New SM Open RvR build with Results.

So yesterday we were bored and decided to go out into the lakes. We were short tanks, so I actually had to spec into an actual tanky type build with a shield. (My knight is almost ready to take over that job though.) I ended up going with a very unusual build. It will look weird, so just go with me on it.

Weird ORvR build

For lower than RR70, don't get Perfect Defenses. Or skip AA and use an armor pot. Adjust as needed.

Another SM was covering Heaven's Blade, so I didn't want to overlap it. We would be fighting against multiple enemies, so the AoE of Nature's Blade was going to be invaluable. I could basically hit an AoE and drain 117 of all stats except wounds from the enemy and buff my group with it. The initiative steal alone is killer. Go check out Blurring Shock's post on initiative.

Just a quick little AJ on some unsuspecting destro there. We got there just in time to save the keep. It's just two bomb groups. It's what we had on at the time. (Ramthorne is Circle of Rage's GM. He's our big strategy guy. He comes up with an idea and I find a way to implement it basically.)

They decided to come back for more.

Yeah, it didn't work too well for them. Especially since we had oil to work with now. So we repaired up the doors, and flew over to Reikland noticing it's in danger of being captured. We ride up to the south BO since is the best place to defend in that zone.

They tried to push in and failed.

We notice Kadrin Valley in trouble, so we go grab a BO there. No opposition, so we came back and did the same thing again. Surely Destro would be defending it this time.

Nope. They wouldn't push in this time. They brought a lot more for round 2. Notice that we pushed out and wiped them this time.

Here's how we did it. After noticing it's a stalemate for 7 minutes, someone mentioned trying to push out on them. The longer we stayed in there, the more chance more opposition would show and wipe us out. They were stacking the door pretty heavily, so we had to clear those stairs in order to have a chance. We had all 4 Swordmasters build up to perfect balance and hold it for Gusting Wind. We waited 30 seconds to wait out any possible immunity timers. All 4 SMs hit Gusting Wind at once and it cleared the stairway. It's easy to block or parry 1 Gusting Wind, but the odds of blocking/parrying 4 isn't so good. We pushed out and had all the tanks (except me, since there were two tanks in my group) hit Immaculate Defense. Everyone else dropped morales at the same time. When the initial morale dump was completed 10 seconds later, I used Distracting Bellow on the remaining enemy and we cleaned them up.

The reasoning behind the build was purely to take advantage of the initiative steal of Nature's Blade. We were heavy on BWs. BWs get more bonus from critical hits than other DPS, so it only made sense to try to capitalize on it. Also the group was incredibly squishy, so I had to make the most of my Challenge ability to help ease the burden on healers by maxing out my avoidance. Forceful Shock was just used to snare and punt away tanks who were guarding enemies.

Next time I'll try to show a different warband make up from 3 bombs. We were just farming the zerg. It's what we had at the time. Against real opposition, we would have gotten rolled and fast.