Guild Wars 2

Actually a 0/15/30/20/5 build is very well rounded for pretty much any situation. DPS will be lower than a dedicated build, but you can do a fair amount of damage if you run with fullzerker+scholar runes. I would highly recommend changing honor’s 20 point talent to provide might on crit to the party as this will proc AH and boost the party’s damage slightly. This is assuming the others in the party are not providing any/much might.

Now, be aware, though, this is a jack of all trades setup. You will be mediocre compared to dedicated builds in either direction, however, if you change gear depending on need (Zerker+Scholar = Damage, Knights+Soldier = Anchor), you should be able to fill those roles successfully in a PvE environment. I have used this variation of build since launch as my all-purpose build.

For any new guardian’s I would recommend the 0/15/30/20/5 build as an entry level trait setup as the versatility and sustain helps to learn the ropes while learning dodge timing and what not. That said, I have since branched off from this to various builds, depending on the circumstances, but I have mostly focused on damage dealing builds as I enjoy the playstyle more.

Now, as far as “DPS/Support,” it is hard to play both and it be a 50/50 split. Typically, if you want to provide support you will want to run with Clerics armor+Boon Duration runes while trinkets are a mix of Knights or Cleric (Celestial can work too, in that situation, but that is currently an ongoing debate that we shouldn’t start here).

As DPS, you will want to get as close to full Berserker’s gear in every slot while using Scholar runes (Ruby orbs work as a cheap alternative, but the difference is noticable.)

As a support oriented Guardian, it can very greatly depending on group comp (or how willing you are to change traits situationally), but one of the most common trait builds you will see for a “support guardian,” especially when an Anchor is needed, will be some variation of 0/0/30/30/10 with AH/Pure of Voice, two shouts and wall of reflection.

As a DPS oriented Guardian our Sword/Scepter our best bests for single target in melee/ranged respectively. A 10/30/x/5/5 baseline is a good starting point while building for DPS. The remaining 20 trait points are divide among either personal survival traits or additional damaging traits.

I could ramble on, forever, but before I start going … more in depth. How/what sort of situations are you trying to prepare for? Strictly PvE Dungeons, Open world, Hybrid PvE/WvW, Strictly WvW, sPvP?

Like the above, you want to use a high DPS build, something with 10/30/x/x/x to maximize sword/focus damage. The goal is to kill Deadeye very quickly. I’d recommend all gambits with the exception of Squeamish. As the combat starts you want to position yourself between deadeye and the quaggan, making sure to face away from it while attacking deadeye. Drop WoR immediately once you’re on top of deadeye to mitigate most of his damage and make sure to blind only when he casts killshots.

Be sure to precast staff #4 as you’re going in, but switching and opening with Sword#2 to get in to position. You may need to practice a bit if you’re not used to the play style. I’m certain you can do it other ways, but this is – essentially – how I did it. The quaggan tends to make things more complicated (you have to heal yourself, especially if the quaggan takes any hits), but is generally a joke if he receives no damage.

Please refrain from posting threads from different forums when we’re discussing things here. It provides nothing to the conversation, if you want to bring up info regarding something in particular, sure, reference the link, but simply putting a link to info elsewhere without context is pointless.

Just briefly glancing at some of the math in this thread I think many of you are overlooking the fact that damage modifiers are multiplicative with one another.

For example, a 10/30/0/25/5 (coincidentally, my preferred dps build for pve atm), has:
1) Fiery Wrath, 10%
2) Powerful Blades, 5% (with sword/spear)
3) Radiant Power, 10%
4) Elusive Power, 10%
5) Scholar/Racial Consumable

No Scholars/Consumable
10% * 10% * 10% * 5% = 1.397 or 39% (I round down, as the game seems to round down all other situations, when it needs to), about 4% more damage than if they were additive.

Scholars/Consumable included
10% * 10% * 10% * 10% * 10% * 5% = 1.691 or 69%, about 14% more damage than if they were additive.

This has been tested and confirmed by myself and several other players that wander around here and reddit.

Just be sure to calculate that when trying to math things out. Crit damage is calculated last in the damage sequence:

(Damage after Modifiers/Debuffs) * (1.5+Crit Modifier)).

Not much you can do, but I’ve been spending my tickets (just the ones I’ve been getting from doing stuff normally, not buying any) on all the easy t3/t2 bosses without gambits for quick silver. T3 bosses give 24s, T2 give 20s. It is terrible compared to the farm before, but it is a quick 1g~ for 5~ tickets for about 10 minutes of work. Obviously, this can only be once daily, but it is there.

I’m incredibly skeptical about that post, I’m hopeful that it is true, however, it is quite possible they misunderstood what question that user had asked in their support ticket. The answer has a high chance to be in reference to the watchwork knight mini which has been confirmed for a fix soon.

That said, I really adore the idea of the combat tonic. I would prefer them to be usable on command (10 minute duration, 10 minute CD – so dying would see it go to waste, otherwise it’d be permanent), especially for the infinite variations. I hope they continue to offer interesting in combat rewards in the same vein.

One issue I have with the current iteration, though, is that changing maps removes the transformation. The CD should be lowered significantly (5 minute CD/5 minute duration) if that behavior is maintained.

The ones sold on the trading post were acquired by players and put up for sale. There may just be no one who has gotten one and wanted to sell it yet.

I’ve noticed that when previewing items, regardless of the appearance on the item, it previews the base item which provided the stats. Not sure why this was implemented/changed, but it would seem to be mostly an inconvenience.

Yeah, I typically try to find a share buddy that has a sub 20s or less kill time, makes it a very clean business for us to get in and out without much wait time.

When I discovered the method early on I decided I would finish my Sunrise. I only needed the Charged Lodestones, Icy Runestones and the precursor. I haven’t spent more than an hour or two on Deadeye since I no longer need any gold (i’ve got about 100 left over, and invested in a few gems for the sales that start tomorrow). It was a long, boring process, but I finally finished the weapon I’ve wanted since beta!

I only have to wait for WoR too, Save yourself is merely an adds a bit of damage. The less time spent in the arena, the less opportunity for mistakes or glitches to occur. I typically wait 30s outside of the arena before queuing again.

You are correct, though, as long as you aren’t wasting time between WoRs you should be fairly close to peak efficiency. I’ve made an embarrassing amount of gold farming Deadeye (750g~) since patch hit, so I’ve more or less perfected my method. I can reach 18g~ an hour not counting any other drops. I was exceedingly surprised when it didn’t get nerfed once everyone discovered and started sharing the deadeye farm when Subject 7 got the nerfbat.

Anyway, not saying my method is perfect, but it is very close to peak efficiency when done properly.

Edit: I a word.

20/30/0/10/10
II and VIII in Zeal – This is merely for the extra power, the focus cd reduction helps ensure you have the focus skills ready for every cycle.
VI, X, and XI in Radiance – Standard fair for DPS builds.
II in Honor – CD reduction keeps Save Yourself on time with the rest of the cooldowns in the cycle.
I in Virtues – If done correctly Aegis will never drop while fighting deadeye and 20% damage boost will have a 100% uptime.

Rest is close to yours, PokerTuna, the exception being I open as such:
1) Precast Staff #4 once the “you will be teleported in” appears.
2) Sword #2.
3) Wall of Reflection + activate Focus #5.
4) Focus #4 + Virtue of Justice at the same time.
5a) Finish autoattack if only the last hit of the chain is left.
5b) Use Save yourself and activate sword #3
6) Autoattack should finish him right near the end of the chain.

I can do this without bloodlust stacks, but the only way to make sure he dies before teleporting is to have some sort of food/buff, I run with Potent Sharpening Stones+100 power/10% crit damage food when i’m farming.

I kill Deadeye in about 8.5 seconds without bloodlust stacks, and roughly 7 seconds with them 25/25.

Quick damage reference:
Auto attacks, 4.8k – 4.8k – 3k * 3 [for the last hit of the chain]
Sword #3, 14-16k
Focus #5, 10-12k

If you can show proof, with screenshots and side-by-side math, of you taking zero damage (as a guardian) from a mob of the same level I will literally give you 100g. OR If you can show any proof whatsoever that your theory has any validity in the realm of actual gameplay.

Though, if your only rebuttal is calling people “kids” and having no verifiable proof… I am pretty certain my gold is safe.

Zero damage taken is not possible. Toughness and armor are calculated first to establish an initial incoming damage value. Any damage that is left after being mitigated by armor is reduced by any active boons or signets by their percent values (they should stack multiplicatively like damage multipiers, but the stack order is vague in regards to vulnerability).

The only way to take zero damage from something would be to have an astronomically high amount of toughness (In the 10s of millions at 80, maybe larger, it has been awhile since I played with the numbers).

@OP
You sound like an infant when you bash kids on an internet forum. If you want a proper discussion you do not rebut a thread full of people telling you are wrong (many with examples) by producing unsubstantiated math. If you truly believe what you are saying, go find a way to test it and show us your result via screenshots.

One thing I would consider when choosing between Mjolnir and Jugg is the “update” coming to legendary weapons that will allow us to change the stats on them dynamically. I absolutely love the idea of having a Mjolnir or a Juggernaut, but if I had to choose between the two I would definitely take the change into consideration.

I’ve spent a lot of time on Deadeye. The problem isn’t the boss, it is the reward. The bags shouldn’t have had such a large amount of silver in them. As of this moment gauntlet tickets are effectively worth 10s each. 15 sprockets are worth roughly 3s, purchasing 5 tickets costs 20s + 15 sprockets, for a total of approximately 23s. This is a 27s profit per 5 tickets. This does not factor in any of the profitable rewards (charged lodestone, maint oil, additional tickets) that drop from the bags. The profit simply needs to be toned down. Adjusted to maybe a 10s profit (bags give 4-8s, average of 6s – instead of 8-12s, average of 10s) should bring down the hourly rate to something that, while an option, isn’t economy breaking.

My hope is that they don’t nerf the champion bags dropping, but instead nerf the silver content within it. Exchange the current silver contents with a higher drop amount for materials instead. This would, or should, make them equally profitable, but without adding “new” currency into the economy.

With the combat log lacking smaller intervals of time (it only displays hours:minutes) it would be an estimate at best which skills provide the damage per second. I’d wager it is Sword>Greatsword>Scepter when just autoattacks are considered, but that is more of a tangent we can discuss later.

It might be constructive to compare the cumulative damage modifiers of each build as well as potential damage of each skill given power/crit chance/crit mod/damage multipliers.

What should be said, however, is:
1) Relative expected damage output – Weapon selections/optimization.
2) Party support, degree of usefulness to the party – Conditon removal/Boons provided to the party.
3) Personal sustainability/survivability – Self-healing, blinds/blocks, etc – The amount of “buffer” a player has to make mistakes given a particular build/gearing setup.

Personally, I’ve been find myself using a 10/30/0/25/5 build in PvE when DPSing. It provides a fair amount of damage modifiers (10% [Target Burning] * 10% [Target Condition] * 5% [Sword/Spear] * 10% [Endurance not full] * None Trait Bonuses) while maintaining the ability to provide might via crit and not sacrificing the loss of the 5 points in virtues.

The build I’ve used in the past to attain huge Greatsword Whirls [20/30/0/10/10] is Dungeon/Fractals viable, but its reliance on Aegis makes its damage output less reliable in most situations. Aegis has the highest priority of all our blocks. If it is currently active, even if shelter/focus/etc are active, it will remove Aegis first. This severely limits the usefulness of Unscathed Contender outside of situations where you can’t control incoming damage perfectly.

Lol, yeah it is has some monsterous potential. We need to make a proper theorycrafting thread, but I don’t think the official forums is the most constructive venue. I think they’d have to make it something like “10% chance on hit to cause 1s of cripple.” That would give us an unpredictable, but powerful cripple effect. The potential to have all of the hits proc cripple is there, but on average you’d see 2-3s of cripple from it. The only issue about anything like that would be balancing. Right now it has a very generous cooldown of 6s with an active time of about 3s. Having a >50% uptime on cripple might be too much.

Smite is one of the hardest hitting abilities guardian’s have. Spec’d and geared properly, it demolishes people in WvW. 1.5k-2k damage per individual hit. Try dropping it into a group of people and see what happens.

Against a single player its effectiveness is diminished, but still quite large. Against larger enemies/world bosses/killable objects it is one of the hardest hitting moves in our arsenal.

The ability itself isn’t weak, but in order to maximize its potential you have to gear and trait for it.

@Tarsius
Probably not the hardest hitting in the game, but definitely in the top 10 in the right circumstances.

I finished Liadri with a 0/5/30/30/5 build using Fullzerker (scholar runes) with scepter/focus as primary, staff secondary.

Few tips from my efforts:
1) End the first phase as quickly as possible, this will give you time to play it safe in the second phase.
2) Shelter, Renewed Focus, Focus #5 can all be used to eat the damage from the visions/AoEs.
3) It is okay to wipe on this for awhile. Take time to learn from your mistakes, though.
4) Reduce Post-processing graphic settings to “None,” this will prevent the blind from affecting you.

I would argue that Zeal is the only guardian tree that is “bad.” There are a few choice traits at 20, but even they are fairly mediocre compared to our other trees. The 25 passive and the 30 options are really uninspired.

Sabull.5670:

Aza.2105:

Does anyone know how much power is +10% damage? I’ve tried searching for this answer and didn’t find a thing.

Thanks!

+X% more damage done is equivalent to +X% more power.

e.g. Sigil of force gives 5% more dmg done. I have 2k power on average. Meaning Force is equal to a 100 Power boost to me. Thus if I can have 10 or more stacks of bloodlust on average, I’m better off with Sigil of bloodlust.

Unfortunately, that number will be incorrect in most all situations. Percentage based damage modifiers behave multiplicatively with one another. If you have 10% from traits, 10% from a slaying potion, and 5% from force your total increase will be (1.1*1.1*1.05)=1.27 or a 27% modifier, not 25%. This effect is is greatly increased with each subsequent damage modifier.

In other words, the more % modifiers you have the more valuable power is. If you’re looking to see the largest return in damage go with Force/% Modifiers. If you want bloodlust stacks too, I very highly recommend stacking it with a second weapon and swapping back to force once you’re at 25.

3462 – (12*35) – 200 – (1250*0.04) – (972*0.06) = 2733

(12*35) = might stacks
200 = Dragon bash food that gives 10% crit damage, and 200 power for 30s on kill
(1250*0.04)(972*0.06) = Sharpening Stone

2733 – 180 – 250 = 2303

180 = Bane Signet (I don’t think the website you’re using has the correct value for this skill)
250 = Bloodlust stacks

2303 – (4*4) – (5*2) = 2277

16 power = Mighty Infusions
10 power = Mights Versatile Infusions

@Proteus
Use powerful slaying potions whenever possible to maximize damage and survivability. All damage modifiers interact multiplicatively meaning the more % damage modifiers you can stack the more effective they are.
(10% burning * 10% condition on enemy * 20% unscathed * 10% undead slaying * 5% greatsword power + 25% vulnerability = 109.5%% increased damage, not 70% increase like you’d think.) If price is a concern, most Powerful potions are cheaper than sharpening stones and if you can’t afford those then the Potent slaying potions are 9% damage, -8% damage from and typically cost significantly less.

Quick Test/Character Sheet Info
20/30/0/10/10, 30 point in radiance switched to Perfect Inscriptions… just for that little bit of extra power (216 vs 180 power, it isn’t much). The highest actual dps, though, will come from sword/scepter autoattacks. Greatsword whirl has some phenomenal aoe burst potential, but its single target is less reliable than sword. This is especially apparent when you factor in RHS’ +15% crit chance.

I suppose my concern is that your 20/25/0/25/0 build may be better off with a 10/30/0/25/5 build focusing on sword/scepter for single targets, with whatever alt weapon you prefer (I usually run sword or scepter with focus+greatsword). A guildie and I have been debating “optimal damage while remaining viable” builds and this is the current build we’ve been discussing to both maximize damage, maintaining survivability, and still offering some utility to the party. This is very close to brazil’s build with some very prominent changes: 10 in Zeal = 100 power, 10% damage to burning targets; the lack of pure of voice, no innate condition removal. This will limit the build (not unlike yours) to situations/groups where condition removal is provided by someone else (or you will need to run different utilities, depending on the situation).

I assume the primary investment into Zealous Blade is for the self-heal, but with significant testing it just isn’t potent enough to warrant using as sustain. At best it is a consolation for taking damage, however, if you’re running fullzerk you should be maintaining max hp as often as possible to keep scholar runes running. ZB just isn’t going to heal fast enough to recover from spike damage and it won’t allow you to facetank like an AH/toughness build has the potential to do.

@wolfpaq
Keep in mind that the number on the right of the character sheet is “attack” which is the max top end of a weapon + power, this number is largely pointless. His actual power stat is only “3,462” in those screenshots.

This turned in to a much, much longer diatribe than I intended, but I’ve spent a lot of time testing/gathering info in regards to maximizing damage so I’ve got a lot of things to say!.

Gonna go ahead and leave this here.
This was done with a 20/30/0/10/10 build and more info can be found in the thread we did a bunch of testing in.

Btw, base hp on a guardian is 10,805. 30 points in Honor is 300 vit, 300 vit = 3,000 hp. Full zerker+30 points in Honor: 13805.

Full zerker and 25 points in to honor: 13305 hp.

I do a lot of “ebb and flow” type maneuvers. I jump headlong into combat to burst a group, then run for my life as I recoup. That two seconds of block allow me to get the distance I need to start damaging safely again. Otherwise, I have difficulty justifying the heal on Signet when it is quite likely you’ll be interrupted mid-heal.

Both will get the job done and signet heals for about 70% of my max health, while Shelter heals for about 40% (@11805 hp). You’re basically choosing between a preemptive heal+damage prevention, and a reactive heal with condition removal.

Well, it is amazing for 1vs1, but anything beyond a single target it is pretty rough. Now, as a part of the zerg it is amazing. Smite is so hilariously potent. If I drop a smite in the middle of a zerg it is a constant stream of 1.5-2k hits depending on the zerg density. It is very easy as well to stay in the mid-line/back-line and chuck 2.5-4k Orbs at people. No on expects a guardian orb to hit like a train. Very rarely do people have a chance to dodge them anyway.

It isn’t perfect, I would say it is viable for multi-person skirmishes. However, you have to play a lot like a thief without any stealth: Very cautious, breaking in and out of combat only when you have your CDs up. It is very, very unforgiving in regards to conditions. I find myself running Contemplation of Purity, JI, and Stand your Ground. I have no other condition removal (I run Sharpening Stone and +100 power, +10% crit damage food) and healing is limited to Shelter/Resolve.

That said, I would recommend trying it if you have the gear as it is almost like playing an entirely different class.

I didn’t have a chance to screenshot as it was happening, but I hit a ranger rather hard earlier this evening.

Gotta love it. (please excuse the lack of a proper crop!)

I think zeal needs some definite improvements. Greatsword Power(Zealous Blade) is a small step in the right direction, but it really misses the mark. I believe increasing the damage to 10% and increasing the heal (either via a flat healing buff, 25-50 hp; or via a reasonable healing power coefficient).would make it a more attractive trait.

Now, honestly, my primary concern with the zeal tree is the lack of reasons to go in to the tree past 20. The newly added Kindled Zeal is disappointing. Even at obscene levels of power the amount of additional damage granted (4000 power, 400 condition damage) would only increase burning by 100 damage. Increasing the conversion may be a solution, however, it is an uninspired bandaid fix. Zeal desperately needs something as fantastic as Right-Hand Strength or Altruistic Healing to compete as a viable investment.

Start by separating Zealous Blade back into separate traits while greatly improving them in the process.

Choose one master and one grandmaster. (“Active” in this instance means they are not currently on cooldown; they are actively providing their passive effects.)

“Zealous Berserker”
Option #1: Increase damage of two-handed weapons by 10%. Master Trait.
Option #2: Increase damage dealt by 5% for each active Virtue. Grandmaster trait.

“Zealot’s Tenacity”
Option #1: Receive healing equal to 3% of damage dealt. Master Trait.
Option #2: Dealing damage restores 3% of your max HP for each of your active Virtues (5 second ICD). Grandmaster Trait.

This isn’t really the perfect thread to derail in order to express some ideas, but I’m genuinely concern with the lack of strong traits in our 25/30 Zeal branch. I expanded on an idea someone had above. I just really wanna see the Zeal tree have something fun and interesting above the 20 point mark. I also believe the 25 Zeal needs to be improved/changed to something more useful as well, but I could literally list off half a dozen ideas so I’ll save it for another thread.

From an objective perspective, what would you guys think of those as master/grandmaster options? Would that get you to invest 30 points in to Zeal?

Given Tarsius’ calculations above, adjusting for the change in spec (No perfect inscriptions, no points in valor), 20/25/0/0/25. I did some proof of concept pulls and it definitely seems feasible. I really just need to coordinate a group of buff slaves to help me break the record.

( 1100 * (2514 + (25*10) + (180+150) + (25*35) + (180)) * ((0.4 * 7) + (0.15 * 7)) / 2600 ) * ( 1.5 + 0.86 + 0.15 ) * ( 1.1 * 1.2 * 1.1 * 1.1 * 1.1 * 1.05 * 1.1 * 1.1 * 1.25 * 1.09 ) = 51589.39

It definitely seems like that would be the ideal build. However, it would be very difficult to get a “perfect” the less precision I have on. It will likely take many, many tests to achieve that number given an 84%~ crit chance and the unpredictable nature of the WW projectiles. I actually have concerns that the risen giant might not survive long enough to take all the damage. I am already knocking him to almost 30%~ by the end of my initial burst sequence. A further 15k damage (on top of however much extra I would do with my opening) might just push it too far… I suppose I could stop using shield of wrath in tandem.

In other news, I’ve been taking this build in to WvW (well, the 20/30/0/10/10) and it is hilariously terrifying. I surprised a mesmer (wasn’t a clone as he insta-downed) with a 12.6k crit, rather unfortunately I was midcombat so I didn’t catch a screenshot of it happening or get to the combatlog before it had been lost in the spam that is WvW.

These are my two primary gear sets.

The first (T3 Cultural) is my full knights/soldier runes/toughness set, build is 0/15/30/20/5. I rarely use this much of my toughness gear at the same time, I very often mix and match my berserker gear in based on situational needs.

The second (Whispers Heavy) is my full Berserker/Scholar rune set, build is 20/30/0/10/10. I have been running this build more frequently and it is a high risk high reward type of playstyle in WvW. Also, no one really expects a guardian to be dealing damage. I often run this gear with my AH build in PvE as well.

These are really the extremes of my gear sets. I also maintain a third set of Soldier armor with Melandru runes for WvW, which I run the more typical 0/0/30/30/10 build as well as -40% condition duration food. It takes a well coordinated group or a zerg to bring that build down successfully.

Edit: typo.

( 1100 * (2514 + (25*10) + (180+150) + (25*35) + (180 * 1.2)) * ((0.4 * 7) + (0.15 * 7)) / 2600 ) * ( 1.5 + 0.96 + 0.15 ) * ( 1.1 * 1.2 * 1.1 * 1.1 * 1.1 * 1.1 * 1.05 * 1.1 * 1.25 ) = 49642

With sigil of night/undead slaying. Well… this is certainly an interesting goal. It would require quite the bit of coordination. And the frost spirit isn’t a guarantee. As soon as I can convince my friends to spend 15-30 minutes in Orr helping me test I’ll see what I can report back.

Did a few tests (also with the warrior around, and an ele that helped with might):

Guardian Damage Sample

In-game character sheet is included as well (this is unbuffed, but with 250 stacks of bloodlust active. There is also a log of one of the unexploded morter shells there in orr doing some stupid high damage.

That was done, undoubtedly, with several of the projectiles hitting as well. It is fairly easy to WW “around” the mob to get additional hits.

Now, as far as the gw2build site, I updated the build/gear I tested with during the screenshot: Updated Build

You will want to add the info below to correct for warrior and his banner/party power/bloodlust stacks (and it doesn’t seem to have the newest traits/skill numbers, nor does perfect inscriptions seem to work, so I compensate for that here).

power: 696,
precision: 170,
critical damage: 15,

I’ll do a bit of testing to determine how many projectile attacks are hitting in addition to the regular eight. WTB Parsable combat log!

Lemme know if you guys need any more info, I’ll try to provide what I can. Busy day today, though, so I won’t be able to test until late tonight/early tomorrow.

So I made a warrior guildie come along and help me out. I pretty much shattered my personal expectations of what was possible under controlled circumstances. This is with 320 power, 170 Precision, 10% Crit damage from the warrior as well as some additional stacks of vuln. Unfortunately I was missing a great deal of might (about 10 stacks) and I did not have the time to wait for a Night cycle for 5% more damage. I firmly believe now that a 40k+ crit is within the realm of possibility under these testing circumstances.

This, obviously, is an ideal situation against a level 80 enemy with moderately low defense (Veteran Risen Giant). However, I enjoy seeing the potential. The Whirl was accompanied by a focus #5 explosion that is also a new personal record.

Yeah, that looks about right from my testing in game. The “burst potential” of greatsword whirl is higher than sword/scepter, but the dps will almost always be lower than simply autoattacking.

For reference, my sword swings in orr against the same veteran giant using the same preparations are critting for 4k+4k+7.5k (2.5k/each hit). Scepter orbs crit for for 3.8-4.2k, smite crits for 2k~ per orb. Greatsword, which attacks slower, does hit harder hitting for approximately 5k+5k+9k. DPS wise, the sword/scepter are going to be the highest throughput when compared to greatsword. They just don’t have any giant hits that feel “big” like Hundred Blades.

As far as protector’s strike/shield of wrath/torch #4, they all lack any individual weapon damage modifiers, so their potential is innately lower than skills that do. However, I have personally seen a Shield of Wrath crit for 17k (did not get a screenshot of that), and before I salvaged my zerker torch (never used it, and I wanted the force sigil out of it) I was able to get pretty reliable 8-11k crits. However, this was before testing using the same methods I am now.

I haven’t really done any extensive tests since getting my ascended zerker neck/accessory (was previously using cavalier ascended neck/knights accessory), and wanted to see if I could push any higher than before. I was able to bring it up a bit. (Screenshot below).

I am very confident that i’ll be able to break 30k once I get a bit of outside help.

Also did a smidge of testing with hammer, but I wasn’t able to break 13k damage. The sigil of intelligence is great for on-demand crit, but I always do these tests with about 72% crit with fury up. I have opted for a sigil of force in my hammer as that should provide the highest potential return. Thinking about it from a dps perspective though… that damage is pretty competitive with a stacked greatsword whirl. 10 second cd on whirl, 5 second cd on hammer and factoring the activation and time spent whirling I’d estimate you could likely get in about two and a fourth (2.25) Mighty Blows in the same window as a single whirl. Obviously this is some very, very rough napkin math, but it seems probable. Again, though, autoattacks are going to offer more optimal throughput overall.

@Akamon

The goal of the build itself is to be feasible in an “uncontrolled” environment. The extra points in honor gives a bit more of a buffer for the scholar runes as well as allowing me to keep Vigor up 100% of the time. The shout CD reduction is actually very helpful as well. However, for pure dps… I’d probably drop both points in to valor. That 100 power would likely be more valuable than the 10% crit in valor. However, retributive armor would likely make me favor going to in to valor (should be approximately 2.5-3% crit chance). The lack of attractive 30 point traits in zeal is the real limitation there.

As far as “burst” potential, I would have to test each of them. However, strictly as a dps comparison and still remaining “viable”, I would have to pick up at least 5 points in honor, dropping the remainder in to 5 valor or 5 zeal.

I’ll post again once I have a chance to see which does better in a potential test.

Those are some respectable numbers and about what one can expect to pull in a practical situation within WvW. The largest numbers were focus #5s on mesmer clones which skews the offensive potential a bit. Assuming this was you, Amins, I see that you indicated your actual damage on a typical target on the comments there.

I am in the process of getting a new graphics card as my 6870 decided it wanted to die, until then I can’t fraps anything with my fallback card (it is an ancient 8800GTS, fear meh). I’ll try to provide some video footage in the near future as well.

My Build
The screenshot below is an example of the highest I’ve been able to achieve solo in a controlled environment. Did this a few days ago for fun, but I have since acquired an ascended zerker neck/accessory, so I believe I can bring the damage up a bit more.

Typically, though, I run with right-handed weapon strength and bonuses to sword/scepter. With the recent patch I typically see Orbs crit for 3.5-4k with Smite’s individual orb hits as large as 2k. Greatsword has phenomenal aoe damage, but scepter/sword will typically have higher throughput on a single target due to the +15% crit chance trait. I switch to the Greatsword Power/Greatsword heals trait if I know I have to deal with significant AoE, but I typically just keep the scepter damage selected to maximize my damage at a range.

This is a very challenging build, though. Definitely not for the feint of heart. Not only are you full zerker and very squishy, but you have to keep Aegis up as much as possible for the 20% damage boost. These screenshots are taken under near perfect conditions: Precast staff Might, full Bloodlust stacks, Food proc’d for an extra 200 power/10% crit damage, Powerful Undead Slaying Potion, and full stack of leap blind from the grubs. With a stacked group and fights where Aegis doesn’t randomly get pegged from AoE I typically whirl for 15k, Zealot’s Defense for 16-18k, and Focus #5 for 10-13k.

I’m actually in the process of doing a proper write up if enough people are interested I can share it here later on.

I think with a bit of support from a banner warrior I might be able to pull off a 30k+ Whirl, however I haven’t bother testing it yet.

Keep a few things in mind, though, this build isn’t really feasible for WvW, I have done some WvW with it, but if you get focused you will die. This is a glass cannon guardian. That said, you can wreck some folks as not many expect a zerker guardian to hit quite this hard. I haven’t tried it in a fractal higher than 18~ or so, but I typically run a 0/15/30/20/5 build for Fractals using the same gear. Much smaller damage, but much higher survivability. The extra 30% critical damage actually helps to pull the damage back up in place of the lost damage modifiers and power, but the damage is still much lower than with the full dps trait setup.

Another interesting one…

Current observations: 3pc grants healing power and not power as stated, no update or change in this status as of the patch notes indicating a “fix.”

Moderator Note: As my previous note was infracted/deleted for a simple bump, is it honestly preferable to create a new thread for each existing subject? I prefer to follow the code of conduct, but from a moderator perspective, I imagine having more of the same thread would be redundant and take more of your time.

Top Stats are Greatsword, bottom stats are Mace/Focus.

15/25/10/20/0 Build; Greatsword for damage, Mace/Focus for tanking/support. I’ve found the build I use, with just the toggling of a few of the traits, can switch between roles quite quickly and easily. Despite my relatively low armor rating, I can also take quite a beating. I change weapons/traits frequently to fit whatever is needed, particularly in dungeons.

Healing power ranges from 200 with the greatsword, to 328 with mace/focus.
Crit damage is 48% with greatsword, and 39% with other weapons.
Crit % chance is 32(+5%) with greatsword, and average of 26-32% for other weapons depending on loadout.

I pretty much always have a Master Maintenance Oil active, which gives approximate 6-8% crit chance. Preferred food is +100 toughness, +70 precision. 10 Point Valor trait grants 5% toughness as precision and in combination with the oil gives 11% of my total toughness as precision. My build is not at all the typical Altruistic Healing/Shout build, but tries to focus on a respectable ratio in offensive/defensive stats. In combination with the 5 point Honor talent precision effectively becomes an avoidance stat. I often have 100% uptime on Vigor during dungeon encounters. In WvW, not quite 100%, but enough to give me a worthwhile enough increase.

DPS Traits Selection

Tank/Support Trait Selection

Runiir.6425:

runeblade.7514:

Runiir.6425:

You must not get how sigils work. The sigil of your main hand weapon can only proc off of auto attacks and the 2nd/3rd skill slots while your off hand sigil can only proc off of 4th and 5th slot skills.
If anything it is worse as people tend to prefer to use similar sigils in both.

+5% damage or crit only effects the skills of the hand that is holding the weapon. Thus equiping 2 +5% crit sigils only nets a 5% crit chance across all 5 skills.

Putting 2 sigils into a 2h weapon makes 2h weapons vastly superior to all others.

False.

I used Sigil of Fire on my shield and it proc when I used my auto-attack main hand sword.

In the 2 hours of testing in the mists upon dummies (you need a predictable enemy so that you are testing only a single variable) I did not see a single sigil proc off of the wrong hand. I find it hard to believe that sigils cross react and yet never cross reacted in a span of 2 hours of testing. In that time my main hand (mostly due to having auto attack skills to proc off of) had 82 procs while my offhand had only 25.

So either you got insanely lucky, or experienced sigil lag and had just used a shield skill prior to the auto attack. Oddly, purely defensive skills can trigger a fire nova yet seem incapable of triggering the lightning strike, examples include the guardian shield’s shelter or the warrior shield’s blocking stance. The nova, if it happens, will trigger upon the end of the ability.

I’m curious if anyone else has done similar testing now.

This is incorrect, first I don’t believe you. Second, I’ve tested this with multiple weapon procs to determine what the exact behavior is.

The easiest way to test this is to equip one of the stacking sigils in the offhand and autoattack something down with the main hand. One of my weapon combinations on my guardian is sword/torch, I’ve got a fire sigil in the torch. The autoattack from sword will and does proc the torch’s fire blast sigil.

However, sigils of the same type share a CD – or at least seem to. I’ve tried double sigil of air in MH/OH with a fairly high (60-70%) crit chance and could not get more than one proc in less than a 5 second interval. My testing in this instance was not conclusive, though.

The logic behind the change to symbol is really quite flawed. Give that the majority of our fields are Light and that you’ve reduced the CD on our leap finisher, the net loss of retaliation is going to be…. very small. This raises the ‘skill cap’ for most players who wish to maintain retaliation, but is a glaringly contradicting point to your stated design philosophy.

Symbol of Wrath was one of the primary damage dealing abilities that greatsword has at its disposal. I would rather have it as just a source of damage with no retaliation than have its recharge time increased so drastically. Given the large amount of traits that synergize with symbols it would be underpowered (In that it would not grant its own buff) compared to the other symbols – at least we’d have more buttons to hit with in a particular interval.