Guild Wars 2

blitzkrieg.2451:

I’m referring to top-tier pvp , literally the only tier that matters if anybody in here is going to be arguing class balance in regards to pvp. Yes, I said it, and yes, it’s the truth.

While PvP is a joke in it’s current state, the best players are in top tier PvP still to this day. I’m not talking about the best duelers (who are also for the most part, majority in PvP), im talking about the best mechanical multi-classing players who are on a higher tier than most.

You will never balance ranger/druid around 1on1s in WvW, at the same time you will never balance it around GvG battles. This is what WvW is essentially therefore any PvP discussion regarding it is null and void. We can always talk about splits though, which I think in some cases is necessary.

With that said…

When you have a pet, that at the same time has some decent utility, it’s a bot, with very horrible AI and pathing. The reliance of this is actually more of a hindrance than it is a help.

I know people think their smoke field + blast combo is great, or their CC chain to bristleback combo is awesome. But in reality, against good players, truly good players, these combos are seen a mile away and easily avoidable.

The difference between say a class like thief or mesmer for example is the rate at which a battle can be turned is immense. The quality of ACTIVE skills for the most part are insanely good and entirely built around full player immersion and control.

I’m not entirely for removing the pet, however, you have to ask yourself is having a pet going to help you get a higher skill ceiling out of the class or effectiveness per say, or is buffing the mechanics of the ranger itself? I would go with buffing the weapon mechanics and traits of the ranger itself any time of the day.

Greatsword , fun … Shortbow? Not so much is it, because it’s heavily reliant on attack #1. Spamming is not fun , active skills are and immense utility is. This is the difference between guardian (even though traps brought that down a bit, id refer more to medi) , thief, mesmer etc are all very effective.

I know people love their pet, but it is also a major reason (not all) for it’s very very low skill ceiling and true class potential.

I’ve played ranger in top tier PvP, dueled some of the best players in NA , learned alot from other solid rangers and know an immense amount about other classes.

This will ultimately be the ranger’s issue.

Very straight forward skills and an AI pet.

Is it fun? Yes, I wouldn’t play the class for so many years otherwise but if the class were more built around character active immersion in utilization of EFFECTIVE ACTIVE skill components and not setting up a few combos to succeed that are horribly telegraphed then you’d have a lot more fun.

Ironically, I think axe/dagger sword/torch has some of the best weapon immersion besides greatsword but i think it’s because of the active use of evasion concept of the sets , they synergize well. If only you could have a good power component with cc on top of it with a weapon set idea like that.

I have one major takeaway from this post: Most of the desire for a petless ranger is coming from pvp players.

I can see how having a facet of your class that you don’t completely control being a problem in pvp. I have no good fix for that, because I maintain that removing the pet reduces ranger to a hippie warrior basically. But I can see why people in pvp would get more frustrated with the pet than the rest of us.

Also, happy someone else thinks skill splits is a good idea.

As far everything else said, I will absent myself from this thread is this is primarily a pvp conversation, and again ask people to put in their thread titles which gametype they are referencing. Thanks!

SloRules.3560:

You are way too tanky for the party you are playing in.

This build seems to be for WvW. Vitality and Toughness are perfectly normal to have there. Half the builds for WvW use celestial gear that I’ve seen (across all classes, not just mesmer).

I want to know one thing. What is it about ranger that makes you insist on playing a ranger when you can play a different class and get the same thing? Like I know a bunch of people want to play the archer idea (which defines a ranger even less than an animal companion), but they don’t seem to want to play a DH or a warrior or a thief who all have access to bows. So what is keeping you here, instead of playing something else, if you hate pets so much?

Jacksavage.3461:

Whether the intention behind elites specializations is understood or not, druid is still very boring and awkward to play. I can’t speak for anyone else but do others think the same? Besides Glyph of Tides, all of the glyphs are unremarkable with no real identity. You just kinda throw things on the floor, hope people are near, then go full glitter storm and run around. Then you die a little inside when the Quickdraw proc is wasted and not applied to a weapon skill.

The base CA healing abilities were nerfed. So if you go the “damage” druid route, the class performs like a revolving almost-healer and pseudo dps that ends up sucking at both. This just further increases the disparity between the core ranger and druid.

I think your rotation is off if you’re wasting Quickdraw, and that has nothing to do with druid. The glyphs fit the celestial theme of druid just fine. The change to how healing power is applied does force you to trait for healing power, but boons don’t depend on any of your stats (except concentration, and are you gonna use Ministrel?), so you can still boon support just fine even with the change in stat priority.

If you are going the damage route, you still have GotL, which is a group 15% increase in damage, and that’s the important part! The fact that you have to use healing to proc it is just bonus points for me, the heal skills become group damage buffs primarily that stack with everything else. The glyphs with verdant etching are minimum healing and condi cleanse on top of their usual effect. And if you really don’t want GotL, there is Ancient Seeds if you are playing a condi build.

Druid has some issues, yes. But so do all the elite specs. And a lot of the real issues are in the base class, not in the elite spec. (come on, pet rework)

anduriell.6280:

alain.1659:

Druid is meh. It is not bad but I would prefer something different. Ranger needed a support option, so druid came. It is not that bad, but it is boring. Not because of the druid only but also because of the current meta. I hope they make a shapeshifter elite for the next expansion. They have the basic understanding for shapeshifting with norn racials(which suck beyond imagination).

But druid is “meh”. Really.

problem with Druid it is not a support option it’s just a healbot that got nerfed enough to not to be able to do it’s job anymore.

Ranger needed a support option no an healbot. Ranger had the support option with the spirits until they got axed, just needed better mobile spirits.

Druid could had been a real option if the vanilla class was ok. And that’s not the case, so the people turn to look for similar features that could had work. Ranger should have been the better DH or at least it’s equal and not like it is now, the other way around.

I know spirits tend to only work well in dungeons and fractals where the bosses don’t move much if at all, but I kinda feel we still have other options for giving boon support. Am I missing something?

anduriell.6280:

bearshaman.3421:

Omg this again? Agreed with those who said you missed the point of elite specs.

Can people get over this? If you want to play an archer, you have 4 professions to choose from. Pick one. Rangers are not defined by their longbow. >_<

dude relax, probably he is a newbe to ranger that saw the no connection between ranger and druid (not even at lore level) and had to ask.

in opposition to tempest-ele, scrapper-engi, chrono-mesmer or DD-thief that are an upgraded versions of their vanilla class. No need to change your playstyle when you go for those.

I know I know, I just hoped we’d moved past this. (sigh)

And while I agree those don’t require a change in the way you play (druid did introduce a new class mechanic and an interesting gimmick in the mechanic with the glyph utility skills), that isn’t what the OP is talking about. He wanted ranger to have DH, which would have introduced absolutely nothing new to the class. LB? already have it. Traps? we have that too. So we would have gotten different traits and that would have been it. That would have been the least exciting or useful elite spec for a class.

As a class, thief probably requires and uses the most mobility. However, every class can be depending on how you play your class and what build you use.

Irijia.6073:

Einlanzer.1627:

.I think it’s mostly WoW’s handling of the hunter class that created this perception. Thankfully they converted Survival back into a melee tree.

I have to point this out because it’s a fantastic example of what Anet should absolutely NOT emulate. The hunter community is currently having a meltdown over changing Survival to melee and the spec is ignored and outright derided by a fair number of folks both in and outside of the Hunter class. It doesn’t help that Blizzard is now in the position of ignoring the other two specs and the mechanics they broke with the change to try and get more people to play melee Survival because it’s so unpopular in general.

It’s a testament to just how unwise it is to change a class’s gameplay by attempting to remove a core mechanic that said class is balanced around and doubly so when you are talking about a game that has a few years and an established fanbase under its belt.

Personally I hope they don’t emulate anything Blizzard has done. There’s a reason I play GW2 and not WoW. Hate that game…. solid franchise ruined….

Obtena.7952:

So you chose a pet class … and you don’t want your pet. /shakeshead. That’s why there are 8 other classes to play. If none of those work for you, time to find a new game.

This. If you don’t like pets, why are you here?

Irijia.6073:

Jabronee.9465:

So Rangers are NON archers, snipers, marksmen etc. No wonder park rangers been roaming around with polar bears, brown bears, moas, spiders, pigs, etc nowadays. Sorry my bad.

Well i switch to DH (after purchasing the expansion) cause i see a true potential to be a Bad S sniper trap class (petless) rather than being a Beastmaster class which Anet calls it Ranger.

Edit: i popped by cause i was once a Beastmaster till Anet introduced me to DH. I would love to dust off my “Ranger” but i gotta dust off the pets too lol

Actually, modern park rangers will often roam about with a dog and their job often involves the preservation of local wildlife but that’s neither here or there. My point is that it is nonsensical to say that Rangers shouldn’t be called ranger because they are a pet class. Again, the name Ranger has zero to do with the weapon type a person is wielding and everything to do with them roaming about in a wide open area.

I’m not criticizing you for playing DH, you should play what you enjoy. What I am saying is that Anet’s definition of a Ranger is not incorrect and that you are annoyed at it because you wanted to apply your own interpretation to what the word means to the class and it isn’t being changed to suit you because, for some reason, you chose a pet class and no longer wanted it to be a pet class.

Agreed on all points. Also..

The vast majority of rangers depicted in games have a animal companion of some kind as a inherent feature of the class. Even more so than ranged combat. This is also accurate of fantasy and historical fiction novels and books. You may argue that Aragorn didn’t have an animal companion, but he didn’t use a ranged weapon either (that was legolas’ shtick).

Now I will 100% agree that the pet mechanic needs work, and several very solid suggestions on how to do that have been put forth. Hopefully some of those will get used. But remove it entirely, and you might as well play a warrior or a guardian or a thief. This is what rangers are. If you don’t like it, you have 8 other class options.

Zeus.9840:

Forgive me if I’m wrong, but I always thought Dragon Hunter was the solution to petless ranger, since we got traps and longbow.

This. Or LB Warrior. We have a pet, that’s a part of ranger pretty much everywhere. And they have already stated that they are gonna be making further changes to the pets to improve that part of our mechanic.

If you don’t want a pet, you have options that still have a LB. or LB and traps. Enjoy.

Omg this again? Agreed with those who said you missed the point of elite specs.

Can people get over this? If you want to play an archer, you have 4 professions to choose from. Pick one. Rangers are not defined by their longbow. >_<

Thanks for the info. unfortunately that one is out of date too…

nottsgman.8206:

as far as I can tell gw2skills did update to include the May 17th changes, although it isn’t listed on it’s update page. the October 18th changes aren’t there though.

the only other one I know of is http://intothemists.com/calc/ but I never found it to be as good as gw2skills one.

Just checked, and it doesn’t have the Venom Share baseline for thief and new trait rending shade, and I think that was in the one before the October update.

Also intothemists hasn’t been updated for anything since before HoT dropped.

Any current editors like gw2skills but currently up to date? I didn’t realize that editor hasn’t had an update in about a year…

Henry.5713:

bearshaman.3421:

Henry.5713:

Banners are unparalled in the amount of easy group wide offensive buffing they provide. There is no way around them if you are looking to be as efficient as possible in a group scenario.
Ranger spirits already are very close to the WoW totems you described. Not sure if they would want another set of skills to function exactly the same way.
My own idea has always been to allow warriors to carry one or even multiple banners on their back to make them fit a fast paced game such as GW2. That would not really fix the issue with banners and too much passive effect stacking in general of course. Would still make them less annoying to use, though.

The spirits aren’t the best comparison. There is no option to move them, and you absolutely must use the GM trait to make them worthwhile. Banners are definitely the superior option of the two.

I was talking about the option to kill the spirits early to have a close to perfect reuse timing for the next wave or encounter. Something that sounds like his option to recall them whenever you want.
Where as you might get unlucky with the cooldowns on banners since you can not decide when to delete them even if you can actually carry them around with you.
If it is a decision between having banners or having spirits then you want banners for sure. I agree. It is not even close.

There’s no way to dismiss the banners? (haven’t messed around with them yet, very new to warrior).

This would be for dungeons and fractals, not raids, as well as the usual open world stuff. I’m at a loss, and have been since venomshare became baseline and all the venoms were weakened in an attempt at balance. Suggestions?

Edit: Also I had a thread on here where I theorycrafted a build that was focused around evasion and making your evades/dodges do as much as possible and tanking (direct damage/condi damage/heal/condi cleanse/gaining initiative and endurance/etc). Not sure if the recent changes made that build unviable now or not…

Being a condi lover, and having played every class in the game at this point, I will heartily disagree that necro is somehow the weakest class in the game for condi. Epidemic is massive, and no one has the ability to just spread conditions like that. Great in fights with one powerful monster and a bunch of adds you don’t want to waste time fighting.

On top of that, the only class that can corrupt boons into conditions, which while not always as useful in pve, does have its uses, and should be kept on hand.

On top of that is condi management. Pull conditions from allies to yourself, and give them to the enemy. Or your minions do it for you. Or Plague Sending/Signet. Or however you want to do it.

3 areas of condi, two unique to the class, that necro is good at. Sure if your enemy stays still, or there is only one enemy, some other classes can hit like a tank with their condi in comparison. But aside from that, we’re doing fine.

Henry.5713:

Banners are unparalled in the amount of easy group wide offensive buffing they provide. There is no way around them if you are looking to be as efficient as possible in a group scenario.
Ranger spirits already are very close to the WoW totems you described. Not sure if they would want another set of skills to function exactly the same way.
My own idea has always been to allow warriors to carry one or even multiple banners on their back to make them fit a fast paced game such as GW2. That would not really fix the issue with banners and too much passive effect stacking in general of course. Would still make them less annoying to use, though.

The spirits aren’t the best comparison. There is no option to move them, and you absolutely must use the GM trait to make them worthwhile. Banners are definitely the superior option of the two.

Is there a Thanksgiving themed in game event, or does it go straight to Wintersday?

When is this event going away?

Guardian. Solid builds for power and condi, can be selfish or very supporty, and can work at all ranges. Also decent access to single point and AoE/cleave effects.

Crapgame.6519:

Levetty.1279:

Durzlla.6295:

Levetty.1279:

Durzlla.6295:

A lot of people asked for a support ranger that utilizes a staff, it was actually one of THE most asked for things on the forums, and then it happened, so try again.

Things that happened in your head didn’t actually happen in real life, you know that right?

Just because you’re ignorant doesn’t mean you’re right buddy.

You honestly want us to believe that people asked for a healer to be added to this game when no mode needed or was designed for one till they needed wow kids to buy their expansion? That Rangers wanted a spec designed entirely for a new mode that they didn’t even know existed? You expects us to believe that Rangers were clamoring for a single target ranged weapon when they already had two? That the only use for this weapon is one very good movement skill and its ability to generate a resource? That all our new skills have a gimmick that turn them all into aoe heals when entering a mode that is already 5 aoe heals? That the only reason anybody picks the spec is for a damage buff trait that was slapped on when they realized that nobody was going to take their healing spec anyway because other classes still did it better? That the new mechanics neither replaces nor interacts with the pet and looks like it was just slapped on because they couldn’t think of anything else to add?

Are you going to pretend there wasn’t a massive backlash when druid was revealed? That they didn’t send Gaile to try and clam us down, which is Anets standard ‘oh kitten the communities kittened send the one they like to talk to them’ response? That the reveal went down so badly that they had to promise to finally fix shouts so that Rangers had something new to use?

Go troll another board.

I apologize. And this wasn’t even to me. Here I was thinking this is going to be bad, but by the time I got to the end I was saying to self, hmm…you know what, this is pretty spot on.

If you don’t mind, let me remind everyone how dire it was to support your comment. Druids got one “open” beta. Just one, and it was the last before failure to launch.

I want to disagree with this but I can’t. This is honestly one of the first really well reasoned and intelligent rants I’ve heard about druid. To be fair, we were asking for a good support build, and while druid does crank out heals, it doesn’t do much else (boon support missing, some stuns I think, and the GotL trait if you aren’t doing condi with Ancient Seeds). I’m definitely curious to see where they go with the next one, and hopefully at some point we’ll either get a good support spec or (fingers crossed) they are looking at a rewrite long term of druid to be more what we asked for in the first place. The line “After a period of observation, the balance team will be changing the druid specialization’s nature somewhat.” gives some hope that the druid spec will be improved.

Like Danikat, I too have played through almost every version of the different storylines, with the exception of a couple low level options for human and asura. Definitely agree changing race and order is a good idea, just for fun.

As for class, Ranger is a good choice for soloing. Guardian is also a good choice. Engi CAN be complicated to play, but that’s entirely dependent on your build. Most meta builds for engi make heavy use of kits, which are utility skills that, when active, replace your 1-5 skills with a new set from that kit. With the negligible cooldown on kits, you end up switching in and out of them frequently.

He’s being silly. As a PC you don’t heed the call of mordremoth.

If you like dagger/pistol on thief, do pistol dagger for your other weapoon set. the #3 skills on each do the opposite of the other in terms of movement (one brings you into melee, the other jumps you back out to ranged). It’s a fun build.

Glad you like the scepter pistol mesmer. It’s my current build for that. let me know if you need any help with it.

Honestly for mesmer, I much prefer using shatters with scepter over greatsword. The greatsword clones do nothing for damage, and only serve a use with the GM trait from Domination for might stacking. Scepter is far more bursty, which you indicated as a preference over sustained damage (though the sustain is good too). offhand pistol also works great with this.

Longbow ranger… enough people have talked about it. +1 to that.

Engi is a complex profession. Your longest range is mortar gun kit which primarily is good for fields not damage. Grenades on the other hand are incredible, and pretty much meta no matter what build you’re using. Flamethrower is good too, but not a very long range. (you have to look at the kits on the engi to understand the engi).

Longbow warrior or dragonhunter is also an option if you don’t want a pet fyi.

Staff ele is also really good if you like a more mage like feel, and lots of combos to be had.

A death shroud necro can do some great damage at range as well, and is tankier than most classes.

Thief with pistols can be very bursty, but they’re right, very single target.

I am fascinated with this thread as well. Last time I asked about condi ele I got a bunch of grief for it, so I’m glad this is a viable thing now.

They changed the traits that affected skill cooldowns in the last patch to make it the same percentage everyone else has. This affected rotations of course, and everyone kittened because god forbid they have to relearn something in this game. Ele is still strong for PVE, end of story.

PVP I have no idea. Not my gametype.

Thanks! Does it always start that late?

When is the yearly Halloween event going to start?

So quick FYI…

In the Lore forums a while back, the issue of some of the things people have listed as “jarring” was explained by one of the Anet peeps. (Referencing the big axe being thrown at SB range comment, and other similar things that realistically wouldn’t happen).

The explanation was that magic is in fact universal, and every class uses magic in their own unique way. In the lore of GW and GW2, people learn basic magic the way we learn the alphabet. You get the basics, its up to you and what you decide to do with your life how you develop that further. So you are actually using magic to spawn multiple axes to throw at ridiculous range with accuracy, and to have it bounce to other targets. That’s ranger magic. Engi magic lets them shoot fire, lightning and poison out of a pistol, or guardian magic where every weapon leaves boon/condition symbols on the ground.

Hope that helps.

No core class does well against elites. Kinda why they are called elites.

This might be redundant, but any word on if the Halloween seasonal events for the Mad King and Dark Prince will be returning this year?

Also most classes can frontline, because they have to just to be able to adequately buff their allies and benefit from buffs themselves. The frontline role is the same as the tank role, not the dps role (just have to be in range for dps, not on the frontline).

One thing to keep in mind: most of your complaints seem to be from a pvp focus. While some of these things don’t make sense for pvp, they do for pve. Make sure to kitten changes with all game types in mind.

Guardian/DH has longbow, but most of the guardian heals are close range, so I wouldn’t recommend it if you want a ranged character. I don’t know exactly how a warrior heal build would work. Ele is ok, but not great at it IMO, but better than a lot of other classes. Engi can do some decent healing as well.

Personally, I’d say you’re better off focusing on Druid. As a class, it will also allow you a wide range of options, and is also one of the better soloing classes for leveling purposes.

MrThompson.8347:

I’m looking for general tips about all 3 areas, PvE, PvP, WvW
I’m a bit mixed up on traits and good weapons and all, I’m level 48 so far and I’m loving Longbow/Greatsword if there’s any tips to build around that combo greatly appreciated!
Definitely gonna spec into Druid when I hit 80 but for now I’m a normal Ranger but I am loving this class so far!

I recommend taking marksmanship and beast master. The Remorseless trait combos well with the GS master lvl trait.

BlaqueFyre.5678:

Literally it is DA 1,2,1 Trick 1,1,3 DrD 3,2,1

With Channeled Vigor as Heal, Shadowstep Signet of Agility and Either Bandits defense or Skale Venom with Basi Venom as elite. Run Dire or Carrion with Krait runes or Rune of Thorns with Agony Sigil and I forget the Bleed duration Sigil

“Pro” d/d Condi Thieves Press 3 as hard and fast as possible while hitting dodge as well…… Repeat,

Surprised you aren’t using Acrobatics in there…

Anyone got a link to this perma-evade condi build?

Well the CD reduction traits got normalized with what most classes have, which means everyone is having to relearn rotations, since the timing for things is completely different, so you aren’t alone there. I’ve just been playing around with it, and going more based on a priority list of things to keep on CD than anything else.

Ophidia Moonstone.2587:

The only melee class I enjoy besides my Reaper is my guardian. I like his speed buffs. I like his defensive traits. I like his weapon options. I have looked for ways to make my Warrior and my Rev faster, they are so slow in the open world, perhaps I am overlooking their speed traits, but I haven’t found a way to make them faster, so I don’t play them other than to farm iron ore or elder logs.

Their only speed buff is on the staff (which I can’t stand).

Well thank you for the reminder. I knew about the radius reduction, which was ouchy enough, but the nerfing of the base venoms…. yeah… no bueno…

I may have to rethink one of my future builds…

Lahmia.2193:

bearshaman.3421:

Lahmia.2193:

bearshaman.3421:

So long as the elites work underwater. I hate that we have only one underwater elite…

We have 2 now. Plague and “Chilled to the Bone”.

True wasn’t thinking about reaper. Still… baseline necro with only one underwater elite???

0_o

You think that is bad? Wells weren’t even usable underwater until a few years into the game.

facepalm

onevstheworld.2419:

I’d suggest levelling your ranger to 80 to learn the basic game systems in a more manageable way (i.e. Dodging, breakbars, positioning, mob attack patterns). Once you have that under your belt, you’ll be able to return to your necro and just concentrate on the class specific mechanics.

Agreed, though if you are going for map completion anyway, you could play either character and learn stuff as you go. Feel free to experiment, but if you feel completely lost you can always try builds posted on the forums here or on metabattle as a starting point to better understanding your classes. Start with starting zones, and work your way up from there (using the gate hub in lion’s arch to move between the different capital cities and attached starting zones).

I imagine that with her having fulfilled her debt to him during the personal story, she left and went back to her people. I don’t think it’s any more complex than that.

The largos are pretty solitary people, and don’t really interact with others. I would love to know how Trahearne even encountered one in the first place, much less got one to owe him a debt.

Guardian. I have all 9 classes, and I like them all, but I feel most heroic playing guardian hands-down.

gavyne.6847:

They’re such beefcakes, the way they run, cast, dodge, etc.. Just not how I picture a necromancer or reaper.

Really for the reaper? The reaper is why I made a norn necro in the first place, because it was basically GW2’s version of a deathknight…

Lahmia.2193:

bearshaman.3421:

So long as the elites work underwater. I hate that we have only one underwater elite…

We have 2 now. Plague and “Chilled to the Bone”.

True wasn’t thinking about reaper. Still… baseline necro with only one underwater elite???

0_o

Was looking at the venom share build on metabattle, and noticed in the comments that people were saying that venom share being made baseline reduced the viability of the build. I don’t understand, could someone explain?

Joxer.6024:

Daniel Handler.4816:

If we got a dps spec that allowed us to frontline, like a quasi reaper, but put out less overall damage in group support would people be okay with that?

Very much so! Just like other classes you would have the options to spec more into a support role, if that was your thing. Not to reference WOW but Death knights are a good example. You could be a tank build and do decent dps as well but if you wanted you could go pure dps, Frost or Unholy, and still be looked at for raids and such.
I know Mesmers can do that but the argument is around the fact that our overall dps is just lacking. I have faith though and its still a fun as class to play!!

Our spec and skill system isn’t nearly as interchangeable as what I remember from WoW. I don’t think it will be as easy as everyone else thinks.

onevstheworld.2419:

bearshaman.3421:

I’m gonna throw this tidbit into the conversation cuz i’m curious to see what opinions are on this. One of the arguments I’ve heard against condition duration as opposed to condition damage is that it stretches your damage out over time, so unless you are using the character for content that has a lot of boss fights (fractals, raids, WB, etc) where the fight is gonna last a long time, you end up losing damage because the creature dies before your damage finishes ticking, so it’s possibly better to beef up the damage so it bursts more than it drags out.

Thoughts?

Condition duration doesn’t spread your existing damage out over more time. Your conditions still do the same damage per second, but they have more seconds to cause damage. As you say, you could just have higher condition dmg stat, but because viper’s gives both damage and duration, it outperforms other stat combos that only give condition dmg.

Conditions in general need time to ramp up. I think what you’re thinking of its the condition vs direct damage argument. In open world, the argument is moot because trash mobs die quickly regardless of damage type. Dungeons are the only PvE content where you may be better off with direct damage.

Actually it was in discussions whether sinister or viper was better, because you get a higher condi damage stat with sinister. In general I’d agree with Viper being the superior option, just curious if any had any thoughts on it. The reason I said it was more bursty was that each tick would do more damage with sinister, you just get more ticks with viper, so which was better, that’s all.