Reaper - Condi Dread Reaper

This is a rough draft. Once adequately written, it will progress to the testing stage, where it can be rated by the community. You can help by proposing changes with a comment.

Focused on: Condition damage

Designed for: Open World

Expansions required:

Difficulty:

Normal

This build was last updated on April 17, 2025.

Overview

A fast-paced Reaper build with strong condi burst, sustained condi damage, and constant CC. This is primarily a Fear, Chill, and Bleed build. It leverages interactions between the traits Dread, Shivers of Dread, and Deathly Chill to rapidly stack 50+ stacks of Bleeding, 25x Vulnerability, 25x Might, Fury, and Quickness.

The main downside is it provides few boons to allies and is mainly a solo build in PvE. Though some conditions it inflicts like Fear, Chill, Blind, along with corrupting enemy boons and cleansing allies' conditions, are useful to allies.

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Build and Stat Calculations

https://gw2skills.net/editor/?PSAFsEGbWZCJsmaWXbTpkVWpjryfTF-DSJYmx/hUgINOpVHKAFeS4ICtLIgVU+9TWe03CqA-e

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Skillbar

Scepter/Warhorn

Sword/Sword

Utility

Weapon Variants

We default to Scepter/Warhorn and double Swords. Sword requires Expanded Weapon Proficiency with Secrets of the Obscure. Other weapon alternatives include:

• Staff: provides burst damage from range, and is the only other weapon besides offhand Warhorn and offhand Sword with a Fear skill, but deals low sustained damage.
• Greatsword: loses a Fear skill but gains more AoE Bleed application with Nightfall and the trait Chilling Darkness, and a strong CC/pull with Grasping Darkness.
• Pistol/X: gains an additional Stun with Vile Blast, but loses the boon corrupt that both Scepter 3 Devouring Darkness and Sword 3 Gorge provide. Requires Weaponmaster Training from Secrets of the Obscure.

Skill Variants

Healing skills

We default to "Your Soul Is Mine!" because of its low 16s cooldown, but any healing skill can be used. You could also consider:

• Consume Conditions - a bigger heal and condition cleanse, but doesn't generate life force.
• Well of Blood - for group healing and a Light combo field.
• Signet of Vampirism - for passive healing in combat, and group leech when cast on a target.

Utility skills

We default to:

• "Suffer!" - Chills and transfers conditions.
• Spectral Ring - The only utility skill that Fears. Mandatory, do not replace.
• Well of Darkness - additional Chill (5 AoE pulses) and Blind (2 AoE Blind pulses also inflict Chill via Curses trait Chilling Darkness). If you replace this skill with something else, also change the Curses trait to Insidious Disruption or Plague Sending.

Other useful skills to consider:

• Well of Power - breaks stun and converts your and allies' conditions into boons.
• Spectral Armor - alternate stun break, regenerate life force quickly.
• Spectral Walk - alternate stun break, lure attackers off cliffs in WvW then teleport back up while they fall to their deaths.
• Spectral Grasp - replaces Spectral Ring when underwater. Use on land for even more CC if needed.
• Well of Corruption - additional AoE boon corrupt for some bosses that gain Protection, Resolution, or Resistance.

Elite skills

"Chilled to the Bone!" in conjuction with Relic of the Nightmare is mandatory, do not replace. Together they inflict Chill, Stun, and Fear, and grant Stability, Quickness, and Fury. Crucially, the skill and the relic are synced to the same 30s cooldown.

Specializations

Variants

• Insidious Disruption - inflict Torment every time your constant Fears hit an enemy.
• Plague Sending for additional condition clear, which this build sometimes needs against heavy condition enemies.
• Path of Corruption for additional boon corrupt.

Equipment

Head
Viper

Shoulders
Viper

Chest
Viper

Hands
Viper

Legs
Viper

Feet
Viper

Backpiece
Viper

Accessory
Viper

Accessory
Viper

Amulet
Viper

Ring
Viper

Ring
Viper

Scepter
Viper

Warhorn
Viper

Sigil

Sigil

Sword
Viper

Sword
Viper

Sigil

Sigil

Rune
x6

Infusion
x6

Infusion
x12

Relic

Equipment Variants

Gear

• Dire or Trailblazer for a more survivable build. Try to keep Bleeding duration at 100%, possibly using Rune of Krait and Sigil of Superior Sigil of Agony together if necessary. Also keep in mind that Precision is valuable, as it causes Chilling Novas, Bleeding on Crit, and increases Condition Damage as a percent of Precision (trait + utility buff). Try to keep at least 30% Crit Chance.

Sigils

Any of the sigils below can work. Prioritize 100% Bleeding Duration, then Condition damage or Bleeding application. Scepter gains an additional 50% condition duration from the Curses trait Lingering Curse, so does not a require condition duration sigil.

• Sigil of Superior Sigil of Earth
• Sigil of Superior Sigil of Geomancy
• Sigil of Superior Sigil of Agony
• Sigil of Superior Sigil of Malice
• Sigil of Superior Sigil of Bursting

Runes

Rune of Trapper are preferred, but any of the runes below can work. Aim for 100% Bleeding duration, then maximum Condition Damage. Try to use the runes where the 5th and 6th runes give 100 and 125 Condition Damage respectively.

• Rune of Berserker
• Rune of Necromancer
• Rune of Renegade
• Rune of Sunless
• Rune of Krait

Relic

• Relic of the Nightmare is by far the strongest relic for this build, both in PvE and WvW. Nightmare's AoE Fear on a relatively short 30s cooldown helps maintain Quickness and Fury uptime, increases "Chilled to the Bone!" breakbar damage, and spreads more Chill and Bleed.

Consumables

Use whatever food is needed to get Bleeding Duration to the 100% cap if needed, then prioritize Condition Damage and Precision.

DPS

• Prioritize Flatbread Ascended food.
• / / /
• / /

Farming

• Prioritize Flatbread Ascended food.
• /
• (and variants)

Usage

Core mechanics

1. Fear grants Quickness and Fury to you and inflicts Chill on enemies. There are five abilities that Fear. Use them all aggressively on cooldown. This is the core of the build.
2. Chill inflicts Bleeding and Vulnerability. Besides Fear, there are three abilities, one whirl combo, and two passive traits that Chill (Chill of Death, Chilling Nova). Use these to fill gaps between Fear skill cooldowns.
3. Critical Hits inflict Bleeding directly from the trait Barbed Precision and Sigil of Superior Sigil of Earth.
4. Critical Hits against Chilled targets cause a Chilling Nova explosion that Chills and Bleeds nearby targets.
5. Gain Might from hitting enemies that are Chilled, hitting enemies that are below 50% health, or autoattacking enemies while in Reaper's Shroud.
6. Breakbar damage happens naturally by cycling through the Damage rotation. The strongest breakbar abilities are "Chilled to the Bone!" and Executioner's Scythe. Omit those from the damage rotation if needed to reserve them for active breakbar phases, but both are on relatively low 30s cooldowns and generally don't need to be conserved.
7. No Concentration or boon duration is needed for 100% uptime on Quickness, Fury, and 25x Might, as long as you're casting all five Fear skills on cooldown.

Weapon Notes

1. Scepter/Warhorn: Conditions inflicted by Scepter are empowered by the Curses trait Lingering Curse. Scepter's autoattack chain inflicts Bleeding to a single target with all three attacks in the chain. The trait Lingering Curse changes Scepter 3 from single target into an AoE boon corrupt skill Devouring Darkness. Warhorn is taken for Fear.

2. Sword/Sword: Offhand Sword inflicts Fear, Chill, Vulnerability and grants Might. Mainhand sword autoattack inflicts Chill. All five Sword attacks cleave and pierce, hitting up to five enemies, giving a high chance to proc Chilling Nova.

3. Staff

Staff provides burst damage from range, and is the only other weapon besides offhand Warhorn and offhand Sword with a Fear skill, but deals low sustained damage. Useful in big open world meta events or WvW Zergs, but Sword/Sword is more effective at stacking Bleed due to its cleave and pierce.

4. Greatsword

Greatsword loses a Fear skill which may cause gaps in Quickness uptime. But it gains Nightfall which, when combined with the Curses trait Chilling Darkness, can rapidly stack Blind -> Chill -> Bleed. Grasping Darkness is also a strong AoE pull that group together many monsters, or damage breakbars.

5. Pistol

With Weaponmaster Training mainhand Pistol is an option. Pistol is a condition weapon, but focuses on Torment and Poison, rather than Bleed or Chill. Pistol gains an additional Stun with Vile Blast, but loses the boon corrupt that both Scepter 3 Devouring Darkness and Sword 3 Gorge provide. Pistol's autoattack Vicious Shot bounces between three enemies, providing more AoE condi cleave than Scepter's single-target autoattack, but less than mainhand sword's 5-target autoattack.

Damage

Rotation Opener

1. Open from 900 range or closer with Sword:

• Utility: Spectral Ring on top of enemy
• Sword 4 x2: Hungering Maelstrom -> Gormandize
• Sword 5 x2: Devouring Visage -> Consume

If using Staff:

• Utility: Spectral Ring on top of enemy
• Staff 3: Chillblains
• Staff 2: Mark of Blood
• Staff 5: Reaper's Mark

If using Greatsword:

• GS 5 Grasping Darkness
• GS 4 Nightfall
• GS 3 Death Spiral
• Utility: Spectral Ring on top of enemy

1. Close to within melee range, then use Elite + Utilities:
2. Elite: "Chilled to the Bone!"
3. Utility: "Suffer!"
4. Utility: Well of Darkness
5. Weapon Swap to Scepter/Warhorn
6. Warhorn 4: Wail of Doom
7. Scepter 3: Devouring Darkness
8. Scepter 2: Grasping Dead
9. Reaper's Shroud
10. Shroud 3 x2: Infusing Terror -> Terrify: Double tap for a quick AoE Fear. Use on cooldown. Killing a mob reduces its cooldown by 50%, so in large packs it's almost spammable.
11. Shroud 5 + 4: Executioner's Scythe -> Soul Spiral: Ice Field + Whirl Finisher spreads massive amounts of Poison and Chill.
12. Shroud 1: Life Rend -> Life Slash -> Life Reap: autoattack in Reaper's Shroud for a few seconds for Crits to cause a Chilling Nova explosion and to allow Fear cooldowns to reset.
13. Exit Reaper's Shroud, attack with Scepter (single target) or Sword (AoE) until Fear cooldowns reset, then repeat the rotation.

Defense

Defense mainly comes from constant Fear disabling enemies, and permanent Chill increasing their ability cooldowns.

• Sidestep and walk or dodge out of enemy attacks.
• Constant Fear prevents incoming damage.
• Permanent Chill reduces the rate of incoming damage.
• Weakness prevents critical strikes and causing glancing blows (50% of normal damage).
• Blind causing the enemy's next attack to miss.
• Reaper's Shroud is as a second health bar and has a natural 33% damage reduction.
• Infusing Terror provides Stability and further reduces damage taken.
• Use Consume Conditions in condition heavy fights. If more is needed, run "Suffer!", Well of Power, and/or the trait Plague Sending.
• "Chilled to the Bone!" provides Stability, Stuns, and Chills.
• All Sword skills heal a little bit, along with Warhorn 5.
• If using Staff, Putrid Mark cleanses your conditions.
• If using Greatsword, Nightfall spreads AoE Blind.

Crowd Control

• Sword Devouring Visage - 1.5 seconds of Fear.
• Warhorn Wail of Doom - 1 second of Fear.
• Spectral Ring - 2s of Fear.
• Reaper's Shroud Infusing Terror ⇒ Terrify - 1 second of Fear.
• Reaper's Shroud Executioner's Scythe - 1.5 seconds of Stun.
• Elite skill "Chilled to the Bone!" - 2 or 3 seconds of Stun, plus Fear with Relic of the Nightmare.