User:Entropy/test

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E/Any Ebon Vanguard Elementalist
This Elementalist uses the skills of the Ebon Vanguard to augment the power of Air Magic.


 * Keep up Attunements
 * Combo from left to right: Cracked Armor, Bleeding, Disease, KD...repeat
 * Spam Lightning Hammer and Lightning Orb for damage


 * Replace Lightning Orb with Blinding Flash if you're worried about the Assassin getting killed.

D/Any Mystic Condition Spammer
This is a PBAoE Condition spammer Dervish.


 * 12+ Mysticism, 12+ Earth Prayers
 * Insightful Staff of Enchanting, Energy +5 while Enchanted
 * Use skills from left to right at point-blank range.
 * Note that Pious Renewal can also be used; activate it right before Mystic Sandstorm. This results in a net gain of 9 Energy at 12 Mysticism, while Arcane Zeal has a net gain of 11 at 12 Mysticism. However, Pious Renewal recharges faster, costs less initial energy, gives back some Healing, and is harder to interrupt; it may be preferable in some situations.


 * To turn this into a more resilient build, switch Heart of Holy Flame for Armor of Sanctity and cast Aura of Thorns first.
 * Radiation Field, Technobabble, and Signet of Corruption would also be nice additions if they fit in the Skill bar.
 * Combines well with a Fragility Mesmer who also uses Epidemic, Hypochondria, Fevered Dreams, and/or Extend Conditions.

D/A Ninja Scythe
12+ Mysticism, 12+ Scythe Mastery

The Dervish base energy of 25 is not enough to pull off the entire combo unless you can hit three foes immediately with Zealous Sweep. For this reason, it's a good idea to have any sort of +Energy runes, insignias, mods, etc. that are available.


 * Pre-cast Faithful Invervention. Wait for Energy to regenerate.
 * Cast Heart of Fury just as you get into spellcasting range.
 * Shadow Step in with Aura of Displacement and use your Attack skills from left to right.
 * Twin Moon Sweep will end AoD and teleport you back to safety.

Note that Faithful Intervention is not necessary, but it is useful in case you're facing hard-hitting foes. It could be replaced with another Attack like Mystic Sweep or some PvE-only skill like Aura of Holy Might.

A/Any The Staff-sassin
This Assassin does not fight with daggers. Instead, they use a Staff for +20 Energy and rely only on Skills and Spells to damage foes.


 * Cripple, Blind, Poison
 * Knockdown
 * Mostly armor-ignoring damage
 * Hilarious in RA!

Needs an Elite. I wish there was a Dual Attack that didn't need Daggers!

D/R Avatar of Lyssa Special Ops Archer
This is a build that aims to utilize Avatar of Lyssa with a Bow, rather than the usual Scythe or even Daggers.


 * 12 Marksmanship, 12+ Mysticism.


 * A Shortbow or Recurve Bow would work best, since you're not using Read the Wind. Zealous is good, but the Inscription should be "I Have The Power!" for +5 Energy, and a Defense or Fortitude mod. 15^50 or whatever isn't terribly useful here since most damage comes from the +bonus damage of Avatar of Lyssa, which is unaffected by 15^50 mods.
 * This build depends entirely upon Avatar of Lyssa for any sort of damage-dealing capacity. If you are in an area where foes use fast-activating skills, this is an ineffective build. The idea here is that you can use multi-shot attacks to hit a foe activating a skill twice or three times. This will trigger the bonus damage from Avatar of Lyssa more than once, so at only 12 Mysticism you end up dealing +82...123 damage. This is huge armor-ignoring bonus damage, and doesn't even factor in the damage of the bow, Critical hits, etc. Even without doing anything, you still get +41 damage at only 12 Mysticism, and under IAS this isn't hard.
 * Obviously, if you already have a good Condition-removing Monk in the party, drop Antidote Signet.
 * Body Shot can serve as all the Energy management you need, if you can get some other party member to constantly supply the Cracked Armor condition. It may even make the Zeaous bowstring overkill.
 * Remember that you need to be Drunk before using Drunken Master!
 * Stance removal will destroy you since your IAS has a 60-second recharge. Consider using Rapid Fire as a replacement in situations like this.
 * Forked Arrow does not work when Enchanted or Hexed; in a Hex-heavy area, replace it with something else. Also, unlike the usual usage, don't cast Zealous Renewal until you're getting near the bottom of your Energy pool.
 * Attacker's Insight at 4 Wind Prayers might work well as a replacement for Forked Arrow.
 * Sloth Hunter's Shot is another good substitute, Energy permitting.

R/Rt Point Blank Glass
This is a pretty good damage-dealing Ranger. Most of the damage ignores armor so it punches through most targets with ease. It lacks defense, though.

12+ Marksmanship, 12+ Expertise


 * You'll want a Shortbow or Recurve Bow since you don't have Read the Wind for accuracy. A damage-type modifying mod is nice. Try Shocking or Ebon to ignore PvE monster resistances.
 * Put down Vampirism before battle. You will get to close range so it won't get attacked. It provides a bit of healing and extra offense for you while also giving a distraction should some monster make it to the backline.
 * Prep with Glass Arrows, then spam Zojun's and Point Blank shot.
 * Followup immediately with Needling Shot. At this point, Zojun's is recharged exactly, so repeat this 3-skill cycle.
 * When the target is below 50%, spam Needling Shot.
 * Use interrupts as necessary.
 * If a target is Blocking: Shoot it once so that you cause Bleeding through Glass Arrows, then change targets.


 * Optional skills: Gaze of Fury when you need to get rid of things like Quickening Zephyr fast, Body Shot if someone can apply Cracked Armor, Drunken Master for long-term IAS, Lightbringer's Gaze against Torment demons, "Dodge This!" to make use of Adrenaline, Antidote Signet to counter Blind, Mental Block to help with defense at close range, Air of Superiority for general goodness...

Battle of Turai's Procession Farming

 * The first step, of course, is to reach Mirza Veldrunner without getting killed. Not too hard, but watch out for Crested Ntouka Bird's Conjure Phantasm. Be patient and wait for patrols, possibly bring running skills like Dodge if you're having trouble.
 * Also, all players and Heroes should be Level 20, though by this point in the game that should not be a problem.
 * You must have three max-range Bows (anything larger than aggro circle). Max-damage 15^50 customized is also never a bad idea. If you have it, Nevermore Flatbow is perfect.
 * Lightbringer title track is helpful to equip, if you have it.


 * The player is required to have unlocked at least the following skills:
 * Edge of Extinction
 * Favorable Winds
 * Winnowing
 * Splinter Weapon
 * Earthquake or Dragon's Stomp

The Player, Any/R or R/Any:


 * 12 Marksmanship, 12 Beastmastery. The rest of the attribute points can go anywhere since they don't really matter; if you do happen to be a primary Ranger, max out Beastmastery or Marksmanship and put the extra points to Expertise.
 * The only skills that the player themself must have, is Barrage and Edge of Extinction. This is the ideal configuration, but Heroes can cover all the other skills if the player doesn't have them.

Two Splinter Barragers, R/Rt or Rt/R:


 * 12 Marksmanship, 12 Channeling Magic. If primary Ranger, extra points to Expertise and max out Marksmanship. If primary Ritualist, extra points to Spawning Power and max out Channeling Magic.

Zhed Shadowhoof (or other Elementalist hero), E/Rt:


 * 12 Channeling Magic, 12 Earth Magic, remaining points to Energy Storage and max out Earth Magic.
 * Glyph of Energy and Maelstrom are optimal but not absolutely required, since Exhaustion isn't important here and Elementalist has enough energy to use costly spells anyways. GoE only makes the process go a bit faster.

The Process


 * Once you've gotten to Mirza, accept the quest and head to the marker; wait for the Margonites to spawn.
 * Run far away and let all the Centaurs die. Eventually, the Margonites will all group together and stop moving.
 * Plant your Heroes with a flag and move in closer. Take out your max-range bow and keep moving in closer until you're within firing distance. But don't actually shoot yet!
 * Unflag your Heroes. Once they get to you, start laying down all the Spirits you have, each person using a different one at once to speed up the process. Winnowing should go last because it has the shortest duration.
 * As soon as all Spirits are up, have all your Heroes cast Splinter Weapon on themselves, and your Elementalist hero cast it on you.
 * Set both Barragers to "Fight" mode, and queue Barrage by clicking on it (green checkmark appears on the skill icon).
 * Target the nearest Margonite and have your Elementalist use Glyph of Energy + Earthquake or Dragon's Stomp. About halfway through the casting, the player uses Barrage.
 * Your two Hero Barragers will also automatically use Barrage at nearly the same time.
 * With just a bit of good timing, the Margonites will all be knocked down for two seconds (to prevent them attacking, healing, or kiting) and then immediately hit for nearly 100 damage per Barrage Arrow that connects. This is enough damage to kill several Margonites at once and injure many others; at this point Edge of Extinction kicks in and kills the rest in a chain reaction.
 * If any Margonites were for some reason still alive, you should be able to easily pick them off.
 * Retreat a bit and wait for the next waves to come and congregate. If they start attacking your Spirits, retreat farther away so they don't come and attack you. Once they calm down and are all bunched up, start over from Step Three and repeat until all waves are dead.
 * The last wave, with Torment Weaver, is usually a bit more loosely grouped and may take two or more tries to kill them all. Torment Weaver himself is usually nearly dead after your volley of Barrage; finish him off, using Maelstrom and Lightbringer's Gaze if necessary.
 * Once you have gotten all your drops, map-travel back to Venta Cemetery and abandon the quest. You can now head back out to Turai's Procession again, speak to Mirza to get the quest, and repeat as many times as you want.

Note: This is four-man farming. It can be done with three people only, however, testing has revealed that without Earthquake or Dragon's Stomp for the KD, you need extraordinarily good coordination and timing to get all the Margonites in one go. What the KD does, is damage all Margonites to below 90% (for EoE), and make them non-moving targets. This way, it is extremely hard for Barrage to miss.

If you want to use only three players, then the requirements change somewhat. You must have either a primary Ranger or primary Ritualist for two of your Heroes (or for yourself and one Hero)...since the duration of Splinter Weapon got nerfed, one person casting it isn't enough anymore.

The player should, again, use the Lightbringer title track and equip Lightbringer's Gaze if they have it.

Two Rt/R or R/Rt, specced into Marksmanship and Channeling Magic:

One R/any or Any/R, specced into Marksmanship and Beast Mastery:

Follow the same process as usual, but this time you skip the KD step and go straight to Barraging. It's generally a good idea to run away immediately even if you think all the Margonites got killed, since it is very likely in this setup that one or more survive.

Take note, that when using just three people, your EXP gain and chance of good drops increases only somewhat...however, the chance of failure increases a lot. If all three Barrages aren't used within about 1/2 second of each other, the Spike will fail and only a few Margonites get killed. When using Heroes, you can try the following: instead of just hitting Barrage immediately, hit Spacebar (or whatever your "Action/Do It" button is) first, wait about 1/4 second, then hit Barrage. This gives your Heroes time to realize you're attacking and you should end up getting better sync.

Touchers
This duo can solo most any boss in Prophecies and some in Factions and Nightfall as well; however, it has trouble versus Monks that are specced to Healing Prayers, as well as those damnable Elementalist bosses with their 2x damage...More than just farming, though, they also make decent teammates for high-level areas. The Hero Acolyte Jin plays this build reasonably well, though she sometimes stays back and focuses on BR'ing the casters instead of Touching. The Bonus item, Soul Shrieker, works great for this build and is effortless to obtain, as well as free!

Throw Dirt disables any weapon-using foes and can be kept up almost indefinitely with two people and ~15 Expertise. Blood Ritual helps out the party's casters during non-farming parts of a run, as well as supplying nearly limitless energy during the solo fights - the two Touchers keep casting it on each other. The rest of the skills are self-explanatory; Whirling Defense lasts for a quite long time and is effective against foes when Throw Dirt is down. Rez is for the rest of the party; it can be swapped for something else like Plague Touch if going against foes who cause Conditions.

So far, this team has been able to do Kepkhet Marrowfeast, Gargash Thornbeard, Gorrel Rockmolder, Thorgall Bludgeonhammer, Flint Fleshcleaver, and Morgriff Shadestone. It failed against Wroth Yakslapper because he has nearly limitless Energy, massive Health, and spams Orison of Healing forever...so, most Monk bosses can outheal. Adding in a third player who does shutdown through Dazed or whatever can work, but then that is three people...

Unlinked Melee Attacks
The following skills can be used with any Weapon.

Scythe Mastery
 * Banishing Strike - AoE Holy damage
 * Eremite's Attack - attack faster
 * Irresistible Sweep - unblockable if Enchant self
 * Mystic Sweep - attack faster
 * Pious Assault - instant recharge if Enchant self
 * Reap Impurities - heal on Conditions foe
 * Rending Sweep - removes Enchantments
 * Twin Moon Sweep - hits twice
 * Victorious Sweep - heal on higher health

Strength
 * Body Blow - Deep Wound if Cracked Armor
 * Bull's Strike - KD
 * Counterattack - regain Energy if foe attacking
 * Griffon's Sweep - KD
 * Leviathan's Sweep - KD
 * Magehunter Strike - attack faster, unblockable if foe Enchant
 * Power Attack - +damage
 * Protector's Strike - attack faster

Tactics
 * Desperation Blow - cause Condition, self KD
 * Drunken Blow - cause Condition, self KD
 * Soldier's Strike - unblockable if Shout self
 * Thrill of Victory - +damage if higher health

Warrior Unlinked
 * Distracting Blow - AoE interrupt
 * Distracting Strike - interrupt, disable if Cracked Armor
 * Skull Crack - interrupt and Daze on spells
 * Symbolic Strike - based on Signets
 * Wild Blow - unblockable critical hit, remove stances

Spear Mastery
 * Chest Thumper - Deep Wound if Cracked Armor
 * Holy Spear - Burning and AoE Holy damage

Critical Strikes
 * Malicious Strike - Critical Hit if Condition

PvE Only
 * Club of a Thousand Bears - KD if nonhuman
 * Sneak Attack - Blindness
 * Whirlwind Attack - AoE attack

One-Shot Wonder?
If you focus entirely on Armor penetration and the most damage for a single attack, then the max you can achieve is...
 * Constant 10% from a Hornbow-type bow
 * +20% from Judge's Insight
 * Chance of +20% with a Sundering upgrade

Total so far: 30-50% AP (added)


 * Penetrating Attack or Sundering Attack for +20%

Total so far: 50-70% AP (base+added)

The Sundering mod is a wildcard, since it can only work 20% of the time. Overall this results in a base armor reduction of -1AL or something, iirc. But we're assuming luck is on our side, so...yeah.

Finally, if you happened to score a Critical hit, you would also deal damage*(sqrt(2)) rather than just the total damage.

70% AP max means that you could hit a target that has up to 280 AL and it would still behave as if the target was a squishy caster with 60 AL. If you hit a squishy caster, then they would be reduced to 12 AL, which is only slightly better than Pre-Searing armor.

Penetrating/Sundering Attack at 20 Marksmanship deal +23 damage. You'd want a Sundering Hornbow of Marksmanship, headgear, sup rune, Golden Egg, Lunar Fortune, and Blessing to achieve this.

Ranger using Penetrating/Sundering Attack

On a 60-AL target, assuming your Sundering and of Marksmanship upgrades did not kick in and you did not get a critical hit and you dealt the Minimum Damage for a bow (6), you would deal...

On a 60-AL target, assuming your Sundering and of Marksmanship upgrades did kick in and you did get a critical hit and you dealt the Maximum Damage for a bow (28), you would deal...

On a 300-AL target, assuming your Sundering and of Marksmanship upgrades did not kick in and you did not get a critical hit and you dealt the Minimum Damage for a bow (6), you would deal...

On a 300-AL target, assuming your Sundering and of Marksmanship upgrades did kick in and you did get a critical hit and you dealt the Maximum Damage for a bow (28), you would deal...

Final notes: a Warrior with Strength or Primal Rage can do a similar thing. However that gets more complicated since that will work with other weapons and other attack skills...Also, there are a lot of other skills that can be used to increase base damage, such as Shadowy Burden, Signet of Strength, Anthem of Envy...etc. But I am not even going to go there since that gets too complicated. So I'll just stick with Ranger.