@MysticoN
yes, but i dont post images or clips on the Internet, call me old fashioned.
@Lumines
Thx but the reason why i made a separate thread was due to a request from a couple of guys in here that thought the crithammer build was worth it, and your post and build is something completely different and kind of offtopic even though interesting.
I use energy in both sets and mix it up accuracy in the offhand. In tpvp i sometimes use intelligence in the hammer.
@Reihert
Yes they do which means hammer symbol applies protection and retaliation with mighty blow triggering the combofield!
No there is no internal cd on altruistic healing but on empowering which might has 1s cd. Which doesnt matter that much since the hammer hits slow.
Yes you will get one heal per boon applied to an ally. Two teammates in the symbol and you get 2+1 heal.
It heals for about 70 per boon/ally and scales really bad, i havent seen it heal for more then 78 with tons of healing power. This is the reason, and vigorous precision and empowering might, why a high crit build do wonders with altruistic healing. The formula is scaling=i+t+s+u+c+k+s+s+o+d+o+n+t+b+ot+h+e+r
In one of my builds it healed for 73 per boon. Here you have a calculation on its potential:
Assume three allies inside the symbol and my build where AH heals for 73.
A hammer chain+symbol hits in total 6 times on a single target. Thats 3 crits (50% crit) generating 3*73. Total of 219hp from vigorous precision.
You get in average 3 hits from empowering might as well but those also hit the teammates and give you 219*3=657
The symbol generates 3 ticks of protection, with 3 allies inside that is 9*73 which in total is 657 hp.
And when you trigger retal you apply retal to 3 people once, which gives you 3*73=219
219+657+657+219=1752 heals to you.
With two allies:
219+438+438+146=1241
Soloplaying:
219+219+219+73=730
Basically its about getting heals from a large number of sources, also why healing on the symbol is kind of interesting even though underwhelming at first glance.
@Grace
Thx, really nice of you even though when i read it i realize that my lack of knowledge in english shine thru. Hopefully its understandable.
@Eveningstar
Thx! Yes it is powerful and i still think we just started to explore the possibilities with the hammer and altruistic healing. It will be very interesting to see what will happen when people get their hands on Grenethgear which combine healing and precision, imo a very deadly combination.
@ShadowbaneX
So true, i played 1h+scepter and fooled around with gs before i switched and the playstyle of the hammer is very different. The biggest difference is that bad gameplay shine thru much more obvious and great gameplay is more rewarding and ofc the pace of the battle. I find mysesf dodging much more often and being more tactical with the hammer then with 1h sword.
One of the reasons why wrote this, besides being asked to, is that i think the community shouldnt mix up personal preference with how effective it is. We are infact a bunch of players that find that 3rd step entertaining and that the playstyle is very entertaining and im certain, if we give it time, more and more will start playing with the hammer due to its very distinct character.
Once again thx for the feedback in this thread and also in the pm i gotten, it makes it worth the time for an illiterate like myself to take the time and effort writing this.
I will definitely get back to you when i have other gear then berserker/knights to try this build with and especially if i can get a couple of pieces of greneth-gear.
What runes, well i use soldier runes for conditionremoval but there are a bunch of choices. When i get a full pvpset i will use crit runes in that. One other rune that is very interesting is rune of dwayna, which gives you and the team regen and also has healingstats. For the one that needs more heals on dodge this is a work of wonder and the regen it gives also trigger altruistic healing.
So once again when you traited checkout what you miss and fix that with the gear/weapon/accessories and upgrades.
What stats to look for?
40-51%% crit
2800-3200 Attack
14k-18k health
2400-2800 armor
200-400heal power
73-105% critdamage
As you can see there is a huge span in which you can still have great damage, decent healthpool and being one tough motherKITTEN.
How i play this then.
- dodge as soon there is room in our healthpool
- Save your heal to last, it doesnt remove conditions when on cd
-Learn to dodge within the chain, between step 2 and 3.
- Dodge towards if you want to stay close, dodge from if you want a gap.
- Making a gap isnt always defense. MB makes it possible to jump into the symbol and trigger it.
- there is time between you placed the symbol and to trigger it, to make a dodge, use that.
- Stop spamming skill one, always “hold” the third step of the chain and start it when you think you will hit. One more reason for holding for a fraction of a second is that you will get more time to trigger the combo with MB.
- The way you play with gs and 1h wont cut it. With the hammer you “run” in the hit.
- Even if you know you gonna miss with the third step, place the symbol, and use MB to jump out of it. Retal rocks.
- Switch often (in pvp, in pve you dont need to switch that often) and have energy sigil in your secondary weapon, ofc if you are into that sigil like i am.
- Save your cc for when they make a run for it. People that cant hit without ccing will have serious issues playing with the hammer.
- Dont quit just because you cant make it work. As soon as you gotten the hang of it it will perform better then any of the other melee weapons we have.
- Choose your secondary based on situation, i play two setups:
tpvp and pve, 1h sword + focus
WvW and some pve content, scepter + shield
When moving around in wvw and pve i ofc use staff for speedbuff but switch it as soon as there is content (mobs or players to be killed) to do.
Hopefully this has given you a picture of some my insights in the crithammer build and hopefully its what you asked me to post. hopefully its what you asked me to post.
In short:
STOP ASKING FOR THE BUILD, ITS NO ONE BUILD, ITS INFACT AT LEAST 30 DIFFERENT BUILDS, BUY A KNIGHTS GEAR AND TRAIT ALTRUISTIC HEALING AND LET THE FUN BEGIN.
(edited by Brutaly.6257)
This build is about keeping the healthpool up at all costs and this is the main difference between it and a meditationbuild which passively has a couple of burst heals, in this build the damage you do is the heals you get. Superfun and demanding but has great rewards when play right.
Empowering might, pure of voice, writ of persistence and writ of the merciful are also traits that work well in a crithammer build. So in short you can invest 20 or 30 points in honor and you have a bunch of nice traits. The only minor trait thats kind useless is elusive power, being short of endurance is kind of missing the point of the gameplay in a crithammer build.
One interesting thing to mention is that rune of the soldier and pure of voice stack. With three shouts nothing sticks to your team and conditionbuilds are totally moot. Especially with purity and signet of resolve which also stack.
In virtues, inspired virtues is the only mandatory trait and thats 5 points. I cant understand that there are people that dont trait this, it should be in any build and i consider it meta. Think about what it does, it gives your group 3 extra boons with an average cd of 60 sec. Thats is the same as getting 1,5 shouts on a 60 sec cd. Wtf we have access to 4.5 utilityslots and some people dont want that. Trait it and stop asking stupid questions ;-)
There are a couple of major traits though that might be interesting and all of them can be used in a crithammer build.
First we have vengeful ofc, packing stand your ground, save yourselves and signet of judgment then this is supernice.
Second we have master of consecrations which is nice for two shouts and wall of reflection/sanctuary.
Third one we have consecrated ground which shares the same purpose with master of consecrations.
In virtues you shouldnt go deeper then 10 points and no less then 5 points so its max one major. Personally i stopped traiting more then 5 points.
Now last but not least, radiance, what should you trait here then since its all about crit and your hammer??
Well the answer is imo a paradox, you trait whats left!!
This is the last one you look at. Some of you will end up with 5 points (great with an extra blind) som will trait 10 points and either get shorter cd on your heal or why not fury when you are set on fire, its remarkable how often those engie/guardian/eles set you one fire.
Some get 15 points in there, super nice for pve to always have VoJ off cd and also kind of nice in pvp tbh, especially spvp.
So in short there is no one single build just a couple of must have traits (imo) and the rest is up to your own strengths and shortcomings.
Healingskill ofc the signet, passive conditionremover, short cd and massive heals. Easy choice.
Utilityskills the shouts are a given, at least 2 imo. If you use two shouts then you can either use signet of judgement for more boons on the team and one great aoe condition when fighting in the front or wall of reflection.
What elite: In pve and spvp i use renewed focus, i thought it was really bad at the beginning but after learning to play the crit hammerbuild i started to realize how nice it is even though 60 sec cd is justified compared to what other classes bring to the table.
For WvW i use tome of wrath, i find it just useless in almost every aspects of the game but in wvw its just so nice. Outnumbered 1 to 3, np, just get behind your group, pull a couple of shouts/virtues for 10 sec protection and then this monster and kill em all.
The greatness of symbol of protection.
The symbol is kind of unique. First of all it doesnt have the downsides of SoW, you dont have to stand still and it also lacks the casting time the other symbols have, yes i know the third step is slow but just compare with the mace symbol or even the staff symbol. Considering SoP infact applies two boons (boons equal to two symbols) and damage from the third step, makes it the most powerful symbol we have.
The only downside with the symbol is infact that you need a target to use it. This downside dictates how you (imo) should play the hammer and thats why the crithammer is an interesting option. A build that deal huge amount of damage while supporting with the best/most boons any class can spew out in a given timeframe and great cc and the more damage you do and the more bons you get out the more you survive and the more damage you do. Its the ideal frontline soldier and pusher and the synergy between SoP and MB is what makes this possible.
What traits/gear do you need?
Gear and traits are the same imo, just two different ways of achieving a goal, so i talk about them under the same paragraph.
The build has its foundation in altruistic healing so 30 points in Valor is mandatory. I also find retributive armor to be mandatory and the reason for that is ofc the extra crit you get from it. The one thing with retributive armor is also that it also has synergies with the gear of your choice, for instance knights gear will give you more crits then berserker due to the toughness it has.
Choose your gear wisely. I gone from berserker to knights and will probably go to pov/vit/tuv the day i have a full set.The reason why im not using the three pieces i have is that i havent decided what runes i should have in it and i want all 6 pieces to get full effect of my runes. I think i will drop below 40% crit when i do but i think it will work out anyway. In my builds i use purity, for both pve and pvp, and in pvp i think its mandatory and part of meta. In pve though there are other stuff that you might find nice to have and purity isnt a must have.
In honor there is only one mandatory trait and that is 2h mastery, without it you wont get the synergy between SoP and MB. Trait it and dont ask questions.. This also means that you have 20 points in honor so you have the first tier to trait as well. Here you have two choices and those are superior aria for shorter cd on shouts and writ of exaltation for larger symbols.
Well which one should you go for? The answer is both, one is better for ranged combat and one is better for melee. Writ of exaltation might seem weak but when you start to get the importance of positioning the symbol you will understand what huge difference the symbol size really does, both for damage and survivability and your capability to support. In coordinated teams i use writ of exaltation.
When you invested 20 in honor you also got selfless daring and vigorous precision. The first one is pretty amazing and the reason for that is that it scales with about 1 to 1 which means that every point you invest in healstats give you back 1h on dodge. I have about 100 heals in my accessories and this trait is also why i chose to have sigil of energy, it allows for 3 rapid dodges on swap and besides avoiding damage it also gives me 1,5k in hp and more time to get something of cd. This means that when it comes to selfless daring healing stats are much stronger then vitality. So when in doubt, more health or more heals, go for healstats as long as you have selflessdaring. EASY CHOICE.
This setup has saved my life numerous times even when not having one single point of healstats in gear, and ofc its a great battle heal when in a group. And its here vigorous precision (and critrating comes into play) which also gives more dodges to you. The thing is that you will have 4 dodges at your disposal in a very short timeframe. Remember, if you have room in your healthpool and vigor runs, dodge, even if you dont need to avoid damage.
(edited by Brutaly.6257)
Wall of text, if you dont want to know about the crithammer gameplay or hammer gameplay in general, dont read any further.
Its been posted before but im been approached by a number of player in pm on this forum and also ingame that wanted to get help, advice or just say that the ones in here promoting the crithammer gameplay have actually changed their perspective on how to play the guardian.
Some of them has also asked me to write a guide about crithammer and how to play it but dont fear, i have no intention of writing a guide and the reason for that is simple, you cant!
The reason why i wont write a guide is that the crithammer gameplay is much more complex then the other weapons and also much more rewarding when you get it together.
What i can do is try to outline some things about builds and overall gameplay and hopefully this might inspire more people to play the offensive support- and controlguardian you get in the crithammer build.
The crithammer build kills the myth that you need to build defense in order to support or that you have to neglect cc if you want to do dps and support. imo the crit hammer build has it all in one package.
So here we go and lets start with:
The foundation of the crithammer build.
First of all you need crit rating, there is no right or wrong here, just see to it that you hit at least 40% critrating. The main reason for that is that you need endurance when playing and since the hammer is kind of slow you will need to dodge more often and also fully exploit the fact that you have a ranged attack with almost 600 in range in mighty blow. Dodge backwards out of reach and then bounce back in with a huge blow.
The second reason you need crit rating is ofc for damage and the hammer hits hard. Its the best melee aoe the profession has with the highest dps in mighty blow and its also much harder to avoid then ZD or WW. Overall, in both pvp and pve it has higher practical dps then any other meleeweapon, at least for me.
When we are talking about damage we need to mention the third step in the chain and if you add in one single tick from SoP then the third step hits with about 15% less damage of mighty blow. Yeah thats right, that is how good the third step is and considering it also applies a “ranged” symbol and automatic retaliation this pretty much makes it the most powerful chainfinisher a guardian has.
(edited by Brutaly.6257)
Not neccessarily. Rune of the soldier does what i need, i need condition removers. Othe players might need more group boons and go for dwayna instead. Dwayna gives both regeneration to the team and ofc altruisitic healing AND regen to you.
Play around, find the hammersetup that suits you, and then invest in the expensive stuff, like superior sigils.
There are a lot of good stuff out there, soldier runes is right for me but it might be very bad for you.
mostly sigil of energy in pve and sigil of intelligence in pvp, if the question was directed towards me.
Berserker, if you want all the benefits from altruistic healing, you need crits.
Vigil, until you get used to the playstyle the hammer demands.
Vigil, if you are against bosses that cant be positioned or outmanouvered.
So both.
I took my vigil set and transformed it onto my berserker since its one of the best looking set in the game, and bought me a knights set instead and use accessories for vit/pov.
So save both and get a feeling for things but play with the berserkerset as much as you can, you will do yourself a favor doing that.
extremely well. You just need to move and position yourself.
Dodge in middle of the chain, dodge out of reach and jump into the symbol and trigger retaliation and a couple of other stunts like keeping the team very close to you for boons on them and heals on you.
The gameplay is different from the other weapons but it definitely works very well once you get the hang of it and its a very active gameplay, you wont get bored..
Almost spot on, but i use signet mastery from radiance to get the heal up more often.
In valor i use purity and retributive armor, besides altruistic healing. Purity isnt that important in pve and can be swapped for something else as you also did.
And as you also pointed out in honor there are multiple choices. I go for writ of exaltation and 2h mastery.
mandatory traits in an altruistic build being:
Altrusistic healing
2h mastery
Vigorous precision
Inspired virtues.
in short, you got it.
PS test this one out as well, note that the runes and pure of voice stack, this is really nice in spvp.
http://www.gw2db.com/skills/calc/guardian#1|0|3527|3410|3406|1311|3411|0|0|0|0|5|0|0|0|30|2281|2175|1395|30|866|1400|884|5|0|0|0|2|17|0|28044|28016|53498|53498|53498|53498|53498|25790|21080|0|0|0|0|
@one man army
Both builds will work out just fine.
One thing though, personally i think inspired virtues should be in every build and i mean every build.
Look what you get for 5 points in virtues. 3 new boons!!!!
It has the same effect as if you have 4.5 skillslots for utility instead of 3 and use 1.5 extras shouts.
Imo this one is a part of the metagame. You just cant ignore using it using it, its just to good.
@Draeka.
Both yes and no but in general you are right.
But the thing is that hammer actually hits an awful lot of times. The chain hits 6 times, three times from the chain itself and 3 times from the symbol.
Then add in that both the symbol and mighty blow are “real” aoe which crits more often due to more targets in the area.
Last but not least, the gs symbol just produces one boon and it forces you to be stationary while placing it.
honestly the only time people use symbol of wrath is tagging targets and as a prestep to use binding blade, the effecive cd of symbol of wrath are is by binding blade imo.
Add the casting time of the gs symbol to the gs chain and then imagine that you are forced to stand still when executing step three.
So in short, the hammer actually hits very often.
I have 12.8k hp as a guardian in full level 80 +vitality exotics (carrion)
That is an atrociously low HP total for a tanky melee class.
Warriors with the same gear have about 20k hp.
People will routinely say that you need about 15k hp to avoid getting insta killed in various dungeon encounters.
I don’t see how you can get there without being a dedicated ‘tank spec’ – but GW2 supposedly gets rid of the holy trinity idea.
I play all dungeons with less then then 14k and not a single shread of toughness in my gear. Why should i have toughness/more hp? its about avoiding damage, not soaking it up.
Why not a knights gear, with a couple of vitality earrings and amulets if you want to be on the safe side. Still not a tank imo since it has better melee dps then most other classes.
@tobeyeus
may i suggest that you consider a switch from shield to focus, the blocks builds more might and also move points into virtues from radiance. In combinations with renewed focus you get 9 stacks of might and an additional 1-3 stacks from empowering might.
With sigil of intelligence you will hit for about 5k with mighty blow on swap with berserker.
And btw, even if you allready know it, you wont be able to burst as often with that build since it lacks 2h mastery and also lack synergy between combofield and finisher.
Question.
Trait Pure Voice: Allies affected by a shout convert one condition to a boon.
Does this convertion also apply a tick of healing, with Altruisting healing?
Yes, note that it stacks with rune of the soldier so shouts remove two conditions on the team and give one boon back which heals the guardian. Once again, this is what i seen on my clips, a proper combatlog would answer 100% correct.
Virtues in the start of the fight, when conditions stack use your shouts, then pull renewed focus and reapply the virtues. All while hitting away with the hammer and giving protection and retaliation. Its a boon machine and great dps in the same package.
(edited by Brutaly.6257)
I just need to find a good looking hammer now…
One last tip, Vigil hammer, the rare faction weapon, great skin, bought one and applied it to my exotic hammer and wont ever change skin.
Same goes for the focus (candles lol), staff and scepter. All of them are great. not overly flashy and grotesque (spelling might be ……. up).
Use the staff in wvw when you lost 3k health and pull of skill 4, empower, and you will understand what this trait really does.
Note that Empowering Might appears to have a 1s internal, unstated cooldown, so even if your Mighty Blow hits 5 enemies and crits on 3, you’ll only get 1 stack of Might (and thus 1 heal).
The point is that for each might you apply you get >70 heals PER teammember you apply it to. Its a groupboon not for the guardian alone.
J
Just to clarify something about altruistic healing
Assume three allies inside the symbol and my build where AH heals for 73.
A hammer chain+symbol hits in total 6 times on a single target. Thats 3 crits (50% crit) generating 3*73. Total of 219hp from vigorous precision.
You get in average 3 hits from empowering might as well but those also hit the teammates and give you 219*3=657
The symbol generates 3 ticks of protection, with 3 allies inside that is 9*73 which in total is 657 hp.
And when you trigger retal you apply retal to 3 people once, which gives you 3*72=219
219+657+657+219=1752 heals to you.
With two allies:
219+438+438+146=1241
Soloplaying:
219+219+219+73=730
Sorry for any miscalculation, doing it on my iphone and adding in my head but the math shows that the more targets and allies the stronger altruistic healing becomes..
Im not saying those figures are 100% accurate, i have 700-1400 hp as a safe bet and then i know im well inside what the hammer actually produces. A parser would be really nice in these kinds of discussions but as of right now we have to settle for looking at clips to determine stuff.
(edited by Brutaly.6257)
Well then note that mighty blow is/has:
- half the cd of WW
- Higher total damage, two mighty blows deals more raw damage then one ww. read the tooltip.
- Much shorter executiontime which means less time to next action and higher dps within a given timeframe.
- Harder to avoid, its fast
- You are not forced to stand still when placing the symbol and use mb as finisher
- Gapcloser, so its almost 600 in real range with the aoe.
- Not as sensitive to retaliation and confusion due to fewer actions/hits pers second.
I take that slow third step in the chain every day of the weak for that.
Not just survivability, ofc about 200 power and around 15% crit damage as well. But frankly, yesterday i hit my mighty blow for 4.8k on a ranger in wvw and he had no conditions on him. So knights gear is enough :-)
you get more crits out of pure knights gear/accessories but lower crit damage. Berserker and knights have the same critstats.
Retributive armor actually makes it better since knights gear has tons of toughness. This also allows for having one or two pieces from clerics or pow/vit/tough and still have the same crit chance as a full berserker gear.
To clarify, i use soldiers runes and still maintain critchance, or close to, im at 49% with knights set and soldier runes and at 51% with a full berserker with crit orbs in the upgrade slots. but the difference is survivability is huge.
1,6k more health and like 300 more toughness.
(edited by Brutaly.6257)
I use two different builds and one you have mentioned, which i use a knights gear with, the other one is 0/5/30/30/5 and then with a full exotic berserker setup beside some accessories with healstats on them. Dodge heal scales 1 to 1 with heal stats. so 100 extra heals and energy sigils makes wonders for survivability.
No i havent anything uploaded, i never uploaded anything on the Internet, havent even got a facebook account. There will be clips out there, more and more people realize that altruistic healing is a great alternative to meditationheals since it takes no utility skills (meditations being kind of selfcentric) away and you can focus you utility on supporting the team.
And if you arent playing solo you will also get more heals out of it. Soloplaying meditations is much better and you dont have to rely on your teammates to use their brains (nor you) since they like spirit weapons are pretty foolproof.
(edited by Brutaly.6257)
You are absolutely right in your assumptions/questions. That is how i perceived how vigorous precision, empowering might and altruistic healing works. Its kind of difficult to determine without proper logs, once again it is what i can tell from watching my ingame clips.
take the staff and use empower (skill 4) when you lost 3k health and are standing in a crowd in wvw and see what happens ;-). That experiment fully supports the above calculation.
As i said, there is a reason why the hammer (which just spews out boons) is slow.
Personally i see more and more people play with hammer, people catch up slow, that weapon is beyond great in crowded situations.
EDIT Empowering might isnt that bad is it? ;-) Or add in two shouts, soldiers runes wich removes conditions and pure of voice which turns on condition into a boon when you use a shout.
The cool thing is that pure of voice is applied before the runes so you get one extra boon (heals from both the shout and from a condition transformed into a boon) and removes two conditions on the team.
If going for pure of voice i wouldnt trait empowering might, just 2h mastery and/or superior aria/writ of exaltation and still have close to 46% crit and 5 points into virtues.
Have fun.
(edited by Brutaly.6257)
70-78, at least, 78 is the most i gotten out of it but im unsure if i maxed healstats then. It scales really bad but its also why it works so well with high crit aoe builds like GS and hammer in particular.
My pve-setup hits for 73 hp per crit.
One crit with empowering might also triggers vigorous precision. with 4 teammates in radius, in a dungeon, that is approx 350 in heals per second. Then add in the protection/retaliation from 2h symbols which renews altruistic healing for each tick and you get 70 more per person/tick inside the symbol and ofc retaliation when triggering it with the hammer.
Assume three allies inside the symbol and my build.
A hammer chain+symbol hits in total 6 times on a single target. Thats 3 crits (50% crit) generating 3*73. Total of 219hp from vigorous precision.
You get in average 3 hits from empowering might as well but those also hit the teammates and give you 219*3=657
The symbol generates 3 ticks of protection, with 3 allies inside that is 9*73 which in total is 657 hp.
And when you trigger retal you apply retal to 3 people once, which gives you 3*72=219
219+657+657+219=1752 heals to you.
With two allies:
219+438+438+146=1241
Soloplaying:
219+219+219+73=730
Sorry for any miscalculation, doing it on my iphone and adding in my head but the math shows that the more targets and allies the stronger altruistic healing becomes..
Im not saying those figures are 100% accurate, i have 700-1400 hp as a safe bet and then i know im well inside what the hammer actually produces. A parser would be really nice in these kinds of discussions but as of right now we have to settle for looking at clips to determine stuff.
The fact is that the slow third hit in the chain actually is an asset since it gives a lengthy delay to trigger empowering might. Ofc if hit 1 and 3 crits in the chain, there is also “room” for four hits of empowering might with in the chain+mb combo.
All while dealing the best aoe we have (yeah its more dps in mighty blow then ww) and applying tons of boons to the team.
Thank god the hammer is difficult to play and hit with!!!
(edited by Brutaly.6257)
the mainreason to specc empowering might isnt due to the stacks you build on your self, in soloplay there are better traits in honor for 2h gameplay.
Its whats happen when you are in a group it gets interesting, and give those stacks to all your teammates and get the heals from altruistic healing in return.
In my head the ideal is to be a decent, consistent DPS setup with a tremendous tank, especially with all that self-healing, so that your allies can rely on you to keep the fight rolling while they duck out here and there to heal up between bursts.
Maybe that’s wishful thinking.
The first part you achive by using the proper tools/weapons and gear. Dealing damage isnt an issue for guardians imo.
The second part you solve with your shouts (protection, retaliation, stability), traited virtues for even more boons and the gamechanger is wall of reflection, its sokittennice in wvw.
Its not whishful thinking, its there up for grabs and its doable in all aspects of the game.. people tend to think there is some sort of contradiction between support and dps, there isnt. You can be good in supporting, doing damage and controlling at the same time. This is why the hammer is just beatiful in its current iteration.
1. hits for 1.2k each crit in wvw and its great when laying down some serious supportive fire on the opponents front, narrow the cone down a bit and increase range and it would just super.
2. Only good thing about it, due to how slow it is, is the selfheal on detonation. Needs to be fixed..
3. Symbol of swiftness, very nice buff and also great aoe damage, hits as hard as 1. People seem to forget about the damage component.
4. Make it possible to move while using, the effect is very nice and in combination with altruisitc healing it is one of the best selfheals, besides the best groupbuff, out there. The only downside is that you are locked in place.
5. Great tool that can be used both in offense and in defense to shut down an area or as a mass-cc when place on top of the opponent.
It scales very poorly with healing stats, i think i have like 72 each tick and i have like 200.
What it does very well though is that it works wonders with vigorous precision and with empowering might.
Ofc with shouts as well and also with inspired virtues.
In one on one heals from meditations are stronger but as soon as you get multiple enemies and/or teammates in the area of your boons then it starts the happen things.
This means that it has great synergies, which relies on the opponents stupidity and your teammates smartness, with the hammer which gives you both protection and retal and crits from symbols and ofc mighty blow aoe.
So trait larger symbols, empowering might and 2h mastery and and get at least 40% critrating and fight away with the hammer.
And no its not op, there are counters to it but those i wont ever write in a forum.
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@Sol
No worries, get more enemies, altruistic healing gets relatively stronger with more opponents. One or the other of vigorous precision or empowering might works just as you described.
Search fo other posts of me and you can find a post i did yesterday, i think, that tried to explain why i think altruistic healing gets stronger with more enemies.
Think my record so far is 12 mobs in one pull in cursed shore, sure it got hectic and i had to use cooldowns, not my elite though. Sure it can be done with a healing specc in minutes but i kill in seconds with 51% critrating and 103% critdamage when going full berserker in pve.
You know that champion gigant that walks around in cursed shore, just south of craven blight. That one i solokilled and with those wurms spawning in en masse, without using one single cooldown and only skill 1 and skill 2 on my other hammer.
I dont think an other profession would do that, staying in melee ranged 100% of the time, and it is those wurms in the aoe that makes it possible. Just try it with any other weapon a guardian has.
@Melizande
no i wasnt promoting cleric gear, it was just one way for the one i responded to to get the healing stats i have. I have accessories with SOME healstats in them. Infact in general im opposed to healing gear. Heals are the worst kind of support imo, then its better to build so you use weapons with a high degree of supporttools in them and for concecrations and/or shouts.
The nice thing is with Knights gear is that you can switch out some gear for pov/vit/tough stuff, and still end up the same critrating as with berserker.
And yeah it was worth it. I bought a full knights gear yesterday and use superior rune of the soldier instead of ruby orbs, survivability just went up by a mile and my critrating went from 51% to 48%., hp went up with 1650, toughness with 50 + what the armor itself gives you and shouts now remove a condition. this mean i could switch some upgrades in other stuff to even more damage and the healsaccessories are now totally gone.
My stats:
HP: 15300
Crit/critdamage: 48%/71%
Armor: 2900
Attack: 2744
I removed signet of judgement and now roll with 3 shouts in wvw, which was the main reason for getting this gear, and alternate one shout with wall of reflection. depending on situation.
Yesterday I also got one piece of karmaarmor, heavy aurora breastplate, with the same stats as the wvw gear but i think i have to play something completely different from my altruistic healing specc to make use of that gear. Probably 0/30/30/5/5 and 1h sword/scepter.
Still i hit a ranger for 4,8k with mighty blow yesterday. WvW i mainly played with staff/scepter but now i use my hammer and scepter and the staff is only a means of transportation and when sieging.
BUT, im actually thinking of moving out of altruistic healing in WvW, you dont gain as much from it there as you do in pve and spvp other then from skill 4 on the staff and since staff isnt my main in WvW i will focus more on damage and support then survivability.
@Sol
Frankly i dont know.
what i do know is i use both empowering might and vigorous precision and i get multiple heals. If thats one or the other or a combination that gives me multiple heals isnt clear.
But whats clear is that what you describe gives 400 health back and if you have a couple of friendlies in the area of the symbol we are talking about over 1k health, that is good enough for me.
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Brutaly, all of your posts about hammer recently have really made me interested in trying it out myself.
I’m still leveling though and I have to ask if it’s any good before 80…I’m particularly worried about not being able to go all the way into the trait point trees or having enough crit to support the build. My character is currently 61.
well ofc its good but it really starts to shine with critrating. At about 40% you will start to get why this is so nice.
Sure you can stack it while leveling as well but its gonna cost you, i swapped gear (one of the reasons i chose armorsmith) every fifth level to keep the critrating as high as possible.
May i suggest knights armor to wear and retributive armor, which is in the same line as altruistic healing. Knights armor have lots of toughness which retributive armor transform 5% of into critrating. It was worth it!
Its two tratis you need, vigorous precision and altruisitic healing. Thats 35 traitpoints. To reach AH you chose purity and retributive armor. Just put the rest in radiance for now and get decent critgear and it will work out really nice.
Are you implying that you yourself count as “allies”? Meaning when you crit, and it applies a vigor stack, even if it’s only on you, it counts you as an “ally” for Altruistic Healing?
Also, how does Selfless Daring turn into additional dodges?
Finally, it applies a heal when you dodge, correct? Does it also count you as an ally in this regard, and get healed aswell?
Thanks!
Yes, you are an ally so every boon you apply to an ally is also applied to you and trigger altruistic healing. So the chain and mighty blow will procc 4 different boons. The average for 50% crit rating is 6 boons applied to you, more if there are more then one target, and an average heal of about 400. With more targets in the aoe the heals will increase dramatically.
My point is that crits give you vigor which increases the endurance regen which makes it possible to make 4 dodges, 3 in a row with swap and one more about 4 seconds later.
And yes it also heals your teammates.
@Eyvindr
Yeah that setup would be similar to mine.
I heal for 500 each dodge so i have about 100 in healingstats.
I use energy in both hammer and focus in pve and accuracy i 1h sword.
In pvp i use intelligence in the hammer. With 50% critrating its 75% chance of critting two mighty blow in a row if MB is the attack you use after swap.
I dont use runes in pve, i use gems. I prefer absolute numbers instead of proccs and situational buffs and those are more priceworth and i can afford to switch and test new stuff. Sure i could buy divinity runes but those are expensive as hell.
During beta i played around with blood sigils but my experience is that you need to get well over 50% critrating until they turn reliable. its a procc on procc. I cant see a hammerbuild ever get that high, not even with full exotic trinkets and gemming.
If i was going pure 1h build i would use them in combination with the chill on swap sigils.
he uses Knight’s amulet (vit/power/preci) but Knight’s armor has (toughness/power/preci) and as accessories he uses combination of power/preci/critDMG with a little bit of vitality.
The build was just an example of my traits, sorry for being unclear.
I use a berserker gear, transmutated from 3 different other skins, and have power/crit/critdamage in everything i use besides just three things which have healing in them.
The reason for healing is that selfless daring scales almost 1 to 1 with healingstats, and in combination with sigil of energy on my focus i get 3 heals in a row in addition to what crits and vigor give me. You need to dodge, why not gain health from it.
If you go with altruistic healing critbuilds is what counts imo since you have two traits that give boons on crit.
@Mordaeth
You are welcome.
Yeah thats correct. With altruistic healing and superior aria shouts is a given.
Sorry for being sloppy when posting.
I left it out of purpose, the main thing was the distribution of points.
I use two shouts (retreat and save yourselves) and signet of judgement.
The reason for that is to move around faster and ofc taking 10% less damage which makes me even less dependent on cooldowns and make me be able to kill faster.
I have 15 k health, 500 heal per dodge and the entire chain was just to illustrate the use of skills.
I do 10k damage, 6k being aoe, with mb+chain+mb while having protection and retal on my team while getting 400-1700 hp from altruistic healing. All in all 4s, what other class does that?
And frankly, this thread isnt about other classes, its about the usability of the hammer.
And SyG makes it very difficult to interupt.
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@Mordeath
My main point was that the hammer probably is, contrary to what people might think, the most offensive weapon we have.
The reason for this is that it can, thru traits, build some really nice survivability which gets stronger the more dps you put out there. Its the best weapon we have to push into crowded situations. Not just thru traits like altruistic healing but also thru the inherent cc it has and ofc aoe and the symbol and its boons.
Take vigorous precision as an example.
If you are up versus one mob you procc it on every crit, granting vigor and in combination with altruistic healing you gain health. So basically leech health form one and taking damage form one.
If you get two mobs you gain even more, you gain vigor for each crit and each mob which allows you to dodge more often and if using selfless daring this means that you almost have an unlimited amount of dodges. Vigor stacking in duration is infact a good thing here.
By using strafing and positioning you can outmanouver the pack of mobs but still get all of them inside the aoe of MB and SoP, hitting with all your aoe, proccing crits and vigor/health but only be exposed to one or two of the mobs dps.
So in short having 4 mobs to leech health from but maybe just 2 being able to hit on you.
The same goes for empowering might, it proccs more often when you hae more opponents, even though it seems to have a 1 s internal cd.
This is an example of what i mean, i think you need to try it in action to fully get my point and it becomes even more clear if you play with a party, the more the merrier, and your teammates get that when you have a hammerguardian in your team you should always, no matter what almost, be inside the symbol of the hammer.
Hammers get stronger by more opponents and in crowded situations.
Strafing is key though, if you play head to head then the above doesnt seem to apply to the same extent that i experience with my hammerguardian.
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No secrets:
Altruistic healing, 5 points in virtues, vigorous precision and full berserker gear.
Either empowering might and/or sigil of battle in 1h sword/hammer or sigil of intelligence in the hammer. Depending on sigil you use different weapons as opener to benefit from both crit from mighty blow or 6 stacks of might when its hammer time..
Ofc 2h mastery so you can permachain mb with the chainskill.
I use pov/pre/critdamage gems instead of runes.
Approach the opponent by using retreat.
Flash in with 1h sword, pull all cd on 1h and build might and force them to use cooldowns and dodge. Use skill 5 on focus just before swap.
Switch to hammer with 100% crit.
Mb
Save your selves give you 70% crit and stand your ground cc immunity when you land mb.
Chain
Mb
Root
Ring of warding
Mb
Banish
Chain
Mb
Swap to 1h
Absolutely supernice in a one on one. Gamechanging versus multiple opponents.
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@ Phor
Check further down in the thread and you find an other build which is my main pvebuild. It incorporates empowering might.
If its more effective? Well that depends on playstyle and what you want to achieve with the build.
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Hammer is fine, just because some of the players havent figured out what its good for doesnt mean that its broken in any way or form.
Especially since there are players doing wonders with it and get OP tells ingame from opponents.
Anyone but me that makes 10k burst with MB+chain+MB? And over 60% that damage being true aoe while adding protection and retal to my team!
Sarcasm on:
Yeah that weapon is seriously broken.
Sarcasm off:
@Aaron
Seriously, low dps on the third chain? Its one of the best attacks we have dpswise, that and mighty blow. no3 crits for 2k alone, the symbol hits simultanously with no 3 and crit for 1k and if you have traited larger symbols it will hit two times. So basically 4k damage. Add in protection and retaliation on top of that ond ofc aoe. The third skill on the 1h sword maxes out on 2k with the exact sam build and GS isnt even in the same league.
There is a reason why that attack is slow, its because it extremely powerful when you land it and especially in large packs of opponents.
Single target, in pve, i kill my target faster with the hammer then i do with the 1h sword and focus and im not depending on cooldowns (zealots defense and focus skills) to accomplish it.
Why cancel it, just do it and then use might blow or any of the other skills.
Ofc i cancel it sometimes but then i do it with a dodge/mb combo. Cancelling it as the norm wont make you gain anything, it just feels better and has nothing to do with performance. That cancelling manouver is present in all the weapons btw. Anyone used focusskills while doing the chain or using shouts. Or aborting the last part of the chain to use a cc-signet?
The fact is that if you dont abort from time to time you have a l2p issue, and this is true with all weapons.
@Non in particular but almost everyone in general.
Gosh how i wish there where parsers for this game so people could get this in numbers. Half the community are fooling themselves when it comes to the hammer.
Search for alarox and what he has posted and checkout the dpscharts he made and you might get and idea of what the hammer is all about.
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@akamon maxing out both valor and honor works just fine. With a berserkergear (exotic) you will end up with well over 40% critchance, over 60% critdamage and about 15k health and over 1800 in power. Pretty impressive condsidering the boons a hammerbuild can generate makes you able to tank huge hordes of mobs.
I use retreat and save your selves as shouts in pve and signets for healing and also signet of judgement for less incoming damage and ofc even more boons to the group and heals to me.
Switch out 2h and mastery for pure of voice for even more teamsupport and heals or larger symbols, or heals from symbols or…………….. The list of alternatives is endless. The only four things you never should alter is:
1. Altruistic healing
2. Retributive armor, i wonder when people will realis how good that one really is?
3. Vigorous precision
4. Inspired virtues
Have fun
My build for solos and group pve.
http://gw2skills.net/editor/en/?fUAQNAS8NlYgSDnFCTkiIXgtAsHYE+Z86hDpIDB;TIBA2ynEOJdS9kyJqsMZJyymlLLZWLMGYcEZLyTkpIA
Used with hammer and 1h focus where hammer is the offensive/sipport option and 1h the option when im about to die, blinds are huge in pve.
Took everyone’s tips seriously and ended up getting full masterwork explorer’s with the pirate rune for more magic find. Omnom bars for even more MF.
I decided to go to Cursed Shore and managed to get a skill point I was stuck on and about 1g 20s in a little over an hour of just cutting through enemies and selling greens/blues and mats to the TP. It feels nice being able to kill 2-3 enemies fairly quickly.
I ended up getting a hammer for my swap, so between that and the great sword things feel a lot better than they did before.
I went 25 Zeal, 20 Radiance, 15 Valor and 10 to Virtues.
Good for you!
May i suggest that you move those points out of zeal, if your not into spiritweapons which isnt that great for open world pve due to cooldowns, and max out altruistic healing.
Just try it with vigorous precision and over 40% crit in combination with the hammer and i think you will ditch the gs as well. Infact is that i use my 1h sword and focus as my defensive option.
Use runes of energy and in combination with vigorous precision and selfless daring you have survivability and alwasy three dodges up your sleeve.
http://gw2skills.net/editor/en/?fUAQNAsdSlYg67mESKEmIFRuALFE0g4Hw41DHSRGC;TYArPGRcEZLyTk5HA
Test this but dont forget you need the critrating, 40-50% is about right..
You dont need 10 points in virtues, 5 is enough, then you get more boons from virtues which synergies really well with altruistic healing and can have those points in honor.
check out retributive armor, in most setups that trait is more powerful then actually investing in radiance. Purity is also great, removing conditions on the fly whihc increases movementspeed thru the maps, when farmign nodes.
Zeal is arguably our worst traitline, unless going spiritweapons, and if you need more power adjust that with gems and gear.
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actually thanks to Brutaly thread about hammers that made me spec hammers haha, thanks Brut! its really quite fun
Np, its weird that so many complaining about the hammer in both pve and pvp when there isnt one single weapon that allows you to play as ferocious and fast as the hammer does.
It is THE frontline soldier of the game.
Stack critchance to 50% and its just hysterical.
If you pull a mob or two and get low on health the solution isnt to try and kite, its infact to pull more mobs to get more heals and more damage.
Saving up to a explorer set now and i will try they out, the extra drops would be nice but not more important then running thru level 80 areas and kill everything fast and furious.
Can just agree with a poster above, i do all pvecontent, open world and dungeons in berserkergear and berserker weapons.
Even with 12k health i just run thru pvecontent with my hammer/1h sword setup.
The only time i struggle is in situations when i need ranged and then i have to equip the scepter and that is solved.
Give it time, berserker is all you need and its superfun in combination with altruistic healing, vigorous precision and inspired virtues.
Even the staff becomes fun with these traits, just use skill 4 when you need health and you will get the picture.
Hang in there, the guardian rocks as offense in pve.
or that symbol duration/size boosts dps with approx 15-20% on a hammer, since it takes no additional time to gain that dps. This is just one example and there are others as well.
Even though interesting it has little relevans, in pve and pvp, when actually doing dps with a traited guardian.
Refer to this post:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/guardian/Guardian-steady-weapons-dps-test/first#post167175Then read my reply. Because remember, PvE is different from PvP.
Not to be harsh but even though that table is correct, based ion the criteria set up in the test, it has no connection to reality what so ever since traits isnt included. Weapons are effected in different ways from traits, for instance comparing singletarget weapons with aoeweapons is misleading.
The fact is that the weapon you score seconds lowest in that test is actually the one thats number two on the dps list.
So by all means, post your testing but please dont crosspost them if they arent conclusive, which they arent.
A guardian can be specced for both heavy support and heavy damage at the same time.
This goes for both spvp and pve.
I maintanked (yeah you read it correctly, i maintanked, aggro for minutes is maintanking to me) some bosses in explorermode with my exotic berserker guardian. Almost 60% critrating, 45% crit damage and using three shouts as utility. Spewing out boons from my hammer and regen form 1h/focus, all this with just 14k health.
You can almost stand toe to toe with champions and you never need have to dodge a veteran.
So yes you can use dpsbuilds and still support your team with boons and cc at the same time.
If that dps is on par with other profession? Frankly i dont know but as long as i can do it with shouts, boons/conditions from weapons and virtues then i think i also solve my supportive duties.
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@Eveningstar
Thx for a much better sumup then mine. I think it covers it.
@Tracker wolf
You say that the hammer isnt a in a good place, might it be that there is more depth in the weapon then you have discovered? There are a abunch of people that use it in tournements and are doing great with it and there are also casual players that would disagree with you.
Might it be that it doesnt work with your playstyle or your preferences? I know this was my issue with the hammer and as soon as i activiely chose to understand the weapon and didnt try to make something out of it that its not, it started do wonders for me.
@Alarox
Thx for posting that, its pretty much sums up why the hammer is in very good shape and its mainly peronal preference that keeps people from exploiting the full power of the weapon.
Your conclusion is spot on, i could live with that change but i fear it would be to fast and spammy. Imo, personal preference but still, one of the things that make the hammer fun is the sluggish way it behaves, its a godkittenhammer and it weighs like 30 kilos. If its to fast i would totally loose the immersion.
An other way to go is to increase the rewards (people tend to act on rewards) in the third step of the chain. Why not make it a true aoe and people might feel they get rewarded?