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PvP Firebrand Thoughts


Ryan.9387

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Hey, I wanted to share a few thoughts on firebrand with everyone.

The info on metabattle is woefully out of date and there isn't much out there for players to figure out what is going on with Firebrand in PvP. Hopefully this helps.

I used to main support ele (Meta D D Ele) in ranked before last season and have considered myself a support main for at least the last two years. After PoF launched, the tides really turned against ele mainly due to condi pressure. While ele could survive off point it couldn't keep allies alive or bunk well. Less than a week before the end of last season I made the switch to support firebrand (Taank). That season I hit legend, and this season I'm currently in the top 10 (NA).

Last season condis were king. Nothing could survive a scourge. Due to the bugs with their shades, they single-handedly established the meta. Every team had a scourge, most had two. At that time I was running Staff / Mace + Shield builds with magi amulet and virtues traitline. Utilities changed wildly match to match but mostly consisted of Wall of Reflection + Hallowed Ground.

Last Season Crappy Magi Bunker Buildhttp://gw2skills.net/editor/?vVAQNAW5ensADNCj9CBGDBkCjlHCbvemPDoZng5TGALA0AySA-jZxHQB+Y/hEeEAAwFBAZlBG4DAAA

I was playing with the support ele mindset at the time. Keep your allies alive. Don't die. Watch their condis, reduce incoming pressure on them etc. It generally worked well but never really had the sustainability I wanted. I couldn't hold nodes 1v1 against scourge. This was the expected outcome of Scourge vs Firebrand but I couldn't stand that a dedicated bunker build couldn't fulfill its role. Eventually, after getting beaten badly in an AT, I dueled a scourge friend and tested out variation after variation to see what could manage to hold vs a scourge.

Last Season Magi Bunker Buildhttp://gw2skills.net/editor/?vVAQNAW5ensADNCjVDBeDBkCjlGC7aYtlCAYFgIQXaPf2PLoA-jZxHQBA4iAMwHAAyKDkwjAgP2fAA

The answer was meditations over virtues. This was definitely non intuitive from the perspective of a support player. After all, why should a support player be taking selfish utility skills? When you averaged it all out, Valor gives roughly 500 hp/s because of medis + aegis and much more condi clear than virtues. This change had a huge impact. At the time (late last season), Firebrand was flying under the radar and over the course of 3 long days I solo queued from Gold to Legendary. People didn't understand the power of Firebrand and didn't know how to counter it. I had games where I bunked fullcapped nodes 1v2, or where I would kite 1v3. The play style was right up my alley as a former support ele main. There was basically nobody left in the game who actively played support at a competitive level in ranked except Mael, and maybe Jeff.

After a few months, people started catching on. I'd get matches with a support firebrand on my team or two on the enemy team. I started losing more games.

Doing well in ranked is only partially about being good at your role. Its mostly how well you beat the meta. The patch brought team fight damage way down. The typical 5 dps comp in ranked changed to 4 dps. Damage from scourge and spellbreaker got reduced. During the time I was stuck on Magi a new set of Firebrand hybrid support builds were rising due to Arken and Hazard. Lower damage meant that Firebrand got freedom for traits and utilities. These players took advantage of that by switching to the Radiance traitline for the huge +50% crit chance and 26% dmg increase traits. They brought pressure that tipped the scales in teamfights. Huge cleave, huge zoning potential, and still remarkable support. Games with 400k dmg and 500k healing were (and are) common with this setup

Current Season Hybrid Support (Overpowered Build)http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vVAQRArd3ensADNCjFBDeDBkCjF+Bbfj2RPpWPgx1eCLAMDKCA-jZxHQBf7EAEwnAgP2fAAHEA5VGAA

I eventually made the switch and found great success with hybrid support Firebrand. My pressure tipped the scales in teamfights and counter intuitively made me more survivable. The zoning pressure from symbols was very powerful at preventing many classes from free casting on you as they could if you were running magi.

This is the situation with Firebrand in PvP today as I see it:

Hybrid support is absolutely king. It is probably the strongest spec in the game right now in the right hands. It shines in the hands of someone who can dance between support and dps. Its the Zenyatta of Guild Wars 2. Its so strong in fact, that I believe a team of 5 of them could win like 5 d/d eles did back in the day in ESL.

Harriers can look appealing, but personally Menders feels superior. Once people catch on to Harrier's Firebrands with 11.6k HP, the meta will shift and groups will stop ignoring the "bunker" with no toughness and no vitality. The trade off isn't quite that simple, because there are quite a few things working in favor of both sides.

Menders3220 Raw Stats (+53%)17.2k HP (+48%)20% boon duration30% crit chance base (+26%)Slightly higher healing (+150)

Harriers2100 Raw Stats11.6k HP80% boon duration (+60%) <--- Affects allies and increases up time of retaliation and Imbued Haste (look it up)4% crit chance baseSlightly higher power (+150)

The overall comparison of Menders vs Harriers is that Harriers increases your team's overall dps (assuming you point mantras at them) while Menders has a significantly higher buffer and can live in a more dangerous situation. Also of note is that most boons don't stack, and having two menders hybrid support firebrands on node will be flat out better than two harriers firebrands on node because the boon duration advantage of harriers is negated with more firebrands on point.

On the competitive side, I still see pure support firebrands being strong and meta due to the class stacking limits. The new class stacking rule (no stacking elite specs) brings up some interesting comps though. Of note is running multiple radiance specced guardians. A core radiance guardian/dh and a hybrid support fb would be potent together, especially because the boons from the firebrand buff the damage of the radiance guard/dh. Its probably unlikely we will see this in UGO though, most teams will probably copy the EU comp that won last UGO. In ATs double hybrid support comps will probably be stronger than hybrid support + dh. It'll probably be some time before this gets popular (if ever) mainly because of the total lack of players playing hybrid support.

Eventually as Firebrand gets more popular (if it ever does) condi builds will get pushed out of the meta because of the abundant condi clear and power specs could see a resurgence. I can easily see teams running FB/FB/x/x/x winning tournaments.

Hopefully this helps anyone reading figure out firebrand in pvp.

TLDR: Bunker firebrands aren't as strong anymore. Hybrid support builds are better. Radiance trait line is overpowered.

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FB MAGI is still strong due to its abilities to handle conditions atm better than any.mender also can work with the same build. radiance trait line moved you as oyu mention to semi support semi dmg sustain. but dont forget the boon removal so with less abilities to proc retal which is easy to removed you wont benefit much for the critical chance buff while already with mender its 30%. might will corrupt to weakness for 10 sec so less dmg less crit less endurance..... scourge will have better chance to handle you.

the main pressure to FB support are s/d thieves and scourge and some mirage with good combo skills.

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You're so wrong its incredible. Like wow. It's one thing to state what you think works in ranked but then you started talking about pro games as if you are even remotely in that area of skill. That build you linked might be strong in 1v1 like old symbol guard, but it will get deleted by holo, scourge, thief etc. Like why do you people think a class that literally does 0 damage while in its sustain tomes can be a good DPS or even bruiser spec? It can't, lol. Firebrand was literally designed to be a pure support build. I don't think you realize how easily that build will die if its only teammates are other FBs.

Also nobody's going to run that cheesey druid comp, people just won't run a garbage double bunker mes comp vs it. Pretty much holo is auto win vs that cheese.

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The proof is in the performance. Hybrid builds are the only FB builds holding consistent spots on the top of the leaderboards. Iirc "moobs" is one of your friends alts.

The only non-fb player who comes close is tsawr running a radiance guard.

Its not what I think works in ranked. It is what flat out does work. If I were the bad player you claim, I shouldn't be ranked where I am. Instead I'd be lower than full bunker firebrands.

From a competitive side, the jury will probably hang. There aren't enough teams playing to find out the facts.

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@Ryan.9387 said:The proof is in the performance. Hybrid builds are the only FB builds holding consistent spots on the top of the leaderboards. Iirc "moobs" is one of your friends alts.

The only non-fb player who comes close is tsawr running a radiance guard.

Its not what I think works in ranked. It is what flat out does work. If I were the bad player you claim, I shouldn't be ranked where I am. Instead I'd be lower than full bunker firebrands.

From a competitive side, the jury will probably hang. There aren't enough teams playing to find out the facts.

If you were as good as you claim you wouldve gotten top 32 in the monthly. There's a reason people like you can't even compete in the tournaments even when you have 50 times more hours in the game recently.

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