Hey i am Lukfruit.3860 i am a lazy casual who likes to play mesmer. Been Playing on and off since 2015?

What i am currently working on[edit]

I am currently writing a What to do with guide and a (Temporally on hold) guide to Commanding

Off-meta Black Lion Chest Key Weekly[edit]

This is work in progress Human, commoner-orphanage, boost to 10 with tomes as guardian, warrior or thief with twink gear, runes and sigils are the meta variants. Here are my notes on off-meta options

To-Do[edit]

: Human - Nobility A; Human - Nobility B; Human - Commoner A; Human - Commoner B; Human - Rat A; Human - Rat B
: Sylvari — White Stag B
: Norn — Optimize Protecting the Mists; Norn — Ancient Foes A; Norn — Ancient Foes B
: Charr — Iron Legion B; Charr — Blood Legion B; Charr — Ash Legion B - Iron legion help
: Asura — Statistics B; Asura — Synergetics B

Try Revenant Condi level 20 with corruption trait line
maybe forgo vengeful hammers for another trait?

Race Notes[edit]

Recommended choices are bold

Human (i do a full key run in about 13 minutes. With twink gear and better execution time can be cut down to about 9 minutes) [edit]

Nobility — TBD
Commoner-Orphanage — it's the baseline, it's the meta. there are multiple guides online, i won't go into too much detail.
Street Rat — TBD

Sylvari (about 4-7 minutes slower than human in my runs)[edit]

Of note is that Sylvari seems to be the only race that can't skip starting zone by levelling and using WP (effectively 30 seconds to 3.5 minutes slower than humans depending on luck just based on this fact alone). In addition to this each 5th chapter doesn't end until the player goes back to the grove and talks to the Pale Tree (~30 seconds more depending on loading times)

Green Knight (about 4-7 minutes slower than human in my runs): Chapter one is relatively quick; Chapter 2 is 4-5 wave defence, takes a lot of time and i don't think it is possible to speed it up much; Chapter 3 is relatively fast. Getting to it is a bit annoying, but go there interact with 3 items (2 inside the building, 1 outside), kill veteran and their escort.; Chapter 4a — Okkam is very fast. Rush in, break the gate, run out.; Chapter 4b — Gwynen is a 6 wave defence, extremely slow compared to the other option. In turn the player gets to fight with their own weapons in chapter 5, which is faster, but is negated by RP time before the fight.; Chapter 5 — Fight a champion. They don't have much HP but you get a very weak hammer, so if you have damaging utilities those will come in handy.

White Stag (about 11 minutes slower than human in my runs)
chapter 1, The player can run past all the risen (the npc needs to reach the final checkpoint for the mission to complete).
chapter 2, the risen will be chasing the stag and can be killed either while they are chasing the stag or at the end of the chase.
chapter 3, just listen to dialogue and kill the elite.
chapter 4a, distraction seems to scale with how quickly the player can win the duel (needs to be verified), and right after the caithe's bar is filled they can start running away from the setlement (the stag needs to reach the final checkpoint for the mission to complete).
chapter 4b, WiP
chapter 5, multi wave defence + duel against a veteran the walks to their spot rather slowly
Shield of the Moon(about 7-10 minutes slower than human in my runs)
[&BDQBAAA=] [&BLoEAAA=] — Waypoints used in this run
Chapter 1 is a back and forth run. Inside the instance the player has to kill the trolls that are guarding the ointment before being able to loot it and then they have to kill the veteran troll. Back to quest giver and then into the home instance.
Chapter 2 is a 4 5+ targets wave defence, with forced 1 minute of wait time beforehand.
Chapter 3 is back at the grove. forced RP walk, followed by improvised weapon fight, followed by a veteran fight with your weapons. if your profession has good damaging utilities might be worth swapping to them.
Chapter 4 is far away from any WP you might have gotten at this point. More RP walk, forced zone clear with additional enemies that come as you clearing the zone, followed by a veteran fight.
Chapter 5a - help a friend. This is a mini boss fight, rather close to the last chapter where you alternate between damaging the boss and killing a wave of 4 enemies. This options is significantly faster than the alternative
Chapter 5b - protect the village. Multiwave defence, with waves spawning on timer and far away from where you'll be standing. Takes ~5 minutes

Norn (about 3 minutes slower than human in my runs)[edit]

Wild Spirits (Minotaur) (about 7-8 minutes slower than human in my runs)
chapter 1 is an extremely slow escort
chapter 2 is a run through several points, followed by a veteran fight
chapter 3 requires the player to either do a giant detour or climb mountains with skyscale, also the player has to kill sons of svanir in the instance on the way to the minoutaur to complete the chapter even though objective doesn't mention it (only the ones next to the tent and bridge entrance)
chapter 4a - merchant slightly faster . Player RPs as a merchant by doing shuttle runs from eir to each of the 3 groups of svanir, and then after a bit of dialogue has to fight each of the groups one by one. overall a slow chapter
chapter 4b - minotaur. Player is transformed into a minotaur with terrible hitbox, and everything but skill 1 being bad. they then have to fight 5 waves of enemies. Not fun or fast.
chapter 5 is far away and player has to kill all enemies in the instance. Also secondary boss likes to charge away and stay there fighting a minotaur spirit.

Protecting the Mists (about 3 minutes slower than human in my runs): Hoelbrak WP [&BHQBAAA=] Home WP [&BNUDAAA=] Grawl Cave WP [&BMMDAAA=] Chapter 3 WP [&BHUBAAA=] — Waypoints used in this run; chapter 1 is very fast, run to a NPC, run to the instance, run to the object ignoring the enemies (if you are nimble enough to not be in combat, tp to the Hoelbrak WP (Horncall WP), otherwise leave instance and TP to Hoelbrak WP), run to the home instance talk to NPCs; chapter 2 TP to Horncall WP run to the instance near the leopard shrine, talk to NPC, enter the portal, kill 4 wave of enemies (2left-3left-2right-2center), leave the portal, TP to home instance, make a choice.; chapter 3a — Bear: TP to Horncall WP, run to the instance north, under the arch, escort the dolyaks while killing NPC (maybe they can be skipped need to verify) and destroying the barricade; chapter 3b — Raven: TP to WP next to the grawl cave from chapter one, go for a swim north into the underwater tunnel, emerge on the other side of the mountain grab a WP and enter the instance. Run to the NPC, escort him while killing 2 waves of enemies, cutscene, ignore the enemies that spawned in cutscene, run to exit, kill the enemies that spawned, continue running to exit. While this instance is further, than the bear one, the chapter itself is faster and you get a WP that is closer to chapter 5; chapter 4 — WP to home instance WP, run to the instance past the Tooth of Jormag, enter the portal, run past all the npcs, skip a cutscene, wait for icebrood to arrive, kill them, enter the portal and listen to NPCs; chapter 5: TP to WP taken in chapter 3, instance is all the way at the waterfall (you likely don't have a WP closer). Get to the instance, run into the cave, agrroing everyone, kill all the enemies (they should have followed you in), skip cutscene, kill veteran and adds, talk to the friendly NPC, ignore the enemies and dps the portal. the end.

Ancient Foes (Jotun) has a forced transform in final mission and it's weaker than your gear.

Charr (about 5.5 minutes slower than human in my runs if doing Blood legion path)[edit]

Blood legion (about 5.5 minutes slower than human in my runs if doing Blood legion path)
[&BIABAAA=][&BKsDAAA=][&BH8BAAA=] — Waypoints used in this run
Chapter 1 is in home instance , where you fight several waves of enemies, and veteran followed by a second instance outside the city where the players fights more waves of enemies and a veteran.
Chapter 2 is an Arena fight where the player fights waves of enemies with a champion and a veteran at the end. with several unskippable cutscenes
Chapter 3a - Wraith. you can jump over fence from a higher nearby rock and run towards the final boss, but in general the NPC would be tied up fighting mobs in the penultimate area and until he reaches the final area, the player will not be able to speak with them to complete the story instance.
Chapter 3b - Fury WiP
Chapter 4 is a large instance where you first scare cows with 1 unskippable cutscene then fight 2 waves of fire elementals (3+3) then far away player has to fight 3 waves of enemies
Chapter 5 is far away from all the previous story instances, player utilities are replaced with skills that are not particularly useful.

Ash legion(about 18+ minutes^~150%slower compared to human runs)
[&BIABAAA=][&BKsDAAA=][&BDcEAAA=][&BH8BAAA=] — Waypoints used in this run
Chapter 1 is a three instance story, with a long "follow them" section
Chapter 2 instance is very far away and involves 3 wave defence and a lot of listening to NPCs to progress
Chapter 3a - help blood legion, story instance is far away and in it you'll have to listen to a lot of dialogue and fight 5 waves of enemies that spawn in large amount
Chapter 3b - help iron legion WiP
Chapter 4 is a 2 instance story, 2nd instance involves killing a veteran with overtuned HP, sneaking around and, you guessed it, fighting 4 waves of enemies (5-5-5-5)
Chapter 5 involves killing a massive amount of enemies, you can summon trolls but they won't kill a lot on their own, and you'll probably have to assist them. Then you'll have to fight 1 easy enemy boss.

Iron legion (about 8 minutes^~66% slower than human in my runs)
[&BIABAAA=][&BKUDAAA=][&BKsDAAA=] — Waypoints used in this run
Chapter 1. Before entering the instance grab hero's Waypoint west of the home instance entrance. The story involves killing a lot of spread out enemies in the home instance. TP to Smokestead WP afterwards.
Chapter 2 is a relatively long defense mission followed by unskippable dialogue and unskippable cutscene in another instance. TP to Smokestead WP afterwards.
Chapter 3 is the fastest mission in this path, kill 3 waves of enemies with "improvised" weapon (the player gets to keep their utilities and they can run towards the enemies to speed this process up) then kill the veteran. Exit the instance.
Chapter 4 is not 1 but 2 defences. in the first defence player has to kill 3 waves with 3 subwaves in them. Subsequent primary waves don't start spawning until the previous wave is fully cleared. Try to kill enemies as they are spawning (due to rng your shot still might miss a few). Start 2nd defence by dropping turrets right next to you to start it earlier and then reposition them afterwards. Before each of the 3 waves you'll have to talk to the NPC to launch the wave. Exit the instance.
Chapter 5a - Blood Legion Cannon. this path is much faster since there are timed defences, destroy 3 trebuchets with a cannon (it takes 2 shots from skill 1 to destroy a trebuchet) and clean up the ghosts (on lower view distance settings, the player might not be able to see trebuchets or the ghosts under certain angles). Then run into the crypt and kill a veteran.
Chapter 5b - Ash Legion turrets. WiP

Asura (about the same or slightly faster than human-commoner in my runs)[edit]

Dynamics — Massively Impressive Golem(about 10 minutes^~80% slower than human in my runs)
[&BEAAAAA=][&BPcEAAA=] — Waypoints used in this run
Chapter 1 has a lot of dialogue and unskippable cutscenes. When done TP to Soren Draa WP (next to Rata Sum)
Chapter 2 is a long "Simon says" mini-game followed by chasing and dpsing the golem. When golem is moving to a specific checkpoint (there will be 2 total), get it as close to 50% without reaching it otherwise it'll stop and regenerate health to full thus extending the duration of the chase. The player will have to go through at least 2 full hp bars of the golem (50% + 50% + 100%). When done TP to Soren Draa WP (next to Rata Sum)
Chapter 3 is a multiwave defense (6+3) with a bunch of unskippable dialogue. When done TP to Hydrone Unit WP (slightly north of the one you've been using)
Chapter 4 requires you to clear the whole mini zone kill everything even things outside of objective circle. When done, exit the instance if fuse option was chosen
Chapter 5-Extract ^{(about 11 minutes^~95% slower than human in my runs)}(other option is faster) is a 4 wave defense, with a veteran fight at the end.
Chapter 5 - Fuse story instance is far away, and involves an npc slow walking their way to the objective. After that the objective is hard to click on. After the fusion, player can run straight to exit of the "facility" and then fight 1 big wave of enemies

Statistics — Very Old Energy Detector(about 8 minutes^~66% slower than human in my runs)
[&BEAAAAA=][&BPcEAAA=] — Waypoints used in this run
Chapter 1 is a long run back and forth instance followed by a second instance far away. In the second instance you can dive into the water and go into the underwater cave without having to wait for the dialogue to finish.
Chapter 2 is a jog to the farthest corner of the home instance followed by jog back and a lenthy 3 wave defense with timed breaks. At the end just leave the instance.
Chapter 3 takes place in 2 instances: Rata Sum and near a lake, where you have no WP nearby. in Rata Sum instance there is a lot of dialogue but some of it can be skipped if you find the artifact early (it's behind the counter where NPC was, next to the wall)
Chapter 4a - Intercept WiP, but it forces you to transform into outdated powersuit, which is bad at combat in modern day GW2
Chapter 4b - Base Assault. It is actually close to the 5th chapter instance and is much faster. Bring stability. Enter instance, wait for dialogue to finish, choose to hack entrance, pick first option afterwards. Run to the top Floor, fight Teyo,, one of her attacks is a 3 second daze. Loot the artifact.
Chapter 5 - enter the cave, carry the piece of metal from the ground and short curcuit one of the keypads, then do the same for the other one. Veteran fight is alternating between dpsing the boss and killing the adds it summons, while it is immune.

Synergetics — Interspatial Translocator (about the same time or slightly faster than my human runs): 1st chapter is a quick wave defence; 2nd chapter is kill enemies and then get to the point skipping everything after a cutscene (if you get to the point without aggro it will be even faster since you have to ressurect a character).; Make sure to do a little detour on the way to chapter 3 and grab a Loch Waypoint — or Old Golem Factory Waypoint — , either will save time in getting to chapter 5.; 3rd chapter is run to the zojja, kill veteran then kill whoeve zojja is engaged in combat with to finish the chapter, select Varkk; 4th chapter-Varkk is a quick wave defence with veteran at the end; 4th chapter-crewmate ???; 5th chapter is a kill veteran event after a bit of in-game dialogue

Profession Notes[edit]

Scroll Boost oriented builds

Instead of using 10 levelup tomes i like to use boost scrolls that your characters get on birthdays. Depending on the scroll though it alters the build a bit. In addition to this i don't really enjoy playing as mesmer, engineer and necromancer for this. I'd say my two favourite classes for weekly black lion chest key farm are elementalists and revenant.

Personal note on level 10 revenant key runs: overall didn't feel that good. No movement skills and felt very limited due to lack of skill points. Maybe it is possible to level dwarf all the way to road and use that instead of the hammers?

overall it seems that doing level 10 runs without twink gear it way too slow, as the lack of skills is traits is really felt. At level 11 you get enough skill points to only unlock 2 consquetive skills

Thief lvl10: 2nd prep trap in thief is better than the first one

Elementalist lvl10: staff still feel better

Personal Note on mesmer key runs: Mesmer has no easy access to movement boosts and the weapons available to them early on are lacking in burst power. as result a large portion on their damage has to rely on shatters. Not sure if it is worth going for focus for swiftness. GS also does not perform particularly well. Maybe Staff + X/Torch is the way to go with Illusions-Shatter Storm Trait
edit: this has been performing relatively well for a mesmer (level 60): Staff + Scepter/Torch [&DQcYPS0dAAAjD24BawEAAIYBAACAAQAAvAEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAADVgBmAFkAAA==] but Staff 3 and Phantasmal Defender feel a bit slow and clunky to use, might be worth to swap the later for something else? Also mesmers CDR on CC might be either working on the weapon that applied the CC, even if it was swapped, or just straight up affects swapped weapons. Particular noticeable with the staff 5

Level 20[edit]

Warrior: Strength Shout/Stance/Banner feels like the way to go, lots of self buff, and discipline provides nice MS buff. Weapons are GS and Hammer. http://gw2skills.net/editor/?PKAUWA7iNCOUA-e

[&DQIECgAAAACmAAAAqAAAAGkAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA=]

Guardian:

Revenant: Pick up a sword for offhand and an axe from levelling reward, during

Legendary Dwarf Stance use weapon skills, during

Legendary Assassin Stance use utility skills and

Ancient Echo, make sure

Impossible Odds is up as much as possible as not only does it increase damage but also grants movement speed.

there won't be enough skill points to unlock 2nd minor traitline

Ranger:

Thief:

Elementalist: Staff with glyphs at 21 you can unlock air spec http://gw2skills.net/editor/?PGQAYjJYVGldhlDA-e

you can't get the major trait, i just don't know how to disable it. Fire at this level relies on sunspot that i don't find comfortable or good

Level 30[edit]

Warrior:

Guardian:

Revenant:

Ranger:

Thief:

Engineer: I think level 30 is the earliest you can use engineer of BLCK runs since this is the earliers you get flamethrower and decent traits to complement it. http://gw2skills.net/editor/?PegAoqlFw6YbsQYxCA-e Not sure ig it's better to go Gadgets or elixirs for skills. Since we go a bit deeper in trait lines we don't get access to the Elite.

Elementalist: Staff with glyphs at 31 you can unlock Elite Glyph http://gw2skills.net/editor/?PGQAYlJwqYUsLGJW0A-e

Level 40[edit]

Level 40 boost provides enough skill points to finish a traitline and unlock 1 elite skill with about 36 skill points left to go.

Warrior: Discipline Shout/Stance/Banner feels like the way to go, lots of self buff, and discipline provides nice MS buff. Weapons are GS and Axe/Sword. http://gw2skills.net/editor/?PKwAEdzlFwGZXsOGJuMB-e

Guardian:

Revenant:

Ranger: GS/Bow with movement speed, might spirit, might command and might elite. Marksmanship traitline for more burst http://gw2skills.net/editor/?POgAMFlZwyYKMRGKOUB-e

Thief:

Engineer: Elixirs are pretty decent, including the elite one (for aoe), however we still need another skill so i chose turret. For traitline i feel Explosions is the best choice due to burstiness and power synergy http://gw2skills.net/editor/?PeQAQlFwOYWsKmKOsB-e Not sure ig it's better to go Gadgets or elixirs for skills. Since we go a bit deeper in trait lines we don't get access to the Elite.