Want to know the best open-world build for your Specterstealer in Guild Wars 2? You’ve come to the right place, read on to learn how to turn your sneaky, dagger thief into a master of shadow and death.

RELATED: Guild Wars 2: End Of Dragons – Best Open World Build For Harbinger Necromancers

While the Thief is a strong class in Guild Wars 2, especially in the player versus player game modes, the Spectrum the specialization turns the thief into an absolutely unstoppable force. Normally the thief is a bit of a glass cannon, but the wraith is not. This elite specialization grants access to a bunch of new tools and traits that greatly improve your survivability (and your companions) while dealing respectable damage.

The Spectrum Explained

The Specter elite specialization, new to the End of Dragons expansion, brings many changes to the thief profession. Your F1 Steal skill becomes Siphon and you can use a scepter in your main hand. The scepter primarily deals status damage, and weapon skill 3 changes depending on what offhand weapon you’re using (more on that later).

You also gain access to another skill, usually related to the F2 key; this skill is called Shadow Shroud. It works almost the same as the Necromancer’s Death Shroud. It acts as a secondary health pool and makes the thief much more durable.

Shadow Shroud

Shadow Shroud is similar to Death Shroud but has a few key differences. A thief powers Shadow Shroud by spending initiative (using their weapon skills) and using Siphon (the F1 Steal skill used by the Spectre). Siphon mostly gives you a big chunk of Shadow Force.

It’s actually easier for a rogue to build their shadow shroud because they don’t have to kill things for big lifeforce bumps like a necromancer. This arguably makes Shadow Shroud better for longer fights, and a rogue can use Siphon in Shadow Shroud to extend its duration.

The best spectrum traits for the open world

The image above shows you the optimal trait choices for building the Specter open world. You will take strokes from the following lines: Mortal arts, trickery and specter. We are going to explain in detail why you should choose these particular traits and what the synergies between them are.

deadly arts

In Deadly Arts, you will adopt the following traits: Deadly Ambition, Panic Attack, and Potent Poison. This line aims to improve your lethality, in particular by forcing you to apply more conditions – especially poison, which is a great source of damage per condition. Let’s look at the strokes in detail.

• Deadly Ambition – made it so that every time you use a dual weapon attack (weapon skill three for the thief) you apply two stacks of poison.
• Panic Strike – change your attacks to also apply poison when immobilizing themwhich goes wonderfully well with our weapon skill 3.
• powerful poison – gives you an extra stack of poison on each trait that applies poison (this is why each trait applies at least two stacks).

Additionally, here are the bonuses you get for putting points in deadly arts:

• Using Siphon on enemies inflicts three stacks of poison.
• You weaken targets when you poison them.
• you treat bonus hit damage per condition on the target (two percent more hit damage per condition).

Deception

You will take on the following traits from the Trickery bloodline: Thrill of Crime, Trickster and Quick Pockets. The trick is to increase the power of your Siphon skill. It also makes it easier for you to gain initiative, allowing you to sustain your attack. Now let’s take a closer look at the cheat trait selections.

• thrill of crime – when using Siphon you will get ten seconds of furypower (three batteries) and speed.
• Trickster – towers gain reduced cooldown and cure a condition when used – this is a great trait even if you only have one Trick utility skill in place.
• Quick pockets – allows you to win three initiatives when swapping weapons during combat, which is a great way to get even more initiative, if you actually do. need that.

Here are the bonuses we get for putting points in Trickery:

• Gain two initiatives when using Siphon.
• Increases maximum initiative by three and also gives you additional expertise.
• Reduces Siphon cooldown 15 percent and also slightly increases hit damage.

RELATED: Guild Wars 2: End Of Dragons – Best Open World Build For Willbender Guardians

Spectrum

Finally, we have the Specter line of traits. This gives us access to all the basic mechanics this build needs to thrive. We will use the following traits: Consume Shadows, Larcenous Torment, and Strength of Shadows. This line of traits is all about increasing our torment damage/status and giving us a ton of support. Let’s look at the strokes in detail.

• Consume shadows builds stacks up to a maximum of five – once the five stacks are made (which takes five seconds), exiting Shadow Shroud consumes batteries, then heals you and your allies.
• larceny torment – Extends the duration of the torments you inflictand you also gain shadow strength each time you apply Torment to an enemy.
• Gain additional Expertise based on your Vitality statdamage is reduced based on the number of states of the target attacking you, and your Rot Wallow effect applies a longer duration torment.

rot wallow is something you gain as a built-in trait for the Spectre, you grant it to allies and it causes their attacks to inflict torment. It also increases the effectiveness of the healing effects of the Specter.

The best equipment for building the open world Specter

The equipment we will use is very simple, we will need a mix of damage and survivability. So let’s go for a combo of Pioneer (resistance, vitality, status damage and expertise) as good as Dire (resistance, vitality and status damage). This equipment configuration will allow us to take some shots and distribute them.

You will use Trailblazer stats in all armor slotsthen you will use Say in the Back, Accessory and Jewel slots – for the Amulet slot, stay on Trailblazer’s.

Spectral Weapons

The thief has access to a varied arsenal, but you’ll be using the staff and pistol for the purposes of this build. Scepter and Pistol skill 3 combine into dual wield skill 3 known as measured shot. This last skill has a second part called endless night. The vast majority of damage in this build comes from this skillmaking it one of the easiest builds to play in the game.

You’ll start by using your Siphon skill (use it in combat whenever it’s off cooldown), then you will use your skill 3 Measured Shot/Endless Night. When you need healing, you can switch to your Shadow Shroud and start spamming your skills (these skills are great for slicing through trash).

Finally, for Sigils, you will use Cleaning and Venomand for armor runes you will use the Tormenting set.

NEXT: Guild Wars 2: End Of Dragons – How To Get A Siege Turtle