Build Wars in Guild Wars

[@KrythsGWStuff]

Thanks for the mention @MagicalMike :) Just discovered your channel! Doing the best I can to come up with as much as possible. This motivated me to do moar!

[@MagicalMike2]

Yeah man, keep going with them. The zealous yell monk almost got me back to try it myself because of how silly that whole interaction is. Honestly a lot of the stuff you come up with is creatively niche.

[@alienhit1225]

Best game at all time. Thanks for sharing.

[@BULALA_O.o]

WORD!😍

[@NaciónNPC]

Best game ever. Ty for keeping content going

[@jaysillynx3190]

A while ago, I started a Nightfall Ironman run on a ranger and made all heroes I picked up a 2ndary ranger as well, giving them all pets. I doubt this makes for a good set up for hardmode content, but it was fun and goofy to have such a huge party while playing through the campaign. The MM necro was happy for sure. Plus it was a fun way to pick up pets I hadn't tamed yet and level them up without doing the boring deathleveling exploit in the menagerie.

[@MagicalMike2]

Just make sure your important backline builds don't have a pet die and suddenly the whole team falls apart from the skill disabling... Thankfully not speaking from experience, lol

[@zidplaylien]

Cool vid! I''ve been feeling the same way - it's really easy to slip back into the meta because of how efficient it is. I recently started streaming an 'Iron Man' playthrough of the game, one of the rules I've set myself is limiting myself to 3 heroes like in the old days. Coming up with hero builds that work around the suboptimal henchman builds has been a fun challenge.

[@MagicalMike2]

I like that idea, that's a fun one. I really don't miss those days though; having got GWAMM with those old restrictions, I have some serious thoughts and feelings about certain missions and vanquishes that I had to endure.

[@zidplaylien]

@@MagicalMike2 Oh for sure. I am playing chronologically (so I had no heroes at all in Factions) and getting the Gyala Hatchery/Eternal Grove masters reward was completely impossible with only henchmen.

[@lMrJackl]

Been playing again recently semi actively mainly doing unfinished content on my ranger. Been using a heal as one feral aggression build which is decent. Then I've also been playing some warrior, hammer with renewing smash and the anniversary elite can land renewing 4 times per knock down for a ton of damage. OQkSE5JTi1JOLFiPvl0kXFmY And something more unusual but fun, E/P weilding spear and a very odd attribute spread but you can just fire off skills 34567 in that order and kill almost anything. The conjure makes your auto attacks ok-ish too, and you can probably drop attunement (not sure what you replace it with however) if the team has BiP. Of course can swap out res sig too. I use a superior water rune, then minor runes on air and fire, and of course the icy spear and off-hand of your choice. The build is kinda flexible too, like you don't have to just go 34567, you can instead use whatever is needed at the time like the blind, or deep wound to finish something, OgllgYK3CzMlJBN8MwAuAmyoB60IAA

[@MagicalMike2]

Unfortunately, skills 4 and 5 are missing from the template when I check it online, so I'm not 100% sure what they are on the E/P. But I get the glyph/steam combo, shatterstone is always a decent damage elite, so maybe it's icy spear and teinai's crystals to work off the elite, for cracked armor and then deep wound? That's my guess anyway, sounds fun.

[@lMrJackl]

@@MagicalMike2 4 and 5 are shell shock and chest thumper. kzbin.info/www/bejne/aIO4mXarmLeGkNU (I recorded a short clip)

[@OneMorePotion]

I just found your channel and had to sub. Love your style of making videos and that you play my favorite game of all time. Keep up the good work! On regards of melee builds. Everything I tried worked in general, but it's exactly the issue you mentioned. They are miles behind Mesmer teams when it comes to clearing times. Plus, especially in HM, many enemies have so high physical resistances that it's almost impossible to get through them in a reasonable time. The armor ignoring aspect of Mesmer magic ist just too busted. And I always find myself in situations when trying out new melee comps, that you basically need to bring an entire back row of support heroes to buff your melee heroes to a point, that they deal satisfying damage. All content is perfectly doable with a melee comp, but there is always this "Casters would be much faster" thing in the back of my mind. It also doesn't really help, that the hero AI doesn't really work well with most Assassin combos. Meaning you are basically locked with only one combo. The moment you add a situational second finisher to the mix, the AI is just lost. Warrior and Dervish are your only real options on heroes, or you basically force any other class into melee based on warrior and dervish skills. And I think it's a bit of a shame using an Assassin hero, who primarily has Warrior skills, and only use their main class abilities to support. Because at that point, it's usually just better to bring a warrior or dervish hero instead. Even going as far as only bringing one melee hero, will make your backrow weaker. Because now you need to think about bringing utility like splinter to the team. Or switch some healing out to account for the higher pressure on only one character of your team. If there is a way to build a really good melee team, it has to be one with only that in mind. And not some hybrid comp. But I'm not sure if you can manage to have 4 to 5 melee heroes simply because your backline will do nothing else than buffing them.

[@MagicalMike2]

Thanks. My commentary on melee builds or physical builds does also include the idea that you'd be supporting them with a whole host of backline stuff too. Things like curses necro with mark of pain and barbs, a blood necro with orders or blood bond, maybe dark dury or mark of fury for adrenaline users. Stuff like that, not necessarily a team composed mostly of physical damage dealers, more like a 4/4 or a 3/5 split with more focus on buffing that stuff. My pet team was using a bunch of these ideas but it was slow; the main problem I had with it overall. And like you said, it works, it's sorta fun for a while for the novelty, but in the back of my mind I'm always comparing it to the mesmer team. A long time ago I used to use a paragon backline that felt unkillable, but the slowness was much worse. It was foolproof stuff, but if you didn't have dedicated huge damage builds for a couple of players, then it would feel like wading through a swamp sometimes. I suppose you could try just giving the backline heroes a spear each, so they can trigger the curses too, but idk how good that would feel. One point for assassins though, crit strikes is a good primary attribute. I was using one for a barrage build and as such, it never needed any energy management and was still able to push plenty of damage out in the right situations. Shame about actual assassin skill chains being a bit rubbish though.

[@OneMorePotion]

@@MagicalMike2 I have an idea for a melee support necro and ritu team to test if the PvE Ritualist elite is any good on a big team of minions. But I'm actually not really sure if all types of minions are effected by spirit weapons. I think the Fleshgolem is at least. But aside of some Areas in Cantha, you rarely have enough exploitable corpses to supply 2, let alone 3, MM necros. And it has quiet some ramp up time in the beginning until you have some minions summoned. In fact, I work on a build to use the Ritualist PvE elite since it got released. It's a super fun idea for a skill and I love the chaos factor of it. But I struggle to see a good usecase. A lot of the melee issues would be solved, if Monk enchantments worked a bit different. But almost everything in HM carries skills that strip enchantments. They would be so powerful if you didn't need to recast them every couple of seconds as soon as there are enemies that counter them.

[@MagicalMike2]

I've seen people using it with minions, absolutely. I mean, you could also condense it in to a boon of creation/explosive growth rit MM.

[@dellevis]

I ended up joining a guild/alliance/discord that hosts these "campaigns" where everyone makes new characters and plays through a campaign, with restrictions, like no items from anywhere but the ones you find, only abilities you find along the way are allowed, etc. Everyone has to come up with weird, fun and wacky builds to make things work, which is really fun. Perhaps that is an idea you can try? Set yourself some restrictions, and see if you can make things work with limited options?

[@Warkrunner]

I've been doing an Ironman solo run on a ranger myself, similar idea!

[@MagicalMike2]

I like the idea, but it'd be the sort of thing I'd only really find fun if I also had a big group of people all doing the same stuff. And yeah I could go out and join a discord for that, but I'm not really in the market for finding that sort of thing for now. Sounds fun though!

[@antoinedancki6395]

Which alliance is it please ? I'm interested to join for some Ironman runs !

[@jeffbo7515]

​@@Warkrunnerdaaaaaamn!!! 😮😮

[@ChisholmCooke]

When venturing into a fleshy area, I remember I built a Fragility / Epidemic style team. The heros actually played really well with application of conditions.

[@MagicalMike2]

Yeah I've enjoyed this idea too, even without flesh you can do blinding surge and AoE weakness to apply the daze and spread that. Actual degen conditions have always felt a bit weak for damage though.

[@ChisholmCooke]

@@MagicalMike2 The secret is to not stat the skills you use for application, so duration stays low, so they double tick Fragility. Which leaves you open to stat massive defensive lines, a healer can cast enfeeble with a 2s weakness duration or whatever it is right. I found running either self fast cast for Epidemic or binding that off one of your heros to a hot key works best, because you wanna get a good woosh. But that's just one of the millions of build ideas out there. Have you gotten together with a friend to run the R/P - P/R Petway yet? Shouts, chants, one spirit Rt/R, and one Orders N/R. Run R/Rt for supplimentary spirit on an hero. Both boss anniversary elites. 16 bodies on the field. Big dmg, Big chaos, big fun. Iv been working it theortically for a bit, normal mode it claps.

[@MagicalMike2]

Right I totally forgot about fragility and low timers on the condis. Not for many years have I ran human team builds like that, but a few of us used to run massive physical paragon/pet teams back in the day so I've had my fill of it, but it does strike me as a good TotPK throwback build.

[@Flak84]

Nice vid! Refusing to change Razah to a mesmer and buying mercenary slots also triggered me to enter the Build Wars and deviate from the mesmer meta. On top of that I also refuse to use Energy Surge on any build whatsoever.

[@MagicalMike2]

I don't mind the e surge stuff personally, but revolving the established meta around extra payments crossed the line for me too.

[@Warkrunner]

Hey, I was in your last video for Vizunuh Square! I can assist in getting a 40/40 air set if needed. Air spells canceling when a target dies is common since they are all single target, but not so on the other elements that have straight up AoE (Rodgort's Invocation, Earthquake, Deep Freeze, etc). I also get bored of using the same build, so for build variation, I've made a rule for myself to never use PvE only skills or consumables. As for physical teams seeming underpowered, there's ways around it. I've been observing how warrior, ranger and paragon heroes use their skills to get an idea of what the AI prioritizes. Turns out, interrupts first, direct damage second, and stances or shouts (instant cast effects) on cooldown whenever they have energy. They use block stances when they get hit, and IAS stances when attacking... except for Flail. They don't use that because it slows movement speed. To get around things like blind, hexes or block, I just threw in some skills like Wild Blow, Recovery or a couple smite monks with Smite Hex and Smite Condition (depending on the area). To boost damage, it seems curse necro with channeling Rt does better than an orders necro. I even went as far as using a Me/N to fast cast Barbs! In the end, I made a number of different attackers and offensive support heroes that could slot into the party depending on what I'll come across: something for mass blind, mass hex, or lots of blocks. Ranger pets are also quite fun with Barbs and Mark of Pain, and I managed to make an IWAY team at one point with all 3 W/R heroes and a MM that murdered anything in quick succession.

[@MagicalMike2]

Oh yeah, you were the MM from the foreign quarter lol. I'm good thanks, I'll just wait until I salvage some 40/40 mods eventually, I was prioritizing giving them to my Zhed builds first. No cons has been a rule I've followed myself forever. I always found it a bit cheesy how everyone relied on them so much back in the day, so I basically swore off them and forced myself to develop better team builds that didn't need them. Nowadays, BiP kind of does that job anyway of enabling so many otherwise "badly" designed builds. As in, standalone they wouldn't work, they need BiP, but since it's so easily used I can forgive it. I like the idea of fast casting barbs, actually. My pet build in the previous video had that and MoP on the MM. IWAY is a fun callback, ha.

[@necropola]

You would actually run a SoS Ritualist without using Summon Spirits from the Kurzicks/Luxons?

[@Warkrunner]

@@MagicalMike2 I mean, it's easy to farm a 40/40 set for any hero in like, 30 minutes from collectors. Some people I know also craft the weapons. @necropola for sure if it's a hero! they can't use those skills anyways.

[@Warkrunner]

In fact, the team build I'm running now has 1 command paragon with Anthem of Envy, Go For the Eyes, Focused Anger, and no adrenaline attacks. This makes it waste energy on its energy based spear attacks then spam adrenaline shouts to regain energy. Go For The Eyes and Anthem of Envy affects everything, even minions and spirits. The interesting part is that spirit attacks from SoS and Bloodsong on the Rt hero count as attack skills for Envy!

[@Prosy137]

I’ll have to see if I can locate this… but a guildie a while ago was playing around with a 7 hero build he called “Daaaa BEARS!” Where every single hero and himself was x/R to have a pet bear. There was some skill interaction behind the genesis of it….. again I hope I can find it and if I do I’ll be sure to post here lol

[@wolfen888]

Ive heard rumours about this! If you can get the builds you’d be the real mvp. This sounds super fun! Please let us know

[@jk6346]

“Lion’s Arch: GuildWars Arena” on Steam? What is this?

[@dunefan9014]

TaO splinter volley. a nice way to go ranged without being forced into spears. Engrave axe ele is also super Kooky and fun, Last but not least Master of magic eles for aura teamwide builds are fun

[@MagicalMike2]

I'm curious about the MoM aura stuff you mention, what's that about? As for splinterbow, I've had about enough of that build for a lifetime, lol.

[@dunefan9014]

@@MagicalMike2 OgBEgUibyMlO4IiK8NIKoOQLIWB MoM aura +OgFUsWmKpaSKF7g8Eia3lBAuDPDA engrave axe ele build , i know you didnt ask to see this engrave build but its too good not to show off

[@MagicalMike2]

The MoM build feels a bit awkward to me but I like the theme. Interesting choice with soldier's stance but I think I'd replace heal sig with something else.

[@necropola]

It's amazing how much room there is left for experimenting with builds in a 1 player + 7 hero context. A Soul Twisting Ritualist for the Union, Shelter, ... goodness, a BiP Heal Necromancer for Party Energy Management and from there you can pretty much go ham on DPS or rather optimize for specific content / areas / mobs / personal preference / quality of life / fun / whatever. And when you are the only real player in the party, there's nobody (apart from yourself) who would care about maximum efficiency (the "meta"). I find it rather sad that having fun like this is rarely possible with other real players in the party. If you look at GW2 (or other MMOs) it's often the community itself who tends to optimize the fun out of the game. Also, I love to use GWToolbox to manage (swap in and out) variants of my Hero Teams. So far I refrained from using auto-cast from GWToolbox. If I find a player build too "spammy", I just play something else.

[@MagicalMike2]

It does feel like BiP/ST and a secondary healer is all you need for a solid backline, the mesmers with ESurge are just the best damage dealers at the moment for spiking a bunch of stuff out quickly whilst also totally denying a few spells. Like, I did Shards of Orr a few weeks ago in HM and that's a spooky dungeon for it's difficulty. But with 2 smite monks dropping RoJ and buffing my ranger with holy damage, Fendi Nin just kinda melted in the end. Very surprising, very robust team setup. In the last video, I showed a bit of Vizunah Square and we had 5 rits on the team. We had a whole conversation between us about nobody wanting to run SoS, which is why I had a weird bow build that chucked Edge of Extinction on too, just because someone suggested adding it in. We didn't play anything really meta there. But the main problem I have is actually caring about my own clear speed in the end. I'll favour meta stuff simply because the idea of grinding through a vanquish doesn't need to take any longer than it already would.

[@necropola]

@@MagicalMike2The SoS Ritualist slot in my builds kinda "scales" from a RoJ Smiting Monk with Strength of Honor (for a melee frontline) over a SoS Mo/Rt or Rt/Mo Hybrid with Splinter Weapon, Strength of Honor and Smte Hex to a full Channeling Magic / Spawning Power SoS Ritualist when there is no Melee in the party. I'm also using (mostly) Mercenaries (bought a full set quite a while ago; dunno, if they were discounted). The main reason (apart from potentially having loads of Mesmers and a Razah double/replacement before finishing Nightfall) was that I could run the same hero teams on all my characters almost from the start (after reaching LA). It also helped to aleviate the pain of having unlocked Goren instead of Norgu and Magrid the Sly instead of Master of Whispers on some of my characters. :-)

[@CuddleCakez]

10:15 Would an autocast program be bannable though? That sounds super useful.

[@MagicalMike2]

Questionable yes, but the Toolbox program itself has been okayed by Anet at this point. wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Feedback:Game_updates/20240514

[@DrOinkman]

nowadays, the only real meta stuff you kinda rely on is ST, everything else is exchangeable imo. also, don't you have enough aoe dmg? talking about lydia, i'm a big fan of giving heroes "find their weakness". i came up with the idea of creating a guild specifically for people who want to make and try out new builds, would you be interested? to be honest i haven't really worked on the guild much yet, but currently thinking about finally getting started.

[@xezberzs96]

I play a team that has every binding ritual except Restoration and Empowerment with 6 dire racing beetles and a AotL N/P. It's a good time and mega braindead, it's about impossible to wipe. My character is a ranger BM with TaO, Ebon Assassin, and Vampirism.

[@MagicalMike2]

Stay away from the Summoner!

[@bw1399]

I am so bad at this game, have played on and off since launch and still havent done a single hardmode, i have come a long way since my longbow necro days, but videos like this always remind me of how much i suck at this game. Ahh well one day i will do a map complete

[@MagicalMike2]

Longbow necro sounds like a fun idea actually, wonder what possibilities that has. My advice would be to get the necro healer hero and the soul twisting rit hero set up, then you can run just about anything with a lot more effectiveness.

[@jeffbo7515]

God Raiu The Fluffy. Add me 😂 same man. Ranger monk days are over 😂

[@lcZahark]

New player here. Been playing for about 2 weeks now and I want to eventually work on the big title for gw2. What class combination would you recommend me to use and do all of the game with it?

[@MagicalMike2]

Literally whatever you enjoy most. Secondary doesn't matter after a point because you can change it whenever you like and every profession is viable and has strong builds to do everything with. It's not worth sweating over, you won't pick something wrong if you enjoy it.

[@GoddessOfTheWinds]

The game is amazing, but I agree that Mesmers and Non-physical damage being a lot better. Ritualists, Mesmers and Necros have been my go-to, and I've been main Ele for a long time now. Eles do have good skills and could be used in my teams, but I prefer mesmers. Honestly, Mesmers are way too strong with AI heroes and their very quick interrupts. I wish the skill selection was more limited and controlled so that you can still mix & match, but don't get overwhelmed with so many that you just don't bother with it. Also, the presence of skills that are just way better that alternatives are weak is not good for the game, but that's always been a plague to the game balance-wise. I have found out that I enjoy swapping my own builds regularly and Ele is perfect for that as Ele has many great elites and many viable builds. As for my heroes, I build a bit more than my standard team, and got a D tank, N minion master, UA monk and a few more that I can switch here and there for a specific map or encounter, but I always keep my team of 4 mesmers.

[@MagicalMike2]

In some kind of weird, RPG world, all the damage types would be way better in specific places. Like it'd matter to take cold damage to some places or whatever, but I don't dislike that depth not being a thing, really. Agree, ele seems to be a very easy class to build something slightly new for and just play around with because the elements are very direct in making sense to me. Just pick an elemental elite and then put some of the same attribute's skills next to it, easy peasy.

[@K0L1]

Hi ive seen some of your older videos and wanted to hop back in GW after years, BUT i cant log in… i googled, looked at some forums, turned off some firewalls for GW.exe didnt help. Reseting password multiple times and didnt recived single e-mail for it idk why. I remember my sing in e-mail and password and it dont work. Anyone knew some trick plz? Thx

[@MagicalMike2]

Try going through GW2 support. I can't help you otherwise though, sorry. GL.

[@modger32]

FA on saturdays and sundays .

[@jk3jk35]

I feel they really missed their chance to bring Guild Wars to xbox 360 back in the day

[@jk6346]

Healer's Boon is no longer cool?!? Come on! ~ Impious Reverence

[@MagicalMike2]

Wdym, you always hated it! lol

[@jk6346]

@@MagicalMike2 Yes, definitely! How many times did we have hearlers say "1 out of 50 energy"!

[@MagicalMike2]

@@jk6346 Like I said, the skill is good; it's the player's fault for misusing it :(

[@jk6346]

@@MagicalMike2 if you had a dream PvE team where everyone fulfilled their role as expected, which profession/role would you choose?

[@MagicalMike2]

@@jk6346 Impossible to answer really, I like playing too many roles when it comes to actual RPGs. I might enjoy being a support wizard one day or a frontline warrior the next. Idk, when everyone's doing their thing and it's all working out, the teamwork feels cohesive and I feel part of it, no matter the role.

[@godseviltwin]

WoH healing monk here. Hate protection skills.

[@MagicalMike2]

But, but WoH gets so much more value when the target also has some damage reduction on them!

[@godseviltwin]

@@MagicalMike2 it gets more when the target is below 50% health.

[@bigblue4364]

I have a solution for you... dual box the game.... playing 2... then 3 and now even 4 accounts at once by hand with no macros is intense, and you have to make some pretty hefty adjustments to the meta builds to make it work. Highly recommend a 4k monitor it makes things more practical.

[@MagicalMike2]

That's an insane solution, may as well play with hero AI set to avoid combat and manually hit all their skills for them.

[@bigblue4364]

I never said i had a sane solution... I set a hot key to target party member 1 and then use spacebar to follow, splitting up to avoid heavy AoE is still a challenge but otherwise I've been having a blast. I've found that things go smoother with 5 hero's rather than 4 so i generally stick to 3 characters right now.