Need advice on Chrono Tank for Raiding

[chrispy.7182]

• Hello
• I am new to raiding
• I want to play Chrono Tank
• There are a few builds online and I am unsure which one I should choose.
• I need advice on what gear stats I should have and what weapons to use.

Thank you!

[Excursion.9752]

First off welcome to raiding! I am not going to be as much help as you would like because I mainly play Druid. That being said I find all my raid builds on Snow Crow's web site. There are many builds out there for a variety of situations. Take your time and read through all the information for the all of the Chrono's different builds. You also will want to watch some youtube videos about the mechanics of each Raid Boss especially from your classes point of view. Hope that helps at least a little.

[Lexi.1398]

All this only applies to POWER BOON CHRONO, condi boon chrono is a different matter of which I do not have enough experience to give advice on.

Weapons:these don't change from off chrono, you're still mainhand sword + offhand sheild / sword (focus if the fight needs pulls)

Traitlines:Generally speaking these are the same as normal boon chrono, but i personally recommend taking dueling 131 over domination on vale gaurdian (VG), soulless horror (SH) and any fight where you're struggling to tank. This is because you get a trait which reduces sword cooldowns, this will reduce the cooldown on blurred fenzy and sword 4, one being a block the other is...blur (which i think is counted as an evade). For VG, traited blurred frenzy will pretty much cooldown at the same time blue teleport circles do so it's an easy way to avoid them when inexperienced, on SH you need all the help you can get to begin with. Relatedly, take improved alacrity over danger time as this also makes your damage avoidance skills cooldown quicker when learning to tank too (even if IA means you no longer have 100% alacrity on yourself, cooldowns are still faster). Also for soulless horror take sympathetic visage (inspiration first row, trait 3) always.

Gear:Swap berserkers (or really any not-diviner peices) to knights (knights is a core stat, buyable on tp and trinkets are buyable via laurels, guild commendations, pristine fractal relics, etc). if you NEED to swap diviner pieces i reccommend swapping them to commanders (you will need to swap multiple commander pieces for every 1 lost diviner to retain the same boon duration as diviners is the only attribute combination with concentration as a major stat), for later consider using captain's to replace assassin's trinkets but i'd only consider that when you begin minmaxing. All of these are offensive focused stat sets - a chrono is very much capable of doing dps even as a tank, so stats like givers and minstrels are really not ideal (along with the fact healing power is almost completely wasted, chrono is not good at healing) but if you absolutely can't survive without minstrels then you can at least still provide boons and tank with them (take peppermint oil for a bit more boon duration if you do this).

Toughness:For gorseval and keep construct, even when learning, you can take minimum toughness- as much as you need to be over the next highest toughness in the squad, they do wet noodle damage (if you are dying as the tank in these fights, you would also be dying as a dps). For soulless horror and quadim the peerless i recommend 1800 for newer tanks (it's kind of excessive tbh, and you can do fine at 1500 if you're comfy with chrono and raid mechanics but haven't tanked them before), for vale gaurdian i'd recommend high toughness but not quite as high as before, 1500~ ish should do fine (VG autos hurt and healers will struggle to heal you in later phases), and every boss that has a tanking mechanic i've not mentioned aren't particularly hard nor particularly easy tanks, whatever toughness is fine.

toughness ingrained into builds via traits/skills/etc that is unavoidable:1150 power soulbeast (and some varaint condi. +150 from pack alpha trait when merged)1175 some healers (NOT META, very rare but exists usually on heal scourges if at all. +175 from mercy runes)1250 sceptre condi ele (NOT META, more common than mercy runes but still unlikely. +250 from earth sceptre 2)1380 soulbeast handkite (this is a role which only exists on deimos, and isn't the only possible hand kiter either. +180 from stone signet, +200 from merging)If a soulbeast is present you will usually be expected to go over their toughness, feel free to grit your teeth at anyone else if you wish, especially if you encounter 2.3k toughness handkiters whom you don't even carry enough toughness to beat on deimos o/

Stuff:Sources of damage avoidance: sword 2, sword 4, sheild 4 (this is a phantasm skill so it can be reset by signet of ether to give you 2 additonal blocks), distortion (f4/continuum split, and whenever you use a signet - ether or inspiration - thanks to the blurred inscriptions trait), and the good ol dodge. i always like to keep one of these in reserve for emergency situations, but not all mechanics can be mitigated by them, some are scripted to hit even if youre dodging/blocking/invulnerable, like the third hit of samarog's auto chain, but most things can be mitigated.

[Cyninja.2954]

Understanding and starting chrono can be rather difficult, especially since Chrono changed a lot over the years. Some of the old videos/guides are out of date and will not work as well.

Lexi.1398 summary is good. I would probably recommend going for a support boon chrono build and gear first, while another more experienced chrono tanks. Otherwise I'm a fan of a full minstrel build for new chronos, both for the survival as well as the capped boon duration. Then phase out more and more gear as needed/able.

Here is also a good video guide on chrono as general overview:

I would recommend to watch the video, but not necessarily go with the scepter (but rather sword) initially. It's beneficial to understand the basic rotation. Still a good video to watch for understanding the class, it's traits, it's weapons and skill.

[TPMN.1483]

Whilst you are learning to tank, and assuming that you've not done it before and are in training runs - you can do something which is more suited to allowing you to make mistakes, such as raising your toughness, increasing your boon duration etc such as:http://gw2skills.net/editor/?PiwAw6zlVwWYOsD2JeqT5tXA-zRJYjRLfZURKkeBo2ss7wG-e-- This is a training build only as its highly defensive and will allow you to get used to whats going on and you should find it easier to maintain boons for the team, whilst learning what skills to use to block incoming damage and attacks. You will find eventually you're going to be running around in legendary armor/weapons/runes and adjust your build for each raid boss/fight as needed when you become better at the profession.

Generally you'll start in a high toughness (e.g. minstrels with high boon duration) for training runs, until you can tank in more zerker/diviners/assassin armor which is the builds snowcrow's is publishing - the main job of the tank is to (in no particular order):

1. Stay Alive
2. Give boons to the team (e.g. quickness and/or alacrity if you dont have an alacrev on the team).
3. Position the boss in the right place
4. Block and invlun. attacks that will one-shot kill you or port you to somewhere else on the map.

It might be good you join one of the training guilds to get used to performing the role - I wish you luck in your journey.

[sokeenoppa.5384]

@chrispy.7182 said:

• Hello
• I am new to raiding
• I want to play Chrono Tank
• There are a few builds online and I am unsure which one I should choose.
• I need advice on what gear stats I should have and what weapons to use.

Thank you!

If you play EU we have a raid guild that does raid trainings aswell. Feel free to join and train your tanking skills with us.

[chrispy.7182]

Thank you everyone. A lot of information to go through. I've been flat out with finishing a project for a client but now have time to focus on learning about Raiding more in-depth. That Boon Generator video is helpful. I'll certainly be trying that out.

@sokeenoppa.5384 I would love to join your raiding guild! That would be so helpful. I will message you in game if that is ok and we can have a chat

[sokeenoppa.5384]

@chrispy.7182 said:Thank you everyone. A lot of information to go through. I've been flat out with finishing a project for a client but now have time to focus on learning about Raiding more in-depth. That Boon Generator video is helpful. I'll certainly be trying that out.

@sokeenoppa.5384 I would love to join your raiding guild! That would be so helpful. I will message you in game if that is ok and we can have a chat

It would be better if you message in discord.Sin#0955

I will answer ingame as well sooner or later.

[chrispy.7182]

@sokeenoppa.5384 Cool. I sent a request on Discord :)

[ButcherofMalakir.4067]

For a chrono tank. Best adivice I can get is to get diviner armor, weapons, backpack and one ring. Pack runes, concentration sigil, force sigils and berserker ring, amulet and accesories. Then get knight accesories, ring and amulet and swap them whenever you need to tank