Catalyst - Support Catalyst
The community gave this build a rating, making it top-tier: Great
Focused on: Control, Support and Condition cleanse
Designed for: WvW Zerg
Expansions required: 
Difficulty:
Normal
This build was last updated on March 06, 2025 and is up to date for the February 11, 2025 patch.
Overview
Catalyst provides 
Quickness as well as many other valuable boons along with cleanse and healing.
Skill Bar
Staff
Utility
Variants
- Weapons
- Dagger/Warhorn
- Utilities
- - Stunbreak
Specializations
- Variants
Template Code
[&DQYaGxEpQz8nDwAAAAAAAI8AAAAdAQAA9xoAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA=]
Equipment
Head
Minstrel
Shoulders
Minstrel
Chest
Minstrel
Hands
Minstrel
Legs
Minstrel
Feet
Minstrel
Backpiece
Minstrel
Accessory
Minstrel
Accessory
Minstrel
Amulet
Minstrel
Ring
Minstrel
Ring
Minstrel
Staff
Minstrel
Sigil
Sigil
Staff
Minstrel
Sigil
Sigil
Rune
x6
Infusion
x14
Infusion
x4
Relic
Build Variants
- Sigils
Consumables
Usage
General/Energy Management
- To generate energy for Catalyst's Jade Sphere abilities make sure to hit enemies with skills that have a high number of hits:
- You want to rotate through elements quickly to get as many boons as possible
- You can be quite flexible with your rotation, but make sure to always have a blast lined up to proc in
- This is easiest if you swap from while casting
- You can be quite flexible with your rotation, but make sure to always have a blast lined up to proc in
Skill Usage and Rotation 
- The main goal of our gameplay loop is to provide a high boon uptime:
- On and
- On auras by utilising
- For this we need to complete finishers in Air and Earth and Water. Blasting in Fire is not required as we gain
Fire Aura from
- For this we need to complete finishers in Air and Earth and Water. Blasting in Fire is not required as we gain
- This means that we want to rotate through all attunemts at a quick pace, roughly once every 15 seconds.
- A good order to go through attunements is ⇒ ⇒ ⇒ ⇒ .
- Note that many skills on staff have a cooldown higher than 15 seconds, so that these skills will only be up every other time.
- In
- - use this to CC the enemy. Place on own backline to slow enemy pushes or on the enemy while pushing.
- ⇒ - this will proc and give us another
Magnetic Aura - - not strickly necessary but a delayed backup finsher for in
- While ⇒
- - place on whoever needs the
Resistance from the initial proc of and such that your team will spend maximal time in it. - - starting this cast in Earth while swapping to Air will proc in Air for the
Shocking Aura - - place on DPS players. Place it right after the Earth sphere, to minimize the time where you don't generate energy.
- - place on whoever needs the
- In
- - extra cleanses and
Superspeed - - use this to CC the enemy. Place on own backline to slow enemy pushes or on the enemy while pushing.
- - an extra knockback
- - AoE blind
- - extra cleanses and
- While ⇒
- When using a delayed blast finisher ( or ) to proc in Air for the Shocking Aura, make sure that the finisher goes off before swapping our of Air
- You might want to delay swapping out of Air a bit, if you want to have access to in Air soon
- When using a delayed blast finisher ( or ) to proc in Air for the
- In
- - AoE for energy generation
- - AoE for energy generation and AoE blind. Note that there might still be a Sphere active at the start, so delay a bit for Energy.
- - Repositioning
- While ⇒
- Make sure you have more than 10 Energy before swapping out of Fire. If not, place another .
- If you have more than 20 Energy before swapping, you can place or
- In
- - delayed blast for
- - for targeted healing
- - for
Frost Aura - - big AoE cleanse and healing. Place towards the direction your team is moving.
- While ⇒
- We can time the blast on so that it procs in Earth. This is good since the staff skill will be on cooldown still
- On the second loop:
- on Staff will be on cooldown, so we need to proc for Magnetic Aura differently:
- Use a delayed
- Use or - These are projectiles and need to hit to count as a projectile finisher. Inconsistent because of projectile block.
- Use - Backup finisher
- Use - Takes a long time to proc, so it's better to use a quicker method.
- will be on cooldown, so we want to proc in Water with
- will be on cooldown, so our cleanses will be lower this round.
- on Staff will be on cooldown, so we need to proc for
Overall Priorities
- High
- Aurashare/Condition clear
- Moderate
- Boon share
- CC
- Low
- Healing
- Superspeed
Surviving
- This build has moderate passive defense
- This build has moderate mobility skill access
- This builds has low active defenses
Active defense priority
- - this is your main mobility skill. If you use Hold down LMB, Lift RMB ⇒ About Face ⇒ ⇒ Lift LMB, Hold down RMB during dodge ⇒ About Face this will move you in the direction you are facing
- - for Stunbreaking
- - for cleansing and Superspeed
- Dodge
Detailed Explanations
Glyph of Renewal
- Focus on reviving allies who are far away with , don't waste the skill on players that can be hand rezzed.
- If possible, use on yourself while casting for Quickness
- This still speeds up the cast if you use the sphere after you started casting the glyph
- If possible, use on yourself while casting for
- Use in on single players and on multiple players
- If you can't be in a good position, don't cast in
- Under General Options / Combat/Movement turn on Allow Skill Retargeting and set Ground Targeting to Instant Cast, this will make cast at the location your cursor is at the end of the cast, instead of where you initially targeted
- Most of your condition clear is reliant on and comes passively while rotating through the attunements while blasting
- also cleanses many conditions - place this when your party is pushing forward
- You can apply Resistance on a long range using due to
- Prioritize for burst condition clear, see the burst healing rotation below
- has a per-attunement cooldown of 10 seconds
- You can start casting a blast in one attunement then swap to a different attunement before the cast ends to proc
- It is easy to swap attunements during , and
- This also works with and , but these skills proc a projectile finisher only when they hit an enemy. does not track the enemy, so its impossible to hit. is a skill shot, but unreliable due to reflects.
- Prioritize getting auras from for and from for
- You can start casting a blast in one attunement then swap to a different attunement before the cast ends to proc
- Use on your group before or during pushes to give
List of combo finishers
- ⇒
- - projectile finisher on hit (unreliable with reflects)
- - projectile finisher on hit (impossible to hit)
Condition clear priority
-
-
- ⇒
- Prioritize and
- Make sure to land the Jade Sphere cast on top of allies for the boons from
- can be used to save allies caught with
Immobilize with the Resistance and 
Protection from
- can be used to save allies caught with
- Place your spheres so that one edge is on your allied group and the other edge is where your group is moving to
- Optimally leave it somewhere your group is regrouping
- Try to fill any gaps in your parties
Stability uptime with ⇒ , especially when your group is pushing
CC
- Use your CC when:
- Your group calls a spike:
- Winds -
- Wells - +
- Shades -
- Traps - +
- On top of enemy downs (while alive players are on top of them)
- Enemy groups moving defensively while your group is pushing
- Your group calls a spike:
CC priority
-
-
- - Skill 4
- - Skill 5
Healing
- Catalyst healing is very limited, but significant enough to save people if comboed
- Use to heal from range
- You can blast the fields created by and for healing
Burst Healing Combo
- -
- - Water Field Blast
Superspeed
- Focus on using when your group is pushing or disengaging from the enemy
Settings
- Under General Options / User Interface check Always show squad health bars and Always show party health bars. These will make it much easier to keep track of who needs your support.
- Also under General Options / User Interface turn on Thick party health bars
- Thick squad health bars can be used too as a matter of personal preference, but is not recommended for large numbers
- Under Squad Options check View as a grid. This will allow you to keep track of your allies' health and be quicker in using . While this doesn't allow you to see conditions on allies, most of your cleanses are passively applied anyway.
Ratings
Comments
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