User talk:Vili/builds

Elementalist/Ranger

Note that Cleansing Wave(skill and evasive arcana) is different from Cleansing Wave(trait). The former heals, the latter doesn't; confusing, I know. The version that does heal is a flat heal, not regeneration, and thus doesn't trigger Cleansing Water. Also, for utility skills, Arcane Wave is a definite must in any staff build to trigger off blast finishers for area might or healing with fire and water fields respectively. Finally, the Ice Elemental from Glyph of Elementals does an occasional 5k aoe heal, while the Earth Elemental essentially can never die, making the glyph a decent moderate cooldown elite for taking away aggro from the group.

For rangers, it's better to take Healing Spring over Troll Unguent on land for the condition removal and water field(fantastic healing tool in dungeons), which rangers sorely lack. For underwater combat, you don't have much choice but to take Troll anyway. Axe would also go better with the build for tagging multiple mobs in events, since it lacks AoE options. A tip with Entangle is to stay away from melee range when you use it, since most melee mobs tend to just freeze there and do absolutely nothing if you are out of range, maximizing the cast. For ranged mobs, pray that its projectiles go over the roots and don't have piercing. Pika Fan 18:45, 15 October 2012 (UTC)

Oh, okay. I haven't actually played my ele yet (because lol eles) and I lack the patience to discover such things while idling in Heart of the Mists, so thanks. As someone else said, there needs to be an area in there where skills recharge 1000x faster, because waiting three minutes for an elite to recharge in order to test what it does is boring. Arcane Wave I dislike because I don't ever want things getting that close to me - or, from another perspective, I don't like using a utility slot just for a finisher. It's probably fine in PvP and dungeons, though.

The thing with Healing Spring is that it's only effective if people actually bother to use it, so for casual PvE and solo it's usually wasted, since people seem to have no clue what a combo field is...or if they do, they don't know the effects, so they'll use any random finisher. Alternatively they'll walk into the spring and hit something like Rapid Fire and think to themselves "wow I must have 10 stacks of regen on me now!" If it's a dungeon, then the potential usefulness of Healing Spring goes way up because 1) you actually have allies who know you exist and 2) they're likely smarter and better than the average scrub. That being said, I've never done dungeons other than everyone's favorite farmable CoF path, and none of these builds are really intended for that purpose (since I can't tell if they'd work or not).

Another reason I prefer Troll Unguent is that at least for my playstyle, it's harder to overheal with it. Most other healing skills in the game, I wait until I'm half-dead so I can get the full benefit. Of course, that's dangerous if there are high damage spikes going around, or I have poison and can't do the mental math to compensate, or I get disabled at a bad time, etc. Troll Unguent I just kind of use whenever it's available, since my pet and I will usually be taking some damage in one way or another, and I try to avoid letting the enemy focus on either of us exclusively for too long.

I also don't agree that Healing Spring is superior because of condition removal (for casual/solo), but I could be biased. On my way from 1-80, my Ranger more or less just laughed at conditions, and I didn't care about removing them. Maybe this was an unusual coincidence, and maybe it was because I had originally decided to go 30 deep in Nature Magic for lol vitality and healing - high vitality makes dots significantly weaker. Still, it was a big contrast from leveling my Thief, where conditions of any sort killed me dead ~instantly. Recently, my Guardian is almost done leveling, and I have to say that conditions are not a big deal for her either; I remove them passively by waiting on Purity or Signet of Resolve. So... I dunno. It's probably a different story in dungeons, but I don't feel conditions are particularly dangerous in PvE for non-Thieves.

As for the mh axe, I hate that weapon. It suffers from the same problem as the Thief's pistol; you can spec for power/crit and make the autoattack decent, or you can spec for conditions and make Splitblade decent. Then there's Winter's Bite, which really doesn't belong in PvE; it's a good at-range snare (still not as good as Muddy Terrain usually), but it lacks the extra abilities of other weapon skill snares, such as also being an evade, or synergizing with traits to give bonus damage, or causing bleeding, etc. The pet inflicts weakness? That's great, since Ranger has like zero other ways to apply that...except it's only against one foe and the duration is likely pitiful. The axe loses significant amounts of damage against a single foe, too...finally, in my experience, Piercing Arrows gives plenty of tagging on its own (should I choose to stay on the shortbow), and sword/axe smacks everything in a really wide radius around me, so it's similarly perfectly good at tagging. Actually, I can't say that's a problem I have ever had for any events on any character. The only time I feel I'm getting cheated out of loot is when people surge way way ahead and engage the enemies early (like, camping right on the spawn points). It's a legitimate tactic, but I dislike it because it puts the individual's profit ahead of the group's benefit; especially on events like defend or escort, putting the fight way far away from its intended area can be dangerous if it splits the fighting force, or there are multiple enemy waves, etc. Vili 点 19:50, 15 October 2012 (UTC)

Elementalist - notes for levelling. Well, that's the thing, isn't it? Either early game eles really suck or I do. Well, I do suck, but not usually this much! Thanks for your builds page, though - it really gives me an insight on how to suck less. — snograt 12:52, 14 November 2012 (UTC)

Shrug, the particular build that I put there for ele doesn't really start to shine until 30 absolute minimum (get Conjure Fiery Greatsword), preferably 60 (Conjurer and Water Magic simultaneously), but definitely 80 for sure. I don't find elementalist particularly hard to play in the early game, but I also have a whole methodology now towards leveling that makes it less difficult, although more boring. I go to all the low-level areas and 100% complete those, earning skill points in the process while also becoming overleveled. That way, I can challenge the personal story much better prepared, and I try to stay overleveled for other PvE parts as well. So for example it'll be Queensdale, Wayfarer Foothills, Caledon Forest, Metrica Province, Plains of Ashford → Kessex Hills → Gendarran Fields → etc, after that have a few different areas I can go, although the choice usually gets made for me based on what Order I join. Priory members will finish Lornar's Pass, for example.

The trick in particular to Elementalist is that it's a high "actions per minute" class; if you want to perform at your best, you've got to mash a lot of buttons rapidly and always be on top of the situation, managing your cooldowns and maintaining battlefield awareness. The build I use doesn't do this quite so much, since it profits a lot from going AFK in Water Attunement, but in general you're swapping attunements rapidly and always looking for best ways to utilize combo fields. I guess my conjures take the place of attunements though, since I need to use the right one for the situation and remember what skills are on cooldown for multiple skillsets. Vili 点 08:43, 15 November 2012 (UTC)

Yes, I've been doing the 4 level 1-15 areas first as a matter of course (then the next 4 levelled areas etc.) - but hell yes, it gets boring by your fourth character. I mean, you have to have one of each class, right? Thankfully I'm not anal enough to need one of each class per race - 40 slots if my maths is correct. Double that for sex. Then again, the same number of races as classes would've been nice. Another 8 crafting disciplines too, please. /spam — snograt 12:26, 15 November 2012 (UTC)

You don't "have" to - after playing Ranger to 80 I can say it's easily the most forgettable class right now, so I could have lived without playing one at all. Necromancer and Mesmer are also pretty flat; the "only good" necro build right now is boring condition spam, and the mesmer is not taken because it's inherently good, but because of broken bullshit like Time Warp. Basically, these three classes don't feel like they have a real purpose or point of being in the game right now. I'll still play them and level them because eventually Anet might change things so they're more fun and have a unique role, but...

It's pretty clear what the purpose is for the remaining 5 classes, or at least they feel different enough from each other. Elementalist and Engineer are versatile classes that mash a lot of buttons to adapt to situations; Warrior is an all-around good class for everything; Guardian's main role is defense and support; and Thief is for high damage and spiking, which is admittedly more of a PvP thing, but still has its uses (they're really good at maintaining Poison, for example, which is great for some dungeons).

I don't think that race makes a huge impact overall. Charr, Asura, and Sylvari each have some interesting and powerful racials...especially on Engineer where they get a bonus skill due to the toolbelt, it can be fun to play around with those combinations. Warrior and Guardian have pretty good non-weapon skills, but Thief and Elementalist definitely could use more variety there, and Ranger there's almost no point to the default utilities at all (they're for PvP, or they're just broken/bad right now). Traps are good, but don't really shine without the associated traits. Still, it's not to the point that I feel I'm missing out by having all Humans.

The bigger deal is the personal story. Humans need six characters to see all variations related to their race; I haven't done extensive research but it looks like that's the same number for all the other races too. If you pair this up with a choice of Order, choice of race to help, and choice of greatest fear, so that you pick each choice twice, that also covers those options. The assault of Orr only needs three characters to see the variations. So six is the lowest factor, and there are five races, so I think you'd only need 30 characters maximum to see all parts of the storyline. There are minor choices that either don't affect anything at all or make changes that are so small they're not noticeable - for example, choosing which of the Six Gods you've been blessed with, as a Human; I'm not counting those.

As for sex, that currently makes almost no difference either. Some dialogue is a little different, and voice acting will also be different, but it makes no overall impact on gameplay. Hell, armor looks exactly the same for male and female Charr and Asura (and pretty similar for Sylvari, to my eyes anyway). Within the six of the same race, it's totally plausible to make some females and males, so I don't think that adds any additional slot requirements.

Finally, I don't see the point of mastering a craft more than once. It's fast and easy experience, so useful for leveling, but characters that level up via crafting miss out on a lot of map exploration and also get way ahead of their personal story. It's a pain to not have <map> unlocked so that you can quickly go there to access a dungeon or holiday event. At the moment, the personal story also helps save money as long as you don't die a ton; you can buy better accessories and back items (only very slightly better for back), but they're rather expensive, and so compounded across multiple characters...

But yeah, GW2 gets pretty boring past the 3rd or so character. I've completed every zone in the game at least once (except Orr, which there's no point in doing that since you're already max level), so it's just repeating the same content over and over. To a certain extent I didn't mind doing this in GW1, because progression went a lot faster in that game; you hit level 20 and got the best equipment way before the halfway point of any campaign. Well, I guess in Prophecies that could happen as late as Droknar's Forge, especially if you got a run, but "power levelling" was cheap and readily available. It's a lot of effort to power level in GW2, and even if you want to level from 1 to 80 via just crafting, that's a lot of materials...I dunno. On the one hand, GW2 rewards having alts for a number of reasons, for example, being able to farm the same nodes repeatedly. On the other hand, it's ridiculously boring to level multiple alts to 80, so even though the game throws experience at you, it feels like it takes forever. In reality I can go from 1-80 in a few days, I guess a week tops, but... Vili 点 16:53, 15 November 2012 (UTC)

So, I have a lvl 50 ele and I've actually been enjoying the conjure weapons! But I was wondering about the weapons you selected, and your build pre-60. Like, I don't really use the flame axe, and you made no mention of the hammer or shield. As for traits, is Water really that useful before you get the "regen = condition removal" trait? Arcane seems a bit more flexible and versatile. --JonTheMon 04:20, 22 November 2012 (UTC)

The hammer and shield are neat for *other people* to use, but I don't like to have my actual elementalist wield them, and especially not solo. Why? Because they are essentially melee weapons, and my build isn't built for non-ranged combat. The hammer would be significantly more useful if Static Field and Lightning Storm used ground targeting (even a short range one); the launching attack is good, but not powerful enough on its own to justify the rest of the skill slot. The leap and the autoattack are of course decently damaging, but they're melee. While one can use the leap as a "free evade" by turning off autotargeting and aiming away from an opponent that one wants to escape, I find that clunky to use, especially since all my *other* ele skills really benefit from autotarget. The precision and crit damage are also meaningless to my build since I don't focus on crits at all.

Earth Shield gives a negligible amount of toughness and some vitality, produces no effect at the location, and is still ultimately a melee weapon. You can smack the opponent for meh damage, leap at the foe for improved meh damage and daze, pull everything in a pbaoe to you (suicidal for staff ele), or do a Captain America Shield on 8s recharge to cripple in a line. If the throw were the autoattack I could see this being a useful weapon, but "in a line" rather than "bouncing and homing" makes it significantly less useful in my opinion. Fortify gives you 3 seconds invulnerable, which is always nice, but you'll never get to use it more than once per shield, and the recharge is hefty for a defensive skill. So overall teh shield isn't useful to my build.

Regarding traits; for now at least, Evasive Arcana is completely broken, which significantly cripples Arcana as a viable choice to invest 30 points in. Attunement recharge reduction is a great thing, but the marginal benefit of +1% more is small; boon duration for my particular build is mediocre, since regeneration/swiftness is my most common one. In comparison, every time you add 5 points to Water Magic, you get a new and useful effect of some sort, in addition to much-needed vitality and healing power (without even taking gear into account, there's a noticeable difference in healing effectiveness from 0 - 30 Water). Soothing Mist is one of the most powerful passive traits/heals in the game, especially considering it's only a 5 point trait - it heals for more than Battle Presence, even, and isn't bugged. Healing Ripple at 80 heals for something like 1500 in aoe, and you can do that every 15 seconds minimum. Bountiful Power could be more useful, I guess, but it's still a neat damage boost from a nominally defensive line. Cleansing Wave lets you wipe conditions, your choice of second slot, and finally Cleansing Water lets you WIPE ALL THE CONDITIONS; I like Soothing Disruption or Soothing Wave depending on if I'm underwater or not, since it makes two of my skills grant regeneration (and maybe vigor) - combine that with Cleansing Water and they also become condition removers. Overall it's just a really solid line, I think, and complements *any* build very nicely (of course if you're not using the same utility skills as me, the last trait slot might be harder to decide).

Check back later for some more detailed advice on how to use the Flame Axe, Frost Bow, and Fiery Greatsword - I have turkey to eat. Vili 点 00:15, 23 November 2012 (UTC)

I had brined turkey, so I'll go out on a limb and say that I had better turkey than you did :P (well, one way you might beat me is if you had superior skin. It was kinda non-existent with my meal). Your points about the weapons being melee or not are pretty valid. The shield doesn't really protect well (like, it could have a bubble or warding or something) and the hammer, well, i've just never really gotten it. As for Lava axe, it seems like it puts you into the medium range, so it seems a tad dangerous. Ice bow has really good skills 4+5, but beyond that it's pretty lackluster. The heal from #1 seems fairly negligible, but is it better than water staff 1? Greatsword, well, it just seems to do a lot of damage, but it does seem like the skills want you go towards the enemy. Anyhow, hope your turkey day was good. --JonTheMon 06:18, 23 November 2012 (UTC)

Well, I don't actually like turkey much anyway - I'd much rather have some BEEF for Thanksgiving. I guess that's not traditional though. So, I'm gonna try to be fancy and use a neat tables rather than writing a giant wall of text:

Levels	Totals	Notes
10-14	1-4 Water for passives	Traits are unlocked; buy first training manual.
15	5 Water	Soothing Mist - Battle Presence+.
20	10 Water	Cleansing Wave - condition removal. Limited to 10 points per line until level 40.
25	10 Water, 5 fire	Flame Barrier. Useless but required.
30	10 Water, 10 fire	Spell Slinger. Most useful underwater.
31-39	10 Water, 10 Fire, 9 whatever	Honestly doesn't matter. Could go Air Magic for speed boost.
40	20 Fire, 10 Water	Buy second training manual to respec. Add Sunspot and Conjurer. Limited to 20 points per line until level 60.
45	20 Fire, 15 Water	Healing Ripple.
50	20 Fire, 20 Water	Soothing Wave on land / Soothing Disruption underwater (gets more useful later).
51-59	20 Fire, 20 Water, 9 something	Honestly doesn't matter. Maybe pick up Air Magic again for speed boost.
60	20 Fire, 30 Water	Buy final training manual to respec. Add Bountiful Power and Cleansing Water.
61-80	20 Fire, 30 Water, 20 Arcana	Arcane Fury, Elemental Attunement, Lingering Elements, Blasting Staff.

Unfortunately I suck at wikicode so I'm not sure how to do the kind of table I want for the weapons...

The range on most staff skills is 1200, while these conjure skills tend to be 900. So you do have to get somewhat closer - but, that's why I recommend opening combat with the staff, e.g. Static Field, to punish the enemy before they move into the smaller range. Remember to stay in Water Attunement if possible while using conjures (you can still attunement swap while holding them) - Soothing Mist remains active.

Lava Axe (technically "Conjured Flame"). Gives bonus power and condition damage, which is perfect for this weapon. This is your general purpose weapon when there are not very many foes / they are small in size. Kite around ("circle strafe") and hurl axes at the foe for decent damage. You have a bonus evade if you need it, can create a Fire Field for allies to combo with, and you have a Leap Finisher as well. Remember that the Lava Axe causes Burning in the area that you summon it, so unless you have some good reason not to, you should drop the copy on top of enemies. Lava Axe is acceptable to sit in for the entire duration because its autoattack is decent enough damage.

1. Lava Axe - Basic spammable attack, and superior DPS to what you can get with the staff autoattacks because it's one attack per second (significantly faster); projectile also has a lower arc and/or flies faster than others, so you'll miss less.
2. Explosive Lava Axe - Good damage for a fast-recharging ground target AoE, and radius isn't bad either.
3. Burning Retreat (Lava Axe skill) - Almost the same as Burning Retreat. The line of fire lasts 2 seconds less, but the recharge is 5 seconds shorter. Use as a free extra evade. Creates a Fire Field.
4. Ring of Fire (Lava Axe skill) - Almost identical to Ring of Fire, but does less upfront PBAoE damage. Creates a Fire Field.
5. Flame Leap - Medium range leap attack dealing good damage and *LONG* burning duration. Leap Finisher. Combine with an immediate Burning Retreat to get out of melee range.

Frost Bow (technically "Ice Bow"). Gives bonus condition duration and healing power, which gives longer chill and boosts the power of Soothing Mist. This weapon is for use in AoE situations or when enemies are large/immobile, such as structures. While you still want to kite around, it's easy to snare with the Frost Bow, so a bit less of a priority. Frost Bow doesn't do anything on impact, so you should drop the copy somewhere convenient that you can pick it up later. Don't sit in the Frost Bow for the entire duration; the spammable skills aren't all that good. After using skills 2-5, drop the Frost Bow and do something else for about 30 seconds. By then, all the skills will have recharged, so you can pick up the second copy. Don't forget that Frost Bow grants Regeneration with Soothing Wave, and later on also removes a condition via Cleansing Water.

1. Water Arrow - Complete garbage; does even less damage and healing than Water Blast or Water Missile, fires slowly, and has a high arc. There is no point to using this skill.
2. Frost Volley - Does decent damage over 5 shots and inflicts 10 seconds vulnerability on each hit; also a Projectile Finisher with each shot, so handy if someone else can set up a Combo Field. Recharge of 8 seconds is a little too long to make it worth waiting around shooting Water Arrows, sadly.
3. Frost Fan - Shoots a spread of 7 piercing arrows, each inflicting minor damage and 1 second chill each. If used at range, you'll probably only hit with one shot; if used at close or point blank range you can usually get all 7 to hit, and the damage becomes decent. The chill will stack. Most useful when you can hit with all 7, or when there are a lot of enemies in a cone so that you can snare them all.
4. Ice Storm - Very dangerous ground targeted AoE that rains down chunks of ice in a smallish area, causing decent damage and influcting bleeding with each hit. Hard to use on moving/small targets, but on large/immobile/AoE things this is just devastating.
5. Deep Freeze - The other really dangerous Frost Bow skill, Deep Freeze takes about two seconds to charge, before shooting off an ice shard projectile. If it hits, it deals a bit of damage, stuns for 5 seconds, and applies one second of chill each second it's active. The shot is homing; however, it is not piercing, so if some other schmuck gets in the way, you might hit the wrong target. Useful to root something in place before pelting it with Ice Storm.

Fiery Greatsword. Gives bonus power and condition damage, which is perfect. This is your trump card for any situation: it deals very heavy damage against any kind of foe, and is particularly devastating to structures. The skills are shorter range than usual, yet it is not a melee weapon; still, you will need to practice kiting well, since you have even less room to maneuver and no bonus evade. Fiery Greatsword causes some damage and burning on impact, so try to drop it on top of enemies unless you have some good reason not to. Fiery Greatsword is well worth sitting in for the entire duration, since it deals so much damage and has a long recharge anyway; I wouldn't drop it unless you absolutely need to run away, which is kind of uncommon because things should die before you do.

1. Flame Wave - Channeled skill consuming only one charge, yet shoots four fireballs at the target, and they are also piercing. Deals good damage, but remember that evading will cancel the skill while still consuming the charge.
2. Fiery Eruption - Tears a rift in the earth, creating a rectangle-shaped AoE which applies burning once every second for six seconds. A little clumsy to use because you can't move while casting it, and has no effect on structures since it's purely condition damage (no upfront damage), but useful if you can get it off and things will stand in it.
3. Fiery Whirl - The most damaging move in your arsenal. Whirls forward approximately 900 units, heavily damaging everything in a line and usually hitting them multiple times too. Especially dangerous to large targets, and absolutely devastating to structures (since you can't pass through them). Also causes cripple, so enemies will have a hard time catching up to you. Finally, has only a 5 second recharge, so use it as often as possible. Whirl Finisher.
4. Fiery Rush - Not usually used, moves you approximately 900 units towards a foe and then slashes them for some damage. Leaves behind a line of fire which may or may not do something (I don't use this skill). Visually looks like a "leap", at least on a human female, but it's not. You can use this to run away if you have autotargetting turned off / target some distant foe, but that's kind of clumsy.
5. Firestorm - Rain fire down on enemies in the area for good damage over time. Most useful when things aren't going to move out of it, so cripple them first with Fiery Whirl. Recharges twice as fast as Ice Storm, although doesn't inflict any conditions.

Anyway, I hope that helps. Vili 点 23:24, 23 November 2012 (UTC)

That does help a bit (and is a fair bit to wade through!). The points about bow#1, summoning the axe, and greatsword#'s 1 & 3 I wasn't really aware of, so that's good. I'll play around a bit more with it and let you know what else I come up with. --JonTheMon 20:07, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

tldr take 10 points in arcane, 20% shorter cd on blast/wave, and fire staff through all the things. When you can get 20 points, swap them all to fire for 20% reduction on those and keep fire staffing through all the things. That's pretty much the fastest option until 60+, and has no problem killing any pack of any size - you rarely die, but even if you do, the massive aoe spam from all the fire skills ticking often rallies you in like half a second. Glyph of lesser elemental/elite version are pretty much the best utility skills available, swap to earth or water to use them though (fire one is barely a dps increase and offers no utility). I'd only ever recommend dropping damage for survivability when you actually start needing it - like if you're constantly running dungeons or soloing higher level DE's. In the lower level range all it does is slow down the killing of the things. -Auron 20:24, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

I don't agree with that, and this is from personal experience, not just theorycrafting. Fireball is not that great an autoattack because it casts slowly, the "aoe" is negligible, and the radius is kind of narrow - by which I mean it's hard to circle strafe with it, since if things aren't within certain angle of your view, Fireball just refuses to cast entirely. It does somewhat more damage per hit, but since you can't shoot and land as many of them in the same amount of time, overall DPS is lower. Lava Font is decent, but slow if you're kiting around things (unless they're ranged foes); it's easier to toss a lava axe behind you for a single explosion of damage than to throw a Lava Font and try to trick foes into staying on it. The AoE burn does approximately 0 upfront damage, and it ticks burn for a bit, but honestly not that impressive either; it also can't be cast unless target is in certain radius. Burning Retreat is good, but takes longer to recharge on staff, even with CD reduction. And Meteor Shower...eh. Good to use on structures, really big foes, and huge packs, but not very friendly overall. Even in most DEs, by the time you actually get the cast off, things are half-dead.

Ablast and wave are...meh. If you're going to go with fire staff, you can only combo them with Lava Font. That would give you a projectile finish for like 2 seconds of burning (who cars, projectile is the worst finisher), or AoE might. AoE might is never a bad thing, but if you're casting Lava Font so close to yourself that you can stand on top of it, there's a problem. In a party situation, blast finishers are somewhat more useful if you have the right combo fields, and moreso now that Evasive Arcana is broken. But it's still targeted on you, and you don't want to be right next to enemies. Also, Soothing Mist should really be gotten first.

The elemental glyphs are okay. The lessers I really don't like because it's a guaranteed 60 seconds of recharge *after* the elemental dies, so it's not a very mobile skill at all. You could reduce it with the certain trait to make glyphs recharge faster, but meh. Yes, conjures also take 60 seconds to recharge - but the usefulness of a conjure depends on the player being smart rather than the AI being not dumb (since they stand in aoe etc), and I wager they do the same or greater damage, and likely better utility. Greater Glyph isn't bad - you get a pretty tough tank that can snare/heal/chill/other stuff maybe that I don't know, and it does good enough damage. It's a feasible alternative to Fiery Greatsword overall. Against structures/massive targets/huge packs I'd much rather have Fiery Greatsword, but against non-massive targets and small numbers of foes, the elemental is probably better (certainly safer). Vili 点 21:09, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

I haven't use glyph of elemental or tornado since the start because fiery greatsword is op. Fiery Whirl will make you evade attacks, so combined with Renewing Stamina and all the multiple hit attacks, as well as the movement, you do not get hit at all. You don't want to stay in Water Attunement if you have Lingering Elements, it'll renew one more time after swapping, so you can maintain at 20 or more arcana. The nerf to evasive arcana really hurts for staff, I loved the blast finisher on water for the spike heals and blast on the ice field.--Relyk 21:45, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

Do you mean a true Evade, as opposed to just moving out of range? Like, I can whirl through a Mark and it won't hurt me? That's some crazy shit. Renewing Stamina doesn't seem like it would proc that much, since my crit rate is <10%, but I'll take your word for it.

Also, what attunement would you use if not Water? Fire Attunement has the laughable Flame Barrier and the +10% damage, but you'd lose Spell Slinger and I'm too lazy to keep swapping traits back and forth. Air Attunement has a small IMS which is barely noticeable in combat and +10% damage, but that would be a different build since I have no room for points in it. Earth Attunement has the completely insignificant +80 toughness and generic +10% damage, so only a little better than Fire, but again I have no points for it. If you're saying to swap elements rapidly so as to gain Fury from Arcane Fury...well, that works I guess. Still seems like a lot of extra button mashing to me. With 20 points in Arcana for 40% faster recharge, you could swap in and out of water every 9 seconds or so. Is that really good enough? I thought "attunement bonuses linger for 5 seconds" would mean that Soothing Mist stops working 5 seconds after leaving Water Attunement...there's no point taking 30 points in Arcana, since +10% boon duration is meh, Arcane Precision won't trigger very often, and Evasive Arcana is broken. Actually, to get Renewing Stamina you need to drop Elemental Attunement, which doesn't seem like a good idea... or am I missing something? Vili 点 22:09, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

Thief

So, I've been contemplating a different thief build (almost 70!), only it goes 25 DA, 30 Crits, 15 Trickery. Does your build emphasize stealing since it's more versatile over raw damage? --JonTheMon 06:47, 26 October 2012 (PDT)

The passive bonuses for Critical Strikes are fantastic - precision and crit damage in the same line. I really don't like any of the traits except for the grandmaster ones, though, which is what stops me from using it. Keen Observer won't work a lot of the time unless you're really staying out of the fray with ranged (and shortbow/pistol don't benefit from it hugely, conditions don't crit); Opportunist is an RNG trait, and I'd rather take one of the more reliable initiative regens; First Strikes I dislike becaues I can't keep track of that many factors at once ("do I have more than 6 initiative after using this?") and I feel pressured to stay above that amount.

I'm not sure what major traits you've picked, but I have issues with those too. Side Strike and Concealed Defeat are the only decent minors; Signet Use can be pretty good if you have a lot of signets, but I don't care for signets in general anyway. Combo Critical Chance is okay I guess; I'm not too fond of builds that rely on spamming the same thing though (whether it's the stealth attack, the dual wield, Heartseeker, etc). Now, Executioner is really amazing, and Hidden Killer would also be great for Backstab if it wasn't bugged.

The reason I take more points into Trickery is because those bonuses are less conditional and I don't have to think as hard about them. More condition damage is good, since I have to rely on that a lot anyway without big/frequent crits. Steal recharge rate is also only available via traits; if I wanted to, I could pick up gear that gives crit/crit damage. I really like Lead Attacks because I get up to a 15% unconditional damage boost to all raw damage at all times. In other words, the only time it does "nothing" is if I'm at 0 initiative, and that is very rare. Compare that to the Critical Strikes traits, every one that I listed has some time (possibly even a lot of time) where it's not doing you any good. You make up for it with the passive bonuses, I guess, but I'm a big proponent of generalization over specialization in this game; but that's a theorycrafting discussion for another day. Anyway, Trickery offers similar traits to what Critical Strikes does, and also has the stealing related ones that I like, so I feel it's more flexible. Flanking Strikes is comparable to Side Strike. Trickster is another recharge reduction trait, so it can be better than Signet Use depending on what skills are brought. Initial Strike is the RNG initiative regenerator. The Grandmaster traits for Trickery are unfortunately not comparable to those of Critical Strikes, although Hastened Replenishment can be good with Signet of Malice or Withdraw for builds that just like to burn an enemy down as fast as possible.

Bountiful Theft and Thrill of the Crime are the choices I make because I feel they are the most helpful to the group, not just to me. AoE Vigor, Fury, Swiftness, Might, and whatever you can rip off the oppoonent every ~32 seconds is not bad at all. The ripping boons part is especially lovely because people don't expect to see that sort of thing ever; only the Mesmer's Arcane Thievery does the same thing. There are some skills that remove boons, but that's just removal; to have boons turned against you can be a nightmare. Oh, you're an Elementalist and you just blew your very expensive panic button, Armor of Earth, for Protection and Stability? That's such a shame, how would you like it if those boons went to me and my allies instead? Meanwhile you will take damage from Mug, I'll Poison you with Serpent's Touch, and also apply Weakness with Lotus Poison. Yeah, he's dead.

Finally, I think it's just good to have Steal on the lowest recharge possible because the stolen skills are so powerful in PvP/WvW. Whirling Axe (stolen skill) and Use Staff deal massive damage, Consume Ectoplasm givers me every boon in the game, Throw Gunk damages and inflicts all kinds of conditions in AoE, Mace Head Crack and Skull Fear disable the enemy (or enemies) for 3-4 full seconds...The Ranger one I'm pretty sure is Seed Pod, which (no joke) plants a tree at my location for Regeneration, healing, and a Water Field. I almost never fight other Thieves in WvW so don't remember what skill I get from them.

The other two things you're missing out on are Expeditious Dodger and Shadow's Embrace. To me, these are key skills; that short burst of Swiftness combines wonderfully with Uncatchable, and Shadow's Embrace is a very reliable condition remover. Some people say Expeditious Dodger is redunant if you're carrying Signet of Shadows, but I disagree - *a lot* of Thieves have it, so you'll never catch them with just Signet. There are other builds for other classes with long-lasting Swiftness too, so it helps for catching them. And of course, inside combat, the improved speed is more noticeable.

Anyway, I'll admit that for just leveling up in PvE, Critical Strikes is probably better; a lot of the situations I am describing are PvP/WvW-centric, and you get a lot of fairly junk stuff with Steal in PvE. Vili 点 12:20, 26 October 2012 (PDT)

Bit more analysis than I was expecting, but no complaints! I feel that the aspects of more general utility (from Shadow Arts and what you can get from stealing) is the difference of your build to pure damage of speccing into Crits. Now, I just have to figure out which one will be better for my situations, probably with a focus on Orr and dungeons. --JonTheMon 20:17, 27 October 2012 (PDT)

No BotM?

Sure, it is not there but I have no problem keeping my little undead friends alive. I'm using (well partially planning to use since I am not level 80 yet):

20 Spite — Reaper's Might, Training of the Master
30 Death Magic — Staff Mastery, Flesh of the Master, Death Nova
20 Blood Magic — Mark of Evasion, Vampiric Master

Your utility skills are, pretty obviously:
Blood Fiend
Bone Minions
Bone Fiend
Shadow Fiend and
Flesh Golem

---

Flesh Wurm is so utterly bad because you can't move with it and even in veteran/champion fights you don't want it since it's yet another ranged minion which doesn't benefit from your main healing skill.

Cleric equipment, boosting Healing Power (most), Power and Toughness. Five runes of Dwayna and one upgrade of choice, probably a rune boosting Healing Power since you are already going for maximum healing power. The sole weapon I ever use is a Cleric's Staff. Actually three; one with a Sigil of Life if I feel needing even more healing power, one with a Sigil of Corruption for more offence and one with a Sigil of Agony (since bleeding is your spammable condition) which is always your main weapon to be swapped to after having fully charged your secondary one.

Explanation of trait choices

• Spite
  • Reaper's Might: Stacking Might whenever you aren't busy keeping up Regeneration isn't a bad idea plus the rest of that pool is rather useless to the build. Even Spiteful Removal barely has a use due to Putrid Mark.
  • Training of the Master: You are a minion master, you want your minions to kill things. Period. Spiteful Marks is a fairly bad alternative for a Minion Master yet still an alternative.
  • Minors: Parasitic Bond is weak but Death into Life gives a nice bonus to the overal supportive plan.
• Death Magic
  • Staff Mastery: Mark of Blood and its regeneration are probably the most powerful assets to a Minion Master outside of the Minions themselves. It keeps your friends pretty reliably alive and can be quite nice for any group event. Staff Mastery helps keeping Regeneration up 100% of the time (if you aren't dumb, you overlap it due to Death Magic's 30% boon duration and Dwayna's 20% regeneration duration boost). Greater Marks is alternative no. 1; I rarely find blocking an issue in PvE and the size is not an issue at all if you know how to pin your targets in one spot with your big boy's charge. Plus, you can't hit more than 5 targets anyway if I recall correctly. Still, if you want it, why not. Alternative no. 2 would be Minion Master. Sadly, even though it's called what you are it's pretty pointless if your plan is to keep your Minions alive. It even doesn't reduce your Minion's "special" attacks like the charge of your Flesh Golem. This trait is only really useful against champions when you are alone or very few.
  • Flesh of the Master: It greatly helps to keep your minions alive since most enemies hit rather slow allowing regeneration to keep up with the pace. That, and all other options aren't that useful. Might take the Greater Marks trait yet I am not the greatest fan of it at all.
  • Death Nova: It's only there for those annoying Jagged Horrors. Might take only 25 points in Death Magic but 25 in Blood Magic for the minor trait Blood to Power but don't see why.
  • Minors: The whole trait line favors Minion Masters and of note is only Deadly Strength which helps a bit evening out the disparity between power and toughness.
• Blood Magic
  • Mark of Evasion: Most of the time, you'll use this to either cover up when Mark of Blood was misplaced or interrupted or to stack Bleeding even more. I rarely find myself in the need for a dodge roll as a Minion Master. Especially due to...
  • Vampiric Master: Between your Blood Fiend, Death Shroud (to negate damage), Full of Life, Vampiric and Vampiric Master there is most rarely a need to heal yourself actively.
  • Minors: I find Vampiric to heal rather rarely but Full of Life - even with the long cooldown - is a nice boost to your survivability since it benefits from your high regeneration duration and healing power.

That's it so far. 109.91.252.10 03:53, 31 October 2012 (UTC)

Greater Marks is a PvP trait since almost nothing in PvE blocks. Anyway it looks viable enough, but it's the "gw2 minion master" I guess. I'm still stuck in the past days of running around the map with a dozen Bone Fiends killing everything, or maybe using Jagged Bones and Summon Bone Minions and Death Nova, or Order of Undeath, or... etc. I have to say that I like Flesh Golem a lot more in GW2 though; it was an awful skill in GW1. Vili 点 04:25, 31 October 2012 (UTC)

Guardian

At one point I contemplated that shout build, but I ended up going with a Spirit weapons build instead. I went 30 zeal, 30 radiance, 10 virtue for all the spirit weapon abilities. What I've liked about it is (besides the increase in damage) the fact that spirit weapons can't be killed, shield of the Avenger is actually kinda good, and i'm throwing around a lot of burning. But that does leave me without much party support (pretty much my weapons and the summon shield) and for my radiance grand trait I picked the 15% crit with one-handed weapons. Have you tried a spirit weapon build and what did you think of it?

Other builds I was contemplating were mediations (seemed a bit too much pvp for me), your shout build, and maybe a tanky build built around Altruistic Healing. Oh, with regards to your build, why didn't you take Stand Your Ground over, say, Hold the Line? --JonTheMon 14:19, 14 November 2012 (UTC)

edit: now that I look at it, with your trait lines, you can switch to meditations easily, or to better symbols (another thought i had). Was that one of your considerations? --JonTheMon 14:21, 14 November 2012 (UTC)

Meditations are a solid skill set, but as you say they are more oriented towards PvP. At the very least, they're not meant to be used while playing solo (totally on your own, no NPC allies or anything), which happens a lot while leveling up. Symbols are a very good build, and actually "the best" or at least "the standard" Guardian build for PvP right now; the Mace is a fantastic weapon to use in such a case.

As to spirit weapons, they're interesting, but I have the same problem with them that I have with almost all other summon type things: the recharge starts after the weapon "dies", not after you cast it, so there's significant downtime involved. Spirit weapons can also take damage and get killed; you can't normally target them, but sometimes they will just disappear even before the normal duration is over anyway, and that's a big problem to me. Avenger's Shield only activates when things are relatively close to you (to it?), which I find problematic when facing long-ranged attacks such as siege weaponry.

I really really don't like Zeal or Radiance trait lines; they just don't hold any traits that are that attractive to me, although this is largely due to my personal preference of weapon sets and utility skills (greatsword/staff/hammer, shouts or consecrations). I won't say it's a "bad" build, since it does good damage and you do have tons of burning. It's just not my playstyle; I built my Guardian to be defensive/support, since I feel that's their greatest strength as a class. When I want to just kill things I play Thief or whatever.

Altruistic Healing is an amazing trait, especially because of the way it works with Might - every stack counts as a separate boon, so if you use e.g. Empower you get massive healing on top of Empower's already not-negligible heal. I just wish Valor didn't have the totally weird passive combination of Toughness and...crit damage. I mean, why did they do that? A full tanky build has a crit rate of like 10% tops >_>

About Stand Your Ground... I already have a ton of Retaliation on myself so I don't really need more, and I don't find that I need Stability too often in general PvE. In the situations where I know I'll need it, I can swap as necessary, and Hallowed Ground is always an option too. Hold the Line gives me on-demand Protection and Regeneration, which I feel contributes better to my defenses/support as well as those of any nearby allies. They're both good skills, really. The trouble is that Retreat is something I'd have a hard time giving up (due to the super long Swiftness), and Save Yourselves is also just a fantastic skill; I do wipe conditions with Pure of Voice, but when I absolutely need to remove every condition, Save Yourselves is the only really viable option. (Great example is when I mess up and let a Risen Plague Carrier explode.)

Anyway, my main reason for picking the Shouts build is because it is the most mobile of all the potential Guardian builds that I've been able to come up with. I don't just mean mobile in that I have Swiftness up 100% of the time, but also that I don't really care about cooldowns, positioning, or anything like that. Because I have increased boon duration and reduced recharge, having all three shouts on cooldown isn't a big problem because their effects persist for quite some time while they're recharging. The range on shouts is also good enough that I don't usually need to worry where I'm standing in relation to allies. Lastly, while there is always a "best" time to use a shout, there is never a "bad" time to use one. Call me lazy, but one of the best parts of the build is that I can still be effective by just mashing all shouts + Elite + Virtues + weapon skills on cooldown. In other words, the skill cap isn't very high - I won't push out significantly better numbers by expending brain power to play. It's a simple build for a simple playstyle. Vili 点 08:43, 15 November 2012 (UTC)

Engineer

Just a couple questions since I recently started an engi: the med kit seems a bit hard to use, so how do you use it best, and that's kinda similar to the issues I have with the bomb kit. Like, for the bomb kit is it all about having enemies chase you? I probably won't end up with a build like you have, but I'm wondering about how to make the skills you recommend work the best. --JonTheMon 19:48, 23 December 2012 (UTC)

I honestly take the skills that I do mainly for their resulting Toolbelt functions, which imo are some of the best among all Engineer skills. In actual usage, especially when I'm being lazy, I don't often use the kits. I might switch to a kit just to get a speed boost from Speedy Kits, but otherwise I'll be lazy and use the Rifle. The big drawback of the kits is definitely that you have to hit more buttons, since they have no autoattack. (Grenades do underwater but that's not a frequent occurrence.)

That being said, Grenadier is a fantastic trait because 1500 range is more than almost anything else in the game. Most ranged monsters can't hit from that far, either, so you can even kite them if you want.

1. Rifle is the general-purpose weapon used for clearing out trash, but it has limited effectiveness against ranged foes and/or AoE. Usually better against a single target than the Grenade Kit; Bomb Kit can be more or less effective depending on how much effort you want to expend. General usage is Hip Shot → Net Shot → do stuff while they can't move → Blunderbuss when they get close → Overcharged Shot. Jump Shot can be thrown in there at some point, but it's awkward to use if you don't want to take damage.
2. Grenade Kit is to use on ranged targets, especially AoE at range, but it shouldn't be used once they close distance because it lacks close-up defensive tools. General usage is Poison Grenade → Freeze Grenade → Shrapnel Grenade.
3. Bomb Kit is to use when things get near you, when enemies are forced into tight balls, when being chased by a powerful melee enemy (e.g. Champion Giant Boar in Queensdale), and especially in events to support your teammates. Concussion Bomb should be followed up by Smoke Bomb, and Fire Bomb should be followed up by Glue Bomb, generally. The basic concept of the Bomb Kit is high risk, high reward. You're putting yourself at great danger by standing right next to foes, but the damage output is quite good and Bomb Kit tends to be the fastest way to kill things. Of course, you can stick to purely using Bomb Kit for defense too. Just use Glue Bomb and/or Smoke Bomb, then go back to Rifle or Grenade Kit as you kite away from the debilitated foes.

As to Med Kit...don't bother using the bandages unless you are totally in trouble, they don't heal enough compared to the cast time. Antidote removes all conditions every 15 seconds, so it's great. Stimulant is the main reason to swap to Med Kit, since it's at least 50% uptime Swiftness and Fury in one skill. Remember that all items are spawned on the ground *in front of you*, so it's best to cast them while running in a straight line to auto-use them.

Skill	Available	Usage
Bandage Self	Always	Use like any other healing skill; better to use often, since it's not that strong, and it won't save you from a spike.
Mine Field	Always	Set up before combat, preferably in narrow choke points, or drop right on top of enemies as they're closing in. Always explode by pressing the button again when enemies are near; the auto-detect blast radius is much smaller than the actual explosion radius. Forceful Explosives trait greatly increases usefulness.
Big Ol' Bomb	Always	Has a fuse of about 3 seconds, so plan accordingly. The blast radius is large and does significant damage and knockback; take this into account when deciding where to place other explosives.
Grenade Barrage	Always	Another big damage skill. Most enemies sitting right in the middle of the targeting ring will get hit by every explosion as long as they don't move. Grenades will explode if they hit something before touching the ground, so be careful if enemies are running in front of you.
Hip Shot	Rifle autoattack	Relatively quick and pierces, so try to line up targets, but it's weak. Can use other actions as soon as cast bar finishes and bullet leaves the gun - important to remember when chaining skills, to minimize wasted shots.
Net Shot	Rifle 2	Use on recharge; lovely snare, especially with Knee Shot if you choose that. If fired immediately after a Hip Shot used to initiate combat, will snare the foe before they can move at all (usually).
Blunderbuss	Rifle 3	Best to use at point-blank range, but has a surprising amount of AoE/range regardless. Doesn't like being fired at an angle, so use Hip Shot to turn yourself before casting if foes aren't "in front" of you.
Overcharged Shot	Rifle 4	Good follow-up to Blunderbuss, but always useful anyway, especially to remove snares from yourself. Opponents that can be launched will be disabled for around three seconds total. For safest use, always cast at point-blank range, but like Blunderbuss it has a surprising amount of range too.
Jump Shot	Rifle 5	Hits very hard, especially if you land both hits, but there's about a one second delay before landing no matter what the flight distance is. Can be used to hit two opponents: one right next to you, and one far away, which is a good tactic to confuse foes and redistribute aggro in events.
Drop Bandages	Med Kit 1-3	Rather useless, they don't heal very much, are awkward to use, and cast time is too long for the heal. If the recharge was cut in half then maybe I could see it being useful...
Drop Antidote	Med Kit 4	Generic condition removal. Can't be used on Immobilize, though, since you won't be able to move to pick it up. Switch to Rifle and use Overcharged Shot instead.
Drop Stimulant	Med Kit 5	Swiftness and Fury with at least 50% uptime; use this on recharge.
Throw Mine	Always	Use the same way as Mine Field. Knocks enemies back a bit, removes a Boon, and is a Blast Finisher. Also one of the only Unblockable skills in the game, which is great to use against annoying enemies like Ascalon Soldiers that block for an eternity.
Bomb	Bomb Kit 1	Hits harder than you'd expect for a spammable attack. Mash this button any time you're not doing anything else. Especially useful to use when running out of combat/kiting around, since they don't slow you down.
Fire Bomb	Bomb Kit 2	Creates a Fire Field. Best used on stationary enemies. Don't accidentally use movement controlling skills like Overcharged Shot on enemies sitting in the burn zone.
Concussion Bomb	Bomb Kit 3	Very dangerous, applies 5 stacks AoE Confusion. Best followed up with Smoke Bomb to prevent enemies from damaging you, while hurting themselves. OK to move enemies afterwards, but don't disable them with e.g. Overcharged Shot, since a disabled enemy can't use skills to hurt themselves.
Smoke Bomb	Bomb Kit 4	Effectively makes foes in the field unable to attack you for 4 seconds, unless they're fast/multi-hit, and creates a Smoke Field.
Glue Bomb	Bomb Kit 5	AoE Immobilize followed up with a Cripple. More powerful with Knee Shot, but useful anyway to keep enemies rooted in the other bombs. Also great to use while running away/kiting around.
Grenade	Grenade Kit 1	Standard spammable attack. Not as powerful as Bomb, but much better at stacking Vulnerability via Steel Packed Powder.
Shrapnel Grenade	Grenade Kit 2	Bleeds in AoE.
Flash Grenade	Grenade Kit 3	Least useful Grenade, since it only Blinds once, but at least they deal damage now.
Freeze Grenade	Grenade Kit 4	Dangerous, since Chilled stacks, and it hits in AoE - you can get 6 seconds AoE Chilled, and more with +Condition Duration etc.
Poison Grenade	Grenade Kit 5	Each Grenade creates a Poison Field and damages a bit on impact. Trajectory is much less reliable than other Grenades; behaves more like a shotgun, which can make it awkward to aim, especially against moving targets.
Supply Crate	Always	Your elite, mostly useful for the large AoE stun. Casting time is a consideration when used on moving targets. The actual things it spawns are fairly useless; the turrets distract enemies for a bit, and the bandages still heal for crap.

Harpoon Gun:

Skill	Available	Usage
Homing Torpedo	Harpoon Gun 1	Shots are slow, but they home and do decent damage.
Scatter Mines	Harpoon Gun 2	Best used at point blank range; hit the button again immediately to make all three explode in your enemy's face.
Retreating Grapple	Harpoon Gun 3	What this does is basically move the enemy to whatever position you had been at, while you move back from there a bit. It seems fairly useless until you remember that Throw Mine and Mine Field still work underwater. Throw those down, and possibly Big Ol' Bomb as well, use Retreating Grapple, and blow your enemy to bits.
Timed Charge	Harpoon Gun 4	Use on recharge. Oddly enough, can be applied to structures too. Automatic Projectile Finisher, if you have any Combo Fields to use it with.
Net Wall	Harpoon Gun 5	Shoots out a thing, and then when you hit the button again, a net appears to immobilize all foes caught in it for 3 seconds. If you've ever fought Krait, then you're familiar with how this skill works. Also an automatic Projectile Finisher. It's useful to swap to Grenades while enemies are snared; great time to pelt them with Poison, Shrapnel, and then Freeze Grenades.

As for Downed, just remember that Booby Trap hits harder than you'd expect. Combined with the damage over time from Throw Junk, it's not unusual to be able to kill something from ~full health.

I hope that explains some things. Let me know if you have any other questions. Vili 点 23:20, 23 December 2012 (UTC)

Thanks. I might consider going back to med kit for the swiftness, since I always feel so slow. Any thoughts on how you'd change it for team support rather than glass cannon (which is a valid team role)? Like perhaps the healing turret or elixir gun (how is it bugged, btw?)? Also, do you have any experience with Norn elites? They seem fairly strong. --JonTheMon 02:49, 24 December 2012 (UTC)

Well, that's what makes Speedy Kits so great - you get permanent swiftness with any kit, just by toggling it every 5 seconds.

I...really don't know, haven't thought about it. Explosives and Firearms don't really lend themselves to defense, unless you're using the "the best defense is a good offense" motto. It would be a wholly different build if you wanted to center around team support. For starters I'd swap out Throw Mine and Grenade Kit, since those are all but useless for support...the poison fields from Poison Grenades are okay if you have the right finishers, but eh. Bomb Kit at least has the aoe snare and blind, but...I'd swap to Pistol/Pistol, Healing Turret, Elixir C, Elixir R, Rocket Turret, Thumper Turret, Elixir Gun, Tool Kit (pick some combo of those). No idea what the traits should be.

Well, Fumigate has the same hitbox problems as Blowtorch, or at least it used to. Other than that I don't remember offhand. Maybe it's fixed now.

Become the Wolf isn't half-bad, you can stack a lot of bleeds, grant fury and retaliation in aoe, and knockdown. Not to mention aoe fear and additional self-heal via life stealing. Specifically for an Engineer I'm not sure how effective it is, though, since engi isn't really designed to stay in melee range. Become the Snow Leopard is a wonderful elite for Thieves since it has a really low cd stealth, but I don't know much about it other than that. Bear and Raven forms I don't know anything about. Vili 点 12:08, 24 December 2012 (UTC)