28 replies to this topic

[Khalif]

Tired of BS instagibbing? Try a bleed build!



The stats:
20 - Shadow arts
20 - Acrobat
30- Trickery

http://www.guildhead...rNo9MGGxVRcMckq



The Gear:
5/6 - Afflicted
1/6 - any condition stat



Points to play by:
-Don't spam Death blossom like a madman, time it out so you don't waste it on a cond. removal

- Stay in stealth when needed, your bleeds will do damage, you don't need to attack.

- Steal only when ini is low, steal will give you 5 ini.

- Stay in p/d when roaming. switch to d/d while fighting

- drop caltrops often, try to drop in AOE situations / control points




Extra
- Shadow trap is an extra skill, you can replace it for anything
- If you are feeling balsy, replace withdraw with HiS.

Edited by Khalif, 23 October 2012 - 04:26 PM.

[Thoman]

Wouldn't really call this "your" bleed build...
This build has been known for ages and is played alot.
Only thing is you made it worse.

http://www.guildhead...rNo9MxGGVRqcMck
This is way better, no need for 30 points in Trickery..
You will want to spend a lot of time in stealth so use reg on stealth.

Edited by Thoman, 23 October 2012 - 05:34 PM.

[Khalif]

Thoman, on 23 October 2012 - 05:33 PM, said:

Wouldn't really call this "your" bleed build...
This build has been known for ages and is played alot.
Only thing is you made it worse.

http://www.guildhead...rNo9MxGGVRqcMck
This is way better, no need for 30 points in Trickery..
You will want to spend a lot of time in stealth so use reg on stealth.

you are loosing too much without condition.

30 points or a bust.

[Phigment]

Khalif, on 23 October 2012 - 06:21 PM, said:

you are loosing too much without condition.

30 points or a bust.

Actually you dont loose anything really.....100 condition dmg is nothing.

I wouldnt run your build at all....You have 0 condition removal, which means I already won our fight imo based on theory craft. Then you have 0 stun breakers for gimmick classes.

[cab5392]

HiS is a given with a heavy investment in shadow arts, and you need condi removal of some sort. I would replace spider venom with RfI, you need a stun break and the initiative gain is nice.  With the latest patch, I would recommend shadow refuge, again it fits with heavy investment in shadow arts.

You do gain more putting those 10 points into shadow arts over trickery, shadows embrace or patience would work as well.

[Khalif]

Phigment, on 23 October 2012 - 08:36 PM, said:

Actually you dont loose anything really.....100 condition dmg is nothing.

I wouldnt run your build at all....You have 0 condition removal, which means I already won our fight imo based on theory craft. Then you have 0 stun breakers for gimmick classes.

experience says other wise.

Edited by Khalif, 25 October 2012 - 03:30 AM.

[Shatteredz]

Khalif, on 25 October 2012 - 03:24 AM, said:

experience says other wise.

A: They are right, your build is simply a populair build made "worse". Doesnt mean its is bad, but the other build perfoms betters.

Personally, i would leave out spider venom in total, invest 10 in acrobatics from trickery for the heal on initiative use, and take 10 out of shadow arts and invest them in deadly arts, like:
http://www.gw2db.com...987-bleed-build

Also, i would go with rune of the undead. Extra toughness and a shitload of condition damage is probably the best rune set for a build like this.

[geist burdill]

I dont see any extended cond duration, no stunbreaker/cond removal... if u put 2/2/2 in ur rune set (aflicted+krait+lyssa) plus sigil of agony, ull get a lot more cond dmg than making ur condition dmg higher, 50% extended duration is roughly equal to have +50% more condition dmg, u should consider it; also, what do u mean by staying with p/d when roaming? outside combat u can change weapons freely, whý not take advantadge of "travel seeker"? if u use heartseeker and imediatelly swap weapons, heartseeker cost 0 initiative, its very good to roam about in a speedy manner...

Edited by geist burdill, 26 October 2012 - 01:27 PM.

[Ravnodaus]

Shatteredz, on 25 October 2012 - 10:37 AM, said:

A: They are right, your build is simply a populair build made "worse". Doesnt mean its is bad, but the other build perfoms betters.

Personally, i would leave out spider venom in total, invest 10 in acrobatics from trickery for the heal on initiative use, and take 10 out of shadow arts and invest them in deadly arts, like:
http://www.gw2db.com...987-bleed-build

Also, i would go with rune of the undead. Extra toughness and a shitload of condition damage is probably the best rune set for a build like this.

geist burdill, on 26 October 2012 - 01:25 PM, said:

I dont see any extended cond duration, no stunbreaker/cond removal... if u put 2/2/2 in ur rune set (aflicted+krait+lyssa) plus sigil of agony, ull get a lot more cond dmg than making ur condition dmg higher, 50% extended duration is roughly equal to have +50% more condition dmg, u should consider it; also, what do u mean by staying with p/d when roaming? outside combat u can change weapons freely, whý not take advantadge of "travel seeker"? if u use heartseeker and imediatelly swap weapons, heartseeker cost 0 initiative, its very good to roam about in a speedy manner...

Wouldn't 3 aff/3krait and a sigil of agony on pistol be the best option? That'd total +50% bleed, for 6 second bleeds instead of 4 second ones. Seems that would up your bleed damage potential far more than the 50-70 ish more conditio damage you could squeeze out of undead runes, imo.

+3 dps per bleed, or +50% total damage?

If you really want to push it, the 2/2/2 gives you 45%, traits 10%, and 2x agaony would be another 20%..totals 75%, so you'd get 3 extra seconds on pistol bleeds. Though for that extra 25% this time we're sacking 150 or so condition damage. So, 7 dps per bleed or another +15% total damage? That one is more debatable imo.

Edited by Ravnodaus, 28 October 2012 - 11:14 AM.

[Dairuiner]

geist burdill, on 26 October 2012 - 01:25 PM, said:

I dont see any extended cond duration, no stunbreaker/cond removal... if u put 2/2/2 in ur rune set (aflicted+krait+lyssa) plus sigil of agony, ull get a lot more cond dmg than making ur condition dmg higher, 50% extended duration is roughly equal to have +50% more condition dmg, u should consider it;

When most of the bleeds you're applying already have quite a long duration (10s on LDB I think?), IMO you should be focused on condi damage than duration. Making rapidly applied 3s bleeds into 5s bleeds is way better than making 10s bleeds into 15s bleeds... coupled with the fact that really long bleeds are just more likely to get condi removed.  So, I'd argue that condi duration is great if you're applying short bleeds to get that extra tic or 2 (i.e. pistol main), but condi damage is what you want when applying already lengthy bleeds (d/d).

Fighting a Guardian for instance, who passively removes conditions every 10 seconds... making conditions last longer than 10s won't make a bit of difference to him. Or the ele, who clears conditions every time he attunes to water (roughly every 10 seconds.) Or the S/D thief, who clears conditions on stealth, roughly every 6 seconds. Etc. Condi duration isn't helping you against these opponents. Condi damage is.

Edited by Dairuiner, 29 October 2012 - 08:24 PM.

[Shatteredz]

Ravnodaus, on 28 October 2012 - 11:08 AM, said:

Wouldn't 3 aff/3krait and a sigil of agony on pistol be the best option? That'd total +50% bleed, for 6 second bleeds instead of 4 second ones. Seems that would up your bleed damage potential far more than the 50-70 ish more conditio damage you could squeeze out of undead runes, imo.

+3 dps per bleed, or +50% total damage?

If you really want to push it, the 2/2/2 gives you 45%, traits 10%, and 2x agaony would be another 20%..totals 75%, so you'd get 3 extra seconds on pistol bleeds. Though for that extra 25% this time we're sacking 150 or so condition damage. So, 7 dps per bleed or another +15% total damage? That one is more debatable imo.

Condition damage is more usefull, because:
-Condition removal. The longer your conditions last, the more likely to be removed before they did all their damage. Condition damage just gives you more damage in the same timeframe. Also, you will simply kill faster, because you do your damage with conditions in a shorter time-window.

Especially the bleed from death blossem is likely to be removed, because it already lasts a pretty long time without any buffs.

Also, you can use blinding power while stunned. Stealt already makes 70% of the spvp people like: oh i dont see him, hes gone, blinding migates the rest of the damage. Togheter with steal acting a stun breaker, I have enough ways to deal with CC in the build i provided(along with 20k health and 2,1k armor)

Edited by Shatteredz, 29 October 2012 - 08:40 PM.

[geist burdill]

Dairuiner, on 29 October 2012 - 08:19 PM, said:

When most of the bleeds you're applying already have quite a long duration (10s on LDB I think?), IMO you should be focused on condi damage than duration. Making rapidly applied 3s bleeds into 5s bleeds is way better than making 10s bleeds into 15s bleeds... coupled with the fact that really long bleeds are just more likely to get condi removed.  So, I'd argue that condi duration is great if you're applying short bleeds to get that extra tic or 2 (i.e. pistol main), but condi damage is what you want when applying already lengthy bleeds (d/d).

Fighting a Guardian for instance, who passively removes conditions every 10 seconds... making conditions last longer than 10s won't make a bit of difference to him. Or the ele, who clears conditions every time he attunes to water (roughly every 10 seconds.) Or the S/D thief, who clears conditions on stealth, roughly every 6 seconds. Etc. Condi duration isn't helping you against these opponents. Condi damage is.

2 things:

Caltrops is the main cond applier in any thief build that specializes in cond dmg, if u have no extended duration, ull aplly 6 stacks, 25% apply 8 and 50% apply 10 stacks, u can remove death blossom bleeds, but caltrops u cant coz it reapplies again within 3 secs max, plus, having a condition thief without caltrops is useless, precisely because of what you said, easy condition removal;

Secondary weapon set is P/D, wich has 4 secs bleeds, this weapon set will benefit greatly from the 50% extended duration, otherwise having it instead of a bow is useless, these are the main reasons for extended condition duration. If instead of P/D he used a bow, well, you would have at least half a point there, as it is, condition duration will be better in this build... but anyway, what you said is valid, its just that the build presented here misses a bow.

[Dairuiner]

geist burdill, on 30 October 2012 - 11:17 AM, said:

2 things:

Caltrops is the main cond applier in any thief build that specializes in cond dmg, if u have no extended duration, ull aplly 6 stacks, 25% apply 8 and 50% apply 10 stacks, u can remove death blossom bleeds, but caltrops u cant coz it reapplies again within 3 secs max, plus, having a condition thief without caltrops is useless, precisely because of what you said, easy condition removal;

Secondary weapon set is P/D, wich has 4 secs bleeds, this weapon set will benefit greatly from the 50% extended duration, otherwise having it instead of a bow is useless, these are the main reasons for extended condition duration. If instead of P/D he used a bow, well, you would have at least half a point there, as it is, condition duration will be better in this build... but anyway, what you said is valid, its just that the build presented here misses a bow.

Fair enough, it really does come down to what you're facing. If they have a lot of condi removals, you want +dmg. If they don't, then +duration gets its time to shine. I lean for the +dmg because it ALL good.. as long as you're applying bleeds they're going to tic harder, regardless of how and when they get removed.  Fact is though, if they don't have condi removals, you're going to kill them either way because, well, you're a condi build.

Something to keep in mind when you're stacking your +condi duration though... test it on a dummy.  Making a 4 second bleed into a 5.99 second bleed only gives you 1 extra tic (it won't tic the 6th time.) and is effectively the same as making a 4 second bleed into a 5 second bleed.  What you're really buying is extra tics, so focus less on % and more on how many ticks you get out of the bleed for REAL.

Edited by Dairuiner, 30 October 2012 - 07:34 PM.

[AssimilateThis]

Made a separate post but there are way too many hard counters for these thief condi dmg builds, even with caltrops.  You run into other builds (e.g. rangers, necros, guardians, etc) for where you're never going to stack enough bleeds on them to kill them by playing hide and seek.  You will get out damaged in the long run if you try to go toe to toe with them so your only real option is GTFO (assuming 1v1 of course).  I personally don't like a build that has way too many hard counters.

[fs23otm]

85 Con Damage = 10% duration on 10sec bleeds (daggers)
85 Con Damage = 25% duration on 4 sec bleeds (pistol/short bow)

Whoever said 50% duration is equal to 50% condition damage has no idea what they are talking about.

Stack damage first then duration in 10% or 25% increments.

The 0/0/30/20/20 build is better because in the long run 100 con damage is only a 5 dps increase vs more survivability

[geist burdill]

fs23otm, on 30 October 2012 - 10:07 PM, said:

85 Con Damage = 10% duration on 10sec bleeds (daggers)
85 Con Damage = 25% duration on 4 sec bleeds (pistol/short bow)

Whoever said 50% duration is equal to 50% condition damage has no idea what they are talking about.

Stack damage first then duration in 10% or 25% increments.

The 0/0/30/20/20 build is better because in the long run 100 con damage is only a 5 dps increase vs more survivability

"whoever said 50% duration, bla bla bla..."

OK, lets lecture the lesser beings, after all, im allways up to lend ppl a hand in understanding this game, basically because every now and then there comes the ocasional ignorant:

The formula to calculate the dmg done by bleed ticks, at level 80, is this -> 42.5+(0.05*condition dmg); lets use 43 instead of 42.5

With 85 condition dmg,as you put it, ur bleeds tick for 43+(0.05*85) <=> 43+4.25 <=> 47.25, lets round to 47;
Now,10 secs of bleed will total 470 dmg, if, instead of adding 85 cond dmg, i add 50% duration, i will have: 43*15 <=> 637.5, rounded up to 634... 634-470=164, wich means 34.89% MORE dmg from extending instead of increasing the bleed dmg... its quite a lot,huh?
Lets look at the P/D set up (wich, as i explained above,is my main motto to increase duration of conditions, coz this weapon stacks 4 secs of bleed, not 10, that and caltrops):
43+(0.05*85)= 47;  47*4=188 dmg, with ur proposal, with my idea, i get 43*6=258 dmg; 258-188=60, wich is 37.23% MORE dmg from extending instead of increasing the bleed dmg.

Now,lets see the build posted:

For this,ill assume full condition equipment, lets use carrion set with the above runes, to total 1434 condtion dmg:
43+(0.05*1434) <=> 114.7,lets round up to 115 dmg bleeds, this in 10 secs will do 1150 dmg, with 15% more  duration (wich will add only 1 second), ull have a total of 1265 dmg;

With MY proposal,  ill switch the 5 afflicted + 1 other condiotn rune with 2/2/2 (krait+afflicted+lyssa) and sigil of agony, for a grand total of:
43+(0.05*1279) <=> 107 dmg bleeds, 107*15=1605 dmg total, 1605-1265=340, wich means i do 26.88% MORE dmg...
Now lets see  the P/D weapon set:
Above build from OP: 115*4 (no extra ticks, you need 25% extended duration for another second) -> 460 dmg;
MY build -> 107*6  (50% extended grants you 2 more secs of bleed) -----> 642 dmg; 642-460=182, wich is 39.57% MORE dmg...

As you can see, there is a huge difference in dmg done to target, even with death blossom; in this kind of builds, wich rely on caltrops to maintain bleeds on targets (otherwise they will be easy to remove) and with p/d set (wich, unlike  death blossom, keep bleeds on target much easier,coz the initiative cost for C&D+sneak attack is much, much more manageable than death blossom spam), extending duration will yeld better results than simply up the condition dmg, plus, caltrops with the OP build will only stack 6/7  bleeds,  unlike 10 bleeds with 50% extension.

Lesson over, you can find more at: gw2guru, user geist burdill, i vividly recommend, its good reading.
Good night.

Edited by geist burdill, 31 October 2012 - 12:04 AM.

[jazzbrownie]

geist burdill, on 31 October 2012 - 12:02 AM, said:

2/2/2 (krait+afflicted+lyssa)

krait/afflicted/centaur is a better option for maximizing P/D damage considering that bleeds are the only condition damage you really need to worry about and the +power is a better choice as well.

[geist burdill]

jazzbrownie, on 31 October 2012 - 04:53 AM, said:

krait/afflicted/centaur is a better option for maximizing P/D damage considering that bleeds are the only condition damage you really need to worry about and the +power is a better choice as well.

Perfectly valid, specially if ure using carrion set wich has power as a secondary atribute, but with double dancing daggers (both sets have it) any time u use this skill in 2 foes, it will hit them twice, reaplying criple and extending criple for 6 secs, with lyssa is 6.6 secs, almost 7 secs, and criple as well as poison and weakness allways benefit from lyssa, so its personal choice here. But valid anyway.

[Dairuiner]

Good stuff, took a few reads to digest the math but it looks correct.  One more thing of note in terms of bleed duration:

+33% bleed duration is the magic number for Caltrops. It makes the 3s bleeds 4s bleeds. If caltrops is a big part of your strategy, you'd be selling yourself short by only having +25% bleed duration.

[Ravnodaus]

Shatteredz, on 29 October 2012 - 08:37 PM, said:

Condition damage is more usefull, because:
-Condition removal. The longer your conditions last, the more likely to be removed before they did all their damage. Condition damage just gives you more damage in the same timeframe. Also, you will simply kill faster, because you do your damage with conditions in a shorter time-window.

Especially the bleed from death blossem is likely to be removed, because it already lasts a pretty long time without any buffs.

Also, you can use blinding power while stunned. Stealt already makes 70% of the spvp people like: oh i dont see him, hes gone, blinding migates the rest of the damage. Togheter with steal acting a stun breaker, I have enough ways to deal with CC in the build i provided(along with 20k health and 2,1k armor)

Yes, but the gain from 3afflic/3krait is pretty substantial. In bleed specs, I feel it is the perfect balance between duration and damage. Personal opinion, but there it is. +30% bleed duration, and 166 condition damage... is pretty much the best you're going to get.

fs23otm, on 30 October 2012 - 10:07 PM, said:

85 Con Damage = 10% duration on 10sec bleeds (daggers)
85 Con Damage = 25% duration on 4 sec bleeds (pistol/short bow)

Whoever said 50% duration is equal to 50% condition damage has no idea what they are talking about.

Stack damage first then duration in 10% or 25% increments.

The 0/0/30/20/20 build is better because in the long run 100 con damage is only a 5 dps increase vs more survivability

Everything you just said is wrong, basically. Sorry. I don't know where you're getting your information, but I highly recommend a new source.

Dairuiner, on 31 October 2012 - 03:18 PM, said:

Good stuff, took a few reads to digest the math but it looks correct.  One more thing of note in terms of bleed duration:

+33% bleed duration is the magic number for Caltrops. It makes the 3s bleeds 4s bleeds. If caltrops is a big part of your strategy, you'd be selling yourself short by only having +25% bleed duration.

Not to nitpick, but the magic number is actually 34%. I've tested 33% with 3 second bleeds and it doesn't give the full extra second, so no extra tick of damage. 34% does get you the full extra second though, and thus the extra tick. (3 x 1.33 = 3.99) Basically, no rounding occurs whatsoever, if it isn't exactly 1 or more extra seconds, it does nothing. 35% is more likely to achieve though, in my tests I had to put an odd number of points in traits, and that really isn't optimal in regular play.

Edited by Ravnodaus, 04 November 2012 - 09:26 AM.

[Ravnodaus]

Dairuiner, on 30 October 2012 - 07:31 PM, said:

Something to keep in mind when you're stacking your +condi duration though... test it on a dummy.  Making a 4 second bleed into a 5.99 second bleed only gives you 1 extra tic (it won't tic the 6th time.) and is effectively the same as making a 4 second bleed into a 5 second bleed.  What you're really buying is extra tics, so focus less on % and more on how many ticks you get out of the bleed for REAL.

You can test it if you like, but you really only need to do some simple math instead. I understand what your message is, focus on the ticks. But you can figure that out with the %s. So focusing on the %s does actually make more sense. Blindly thinking any +%s is going to be good isn't smart, no... but if you use a 4 second bleed for example, knowing that every +25% gives you another tick is going to help you.

1s needs 100%
2s needs 50%
3s needs 34%
4s needs 25%
5s needs 20%
etc.

Edited by Ravnodaus, 04 November 2012 - 09:12 AM.

[Hankchinaski]

Hey guys, what do you think of this build?  It also uses spider venom but is boosted by the poison traits in deadly arts... not my build I found it elsewhere - wondering how shadow arts and shadow refuge instead of the venom stuff compares:

http://gw2skills.net...GbTumkNt Ygx8AA

[Mursie]

geist burdill, on 31 October 2012 - 12:02 AM, said:

"whoever said 50% duration, bla bla bla..."

OK, lets lecture the lesser beings, after all, im allways up to lend ppl a hand in understanding this game, basically because every now and then there comes the ocasional ignorant:

The formula to calculate the dmg done by bleed ticks, at level 80, is this -> 42.5+(0.05*condition dmg); lets use 43 instead of 42.5

With 85 condition dmg,as you put it, ur bleeds tick for 43+(0.05*85) <=> 43+4.25 <=> 47.25, lets round to 47;
Now,10 secs of bleed will total 470 dmg, if, instead of adding 85 cond dmg, i add 50% duration, i will have: 43*15 <=> 637.5, rounded up to 634... 634-470=164, wich means 34.89% MORE dmg from extending instead of increasing the bleed dmg... its quite a lot,huh?

You have done a great job helping lesser beings understand +duration.  To recap based on your number theory...

with + dmg you did 470 dmg in 10 secs (47*10)... and zero additional damage from seconds 10 thru 15 sec assuming no additional dmg done besides the one dot application

with +duration you did 430 dmg in 10 secs (43*10) and 215 additional dmg from seconds 10 thru 15 (43*5)... a total of 645 dmg in 15 seconds assuming no additional dmg done besides the one dot application.

Now consider this - your opponet has 460 health upon combat initiation... his cooldown on heal is currently at 10.01 seconds.... (I think you see where I'm going here)..  with + dmg you have killed him with 470 dmg before his cooldown is up.  With +duration you left him 30 points and he is able to activate his heal.  Obviously this has been incredibly streamlined for demonstration purposes but hopefully the point is still valid.  Your calculations fail to consider the time to kill element that is crucial for most pvp encounters...

If you are discussing beating a door down... then continue youor conversation... it is most relevant there and I will not disagree with you as I care not for carebears and carebear things.

If you are discussing pvp .... and you disagree... let's discuss further.
Good Night.

Edited by Mursie, 17 December 2012 - 09:20 PM.

[geist burdill]

Mursie, on 17 December 2012 - 09:19 PM, said:

You have done a great job helping lesser beings understand +duration.  To recap based on your number theory...

with + dmg you did 470 dmg in 10 secs (47*10)... and zero additional damage from seconds 10 thru 15 sec assuming no additional dmg done besides the one dot application

with +duration you did 430 dmg in 10 secs (43*10) and 215 additional dmg from seconds 10 thru 15 (43*5)... a total of 645 dmg in 15 seconds assuming no additional dmg done besides the one dot application.

Now consider this - your opponet has 460 health upon combat initiation... his cooldown on heal is currently at 10.01 seconds.... (I think you see where I'm going here)..  with + dmg you have killed him with 470 dmg before his cooldown is up.  With +duration you left him 30 points and he is able to activate his heal.  Obviously this has been incredibly streamlined for demonstration purposes but hopefully the point is still valid.  Your calculations fail to consider the time to kill element that is crucial for most pvp encounters...

If you are discussing beating a door down... then continue youor conversation... it is most relevant there and I will not disagree with you as I care not for carebears and carebear things.

If you are discussing pvp .... and you disagree... let's discuss further.
Good Night.

Ill start by saying that the "lesser beings" thing was awarded to that other guy, coz of his snarky response in which he is not even calling people by the name, albeit being more than obvious that he was referring to me, so i was directing that at him and only him. This should be pretty obvious.
Now on to the TTK question: TTK has nothing to be brought here, the discussion was only in terms of dmg wise, and taking as background the build posted, which includes a P/D set and caltrops. On the damage wise, theres noting that can be discussed here,as its obvious that my case is the winning case. On the TTK, obviously you want to "burst" down as quickly as possible, and ur extremely farfetched example may present a case where more dmg on the dots would be better, but lets be serious here, ok? i think what i  explained was in a totally different context, and had nothing to do with time to kill, just how much dmg you put out with either more dot or more duration.Also, if u followed this thread, ull see that for the D/D bleeds, more dot will work better, coz LDB bleeds you for 10 secs, which is a long duration already, but the build posted here has a great emphasis on P/D and caltrops, and both this aspects of the build will entail a more duration oriented build, to extend the number of bleed stacks you can put on your target, plus, as i explained in the other response i gave you, we do not sacrifice almost nothing in terms of condition dmg, in fact, with 3 krait+3 afflicted+2 sigils of agony ill get the bleeds to extend 50% and will only lose 27 malice, which is less than 2 dmg per tick... And this is in a PVP scenario. Now imagine ur TTK scenario and instead of D/D and LDB we use P/D and sneak attack + vital shot, u can stack 7 bleeds at normal duration or 10 at 50% duration, which will kill you first?

I dont do math oriented theorycrafting in a vacuum, ive been doing this since before the first open beta (27th April), and what i say here has been repeated and agreed upon by others elsewhere and everywhere, short duration dots benefit a lot more from duration that from increasing dmg, mostly because you can go farther with increasing duration than with increasing dmg ticks. And you dont sacrifice anything.

Ill share the spreadsheet i made where i do my "math therycrafting", if you have Office or Open Office, you can use it your self, ull see that even stuff as TTK is in there: https://docs.google....NVUFhyS3c#gid=4

[Mursie]

geist burdill, on 19 December 2012 - 12:34 AM, said:

Ill start by saying that the "lesser beings" thing was awarded to that other guy, coz of his snarky response in which he is not even calling people by the name, albeit being more than obvious that he was referring to me, so i was directing that at him and only him. This should be pretty obvious.
Now on to the TTK question: TTK has nothing to be brought here, the discussion was only in terms of dmg wise, and taking as background the build posted, which includes a P/D set and caltrops. On the damage wise, theres noting that can be discussed here,as its obvious that my case is the winning case. On the TTK, obviously you want to "burst" down as quickly as possible, and ur extremely farfetched example may present a case where more dmg on the dots would be better, but lets be serious here, ok? i think what i  explained was in a totally different context, and had nothing to do with time to kill, just how much dmg you put out with either more dot or more duration.Also, if u followed this thread, ull see that for the D/D bleeds, more dot will work better, coz LDB bleeds you for 10 secs, which is a long duration already, but the build posted here has a great emphasis on P/D and caltrops, and both this aspects of the build will entail a more duration oriented build, to extend the number of bleed stacks you can put on your target, plus, as i explained in the other response i gave you, we do not sacrifice almost nothing in terms of condition dmg, in fact, with 3 krait+3 afflicted+2 sigils of agony ill get the bleeds to extend 50% and will only lose 27 malice, which is less than 2 dmg per tick... And this is in a PVP scenario. Now imagine ur TTK scenario and instead of D/D and LDB we use P/D and sneak attack + vital shot, u can stack 7 bleeds at normal duration or 10 at 50% duration, which will kill you first?

I dont do math oriented theorycrafting in a vacuum, ive been doing this since before the first open beta (27th April), and what i say here has been repeated and agreed upon by others elsewhere and everywhere, short duration dots benefit a lot more from duration that from increasing dmg, mostly because you can go farther with increasing duration than with increasing dmg ticks. And you dont sacrifice anything.

Ill share the spreadsheet i made where i do my "math therycrafting", if you have Office or Open Office, you can use it your self, ull see that even stuff as TTK is in there: https://docs.google....NVUFhyS3c#gid=4

I'm not sure I follow your numbers regarding the tradeoff on runes.  I do wvwvw.. in that scenario... i use runes of the undead.  the 6th bonus of +5% toughness becomes condition...combined with foods like master tuning crystal that convert % of toughness into condition makes the trade off to the runes you advise very much something to consider.  I am no trying to say +duration is bad... I simply want to make sure, before I pay the monies to change stats to that... that it in fact is worth it.  I am a p/d build... no caltrops...and I was not (and am still not entirely) convinced that +duration is worth having over the sacrifice of the +dmg

[geist burdill]

Mursie, on 19 December 2012 - 03:15 PM, said:

I'm not sure I follow your numbers regarding the tradeoff on runes.  I do wvwvw.. in that scenario... i use runes of the undead.  the 6th bonus of +5% toughness becomes condition...combined with foods like master tuning crystal that convert % of toughness into condition makes the trade off to the runes you advise very much something to consider.  I am no trying to say +duration is bad... I simply want to make sure, before I pay the monies to change stats to that... that it in fact is worth it.  I am a p/d build... no caltrops...and I was not (and am still not entirely) convinced that +duration is worth having over the sacrifice of the +dmg

Look, its pretty simple, and what i wrote was in a real PVP scenario, TPVP, SPVP, not www, but even so; i  use 0/0/30/20/20 build in  www, and i went for the centaur rune full set,my personal choice based on my play style, since i always use withdraw as my heal skill, this gets me perma swiftness and allows me to discard SoS, opening a slot, but if ure using p/d, u MUST have at least 50% duration, otherwise your bleeds wont stack as much.
If you use vital shot, ull put 5 bleeds on target, that will last 4 secs, by the time you get the 5th bleed, the 1st will be wearing off, coz  4 secs have passed, so at any given time ull be able to see only 5 stacks of bleed. If you  extend to 6 secs, ull be able to stack 7/8 bleeds at least, and you will  always see ur target with 7/8 bleeds instead of 5. Now think about it:
- every 20 points of condition damage will give you ONE more point of bleed  dmg, if you have 200 more condition dmg, ull be doing 10 more bleed dmg;
-If you go for maximum dmg, and you have, say,1000 tufness, your rune of the undead will give you 183+50 condition dmg, which is 233 more dmg, or, in bleeds, they will do 11 more dmg  per tick; if you have 2000 tufness, ull get +283 cond dmg, which translates into +14 dmg per tick. This makes ur bleeds do 54 (with 1000 tufness) or 57 (with 2000  tufness). Since undead rune doesnt increase duration, ur pistol will only stack 5 bleeds, which will do 5*54 (255) per second for 4 seconds (1020 total dmg), if i run with 3 krait+3 afflicted+sigil of agony+10 points in power, ill get 50% more duration, or 6 secs, enabling me to stack, lets say, 7 bleeds. This rune choice gives me 83 condition from 3 krait and 83 from afflicted,for a total of 166, or 8 more dmg from bleeds, which will make them tick for 51. Now do the maths-> 7*51 (357) for 6 secs (2142), this is basically TWICE as much...
As you can see, since for duration the only sacrifice is in your runes, not all equipment, its more worth it to go for extending, particularly on short bleeds, like P/D. Also, this solution is more bursty, so even if there is condition removal, as long as you stack more bleeds before removal, ull always win in dmg done to target. In the previous post i made a mistake, where i put 27 less dmg, its in fact 17 less  dmg, thats the difference between a malice full set and a 3+3 rune  distribution.
I dont know about food in www, what is the rate of convertion from tufness to condition from those cristals, but from my example above, you can already see  that you will need a LOT of tufness to override duration.

What i advise you to do is this:  go to the mists, where everything is free, and test a full undead build with full trickery and full rabid set, without duration,  and then use vital shoot on dummies; then watch how many stacks you see on dummies (ull see only 5, and the last one will only glimmer for a split second). Then repeat the  test with sigil of agony, 2 krait, 2 afflicted and 2 centaur (or lyssa), ull see that even tho the bleeds tick for less, they will stack up to 7/8, and the dummy dies much faster.

[Mursie]

I like where you are going with this.  your logic is starting to make sense.  aside..but related... i checked the centaur runes and I like your thoughts on that..but have you instead just figured... use gain vigor on healing in acrobatics...and by using withdraw you have vigor up almost 24/7 (especially if you get bountiful theft in trickery)...and with 2 secs of swift on dodge.. you have swiftness anyways from dodges... (also thrill of crime in trickery is option).

I say that because other than the swiftness and + duration on the rune.. your power bonuses are pretty much worthless yes?

anyways... aside from that I'll have to check into more duration.

i was also running 30/20/20 with stealth regen, condition stealth remove, and master of deception.  running shadow refuge, shadowstep, blinding powder  and then vigor on heal, might on dodge, bountiful theft and thrill of crime.

I was using prec/tough/cond dmg gear with earth sigil and agony sigils...   I guess I could give up the earth sigil for an additional agony sigil and then get 3/3 krait - afflicted.  I hate having to lose the earth sigil bleed thoguh...its pretty strong.

If based on this build you could make further recommendations please let me know.  obviously I love having the stealths (his, refuge, bp) on short cooldowns - hence master of deception.  I also loving having vigor up for the dodges and swiftness off of that.

[geist burdill]

I play sort of a hibrid build, with shortbow and P/D, when im with a zerg, my shortbow dishes more dmg if its power oriented, whereas my pistol bleeds benefit from carrion gear when im roaming solo; i cant play without 19k HP and 2.4K armor, so i decided to go with soldier gear for coat, helm and backpiece (they add 72, 32 and 14 tufness, which is 118 total, with 1980 default armor from thief and 300 in shadow arts ill reach 2398 armor total).All the other armor pieces and trinkets are carrion. Since the carrion gear is sorta hibrid between power and malice, i went this way and added full centaur runeset.This rune gives perma swift for me and team mates, and using vigorous recovery only (which i use, btw) does not give me more mobility than equiping SoS, even with dodge rolling galore i still move better with the signet, so i decided to buy the full set, which also coupled with the bleed +15% serves both in power and condition.The rest of the gear is carrion, so i get around +1000 malice and +1800 power. With a sigil of bloodlust, agony, doom, might on dodge and stealth, i easily get 10 stacks of might, which pumps me with +2400 power, +1350 malice and +25% bleed duration, poison on weapon swap to keep them poisoned, etc.
This isnt by any stretch an optimal build, its just me fooling around in www, so dont use if you wanna get max efficiency. It is, however, an excelent troll build, sneak attacks with this power on underleveled players can hit for 2k dmg plus the bleeds, with the initial cloak and dagger it almost takes them to 50% in a flash.

As for advice, well i say that go with carrion gear if you want to play the P/D build, i dont like playing with less than 19k health and 2.4k armor mostly because of instagibing from backstabbers, shatterers, 100 bladers, etc. I play with everything you said, vigorous recovery, thrill of crime, bountiful, shadow embrace, shadow rejuvenation, i use infusion of shadow for initiative management instead of deception, and i use power of inertia. About deception, let me warn you that deception does not reduce cooldown on Hide in Shadows, that heal is not a deception skill, so you might wanna reconsider replace with infusion of shadow, shadow protector or cloaked in shadows.As for utilities, again we are in sync, i use exactly the same (how can one not play with those, they are uber!!), but when im loading bloodlust i replace shadowstep with caltrops to farm a few mobs first, it makes rounding wolves and killing them with shortbow extremely easy, once i have the 25 stacks (i take no more than 8/10 minutes), i replace with shadow step. If you usually buy food, get sigils and food to extend duration of bleeds to 75%, and get the corruption sigil to gather 250 malice from mobs, ull get an obcene amount of condition dmg with this.

[Mursie]

well, I've given it thought and have decided on the following:

I have one sigil of agony for 10%

i'll start using the rare veggie pizza for +40% to hit the 50% sweet spot.  i'll keep the rest of my build as is... with undead runes.  the discussion has been helpful