Buran.3796

> @"Nephalem.8921" said: > Regarding fb. It has currently the fastest fractal cm solos. saying its only good for burst is just wrong. Well it is like that if you use a Lord Hizen build. Use instead: > That Lord Hizen build you mentioned is only good vs normal mobs. The builds i linked are better vs everything else. ...As I promised I've been trying that build from Roul and I must conceed that the damage is impressive (compared to everything else), even without using the Balthazar runes, the food and the signet it melts targets targets faster than a pure viper condi Renegade. But I'm not sure about the sustain: has very limited access to breakstuns/stability, and if you want cleanses (through tomes or utilities) you erode your dps. Sure, kills things faster than other builds, but also dies faster and is one of the best glass cannons to reach 0 dps due a input mistake... Powerful for the "pros", but for the average joe the Renegade variantes and the condi Herald do similar work (at considerably lower pace) much safer and with way more room for errors.

> @"Shaogin.2679" said: > Burn DH is still a meta level PvP class that spawns plenty of complaint threads in these forums. What is even more significant, is that no matter how much Guardian is nerfed, some new build always claws its way back up to being meta. Revs are great too, sure, but they have no viable power dps build for PvE content. Currently, they are forced to play boon support. Even their condi build pales in comparison to the Firebrand condi build, which is the only meta condi build in existence for fractals due to how bursty it is. Burn DH trapper is an AoE burst one-trick-pony build which farms bad players, but has very little defense (cleanses, stunbreaks, stability... ) in order to be bursty. I don't think they are meta at all (at high level play), is just that is popular because the other Guardian builds (specially Firebrands) are at so poor state in PvP that almost every Guardian player choses to run that glass cannon in order to get nukes. In teamfights is easily countered by stability and/or condi transfers. Albeit not meta, power Renegade works great at PvE (less damage than condi but way larger sustain). I'll conceed that burn FB are the kings of burst (and power DH amongst the kings of power burst), but as a player which former mained a Guardian I dislike the lack of continuity between what works (for a Guardian) in PvE and what works in WvW and PvP.

> @"Shaogin.2679" said: > No class in the game has more build diversity than Guardian. You can play something new, but once you get used to playing that new class, you'll just run into the same issue again. Used to be that way, but at the moment Guardian is at a very bad place in PvP: FB is just bad, core is weak and DH runs a PvE build which only works vs bots and A.I. level players. Otherwise yeah, Guardians are fantastic both at PvE and in WvW zergs. I would say that currently Revs have better variety in the sense of "different builds which pwerform great at every game mode".

> @"Leonidrex.5649" said: > the fact that developers dont respect your time doesnt mean that YOU should disrespect the time of your fellow players Doesn't bend the rules. Ask ANet a shorter warm up time. I don't complain when people ditches the cutscenes in instanced content; people are free to use the prematch time as they can. Wan't a more likeable experience? Run custom arenas with friends.

> @"Crackers.9628" said: > Why do you always feel the need to make everyone wait? Strangely enough, you instantly pressed ready when there was a penalty for not doing so. We're already waiting for the queue time (5 minutes every game), map decide, screen load, and the looong ready up. I have to manually check if the game correctly charged my loadout, because despite the templates, the Revenant is bugged and keeps swapping my utilities around. Then I have to check who's on each team, not only due composition, but also how many bots and blocks fills each one. Sometimes just taking a look gives a good insight of how the match will be going. Finally, I don't see the reason to hurry: despite the petitions, ANet never changed the huge queue screen which blocks your vision in every game mode when you are waiting to join, or never implemented a "give up botton" for when a team is being snowballed, etc. Is blatant that the game is being neglected in terms of support (and not only PvP), so if the developers don't have hurry, why should I?

> @"hash.8462" said: > I have perma quickness/protection/25xmight/25xvulnerability and a 240 radius symbol that hit 5 targets and decent healing, is hard to be killed; > at golem damage is around 10k with only self boons and I'm fine with it, > when fighting a boss, adds generally melt around me, personally I like hammer on guardian. I would like to see how your hammer performs just vs a mundane veteran bristleback.

> @"Altion.9576" said: > It sucks, meanwhile Revenant has the best hammer ingame imo. Best one currently in the game is Scrapper's. Rev's hammer is useless in PvE and PvP, and in WvW the last batch of nerfs since 2018 turned it into crap: the aa is slow and easy to negate, and the damage is just low; Coalescence of Ruin cancels itself if you move beyond 30º of your starting position when you begin the cast, or if you move forward or backward too fast, and is oftenly blocked in uneven terrain (and by uneven I mean a 5 cm step or some other random crap); Drop the Hammer is the slowest and most telling skill in the game while dealing 0 damage. Phase Smash has i-frames but at the same time roots you, and the cooldown is just too long to be anything but a joke. I used to run a hammer Guardian and a hammer Rev at every game mode when GW2 and HoT were released, and let me tell you that now they are garbage, specially Rev's one because numbers aside (damage, cooldowns, procs... ) they changed the mechanics of CoR, so now along sobpar damage is 0% reliable, even at PvE.

Last time I used Guardian's hammer was like 4-5 years ago. Warrior's hammer around 3 years ago. Rev's hammer like 1.5-2 years ago. That's related to all game modes. Sometimes I use Scrapper's hammer, but only in PvE because I don't play Engineer in PvP. Outside bruiser Scrapper builds I would say that the hammer is a weapon that doesn't exist in GW2, and have been this way for a while.

There's 0 relation between armor, health, class and sustain in this game due the main factor of being durable in combat is more linked to skills and traits than to armor class or even stats. Also, the outfits entirely ended any sort of coherence in that regard (but I won't blame medium armor players for wearing outfits looking like plate armor or bikinis, I would also be mad if almost every skins for my favs would been butt capes and trenchcoats).

> @"Nephalem.8921" said: > The enire fb part is completely wrong. I really dont understand why you mentioned the viper sc build. you can use full trailblazer as condi without really losing damage. Condi ren does A LOT more dmg than herald and the battle scars variant has enough sustain to solo all the bounties. Condi ren is not squishier than power. The opposite thanks to op trailblazer. > Going herald makes you even more tanky but you lose a lot. Lord Hizen builds focus way too much on survivability. You are the only dmg source in solos so thats not a good approach. > Regarding fb. It has currently the fastest fractal cm solos. saying its only good for burst is just wrong. Well it is like that if you use a Lord Hizen build. Use instead: > > That Lord Hizen build you mentioned is only good vs normal mobs. The builds i linked are better vs everything else. I'll watch the examples and respond later after doing my own research and testing (probably this weekend or in a few days) because I'm not dogmatic and I'm trully interested in to learn more about using different playstyles and maybe finding out ways which could fit me/serve me the best. So I'll test that with an open mind and genuine interest. Will come to share my impressions later. But about trailblazer instead of viper, I don't thing that changes the things too much: the damage is very close (~90%) while giving us way more HP and armor to prevent one shoots, but a trailblazer Renegade doesn't change its features: lives on fastly refilling HP from damage suffered, but lacks active mitigation, stability and the same amount of CC that the power variant has. And despite trailblazer is arguably strong due you only need two stats to do condi damage (condition and condition duration) I don't find that stat "op" because due the power creep from the expansions a lot of power builds only need two stats also (power and crit damage) because now there's a lot of skills and traits which enhance critical chance to the point that crit chance is no longer mandatory, making some builds based on Cavalier stats as "op".

> @"Heizero.9183" said: > Me and my guild love hammer guard so much its not uncommon for us to run 3 or 4 at a time when roaming. > I can see how 3-4 of you fighting at the same time with hammers in WvW can make you feel that the weapon is powerful. But that's a hollow feeling, like armwrestling a 7 year old and bragging about winning. There's a reason you don't see hammers in neither PvE nor PvP (aside from Scrappers). They are outdated. They didn't endure the power creep of PoF.

> @"Nephalem.8921" said: > Why not condi ren? Can use trailblazers and does more dmg than power ren. Condi fb with trailblazer/plagedoctor is quite op awell. The problems with the proposed trailblazer scourge or staff mirage in this thread is that their dps is extremely low. > Condi ren and condi fb do a lot more dmg while being just as tanky. Condi fb is also quite op if adds are around because the main dmg skill resets after each kill. Is a theme which already has been debated in threads like this one: https://en-forum.guildwars2.com/discussion/121056/condition-renegade-or-condition-herald#latest My take on that, which is based in a not that large PvE experience but in having a legenday armor and weapons to swap between loadouts and trying those builds against the same enemies: Condition Renegade (in both raids and open world) usually run full condi viper stats, Nightmare runes (multi condition buffs) with Kalla and Mallyx, short bow & mace + axe, and Renegade (2,2,2), Corruption (1,3,1) and either Invocation (2,1,2) for more damage and energy or Devastation (3,3,3) for the extra sustain. Is a build focusing in dealing damage afap, so the trait selection is focused on enhancing bleeds with Blood Fury and Heartpiercer, and the concept is to melt enemies as fast as possible stacking conditions. Has a strong defiance bar-breaking game with Darkrazor's Daring, but lacks stability, protection and blocks/i-frames. You can see variants of that build in both meta battle and the snow crows page, and are mainly builds designed to work well inside teams with support, not so much soloing the game (albeit Nike DNT has a good variant which can be found in Youtube and is discused on those two threads. Paper Now, the power Renegade is an entirely different beast. Mine is based on the Paper Roll's build but with changes in the stats to optimize boon duration: http://gw2skills.net/editor/?PmwAUxzltQHMNqhlROsN6hNSfMDKgJ11/rF-zRZYBJ1AY4wOC68MiVF0rUwjngA6t47rF-e This build uses a mix between commander and cavalier/berserker stats with the Leadership runes to achieve almost 48% boon duration, weapons are short bow and dual swords with Kalla and Jalis as legends. Since conditions are secondary damage doesn't need to invest in Blood Fury or Heartpiercer, so takes instead Renegade (1,3,2) Ashen Demeanor and All for One, which means amazing crowd control and 6 seconds of protection every time we cast a Kalla summon (so perma-protection while in that legend). Devastation (3,3,3) for the Battle Scarrs life siphoning triunvirate complements the life leaching from Soulcleave's Summit, and Invocation (2,2,2) grants good mobility in combat (Rapid Flow) and plenty of energy (Charged Mist). Now, Jalis has his own damage mitigation with a heal which removes up to 5 conditions, the 20% damage reduction from Vengeful Hammers, the 50% damage reduction from Rite of the Great Dwarf (5 seconds). You can't get all of them forever but you have plenty of tools, which includes also perma-stability if needed (Inspiring Reinforcement) and the perfect bar breaker complement to Darkrazor's Daring: Forced Engagement. So: that build has huge damage mitigation and crowd control tools in a loadout which already has over 3000 armor and a base crit chance of 41,5% which edges 95% most of the time (with close to 190% crit damage). When you solo open world with the condition variants you deal damage faster, and that works very well when you one shoot targets: a veteran chack? summon Darkrazor's, release Sevenshots and the target melts doing nothing... Which is more or less what happens with the power build, only a bit slower. But when you can't one shoot a target or crowd and the fight last longer (like versus a few bristlebacks or smokescales , or a champion or a bounty) the things change: then the condition variants rely just in recovering life through Soulcleave's and (if available) Battle Scars, whereas the power build has the same leeching capabilities while also having a large access to protection, damage mitigation, stability, more strong defiance bar-breaking tools and a valuable i-frame in sowrd #2. I've soloed most of HP champions with power herald, condi herlad, condi renegade and power renegade. I've also tried to solo some bounties with those builds (albeit my skill dealing with magic unstabilities is poor due didn't focused in PvE in the past). The power Herald is my favourite vs most of champs due how fast it moves and breaks defiance bars, but being 100% mele is risky vs some monsters, and the AoE damage is very lacking. In bounties have been able to reach 60-65% of some foes before the times expires, but isn't the best build because with power you can't deal damage and evade/block/survive at the same time. With condi Herald reached 70-75% of the HP on some bounties, and is for sure the tankies PvE build in the game. Some players way more skilled did solo almost everything with that build, and the only problem is that is a pure close range build which is risky vs some foes and is subpar for large events in which other players cloacks AoEs from enemies and you suddenly end in downstate because the framerrate dropped to single digits and the landscape was cluttered with visual effects. The Renegades have the advantage of a functional ranged weapon which can also fight af mele if needed. The condition variants do damage faster but are also squishier. The power Renegade is closer to the condi Herald in tankiness and lets you to have mistakes, for a more relaxed gameplay which also requires less skill and that's a huge bonus for new players. And that's the reason why I think that power Renegade is probably the best solo build in the game. Not sure if at high level is able to achieve the same feats as the condi Herald, but has more variety in terms of mele and ranged combat and a stronger bar breaking game. Finally, about the Firebrand: I mained Guardian before the Revenant, and I do play mostly both those classes (~8k hours in total). Past condi Firebrand was great. Currently Firebrand is hot garbage for solo content. I've been using power DH, condi DH, power FB and condi FB for PvE, PvP and even WvW. Related to the topic (PvE): Sustain in the FB class is currently bad, and you lose a lot of damage if you try to prevent that using traits. The FB open world builds from meta battle or guides like the one from Wooden Potatoes rely entirely on (bursting) killing the foes fast enough to activate Renewed Justice. That's great when you fight miniraptors, but works poorly vs tanky crowds of veterans and crumbles apart vs bounties. The condi Firebrand has also a very limited break breaking tools compared to a power Herald or a Renegade (you have to almost deplete all your tools to delete a blue bar). The best soloing build for Guardian/FB is the power FB which uses Lord Hizen in one of it latest videos, which is a variant from the quickbrander (but stats based in marauder/cavalier). It uses Valor instead of Zeal and Litany as the healing; uses quickness to achieve large burst while relying on Mantra of Lore for cleanses and Mantra of Liberation for stability, stacking regeneration, fury and well placed aegis to survive. It requires a huge skill to be played, because is a pure mele build which falls appart if gets interrupted, and you need to both known which attacks from the foes you need to block/evade and be familiar with the cooldown rotations of your 10 +15 skills and the cooldowns of each mantra. Is amazing once mastered, buy WAY harder to play than condi Herald or Renegades. That are my two cents of the topic. Hizen (which is a master at soloing PvE content) thinks that the two easiest classes for that task are Revs and Necros, and I'm waiting to see if He makes any changes over his older builds for those classes. Imo condi Herald and power Renegade are the most friendly solo builds which perform the best at extra hard content.

Trying to decide between condi Herald and power Renegade for that title. Condi Herald is more tanky and able to solo almost everything, but kills at slower pace and is pure mele, it's sustain is in part linked to the Tormenting runes, so changes could screw that status; power Renegade is a bit less tanky but does more damage, its boons last way longer and has more recovery, can be played both at range, mele or mixing both styles, and is not as vulnerable to balance patches because has tons of sources for sustain and survability.

Hammers are overall in very dysmal state amongst the few classes which use them. Warrior's hammer: insanely weak in PvP and garbage at PvE; Guardian's hammer: too low damage in PvE and too slow for PvP (also featuring cc moves which are entirely outdated); Scrapper's hammer: good for brusier builds at PvP and roaming, bad at PvE where the spec is entirely outclased by the Holo; Rev's hammer: useless at every game mode (including zerging). In GW2 the weapons frame the combat skills you can use, which has the good part in which classes aren't glued to a predefined look or fighting style. But the problem is that when a weapon is clearly underperforming compared to others they are fastly ditched by the players, and since the pace of balance patches is glacial once a weapon falls from grace oftenly that means facing years of no usability ahead. In the case of the Guardian and Rev the hammer feels just abandoned content, as dated as dungeons...

> @"medivh.4725" said: > Mine a nord and he is so bored? What I'm saying make the combos stylish and fun to look at... The animation in the mace is similar to the human, but in the last hit of the aa with sword instead of a linear thrust paralel to the ground the norn lands a 45º stab aiming to the grounbd, which looks weird. In terms of animations male norn isn't the best choice for a Guardian...

> @"ArthurDent.9538" said: > There is nothing in herald that would give it more damage than a renegade Remaining alive. That's why I think power Renegade> condi Renegade for PvE. Is closer to the sustain condi Herald has.

Rabid's Mirage. Tons of damage and sustain just standing spamming dodges and two-three skills.

> @"Blackrystal.3508" said: > I want a build for solo boss or story in pve but i don’t know what is the best class for pve I would say that this is amongst the best builds you can build for a solo Warrior: Is a build focused at mele range with high armor, power and crit damage, some i-frames and decent mobility, which relies in a good timing with the adrenaline attacks and Full Counter to prevent damage, regain health and break defiance bars. But has some disadvantages: no range and stability based on movements means that a bad timing will kill you fast, because lacks blocks and defensive passives. I would say that Revenant is better for solo. You have 3 builds which can perform well at that task: pure power Herald has lower damage (specially in AoE), but a lot of mobility and self sustain options, with the best breakers of defiant bars in the game. I think that is faster vs most of hero point champs but can struggle at dealing damage vs some bounties because usually can't attack and defend at the same time. The second option is a condi Herald: is much more tankier and has plenty of AoE damage, but is a bit slowers vs single targets. Again, is a mele build, but can solo fractals and bounties, so is stronger. The third option is using a Renegade with short bow, and you can go condi with either full damage viper (max damage), full trailblazer (damage + tankiness) or power (cavalier + commander) to get less damage but much more damage mitigation, stability and sustain. I would say that overall power Renegade would be the best option for most of the players: has both range damage and mele damage, almost permanent protection, stability on demand and a strong set of breakers for defiant bars. But players from the meta will tell you that you should run full viper... But those oftenly struggle to fight a couple of veteran bristleback at the same time...

Lately NotoriousNaru have been playing this build in this twitch channel (although He multiclass so is hard to predict when will use that one again). My advice in Conquest would be: play in teamfights pressuring at range and use Jalis + staff to get sustain under focus and gain time to disengage with Shiro. Avoid 1 vs 1 if possible, and dont run this build in 2 vs 2 because the meta ones will outlat it in sustain.

> @"Veprovina.4876" said: > Why trailblazer though? Do some traits have interaction with the Toughness stat? Or is it just for survivability? Cause i don't plan on doing WvW with any of it, this is just for Open World and story. I know you don't have to really *gear up* for any of it, but in addition to what's good, it's also a question about what's fun to play. :smile: > Short bow's damage in the auto attack is fairly balanced between power and condi, so if you go viper you take full advantage of increasing both sources of damage, but in the other skills favours condition damage, so if you plan to mix them a lot the difference in damage between full viper and full trailblazer is ~10%, so is not that large. Condi Renegades usually run 2,2,2 in the Renegade traitline to maximize bleeds and cleave thrugh arrow piercing, which means that you won't have the protection from All for One, and your HP and armor will be base, with Darkrazor's Daring summon as the main defiance bar breaker and Soulcleave's Summit and Devastation 3,3,3 (Battle Scars) as the main sustain tools (works best with burst as Sevenshots). Trailblazer provides a huge amount of survability boosting both armor and HP. Usually a full viper Renegade will aim for runes of the Nigthmare because the shortbow mixes bleeds, torment and burns as sources of damage. Condi Herald and power Renegade do work entirely different: condi Herald uses torment runes to both increase damage and gain life, because mace and axe do mainly torment or burn damage and Embrace the Darkness adds more torment. The weapon and legend/trait selection is tankier (Shield, Infuse Light, Facet of Chaos... ), so the gameplan is usually facetank at mele range engulfing everything in torment. Power Renegade has perma protection under Kalla and even more damage mitigation with Jalis (plus stability: a rare avis in the realm of the Revenant) so, again, doesn't reach the same damage as a viper build, but still has a powerfull punch while having huge damage mitigation (and the same sustain/life drain abilities). They play different. For team PvE content viper is optimal (assuming others provide support). For soloing champs an bounties the other two work better (a lot of bounties are soloable with them, and most should die easily if two players run those builds vs them).

Hard to say which one is stronger; best part of condition Herald is how strong is at sustain while dealing really big AoE stacks of torment, but the stats which works the best for that build is trailblazer with torment runes (is also mainly a mele build). For viper stats I think that condi Renegade will work better: has less sustain but can fight both at range or mele. Anyway for Renegade I do prefer power stats. Builds: Condi Herald (oftenly I use sword in the swap weapon with the shield, is PvE but works in WvW roaming changing a pair of traits): http://gw2skills.net/editor/?PmxAke7lhQKsIyiJRXMICjBSiMBqgj+SdrD-zRJYkRLfZ0RBESK49BJI6tsonG-e Viper Renegade (albeit I think it works better with at least half of the gear in trailblazer): http://gw2skills.net/editor/?PmQAUlhQLMJSjFRZMIajBSjMBygj+1/TF-zRRYkRBYG+yojCIkEQ4Zh3PN-e Power Renegade: http://gw2skills.net/editor/?PmwAUxzltQHMNqhlROsN6hNSfMDKgJ11/rF-zRZYBJ1AY4wOC68MiVF0rUwjngA6t47rF-e More about the topic: https://en-forum.guildwars2.com/discussion/120588/which-other-legend-to-pair-with-mallyx-aside-from-kalla#latest Anyway those are thinking about soloing champs and bounties at PvE; if you're just doing story mode you should just trample across the content in that game mode with any of those.

> @"melandru.3876" said: > this build, no offense, seems a meme version of an allready meme build. maybe decent in silver i dunno where people don't cleanse anyway Was able to do 800k damage with that build in one of my conquest matches last season, and killing plenty of foes in different scenarios. The carrion amulet provides both condition and power damage, and you don't need cover conditions or burst because is a bruiser: kills in attrition figths over time. Doesn't matter if the target cleanses, because your'e re-aplying burns constantly. And you're immune to condis: 11 cleanses every 32 seconds. I'm not saying that is great, but goo luck trying to kill that in 1 vs 1...

> @"melandru.3876" said: > sustain and burn dh in the same sentence?? > > burn dh has no sustain at all, it's a glass cannon > Only if your condi DH is a trapper. You can run a condi meditation DH and have tons of sustain at the cost of losing burst: http://gw2skills.net/editor/?PWABw+t3lNwAZesP2IeWXZtKA-zZoOkEkA9KECYF44B On the topic of this thread: numbers in PvP are currently low, despite there's only one single game mode which provides seasonal track rewards (which are the ones which grant tokens for ascended gear and most of the gold in PvP). I'm not opposed to run Conquest and 3 vs 3 at the same time, but understand that the choice will hurt the queue times of both modes...

*12 characters, all at 80: 2 Guardians, 2 Warriors, 2 Revenants and one of each other class. *Half of them male and half of them female; six Norns and at least one representative of each race. *A full legendary heavy armor set (PvP) and seven ascended full armor sets (2 heavy in trailblazer, 1 heavy in berserker, 1 heavy in viper, 1 mid in berserker and 1 light in viper). *5 legendary weapons (Eternity, Flameseeker of Prophecies, Bolt, The Shining Blade and Astralaria) and the legendary amulet from PvP (The Ascension). *A lot of ascended weapons but not in every character: I play mostly Revenants and Guardians. *Trinkets are ascended in all of them, in fact some have several sets in different loadouts for different builds.

By the way, another argument for the Kalla + Jalis power Renegade: I love how with power Herald and Surge of the Mist, Jade Winds, Elemental Blast, Chaotic Release, Chilling Isolation and Shackling Wave we have a plethora of tools to fastly disable defiance bars, albeit some of them reduce our dps or requiere stability/good positioning to be used... Power Renegade has Darkrazor's Daring and Forced Engagement: both are absolute monsters at destroying blue bars and since we have access to stability with Inspiring Reinforcement and Darkrazor's we can keep delivering barrage after barrage of Sevenshots and AA while disabling champs and legendary foes without degrading our dps too much.