Ideas to unconventional build (pve)

Hi community, newbie player and currently guardian here. Also my first post in the forum (also I am not a native speaker) so please bare with me. I played radiant greatsword just like meta battle website for openworld pve. After the nerf of righteous instincts (RI) recently, I experimented with all traits and came out with a rather unconventional build: http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vVAQJARWnkICFChtCBWDB8DhD+h6WubwIgDg07PtPw4unA-jxRBQBOd/BzoEEP6aok6PA4SAcFlfP4JAAA-e

It should be noted that I am not claiming this build attempt is a next meta build, rather I think it is just for fun because it is refreshing and different!The basic idea is to still have RI but also rely on fury boon to get 100% crit. chance. Source of fury is focus of the monk. Additionally I chose honor trait line to get emporing might trait to further support allies and myself with might stack in critical hit. So basically it is a lot of might, group support and usual retaliation greatsword guardian. I didn't figure a rotation out yet besides the usual greatsword guardian rotation.

So what do you think, I am looking forward to your feedback. Thank you in advance.

EDIT: Add utility skills to build.

It's quite the unconventional PvE build, I'll give you that. It seems like you're trying to make a hybrid build, only to me it's leaning slightly more towards being a DPS build than hybrid or support. The staff is only useful for full support builds and since your build uses full berserker gear, it doesn't make the staff any better.

Since the power build relies on having both retaliation and fury at the same time, you're better off using the sword/shield weapon set because of the Symbol of Blades that grants you and allies fury. Getting 1 stack of might when you critically hit someone is fine, but if you have a druid in your group then it's not worth using. I know the Honor specialization is made for supporting allies, but looking at this build, it would be better to use the Virtues specialization with the traits Absolute Resolution and Battle Presence along with the Signet of Courage elite skill.

Thank you very much for your insightful comment! Exactly, my build relies on retaliation and fury in order to reach that 100% crit. chance. The sources for fury are two meditation skills, with focus of the monk I gain fury if I activate a meditation skill (Litany of wrath and smite condition are the two skills).

I also thought on using the "Inner Fire" trait which also grants fury, if the enemy has three stacks of burning. But for that I think I have to use torch in order to apply stacks of burning, I am not sure how to apply so much burning with other methods.

You are pointing out the Virtue specialization, I additionally found out that it offers the "virtue of retribution" trait, so with that I have even more sources of retaliation. With that I get retribution on every activation of a virtue!

I will not let off my little experiment here so easily, it is definitely worthwhile to try these interesting things out.

@Holy Hallidor.3067 said:

The basic idea is to still have RI but also rely on fury boon to get 100% crit. chance. Source of fury is focus of the monk.

So what do you think, I am looking forward to your feedback. Thank you in advance.

Ok, so the original Radiant GS builds already did that first part because it used Valkyrie stats, and base crit chance was very low. If you want a similar play style to the old Radiant GS build and just need to tweak the crit chance back up, try marauder's, or try running one half valkyrie, and the other half berserker or marauders. Going full berserker is a bit overkill in my opinion.

The Virtues trait line is very important to the core guard version of the Radiance builds because of the Virtue of Retribution trait, which applies retaliation whenever you use a virtue. While this obviously has synergy with Righteous Instincts, it also has synergy with Renewed Justice. Renewed Justice resets Virtue of Justice when you kill a foe, which is incredibly powerful in PvE against groups of weaker foes. It allows you to continually re-apply retaliation, and also allows you to stack might.

Honor/Staff is generally used as a support, so if you're soloing in PvE I wouldn't go that route. If you're playing in a small group, it's a bit better. But if you're just taking Honor for the Vitality boost because you're at 11k running full berserker, there are better ways to do that.

If you want a set of weapons with both ranged and melee options, try sword/focus and scepter/shield. It works quite well for me.

Thank you for your feedback! You've got a point with the marauders equipment.

I understand that the Virtue specialization is almost unavoidable, it has some great traits and synergies.

The honor specialization is used because of emporing might and the vitality boost, but I guess that choice is not optimal.

You're reading my mind, I'd like to use two different ranged weapon sets, I try the combination you suggested.

I also found out that with right hand strength trait I also gain 15% crit. chance. Maybe that is also considerable when switching to sword, and I do not need fury boon from focus of the monk/meditation skills after all.

@Holy Hallidor.3067 said:

I also found out that with right hand strength trait I also gain 15% crit. chance. Maybe that is also considerable when switching to sword, and I do not need fury boon from focus of the monk/meditation skills after all.

Yes, sometimes I do that as well. It's quite appealing when you're using only one-handed weapons.

The basic Radiant GS/Hammer builds are very well synergized, but also very flexible. You can change one or two things and adapt them for nearly any mode of play, and it'll still stand up as a solid build. (Ironically the first thing I tend to throw away is the GS or Hammer).

The trick comes in not changing too much at once, knowing what you are giving up, and knowing why you are making the change.

@"Deimos.4263" said:The trick comes in not changing too much at once, knowing what you are giving up, and knowing why you are making the change.

Thanks again for the feedback, I wanted to share my current state of the build after your input of you both. I changed my berserker amulet with a valkyrie one to have exactly 50% base crit. chance. If I can manage to maintain fury boon, I thought I can even change some more equipment to reduce precision to 30% crit chance and to increase vitality:http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vVAQRAsd7enkICFChFDBWDB8DhD/hKnEV4OYDgv9OvhbK8BA-jRCBQBjUZAOU/5MKBBwTAACnEAso0LPaYSh+hnu/AA-e

The build is still unconventional I guess, but currently does make fun and I enjoy.

@Holy Hallidor.3067 said:-snip-

Pay him no mind, seems to me he's just venting frustrations.The only really un-optimized part of the build is Master of Consecrations + Hallowed Ground. Fact is that as a solo Guardian without major boon duration investment you can never keep up Retaliation 100% of the time without also losing DPS. In group content you can rely on other classes like Chrono or Tempest to extend the duration of your boons, and it's an all-around win-win situation. In solo content you really don't need that much retal, the windows of it you gain from your F-skills is enough to down pretty much anything except story bosses maybe. And in those instances playing the mechanics of the encounter is more important, to succeed, than playing your class.

I guess I switch to "Unscathed Contender" and "Stand your ground! " instead of Hallowed and MoC.

Posted on the wrong topic, oopsie

I am in the progress of making this build, now just need the runes (HealerDH at 11-12k dps at SC golem+environment settings with 3k staff 2 healing at 6.5 seconds recharge with only rune of air and no food) per guildies I am aiming for 16k dps once gotten the runes and foods + utility buffs

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vVAQNArdWn8ABFChddCWBBkdiF+hSu8P/6HLA2h/06BG3JA-jxSBABWcIAwTPwpaCMTJoxnAA9PCAXp0ALlZpq+DAPAgB3fgUAcO0C-e