PvP Combat Basics

Introduction

A guide to GW2's most important PvP mechanics and tactics to help new players improve their gameplay and understand Conquest better.

WORK IN PROGRESS

Combat Reset

Out of combat (OOC) health regenaration in GW2 is extremely fast. If you're leaving a fight and you aren't scared of getting jumped on low HP then simply wait for OOC regen to kick in instead of blowing your healing skill.

You could even incorporate this into your game plan. Sometimes on low HP it's best to reset the fight by disengaging, if you put enough distance between you and your enemies and manage to drop combat you'll be back at max HP in a matter of seconds. Then you could head back into the fight.

Bleeding Out

Time is one of the most valuable resources in Conquest, so wasting the time of the enemy team could contribute to your victory.

The concept is simple: don't finish off the downed opponent after you win a fight, instead let them die slowly. By delaying their respawn you make things easier for your team as they don't have to prepare for the defeated enemy joining the next fight before you could get there.

It's not always the best idea however, so you need to factor in a couple of things:

• Where's the downed opponent? If they died on the capture point and you don't have a CC that works on downed like Stomp then you have no choice but to finish them if you want to cap.
• Is the fight still ongoing? If you were in a teamfight and they have allies around then don't take risks, finish them off as soon as you can.
• Are their allies nearby? Even if it was a 1v1, if they are near their spawn their allies could soon come for them to pick them up.
• How much damage or Stability do you have? If your cleave is strong or you have access to Stability then you could take bigger risks because even with allies nearby you might be able to deny rez attempts if you have to.
• Are they a Ranger? Rangers could use their pet to selfrez with Lick Wounds after spending a few seconds in downed state. This goes back to the previous point, if you have enough pressure or means to safe-stomp you might be able to stop this, but on many low damage builds you might not want to take risks with Rangers and just finish them off.

Tip: don't grief yourself as a Warrior. While getting back into the fight with Vengeance might seem like a good idea at first, do keep in mind that this skill prevents capture point contribution! In a 1v1 your opponent could simply cap the point and leave, in which case you're just delaying your own respawn for no reason. Of course there are exceptions where Vengeance could be useful, like getting up to stomp a downed enemy in a teamfight and sometimes taking a risk in a duel to get a kill on a low HP enemy who got greedy trying to bleed you out could work, you should think twice before using this skill.

Targeting

You don't always want your skills to lock onto a target in GW2, especially when it comes to mobility skills. If you want something to take you in any direction other than your target simply click off to a neutral part of your screen (any part of the terrain that isn't interactable) before using a mobility skill like Burning Speed or Leap of Faith. Having the wrong settings however could quickly ruin things for you.

Go to Options ⇒ General Options ⇒ Combat Options.

Disable "Autotargeting". This is option is notorious for selecting a new enemy even if you had no target, which prevents you from using mobility skills for things like disengaging. You don't want to be in a sitution where you detarget, use a mobility skill at 5% HP to run away, but Autotargeting reselects the enemy and takes you right to them instead of away from them.

Now that you know how to properly detarget, let's talk about retargeting.

Still under Combat Options check the box for "Allow Skill Retargeting". This enables you to do things like switching targets in the middle of the cast so that the skill can go off on someone other than the initial target or even hiding windup animations.

Some examples of retargeting:

• Engineer's Magnet has a skill effect that connects you to the target, which gives enemies a chance to avoid the pull before the skill goes off. You could confuse enemies by casting it on the wrong target, make them dodge and then switch to the real target at the last moment. Or throw in some detargeting to the mix by using the skill without the target so nobody sees it coming and then target an enemy in the last moment to pull them in, giving them very little chance to avoid the CC.
• You're using Rapid Fire but the target goes behind a pillar to block your line of sight. Instead of wasting half the skill shooting arrows into a structure simply select a new target (assuming there is one) to get the most damage out of Rapid Fire (and other channeled abilities in general).