Galeshot - Galeburst

The community gave this build a rating, making it top-tier: Great

Focused on: Strike damage

Designed for: PvP Conquest

Expansions required:

Difficulty:

Normal

This build was last updated on November 25, 2025 and is up to date for the December 9, 2025 patch.

Overview

A Power Galeshot build for PvP that goes all in on burst damage, both ranged and melee.

Skill Bar

Spear

Sword/Mace

Utility

Template Code

[&DQQIKx46ThlUHQAAqwEAALsAAAB1HQAAWx0AAAsuAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAADCQFaADUAAA==]

Copy Template Code

Equipment

Spear

Sigil

Sigil

Sword

Mace

Sigil

Sigil

Rune

Amulet

Relic

Equipment Variants

Relics

• Relic of Zakiros - higher sustain.

Usage

Galeshot basics

• Rangers with the Galeshot elite specialization gain access to a new set of skills with Summon Cyclone Bow. This acts similar to an Engineer weapon kit - you can swap in and out of it anytime you want, there's no CD, and your weapon skill bar will be repalced by the Cyclone Bow's.
  • Equipping and dropping the bow counts as weapon swapping for sigils for traits and sigils.

• You can't use weapon stowing to cancel skill casts while on the Cyclone Bow.

• Every Cyclone Bow skill costs at least 1 Arrow (aside from the auto), which is a new resource. Arrows are passively generated over time.

• Using skills with an Arrow cost grants you stacks of Wind Force. At 5 stacks your autoattack becomes Hawkeye, a powerful ranged burst skill.
  • Wind Force Stacks are lost upon leaving Cyclone Bow.

General

• Both weapon sets have great damage, but Sword/Mace is your more defensive/utility focused one and Spear is geared towards offense.

• Pet swapping acts as a Blast finisher thanks to Clarion Bond. Being instant, you can have Smokescale place a Smoke Cloud under you (even while you're stunned), and swap pets for AoE stealth.

• Smokescale's F2 Smoke Cloud is a useful combo field:
  • Projectile finishers like Falcon's Stoop could Blind your target, increasing your sustain.
  • Both weapon sets have either leap or blast finishers for stealth stacking.

• Jetstream gives you a baseline passive movement speed boost, but it's not as good as Swiftness. If you're about to leave combat and move to the next fight, consider swapping pets or weapons (or equipping Cyclone Bow). Both of these actions proc Swiftness from traits.

Spear

• Spear's gimmick is stealth attacks - whenever you're stealthed, stronger versions of skills 2-5 become available. As striking an enemy reveals you, you only get to use 1 of these skills per stealth window.
  • Stealth attacks share a CD with their regular versions! If you combo stealth with Warclaw's Engage (which is a leap finisher), Predator's Ambush will be on CD so you won't get to use it as a followup.

• Skills 2-4 deal heavy damage while #5 (Panther's Prowl) fills a utility purpose.

• Panther's Prowl is perhaps the most important skill on this weapon, as it's an easy way of obtaining Stealth. Not only that, but it allows you to use stealth attacks even when you're Revealed! So this could even fit into burst combos - in case you've just revealed yourself by doing a stealth attack, Panther's Prowl could unlock other stealth attacks without having to wait for Revealed to fall off.

• Skill #2 on Spear, Mongoose's Frenzy is a simple melee cleave with high damage. Works fine as a followup to skill #4.
  • Stealth attacks: Wolf's Onslaught adds an extra strike at the end, increasing its damage significantly but also its cast time. Works best when the target's CC'd and can't fight back or if you. It's the go-to option if raw damage is all you want.

• Skill #3, Falcon's Stoop is a solid ranged attack. You can extend its range and make it unblockable by stealthing up.

• Skill #4, Warclaw's Engage is a highly versatile skill and the primary candidate for stealth attacks. Works as a leap finisher, mobility tool, has good damage and could Daze targets if stealthed. If you can get stealth from other sources, use this in stealth. If you can't, use this to gain stealth by comboing with your Smokescale.

• Both pets can help you with obtaining Stealth. On Smokescale you need to work for it by doing combos in the smoke field, but on Panther you just press Stalk.

Damage

• Cyclone Bow (CB) is where most of the burst comes from.

• Much of the CB playstyle revolves around Bluster, a hard hitting ranged skill. You can reset its CD by using Pelt and Supersonic Arrow, so you should chain your skills with that in mind.
  • The only skill (aside from the autoattack) that doesn't recharge Bluster is Fleeting Zephyr, but that's fine since that's your only defensive skill on this set and you wouldn't want to use it in burst combos anyway.

• Bluster is for single target damage, Pelt is AoE but good for single target too, and Supersonic Arrow is better than both but makes you stationary - in exchange it CCs targets. All of these skills give you Wind Force stacks.

• At 5 stacks of Wind Force your autoattack becomes Hawkeye, the true burst skill of this set. While it's AoE, it deals increased damage to your main target.

• We've covered Spear already, so let's talk about Sword/Mace.

• Pounce is the hardest hitting skill here, and one that works best when used after Serpent's Strike, as SS can boost Pounce's damage by applying a movement impairing condition. SS also has a longer leap, so you can use this as a gapcloser.

• Weapon swap gives you Fury, and Fury refreshes Opening Strikes via the trait Remorseless. This casues your first attack to deal more damage following a weapon swap. This only covers 1 hit, not the entire skill.
  • Swapping pets procs Clarion bond which also gives you Fury, so you can instantly boost the damage of your next hit by swapping pets.

• If you're swapping to Sword and immediately do a Serpent's Strike, it'll do more damage because of Remorseless. Then you can boost Pounce's damage too with a pet swap.

• Thistleguard does less damage than the Sword skills but still hits relatively hard, and it has the shortest cast time on this set which makes it easy to fit into burst combos.

• Wild Strikes is harder to pull off because of the long cast time, it's best used for situations like downed cleave, or if you have Stability or Quickness.

Sustain

• You don't really have much in terms of consistent damage mitigation, but you do have tools for avoiding bursts, mainly in the form of evade frames. You'll find them on both weapons, Cyclone Bow, and even among your utility skills. These can even be used to avoid incoming attacks when you're Immobilized, whereas you couldn't use regular dodges there.
  • Serpent's Strike on Sword.
  • Warclaw's Engage on Spear.
  • Fleeting Zephyr on Cyclone Bow.
  • Whirlwind on your utility bar.

• Signet of Stone acts as a panic button. While it doesn't break stuns, it can be used while stunned and protects you from incoming strike damage for its duration.

• "Protect Me!" fills a similar role as Signet of Stone as it mitigates incoming damage and even absorbs some of it, but it's not quite as good. However it does break stuns.
  • If another stunbreak or at least the signet is available then you're free to use it for just mitigation, but otherwise you should keep it for emergencies.
  • The barrier can be used to soak condition damage too.

• Whirlwind is perhaps the best defensive skill in the build. Not only does it break stuns, it repositons you while evading incoming attacks and even grants Superspeed to help kite or run to a safe spot. Being a Squall skill it also removes all movement impairing conditions + another 1 via trait synergy.

• Condition cleansing in the build is rather bad. You mainly rely on not getting hit, but there are a few cleansing tools you could use when in trouble:
  • Joy of Movement makes Squalls remove Cripple, Chill and Immobilize + 1 other condition. If you have a lot of conditions on you, consider using any Squall first in order to get rid of a bunch of non-damaging conditons. This is going to increase the odds of you cleansing damaging conditions with your remaining condi removal skills.
  • Soothing Breeze (healing skill) is your best cleanse, removing 2 conditions on top of having Squall synergy.
  • Then comes Thistleguard and Sigil of Cleansing on Sword/Mace.

• Consider using Stealth from pets and disengaging a bit if you're really pressured, of if you've used up all your cleanses.

• Stalk is able to instantly stealth you even while stunned. It won't help you vs AoE and cleave skills, but it could still be used in a last ditch effort to at least make it harder for enemies to land skills that require a target. If used before they start casting skills like True Shot, Mirror Blade, Skirmisher's Shot or Water Trident, you might save yourself from a lot of damage.

Related Builds

• Galeshot - Galeburst Roamer - WvW version of this sPvP build.

Top Streamers

• Twitch: Boyce