I run sword and board / LB celestial war. 3/5/6/0/0
My attack routine takes 1.85 seconds. It does about 3K direct damage and 2K bleed damage. That will go up or down depending on the group.
I have 3.4K armor that spikes up to 4.4K armor when I break a stun.
I normally run PUG groups. It is really easy to run with non-zerk, non-80s through paths. If the groups is low enough in stats, we don’t stack. We don’t run past mobs. The path takes about twice as long, but I have way more fun doing that than yet another stack-fest 10 min or less clear.
Honestly my zerk gear kills a bit faster because of no ramp up time and I can do some cool stuff with it while having fun. But it is just so same-y. I was always experimenting with builds and avoiding the meta even in GW1.
My only issue with the zerk meta is people too bad at the game to play with non-zerk people, and arrogant people who think they are good because they wear zerk gear. Thankfully they tend to play with each other and I can avoid them.
Some people do just want to speed clear, those people are also fine. I’d rather play with the build I want than complete the dungeon 33% faster, but that is their prerogative.
The zerk meta will die when the AI gets better.
I think shield mastery and missile deflection traits should be merge as one. That’s all that is needed to improve shield.
It would be nice.
I never take reflection because the cooldown is so useful (and bonus toughness). Two traits for an off-hand is somewhat overkill.
I am going to call it a Warden.
Something like this: http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Warden
As someone who runs celestial war, I marvel at all the various ideas and balance changes that do not affect me at all.
I have a zerker set. It does more damage. It does not allow me to carry a weak pug group through a dungeon.
I would like to nerf the noob zerk meta. Somehow discourage stacking.
I shake my head whenever people think they are good because they run zerk and then do not know how to dodge because all they did was stack at the right places up to that point.
Not really. Mob Damage is high enough that you have to dodge the big attacks regardless of gear.
Wow look at that amazing video worthy achievement and team coordination with active defense/healing skill burst.
You are right perhaps dodging is not the only mark of skill.
The only 5 man zerk that is impressive are the ones setting speed records for a dungeon. Aside from that, zerk is low skill play.
Still – playing as a full zerker is harder than playing as full PVT.
If full zerk wasn’t easy, then why are non-zerks considered carried?
High deeps means you have to dodge less attacks. Thus less skilled require.
Non-berserkers are carried because in a 5 man group with four berserker characters and one Nomads the Nomads fellow did not contribute 20% of the party dps. So in all probability he contributed below his fair share to the group, thus carried.
High deeps means less dodges. Right. Full nomads means zero dodges. Thus zero skill required. You sure this is the logical road you want to go down?
Not really. Mob Damage is high enough that you have to dodge the big attacks regardless of gear.
What Nomads people can ignore is the small attacks. Although Nomads is really only for WvW commanders, where the whole zerg can be routed if the commander goes down.
I love when “speed clear” arah groups take 4 hours and the “ultra-noob” non-zerks clear p4 in 1.5 hours with no wipes.
Still – playing as a full zerker is harder than playing as full PVT.
If full zerk wasn’t easy, then why are non-zerks considered carried?
High deeps means you have to dodge less attacks. Thus less skilled require.
I really enjoy the soft aggro. I run celestial war a lot in PvE. I end up having between 3.4K to 4.4K armor. All the attacks going my way makes it easier to carry pugs without being as slow as soloing.
All gear is easy mode. If you really want to claim skill, solo the content naked. It has been done.
Zerk is a form of easy mode. Rolling zerk does not make you good.
Zerk should do tons of damage.
Damage just should not be the only thing that matters for gear.
Active defense could scale better with stats. For examples, warriors get a trait that gives then 1000 toughness for 8 seconds after breaking a stun. It is an active defense, but does not negate the need for defensive stats.
You are still stuck in the Holy trinity if everyone is running DPS.
Haha warriors underpowered. Good one.
the dungeons have been abandoned.
Oh man it totally feels that way.
Dungeon emblems isn’t even the best way to get exotics. You just edge of the mist level and you will have enough badges to get a full exotic set of armor.
Then go sPvP to get the skins.
Non-zerk gear is only useful in WvW. So they might as well remove it from PvE all together, forcing noobs to learn how to play, and this debate will be over once and for all.
Yeah there is plenty of PVE content that is hard to zerk through.
That is stuff no one runs though because it is hard to zerk through.
I tried zerking the new zones and living story.
It was way easier when I switched to a celestial spec.
The new mobs seem to dish out less damage, but are far harder to avoid. I like zerk being max damage, but you should feel the danger when running it.
For all these people calling zerk = skill. That only applies to solo runs. When people stack and burst a boss down before it finishes a wind-up, that is not skill in any sense of the word.
A few days ago I ran P4 arah with one person who really new what he was doing and a bunch of non-zerker “noobs”.
I had done the path before, but I was no expert. We didn’t run past monsters. We killed everything between us and victory.
It took us under an hour and a half to finish and we beat lupi on the first try.
Now on the flip-side, I went in on P3 arah with some folks who did F-all damage and we didn’t get past the first boss. Our DPS was low. People didn’t know what they were doing and we had no AOE condition clear.
Offense should probably be your main stat. You should combo at-least two sources of damage (Power, Crits, Conditions).
The newer content seems to be punishing zerk more than dungeons. Heck, the xp boost they did this past weekend did not even cover dungeons.
I have enough healing power that healing surge is nearly as effective as healing signet.
If solo, I have about 3.6K DPS. If in a group my DPS is up to 5.6K.
That is not burst. That is not a zerk build.
I notice a lot of talk about DPS, but very few people ever seem to post actual numbers.
Because of the number 5 trait in defense. Armored attack.
10% toughness converted to AP.
Oh yeah. I was just surprised that a tanky-er spec lead to higher power than a non-tanky spec.
Dual Wield Agility just like Dual Wield doesn’t apply when Warhorn or Shield are used as off-hand. It must be an Axe/Sword/Mace.
I know this. When running 6/6/0/0/2, I use two swords.
I am running a full celestial warrior.
I actually have more power when going 3/5/6/0/0 than 6/6/0/0/2
Now the damage is still higher on the later because of the +15% and 10% increased attack speed.
I run sword & shield (normally). I seem to have an easier time with the newer content in this gear than I do with my zerk set. It helps that bleed seems to cut right through tough bark.