Guild Wars 2

I pretty much only do open world metas and solo stuff, so this is what I’ve been using since the latest balance patch:

http://en.gw2skills.net/editor/?vVAQJARTn8cCdditCBOCBEEhl4BrKA0AqXWhg8VkSe/1/WgA-TBSBQB5Q9nMqU7G7PoCdBA4JAYSlgiUZBFuEAAA-e

The big thing here is keeping Retaliation and Fury up for when you use GS#2 and Procession of Blades. With Retaliation and Fury, you have a 100% crit chance, which turns GS#2 and Procession of Blades into murder machines.

Flame Legion runes because it can be difficult sometimes to maintain 90%+ for Scholar runes, Force sigils because it’s the best, and Strength sigils because I found Air to be kinda mediocre for open world since you’re usually pulling 2-3+ mobs at a given time. Maybe Fire is better, I’m not sure yet.

Since you can easily dump precision, you can replace Berserker gear for some Valkyrie gear to gain a significant health boost. I’m currently sitting at just over 20k, which is much better than the paltry 12k or so health a Guardian gets.

I’m far from an expert and I suspect raiding or fractal builds will be better tuned but I’ve been running this build in the open world:

http://en.gw2skills.net/editor/?vVAQJARTn8cCddilDBOCBEEhl4BrKA0AqXWhg8VkSe/1/WgA-TxRBQB6RXgJVCmRlfWS9nbs/wDuEAA4JAAA-e

Note that the final Radiance ability isn’t updated in that builder. In game it gives +50% chance to crit when Retaliation is active as well as giving stacks of Might every second you’re under Retaliation. The thought process behind the build is to maximize burn uptime at 3 stacks for near-constant Fury as well as running lots of ways to throw down Retaliation.

I went with Valkyrie because when properly self-buffed you have a 100% crit chance, but I could see running more Valkyrie pieces if you have other means of gaining crit. Of course, Valkyrie’s vitality over an offensive stat is less than ideal for top level play, but I suck at this game and the HP buffer is nice.

EDIT: Oops, forgot about Radiant Power giving +10% crit on burning enemies. Changed the amulet and a ring to Valkyrie, bringing my crit chance to close to 20%. Here’s the adjusted build:

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vVAQJARTn8cCddilDBOCBEEhl4BTe/1/WgVBgGQ9yKEkviUA-TBSBQBA4JAYSlgiUZRGVq9gLBwN2fwSq/oHdBAA-e

STIHL.2489:

Well for openers, and this is just walking into the zone, they made travel around the zones multi-leveled (and requiring at last some masteries) thus turning each zone into ginormous jump puzzles.

So you’re upset because the game was more difficult?

But, if you really had not idea of the many thing that were done that made HoT unfriendly towards casual players, so much so that you needed to ask this question, I am going to wager that you are nowhere near close to being a casual player yourself, so, no offence to you in any way, but it would be impossible for you to gauge if PoE was in fact casual friendly or not, thus you really could not answer my question.

Started playing with HoT after a friend recommended it. I haven’t done a single fractal or raid. I play infrequently. I’m the definition of a casual.

Your definition of “casual” is flawed. You can be a casual player and still be proficient at playing a game. If you want to mindlessly faceroll through content then I don’t know what to tell you.

STIHL.2489:

It did.. very much so, with HoT.

In what way?

UmbraNoctis.1907:

Also keep in mind, that you can easily change utility skills and/or traits, so if you are struggeling with condis or cc for examle, you can just take an additonal stunbreak or condi cleanse. Don’t hesistate to adapt if neccessary. Builds don’t have to be set in stone.

This is advice I could take for my other characters, as well. I come from other MMOs where certain build choices are set when you select them, so I have to break that mentality.

Thanks for the feedback! I’ll look into acquiring those pets. As for Marauder vs. Berserker, as I said before, I’m pretty awful at this game, so sacrificing a little bit of DPS for more survivability seems like a fair trade. On the other hand I’m going to have a plethora of healing so we’ll see.

I started out as a Guardian and enjoyed it okay. Then I made a condi Necromancer and fell in love. As I don’t have a medium armor class and hate Thieves with a passion, it was between Engineer and Ranger. I’m leaning towards Ranger, so, here we are. I’m pretty tied to playing a LB/GS Power build because they look like they’re the most fun for me, but otherwise I’m open to suggestions. I primarily play solo aside from doing meta event zergs and have no interest in fractals/raids. I guess anything would be viable in open world PvE but consider me a serious casual.

Here’s the build so far:
http://en.gw2skills.net/editor/?vNMQJATRnUqAtCiNsAWsActgl9Ab52FAObPxhjwTD+tmX7rpsk0MlE-TBCBQBQZ/BA8EAEo6PSQJoEV+FgLBg80FEOzfAA-e

1) Which pets should I be using? I’ve read so much conflicting information. One for tanking, one for DPS? Which would those be?

2) I’m not really sure about my sigils and runes, so I just kinda threw in what sounded good. With regards to runes, I’m not sure if Ranger is better than Strength. Obviously Scholar would be useful but I’m terrible at this game and keeping my health above 90% consistently doesn’t seem like a wise investment.

3) I feel mostly confident in my Specialization choices, but that probably means they’re horribly wrong.

Any opinions or advice before I use the free 80 boost I’ve had sitting in my shared slot for months?

Hey gang.

Started playing a few months ago as a Guardian/Dragonhunter and while it’s a fun class, I’m looking to play something ranged. The Necromancer appeals to me due to a misspent youth playing Diablo 2. I’m something of a “serious casual” in that I like to optimize despite having zero interest in Fractals/Raids. For this build, I wanted to focus on conditions and minions because those are the things that appeal to me most about the class. I just want to roam the world, bleed all of the things, and be virtually unkillable in HoT content.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vRAQNArYWjM0QTN2WDe1A7NOCGqYSHARwcG2hcQeCpQJA-TRSBQBNTfD2sgQL7HUOzfA4JAMNlfO7UA8MlgFU9HA-e

Since I don’t have ascended gear I tried bumping my Expertise/Condition Duration up with Nightmare Runes. Would Berserker Runes still be better in this case? Also, would it still be worth going Reaper if I won’t use a greatsword? Anyway, I’m open to suggestions. Thanks in advance for any advice y’all impart.