LF Herald Zerg advice (WvW)

I'm pretty comfortable with my Herald in PvE content, and have started running him in WvW as a backline hammer. I'm looking for advice on facet use though, mainly when should I be using what?

I'm running Glint / Jalis right now.

Typically I'll be running with Darkness, Strength and Elements on upkeep, then use Elemental Blast as the fight starts. What about Facet of Chaos or Light? When is the best time to use Chaotic release for example?

When we are getting bombed, ill swap legends to Jalis, hit F2 and hit Rite of the Great Dwarf. Inspiring Reinforcement used where impactful.

I'm not in a WvW guild (pretty casual WvW'er) so I'm mostly with pugmanders and no voice comms, so nobody is calling out for cooldown usage.

My current gear is full Zerk + Scholar runes. My survivability seems fine, but I'm not sure if my deaths are ascribed to positioning, poor rotations, gear or all of the above.

Any tips are appreciated ^_^

I've found far more success pairing any other Legend with Shiro. The problem is that the current meta comp for zergs is pretty solid on sustain, so really the only thing Glint adds is some fury stacking and sometimes protection. But because of how short lived boons are with Scourges running around, Glint is only really good for Pre-push stacking and restacking after push (presuming your side didn't crumble). Jalis offers more self defense then group defense, because its skills simply can't cover enough people defensively to be a big advantage. Mallyx for Resistance and boon strip is a somewhat decent option as offensive tools, but also struggles with group support with how its designed.

Well..... more specifically, Rev as a whole is having an extremely hard time with mobile support in WvW. Its strongest support skills are really bad when the group is moving fast. And of the skills that can keep up, they're designed more for high impact in sPvP and thus suffer from low trigger frequency, and can't deal with high volume actions.

The reason I said Shiro earlier, is because its the one kit that has enough mobility to shine in both sPvP and WvW. Even as a back line, the 2 teleport abilities can used as repositioning to avoid or get out of zerg bombs, reach higher ground, and move through dangerous areas quickly. When paired with Jalis, Shiro acts as a strong offensive opening (and back up escape), and then can swap to Dwarf to stall or heal up in standing fights. In smaller scale fights, Mallyx has strong utility with its ability strip boons in a line, pulsed damage, and easy access to resistance. Glint tends to get used mostly for its strong healing skill and chaos launch, though it does offer some well rounded utility and boon upkeep if the group is short on fire brands. Ventari has niche utility in low mobility situations (such as baby sitting siege, tower lords, and choke points). Kalla is similar to Ventari, but with more offensive utility focus.

If you're gonna go Hammer Rev, basically it boils down to Glint for Fury uptime and F2's boon duration bonus, and Herald Traits for damage bonuses. Or Renegade for personal damage and access to alacrity, but at the cost of lower overall group utility. Honestly, building for group utility is not really needed; and you are usually better off focusing on enhancing personal damage so long as the group sustain jobs are already filled. 80% of Hammer Rev's benefit to the Zerg is the hammer skills themselves, and any group support you have is a side benefit of your build choices.

As for what you're doing wrong..... that fact that you think Rev has rotation in WvW is what sums up the problem. In order to be effective, Rev has to make a lot of discrete choices (outside of "Spam Hammer 2"), to actually get the most of its skill use. This is kind of back asswards, given Condi Rev HAS to play the rotation game, but Power Rev instead has to play more reactive/adaptive due to energy contention and the bursty nature of its power based attacks. Everything else is probably just a positioning issue, because you're dependent on the Support Comp to basically counter Scourge bombs. The rise of power scourge largely put Revs out of business, as they can't offer enough sustain for Group comp, and the shift away from Pirate ship also took away what Hammer Rev is strongest in.

I havne't tested all of the new herald changes yet, but recently I've had more luck with Power Renegade with Shiro/Jalis to maximize the potential as a damage slot. Shiro for high mobility situations, Jalis for low mobility ones, Hammer for most fights, and then using Sw/Sw to pick off stragglers cut off from their zerg.