Deadeye - Power Rifle Roamer

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Overview

A Rifle Deadeye build for WvW roaming which focuses on single target burst damage.

Skillbar

RifleHealingUtilityElite

Dagger/Pistol

Slot Changes

Elite

- better disengage potential.

Weapons

There are many alternatives to Dagger/Pistol:

Sword/Dagger works as a semi-defensive set with evasion on skill #3 and has a decent reach + damage and boon stealing.
Sword/Pistol can be used for the evasion, CC, and AoE burst.

Specializations

Equipment

6x

Superior Rune of the Scholar

18x

Mighty WvW Infusion

Stats

The ratio of Marauder and Berserker's pieces can be changed based on personal preferences. Add a few more Marauder pieces if you're feeling too squishy, or replace them with Berserker if you're willing to take risks.

Runes

- lower opening burst, but more consistent damage modifier and better Might uptime.

Sigils

Superior Sigil of Force can be replaced by:

- bigger burst window for .
- if you're willing to carry 2 rifles with you, your second one should have Night instead of Force. Use the Force rifle during daytime, and the Night one during the night.

Consumables

Food

- defensive/utility food with synergy
- Budget version:
- extra damage.

Utility

- better opening burst, goes well with Scholar runes.
- consistent, cheap, and great damage modifier.

Usage

Elite specialization basics

is replaced by , which has greater range but also a cast time. We're still going to refer to this as a steal.
Stolen skills are also replaced by new ones for each profession, although these are much less situational and can be used more freely. One thing to note is that you cannot pick the target freely for the new stolen skills, they will always be used on your marked target (even if they are in stealth).
- If you want to know more about these skills, here's a list of them from the official wiki.
Your specialization resource is called Malice. It's built using attack skills with initiative cost on your marked target and you can have up to 5 stacks of Malice, each increasing your damage by 3%. Stealth attacks such as consume Malice and are further empowered based on the number of Malice stacks.
At the 5 Malice threshold stolen skills such as grant Stealth on activation, which is going to be their primary purpose - but be wary that they also do damage, so if you were already in stealth these will reveal you instead. There is a workaround for this however: stolen skills need line of sight (LoS) to deliver damage, if you intentionally break LoS then you can use them for the stealth without drawbacks.

General

Start fights with to begin passively building Malice. Stealing also procs , which gives you a ~4 second window to burst targets while you have Quickness and the stat increase that comes with it.
provides easy stealth access on rifle, the only limiting factor will be endurance.
Use when you either run out of initiative, want to gain Quickness, have to switch targets, or need to interrupt via .
is easily the most versatile skill in the build. Couple of applications include:
- Extending the reach of rifle by 1200 range instantly.
- Escaping from melee, and then doing it again with when they get close.
- Stomping downed opponents with Shadowstep ⇒ Shadow Return.
- Breaking stun and cleansing conditions.
Breaking stealth with damage can be beneficial for your burst thanks to - does it by default.
is good for more than just cleansing conditions or boosting your precision, its active effect restores an entire dodge roll's worth of endurance which can be turned into stealth.
is both a defensive and offensive elite. The rather lengthy evade frame with increased movement speed makes it an excellent panic button when you're under fire. On the other hand the skill deals heavy AoE damage whilst evading, which makes it great for pressuring melee targets in general with next to no risk.
- Note: skills like or are able to interrupt Dagger Storm, so don't be completely careless.

Rifle

Main weapon set. Burst, mobility, easy stealth access.

Rifle technically has 10 skills, but about half of them won't be used much.
swaps your rifle skills for more powerful ones, but makes you stationary (this can be cancelled with the same button). You can still use dodge rolling, teleports, and without breaking kneel. Always kneel if you want to do damage with rifle attack skills.
is basically the of this build when it comes to mobility, but that's just one aspect of it. In combat this serves as a spammable condition cleanse or even combo tool for stealth access when used in a smoke field.
- We recommend that you set up a bind for "about face" (Options ⇒ Control Options ⇒ Movement). This makes it easier to teleport forward with this skill using the following sequence: about face ⇒ ⇒ about face.
(TRB) will be the main skill to spam on the weapon, this is where most of your damage comes from, not to mention Might and Malice stacking.
can be used either to set up burst with the Immobilize, or as a cheaper way to reach the Malice cap (Spotter costs 3 Initiative and gives the same amount of Malice as the 6 initiative TRB). The boons provided are also quite good.
At maximum (5 stacks) of Malice you should enter stealth and do a . Exceptions include targets at very low health, in that canse it may be quicker to just spam them down with TRB.
- At maximum malice prioritize using stolen skills for stealth access, don't waste dodges if you don't have to!
could be useful against other ranged specs, but a more common application of it is stealth stacking. It's a combo field which can be utilized by you or your team. After dropping SC at your feet, cancel kneeling and use to combo stealth (the two skills are also tied to the same button).

Rifle burst rotation template:

, which already puts you at 1/5 Malice with
x2 or x2 or a mix of both - after this, you should be at 5/5 Malice
Stealth using either a stolen skill or a dodge