lodjur.1284

This should be good. Let's see if we can hit all the checkboxes Every build listed will be condi. None of them will actually be strong choices for solo/duo. They will all be builds that are very easy to counter. Doesn't do enough damage to kill anything. No burst.No sustain (unless you're in melee with multiple enemies)Little to no mobility. Amazing choice for roaming clearly. Also full TB+Torment runes is just bad, duration caps at 100%... Worst sustain in the game and top 3 worst mobility in the game, excellent roaming choice. When roaming you're generally no more than 2. Not really many people to stand behind. At least this one has enough damage to kill anything. Finally an option with sustain. Now if it only had enough damage to kill anything. Or any mobility at all.... Great option if you like tanking out 1-2 people then dying to the inevitable 5+ people that come before you've killed anyone. Warrior just needs 1 cleansing sigil actually and excels against most of the stuff you listed and also happens to be a much much stronger choice for roaming lol.

Though that is probably why we are in the situation we are in now. Power is multiplicative and it's just hard to race defensive stats against us. But I guess this is a good thing since unlike OP I don't have that extreme difficulty of killing people. Well ye, I mean if toughness could race 3 stats that would be a bit weird. Depends on your class. Adding 3k health to a class with only 11k base health is just huge and possibly mandatory. OTOH, my warrior doesn't really feel the need for that much vit since they start so much higher. Still good though. Add into consideration that durability runes also would give you 10% more health, and that's just an amazing investment overall. Weirdly enough Balth runes are also +10% health. Ye of course. Marauder on warriors is imo not ideal (demo would probs be meta if it existed). Durability runes is of course fantastic. But that "Weirdly enough Balth runes are also +10% health." Something tells me you don't like burnguards haha. On a more serious note I think balth got the 10% hp to be comparable to the other "buff one condi runes" like torment/perplex The main point was that adding 300 healing power is similar to adding some random toughness/vit, it can be good, it isn't always optimal but doesn't require large amounts to do something. Similar how to running some amount marauder is very often optimal. Speaking of that Warrior is in a funky place now with Defense being much weaker than it was. Of course, a lot of warrs were moving away from it anyways, but I did notice they're not as invul as they were before.... not complaining. Ye war feels to me at least a lot more reasonable than it used to. Tho I haven't actually played it very much recently. Virtues does have some good utility with the condi clear and faster virtues recharge. I suppose that doesn't mean a thing for core burn since their defenses suck though other burn guardian variants tend to benefit. They tend to ditch radiance since it's a damage only tree but muh deeps. Ye core burn is one of the squishest builds on the game even with full defensive stats and 10% hp from balth runes (well I guess rather the worst self-sustain build in the entire game) Essentially my point, virtues+zeal needed to do anything resembling damage as the build is just non-functional otherwise, allowing for 1 utility (FB) /tank (DH)/Damage (radiance). But all versions of it are extremely lacking in burn self sustain and tankines. Despite their defensive stats. It's just visual clutter that needs to be nerfed. If I turn off Effect Lod in most places of this game I get blinded to death. (Me, not my character) PoF was a disaster in that regard FB, Scourge and Holo creates such bright visual noise. When I turn on effect LoD it culls scourge elites and stuff though so can't play with it on. Yep. Though I think it's prolly for the best that it stays that way as it does give everyone access to a decent personal clear without increasing group clears (which imo are a bit of a problem) Ye but it does help Anet balance I think. While it is kinda balance by "making everyone the same" it at least only takes away one rather small portion of builds (and they're far from the worst offenders in that regard) I mean tbh to irritates me it's enough with just the mobility as enough people worry it just never quit, even after 10+ attempts at killing you. But kind of a difficult problem to solve without completely redesigning some classes.

That seems strange, since it's easy for tempest to just go into water and clear some quickly. Maybe you already have resistance? I guess it's possible if your healing is extreme to just simply outheal it. Back in the days of yore, Diamond Skin + Wash the Pain Away was just good enough (but only for myself). Recently, Rugged Growth was bugged on ranger and I didn't even need to clear torment-- I would just outheal it. But that does bring up immobs and stuff though. I meant group clear wise. It's not even a struggle with conditions it was just interesting to find out that your tempest clears like extremely few conditions for our group. But we all have cleansing so rarely needed Well that means your ele knows to not waste skills instead of just randomly pressing buttons! But yea can't cleanse if you have no condis to clear.Ye exactly. It also helped us realize just how bad trooper runes are etc

That seems strange, since it's easy for tempest to just go into water and clear some quickly. Maybe you already have resistance? I guess it's possible if your healing is extreme to just simply outheal it. Back in the days of yore, Diamond Skin + Wash the Pain Away was just good enough (but only for myself). Recently, Rugged Growth was bugged on ranger and I didn't even need to clear torment-- I would just outheal it. But that does bring up immobs and stuff though. I meant group clear wise. It's not even a struggle with conditions it was just interesting to find out that our tempest clears extremely few conditions for our group (ie in a normal fight we all clear roughly 125-250ish conditions personally and tempest did maybe 20-30clears on the group (size 3)). But we all have cleansing so rarely needed

Why yes, but the breakpoint is definitely not "everyone runs conditions". I never said it was. But That's what the topic was in, before you replied. It basically is. If you invest say, 300 healing power, you'll get an extra 37.5 health/s when it comes to regen, for example. If you put that into precision, you would get about 14% crit. You have to be a full on healer for it to accomplish much, except for some builds that do have things that scale well with healing power. But a lot of that was nerfed. And 1500 healing power is 187.5/sec Stacking it doesn't magically make the stat better. 37.5 hp/sec from just regen isn't useless. Uhh.... that's still 167.5 vs 317.5 total; that's nearly twice as much healing going on. I picked regen because it is something that scales well with healing power as an example. An actual support such as firebrand, scrapper, or tempest, is going to have all kinds of sources of healing while someone more focused on damage isn't. You should also note most things that do scale well with healing power are usually group heals, so trying to invest even a few hundred stats into healing power for self-sustain besides on (i dunno, eles?) is not an efficient use of stats. More of a stat gives more, who would've thought. Doesn't mean that the scaling would be exponential (or some other type of function) that would somehow cause low amounts to provide comparatively less benefits than high amounts. Lol it doesn't subtract stats, sure. And never said it was exponential. Then why would it somehow only be good in large numbers? That's just how most stats work. It's like adding 300 random power to a condi build with no precision or ferocity. It doesn't really do much. Regen is one of the better scaling with healing power. A lot of skill 6s for example, don't scale well with it. That's because power/preci/ferocity need each other to be good, very simplified its PowerPrecisionFerocity. Healing power doesn't need any other stat. Adding a few hundred random vitality to a power build is called marauder and is pretty good, adding some toughness/vit/boon duration is called durability runes and is pretty strong. Demolisher would also be great if it existed in WvW. Which is a much closer comparison. That's usually because they can't afford to take the offensive trait lines. Though I guess that's neither specific to either power/condi. It's def more common for power builds to be taking defensive traitline. Tho varies a bit from class to class obviously. A lot of condi builds need certain traitlines to do anything resembling damage (ie like burnguard with zeal/virtues), which isn't usually the case for power. ? It scales linearly. Exactly. Regeneration for example Oh that, well I mean that's just how numbers work. The same applies to vitality or toughness. See above point about marauder. Referring to power builds. Well power damage is still very high, yes. Well, I dunno any soldier roamers. /shrugs that was about the zerg meta. Fair enough. Oh wasn't being specific about that sentence; more like in pve as well atm; though that is off topic. Fair enough. Can be hard to see with the 6547654765765 other things on the ground. Ye, exactly if things weren't so zergy burnguard wouldn't be great. I would hate to see it get the scourge treatment. Well, almost seems like that sigil is too good. Maybe. I personally like that it helps even out access to clears a bit. So I am personally okay with it being broken. But ye could be too strong as it's "always" BiS even if all condi builds created existing.

Well, you need to compare apples to apples for sure. You should also take into account say, a Scourge's boon strips along with their damage. And damage scrappers/burn guards ought to be compared against each other. And don't log against NPCs of course xD And yes, I think that's why the best indicator is the bombs (not the parts where you're just chasing people down for more bags). Fortunately, arcdps also tells you who dies or res's people too. There's many factors and you really need a lot of data. Sometimes people can also do bad because their support did badly, or went afk. But if you have 50 fights, and I'm the Firebrand where my party always wipes first and has no boons, then something is probably up if they do well when I'm not the firebrand. There's also collective failure when the whole squad does badly, and it would be fallacious to really point the finger at any one individual. Indeed, do not be like some hotshot commanders and use this as a tool to shame people. (unless they really do constantly wander off into Narnia) This. Agreed completely. Arcdps is a very powerful tool that with the log function can tell you a lot of things. It just requires the user to know how to use it correctly. Though of course it could use some improvements (espec the WvW version, when compared to how fantastic the tool is in PvE) I'm just amazed it even works at all. The log can even show you the relative movement so you can see who's on tag. It also is able to tell how long a fight lasts even if you break combat. Ye I personally just wish it could slow enemy information better, but it's most likely not possible. Yes very much so and can often help discern what runes are most effective and helped at least me realize that in our group tempest clears next to 0 conditions, which was interesting.

I think it does, at least I see stuff like vampiric presence/sigil of blood/life stealing food on my incoming damage in it. Cleaving is pretty useful tho, at least for smallscale. Well, you need to compare apples to apples for sure. You should also take into account say, a Scourge's boon strips along with their damage. And damage scrappers/burn guards ought to be compared against each other. And don't log against NPCs of course xD And yes, I think that's why the best indicator is the bombs (not the parts where you're just chasing people down for more bags). Fortunately, arcdps also tells you who dies or res's people too. There's many factors and you really need a lot of data. Sometimes people can also do bad because their support did badly, or went afk. But if you have 50 fights, and I'm the Firebrand where my party always wipes first and has no boons, then something is probably up if they do well when I'm not the firebrand. There's also collective failure when the whole squad does badly, and it would be fallacious to really point the finger at any one individual. Indeed, do not be like some hotshot commanders and use this as a tool to shame people. (unless they really do constantly wander off into Narnia) This. Agreed completely. Arcdps is a very powerful tool that with the log function can tell you a lot of things. It just requires the user to know how to use it correctly. Though of course it could use some improvements (espec the WvW version, when compared to how fantastic the tool is in PvE)

Why yes, but the breakpoint is definitely not "everyone runs conditions". I never said it was. But That's what the topic was in, before you replied. It basically is. If you invest say, 300 healing power, you'll get an extra 37.5 health/s when it comes to regen, for example. If you put that into precision, you would get about 14% crit. You have to be a full on healer for it to accomplish much, except for some builds that do have things that scale well with healing power. But a lot of that was nerfed. And 1500 healing power is 187.5/sec Stacking it doesn't magically make the stat better. 37.5 hp/sec from just regen isn't useless. Uhh.... that's still 167.5 vs 317.5 total; that's nearly twice as much healing going on. I picked regen because it is something that scales well with healing power as an example. An actual support such as firebrand, scrapper, or tempest, is going to have all kinds of sources of healing while someone more focused on damage isn't. You should also note most things that do scale well with healing power are usually group heals, so trying to invest even a few hundred stats into healing power for self-sustain besides on (i dunno, eles?) is not an efficient use of stats. More of a stat gives more, who would've thought. Doesn't mean that the scaling would be exponential (or some other type of function) that would somehow cause low amounts to provide comparatively less benefits than high amounts. Lol it doesn't subtract stats, sure. And never said it was exponential. Then why would it somehow only be good in large numbers? ? It scales linearly. Exactly. Regeneration for example 130 + (0.125 * Healing Power) (according to wiki) with 500 healing power that's 130 + (62.5) or 192.5 compared to 0 healing power that's roughly a 48% increase with 1000 healing power, that's a 130 + (125) or 255, compared to 500 healing power that's roughly a 32.5% increase Assuming you have a fight that even lasts that long. I would take that 3000 health or 300 tough any day of the week esp if it stops me from being 2-3 shot. At least in a condi meta 2-3 shots wouldn't exactly be common. Which is where the situation of Plague>Trailblazer exists, in actual GW2 Trailblazer is way better because power is dominant. If power ever got so weak that only 20-30% used it, I would swap to plaguedoctor/shaman (or a combination of plague/tb possibly) in a heartbeat on all my condi builds. Suit yourself. Well it would be the correct call, more vit and more healing power would be far better than toughness in a condi meta. I mean, there's still the potential of losing 20-30% of the time. If only 20% of people ran condi, there's a good chance you would still die if you didn't pack any clears even if they were weaker. If power had gotten weak enough for only 20-30% to run it, then it honestly wouldn't be a threat. Well, I know, they must all die really fast. To guards? At least I can clear guards just fine with base toughness Well, that might be true. I can't really say I've seen that happen since the balance patch beyond some really glassy builds that are more likely zerker. (wouldn't zerker be a better option?). But I dunno, does that mean power builds have to basically all build glass to do anything? You brought up marauder. Damage is still pretty high. Mostly Anet nerfing any condi build with access to active defenses (imo with good reason). Like Condi Mirage, Condi Thief, Condi Weaver. Also generally power specs needing less of their damage to come from utility skills/traitlines/sigils compared to condi (as their damage is mostly from stats). Also an inherent nonbo with active defenses. As those work way better with burst than with sustained damage. True of Firebrand, somewhat true of Scrapper (though honestly without stealth not really that special); Purity of Purpose is busted. And shout warrior's been around forever and has been on and off. It's more for condi remov (esp that immob spam lately) Imo scrapper is overall overrated post nerf, at least in smallscale. Our healer has next to 0 group clears (tempest). Don't really have an issue with condi. Well, guardian burn has been busted throughout the game. Nah, burnguard was a meme build until the current version of eternal armory+SoJ It honestly isn't actually broken. It has plenty of weaknesses Worst self-sustain in the game by far. Almost no cover condis Little to no CC Very little group support No real utility beyond damage. it only get so high damage in zergy situations because people don't move out of stuff and just stack in everything cause of AoE caps (and culling/lag/stupidity) Zerg situations aren't really relevant in a conversation about trailblazer tbh, the statcombo is only at all relevant on burnguard there. Cleansing sigils are quite the rage though, even though they'd put you at a disadvantage against a non-condi user though. I suppose you can argue they're probably too good. The opportunity cost is extremely low. Not running cleansing sigil is in 99% of all cases just wrong, especially as power. Sure, and I was just wanted to joke about siege, but hey. Well....

Why yes, but the breakpoint is definitely not "everyone runs conditions". I never said it was. But That's what the topic was in, before you replied. It basically is. If you invest say, 300 healing power, you'll get an extra 37.5 health/s when it comes to regen, for example. If you put that into precision, you would get about 14% crit. You have to be a full on healer for it to accomplish much, except for some builds that do have things that scale well with healing power. But a lot of that was nerfed. And 1500 healing power is 187.5/sec Stacking it doesn't magically make the stat better. 37.5 hp/sec from just regen isn't useless. Uhh.... that's still 167.5 vs 317.5 total; that's nearly twice as much healing going on. I picked regen because it is something that scales well with healing power as an example. An actual support such as firebrand, scrapper, or tempest, is going to have all kinds of sources of healing while someone more focused on damage isn't. You should also note most things that do scale well with healing power are usually group heals, so trying to invest even a few hundred stats into healing power for self-sustain besides on (i dunno, eles?) is not an efficient use of stats. More of a stat gives more, who would've thought. Doesn't mean that the scaling would be exponential (or some other type of function) that would somehow cause low amounts to provide comparatively less benefits than high amounts. The jump from 0>500 healing power is %ually bigger than the jump from 500>1000. Survival time is just hp/(dps - hps) increasing hps can be just as effective as increasing hp or decreasing dps. After 80 secs of fighting (assuming no overhealing, which is slightly unrealistic but so is only measuring regen) 37.5 hp/sec beats out 3k hp. In fact it's quite often correct to run trailblazer+apo/settler when solo on some condi builds. Over tb+dire. Depending on stuff like base hp, scaling, gameplan, mobility etc If power ever got so weak that only 20-30% used it, I would swap to plaguedoctor/shaman (or a combination of plague/tb possibly) in a heartbeat on all my condi builds. Because such a situation would mean that Condi builds would be far more common, clearly what once should prioritize fighting against. In a world where only 20-30% use power, it's wild be weak enough that one could beat most of them with minimal investment. However, we don't live in that world and toughness is by far the strongest defensive stat on most builds. You def wouldn't invest any stats into anti guard tech, most power builds have little to no toughness atm. Eh? Do you really need boon duration to spam resistance on a rev? All of these classes literally kitten these things out. You def can't get full uptime without, so it's useful, if not necessary. 1 sec extra stab does seem pretty nice. So is 1 extra second of cripple or especially immob; but w/e.Condi clears are slightly more common than boon removal. No, it would mean power damage is too low if people take no toughness and still don't die to power damage. Not that I believe that myself, but no, there would be no such conclusion. Noone talked about not dying, we were discussing the speed of dying. Why are we splitting hairs again over dying vs "shredded in a few seconds"; it should be pretty clear I didn't mean "die over time". But fine, I can rephrase it to "No, it would mean power damage is too low if people take no toughness and still don't die get shredded in a few seconds to power damage"Which isn't the case. Marauder builds kill each other in seconds outside of active defenses (which most condi builds can't afford) I'm not even sure why condis can only exist with these 2 stats, but ok. Condi needs to survive long enough to start doing damage. Power does it's damage much much faster. Now that is true to a certain extent. Hence it needs toughness, or power damage needs to go way down. Condi being more tanky is part of the tradeoffs between the two. I never said it is a requirement, but realistically a majority should be running it, if it's as much better as people claim. Yet this is not the case. It's a direct response to "Condi builds simply shouldn't exist" in regards to dire/trailblazer. Though tbh I don't really get what you were getting at all. Exactly what I said In a fight of trailblazer vs plaguedoctor where both builds have reasonable clears. Plaguedoctor wins hands down, even more so in group fights. It gives everything you want against condi, yet noone runs it. Because defending against power is more important. These builds would be used even if there was 0 condition builds. The strongest healers also happen to have the best clears. Also yes burnguard is unique in a lot of ways. Permeating is so strong by itself in an AoE cap meta because it can stack such an absurd amount of condis in such a small time. Changing it's duration changed nothing as in the situations where permeating works, if it even got to half it's duration the target is generally dead. If any build could do similar amounts of condi dmg in any other environment, it would be broken. Also the point was more directed at smallscale, where cleansing sigil+1-2 traits/skills is more than enough. Zerg situations aren't really relevant in a conversation about trailblazer tbh, the statcombo is only at all relevant on burnguard there. But even if it was, they don't overload on clears to deal with condi, they do it because immob (and to a much lesser fear/taunt/chill etc) is a death sentence in those environments. Also because the opportunity cost is next to 0. Also outside of zergs at least, firebrand is far stronger against condi than scrapper. Anyway to sum all this up before it gets even more off topic. Condi gets "better" stat combos because they have bigger tradeoffs other places and need more time.

Why yes, but the breakpoint is definitely not "everyone runs conditions". I never said it was. But It basically is. If you invest say, 300 healing power, you'll get an extra 37.5 health/s when it comes to regen, for example. If you put that into precision, you would get about 14% crit. You have to be a full on healer for it to accomplish much, except for some builds that do have things that scale well with healing power. But a lot of that was nerfed. And 1500 healing power is 187.5/sec Stacking it doesn't magically make the stat better. 37.5 hp/sec from just regen isn't useless. Eh? Do you really need boon duration to spam resistance on a rev? All of these classes literally kitten these things out. You def can't get full uptime without, so it's useful, if not necessary. 1 sec extra stab does seem pretty nice. No, it would mean power damage is too low if people take no toughness and still don't die to power damage. Not that I believe that myself, but no, there would be no such conclusion. Noone talked about not dying, we were discussing the speed of dying. I'm not even sure why condis can only exist with these 2 stats, but ok. Condi needs to survive long enough to start doing damage. Power does it's damage much much faster. I never said it is a requirement, but realistically a majority should be running it, if it's as much better as people claim. Yet this is not the case. If a majority were running condi builds, then plaguedoctor would be better than trailblazer (espec as the expertise would be wasted from everyone overloading on clears in such a meta).

It must be if you say it has no drawbacks. This by definition mean its best in slot and used by everyone, because why shouldnt it, its too good. I was talking about solo roaming. And yeah no drawbacks was bad wording. I still think Dire/TB are really unbalanced stat combos though. It's the best of both worlds and it makes for really boring fights.Yet if everyone would use it, no one has any use for toughness, making it incredibly wasteful in terms of its stat combo. Its only usefull if its facing lots of power. Which means... theres lots of power when solo roaming. Hm. Weird. Well, guards and siege! Also, just because the difference isn't absolute doesn't mean there isn't a disparity. I hope this part is sarcasm. Oh idk, it was kinda suggesting that you have to deal with direct damage somewhere even if everyone were running condi. Guards. Lol. I mean, siege exists too, no matter where you go. But that's a moot point because it does not require everyone to run condi to suggest it is better than power. Something about hyperbole.Well it would certainly help your cause if a majority ran conditions. But an absolutely overwhelming majority is power. It doesn't. Healing power scales linearly. Actually, the first point of healing power is better than the second point etc if you measure it as a percentual increase. So idk why people keep spreading that kinda myth. I dunno, you were the one that brought healing power up. With the nerfs to healing scaling, it's even more irrelevant to many builds besides full on healers. Nope you suggested it was useless in low numbers. Which you're now doubling down on even though it's still wrong. That really depends on what build, and rapidness of condi application. Burn guard for example, has mostly short condi application of anything that's not burn. No they don't lol. Then again burnguard doesn't have a ton of covers. Only really cripple and vuln (and possibly doom sigil) all of which have long durations. Ye like Resistance on rev is bad Stability on guardian is bad Protection on ele is bad Etc I guess everyone that runs marauder gets shredded in seconds? Well that would certainly make a case for power dmg being too high wouldn't it? Given that toughness only helps vs power. Marauder vs marauder is actually either incredibly bursty or involves very strong non-stat defenses, which few condi traitlines/weapons have. You can't make the argument that trailblazer/dire is overpowered without saying that either Power is overpoweredCondi builds simply shouldn't existSo ye...

I think he means DPS to downed enemies should be halved? That's how i've read it anyway, nothing to do with Arcdps. "I think the DPS plug-in statistics are flawed" "I think the statistics of this part should be halved." I would be very surprised

Well I disagree. Obviously being able to filter to only show non-downed damage (or only downed damage). As more options are always nice. More importantly, this is hardly the place for such a request. Anet didn't create Arcdps and have no power to change it. Contact the creator instead

It must be if you say it has no drawbacks. This by definition mean its best in slot and used by everyone, because why shouldnt it, its too good. I was talking about solo roaming. And yeah no drawbacks was bad wording. I still think Dire/TB are really unbalanced stat combos though. It's the best of both worlds and it makes for really boring fights.Yet if everyone would use it, no one has any use for toughness, making it incredibly wasteful in terms of its stat combo. Its only usefull if its facing lots of power. Which means... theres lots of power when solo roaming. Hm. Weird. Well, guards and siege! Also, just because the difference isn't absolute doesn't mean there isn't a disparity. I hope this part is sarcasm. Oh idk, it was kinda suggesting that you have to deal with direct damage somewhere even if everyone were running condi.Guards. Lol. You don't really need expertise on most condi builds. Balthazar/Tormenting(or some other duration runes, but bleed/poison is generally long enough anyway) would be enough if the expertise didn't come on a statcombo with toughness. There's a reason you don't hear anyone whine about shaman stats, they should be pretty sick in a condi meta (Vit+condi+Healing). But since we're still in a power meta (like we've always been), toughness is great. Power is still way way way more common than condi in all group sizes (not even saying its better (which it is)). I mean nobody whines about cleric either...Exactly. It doesn't. Healing power scales linearly. Actually, the first point of healing power is better than the second point etc if you measure it as a percentual increase. So idk why people keep spreading that kinda myth. Shaman or Plaguedoctor would definitively be the best stat combo if condi was dominating. Plaguedoctor even gives as much condi dmg as trailblazer with big vitality so... Cover condis are to prevent clears, their duration is usually long enough without expertise. Trailblazer/Dire are used because power is dominant and you get shredded in seconds without the toughness. Not because "there's no other stats".

It has drawbacks. I will list the biggest ones here. Most condi builds need a dedicated healer to do well. This is because they lack self-sustain, with the exception of necro (only recently, and honestly very overhyped) and ele (tho fairly meh atm), all condi builds lack sustain, which is a big problem when your gameplan is to win by attrition. I'm not sure why you think this. Necro has the worst sustain in the game, shroud doesn't heal you. Condi rev, condi renegade(the most sustain in the game BY FAR) and condi firebrand all have the most sustain in the game and are condi builds. The only builds with nearly as much sustain as these is power holosmith, power rev, and power tempest. Most power builds have nearly zero sustain outside of holosmith, rev, and power tempest. However, power tempest either gives up tons of sustain for damage, or gives up tons of damage for sustain - something all the above condi builds, power holosmith, and power rev do not do.Condi herald has the dragon heal, which I hate and would love to see nuked. However in a smallscale setting, especially against ranged it has bad sustain. It Condi revenant/renegade (as those are the most similar) has sustain unless you're in melee with 5 enemies with tormenting runes. That's extremely risky, with a medium reward. Doesn't feel like a problem. But if your argument is that healing for at most 2k/second, when you're in MELEE on a build with Close to 0 mobility Almost no stab Awful stunbreaks Is broken then idk what to say really. I guess if you're fighting npcs it's pretty broken sustain... Condi necro with death magic and/or spite can get pretty sick sustain, espec 1v1. There's a ton of variants, a rather common tanky one is with Unholy Sanctuary+Signets of Suffering+Signet of Vampirism, can heal like 800/sec in shroud. Condi firebrand has awful sustain. Condi guard by default is locked into Virtues+Zeal neither offers sustain. The firebrand traitline also doesn't provide very much with low healing power. So Power Ranger (and elite specs) has no sustain? Power Warrior (and spellbreaker) has no sustain? Power Scrapper has no sustain? Power thief/mes (and relevant elite specs) doesn't have enough mobility to reset every fight (which is like sustain but better)? Just from the top of my head It must be if you say it has no drawbacks. This by definition mean its best in slot and used by everyone, because why shouldnt it, its too good. I was talking about solo roaming. And yeah no drawbacks was bad wording. I still think Dire/TB are really unbalanced stat combos though. It's the best of both worlds and it makes for really boring fights.Yet if everyone would use it, no one has any use for toughness, making it incredibly wasteful in terms of its stat combo. Its only usefull if its facing lots of power. Which means... theres lots of power when solo roaming. Hm. Weird. Well, guards and siege! Also, just because the difference isn't absolute doesn't mean there isn't a disparity. I hope this part is sarcasm. You don't really need expertise on most condi builds. Balthazar/Tormenting(or some other duration runes, but bleed/poison is generally long enough anyway) would be enough if the expertise didn't come on a statcombo with toughness. There's a reason you don't hear anyone whine about shaman stats, they should be pretty sick in a condi meta (Vit+condi+Healing). But since we're still in a power meta (like we've always been), toughness is great. Power is still way way way more common than condi in all group sizes (not even saying its better (which it is)).

It has drawbacks. I will list the biggest ones here. Most condi builds need a dedicated healer to do well. This is because they lack self-sustain, with the exception of necro (only recently, and honestly very overhyped) and ele (tho fairly meh atm), all condi builds lack sustain, which is a big problem when your gameplan is to win by attrition. The other 2 exceptions would be thief/mesmers who have so much mobility they don't care about their sustain, but their condi variants are less annoying to fight than their power counterparts. Most power builds have enough mobility and/or burst to not need sustain, or have strong sustain traits. You're hardcountered by anything with strong clears and by resistance. Much more than any power build is by, well anything. Worst scenario as power you have weakness and they have protection and you end up doing 50-60% less dmg, worst case as condi they have resistance or large amounts of clear (which firebrand both providers) and you do 90-95% less dmg (depending on how much power dmg your class pushes out). There's a reason condi builds are nonexistent in larger scale fights. You don't have any synergy with a high mobility build, which means you're not doing the most broken thing you can be doing. Burst is an obvious combo with mobility, conditions are not. Mobility is by far the strongest thing in smallscale. Condition builds rarely excel at it. I mean you can think condi is op, but saying it lacks drawbacks is just a lie. Personally I find condi builds much much easier to fight than power and this after dedicating a very large part of our group comp/our builds to fight power and extremely little to fighting condi (ie healer with almost 0 clears, no strong anti condi skills from anyone else etc, just cleansing and the lowest opportunity cost traits on everyone else) (groupsize 3).

Having them be a currency would be nice, having to dedicate 2 inventory slots on every char I do WvW on is pretty annoying.

ACs aren't even that annoying, even while outnumbered ballastae is tho as it's really bursty (and siege golems in camps are annoying af).

That's not a problem in WvW ... the objective isn't to kill people ... that's just a means to an end to capture zones, etc ... If you want to simply kill people, you have PVP for that. PvP is about nodes. It's not about fights even remotely. WvW is by far the best place to go for fights. I haven't looked at the scoreboard any at all (beyond to see if I will need to move server to escape t1-t3 lag/zergfests) and WvWs been my primary gamemode for years now. You are however 100% right about unkillable builds not being a problem if they pose no threat in WvW as one can always just move on. Right ... because in PVP, there is a much more direct link between successfully killing players and winning. That's not as direct in WvW. You can kill tons of players ... but still lose because WvW objectives are strategically linked to the zone ownership. No there's barely even a link in PvP. Also a lot more people play WvW for reasons beyond trying to go up 1 tier so one can get more lags and enemies that are more scared to leave their blobs. I won't argue with you because clearly you missed the point ... there is a DISTINCT difference between the objectives in PVP and WvW, and that difference is why tanky builds in WvW isn't a problem, EVEN if those players are unkillable, which I doubt. I agree with that point, which I said. I just find the "go PvP if you want fights" argument to be flawed. Except it's not flawed because it's true. it's almost impossible to avoid fighting other players without it impact your success in PVP because of how PVP is implemented. It's completely possible to avoid fighting players in WvW without it impacting your success in WvW. Different objectives, different environment. Yet if you care absolutely nothing for objectives and just wanna fight wvw is your best bet. Also sPvP got garbo balancing (for fights at least as the gamemode is most def not about fighting) and has 0 build diversity That's not a problem in WvW ... the objective isn't to kill people ... that's just a means to an end to capture zones, etc ... If you want to simply kill people, you have PVP for that. PvP is about nodes. It's not about fights even remotely. WvW is by far the best place to go for fights. I haven't looked at the scoreboard any at all (beyond to see if I will need to move server to escape t1-t3 lag/zergfests) and WvWs been my primary gamemode for years now. You are however 100% right about unkillable builds not being a problem if they pose no threat in WvW as one can always just move on. Right ... because in PVP, there is a much more direct link between successfully killing players and winning. That's not as direct in WvW. You can kill tons of players ... but still lose because WvW objectives are strategically linked to the zone ownership. No there's barely even a link in PvP. Also a lot more people play WvW for reasons beyond trying to go up 1 tier so one can get more lags and enemies that are more scared to leave their blobs. I won't argue with you because clearly you missed the point ... there is a DISTINCT difference between the objectives in PVP and WvW, and that difference is why tanky builds in WvW isn't a problem, EVEN if those players are unkillable, which I doubt. I agree with that point, which I said. I just find the "go PvP if you want fights" argument to be flawed. I don't pretend to be a balance engineer, and I also don't have the ability to test changes in game like the devs do. That is something I would need access to, as well as being able to see what build these people are running, I can make guesses based on what I see, but there are lots of unknowns and while I play most classes, some I don't know well enough to be able to tell what traits etc they are running just from a fight (at least not all), and PMing them about their build often just results in some insult and block, after all, most of these people enjoy being trolls, so it's expected. I am also probably not the best person for that job either, as there are many far better players than myself. For me it comes down to, in the example of the engi, it's ability to heal, often times going from 10% to 90% instantly, even though it still has high mobility access, blocks, invulnerability, barrier up time, range denial, CC etc etc, yes, lacks pretty much all dmg. It's the fact it can face tank and STILL do all of the above, making it great for trolling, and most classes have SOME sort of build that can troll well, though some much better than others, such as some thief builds or druid builds. This comes down to not just stats, or a healing skill, but having access to other sources of healing, many skills that having extra healing, protection up time etc. boons are a big part of it. Even in large scale, its all about who can strip the stab and bomb faster than FB and engi can clear everything and reapply boons. However this is becoming more common in builds at the solo level, with almost full protection up time, constant stab etc, strong boons like these should not have that sort of up time (big time in solo), it becomes more like a passive that is always up, rather than skilled use to counter a CC or burst etc. Now, before the engi mains come in thinking I am asking for a nerf, I am not, most engi builds I have zero issue with, it's the troll build only, though knowing anet, their fix would be short sighted and nerf it across the board. It's to easy to just throw things out there that would fix the issue, but hurt something else, such as other builds or diversity. And yes, I understand these builds are part of that, however that does not change my stance that they (troll builds) are not healthy for the game. There is no fix for "troll" builds that doesn't hit "legit" builds. Hit? Probably not, but that is not the goal, keeping them useful while giving something else as a trade off to replace what the "legit" builds lose. I don't buy into "can't be fixed" that is just lazy. So many games get it right, so can this one, we have just had so little serious looks at balance that it seems impossible at this point. If a class can't be balanced it's a design issue and it needs to be rethought.Nothing is perfect. "Troll" builds are scarce and not even that annoying, if they could be nuked without any collateral damage sure, but it's not worth the collateral damage to hit a few outlier builds that see extremely little use and are annoying but not much else.

That's not a problem in WvW ... the objective isn't to kill people ... that's just a means to an end to capture zones, etc ... If you want to simply kill people, you have PVP for that. PvP is about nodes. It's not about fights even remotely. WvW is by far the best place to go for fights. I haven't looked at the scoreboard any at all (beyond to see if I will need to move server to escape t1-t3 lag/zergfests) and WvWs been my primary gamemode for years now. You are however 100% right about unkillable builds not being a problem if they pose no threat in WvW as one can always just move on. Right ... because in PVP, there is a much more direct link between successfully killing players and winning. That's not as direct in WvW. You can kill tons of players ... but still lose because WvW objectives are strategically linked to the zone ownership. No there's barely even a link in PvP. Also a lot more people play WvW for reasons beyond trying to go up 1 tier so one can get more lags and enemies that are more scared to leave their blobs. I won't argue with you because clearly you missed the point ... there is a DISTINCT difference between the objectives in PVP and WvW, and that difference is why tanky builds in WvW isn't a problem, EVEN if those players are unkillable, which I doubt.I agree with that point, which I said. I just find the "go PvP if you want fights" argument to be flawed. I don't pretend to be a balance engineer, and I also don't have the ability to test changes in game like the devs do. That is something I would need access to, as well as being able to see what build these people are running, I can make guesses based on what I see, but there are lots of unknowns and while I play most classes, some I don't know well enough to be able to tell what traits etc they are running just from a fight (at least not all), and PMing them about their build often just results in some insult and block, after all, most of these people enjoy being trolls, so it's expected. I am also probably not the best person for that job either, as there are many far better players than myself. For me it comes down to, in the example of the engi, it's ability to heal, often times going from 10% to 90% instantly, even though it still has high mobility access, blocks, invulnerability, barrier up time, range denial, CC etc etc, yes, lacks pretty much all dmg. It's the fact it can face tank and STILL do all of the above, making it great for trolling, and most classes have SOME sort of build that can troll well, though some much better than others, such as some thief builds or druid builds. This comes down to not just stats, or a healing skill, but having access to other sources of healing, many skills that having extra healing, protection up time etc. boons are a big part of it. Even in large scale, its all about who can strip the stab and bomb faster than FB and engi can clear everything and reapply boons. However this is becoming more common in builds at the solo level, with almost full protection up time, constant stab etc, strong boons like these should not have that sort of up time (big time in solo), it becomes more like a passive that is always up, rather than skilled use to counter a CC or burst etc. Now, before the engi mains come in thinking I am asking for a nerf, I am not, most engi builds I have zero issue with, it's the troll build only, though knowing anet, their fix would be short sighted and nerf it across the board. It's to easy to just throw things out there that would fix the issue, but hurt something else, such as other builds or diversity. And yes, I understand these builds are part of that, however that does not change my stance that they (troll builds) are not healthy for the game. There is no fix for "troll" builds that doesn't hit "legit" builds.

Disregarding the suboptimal trait/skill/sigil/rune setup Pizza is bad food, there exists many strictly better options Icicle is a bad utility, magnanimous/corsair tuning crystals are clearly much better Infusions slots aren't even full Clearly not the bestest

TTK was about the same as it is now, outside of the few outlying builds, though rotations and combat was faster, the TTK in my own recordings works out about the same. Just like Sustain is fine (I never said otherwise), except for the few outlying builds. Overall TTK has gone up a bit imo and feels good now. I am sure in some situations it has, though part of that I believe is due to people running more tanky. Before the patch for a few weeks, some people I duel with did testing on TTK on different builds and classes, most required changes, however TTK is still about the same, you run more glassy on the builds, however that doesn't matter as much as you would think, because over all dmg was nerfed and the 1 shot combo builds dont really exist anymore, so most fights turned out the same. Though if you feel it went up, it's not something I would care to argue, as if it did, it was not by that much, again, excluding the outliers from before.Fair enough Imo contesting should be doing damage to the actual building. But anything would be an improvement over the current state, tho i don't really care. On troll thief yes, however even sustain built ones I still manage to kill, as they rely on mobility and evades, not pure tanking dmg and being able to heal through it, while annoying to fight, I find them more than killable, as most are not that good, as I said above, sustain builds that require active skill use I don't mind as much and can often still kill. Though I would not argue that the point is still to troll, as it is, so removing it from the game I would have no problem with.The non-mobile ones you can generally run from. But out of curiosity what builds do you feel needs a bed to sustain and how would one achieve this without nerfing them in a group setting (or a solo setting where they don't run a 0 dmg build)? I said nothing about stats, nor do I think that is the problem. And nerfing stats is only going to impact all builds, including non-troll builds that depend on them. Alright, good

TTK was about the same as it is now, outside of the few outlying builds, though rotations and combat was faster, the TTK in my own recordings works out about the same. Just like Sustain is fine (I never said otherwise), except for the few outlying builds. Overall TTK has gone up a bit imo and feels good now. I never said troll builds or sustain builds were new, how long they have existed for has nothing to do with if they are healthy for a game. Thats the point, some of the builds have so much you dont have to be good to survive, that is what makes them so troll. If it was due to well played counters and the like, I have no problem with it. Well mobility/avoidance is the problem, thief can do ranged poke and keep you in combat forever in full zerk too, this is really common and something I encounter almost on a daily basis, defensive stats have nothing to do with it. There's a reason you don't see "troll" firebrands or necros. Imo contesting should be doing damage to the actual building. But anything would be an improvement over the current state, tho i don't really care. Thats the point, the troll is to keep you in combat and to contest WPs. It can't kill me or do much else other than troll, so removing these from the game is no loss. I don't understand your defense of the build, you admit it's a troll, so why keep it? Well changing defensive stats shouldn't change much. If you're saying "Lets nerf mobility, stealth and/or evades" Then I am for it. But if you're saying let's nerf defensive stats then I am against it. That's not a problem in WvW ... the objective isn't to kill people ... that's just a means to an end to capture zones, etc ... If you want to simply kill people, you have PVP for that. PvP is about nodes. It's not about fights even remotely. WvW is by far the best place to go for fights. I haven't looked at the scoreboard any at all (beyond to see if I will need to move server to escape t1-t3 lag/zergfests) and WvWs been my primary gamemode for years now. You are however 100% right about unkillable builds not being a problem if they pose no threat in WvW as one can always just move on. Right ... because in PVP, there is a much more direct link between successfully killing players and winning. That's not as direct in WvW. You can kill tons of players ... but still lose because WvW objectives are strategically linked to the zone ownership. No there's barely even a link in PvP. Also a lot more people play WvW for reasons beyond trying to go up 1 tier so one can get more lags and enemies that are more scared to leave their blobs.

Pure Damage builds should not be allowed. Lower skilled players are always going to gravitate towards such highly mobile and bursty builds, as you not punished for mistakes that hard and these builds are very forgiving which is great for new/lower skilled players which also make up the majority of the player base. So what happens is you run around and most of your fights are against people that you just instantly burst kill, and they can just burst kill you, which ends up being an unfun experience of 1 shots. Could something please be done to adjust the stats on WvW's PvE gear to ensure such builds are not in the game like you do for PvP? I feel this would make WvW a lot more enjoyable and a better experience. Thanks for reading! Exactly Berserker, Assassin, Marauder etc are all so unfun to fight, I just get 100-0 in a few seconds, no counterplay possible even, and even if i win it was over in a second or two And you are right....Which is why just a few months back we had a HUGE power reduction, though as I said back before it released, that sustain needed to be looked at just as much, as the idea was, or should have been a reduction in BURST ability, that is the "1 shot" combo builds, it shouldn't have have been to increase the overall TTK. I know more than a few who didn't agree with me, however I think over all TTK was fine before the patch, it was outliers that if you did the rotation right, you were going to get a down. However, they did not look at all the aspects of sustain and here we are.Sustain for nerfed. Sustain is fine atm. TTK was too low. Trollbuilds exist, nomad thief for example isn't anything new. They're annoying but that's about it, they don't achieve anything. The "best" ones aren't facetanking much they just run high mobility/evades with tanky stats to cover any gaps in their evade uptime. If anything the keep tagging mechanic and/or how ridiculous mobility there is should be reduced. Well they can't kill you either so just move on, as a solo player you won't be able to kill everything

Ye I was super confused when I came back and couldn't swap mid air. Really screws you over with charged mists