Guild Wars 2

So with the new grandmaster traits there was one that caught my eye and I’m not sure how viable it’s going to be yet but…. Has anyone thought about making a might sharing build revolving around the greatsword?

The new tactics grandmaster trait gives might to everyone around you when you gain might.
The arms trait gives you a stack of might everytime you crit with a greatsword.
Stack that with empowering allies (in the tactics line anyways) and run knights or zerker gear? Two banners (discpline and strength) seems like a pretty strong boost in dmg. You can also run the arms new grandmaster trait and run something like axe/mace or axe/sword. so you get extra dps from your axe when you’re not stacking everyone with 25 might…. you get might on greatsword crit, banners (don’t know if that will count, I mean it IS your banner…), signet of rage and FGJ… seems like you can stack an entire party to 25 might on your own for at least 6 seconds lol. And every crit just stacks another one. Any thoughts on this?

I love that trait, too.
I’m currently playing a 4/4/0/6/0 Shout Build. So the downside of picking Phalanx is dropping Healing Shouts for me. Those little heals are always a welcome support to the party.
I guess it depends on the situation what to play with. If you’re in a more defensive situation I’d probably play with Healing Shouts, when you need more dps go with Phalanx.
All in all this trait offers room for some great support builds.

This trait is an awesome way to share the OPness of Warrs :P
Runes of Strengh + Forceful GS + Phalanx is going to maintain a lot of might on the group.
I’m not sure how that works though, can anyone enlighten me?
If you gain a might through someone else’s shout or utility, do you still share it?
If you gain 3 stacks of might through FGJ, do you share all 3?

I believe the trait says when you give yourself might. So it has to come from your own skill. But with all the might stacking for the group and the arms trait that gives increase speed plus dual wielding your dps would get pretty high as well as you would increase overall group dps. Wondering if this might be a good support/dps warrior build.

I just testet it in HOTM. I also gives might to your allies when you gain might with crits when you have the trait “Forceful Greatsword”. This will definitely be my new PVE build!

My buds and I were playing last night with this and with a guardian using one of there staff abilities on me I was granting might to the whole party on top of greatsword might it was frickin awesome

^ wait. Empower triggers this as well?

Does that mean you can have 2 warriors setting up a might chain?

Ya it does. And that would be something interesting to try out.

It’s hilarious, you can give 5 stacks of might to your party from Signet of Rage, 6 stacks from FGJ, 6 stacks from your Fire Field blasts as it has no ICD.

Unfortunately I find the might duration too short to be of much use in a casual party.

What radius is it?

If the answer is 240 yards or less, the group will be tightly stacked. The group is therefore likely to be pro enough to be stacking fire field blasts.
Thus is one of the major problems with ‘support’ atm.

I believe it 600 if I’m not mistaken.

It’s pretty amazing really. I tried it in 2 different ways:
(both with berserker gear and runes of strength, 20% boon duration food, using FGJ and warbanner and sigil of strength/battle)

Longbow fire field blasting (banner, stomp, arcing arrow, warhorn) basically how we used to stack might before phalanx. Still great for stacking might, but keeping it up takes a lot of attention and causes your own damage to suffer. Probably better for wvw might stacking (if you’d want a warrior for that though?) since you can pop your might stacks anywhere.

Greatsword (forceful greatsword) now this is just crazy. Your own damage is still really good despite having to drop the adrenaline 15%crit/dmg grandmasters and you just stack might on the party passively as you kill stuff. You get your party to 25 stacks in a matter of seconds and stays there for a whole boss fight. Downside is that it doesn’t help vs. structures since you need to crit, but that’s a minor issue.

Does the might granted benefit from your own might duration bonus?

Yes, this is now the definitive Might sharing build. You can practically replace the need for fire fields by running a single warrior with this build.

My personal setup as soon as I unlocked the trait day 1 was thus

• Full Berserker Gear
• 0/20/20/30/0 for Traits
• Forceful Greatsword (for Might on crit with Greatsword)
• Sigil of Strength (for Might on crit with Greatsword)
• Phalanx Strength (anytime you gain Might allies do as well)
• Empower Allies (+150 Power to yourself and allies in aura radius)
• Full Runes of Strength (+45% Might Duration, 25% chance to gain Might when hit, and +7% damage while effected by Might)

This gives me a total of +75% Might Duration (counting the +30% from Traits), 2 stacks of Might for myself and allies per critical hit, along with the awesomeness of giving a quick 11 stacks from For Great Justice! and Signet of Rage.

You can literally maintain a perma 25 stacks of Might for the entire group off of ONE WARRIOR in a single Hundred Blades use + a few auto’s.

Unfortunately, I feel that my Guardian has been completely obsoleted in this patch…but I am REALLY enjoying the massively stupid damage boost for the entire party that is this simple, easy-to-maintain 25 stacks.

Do note that the 20 points in Defense are NOT required, that’s just my personal preference for Dogged March/Adrenal Health/Cleansing Ire.

EDIT:
Well, to add just a bit more info and clarification, I was outputting roughly the same damage as I had been pre-patch (pre-patch I had 30 in Crit Damage trait tree as well, but post-patch my traits are 30 in Tactics for Phalanx). Between all the power bonuses I was tossing out the group was NOT lacking for damage, and neither was I

Additional Power Source Breakdown:

• 25 stacks of Might (gives +875 power and condition damage)
• Empower Allies trait (+150 power to you and allies in aura)
• Banner of Strength (+170 power and condition damage)
• Rune of Strength (+7% damage while you are effected by Might)
  = grand total of +1195 power and condition damage to the entire group, and you get +7% on top of that.

Enjoy mates.

redslion.9675:

Does the might granted benefit from your own might duration bonus?

Same as all other boons/conditions: if the original source is you then it benefits from any boosted duration effects you have.

Exemplar.1479:

redslion.9675:

Does the might granted benefit from your own might duration bonus?

Same as all other boons/conditions: if the original source is you then it benefits from any boosted duration effects you have.

I didn’t know that, thanks!^^

Exemplar.1479:

Yes, this is now the definitive Might sharing build. You can practically replace the need for fire fields by running a single warrior with this build.

My personal setup as soon as I unlocked the trait was thus:
Full Berserker Gear
Forceful Greatsword (for Might on crit with Greatsword)
Sigil of Strength (for Might on crit with Greatsword)
Phalanx Strength (anytime you gain Might allies do as well)
Full Runes of Strength (+45% Might Duration, 25% chance to gain Might when hit, and +7% damage while effected by Might)

This gives me a total of +75% Might Duration (counting the +30% from Traits), 2 stacks of Might for myself and allies per critical hit, along with the awesomeness of giving a quick 11 stacks from For Great Justice! and Signet of Rage.

You can literally maintain a perma 25 stacks of Might for the entire group off of ONE WARRIOR in a single Hundred Blades use + a few auto’s.

Unfortunately, I feel that my Guardian has been completely obsoleted in this patch…but I am REALLY enjoying the massively stupid damage boost for the entire party that is this simple, easy-to-maintain 25 stacks.

I ran this build last night for a bit and it works pretty much like you’d expect it to. EA was good, a practically constant 25 stacks of might for the whole party was great (didn’t feel like I was wasting stacks either at the rate it was ticking on/off), and banners.

I noticed my personal damage level was lower, of course, but it would be cool for some of the more number-crunching folks to see if it’s worth it (pug vs. organized fire field might stacking routines).

Agronach.4903:

Exemplar.1479:

Yes, this is now the definitive Might sharing build. You can practically replace the need for fire fields by running a single warrior with this build.

My personal setup as soon as I unlocked the trait was thus:
Full Berserker Gear
Forceful Greatsword (for Might on crit with Greatsword)
Sigil of Strength (for Might on crit with Greatsword)
Phalanx Strength (anytime you gain Might allies do as well)
Full Runes of Strength (+45% Might Duration, 25% chance to gain Might when hit, and +7% damage while effected by Might)

This gives me a total of +75% Might Duration (counting the +30% from Traits), 2 stacks of Might for myself and allies per critical hit, along with the awesomeness of giving a quick 11 stacks from For Great Justice! and Signet of Rage.

You can literally maintain a perma 25 stacks of Might for the entire group off of ONE WARRIOR in a single Hundred Blades use + a few auto’s.

Unfortunately, I feel that my Guardian has been completely obsoleted in this patch…but I am REALLY enjoying the massively stupid damage boost for the entire party that is this simple, easy-to-maintain 25 stacks.

I ran this build last night for a bit and it works pretty much like you’d expect it to. EA was good, a practically constant 25 stacks of might for the whole party was great (didn’t feel like I was wasting stacks either at the rate it was ticking on/off), and banners.

I noticed my personal damage level was lower, of course, but it would be cool for some of the more number-crunching folks to see if it’s worth it (pug vs. organized fire field might stacking routines).

The argument could be made that its more beneficial to run it in pugs groups since pug groups can be really low DPS sometimes. The question is is the damage nerf going to be noticeable in a party that kills slow without you giving them 25 stacks of might. I think the anwser is clear. Now the solution to this is to come up with a build that gives more DPS while using this trait.

The build is this. Substitute Phalix str for shouts. For second sigil in GS use sigil of str.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vIAQNAR3Zj8cU5ZfH2ewJaA4ygKm0HsL9oMySD-z0gAUGEJG4KvIaskCYUhRA-w

Warlord.9074:

Agronach.4903:

Exemplar.1479:

Yes, this is now the definitive Might sharing build. You can practically replace the need for fire fields by running a single warrior with this build.

My personal setup as soon as I unlocked the trait was thus:
Full Berserker Gear
Forceful Greatsword (for Might on crit with Greatsword)
Sigil of Strength (for Might on crit with Greatsword)
Phalanx Strength (anytime you gain Might allies do as well)
Full Runes of Strength (+45% Might Duration, 25% chance to gain Might when hit, and +7% damage while effected by Might)

This gives me a total of +75% Might Duration (counting the +30% from Traits), 2 stacks of Might for myself and allies per critical hit, along with the awesomeness of giving a quick 11 stacks from For Great Justice! and Signet of Rage.

You can literally maintain a perma 25 stacks of Might for the entire group off of ONE WARRIOR in a single Hundred Blades use + a few auto’s.

Unfortunately, I feel that my Guardian has been completely obsoleted in this patch…but I am REALLY enjoying the massively stupid damage boost for the entire party that is this simple, easy-to-maintain 25 stacks.

I ran this build last night for a bit and it works pretty much like you’d expect it to. EA was good, a practically constant 25 stacks of might for the whole party was great (didn’t feel like I was wasting stacks either at the rate it was ticking on/off), and banners.

I noticed my personal damage level was lower, of course, but it would be cool for some of the more number-crunching folks to see if it’s worth it (pug vs. organized fire field might stacking routines).

The argument could be made that its more beneficial to run it in pugs groups since pug groups can be really low DPS sometimes. The question is is the damage nerf going to be noticeable in a party that kills slow without you giving them 25 stacks of might. I think the anwser is clear. Now the solution to this is to come up with a build that gives more DPS while using this trait.

Well, to add just a bit more info and clarification, I was outputting roughly the same damage as I had been pre-patch (pre-patch I had 30 in Crit Damage trait tree as well, but post-patch my traits are 30 in Tactics for Phalanx). Between all the power bonuses I was tossing out the group was NOT lacking for damage, and neither was I

Additional Power Source Breakdown:

• 25 stacks of Might (gives +875 power and condition damage)
• Empower Allies trait (+150 power to you and allies in aura)
• Banner of Strength (+170 power and condition damage)
• Rune of Strength (+7% damage while you are effected by Might)
  = grand total of +1195 power and condition damage to the entire group, and you get +7% on top of that.

I haven’t done raw mathematical calculations, but from my experience running this all day in dungeons the other day, this is definitely a new go-to build option for warriors, is absolutely amazing in PUGS (since those are usually not coordinated for Might stacking via fire fields), and just feels flat out awesome to be the one responsible for giving your entire party 25 perma-Might stacks solo

NOTE: I have edited my original post to include pertinent pieces of this info, as well as formatted it a bit better. Also reformatted this post. Hope it all helps.

I tried running this setup last night and my overall dps was still pretty high, not as crazy high as before the crit dmg nerf but it still kept up pretty well. Kept a lot of might stacked up too:

STR – V
ARMS – V – X – (New grandmaster for 10% increased attack speed)
DEF – 0
TACT – V(if only war, VI if someone else is running it already) – VIII – Phalanx Strength
DISC – 0

GS/ Axe+Mace

Any thoughts of this setup? The axe dmg was where you got the most out of the build, then swap on cd to stack might up again, I like to HB+GS4+either whirlwind or auto for a few more stacks.

I finally managed to get my hands on a full set of the runes, but I am debating on what armor stats to assign them for PvX, mainly WvW. Originally in large or small scale play I was thinking either Knights (for the higher crit chance with Forceful GS to apply more might on the damage fly) or PVT because ~%40+ crit chance with fury up is still good enough to apply ample might to the group…

So conflicted!

Exemplar.1479:

Yes, this is now the definitive Might sharing build. You can practically replace the need for fire fields by running a single warrior with this build.

My personal setup as soon as I unlocked the trait day 1 was thus

• Full Berserker Gear
• 0/20/20/30/0 for Traits
• Forceful Greatsword (for Might on crit with Greatsword)
• Sigil of Strength (for Might on crit with Greatsword)
• Phalanx Strength (anytime you gain Might allies do as well)
• Empower Allies (+150 Power to yourself and allies in aura radius)
• Full Runes of Strength (+45% Might Duration, 25% chance to gain Might when hit, and +7% damage while effected by Might)

This gives me a total of +75% Might Duration (counting the +30% from Traits), 2 stacks of Might for myself and allies per critical hit, along with the awesomeness of giving a quick 11 stacks from For Great Justice! and Signet of Rage.

You can literally maintain a perma 25 stacks of Might for the entire group off of ONE WARRIOR in a single Hundred Blades use + a few auto’s.

Unfortunately, I feel that my Guardian has been completely obsoleted in this patch…but I am REALLY enjoying the massively stupid damage boost for the entire party that is this simple, easy-to-maintain 25 stacks.

Do note that the 20 points in Defense are NOT required, that’s just my personal preference for Dogged March/Adrenal Health/Cleansing Ire.

EDIT:
Well, to add just a bit more info and clarification, I was outputting roughly the same damage as I had been pre-patch (pre-patch I had 30 in Crit Damage trait tree as well, but post-patch my traits are 30 in Tactics for Phalanx). Between all the power bonuses I was tossing out the group was NOT lacking for damage, and neither was I

Additional Power Source Breakdown:

• 25 stacks of Might (gives +875 power and condition damage)
• Empower Allies trait (+150 power to you and allies in aura)
• Banner of Strength (+170 power and condition damage)
• Rune of Strength (+7% damage while you are effected by Might)
  = grand total of +1195 power and condition damage to the entire group, and you get +7% on top of that.

Enjoy mates.

you know whats a better might sharing build? hambow

why 20 in defense?

I’m curious but haven’t gotten around to doing a proper test yet. Does Might gained from Fire Aura (Leap + Fire Field) also count for the Phalanx trait?

leap doesn’t count no. leap also doesn’t grant might. blast grans might. leap grants fire aura. not same thing. but if you get attacked while u have fire aura that grants might and yes that counts.

I’ve just tried out a 0/5/0/6/3, LB/GS (FGJ, SoR, stomp, BoD) basically the previous meta but the strength tree moved to tactics and switch out SoF for stomp for the extra blast finisher. It is ridiculous the amount of might we all have. Constant 25 stacks. With my usual party while i’ve reduced my personal dps as a group we’re getting through a little bit faster.

I think its great gives warriors a niche roll that is OP but it benefits the likely people who would otherwise complain that its OP its a win win.

I like the combo between phalanx strength and arms X.
Sadly I don’t see it beeing useful in speedrunning groups, since there are better ways to stack up might and the current might mechanics can actually hurt the group, due to the low duration – 8 seconds at best. This sucks and should be changed already.

In less “try hard” groups the combo is pretty nice, granted most of your group have some idea of what they are actually doing (not if they die all the time or run very poor builds). I would say that if you run with friends/good guildies this might be something to go for. For PuGs? Depends on how much credit you want to give yourself and your fellow random r… player. I’d stick to 6/5/0/0/3 for arah&co, but that’s because I know I can get any group through arah with this build.

I guess the most optimal build would be
0/5/0/6/3
Full Zerker
Strength runes
FGJ! Banner of Discipline (still better than Banner of Strength) anything SoR
GS with Slaying/Night + Force/Energy / Axe+anything with Slaying/Night+Sigil of Battle
Why 3 in discipline? Because GS camping is bad. period. Also Sigil of Battle will compensate for most of the might you don’t get when you are on Axe.
5 in arms? Attack of oportunity!
6 in tactics? well duh.

What about WvWvW? It might actually be useful there.

Or in spvp.

Warlord.9074:

why 20 in defense?

If you read my post I actually explained that I take 20 in Defense as a personal preference, and that it is NOT required for the Phalanx Strength basic setup. I like to have Adrenal Health and Cleansing Ire. Feel free to toss points elsewhere. By no means am I dictating a build, the post was merely to showcase my take on Phalanx Strength.

Agony.3542:

I like the combo between phalanx strength and arms X.
Sadly I don’t see it beeing useful in speedrunning groups, since there are better ways to stack up might and the current might mechanics can actually hurt the group, due to the low duration - 8 seconds at best. This sucks and should be changed already.

Actually, selling the trait as "8 seconds at best" sells it a bit short..

With just the build I posted above it is 10.5 seconds of Might per application. 6 second base enhanced duration of +75% (30% from Tactics trait line, and +45% from Might Runes) of 6, which is 4.5, thus 6+4.5 = 10.5 seconds. If you really wanted to, one could consume Boon Duration food to further enhance that.

So just to be clear, even with a basic setup of taking the Phalanx Strength trait itself and Might runes you’ve got 10.5 seconds of Might being granted to allies. That is a rather good duration (which beats out the somewhat roughly comparable Empowering Might trait of the Guardian, which provides 1 stack of Might to allies for 5 seconds on a Critical Hit), doesn’t require any fields or coordination to apply, and can be maintained at 25 stacks for the entire group during battle by just one person.

(For comparison, blast finishing in a fire field provides 3 stacks of Might at a base duration of 20 seconds.)

Is it going to be the new meta in speedrun groups? Probably not. If you can blast finish then obviously you should, as in a coordinated group you’re going to be able to stack up 25 stacks at a longer base duration.

But I do think that the power of this trait should not be underestimated considering the strengths of the trait that have been outlined already. This is one of the few good traits to come out of this patch (for any class) and should not be overlooked.

Agony.3542:

I like the combo between phalanx strength and arms X.
Sadly I don’t see it beeing useful in speedrunning groups, since there are better ways to stack up might and the current might mechanics can actually hurt the group, due to the low duration – 8 seconds at best. This sucks and should be changed already.

In less “try hard” groups the combo is pretty nice, granted most of your group have some idea of what they are actually doing (not if they die all the time or run very poor builds). I would say that if you run with friends/good guildies this might be something to go for. For PuGs? Depends on how much credit you want to give yourself and your fellow random r… player. I’d stick to 6/5/0/0/3 for arah&co, but that’s because I know I can get any group through arah with this build.

I guess the most optimal build would be
0/5/0/6/3
Full Zerker
Strength runes
FGJ! Banner of Discipline (still better than Banner of Strength) anything SoR
GS with Slaying/Night + Force/Energy / Axe+anything with Slaying/Night+Sigil of Battle
Why 3 in discipline? Because GS camping is bad. period. Also Sigil of Battle will compensate for most of the might you don’t get when you are on Axe.
5 in arms? Attack of oportunity!
6 in tactics? well duh.

You can pump your boon duration to 205% with a banner of tactics:

30% from traits, 45% from runes, 20% from chocolate omn cream (40% MF, so you’ll want that anyways), 10% from banner. That’s 12 seconds of might.

But I agree, I don’t see this build being in an optimised speedrun. Also, you can still stack to 9.6 seconds without Strength Runes (food + banner), so Im debating whether Strength Runes are actually optimal for the build.

I havn’t done the math, but I was stacking to 25 fine with Scholar, which of course, gives you higher personal DPS.

Xae Isareth.1364:

Agony.3542:

I like the combo between phalanx strength and arms X.
Sadly I don’t see it beeing useful in speedrunning groups, since there are better ways to stack up might and the current might mechanics can actually hurt the group, due to the low duration – 8 seconds at best. This sucks and should be changed already.

In less “try hard” groups the combo is pretty nice, granted most of your group have some idea of what they are actually doing (not if they die all the time or run very poor builds). I would say that if you run with friends/good guildies this might be something to go for. For PuGs? Depends on how much credit you want to give yourself and your fellow random r… player. I’d stick to 6/5/0/0/3 for arah&co, but that’s because I know I can get any group through arah with this build.

I guess the most optimal build would be
0/5/0/6/3
Full Zerker
Strength runes
FGJ! Banner of Discipline (still better than Banner of Strength) anything SoR
GS with Slaying/Night + Force/Energy / Axe+anything with Slaying/Night+Sigil of Battle
Why 3 in discipline? Because GS camping is bad. period. Also Sigil of Battle will compensate for most of the might you don’t get when you are on Axe.
5 in arms? Attack of oportunity!
6 in tactics? well duh.

You can pump your boon duration to 205% with a banner of tactics:

30% from traits, 45% from runes, 20% from chocolate omn cream (40% MF, so you’ll want that anyways), 10% from banner. That’s 12 seconds of might.

But I agree, I don’t see this build being in an optimised speedrun. Also, you can still stack to 9.6 seconds without Strength Runes (food + banner), so Im debating whether Strength Runes are actually optimal for the build.

I havn’t done the math, but I was stacking to 25 fine with Scholar, which of course, gives you higher personal DPS.

Strength runes definitely aren’t needed. Was having no problems being at 25 stacks without them. It’s only the 7% dmg that intrigues me. The rest is filler imo.

Ok I was thinking about this for a bit.
Here is the deal.
With 20% reduced cd on shouts, FGJ! will give you 3 stacks of might for 42 seconds, on a 20 second cooldown. →6stacks permanently
Sigil of Battle will grant you 3 stacks of might for 35 seconds with a 10 second cooldown. → 9 stacks permanently, 12 for 50% of the time
Signet of rage will grant you 5 stacks of might permanently.
This will bring you to 20-23 stacks beeing easily maintainable. Arms X might not even be necessary .
Extra boon duration wont bring any benefits due to the way might stacks work. You can’t accumulate them over the cap of 25, the only point were the extra boon duration would make some difference is with Sigil of Battle maintaining 12 stacks permanently instead of only “10,5 stacks” “1,5 stacks” for a utility and a food buff is a bit weak, dont you think?
The base duration of Arms X might was 5 seconds last time I checked, the wiki says the same and there was no change mentioned in the last patchnotes. With 30% might duration you’ll get 6,5 seconds of might, with 75% you get 8,75 seconds. I don’t know how the game handles the fractional numbers, but iirc you have to reach full seconds, not sure on that though.

I think the might duration is fine boon duration doesnt help much. Id like to see some other runes besides str though str looks nice but it costs too much. I think Hoelbrak runes for WvW are better than they were before.

sinzer.4018:

Xae Isareth.1364:

Agony.3542:

I like the combo between phalanx strength and arms X.
Sadly I don’t see it beeing useful in speedrunning groups, since there are better ways to stack up might and the current might mechanics can actually hurt the group, due to the low duration – 8 seconds at best. This sucks and should be changed already.

In less “try hard” groups the combo is pretty nice, granted most of your group have some idea of what they are actually doing (not if they die all the time or run very poor builds). I would say that if you run with friends/good guildies this might be something to go for. For PuGs? Depends on how much credit you want to give yourself and your fellow random r… player. I’d stick to 6/5/0/0/3 for arah&co, but that’s because I know I can get any group through arah with this build.

I guess the most optimal build would be
0/5/0/6/3
Full Zerker
Strength runes
FGJ! Banner of Discipline (still better than Banner of Strength) anything SoR
GS with Slaying/Night + Force/Energy / Axe+anything with Slaying/Night+Sigil of Battle
Why 3 in discipline? Because GS camping is bad. period. Also Sigil of Battle will compensate for most of the might you don’t get when you are on Axe.
5 in arms? Attack of oportunity!
6 in tactics? well duh.

You can pump your boon duration to 205% with a banner of tactics:

30% from traits, 45% from runes, 20% from chocolate omn cream (40% MF, so you’ll want that anyways), 10% from banner. That’s 12 seconds of might.

But I agree, I don’t see this build being in an optimised speedrun. Also, you can still stack to 9.6 seconds without Strength Runes (food + banner), so Im debating whether Strength Runes are actually optimal for the build.

I havn’t done the math, but I was stacking to 25 fine with Scholar, which of course, gives you higher personal DPS.

Strength runes definitely aren’t needed. Was having no problems being at 25 stacks without them. It’s only the 7% dmg that intrigues me. The rest is filler imo.

The 100 ferocity on scholar’s alone basically equates to that on a forceful GS build, and then there’s the 10% damage on 90%+, which isn’t hard to keep up cos of the build’s higher HP if you just slot healing signet.

So, Im really wondering if all this hype on strength runes is anything but hype. I can see it being more useful in WvW though, where things aren’t so rotation-based.

Agony.3542:

Ok I was thinking about this for a bit.
Here is the deal.
With 20% reduced cd on shouts, FGJ! will give you 3 stacks of might for 42 seconds, on a 20 second cooldown. ->6stacks permanently
Sigil of Battle will grant you 3 stacks of might for 35 seconds with a 10 second cooldown. -> 9 stacks permanently, 12 for 50% of the time
Signet of rage will grant you 5 stacks of might permanently.
This will bring you to 20-23 stacks beeing easily maintainable. Arms X might not even be necessary .

I might be wrong on this but the might you give to others with Phalanx are fixed at 6+ boon duration.

Xae Isareth.1364:

sinzer.4018:

Xae Isareth.1364:

Agony.3542:

I like the combo between phalanx strength and arms X.
Sadly I don’t see it beeing useful in speedrunning groups, since there are better ways to stack up might and the current might mechanics can actually hurt the group, due to the low duration – 8 seconds at best. This sucks and should be changed already.

In less “try hard” groups the combo is pretty nice, granted most of your group have some idea of what they are actually doing (not if they die all the time or run very poor builds). I would say that if you run with friends/good guildies this might be something to go for. For PuGs? Depends on how much credit you want to give yourself and your fellow random r… player. I’d stick to 6/5/0/0/3 for arah&co, but that’s because I know I can get any group through arah with this build.

I guess the most optimal build would be
0/5/0/6/3
Full Zerker
Strength runes
FGJ! Banner of Discipline (still better than Banner of Strength) anything SoR
GS with Slaying/Night + Force/Energy / Axe+anything with Slaying/Night+Sigil of Battle
Why 3 in discipline? Because GS camping is bad. period. Also Sigil of Battle will compensate for most of the might you don’t get when you are on Axe.
5 in arms? Attack of oportunity!
6 in tactics? well duh.

You can pump your boon duration to 205% with a banner of tactics:

30% from traits, 45% from runes, 20% from chocolate omn cream (40% MF, so you’ll want that anyways), 10% from banner. That’s 12 seconds of might.

But I agree, I don’t see this build being in an optimised speedrun. Also, you can still stack to 9.6 seconds without Strength Runes (food + banner), so Im debating whether Strength Runes are actually optimal for the build.

I havn’t done the math, but I was stacking to 25 fine with Scholar, which of course, gives you higher personal DPS.

Strength runes definitely aren’t needed. Was having no problems being at 25 stacks without them. It’s only the 7% dmg that intrigues me. The rest is filler imo.

The 100 ferocity on scholar’s alone basically equates to that on a forceful GS build, and then there’s the 10% damage on 90%+, which isn’t hard to keep up cos of the build’s higher HP if you just slot healing signet.

So, Im really wondering if all this hype on strength runes is anything but hype. I can see it being more useful in WvW though, where things aren’t so rotation-based.

It looks like hype to me. Scholars are way better.

Xae Isareth.1364:

I might be wrong on this but the might you give to others with Phalanx are fixed at 6+ boon duration.

It’s affected by boon duration. I’m applying ~8s stacks (only BD from tactics). I think it’s actually based off your BD but i’ve not had a friend helping me out by standing there with differing amounts of BD yet but from applying it to randomers standing around in Gendarran it’s the same duration.