Guild Wars 2

The Reef Drake pet’s F2 confusion stack is currently not doing the damage it’s F2 says it can do in PvP.
The overtime ticks from the pet are currently doing 101 damage even with the trait to increase condi damage for the pet.

If you use an nvidia card, MSi Afterburner is a good free tool for recording in-game footage. There’s also Fraps and bandcam which aren’t free.

Condi Necro can 1v1 an Ele on point and beat them. Cele Nec just stalls for long and could win but it’s really dependent on the mistakes the Ele makes.

Chuck Zitto.2367:

I really really would love just one reliable blast finisher that isn’t a mark that has to be tripped to trigger. Maybe the reaper 5 greatsword skill instead of the stun on it make it a blast finisher. Maybe one of the new shouts could be a blast finisher.

Bone minions?

nearlight.3064:

Dirame.8521:

nearlight.3064:

Dirame.8521:

Zenith.7301:

Who gives a kitten about fear, it’s useless in PvE all it’s useful for ever since the defiance changes affecting fear is to get you booted out of the party for spreading mobs.

Engineer can might stack better than a necromancer and have similar bleed and poison output, with burning and confusion on top of it all. And engineer is one of the best classes at stacking vulnerability as well.

Why are you answering my post, a post obviously tailored to PvE, with PvP counterpoints?

Necromancer is among the weakest condi specs in PvE. This is not debatable, there’s plenty of spreadsheets and videos showcasing optimal DPS condi setups and builds for PvE out there. Start with DnT.

Sinister Engi>Burning Guard>Sinister Ranger= Condi warrior>Condi ele> Condi Mesmer>Necromancer.

And then there’s the fact that a condimancer, being the worst condi class for PvE also brings no group support or boosts to group DPS remotely competitive with the alternatives.

Well if we’re talking PvE then no worries. I was talking PvP.

Yeah Ceimash (I remember you as Jebro in Deathshroud). I respect Zenith for his argumentative skills, but he mainly focuses on PvE with some exceptions, whereas people like us see these types of topics as PvP debates, which they in general tend to be. On these forums its not always clear which of the 3 game modes is being discussed in depth, which can be frustrating sometimes.

Anyway as far as PvP is concerned, as I said before I beleive condi necro is viable, but not optimal, but reaper trait synergies have the potential to change that.

Yea, I guess I’ll start almost every post with “In PvP” from now on. and glad you recognize me. The problem I have with your thoughts is that, I don’t feel the Cele Necro is that great but, I can’t argue much because it’s just my opinon

You’re on EU right though? Aren’t condi builds used more often over there in general? Also while I don’t follow the EU scene as much as NA, I can’t really think of any well known necromancers in higher tier EU unlike NA.

There are some good Necros on EU, it’s just the one person I respect as one the best PvP necros doesn’t play as much. I do follow the NA scene a bit, and I’ve seen a few matches. My thoughts from what I’ve seen is that the build is carried by it’s positioning relative to teammates. Not entirely by it’s own survivability and or damage. Which is the staple for most Necro builds. The only difference is that one build has more effective HP and the other has more condi-deeps.
I’ve also heard that Nos might have a “secret” build, which might mean that he himself doesn’t think the Cele build is the be all, end all.

nearlight.3064:

Dirame.8521:

Zenith.7301:

Who gives a kitten about fear, it’s useless in PvE all it’s useful for ever since the defiance changes affecting fear is to get you booted out of the party for spreading mobs.

Engineer can might stack better than a necromancer and have similar bleed and poison output, with burning and confusion on top of it all. And engineer is one of the best classes at stacking vulnerability as well.

Why are you answering my post, a post obviously tailored to PvE, with PvP counterpoints?

Necromancer is among the weakest condi specs in PvE. This is not debatable, there’s plenty of spreadsheets and videos showcasing optimal DPS condi setups and builds for PvE out there. Start with DnT.

Sinister Engi>Burning Guard>Sinister Ranger= Condi warrior>Condi ele> Condi Mesmer>Necromancer.

And then there’s the fact that a condimancer, being the worst condi class for PvE also brings no group support or boosts to group DPS remotely competitive with the alternatives.

Well if we’re talking PvE then no worries. I was talking PvP.

Yeah Ceimash (I remember you as Jebro in Deathshroud). I respect Zenith for his argumentative skills, but he mainly focuses on PvE with some exceptions, whereas people like us see these types of topics as PvP debates, which they in general tend to be. On these forums its not always clear which of the 3 game modes is being discussed in depth, which can be frustrating sometimes.

Anyway as far as PvP is concerned, as I said before I beleive condi necro is viable, but not optimal, but reaper trait synergies have the potential to change that.

Yea, I guess I’ll start almost every post with “In PvP” from now on. and glad you recognize me. The problem I have with your thoughts is that, I don’t feel the Cele Necro is that great but, I can’t argue much because it’s just my opinon

Zenith.7301:

Who gives a kitten about fear, it’s useless in PvE all it’s useful for ever since the defiance changes affecting fear is to get you booted out of the party for spreading mobs.

Engineer can might stack better than a necromancer and have similar bleed and poison output, with burning and confusion on top of it all. And engineer is one of the best classes at stacking vulnerability as well.

Why are you answering my post, a post obviously tailored to PvE, with PvP counterpoints?

Necromancer is among the weakest condi specs in PvE. This is not debatable, there’s plenty of spreadsheets and videos showcasing optimal DPS condi setups and builds for PvE out there. Start with DnT.

Sinister Engi>Burning Guard>Sinister Ranger= Condi warrior>Condi ele> Condi Mesmer>Necromancer.

And then there’s the fact that a condimancer, being the worst condi class for PvE also brings no group support or boosts to group DPS remotely competitive with the alternatives.

Well if we’re talking PvE then no worries. I was talking PvP.

Lightsbane.9012:

Dirame.8521:

Lightsbane.9012:

i’m reading through your hybrid with death perception, and i can’t seem to agree with 80% of the traits you’ve taken. unless this is for pve purposes, otherwise FITG is an absolutely must in wvw/pvp. as most of your damage will probably be done with the scepter, i find soul marks to be a poor choice as well. reducing the cooldown of deathshroud makes it so rending shroud is even more on demand(and thus have a point) Signets of suffering i can’t really understand either to be honest, or spectral grasp as you are almost always at range anyway. in full honesty i’m not seeing a point of the spite line in this set up at all. unless you went spiteful renewal, chill of death, and close to death. all three of these serve your build that much better.
if i was going to run curses in any sort of condition build at all, i would definitely take parasitic contagion.
you also run no toughness at all.
now that i’ve seen the full set up of it, why is it called hybrid at all? because you have 1900 power? you may as well just go full condi.

The key here is theory and practice. You cannot justify my reasoning because you haven’t actually seen it in action.

When you spectral grasp a target (apart from it being a great interrupt) it gives you life force, and you’re applying chill to them which in turn applies vuln(bitter chill). They are also now right next to you which sets up Weakening Shroud, Rending Shroud, Tainted shackles and the 2.5s fear you can get when the target is withing 600 range. It also puts them within Locust Swarm range which gives you life force if you activated it before the pull. And with that you’ve just applied 6-7 conditions to your target not including the immob at the end of Tainted Shackles.

As for Signet of Suffering, it reduces the cooldown of your passive and active Plague Signet (this is useful, trust me). It also allows you to convert boons using the signets. So if you’re stunned and the target just so happens to have stab as their top most boon, you just just Plague Signet and instantly chain stun them from there.

Spite also gives you might when the target is below 50% and you apply more vuln to the target when they are below 33%. This increases your damage.

Death Perception works well with Carrion. It’s a condi build but the amount of damage you can do to a squishy with a life blast, makes it more of a hybrid than you might currently realize, which is why I call it the Hybrid.

see, i ran plague signet when it was 48s traited. this 30 second cd that it is now is fine for my mostly melee build. i’m just listing what i would do differently. but despite how effective you are/think you are with that build, that <1900 armor will come back and bite you, all it takes is an unseen killshot warrior, and 12k+ of that 28k hp is effectively gone. i know the basics of necromancer so including all of that information was sort of pointless, either way, you seem to have your bases covered from your reply, except one really big one: direct damage. (something parasitic contagion would help with.) what are you going to do when condis aren’t enough to drop someone?

Oh don’t get me wrong, I know the Hybrid has weaknesses and I never expected to win every fight in the first place. But I do know it’s Strenghts and I will play to them and I advice anyone who tries the build to do so as well. Applying weakness on targets that I can see, dodging (sigil of energy), and CC are your tools. Use them wisely.

Also you may want to check my previous post because I updated it with more responses to your other questions.

Lightsbane.9012:

i’m reading through your hybrid with death perception, and i can’t seem to agree with 80% of the traits you’ve taken. unless this is for pve purposes, otherwise FITG is an absolutely must in wvw/pvp. as most of your damage will probably be done with the scepter, i find soul marks to be a poor choice as well. reducing the cooldown of deathshroud makes it so rending shroud is even more on demand(and thus have a point) Signets of suffering i can’t really understand either to be honest, or spectral grasp as you are almost always at range anyway. in full honesty i’m not seeing a point of the spite line in this set up at all. unless you went spiteful renewal, chill of death, and close to death. all three of these serve your build that much better.
if i was going to run curses in any sort of condition build at all, i would definitely take parasitic contagion.
you also run no toughness at all.
now that i’ve seen the full set up of it, why is it called hybrid at all? because you have 1900 power? you may as well just go full condi.

The key here is theory and practice. You cannot justify my reasoning because you haven’t actually seen it in action.

When you spectral grasp a target (apart from it being a great interrupt) it gives you life force, and you’re applying chill to them which in turn applies vuln(bitter chill). They are also now right next to you which sets up Weakening Shroud, Rending Shroud, Tainted shackles and the 2.5s fear you can get when the target is withing 600 range. It also puts them within Locust Swarm range which gives you life force if you activated it before the pull. And with that you’ve just applied 6-7 conditions to your target not including the immob at the end of Tainted Shackles.

Let’s also remember that the constant re-application of vuln means that classes that cleanse, will cleanse the vuln first, which is not the one they probably want remove.

That being said, you can replace Spectral grasp with anything you prefer. I use it based on personal preference.

As for Signet of Suffering, it reduces the cooldown of your passive and active Plague Signet (this is useful, trust me). It also allows you to convert boons using the signets. So if you’re stunned and the target just so happens to have stab as their top most boon, you just Plague Signet and instantly chain stun them from there.

Spite also gives you might when the target is below 50% and you apply more vuln to the target when they are below 33%. This increases your damage.

Death Perception works well with Carrion. It’s a condi build but the amount of damage you can do to a squishy with a life blast, makes it more of a hybrid than you might currently realize, which is why I call it the Hybrid.

Also Soul Marks ensures that you actually HAVE a Deathshroud to enter in the first place. Yea you might have DS off cooldown fast with Speed of Shadows but how much DS do you have really? 10%? 15? Not worth it from my play perspective.

And I agree that FitG is great. That’s why my other builds utilize it. The Hybrid build is it’s own thing.

The written guide is now done.

Gameplay from me playing a full match is also on the way.

Zenith.7301:

Bleeds are weak as hell, burning is much stronger.

Problem with condition mancer is warriors are better at stacking bleeds than us, engineers are the kings of burning and many other cover condies, and poison is a tie between engineer/thief/ranger.

Condi necromancer excels at NOTHING in terms of condi application. It has modest access to the weakest conditions (bleeding, poison), miserable access to the strongest (burns), and worst of all his aoe condi pressure is far inferior to an engineer.

Engineers have always eclipsed all other condi builds. They get to frontload conditions more quickly, more of them are available (confusion, bleeding, poison, and birning in high amounts in one class), and to top it off engineers can apply those via aoe much better, they have better active defenses (turret heal is the best heal ingame, elixir s+ toolkit gear shield for several seconds of invulnerability).

Engineers also have lots of valuable combo fields and blast finishers, meaning they give themselves boon rather well as well as stealth, so they’re like a better necromancer who also has strong access to self buffing via might stacks and blasting water/smoke fields.

Whilst bleeds have slow damage build up and poison too, it’s the combination of Bleeds, poison, vuln, might stacks, torment and fears that make up the cusp of the damage that necro deals. They don’t need burning. They excel at fears.

Login.5102:

Our current trait layout makes power and hybrid builds more effective.

Condi builds have too many traits competing in the same spot. Terror or POC. Weaking shroud or Ling curse. Vital persistence? not if you want Master of terror.

Dhumfire…
corruption skills…

current amulet/trait synergy just makes condi necro weak atm

Isn’t the name of the game min/maxing? Finding the most optimal combination meaning, a certain trait will be weaker in a given combination so you just eliminate it from your options?
You don’t need PoC if you’ve got Signet of Suffering, if you want more survivability go for Vital Persistence, if you want longer fears meaning more damage, go for Master of Terror, Dhuumfire = more damage, Foot in the Grave = more survivability, Death Perception = Variability in your damage tools.

It’s all about how you want to spec. This mentality of “every choice must be easy for me” needs to die in a fire. It’s how we end up with Eles and Mesmers. Oh wait, I forgot, that’s exactly what most of you complainers say you don’t want but are inadvertently pushing for.

I’m going to be testing and probably streaming as well. I’ll be testing Dragonhunter and Reaper most of the time. If they are allowed in PvP, I’ll be in there as well. So yea, follow me on twitch!

flow.6043:

Dirame.8521:

Nepu.2918:

Dirame.8521:

counter to Rampage

how exactly do you do that?

Corrupt Boon, DS 3, Plague Signet (with SoS trait of course), Staff 5. They’ll step out of their Rampage right after the 3rd fear.

It’s quite common for warriors to activate Berserker Stance before they go into Rampage, so in that case all of your corruptions don’t do anything.

Also, even if they aren’t immune to conditions, you still have to actually land Corrupt Boon. Not only is this hard enough on its own but sometimes you have no chance of casting it at all because 0.5 sec cast time is simply too long if the warrior also has quickness. Plus, there are 3 low cd stuns on Rampage, corrupting stability with a 40 sec cd skill isn’t really a good trade-off, especially when those stacks of stability keep refreshing every 3 sec.

@Plague: this is not a counter to Rampage. All you’re doing here is sacrifice your own elite so you die less quickly.

The only thing that can be done against Rampage is run away (which necros can’t do) or kill it with focus fire (which usually takes at least 3 people).

I guess you haven’t tried it. The very fact that the stab refreshes is actually their greatest weakness because it’s always at the top of the chain when you want to corrupt it. You can corrupt it with Plague Signet then chain that into Warhorn Daze, dodge the next two stun attacks and use deathshroud to tank them till berserker stance wears off, then come out of DS and corrupt and fear them, chain that with weakness combo from Chillblains and Putrid Mark.
It’s not like Berzerker stance lasts as long as the Ramapage.

nearlight.3064:

Egorum.9506:

i tried out cele signets earlier and had significantly lower dps. higher healing and that’s about it. kitten near anyone can straight up kite you too. you can’t play condi like you do power or hybrid, DS isn’t for soaking damage unless you really need it to- it’s for dps.

if you’re using scepter 1 to deal damage you aren’t playing condi necro right, it’s not the AA that deals the damage with this build. it’s spectral grasp into 2.5s fears and dark path that deal the burst. plague, locust, and vamp signet are dealing the damage on anyone with stab or high stacks of might. That amounts to all the popular builds right now. play smart and boon eles and guards drop like you wouldn’t believe, i love fighting burn guards when they pop CDs for that 10 stacks of burn only to have them plagued back.

it’s hilarious when people use the long lasting condi skills on a power build, they’re just asking to have it returned with staff 4 or generosity sigils.

Condi Necro=high Burst Damage, poor sustained damage, low survivability
Cele Necro= Good Sustained Damage, poor burst damage, high survivability

So in my mind cele outperforms condi just because its good at 2 out of 3 things I’m using to grade it, while condi is only good at 1 out of those 3 things.

I wrote an extremely long post 2 weeks ago or so about why condi necro isn’t optimal right now. I dig it up so here’s my indepth analysis in the post below (had to double post because it was so long.

Well, I’ve been playing this condi Necro for a while and it does 2 out of 3 of those things really well. good condi burst, good sustained damage and okay survivability (depending on how you spec it). Your ideas that you may need certain things for the build to work may be keeping you from really giving it a proper try.

I actually gave the build to Djooce before I made my guide and he played it and fell in love with it because of how much power it has. He actually went from Rabid to Cele and back to Rabid again because, whilst Cele provides good survivability, the damage from Rabid is just undeniably amazing.

Pelopidas.2140:

What we are supposed to offer that other classes dont is AoE denial and debuffing. Setting up targets for team to execute, making the other team ineffective.
Bleeds, chill, poison, weakness in combination with soft CC and fears is our style. Which is slowly being stolen by rangers i just realized

They don’t do weakness or AoE bleeds that well. Only downed cleave.

Hey guys!

New week, time to show a build. This week it’s all about the masters of condi, the Necro. It’s all about how Necros can use their ability to stack vuln to their advantage in condi builds. Some people seem to have forgotten that vuln can actually increase condi damage but I’m here to remind them and show them how powerful it can be.

This build can be specced in several different ways and I go through those ways in the video and the upcoming written guide. Check the links below for the build and the video, try out the build and tell me what you think.

The Video Guide:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mYxb3yKxTuA

The Written Guide
http://intothemists.com/guides/6253-the_condivulnmancer

Full match with the Vulnmancer using the Blood Magic Edition:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mJetybPVICM

Builds used in Video:
Condi Vuln Necro: http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vRAQNBmWDbkjGatxybwzG4vxRvQBb6CIAiRdCUB0vYLqCA-TZhHABBt/AAXAAkKDEwTAA4DCAA

Hybrid Necro with Death Perception: http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vRAQNBmWDbkjGatxybwzG4vxRvQBb6CIAiRdCUB0vYLKWA-TpBHABA8AAGa/BBOIAJVGYgjAgwXAAA

Blood Magic Edition: http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vRAQNBmWDbkjGatxybwzG4vxRvQNz6hYehNdBEAxoOBqAA-TZhHABBt/AAHEAkKDEwTAA4LAAA

Death Magic Edition: http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vRAQNBmWDbkjGatxybwzG4vxRvQJnhTIehNdBEAxoOBqAA-TZhHABBt/AAHEAkKDEwTAA4LAAA

https://heartofthorns.guildwars2.com/en/

Nepu.2918:

Dirame.8521:

counter to Rampage

how exactly do you do that?

Corrupt Boon, DS 3, Plague Signet (with SoS trait of course), Staff 5. They’ll step out of their Rampage right after the 3rd fear.

Chaos Archangel.5071:

Hey guys. I made a necro recently out of curiosity on Rym’s blood magic support build. The class seems cool but I feel really ineffective.

Its not the build or entirely my lack of skill, I just don’t see what exactly I’m doing that another class couldn’t do better? With the sole exception of healing/rezzing I feel rather.. Redundant.. I just can’t figure out anything Necro excels at that another class couldn’t do?

So I ask all of you.. When you play Necro in PvP what do you contribute to your team beyond damage? What role do you play?

Good condi application, good boon control, good condi control, good lockdown capability, downed cleave, counter to Rampage without the need for Moa, counter to Eles, counter to all kinds of Guardians, counter to engies, Weakness spam, chill spam. Yea that’s about it I think.

Xyonon.3987:

Wait … I didn’t use this trait since the patch – I thought it was the same! So what’s the difference? It still drops a smoke bomb but it ain’t a combo field??? O.O

Yeap.

Cecilia.5179:

I think I estimate Reaper rather well. Bad utilities are inexcusably bad. GS relies on the part of horror movies where the characters forget to use their brains. Chill is being nerfed constantly, making Reaper’s core mechanic weak. Reaper cannot approach or escape, but Reaper is a melee oriented spec. Condition Reaper relies on Condition Necro being improved and Power Reaper relies on Axe/Focus being improved, both of which Anet has claimed don’t need improvements. The core design behind Reaper is making Necromancer PvE viable.
Final Verdict: Farming Machine

Oh, Condi Necro definitely doesn’t need any improvements. And when the Reaper lands, you’ll probably get to see why.

And I know Anet employees will read this and go “is he in the closed betas?” “How dare he say that if he’s in the closed betas?” I can assure you, I am not.

I definitely won’t be using GS in PvP because I hate slow weapons. I’ll try it but doubt I’ll stick with it.
The thing I’m most looking forward to using is Reaper Shroud. Reaper Shroud is going to wreck so much face, you guys aren’t even ready.

Just thinking about it now, I don’t even need to go into RS to wreck face, I can do it from the outside. OMGAH! You naysayers aren’t ready.

Give this a try; http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vdAQFAUlUUharYfXw+KQ7FLTG046rQ8Ff2BCw3xTezB-TBiFABIpEzKlgDqqiR7PKPA4BAQoaFnpDIhLAQAgDghHOA88zP/8zP3wDP8wDPcpAGVkF-e

Just whipped it up right now based off something I’m currently testing. Rocket turret is there just for the toolbelt skill. The toolbelt skill is beastly in damage and you’ll be surprised the numbers you’ll get from it. Rocket boots is there for mobility, Elixir S just there if you need to escape from a sticky situation and you main tool is actually the Mortar kit because of it’s immense range and toolbelt skill.

Double Rocket (after dodging an attack and proccing Kinetic Battery) combined with Double Orbital strike will be some crazy damage when going into a zerg.

GrandHaven.1052:

Hi guys.

Just here to pop my thought through on why I think the engineer is in just a shoddy place.
This is for PvP and WvW (small scale) only.
To be clear this is my opinion and I could be completely wrong.

1. Over-abundance of blind.

As Engineers we VERY rarely autoattack, they do pitiful damage, SLOW attack speed and generally are a waste. This makes blinds SUPER effective vs the engineer.
Its very clear that Mesmer(on shatter when traited, which is common in this meta) and Ele(when traited into fire) is able to completely beat us out due to these blinds.

Haven’t found this to be a problem.

GrandHaven.1052:

3. Lack of defensive traits

We have tons of healing with our new traits with decent uptime on protection as always. This ties into the above, but once again we have very little truly good defensive traits.
AMR now has A SUPER high CD, and the bug that it has with healing turrets overcharge majorly affects its performance.

We have a lot of active defences in the form of hard CC, soft CC and our very own blinds.

GrandHaven.1052:

4. Our role.

We don’t have a place.
OUr builds the moment are hard damage via Marauders SD or similar burst builds. However that position is very much filled by mesmer, with more AOE/single target damage and more mobility AND more mitigation, and to a lesser degree thief, more mobility and more single target damage.
We can also run tanky support just fine, but this again is outclassed by MILES by bunker guards or Eles.

We can still provide condi damage in the form of FT/EG or FT/Bombs (even with it being bugged). The only problem I have with FT/Bombs is having to stay close to someone to deal a good deal of your damage which can be detrimental when fighting Mesmers and LB Rangers.

GrandHaven.1052:

5. Stability and CC.

CC and stability as always been a strong way to counter engineers, but its worth mentioning this aggregates the issue post patch.
Engineers depends on CC to get damage out as most of our damage is on AOE and ground targeting skills. If we can’t pin down our opponent, we can’t bring the damage out.
As a class that lacks decent stability, unless you run the terrible FT, we get CC’D to hell from Mesmers and warriors while we are completely unable to counter while they have their stab/distortion up.

Blinds are a good counter if you run Crate or Mortar, or bomb kit. Dropping a Crate on a Rampage literally nullifies the Rampage if you stand in the smoke field. Mortar kit, does the same thing but doesn’t last as long as Flameturret’s smoke field. Bomb kit doesn’t blind as often as the other two.

GrandHaven.1052:

Finally
7. condition changes.

Bleeding has always been a great source of added kick for an engineer, sure IP was our bread and butter and definitely a strong trait prepatch, but now that bleeding is gutted even with high condi numbers we lose out on a LOT!
Even IP is pretty bad post patch when you compare it to other classes burning burst potential, ele and guard for some.

From playing Necro, I’ve definitely found bleeding to not be a great main source of damage but Bleeding has never been that. It’s always been 1 part of a greater whole.

As a Condi class you need a hard hitter that combos with bleeds to really push the damage. For Necros, it’s Terror(fear deals damage). For engies it’s burning and without IP or Incen-Ammo, I find our damage extremely lackluster.

I personally have very little qualms with Engies tbh. I’ve found power builds that aren’t SD that deal laughably incredible amount of damage, the one condi build that is just too good right now and a bunker build that needs tweaking.

Some of you may be struggling, that I can empathize with considering what we have to face but consider deviating from the status quo. Grenades and toolkit shouldn’t be the be all and end all.

jcbroe.4329:

Against the meta, I would honestly say that a well played LB/GS works better.

There’s a reason why there isn’t a single notable person running full condi in PvP (the closest are cele eles and necros).

WvW might be different though with the foods and weapon types (are people still using givers for more condi duration?) and etc.

Just because “notable people” don’t run a particular combination does not mean that combination sucks. It may just mean they are too busy being enamored by a different combination.
I can tell you, I’ve seen more condi builds beat Eles than Power builds. My word may no stand for much as I’m not a notable person but as Eles are the most OP thing running around right now, I wouldn’t take that lightly.

Maybe it does have a higher skill cap. I’m also guessing some of them get destroyed by Necros, Mesmers and Eles or soemthing.

That being said, people haven’t seen the burn guard featured in a PvP match prominently yet. Once it becomes common place in 1 competitive winning team, you’ll start to see it everywhere.

That stuff was supposed to be baseline…. /cry

Some will have you believe that LB/GS works better. Truth is, it’s just DIFFERENT. They fill different roles and do different things.

In solo-que, where no one wants to hold a point for more than 5s, LB/GS won’t help your team, it’s probably going to do more harm than good. There’s only 1 player that I know of who I’ve seen play LB/GS better than anyone and that’s Conditank. And even he can’t hold a point better than an average Sw/T Ax/D condi build.

Condi bunkers can win against Eles, mesmers, Engies, Thieves, Warriors even when they rampage, heck even Necros that love to transfer condis, it’s all about who’s behind the wheel.
They have good Rez denial and good rezz defence with Spike trap, great survivability with evades and good DPS support with a well timed entangle. What’s not to like?

Heimskarl Ashfiend.9582:

Hmm, snakes would be cool, but I think the animations would be hard to do well, meaning they won’t do them.

Myself, I’d just love a Raptor with smoke field F2 or Bat with a ‘echo locate’ aoe reveal.

Errr…. have you seen the new dragon minipet? What animations do you think would be hard to do well for a Snake?

Leeto.1570:

So is it ok to expect that after month there is gonna be something done about these moflocks?
Or fix something else anything… just do something…
Maybe im just biased and wrong, maybe really a game company that cant make leaderboard for 3 years actually managed to make one of their biggest balance patches completely perfect and there is no update required.

If you haven’t noticed, the patch notes are up and they fixed Mantra cooldowns.

Hey guys, I’m going to be streaming for a bit (11-3pm gmt) so come be my audience while I punch things in the face.

http://www.twitch.tv/ceimash

Stream is down.

Demented Yak.6105:

If you can’t do something with an ele, you need a better imagination.

That said, I find it kittening hard to survive on the frontline and as FrownyClown has already explained: we need more stability!

How can you need more stab when you’ve got 2 armor of earths (20 stacks of stab) and 1 trait that allows you to go into earth to gain stab?

Leo G.4501:

Personally think each shout should have a generic name like Furnace Call or Tundra Voice and each race/gender would say somethink unique like the attunement swap lines.

That would also work as well. Right now though, the shouts just sound very cringe worthy.

It’s only PvP and maybe WvW people complaining. PvE is having a ball right now.

Switch Cele to Carrion, take Sigil of Smoldering instead of Sigil of Air, think about taking Runes of Balth instead of Strength or Hoelbrak because you should still maintain a good stack of might without the extra boon duration.

Those are my thoughts.

yhvh.8703:

I think it should be made of 2 short words max. “Wash the pain away!” is just too long!

If that was “Pesta valu ara!” all of a sudden it’s just like….. THAT’S SO COOL!!

^That’s estonian for wash the pain away btw.

You don’t have to play it like Condi Rangers. Personally would use it to stealth burst someone.

nearlight.3064:

This is how I feel about engi right now. I am by no means an engineer main, I merely alt the class for fun on occassion, and when I do these days, I get wrecked.

I spend most of my matches running away from mesmers and elementalists with gear shield, elixir s, and its toss variant. Yes the stealth usually lets me escape if I haven’t lost too much health, but I feel like my ability to actually do anything to them is poor, and if I come back, my cooldowns will be up and I’ll die. This is on both power and condi builds, that are both forced to take elixir S and tool kit to even have a chance to run away to survive in the first place.

Anyway, since there is no longer any magical catch all build like the old cele rifle, I feel frustrated when I play it compared to my other classes, such as necro.

So how do you engis feel? Do you spend too much time running away from godmode builds? What would you change in the game in terms of traits and amulets and runes and what not to find an engi build that doesn’t have to spend so much of its time running away?

Unless the mesmer has mantra heal or mantra cleanse on their bar, I spend my time chasing them around.
And it’s really hard fighting Eles because when they nail their burst, it just hurts. At some point early in the patch release, I could beat eles even when people said they were tough, but now, it’s just harder for whatever reason. I feel I need to adjust the way I play because it seems they’ve adjusted how they play.

I’ve been playing my FT/EG build which has got me most of my wins in SPvP lately. Try it if you like http://intothemists.com/guides/5967-fteg_mightstacking_build

BurrTheKing.8571:

For Necro:

• Rather than making it the attrition class that it was in GW1, it is now a class that doesn’t actually have good condi application unless the enemy has good application.

A passive that just transfers condis for you? How fun and engaging! /s

Whilst I agree with most of what you said, this in particular, you are totally wrong about.

As long as I know their weakness my frustration levels are fine. What I’m not fine with is EVERYONE and their mother playing mesmer. Joe shmoe who I could easily turn into mush if i decided to turn on THE REAL interrupt mesmer comes at me with 5 of his other friends playing the same class… that’s annoying and painful to endure.

I literally won a match against 3 mesmers by 1 point. The match went to timer and we won by 1 point. If the match was one second longer, they would’ve won because I was literally on the verge of being stomped whilst holding the point that gave us the win.

Can you feel it? Can you feel it? Be ready!

ThePaladin.2140:

Ark Bladesteele.2943:

ThePaladin.2140:

Ark Bladesteele.2943:

ThePaladin.2140:

I was getting really confident with my build to make 3 good short montages of it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tzE45fq9X40

It was only when I hit something I couldn’t kill, a really good ele with diamond skin. My Dire pure burn guard might as well have been throwing pebbles at a Terminator.

What traits are you using there? Are you not running Valor/Zeal/Radiance?

Radiance/valor/virtues. Zeal has too little contributions compared to virtue.

You were using GS. Zealous Blade, Fiery Wrath, Symbolic Exposure, Symbolic Power? Perhaps you might be better off with sword/focus than GS, since it doesn’t do much for you here.

Pure Dire burn guards are not very effective condi classes, which is why I opt for a hybrid with just 700 condition damage and 2300 power. I still manage 3-3.5k burn ticks. With only one primary damaging condition, it’s really easy to cleanse, so I prefer Zeal for the GS CD reduction, symbol vuln, and extra damage against burning foes. Since Dire already has a lot of sustain, I would trait into damage further.

Glassier classes would benefit from Virtues a lot more, I think, although I suppose Supreme Justice makes more sense for a pure burn Guard.

The build works a lot better with sword/focus with the scepter/torch. I’ve tried it. I have just fallen madly in love with my sunrise not to use it haha. I have run into people who know how to cleanse effectively watch my second video. There’s a fight there with a really good ele who kept cleansing my burns but ultimately, all the cleanse will not help you when 2-3 stacks are built every other attack.

When built just to burn, a guard can be quite effective. Ele with diamond skin has been my one big direct counter.

When fighting Diamond skin eles, stay in GS and try to land Binding blade and your Whirling Wrath. Don’t pull them after landing BB, BB will tick for damage overtime and your Whirling Wrath SHOULD do enough damage to bring them down below their 90% threshold. Then you can pull them and switch to S/T to burn them.

Ragnar the Rock.3174:

Dirame.8521:

avatarpranav.1379:

Hey guys,

Just wondering your thoughts regarding synergy between hammer and the new spec. Do you think based on what we know now that hammer would do well with the new spec?

I’ve been maining guard since launch and worked really hard to get my Jugg and would like to know if dragon hunter would do well wielding a hammer.

Thanks guys

Traps + Hammer 5. Nuff said.

Traps are very very niche however.

Any enemy that can teleport out of them is going to make them useless.
Enemies with condi cleanse & stability will also make them crap.
By using them you also give up lots of support & survivability.

So I think they may end up useful in PvE but their usefulness will be debatable in WvW and PvP.

So…….. what you’re saying is I have to time my Ring of Warding and trap placement. GOT IT!

Obtena.7952:

Dirame.8521:

avatarpranav.1379:

Hey guys,

Just wondering your thoughts regarding synergy between hammer and the new spec. Do you think based on what we know now that hammer would do well with the new spec?

I’ve been maining guard since launch and worked really hard to get my Jugg and would like to know if dragon hunter would do well wielding a hammer.

Thanks guys

Traps + Hammer 5. Nuff said.

For PVE, I doubt it … AI is not smart enough in mobs to make them run away from our attacks

Maybe they will be? Who knows. Best make builds that are future proof.

Sauncho.8076:

I don’t know, I haven’t had any issues dealing with burn guardians. Probably the same reason I have yet to see any burn guardians in higher levels of competition. It’s not a coincidence.

Well….. just because no one plays it, doesn’t mean it can’t work. Even from the little fight of (i think it was Tage or Fraelina) someone using COndi guard in the WTS on ORNG with Hammer and S/F, it was absolutely devastating with the right timing when lobbed into a team fight.

Yea no one plays it, doesn’t mean it ain’t viable.
———-

And if you want something new, you should just sit down and stare really hard at your weapons and traits. You’ll figure something new out.

No for real, that’s literally what I’ve been doing.

I feel like that thing was too powerful for it’s own good. I know I was an advocate for condi guards before the patch (in fact, I was one of the people who made what I consider to be the first working condi guard build #humblebrag) but, it’s like Anet just went, well condi guard is on the verge of being a thing…….., let’s give it steroids.

I mean sure, let’s! But seriously though, condi guard could 2v1 heck, even 3v1 before the patch, now, if played well, they could end a team fight just by existing.

http://intothemists.com/guides/5967-fteg_mightstacking_build

I’ve been using the above build since the beginning of the game so I know almost everything about the build but as it seems you’re a WvW guy, I’m probably not going to cover a few things that might pertain to you.

In any case, I would suggest switching Elixir gun for Bomb kit in that build so that you can perform stealth combos for escapes or just for sneak attacks. Performing sneak attacks in the middle of the fight, just like mesmers, would actually do a lot to see that you win the fight.

Against Eles, it’s a matter of dodging the right things and making them use their cleanse against everything but your burns.

After watching the stream I really feel like if the Ele said “Ignatio!” for “Feel the burn!” I’d be more into it. As of right now though, I’m really not into it.

avatarpranav.1379:

Hey guys,

Just wondering your thoughts regarding synergy between hammer and the new spec. Do you think based on what we know now that hammer would do well with the new spec?

I’ve been maining guard since launch and worked really hard to get my Jugg and would like to know if dragon hunter would do well wielding a hammer.

Thanks guys

Traps + Hammer 5. Nuff said.

Bohantopa.5729:

“Feel the Burn” is ok as a shout. Sure some arcane gibberish would be nice but also much harder for other players to remember what you just did (for or to them).

But “Eye of the Storm” and “Aftershock” dont really come over as something anyone would shout, also the words dont sound active enough. They should be changed into “Bring the thunder” and … (cant think of an appropriate active sounding shout atm).

Oh please, Kage bushin no jutsu.<- That’s from Naruto and it’s not english. It’s easy to remember if you make it memorable.

Nothing beats Aetherized Hammer, for engie if you can afford or even find it.

PlatinumMember.5274:

I hope you have better videos than that one. I mean against a fresh air ele, all you have to do is not get hit by their predictable routine then wail on them.

I am intrigue though.

He wasn’t fresh air. He was just using scepter to blind me to no end. I fought him in D/D as well as what the preview shows; S/D.