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Guild Wars 2 |OT4| The only subscription you need is this thread.

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Retro

Member
Oh nice. Everything except the traveler runes there is pretty cheap indeed too.

I'm thinking it could be made a bit more effective PvE-wise by taking 2 out of the Defense line (that hammer grandmaster can't reliably work on bosses or champs), but I don't know where to put them. Cleansing Ire definitely seems too good to pass up.

It might be personal preference, but I find the cooldown on hammer skills to be a tad long, so the 20% reduction from the Grandmaster is much more important than the extra damage to disabled targets
 

Hawkian

The Cryptarch's Bane
Good point. I was worried Signit of Stamina was a bit overkill, so I've swapped it to Fury. That puts crit at 55%, when using the oils and food. Swapping out Berzerker Stance for Banner of Discipline, because it gives the warrior another blast finisher (a whole two!).

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fJAQJA...p8rGdBCu/ghaYkQJIAPpAPugAJY+TH1f24QIQKAR1VB-e

Looks almost ready to try?
Heh, and note with that Banner down you're up to 63% chance and 234%. With fury from any number of sources in a dungeon you have a 7% chance not to crit. And 22472 health. And the banner is helping the rest of the party too.

yeeeeeeesh
It might be personal preference, but I find the cooldown on hammer skills to be a tad long, so the 20% reduction from the Grandmaster is much more important than the extra damage to disabled targets
yikes, ignore me, didn't even notice the cooldown reduction. It's not like the extra damage is useless in dungeons either unless you're skipping eeeeeeeverything, plenty of elites can be stunlocked for fun and profit
 

Hawkian

The Cryptarch's Bane
Divinity runes are a tiny fraction of the cost of Traveler's. The latter is prized for the permanent movement speed bonus on the 6. Retro is totally right, that's nullified by the build (just switch to hammer). Pick the cheapo rune with the primary stat of your choice I say, the condition/boon duration on Traveler weren't doing that build any favors either actually!

edit: Hoelbrak runes are more expensive than Traveler's XD you're thinking of all the "super premium" rune sets!
 
Wow, okay. Yeah. What happened? Divinity (when I looked) was like 12g each. Now it's 1g80s.

JMltWih.png


Traveller, when I bought it, was NOT EVEN A GOLD, and now they're 7g?!

WXi7xNV.png


(Shows you how long ago it was I bought the Traveller set for my Engineer, but still. Wow).

edit: Hoelbrak runes are more expensive than Traveler's XD you're thinking of all the "super premium" rune sets!

EDIT: More like, the last time I looked at Rune prices, they were dramatically different from how they are now. Hoelbrak was barely a gold last time I checked, and now:

JHzZnjK.png


9 gold? Seriously..
 

Hawkian

The Cryptarch's Bane
It was the feature pack (right? whatever patch had the huge rune/sigil rework), it completely upended the market and shifted the viability of different sets around. Tons of guardians and mesmers run traveler to make up for their utter and complete lack of movement speed options (Runes of Speed being the poor man's equivalent of that, Vitality-primary runes are not highly prized).

edit: hoelbrak old/new
It's still overpriced though.
 
I want to interject into this conversation just to say how much I love making character builds in GW2.

I mean, I'm probably awful at it. But damn if it isn't fun. There's a lot of interesting choices and I think most or all are at least somewhat viable.
 

Slightly Live

Dirty tag dodger
What iss the best method of farming the billion T6 mats needed for finishing a legendary?

I can see the finish line of this Legendary marathon in the distance, just over Mat Hell Hill and around Obsidian Shard's Death bridge.
 

Hawkian

The Cryptarch's Bane
I want to interject into this conversation just to say how much I love making character builds in GW2.

I mean, I'm probably awful at it. But damn if it isn't fun. There's a lot of interesting choices and I think most or all are at least somewhat viable.
I absolutely agree (obviously, I mean I'm theorycrafting a class I don't even want to play :p). As much as Retro reviles the trait system (and I certainly have plenty of problem with it and specific traits), I think GW2 offers a ton of room to get creative and find something that's both fun to play and works without completely gimping your party. I can't imagine a version of GW2 where I had to follow a recipe to be effective rather than playing around with what I like and refining it over time. :D
What iss the best method of farming the billion T6 mats needed for finishing a legendary?

I can see the finish line of this Legendary marathon in the distance, just over Mat Hell Hill and around Obsidian Shard's Death bridge.
Not my area of expertise, but go for clovers first as that'll load you up, and then your best bet would be farming risen in cursed shore for Heavy Moldy Bags I suppose. Upconvert every time you hit 50 of the T5 as well.

Realistically, earn gold in your preferred manner and list buy orders for the mats on the TP.
It took me a while to realize Soldier rune = trooper rune
That reminds me, how viable would a shout support ranger be? I don't even know what any ranger shouts do, they must not be that popular..
 
What iss the best method of farming the billion T6 mats needed for finishing a legendary?

I can see the finish line of this Legendary marathon in the distance, just over Mat Hell Hill and around Obsidian Shard's Death bridge.

Laurels. Buy the T6 mat bags every day with your Laurel, sell the ones you don't need to buy the ones you do. I did that for several months (the Monthlies give a lot of Laurels), and it *really* adds up.
 

Trey

Member
I don't always optimize. I ran ogre runes on my warrior for the longest cuz I love the Rock doge and it fit the theme of my character.

Warrior is so fun. So much mobility, so much power, so many useful buttons, so many options. I never feel like I can't fight something with my warrior, and I feel that sonetimes with my Ele.
 

Retro

Member
I absolutely agree (obviously, I mean I'm theorycrafting a class I don't even want to play :p). As much as Retro reviles the trait system (and I certainly have plenty of problem with it and specific traits), I think GW2 offers a ton of room to get creative and find something that's both fun to play and works without completely gimping your party. I can't imagine a version of GW2 where I had to follow a recipe to be effective rather than playing around with what I like and refining it over time. :D

It's not the trait system I dislike, it's the passive nature of traits. If every single trait did something instead of just statistically making something better, I'd be perfectly fine with the trait system as it exists.

Oh, except I think speed-boosting traits should be removed and the baseline speed increased. One of the things you do not fuck around with in my book is the convenience factor of mobility; anyone who doesn't have a speed boost feels gimped because MMOs are inherently heavy on travel. That should be off the table.
 
It's not the trait system I dislike, it's the passive nature of traits. If every single trait did something instead of just statistically making something better, I'd be perfectly fine with the trait system as it exists.

Agreed - the traits should be more like the Runes system from Diablo 3.
 

Hawkian

The Cryptarch's Bane
I don't always optimize. I ran ogre runes on my warrior for the longest cuz I love the Rock doge and it fit the theme of my character.
I think picking interesting/thematic rune sets is a blast. I cannot imagine running scholar runes or ruby orbs, personally. Hell, on my thief I have 2/3 rune sets that have something to do with birds of prey XD

Totally agree with you Retro. GW2 feels so much more like an action game on my thief because of how easily I can get around the world. Out of combat (well, in PvE at least) movement speed should be as fast as a thief in Fleet Shadow stealth for every class 100% of the time!
 

Levyne

Banned
Black Citadel has been the most confusing place for me to 100% so far :/

Yeah, it's full of little instance doors and stuff like that. Gotta get close to what may seem to be closed off to see if a pop-up window appears. If it comes to it I bet you could find a video guide for what you're missing.
 

Hawkian

The Cryptarch's Bane
Black CItadel is confusing and labyrinthine but makes sense to me once you get it. It's very much like the utilitarian, industrial staging ground for an army that it represents. All the areas are very distinct and it's function over form at every turn. I can finally navigate it quite well, especially the Factorium area the paths to the two gates.

The freaking Grove, on the other hand, I cannot figure out for the life of me. I have tried. It just feels like it was put together by some Sylvari in one shot with no blueprint, like oh this will go here, this would look cool over here, ooh why don't we go up a story, now let's have a little helicopter gondola that skips a story back down, this is all turning out so pretty! I literally get lost just looking at it on the map and flipping between layers. It is gorgeous though, no denying it
 
Black CItadel is confusing and labyrinthine but makes sense to me once you get it. It's very much like the utilitarian, industrial staging ground for an army that it represents. All the areas are very distinct and it's function over form at every turn. I can finally navigate it quite well, especially the Factorium area the paths to the two gates.

The freaking Grove, on the other hand, I cannot figure out for the life of me. I have tried. It just feels like it was put together by some Sylvari in one shot with no blueprint, like oh this will go here, this would look cool over here, ooh why don't we go up a story, now let's have a little helicopter gondola that skips a story back down, this is all turning out so pretty! I literally get lost just looking at it on the map and flipping between layers. It is gorgeous though, no denying it

See and its that utilitarian army style layout that I find bothersome, where as the Grove feels natural. sure it can feel all over the place but it never gets confusing to me. It feels like it just grew like that naturally, where the Black Citadel was designed to be confusing for outsiders.

But can we all agree that Rata Sum is the easiest and best of all the racial cities? Asuran superiority is at its finest there.
 
Since profession theory-crafting is so much fun, and we are all about Warriors today, this is my typical GAFractal build. It changes some on bosses where I bring Rifle instead of Bow or when I bring Axe/Mace instead of Greatsword, but this is the basic build for most of the runs.

http://en.gw2skills.net/editor/?fJEQJARTjMd09ZtHWeQHaAmgCXnfNCCg0rQME8A-ThBBABYt/o8DgLpQe6aC4JFUp6PnpEMAACwv9N+23IxJOxJeiTciTciTsf7bJ+bJ+bSBYuwI-e

The idea is to support the party over pure personal DPS, but I still want to do my part in burning foes down too.


Empower Allies is +150 power to each party member. Banners of Strength/Discipline are +170 power, condition damage, precision, and ferocity to the party, and they can be picked up and used for their swiftness and fury skills and planted as a blast combo finisher. For Great Justice is additional party might and fury. Battle Standard has nice boons, but it is really there 99% of the time as the "oh shit, the entire party is about to die, maybe now would be a good time to do something to help" button.

Critical hits from any Greatsword skills (particularly Hundred Blades and Whirlwind Attack) help stack might on the party thanks to Forceful Greatsword and Phalanx Strength.

Bow use is preferred over Rifle in general cases largely for Combustive Shot so I can have a reliable fire field to blast my banners into. AoE damage, burns, blinds, and immobilization are all nifty too.

Healing is all passive with the Healing Signet, Adrenal Health, and Omnomberry Ghosts. I almost never actively think to use a healing skill; if I get into trouble, the best thing to do is to back off and play defensively/ranged for a few seconds to build back a little HP. There's no room for condition cleansing, so pray to Dwayna and hope for the best!


The only major change that happens outside of weapon swaps (and fitting in their corresponding traits) depends on how the party seems to be doing. Swap in Soldier Armor with Traveler Runes when a little more bulk is needed, or fit Banners of Defense/Tactics in to boost party survivability as a whole, along with swapping in the Tactics Grandmaster Trait Inspiring Battle Standard for constant health regeneration.
 

Hawkian

The Cryptarch's Bane
But can we all agree that Rata Sum is the easiest and best of all the racial cities? Asuran superiority is at its finest there.
Obviously.
It changes some on bosses where I bring Rifle
Thaumanova Reactor MVP!

I have to attest to the quality of your build, you kept the party battle-ready in every encounter and had a clutch Battle Standard blast to turn the tide at least once too.

Speaking of theorycrafting guys, help me out with a rune set for my Mesmer support build. I initially relied on rune sets that exploited the tiny cooldown on Mirror, having hated all the Mesmer heal skills, but since Signet of the Ether I actually only use it on one of my three builds now.

I need a good rune for giving out boons to the party. Something that gives out Regen (least desirable), Protection, Might, or Fury (most desirable) via something other than on heal or elite. On hit or on crit would be fine. Most important thing is that it doesn't affect just me but allies. Any suggestions?
 

Lunar15

Member
I might shock people by saying this, but (Chapter 4 Spoiler):
I'm actually quite excited to see Trahearne again. To be fair, I never hated him as a character. The writing around him and how he was used in the story was terrible, but he himself isn't bad. I'm mainly excited to see him because now it truly feels like the Pact is getting involved the world is moving forward from Zhaitan.

Getting a letter from him was pretty neat. It felt like "oh, hey, here's an old friend I haven't spoken to in a long time".
 

Moondrop

Banned
Really? I've never seen anyone advocating Vitality over Toughness before... though I guess it makes sense, since conditions...

Well, Valk is also Power primary, versus Toughness primary for Knight's. I am surprised at Valk over Soldier/Zerk or a split though. What is your crit chance at with that build? I'm thinking you must get a ton of fury uptime to make that work?

Sorry, I meant I use a Valkyrie amulet for warrior in sPvP. In PvP Valkyrie is ++Pow,+Tough,+Fer,+HP, but in PvE it's ++Pow,+Vit,+Fer. Yes this build has a lot of fury uptime, but it's really about exploiting Sigil of Intelligence + Eviscerate.

I can't believe I'm missing the warrior theorycrafting; actually getting work done today.

I will interject that Divinity runes are terrible post-feature patch.

That reminds me, how viable would a shout support ranger be? I don't even know what any ranger shouts do, they must not be that popular..
But ranger theorycrafting I refuse to miss!

No, it's not viable mainly because the shouts don't work together as a build. Sic 'Em is a great pet buff. Guard has a tiny CD, and so is used in these ranger regen shout builds, but the actual function is worthless. Protect Me is great if you bearbow (kind of kidding, but it's opposed to Beastmastery). And Search and Rescue is fun but not really viable.
 

BraXzy

Member

This is amazing. Made me want to roll a Guardian. But before that, I should probably dive into WvW on my Warrior properly.

As I gradually progress further along the path to my Legendary, it pains me that the buy order for the precursor continues to soar higher and higher. Zommoros save me.
 

Levyne

Banned
Search and Rescue is useless. Guard is useless in PvE and situational at best anywhere else to my knowledge. It does have a nice cooldown. Protect Me I think I only ever slot during Grawl Boss sometimes (and that's only because I'm trying to maintain Peak Strength because I tend to slot into Bark Skin for that encounter.) Even then, it will tend to instantly destroy your pet so it's self defeating in a way.

Sic Em is good, but I don't like to rely on the pet. That's just me personally.

On top of all that, you can only trait it to regen, which is not super.
 

Hawkian

The Cryptarch's Bane
Sorry, I meant I use a Valkyrie amulet for warrior in sPvP. In PvP Valkyrie is ++Pow,+Tough,+Fer,+HP, but in PvE it's ++Pow,+Vit,+Fer. Yes this build has a lot of fury uptime, but it's really about exploiting Sigil of Intelligence + Eviscerate.
ohh. that makes sense. I forget how bursty warriors can be with Adrenaline.

I can't believe I'm missing the warrior theorycrafting; actually getting work done today.
I, um, hope I didn't make too much of a fool of myself in your absence, I realized about halfway through how unqualified I really was to be giving advice ha
But ranger theorycrafting I refuse to miss!

No, it's not viable mainly because the shouts don't work together as a build. Sic 'Em is a great pet buff. Guard has a tiny CD, and so is used in these ranger regen shout builds, but the actual function is worthless. Protect Me is great if you bearbow (kind of kidding, but it's opposed to Beastmastery). And Search and Rescue is fun but not really viable.
Ah, that is a shame. those definitely don't seem like they earn a slot over some of the cooler ranger utilities.

edit: Oh darn miktar, you went for Divinity after all :( Well at the very least it doesn't controvert the build's strengths at least. You could've saved a ton though going for a cheapo rune :X
 

SirKhalid

Member
Woohoo, I am unbanned. Customer support failed me, but I post in the GW2 forums and Gaile Grey respond in 10 minutes. I got a tome with 4000 influence! It will help my guild bank number 2.
 
Awesome advaice
This is some really good stuff. Ike has always been a great boon to any fractal run I've been on, so I usually focus on zerk damage when we go GAFractaling. On the other hand, when the party need more support, I'll put on my zealots set and run a shout healing set. It seems to really help with the cleanse and healing while I can still hit like a truck.

This is an ideal setup. I usually just run zealots armor and have zerk everything else, since I haven't gotten around to making it. The Greatsword is the only weapon that's a constant in the build, the other set is variable according to the situation you're in. I usually rune with my mace thanks to it being so handy in assorted situations. In the mainhand, it's a single target CC and block for bosses, while in the offhand it's better for dealing with multiple enemies with vuln spreading and an aoe knockdown.

Note that the shouts in this build are even more valuable now thanks to inspiring shouts. Every shout boosts adrenaline by almost 1/3 of the maximum. You can pretty much use burst skills willy nilly and still keep up zerker power (strength 11).
 
I might shock people by saying this, but (Chapter 4 Spoiler):
I'm actually quite excited to see Trahearne again. To be fair, I never hated him as a character. The writing around him and how he was used in the story was terrible, but he himself isn't bad. I'm mainly excited to see him because now it truly feels like the Pact is getting involved the world is moving forward from Zhaitan.

Getting a letter from him was pretty neat. It felt like "oh, hey, here's an old friend I haven't spoken to in a long time".
i totally agree with you. I hope they don't change him too much or do something stupid and make him evil.
 

Hawkian

The Cryptarch's Bane
Oh, glad you got unbanned Khalid! Gaile is awesome.

man that ranger shout trait should totally give aoe protection instead of regen.
 
edit: Oh darn miktar, you went for Divinity after all :( Well at the very least it doesn't controvert the build's strengths at least. You could've saved a ton though going for a cheapo rune :X

Divinity was the cheapest part of this entire setup :p Have you SEEN what Sigils of Accuracy and Energy go for?
 

Hawkian

The Cryptarch's Bane
Divinity was the cheapest part of this entire setup :p Have you SEEN what Sigils of Accuracy and Energy go for?
Sigil of Accuracy looks like it goes for just over a gold? And you just need two...

Coulda gone for, say, Rune of the Privateer for a total of ~20s ;_;

edit: Just remember to use a black lion salvage when doing the above. The 20% chance of a near-complete loss is not worth the risk!
 
Sigil of Accuracy looks like it goes for just over a gold? And you just need two...

Coulda gone for, say, Rune of the Privateer for a total of ~20s ;_;

edit: Just remember to use a black lion salvage when doing the above. The 20% chance of a near-complete loss is not worth the risk!

Something cost me 10 gold, and it was one of the sigils.. Probably Battle.

I remember when Privateer was an expensive runeset, lol.
 

Hawkian

The Cryptarch's Bane
Oooh yeah, Battle is cray. Just bought one of those myself.

edit: Accursed chains for sigil of accuracy is like buying a Lexus so you can pry off the logo and use it as a paperweight, hehe

edit again: Looks like Pack or Privateer are what I want on my mesmer. Leaning toward Pack primarily cause the wolf effect is classier than being a pirate.
 
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