Support Druid

June 2024

Introduction

Support Druid is a bursty condition cleanser with both defensive and offensive capabilities. Druid can provide strong heals and boons. However, it shines in its ability to spam cleanses and stun break allies within a large radius.

Build Fundamentals

Healing and damaging enemies will grant you Astral Force and you passively gain Astral Force thanks to Natural Mender. Once the bar is full you can then consume it to gain access to the Celestial Avatar form which lasts for 15 seconds. This profession mechanic changes all of your weapon and Glyph skills, giving you access to powerful tools to support your party.

Build Specifics

Main Priorities

As a support class staying alive should be prioritized above all else since you can’t provide much support if you’re dead. Keep your health above zero with tactful use of dodging and positioning. Your positioning and facing are important as many skills are both directional and channeled. Stay slightly behind the Commander Tag to more reliably land your support skills on either the main group or players in the tail.

Maintain a proper rotation of skills to cleanse and heal your party consistently. Outside of Celestial Avatar, rotate through Staff skills, Beast skills (Shake It Off and Hunker Down), your heal skill Healing Spring, and Glyph of the Stars.

During Celestial Avatar form your priorities are Lunar Impact, Seed of Life, Rejuvenating Tides, Cosmic Ray, Glyph of Alignment.

Weapon Skills

Some of your weapon skills have strong support utility and relatively short cooldowns. Timing is key when using them, and understanding how to use them effectively will help your groups sustain.

Solar Beam Anytime you are not hitting other skills, you should use Solar Beam to keep allies topped off. Fun fact this skill heals allies through walls and you can target allies!

Astral Wisp Use this as a targeted heal for an ally or place it on your commander.

Ancestral Grace This is one of your main burst heals and increases your mobility. When you reach the target, heal nearby allies. The recharge is reduced by 5 seconds if you heal another ally. Ancestral Grace is a blast finisher and can be used on Healing Spring, Sublime Conversion, or Glyph of the Stars to combo an area of healing.

Vine Surge Try to hit enemies and allies during clashes to maximize value. This skill is buggy on uneven terrain so use it wisely or close to allies if you need to use it on slopes.

Sublime Conversion This skill has no target cap for allies, so you can use it to give your entire group and turn all the enemy projectiles into healing.

Thanks to Quick Draw it is possible to reduce the cooldown of your next weapon skill after weapon swapping by 66%. If you need burst healing, weapon swap into double Ancestral Grace or you may want to use Vine Surge after every time you weapon swap for more utility/soft CC.

Flourish heals nearby allies by striking your mace on the ground, you will gain Nature's Strength if you hit an enemy and at 5 stacks, Force of Nature will increase your healing and damage output.

Oaken Cudgel Leap forth, your enemies and heal your pet. Gain Nature's Strength when hitting an enemy and use this skill to blast your water fields.

Hunter's Call Good single target skill to stack onto an enemy.

Call of the Wild Share , and to your allies, your enemies and blast a field. Addionally grants thanks to Windborne Notes.

Celestial Avatar

As explained previously Celestial Avatar is the Druid’s profession mechanic, changing the player’s weapon and glyph skills while in the form. Thanks to the trait Druidic Clarity you will cleanse 3 conditions from yourself and allies when you enter Celestial Avatar. Finally due to the trait Celestial Shadow this grants and to nearby allies when Release Celestial Avatar form.

(TIP) At the start of the fight you could enter Celestial Avatar and instantly end it for 3 seconds of and 2 seconds of .

Cosmic Ray Use this skill as a filler to heal during other skill’s cooldowns.

Seed of Life Instant cast double condition cleanse, you can use this while casting other skills.

Lunar Impact This is another one of your burst heals which is used prior to Seed of Life due to the cast time, this will enable you to blast a light field comboing an area of cleanse.

Rejuvenating Tides Pulsing heal around yourself and a water field.

Natural Convergence Not a priority skill but if used can lock down enemies for 8 seconds! You can cancel the cast to gain some yourself if needed, the complete cast will apply .

Healing Cleansing & Utility

Your main sources of healing and cleansing outside of Celestial Avatar other than your staff skills are the following;

Healing Spring Place this trap when clashing with the opponent or pre-emptively before an enemy spike/push. Once tripped it grants regeneration, is a water field and cures a condition, it then pulses a condition cleanse every second for 5 seconds for a total of 6 conditions removed per target.

(TIP) The trap begins its cooldown as soon as it is dropped, not when it triggers. Due to its long permanence duration, this means you can precast it in a location you may think the fight will be to maximize its use.

Frost Spirit provides and and cleanses conditions. Casting the spirit on top of a water field will blast it twice thanks to Nature's Vengeance, and also cleanse conditions twice!

Glyph of Alignment is one of your burst heals and cleanses 3 conditions. This should only be used during celestial avatar form. With only a small radius of 300 ensure you are close to your allies that need your support.

"Protect Me!" instant cast 600 range Command that stun breaks yourself and allies while granting and .

Glyph of the Stars is a 360 radius 1200 ranged casted water field that pulses 6 times, it heals allies and cleanses a condition per pulse and grants . Use this wisely and rotate it with your other skills, try not to overlap the cleanse though as thats your priority. The Celestial Avatar version Glyph of the Stars loses its condition cleanses but revives downstate allies.

Pets

Chances are that your pets will die fast (even if they are set on avoid combat) so its best to use the weaker of the two beast skills first and asap.

Hunker Down is your Siege Turtle skill, use it to share and block enemy projectiles.
Your Brown Bear[s] skill Shake It Off cures conditions on yourself and all nearby allies within 600 range. Ideally, use this skill just after you pet swap to remove the chance the pet is dead and therefore the skill is not accessible.

(TIP) stow your pet before the fight if needed and set it on avoid combat.

Alternatives

Utilities:

You can use Glyph of Rejuvenation instead of Healing Spring if you prefer to forfeit cleanse for even more burst heals. If you do swap heals, don’t forget to swap out the trap trait Trapper's Expertise in favour of Primal Reflexes. The only other trait that is viable is Verdant Etching which gives on Glyphs, you will lose and when Release Celestial Avatar so something to consider.

Traits:

Invigorating Bond over Nature's Vengeance if you are not running Frost Spirit.

Runes:

Superior Rune[s] of the Water for more Boon Duration or Superior Rune[s] of the Druid for more Healing Power.

Relics:

Relic[s] of the Monk is a good alternative to increase your healing output without requiring blast finishers.