Why Marshal on Healscourge with scepter/torch?

[Wisely.4819]

People say that direct power attacks are a miniscule percentage of condi damage builds - that it makes up roughly 15% of condi builds' damage. Isn't the major power wasted with Marshal pieces then? If you're going for extra damage, why not Seraph with precision+condi as major or Plaguedoctor with condi major?

[Anchoku.8142]

While I do not use Scourge much, anymore, dagger builds LF quickly so you can use a hybrid power/condi setup to spam barrier. I am sure others in the forum are better versed in Scourge use so some of what I write may be garbage.

LF generation on a pure condi dps build is lower due to scepter so, to spam barrier support, a power-heal setup with MH dagger puts Scourge conditions in the back seat and barrier-spam in front. This is a full-support Scourge.

Yes, Scourge has to dump a lot of condi dps to give lots of barrier. However, if your group is fine with less frequent barrier and you time its use properly, you may go more condi in your build.

[SoftFootpaws.9134]

Marshal's is taken because it offers near-max Healing Power outside of sets like Cleric/Magi without sacrificing too much damage. This is because Healing Power is a major stat on it, which is extremely rare.

With most other sets you get more tankiness/Boon Duration/etc, but only 1k of healing instead of 1.5-1.8k. This is very important on Scourge, because barrier application isn't affected by outgoing healing% modifiers, nearly all of Scourge healing & barriers is just raw Healing Power. This is why they also often take Rune of Rebirth, Sigil of Life, etc. instead of the usual support builds found on other classes.

The point of having any damage on the build isn't to help the group--your damage will be on the order of 10% of DPS players with a good rotation. Its so you can build up sigil stacks, deal with adds, tag enemies and survive on your own when caught out alone. This seems counter productive but if you've ever played a meta character in Minstrel's or similar you'd understand the struggle.

Scourge can also only make limited use of Concentration, their only good boon access being 25 Might stacking for the group. They do give some boons out from other sources, such as from converting conditions, but not enough to be worth it.

Pretty much all that's worth investing in for Scourge is damage, Healing Power and sometimes Vitality.

[Wisely.4819]

@"Hannelore.8153" said:Marshal's is taken because it offers near-max Healing Power outside of sets like Cleric/Magi without sacrificing too much damage. This is because Healing Power is a major stat on it, which is extremely rare.

With most other sets you get more tankiness/Boon Duration/etc, but only 1k of healing instead of 1.5-1.8k. This is very important on Scourge, because barrier application isn't affected by outgoing healing% modifiers, nearly all of Scourge healing & barriers is just raw Healing Power. This is why they also often take Rune of Rebirth, Sigil of Life, etc. instead of the usual support builds found on other classes.

The point of having any damage on the build isn't to help the group--your damage will be on the order of 10% of DPS players with a good rotation. Its so you can build up sigil stacks, deal with adds, tag enemies and survive on your own when caught out alone. This seems counter productive but if you've ever played a meta character in Minstrel's or similar you'd understand the struggle.

Scourge can also only make limited use of Concentration, their only good boon access being 25 Might stacking for the group. They do give some boons out from other sources, such as from converting conditions, but not enough to be worth it.

Pretty much all that's worth investing in for Scourge is damage, Healing Power and sometimes Vitality.

Thanks, that's informative. If survivability is an issue, why not roll full shaman? Is "getting caught out alone" a thing in raids?

[KrHome.1920]

@Wisely.4819 said:People say that direct power attacks are a miniscule percentage of condi damage builds - that it makes up roughly 15% of condi builds' damage.For PvE I doubt that.

Unlike in PvP and WvW, scourge has actually some decent damage multipliers in PvE - at least decent enough to get hardnerfed (0.666 -> 0.1) in the competitive modes.

[Anchoku.8142]

@Hannelore.8153 said:Marshal's is taken because it offers near-max Healing Power outside of sets like Cleric/Magi without sacrificing too much damage. This is because Healing Power is a major stat on it, which is extremely rare.

With most other sets you get more tankiness/Boon Duration/etc, but only 1k of healing instead of 1.5-1.8k. This is very important on Scourge, because barrier application isn't affected by outgoing healing% modifiers, nearly all of Scourge healing & barriers is just raw Healing Power. This is why they also often take Rune of Rebirth, Sigil of Life, etc. instead of the usual support builds found on other classes.

The point of having any damage on the build isn't to help the group--your damage will be on the order of 10% of DPS players with a good rotation. Its so you can build up sigil stacks, deal with adds, tag enemies and survive on your own when caught out alone. This seems counter productive but if you've ever played a meta character in Minstrel's or similar you'd understand the struggle.

Scourge can also only make limited use of Concentration, their only good boon access being 25 Might stacking for the group. They do give some boons out from other sources, such as from converting conditions, but not enough to be worth it.

Pretty much all that's worth investing in for Scourge is damage, Healing Power and sometimes Vitality.

There is only a 20% reduction in healing power between a 3-stat minor heal compared with 4-stat major heal while a 3-stat major heal is 20% greater than a 4-stat major heal.

Marshall's is is at a sweet spot but it and most other healing equipment favor power builds and thus main-hand dagger. Also, it is perfectly acceptable to mix equipment with different stat's.

Unfortunately, there is no equipment with condition damage, healing and expertise for use with a scepter or condi-heal Scourge would be a top-tier support elite but that would also enable many other professions to do the same making PvE a lot easier. Condition damage builds do not require a third stat (precision) like power builds do to achieve full dps so there may never be an equipment stat that fully allows healing and condition dps. Imagine a raid where half the quad was first or second string healers on top of being full condi-dps.