Soulbeast - Poisonbeast

The community gave this build a rating, making it second-tier: Good

Focused on: Condition damage, Mobility and Sustain

Designed for: PvP Conquest

Difficulty:

Easy

This build was last updated on October 04, 2023 and is up to date for the October 8, 2024 patch.

Overview

A Condition damage-based Soulbeast duelist build for PvP with high sustain.

Skill Bar

Shortbow

Axe/Dagger

Utility

Skill Variants

Utility

• Flame Trap - extra damage, adds a new condition (plus a combo field) and more trap synergy to the build on a very low CD.

• Viper's Nest - slightly worse than Flame Trap overall but has Predator's Cunning synergy.

• Signet of Renewal - passive healing, mass cleanse and stun break on active.

• Griffon Stance - could come in clutch when you're out of dodges and need to evade an enemy burst.

• Lightning Reflexes - low CD stun break, evasion and Immob removal.

Pets

• Siamoth over Alpine Wolf - they both have Unflinching Fortitude and a CC, but Alpine Wolf has better mobility and 2 leap finishers in Beastmode to combo with Healing Spring for more healing, while Siamoth has a better F2 skill, slightly longer CC duration and a bit more damage in Beastmode. Very similar pets, this one comes down to personal preferences.

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Specializations

Variants

• Light on your Feet is an equally viable option, trades some flexibility for improved bow skills and a bit of extra condition duration.
• Primal Reflexes could be considered when you're NOT taking a second utility trap for the optional slot, as neither Spike Trap nor Healing Spring gain much value from Trapper's Expertise.

Specialization Variants

Nature Magic over Skirmishing: lower damage, higher sustain. This variant's also quite helpful against condition builds due to Evasive Purity.

Equipment

Shortbow

Sigil

Sigil

Axe

Dagger

Sigil

Sigil

Rune

Amulet

Relic

Runes

• Rune of Necromancer - higher damage if you can afford to give up the incoming condition duration mitigation of Orr.

• Rune of Dolyak - higher sustain option, makes it harder for enemies to burst you.

Relics

• Relic of Antitoxin - better condition cleansing.

• Relic of the Fractal - adds new conditions to the build, makes it harder for enemies to cleanse bursts but has a 20s CD.

Usage

Elite specialization basics

• Soulbeast allows Rangers to meld/merge with their pet, becoming one. This is done through Beastmode which has a 10s CD.

• Traits related to swapping pets now activate upon entering/leaving Beastmode.

• Pet related traits and skills such as Poison Master continue to function even while merged, but this time you'll be the one who benefits from them, not the pet (although sometimes the effects are lessened).

• Melding with a dead pet and then exiting Beastmode instantly revives them.

General

• Quick Draw makes your toolkit way more flexible by significantly reducing the CD of the first skill you use after swapping weapons, allowing you to better adapt to situations. There are a lot of ways to use this trait, here are a few ideas:
  • On Short bow you should either open with Poison Volley for burst damage, Quick Shot if you need sustain (evade attacks), or Concussion Shot if you want more CC.
  • On Axe/Dagger the prime considerations are Winter's Bite and Stalker's Strike. Both of these offer a mix of damage and survivability. In terms of raw damage Splitblade could be better than Stalker's Strike when SS wouldn't inflict the extra Poison stacks.

• Eternal Bond allows you to swap pets while in Beastmode! This makes it significantly easier for you to adapt to the situation. For example you could use both pets' mobility skills back-to-back while traveling between capture points, or you could swap to Alpine Wolf for the stunbreak even if you're on Hawk.
  • With this trait you should usually rotate through the abilities of both pets before leaving Beastmode.

Mobility

• Maintain permanent Swiftness with Quick Shot and Quickening Screech.
  • Turn around before using Quick Shot in order to move "forward".

• Roam between capture points with Swoop (soulbeast) and Crippling Leap (soulbeast).

Damage

• The basic gameplan is simple: CC targets with Spike Trap, Crippling Shot, Concussion Shot (from behind or the sides), Entangle and Brutal Charge (soulbeast canine) then spam as many weapon skills on them as possible + Primal Cry.
  • Use the immob from Crippling Shot to root targets while you flank them with Concussion Shot.

• Enemies under the eye of Relic of Cerus get hit every second, so the value of this relic goes up significantly if you can root them right under the eye with Entangle. Consider setting up the Entangle with Spike Trap.

• On bow spam Crossfire as much as you can, ideally from behind. Many short bow skills have increased effectiveness when striking from behind or the sides, use CC skills to make enemies stationary and walk behind them whenever possible.

• Poison Volley and Splitblade are cone-shaped attacks and should be used in melee range (point-blank) to ensure that all the projectiles hit the main target.

• Crippling Shot should be used a few seconds before entering a fight, preferably while merged with your pet. This gives you a buff that makes your next 3 attacks inflict Bleeding while the skill continues to recharge. Doing this without merging basically has the same effect except your pet will gain the buff, and pets are less reliable than players (although there are exceptions..).

• Winter's Bite is the best skill on Axe. While it does less condition damage than Splitblade it applies up to 3 conditions to the target, which overall puts more pressure on them. The Weakness even helps with mitigating incoming damage.
  • This is best used in Beastmode as the Weakness will immediately apply when the skill hits instead of having to wait for your pet to attack.
  • In Beastmode the Winter's Bite effect is applied to you for 15 seconds even if you throw this skill at the ground with no target, while out of combat. As the duration is longer than the skill's CD it's worth using as you're traveling the map because you'll be able to begin the next fight with a free Weakness.

• If you're using Stalker's Strike for the damage and not the evasion, you should first make sure your target is crippled. Crippling Shot has the benefit of allowing you to use Stalker's Strike as the first skill after swapping weapons for Quick Draw synergy, while still getting the most damage out of it.

• Lacerating Slash (Hawk F2) is a spammable source of Bleeding and Poison from Poison Master.

• Eagle's Beastmode F3 skill Primal Cry is one of the best skills when it comes to condition variety and should be used on CD to pressure enemies.

Sustain

• Most of your cleansing comes from Healing Spring. This is also a Water field with a long duration, and there are plenty of finishers in the build that could be used to combo extra healing. Just about all of your mobility skills are also combo finishers, including Wolf's F1-2 skills while in Beastmode.

• If damage is starting to overwhelm you and you are out of CDs, just run away with one of your many mobility skills such as Swoop (soulbeast) and wait a little before re-engaging. Make sure you don't have an enemy target selected and autotargeting is turned off in the options!

• Dodging applies Protection, which also heals thanks to the trait Rugged Growth.

• Wolf's Unflinching Fortitude is perhaps the most powerful defensive skill in the build. It breaks stuns, grants immunity to direct damage and even cleanses some conditions.

• Applying Poison steals some health from the target.

• Unstoppable Union grants Protection and as Beastmode has no cast time, this can be used even while CC'd in order to survive enemy burst.

• Dolyak Stance is useful in just about any situation. It mitigates both conditon and strike damage, makes you immune to any form of CC, and even cleanses some conditions.

Related Builds

• Soulbeast - Condition Trapper Roamer - WvW roaming version of the build.