Guild Wars 2

Mesmer gained the most from my perspective. The number of things made baseline, and the significance of the trait consolidation seem to have opened up a lot of possibilities.

I switched from phantasm mesmer to trapper ranger for WvW roaming. I thought I would try out the elite that got traps, but I actually don’t think I would enjoy guardian trapper.

On the other hand, I’m excited about a possible chronomancer phantasm build for mesmer.

Thx. I was trying to ask if the Runes of the Defender triggered on projectile blocks or reflects. Sorry it wasn’t clear, but it sounds like the answer is “no” to both of those.

I played a phantasm mesmer roaming in WvW for about 1.5 years. It was a lot of fun, but it was tough to win outnumbered fights.

I’m mulling over some builds now that I think are more viable given the changes.

A lot will depend on the final numbers, but the chronomancer specialization will solve the mobility side of things.

The build I’m mulling over right now is very defensive, so I’m trying to decide if it will put out enough damage.

Fluff, one more question on these runes if you don’t mind.

Do they trigger on projectile blocks as well (like axe 5)?

Thx!

Chaos also has the chaotic persistence minor trait. That looks like it will probably increase condition duration by around 10% in a lot of cases. So that’s kind of like getting a 10% damage boost. You can also take chaotic transference to boost condi damage in this line.

Basically, it seems like Deceptive Evasion isn’t needed since you can use up all your shatter skills faster than you run out of ways to create illusions.

But only time will tell if it actually works like this

Is it cheesy because it’s like the blackwater build or is it cheesy just because it use PU or uses condis? There are a likely to be a lot more condi builds after HoT is released.

In any case, I’m not sure Dueling is so much better than Chaos for a condi shatter. With the extra defense from PU, maybe it’s possible to slot Mirror Images. If you can fit in Mirror Images, you get a possible scenario like this (assuming I understand the traits correctly).

Get three clones out
F5 shatter – all clones are still available because of Illusionary Reversion
F2 shatter
Mirror images + Decoy
F3 shatter (since these are new clones, they should be still be available unless there is internal cooldown on Illusionary Reversion)
F1 shatter
F5 reactivate (Mirror Images and Decoy should be off cooldown)

That seems like a 9-clone shatter in a couple seconds and it seems like at least six of them should have super speed. Plus that seems like 12 seconds of alacrity and quickness.

Maybe that is cheesy, but it seems like it would be fun and it’s not as passive as the on-death traits of the blackwater build

Since I’m guessing the bird doesn’t dodge that much, it seems like maybe it’s not a bad thing to go ahead and just try to burn it down. With burning, poison, and maybe 10 stacks of bleeds, it seems like that could be done in 10 seconds or less.

With spike trap and entangle to immobilize, and maybe even a concussion shot to interrupt, it feels like you can deal with the bird long enough to take it out. That might use all the traps, but they are all back again in 20 seconds.

How do you think this build does against a condi trapper? I get that the bird has a ton of healing, but since I’ve been playing trapper, I’ve never seen any healing that keeps up.

Yeah, part of this is just my love of stealth

But it feels to me like the whole game is going to get a lot more dangerous when HoT comes out. So far, basically all the builds that I’ve looked at are significantly stronger than older builds. So it feels like the bar is going to get raised on defense as well – particularly if you expect to fight 1v2 fights while roaming.

Perhaps this is much more defense than needed. In that case, I could imagine doing something like dropping Arcane Thievery and putting in Mirror Images. That definitely lets you get the battle going faster…

Still lots to see, but I think some of the new builds are going to have very powerful combinations of skills

I tried to create a condi mesmer WvW roaming build a couple of times without having deceptive evasion. With the Chronomancer traits posted today, I think you can now make something pretty cool.

http://dulfy.net/2015/05/02/gw2-specialization-calculator-that_shaman/#profession=mesmer&traits=“Chronomancer”,1,4,9-“Chaos”,3,6,8-“Illusions”,3,6,9

In case the link doesn’t come through, this comes out as:
Chronomancer
-Time catches up
-Illusionary reversion
-Seize the moment

Chaos
- Master of manipulation
- Chaotic dampening
- Prismatic understanding

Illusions
- The pledge
- Malicious sorcery
- Maim the disillusioned

Staff, scepter, torch
All dire gear
Runes of tormenting

Probably take Mirror as the heal (12 second cooldown, plus 2 seconds extra of block)
Utilities
- Decoy
- Blink
- Arcane Thievery (with all the new condis being added, I think torch is not enough)
(Maybe swap Blink with Mirror Images)

Feels like with the extra 50% damage on torment, this could be effective.

Back to the original question, it seems like the new burns are maybe between 1/2 and 1/3 what they were before in terms of damage (I’m guessing based on other videos). So if that’s the case, it seems likely that torch will do something like 2 stacks for six seconds.

I think a lot is still being worked on in terms of balancing condition damage. For the DragonHunter, the bleed stacks are pretty tricky to get on and keep on against another player. Those really high number of hits seem unlikely in real-world cases, and players will cleanse.

Thx for sharing the build – I like the creativity.

In case you haven’t found recording software that works, you might try the free download of Bandicam. http://www.bandicam.com/ I used FRAPS for a while, but it’s saved files are really big.

Have fun!

Have their been any statements about pet stats changing in HoT or when they release the specialization updates?

In particular, I’m wondering about base condition damage. It feels like the base condition damage is so low that even taking the trait for +350 really makes basically no difference in terms of dps output.

Have there been any dev statements about pet stats? Thx!

Guardian always looked cool, but I’ve never made one since I could never find the “tricky WvW roaming” type of build that I love.

With Trapper Runes, I was hoping to do a 5-trap Guardian build. The two problems are condi clearing and long recharge on the traps.

I think the answer could be changing one of the grandmaster traits to something for traps. (Like remove one condi when a trap is activated, 20% cooldown on traps). I think the GM traits are supposed to be “build-defining”. In a specialization that brings trap utilities, heal and elite, it feels like there should be at least two traits.

Thx and have fun!

I had a lot of fun playing my mesmer for more than a year, but a few months ago, I switched to a trapper ranger. It’s just been crazy-fun in WvW. If you want to try something while you’re waiting for the specialization changes, I encourage you to give it a shot (make sure to use the trapper runes).

In any case, I saw that ArenaNet will be adding traps to one profession via their elite line. So on the chance that this is mesmer, I would be really excited to come back and try a new build. There are two thing that I think would be needed in addition to getting traps.

First, you need some kind of stun break. This is a weak spot of ranger trappers, but it gets handled a little via a trait. I was thinking that mesmers could actually get a stun break trap. You put it down, and the first time you get stunned (or you could expand it to control effects), the trap teleports you back to where you put it (within a 1200 range) and does something like weakness and chill. That gives you some strategy about where you place it and where you try to fight.

Second, you need a way to handle conditions. Rangers get this through empathic bond and a big health pool for the ranger and the pets. Here again, I thought the cool idea would be to make it a trap that does something really similar to arcane thievery. So you put the trap down and when an enemy triggers it, it pulls condi’s from you to the enemy and boons from enemies to you.

I know that I’m way out on a limb here since it’s not even confirmed memsers will get traps in their elite. But this would allow really fun builds. I think I would be happy to play this without deceptive evasion, blink or decoy.

Hey sticker – totally agree that they are not done yet. I’m not actually worried about my build, I think I will still be happy with traps if these changes happen (it’s really hard to know because most builds are getting buffs).

Since I make software for a living, I thought it might be helpful to give a thread that was at least somewhat structured for quick reading so that devs could understand where people were coming from and what they thought of the future for their build given the information presented today. I think that’s easier for them to consume than a bunch of posts that say “it’s great” or “it’s horrible”.

The devs asked for people to post if they felt the spirit of their build would be broken given the specialization changes they talked about today. I thought it might be useful to create a thread that let people provide a bit more granular feedback on their impressions of how the changes would affect their current build as well as raise questions or concerns.

There are nice notes on Dulfy here: http://dulfy.net/2015/04/24/gw2-specializations-ama-livestream-notes/

I’ll make the first entry with a format that I hope is easy for devs to scan.

Build: Trapper
Primary play style: WvW (roaming)
Gear:
- All dire stats
- Shortbow Axe/Torch
- Trapper runes
- Geomancy x2, Corruption, Leeching sigils
Pets: Marsh Drake, Jungle Spider
Current traits:
- Marksmanship: Keen Edge
- Skirmishing: Primal Reflexes, Trapper’s Expertise, Trap Potency
- Wilderness Survival: Shared Anguish, Hide in Plain Site, Empathic Bond

New version of build:
Skirmishing: ? , Trapper’s Expertise, Light on your Feet
Wilderness Survival: Abidexterity, Shared Anguish, Empathic Bond
Third specialization is unclear – maybe Beastmastery

Is the spirit of the build preserved? Yes

Questions/concerns:
- Assume that all traps are ground targeted now in baseline?
- How does 1/2 second arming on traps interact with trappers runes if at all?
- Will base crit chance be high enough that any on-crit traits are useful?
- Will shared anguish have HIPS built-in? It’s moving from 90 to 60 second cooldown but HIPS is gone.
- Will healing spring be a trap?
- Will druid specialization work with traps?
- Beyond this build: how are conditions really changing?

Just wanted to say thanks for taking so much time to show the kinds of changes you’re looking at in all the professions. It’s clear that you’re trying to give everyone more things to be excited about with their characters.

Keep up the great work!

When I first read these two lines:

One specialization will have access to traps…

We’ll also be reusing old types of skills like shouts and traps to create more synergy with the Rune system.

I thought for a minute that maybe druids would be elite trappers. But now as I think about it, I think it’s more likely that this means that some class that doesn’t have traps now will get trap utilities (and maybe a trap heal and trap elite?)

Do you think that’s the right interpretation?

If so, what profession would you guess gains traps in their elite specialization?

In general terms, I think the reasoning that most of the time a person should lose a 1v2 is correct. But some builds have a better chance of winning these fights than other builds (and some builds have a better chance of escaping an outnumbered situation).

I think trapper builds have a better chance of winning because you have so much AoE damage. It’s possible to do a lot of damage to multiple targets, and that’s what gives it better odds at 1v2’s than some builds.

You can see from my game play that I make tons of mistakes. But here are a couple of outnumbered fights that I uploaded to YouTube to share with a friend.

You can definitely argue that the opponents die because of all their mistakes, and I lose plenty of outnumbered fights (and even some 1v1 fights). But it’s definitely possible to win outnumbered fights with a trapper build.

I can’t quite tell from the thread if you’ve tried (or you’re open to different) other kinds of condi builds, but I would encourage you to try a trapper build with the trapper runes.

I switched from playing mesmer to this, and it’s just amazing how fun it is for me
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fNQQNAnfVjEq0ua3KmrQ1aABhaVA0+FChWgd9mBbQKjaEv9A-TFyCABWcIAA4BAAo+gw3fwT1fm4MAkoSwsU+FAABwRP6RP6RPazcmzcmzcmFCYxaA-w

In 1500 hours roaming with my mesmer, I probably won 5 fights that were 1v2. With this build, I’ve won probably 30 of 1 v 2’s and a couple 1 v 3’s in about 300 hours of playing (granted some of these are against bad opponents, but some are silver, gold, and platinum ranks).

Yes, it can be tricky to get stomps, but I actually find that I prefer to down the first opponent and then pour AoE damage on the body. Many times, the second opponent comes in to help and ends up downed as well.

Thx for the feedback. I tried dagger as well, and it also seems good. I used axe mostly because I liked having the range.

There is some healing in this build:
- consume conditions
- staff 2
- unholy sanctuary – it heals for about 185 per second with the celestial amulet

The concept I was trying to achieve was build life force quickly so I could frequently be in death shroud. In death shroud, you are building might stacks while you’re healing. If somehow you could sit in death shroud for about 20 seconds. That’s around 13 stacks of might (because life blast is really every 1.5 seconds) and its about 3700 healing.

Then blood is power and lich form give a burst damage ability. And with a good number of might stacks, a handful of bleeds can tick at 400 or more per second.

That was my theory anyway… lol. In practice, I’m really spastic with this build – I just don’t have a feel for moving between the skills. I want to believe the build is good, and I could get better at it.

I’m hoping to play stonghold, so I’ve been looking for a build. I put together one that seems to hit pretty hard (not as hard as a full power necro) and also has a lot of survivability, mobility and stability.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fRAQNBmODbkjmib7px6GOcT8MUSHBBQzCVQS9PsDxAA-TJRBwA02fQzDB4bZAAXBAA

In very limited conquest testing, I’m pretty bad with it. Some of that is for sure because I’m new to both necro and pvp. But maybe the build just isn’t a great idea.

Anyone see anything clearly wrong with this build?

Trait says you do 5% more damage while above 50% life force

Is this only for death shroud attacks?

Or does it apply to your regular weapon attacks when you’re out of death shroud as long as your life force is above 50%?

Thx!

Thanks very much for the advice. I did some custom arena (solo queue) last night.

It was pretty good for learning maps.

As you warned, the fights were almost always unbalanced. So it was a bit tricky to try to evaluate the builds I was trying.

It’s nice that nobody really seems to care if you mess up there, but I can see how it’s value for learning the game drops off pretty quickly.

Can’t play during the beta tomorrow, but I’ve been looking at ideas for builds for defenders. I wanted to do a trapper ranger, but I think this might be better. It has a lot of fear to push back NPC’s (and players).

Would be cool to see if someone tests something like this during the beta
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fRAQNAW7Yjc0UcbtN+2wfbigBRyWfi+QgJU+NKA-TJhHwAB3fAwFB4YZgAPBAA

Before the pvp UI rework, I tried my first two games of pvp. I didn’t understand the choices, so I ended up in the ranked matches. I did two games and hosed my team in one of them.

Now, I’m curious to try again, but don’t want to cause problems. The buttons at the top say Practice (Custom Arena) and Play (Unranked Arena). If I want to learn the maps and get some practice fighting with a pvp build that’s a bit different than my WvW build, which button do I choose? What’s the difference between them?

Any other tip for an experienced WvW player, but total pvp newbie?

Thx!

I’m learning a ton from this thread, and I never pvp. I’ve been trying to theorycraft a build like the trapper I play in WvW, but it doesn’t seem that viable.

Has anyone tried might-stacking builds? This is an idea for a hybrid power-condi build that focuses on stacking might and getting bleeds on crits.
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fNAQNAnYTjEq0yaNLesQ1aADhqdLEsVNrAwd8+CXdKrYEv9A-TZRFwAEeCALOBAAOEAs2fwaZAA

The big problem seems to be no real mobility. (Is it possible to swap utilities while playing? Sometimes I’ve swapped in Signet of the Hunt in WvW at times. I don’t know if pvp mechanics/gameplay allow for this.)

I’m reading this as 4-5 ticks of bleeding at 2k per tick.

So with decent condition damage (guard killer stacks, corruption stacks, etc) that’s about 14 or 15 bleed stacks.

Splitblade does 5. Sharpening stone utility gives you 5. So if he uses sharpening stone and hits the full splitblade, that’s 10. Then some combination of keen edge, sharpened edges, geomancy sigil, and sigil of earth should get the other 4 or 5 stacks pretty quickly. Entangle or spike trap could also fill the gap quickly. Pets can add bleed stacks as well, but they tick for less damage so you need to get more than 14 or 15.

Oh… and duck snort is OP

After about 1500 hours of playing mesmer in WvW, I switched to a trapper ranger about 4 months ago. I love it for small group and solo play. It can work well in some zerg fights, but my pets die quickly (and this is my only condi removal). I can’t really speak for pvp or pve.

Trapper runes are the reason I made this character. Geomancy sigils are great. I also use corruption and bursting.

The stealth/speed mechanism with the runes could use a bit of tweaking. But after a while, I have mostly gotten used to it and accept that many times I won’t get stealth.

My build is quite close to the meta battle one you linked. I prefer jungle spider and marsh drake, and I use vipers nest instead of frost trap. I also prefer keen edge trait to nature’s protection. I don’t use sharpened edges (use the vigor trait instead), so I go ful dire instead of mixing in rabid. I also like hide in plain sight better than off-hand training.

As much as I love playing this character and don’t want it nerfed, I would say it’s close to over-powered already. This is mostly based on my time as a mesmer, so perhaps it’s just that was really underpowered.

In terms of counters, I never worry about a 1v1 fight. I still lose some of them, but I feel like I can win every possible fight. The ones that can be trouble are diamond skin ele, condi thief, something with a lot of stuns (no true stun breakers in my build), and necro if I foolishly let him put my own condis back on me.

Hope you try it out and enjoy it!

I chatted with the opponent afterwards. He was fairly new to playing ele, so I’m sure there are things he could do better. He was very cool to chat with, and I’m sure he would have beat me had we fought again.

I make lots of mistakes in every fight, and this one is no exception. I’m mostly trying to think about how to generate 2000 damage in small enough window that I can get conditions ticking enough to keep him below 90%.

Given that he has 4 guard-killer stacks and presumably celestial gear, I think he’s around 20,000 health.

Thx much for the help!

Thx much for the tips. I rarely see a diamond skin ele, so I have a lot to learn there.

I did try to land the F2 on the drake, but without an immobilize, it’s hard to get more than a couple hits. I guess I would need to try to sync with concussion shot

It doesn’t seem like 1500 – 2000 is that much damage, so I guess I shouldn’t call it “burst”. But direct damage is pretty low in my build, and the opponent had life-steal food in addition to healing. I got really lucky with the drake attacks.

So far, I feel like this build could beat any other build if I played it well, so I don’t want to change it if I can find a way to play against those with excellent condi defense.

Either way, this sure is a fun build to play. Thanks again for all the help!

One thing to consider if you’re coming from a thief perspective is that the trapper runes not only give you a little stealth, they give you a little burst of speed. I don’t think either of them are really close to what you have on a thief, but I think you may like the in-combat mobility.

I record video fairly often (mostly to share with friends). All the recent ones here are trapper condi WvW roaming. A bunch of the ones where I’m with another person are with a survival ranger build, so you can see a little bit of both in those.
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCqzNWP8L3BAAQXDbDdXF02Q

This video is one where I added some music and pointed out a few things I’m learning:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kGNHdiMjePE

I got lucky and won a fight I should have lost. (And one of the cool things about GW2 is that sometimes people stop and chat after a WvW fight – thx to my opponent for chatting afterwards.)
http://youtu.be/41g1nid7G98

Winning this came down to lucky hits by the drake, and an opponent who just missed a heal.

So here’s the question: With a trapper condi build, how should I try to fight a diamond skin ele? It seems like I need to create a direct damage burst, but my build is really not set up for that. I guess if I knew it was going to be diamond skin ele, I could switch to a dps pet. Any other tips?

Here’s my current build – thx!
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fNQQNAnfVjEq0ua3KmrQ1aABhaVA0+FChWgd9mBbQKjaEv9A-TFyCABA8AAO+QAAo+gw3fwT1fm4MAkoSwsU+FAABwRP6RP6RPazcmzcmzcmFCYxaA-w

I think in many cases it is a buff. But if your opponent cleanses early, it’s a nerf (I think)

I’m assuming that the first “tick” of damage would always happen at the same time. So when I look in the combat logs, I see the first burn or bleed or poison is smaller number than it used to be.

It’s not a big deal, but I’m just trying to confirm that it looks the same to other people.

The patch note read like this is a buff.
<em>Conditions will now deal this fractional damage either at the beginning or end of their duration, depending on when the next damage pulse would occur and their remaining duration.</em>

I think in cases where the opponent never removes the condition, it is a buff.

Looking through my logs, I seemed to find more cases the partial amount was applied as the first tick of condi damage. So my first burn tick showed up as 200 versus a typical 800. Under the old rules, that first tick is 800 and I never get the 200 tick (either I get nothing or I stack on more burns and eventually it becomes a full second).

So if I fight an opponent who cleanses the burn early on, I lose that 600 damage I would have had in the old system.

I’m not complaining at all. I think this is a great change – especially because anything that makes condi’s more viable in PvE is awesome. And I think condi builds are very poweful, so a small nerf is okay.

Am I thinking about this correctly? Does it look the same in logs for other folks?

I played about 1500 hours of WvW roaming on my mesmer. My friend played warrior and guardian.

Until we switched to (different) condi ranger builds, we never accomplished what we have done in the last couple of months.

If you ever feel bad about what you can do as a ranger in WvW, I would suggest switching to a mesmer. This is an awesome profession.

Thx much for the help. If your curious, the reason that I was exploring these pets was I was wondering about a possible tweak on my build. It looks like this most of the time:

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fNQQNAnfVjEq0ua3KmrQ1aABhYVQ73wW2RZbp8jR82D-TFyCABA8AAO+QAAo+gw3fwT1fm4MAkoSwsU+FAABwRP6RP6RPazcmzcmzcmFCYxaA-w

After I did some analyzing, it looks like the drakes are only doing about 12% of my total damage output in WvW fights. So I started wondering about taking Sharepened Edges as my adept trait in the skirmishing line.

Because I’m using all dire gear, my crit chance isn’t that great. So I looked at using the Red Moa to give me a high uptime on fury (especially combined with the 5 seconds on weapon swap).

Because the moa seems really fragile, I considered pairing it with the bear. This also looked like it would have nice synergy because Empathic Bond is my only current condi removal, and occasionally in heavy condi fights (like necro), I have trouble.

What I thought might make the whole package better overall was the heal from the moa and possibly the defy pain from the bear. And since it was a bit tricky to find answers on just how these worked, I decided to do some testing.

Anyway, I’m learning a lot and appreciate the advice. I’m now testing Primal Reflexes instead of Agility Training as the adept trait in skirmishing.

Thx – I have fun putting the videos together, so I’m glad someone had fun watching it.

Just a quick video to share some of the things I think are fun about playing a trapper ranger in WvW as I try to defend a tower. I make tons of mistakes, but I really like playing this build. Plus I get to use more 80’s music in a video…

http://youtu.be/dZ1PDPsNYD0

Thx for the clarifications!

I’m still pretty new to the profession, so I’m trying to make sure I understand how things work. There’s a pretty large amount of old information around on the web, and it’s a bit tricky to sort through what’s still relevant.

Well, there are a few places in the tooltips where “you” is a bit ambiguous, and searching the ever-wise internet, there were a bunch of places that suggested that this skill affected the ranger.

And for some reason, this skill has a range of 1200. So if it only affects the bear, what is the range for?

Thus, I asked and then researched and tried to confirm. So it appears to be working as designed.

So, does it mean Defy Pain is bugged/broken if it doesn’t apply to the ranger or has it always been this way?

I see a lot of people running around with a bear pet

The video shows me trying to test a couple of pet-activated skills.
http://youtu.be/7wt7f5GEpTU

The bear uses bite to self-heal very frequently.

Defy pain does not seem to apply to the ranger. I take damage while defy pain is clearly in effect. I have only recorded the bear using the skill when it gets to about 25% health.

Either harmonic cry is a cone attack or the distance is evaluated at the very end of the screech. I have trouble getting the pet to do it reliably, so hard to get samples. I thought I have had samples before where there are three cries. But this video only has two.

It would be nice to know if this matches anyone else’s results. (And if there is similar testing anyone has done for other pets)

Yup, it helps in general. I did a bunch of testing with drake pets and recording them on video to understand.

As far as I could tell with drakes, the way they work is that they use the right-most skill (tail whip) basically as soon as possible when swapped in combat. Then they just use the standard Bite attack. The only times I’ve ever seen a drake use Chomp are if it is below half health. I suspect that a moa works the same way.

With brown bear, I can’t see anything on the screen or in the logs to indicate it is ever using Defy Pain. That’s the one I’m most curious about.

I’m experimenting with a different set of pets, and have a few questions:

Brown bear – defy pain.
- What causes the bear to use this skill?
- Does it protect the bear, the ranger or both? It has a range…
- What effect should you see on the screen? Does anything show in the combat log?
I’ve been trying to catch this in video, but the bear never seems to use it

Red moa – harmonic cry.
- What causes the moa to use this skill? (moa being damaged?)
- The one time I recorded it in the logs, it looks like it channels in three pulses. Is that right?
- Why does it have both a radius and a range?

Thanks for all the help!

Thx! I’m pretty new to ranger (just a couple of months), so I guess I was seeing something from older times when I saw the 30% stat.

I agree I need to get better with the pets. Given this data, I’m thinking about trying something really different. If the best a tanky pet is going to output is around 12% of my total dps, I might consider giving up more pet dps in exchange for some other benefit.

Thx again

I remember reading somewhere that pets were supposed to be about 30% of the total dps that a ranger outputs. That seemed high compared to what I thought was happening in my build, so I decided to collect some data.
http://youtu.be/sLlGMDtoams

In case you want to save the five minutes, in all three of my tests the ranger did 88% of the total damage and the pet did 12%. The tests are not “controlled” tests in any way. I take out a sentry, then capture a camp, and then captured some video from a chaotic fight that had a couple significant parts that were 1v1 and some parts with multiple targets. I’m not trying to optimize for one kind of damage over the other during the tests – I’m just playing how I normally play. I use the pet F2 skills at times and count the damage as the pet’s damage.

I’m using drakes, so they aren’t heavy dps pets. The only trait augmenting the pets is “agility training”. The other interesting observation is that, against human opponents, the pets do about 8100 of the 31,000 damage against opponents who are downed. If you take that damage out of the totals, the pets are doing about nine percent of the total. Doing damage to downed opponents is valuable, but it’s interesting that it makes up more than a quarter of the pets total output even with agility training.

The questions this leaves for me are:
- Is agility training worth it? (My tests on moving golems showed about a 25% increase in dps for the drakes – but the pet numbers are pretty small in the bigger picture)
- If I managed the pets better, would they be a lot more dps?
- Should I try to add in a higher dps pet? (the big value for me in the drakes is that they are good at soaking up condition damage)
- Maybe the right strategy for me is to think of the pets purely for utility value?

I’m really happy with the build I have now. I don’t think I actually need more damage from the pets. I’m just thinking about whether their are better options. This is how the build looks right now:
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fNQQNAnfVjEq0ua3KmrQ1aABhYVQ73wW2RZbp8jR82D-TFyCABA8AAO+QAAo+gw3fwT1fm4MAkoSwsU+FAABwRP6RP6RPazcmzcmzcmFCYxaA-w

I haven’t really done any pvp, but I really like trapper ranger (with trapper runes) in WvW.

For those that do a lot of pvp, if trapper runes were allowed in pvp matches, would trapper rangers be more viable? (Runes give super speed and stealth on trap deployment)

I would really like to try stronghold when it comes out, but I’m thinking my current build would just be too slow and not help the team enough