Guild Wars 2

To begin I wish to point out that I understand that there will be lovers and haters of the greatsword, however this is not a hate/love post about the greatsword but rather a critique of it’s abilities.

My question is as follows, outside of the 100 blades skill how have people managed to use the other greatsword skills to it’s full effect.

- Whirlwind Atk [ I find that I hardly ever get the full damage from this skill on an opponent.]
- Blade trail [ I find that this skills boomerang effect is not noticible, there are times whereby my weapon does not come back]
- Rush [absolute fail for me, the target range, the area of effect and the execution of the attack at the end of the rush. This ability does not feel fluid]
- Arching strike (burst) [For a 2handed sword burst ability to simply be hit people slowly on the head is really dissapointing and quite easy to dodge]

Also am I the only one with the opinion that 100b should be the greatswords Burst ability??

I look forward to the peoples answers hopefully you can inform me as to how i can fully utilize the greatsword.

Signed Overlord Dave

I’m with you man – I really don’t think it’s that great. I’ll take a mace and a shield against a Greatsword any day.

Dual Axe for me.

GAMER.1578:

Dual Axe for me.

Dual axe is fantastic (sword/axe for me) but I wanted to get an opinion on how to use the Greatword better I dont want to feel as though A.Net is going to make a weapon that’s going to be sidelined.

I actually love a lot of the great swords skills if i am honest. whilst 100 blades is cool and beefy i’m not a fan of abilities that root you. What floats my boat is the mobility.

The greatswords 3 key is amazing escape utility. If you’ve ever tried the discipline tree (can trait movement abilities to break immobilize).

4 key often boomerangs in wide open spaces, but i find if i havent given room for it inside a cave – it wont come back.
(Edit:) Also this can be used on the run and thrown behind you so those enemies chasing you get a full smack – twice -

5 key is a bit lackluster, but as a gap closer (the distance travelled can be quite far) its doing its job. it can also be used as an escape if you’re quick with detargeting or retargeting an enemy outside the main melee.

I agree the burst skill doesnt quite feel bursty. The fury boon is great though, however there are a lot of ways as a warrior to get fury and it stacks in duration rather than intensity.

Despite that – I love Burst skills that do not root me, like swords flurry (cool skill and usefull for alot of reasons just not my cup of tea).

Bottom line the great sword is one of my favourite weapons so far.

my weapon switch combo is MH Axe/ OH Mace – I used to use Axe/Axe but the stun and more importantly the vulnerability from the Mace 4 and Axe 2 go quite nicely with a shout and a weapon swap for Greatsword 100 blades.

edited: because i am OCD

I use greatsword in a highly mobile attack pattern. Dodge, dodge, burst, wirlwind past, dodge back in, dodge out, cripple, rush, HB. Basically utlize movement to the full extent. traiting full into power means your getting damage of those dodges and when you’ve finished dodging back and forth past them you’ll have damage boost on your attacks. Don’t think of HB as your main damage skill. Start using it last in a chain.

I use the great sword with huge success in WvW:

- Whirlwind Atk [ For mobility, rush down fleeing opponents, lounge into large groups.]
– Blade trail [ Excellent for crippling fleeing enemies, crowd control /since it pierces]
– Rush [Use it nonstop to travel large distances and hunt down fleeing enemies]
– Arching strike (burst) [Rarely use this one, save F1 for my bow = 7000 crit dmg to large groups on and below castle walls.]

Damage wise , 2h Sword falls back sadly. Supposingly a 2hander ought to do much more damage than it currently does. Only 100Blades do nice damage and thats a cooldown to be used on a stationary target.

But it provides nice closing ins and outs. And thats the whole point of the long sword (in this game).

Basically, the reason to use greatsword is 100 blades. This ability does obscene damage and has a really low cooldown (a little over 6 seconds when traited, 8 otherwise.) If you’re built right, 100 blades + the 3 skill kill most targets when doing solo PvE, producing the lowest time to kill of all the weapons, and IMO the lowest TTK of all weapons and all classes. The rest of the greatsword is built around mobility, with a mediocre but decent auto attack. You can use just the mobility skills and auto attack to do really good melee damage while keeping yourself out of harms way and on the move.

Is the greatsword good for PvP? No. Self-root means 100 blades is useless there. Is it good for dungeons? Reasonably so, as the self-root is sometimes a problem, sometimes not. I find I need to dodge fairly often so it loses some of its usefulness.

The way to trait the greatsword is to take the passive adrenaline traits and the greatsword traits. You take the passive adrenaline traits because the adrenaline skill blows on the greatsword. Especially since you can get 100% fury uptime with signet of rage and ‘for great justice’. So an extra 12% damage from the adrenaline trait, then 10% damage from the greatsword damage trait, then 10% damage against bleeding targets and bleed opponents on criticals, then 9% extra crit chance from adrenaline, and might on crits. Some of these are minor traits, but those are the essentials. If you do hundred blades on a group of enemies, you’ll go up to 25 stacks of might and pull off over 10,000 damage on all of them at level 80 with a 3 second channel, which is pretty impressive considering you can do it again in 6.25 seconds and do plenty in the meantime.

Thank you guys for the advice, so far to my understanding the Greatsword is a mobility weapon when combined with the trait that frees you from immobolize.

However it does seem to be limited to PVE, has anyone had any luck utilizing some sort of combo in PVP?
Also – RAPTOR SPECTRE i like your combo idea i will give it a try.
I guess i am asking for combo ideas as well.

GS is viable in PvP if you play hit-and-run.

The mobility is extreme.

Why is the Greatsword so great?

For PvE at least, it’s really Whirlwind Attack. Extra dodge on a 10-second cooldown that also happens to do a lot of damage and move much farther. This skill is the main reason I keep greatsword as one of my weapons in PvE. It’s just an amazing survivability tool.

I think that the Greatsword is great for PvE, not so much for PvP. It’s single target/AoE damage synergises well with the Longbow for PvE. Being stuck in-place to use HB really doesn’t matter in PvE – unlike in PvP.

Because no one wants to weild the Prettygoodsword.

I’ve seen Greatsword used in PvP at great effect, have you seen Frenzy+Hundred Blades?? my god…it decimates anyone its in contact with. With the right skills and traits such as Throw Bolas plus the trait Leg Specialist, will give you ample time to drop the combo every 60seconds, pretty much killing your target. O_O

Elrohin.1409:

I’ve seen Greatsword used in PvP at great effect, have you seen Frenzy+Hundred Blades?? my god…it decimates anyone its in contact with. With the right skills and traits such as Throw Bolas plus the trait Leg Specialist, will give you ample time to drop the combo every 60seconds, pretty much killing your target. O_O

Don’t forget whirlwind afterwards, then you can go and run off to wait for the 3 cool-downs before doing it all again?

Is that fun? Only feeling like 2-3 skills are going to net you a kill? Personally, I think that’s what’s wrong with the class, greatsword is seen as the only “serious” choice.

Trev

Don’t be coy, anyone worth their salt running this build will be using rush to get out of bad situations and blade trail to help bait evades, along with weapon swaps. This is what really gets me, if frenzy is so unskilled then how are these “one trick ponies” doing so well outside of the cool down?

If used on cool down it’s up less than 10% of the time, these warriors aren’t just “waiting on 3 cool downs to do it all over again”, give me a break and come up with something better. If baiting evades and stun breaks isn’t skill, than what qualifies?

I find GS meh…

Rather run sword/axe. You have I feel, better aoe with axe 5. You have a jump on 8 sec cooldown on sword 2. You have snare and of course the bleeds from sword 1.

Plus axe 4 is 20% to crit on demand. Great combo

@ TheMerc, fair enough if they actually do use other skills for anything other then running off.

But how many people in WvW have you seen do this?

And where in the post I quote is it even implied they do anything of the sort? It’s not about being coy, it’s simple, skill should count more then one-trick-ponies I agree, but again, that’s not the rule here, the rule here is that MOST warriors who use GS/WW/frenzy don’t do much else, because really, to get good results in WvW (I don’t know about SPVP), you don’t have to. It’s making people lazy and giving our class a poor representation, I’d love to run around pretending I’m Cloud, but I’d rather have the option of all those other weapon combo’s being (seen as?) just as viable and useful as each other, just different in flavour.

You honestly going to state that all the other weapons are even remotely as popular as GS? Even put together, I bet the GS outweighs them all put together in amount of warriors using it. That is not an effect of anything else but imbalance. That cannot be what ANet wants to see, and shouldn’t be what we as warriors and players in general want to see ether.

Trev

From the WvW I’ve done you’ll be using ranged weapons or support weapons instead of running into the Zergs, except smaller skirmishes anyhow. But I don’t particularly care for WvW honestly, SPvP is what I’ve been doing since I got the game, my rank is almost higher than my over level.

I hope they make other weapons more viable but nerfing a weapon or build because it’s popular or the best option out of less desirable ones is bad no matter how you spin it.

Does no one use the hammer? After trying all the weapons I love the hammer, can’t stand the attacks with the greatsword although they do look cool.

I am talking about in PvE as I haven’t done PvP and don’t really care if it’s ‘not kewl’ in there.

The hammer is too slow. I take too much damage using it.

It seems to me that the only drawback to GS is it’s slower attack speed which 100b basically negates. This combined with signet stacking makes it very powerful. You can get your crit rating extremely high and 100b will do massive amounts of damage if you manage to find a rooted target in pvp. This doesn’t even matter in pve since the target is going to be standing there fighting you anyway. Whirlwind is useful not for it’s damage, but for the free dodge. Very useful.

It’s basically the fotm cheese build. It’s our heartseeker.

I would prefer using dual axe for damage and fun at jumping around high damage critting people. Also using hammer and knocking down people with basically every skill XD.

“My question is as follows, outside of the 100 blades skill how have people managed to use the other greatsword skills to it’s full effect.”

Mobility. Mobility, mobility, mobility. You state that Whirlwind Attack and Rush are bad, but they are for mobility. I NEVER use Rush as an attack (use Whrilwind Attack for damage quite often, as the cooldown is so small and the damage is about 5x higher than auto attack). And as for your assertion about Whrilwind Attack almost never doing full damage, I would say it deals full damage about 90-95% of the time.

Also, amazing traits:
Gain might on critical hit with a greatsword or spear. Greatsword and spear skill [sic] recharge 20% faster.
Movement skills break immobilize.

Those 2 are specific to greatsword, but the passive Adrenaline traits are good too, since they’re most likely better than the fury attack in PvE (and, important to note, this whole post is specific to non-dungeon PvE, however bull rush—>quickness—>100b is the cheesiest thing in sPvP against casual players who can’t dodge bull rush).

For the 100 blade skill, I really don’t see people using it effectively. this skill can be stopped half way by performing a dodge or whirlwind. Whenever im in world vs world and I fight somebody with a two handed sword and try 100 blades on me i back up and they just keep using it until it runs out. The way i use them in pvp situations is use the throw ability (if there running) or the stomp ability (if they are going to fight you) to immobilize your opponent. then use 100 Blades + fury to get the most damage. If they try to run or fight back when im half way threw 100 blades I perform whirlwind to put distance between us while doing damage at the same time. Finally I use stance (i think thats what its called) so i take no damage for a brief amount of time which is enough to summon my 2 hounds (elite skill) and then i continue from there. by that time my opponent has lost a huge chunk of health.

GS is carried by HB. and thats all. The Autoattack does less dmg per hit than any other melee weapon the warrior has (I tested it by swinging at targetdummies, so vuln is factored into this). Skills 3 and 5 are too clunky to count as “movement oriented”. Sword/Horn beat those two anytime. Skill 4 is ok, but not a “in combat” skill.

The Weapon always boils down to " I spam 2". Considering HB is roughly 4.5 Skill 1 swings long, but “only” does roughly 6 swings of dmg (That is, 2 full chains of Skill 1), the GS suddenly does not look so great at all.

I rather go Sword/Axe or Axe/Axe or even Sword/Horn if I want the movement.

The vulnerability on the greatsword autoattack pushes it above axe if you have 2 or more allies (doing comparable damage to you).

DaSBrOtZwEiMaL.9462:

Skills 3 and 5 are too clunky to count as “movement oriented”.

Whirlwind Attack “clunky”? I never noticed that. I find it incredibly reliable as both a movement skill and a dodge.

Why is the Greatsword so great?
dps and mobility…your able to close in kill in a couple seconds and get out.

Whrilwind is probably one of the best skills in the game.
gap closer,
evade attacks and aoe (i.e. free extra dodge with low cooldown),
getaway with a lot of damage if used correctly,
highest base dps (not overall damage) in the game if the enemy is against a wall.

Blade trail is extremely good if traited to immobilize, but the blade will only return if it didn’t hit a rock or something.

I find the great sword to be quite useful in every possible way PVE wise specially when you go into the 70+ maps.

The normal attacks have a nice open range to deal damage to multiple things at once and the great sword is one of the easiest weapons to spec into. +10% damage with great sword and spear in the Pow.T and – 25% cool down on our skill cool down in the Pre.T. As for the skills go.

Whirlwind Atk: Personally I use this skill to get away from mobs while dealing some damage in other to get a heal in or buy myself time for my heal to CD. If used properly it deals quite some damage.

- Blade trail : I use this when mobs are close together and i want to pull them closer without switching to a range weapon. Since it usually crits a lot it usually buff me with might &/or swiftness.

- Rush: I don’t use this much pve wise thanks to the camera work in game one of the few flaws I see in the game also it seems to be bugged and making you run pass the enemy you are targeting sometime, However it does serve when you wish to run away from something or simply rush your way somewhere asap.

- Arching strike: Never use this, I keep my A. Bars full for the +9% power and +9% damage bonus. The burst doesn’t burst it hits lower than normal attacks and is over all a waste of animations.

Also am I the only one with the opinion that 100b should be the greatswords Burst ability??

I don’t thing 100B should be our burst is the one skill that makes great sword good in pve. In pvp however I take a sword and shield or dual axes or sword/mace over GS any day. And I done my fair share of pvp with all of those including the GS.

WvW wise the greatsword is viable specially when enemies come to you in mobs. Since most WvW players are headless chickens looking for easy kills when mobbing you get to kill em easy with 100b. But if you do meet with a good player you will wish to have another weapon set up anytime over a GS.

@Lyonell.1753 & @koticgood.4367

Thanks for answering the question in detail, with actual trait lines and situations for the Greatsword.
To show that this post is truely helping me in GW2 here is something i’ve learned and managed quite well.

Greatsword Utility skills: Bola, Bull Rush, Frenzy, signet of rage and Mending (sPVP if yoru not mending your doing it wrong)
Combo that I use to great effect in sPVP:

Rifle (because only an idiot would run in first w/o getting free dmg from far away), rifle 4, 2, 3 – bull rush, switch to GS, whirlwind through opponent, Rush back (the ability has been fixed so that it faces the target upon swing A.net is listening!!). Now for the tricky part, many will be tempted to 100B, and ofcourse you should but use blade trail (traited to immobolize) if not use Bola, then 100B, IF they manage to roll away DO NOT WAIT TO FINISH YOUR ANIMATION, switch to rifle and repeat.

Now your asking Dave how bout your frenzy and signet of rage ? well i use signet of rage when ever i get the chance simply for the speed boost, and frenzy is often used with my rifle not my GS.
GS imo cannot be a stand alone weapon, but it’s synergy with the Rifle is quite a sight to behold.

I am rather happy as to how the Whirlwind atk links to Rush smoothly.
Also by no means do i ever use Bladetrail to slow someone down far away always use a rifle in that situation.

Thanks again guys.

Because of 100 blades.

TechgnomeHD.9875:

Because of 100 blades.

I’m finding that I am using 100b more often in PVE and less so in pvp.
And if you read my post it’s a critique of the other GS abilities and their usefullness.

I want to play Axe + warhorn

I want to play Shield warrior

I want to be tanky defensive

I dont care that much about 100b.

But the fact of the matter is, the greatsword is by far our best weapon.

Its the most defensive weapon, the most offensive weapon, the weapon with the most damage potential. the only thing it lacks in is probably dueling long fights.

Sorry, dont care what people say about shield = defensive war. In open world, you get focused down, you pop shield block and you survive for a few seconds, but you get CCed up the wazoo, and the cooldown is far too long for you to retrigger. The GS offers me ridiculous mobility. I get low, i turn around, hit 3, then 5, and im out of range out of every ability in the game in 1.5 seconds. With a shield, i pop 5, i make a run for cover, but i have no mobility, so i dont get far. I feel helpless with a shield whereas i feel like i can survive vs a zerg with a GS.

And i dont buy this 100b only vs nubs bs.
100b works in all levels, even against high skilled opponents, the only difference being you have to suck their purge/cleanse out before you 100b. This is even easier in a real world environment when you are in an assist train. 100b burst is near unavoidable vs an assist train with many so many CC options (gg if you have a ranger buddy)

Ive done a lot of dummy practicing and 1 hand axe autoattack does more damage than GS, but the problem with axe is mobility.

Every class has an atleast one escape and every person has 2 dodge rolls. You need a fast refresh gap closer in every weapon you use. GS just happens to have 2 long range ones on a fast refresh.

Like I said, i want to play axe (its autoattack DPS is higher than GS), but you need mobility.

GS – easily our best weapon.

Greatsword is great, axe is great, sword is great, warhorn is great, longbow is great, rifle is great, hammer is great, shield is great, and mace isn’t great. It all comes down to play style and preference. Use what feels good to you and is fun because they are all just as useful.
Trait for your preferred weapon and profit.

Who cares if a bunch of warriors are using GS? Maybe heaven forbid they just find it fun to play with. Maybe a majority of players like the way two-handed swords look. Why should anybody care what anybody else is using? Use what you find fun and leave it at that. This game is about having fun.

its great for starting lvls until you find 2 axes to use.

how do I use 100 B in WvW?

this is the problem I am having. I get burst down while channeling, and people simply move out of it.

iam level 10 now. what do I do?

Melee in WvW is rather risky until the enemy is forced to close or is in chaos. Its a lot like real warfare out there in that the battle will stay at range until onside thinks it has the advantage or the other side breaks and runs. Use range until the opportunity to close to melee opens up. If you charge a solid battleline you will die. Its also great for doing things like holding a gate that just broke. You’ll most likely die holding the gap but you should cause enough damage that you have a good chance of stopping the charge into the castle.

i only think the burst spell ar very very useless….. i use it rarely pnly for buff nothing more hit for too low damage and do always the same damage on the target not scale with adrenaline rest is ok for me

I really enjoy the great sword, but do feel that Hundred blades rooting people to the ground is a bit unfair. Also our fury skill is a bit week on a hit. I tend to keep my fury and use it on the rifles fury skill when a player is running away. It just does so much more damage.

Knighthonor.4061:

how do I use 100 B in WvW?

this is the problem I am having. I get burst down while channeling, and people simply move out of it.

iam level 10 now. what do I do?

Level 10 is fodder.

I noticed a massive difference (30-50%% dam increase) when i geared myself up at 80 vs being level 80. As level 10. you will have a couple of skills and thats it.

I’ve always done quite well with a greatsword (mainly in PvP though, I’d recommend a different leveling build for PvE).
You just need to move around A LOT. Use your skills Whirlwind Attack and Rush, they will help you out a lot. Especially when someone realizes they’re about to get screwed and start to run away.
That was very general, just figure out how you like to play and then work around that