Is the meta Dragonhunter build wasting stats on precision?

So this has been bugging me for awhile, when you look up meta dragonhunter builds it suggests full berserker with rune of the scholar giving you almost 50% crit chance, but just from the radiance trait line alone you get 60% extra crit with retaliation up and burning on an enemy, not to mention fury gives an extra 20% crit , meaning you've got like 130% crit chance now. I'm not an expert at the game or anything but isn't this a waste of 30% crit chance? Wouldn't it be more beneficial to run like 20% crit and put the points in other stats?

Berserker is the best stat combination for that.
Besides, having a bit more crit chance when those conditions aren't met is a DPS increase too in most cases

You can run Valkyrie gear with the GM radiance trait to give you a bit of leeway for survivability without sacrificing precision.Or run full Berserker and the signet trait for more power, a boost to your party's DPS, and a breakbar skill via Bane Signet.

While you can drop Berserker for Valk, you probably don't want to. If your chrono can't keep retal on you 100% (sadly quite common in pugs), your damage will absolutely tank in valk gear. I only consider using Valk when I know the chrono is good, but most people can't be bothered getting a second set of gear just to squeeze out that tiny bit of extra scholar uptime.

@Applesauce.5271 said:So this has been bugging me for awhile, when you look up meta dragonhunter builds it suggests full berserker with rune of the scholar giving you almost 50% crit chance, but just from the radiance trait line alone you get 60% extra crit with retaliation up and burning on an enemy, not to mention fury gives an extra 20% crit , meaning you've got like 130% crit chance now. I'm not an expert at the game or anything but isn't this a waste of 30% crit chance? Wouldn't it be more beneficial to run like 20% crit and put the points in other stats?

You might be right but unfortunately there isn't a stat combination which gives more power and FEROCITY more than berserker.

Berserker is for example +60power, +40 precision, +40ferocity.Valkyrie is +60power, +40vitality, +40ferocity.

You gain extra health but power and ferocity which are the stats which makes you deal more damage are exactly the same.

If existed a stat combo like +60ferocity, +40power, +40vitality probably would be better than berserker (i didn't do the math to calculate so im not 100% sure).

So in pve your health doesnt matter at all thats why go straight berserker ans scholar runes which gives of course ferocity as well.

In pvp wvw, its used valkyrie on core guardian because you can't survive with 10hp while zerging or roaming.

I hope you understood :)

@whoknocks.4935 said:

@Applesauce.5271 said:So this has been bugging me for awhile, when you look up meta dragonhunter builds it suggests full berserker with rune of the scholar giving you almost 50% crit chance, but just from the radiance trait line alone you get 60% extra crit with retaliation up and burning on an enemy, not to mention fury gives an extra 20% crit , meaning you've got like 130% crit chance now. I'm not an expert at the game or anything but isn't this a waste of 30% crit chance? Wouldn't it be more beneficial to run like 20% crit and put the points in other stats?

That's right. With correct buffs, berserker wastes a lot of precision but there's simply no gear that brings more useful offensive stats. The vita from valkyrie is useless, too. However, when you don't have reta up, berserker's precision compensates for that, while valkyrie damage will drop massively.

@CptAurellian.9537 said:

@whoknocks.4935 said:

@Applesauce.5271 said:So this has been bugging me for awhile, when you look up meta dragonhunter builds it suggests full berserker with rune of the scholar giving you almost 50% crit chance, but just from the radiance trait line alone you get 60% extra crit with retaliation up and burning on an enemy, not to mention fury gives an extra 20% crit , meaning you've got like 130% crit chance now. I'm not an expert at the game or anything but isn't this a waste of 30% crit chance? Wouldn't it be more beneficial to run like 20% crit and put the points in other stats?

Exactly, Berserker is taken for the power ferocity stats in dragonhunter, because it's the highest power and ferocity you can get out of stat combos.Precision feels the gap if for some reason you don't have 100% retaliation uptime.

Reaper has the same issue as here but the precision serves even less of a function, as they can fully meet the 50% crit chance trait by themselves.There's simply no better alternative to Berserker gear. A stat type with Power, Ferocity and Condition Damage would be best. Passive burns from Justice procs would get pretty meaty if that was a thing. Grieving is almost there but it's second major stat, condi damage, is wrong. It should be Ferocity instead.

I'm pretty sure you severely overestimate the effect of burns in that scenario. A DH does not put out enough burn stacks with sufficient duration to make condi damage matter.

@CptAurellian.9537 said:I'm pretty sure you severely overestimate the effect of burns in that scenario. A DH does not put out enough burn stacks with sufficient duration to make condi damage matter.

If you could guarantee 100% uptime of burn and retaliation for the increases, why wouldn't you take extra damage on your burns? Yes you only get burning from throwing the spear (edit: also torch 4), but it would still be an increase. Sadly you can't guarantee 100% uptime and said stat combo doesn't exist.

Of course it would be a damage gain under optimal conditions, though I doubt it would ever hit the 2% mark (the burns, not the ferocity thing). In practice, I'm more curious whether reta uptime is high enough to make such a set a net gain over berserker.

@CptAurellian.9537 said:Of course it would be a damage gain under optimal conditions, though I doubt it would ever hit the 2% mark (the burns, not the ferocity thing). In practice, I'm more curious whether reta uptime is high enough to make such a set a net gain over berserker.

Under optimal circumstances it probably would be a net gain. I would be curious about how well that works in practice as well, and whether it would be beneficial to go Berserker runes over Scholar.

@whoknocks.4935 said:

@Applesauce.5271 said:S>If existed a stat combo like +60ferocity, +40power, +40vitality probably would be better than berserker (i didn't do the math to calculate so im not 100% sure).

Er..you guys forgetting Marauder? Power / Precision / Vitality / Ferocity.

@whoknocks.4935 said:

So in pve your health doesnt matter at all thats why go straight berserker ans scholar runes which gives of course ferocity as well.

I disagree with this statement, unless what the OP is doing is participating in raids, well coordinated fractals, or playing solely in Core Tyria outside the Cursed Shore.

If however, you are playing in HoT / PoF maps / metas, and you pug your fractal runs, you absolutely need health and defense. The problem with the Meta builds is they provide optimal builds to be used under OPTIMAL circumstances.

In other MMOS that use the Tank / Healer / DPS trinity, of course you focused all stats on your role, and if the DPS dies, it was because someone wasn't doing their job correctly. But in GW2 damage is delivered differently as everyone has a form of healing, damage and mitigation, and Guardians, while possessing lots of utility and defenses, also have one of the lowest health pools.

@Turkeyspit.3965 said:

@whoknocks.4935 said:

@Applesauce.5271 said:S>If existed a stat combo like +60ferocity, +40power, +40vitality probably would be better than berserker (i didn't do the math to calculate so im not 100% sure).

In other gamemodes like open world hot and pof maps you can run whatever you like, but if you aim to reach the max dps out of your power class you ahve to go berserker no question and not marauder at all.

Marauder sacrifices something like 7% dps. That's sub-optimal, but certainly not unusable.

Honestly if you really wanted to optimise for survival in pugs with the minimum cost to dps and with the least dependance on pug chaos chronos. I would probably consider running valk and swapping sigil of air for sigil of concentration. That way you get both the bonus vitality and you have way better retal uptime.

@"whoknocks.4935" said:Errrrrr. marauder sacrifice many % of the dps and it's not usable for dps rotations, simply berserker is the top dps max output you can get and no questions.

I wouldn't say "no questions".

Does this class get a significant amount of precision from their traits? Yes? Then they may be able to run some valk pieces in place of zerk for a little bit of free extra hp (helps with scholar uptime).Does this class not get enough precision from traits to cap crit? Yes? They may want to invest in a few pieces of Assassin's if a sigil of accuracy isn't enough.

While it certainly isn't overly complicated, it's definitely not a clear-cut "always run zerk" for power builds. It gets even more fun now that spotter isn't a guaranteed buff to have. Quite a few classes need to change their builds in raids a little bit to compensate if they're shooting for optimal damage.

@cat.8975 said:

@"whoknocks.4935" said:Errrrrr. marauder sacrifice many % of the dps and it's not usable for dps rotations, simply berserker is the top dps max output you can get and no questions.

It's no question if you wanna achieve the max dps output you can get out of your profession.

If you are in a guild with friends you can run marauder, soldier or anything you want.But if you want to do the max dps "always run zerk", and not because it's a trend, it's PURE MATH that the dps is higher, you can't deny math, a dps rotation made with marauder will be always lower to the same dps rotation made in zerk gear.

In this particular case radiant dragonhunter you can substitute some zerk for valkyrie for extra hp but only if you have a 100% retaliation uptime, otherwise you start doing nocrits and the dps will be lower.

Meh, I'd rather lose a small amount of damage and get pumped-up to 16k health which feels just about perfect in melee even with aegis, blocks, etc. I believe 16k is where our base health SHOULD be (IMHO).

@"whoknocks.4935" said:

It's no question if you wanna achieve the max dps output you can get out of your profession.

If you are in a guild with friends you can run marauder, soldier or anything you want.But if you want to do the max dps "always run zerk", and not because it's a trend, it's PURE MATH that the dps is higher, you can't deny math, a dps rotation made with marauder will be always lower to the same dps rotation made in zerk gear.

In this particular case radiant dragonhunter you can substitute some zerk for valkyrie for extra hp but only if you have a 100% retaliation uptime, otherwise you start doing nocrits and the dps will be lower.

You didn't even read my comment, did you?

@Flintbrow.7985 said:Meh, I'd rather lose a small amount of damage and get pumped-up to 16k health which feels just about perfect in melee even with aegis, blocks, etc. I believe 16k is where our base health SHOULD be (IMHO).

There's no real reason for this aside from your opinion? I feel perfectly comfortable with a 12k health berserker DH, it usually just comes down to killing mobs before they can touch you. (on the other hand, I did all of PoF story on firebrand, and I didn't swap any of my gear aside from my weapons)

@Yannir.4132 said:

@"Flintbrow.7985" said:Meh, I'd rather lose a small amount of damage and get pumped-up to 16k health which feels just about perfect in melee even with aegis, blocks, etc. I believe 16k is where our base health SHOULD be (IMHO).

Yep, IMHO means it's just my opinion. I'm just not good enough to mitigate enough damage with 12k...also, I am lazy and don't try too hard. I also prefer core guard to DH even though I like the traps, just pretty much nothing else including LB, virtue "upgrades" and the traits are so blah to me. I'm just satisfied running radiance, zeal and virtues. It just feels right...I can't really explain why.

I've personally been running Marauder with Rune of the Wurm,, since...well since Marauder gear came out. Tons of HP(21k) for mistakes / lazy play and still plenty of damage to kill things fast

@Yannir.4132 said:

@Flintbrow.7985 said:Meh, I'd rather lose a small amount of damage and get pumped-up to 16k health which feels just about perfect in melee even with aegis, blocks, etc. I believe 16k is where our base health SHOULD be (IMHO).

Talking purely from PvE, is 12k adequate? Sure. I can probably even manage with 8k in HoT maps soloing champs. However I do play other classes. SB, chrono and engi all deal higher damage, have higher HP pools and arguably better sustain. Even rev in PvE is far more survivable (though it deals like 7-8% less damage).

On the "12k health" issue, I've found Litany of Wrath comboed with either greatsword 3 or Procession of Blades to be more than adequate to take you from near death to full health. You do have to time it right though, or you may die :3