so which supports are viable now

[Stand The Wall.6987]

healbreaker is loldruid is lolfirebrand is loltried a weird sage chrono spamming mantra of pain. seems on the edge of viability but not enough team cleanse.

haven't tried tempest or core guard. double sage scourge might be a thing but only 1 on a team seems like it wouldn't work. scrapper has the best healing i think but not a lot of ways to deal with power pressure. herald is ok i guess, you need herald for heal facet and shield or there is no way to deal with pressure. 2k natural harmony is very weak, plus the tablet is too slow most times and the orb mechanic of ventari is a meme.

looking like tempest or scrapper, rest fall behind. the repeated nerfs to core guard and then removal of menders might be the straw that broke the camels back.

[felix.2386]

support scourge and support core guard, duhhealbreaker still kinda playable, with reveal and CC spam.

[mistsim.2748]

Sage Scourge for sure.

Probably Sage Druid with 2 traps and Ancient Seeds, but I have to test this.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?POgAYVlVwYYhML2JW+Opt6SMeFA-z5YfCKcA

Something like this. I wouldn't run it as a side noder. I'd just follow the team or +1 for disruption and heals. It brings a ton to the table, especially with projectile hate, and Healing Spring given the emerging and oppressive condi meta.

Tempests have honestly just been food for me (not on that build). They can't just can't keep up with the pressure any more.

[Trevor Boyer.6524]

Supports that seem strong from 5 man AT point of view:

1. Support Scourge = This is dominant. Still lots of barrier and condi cleanse, generates a lot of might, converts a lot of boons into condis, it can decap nodes without needing to kill anything due to fear spam and it can actually do this solo and win 1v1s outside of vs. Spellbreaker and Rangers, can abuse revive functions, and in general dishes out a lot of damage for the level of sheer support it possesses. But what really makes Scourge stacking broken is that unlike boons & traits such as Regeneration or Absolute Resolution that do not stack intensity from multiple sources, Barriers DO STACK from multiple scourge sources. <- This is really why Scourge stacks are cheese.
2. Core Guard = It's still good, but it's definitely a 2nd choice under Scourge. Good raw healing, might stacks, condi cleanse, it does have stab, good aegis output when it matters, but it has no damage output and rather ineffective decap ability, it also can't actually win 1v1s. I'm not really too sure exact details of what happened, but Core Guard support feels more effective than Firebrand.
3. Prot Holos = Surprisingly strong choice to counter Scourge play, which lately is bringing back Prot Holo play. They cleanse a lot of condis for the team and actually most of that condi cleanse is converting condis into boons for your team, so you can see how it's countering Scourge offense. Prot Holo also has a lot of damage output and CC to be able to deal with Scourges.
4. Literally any revive skill/trait in this current patching is OP support, even when brought on non-support builds.

Anything outside of these 3 builds and in general revive skills/traits, I'm not seeing do very well in ATs as of lately. It's not to say that Tempest or Shout Spellbreaker isn't viable at all, but the way the meta is being driven by Scourges in this patching, the above 3 listings are the potent supports.

[Leonidrex.5649]

power inspiration mirage with double feedback, to zoom around and deny any fun ( kills ) from anyone.mark my words its the real shit

[Stand The Wall.6987]

@mistsim.2748 said:Probably Sage Druid with 2 traps and Ancient Seeds, but I have to test this.

yea i faced one the other day, it was mean. god i hate pulsing immob so much.

[Stand The Wall.6987]

@Leonidrex.5649 said:power inspiration mirage with double feedback, to zoom around and deny any fun ( kills ) from anyone.mark my words its the real kitten

yea interesting that the trait wasn't nerfed, guess they skipped over it cuz no one uses inspiration.

[Stand The Wall.6987]

@Trevor Boyer.6524 said:Supports that seem strong from 5 man AT point of view:

1. Support Scourge
2. Core Guard
3. Prot Holos
4. Literally any revive skill/trait in this current patching is OP support, even when brought on non-support builds.

scourge seems like it will always be strong. i hope they stop with the nerfs and start buffing stuff, such as strong meta classes counters. berserker and daredevil come to mind.

i honestly don't understand why core guard works. everything it does another class can do better with the exception of stab and burst heal sorta. ofc theres rez sig too. heal rev has similar burst heals but with much shorter cd, and better condi cleanse and stab if running dwarf (altho i don't think dwarf/ ventari is viable). it misses out on a rez but it has decent rez safety with cc spam and no enemy stab. heal scrap has better overall heal but less burst and way better condi cleanse, as well as good cc and better ways to deal with burst. scrap also has a good rezzer. tempest is very durable, has ok cleanse, kinda falls behind on the heals but makes up for it in utility.

prot holo is pretty good yeah, tried it a few times. interesting to see the meta build take thumper turret, i also used it in my build altho i might've unconsciously copied that from a mat i watched if they used it there. it does everything well, holo is a strong all round class.

on the subject of revives, the guard bubble is funny as hell. its a great way to secure revives and stomps and generally piss off the enemy team. must be annoying to be manhandled like that lol. i would be torn between that and the heal bow if i ran core guard. to hell with retreat shout.

[choovanski.5462]

tempest looks like it's gonna be the meta choice rncore guard is strong too, and scourge as an off support too ofc

[mistsim.2748]

@choovanski.5462 said:tempest looks like it's gonna be the meta choice rncore guard is strong too, and scourge as an off support too ofc

Faced a bunch of tempests in low Plat and they basically do a whole bunch of nothing. Other than die very fast when perma immobed and bombed by condis.

From what I've seen, Scourge is by far the most effective support and I don't see the support meta going beyond just Scourge unless it sees some significant shaves.

It's a Rez meta right now. Much easier to just let someone drop, teleport their body to you, and Rez them near instantly.

[RedAvenged.5217]

Offensive pressure + Rez potential is the meta- definitely tempest since those are great. In my testing I found sage bunker scourge to be great cuz of Rez potential.

The only actual questionsof what might be good is-

1 - can a burn/condi support besides scourge work, which might be firebrand but who knows how good it is.

2- some kindof engineer for the elixer rs insane Rez power. Only question is how can u make that work in team fights? Will it be a cc machine or will it spam boons?

That’s about it. Ofc all supports will work to a degree but tempest and scourge for sure, rest up in the air

[NorthernRedStar.3054]

I've been playing shoutguard to a good success. It's not as strong as scourge, obv, and requires far more terrain use, LoS and timing.

[Green Thumb Gamers.3608]

Resmer aka ResBot aka Stompbot

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?PiwAs6ZlVwAZJsGWJeqS5tOA-zZoOjMlC9qCc8A

[&DQctFRc5KB0jDwAAfwEAAIMBAACTEgAAsxIAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA=]

[Vancho.8750]

@Trevor Boyer.6524 said:Supports that seem strong from 5 man AT point of view:

1. Support Scourge = This is dominant. Still lots of barrier and condi cleanse, generates a lot of might, converts a lot of boons into condis, it can decap nodes without needing to kill anything due to fear spam and it can actually do this solo and win 1v1s outside of vs. Spellbreaker and Rangers, can abuse revive functions, and in general dishes out a lot of damage for the level of sheer support it possesses. But what really makes Scourge stacking broken is that unlike boons & traits such as Regeneration or Absolute Resolution that do not stack intensity from multiple sources, Barriers DO STACK from multiple scourge sources. <- This is really why Scourge stacks are cheese.
2. Core Guard = It's still good, but it's definitely a 2nd choice under Scourge. Good raw healing, might stacks, condi cleanse, it does have stab, good aegis output when it matters, but it has no damage output and rather ineffective decap ability, it also can't actually win 1v1s. I'm not really too sure exact details of what happened, but Core Guard support feels more effective than Firebrand.
3. Prot Holos = Surprisingly strong choice to counter Scourge play, which lately is bringing back Prot Holo play. They cleanse a lot of condis for the team and actually most of that condi cleanse is converting condis into boons for your team, so you can see how it's countering Scourge offense. Prot Holo also has a lot of damage output and CC to be able to deal with Scourges.
4. Literally any revive skill/trait in this current patching is OP support, even when brought on non-support builds.

Anything outside of these 3 builds and in general revive skills/traits, I'm not seeing do very well in ATs as of lately. It's not to say that Tempest or Shout Spellbreaker isn't viable at all, but the way the meta is being driven by Scourges in this patching, the above 3 listings are the potent supports.Lets try dumb theory crafting what about Damage ele build but you take Conjure shield and you give the shield to your team fighter, which is probably a necro so you now have a the nightmare scenario of a necro with a shield.

[Archer.4362]

With the new patch none, it is now a kill kill and see who dies before 10 times in the game

[Lord of the Fire.6870]

Yes the patch nearly nothing in the sense that support builds in general didn't get worse it is like -5% selfheal +25% dmg +5% outgoing .(except scourge heal)What changed is that people started to use more range pressure as scourge/reaper and this started even before the patch and playing more necro in general.

Basically they going in 900-1200 range and using the weapons skill ( I think mostly staff) and using their fear skill until you are out of condi clean ad some point they jump on you and using their utility skill which in case of scourge they are all unblockable which means your block skill is wasted. They also using the fear the cancel any rezz skills.

When ever this happens I also see the rest of my random team rarely with me which I only can partially can complain Scourge ability to set pulsing condi fields which contains soft cc is obnoxious.

On the other side if everyone had condi clean for the team with them this would turn out to be a popcorn strategy.