Harbinger - Celestial Elixir Roamer
The community gave this build a rating, making it top-tier: Great
Focused on: Hybrid damage and Mobility
Designed for: WvW Roaming
Expansions required: 
Difficulty:
Easy
This build was last updated on January 19, 2025 and is up to date for the February 11, 2025 patch.
Overview
A Celestial Harbinger WvW build designed for roaming known for its high sustain, strong damage and decent mobility.
Skill Bar
Pistol/Torch
Staff
Utility
Skill Variants
Weapons
There are several viable options for the off-hand slot. Torch however requires the Secrets of the Obscure expansion so if you don't have access to it then you're forced to pick one of the following weapons (except Sword, which also requires SotO):
- Warhorn - this is mostly taken with a for improved mobility. The
Swiftness sources in the build however are scarce and with long CDs, which makes this vulnerable to boon removal. The unblockable CC of Warhorn 4 can be good value too but it has a shorter range than the one on Torch. Warhorn also makes it easier to drop movement speed runes for something with higher stats.
- Focus - adds a great boonrip skill with high damage, it's the most bursty option (and the lowest sustain one).
- Dagger - a defensive weapon with extra condition removal and damage mitigation through
Blind and 
Weakness.
- Sword - primarily a defensive/CC focused weapon. The Weakness and Fear make it valuable even if its damage is on the lower end.
Utility
Viable choices for the optional slot (or even in place of ):
- - low CD stunbreak with damage mitigation, and the
Resistance is useful against Blind spamming specs like Holosmith or D/P Thief.
- - stunbreak that could also be used as a mobility tool, it's especially useful at scaling difficult terrain and kiting to the highground. The downside is the long cast time, especially when you're trying to set this up as an escape tool while disengaging.
- - if you need more cleansing.
- - area denial skill that could ward off attackers or trap enemies inside.
Template Code
[&DQgnGgIvQCfnGqIAvQH6ANcaMAGLAL0B6BqSAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAADWQA2AC8AAA==]
Specializations
Variants
- Take if you want more passive survivability.
Variants
- lets you share your elite's boons with allies, something that's worth considering if you're roaming with a group.
Specialization Variants
Taking 
Soul Reaping instead of 
Death Magic for more condition damage, better Life Force management and unblockable Staff Marks is also a viable (albeit much less popular) choice. This however is a high risk/reward option, as your sustain is going to be considerably lower:
Equipment
Head
Celestial
Shoulders
Celestial
Chest
Celestial
Hands
Celestial
Legs
Celestial
Feet
Celestial
Backpiece
Celestial
Accessory
Celestial
Accessory
Celestial
Amulet
Ritualist
Ring
Ritualist
Ring
Celestial
Staff
Celestial
Sigil
Sigil
Pistol
Celestial
Torch
Celestial
Sigil
Sigil
Rune
x6
Infusion
x18
Relic
Stats: a Ritualist Amulet + 1 ring coupled with would give us roughly 25% boon duration and 10% condi duration, among other things. These Ritualist pieces also sacrifice some passive tankiness (mainly Toughness) and strike damage (lower Power/Precison/Ferocity), shifting the build a bit more towards active sustain and condi damage. You can still keep playing full Cele if you prefer the Power bursts of Harbinger shroud or the slightly higher passive sustain, the difference isn't anything major either way. This is just something you can refine and tinker with. Going more into the Ritualist direction could also work, but with each Cele piece you sacrifice you become more squishy and your direct damage drops further.
Equipment Variants
Runes
Traveler is mainly taken for its passive mobility and boon duration. Other viable options include:
- - keeps the passive mobility boost and boon duration but focuses more on strike damage. Consider going full Cele with no Ritualist pieces in order to further lean into the Power angle.
- - solid offensive option if damage is all you care about.
- - way higher
Quickness uptime and good stats.
Relic
- - more
Poison spam and higher healing reduction from it, which is especially useful when fighting other high sustain builds.
- - more bursty than Demon Queen but in longer fights the healing reduction could be better than the extra Poison stacks. Worth considering when playing with 1-2 utility elixirs.
- - boosts both your strike damage and condition pressure while being easy to maintain.
- - extra survivability.
Sigils
- over Cleansing - slightly worse condition removal for increased pressure. In most cases Generosity should be enough, but Cleansing is the safest and most forgiving option.
Consumables
Food
- - passive damage mitigation and great stats.
- - active damage mitigation.
- - budget version
Utility
- for a condition focused approach, or for a direct damage focus.
- Budget: either from Canned Food Crates found in WvW s or purchased from the Permanent Portable Provisioner.
- Alternatively you could use a for an even more tanky build, especially if you've sacrificed some of it for Ritualist pieces.
Usage
Elite specialization basics
- doesn't replace your health bar! Unlike other Necromancer shrouds, Harbinger Shroud can't be used to soak damage, which makes this spec more squishy by default. Death Magic should offset this a bit.
- You can enter shroud even with no Life Force to use, but staying inside still drains your LF each interval.
General
- is unique in a sense that it doesn't require Life Force to activate - this skill even gives you LF! Because of that LF management is much less of a concern on Harbinger builds.
- is one of the more versatile skills in the build:
- On Staff always try to use AFTER for a free Weakness combo.
Damage
- This part of the build is rather straightforward, there aren't any complicated burst chains you have to learn. It's all about keeping the target constantly pressured.
- In terms of damage, Shroud > Pistol > Staff. Staff is mainly a utility/defensive weapon.
- Elixirs apply Blight to you and Shroud skills can consume Blight, empowering them. Consider using elixirs right before entering Shroud. is especially good at kicking off burst combos. You always get the boon of elixirs you use, but enemies must be inside the impact area to get the negative effects.
- fires quickly and with little to no animation, which makes it hard to dodge for enemies. Use it to set up abilities that have longer cast times like or high importance such as .
- should always be used in melee range to ensure that all the projectiles hit the main target.
- serves as an ideal setup for other shroud skills (except for which could "stunbreak" enemies as the daze overrides the stronger CC of Vital Draw).
- (shroud auto) is the best filler in the build, capable of delivering some serious damage if left unchecked especially with the passive Quickness.
Shroud burst combo example:
- to get into melee range.
- to deliver damage while avoiding incoming attacks and dazing the target, making it harder for them to prevent the next step of the chain. It's also yet another mobility skill in case you were still not in melee range.
- for CC.
- at point-blank range for maximum effectiveness.
- spam.
Pistol burst combo example:
- could serve as an opener as it has a very low cast time and doesn't really require setup, but it could also be used after Vile Blast.
- to set up Oppressive Collapse (OC), which has a much more visible animation and would be harder to land. Note: OC in general works best against slowed/stunned targets - the AoE ring spawns under your target the moment you press OC, so enemies with
Superspeed or mobility skills could even escape the ring before the skill finishes. If they manage to leave the ring in time they'll avoid the CC.
Weapon swap and Staff
- in melee.
- Swap to Staff to proc and
- (Staff #3)
- (Staff #4)
- (Staff #5)
- and do your shroud rotation.
Sustain
- Both entering and staying in shroud removes conditions thanks to and .
- Entering Shroud triggers and reduces incoming damage via . If you're CC'd and getting focused you can enter shroud for the Weakness and damage reduction as a defensive measure. The Weakening Shroud proc can even trigger for some cleansing and additional counter-pressure.
- Removing and applying conditions generates Carapace stacks from Death Magic, reducing direct damage taken. At 25+ stacks is going to start pulsing
Protection for further mitigation. This boon also reduces condition damage taken thanks to (if taken).
- grants Carapace even if the condition was removed through other means, like .
- (SW) is great for preventing condition pressure from ramping up on you. Activating its chain skill which "ends" Spectral Walk does not stop the cleansing. This skill has many uses, for example:
- Activate SW ⇒ jump off a cliff while being chased ⇒ when your enemies jump after you.
- Activate SW ⇒ (Flesh Wurm skill) ⇒ teleport back when they catch up to you. This works for stomping downed enemies as well, the channeling isn't interrupted by either of these teleports!
- provides much needed vertical mobility, allowing you to teleport to the highground if you need to escape or chase someone.
- Harbinger has better mobility than the average Necromancer build which could prove useful when it comes to surviving damage. and are both great for building (or closing) gaps.
- and are the closest things you have to a mass cleanse.
Related Builds
- Harbinger - Pistol Curses - Conquest PvP version of the build.
Ratings
if you are bad and need training wheels to do anything in this game mode - play this
Continues to be S+ tier, one of the strongest roamers around. Somehow it even keeps getting buffed (Deadly Strength) and is one of the biggest winners of the relic patch.
God Mode Activate! Literally nothing kills it if you're not stupid enough to attack into reflects. I normally play Heavy classes but Cele Harbinger stomps everything else roaming in WvW rn. You can even BloodBank it up and be double immortal.
Comments
Get MetaBattle Premium
Enjoy an ad-free experience & support the website, for less than $1 per month! Upgrade to Premium
Enjoy an ad-free experience & support the website, for less than $1 per month! Upgrade to Premium
