This is an automated archive made by the Lemmit Bot.
The original was posted on /r/guildwars2 by /u/Creeperskull on 2024-11-03 16:49:27+00:00.
- Introduction ===============
Hello, I’m Costaprimo.
For those who don’t know me, I am currently the holder of the condition damage berserker benchmark and have been for about 4 years by now. I have spent those years pushing both condition damage berserker and condition banner berserker back when that was a thing to their absolute limits. Other than condition damage berserker I did benchmarks for bladesworn at the release of EoD and later showcased the viability of sword on bladesworn and I have made meaningful contributions to spellbreaker and power berserker as well.
This is all to say, I generally know a lot about Warrior in the context of PvE and my history can back this up.
The context of this writeup will solely be PvE, so keep that in mind.
Condition damage berserker is currently very weak and generally in a bad spot and has been for a very long time now. There were 3 months of glory from late July 2023 to late September 2023 where it was in a really good spot, but since the nerfs September 26th 2023 it has been in a rough spot once more. This writeup seeks to explain the primary reasons as to why and what can be done to make it better.
Initially the problems and solutions will be outlined, but explanations and justification will follow later in the writeup for those interested.
1.1 Core Problems
The core problems of condition damage berserker are currently
- Difficulty
- Damage ramp
- Aurashare
1.2 Proposed Solutions
Following proposed changes should help solve the problems mentioned.
Crack Shot -> First Strike (NEW)
Inflict bleeding (5s) to nearby enemies on weapon swap.
Dual Shot (Buffed)
Inflict 1s of burning per hit (NEW)
Scorched Earth (Buffed)
Burning: ~~2.5s~~ -> 3s
Bug Fix: 2 instances of Scorched earth pulsing at the same time no longer causes one of the instances to not hit the target.
Flaming Flurry (Buffed)
Burning: ~~2.5s~~ -> 3.5s
Coefficient: ~~1.4~~ -> 2.0
Last Blaze (Changed)
When you use a rage skill, inflict burning (4s) on nearby enemies. (unchanged)
Your rage skills extend the duration of berserk mode by 1 additional second (NEW)
King of Fires (Changed)
Burning duration increase: 33% (unchanged)
~~Gain fire aura (5s) when you critically hit an enemy (15s ICD)~~ ->
Gain fire aura (5s) when you inflict burning on an enemy with 5 or more stacks of burning. (15s ICD)
Berserker skills detonate fire aura, damaging and burning nearby foes.
Coefficient: ~~0.7~~ -> 0.3
Burning: ~~3 stacks (3s)~~ -> 2 stacks (1.5s)
No longer consumes the fire aura on detonate (NEW)
1.3 Results
The proposed changes should result in a healthier and more forgiving damage profile and rotation with an estimated gain of 4150 dps which would put the new benchmark at around 46350 dps.
- Core Problems (In depth) ===========================
So what did I mean with the core problems that I listed? This section will explain each of the core problems as I see them while trying my best to not rant too much.
2.1 Difficulty
A lot of the pain points for berserkers are related to its difficulty. It is simply too punishing to mess up and there is no baseline to fall back to due to its priority based nature and high tempo. The rotation is very fast paced (100+ APM) with no breaks and a lot of the damage comes from tempo alone, so if you do skip a beat it comes at the cost of an immense DPS loss. The tempo also makes it very hard for an inexperienced player to get good value out of condition damage berserker as they will often default to auto-attacks and bursts when they lose track of the rotation or rather the tempo, but currently these are very weak which hinders the inexperienced players further. I am not trying to define tempo as the problem, but rather that without tempo you do no damage, which hurts the average player too much, which is the problem. The first thing I tell people who ask for help shouldn’t be “just go faster”, that should be the last thing you have to work on, but currently it is not.
Another big pain point is running out of berserk on condition damage berserker. Last blaze is simply too valuable to swap off for smash brawler and the free berserk extensions that comes with it, but you have to trade a lot of damage for the comfort of staying in berserk longer. This also calls back to the reliance on tempo as if you lose tempo or alacrity you likely aren’t using your rage skills as frequently as it is required to not run out of berserk.
2.2 Damage ramp
The reason condition damage berserker is weak despite having a 42k bench is due to its very slow ramp up. Only reaching ~37k 20s into the fight is incredibly bad and can only be justified with a proper return through ramping damage. Sadly condition damage berserker doesn’t get that either. Compare this to Condition damage virtuoso, weaver, or willbender. All of these start at 44k or higher and ride it out. They not only get to have a bigger burst, but also better sustained damage as well, which makes all of these build superior in any given situation.
This can also be tied to the prior point about difficulty where despite the high tempo and learning curve the reward in the end is not worthwhile. Either condition damage berserker has to start out a lot higher and be able to ride it out or it needs a little bit help early and to ramp higher.
2.3 Aurashare
To quickly explain aurashare for those who might not know. Berserker have a trait called “King of Fires”. This trait allows you to detonate your fire aura to inflict burning on nearby enemies, consuming the fire aura in the process. This means that if you pair it with something like a tempest or catalyst that can share a lot of fire auras you can increase the berserker's damage significantly due to the added burning output. Currently the condition damage berserker benchmark with an aurashare tempest is roughly 47k.
The point about damage ramp remains despite the damage increase condition damage berserker sees from aurashare. It still starts out only at about 40k and while it does ramp up higher it still takes way too long, and in the end it is just barely higher or on par with the currently high performing builds who don't need a dedicated ally to boost their damage.
But the problem isn’t that aurashare is too weak, but rather that if condition damage berserker is buffed at a baseline, then the aurashared variant potentially becomes oppressive. Say condition damage berserker is buffed to 46k, then the aurashared variant would be at least 51k depending on the type of buffs made. It is always something to keep in mind which is why it is a problem.
- Solutions (In depth) =======================
I am a big fan of the high tempo rotation I have developed over the years which is also why the changes I propose don't really change that. The tempo isn’t the problem, but the reliance on it is. Generally the goal is to guide players towards doing the right things and get rewarded for it. It doesn’t necessarily have to happen at a 100+ APM, but as long as you use your burst skills and weapon swap roughly off cooldown then you should see some success.
3.1 Crack Shot -> First Strike
Crack Shot is for all intents and purposes a dead trait. Every independent effect is too weak to justify taking the trait, rifle doesn’t magically become a good weapon by having its autos be 10% stronger, the burning on longbow is too weak to be exciting and the fact that condition damage berserker haven’t taken the trait after they made the cooldown reduction from the trait baseline speaks for itself in terms of the value provided, and we get an underwater raid then the bleed on auto for harpoon gun is also worthless.
Crack shot is a very good example of what removal of CDR on traits did to these traits in terms of overall power. What was once a great trait is now close to worthless.
Which is why I propose it to be replaced with a new trait that actually has significant value and feels more in line with the condition damage berserker rotation.
First Strike
Inflict Bleeding (5s) to nearby enemies on weapon swap.
The reason why I suggest bleeding on weapon swap is because I want to give warrior another condition trait for starters as outside of the arms traitline and berserker it doesn’t really have access to anything other than crack shot. This should also help nudge players towards remembering to weapon swap while playing condition damage berserker as you can get quite a bit of damage from it. Putting it at 5 seconds means that if you swap off cooldown you can have 2 instances going at all time assuming 100% bleed duration which comes out to about 700 dps, which makes it about 100 dps better than warrior’s sprint.
It could probably be stronger than 5s without causing issues, and 6-7s would be more in line with not punishing players for dropping tempo as you get to delay weapon swap without dropping below 2 bleed instances. At 7s it would be roughly a 1k dps increase at peak efficiency, which becomes an effective 400 dps increase since the trait would be taken over warrior’s sprint.
3.2 Dual Shot
Inflict burning (1s) on hit.
Longbow autos are slow and incredibly weak and without being traited with crack shot they apply no conditions on their own outside finisher...
Content cut off. Read original on https://old.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/comments/1gir9jf/pve_condition_damage_berserker_manifesto/