Soulbeast - Condition Stancebeast Roamer

This is a test build. You may comment and rate it.

Focused on: Condition damage, Mobility and Sustain

Designed for: WvW Roaming

Difficulty:

TBD

Overview

A well rounded Soulbeast WvW roaming build with good damage, mobility, CC and sustain. While designed primarily for 1v1s, the build can also hold its ground in smaller group fights and has no trouble soloing camps and other objectives roamers tend to go for.

Skill Bar

Dagger/Dagger

Shortbow

Utility

Template Code

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Equipment

Head
Trailblazer

Shoulders
Trailblazer

Chest
Trailblazer

Hands
Trailblazer

Legs
Trailblazer

Feet
Trailblazer

Backpiece
Trailblazer

Accessory
Trailblazer

Accessory
Trailblazer

Amulet
Trailblazer

Ring
Trailblazer

Ring
Trailblazer

Dagger
Trailblazer

Dagger
Trailblazer

Sigil

Sigil

Shortbow
Trailblazer

Sigil

Sigil

Rune
x6

Infusion
x18

Consumables

Food

There are several viable options:

• - this food offers passive damage mitigation and a general stat boost.

• - keeps the 10% mitigation of the Oyster Soup, but focuses only on your offensive stats.

• - great defensive option with Companion's Defense and Rugged Growth synergy.
  • Budget version:

Utility

• - optimal but expensive.
  • Budget version: - comes from Canned Food Crates, way easier to get and barely weaker.

Usage

Elite specialization basics

• Soulbeast allows Rangers to meld with their pet, becoming one. This is done through Beastmode which has a 10s CD.

• Pet swapping is disabled while in combat.
  • Hawk is the pet you'll be using in combat.
  • Wolf is only used to avoid getting stomped while downed, as Soulbeasts can still swap pets in the downed state. Wolf has 2 CCs - 1 right after you swap to this pet, and another on the F2 ability Terrifying Howl (which you're also able to use even if the UI isn't there).
  • Traits related to swapping pets now activate upon entering/leaving Beastmode.

• Pet related traits and skills such as Poison Master continue to function even while merged, but this time you'll be the one who benefits from them, not the pet (although sometimes the effects are lessened).

• Melding with a dead pet and then exiting Beastmode instantly revives them.

General

• Quick Draw makes your toolkit way more flexible by significantly reducing the CD of the first skill you use after swapping weapons, allowing you to better adapt to situations. There are a lot of ways to use this trait, here are a few ideas:
  • On short bow you should either open with Poison Volley for burst damage (this is the most common), Quick Shot if you need sustain (evade attacks), or Concussion Shot if you want more CC.
  • On dagger/dagger usually can't go wrong with a Stalker's Strike opener as this skill has both good damage and a lengthy evade frame for general survival. If you're not in melee range and don't need to evade anything, go with either Double Arc or Crippling Talon.

Mobility

• Maintain permanent Swiftness with Quick Shot and Quickening Screech.
  • Turn around before using Quick Shot in order to move "forward".

• Swoop (soulbeast) is your best mobility skill for disengaging/gap closeing or just general roaming.

Damage

• This is fairly straightforward, your burst damage comes from short bow while dagger/dagger is slightly more defensive but still brings decent pressure to the table.

• On bow spam Crossfire as much as you can, ideally from behind. Many short bow skills have increased effectiveness when striking from behind or the sides.

• Poison Volley is one of your burst skills and should be used on CD. Due to the cone shape of the volley it's best used in point-blank range, right in melee to ensure that all the arrows hit the target.

• Crippling Shot should be used a few seconds before entering a fight, preferably while merged with your pet. This gives you a buff that makes your next 3 attacks inflict Bleeding while the skill continues to recharge. Doing this without merging basically has the same effect except your pet will gain the buff, and pets are less reliable than players (although there are exceptions..).

• If you're using Stalker's Strike for the damage and not the evasion, you should first make sure your target is crippled. Crippling Shot has the benefit of allowing you to use Stalker's Strike as the first skill after swapping weapons for Quick Draw synergy, while still getting the most damage out of it.

• Lacerating Slash (Hawk F2) is a spammable source of Bleeding and Poison from Poison Master.

Sustain

• Every stance in the build is defensive by nature and can be shared with allies, which you should aim to do whenever possible.

• The build doesn't have a lot of means to deal with conditions, limited mainly to Bear Stance and Sigil of Cleansing.

• If damage is starting to overwhelm you and you are out of CDs, just run away with Swoop (soulbeast) and wait a little before reengaging.

• Dodging applies Protection, which also heals thanks to the trait Rugged Growth.

• Applying Poison steals some health from the target.

• Unstoppable Union grants Protection and as Beastmode has no cast time, this can be used even while CC'd in order to survive enemy burst.

Related Builds

• Soulbeast - Poisonbeast (sPvP) - the Conquest PvP version of this condition Soulbeast roaming build.
• Soulbeast - Condition Trapper Roamer - a very similar condition Soulbeast roaming build that uses Traps.