User:Masel/Builds/Scourge
Pistol + Torch Condition Scourge[edit]
Criterion | Rating |
---|---|
Burst Damage | 2/5 |
Sustained Damage | 5/5 |
Utility Options | 5/5 |
Survivability | 5/5 |
Difficulty | 1/5 |
Condition Scourge is a very straightforward and strong Condition damage build for instanced content, especially with a simplified rotation with like the one I use. It's also a great pick for solo gameplay, as it can provides itself with good amounts of many essential boons ( Alacrity, Protection, Fury and Might) and substantial amounts of Barrier. It is therefore inherently resilient and also provides good Defiance bar damage. Finally, it can also be adjusted to provide Alacrity to allies easily, without any adjustments to gear whatsoever.
Link to the Build on the Editor
Playstyle & Skills[edit]
Skill Type | Skills | |||||
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Shroud Skills |
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Pistol + Torch Skills |
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Utility Skills |
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Manifest Sand Shade [edit]
- This skill will place a Shade at the targeted location, which stays there for 8 seconds.
- The Shroud skills on Scourge all affect the area around your character and each Shade you have placed, allowing for interesting tactical gameplay. You can plan ahead by placing Shades shortly before enemies spawn, focus on something else and still have your Shroud skills hit them.
- The Shades have an 8 second cooldown, allowing you to maintain 1 Shade permanently (this becomes easier with Alacrity up). That is also very important to keep the buffs from Sand Sage up, increasing Condition duration and Boon duration by 15%.
- 15 Expertise (Concentration) converts into 1% Condition duration (Boon duration).
- Most of your damage comes from applying Torment, Bleeding and Burning.
Rotation Concept[edit]
- Scourge is fully ranged build by default (aside from Plaguelands), making it very convenient for all kinds of gameplay, as you can freely position yourself and still maintain high damage output.
- The rotation is very simple, as it involves using your weapon and utility skills on cooldown. With Pistol on the main hand, you do not even have to keep track of an auto attack chain. If you lack access to Pistol, using a Scepter instead is a littel worse, but just fine. The fully optimized rotation involves using both anyway.
- Use Manifest Sand Shade on cooldown.
- Use Nefarious Favor on cooldown to trigger Sadistic Searing as often as possible.
- In order to understand the rotation design, it's important to know that Blood Is Power applis Bleeding and Torment to yourself. For maximum damage output, you want to transfer these conditions to enemies as soon as they are applied to you.
- Always pair Desert Shroud and Blood Is Power: Desert Shroud applies the buff from Plague Sending for 6 seconds and the hit from Blood Is Power immediately transfers the self- Bleeding and Torment.
- The only thing you need to be aware of is that using both counts of Blood Is Power as soon as possible is not ideal for sustained damage, as it has a longer cooldown than Desert Shroud. If you use both Blood Is Power counts too soon, you will end up having to delay Desert Shroud to be able to transfer the self- Bleeding and Torment. In actual groups, they usually get cleansed off before you can transfer them in that case.
- It is fine to cleanse (and not transfer) the self-conditions applied by Plaguelands. Sometimes, when Blood Is Power and Plaguelands coincide, prioritize combining Blood Is Power and Desert Shroud.
- As all Necromancers, Scourge gains Life force from nearby deaths or by using skills that directly grant it.
- The rotation will slowly drain you Life force pool against a single enemy. As soon as something around you dies occasionally, you should not have any Life force issues in the long run.
- If you need additional Life force, replace Signet of Spite with Summon Shadow Fiend.
CC Skills for breakbar damage:[edit]
- Vile Blast
- Garish Pillar
- Oppressive Collapse
- Since we're not using a second off-hand weapon, you can put on a Warhorn to use Wail of Doom
Gear[edit]
Important Stats in Hero Panel (descending in Importance):
- 65% Condition Duration in the hero panel: Sand Sage and Barbed Precision together with Meaty Asparagus Skewer give the remaining 35% for Bleeding and 30% for Torment.
- Maximize Condition damage
- Maximize Critical chance to trigger Barbed Precision reliably.
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 |
Pistol (Main Hand) | Viper's | Superior Sigil of Torment |
Torch (Off Hand) | Viper's | Superior Sigil of Bursting |
Purpose | Item Type | Source |
Damage | Ascended Food | Cilantro and Cured Meat Flatbread |
Damage | Non-Ascended Food | Meaty Asparagus Skewer |
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 and trinkets of Viper's with rare/exotic Ritualist's.
- If you want easy Exotic stat-selectable armor for additional pieces of Viper's, Ritualist or Celestial, take a look at TEID-07 Unified Vendor System in WvW and Bladed armor in PvE.
Traits[edit]
Curses | ||||||
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Soul Reaping | ||||||
Scourge | ||||||
Curses [edit]
- Bread and butter traitline for Condition Necromancers, as it includes traits that increase Bleeding output, duration and general Condition damage.
- Barbed Precision applies Bleeding with a 33% chance on critical hits, which is why we want to have a decent amount of Critical chance on Condition Necromancers
Soul Reaping [edit]
- The most relevant traits here are Soul Barbs and Dhuumfire.
- Soul Barbs increases damage by 10% for 15 seconds after entering or exiting Shroud. On Scourge, that's easy to reach by casting Desert Shroud on cooldown.
- Dhuumfire empowers your Shades to apply additional Burning.
Scourge [edit]
- Scourge will empower your Torment and Burning via Demonic Lore and Fell Beacon, respectively.
- Due to Sand Sage and Blood as Sand, you should always maintain 1 Shade to reduce incoming damage and increase both Boon duration and Condition duration.
DPS Rotation Showcase[edit]
You can find my most recent rotation showcase here.
Open World Build[edit]
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[edit]
- The first step for increased survivability is to use Death Magic, Abrasive Grit, Desert Empowerment, Herald of Sorrow and Parasitic Contagion.
- So essentially, we're playing Alacrity Scourge with Death Magic.
- That way, you obtain massive amounts of Toughness, permanent coverage of Protection and passive healing at a fairly small damage loss:
Death Magic | ||||||
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- Putrid Defense & Corrupter's Fervor stack up Death's Carapace very fast and thus provide pulsing Protection when you have more than 25 stacks. Each stack of Poisoned you apply grants 2 stacks! Starting combat with Manifest Sand Shade, Weeping Shots and Vile Blast will stack up 30 stacks within ~2 seconds of starting combat.
- Herald of Sorrow provides Protection and pulsing Barrier via Sandstorm Shroud, which is great to bolster yourself when starting combat prior to stacking Death's Carapace up.
- Deadly Strength also gives large amounts of Power and Condition damage per stack of Death's Carapace.
- Parasitic Contagion heals you for 5% of your outgoing condition damage, which is a nice passive heal you get as long as you keep applying conditions.
- In order to increase inflow of Barrier, we use Sand Flare and Serpent Siphon. The following skills will apply Barrier to you (and allies):
- Sand Flare
- Serpent Siphon
- Sand Cascade
- Sandstorm Shroud x 6
- With Desert Empowerment, Manifest Sand Shade applies Barrier. That way, you can also cover Alacrity on yourself and allies!
- If all of that isn't enough, use the survivability food and utility item listed above for another -10% damage taken and 150 Toughness!
Boon Coverage[edit]
- The coverage of Protection was explained already.
- In order to cover more boons (on allies too!) and increase Life force inflow, we'll also make use of Desiccate:
- Abrasive Grit, Desiccate and Oppressive Collapse provide Might, also in an rea around you.
- Furious Demise and Desiccate apply Fury.
- Through all the Barrier mentionedn above, you will automatically cover Alacrity.
- 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.
- 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.
- Serpent Siphon will apply area Aegis once and additional Regeneration, allowing you to maintain a good uptime on it.
Dealing with Conditions and Control effects (CC)[edit]
- Nefarious Favor cleanses conditions in an area with a very short cooldown and without a cast time.
- Abrasive Grit cleanses conditions on allies whenever you apply Barrier to them, which is... basically always.
- Spectral Walk cleanses conditions, allows you to cover Swiftness on yourself and is a Stun break.
- Spectral Armor grants lots of Life force, provides additional Protection and is a Stun break.
- Trail of Anguish grants Stability, Swiftness, is a Stun break and applies Burning. It has the shortest cooldown of the available Stun breaks.