Guild Wars 2

Wethospu.6437:

High end food (100/80) is like a 5 dps increase. Up to 50% of dungeon time is spent fighting so using high end food means about 2.5% increased g/hr.

Using Truffle Steak requires 40 silvers per hour. 2.5% of 10g is 25 silvers. So using Truffle Steak means about 15 silver loss per hour.

Similarly 80/60 is a 4% dps increase and 2% of 10g is 20 silvers. So using Asparagus means about 5 silver increase per hour.

Griffon Egg Omelet (60/50) is like a 3% dps increase and 1.5% of 10g is 15 silvers. Using it means 13.5 silver increase per hour.

---

Why all guides suggest using high end or mid end food?

Because people don’t write build guides to maximize gold per hour, but to maximize build quality.

Wait you use your tokens to buy potions?

what.

I would assume most people run Truffle Steak or Steak and Asparagus and conservatively 10g/hr.

I have more fun when I do more damage, so I like the change.

Also, what is a “DPS warrior”? If you’re talking about using Discipline instead of Tactics you have to ask how much is Heightened Focus really worth, since its the only real DPS increase in the entire Discipline line. I think you’d find that EA + Empowered > Heightened Focus in group play. In solo, HF is a much cooler trait since in a 5 minute boss solo you’ll get it multiple times, but I still think that the DPS of Tactics is better than Discipline even in solo. The reason to take discipline for a solo is Fast Hands allowing you to play more defensively… which is the reason I think the so-called “dps warrior” should be renamed “defensive warrior.”

Heimskarl Ashfiend.9582:

Arcing Sear: This skill has been replaced with Arc Divider. Arc Divider creates a 450 range shockwave that damages up to 5 foes it hits. This skill deals 75% more damage to foes below 50% health.

So, will this skill still apply burning or direct damage only? If it no longer applies burning, I’d be pretty disappointed at the lost synergy for a Berserker Phalanx GS build like this. Oh well.

I’m not sure why you’d think that build would get worse with the change? What loss do you see there that isn’t made up for by the direct damage buff?

Based on dev comments on the forums, I think we can expect a balance pass before/with HoT for the vanilla specializations. They have said several times Ele’s dominance in every game mode will be addressed.

A first revenant is far better than a second ele in a world without ice bow. The more interesting question is whether or not a ranger will end up being better than the first ele from a total team DPS standpoint without ice bow.

creepmatic.9435:

Sarahfull.4930:

Today was funny. I wasn’t in the mood for a fractal and I saw someone selling a lvl50.

I ask them if I could ask something first before I pay, so I asked if they got mossman. They said yes, and when I asked how they did it I instantly get vote kicked by them all xD

Before you, we had someone that wasn’t interested in buying, he just wanted to “talk” about what’s new with the game… we kicked him so many times, he kept spamming join, making people leave the party, while i was kiting Mai Trin. We didn’t want to risk a wipe/reset so was only natural to boot you too.

And to answer your Mossman question, no we didn’t killed him underwater. So kittening awesome right?

Wow thats a rekt. That’s leaving the baby in the car for 8 hours.

Lets keep the dungeon forum pity party train going.

DresdenAllblack.1249:

In PvE, wouldn’t Destruction of the Empowered be better than the cooldown on a single banner?

99% of PvE mobs don’t have boons. And the banner is the single most important thing you can do.

Iris Ng.9845:

Thief is much more preferred in any fast run groups just because he supports and utilizes icebow better than the engi.

Berserker engie is weaker than Thief with ice bow, yes, but the difference isn’t noticeable to the human eye. A 9 second ice bow boss fight lasts 9.5 with berserker engie in place of thief, and thats being generous to the Thief. Whoop de doo.

I can’t wait for Ice Bow to be gone then we get to read all the threads about how useless Thief is as a class in PvE.

I just find it funny how when there is a major pvp tournament twitch chat is full of 3000 backseat gamers who act like they are hardcore pvp bros who know their stuff, but there are only 30-50 top level pvp players in the entire game, so 99% of the pvp audience is tryhard wannabe elitists.

Kesmai.8527:

I would love to see goin into Berserker, having your weapon skills change to something else…similar to what Reaper does when entering Reaper Shroud. It could be anything from punching things with your bear hands,

…Rampage…already exists.

Individual DPS is meaningless in 5 person content. Compare different 5 person compositions if you want meaningful numbers. This is why we don’t/haven’t bothered putting out updated DPS numbers.

Torqbow.2839:

For a game that lacks hardcore competitive PvE, there certainly is a lot of wannabe elitists out there. It’s pretty amusing.

The same could be said about the PvP in this game.

Quickfoot Katana.8642:

The fact that Anet has got members of the Dungeon community who understand the mechanics of the game at a high level does give me a hope for their raids.

That is, depending on how much they want to tune them down after the testing is done.

Your sarcasm meter is broken, might want to get it looked at.

Yes, I have been raid testing for months. Lets just say that if your team isn’t planning on running a full tanky spec ranger you won’t be full clearing the raid anytime soon.

Tipper.6973:

- Phalanx Strength moved from Tactics to Strength. Right now, if you are a warrior who wants to do group pve content, you are required to take both Strength and Tactics. This cripples build diversity and group eligibility. Berserker is very unlikely to see play because of this, and if it does somehow see play over Arms (for example) you are still extremely restricted in what you can do with the class because your other two traitlines are locked in already.

If you move PS to grandmaster Strength then you can’t take Berserker’s Power and we are back to poop tier DPS.

Signet of Fury costs you 8% crit chance. Giving that up means you’re now back to Arms being the better choice. You damage already gets kitten outside of Berserk, losing 8% more crit chance just lowers it by another 5%. The only way it makes sense is using Head Butt, especially since activating Head butt is a huge dps increase. 2.25 coefficient with a 1/2 second cast time is no joke.

Your berserk mode is ending soon. Right before it ends you use a primal burst. That gives 10 seconds of BP. Right after BP ends, your Berserk comes off cool down and you can reactivate and use the burst. There will be a one or two second down time between when BP ends and when Berserk comes off cooldown.

Let’s say you refill your adrenaline quickly during the berserk down time thanks to cleaving multiple mobs or whatever. You can use Arcing Slice to avoid any BP downtime. But then when Berserk mode is ready again you won’t have adrenaline. Thats when you can headbutt to fill up your adrenaline and activate Berserk.

Essentially you can use Headbutt to fill in the gaps in either BP or Berserk since its 30 free adrenaline strikes. Since the Berserk downtime is only 10 seconds now, it should be fairly easy to manage all this. The real key will be making sure you save your last Primal Burst to hit right before the end of Berserk so the BP lasts as long into the downtime as possible.

Bunnytown.7801:

Yes. In dungeon PUGs it’s very much a thing.

It’s a thing in every group.

darthgreg.2340:

Disappointed that Berserker doesn’t offer enough to a dungeon/raid power build to displace Arms as a trait-line. Gotta run Strength for Forceful Greatsword, gotta run Tactics for Phalanx Strength, just leaves one trait line to play with. Even though Arms is tuned more for condition builds, it still beats out Berserk for power builds – this is really sad.

In terms of PvE feel, the on/off mechanic of Berserking is pretty clunky. The GCD/after-cast changes above definitely help this, but I don’t think is quite solved.

Nike himself said that Berserk’s biggest problem for PvE power-builds is up-time. The current change to Smash Brawler brings its maximum up-time from 50% up to 60%. I don’t think this is enough.

What if Smash Brawler were changed to allow Warriors to maintain 100% Berserk up-time in constant-contact PvE scenarios? “Critical hits extend Berserk duration by 1 second.” “Primal bursts extend Berserk duration by 5 seconds.” Something like this that means when a Warrior is Berserk and fighting, he can actively keep it going until combat ends, he disengages, or there is a lull in the fight.

This type of mechanic would feel really, really good. It’s too strong for an Adept probably… what about making it baseline?

I don’t want to paint it that bleakly. There is a really good chance that a rotation can be found with Headbutt that allows us to keep Berserker’s Power up 100% of the time. This beta, the issue was that once Berserk ended you had this 15 second dead zone where you couldn’t keep up BP.

Now, using Head Butt as our elite and with Smash Brawler changes, there is a pretty good chance if you use your Primal Burst right before Berserk ends you will be able to keep only 1 or two seconds of downtime before your next Berserk.

I’m a lot more confident now that Berserker will be able to replace Arms. I’ll be doing heavy testing in BWE3 and we’ll know more for sure then.

@RobertGee, great work so far taking the feedback and giving good results. One thing worth considering is there is no GM trait that jumps out as the “PvE trait.” King of Fires is the best choice, especially for a condition damage build but it is pretty good so long as you are in a group. But its still rather unexciting for a Power build in PvE. Bloody Roar is decent too but access to Fury isn’t a huge issue in PvE either. I don’t have a particularly good suggestion, but perhaps adding a 5% damage modifier vs. Burning foes to King of Fires? Kinda brute force, but it is reminiscent of the Bloodlust trait from Arms and makes some sense as a Berserker version of the concept.

Sword/Torch+LB is a nice increase over the current build, but wasn’t where it needed to be to have impressive damage. I’m hoping the increased Berserk attack speed, ability to burst 3 times per phase, and double damage of the primal sword burst get it to the point where I can say its a strong alternative in solo play for Warriors.

The big drawback is without off hand sword you lose a block which can be important in solos.

Hey thanks for the shout out. When the expac hits the best condi build will be Sword/Torch+Longbow so if its specifically a sword/sword aesthetic you’re looking for rather than just the best condi build you can get, you may not want to plan on it long term.

PvE condi warrior: buffed torch 4 slightly, nerfed torch 5 heavily. Buffed primal burst on sword heavily. Will run numbers later but seems like a pretty nice net gain.

PvE Direct damage warrior: still no compelling reason to run Berserker instead of Arms even with the attack speed increase.

Forge you say? Hmmmm.

You probably want to specify which game mode you’re interested in. If you answer is “all of them” you aren’t going to find a quality guide that prepares you for all three modes in one package.

SlyDevil.3952:

Wethospu.6437:

Does anyone know if monsters’ condition damage follows the general condition damage formula? Also does condition damage round up or down?

I would assume that it follows the general formula, you’d have to see if frifox is able to pull the condi dmg stat off an enemy to check.

Are there any enemies who apply conditions that also give themselves Might stacks? Seeing how their ticks scale as they gain/lose Might would let you back into the formula.

Photinous.4628:

Shiro/Mallyx has the biggest DPS output, I believe this will be the PvE meta. Herald is only useful if your group lacks a PS warrior and ele/ranger, in my opinion, but you’re giving up a lot of damage by staying in glint.

Nope, Glint/Shiro will be the default in PvE with Glint/Ventari for times you need the projectile bubble. Glint has some very interesting PvE interactions that you’ll just have to wait for our guide to come out to hear more about. =)

tldr; someone had a bad experience pugging.

From a PvE end game perspective Berserker has no real place. If you take Tactics and Strength as a given, replacing Arms with Berserker is, at best, a lateral move. The DPS is roughly similar in the shortest of fights (10 seconds or less) but quite a bit less in any fight lasting over 15 seconds.

The main reason for this is the downtime after Berserker ends is far, far too long for PvE. The build ONLY does acceptable dps when in berserker, so for a 30 second fight you’ll have 15 seconds of adequate dps and 15 seconds of garbage tier. This isn’t good enough, if the intention is to become part of the meta for Phalanx Strength direct damage builds in place of Arms. If the downtime of Berserker was reduced to less than 10 seconds it would be much closer to optimal, though it would still carry much downside.

For non-meta pve condition damage builds, the Torch is an upgrade over offhand sword. However, the best condition damage build for PvE (Arms, Discipline, Berserker) is about 2k less DPS than Ranger’s best condition damage build and about 6k less damage than the Engineer. The warrior condition damage pve build should be at least equal to the ranger’s, especially in light of the fact that the ranger brings superior team buffing (Spotter, Sun Spirit, Frost Spirit vs Banner of Strength).

The #4 skill is good, however the base burn duration is weak. 1 stack of burning that lasts 2 seconds is insufficient. It should be 2 stacks of burn, or one stack that lasts 4 seconds. Compared to Ranger’s Throw Torch it’s abysmal. Ranger gets 2 stacks that last base 6 seconds. Warrior gets 1 stack that lasts 2 seconds. Same cool down, ranger has a faster cast time. I would suggest buffing it to inflict the same burning scale as Throw Torch.

The #5 skill is pretty good but still weak. The pulsing burn should be base two seconds duration instead of 1. The end explosion has good base duration (5 seconds) but should be doubled from 2 stacks of burning to 4. This would make the skill competitive with Ranger’s Bonfire. I understand the advantage of a mobile fire field in PvP and that the skill is balanced with that in mind, but in PvE the relatively weak damage is crippling the weapon.

As far as traits, Blood Reaction is the only decent trait for a PvE power build. All the other traits only really exist because you have to pick one. The adept tier is especially bad. You have a WVW option, a condi option and a PvP option. At the GM level there is again no interesting trait for a Power build. I suggest changing one of them to perhaps increase the IAS of Berserk mode from 10% to 15%.

I would also suggest either merging King of Fires with Heat of the Soul so they are one good trait, or conversely, allow King of Fires to apply burn on crit to your target (rather than nearby enemies only) with the same ICD and effect as Engineer’s Incendiary Ammo.

dlonie.6547:

I wish I was as awesome as OP and Nemesis. Then I could be a prick in PuGs, too.

http://puu.sh/jNn7F/f31d345a46.jpg
http://puu.sh/jNnal/cc4352119b.jpg

Who watches the watchmen when the anti-elitists are being elitist to non-elitists?

Batresh.3958:

If you should rant on somebody, you should rant on Nike or Brazil for not making a build that can get over 14k dps…

A phalanx warrior build isn’t designed to get over 14k dps. Whats funny is, in Nemesis’ video Brazil executed the build poorly and played a kitten version… and still made almost 12k dps. LOL. Imagine if he played perfectly.

I hate having to fight these reddit wars by myself.

EcoRI.9273:

Let’s be real if a necro was “very effective” in a raid, I can’t see it being hard. It seems like as long as you know the mechanics you will do fine.
Also I probably wouldn’t want any thieves/ele if there are mechanics in the raid where you can get 1shotted easily.

To be fair to the devs, every raid on the practice test server in the history of every game was tuned hella easy and then buffed to the moon for release. It doesn’t surprise me that necro is adequate in a low power version of what the players will face.

also, don’t underestimate the power of Transfusion when people in your party go down a lot!

Kordash.2197:

dominik.9721:

pls don’t confuse being realistic with being negative.

Oh, so you’re this kind of guy… Okay.

Back on topic, i just saw Nike’s post on reddit about the buff sharing. I like the idea, but i’m not sure this will ensure a better party diversity unless each class bring something unique and unstackable like EA for warriors. Thoughs ?

Link for reference : https://www.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/comments/3jhf4t/a_plea_to_the_devs_to_make_raid_buff_sharing/

Warrior: banners, Ea, PS
Ele: conjures, water fields, Fury
Guardian: reflects, stability, strength in numbers (dont laugh, hard content maybe), aegis
Ranger: spotter, frost spirit
Rev: 10% crit buff, healing, reflects
mesmer: time warp, well of action, shared distortion, reflects
necro: vampiric aura, transfusion, BiP
Thief/engie: smoke fields, heavy CC (could be extremely important to be able to melt breakbars quickly), blast finishers on demand.

Rym.1469:

deSade.9437:

Revenants are gonna be hit so, so, so, SO bad by build locking. Like, so bad. Wow.

I don’t really see it. You mean, not being able to swap to Mace for some mightstacking? Because once you have your build as Revenant, you’re likely to stay with chosen legends.

Not accurate at all. The Rev is supposed to switch legends around on an encounter by encounter basis depending on what utility skills are required for the team. Legends are nothing more than utility skills, saying you don’t need to swap legends is just as crazy as saying you don’t need to swap utility skills on other classes. If youre in favor of build locking, you might actually say that. The reason why it’s particular bad for the Rev is that unlike other classes, the entire class mechanic of the Rev is based on changing Legends to change your abilities. It would be like saying an Elementalist could only pick two attunements at the start of the raid and couldn’t swap to the other two.

I don’t care about what happens in underleveled dungeons, no one min/maxes for that unless they are going for record runs which is all of 4 guilds in the game.

At level 80 the data is pretty clear: http://www.dtguilds.com/forum/m/6563292/viewthread/23370398-average-boss-kill-time

So again, you giving me some BS anecdotes about your team melting bosses in 10 seconds is not an argument nor is it evidence. This is the data from record runs, until you offer something more compelling than that you should probably let my point stand.

Rising Dusk.2408:

ShadowLordX.5148:

I’m curious, does DnT have numbers for revenant’s dps while in various legends? If Revenant actually has more dps than guardian, at least while in Shiro/Mallyx, and not too much less dps while in Ventari, then it might be a viable alternative in certain content. Although the fact that Revenant only destroys projectiles rather than reflects them is definitely problematic. You’d still be losing out on some of guardian’s utility that revenant can’t bring (partywide blocks, blinds)

If they do have numbers from the first BWE, they’re out of date. Revenant is getting huge mainhand sword buffs and other buffs elsewhere for the second BWE, so those will be the most recent numbers. My gut instinct is that it will have higher DPS than a Guardian just from Sword/Axe alone, and also carries an AOE Ferocity buff, and therefore will be a much better choice for the support slot than a Guardian.

It’s pretty easy to plug the list of changes into what we already have and get an idea. FWIW, in group play, the legend you pick isn’t particularly relevant since your DPS is determined mostly by traits and weapon choice and utility skills play only a small factor. Based on the changes they listed for this coming beta, if they stick with them Rev will be pretty strong.

I’m tired of people who start posts off with some variation of “I never understood why…” and then proceed to give you their very strong opinion on it. If you don’t understand a topic, other than an inflated sense of your own self-worth, why are you creating it?

ShadowLordX.5148:

1 Guard/Mesmer: Reflects/projectile blocks/condi clear/stability/group aegis/distorion. Group quickness and fury. Rev can bring some of this stuff, but at a much higher cost than Guard or mesmer, and lacks the unique utility each class can provide.

Rev can do many of these defensive support things, as you said. The value of the Rev is they can do those things, when needed, but when not needed they can switch gears to offensive support. They are a bit more versatile than those. The problem is they suffer the jack of all trades issue that Engineer has, where in a record type scenario you go for specialists not generalists.

EcoRI.9273:

You know with the raid example they gave on the tongue boss, I am a bit worried about the challenge in it. Honestly how hard is it to DPS down a wall that doesn’t have any defensive measures?

Who knows what other mechanics will be happening simultaneously? There could be adds, aoes or who knows what happening to make the “wall team” life difficult.

The most powerful food in the game is Koi Cakes / Rare Veggie Pizza. In terms of DPS increase for the builds that want it, no other food even comes close.

Miku Lawrence.6329:

Everyone will try it in a PS/Thief/Guard/2 Eles party (x2) and if it doesn’t work they’ll swap the guardian’s build to something more tanky or more supportive. Mesmer to portal everyone out of oneshot aoe maybe?

You only need one Thief. Only need one guard. Might only need one warrior depending on how they do buff sharing. Chronomancer is definitely worth a spot. If buff sharing goes to 10 Ranger and Necro will be worth a spot.

Engineer, oddly enough, seems like it would be in the worst spot since 10 people can passively keep 25 vuln up and engie has no real team buffs.

Valik Shin.9027:

Dungeon bosses drop in 10 seconds anyways with a good group.

No, they don’t. At level 80, the average boss fight in record runs is 24 seconds. That’s record runs. Not casual LFG pugs. Record runs. Where people are doing the absolute best min max damage they can do. So please take note that Vulnerability production is incredibly important.

Are you aware that several guilds use Frailty sigils on their weapons in level 80 dungeon record runs? It’s that important.

Killyox.3950:

In group play everyone and their mother has vulnerability. Engineer and Shiro Rev stack it within seconds to 25 for example ;p. So do other classes.

I pay a bit more attention to Vulnerability than you, and what you state is categorically untrue. In a meta group of Ele, ele, guard, thief, war your Vuln drops off after about 10 seconds or so. Every stack matters.

Impairing Daggers and Distractin Daggers are really powerful. A Power Block on Thief and access to Slow are situationally extremely powerful.

Daredevil

PvE: 3/10 (possible 5/10 if perma-Weakness becomes desired above top DPS. Distracting Daggers and the Slow daggers are very good utility skills too)
PvP: 7/10 (Daredevil + Acro = people will want to kill themselves)
Flavor: 10/10

Berserker gets you…

10% attack speed boost
20% crit damage
Perma Berserker Power

Arms gets you

12% crit chance
3.5 average stacks of vulnerability
5% damage
Perma Berserker Power

In solo play, it comes out to pretty much a wash DPS-wise. In group play the extra Vulnerability makes Arms hands down superior.

The big thing is that Berserker > Discipline in solo play. Strength, Arms, Berserker greatsword camping. If you don’t need Fast hands Berserker is clearly better than Discipline.