Guild Wars 2

Oh, and while we’re talking about Sword: Remove the projectile property from Sword Wave. Sword autoattacking is the only autoattack from a melee weapon in the game which can be reflected back in your face in Fractals and elsewhere, which is incredibly irritating.

Leap combo on #2, better tracking (homing? Target leading? Or better yet, don’t root us) and maybe 5-10% more damage on #3 so that it’s actually worth interrupting your autoattack for it.

Better still, give us a damaging condition on #2 or #3 (that isn’t burning, we get plenty of that from autoattacks) to make the condition damage on the Radiance line have some worthwhile application. Mobility stays the same, but build options and damage open up.

Better still, make #3 a full block. Using #3 as a ranged punish is great in theory, until you realize that you can’t actually hit anything that isn’t standing in front of you, so it ceases to be a ranged punish and instead becomes a very poor emergency defensive skill. If it were a full block it could be used as a melee punishing skill as well.

Also, combine Supreme Justice with Permeating Wrath.

Here’s my Guardian, plus alternate universe Warrior variation.

The problem with any static AOE like symbols/wells/etc is that they’re great in PvE where stuff doesn’t move, and they’re great in PvP where you have static points to defend/attack, but they’re only bad in mobile fights. So they’re balanced in 2/3 game modes, but crippled in another.

Personally I think symbols should become auras instead of ground AOEs but meh.

Where is your crit coming from with that setup? Having 95 crit damage is great, until you realize you almost never take advantage of it. Intelligence sigils are really janky, though that can work for MB crits.

Nothing really changed for burn builds this past balance patch. I’m waiting for the next one to really redo everything. I’d do it now but class got in the way.

I’m using this guy

I swap things out fairly regularly though. That’s more of a dungeon variation. For WvW I swap in Writ of Exaltation and Pure of Voice. In condition heavy dungeons I swap Save Yourselves for Purging Flames and Vengeful for Master of Consecrations.

If you don’t want to craft Celestial armor, you can get basically the same results with Cleric’s helmet and legs, Berserker shoulders, gloves and boots, and Soldier’s chest. You’ll just have less healing power and less Crit Damage, but higher Power, so it basically balances out.

I also use Traveler’s runes in WvW instead of Monk/Water.

You’re going to have to elaborate on what your build is if you want that kind of a judgement call. If you don’t have many boons to speak of (Meditations build, Consecrations, etc) then it’s pointless. If you do, then go for it. Boon duration is very valuable and can make or break certain builds.

It depends on the definition of viable. It’s fun, yeah. I think the hammer/mace symbols + permeating wrath build I’ve got now is probably one of my favorites. I usually kite the gravelings in Ascalonian Catacombs path 1 during the Hodgins graveling mound ordeal, and typically I’m the last one standing because I’m able to keep burns on 20 or 30 gravelings (if it gets that bad) and actually kill them. There are other small moments when it really shines besides that. But ultimately it’s not “meta” – that is, it’s not the best, for anything. I’m hoping that the December 10 patch will do something about that, but I’m not holding my breath. I said the exact same thing for the last major balance patch, ha.

But for the time being, my build is fun. I can heal, I have very high AOE damage potential if anemic in 1v1, and it’s satisfying everywhere I’ve been so far. So yeah, go for it. Just be aware that it’s not going to be the best, but as long as you’re content with that it’s fun.

If you do use permeating wrath (which, for reference, is basically my definition of a “burn build” – little else compares) just keep in mind that any attack with multi-hit capability is going to be to your advantage. Sword autoattacking, symbols (multiple targets per pulse), Smite with the scepter, Whirling Wrath, and so on.

If you don’t use permeating wrath (or a torch, but you can find out what I think about that in the guide itself) then you’re going to be pretty behind in terms of how much burning you can actually apply.

3000-3200 isn’t going to make a whole lot of difference. For comparison though, a full DPS build is gonna be on the order of 5000-6000.

JonPeters.5630:

snip

Well, hopefully it’ll give me the impetus to rewrite the burning guide. I’m at least somewhat hopeful now, though I was hopeful this past balance patch and was a little disappointed on the condition front.

It’s difficult if not impossible to do if your latency is too high. The animation time causes the total time between Mighty Blows to be closer to 5-6 seconds, such that even an upgraded Purging Flames doesn’t last long enough more often than not to actually support two blasts. It’s all luck.

Hallowed Ground on the other hand can absolutely pull of two fire blasts. But Purging Flames is fiddly at best.

Because the rotation takes about half a second longer than sword/greatsword. I guess. It never bothered me.

Sadly, it doesn’t work that way. The soulbinding is attached to the stats. What happens is this:

[Ascended appearance] + [Ascended stats (soulbound)] : [White appearance] + [White stats (account bound)]

You can create a new item by mixing the appearance with the stats of these two. So you can get the appearance of the white on your soulbound stats, or you can get the appearance of the ascended with the white stats (making it account bound), but you can’t make those stats account bound by any mixing combination because the binding is attached to the stats.

Make sense?

Basically, the trick you describe can ONLY make skins account bound for use on other characters. It doesn’t let you transfer stats to other characters.

Well, fortunately 100 Blades isn’t all there is to warriors. Like every class, your options really open up past 30.

Guardian and Warrior both have lots to offer you. They both have tons of options for support and DPS (condition and direct, though in very different ways), as well as control.

Mace also has identical autoattack timing to hammer. It’s basically the same rhythm.

It’s not even worth discussing. The idea behind the trait is sound, the problem is that in practice it’s completely worthless because it doesn’t give you enough DPS to warrant taking it, and 3% more isn’t going to change that. If this were a Necromancer trait I would be horrified, because it would be an absolutely disgusting increase in damage for them, but we aren’t Necromancers. The best we can do is burn everything in the room, and we have to work really hard to do that. Burns alone don’t make 200 extra condition damage for your average Guardian a worthwhile investment.

I mean, for the sake of bludgeoning this point home in case Anet is reading it, look at it this way. For a 2k power character, you’re spending 30 trait points for 58 DPS per target you are capable of burning at 13% conversion. To a 3000 DPS character, that’s a drop in the bucket. No one cares. Specced correctly you can burn a nearly limitless number of targets but it doesn’t matter, because PvE doesn’t have that many targets and PvP doesn’t reward dribbles of damage, it rewards spikes. Guardians don’t provide “condition pressure” so that’s not an excuse either.

The only time something like this is rewarding is when there are so many targets near you that you can’t cleave all of them with your direct damage attacks, because with Permeating Wrath and lots of burn duration you can theoretically be damaging things way beyond your cleave limit. But there’s no gameplay to support that kind of tactic.

The problem is Kindred Zeal is awful, and will stay awful until they bump it up to something like 30-50%. It doesn’t mean jack diddly to have condition damage when your only damaging condition is burning. Perplexity be kitten ed.

Working as intended. Trait tooltip is incorrect, it doesn’t add a flat figure to the duration, but rather 50% rounded down. All other symbols last 4 seconds, thus are given 2 full seconds more by the trait. Protection is the odd one out.

Nespinha.3165:

I´m not asking for a build, it´s a simple question.

In your opinion, if I have 35% crit chance how much crit damage should I have and why?

Or if I want to use 65-68% critical damage, at how many crit chance should I play?

Just want to understand if i´m wasting too many points in precision or crit chance or if these stats are ok

You’re asking the wrong question.

linuxotaku hit the nail on the head: The issue is that some gear gives more critical damage per point of other stats than other slots. So when you’re trying to avoid wasting stats, the way you do that is by making sure that the gear you wear that IS specific to damage is in the correct slot. You can figure out all of the ratios very simply; Look at Berserker stat gear for any given slot, divide the total non-crit damage stat points by the crit damage. e.g. 60 power 40 precision 6% crit damage – 100/6, gives you 16 stat points per crit damage point. The lower the number, the better. Trinket wise, accessories give you the best ratio of crit damage, and Exquisite Rubies are the best upgrades for that purpose as well. For armor, Shoulders, Gloves, and Boots give the best ratios.

So here’s how you would address your scenario: You look at your build, and you say “Okay, I have roughly the stats that I want, but I want to make it as efficient as possible.” Let’s say you’re wearing all Knights armor and all Berserker trinkets. What you’ll find is actually more efficient is if you swap out your Knights Shoulders, Gloves, and Boots for Berserker (because of better ratios of crit damage to normal stats) and then replace your rings and possibly amulet with Knights. Your stats will be roughly equal to before, but you will be getting more efficient conversions of other stats to critical damage.

Basically you can think of it like this: Start off designing your build without damage in mind, and then salt to taste with Berserker gear until you hit the damage point you want in that build. When you do that, start replacing slots with berserker gear that have the best ratios first, which is Accessories (like Ruby Orichalcum Earrings). Then move on down the list until you finally hit whatever your target stats are for damage.

The reason you have to do it like this is that you can’t really say “for x crit damage y crit chance is optimal” because you’re locked in to specific stat distributions. You don’t get to allocate stats point by point in this game. The only thing that really matters is that Berserker gear is the best direct damage gear in the game, and so any time you’re building direct damage into your loadout you should always do so by giving yourself Berserker gear. Adding Berserker gear will always give you more DPS, more efficiently, than any other stat distribution.

It heals for less than Shelter if you have no conditions on you. The only time it outperforms Shelter is if you cure two conditions with it, but you still miss out on the Blocking from Shelter. It does have some party utility from the group wide condition clearing but to be honest, it’s quite limited. I won’t be using it.

Smooth Penguin.5294:

mage.3570:

A couple of weeks back, I opened 25 chests, got 5 scraps.

Today, I opened 15 chests, got 0 scraps. ZERO!!! This is really ridiculous. What kind of sick RNG is in the game?

You opened those 40 BL Chests will the full knowledge that there are no guarantees that you’ll get what you want, and then complain that you didn’t get what you want? It’s like going to the store to buy an apple pie, then getting upset there wasn’t any strawberries in it.

Stop defending a stupid system.

It’s stupid. It’s completely asinine that people have to spend an enormous money on a GAMBLE (and it is that, gambling) in a game like this.

It doesn’t matter what the expectation is for the user, beyond this: People expect to invest time/money and be rewarded accordingly. Not on the whim of RNG.

The male version is freaking incredible. The female version is AWFUL. The only thing appealing about it is the boots, and they clip with almost everything. Also the fact that they’re stilettos is ridiculous. Incredible disappointment.

Halberds! Voulges! Polehammers! Bardiches!

Bring on the polearms and greataxes.

The RNG chest gambling is awful. Truly awful. It’s one of the few really dark blemishes on this otherwise good game. Look through the posts in the most recent Southsun event and you’ll see the immortalized cries of people like me who spent hours and hours and hours farming for a Southsun claim ticket to get a sclerite weapon. Some people opened thousands of chests and never got one.

None of those are full sets, Solo.

I love the update so much I’ll be rerolling my Necro as a Sylvari now. Woo.

Sponsored by Amins.

In all seriousness, that’s not really a good test of PvP viability. NPCs don’t know how to use burst rotations, swap weapons on cooldown, stunlock, kite, or do any of the other things that make players… players. A Healway build would get smashed just standing still and trying to go toe to toe, but as soon as you start to play it as it was meant to be played, it changes completely.

All you prove is that X class can facetank an NPC for Y seconds longer than the rest. Which means next to nothing.

You’re obviously frustrated with something. It’s much more conducive to the global conversation to actually contribute your thoughts instead of being vague and hiding them behind a snarky but ultimately meaningless test. If you don’t know how to parse your thoughts on the issue, take some time to think about it until you do, then start or contribute to a thread about your real issue.

Threads like these don’t get anyone anywhere fast.

Under no circumstance will torch 5 ever out-dps simply autoattacking. That’s the main issue with it as a weapon. Torch 5 is completely and utterly abysmal. If they ever improve it, it will become the official dps weapon of choice; for right now, it’s really bad save for the burst on 4.

You’re late to the outrage train. We’ve been over Sword 3 in detail in the past. There really are more important things to be mad at at the moment.

It’s an omnidirectional projectile block which lasts through the duration of the animation. The only times I actively use it to block projectiles is against Kill Shots from warriors, and it works great for that.

The entire reason that Spirit Weapons were nerfed was due to how badly they could be exploited. They could sometimes be summoned through walls, in order to attack people or monsters that you ordinarily couldn’t reach. You could run out of a gate during a siege, pop a weapon or three, then run back in and those weapons would continue to run wild and unchecked on anyone attacking the gates and there was no counter to them what so ever.

Anet was absolutely right to change them. The problem is that they nerfed them too hard in the process and have been playing catch up ever since.

Instead of playing catch up and performing incremental improvements over a span of months, they should be completely redesigned. Frankly, everything minion related (turrets, pets, etc) in this game is awful, so I don’t even think they should be minions anymore. They should IMO basically be static “buffs;” They follow you around extremely closely and only attack things that are basically in melee range of you, with the exception of the bow which can support the ranged options. It’s a burst damage option to increase your DPS temporarily. In the process, make them invulnerable again but tied to any CC the Guardian receives; CC the Guardian and the Spirit Weapon goes too. It’s counterable, it’s not vulnerable to godawful minion behavior, and it’s in keeping with the original design spec.

Mattargul.9235:

foofad.5162:

It hasn’t even been a day yet. Let things settle before you blow a fuse and overreact.

You are new to the internet, aren’t you?

No, I just don’t think people should be given a free pass to be irrational just because it’s a forum.

It hasn’t even been a day yet. Let things settle before you blow a fuse and overreact.

Tons of people just dip into 10 Zeal for Fiery Wrath. It’s one of the staple traits. Torch is only worthwhile if you lack Permeating Wrath, but even then it’s iffy at best.

Burning Bolts is crappy. Basically, you only throw out one bolt per second the whirl is active. Or maybe it’s half second, I forget. So in other words for something like Whirling Wrath you only throw out like two or three bolts, total. And they only apply a couple of seconds of burning.

You can’t get multiple combos from multiple fields. It picks the oldest on the pile and goes with that.

Shattered Aegis is also crappy. It’s a two second AoE burn, but you only have access to your auto-Aegis (every 40 or 30 seconds traited), VoC popping (long cooldown) and Retreat in terms of actually applying Aegis. So you’re looking at many many seconds of cooldown for little return. I’m not sure if Shattered Aegis applies to allies.

I suspect that SA is one of the traits that will get overhauled in the big patch. I’ve actually been waiting to edit this post in a significant way until the balance patch, in hopes of some new stuff dramatically changing things.

You should have enough. Go to the mists, equip a sword, and run through the autoattack chain against a single golem. When you hit the last attack, you should see two burning ticks within a second of one another.

It’s hard-limited to 100% from any source, whether boon specific or generalized. 100% general + 20% boon specific is still truncated to 100%.

No, nothing about the usefulness of condition damage is tied to our low base HP. Our traits and abilities just aren’t made to make use of condition damage as a stat, but that’s not our HP’s fault.

Aegis is bugged (I assume, I don’t see how this can be intended) such that it blocks simultaneously with any other block you have up. In other words if you use Shield of Wrath and have Aegis, and you take one hit, SoW is reduced to 4 more blocks and Aegis is consumed. Same deal with Mace 3. One hit, Aegis + block are consumed.

Very annoying.

No reason to use HtL over Retreat when you have Unscathed Contender, you need that extra on demand Aegis to make UC worthwhile as a burst skill.

Daecollo.9578:

FoopOplo.7914:

I’m not here to be mean or a downer, but yeah AH only heals the guardian giving the boons. It’s just worded kinda weird on the wiki. Sorry man.

Yes, but that is what i’m saying.

IF all 5 have AH, that is a lot of healing if they all stack on 1 spot.

But… you don’t need 5 guardians for that. Why have a group of 5 guardians? All you need to test the build is one.

You are the grumpiest person on the Guardian forums. It sounds more like you’re just not having fun anymore, which is fine. But it’s not like stomping around ever got any of the other classes their changes any faster.

Don’t be grumpy though! It’s not good for you!

If you want AoE healing, you need Selfless Daring and then everything else is gravy. Staff gives you two more heals, Mace gives reliable Regen and AoE healing on third autoattack. You can run basically whatever else you want.

This is what I use right now in PvE. You can get virtually the same stats with less “waste” on things like Condition Damage using a Cleric’s helm and Berserker shoulder, gloves, and boots. You can match it almost stat for stat using Valkyrie instead, to get the same defensive numbers. Your Power will be about a hundred higher. But it’s such a minor difference in effective power and health as to be pedantic, IMO.

I would never use Celestial trinkets, but I’m enjoying my full set of armor. It’s definitely not the greatest for any one thing, but what I really like about it is the build flexibility it gives me. I don’t feel bad using it in either my full offensive or full defensive sets. My damage is diminished somewhat (85%) compared to full zerk in my full zerk builds, but not so much that I really notice it. Granted, I already have full sets of berserker and soldier and all the rest that I use in those builds… but not having to switch around so much is nice. Feels like I retired or something.

Right now, I run a catch-all build. Does a little bit of everything; Decent damage (unless you ask GK, in which case he’d remind me – correctly – that it does half the damage of a full meta zerker build), 800 healing power for direct heals, 2600~ armor and 15k HP. I like it in WvW quite a lot, especially. Play it like a healway only with much better damage.

Anyway, I don’t know why I decided to spill all that, but eh. Haven’t posted in a while. School started :O

Attack is functionally useless. Tooltip damage does indeed take into account the average of the weapon damage spread but there’s no reason you can’t use the upper or lower bounds for theorycrafting.

Utilities use 1000 for weapon damage, for their tooltip damage.

Not to be a pedant, but “linearly” means that when you graph it, it takes the form of a line. It doesn’t have anything to do with exponents specifically although exponential equations are not linear. When you plot [(Coefficient * Weapon Damage * Power) / Armor] with Armor as the only variable, the result is a curve. If you plot it with Power as the only variable, it’s linear: Damage scales linearly with Power (or coefficient, or weapon damage), but on a curve with Armor.

Granted, you now have no hands.

I wish ranger pets could be told to fetch.

I think, given all our other sources of Retaliation, that a cleanse-on-blast would be very nice. It might need some balance though. Maybe a 50% chance to fail or something. But yes, it’s a good idea.