WvW Support Rev woes

So, Ive been running a support rev for my guild in WvW. Im specced into Herald and initially I was using Glint/Ventari, however I recently switched to Mallyx/Ventari but still specced Herald. Ive been trying hammer, staff, sword/shield...

I have two major issues with supports in WvW in general and in particular, Ventari.

1. The obvious...little reward. My guild mates are saying "man Ive got 30 or 40 bags already" in 30 minutes. I may have 5. Not to mention, Im always hearing "Great DPS guys, wow that was some amazing dps...huge bombs". And its funny, because 9/10 times that our zerg outlasts opposing zergs is because the supports (and specifically me because Ive noticed it) stay alive. If Im standing toward the end, so is our zerg and we've won. No love. And I don't think healing is accurately measurable on meters in the way DPS is, correct?

So to sum this point up: Very little bag accumulating = little gold coming out of WvW. Very little recognition for a job well done.

2. This is specific to Revenant/Ventari... The obvious, it is annoying to drag the tablet around. To be more specific, Its tough to keep track of my tablet in a huge zerg when I have all graphics turned down to best performance so that my computer doesn't melt. I am trying to follow my commander around with the tablet, trying to move it through the group, using the tab heal and condi cleanse when I can. When the commander calls for a bubble, I try to do that. The problem is that the tablet gets lost in the sea of effects, I can't see where it is to know if I am effectively doing anything.

Also, the range at which I can click is often annoying. I am trying to stay backline and move the tablet around, trying to follow the commander. He moves out of range (which isnt too far) which forces me to move into the aoe bad floors.

To sum up this point: Its difficult to keep track of my tablets position, to keep the heal on cooldown, and to make sure Im not dying in the process. All the while, trying to get a bag or two?

I find my job as a support, specifically a tablet rev is infinitely more difficult than those front line bombers that just pile into the enemy front lines with huge AOE (knowing that theres someone like me to keep them up right).

Anyone experience anything similar? Is it an uphill battle? Should I just accept the listed difficulties above? Or is grass greener elsewhere in the support space where I can adequately and more easily support my zerg while getting more bags?

Any comments or notes to your experience would be appreciated!

For tagging i would suggest using hammer AA's and skill 2, or if your gear is tanky enough, join the frontline and use staff. If your party in the squad has a firebrand or two you should have permanent stability and enough sustain to tag without issues. Even if your gear has little to no power on it, just getting one or two hits on people should be enough to get you tag credit.

Ventari is best used for burst healing, with the play style having a lot of micromanagement of the tablet. (I personally enjoy this, others may not.) With the appropriate gear (Recommend full Minstrel's with transference and benevolence sigils + monk runes) your Natural Harmony should be getting around 10-13k heals. While you can provide condition cleansing through Purifying Essence or the combo of Energy Expulsion inside Protective Solace, it's probably better left to other classes.

When zerging i personally prefer running renegade as my elite spec for the Orders from Above F# skill that provides a large chunk of alacrity, which combined with your tablet's (If salvation traited) Natural Harmony can provide 100% uptime to your party, or to people using siege equipment (Which speeds things up a lot)

In short;

• Try to limit your actions to 1) Tagging enemies with hammer from range or by using staff in the frontline. 2) Providing burst heals by pre-loading Natural Harmony and then moving the tablet onto your target. 3) Provide boons to your subgroup (Various as herald, mainly alacrity as renegade, resistance on both.)
• Accept that playing Ventari is likely going to mean you will have minimal DPS depending on how you compromise with gear. You can run things like zealot's to have more power, but your heals and support capabilities will be lower compared to running full Minstrel's. It's definitely possible to get plenty of bags even though your damage is low.
• Ventari rev can be difficult at first but the immense satisfaction from healing somebody from 1%-100% with one burst is worth it in my opinion.

@WraithOfStealth.1624 said:For tagging i would suggest using hammer AA's and skill 2, or if your gear is tanky enough, join the frontline and use staff. If your party in the squad has a firebrand or two you should have permanent stability and enough sustain to tag without issues. Even if your gear has little to no power on it, just getting one or two hits on people should be enough to get you tag credit.

Ventari is best used for burst healing, with the play style having a lot of micromanagement of the tablet. (I personally enjoy this, others may not.) With the appropriate gear (Recommend full Minstrel's with transference and benevolence sigils + monk runes) your Natural Harmony should be getting around 10-13k heals. While you can provide condition cleansing through Purifying Essence or the combo of Energy Expulsion inside Protective Solace, it's probably better left to other classes.

When zerging i personally prefer running renegade as my elite spec for the Orders from Above F# skill that provides a large chunk of alacrity, which combined with your tablet's (If salvation traited) Natural Harmony can provide 100% uptime to your party, or to people using siege equipment (Which speeds things up a lot)

In short;

• Try to limit your actions to 1) Tagging enemies with hammer from range or by using staff in the frontline. 2) Providing burst heals by pre-loading Natural Harmony and then moving the tablet onto your target. 3) Provide boons to your subgroup (Various as herald, mainly alacrity as renegade, resistance on both.)
• Accept that playing Ventari is likely going to mean you will have minimal DPS depending on how you compromise with gear. You can run things like zealot's to have more power, but your heals and support capabilities will be lower compared to running full Minstrel's. It's definitely possible to get plenty of bags even though your damage is low.
• Ventari rev can be difficult at first but the immense satisfaction from healing somebody from 1%-100% with one burst is worth it in my opinion.

All good points. When I am able to keep track of my tablet and I use it appropriately (when Im not being ganked and the tab is in the right spot), I do see some huge heals and its very nice. I would venture to say that we can outheal most classes.

With that said, I find myself micromanaging the tablet, as you say, more than enjoying the experience and moving with my driver. And at the end of it, especially in an open field and not a keep, theres no reward to show for my time and effort spent.

Im going to try out a boonbot sort of build, activating maybe jalis elite, along with glint elite and a few other facets. Huge CC, huge buffs, all the while just pouring out damage when I can. I wont need to worry about tablet location, movement and heals. Starting to think a tabby is more for fractals, raids, or spvp.

Mace/x can be a nice weapon set for tagging. Mace 3 is also a nice low cooldown, long range blast finisher which can proc up to 3 times. Great for water fields, easy to hit twice in a FB water field. It's also not a projectile so will still hit enemies through bubbles. You can run any offhand with it.

But yeah, overall it's probably not the best build to get bags on.

1. Switch sword shield for hammer. This way you get more projectile hate, more cc and more tagging potential.
2. Don't run glint. Take core with jalis ventari or mallyx ventari.retribution, salvation, and invocation. This way you get more projectile hate, the 50% dmg reduction for your group, retaliation for even more tagging and an on demand heal when switching to ventari which can be used as 1.2k range heal with hammer 3.

Or go with the Renegade suggestion from above ^^

TL;DR dont run support rev i WvW.

The thing is, zergs dont need you doing that. Ever. There are much better support builds. The only thing the zerg needs from the rev is damage and passive swiftness. The meta WvW rev is full on power zerker/marauder mix, none other exists.

As a bonus this gets you tons of bags since you just spam hammer into enemy zerg.

It's a fun build to play. However, a well played melee or caster rev will have a lot more impact during a zerg fight. Every time I used full minstrel ventari and after losing a zerg fight I thought to myself: Man, I could have downed those 5 people in front of me and it would have possibly turned the fight around. I'm sure it would have.

I can see ventari becoming a thing if

1. Firebrand gets another nerf. The problem here is that firebrand keeps scourges and spellbreakers somewhat in check. If firebrand gets another nerf, then the other two will need some as well.
2. Tablet radius is increased
3. Ventari gets a stunbreak
4. The elite gets a rework. I have no idea what but none of that fragment nonsense we currently have.
5. The tablet moves even faster than it does now.

Once these things are resolved I think 1 ventari rev in a zerg can be an asset to the team when played properly.