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Best I could understand from a few mentions here and there is that Power Holo gained some nice DPS, but I don't have numbers, just hearsay. Hoping to see something interesting, but I think Pyro mentioned to me that Sw/P Holo can rival numbers of the Rifle/Kits setup so that's pretty neat. For anyone with a remote interest in the other stuff Engi got, no, put your healing dreams away. There are still several crucial issues with Engi healing support for PvE AND WvW that are not likely to be solved simply with creative use of what we have right now. That said, the cleanse support that Engi gained is not stat-reliant, so WvW specs can pretty easily pick up very strong supplementary support options within their bruiser and damage specs, so that's nice. I have had excellent results for Scrapper and Holo.

From this evening, a lovely ninja of Hills from a hot map.

I will try to get some footage of Power Holo sorted out. Pretty happy with the results I am getting, looking to move on to Soulbeast and try a friend's build.

Oh dear lord, the sustain.

So, is everyone who was able to transferred? Did anyone need help with anything to get started?

There will be a lot to learn across the board, myself included. But this should be fun and excellent as long as we are all willing to play towards success, however we end of defining that in our goals. I will be our guardian; I believe that I might have the most time in this setting and I will try to share what I know. What's strong, weak, safe, risky, for both tactics and builds. Something that I mentioned to Mold earlier this evening. Combining a Support Aura Tempest with a Support Guard (both in minstril), is such a nicely broad support base that we can run nearly any builds alongside those and do pretty well. I may rotate in some Scrapper play if someone would like me to train them a bit on the Guardian role.

*insert joyous exaltations here* I am excited and can help people with builds for nearly every class. I have played most build arch-types and am happy to share insight. Looking forward to some havoc!

With the new explosives traits, I think there is potentially for Engineer to be either a primary, or very strong supplementary might stacker. Both Power and Condi setups would be modifications of the DPS setups, swapping Scholar to Strength and Berserker to Aristocracy for example, but I am unsure exactly utilities to setup with. Power is a bit simpler, I wanted to experiment with going ham on the blasts and bringing very strong CC in the form of Thumper + Traited Mine + Bomb Kit. Maybe keep Nades for the new toolbelt over Thumper to retain that damage.

I have been keeping tabs on one of the people I have been following for a while, Farbstoff. He is a very nice German programmer that likes Necromancer. Due to qT not having time, per there write-up, they recommended folks keep an eye on Condition Reaper benchmarks from Farbstoff. I have not looked into Power Reaper from Brazil too seriously, because the initial findings did not seem to yield strong results. But this caught my attention. Rotation - Avg DPS Realisitc Buffed: 30 - 30,5K While this does appear to have some built in ramp-up time, as many of the condition builds do, this was achieved with realistic buffs, as well as no epidemic. That's a pretty big deal, because that is respectable DPS for a Condi DPS class IF it were the case that they also brought Epidemic for heavy/dangerous add fights. I would like to have a discussion on fielding this build in a Condi Subgroup-style comp in fights where Epidemic could provide that unique value that seems to be one of the only things Necro has left. The goal is not really to just give Necro a place for that sake of it, but if this DPS is indeed achievable, and it can swap one utility out for Epidemic, I think that has genuinely strong value. Proposed sub-group: Chrono - Druid - Condi PS - Condi Engi/Condi Ranger - Epi Necro Fights where this might see the most value: Sabetha: The goal is to melt adds with Epi-bounces. heavy anti-Karde set-up with Epi against both turrets and back to Sab when she returns, and Karde takes that 25% bonus condition damage. Sloth: Same as before, we melt adds, and multi-bounce if done with caution for full Condi-Mirror setup with two Necros. Chess: If the single target DPS of this builds holds up, I see the strong potential for running a full Condi squad. The double of epidemics could mean fast melting of the chess pieces without having to worry about the pulsing slow from the pieces tripping up taking them out due to slower use of multiple cleaving cooldowns from power builds in that pinch situation. We also might be able to make good use out of the Epi-bounce when one of the pieces gets close during that first pass and be able to push out damage a little harder for that section. We don't typically have too much trouble with either Sab or Sloth, so this might just be an interesting approach for us. Chess I know I have seen some groups favor condition setups with necros for the strategy I outlined, so I would like to give that a go, sounds fun. I gave some thought to other fights, but many of the fights have power biases, and we are already strong on those fights with the setups we bring, so there may well not be enough value in investing into new [condition=>epi] strats to make it worth or while for the time being. Would others be interested in giving this type of set up a go if we can have some success in reproducing Farbstoff's results reasonably (yes, this is a strong caveat)?

Got to do some Golem testing, as well as some messing around with T4 Dailies. Your impression is pretty spot on. I would say in a Raid environment it's easier (due to consistency for many elements) to pull this build off, but it's pretty reliant on a few things you can't necessarily control. Get stuck in GS with a bad swap, lose massive damage. Mis-order, damage loss. RS4 into non-ice or fire field, hefty loss. I like the potential for the fights where epi blasts are a strong enough reason to bring the necro. This build gives it the potential to do competitive Condi DPS while bringing that Epi, but for other runs where the epi is just alright, I don't know.

Hi Jojo!

If that's the case, that is a little disappointing, but understandable. If that is the case, and double Chrono is still the way to go, then a few follow up questions come to mind. If we want to test the concept of a non-mirror comp, what might be some theoretical distributions if the only thing we were looking to change was swapping out 1 warrior? What about a warrior and a druid as well? Would those two pursuits even be worthwhile efforts? Is it the case that mirror simply remains the most efficient set up? So many questions. Edit: I really, REALLY wish they would have added another strong quickness generator. Even if it could not compete with Chrono, if it was able to cover gaps just enough to allow for the solo Chrono while still being a build worth bringing at least partially on it's own merit, that would have been excellent.

I have been toying with the same idea Bone. There are a few things I would like to test to see if a 8-1-1 might be a reasonable set up. For this to work, I would like to assume some things that I would need to test before such assumptions could be made: -There are several candidates for secondary might-stacking that might keep the warrior from having to re-gear into something crazy. I will be on TS later tonight after class if anyone would like to do a little think tank session. -Stat aura traits pulse every 3 seconds, and last 9 seconds. I want to test a few of the assumed characteristics about the priorities associated with them. -Similarly, I want to observe the behavior and characteristics of Spirit buffs. -I am hoping to try and do a little more research to see if anyone has anything more concrete on Chrono Solo-Perma-Quicknessing rotations. Even though qT hopes to have all of there stuff out tomorrow (excited to see what Lugi will do for Engineer), these are still things I would like to do some observational tests on if they do not. I know they tried something like an 8-1-1 setup on Sab, but I would like to know more or try to find out more myself about the elements in play that could make it worthwhile.

I won't be able to to do much in terms of math tonight (I will leave that to Ziggy, he is far more versed in the numbers than I am), but yes, Engi is now Space Jam. Both the Power and Condi builds got serious buffs. Power is more clear cut in terms of gains. Some early numbers I have seen for Necro are also promising, but I will once again defer to Ziggy when he is able to get the numbers.

It's all good. I think that we might still want to work with mirror comp, but the classes will be what is mirrored, not the builds and utilities themselves necessarily. We net gain because of the GotL average going up and the second PS being able to bring extra CC or defensive banners. Even if that is the only change, that is something.

Condi Ranger was buffed. They take Trap Trait, not Sharpened Edges I believe. I think we may still want two druids, even with the GotL change, or we stop assuming Frost Spirit and Spotter for one subgroup, but those both don't mean as much to a Condi group. Here is my thought currently. Power PS (Disc. & Strength), Healing Druid (Frost, Spotter, GotL), Quickness Chrono + Two Power DPS Condi PS (Def. & Tactics OR CC), Healing/Condi Druid (Sun, GotL [we might be able to assume 5 stacks all the time as opposed to three now]), Quickness Chrono + Condi/Power Engi (Even without Spotter I think Engi still over crits because of traits), Condi DPS One of the Power DPS might optimally be Power Engi for the aura, as passive conditions ticking for more in additional to maybe being the top Power DPS now might take the cake.

Reaper is a maybe, that was a lot of buffing. For the Druid, the 150 precision might be best replaced all together with Precision trinkets, and bringing an extra DPS for fights where only one healer is needed, or Condi Druid using Hidden Barbs instead of the second Spotter. Edit: To clarify, the idea of a Condi subgroup and a Power subgroup could be the difference here. Condi subgroup might value the precision less and thus that group would get the Condi Druid using Hidden Barbs. For the power Group, they would want that Spotter from a Healing druid if that works out comp-wise. You might not, but in fights where a second healer is needed, maybe get a Healing Rev instead of the Healing Ele. That should push Alacrity uptime much closer to 100%. For Darefdevil, maybe. I don't know it well enough. The second PS could bring more CC, FGS (if not Condi and thus using it already) and maybe even the other banners! Not kidding, extra stats are extra stats even if they are defensive. That could mean a nice survivability uptick for the group.

Need to do some math to confirm, but I think Engi now wins at DPS. *maniacal laughter*

The incoming damage pushes something to the tune of 2-3k per second in spurts and if you can't use your healing signet because you give up the Heal over Time effect, I don't think you could really last more than a few molesty hand sets. I really do think that build would need more. The Signet passive plus regen may very well not be enough. Would you be able to do the math and see what kind of healing per second you could get?

That build would need more healing I think. even with some strong defensive stats, you still need the sustain to match. I thought about doing a mesmer build for this roll, and it likely would need Restorative Mantras paired with Power Return and Power Spike cycling.

After some practice in a pug, yeah, I think this build performs well. Still thinking about some modifications I might do to it, but liking the results so far.

After doing some light experimentation, I think I can what the Rev build is aiming for even better with this: Let the weirdening begin.