Condi gear setup with both damage and survivability?

Hey guys,

I played a long time with power builds, then I first started into the condi world with Firebrand. Most condi skills on Guardian hit like a truck in addition to applying burn (look at all Firebrand's tome skills, all Axe skills, Torch 4, etc), so I needed both Power and Condition gear. For this reason, Carrion and Viper stats were great for Guardian.

But then I recently started enjoying condi Soulbeast. Yet my Firebrand can unleash way more damage with so much burn and power, I must say I feel much safer playing Soulbeast, and this is my main now. However, the first thing I noticed is that Ranger's condi skills scale too badly with power, and it took me some time to actually get used to it. The good part is that Power is no longer important, so I can focus on Condition, Expertise, Precision, Vitality and Toughness.

So, my idea now is to use:

• Rabid weapons (condi, precision, toughness)
• Dire armor (condi, toughness, vitality)
• Viper trinkets (condi, power, precision, expertise)

Can this setup work? Any other suggestion? I'm looking for a mix of damage and survivability here.

If you want some bulk and still do nice crits i would choose rabid and vipers. Maybe dire weapons if you reeeeeaally need the vitality.For full bulk ranger without a lot if crit chance i would choose trailblazer trinkets from LS3 and dire gear. You are pretty much indestructable and do a lot of condi dmg.Otherwise you do not need much bulk if you can play a ranger right. Using shortbow is very helpful if you wanna gwt out of trouble fast and sword/dagger has good evades.

Yes. It's really a quesrion of how much toughness/vitality I need to feel safe.

But the point I found out is that Power and Precision contribute so little to my damage, that I can pretty much do enough damage with only Condition and Condition Duration, adding everything else to survivability.

In fact I'm even considering Trailblazer now. LOL

@leasm.1279 said:Yes. It's really a quesrion of how much toughness/vitality I need to feel safe.

But the point I found out is that Power and Precision contribute so little to my damage, that I can pretty much do enough damage with only Condition and Condition Duration, adding everything else to survivability.

In fact I'm even considering Trailblazer now. LOL

To get away cheaper you can use dire armor and weapons at first and farm the trailblazer trinkets from LS3.After that you can replace your armor/weapon step by step.For runes i normally use trappers+nightmare combi for the condi duration. Runes of the undead is actually a nice choice too because you have no riak to overshoot the duration but invest in toughness and more condi dmg.

is this for PvE or WvW? for PvE i'd probably mix some carrion in with vipers as long as you keep crit chance high enough. the majority of your condi dps comes from poisons and bleeds and on-crit bleeds are one of the sources.

i find guardian really squishy compared to ranger but i've played mostly on ranger since launch, you already have 4k+ more health than a guard. toughness in pve probably won't help all that much.

What Prophet said--PvE or WvW?