Berserker - Defensive Gunzerker Roamer

This is a test build. You may comment and rate it.

Focused on: Strike damage, Mobility and Sustain

Designed for: WvW Roaming

Expansions required:

Difficulty:

Normal

This build was last updated on February 25, 2025.

Overview

A high damage Berserker build for WvW roaming that's putting the Rifle buffs to good use. This build goes for a more balanced and hopefully viable approach, adding plenty of extra sustain.

Skill Bar

Rifle

Staff

Utility

Skill Variants

Utility

Viable choices for the optional slot:

• Shattering Blow
  - projectile-reflect, Stability and a source of adrenaline building.

• "For Great Justice!"
  - improves your damage and most importantly your Fury uptime.

• Signet of Might
  - unblockable attacks and damage boost.

Heal

• Blood Reckoning
  - this is another great skill for adrenaline building and one that can even reset your burst skills. It's an offensive option, and your condi cleansing becomes way worse. While this skill can make you win fights faster, doing so almost becomes a necessity as you won't be able to keep up with your opponents in longer fights, especially if they're playing a condition build.

Template Code

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Specializations

Variants

• Cull the Weak
  could give you more damage and add a new source of mitigation to the build, but it's worse against ranged builds as you have to sacrifice the other trait which makes Aegis not pop when it's hit by projectiles. You also lose the reflect.

Equipment

Head
Assassin

Shoulders
Assassin

Chest
Assassin

Hands
Assassin

Legs
Assassin

Feet
Assassin

Backpiece
Berserker

Accessory
Berserker

Accessory
Berserker

Amulet
Berserker

Ring
Berserker

Ring
Berserker

Rifle
Marauder

Sigil

Sigil

Staff
Marauder

Sigil

Sigil

Rune
x6

Infusion
x18

Relic

Equipment Variants

Stats

• Full Berserker gear is offers stronger bursts but less consistency.

Runes

• Superior Rune of the Scholar
  makes the same tradeoff as Berserker gear.

Relics

• Relic of the Midnight King
  lowers your burst damage but adds another Fury source to the build which can be important, especially when not playing
  "For Great Justice!"
  .

Consumables

Food options

• Peppercorn-Crusted Sous-Vide Steak
  - passive damage mitigation and great stats.

• Slice of Candied Dragon Roll
  - extra Precision and armor ignoring damage procs that also heal you. It's cheap too.

Utility

• Superior Sharpening Stone
  or
  Tin of Fruitcake
  , whichever is cheaper at the moment.

Usage

Elite specialization mechanics

• Berserker grants Warriors acceess to
  Berserk
  (F2), a mode during which they gain new burst skills.

• To Enter Berserker mode you must have full adrenaline (30/30). The Berserking burst skill
  Gun Flame
  (Rifle) and
  Rampart Splitter
  (Staff) become available during this time frame, these cost 10 adrenaline (which amounts to 1 regular adrenaline bar, 1/3 of the cost of what it took to enter Berserker mode).

• Shattering Blow
  and
  Sundering Leap
  are both important adrenaline management tools. They're especially useful for getting back to full adrenaline just before
  Berserk
  recharges so you don't have to waste time building adrenaline while Berserker mode is available. Even in Berserker mode they are useful, allowing you to quickly fill up the adrenaline bar for back-to-back burst combos.

General

• Both the initial cast and the landing strike of
  Sundering Leap
  restore adrenaline, so try to land on top of enemies. This skill is also a great gap closer / disengage tool if you don't care about the adrenaline.

• Versatile Rage
  restores 5 adrenaline on weapon-swap. This is quite useful when you're just a little short of having enough adrenaline to use burst skills, especially if you're having difficulty building adrenaline.

• Signet of Rage
  is mainly taken for its passive, but you could also use this as a setup for one final burst if you feel like you could get the kill with all the extra Might.

Damage

• Gun Flame
  is your most important skill.

• Explosive Shell
  is a great followup to Gun Flame, quickly delivering another packet of damage.

• Brutal Shot
  works as a setup skill for Gun Flame, applying Immobilize after the evade frame.
  • This also counts as a mobility skill and will proc extra damage from
    Relic of the Stormsinger
    .

• Volley
  is more of a filler. Great damage, but your CCs are better spent setting up something else.

• Try to use
  Valiant Leap
  before swapping to Rifle in order to gain Fury.

Survival

• Almost every skill on Staff is a healing skill. This weapon is great for recovering your HP or moving out of harm's way using its mobility skills.

• While Rifle is mostly an offensive weapon, the evade frame on
  Brutal Shot
  is quite a powerful defensive tool.

• Both entering and leaving
  Berserk
  grant you powerful defensive buffs, making this an important part of your sustain:
  • Savage Instinct
    - stun break and immunity to strike damage.
  • Dead or Alive
    - grants
    Blood Reckoning
    which causes damage you deal to heal you.
  • Eternal Champion
    - grants Stability and endurance.
  • Burst of Aggression
    - the Superspeed could help you run away from enemies if you're being focused.

• Don't hesitate to cut Berserker mode short with Eternal Champion (F2) if you're taking too much damage.

• Dodge rolling applies Resistance which is great against builds with a lot of Blind and Weakness spam, allowing you to land important skills without having to worry about the attack missing or glancing.

• Blocking an attack reflects projectiles. This is especially useful when it comes to your Aegis sources like
  Sundering Leap
  or
  Line Breaker
  because anything you reflect doesn't consume the Aegis! Meaning that Aegis can now block more than 1 attack as long as it's a projectile. Against projectile users you might want to be extra careful with aiming these mobility skills so that you always stay at range and avoid getting hit by things that aren't projectiles as long as possible.

• Cleansing Ire
  provides a steady stream of cleansing in combat.

• Always factor in what other cleansing CDs are available before you'd heal with
  Mending
  as this is your best mass cleanse. If the answer is none and you heal with no conditions on you in a condition matchup, you might get killed a few seconds later due to the lack of cleansing. Sometimes it's worth holding onto for a few extra seconds just to be safe.