How's Power Soulbeast for low tier fracs and open world?

I know many people will say "you can play anything in Open World and succeed", but there's a thin line in between having the damage and survibability of a Daredevil with berserker gear, or going Sword/Shield Power Warrior with Soldier gear and saying "everything works!" while taking 1 minute to kill a normal HoT mob...

In terms of how awful (or good) it can be... How would you say a Power Zerk Soulbeast is?

I love Power Soulbeast. It all depends on how you build.The biggest turn-off with Soulbeast is, well, the Soulbeast trait line is pretty limited in what it can give you. So you have to balance damage against survivability with what really ends up being just two spec lines.

I duo pretty much everything, so I went straight damage--my other lines are Beastmastery and Skirmishing for self-damage buffs, so I essentially completely lack condi cleanse (my partner is fantastic at helping me with condis, which is why I could do that). I could see swapping out Skirmishing for Wilderness Survival and not losing too much damage, and getting back some survivability if you need it. Honestly, if you're soloing anything, I'd pretty much baseline recommend Wilderness as a necessary trait line.

With a Smokescale as my merged pet, I get a direct damage and crit damage boost, an additional knockdown and evade, and Worldly Impact. When Merged, I use Sic' Em (40% damage increase to self), Maul, and then Worldly Impact. You can crit for 10k+ consistently with Maul if you run full Zerker's and 15k+ with Worldly Impact (I've seen quite a bit higher in ideal conditions). That means you can hit a 35k+ combo with Maul + Worldly Impact + Hilt Bash + Maul (plus whatever you manage to get out of the following Swoop). Before Soulbeast, my Maul + Hilt Bash + Maul combo nabbed me about 12k damage (with full Zerker's), so I personally saw a 300% damage increase.

I'm working my way up through fractals for the first time and I'm in Tier 2 with absolutely no problems--not even the Condition instabilities (although that might change in T3 and T4). Open World is even easier a vast majority of the time. All in all, I'm a big fan of my power Soulbeast.

@Syreas.8403 said:I love Power Soulbeast. It all depends on how you build.The biggest turn-off with Soulbeast is, well, the Soulbeast trait line is pretty limited in what it can give you. So you have to balance damage against survivability with what really ends up being just two spec lines.

I duo pretty much everything, so I went straight damage--my other lines are Beastmastery and Skirmishing for self-damage buffs, so I essentially completely lack condi cleanse (my partner is fantastic at helping me with condis, which is why I could do that). I could see swapping out Skirmishing for Wilderness Survival and not losing to much damage, and getting back some survivability if you need it. Honestly, if you're soloing anything, I'd pretty much baseline recommend Wilderness as a necessary trait line.

With a Smokescale as my merged pet, I get a direct damage and crit damage boost, an additional knockdown and evade, and Worldly Impact. When Merged, I use Sic' Em (40% damage increase to self), Maul, and then Worldly Impact. You can hit 10k+ consistently with Maul if you run full Zerker's and 15k+ with Worldly Impact (I've seen quite a bit higher in ideal conditions). That means you can hit a 35k+ combo with Maul + Worldly Impact + Hilt Bash + Maul (plus whatever you manage to get out of the following Swoop). Before Soulbeast, my Maul + Hilt Bash + Maul combo nabbed me about 12k damage (with full Zerker's), so I personally saw a 300% damage increase.

I'm working my way up through fractals for the first time and I'm in Tier 2 with absolutely no problems--not even the Condition instabilities (although that might change in T3 and T4). Open World is even easier a vast majority of the time. All in all, I'm a big fan of my power Soulbeast.

you have a link of that build?

@lugzan.4561 said:

you have a link of that build?

No, sorry. I haven't bothered to post any of my builds since 2012, and I never uploaded any of my Ranger builds anyways. My builds work for me and my playstyle--I'd rather give someone pointers or ideas and have them find what does and doesn't work for them than have someone copy+paste my build. If people are looking for "optimal" builds, I'm not qualified to help with that anyways.

I'm doing marsmanship beasmastery soulbeast, longbow gs. The condi cleaning stance and moa stance, sic em, protect me and strength of the pack, merging with a smokescale. Dunno how "optimal" this is but it's fun and works.

Power berserker Soulbeast is amazing for open world and even low level fractals. You just have so many CC's, evades/blocks, gap closers and burst skills available at all times. The vast majority of mobs will completely melt if you pop "Sic' Em!" and go ham. Condi-builds are more effective against tougher mobs, like the bounties or certain fractal bosses but power doesn't fall too far behind, even then.

@AnariiUK.7409 said:Power berserker Soulbeast is amazing for open world and even low level fractals. You just have so many CC's, evades/blocks, gap closers and burst skills available at all times. The vast majority of mobs will completely melt if you pop "Sic' Em!" and go ham. Condi-builds are more effective against tougher mobs, like the bounties or certain fractal bosses but power doesn't fall too far behind, even then.

It's alright. The burst potential is pretty great. I took down a vet hero challenge mob (one of the awakened ones in the desolation) with two back to back 35k maul crits after breaking its breakbar.

Cons: very little condi cleanse, making a mistake in your rotation costs you a lot more damage than other classes due to being so reliant on sic em.

Try the Soulbeast Frontline WvW build from Metabattle and add some offensive stats, i use this builds with zerker gear and its awesome. Change the Soulbeast traits for soloplay and u will be fine.

Fro condi cleanse use the Brown bear next to your stone Gazelle, u dont need a second dps pet and u dont need 100% dps uptime in open world. Just switch to the bear, use the cleanse or the resistance in beaste mode.

@lugzan.4561 said:

@Syreas.8403 said:I love Power Soulbeast. It all depends on how you build.The biggest turn-off with Soulbeast is, well, the Soulbeast trait line is pretty limited in what it can give you. So you have to balance damage against survivability with what really ends up being just two spec lines.

I duo pretty much everything, so I went straight damage--my other lines are Beastmastery and Skirmishing for self-damage buffs, so I essentially completely lack condi cleanse (my partner is fantastic at helping me with condis, which is why I could do that). I could see swapping out Skirmishing for Wilderness Survival and not losing to much damage, and getting back some survivability if you need it. Honestly, if you're soloing anything, I'd pretty much baseline recommend Wilderness as a necessary trait line.

With a Smokescale as my merged pet, I get a direct damage and crit damage boost, an additional knockdown and evade, and Worldly Impact. When Merged, I use Sic' Em (40% damage increase to self), Maul, and then Worldly Impact. You can hit 10k+ consistently with Maul if you run full Zerker's and 15k+ with Worldly Impact (I've seen quite a bit higher in ideal conditions). That means you can hit a 35k+ combo with Maul + Worldly Impact + Hilt Bash + Maul (plus whatever you manage to get out of the following Swoop). Before Soulbeast, my Maul + Hilt Bash + Maul combo nabbed me about 12k damage (with full Zerker's), so I personally saw a 300% damage increase.

I'm working my way up through fractals for the first time and I'm in Tier 2 with absolutely no problems--not even the Condition instabilities (although that might change in T3 and T4). Open World is even easier a vast majority of the time. All in all, I'm a big fan of my power Soulbeast.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vNAQFARnUqAtCilsAWsActgl8Aj5gVwCeLBgCwpL/9Wf7vlcs0A-jhRBABAcBAua/R5nZKBpU9nHeAA4pDgMA6jB-e

Something like that.

Power SBeast works fine for Open PvE and early fractals. For later fractals you have to swap to condi because enemies get really tough and you can surpass that with condi dmg.