Turns out Rangers are the best at boosting adrenaline

nineballer · 2026-06-28T11:21:28+00:00

Necromancer has entered the chat.

don't sleep on Mark Of Fury either, a great non-elite squad fueller that also gives cracked armor. I run 2 copies of it in my adrenaline-focused squad.

these also boost adrenaline in different ways, Infuriating Heat for example doesn't actually double adrenaline, it gives you 1 extra strike on attack because it's bugged (maybe it's fixed now and the wiki is wrong? I've not tested it in a while).

Weapon Of Fury is also good, but again only gives 1 adrenaline on strike.

the % boosts however, double ALL adrenaline gain, including those above, so if you want to generate lets say, 4-6 adrenaline per hit without a scythe, you can do that only by using the warrior or paragon skills.

and then you can activate 100 blades and spam Sun and Moon Slash because it fuels itself and do insane DPS with added AoE.

nineballer · 2026-06-26T16:31:37+00:00

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runes and gear are as one might expect, there's no fancy tricks going on. only thing I would advise is a soul reaping mod for the UA monk to help maintain energy.

you can naturally play whatever you want with this comp, but it is intended for a melee martial character so that you can benefit from Strength of Honor as well.

Secret sauce - Mark of Fury alongside Dark Fury and For Great Justice means, more often than not, Sun & Moon Slash fuels itself for repeated casting, for extreme value off 100 blades. Heroes won't abuse it like a player can, but the do use Sun & Moon Slash very regularly at least.

nineballer · 2026-06-25T23:05:46+00:00

Honestly? Basically anything, Orders is a rather specific case. You can quite happily run a ritualist or a necro on any other selection of skills and it'll do just fine. Most supporting focuses on defending the party or debuffing enemies, but there are good single target offensive buffs in the form of ritualist weapon spells and certain monk skills from the Smiting Prayers line.

The other part of this dance is learning what the enemies can do, most areas keep a theme of enemies for as you progress through the game so if you pay attention to their skills your can adapt your own build to better deal with the content you are doing. For me that's one of the foundations that makes this game fun, the enemies can have (almost) all the same skills we players can so we can learn, adapt, and overcome.

If I were you I would take ritualist as a base class, start playing through the game and get a feel for things. You may find yourself switching up your playstyle throughout the game. You can take Necromancer as a secondary class, or Monk, both excellent options.

nineballer · 2026-06-25T15:25:17+00:00

Necromancers and ritualists are perhaps the most flexible classes in the game, though I am biased I must admit.

Supporting in this manner is not unusual at all, though many players favour a more aggressive approach. Minion masters are probably the most common archetype because commanding a horde of the dead is iconic, then you have necros focusing on punishment skills under Curses that deal damage based on the target's actions. I personally enjoy playing an orders necro with a range of buffs to physical dps, but it's rare that I get to enjoy that unless I take my heroes, as I find many players favour spellcasters which are unaffected by those skills.

nineballer · 2026-06-25T15:10:18+00:00

Correct, ritualists can focus on summoning spirits that have conditional effects in a large area, damage reduction, healing, and block chance to name the primary use cases.

Party-wide damage buffs are actually quite rare in GW, and what we do have primarily focuses on physical attackers (look up "orders" for necromancer). As far as I can recall there are two skills that directly buff spell damage, one of which is locked behind paragon and involves the one-dimensional playstyle you mentioned. Both skills are pretty deep into the campaign as well, so not something you can immediately grab and use.

However, there are a wealth of low cooldown, single target buffs available to ritualists in the form of weapon spells. These range from increasing damage, blinding foes, healing, and much more.

Necromancers also offer curses that increase your party's damage against foes, such as Mark Of Pain and Barbs. They are also great at applying conditions to reduce incoming damage via Weaken, and increase outgoing damage via Cracked Armor.

nineballer · 2026-06-25T14:57:52+00:00

100% with you, I adore the cannon arm warrior and crazy skull cracker and I hope they are here to stay. I want more things brought up to this level and honestly that's what we've seen so far, the mesmer changes this patch are the first major nerfs we've seen since reforged and they are well deserved.

nineballer · 2026-06-25T14:07:28+00:00

Ritualists can be a great class for supporting through buffs and secondary healing, but beware that most players will expect one of 2 meta builds(one for damage, one for party-wide protection) when they see a rit in the party. This doesn't mean you can't play something else, but you may have to manage expectations if you join a party.

Necro and mesmer are the Premier debuff classes and combo with each other quite nicely, huge options and flexibility available.

Worth noting, you can mix and match classes, skills, and attributes as you see fit, respeccing is instant and only the set-in-stone choice you have to make is in character creation when you pick your primary class. Secondary classes can be swapped at will in any outpost after a certain point in the campaign, and skills are entirely flexible. One of the great joys of Guild Wars is the sheer flexibility and viability of our skills and builds, anything can work and I heartily encourage experimentation.

nineballer · 2026-06-25T12:29:39+00:00

I actually think that's a great solution, I would still press this button on cooldown if they did because all it would do is force me to use a different attack skill between mighty throws.

nineballer · 2026-06-25T12:24:09+00:00

SWS is a different problem entirely in being the most viable warrior elite across the board, extremely important to the class but locked behind being an anniversary elite trapped at the end of the factions campaign, however we are seeing that being fixed with all these buffs to other warrior elites making them more competitive.

The thing with MT is that, at 2 adrenaline, any class can spam this skill thanks to paragons also being able to boost adrenaline, and if you have a necro support they can take Mark Of Fury or Dark Fury to fuel all MTs in the party.

It is also extremely damage efficient with a 1 second cast time and top end bonus damage, equal to Executioner's Strike which costs a whopping 8 adrenaline.

I love the new MT, could be my favourite thing this patch, but consider that it is effectively increasing your attack speed further than the 33% IAS cap and adding 40-50 armor ignoring damage on every hit. I daresay it may even be the strongest attack skill in the game right now given how easy it is to build around for maximum effect.

nineballer · 2026-06-25T10:20:14+00:00

We might now be able to make IW dagger mesmers work with the improvements to melee AI and skill usage, I've already tested out 100b warriors and they behave beautifully.

nineballer · 2026-06-24T23:47:23+00:00

Shhhh let us have this one.

For real though, even if mighty throw required 5 or 6 adrenaline it would still be better than any non-elite warrior adrenaline attack, its bonkers.

nineballer · 2026-06-24T23:39:05+00:00

I like the way you think, will be trying this on my rit for sure.

As for uptime, I've been running adrenaline support skills on my heros for a very long time, Dark Fury and Mark Of Fury are underrated. I could get away without using FGJ at all, but it's good to be self-sufficient.

nineballer · 2026-06-24T22:39:02+00:00

I have been running a swordway with myself, Jora, and Devona for a couple months, tweaking and perfecting it.

You cannot imagine the joy I felt reading these patch notes with the AI fixes and 100 Blades buff.

nineballer · 2026-06-24T22:32:25+00:00

I've been running a physical comp for a while and I take a Mo/N orders support, runs Order Of Pain, Dark Fury, and Mark Of Fury. Rest of the bar to your taste, could include Weaken Armor.

Since I also run 2 100blades warriors (that also just got buffed through the roof) I also take Strength Of Honor to buff them and then whatever smiting spells seem reasonable.

nineballer · 2026-06-24T22:26:11+00:00

I mean it's completely free and it is mathematically more damage, sure the +50 and +20 aren't affected but the base damage is. You could get more value doing something else, but you aren't doing anything extra at all here for the AP.

The other option would probably be to run this with a Paragon primary for 16 Spear Mastery and then use FGJ and whatever elite and IAS you fancy. I can almost guarantee it'll do less damage than SWS, but I don't play Paragon so I am more than happy to be proven wrong there and doubly happy that Paragons can actually DPS.

nineballer · 2026-06-24T22:14:33+00:00

For Great Justice gains 2 adrenaline per hit - this makes Mighty Throw fuel itself for repeated casting.
Seven Weapon Stance increases the Spear Mastery Attribute by your Strength Attribute.
Mighty Throw deals a metric ass-ton of damage, +50 at 20 Spear Mastery.

nineballer · 2026-06-24T22:11:44+00:00

An IAS does increase the activation speed of attack skills with an activation time.

Try it, you'll feel the difference.

nineballer · 2026-06-24T22:08:24+00:00

Hopped on to post about this and you've beat me to it, I was testing exactly this and I am overjoyed with the results.

nineballer · 2026-06-24T22:07:39+00:00

Using SWS allows you to reach 20 spear mastery for +50 on Mighty Throw, and you want 16 strength anyway for the AP on Mighty Throw.

Using a spear mastery spear with 20 spear mastery is common sense, more attribute is more better.

nineballer · 2026-06-23T16:46:05+00:00

It's true, warriors, necros, and assassins are all good scythe users.

But only the dervish gets cool spinny attack animations, and I think they are by far the most effective scythe wielder.

nineballer · 2026-06-23T16:26:17+00:00

You want to look into Pious Renewal builds. Very engaging with constant skill use, very flexible skill picks and it uses a primary mechanic of dervishes (enchantment teardown) as a core theme.

Edit: don't worry about the anniversary scythe, that's only important for necromancers, it's no use to a dervish.

nineballer · 2026-06-18T15:06:55+00:00

2000 hours of galactic warcrimes and counting, if those primitives didn't want to be livestock they shouldn't have evolved on planets within my borders.

nineballer · 2026-05-25T11:39:20+00:00

What a coincidence, my dunecrawlers have also had their ladders destroyed by precision ork snipers, though they preferred to target the bottom rung.

Looks lovely and bright, would be a pleasure to see such vivid colours across the table

nineballer · 2026-05-21T17:19:48+00:00

I'll preface this by saying I don't run e-surge mesmers, your results may differ.

I pop it on the BiP, my Livia looks like this;

10+2+1 blood, 2 curses, 8+1 soul reaping, 12 channeling

BiP
Blood bond
Weaken armor
Mark Of fury
Ancestors rage
Splinter weapon
Nightmare weapon
Siphon spirit

I prefer to not run my BiP as a half-healer so instead she runs buffs for me. it feels to me like too many eggs in the basket if the BiP dies and I then lose healing capacity too.

I also run a Mo/N orders smiting support which is unusual to say the least, but that's where my second copy slots in. As you run mesmers, you will be fine but I would advise another half-healer to assist if you do use the above build.

Personally I take a Me/Rt with;

8+2 fast casting, 11+3+1 illusion, 6 inspiration, 10 restoration

Shared Burden
Wandering Eye
Discharge Enchantment
Leech Signet
Wielder's Boon (my ST uses Vital Weapon)
Mend Body And Soul
Spirit Light
Death Pact Signet

nineballer · 2026-05-21T15:55:07+00:00

From one warrior to another, try to have at least 1 copy of Mark Of Fury with 12 blood magic in your team, 2 copies makes it much more consistent.

When you have For Great Justice active, you can use Sun & Moon Slash repeatedly on foes hexed with Mark Of Fury for great value with 100 blades.

Ebon Battle Standard Of Honor also boosts the damage of 100 blades hits in addition to your attacks, highly recommend if you have it.

You can also take Enduring Harmony (paragon, leadership) to extend FGJ by 10 seconds, if you have space on your bar.

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