Holosmith - Power Holo
The community gave this build a rating, making it top-tier: Great
Focused on: Strike damage and Mobility
Designed for: Open World and Open World General
Expansions required: 
Overview
A power Holosmith build for open world. to cauterise enemies with the power of concentrated sunlight. This build has great damage both in AoE and single target, decent mobility, and is slightly resilient. Compared to scrapper and mechanist, this build is harder to play but does higher damage after learning to play it. However, it isn't that great for soloing as it doesn't have barriers like scrapper or a very tanky pet like mechanist.
Template Code
Skill Bar
Weapon variants
Rifle - range
Hammer - similar damage, defense, and cc to 
Sword/
Shield with slightly more mobility. Requires access to Weaponmaster Training with Secrets of the Obscure.
Skill Variants
Healing
The choice of heal skill is very open. We recommend because it provides very high healing and cleanses 2 conditions when first deployed, while creating a water field where you can detonate the turret to provide even more healing (See: Guide:What are Combo Fields). Always pick up the turret or detonate it, as it will provide more healing over time than the super weak regeneration that leaving the turret deployed provides. Other options can be considered.
- provides a decent heal with a low cooldown with the toolbelt skill , a Blast finisher with , condition cleanse and water field with , and some ally healing.
- - helpful to negate a big attack or a oneshot, and has a helpful 2 second stun on the toolbelt skill . This skill requires a bit more skill to use, as it only provides large healing if you were to take lethal damage.
- - good healing when used above 100 Heat, but not too good at low Heat. Its toolbelt skill is quite niche, transforming the conditions you suffer from into Burning (transforming more conditions at higher Heat levels), which can do more harm than good.
Utility Skills
has great damage and crowd control. Don't replace it.
is great for damage. Don't replace it.
provides great damage through the kit and its toolbelt skill. You can replace Grenade Kit if you don't like it.
- - great stun break and damage reduction with a low cooldown, even lower if used at high Heat.
- - provides a projectile block on demand and a toolbelt skill that deals good damage. Situational since you are already using a shield, and this skill only blocks frontal attacks.
- - heavy melee range crowd control on a short cooldow, in case you need more crowd control than what Throw Mine provides (though it does almost no damage). Its toolbelt skill does a little ranged crowd control.
- - provides boons to yourself and nearby allies, and its toolbelt skill pulls nearby enemies, though sadly it has a small range.
Elite skill
deals great damage and Crowd Control.
- inflicts more crowd control but has less damage and a longer cooldown.
Specializations
Specialization Variants
- - DPS increase in group events when allies are providing
Fury. - - trades some damage for defense,
- - more condition cleanse.
Fast Tagging
In events that require fast AoE damage, take and with a for higher tagging potential.
Equipment
Ascended gear is not required; exotic gear with the same stats will work.
Standard Equipment
This gearset is useful across all of PVE.
Berserker
Berserker
Berserker
Berserker
Dragon
Berserker
Dragon
Berserker
Berserker
Berserker
Berserker
Berserker
Berserker
Berserker
x6
- You can use to trade a minor amount of damage for sustain, to start combat with boons, or for a little extra defense.
- For defense, equip the highest tier Jade Core you can afford. Use defensive food, traits, or skills if required. If necessary, use
Knight trinkets.
Consumables
Budget consumables are acceptable for use in open world.
DPS
- Prioritize Steak Ascended food.
- /
- /
Defense
Farming
- Prioritize Steak Ascended food.
- /
- (and variants)
Usage
Photon Forge
Most of your damage comes from Photon Forge, the holosmith's profession mechanic. Using skills inside the Forge generates Heat, some Heat is also gained over time. Having high Heat is great, as it increases your damage through and . However, you must exit Photon Forge before you accumulate 150 Heat, or you will Overheat, which does great damage to yourself, prevents you from accessing the Forge until it cools down, and puts your toolbelt skills on cooldown, so a terrible thing to happen.
When you exit Photon Forge, it will begin to cool down after a few seconds, and you will slowly lose Heat and heal yourself a little through . Once the Forge has cooled a bit (but not all the way down), you will enter it again. This way, you will always have some good amount of Heat to benefit from the aforementioned traits.
Damage
As mentioned, having high Heat is great, and your Photon Forge skills not only generate Heat but also do great damage. You should open fights with your Photon Forge, use your Forge skills until you're very close to overheating, then exit the forge and fight with your sword and Grenade Kit. Once your Heat cools down to about 80, you should enter the Forge again. Your highest damage skills are:
Rotation
Against bosses and other durable enemies, try to follow this rotation. If possible, start with high Heat, about 80. You can use to quickly generate a lot of heat. If possible, use Throw Mine before the fight, so you can detonate it later once you have high Heat so it does more damage (the skill begins to cool down when you place the mine).
- Photon Forge auto attacks.
- (skip if a nearby ally is providing you with Quickness)
- +
- Sword auto attacks.
- Sword auto attacks.
- Repeat
- Use the following skills off cooldown inside Photon Forge when above 100 Heat instead of Forge auto attacks: , , , .
Notes and tips
- If you enter Photon Forge at about 80 heat as recommended, your second will be used very close to overheating. But this won't be a problem because you can leave Photon Forge right after the yellow casting bar of Corona Burst disappears. This might cause you to reach 150 Heat outside of Photon Forge as Corona Burst generates its Heat over 1.5 seconds after casting, but you can't overheat outside of the Forge.
- If possible, precast and before fights.
- You can enter and leave Engineer Kits without interrupting your current action. So you can press the key for and equip the kit immediately and it won't get interrupted. This is great for when you are only going to use and exit the kit, as you have to wait 1 second before you can exit the kit, this way that one second will pass by as you finish casting Refraction Cutter and cast Shrapnel Grenade, making the rotation much more fluid. Do note that Stow Kit does not interrupt your ongoing action but
Weapon Swap does, so don't use weapon swap. - To quickly generate Heat before fights you can use , , and auto attacks. You can also use if you won't be needing the Crowd Control.
- Remember to try to stay always at high Heat to benefit from and . Even your sword skills are more powerful when used at high Heat.
- only stuns enemies that attack you while you from melee range.
- Photon Forge auto attacks have been bugged since launch and are much slower if you manually press the key. Instead, just rely on auto attack and don't press the key.
Defense and Sustain
- and provide a little sustain in long fights, but you're vulnerable to burst damage.
- You can block attacks and reflect projectiles with your shield.
- With your great burst damage, you will kill trash mobs before they kill you. You can also use your CC to incapacitate them so they can't fight back.
- In longer fights, if you need more defense, you can consider using the defensive utilities and/or at a dps loss.
- Remember that cleanses 2 conditions. If you need even more cleansing, use .
Crowd Control
- (if using )
Ratings
Comments
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