13 replies to this topic

[Bariusdrop]

Edit: Sorry everyone! Build should now be working, and @Osiris, I fixed the font shortly after posting it (Within a minute or so). Thanks again guys!

Hey everyone!

The last week or so I have been playing around with warrior builds, and noticed that a substantial amount of players use shouts or banners with 30 in tactics for the hammer. My problem was that I wanted a hammer warrior in PvE without building him around support, but instead using him for control and survivability. This is what I came up with.

http://gw2skills.net...qwFjiiIe1j2UH5A

Basically, the biggest problem I have with the build at the moment is that the Discipline line gives this whopping 30% crit damage and I have no real way to take advantage of that. I figured without ANY precision gear I could average a 20% crit chance with Heightened Focus and Sigil of Accuracy. This could get better with fury and things like that and synergizes well with Sigil of Intelligence for a swap to rifle and maxed burst skill.
Essentially, I wanted to make a hammer build that does not use spend 50pts into support trees (defense/tactics). I wanted to emphasize control and also be completely flexible with my utility skills (not being pigeon-holed into three shouts or locked into a banner or two). The ones in place are just generalist ones at the moment. Condition removal, Stability, and a spammable interrupt. Please let me know what you think!

-Barius

P.S. any advice on gear would be great. Right now I am looking at a power/vit/toughness set up with precision trinkets or something like that.

Edited by Bariusdrop, 17 January 2013 - 03:14 PM.

[Osiris Neits]

I was interested in your topic, however the font and size you chose is unreadable on my computer, and i don't have a magnifying glass handy.

[chullster]

Sorry but the link you provided doesn't work right now, though I can read what you typed

I'm of a similar feeling to you, don't want to be stuck with shouts or banners all the time, and would like a full DPS hammer build (I know it's not the best DPS weapon). Tried 20/0/20/0/30 with huge crits but other than that there's not much on the forums build wise.

[lalangamena]

Bariusdrop, on 17 January 2013 - 12:32 PM, said:

Hey everyone!


http://gw2skills.net...j2UH5A;TIALOGEA

-Barius

your link is broken  

[Osiris Neits]

Thanks for increasing the font size, but yeah- broken link

[shiggidyshwa]

chullster, on 17 January 2013 - 12:43 PM, said:

Sorry but the link you provided doesn't work right now, though I can read what you typed

I'm of a similar feeling to you, don't want to be stuck with shouts or banners all the time, and would like a full DPS hammer build (I know it's not the best DPS weapon). Tried 20/0/20/0/30 with huge crits but other than that there's not much on the forums build wise.

Why would you roll a huge crits build and not invest into Precision?

[chullster]

shiggidyshwa, on 17 January 2013 - 01:42 PM, said:

Why would you roll a huge crits build and not invest into Precision?

Because I get enough precision from gear and fury. That and there's no traits I like the look of in the low end of that line. The vuln. on crit sounds nice, but you dont hit as fast so 1 or 2 stacks doesn't seem a wise investment for 10 att. points. The +10% dmg to bleeding targets is too far up (25 points) to use as well with a non-GS/rifle build.

Edited by chullster, 17 January 2013 - 02:38 PM.

[TGIFrisbie]

Master Maintenance Oil.

[Bariusdrop]

Just a shameless bump since I managed to fix the link and I am hopeful that I can net the previous posters to come back.

[chullster]

Bariusdrop, on 17 January 2013 - 04:26 PM, said:

Just a shameless bump since I managed to fix the link and I am hopeful that I can net the previous posters to come back.

Thank you. Had a look, and though kick is a fun skill to use, the shout for great justice buffs your own and allies nearby damage and you say you want Kick as an interrupt, just either use a hammer rupt, which you have 3 of, or switch to another weapon set like mace/shield or mace/mace which has 2 or more interrupts on the weapon skills.

I like Embrace the Pain, but I prefer Cull the Weak with a hammer as I spam the weakness attack on recharge, I think the tool tip also shows that attack to have the 2nd highest damage too.

The updated healing burst is good with a hammer as you can use it to instantly refill your add. bar and it can have a bigger heal too. You already have a condition remover, but these skills are open to change depending on where you're playing.

In PvE I rarely get immobilised that often so I took the signet CD reduction trait at master level.

I'm torn with the GM level trait in the Discipline line, I like the quicker refilling add. bar trait you chose, but I also like earthshaker available 2 seconds earlier too. I try the one you've picked, bar is full but not ready to use, I chose the other, ES is ready to use, but the bar isn't full.

Nothing is set in stone with hammer, and I keep messing about with traits trying to see if any improvements can be found.

[Bariusdrop]

chullster, on 17 January 2013 - 04:47 PM, said:

Thank you. Had a look, and though kick is a fun skill to use, the shout for great justice buffs your own and allies nearby damage and you say you want Kick as an interrupt, just either use a hammer rupt, which you have 3 of, or switch to another weapon set like mace/shield or mace/mace which has 2 or more interrupts on the weapon skills.

I like Embrace the Pain, but I prefer Cull the Weak with a hammer as I spam the weakness attack on recharge, I think the tool tip also shows that attack to have the 2nd highest damage too.

The updated healing burst is good with a hammer as you can use it to instantly refill your add. bar and it can have a bigger heal too. You already have a condition remover, but these skills are open to change depending on where you're playing.

In PvE I rarely get immobilised that often so I took the signet CD reduction trait at master level.

I'm torn with the GM level trait in the Discipline line, I like the quicker refilling add. bar trait you chose, but I also like earthshaker available 2 seconds earlier too. I try the one you've picked, bar is full but not ready to use, I chose the other, ES is ready to use, but the bar isn't full.

Nothing is set in stone with hammer, and I keep messing about with traits trying to see if any improvements can be found.

Quick question. Since you are testing things around on a warrior with those points (more or less), if you use Quick Bursts for the 8-second burst skill and Embrace the Pain does that help alleviate the problems? I noticed you said that you would use Cull the Weak in its' place, but would you reach the adren. cap with a few hits on your person within those 8 seconds? If so it would be a great trait pick. If not I will most likely swap it to Cull the Weak and keep Adrenal Reserves because I would rather sit at full adrenaline longer to utilize my passives rather than have a cooldown I can't keep up with. Thanks for the tips, kick will be swapped for 'For Great Justice!' immediately. As far as the immobilize breaker, I took it more to make sure I could use Earth Shaker on demand regardless of the immobilize, but you're right to default to the signet reduction for the ultimate as well.

Thanks!

[chullster]

Bariusdrop, on 17 January 2013 - 06:23 PM, said:

Quick question. Since you are testing things around on a warrior with those points (more or less), if you use Quick Bursts for the 8-second burst skill and Embrace the Pain does that help alleviate the problems? I noticed you said that you would use Cull the Weak in its' place, but would you reach the adren. cap with a few hits on your person within those 8 seconds? If so it would be a great trait pick. If not I will most likely swap it to Cull the Weak and keep Adrenal Reserves because I would rather sit at full adrenaline longer to utilize my passives rather than have a cooldown I can't keep up with. Thanks for the tips, kick will be swapped for 'For Great Justice!' immediately. As far as the immobilize breaker, I took it more to make sure I could use Earth Shaker on demand regardless of the immobilize, but you're right to default to the signet reduction for the ultimate as well.

Thanks!

You're welcome.

I'm not properly testing the traits, just swapping stuff about and seeing how I go. I'm not sure which of the GM traits to use really, they're both pretty good, I do sort of lean towards quick bursts so I can use Earthshaker even if not a full bar more often. I also use signet of rage with hammer, as another instant refill every 24 seconds when combined with an 8 sec burst recharge helps out a lot. Nothing is certain with hammer at the minute.

[Bariusdrop]

So this is my final iteration of a build without shouts or banners. Figured I would post it for those interested. Thanks to those of you who gave me advice (and more is always welcome).

The basic idea behind it is to maintain your adrenaline and also be able to use earth shaker every 10 seconds. The full adrenaline bar gives you a 12% damage boost, 9% crit, regeneration from Adrenal Health, and a bigger heal. This build also (coincidentally) has a large amount of crit damage from maxing out the discipline line. This led me to spend my last 10 points in Arms to get an extra 4.5% crit from precision and also the trait Unsuspecting Foe for the 50% crit chance on stunned enemies. The sigils are to guarantee crits on the rifle burst skill and to help pad the crit rate of your hammer. If I'm doing the math right you should have a crit rate of 25% or so with the hammer out before gear is applied. With a full set of knight's gear you can build on the toughness you get from hammer with some vitality and also fill out your crit chance.


http://gw2skills.net...2IsxajzGpNLOGEA


A few points of conflict I've had (and would love some more advice on are:
1. Would it be better to move the 10 in arms over to tactics? (giving me access to 70 more power on the aura and some more vitality)
2. How helpful is Embrace the Pain? Many people don't seem to take it but given that having a full adrenal bar is key to this build, is it helpful?
3. Runes of the Dolyak seem to be ideal, but could a case be made for runes of the soldier or maybe a set with precision and crit damage in it?
4. Gear- Full knight's, or half knights and half Valkyrie?

Now I'm trying to get into the specifics of it. Any more feedback would be great. Thanks everyone!

P.S. I checked the font and the link prior, they both should be working. Cheers!

[Ninja Battle Lion]

1. Arms 10 is probably the weakest point in your trait setup. But rather than speccing into yet another tree, I'd bump Strength to 15 for the endurance-on-Burst minor and Defense to 25 to get another little Power boost. As for skills, I change those often myself, though I do think Balanced Stance is pretty situational and would rather see something like Shake It Off! for basic usage.

2. From personal experince, not really helpful. IMHO you'd be better off with something like VI or II. As for needing full Adren, that's arguable, but I will expand on that below.

3. DO NOT and I mean DO NOT rune for plain stat increases. It's just a waste. Soldier's ain't worth it with only the 1 Shout stuck to your bar. Find out what your build is good at, then expand on that. In your case I'd go for increased Boon/Fury/Might duration or increasing Crit Dmg.

4. Berserker's.

Back to point 2, and 3 I guess: I hope you soon realize how powerful Blast Finishers really are, and that ES is the only one available to Warriors on weapon skills. For this reason I would suggest Disc XI over XII, since abusing combo fields more often is way more important than getting a 2 instead of 1 second stun. This makes Boon increasing runes a really attractive proposition as well since all your buddies will benefit from them.