Guild Wars 2

Like the title says, i dont know which one to go. I’m level 80 and have full flame legion armor set that gives pwr pre and crit dmg. But i was thinking of aurora karma set that gives pwr vit and tough. I mainly use GS, rifle, and long bow. Which do one do you guys prefer and why? Also, what traits do you guys prefer with each armor? Thanks.

Depends on what you want to do. If you want DPS then go with the berserker one (PPC), if you are more concerned about survivability, then go Soldier (PTV). My opinion: Go with Knight’s gear (power toughness precision) until you are sure if are confident enough to risk yourself with berserker or if you prefer a more conservative playstyle with Soldier.

Generally, with Warriors you don’t really need any more Vitality since we already have a high base HP. It’s either Knights (PPT) or Berserkers (PPC). There was an optimization guide about how to mix these two properly so you can have the most toughness out of your gear without trading off too much critical damage (that’s what I’m using right now).

Hmmm interesting…definitely going to look into knights or berserkers, or mix of them.

Seems like best thing to do is mix my flame legion armor with knights, does anyone have an idea how i should mix it up?

I just changed to be more damage oriented. I’m planning on going Knight’s armor with Emerald Orbs, and Cavalier jewelery with Ruby Orbs. Cavalier Hammer/Greatsword

Kokop.6715:

Seems like best thing to do is mix my flame legion armor with knights, does anyone have an idea how i should mix it up?

[Optimized Build]

Knights
Head
Chest
Legs
Rings
Two Handed Weapons

Berserkers
Shoulder
Hand
Foot
Amulet
Earrings
One Handed Weapons

Accessories
Exquisite Ruby Jewel on ALL pieces

If you have access to ascended gear, then you want zerker for rings and back. It doesn’t need to be infused

Oreoginal.1580:

Kokop.6715:

Seems like best thing to do is mix my flame legion armor with knights, does anyone have an idea how i should mix it up?

[Optimized Build]

Knights
Head
Chest
Legs
Rings
Two Handed Weapons

Berserkers
Shoulder
Hand
Foot
Amulet
Earrings
One Handed Weapons

Accessories
Exquisite Ruby Jewel on ALL pieces

This “optimum” build is based on the assumption that if crit damage is more expensive than average, it must not be good. That is not necessarily correct. It could very well be that all berserker pieces are a greater increase in damage output from crit damage than you’d gain in damage reduction from toughness.

Just because something’s cheaper doesn’t make other cheap things a bad deal.

as far as I know and have tested and have success with, building the warrior with high power, precision, crit damage with a good amount of toughness is the most balanced build in terms of DPS and tankiness.

Warriors already have a high amount of base HP so toughness is going to help them alot more, plus we have one of the best if not the best burst heal in the game in healing surge.

Obviously going full glass cannon or full tank aren’t really the most optimal builds for a warrior. Try to take advantage of Berserker’s Power (12% extra dmg full adreanaline) and the trait in Arms that gives you 10% more damage on bleeding foes. These synergize very well with having high crit damage (60%+ crit damage) is a pretty good number without sacrificing so much survivability.

ya, any berserkers imo sacrifices too much in the way of toughness (your best stat)

exquisite ruby jewels are good for the jewlery…

but youd do best mixing knights and cavaliers (PTC)

killahmayne.9518:

Obviously going full glass cannon or full tank aren’t really the most optimal builds for a warrior.

It’s not obvious at all. Not to mention you really aren’t gaining all that much survivability anyway from a few toughness accessories and armor pieces. Maybe 10% damage reduction? Big deal.

Yaki.9563:

killahmayne.9518:

Obviously going full glass cannon or full tank aren’t really the most optimal builds for a warrior.

It’s not obvious at all. Not to mention you really aren’t gaining all that much survivability anyway from a few toughness accessories and armor pieces. Maybe 10% damage reduction? Big deal.

I agree. My warrior is currently 25/25/0/0/20 in berserker gear. I currently have two accessories that are non berserker stats (one with power/tough/vit and another with a mix of everything). The difference is not even noticeable from pure berserker trinkets..with the exception with slightly smaller numbers from my dps. If I had exotic/ascended berserker items for those two slots, then I’d have already replaced those two non dps items.

I’ve even tried shaving some points from the other trait lines and going 15 into defense for adrenal health, but even that had negligible impact.

The short story is that full glass is the most effective and efficient pve set up a warrior can possibly choose currently. Our only outstanding contribution as a warrior is pure and consistent dps output. Guardians outclass us in terms of group survival support and self survivability. Thieves outclass us in burst dps. Anything other than dps and dps support from a warrior is less than maximum efficiency. That’s not to say that a full support (defense/tactics) warrior is not valuable, because the extra regen/heals from shouts/banners is nice…especially in the absence of a support guardian. I’m just saying glass warriors are getting a bad reputation despite being the most productive warrior set up in pve content.

I went with mentioned set by Kokop except I take almost all emeralds and my Kraka shell. All just depends what you want to do. Going all Knight’s is fine too. Without going into crit tree I have 32% crit+10% from axe trait+9% full adrenalin+20% from perma fury allows me to support with my shout build and almost crit all the time.

I use full zerker in pve/dungeons, but I also have a pvt set, which I use in wvwvw/gathering mats. Trinkets are zerker with both sets.

Yaki.9563:

killahmayne.9518:

Obviously going full glass cannon or full tank aren’t really the most optimal builds for a warrior.

It’s not obvious at all. Not to mention you really aren’t gaining all that much survivability anyway from a few toughness accessories and armor pieces. Maybe 10% damage reduction? Big deal.

I am talking about from a wvw and pvp standpoint, i dont really care for pve. And yes it does make a difference. Try having 1400-1600 toughness as opposed to 916 with just a 20% drop in crit dmg and minimal power/precision loss, and you will see what i mean. You can still have 75-85 base crit dmg (you could probably get 95 with the axe) with 45%+ base crit chance and 1900+ base power without being breathed on and dropping. It is possible and you still will be very durable whether it is PvE or WvW or just 1v1s in general. Why not just have 1 set of gear that can do all that?

And going glass cannon for dungeons like fractals (at least level 15, especially as a warrior with a lack of disengage and deaggro abilities) is not good either. A dead warrior does 0 dps

cloudysan.4397:

I went with mentioned set by Kokop except I take almost all emeralds and my Kraka shell. All just depends what you want to do. Going all Knight’s is fine too. Without going into crit tree I have 32% crit+10% from axe trait+9% full adrenalin+20% from perma fury allows me to support with my shout build and almost crit all the time.

The axe trait adds crit damage, not crit.

killahmayne.9518:

And yes it does make a difference. Try having 1400-1600 toughness as opposed to 916 with just a 20% drop in crit dmg and minimal power/precision loss…

You are gaining 500-700 toughness from just a handful of armor pieces/accessories? Even using the worst crit damage:toughness ratios on gear, 700 toughness is going to be about 45% crit damage not 20%. 700 toughness is about 25% damage reduction. 45% crit damage is about the same increase in damage output. With such an even trade-off, why would you go for toughness instead of damage increasing stats when your focus is dealing damage?

Anyway, even if you conclude that you’d like the toughness it doesn’t make the decision obvious by any means.

Yaki.9563:

killahmayne.9518:

And yes it does make a difference. Try having 1400-1600 toughness as opposed to 916 with just a 20% drop in crit dmg and minimal power/precision loss…

You are gaining 500-700 toughness from just a handful of armor pieces/accessories? Even using the worst crit damage:toughness ratios on gear, 700 toughness is going to be about 45% crit damage not 20%. 700 toughness is about 25% damage reduction. 45% crit damage is about the same increase in damage output. With such an even trade-off, why would you go for toughness instead of damage increasing stats when your focus is dealing damage?

Anyway, even if you conclude that you’d like the toughness it doesn’t make the decision obvious by any means.

I run a build that has 10 strength, 25 arms, 15 defense and 20 discipline. Most people from what I have seen go about 20 discipline anyway.

I run berserker gear for the most part with all berserker type trinkets, except for the chest (gives me +101 toughness) and pants (gives me about 67 toughness) and the traits give me 150 toughness. I run superior rune of the forge which gives me 165 toughness. Also a backpack that gives me 60 toughness. Also the minor trait in defense gives me +100 toughness and the one major trait which gives you +200 toughness on cripple, chill, etc. But for the purposes of this let us just say +100 toughness. You can even use the dolyak signet for extra toughness as well which bumps you even higher.

Together that is approximately +643 extra toughness. What am I losing? 5% crit damage from the chest, 3% crit damage from the pants and about 12% crit damage from the runes if I went for something else. My backpack also gives me crit damage. Alternatively, you could go power toughness crit damage gear and you would barely lose anything (besides a bit of precision). Or you could switch the traits a little bit to give you 30 discipline.

So all in all, it isn’t a decrease of 45% crit damage like you say. Or even close to that. At least if you take into consideration everything from gear, to traits, to runes, etc. All it requires is a bit of math to come to this conclusion. Would I take +643 extra toughness over 20% crit damage (or 30% at the absolute most for those who actually do 30 discipline?). You guys decide.

Without counting traits, if you were to gear:

1. Full soldiers armour, full knights jewellery, soldier weapon
2. Full knights armour, jewellery and weapon.

Set 1 would actually have 3k extra health and rate higher in damage than set 2. Even though using soldiers armour and weapon in 1 sacrifices some precision, the gain from power being a major stat outguns the loss in precision.

Of course none of this factors in crit proc traits or items which can make or break the deal.