PvE Hammer (try)

Oh, and I forgot to say one more thing. What would it take to challenge you, like people did with DH bow, to make a PVE build for Hammer Warrior? ... asking for a friend :P

That was the end of a nice conversation I had a couple of weeks ago. This thread and the build I show below are part of a request. I am not a huge fan of this class. Even if you bodge random traits together, you almost always end up with something significantly stronger than a good Engineer build. Greatest HP pool, most weapons, strong in condition and power, nice support and part of the meta since ... ever?

Anyway, request is request. Your hammer is another unsatisfying weapon. It is slow, clunky and most skills look like a huge waste of time. I already know a weapon that almost shares the same fate, Mace. So I gave myself the task to create a playable and fun mace & hammer build, yay.

How to make Hammer and Mace fun? Players need rewards to do something unusual, so I had to find a way to make Hammer and Mace rewarding. Both weapons have one thing in common, plenty of CC. You also have a very funny trait in Strength called Body Blow. Body Blow causes weakness and bleeding to a target if it suffers from a CC skill. Bleeding is not a powerful condition, weakness ... works with Cull the Weak of the Defense traitline. The result is + 7 % damage while the enemy has weakness. Not bad. Merciless Hammer from the Strength traitline has + 20 % damage on disabled foes.

Power or Condition? I decided for hybrid, because of the rune set. I am using the Superior Rune of the Aristocracy. The what? On the long list of useless runes, this one is on the last page, bottom. I was searching for a purpose for this thing for ages. However, here it suits perfectly. The Superior Rune of the Aristocracy is from Caudecus Manor. It boosts condition damage, might duration and grants 5 stacks of might for 4 seconds after inflicting weakness on a foe (cooldown 1s).

Note: As the links are currently broken on this board, we are going to use the old way. I write it as code, so you can easily copy/paste the link into your url bar. Sorry for the inconvenience.

Warrior Hammer & Mace (try)http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vJAQNAS5fjEdQVH2GCudApIWCCMkZwPIGYcAKhBg3l70N7C-jBiCQBA4iAsn9HAkuBqq+zXUewXlYP4JA0XlgkCYURbA-e4

TRAITS:

• Strength: 3-1-3
• Defense: 3-3-1
• Berserker: 1-2-2

GEAR:

• Hammer, Mace & Torch = Assassin stats (Superior Sigil of Strength & Superior Sigil of Debility)
• Armor = Grieving stats (Superior Rune of the Aristocracy)
• Backpack & Earrings = Diviner stats
• Rings & Amulet = Assassin stats

Heal-Skill: Mending (obviously)Utility-Skills: Kick, Frenzy, StompElite-Skill: Rampage (obviously)

LINKS:

• Superior Sigil of Strength: https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Superior_Sigil_of_Strength
• Superior Sigil of Debility: https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Superior_Sigil_of_Debility
• Superior Rune of the Aristocracy: https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Superior_Rune_of_the_Aristocracy

Note: No Superior Rune of the Scholar and no Superior Sigil of Strength, that is blasphemy! I know. There is an alternative option, you can replace the 6 Assassin parts with Viper. That way you also gain + 20 % condition duration and gain 1 free sigil slot for your beloved Superior Sigil of Strength. But you will end up with ~ 40 % crit rate. That is a bit low. I designed the build to be used solo. Sorry.

MechanicsThe most tedious parts of Mace and Hammer keep you buffed. The autoattack-combo from Mace is always a granted weakness source at hit #3. It is the most reliable of them all. The biggest problem you will run into is the Rune. The 1s cooldown turned out to be a bit long. Mashing the CC skills one after another can lead to less buffs, so you are required to do a few non-cc hits inbetween (= Hammer autoattacks). Again with the Mace auto-attack, that is no problem.

Power is still your main damage-source. Condition damage is used to empower bleeding, confusion and burning. It improves your total damage.

During peak-times (Berserker mode/Frenzy) you can maintain 25 might stacks without much trouble. Just hit the enemy with everything you have and add a CC skill every few hits.

PlayingWhen your weapon-skills are on cooldown or you are out of Berserker, you can use Kick or Stomp. Rampage can be used as a filler when both Berserker and Frenzy are on cooldown.

Best strategy is to camp Hammer while you are in Berserker. When the mode almost ends, switch to Mace. Camp Mace and activate Frenzy. Probably start with Mace #3, the go for the auto-attack combo. Use torch and blocks as needed. Then use one of your remaining Utilities, the Heal Skill or activate Rampage.

It is a very aggressive playstyle that rewards you fighting in front line and harassing your opponents as much as possible. Your enemies become your punching-bag. I tested the build in Orr at first and had problems to maintain my buffs, because I constantly ran out of enemies :S.

The main objective of my builds is to leave the players some freedom in how they play the character. So I do not offer you a strict rotation. You can try out stuff and see what fits best to your playstyle. I am really bad with warrior, so I cannot even give a realistic value for the DPS.

Still, I am happy with the build. Same as with the DH Longbow build, it is the try of a scrub. It is not a meta-build. It shows what you can get out of the hammer and the mace if you try, but also the limits. The weapons are definitely not strong enough to compete with other weapons of the Warrior like GS or Axe.

• Arion Brazeli/Chupakazul, thanks for the challenge. Sadly that is the best I can do with a class I know so little.

@"HnRkLnXqZ.1870" said:

Oh, and I forgot to say one more thing. What would it take to challenge you, like people did with DH bow, to make a PVE build for Hammer Warrior? ... asking for a friend :P

• Strength: 3-1-3
• Defense: 3-3-1
• Berserker: 1-2-2

• Hammer, Mace & Torch = Assassin stats (Superior Sigil of Strength & Superior Sigil of Debility)
• Armor = Grieving stats (Superior Rune of the Aristocracy)
• Backpack & Earrings = Diviner stats
• Rings & Amulet = Assassin stats

• Superior Sigil of Strength:
  https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Superior_Sigil_of_Strength
• Superior Sigil of Debility:
  https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Superior_Sigil_of_Debility
• Superior Rune of the Aristocracy:
  https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Superior_Rune_of_the_Aristocracy

• Arion Brazeli/Chupakazul, thanks for the challenge. Sadly that is the best I can do with a class I know so little.

Wrong elite spec for hammer. If you want PvE hammer run Core or Spellbreaker.

Core:Str: Bot Top BotDisc: Mid Bot BotDef: Mid top top

SpellbreakerStr: Bot Top BotDisc: Mid Bot BotSpB: Top Top Any

Mace/shield or GS for coredagger/shield or Gs for Spellbreaker

Earthshaker->full counter-> Earthshaker-> weapon swap -> Arcing Slice is potent especially in WvW.

A good generic PvE combo is Fierce Blow -> Backbreaker -> Staggering Blow -> Earthshaker.

Warrior hammer is pretty damn solid, its just not best in class for DEEPS which is what matters for high end PvE. Mace/shield does more CC damage which is weird but Hammer does aoe CC so it is better for certain Fractal instabilities than Mace/Shield or Mace/Mace.

On the one side I like your ideas and the synergies you used. But on the other side I think it's still better to use GS trait and Berserkers Power and Scholar Rune. You still get might and have the better Multipliers.

I've recently tried around a bit and used the Hammer trait. I found out that it has no internal cooldown, despite one being listed there. Meaning any CC gives you a guaranteed 10 adrenaline, doesn't have to be hammer. Since Hammer 2 is one of the hardest hitting skills getting a 20% damage increase on it also feels very good. Just some food for thought.

@Rettan.9603 said:On the one side I like your ideas and the synergies you used. But on the other side I think it's still better to use GS trait and Berserkers Power and Scholar Rune. You still get might and have the better Multipliers.

That works too as a DPS hammer build, but hammer is more of a CC weapon and Body Blow compliments it. Either work very well though.

@Blocki.4931 said:I've recently tried around a bit and used the Hammer trait. I found out that it has no internal cooldown, despite one being listed there. Meaning any CC gives you a guaranteed 10 adrenaline, doesn't have to be hammer. Since Hammer 2 is one of the hardest hitting skills getting a 20% damage increase on it also feels very good. Just some food for thought.

There is no ICD, but there is an interval for defiant foes whose breakbars are broken. Merciless Hammer is definitely better for a Spellbreaker. I wish Merciless Hammer and Berseker's power could be taken together...

@Lan Deathrider.5910 said:

A good generic PvE combo is Fierce Blow -> Backbreaker -> Staggering Blow -> Earthshaker.

why da hell would you open with fierce blow???

@melandru.3876 said:

@Lan Deathrider.5910 said:

A good generic PvE combo is Fierce Blow -> Backbreaker -> Staggering Blow -> Earthshaker.

Ah your right I forgot that they increased the damage on controlled foes with it.

Still does high damage regardless and you can fit it in the end of the combo as well. But Backbreaker ->FB->SB->ES works. FB is still a good filler skill if your CCs are on cooldown.

The real reason why you would lead with Fierce Blow is that BB knocks down for longer on a weakened foe, so FB->BB or BB->FB depending if you need more CC or more DPS.

3-4-2-f1-2-5-2

@melandru.3876 said:3-4-2-f1-2-5-2

Except that even traited FB has a 4.8s CD so that last FB will never do increased damage. 3-4-2-5-AA-F1-2 would do more damage.

The hammer is unironically pretty good in open world already. In fact it's one of my favourite open world weapons to use along with spellbreaker. The only objection I've ever really had to hammer is that I'd prefer it if backbreaker did some cleaving and I think some of the skills (along with the mace to be honest) should charge a little quicker. Beyond this I've always disliked that the good/interesting traits for a hammer (bodyblow and merciless hammer) compete with other really good traits like forceful gs and berserker's power. That's just the trade off though.

@Ambrosius Custard.8137 said:The hammer is unironically pretty good in open world already. In fact it's one of my favourite open world weapons to use along with spellbreaker. The only objection I've ever really had to hammer is that I'd prefer it if backbreaker did some cleaving and I think some of the skills (along with the mace to be honest) should charge a little quicker. Beyond this I've always disliked that the good/interesting traits for a hammer (bodyblow and merciless hammer) compete with other really good traits like forceful gs and berserker's power. That's just the trade off though.

Yep. I've felt that mace and hammer were just a tad slow myself ever since launch. Cleave on Backbreaker would be amazing and is one of the few things that I think would make Hammer a better weapon.

Spellbreaker Hammer is pretty good. Have you tried Arms with Opportunist and No Escape?

I kind of get why they're slower, I think they wanted them to feel 'impactful' as weapons, but IMO they just feel a little awkward at their current speeds. The lack of cleave on 5 always felt really odd for a weapon that is essentially specialised towards AoE control and damage, even if it only knocked down the primary target but caused some cleave damage to others close by it'd be something.

Not tried the hammer with Arms and Spellbreaker yet but been meaning to.

@Ambrosius Custard.8137 said:I kind of get why they're slower, I think they wanted them to feel 'impactful' as weapons, but IMO they just feel a little awkward at their current speeds. The lack of cleave on 5 always felt really odd for a weapon that is essentially specialised towards AoE control and damage, even if it only knocked down the primary target but caused some cleave damage to others close by it'd be something.

Not tried the hammer with Arms and Spellbreaker yet but been meaning to.

Opportunist, Sundering Burst, Burst Precision should work well. Unsuspecting foe is kind of meh, especially since you should have hit Crit chance anyway.

For a class to be enjoyable, it not only needs to be PvE efficient, but also WvW and PvP.NPCs do not offer a challenge, thus any weapon set will do for PvE. Even if the weapon set is mediocre like hammer and mace in the case of warrior.

HOWEVER, for PvP or WvW hammer and mace are completely useless because of the following:

• Slow
• Non rewarding
• Melee 130 range

Hammer does not have defensive skills, yet it is very low in damage, very telegraphed, very slow, very very very boring.

@Hitman.5829 said:For a class to be enjoyable, it not only needs to be PvE efficient, but also WvW and PvP.NPCs do not offer a challenge, thus any weapon set will do for PvE. Even if the weapon set is mediocre like hammer and mace in the case of warrior.

HOWEVER, for PvP or WvW hammer and mace are completely useless because of the following:

• Slow
• Non rewarding
• Melee 130 range

Hammer does not have defensive skills, yet it is very low in damage, very telegraphed, very slow, very very very boring.

But Earthshaker in the middle of the enemy zerg with a sigil of absorption + spellbreaker is so much fun Hitman.

Hammer in pvp and wvw only works if the other player isnt watching what you're doing. If they are, they shouldnt ever get hit by the hammer.

That being said... When Hammer 2 lands in wvw on a disabled foe (take that as you will) it can land for 11-14k.. yeah sure its not the 17k that a theif can do off the bat, but its something.

I still however want to see a total hammer rework, make it faster make it have utilities and please... make it actually fun to use!

@Smoosh.2718 said:Hammer in pvp and wvw only works if the other player isnt watching what you're doing. If they are, they shouldnt ever get hit by the hammer.

That being said... When Hammer 2 lands in wvw on a disabled foe (take that as you will) it can land for 11-14k.. yeah sure its not the 17k that a theif can do off the bat, but its something.

I still however want to see a total hammer rework, make it faster make it have utilities and please... make it actually fun to use!

Ham 2 can end people for sure. I agree though that Hammer may have been fine at release, but now it and MH mace need an overhaul.

@Hitman.5829 said:

Hammer does not have defensive skills, yet it is very low in damage, very telegraphed, very slow, very very very boring.

This is the highlight, like yeah sure leaping with Earthshatter smashing ground is fun but other than that hammer 1-5 feels very2 slow and sluggish, it's like you can cast 5 (Backbreaker), but people will immidiately dodge away.

Hammer itself is not boring, imo there is not much more satisfying than landing a hammer chain on a target and watch their hp drop. It worked pretty well pre hot.

It was slow, but rewarding.The problem nowadays is that every single class has high amounts of stability and/or stunbreaks, making it so hard to land any cc on them, especially when the defenses have lower cds than the hammer.

@RedShark.9548 said:Hammer itself is not boring, imo there is not much more satisfying than landing a hammer chain on a target and watch their hp drop. It worked pretty well pre hot.

It was slow, but rewarding.The problem nowadays is that every single class has high amounts of stability and/or stunbreaks, making it so hard to land any cc on them, especially when the defenses have lower cds than the hammer.

I second this. Slapping people around at launch with a hammer was sooooo satisfying, but as @RedShark.9548 says there is just too much stability around now, There should be some stun breaks, and indeed some classes have a fair bit, like Warrior, but others have fewer. I would say lets buff hammer to compensate, but reverting Stability to its original version and stripping it from some skills may be the better choice to curb the power creep. Not that I'd love to see Hammer updated, I would, but its not that high on the list of things on Warrior that need to be updated.

I just want to comment on the state of hammer warrior in open world and story PvE. I know these modes don't get as much attention on the forums, with only raids, dungeons and fractals really being discussed seriously; but hammer warrior in its current state is an embarrassment, and I suspect a lot of people spend a lot more time playing open world PvE than these other modes.

Having returned to the game recently after a seven year hiatus, I loaded up my main and played him through all the seasons prior to The Icecbrood Saga and the full HoT and PoF campaigns as solo hammer warrior. I like to play as hammer partly because it feels good (animations, sound and screenshake all give the warrior's hammer more of a feeling of weight than any other weapon in the game), and partly because the only legendary I have is Juggernaut.

I had to modify my gear somewhat, as I'd left my character with all Soldier's gear when I stopped playing. I first tried running Berserker's, but found survivability to be really bad, so instead made a full set of Celestial. I ended up doing about the same damage as when I was using Berserker's, but with a lot better survivability.I was running Arms bottom-middle-top, Strength middle-top-bottom and Discipline middle-bottom-bottom.Skills were "To The Limit!", "For Great Justice!", "Shake It Off!", "On My Mark!" and Signet Of Rage.

Having been a Hambow warrior when I stopped playing seven years ago, I went with that this time as well, and ran a longbow as my other weapon.

And I survived well enough, and was able to tank a lot of fights solo, but it took forever.With the removal of damage bonuses from CCs and the prevalence of blinds for really basic mobs in PoF, even basic combat were taking a really long time to resolve. Non-veteran mobs that shouldn't prove a challenge became massive speedbumps to my hammer warrior, such as Sand Lions, Scarabs and the dreaded Dust Mite.On top of which, for a weapon focussed on CCs as much as the warrior's hammer is, it became almost useless against bosses, and didn't reduce the break bar as much as I felt it should given the damage nerf. And while adrenaline build-up was pretty good, with the nerf to CC damage the fun has completely gone out of the Combustive Shot / Earthshaker combo.

Even with all this though, I thought maybe it's as difficult for other professions or weapon combinations and I just had to sigh "Git Gud".

This was shattered when I eventually swapped to Berserker geared double axe for The Icebrood Sage. Sudenly, things were dying incredibly quickly, and survivability was less of a problem because things didn't generally stay alive long enough for it to be one.Blinds became a non-issue due to the sheer quantity of attacks I was pumping out, and I realised just how unimportant CC is for open world PvE when compared to DPS. The amount of scenarios where I needed CC could be counted on the fingers of one hand, where every other scenario benefitted from the increase in DPS offered by running dual axe.Hell, I suspect even running full Celestial double axe would STILL substantially overshadow hammer.

When I first switched to using dual axes, I also decided to run a rifle as my other weapon. It was good for single-target DPS, but I eventually swapped back to longbow for Combustive Shot, and waddya know? For open world PvE that combos better than Hambow these days too.

At the moment, I would find it really hard to recommend anyone runs through the campaigns and explores the maps as a hammer warrior. About its only benefit is survivability, but you need that considering how much longer fights will take you than with just about any other weapon combination.

So what class IS good with hammer these days? I still want to use my Juggy, but there's not much point on my warrior considering it's in such a sorry state there.And it really shouldn't be that way.

Hammer warrior needs some serious TLC from ANet. It looks like it's never really recovered from the Hambow nerf, and they didn't even consider its slow attack speed when designing later content.

@"Mungrul.9358" said:I just want to comment on the state of hammer warrior in open world and story PvE. I know these modes don't get as much attention on the forums, with only raids, dungeons and fractals really being discussed seriously; but hammer warrior in its current state is an embarrassment, and I suspect a lot of people spend a lot more time playing open world PvE than these other modes.

Having returned to the game recently after a seven year hiatus, I loaded up my main and played him through all the seasons prior to The Icecbrood Saga and the full HoT and PoF campaigns as solo hammer warrior. I like to play as hammer partly because it feels good (animations, sound and screenshake all give the warrior's hammer more of a feeling of weight than any other weapon in the game), and partly because the only legendary I have is Juggernaut.

I had to modify my gear somewhat, as I'd left my character with all Soldier's gear when I stopped playing. I first tried running Berserker's, but found survivability to be really bad, so instead made a full set of Celestial. I ended up doing about the same damage as when I was using Berserker's, but with a lot better survivability.I was running Arms bottom-middle-top, Strength middle-top-bottom and Discipline middle-bottom-bottom.Skills were "To The Limit!", "For Great Justice!", "Shake It Off!", "On My Mark!" and Signet Of Rage.Run Marauder Stats instead of Celestial. Go Arms Mid/Top/Top, Stength Top or Bot/Mid/Mid or Bot, Discipline Mid/Bot/Bot.

Only run Body Blow if you are using Runes of the Aristocracy for might on weakness. If you have trouble surviving swap Merciless Hammer for MMR. Take Body Blow then with Runes of the Aristocracy. Swap "OMM!" for Bull's Rush or Balanced Stance.

Having been a Hambow warrior when I stopped playing seven years ago, I went with that this time as well, and ran a longbow as my other weapon.

And I survived well enough, and was able to tank a lot of fights solo, but it took forever.It took forever because you used Celestial. Run Marauder's instead.With the removal of damage bonuses from CCs and the prevalence of blinds for really basic mobs in PoF, even basic combat were taking a really long time to resolve. Non-veteran mobs that shouldn't prove a challenge became massive speedbumps to my hammer warrior, such as Sand Lions, Scarabs and the dreaded Dust Mite.The damage was removed in WvW and PvP not PvE. You lack of damage was from stat choices.On top of which, for a weapon focussed on CCs as much as the warrior's hammer is, it became almost useless against bosses, and didn't reduce the break bar as much as I felt it should given the damage nerf. And while adrenaline build-up was pretty good, with the nerf to CC damage the fun has completely gone out of the Combustive Shot / Earthshaker combo.Hammer is only slightly less breakbar damage than Mace/Mace, but is AoE and is higher DPS to compensate. Again the CCs still do damage in PvE.Even with all this though, I thought maybe it's as difficult for other professions or weapon combinations and I just had to sigh "Git Gud".

This was shattered when I eventually swapped to Berserker geared double axe for The Icebrood Sage. Sudenly, things were dying incredibly quickly, and survivability was less of a problem because things didn't generally stay alive long enough for it to be one.Axe/Axe will melt anything in PvE with Berserker Gear. That's its job. Try running Hammer + Axe/Axe instead of Hammer + Longbow.Blinds became a non-issue due to the sheer quantity of attacks I was pumping out, and I realised just how unimportant CC is for open world PvE when compared to DPS. The amount of scenarios where I needed CC could be counted on the fingers of one hand, where every other scenario benefitted from the increase in DPS offered by running dual axe.Bingo, CC is useful for things like Ley-Line Anomaly, Bounties, FotM, and Raid bosses but in OW PvE its just quicker to cleave everything down with Axe 5. Hammer is still fun and works when you spec for it right.Hell, I suspect even running full Celestial double axe would STILL substantially overshadow hammer.Because Axe/Axe is more DPS regardless of stats chosen than Hammer, because that is the set's job.When I first switched to using dual axes, I also decided to run a rifle as my other weapon. It was good for single-target DPS, but I eventually swapped back to longbow for Combustive Shot, and waddya know? For open world PvE that combos better than Hambow these days too.Axe 5 in fire field is a lot of burn ticks.At the moment, I would find it really hard to recommend anyone runs through the campaigns and explores the maps as a hammer warrior. About its only benefit is survivability, but you need that considering how much longer fights will take you than with just about any other weapon combination.Not everyone is good at dodging, so the amount of CC hammer brings in an AoE helps. In PvE it is fairly balanced, but in PvE people specialize into roles for content which leaves it behind.So what class IS good with hammer these days? I still want to use my Juggy, but there's not much point on my warrior considering it's in such a sorry state there.And it really shouldn't be that way.Scrapper would be your best choice.Hammer warrior needs some serious TLC from ANet. It looks like it's never really recovered from the Hambow nerf, and they didn't even consider its slow attack speed when designing later content.What needs to happen is for Body Blow to have it's bleed removed and replaced with power damage like how Lightening Rod works for Eles.