Reaper - Greatsword Roamer

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

Focused on: Direct damage

Designed for: WvW Roaming

Difficulty:

TBD

This build was last updated on August 22, 2022 and is up to date for the October 8, 2024 patch.

Overview

A bursty Power Reaper build for WvW roaming. Its sustain is rather low, but sometimes the best defense is a good offense.

Skill Bar

Greatsword

Axe/Focus

Utility

Skill Bar Variants

Utility

For the optional slot:

• Summon Flesh Wurm - ranged teleport and stun breaking, useful for disengaging or chasing down targets.

• Corrupt Boon - unblockable boon corruption.

• Spectral Grasp - ranged CC which stops enemies from escaping, and even helps with LF management.

Weapons

• Taking Staff over Greatsword is also a viable option. With this variant pick up Soul Marks on Soul Reaping.

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Specializations

Specialization Variants

If you're roaming in a group and you have a support to fall back on, replacing Blood Magic with Spite can also be considered:

Variants

• Spiteful Renewal trades some vulnerability stacking for slightly higher sustain.

Equipment

Head
Marauder

Shoulders
Marauder

Chest
Marauder

Hands
Marauder

Legs
Marauder

Feet
Marauder

Backpiece
Cavalier

Accessory
Marauder

Accessory
Marauder

Amulet
Cavalier

Ring
Cavalier

Ring
Marauder

Greatsword
Marauder

Sigil

Sigil

Axe
Marauder

Focus
Marauder

Sigil

Sigil

Rune
x6

Infusion
x18

Runes

• Rune of Superior Rune of Strength - if you're willing to sacrifice sustain for higher damage.

• Rune of Superior Rune of Speed - retains some of Durability's sustain and offers better mobility in combat.

Consumables

Food

• - passive damage mitigation and great stats.

• - active damage mitigation.
  • - budget version

Utility

• or .

Usage

General

• Spectral skills are going to be the main Life Force (LF) builders
  • Even at maximum LF you can consider using Spectral Armor before entering Reaper's Shroud. Both the Protection and the extra LF from incoming attacks are going to increase the time you'll be able to spend in shroud.

• Build Life Force by killing critters or any other PvE mob while roaming.

• There's more to Spectral Walk (SW) than just being a stun breaker with a bit of LF management, this skill allows for quite a bit of creativity. For example:
  • Activate SW ⇒ jump off a cliff while being chased ⇒ Spectral Recall when your enemies jump after you.
  • Activate SW ⇒ break line of sight ⇒ cast "Chilled to the Bone!" ⇒ teleport back at the very end of the channeling (this makes it harder to avoid and reduces the chance of getting interrupted, although the outcome is going to be a bit luck based).
  • Activate SW ⇒ Necrotic Traversal (if using Flesh Wurm) ⇒ teleport back when they catch up to you.

• For mobility use the following sequence: Reaper's Shroud (this also applies Swiftness from Speed of Shadows) ⇒ Death's Charge Exit Reaper's Shroud just before Death's Charge finishes.

• "Chilled to the Bone!" has a very distinct animation which makes it easy to avoid, if you feel like that's going to happen then stow your weapon to cancel the channeling. This is also great for fake casting - you can use the skill, cancel it immediately with weapon stow (the whole animation will still play, potentially baiting out dodges or other defensive CDs), and send it only on a CD of 5 seconds.

• Ghastly Claws and Spinal Shivers are some of the best burst skills in the build, try to use them while the Sigil of Superior Sigil of Vision proc is active.

Shroud

• Most of your burst comes from Reaper's Shroud, where your damage is further increased by Death Perception and Reaper's Onslaught.

• Opening with Infusing Terror is very common, as it helps getting your damage off uninterrupted while the damage reduction helps you stay in shroud longer.
  • Terrify is the chain skill of this slot. This should only be used when either A) you need an emergency CC, or B) Infusing Terror is about to expire.

• Death's Charge should be used in the field created by Executioner's Scythe for the Frost Aura whenever possible.

• Soul Spiral should primarily be used on CC'd or downed targets (as Poison reduces the resurrection healing coming from their allies), but thanks to the permanent Quickness while in shroud this skill is now much easier to land without any real setup.

• Executioner's Scythe's a single target skill for the most part, as it only stuns one target. Terrify can Fear targets long enough to prevent enemies from dodging this skill.

• Use autoattacks when eveything else is on CD.

Greatsword

• Nightfall is the only thing that justifies taking Greatsword, its strength is arguably on par with Well skills. Nightfall is fairly versatile and useful in many situations, especially when it comes to surviving vs melee players.

• The autoattack chain is just way too slow and will barely (if ever) be used.

• Gravedigger suffers from the same problem as the auto chain, but at least it hits way harder. This will mostly be used as a downed cleave skill when Shroud is on CD, but if you're feeling lucky you can try to use it for bursting in regular combat especially against bunkers. Much easier to land with some lingering Quickness from Reaper's Onslaught.

• Death Spiral is excellent for stacking some vulnerability/life force.

• Grasping Darkness is a decent CC but can be hard to land against moving targets.

• After unloading skills 3-5 spend most of your time in Reaper's Shroud waiting for weapon swap to come off CD.

Related Builds

Spectral Onslaught - the Conquest PvP version of this roaming build.