Dagger/Dagger PvP Soulbeast

Here's a guide I made, (top 100 EU soloQ on 2 accounts) https://new.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/comments/gbmb49/condition_soulbeast_pvp_build_guide/I think itll gain popularity quickly because core has taken a hit and I've shared this for anyone to try. It's gonna be annoying fighting my mirror ;)

I kinda like the poison over the bleeding variant :smiley:. Both seems good with pro and cons, but should work the same.

It's a great build, definitely more than viable in plat. If MH dagger had an i-frame on the 3, I would use it. But in its current state, i prefer MH axe.

Just run a second trap instead of Sharpening Stone. If single trap, then slot a second stun breaker.

Whether people like it or not, we'll be seeing a lot more condi SB's in higher tiers. I think those who doubt it should try it for 20-30 hours, no point in putting out any more guides for the haters. Try it yourself, or don't, but then don't talk smack about something you don't understand.

Slightly disagree. The better the player the lower the value of your trap, more traps is often a weakness not a strength, I've beaten many rangers trying to make trapper rune and all that crap work. Sharpening stone is on demand cleanse, fury and good damage. About the MH axe, I enjoy it but dagger will proc [Predator's Cunning] way more than axe which will help with sustain, on top of that if you take axe MH you have only projectiles and a single ele can render you useless. Also dagger leaps can be used for 1.3k heal or 8s weakness per leap. Axe just doesnt compete with it in my opinion

hey thanks, tried a few games, had fun with it. i used a different pet, the bird with f3 pull/immob cuz i just love that skill and it works nice with pulling opponent into the trap. changed to the quickness on beastmode skill trait for that one too.

Just wanted to chime in here, instead of the subreddit post. I actually commented in the subreddit AFTER my post above.

The poison stance variant is excellent. I run it with Sunless runes for that additional interrupt... it's huge. Dagger took some getting used to, but the additional heals from it and the cleave on downs are great. Axe/dagger does significantly less damage overall, although Winter's Bite is probably one of the best abilities in the game.

The support from Dolyak and the Spiritual Reprieve heal can seriously turn fights around. I missed having stab.

Healing Spring vs. Bear Stance - still torn on this one. Bear seems a lot more convenient, but HS has lower CD and can help the team more.

Regarding my comment about traps and Trapper runes - yes, they fell off hard at the top of Plat 1, couldn't break into Plat 2. I've been practicing the poison stance build and it seems to have a much higher skill ceiling. I've been dealing with Holos (good ones) quite comfortably. No real 1v1 struggles so far.

Man gj for all effort done on figuring out counterplays and writing it down. I play it for long time actually and i can say you made good points. There are some things i want to add because it can make more depth to it. First of all snow wolf is great choice for that build and the reason is another 2x leaps+stunbreak and imunity to power although i like feel of dagger+siamonth too aswell as its ability to use it before combat. Smokescale works good when you go close and there are comps which want to spike you and you can almost permastealth with wolf leaps and dagger to get some sneaky decaps aswell. What you say about smokescale having no use in combat is not true especially on your vulture stance variant because he proc smokeassault from range as first skill so you have good control of it to combo vulture stance+smokeassault on pet and than smokeassault beastmode and its 10 stacks of poison + if you run mirage rune you can even cover it. Mirage rune is great choice for sword not rly for double dagger atleast in my experience. If you run carrion amulet, sigil of inteligence on d/d is great choice to crit with dagger 4. I use snow wolf as main pet because lower cd on leaps nad aoe chill works great for dagger 4 too. Quick draw is good if you gonna fight core necros because of shortbow 5 cc. Killing pets vs ranger is way to go and traps are great for it but having 1 stunbreak+another on siamonth is not that good in this meta but if it works for you its cool. Entangle+ sunless rune is great aswell but trapper runes make that build more viable because double dagger fits that style but i don t like abuse of that rune aswell on other kind of builds but on d/d i found it legit.

bumping this for 3's. get off the core and power SB teat. this is much stronger.

@Kraitan.8476 Do you have any success using this build in 3v3? Or would you recommend something else?

@Sznurek.8791 said:@Kraitan.8476 Do you have any success using this build in 3v3? Or would you recommend something else?

I'm not him, but the build seems effective in 3's.

Clocked about 30 hours on the Poison Master variant, and I'm in gold 3 right now without too many issues. Still climbing. It's definitely way better than any other ranger build that I've run into. In 3's, you will get focused a lot, and good players are basically impossible to run away from on these tiny maps. Core rangers and druids just feed in this game mode, but not this build. Healing Spring, evades, Entangle, and Spiritual Reprieve are big impact abilities.

You need Jacaranda instead of Owl, for the cleave, otherwise you won't be able to kill any downs.

Shortbow is really, really good for the evade, stun, and immob. You need i-frames from SB3 and dagger 4.

The build puts out a ton of consistent pressure while tanking and supporting very effectively. I put out a ton of heals, cleanses, and peels for my team. It's not a cheesy, or particularly easy build, but it's quite effective.

This build sounds sweet, what do you use outside of pvp?

Couldn't tell you how stoked I was to see this since it's very similar to a build of mine I've used for quite some time now.

I also couldn't tell you how very much so interested I am to hopefully play against you build with my own some day in the future since I'm very much so curious how much you've tested pet choice and combo field usage.

So yeah, again thanks for the great post!

Been trying this just for a couple days. I find that slow, telegraphed dagger skills are rather hard to land most of the time, which hampers damage quite a bit. This causes me to rely primarily on short bow, which is mostly utility. Any thoughts on how to make the most of d/d versus highly mobile targets like thieves or other rangers?

@Battlebrew.1708 said:Been trying this just for a couple days. I find that slow, telegraphed dagger skills are rather hard to land most of the time, which hampers damage quite a bit. This causes me to rely primarily on short bow, which is mostly utility. Any thoughts on how to make the most of d/d versus highly mobile targets like thieves or other rangers?

MH dagger does a lot of damage. just by swinging your 1 and 2, you're healing a bit, and doing significant dps. i do wish dagger 3 had a cripple, but you can use dagger 5 before engaging.

I generally do Shortbow 4 into 2, then swap to d/d. Then dagger 4 into dagger 2, followed by a few dagger 1's.

save dagger 3 charges just for leap combos over the traps. when pressed hard, they are ok for disengaging/kiting as well.

if you really hate MH dagger, you can swap to axe. you'll lose the extra 3k heals, and quite a bit of dps. but it definitely feels more comfortable. after testing MH axe again (after a few months of d/d), my main issue is it has low sustained dps. axe 3 + 2 combo you can do every 8 seconds only, and axe 1 is entirely useless on a condi build.

I agree that MH dagger needs a little something. Dagger 3 should be a cripple, and/or a brief i-frame. Range on 1 & 2 should be increased to 200. it would make the weapon feel a lot smoother without making it OP.

I've been playing with the "bleeding & survival" build lately, but have made a few changes to something that I have found to work pretty well:

Swapped dagger mainhand for sword

• I've found the mobility/evades from this weapon to be more useful than dagger mainhand for the most part

Swapped bird for wolf

• Birds have been nerfed to hell and you get a pretty similar leap on a 10 second cooldown instead of an 18 second cooldown
• The stun is generally more useful than the swiftness (and you can still pop swiftness at the start of a match with an alt pet, then swap to wolf)
• The evades/mobility of sword negate the need for most of the defensive utility of birds
• Wolf howl is still awesome for surviving when downed or for preventing stomps
• I also just really have an old school fondness for the days back when wolfs were a staple of pretty much all ranger builds before HoT

Swapped Viper's Nest for Flame Trap

• Lower cd and more damage
• Poison from Viper's Nest is great, but it's still abundant enough to not be that necessary

Different runes/sigils since there's not the same as much focus on bleeding without dagger mainhand, particularly if not taking skirmishing traits

• Still a bit undecided on rune choice here, but Rune of Adventure and Rune of Scavenging seem like decent choices. Rune of Resistance seems very popular at the moment, but probably not too necessary, depending on the team you face.

@"Dahkeus.8243" said:I've been playing with the "bleeding & survival" build lately, but have made a few changes to something that I have found to work pretty well:

Swapped dagger mainhand for sword

• I've found the mobility/evades from this weapon to be more useful than dagger mainhand for the most part

Swapped bird for wolf

• Birds have been nerfed to hell and you get a pretty similar leap on a 10 second cooldown instead of an 18 second cooldown
• The stun is generally more useful than the swiftness (and you can still pop swiftness at the start of a match with an alt pet, then swap to wolf)
• The evades/mobility of sword negate the need for most of the defensive utility of birds
• Wolf howl is still awesome for surviving when downed or for preventing stomps
• I also just really have an old school fondness for the days back when wolfs were a staple of pretty much all ranger builds before HoT

Swapped Viper's Nest for Flame Trap

• Lower cd and more damage
• Poison from Viper's Nest is great, but it's still abundant enough to not be that necessary

Different runes/sigils since there's not the same as much focus on bleeding without dagger mainhand, particularly if not taking skirmishing traits

• Still a bit undecided on rune choice here, but Rune of Adventure and Rune of Scavenging seem like decent choices. Rune of Resistance seems very popular at the moment, but probably not too necessary, depending on the team you face.

looks good, i might try this.

the problem with sword is that it cripples your damage output, for a minor increase in survivability at best. you wont be able to cleave downs, and you won't be able to do anything against projectile hate (main advantage of dagger).

without bird, there's no swiftness =( so your mobility will suffer a bit during rotations, but theres still shortbow 3.

@mistsim.2748 said:

@"Dahkeus.8243" said:I've been playing with the "bleeding & survival" build lately, but have made a few changes to something that I have found to work pretty well:

Swapped dagger mainhand for sword

• I've found the mobility/evades from this weapon to be more useful than dagger mainhand for the most part

Swapped bird for wolf

• Birds have been nerfed to hell and you get a pretty similar leap on a 10 second cooldown instead of an 18 second cooldown
• The stun is generally more useful than the swiftness (and you can still pop swiftness at the start of a match with an alt pet, then swap to wolf)
• The evades/mobility of sword negate the need for most of the defensive utility of birds
• Wolf howl is still awesome for surviving when downed or for preventing stomps
• I also just really have an old school fondness for the days back when wolfs were a staple of pretty much all ranger builds before HoT

Swapped Viper's Nest for Flame Trap

• Lower cd and more damage
• Poison from Viper's Nest is great, but it's still abundant enough to not be that necessary

Different runes/sigils since there's not the same as much focus on bleeding without dagger mainhand, particularly if not taking skirmishing traits

• Still a bit undecided on rune choice here, but Rune of Adventure and Rune of Scavenging seem like decent choices. Rune of Resistance seems very popular at the moment, but probably not too necessary, depending on the team you face.

It's less damage from your sword attacks, but since the wolf is a deadly pet, you also get a damage boost there compared to owl. Traps and poison volley from SB seem be more than enough for cleave in my experience, plus there's primal cry on merge with wolf.

On rotations, as you said, shortbow will give you near 100% swiftness as long as you know how to 180 turn to cast. Even then, it's usually not even worth casting on small maps since the two sword leaps (again using the 180 turn for Hornet Sting) along with wolf leap will get you to a point faster then running speed.

Playstyle is likely to be quite a bit different though since this makes you'll rely more on SB for direct damaging attacks.

been playing this a bunch more, and it's a build that keeps on giving. I continue to use the Poison Master/Stances variant.

for me the game changer was really knowing when to switch to the Stout pet. I will humbly suggest the Alpine Wolf instead of the Siamoth. you get: 2 leap finishers (which is another 2600 heals over the Healing Spring), a decent disengage (800 range), and a knockdown. I know the Siamoth can give plasma, but it doesnt drop it every time and beyond that, the wolf is so much better. With this combo, u can get 4x 1300 heals over your Healing Spring.

There's a ton of projectile hate in the game and I'm definitely sticking to the MH dagger for the leap finishers, and really good cleave.

Right now the meta is bunker condi and this fits right in. As a ranger, you need something to perform in the meta and this one helps. I run something similar and ran into this build here on the forums. Performs well. Noticed running 3 traps actually hinders utility and damage output; 1 trap is perfect.

I've personally been using Iboga for the x2 confusing/torment and flame trap. There is enough poison applications throughout the build to forgo a poison trap.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?POwAgiVlFw8YfsJ2JeKT6v/SeQcA-zZoKlCChMTgeLgujAfGA

Very close to what I use personally. I use Nature Magic to basically make ends meet with not using Owl's heal and use Iboga for the short CDs/AoE Bleed and Vulnerability.

I used to run a build like this when the game first opened. No Soulbeast or D/D of course but I'd use S/D almost entirely for the evades. I like running it now and almost entirely staying in beast form for the escape/heal and just find it fun to roam with in sPVP.

Someone has been ratting on this build. Never thought it was OP in the slightest, but just right. I think some of the higher level players have been getting wrecked by this in duels, and they probably complained to CMC.

Viper's Nest nerfs are quite significant. Duration never matters in spvp. The condi burst we lose from the nerf is big, and it might be worthwhile running the fire trap instead.

I'm considering running this instead now:

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?POwAUx/lVwsYfsH2JWePlvzSO3EA-zZoOkCUAJICyUK42B

@"mistsim.2748" said:Someone has been ratting on this build. Never thought it was OP in the slightest, but just right. I think some of the higher level players have been getting wrecked by this in duels, and they probably complained to CMC.

Viper's Nest nerfs are quite significant. Duration never matters in spvp. The condi burst we lose from the nerf is big, and it might be worthwhile running the fire trap instead.

I'm considering running this instead now:

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?POwAUx/lVwsYfsH2JWePlvzSO3EA-zZoOkCUAJICyUK42B

its a buff, 2 psn stacks for 13 secs is insanenot every spec has on demand cleanse all the timelook at holo or rev who use resistance over cleanse, or anyone rotating/trying to get out of combatnot so significant i think but still a buff

@Koen.1327 said:

@"mistsim.2748" said:Someone has been ratting on this build. Never thought it was OP in the slightest, but just right. I think some of the higher level players have been getting wrecked by this in duels, and they probably complained to CMC.

Viper's Nest nerfs are quite significant. Duration never matters in spvp. The condi burst we lose from the nerf is big, and it might be worthwhile running the fire trap instead.

I'm considering running this instead now:

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?POwAUx/lVwsYfsH2JWePlvzSO3EA-zZoOkCUAJICyUK42B

It's a small buff if you're dueling against something that has little to no condi cleanse.

It's a nerf because you get less heals from Predator's Cunning, and less condi burst.

Overall the build should be fine, but time to kill will slightly increase because of this.

@mistsim.2748 said:

@Koen.1327 said:

@mistsim.2748 said:Someone has been ratting on this build. Never thought it was OP in the slightest, but just right. I think some of the higher level players have been getting wrecked by this in duels, and they probably complained to CMC.

Viper's Nest nerfs are quite significant. Duration never matters in spvp. The condi burst we lose from the nerf is big, and it might be worthwhile running the fire trap instead.

I'm considering running this instead now:

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?POwAUx/lVwsYfsH2JWePlvzSO3EA-zZoOkCUAJICyUK42B

The build is just fine, if anything I'd say the build is a bit worse against players that are very aware with what they're doing but better against players that make mistakes. You just need to experiment around with it and you'll see the changes that can make it shine, like for example I've had a similar build compared to the original posters for quite some time. But in contrast my build was more pressure focused at the loss of some mitigation, there's a few changes mainly in stats that I'd personally go for but the main thing the build needs in my opinion is the jungle/black widow spider.