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Crit Cap

  • April 6, 2023
Guide
Why is achieving crit cap important?
Achieving 100% Critical Chance is desirable for most power-based Guild Wars 2 builds. As your Critical Damage will be much higher due to large amounts of Ferocity, the value of Critical Chance (and therefore Precision) exceeds other attributes like Power.
At level 80, the conversion formula to calculate Critical Chance from Precision is:
Critical Chance = (Precision - 895) / 21
From the above equation, it follows that 2995 Precision is enough to reach 100% Critical Chance.
You can subtract the following values in general:
Which brings it down to 1470 Precision, without any traits, gear, upgrades or consumables.

Gear
Runes and Sigils are our next step to consider increasing Precision The most obvious choice would be
, but in Fractals we want to take
(and
) to benefit from frequently broken defiance bars. Which leaves us with item affixes and runes as other sources of Precision.
A full ascended set of Berserker items is equal to 961 Precision (dual wield) or 960 Precision (two-handed).
So you'll 509 Precision (dual wield) or 510 Precision (two-handed) to reach 100% Critical Chance. The next source of Precision we should consider our our runes:
Common Power Rune ChoicesPrecision Required Dual WieldPrecision Required Two-Handed
509510
209210
334335
If your chosen Rune doesn't have you reaching 100% Critical Chance, the next step is to swap Berserker's items (Major: Power; Minor: Precision, Ferocity) for Assassin's (Major: Precision; Minor: Power, Ferocity) to gain more Precision. Additionally some condition builds such as Condi Virtuoso benefit from incresed Precision. In this case Viper's items (Major: Condition Damage, Power; Minor: Expertise, Precision) are swapped for Sinister (Major: Condition Damage; Minor: Power, Precision) and Rampager's (Major: Precision; Minor: Power, Condition Damage) items.
Our final gear choice we can make to increase Precision is to use Consumables and Infusions. Most power builds use
for food. However
can be a good choice if you miss a small amount of Precision to crit cap. Also available to use is
can be used but we would recommend taking extra Assassin's items if possible to be able to benefit from Acsended Feasts.
Keep in mind that you can also take
(Or its +7 and +9 counterparts), but normally it is easier to calculate with a full set of Power infusions.
Use our Gear Optimizer to calculate the optimal setup of Runes, Sigils, Stats and Consumables.

Skills/Traits
While some professions have access to passive signet utility skills increasing Precision by 180 points, there is usually a better DPS skill if you are crit capped already.
If for some reason your build isn't optimized yet and you are missing at least those 180 points, it is recommended to take the Precision signet instead of the weakest other utility skill.
Apart from that, various traits increase either Precision or Critical Chance directly.
Some of them will easily put you above 100% Critical Chance so you don't need any Assassin's pieces.
Below are some popular trait choices to push Critical Chance.

Skills increasing Critical Chance
ProfessionSkillPrecision
Warrior
180
Thief
180
Elementalist
180

Traits increasing Critical Chance
ProfessionTrait LineTraitConditionCritical ChancePrecision
ElementalistWeaver
Target must have Weakness10%210
GuardianRadiance
Target must have Burning10%210
GuardianRadiance
Player must have Resolution25%525
GuardianRadiance
-3.8%80
RangerSkirmishing
Player must hit from behind or the side10%210
RangerSkirmishing
Player must have Fury10%210
EngineerFirearms
Target must have Bleeding10%210
EngineerFirearms
Target must be closer than 300 units15%315
ThiefCritical Strikes
Player health must be above 90%5%105
ThiefCritical Strikes
Player must hit from behind or the side7%147
NecromancerCurses
2% per unique condition on targetup 28%up to 588
NecromancerReaper
2% per stack of Vulnerability on targetup to 50%up to 1050
RevenantInvocation
Fury has increased effectiveness25%525
RevenantRenegade
10% which is increased to 33% if the Player has full endurance10%/33%693
MesmerVirtuoso
Player must have Fury10%210
WarriorStrength
-5%105
WarriorArms
Player must have Fury5%105

Traits increasing Precision
ProfessionSpecializationTraitNotePrecision
SoulbeastBeastmastery
This will only apply to yourself if you are in
150
ThiefDeadeye
Target must be marked200
ElementalistWeaver
Converts 13% of your Vitality to Precision
Note: Conversion traits only take flat modifiers from items, runes, food and infusions into consideration. Things like boons (e.g. Might), traits (e.g. other conversions), skills (e.g.
) or the
are not included.