Druid - Staff/GS Duelist Druid
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Focused on: Strike damage, Mobility and Sustain
Designed for: PvP Conquest
Difficulty:
Normal
Overview
A PvP Druid build made to win smaller skirmishes and provide some support for teammates on the side.
Archival note: disappeared with the removal of Ancient Seeds
Skill Bar
Staff
Greatsword
Utility
Template Code
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Specializations
Variants
- offers more cleansing in case you'd need it.
Equipment
Staff
Sigil
Sigil
Greatsword
Sigil
Sigil
Rune
Amulet
Amulet
- - more sustain and support, lower damage.
Usage
Elite specialization basics
- Rangers with the Druid specialization gain access to (CA) and Astral Force (AF). You build AF mostly through healing, Regeneration from Command skills helps a lot there. Once the bar is full you may enter Celestial Avatar, flipping your weapon skills over to 5 new ones.
- Both entering and leaving CA counts as a weapon swap and could even proc while on Staff.
General
- Your primary role is to win 1v1s and smaller skirmishes, but you also have the ability to support your team a bit, especially on amulet.
- Staff is more of a defensive set while GS is where most of the damage comes from.
- CC is a central part of the build.
- Interrupting a foe grants Fury from , which synergizes with for even more damage on your next hit. The best followup when you have these damage boosts is on GS. and
- Striking a CC'd enemy Immobilizes them via . This can only happen once every 20 seconds. It doesn't have to be you who delivers the strike, the trait will proc even if it's your pet that hits them.
- While Daze is an instant trigger for and the damage modifier procs from Marksmanship. It's also instant, so could be used even in the middle of casting (your pet can still proc the Immob from Ancient Seeds before it lands). is a valuable stun break, it's also a great skill for setting up burst damage - the
- is the perfect setup for and even recharges Maul if it was already on CD.
- The elite Stability and minor healing. As a Water field you could also combo extra healing with various skills like or . In Celestial Avatar however this flips over to its other version, which is a support tool for reviving allies.
- The version of this skill could even be used to rez yourself if you manage to drop it on your location right before you go into downed state.
is a useful source of
- recharges faster if it heals an ally - pets also count for this. In 1v1s always try to land on top of your pet for CD reduction. Even if you have to use this skill for disengaging you could try swapping pets right before the skill ends, that way your pet should spawn on your new location and be in range of the AoE healing.
Pets
- Setting your pets to avoid combat and managing them manually would be optimal in order to gain greater control over when they use their opening ability.
- The first strike Jacaranda does once you swap to it is a heavy AoE with a longer duration, you should always try to land it while the target is Immobilized. Jacaranda itself has its own Immob on F2: .
- Smokescale's first action is to do a Smoke Assault. This skill does good damage while the pet stays glued to the target, which is especially great if they are trying to kite you. The pet will then follow it up with a knockdown.
- Swapping pets procs 2 traits:
- This gives you an instant trigger for Fury which (through Marksmanship synergy) makes your next attack deal more damage and be a guaranteed critical strike. Swapping pets as you're about to land a is a significant damage boost.
- The Quickness has many uses from boosting your damage to making it easier to get your heals off in .
- Superspeed is great for creating some breathing room while being chased.
- The lesser Call of the Wild proc could instantly blast combo fields for healing, stealth or cleansing while the AoE Weakness is yet another source of damage mitigation.
and , making pet swapping itself an extremely powerful part of your kit!
- Smokescale's F2 ability is Stealth for you and your team. Both weapon sets and Celestial Avatar have combo tools for blasting this field.
- It's even possible to stealth yourself while you're downed or sitting in a CC! All you have to do is make Smokescale drop a Smoke Clud and then swap to Jacaranda to proc which is a Blast finisher. While downed this could prevent you from getting stomped, and makes it harder to focus you while in a CC.
which could be used to combo
Celestial Avatar
- Exiting Stealth and Superspeed. Oftentimes this could provide more valuable sustain than CA itself - when you're under heavy pressure you may not always get the chance to channel healing skills, but quickly dropping in and out of CA for the Stealth and Superspeed (followed by a mobility skill if possible) should be enough to leave your enemies behind and resustain in safety.
- Keep in mind that this proc is AoE, you could even use it to help allies escape or prevent downed players from getting stomped.
procs for AoE
- should usually be used on cooldown. This skill is instant and has a very short delay before going off, which means it could be used even while channeling other skills. In fact you should always try to line it up with for the Blast finisher which cleanses yet another condition for you and nearby allies (drop Seed of Life while casting Lunar Impact).
- is a quick and huge heal which also CCs enemies. As a Blast Finisher always try to use it in a combo field. This is usually the first skill druids use upon entering CA because ideally you'd get 2 casts off before dropping out of this form and the CC could buy you time to channel other skill uninterrupted.
- is very straightforward, just use it to heal yourself and allies if you're not taking too much damage during the channeling.
- Stability alone. The channeling can be interrupted by moving or weapon stowing, but the Stability will still remain - you can use that to safely cast another skill like if need be. is excellent for cleaving enemies. Note: this skill can be used defensively just for the
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Ratings
It's a fun build but there are better options out there. I like the combos with the roots and the extra utility Cele Avatar brings to the usual ranger toolkit, it's not like the build is one dimensional either. Druid's simply just a bit mediocre right now in terms of power level. Satisfying gameplay tho.
I missed druid but I still miss the return of competitive druid. This is fun to mess around with but if I expect the next game to be hard I always find myself swapping to untamed. 20s CD on cele avatar is absurd and should be brought down to 15 at least, sustain and damage are both lacking. I play it when I want to have fun, I play untamed when I want to win. Maybe one day that will change but today is not that day.
Started Guild wars 2 pvp 2 months ago, i almost only played this build with zerk amulet, i managed to reach and stay plat 2 "easily" but i struggle to pass p3. A lot of counter classes but once you know them you can adapt your gameplay and rotations. Hard to play against really good players
This build it's a good roamer option for ranger mains, it deals amount of CC and dmg, you can also bring support and sustain to yourself.
Comments
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