec, toughness from gear and some + healing from the trinkets without sacrificing your +%crit damage or precision.

Having a PTV weapon actually is nice because I swap out to a zerker ranged weapon where im likely not going to need that toughness and vitality.

Anyhow heres the build, much better site for PVE builds.

http://gw2buildcraft.com/calculator/warrior/?8.0|1.1c.h1b|3.1g.h17|1n.77.1g.77.1n.71g.1g.71g.1n.71h.1g.71h|411.0.211.0.311.0.211.0.311.0.2s.0|a5.k5a.0.u48c.a5|1.7|5x.69.6a.6b.6m|e

Saw the “sonic boom” in sPvp and laughed at how bad it was. It rooted you in place to attack and any average player can get out of it and proceeded to kill that warrior. I think this only works on players that has zero condition removal, escapes, CC and for those players I question their build.

Hi Nova, I recommend you this build which is from Avlis.

http://gw2buildcraft.com/calculator/warrior/?8.0|1.1g.h19|7.1g.h1.e.0.h1l|1g.7r.1g.7r.1g.7r.1g.7r.1g.7r.1g.7r|1g.67.1g.67.1g.67.1g.67.1g.67.1g.67|0.p6a.p18.0.k5a|15.7|5y.64.6b.6i.6m|e

Though you see it’s full Berserkers set, it’s incredibly survivable. He designed this build for WvW but it’s still extremely useful in PVE and Dungeons. This build uses GS+Axe/Shield, however you can use Hammer, Mace or Rifle if situations require. You can even swap out traits without re-traits, eg. Merciless Hammer, Sundering Mace or Crack Shots when you need it.

With Mobile Strike and -Condition Durations, chill is not an issue with the exception in maps like SOD or Cursed Shores. These mobs give extremely long conditions. Hope this helps. Cheers

I read all your suggestions and they’re all very insightful, thanks. I’ve never actually considered mis-matching gear, just shows how ocd I am. I also never even considered 20 points in discipline. Mobile strike does look pretty fantastic, if only it worked on cripple.

Yea man, I can’t live without Fast Hands minor trait. Not to mention the extra 5 points to get Signet Mastery (don’t bother with Sweet Revenge, I’ve had it work more times since I’ve gotten ridden of it compared to when I actually had it.)

Definalty mismatch armor, berserkers helm/chest/pants are HORRIBLE wastes of stats for the +% crit dmg.

Thelic.1847:

Definalty mismatch armor, berserkers helm/chest/pants are HORRIBLE wastes of stats for the +% crit dmg.

Yes and no, if you want to maximize crit damage, there is currently no way around not using berserker helm, chest and pants.

peter.9024:

Thelic.1847:

Definalty mismatch armor, berserkers helm/chest/pants are HORRIBLE wastes of stats for the +% crit dmg.

Yes and no, if you want to maximize crit damage, there is currently no way around not using berserker helm, chest and pants.

May I refer you to this.
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Item_nomenclature#Comparison_of_numeric_vs._percentage_attributes

We can actually see the head, legs, rings, and back have a 1:16 ratio of numeric to percentage stats while weapons fall in a 1:14 for 2H and 1:13 for 1H. compare this to 1:12 for boots, glove, shoulder and an amazing 1:5 ratio for jewels.

Some classes should not be using full zerker in dungeons, warrior is one of them. Its very irritating when a full zerker signet warrior sits on the floor in my dungeon group, or worse drags one of the contributing members to revive him. This chart simply outlines where its best to trade off your +% crit damage for toughness or other stats.

Basically all classes that run some sort of precision build should be running zerker jewels to make use of that awesome ratio.

And of course if you want “max crit damage” your going to run full zerker, my GFs longbow ranger has over +100% crit damage in zerker everything, but shes a ranger and sits at 1500 range, compared to myself who needs to be in their face eating hits, and dishing them back without taking a floor nap.

Thelic.1847:

And of course if you want “max crit damage” your going to run full zerker, my GFs longbow ranger has over +100% crit damage in zerker everything, but shes a ranger and sits at 1500 range, compared to myself who needs to be in their face eating hits, and dishing them back without taking a floor nap.

Why are you in melee range 100% of the time? Why are you eating hits?

You can learn to be full berserker if you want to pay attention and dodge (build for endurance regain, utlity/sigil/vigor buff/F1), and then know when to leave melee range and swap to range, kite, and heal up and do it all without eating dirt.

I’ve been doing it for months… The right gear is as customizable as the play-style you want to play. Berserker is just a higher risk for higher reward style.

Thelic.1847:

peter.9024:

Thelic.1847:

Definalty mismatch armor, berserkers helm/chest/pants are HORRIBLE wastes of stats for the +% crit dmg.

Yes and no, if you want to maximize crit damage, there is currently no way around not using berserker helm, chest and pants.

May I refer you to this.
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Item_nomenclature#Comparison_of_numeric_vs._percentage_attributes

We can actually see the head, legs, rings, and back have a 1:16 ratio of numeric to percentage stats while weapons fall in a 1:14 for 2H and 1:13 for 1H. compare this to 1:12 for boots, glove, shoulder and an amazing 1:5 ratio for jewels.

Some classes should not be using full zerker in dungeons, warrior is one of them. Its very irritating when a full zerker signet warrior sits on the floor in my dungeon group, or worse drags one of the contributing members to revive him. This chart simply outlines where its best to trade off your +% crit damage for toughness or other stats.

Basically all classes that run some sort of precision build should be running zerker jewels to make use of that awesome ratio.

And of course if you want “max crit damage” your going to run full zerker, my GFs longbow ranger has over +100% crit damage in zerker everything, but shes a ranger and sits at 1500 range, compared to myself who needs to be in their face eating hits, and dishing them back without taking a floor nap.

I am well aware that helm, chest and legs offer less crit% per other damage point.
Having crit damage is very important though. At 4k effective power, every 1% of crit damage is equal to ( 40 * crit chance )Effective power. Generally as a warrior you really will have at least 80% crit chance so it’s equal to 32 effective power. This is much more then any of those 16 stat you are replacing. It only increases as you scale up the damage. Therefore if you really wanted to take some toughness pieces, the best choice would be to get cavalier trinkets, as cavalier armor is generally not available (except for random fractals drops i believe)

Artaz.3819:

Thelic.1847:

And of course if you want “max crit damage” your going to run full zerker, my GFs longbow ranger has over +100% crit damage in zerker everything, but shes a ranger and sits at 1500 range, compared to myself who needs to be in their face eating hits, and dishing them back without taking a floor nap.

Why are you in melee range 100% of the time? Why are you eating hits?

You can learn to be full berserker if you want to pay attention and dodge (build for endurance regain, utlity/sigil/vigor buff/F1), and then know when to leave melee range and swap to range, kite, and heal up and do it all without eating dirt.

I’ve been doing it for months… The right gear is as customizable as the play-style you want to play. Berserker is just a higher risk for higher reward style.

I seriously doubt that your surviving high level fractals (30+) with a zerker build. The minimal damage increase isn’t worth the loss of survivability as the OP stated as his primary concern.

“I play mostly dungeon and group events in PvE. I’m seeking for this character to be able to do damage that’s effective but still able to stay up in the fights. I hate chill (seriously hate that condition).”
= use rifle(or bow) with berserker gear, i would lead optionally to play with condition build but theyr a mess in many pve dungeons and stuffs.
with rifle you you deal good damage, a lot lower than melee but atleast same or more than some weard hyprid melee stuffs. Will be way easier to survive in battle but dont worry, you still have to pay some attention. Playing as ranged you actually will learn faster the basic dodging system becouse you can watch, rather than going in with some hybrid build and getting fced up every half a second.
And you dont need to change that build for fractals either, did 48 easily with full berserker and with no defensive utility skills or ghost. Was also only melee in the group.
PS: as a ranged you wont get chilled

^ Becoming a mind numbing ranged drone is not, and never should be, an option for a warrior. Also full zerker warrior at 48 FotM with all ranged teammates? My bullkitten senses are tingling.

I really like the idea of mixing my stats, I do have the problem of getting tunnel visioned sometimes. However I think I would stick with a set of gear (right now I’m using Knight cause I like the toughness with the offensive stats) but for jewels I’m using all 6 zerk (exq ruby) in Soldier Back/Trinkets.

This is working pretty well for me at the moment I’m happy to say, I do pretty decent damage and with FGJ + Sig Rage I can get fury most of the time which procs might as well as boost my damage. The Soldier trinkets etc gives me more power while Knight provides me with defence.

I’d like to hear what you guys think about the defence trait “Last Stand”. Personally it saved my life loads of time, but the 90 second proc is admittedly long and when it’s not active, the slot is being wasted.

Something I noticed I’ve been doing lately is having [Banner Cool Down] + [Shout Cool Down] + [Banner Regen]. I keep 1 banner (mostly the precision one cause I got a sigil of fire on my GS) with FGJ and SIO on bar. I’m still using Soldier’s Runes which I really enjoy so the two shouts gives me some removal (SIO can do two and break stun), and the banner gives me a pretty big stat boost and the regen heals more in the long run.

But what I’ve noticed is that in a dungeon, almost all the time, someone will be putting up regen on my toon anyway, so I think I may switch back to shout heal since regen doesn’t stack. What I’m stuck with is that I can’t decide to remove banner from my bar so I can have an extra shout with heal/remove or is having that banner there worth it? (opinion on banner regen would also be very helpful, do you guys think it’s a bit of a waste since it doesn’t give benefit if someone is already applying regen? – I end up switching my traits around a lot to try and be fluid but it lags my momentum a bit while running through stuff)

One last thing, what do you guys think about that trait [Restorative Strength]? Has anyone tried it and found it effective?

Thanks for all the reply so far, I highly enjoy all the debate and they have influenced the way I look at warrior greatly

I really like having the 3 shouts. The shout heal is much better then banner regen as It stackw ith evrything and can be used for emegencies. I usually run FGJ, SIO and OMM, but lately ive been finding more uses for the fear. Its great in some of the dungeons for getting revives off or pushing mobs into corners. A well placed and timed fear can leave an entire pack of mobs running into a single corner ripe for the picking with your 100 blades.

I do swap to the elite banner on occasion where I know teammates are going to be downed in hard spots to revive them. The grawl fractal is bad this way.

Nova.7509:

I really like the idea of mixing my stats, I do have the problem of getting tunnel visioned sometimes. However I think I would stick with a set of gear (right now I’m using Knight cause I like the toughness with the offensive stats) but for jewels I’m using all 6 zerk (exq ruby) in Soldier Back/Trinkets.

This is working pretty well for me at the moment I’m happy to say, I do pretty decent damage and with FGJ + Sig Rage I can get fury most of the time which procs might as well as boost my damage. The Soldier trinkets etc gives me more power while Knight provides me with defence.

I’d like to hear what you guys think about the defence trait “Last Stand”. Personally it saved my life loads of time, but the 90 second proc is admittedly long and when it’s not active, the slot is being wasted.

Something I noticed I’ve been doing lately is having [Banner Cool Down] + [Shout Cool Down] + [Banner Regen]. I keep 1 banner (mostly the precision one cause I got a sigil of fire on my GS) with FGJ and SIO on bar. I’m still using Soldier’s Runes which I really enjoy so the two shouts gives me some removal (SIO can do two and break stun), and the banner gives me a pretty big stat boost and the regen heals more in the long run.

But what I’ve noticed is that in a dungeon, almost all the time, someone will be putting up regen on my toon anyway, so I think I may switch back to shout heal since regen doesn’t stack. What I’m stuck with is that I can’t decide to remove banner from my bar so I can have an extra shout with heal/remove or is having that banner there worth it? (opinion on banner regen would also be very helpful, do you guys think it’s a bit of a waste since it doesn’t give benefit if someone is already applying regen? – I end up switching my traits around a lot to try and be fluid but it lags my momentum a bit while running through stuff)

One last thing, what do you guys think about that trait [Restorative Strength]? Has anyone tried it and found it effective?

Thanks for all the reply so far, I highly enjoy all the debate and they have influenced the way I look at warrior greatly

Regarding Last Stand, unless it has been patched I do believe it activates AFFER you’ve been knocked down, providing no saving from the initial knockdown = useless in my books, not to mention it collides with the Utility Skill (they don’t stack.)

With the banner regen, the duration is added but as our regen is so low, it will get drowned out until the other player’s regen wears off. I continue to use it anyway in PuG’s because I rely on the healing more than I realise (tried removing it) and hoping for another teammate to pick up on the extra healing just doesn’t always happen. Not to mention few players provide LONG LASTING regen, usually only a few seconds, then banner healing can fill in the gaps.

For PvE Restorative Strength isn’t really necessary, as a warrior were in melee range most of the time anyway, so getting slowed down (these effects rarely last long in PvE anyway) isn’t much of a problem. The +12% damage at full adrenalin trait is much better IMO. However in PvP/WvW? I can’t live without it, other professions pride themselves on locking us down, which makes it very hard to keep on top them, combine it with Mending and you’re pretty close to a full condition wipe.

Good luck to you.

Dolan.3071:

Regarding Last Stand, unless it has been patched I do believe it activates AFFER you’ve been knocked down, providing no saving from the initial knockdown = useless in my books, not to mention it collides with the Utility Skill (they don’t stack.)

Last Stand has been changed for about 2 months now and works immediately without the first CC effect applying… awesome, yet not, 90 second internal cooldown versus the utility on 40 seconds and it goes off even if its a 1 second Daze versus a 3 second Fear … The talent also competes with other useful talents (Hammer or Mace builds).

Artaz.3819:

Dolan.3071:

Regarding Last Stand, unless it has been patched I do believe it activates AFFER you’ve been knocked down, providing no saving from the initial knockdown = useless in my books, not to mention it collides with the Utility Skill (they don’t stack.)

Last Stand has been changed for about 2 months now and works immediately without the first CC effect applying… awesome, yet not, 90 second internal cooldown versus the utility on 40 seconds and it goes off even if its a 1 second Daze versus a 3 second Fear … The talent also competes with other useful talents (Hammer or Mace builds).

Thank god, that trait was so rubbish before hand. Still in PvE I’d rather just swap in the utility for moments when I know I need it and have quicker access to it – AC P1 (when not glitching the boss.) In PvP that would actually be pretty handy if you built a hammer/mace warrior, though again the CD is on par with Endure Pain…