User:Masel/Builds/Druid

Dagger + Torch Condition Druid

Build Rating (Subjective)

Criterion	Rating
Burst Damage	5/5
Sustained Damage	5/5
Utility Options	4/5
Survivability	5/5
Difficulty	2/5

Condition  Druid is a very strong and relatively bursty Condition damage build for instanced content, even with a simplified rotation with like the one I use. It's also a great pick for solo gameplay, as it can provide itself with good amounts of the most essential offensive boons:  Quickness,  Protection,  Fury and  Might. It is inherently resilient, provides good self- and ally-healing, area  Stability, permanent  Immobile and many Dazes.

Link to the Build on the Editor

Playstyle & Skills

Skill Type	Skills
Celestial Avatar Skills
Pet Jacaranda Skills
Dagger + Torch Skills
Utility Skills

Rotation Concept

• The rotation involves using your weapon and utility skills on cooldown and entering   Celestial Avatar as often as possible. That way, you maintain  Natural Balance for higher damage and survivability.
• While the   Celestial Avatar do not have native offensive power,  Eclipse will give them damaging conditions. Given that they retain their defensive support, it makes them very powerful.
• In this build, we are stacking Dazes and source of  Immobile to trigger  Blood Moon as often as possible. That is also the reason why the Jacaranda is the strongest pet, as   Jacaranda's Embrace applies several small hits, with every hit applying  Immobile.
• To be able to go into   Celestial Avatar on cooldown, you need to heal yourself or allies AND deal damage, as that will grant you Astral force via  Celestial Being.
• To do this, it is important to turn on the mildly threatening arena damage in the Special Forces Training Area. In actual content, using area healing abilities like   Healing Spring can help increase Astral force inflow.
• You should always precast   Sharpening Stone to increase your burst damage, it is not stripped when combat starts.
• Inside   Celestial Avatar, use   Natural Convergence,   Seed of Life and   Lunar Impact on cooldown. Note that   Seed of Life does not have a cast time and can be used during other skill casts.
• Outside of   Celestial Avatar, use all skills on cooldown.

CC Skills for breakbar damage:

•   Spike Trap can be used instead of   Viper's Nest for another Launch at a small dps loss.
•   Lunar Impact
• Entering   Celestial Avatar through  Blood Moon
• Many applications of  Immobile in the rotation, maintaining it permanently.

Gear

Important Stats in Hero Panel (descending in Importance):

1. 70% Condition Duration in the hero panel: Superior Sigil of Agony together with  Natural Balance give the remaining 30% for  Bleeding.
2. Maximize Condition damage
3. Maximize Critical chance to trigger   Sharpened Edges reliably.

Gear

Armor	Prefix	Rune
Head	Viper's	Superior Rune of the Trapper
Shoulders	Viper's	Superior Rune of the Trapper
Chest	Viper's	Superior Rune of the Trapper
Gloves	Viper's	Superior Rune of the Trapper
Legs	Viper's	Superior Rune of the Trapper
Boots	Viper's	Superior Rune of the Trapper
Trinket	Prefix
Amulet	Viper's
Ring 1	Viper's
Ring 2	Viper's
Accessory 1	Viper's
Accessory 2	Viper's
Backpack	Viper's
Weapon	Prefix	Sigil
Dagger (Main Hand)	Viper's	Superior Sigil of Agony
Torch (Off Hand)	Viper's	Superior Sigil of Earth
Purpose	Item Type	Source
Damage	Ascended Food	Cilantro and Cured Meat Flatbread
Damage	Non-Ascended Food	Plate of Beef Rendang
Survivability	Ascended Food	Peppered Cured Meat Flatbread
Survivability	Non-Ascended Food	Oysters Gnashblade
Damage	Utility	Toxic Focusing Crystal
Survivability	Utility	Potion Of Karka Toughness
Damage	Relic	Relic of the Fractal

• For a budget variant, simply replace all ascended armor pieces of Viper's with rare/exotic Ritualist's.
• You can use an Axe or a Shortbow on the secondary bar to have access to a ranged weapon on demand. Shortbow is a great weapon for Open World too; more on that below.

Traits

Skirmishing
Wilderness Survival
Druid

DPS Rotation Showcase

You can find my most recent rotation showcase here.

Open World Build

You can find my most recent open world build showcase here.

Link to the Build on the Editor

For OW, it can make sense to make a build more forgiving, so that you can sustain on your own.

Increasing General Survivability

• The first step for increased survivability is to put a Shortbow on the secondary bar and swap to  Light on your Feet in  Skirmishing. That way, you can stay at range whenever it is too dangerous to be in melee range.
• Second, change gear pieces to the following:

Gear

Armor	Prefix	Rune
Vatlaaw's Mask …	Rabid	Superior Rune of the Afflicted …
Vatlaaw's Pauldrons …	Rabid	Superior Rune of the Afflicted …
Vatlaaw's Coat …	Rabid	Superior Rune of the Afflicted …
Vatlaaw's Gloves …	Rabid	Superior Rune of the Afflicted …
Vatlaaw's Leggings …	Rabid	Superior Rune of the Afflicted …
Vatlaaw's Boots …	Rabid	Superior Rune of the Afflicted …
Trinket	Prefix	Upgrade
Candy Corn Amulet	Celestial	Chunk of Petrified Echovald Resin
Ring 1	Viper's
Ring 2	Viper's
Accessory 1	Viper's
Accessory 2	Viper's
Any Crafter's Backpack (Any Crafting Profession)	Celestial	Embellished Brilliant Chrysocola Jewel
Weapon	Prefix	Sigil
Stardust …	Celestial	Superior Sigil of Agony & Superior Sigil of Earth

• Rabid retains the Precision to trigger  Sharpened Edges, but gives you Toughness at little cost and a very small damage loss. Paired with Superior Rune of the Afflicted, you retain the 100% duration on  Bleeding.
• If you want easy Exotic stat-selectable armor for additional pieces of Celestial, take a look at TEID-07 Unified Vendor System in WvW and Bladed armor in PvE.
• In terms of gameplay, remember that going into and exiting   Celestial Avatar decreases incoming damage by 10% via  Natural Balance, so make sure to do that frequently.
• Use the survivability food and utility item listed above for another -10% damage taken and 150 Toughness!
• If you can, make use of jade protocols!   Jade Tech Offensive Overcharge and   Jade Tech Defensive Overcharge give 150 additional Toughness, Vitality, Condition Damage and Power as well as all boons aside from  Stability,  Resistance and  Resolution on entering combat. These effects can be pre-stacked by using an Enchanted Snow Diamond Tonic repeatedly when out of combat. The  Protection from this is another free gain to survivability!
• In story instances (or if you don't want the hassle of reapplying protocols), you can abuse the synergy between Relic of the Cavalier and   Blast from the Skyscale to apply lots of  Aegis,  Resistance,  Might and  Quickness to yourself. It has an internal cooldown of 1 second and thus applies the boons on every hit of   Blast.

Boon Coverage

• In order to cover essential boons, we'll swap out   Sharpening Stone,   Viper's Nest and   Glyph of Alignment for   Quickening Zephyr,   Sun Spirit and   Stone Spirit.

• That allows you to cover essential boons quite easily:

1.   Quickening Zephyr and   Instinctive Engage can provide a decent uptime on  Quickness!
2.   Natural Convergence,   Sun Spirit,   Rejuvenating Tides and Relic of the Midnight King provide  Might
3.  Tail Wind and  Furious Grip apply  Swiftness and  Fury whenever you swap weapons.
4.   Stone Spirit will apply area  Aegis once and pulsing  Protection, allowing you to maintain a good uptime on it. This is especially important due to  Rugged Growth, which heals you while you have  Protection.
5. Using the Siege Turtle pet can aid  Protection uptime through   Hunker Down.
6. Alternatively, you can also make use of   "Protect Me!" instead of   Quickening Zephyr.
7. Make sure to use   "We Heal As One!" on cooldown to extend the boons you have on you and copy the boons from your pet to you and vice-versa.

Dealing with Conditions and Control effects (CC)

•   Seed of Life cleanses conditions.
•   Quickening Zephyr is a Stun break.
•   Natural Convergence grants  Stability, allowing you to ignore incoming CC.
•   "Protect Me!" can be used for another safety net.
•   Healing Spring cleanses conditions on every pulse.