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Are there any build guides for a solo PvE GF?
codexia
Member, Neverwinter Beta Users Posts: 33
Yes, I know, there are better classes for soloing. I like GF, I want to play a GF. Just getting that out of the way.
Anyway, I've scoured the forums and internet and seen about a dozen builds that say they work for solo but they are generally hybrid builds. I'm wondering if anybody has any advice, or knows of any guides, that are for GFs that plan to stay almost entirely solo. As of right now I only really have about an hour a day to be on my computer so grouping would simply not work for me most of the time.
Anyway, I've scoured the forums and internet and seen about a dozen builds that say they work for solo but they are generally hybrid builds. I'm wondering if anybody has any advice, or knows of any guides, that are for GFs that plan to stay almost entirely solo. As of right now I only really have about an hour a day to be on my computer so grouping would simply not work for me most of the time.
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About myself: I play GF since beta as my main (fatmushroom@whymushroom). I always played Iron Vanguard. I’m one of the few who likes to play full support as Tactician. This is how I would spec my GF when I want full solo play potential. Have fun!
Solo GF (Iron Vanguard)
Powers
At-Will
LMB: Cleave (AoE) or Crushing Surge (single target) for damage.
RMB: Tide of Iron (debuff) to reduce damage resistance (DR) or your enemy
Encounters
Always mark (bigger) targets with tab. It will debuff enemies and you gain combat advantage (CA). Stacking all your (de)buffs and keeping them up is key!
AoE
Single Target
- Lunging Strike: decent damage, warp to enemies is nice. Playing solo content, I have this one always slotted.
- Griffon’s Wrath: low damage, stuns foes, it can miss. I don’t know about this one, fun to play around with it I guess. I don’t use it ever.
- Knee Breaker: high damage over time, difficult to use because it can miss.
- Knight’s Challenge: you can make very good combo’s with Anvil of Doom for high damage. But difficult in use.
- Anvil of Doom: high damage, when timed right (foe has 40% HP) you get double damage. This power can miss too.
- Bull Charge: decent damage, knocks enemies prone.
Using single target powers is a very personal choice. I like the movement of Lunging Strike, the damage for Anvil of Doom and a good knock back (to prevent foes from drinking potions or something) from Bull Charge is nice too.Passive
- Shield Talent: slot this if you’re short of stamina often. Personally I think you should put up your shield only to dodge red areas (aim to the middle of the red area) or to dodge control spells.
- Guarded Assault: reflect 15% of incoming damage back. Good choice IMO.
- Combat Superiority: 10% damage buff to enemies who have hit you. If you don’t need the defensive passives, I think this is a good 2nd choice. But I have never used it before, because in parties you want more threat or defensive items.
- Ferocious Reaction: Awesome lifesaver. Works like a second soulforged, but deals damage too!
- Trample of the Fallen: 15% damage buff to controlled enemies. Seem okay, but foes aren’t that often controlled. I think Combat Superiority is more effective.
As standard I would slot Guarded Assault and Ferocious Reaction.Dailies
- Villain’s Menace: does decent AoE, buffs you a bit and you’re immune to control spells. It’s nice but not my favorite. I prefer dodging control spells with my shield. But it depends on playstyle here.
- Fighter’s Recovery: I love this thing! You’re low on HP? Pop it up, use Enforced Threat or Frontline surge and you’re full HP again! I have this always slotted.
- Terrifying Impact: good damage AoE, stuns enemies. Maybe a bit difficult aiming, but I really like the stunning effect of it. Good second choice.
- Supremacy of Steel: reflects incoming damage. It’s okay I guess.
- Indomitable Strength: high single target damage, knocking enemy prone. Good for single target fights.
As a standard I would use Fighter’s Recovery and Terrifying Impact.Feats
Heroic
From Conqueror:
- Shielded Resurgence (5/5): gain AP while guarding. AP is always good.
- Strength Focus (0/3): gain some stamina, damage bonus. At 15 points spend on strength, it’s just another .75% stamina, damage bonus.
- Toughness (3/3): +9% HP. This is big!
- Shield Resurgence (0/3): gain HP when controlled. It’s okay, but not overwhelming.
- Strength Focus (-/5): foe deals less damage. I think this is slightly better than Shield Resurgence. When you have a lower GS, this would be better than Armor Specialization.
- Armor Specialization (-/3): boosts AC and Defense. For high GS players this would be the choice instead of Strength Focus.
- Potent Challenge (0/3): You don’t need threat for solo play.
- Powerful Attack (5/5): buff your Encounters and Atwills by 10%.
- Grit (0/3): gain Temporary HP when healed my party members.
- Pin Down (-/3): prone duration +.3 seconds.
- Weapon Mastery (3/3): adds 3% crit chance. It’s okay for solo play I guess.
- Ubiquitous Shield (0/3): reduce CA against you. Meh. Normal CA is +15%, so when they have CA on you, their buff would be 11.25% instead of 15%. I think even tanky GFs aren’t using it.
Now you have 4 more points left. I suggest putting it in Strength Focus or Armor Specialization.Paragon Feats
For solo play Conqueror is the way to go.
From Protector:
From Tactician:
Gear and Stats:
For solo play, I suggest the T2 set of the Grand Regent. The added power (20% of you defense) is good. The Draconic Templar set is better, but takes more time to complete the set. Other sets are either better in parties, or gives crit (which isn’t that useful for a GF).
Guidelines for stats:
Offense:
1. Armor Pen: aim for 18-20%.
2. Recovery: aim for 2k recovery first. Laster try to get 3k
3. Crit: aim for 1.5k first, get maybe 2k later
4. Power: points left? Stack power.
Defense:
1. Defense: aim for 3.5k first, 5k+ later
2. Regen: as much as possible, but you won’t really need more than 1.5k
3. Deflect: aim for 1k first, 2k+ later
4. Life Steal: 1k (edited: it's not useless for solo play)
I agree with most of your guideline. It's pretty detailed for a post
May I add two things? Defense imo is needed in conjunction with AC to reach the ~50% damage resistance. A T1 Knight Captain wearer with your proposed feats in AC needs ~4.6k. A T2 set GF only needs ~4.4k in order to reach that 50% damage resistance.
Personally I wouldn't stack defense above those values, because of the diminishing return.
My second point is Life steal. It is NOT useless and it will be mandatory instead for Mod 6. That's somethin to think about, too.
A single enforced threat (20 target limit afaik) does 15k per target. You can easily say it's a life saver. Some lifesteal - around 1k- is very handy, especially for solo players.
I hope people continue to play GFs, even if it's no fancy DD class.
Heroes of Darkness
Retired since 02/15
My opinions are my own. Please do not judge my friends nor guild for my statements.
And yea, I do plan to play my GF, at least until Paladin comes out. That was the class I had wanted to play when I first heard about this game back in beta but there was no Paladin to be seen. Who knows, maybe I'll like GF so much I'll stay even when Paladin comes out?
For solo play I think you have generally enough defensive stats. So I think STR>CHA>CON>DEX. INT and WIS isn't useful for solo.
STR: obvious more damage.
CHA: if you mark your targets a lot, you will haven combat advantage often enough to make good use of it.
CON: more HP and AP, its good. But for solo, I prefer stacking damage bonus.
DEX: okay defensive stats, resistance ignored if fine too. But I wouldn't stack it
Choosing STR>CON>DEX>CHA is fine too, but more defensive build.
Good point. 1000 life steal is better than 3.5k+ defense. For my support tactician build it is useless as I cant kill a fly. Edited in first post.
Try running through dungeons, with the baddies nipping at your heels until you get to a point where you have to interact with something. **Then** hold your ground. Some of the baddies will have lost interest and will have fallen back. But, even if they don't, your multi-target attacks will be more effective when they hit 8 dudes at a time instead of 3. It's a soloing technique that doesn't work for most classes (and it may not work in all dungeons) but really speeds things up for GFs, particularly doing our dailies.
The Dex Modifier does not show up in the Resistance Ignored calculation in the character sheet... you need to add it yourself. I learned that the hard way, as I liked Dexterity for its AOE Resistance and Deflection bonus. So, I amped it up to 20 (10% RI modifier) and then had way too much Armor Pen for PVE. Very costly mistake, as it was in my purple artifacts and my armor set.
Even with the build up there I've been having so many doubts, it drives me crazy having a respec cost so much Zen. I spend more time micro analyzing every single skill choice than I do playing the character.
Basically whatever you choose you will be weak compared to all other classes, and will struggle to get Great Success in Heroic Encounters unless you deliberately stand in dragon breath, etc.
I have been GF since open beta and played him exclusively for 11 months. I then rolled a CW and couldn't believe the difference. My GF has 21k gs, 7 purple companions, 4 legendaries, and my 16k CW only epics and 1 purple (lillend) and melts mobs in seconds and heals with life steal. Plus CW's is favored by the devs and will always be one of the top classes, whereas GF is the most neglected class in the game.
I still main with my GF and all the content is easy. I am conqueror, timeless hero (black ice is better but so bored of farming to keep it empowered) and perfect vorpal (perfect bronzewood served me well for a year). But it took me a long time to get to be powerful whereas any other class can be better at lower gear scores. Love my 400k Anvils against dragons.
I now wish for a free CHANGE CLASS RESPEC token since I am so tired of NEVER getting any drops. 100 Tiamats and no draconic templer gear, yet my CW gets it nearly about 50% of the time Tiamat is T2.
This is the way the truth and the light for speeding up solo content. You will have less DPS than most. You will also have more HP and more mitigation as well. Slot loads of AOE and make a few big fights rather than a few little fights.
That aside, I really didn't have much difficulty getting through Sharandar and Dread Ring as a Tactician GF, killing everything with a round of Frontline and Enforced Threat. Add some Terrifying Impact and Lunging Strike for larger pulls, and most things will be lying down too much to hurt you. It does take me more time to kill mobs in IWD as my DC and CW, but you are really comparing 10 seconds to 60 seconds. Most of the time you will be running place to place.
Unless you plan on PvPing, you don't need the Black Ice set, so just go in to have fun.
As far as Tiamat goes, no GF, no matter the GS, is the key to victory. It's a high debuff + certain classes single target damage that is the key, and you won't match a TR's Duelist Flurry Bleed. The hard part is using party based buffs like Into The Fray and Knight Captain's set and getting people to party with you. I've found it easier to invite people after Severin is dead and you have gathered around the Cleric you choose to defend. If I see a GF use Into the Fray, I invite him and 3 others, and presto, party of 5.
RNG hates everyone. But if you are only an hour or so a day, I'd skip Artifact gear entirely, do the Jewelrycraft Profession, and get the PvE weapon set from Valindra's Tower, from the end chest there. You don't need Artifact gear to solo PvE your Dailies.
I've been running a protector build that honestly has been fine in soloing while still great in group content. I went all tank with my spec and really have no regrets on reduced DPS.
I also have to disagree on the black ice set. Again as a tanking spec I went with purified black ice got the full set even the gauntlets and felt that it was worth the trouble and the black ice farming to keep it charged until I really wasn't doing IWD anymore.
The key as a GF to getting great result in an HE for me at least has been tanking. Spam the tab button get agro and keep it.
Note I'm also saying this as a solo player. Yes I enjoy the occasional dungeon or skirmish for loot to sell or salvage but mainly I solo as a full tank spec so it's not that crazy.