583 replies to this topic

[ZCKS]

After tons & tons of dungeon runs I have finaly settled on a build as well.
http://gw2skills.net...LZWLKGWcsYbxzCA is what I finally settled on.

With it I run all berserker/knights exotic gear at the moment. For stats I have 1700+ power, 47% critical chance, 2600+ toughness, 14.6k health and quite a few abilities/traits that work together to give me an insane amount of support/survivability & self healing.

[Goojilla]

Thanks for the video.

[AEnesidem]

completey fell in love with the build. a question though. flavour wise sword/shield is my favorite weapon set. Is this a viable choice, is it suboptimal, and what changes would you make to the trats if you where to use sword shield? just curious about this

[AEnesidem]

AEnesidem, on 13 October 2012 - 11:53 PM, said:

completey fell in love with the build. a question though. flavour wise sword/shield is my favorite weapon set. Is this a viable choice, is it suboptimal, and what changes would you make to the traits if you were to use sword shield? just curious about this

sorry for the weird quote thing i just wanted to correct some spelling errs and i must've miss clicked in my half sleeping mental state

and on a last note: could someone maybe give me a link to a meditations solo farm build? since i am now accessing ruins of orr etc...and i have absolutely no inspiration for a solo build.

Edited by AEnesidem, 14 October 2012 - 12:33 AM.

[Strife025]

AEnesidem, on 13 October 2012 - 11:53 PM, said:

completey fell in love with the build. a question though. flavour wise sword/shield is my favorite weapon set. Is this a viable choice, is it suboptimal, and what changes would you make to the trats if you where to use sword shield? just curious about this

Well two-hand mastery would be a waste, so possibly take 10 points out of honor, throw it into virtues for longer boons in your protection from shield and shouts and take out purity for shield mastery.

It's going to end up doing less damage then greatsword and you're going to lose out on the huge cleave/aoe area, so not sure how it will fully compare to my build, but you can test it out.

As a general note, I have finished video guides for all AC paths, CoF 1 and 2, and HotW 1, I'm currently compressing and then uploading them which takes a while, I'll make a new thread for them. I'm also going to start trying to work on the paths/dungeons people don't run as much. If anyone is interested in setting up a static dungeon group to make these videos, let me know. My guild is a WvW guild mainly so not alot of people dungeon run much.

Need to know what you're doing, have full exotics, and have voice chat of some kind (I have a mumble and TS server to use). Server doesn't matter, you can group together and zone in from any server. Sorry not trying to teach and carry people while making these videos.

Edited by Strife025, 14 October 2012 - 02:30 AM.

[maniacshoter]

i really liked the build , but i still wonder how to procede with the Greatsword in WvW , it just doesn't seem viable to use it agains't large group of players , any advice would be great.

[Lypi]

I've been doing path 3, 1 and when I have lot of spare time 2 of Sorrow's Embrace on a daily basis, if you want me to come or want to tag along for a run to see shortcuts and other stuff before recording an official one, lemme know, justs trying to give back some help. =)

I've got a support guardian build we talked discussed about, full exotics, comms etc.

I also have a couple of good candidates among those that usually join my runs.

[Sheffyeld]

Hi Hi.

Well, i'm doing a solo pve/dungeon (sometimes) guardian, because i'm bored with my warrior :3. So I did this build : http://gw2skills.net...8gVFiHWBMepgiSE

What do you think? *Yes, i want to use sword + shield, because my wife will play in this guardian too. She wants that e_e, but I want GS, but okay*

I was thinking to use Valkyrie armor *cheap <3*, but what do you suggest for me?

Ty

[Little Bear]

This is a fantastic guide overall & I love the build (as it's basically nearly the same as mine, save a few traits). My difference in the skill-line is the Elite.

I understand that the Tome of Wrath is a phenomenal healing elite and that it provides so much damn utility. The issue though, is the fact that it gets rid of your 6-9 skill set, rending a majority of your boons & support useless. Personally I've been running Renewed Focus. Not only does it renew my virtues instantly (which is free healing & boons/defence), it also gives me 3 seconds of invulnerability. With the correct timing, I can pull of 2 F2's within the same frame with good timing as well as 2 Aegis', and still be tanking a mob effectively (asides from the condition damage that goes through invulnerability) while still maintaining my support skills.

Just curious on what you think about this elite, or if it's truly interchangeable with Tome of Wrath or you'd just consistently keep with Tome of Wrath.

[Strife025]

Sheffyeld, on 15 October 2012 - 04:04 AM, said:

Hi Hi.

Well, i'm doing a solo pve/dungeon (sometimes) guardian, because i'm bored with my warrior :3. So I did this build : http://gw2skills.net...8gVFiHWBMepgiSE

What do you think? *Yes, i want to use sword + shield, because my wife will play in this guardian too. She wants that e_e, but I want GS, but okay*

I was thinking to use Valkyrie armor *cheap <3*, but what do you suggest for me?

Ty

If your using 1 handed and already taking 25 in radiance, you should really just go the full 30 for 15% crit chance which is huge. Going to be alot more useful then 10 in Zeal, since when you use justice of virtue it's only going to burn one mob, while 15% crit chance benefits every mob you hit 100% of the time. Not to mention you'll probably have around 190% crit damage with valkyrie set and your traits/precision, so you would get a benefit of .15*.90 = 13.5% more damage from that trait, plus any on-crit procs would proc more. 5 in Zeal is pretty useless as well, so I'd take the other 5 out and put it into reckless daring so you dodge heals for around 400hp a dodge.

For gear, Valkyrie isn't bad if you don't want to run dungeons for pwr/tough/vit. But you probably want to mix it up with emerald jewelery because you want some toughness and not all straight vit.

Little Bear, on 15 October 2012 - 05:16 AM, said:

This is a fantastic guide overall & I love the build (as it's basically nearly the same as mine, save a few traits). My difference in the skill-line is the Elite. I understand that the Tome of Wrath is a phenomenal healing elite and that it provides so much damn utility. The issue though, is the fact that it gets rid of your 6-9 skill set, rending a majority of your boons & support useless. Personally I've been running Renewed Focus. Not only does it renew my virtues instantly (which is free healing & boons/defence), it also gives me 3 seconds of invulnerability. With the correct timing, I can pull of 2 F2's within the same frame with good timing as well as 2 Aegis', and still be tanking a mob effectively (asides from the condition damage that goes through invulnerability) while still maintaining my support skills. Just curious on what you think about this elite, or if it's truly interchangeable with Tome of Wrath or you'd just consistently keep with Tome of Wrath.

Tome of Courage is the healing tome , but yes Renewed Focus is fine as well. Usually the skill set issue isn't a problem because I'm only going to switch to my Elite while my shouts are on cooldown anyways. Honestly, I don't really use it too often, I basically just like the option of the daze + full heal for my group. I'm in the process of uploading a CoF path 2 run from last night where we did the Magg Event by actually killing all the mobs, but you'll see I used it in that fight just to throw out a full heal and daze and then immediately switch out of my Elite. But yes, Renewed Focus is excellent when you hold the agro and depending on your group, especially in PUGs, it may be better.

The skills in my build are more flexible like any build, depends on situation. What I posted is just what I use a majority of the time for PvE.

[axjv]

Your Guardian build is certainly very powerful. I run a similar build, with points into Valor, Honor and Virtues (0/0/10/30/30). Same general idea as yours, but less focused on boon application and more focused on boon duration. My role in a group is generally initiator/support, with decent damage.

Valor: Purity
Honor: Superior Aria, Writ of Exaltation, Writ of the Merciful
Virtues: Vengeful, Absolute Resolution, Shielded Mind

Utilities: Signet of Resolve, Hold the Line, Save Yourselves, Signet of Judgment, Renewed Focus
Gear: Half Cleric/Half Soldier's with 40% boon duration runes, and Sigils of Accuracy/Purity. GS + Mace/Shield as my main sets, carrying other weapons in my inventory for certain situations.

Generally, I find that reallocating points from Valor into Virtues gives me a considerable amount of survivability/utility, and helps me perform my role more efficiently. Although might on crit and AH are certainly very powerful, I find that Shielded Mind and Absolute Resolution are nearly necessary in tougher instances. While I don't take Pure of Voice (which is a great trait) or Soldier Runes, I find that Absolute Resolution + Purity + Signet of Resolve are more than enough for my condition removal needs. Having up to 3 stun breakers (SY, Courage, and Courage again after Renewed Focus) will enable you to eat up as much CC as possible, so that your group won't have to deal with it. Furthermore, Shielded Mind gives me a get-out-of-jail card: If I am being locked down and nearly guaranteed to die, I can pop all of my Virtues and cast Renewed Focus, breaking stuns, healing, and giving me access to another stun breaker/heal.

I am aware that relying on Symbols for group support is undesirable in that they are stationary, but I generally take advantage of 100% uptime on Vigor and heal my group using my dodge rolls. Since I make use of Symbols, heal on dodge, and the Shield skills, careful positioning is key for me. Hitting the maximum number of people with your buffs is what makes the difference between a decent and a great player.

With this setup, I can take on 4-5 elite (silver) mobs solo without a problem. I've also managed to solo AC as a self-challenge. Although this build may have slightly less damage output than yours, me and my party are nigh unkillable with boons that last ridiculously long along with multiple stun breakers, condition removals (virtue of resolve, purity, signet of resolve), self heals, group heals (symbols, dodge rolls, shield of absorption), and constant uptime on damage mitigation (protection + SoJ).

Edited by axjv, 15 October 2012 - 05:22 PM.

[Milkshakez]

ZCKS, on 13 October 2012 - 05:51 PM, said:

After tons & tons of dungeon runs I have finaly settled on a build as well.
http://gw2skills.net...LZWLKGWcsYbxzCA is what I finally settled on.

With it I run all berserker/knights exotic gear at the moment. For stats I have 1700+ power, 47% critical chance, 2600+ toughness, 14.6k health and quite a few abilities/traits that work together to give me an insane amount of support/survivability & self healing.

That's actually really close to what I run, though I use a mace/focus instead of sceptre/focus. It's a damned good build, and I've found it to be incredibly "tanky" even against dungeon bosses - if such a term can truly be used given the mechanics of GW2.

[CrystallineDIVA]

You are running altruistic healing and you avoid those 5 points into virtues? Sorry but you should take a close look at your build.

[Kraviec]

I was thinking about a all-around GS PvE build and have come up with this:
http://gw2skills.net...qxWjrGZNLKGQs/A
The spread might look poor (0/15/30/20/5), but the idea was to get Renewing Justice, Altruistic Healing, Inspired Virtue and as much Honor line as possible for vitality. 15 points in Radiance just synergize so well that after playing a different build that used it, I can't imagine playing without those three traits. I'm not a fan of meditations, consecrations or spirit weapons, I like my charr shouting at everyone, so all traits related to these skills just don't appeal to me.

So, watcha think?

Wow, just noticed there's a very similar build already, so I have a question instead - I'm mainly using GS and Staff, so my both weapons take advantage of Two-handed Mastery, and all my utility are shouts. On the other hand, Empowering Might really looks promising. Is swapping 2H mastery for empowering a good trade-off?

Edited by Kraviec, 15 October 2012 - 08:50 PM.

[Milkshakez]

CrystallineDIVA, on 15 October 2012 - 06:01 PM, said:

You are running altruistic healing and you avoid those 5 points into virtues? Sorry but you should take a close look at your build.

Who's that aimed at?

Kraviec, on 15 October 2012 - 08:45 PM, said:

Wow, just noticed there's a very similar build already, so I have a question instead - I'm mainly using GS and Staff, so my both weapons take advantage of Two-handed Mastery, and all my utility are shouts. On the other hand, Empowering Might really looks promising. Is swapping 2H mastery for empowering a good trade-off?

If you buff up your crit (mine sits in the 40s atm with knight's gear) then you can maintain a good, consistent might-stack with both GS & staff. However, reducing your cds brings more overall utility to the table - and potentially more DPS for your group, since the CD on Empower is reduced.

[NatasMC]

Nice build, very close to my build. Your just missing a few pieces to be more tanky and dps

And i dont understand why nobody use shelter healing with might of the protector this is one of the best thing guardian have.

Edited by NatasMC, 15 October 2012 - 09:22 PM.

[Strife025]

CrystallineDIVA, on 15 October 2012 - 06:01 PM, said:

You are running altruistic healing and you avoid those 5 points into virtues? Sorry but you should take a close look at your build.

I talk about 15 radiance 5 virtues in both my video and this thread, simple fact is, it's not good for dungeons. Anyone who thinks it is hasn't run very many dungeons or done any analysis.

The only reasonable area you would replace 15/5 on my build, would be the 10 points in honor and take out EM. If you were fighting a group of mobs EM would be procing almost every second, so the only way 15/5 would give you more might is if you were killing mobs every 3 seconds (I believe Inspired Virtues gives 3 stacks of might per Justice but I'm not home to check?), and if you are doing that then the mobs are so easy you have no risk of dying anyways.

Take any boss or harder encounters in dungeons, it's going to be against silver mobs and bosses (obv.) 99% of the time. Take things like 2x Silver Knights in TA, bosses in CM, bosses in HotW, 2x silver mobs in HotW, bosses or "defend" events in CoF like Magg Bomb event and path 3 defense event which is primarily silver mobs that won't die fast enough to make 15/5 useful, GL in Arah, Alpha in CoE, silvers and bosses in SE, etc.

There are almost no scenarios where 15/5 wins out vs EM against challenging content, both with might stacks or healing. Like I said, I have 2x 80 guardians and ran 15/5 for quite a long time.

The only time 15/5 is good is for trash farming. If you watch the last 2 minutes of my build video, you can see that I have no risk of dying, even without trying, in my mf gear, against 5 (4 since one leashed it seems after re-watching it) mobs I gather up. 15/5 is a crutch for bad gear for PvE world content or is there because of a 20-30 virtues build which isn't this build. Not saying 15/5 is bad, but it's not necessary or ideal for every Guardian build which includes this AH build.

If you go to my youtube page I am putting up "speed" dungeon runs with AC and CoF 1 currently uploaded,  CoF path 2 killing all mobs at Magg Bomb event by 95% of her bar and a <20 minute run of HotW path 1 with almost full melee time against every boss (except obv. the WW move of last boss) are uploading as we speak but it takes like 4 hours to upload one video for me. Will be trying to slowly go back through dungeons and upload "speed" runs over the next few weeks since I've already completed most dungeon paths and just need to pull in a dedicated group over voice chat to speed run them. Feel free to prove me wrong that 15/5 would be better in a majority of dungeons or instances though, it's not like I don't have footage showing burst AH heals every time EM procs.

I'm fine if people show that 15/5 is better then EM since I haven't found that to be the case, but general comments like yours obviously show you know nothing about this build.

Kraviec, on 15 October 2012 - 08:45 PM, said:

I was thinking about a all-around GS PvE build and have come up with this:
http://gw2skills.net...qxWjrGZNLKGQs/A
The spread might look poor (0/15/30/20/5), but the idea was to get Renewing Justice, Altruistic Healing, Inspired Virtue and as much Honor line as possible for vitality. 15 points in Radiance just synergize so well that after playing a different build that used it, I can't imagine playing without those three traits. I'm not a fan of meditations, consecrations or spirit weapons, I like my charr shouting at everyone, so all traits related to these skills just don't appeal to me.

So, watcha think?

Wow, just noticed there's a very similar build already, so I have a question instead - I'm mainly using GS and Staff, so my both weapons take advantage of Two-handed Mastery, and all my utility are shouts. On the other hand, Empowering Might really looks promising. Is swapping 2H mastery for empowering a good trade-off?

Two hand mastery is better then EM imho if you're using 2x 2-hand weapons, that cooldown is just too valuable.

Edited by Strife025, 15 October 2012 - 10:19 PM.

[Strife025]

NatasMC, on 15 October 2012 - 09:19 PM, said:

Nice build, very close to my build. Your just missing a few pieces to be more tanky and dps

And i dont understand why nobody use shelter healing with might of the protector this is one of the best thing guardian have.

That's actually interesting and something I haven't played around with.

I use shelter in WvW but found the almost 2x as much heal and passive condition removal when it's up (and alot of the times I don't need to use my heal and can just dodge out and use Empower) for roughly the same cooldown with signet mastery was better for PvE.

In PvE I also found shelter wasn't as needed because with a 3 dodge + vigor build like this it's always easy to dodge out of bosses more damage attacks.

But maybe I'll play around with it and see how those might stacks build up, thanks.

[Brine]

Strife025, on 15 October 2012 - 10:27 PM, said:

That's actually interesting and something I haven't played around with.

I use shelter in WvW but found the almost 2x as much heal and passive condition removal when it's up (and alot of the times I don't need to use my heal and can just dodge out and use Empower) for roughly the same cooldown with signet mastery was better for PvE.

In PvE I also found shelter wasn't as needed because with a 3 dodge + vigor build like this it's always easy to dodge out of bosses more damage attacks.

But maybe I'll play around with it and see how those might stacks build up, thanks.

I'm going to start doing HOTW exp. How hard is it? Also, I never liked the armor style, but yours really changed my opinion of it. Your character looks amazing. What dyes you are using?

[Strife025]

Brine, on 15 October 2012 - 11:58 PM, said:

I'm going to start doing HOTW exp. How hard is it? Also, I never liked the armor style, but yours really changed my opinion of it. Your character looks amazing. What dyes you are using?

Path 1 is extremely easy and takes 20 minutes. I'm currently uploading a path 1 walkthrough on my youtube page, but CoF2 and AC 3 are before it so it probably won't be finished until tomorrow (takes like 4 hours for a 20 min video @ 720p to upload for me ~_~). Path 2 and 3 aren't "hard" but they are about twice as long as Path 1 because there are more bosses and an underwater final boss for both paths. So they are rather annoying. Eventually I need to go back through them to update my dungeon runs though.

Dye's are Blueberry, Lemonade, and Blue Ice which looks white on heavy armor.

If I'm free you can message me ingame @ Strifey.7215 and I can include you on a hotw 1 run since I usually still run those once a day.

For everyone else, I'm still trying to get a good dedicated group to run through some of the other dungeons people don't do as much so I can make a "speed" run guide for every dungeon in the game

Edited by Strife025, 16 October 2012 - 12:04 AM.

[Brine]

Strife025, on 16 October 2012 - 12:03 AM, said:

Path 1 is extremely easy and takes 20 minutes. I'm currently uploading a path 1 walkthrough on my youtube page, but CoF2 and AC 3 are before it so it probably won't be finished until tomorrow (takes like 4 hours for a 20 min video @ 720p to upload for me ~_~). Path 2 and 3 aren't "hard" but they are about twice as long as Path 1 because there are more bosses and an underwater final boss for both paths. So they are rather annoying. Eventually I need to go back through them to update my dungeon runs though.

Dye's are Blueberry, Lemonade, and Blue Ice which looks white on heavy armor.

If I'm free you can message me ingame @ Strifey.7215 and I can include you on a hotw 1 run since I usually still run those once a day.

For everyone else, I'm still trying to get a good dedicated group to run through some of the other dungeons people don't do as much so I can make a "speed" run guide for every dungeon in the game

Alright, thanks for all those answers

[Amins]

Stryfe, try Rune of Centaur with your current build.

I think you'll like it, you can't cleanse everyone's conditions all the time... they have to be able to do it sometimes =]

[AEnesidem]

Strife025, on 16 October 2012 - 12:03 AM, said:

Path 1 is extremely easy and takes 20 minutes. I'm currently uploading a path 1 walkthrough on my youtube page, but CoF2 and AC 3 are before it so it probably won't be finished until tomorrow (takes like 4 hours for a 20 min video @ 720p to upload for me ~_~). Path 2 and 3 aren't "hard" but they are about twice as long as Path 1 because there are more bosses and an underwater final boss for both paths. So they are rather annoying. Eventually I need to go back through them to update my dungeon runs though.

Dye's are Blueberry, Lemonade, and Blue Ice which looks white on heavy armor.

If I'm free you can message me ingame @ Strifey.7215 and I can include you on a hotw 1 run since I usually still run those once a day.

For everyone else, I'm still trying to get a good dedicated group to run through some of the other dungeons people don't do as much so I can make a "speed" run guide for every dungeon in the game

quite interested in the speed dungeon run thing!

[Aaron The Guardian]

Strife025, on 11 October 2012 - 06:27 PM, said:

Honestly, I can't really just start making builds for everyone, I can answer questions and try to give advice based on my experience, but you need to figure out what type of role or build you want at least. I just know alot about my specific build and wrote a guide for it, I have general guardian knowledge obviously since I have spent hundreds of hours on the class, but I don't claim to be an expert or even know every single build. I mean the game is like 6 weeks old, I'm sure other smart people will come up with stuff I haven't thought of.

Mace/shield means you basically want to be a support/tanky build, with swap to root + range + focus shield when you need to back-off, so you're probably wanting to go for boon duration shout build which works with mace regen symbol and shield protection buff, or possibly some spirit weapons. Crit and 2 hand mastery are obviously pointless in that build, and AH isn't really good for that build either. Obviously shouts or spirit weapon duration depending on what you do, 10 in radiance for signet cooldown, 20 in Valor for shield trait, then 20 in honor because reckless daring is amazing for heal/support builds and you could either take some res or symbol traits and 20% shouts if you go shouts. Battle Presence could be okay with 30 but I would really only think about it if you took Absolute Resolution, and even then it would have to be very specific to a support build for healing which I think would be better with staff instead of scepter.

Really it's all theory crafting and you need to test and figure out some stuff yourself, because I haven't done any real testing on a mace/shield build that supports and increases boon duration or uses spirit weapons.

I understand. I have been trying out a lot of builds and am having fun doing it. Thanks for all of the awesome info on your thread. I look forward to seeing the videos!

[G L J]

The best lesson I have ever learned was to understand why somebody did something, instead of only learning how they did something. If you only understand how they did something, you will be missing the vital thought process behind what makes anything tick. For example, 20/0/10/20/20 (my build) may sound spread out, but when you realize that the 20 in zeal is for spirit weapons it makes sense. The same to any copied information.

If you can understand why somebody built their build and work from there, you will go significantly farther than if you just copy it.

~~~

also, Strife, I'd be interested in reading your opinions on Spirit Weapons. I find them to be fairly underutilized, but I can understand why - they're offensive weapons on a class that most people roll defensively. I wonder if you've played around with them and what you think.

Edited by G L J, 16 October 2012 - 05:52 AM.

[AEnesidem]

I'm also looking for people who want to grind tokens in HotW, AC or sorrow's embrace for the soldier armor ^^

[The Maxx]

hi,

right now i'm running a   30/0/10/30/0 build wanted to test hight healing power(cleric's) +  Zealos blade, + SUPER symbols (longer, bigger, stronger, healing, vulnerability) it's been great sofar ... but to be honest 1 symbol on the 2h-sword just don't justify it. And with my playstyle I don't stay long enought in the sigil...

So I wanted to build a shout build.
And I had a few questions:  
Does pure of voice and soldier stack? can i remove 2 conditions with 1 shout? and convert one into a boon? (that sounds soo powerfull with AH)
and does the soldier also remove 1 condition from allies?
I realy like the signet of judgment 10% less dmg + 360 hp on use every 16 sec, year its only 1 boon per player but it still is pretty interessting ... but now is the qustion if its worth it... or is Stand your ground/hold the Line better.
Well thats more or less it ... it thought about it a lot and realy wanted to find a flaw in that awesome guide, but after all i came up with the same results as you.
thanks for the help
max

ps: where can i find that Staff ?

my opinion on spirit wepons: great offensive with scepter torch + spirit burning and condition dmg that stuff burns everything...

[Strife025]

AEnesidem, on 16 October 2012 - 03:01 AM, said:

quite interested in the speed dungeon run thing!

My hotw video uploaded:

Unedited version with me walking my party through it who were in teamspeak. As you can see, the video is only 15:08.

I also have all 3 AC paths, CoF 1&2 (including Magg Bomb event all mobs killed by 95%), and working on compressing and uploading CM when I get home tonight on my youtube page. These are all very fast paths that are basically sub 20 minute runs. SE path 1 is also another ~20 min dungeon.

Oh and I have some WvW footage I need to edit and eventually throw up so people can see exactly how I use GS in WvW in an organized guild. I love when it's nighttime for Ghost Chili Peppers also which really helps with anti-kiting, too bad there's not always chill food like that .

Once I get all these "speed" runs up I'll start working on the longer dungeons or one's that I don't know all the parts you can run through to try and figure them out.

I would say if we have an open spot I'm open to other people coming if they can pull their weight, but it looks like you're on EU server.

G L J, on 16 October 2012 - 05:49 AM, said:

The best lesson I have ever learned was to understand why somebody did something, instead of only learning how they did something. If you only understand how they did something, you will be missing the vital thought process behind what makes anything tick. For example, 20/0/10/20/20 (my build) may sound spread out, but when you realize that the 20 in zeal is for spirit weapons it makes sense. The same to any copied information.

If you can understand why somebody built their build and work from there, you will go significantly farther than if you just copy it.

~~~

also, Strife, I'd be interested in reading your opinions on Spirit Weapons. I find them to be fairly underutilized, but I can understand why - they're offensive weapons on a class that most people roll defensively. I wonder if you've played around with them and what you think.

I'll be honest I hate them mainly because I hate pets (even though they aren't true pets). I haven't played around with them enough to know enough about them, out of everything the guardian has it's the thing I've used the least. Only thing I've really used it with is in overworld PvE, the sword is obviously good damage and the bow is good for conditions, but I found the hammer annoying the hell out of me because of the knockback and never used the shield to much.

So you probably know alot more about Spirit Weapons then me. I just don't like them at all in WvW and found shouts to provide more utility and are more reactionary for instant use in dungeons. I'm not sure what skills you run normally, but I'm assuming you would still take some type of stun break? I don't think I could live without at least Stand Your Ground and Save Yourself for instant stun/fear/knockdown breaks. I don't doubt they provide some more damage since it's basically passive pets whacking on a mob, but it's kind of not really my playstyle so I wrote them off rather early after playing with them a bit.

Edited by Strife025, 16 October 2012 - 06:08 PM.

[Linfang]

Very nice post Strife. Was nice of you to take the time to detail all this info. I am working to either get geared with power/vit/tougness via dungeons, Orrian karma gear, and wvw, maybe a little of each.

[Strife025]

The Maxx, on 16 October 2012 - 03:14 PM, said:

hi,

right now i'm running a   30/0/10/30/0 build wanted to test hight healing power(cleric's) +  Zealos blade, + SUPER symbols (longer, bigger, stronger, healing, vulnerability) it's been great sofar ... but to be honest 1 symbol on the 2h-sword just don't justify it. And with my playstyle I don't stay long enought in the sigil...

So I wanted to build a shout build.
And I had a few questions:  
Does pure of voice and soldier stack? can i remove 2 conditions with 1 shout? and convert one into a boon? (that sounds soo powerfull with AH)
and does the soldier also remove 1 condition from allies?
I realy like the signet of judgment 10% less dmg + 360 hp on use every 16 sec, year its only 1 boon per player but it still is pretty interessting ... but now is the qustion if its worth it... or is Stand your ground/hold the Line better.
Well thats more or less it ... it thought about it a lot and realy wanted to find a flaw in that awesome guide, but after all i came up with the same results as you.
thanks for the help
max

ps: where can i find that Staff ?

my opinion on spirit wepons: great offensive with scepter torch + spirit burning and condition dmg that stuff burns everything...

Yes Pure of Voice and Soldier Stack, although I find I usually have enough condition removal with just Soldier. Also note that Pure of Voice doesn't seem to remove conditions from yourself, while Soldier does. Both remove it from everyone that gets hit by the shout in your party.

Judgement is a personal preference, and for me I like shouts better. With soldier runes 1 more shout = 1 more condition removal for your entire party. Also having both Stand your Ground and Save Yourself give the added benefit of a stun breaker, which also means you can break out of fears and knockdowns and that will many times save your life. Hold the Line is the best shout imho because of low cooldown (for both AH and condition removal) and the excellent boons it provides, so I would never give it up.

The staff is just the AC dungeon staff. Pretty much all my gear is dungeon exotics because I run them everyday with friends and am swimming in them at this point. I transmuted my mf greatsword onto the AC sword skin because Pearl looks dumb and I have over 1k AC tokens right now :x

Edited by Strife025, 16 October 2012 - 09:25 PM.