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 how to play like a Mist Y

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Mistress Misty
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Mistress Misty
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PostSubject: how to play like a Mist Y   how to play like a Mist Y I_icon_minitimeSun Feb 10, 2013 11:30 am

I wrote a bunch of guides a few months ago on how I play each profession in dungeons. I'm going to update them one by one and post them on here. First, how I play ele:
This build has changed dramatically since I first posted it. What I'm running now is a variation on the popular Lightning Hammer build. It's the ultimate glass cannon - more damage than even a warrior can do, and pretty much as squishy as you can possibly get. Whilst it excels when supported by a full team, it still deals considerable damage by itself, and is not without its own contribution to boons and healing for the team.

Here are my traits and equipment:
Fire Magic:
III - Ember's Might
- +5% damage to burning foes - if you have a guardian in your team, most foes will probably be burning all the time, especially single targets like bosses
VIII - Conjurer - 10 extra charges on conjure weapons, which are the cornerstone of this build
Air Magic:
VI - Bolt to the Heart
- +20% damage to foes with <33% health; this translates to +6.66% damage on average
VII - Arcane Lightning - every time you use an arcane skill, gain a buff giving +10% for 15 seconds; use Arcane Wave lots, and get a nice damage boost
Water Magic:
IV - Piercing Shards
- +20% damage to vulnerable foes while attuned to water; all foes should always be vulnerable, and you should always be in water attunement
VI - Vital Striking - +10% damage while above 90% health, like you needed an incentive to not go below 90% health...

Armour is full Berserker's (power, precision, critical damage) with 6 Superior Runes of the Scholar. I wield a scepter and dagger with the same stats and Superior Sigils of Force and Fraility, although I like to use a separate scepter with a Superior Sigil of Bloodlust to build up stacks of power if I'll get the chance to kill plenty of enemies without getting downed. Trinkets are full ruby; spineguard is Berserker's with an exquisite ruby jewel.
All that gives me the following base stats (standing in LA with no buffs):
Power: 2346
Precision: 1714
Toughness: 1086
Health: 13995
Armour: 2006
Condition damage: 0
Healing power: 281
Critical chance: 42
Critical damage: 82


Those stats are inaccurate, because I'm still wearing trinkets from my old build.

These are my optional skills:
Signet of Restoration (much like Healing Signet on a warrior, the passive healing is excellent so you'll never need to activate it)
Signet of Fire (never activate this either, and just appreciate the precision)
Arcane Wave (instant AoE damage and a blast finisher)
Conjure Lightning Hammer (the most important skill in your build - I'll explain more about it below)
Glyph of Elementals (it's always nice to have a friend)

Sometimes I use these instead:
Arcane Shield - occasionally you'll be in a fight where you know you'll need/want to block rather than dodge, and Arcane Shield allows you to do this without stopping your DPS. It also triggers Arcane Lightning, so if you rotate it correctly with Arcane Wave, you can keep the bonus up for 45 seconds, or 2/3 of the time.
Mist Form, Lightning Flash - excellent for running through stuff. You can also use Mist Form and Arcane Shield to gather a node or commune with a skill point without taking damage.
Glyph of Lesser Elementals - sometimes you really want an extra ally for additional damage/utility or just a meat shield.
Glyph of Elementals - occasionally you'll have time to pop an elite but won't be able to get your enemies up against a wall.
Conjure Frost Bow, Glyph of Storms - against targets with large hitboxes, the wide AoE from these skills is very strong.

Conjure Weapons:
This build revolves around wielding a conjure weapon almost all the time. A few exceptions are using Cleansing Wave to heal, laying down a Ring of Fire so the team can stack might, or using pretty much any air skill for utility. However, when you're holding a conjure weapon, you should stay in water attunement the whole time. Don't drop the weapon until it expires.
Here is some more information on how to use environmental weapons. When you cast the weapon, place it at your feet, or where you expect to be in ~30s when the weapon in your hands expires. If it's a Lightning Hammer you should be picking up the new one to keep you going until the skill recharges; if it's a Fiery Greatsword, someone else in the team should have picked it up. Yell at your teammates if they're doing it wrong.

General tips:
You are ultra squishy - you NEED to learn to dodge. Otherwise you'll get one-shot. Don't forget though, your Lightning Hammer auto-attack chain inflicts blind, so don't waste time and endurance dodging attacks that are going to miss.
If you use Vapor Form when downed, you'll get more downed penalty when it ends, and you'll annoy anyone who was reviving you. Think carefully before you use this.
Be prepared to explain to people how to use the conjure weapons when they have to pick them up. If you see people not using [yellow]Fiery Rush[/color] correctly, hold down your push-to-talk and do your best Chewbacca impersonation.
When a conjure weapon expires, before you grab a new one is a great time to throw down Ring of Fire. Then get your Lightning Hammer, throw down a few blast finishers, and switch back to water as soon as possible.
Fiery Whirl (used against a wall) is excellent damage and evade - time it to make the most of both of these things.


Last edited by Mistress Misty on Sat Aug 17, 2013 1:43 pm; edited 7 times in total
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Mistress Misty
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PostSubject: how to play warrior like a Mist Y   how to play like a Mist Y I_icon_minitimeTue Feb 12, 2013 5:22 am

The primary focus of my warrior build is enormous DPS at the expense of a lot of survivability - this is known as a "glass cannon" setup. Warriors can consistently pump out more damage than any other profession, so don't put that to waste. Whilst this is a very dangerous way to play, the rewards greatly outweigh the risks, and with practice you can even do this without getting downed every 5 seconds.
Bear in mind I don't play with the intention of seeing the highest possible numbers on my screen, or completely sacrificing every other form of usefulness just to have the highest possible DPS. Much of my setup is aimed towards benefiting the team as a whole, although this is still highly effective in a solo situation.

Here are my traits and equipment:
Strength:
V - Berserker's Power
- massive boost to damage when you have high adrenaline, so keep it high; don't use your burst skill!
IX - Slashing Power - +10% greatsword and spear damage, kind of a no-brainer
Arms:
V - Rending Strikes
- inflicts vulnerability on critical strikes, which is basically awesome
X - Forceful Greatsword - gain might on crits from GS and spear (awesomelicious) and faster cooldowns on your attack skills (also awesomelicious)
XII - Last Chance - 4s of quickness when your target hits 25% health; great on bosses, but be prepared to make good use of the leftover quickness if the enemy dies before it runs out
Tactics:
VI - Empowered
- +2% damage for each boon on you; get as many boons as you can, koz those 2%s really add up
Discipline:
V - Heightened Focus
- same deal as Berserker's Power but with crit chance; this boosts your crit chance to 91% when you have Fury and 25 stacks of precision

Armour is full Berserker's (power, precision, critical damage) with 6 Superior Runes of Divinity. These runes give you balanced stats and so move away slightly from the glass cannon ideal. If you prefer to max DPS and don't care about other stats, or you just don't want to shell out for 6 of the most expensive rune in game, other options include Runes of the Scholar/Soldier/Rage or just ruby orbs. Look up the stats on each and see which you prefer.
In my main weapon set I wield a greatsword with Berserker's stats and a Superior Sigil of Frailty, although I like to use a separate GS with a Superior Sigil of Perception to build up stacks of precision if I'll get the chance to kill plenty of enemies without getting downed. Trinkets are full ruby; spineguard is Berserker's with an exquisite ruby jewel.
All that gives me the following base stats (standing in LA with no buffs):
Power: 2189
Precision: 1971
Toughness: 976
Health: 20022
Armour: 2187
Condition damage: 360
Healing power: 60
Critical chance: 54
Critical damage: 83


If you're in a team that requires you to be somewhat tanky, or you just find yourself unable to survive long enough to do effective damage, you can switch to Soldier's (power, toughness, vitality) gear. This will cause a significant decrease in damage output, but you'll also have an appreciable increase to your survivability. Think of it as a decrease in risk that comes with a small decrease in reward. If you're new to glass cannon warrior and still having trouble keeping yourself alive in most situations, I can highly recommend wearing the Soldier's armour, since a full set is cheap to acquire from AC and comes with decent runes.


These are my optional skills:
Healing Surge (activate this to build adrenaline or just for a powerful heal - it's very strong)
Banner of Discipline (place it well, and yell at your team to pick it up and use skills 2 and 3 for the buffs)
"On My Mark!" (assuming the rest of your team is actually doing any damage, you can increase it on a single target by 4-10% if you time this well)
"For Great Justice!" (try to get as many allies in range as possible, but use this even if it's only you getting the effect)
Signet of Rage (activate this pretty much on recharge and let the boons stack up)

Sometimes I use these instead:
Healing Signet - if you just don't have time to activate your heal, the passive on this is fairly strong
Frenzy - think carefully about what this skill does - it doesn't make any of your skills do more damage; it just allows you to use them faster, so timing is very important
Signet of Stamina - in some areas you can reasonably expect to get a billion conditions at once (e.g. necros in AC); in others, the additional endurance is very useful
"Shake it Off!" - if your entire team is crying out for conditions to be removed, you can be their saviour!
Banner of Strength/Defense/Tactics - if there's another warrior running Banner of Discipline, there's not much point having 2 copies; also bear in mind that some foes are immune to critical hits, so precision and prowess are useless
Endure Pain, Balanced Stance, Dolyak Signet - when you're running through or tanking a bunch of enemies with KD and a lot of damage, any/all of these skills can be worth it to keep you alive.
Battle Standard - if your team is going to ball up and could really do with a big boost (including stability)... look at the 4 minute cooldown and make sure you can put up with that. Otherwise, put this in your bar when you expect you'll have to revive a bunch of people (e.g. running through stuff, fighting lupicus).
"Fear Me!" - very occasionally you'll need to disperse foes whilst running through them; don't use this if you intend to fight

Alternate weapon set
Rifle. Use a rifle. Sometimes you will want to use a ranged weapon, and other times you will NEED to use one. Longbow on warrior is trash, simply because of the 900 range. If you're fighting in melee and the enemies are hurting you more than you can hurt them, you should probably back out and switch to your rifle.
There are undeniably a few occasions where you know you're not going to need ranged damage, so you can consider changing your alt set. Use mace and shield for pure defense, or sword and warhorn for moving fast.

General tips:
Unless there's a guardian or someone else traited for tanking, your role as frontline puts you in an ideal position to lead the team. You don't need to order them around or anything, but you should gain initial aggro and pull any enemies to where you want them.
Be prepared to use Vengeance. If you're downed in melee range of dangerous foes, it's likely no-one will want to run up and revive you.
You can use Frenzy to revive people twice as fast!
To get the most out of Whirlwind Attack when your foes aren't conveniently lined up, try to position yourself against a wall so you don't move too much and so keep hitting the close target.
Movement is VERY important for a melee fighter: Rush and Whirlwind Attack are pro gap closers, so learn to use them well. Whirlwind Attack is also great for evading.


Last edited by Mistress Misty on Mon Apr 29, 2013 7:41 am; edited 3 times in total
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PostSubject: how to play engineer like a Mist Y   how to play like a Mist Y I_icon_minitimeTue Feb 12, 2013 7:24 am

Engineer can be a very versatile profession; I've chosen to concentrate on very long range, which unfortunately clashes with the dungeon meta of the team balling up and meleeing everything. Most dungeon encounters do not encourage ranged attacks and projectiles, but World vs World is a different story, and even Fractals of the Mists has a lot of enemies that most people prefer to range. So whilst I don't get much satisfaction from engineer in traditional dungeons, I love this build in other areas of the game.
I make heavy use of grenades (1500 range is absolutely godly), other kits and also toolbelt skills. This makes me useful in a variety of situations, since I can do more ranged AoE damage than pretty much any profession, but I'm still relevant if a close fight is forced on me.
I mostly use this in WvW, although I also enjoy it in Fractals and solo general PvE. A few imaginative modifications to the traits and optional skills will go a long way towards adaptation.

Here are my traits and equipment:
Explosives:
IV - Empowering Adrenaline
- +5% damage when endurance is NOT full - assuming you know how to dodge, this will quite often be the case and you'll get a nice boost
VII - Explosive Powder - +10% damage to explosions; easy choice
XI - Grenadier - extra range on grenades AND you get an extra grenade with each attack... this is straight up over-powered
Firearms:
V - Precise Sights
- 50% chance to cause vulnerability on critical hits; your high crit chance combined with the ridiculously fast rate of chucking grenades means you can get 25 stacks of vulnerability on a target by yourself
Tools:
VI - Speedy Kits
- gain 5 seconds of swiftness when you equip a kit; perma swiftness is under-rated! Keep refreshing your kits to take advantage of this
IX - Scope - +10% crit chance on targets further than 600 units away - it can be hard to tell exactly how far your target is, but it's not something you need to over-think
5 extra points in Firearms and Tools for the bonus crit chance and damage.

Armour is full Berserker's (power, precision, critical damage) with 6 Superior Runes of the Scholar. I wield a pistol and a shield with the same stats and Superior Sigils of Strength and Force, although I like to use a shield with a Superior Sigil of Bloodlust to build up stacks of power if I'll get the chance to kill plenty of enemies without getting downed. Trinkets are full ruby; spineguard is Cavalier's (power, toughness, critical damage) with an exquisite ruby jewel.
All that gives me the following base stats (standing in LA with no buffs):
Power: 2446
Precision: 1794
Toughness: 916
Health: 15082
Armour: 2041
Condition damage: 150
Healing power: 0
Critical chance: 46
Critical damage: 103


These are my optional skills:
Med Kit (easily the most powerful engineer healing skill, but it takes a lot of getting used to so persevere)
Grenade Kit (feel free to camp on this most of the time, and learn what all the skills do!)
Elixir U (beware the unpredictable negative effect, but otherwise use it just like you'd use any other quickness skill)
Utility Goggles (stun break, fury, blind immunity, and no activation time!)
Supply Crate (throw this down somewhere sensible to tip the scales in your favour)

Sometimes I use these instead:
Slick Shoes, Rocket Boots, Elixir C - good for running
Flamethrower - it's good for destroying rams in WvW koz you can fire straight through gates... otherwise it's fairly weak
_____ Turret - when you're brain AFKing at a boss (or actually AFKing), these provide a bit of extra damage, but it's not good enough for standard combat
Elixir R - any time you're expecting someone to get downed and know it won't be convenient to revive them, equip this in advance and remember to use the toolbelt skill!
Elixir S - stun break and invulnerability are nice to have available sometimes


Toolbelt skills are amazing...
Love them and they will love you back:
With ~289 HPS, Bandage Self is actually your primary heal. All 3 Drop Bandages together only give ~240 HPS, and waste a lot more casting time.
In most cases, you should be using Grenade Barrage on recharge for the high damage.
Toss Elixir U will randomly either give you a Wall of Reflection or a Smoke Screen, each of which lasts for 9s. They can both be relied upon to stop projectiles, although whilst Smoke Screen doesn't reflect them, it will inflict blind every second in its area of effect.
Analyze is a bit like warriors' "On My Mark!", but with these traits it's strictly better (unless the warrior has a strange setup)!
Check out all the available toolbelt skills - very few of them are useless, and many are better than the actual skill!

General tips:
Your role is mostly a backline nuker, since you have longer range than everyone else. You're in a fairly good position to call targets if nobody else is doing it, although you'll rarely need to actually highlight an enemy, since nearly all your skills are AoE ground targeted.
When using grenades on a small target, try to aim as close as possible to the centre of the target so all the grenades hit the mark.
When you're out of combat, you can switch out a skill, even if its toolbelt skill is on recharge. An example of when this is useful is using Super Speed (Slick Shoes toolbelt skill) while running, then immediately switching to a skill you'll use in combat.
Since your kits have a negligible cooldown, you can freely switch between them and your actual weapons for just a couple of seconds at a time, whereas other professions can get stuck on the wrong weapon set for too long. So make frequent use of your pistol and shield - you get several finishers, confusion, projectile reflects, crowd control and more.
This also means you can freely switch for a skill with a long-ish cooldown (e.g. Drop Stimulant), and then switch back immediately to make the most of the cooldowns on your other sets.


Last edited by Mistress Misty on Sat Aug 17, 2013 3:50 pm; edited 2 times in total
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Mistress Misty
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PostSubject: how to play necromancer like a Mist Y   how to play like a Mist Y I_icon_minitimeTue Feb 12, 2013 8:12 am

Necromancers are almost certainly the best profession for condition damage, and despite wearing light armour, they're still extremely resilient. The way I play necro, I can do more condition damage than a ranger (and spread it around), whilst having more survivability than a guardian. On top of all that, I have a lot of means of shutting enemies down with snares, blind, fear and weakness.
In my opinion, the best part of this build is the Plague elite - in areas with large groups of foes, it's probably the most useful skill in the entire game. This makes it ideal for pretty much every dungeon, and I really like it in general PvE for times when you aggro more than you could otherwise handle. It can even be good in WvW - this build in general works great there, as I learned while mapping. Plague in particular is fantastic for tagging a whole zerg without dying. With all that said, sometimes you'll want to swap out Plague because it's pretty crap for single targets (and dreadful against dredge), so be prepared for some creative flexibility.

Here are my traits and equipment:
Spite:
V - Spiteful Spirit
- gain 3 seconds of retaliation when you enter Death Shroud; speaks for itself really
Curses:
II - Hemophilia
- +20% bleeding duration, makes perfect sense considering how much bleeding you do
VII - Master of Corruption - 20% faster cooldowns on all corruptions, which is ideal for a corruption-based build i.e. this one...
XI - Lingering Curse - +33% duration to conditions from scepter attacks; that's a lot of conditions!
Soul Reaping:
VI - Unyielding Blast
- Death Shroud auto-attack pierces and causes vulnerability, very very strong
X - Soul Marks - gain 3% life force when your marks are triggered, lovely stuff
XI - Foot in the Grave - gain 3 seconds of stability when you enter Death Shroud so you can be even more of a tank

Armour is full Rabid (condition damage, precision, toughness) with 5 Superior Runes of the Krait and a Crest of the Rabid. Pro tip: put the crest on your headpiece, and then put a 6th Krait rune on your aqua breather so you get the +100 power underwater without wasting it on land.
In my main weapon set I wield a scepter and off-hand dagger with Rabid stats and Superior Sigils of Agony and Battle. In my other set I have a staff with the same stats and a Superior Sigil of Corruption. Trinkets are full chrysocola; spineguard is Rabid with an exquisite chrysocola jewel.
All that gives me the following base stats (standing in LA with no buffs):
Power: 1346
Precision: 1596
Toughness: 1296
Health: 21672
Armour: 2216
Condition damage: 1503
Healing power: 0
Critical chance: 36
Critical damage: 30


These are my optional skills:
Consume Conditions (this removes ALL conditions, and if you manage to inflict a lot upon yourself right before healing, the heal will be stronger)
Epidemic (supposedly this only hits 5 enemies, but either way it's strong - learn to target an enemy next to the one you really want to stack extra conditions on)
Blood is Power (if you use this without a target, you'll get the might without the bleeding!)
Signet of the Locust (who doesn't love running 25% faster? Don't bother activating this unless you absolutely need to, since it's a good one to switch out when you're standing around for a battle)
Plague (this skill makes you win the game for 20 seconds - you get stability, an enormous buff to your stats, and you can apply conditions to everything in a huge area. Unless you're up against dredge, or enemies that hit like newborn kittens, you'll want to use the 2 skill in Plague form. This applies blind and poison once per second, meaning that your enemies will have to attack more than once every second to get any hits at all. Sadly, AoE attacks will only miss one target, so tell your team mates not to ball up on you if you're facing AoE.)

Sometimes I use these instead:
Corrosive Poison Cloud - the benefits of a poison combo field should be self-evident, and self weakness is good for fueling Consume Conditions
Spectral Walk - if you're bad at running through stuff, the swiftness and stun break are great; the teleport also has some interesting properties which are potentially useful
Signet of Undeath - the passive effect is a very slow way to get life force, but the active will always be appreciated by your team, so equip this if you expect people to get downed
Lich Form - sometimes, believe it or not, Plague is not a good choice of elite e.g. against single targets, enemies who are immune to blind (dredge) or conditions in general, or if you just don't need to protect the team. Lich Form also gives stability and a boost to your stats (not quite as good as Plague's though), and provides you with some strong 1-5 skills. They're pretty self-explanatory, so just learn what they all do.

Tips on using Death Shroud:
1. if you have multiple mobs around you (especially trash mobs), use skill 4 to keep up your life force and do a lot of damage
2. if you're not in the middle of such a mob, use skill 2 to jump into one and chill them!
3. skill 3 has no activation time, and neither does Death Shroud itself, so if you get stunned you can hop into Death Shroud and fear your enemy away from you
4. with the Unyielding Blast trait, your auto-attack two stacks of vulnerability - this is the best reason to stay in Death Shroud
5. if you double tap F1, you won't lose any life force but you will gain fury, retaliation and stability from your traits
6. the most obvious use of Death Shroud is to give yourself a second health bar - if you sit on low health with full life force and then get killed, you should feel stupid
7. unless you're desperately trying to stay alive, don't let your life force drop below half, since your traits (and the way your auto-attack works) make you do more damage when you're above 50% life force

General tips:
You are a tank. You have more health and armour than pretty much anyone else, so there's no real excuse to stay out of the front line.
Some people hate the necro downed skills, but if you use 1, 2, 4, then repeat, you should have a better chance to rally than you would on another profession.
Please don't use minions.
Staff auto-attack does a lot more direct damage than the scepter, but for anything that's susceptible to conditions, camp your main weapon set. However, learn how to use all the marks on the staff and be prepared to make use of them to control your foes and benefit your allies.
Plague is really cool for running through large groups of enemies - even if they do hit you through the blind, you'll have stability!


Last edited by Mistress Misty on Mon Apr 29, 2013 8:29 am; edited 1 time in total
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PostSubject: Re: how to play like a Mist Y   how to play like a Mist Y I_icon_minitimeTue Feb 12, 2013 12:28 pm

iMerge
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Mistress Misty
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PostSubject: Re: how to play like a Mist Y   how to play like a Mist Y I_icon_minitimeTue Feb 12, 2013 12:54 pm

yooou should make a sub-forum for guides so that these can be separate without causing so much clutter
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PostSubject: how to play ranger like a Mist Y   how to play like a Mist Y I_icon_minitimeTue Feb 12, 2013 2:50 pm

Ranger is the first character I made and I still enjoy it loads. That said, I'm a firm believer that rangers are the weakest profession in PvE, and there are almost no situations where a ranger is more desirable than any other profession. Still, there's a lot of fun to be had once you accept this, and the game is at least balanced enough that a good ranger can pull his weight in an average team.
The aim of my build is to provide single target DPS from a very long range, whilst retaining high survivability even as a glass cannon in a typically dangerous situation. There is some utility, with a lot of options to add more, depending on the situation.

Here are my traits and equipment:
Marksmanship:
VI - Beastmaster's Bond
- gain 9s of fury and might (3 stacks) when your pet's health hits 50%, but try not to let it die!
VIII - Piercing Arrows - your arrows pierce your enemies, so try to line them up and hit as many foes as you can
X - Remorseless - increases longbow and speargun damage by 5% and range by... a bit more; this gives you access to 1500 range, which most professions can't have
Skirmishing:
I - Pet's Prowess
- +30% crit damage for pets, not superamazing but you have some really poor alternatives
X - Quick Draw - 20% faster cooldowns on all bow attacks, ideal for spamming stuff
XII - Moment of Clarity - you and your pet get an attack boost each time you interrupt, and +50% to daze and stun durations; try to get interrupts as often as possible to take advantage of this
Wilderness Survival:
VI - Wilderness Knowledge
- 20% faster cooldowns on survival skills, very useful considering how many of them are worth using

Armour is full Berserker's (power, precision, critical damage) with 6 Superior Runes of the Ranger.
In my main weapon set I wield a violet]longbow with Berserker's stats and a Superior Sigil of Frailty. In my other set I have an axe and warhorn with the same stats and Superior Sigils of Perception and Battle. Trinkets are full ruby; spineguard is Berserker'swith an exquisite ruby jewel.
All that gives me the following base stats (standing in LA with no buffs):
Power: 2118
Precision: 2158
Toughness: 1041
Health: 15332
Armour: 2105
Condition damage: 302
Healing power: 25
Critical chance: 63
Critical damage: 82


^ Actually you can pretty much disregard those stats, since my trinkets are currently an awful mess until I acquire decent ascended gear to replace it, which won't be supersoon koz I don't care too much about my ranger. The stats listed are what I actually have; if I had the correct equipment listed above, power and crit damage would be a bit higher, at the expense of a bit of condition damage.

For my pets I use a Carrion Devourer and a Jungle Stalker. The devourer is ranged and provides a lot of AoE poison. The stalker can stack vulnerability on targets and provide might to allies. Both pets are high DPS.

These are my optional skills:
Troll Unguent (this gives the highest heals per second, and can be cast early if you know you're about to take damage)
Sharpening Stone (active this on recharge pretty much - it has no cast time and will almost never run out)
Quickening Zephyr (as with other skills that give quickness, good timing is key to getting the most out of this)
Signet of the Hunt (the permanent speed boost makes you ultra mobile; great for positioning and avoiding getting hit)
Rampage as One (don't be a derp and switch your pet while this is up, but try to time it when you have QZ and Rapid Fire available)

Sometimes I use these instead:
Signet of Stone, Signet of the Wild, "Protect Me" - sometimes you need maximum survivability
Frost Spirit - place it somewhere convenient and you'll boost your party's damage significantly, and if there are enemies on top of it you can chill them with Cold Snap
Sun Spirit - if you don't have a guardian or ele or whatever putting perma burning on all your enemies, this will do better damage than Frost Spirit
"Search and Rescue" - pets are really slow at reviving, but very occasionally they're useful (e.g. the end of TA up path, if someone dies on the running part right before the cliff... if you have a flying pet, it can revive them)
Healing Spring - if you absolutely want AoE heals, this is pretty strong, and the condition removal can be useful
Entangle - very powerful AoE snare and bleeding; look out for opportunities to use it i.e. whenever you have a ball of tough enemies

Combos are strong:
You have very few combo fields at your disposal, but your main consideration is that every single one of your finishers is a physical projectile. Line yourself up to make the most of the combos available, but lining up targets for Piercing Arrows is generally more important.

General tips:
Your role in the team is somewhat similar to PvP rangers in GW1, except without the emphasis on interrupting. Be highly mobile, pressure the enemies with conditions, and make good use of your pet to harass targets.
When soloing, use your pet as a tank. Learn to make use of all the pet controls. Switch pets before they die, so you don't have to suffer the 60s cooldown.
Positioning is VERY important for rangers. Flank your enemies if you can. Also try to line targets up to make use of Piercing Arrows. When you're auto-attacking (i.e. when everything else is on recharge), do your best to stand at long range. If you're stuck in a small space, consider switching to shortbow.
Switch weapons fairly often to make use of the strong axe and warhorn skills, but mostly camp the longbow because Ricochet is usually not very useful.


Last edited by Mistress Misty on Sat Aug 17, 2013 4:48 pm; edited 3 times in total
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Drake
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PostSubject: Re: how to play like a Mist Y   how to play like a Mist Y I_icon_minitimeTue Feb 12, 2013 3:55 pm

Mistress Misty wrote:
yooou should make a sub-forum for guides so that these can be separate without causing so much clutter

Agreed.

Thanks for writing these up! I often wonder how I should approach a certain class and this will help very much.
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PostSubject: Re: how to play like a Mist Y   how to play like a Mist Y I_icon_minitimeTue Feb 12, 2013 4:30 pm

While guides are very helpful and I'm glad you're posting these, having a subforum entirely for a realistically small number of posts isn't really how these forums are setup. There are two general approaches to how to structure a forum. One is based on content regardless of volume of posts and the other (what we do) makes subforums based on content with post volume relevant. The first approach is generally only done on very large/high volume forums.

Really we could break our forums down into GW2 talk and non-GW2 talk (other than applications and quiz games), based off the number of posts made we'd still see about a dozen posts a day. And when your post volume is that low you don't have to worry overly much about dividing the content down so precisely.



And on another note, I run my necro much like you posted. In WvW it's insanely fun to spam chill onto zergs and it's really great for defending positions. And while chill isn't as powerful in pve, the builds like you posted are a great way to adapt the gear/trait setup to still have fun there.
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rhokk
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PostSubject: Re: how to play like a Mist Y   how to play like a Mist Y I_icon_minitimeTue Feb 12, 2013 5:25 pm

On the topic of the forum's layout: I don't think that there's any harm in being a little more organized about discussing things. Adding a couple more subforums won't increase the burden on admins too much, will it? It would certainly free up room on my bookmarks bar.


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Albus [HRUU]
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PostSubject: Re: how to play like a Mist Y   how to play like a Mist Y I_icon_minitimeTue Feb 12, 2013 6:25 pm

i don't think more sub-forums necessarily means more organized. i think in this case less is more.
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eVoVe
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PostSubject: Re: how to play like a Mist Y   how to play like a Mist Y I_icon_minitimeWed Feb 13, 2013 5:59 pm

No need for a new forum. Just make a new sticky in general or guild with links to any guide you find useful.
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greyhawk
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PostSubject: Re: how to play like a Mist Y   how to play like a Mist Y I_icon_minitimeThu Feb 14, 2013 6:02 am

Tortured Root (accessory), Colossus Fang (amulet), and Plague (ring) are all available on the trading post, 1 fang and 2 roots cost me 12g last night which i think is pretty cheap.

FotM : The rabid ascended rings are Khilbron’s Phylactery and Ouroboros Loop
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mekkanic
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PostSubject: Re: how to play like a Mist Y   how to play like a Mist Y I_icon_minitimeFri Feb 15, 2013 9:07 pm

greyhawk wrote:
Tortured Root (accessory), Colossus Fang (amulet), and Plague (ring) are all available on the trading post, 1 fang and 2 roots cost me 12g last night which i think is pretty cheap.

FotM : The rabid ascended rings are Khilbron’s Phylactery and Ouroboros Loop

The karma vendor at the Temple of Dwayna (Cathedral of Zephyrs in Machor's Leap) now sells these exotic jewelry trinkets/exotic back piece for 42K karma apiece.....
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Mistress Misty
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PostSubject: how to play mesmer like a Mist Y   how to play like a Mist Y I_icon_minitimeWed Mar 06, 2013 6:07 pm

Mesmers are probably primarily known for the amazing utility they offer to the team. Although this is actually under-appreciated (we can do more than just Portal and Time Warp!), some people might not realise that mesmers actually have the ability to deal very high critical damage, contributing very high spike damage as well as their support. I really like getting 3 phantasms up to blast a boss, but I'm not afraid to use Mind Wrack too. The other shatters are quite weak in my opinion (Diversion and Distortion are both very situational) - I'm all about fast damage.

Here are my traits and equipment:
Domination:
III - Empowered Illusions
- +15% illusion damage; insignificant for clones koz they do almost no damage, but for phantasms this is ace
Dueling:
II - Phantasmal Fury - perma Fury for phantasms, excellent DPS boost
Inspiration:
II - Glamour Mastery - -20% cooldown on glamours; this affects Null Field, Feedback, Veil, Portal, all good skills
VIII - Warden's Feedback - -20% cooldown on focus skills, and they both reflect projectiles... obviously use them more when you're facing projectile attacks
Illusions:
III - Compounding Power - +3% damage for each illusion alive; try to keep as many up as possible and you'll do hella DPS
X - Phantasmal Haste - -20% cooldown on phantasms' attacks; the more they attack, the more effective they are!
5 extra points in Inspiration and Illusions to boost your illusions even more.

Armour is full Berserker's (power, precision, critical damage) with 6 Superior Runes of the Ranger. The 6 effect on these runes is actually glitched - you get the bonus damage at all times, regardless of whether or not you have a "companion".
In my main weapon set I wield a sword and focus with Berserker's stats and Superior Sigils of Frailty and Force, although I like to use a staff with a Superior Sigil of Bloodlust to build up stacks of power if I'll get the chance to kill plenty of enemies without getting downed. Trinkets are full ruby; spineguard is Berserker's with an exquisite ruby jewel.
All that gives me the following base stats (standing in LA with no buffs):
Power: 2070
Precision: 1904
Toughness: 916
Health: 17582
Armour: 1836
Condition damage: 250
Healing power: 250
Critical chance: 71
Critical damage: 87


Bear in mind that those stats are higher than usual, because my trinkets are mostly Ascended. All my previous guides are based on exotic or lower trinkets.


These are my optional skills:
Ether Feast (even without illusions up this is a strong heal, and you should always try to use it with multiple illusions up)
Signet of Inspiration (the passive effect is kinda lame, but activate it when you have loads of boons and you'll benefit your party hugely)
Feedback (throw it down on enemies that use projectiles, right before they use them - learn to use this well)
Blink (stun break and gap closer, more useful than you might actually think!)
Time Warp (tell your team you're going to use this, and try to do it when everyone will be able to take the most advantage of it)

Sometimes I use these instead:
Portal Entre - you really need to work this out for yourself, but be aware that it does have a range (albeit a very long one) and a short duration once you use Portal Exeunt
Null Field - whenever you're expecting a lot of AoE conditions or foes with a lot of boons, this is a good choice
Veil - place this in front of your team as you're about to run through stuff
Arcane Thievery - this is more about stealing boons from your foes than transferring conditions; be aware of when to expect enemies that have boons worth stealing
Mantra of Resolve/Concentration - these are pretty much just for running through things or staying alive

Alternate weapons
As a glass cannon with light armour, it's sometimes necessary to keep your distance from the enemies. You should pretty much always have your sword and focus available, though. Sometimes it's appropriate to use a greatsword - it's the best choice for long range direct damage, but unlike the staff it doesn't offer much defense, so unless I'm confident that I can just stand back and attack, I'll make use of the staff's defensive utility.
Remember though, once you learn a boss's moves you can mostly stay in melee range. If I know I won't need to go ranged, I actually wield a sword and pistol in my second set.  Blurred Frenzy will make you invulnerable for 2 seconds, and Magic Bullet can shut down 3 foes that may be trying to kill you. The primary reason for using the pistol off-hand instead of focus is Phantasmal Duelist. Not only does it deal excellent direct single target damage, its attack is a small projectile finisher. You don't have to stay in melee range all the time either, although the sword auto attack is great for damage if you can safely do so.

General tips:
Try to have Signet of Inspiration ready when you use Time Warp, since that's the time when everyone will want all that extra might.
Always shatter your illusions before their target dies - it's a shame to let them go to waste.
Critical Infusion, combined with your very high crit chance, gives you plenty of vigor to dodge more than other professions. Make use of it.
A lot of your skills (including all your shatters) have no cast time - every one of these can be used in the middle of casting another skill.
Time Warp can be very effective for reviving someone who's completely dead in superquick time.
Spread your ranged phantasms out, koz they're not smart enough to move out of AoE.... or at least try to put them somewhere they won't take damage.


Last edited by Mistress Misty on Sat Aug 17, 2013 4:26 pm; edited 8 times in total
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Nente/Wes
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PostSubject: Re: how to play like a Mist Y   how to play like a Mist Y I_icon_minitimeWed Mar 06, 2013 7:34 pm

How to play like a Mist Y = be bad

Smile thanks for moving these over to this forum they have helped me in the past
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Mistress Misty
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PostSubject: how to play guardian like a Mist Y   how to play like a Mist Y I_icon_minitimeFri Mar 08, 2013 2:21 pm

I think most people would reasonably agree that guardian is the most variable profession in terms of the way you can set up your equipment and traits. With that in mind, take note that ALL of my profession guides are MY way of playing, and not necessarily the "best". I find this setup very enjoyable and effective, although I have actually made a second guardian who's set up very differently. I'm not going to post that on here because it's just a standard DPS guardian and not a creation of my own.
My job is keeping the team alive. I do this in several ways: boons (especially aegis), inflicting huge amounts of AoE blind, and holding aggro. Sometimes it just means staying on my feet long enough to revive people. Like most guardians, I'm somewhat similar to the traditional concept of a tank - I'm not especially interested in how much damage I can personally deal (although I am totally satisfied with my DPS), but I do all I can to keep myself alive to protect the team.

Here are my traits and equipment:
Radiance:
VI - Blind Exposure
- apply 3 stacks of vulnerability for 5s when you apply blind; makes your team do a bunch more damage, koz you'll be inflicting a LOT of blind
Valor:
IV - Strength in Numbers
- +150 toughness for nearby allies, obviously to make your buddies die less
VI - Retributive Armor - 5% of toughness is converted to precision; you have a shedload of toughness with this setup, so might as well take advantage of that
XI - Altruistic Healing - you get healed every time you apply a boon to an ally (including yourself); this is absurdly overpowered, to the point that you may become recklessly overconfident, so beware of that!
Honor:
II - Superior Aria
- 20% faster cooldown on shouts, koz your main utility skills are shouts
VIII - Empowering Might - 5s of might to nearby allies whenever you crit; this is insanely awesome because it synergizes with Altruistic Healing
5 extra points in Radiance and Virtues for more blind spam and boons.

Armour is full Knight's (toughness, power, precision) with 2 Superior Runes of the Monk, 2 Superior Runes of the Water and 2 Superior Runes of the Fire. I wield a hammer with the Soldier's stats (power, precision, crit damage) and a Superior Sigil of Perception, although I like to use a separate greatsword with a Superior Sigil of Perception to build up stacks of precision if I'll get the chance to kill plenty of enemies without getting downed. Trinkets are full Soldier's; spineguard is Soldier's with a Crest of the Soldier.
All that gives me the following base stats (standing in LA with no buffs):
Power: 1914
Precision: 1392
Toughness: 2035
Health: 17845
Armour: 3246
Condition damage: 150
Healing power: 250
Critical chance: 27
Critical damage: 30


A lot of people will vary the balance between soldier's, knight's and berserker's stats, and that's entirely a personal choice of how tanky you want to be vs how much damage you want to be doing. Just by running this build though, you've already committed to being a tanky guardian, so unless you're capable of dodging and staying up by whatever means, don't wear berserker's. If you do want that extra damage, make sure you put the berserker's stats on your trinkets - that way you'll get more critical damage per point of toughness you're sacrificing.

These are my optional skills:
Signet of Resolve (overpowered heal, and the passive removes conditions!)
"Stand Your Ground!" (nice fast cooldown for stability and a stun breaker)
"Retreat!" (swiftness and aegis are absolutely glorious)
"Hold the Line!" (mm, survivabilty)
Renewed Focus (being invulnerable is nice, and always activate your available virtues as you use this, so as to take full advantage)

Sometimes I use these instead:
Wall of Reflection - if you're expecting projectiles, you should almost certainly put this in.
"Save Yourselves!" - removing conditions from your allies is not all that important, but breaking stun is often useful, and all those boons are delicious.
Hallowed Ground - when you know you're going to be standing still somewhere and needing stability; the Defiler in Twilight Arbor and the Elemental Source in Fractals are good examples.
Shield of the Avenger - great for protecting against projectiles, but will die quickly vs melee.
Sanctuary - another good one for standing still and defending.
Tome of Wrath/Courage - if the party's going to be balled up, make a judgment on whether you'll want massive heals or some damage support, but be prepared to sacrifice the rest of your skill bar.

Alternate weapons:
Depending on how much defence your party is going to need, choose carefully between hammer and greatsword. Sometimes you'll want to have both, but this means having no ranged weapon. The hammer auto-attack chain creates a strong symbol, and Mighty Blow still allows you to deal some damage with a blast finisher. Meanwhile, greatsword is a lot more offensive, with an AoE blind from Leap of Faith and very useful crowd control with Binding Blade. Very occasionally you'll want to use staff as your main weapon; all 5 skills have a valuable utility purpose, so read them and see for yourself.
For my standard second weapon set, I use scepter and focus. The scepter is the only available guardian weapon with 1200 range, and the damage from Smite is decent when melee is not an option. Ray of Judgment gives you even more delicious blind, and Shield of Wrath is another good tanking skill.

General tips:
You're almost always going to be a LOT tankier than the rest of your team, so try to be the first one to grab aggro - if you're afraid that the enemies are going to hurt you, just imagine what they'll do to someone else if they get hit first.
Spam F1, especially when you're standing on top of the enemies... or use it intelligently to impede the enemies' attacks, but spamming F1 is much much easier, and generally the smart thing to do in a big fight.
Save your healing skill for emergencies, as it has a strong passive and a long cooldown. If you want more health, you can trigger Altruistic Healing in a number of different ways: Empower is amazing if you have a staff, Inspired Virtue is lush, your shouts all give multiple boons, several combos grant boons, and just attacking will active Empowering Might. See how many more you can find, and you'll be even more effective as a tank.
Keep yourself alive! Anything that can down you will almost certainly make light work of someone who tries to revive you.
Do not get over-confident. No matter how resilient you are (compared to other professions), you are never invincible.


Last edited by Mistress Misty on Sat Aug 17, 2013 2:29 pm; edited 4 times in total
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Mistress Misty
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PostSubject: Re: how to play like a Mist Y   how to play like a Mist Y I_icon_minitimeMon Apr 29, 2013 8:42 am

I've updated a few things, particularly some of the traits on the ele and ranger guides. I also added links (click on "traits and equipment") to the exact traits and equipment I'm running on each character (as of the time of this post, subject to change when I get better stuff!). It's a little bit inaccurate because the website doesn't have non-max gear but it's close enough.
Elementalist: http://intothemists.com/calc/?build=-k;4B2FY0w4Z0kY0;9;4OO-J-27-56;235;25R0;0k2-udbTudbTb-knF6;1Fb-V1-60B1G2LZR_9o-Gs1J;4cF1;0F18;9;5V;9;9;50;45-6H
Warrior: http://intothemists.com/calc/?build=-s;4RKVL0Z4BL-60;9;4JT-9948-49B;15;04;0M-k4-k2EV19cV19cn-FW0-T6-VYLdp-wWz12Z8_Ea-30C70H;2V8aF1;0F1;9;9;9;9;9-5k3l
Engineer: http://intothemists.com/calc/?build=-V;4sPVg0k5cQFx0;9;4TE;0O16A4;658-OR;1J0-udbTudbTn-FgNL;1N_-Va-f0k1pYvZ0a630C70HV8;0V8aF1-ZF1;9;9;9;9;2V;55-6e
Necromancer: http://intothemists.com/calc/?build=;00;3kHkC0347IkJ0;9;49T;0T4;016A;459A8oW8-k2E-F8_JH8_IsFqs6Z7-Fbu7A-F0K1PYUZ_49-0JV-7-6;16R;1ZF1;9;9;0F;9;9;6V6s5B
Ranger: http://intothemists.com/calc/?build=-F;5Fkx-f2VEV-0;9k8L;1TT9;057909B5;6M-k8SkI1zxrUzxrUJwFz0-L09WYTda-f0k1pYvZ0a630CF-9V6;0V6T;1ZF1;9;9;9;9;9-5k3k
Mesmer: http://intothemists.com/calc/?build=-N;4VPV11S73VV71;9;499-OO2;01;317-29-O-k45k2EzxrUzxrUn-FW0-gY1dYud3V80DXH2NZT4230C-2H;4aF18ZF1;9;9;9;9;2F;55k3S
Guardian: http://intothemists.com/calc/?build=-7;4RFk40K3FG-90;9;5ETJ4;15;035A17;2Z-V7ck2EottbTy8Sa-Fd0-F22Gbsc1W6XAYEZL4S51sVGs0V;5F1-ZF18Z;9;9;9;9;0V;50-6c
Thief (guide to come soon!): http://intothemists.com/calc/?build=-c;4Rwkc0N5ROkd0;9;4OT;0E25-59A;44;0JJk8-kY8udbTudbTNBGv-A-6-VYLda-f0k1pYvZ0a6H0B70HV8;0V8a;1ZF1;9;9;9;9;9-Ek3S
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