Ultimate WvW Siege Weapon Guide

Are you confused by the different types of siege, what they do and how they're best used? You're in luck. In this guide, I will go through each type of siege there is and what they can be used for.

Siege Basics

Before we dive into the different types of siege, I want to quickly brush over some of the absolute basics of siege.

Siege weapons are items that can be built inside World vs. World using supplies. Each type of siege is used for a particular reason and has specific skills that give them a unique use and feel.

All the types of siege have their own rank abilities that you can upgrade to give yourself access to more and stronger skills on each type of siege. One general tip is that until you have fully upgraded the abilities for a specific type of siege, then you should let someone else use it. This is because the siege will be much more potent and powerful when it's fully upgraded.

If you want to learn how to prioritize your ability upgrades in World vs. World, then feel free to check out my guide on the subject.

There are two overall categories of siege:

• Self-placed
• Structural

Let's dive into each one and what types of siege can be found in each category.

Self-placed siege

Self-placed siege is a siege that requires a blueprint before you can build it. Within this category, you will find both a type siege that can be moved after you have built it and some sieges that are fixed in place.

This category of siege usually comes in 3 variations: Regular, Superior, and Guild. I say usually because Siege Golem variations are slightly different than the other types of self-placed siege. I will cover this specifically in the Siege Golem chapter.

Superior variants generally deal 50% more damage than the regular variant and guild variants are like superior variants but require fewer supplies to build. The only one not getting more damage when superior is the Shield Generator. Superior Shield Generators will instead get a 50% longer range and the Guild variant even further. Guild Shield Generators are still cheaper than the Superior Shield Generator.

Let's have a look at the types of siege in this category.

Flame Ram

Flame Ram is your main siege when trying to attack a gate. It has a relatively cheap supply cost which makes it very easy to place a lot of when attacking an objective. The downside of rams is that they are very short-ranged and have to be placed very close to a gate compared to other types of siege.

On the flame ram, you want to focus on using skill 1 off cooldown and if you have the 2nd or 3rd ability upgrade, then using skill 2 when it's off cooldown is a higher priority than skill 1.

When a gate finally goes down, you want to use skill 4 to give a 50% damage reduction to 50 allies around you, which is perfect for pushing through the destroyed gate.

Arrow Cart

Arrow Carts is the siege you want to use if you want to apply some pressure in a large AoE to many enemy players at once. It can hit up to 25 enemies at once, but every player can only take damage from an arrow cart every half a second. Arrow Carts are not particularly useful against siege.

When using an arrow cart you want to use skill 1 as long as it is off cooldown. If the enemies you are hitting are trying to move around then using skill 2 to cripple them is definitely a benefit and in this case, it has a higher priority than skill 1. If your enemies are stealthing up, then using skill 4 is your solution. It will reveal up to 50 enemies, assuming the arrow cart hits them. Using skill 4 also allows you to poison those same enemies, which will help lower the enemies healing abilities.

Ballista

Ballista is a heavy-hitting single target focused siege weapon aimed at taking out other types of siege quickly. It also does a lot of damage to individual enemies and it does have a few interesting utility skills that are meant directly for enemies instead of siege.

Generally, you want to keep using skill 1 as with the other types of siege so far. One thing to understand is that a ballista shot moves in an arc and will require a line of sight. Sometimes you can get around this, by using skill 2 that explodes on impact or skill 3 that will be shot at a much steeper arc, allowing it to shoot over objects that might be blocking it.

If you're using the ballista then using skill 4 will allow you to shoot gliding enemies out of the sky. This is not utilized particularly often though.

Catapult

Catapult is your go-to short to medium-range splash damage that can be used against both gates and walls. Catapults are also a bit special, in that the longer you charge them, the more damage they will do, besides simply shooting further.

Splash damage means that it hits in an AoE on impact, allowing it to hit multiple walls at the same time. Aiming your catapult towards the mid-point between two walls is therefore the best strategy because that will cause the boulder hit to deal more damage overall. You can also use this splash damage to hit slightly beside a shield generator bubble, preventing the shield generator from blocking the shot and allowing you to still hit the wall you wanted.

When placing your catapult, you want to throw it in the direction of the wall or gate, from where your character stands. This direction compared to your character will be the direction the catapult faces when it is initially built. Should it be aimed incorrectly, then you can use skills 1 and 3 to turn it. This does take some time though.

If enemies are shooting catapult or trebuchet shots towards yourself, then use skill 5, Siege Bubble, to block their shots. This does have to be timed correctly as the bubble duration is pretty short.

The benefit of using a catapult to shoot at the enemies is that they will get knocked back if they do not have stability. This allows you to cancel their shot charge if one of the hit enemies is controlling a catapult or trebuchet.

Trebuchet

A trebuchet is your long-range siege to attack towers and keeps from as far away as possible. It is even possible to have a trebuchet inside your own tower while shooting the wall of a nearby enemy keep or castle and vice versa. Because of the long-range trebuchet has, it is also a relatively slow piece of siege. Sometimes it will be smarter to pick a catapult and go up close to an objective, although that can leave you more exposed.

Just like the catapult, then the impact of a trebuchet will knock back enemies, so learning to aim for enemy siege can give you great benefit.

Trebuchets can also switch between multiple types of shots, a regular boulder shot and a rotting cow shot. The regular shot will do the most damage to walls and gates, where the cow will apply poison to the enemies, lowering their healing abilities.

When you have your trebuchet abilities fully upgraded, then the regular shot can drain supplies from a tower, keep or castle by aiming your shot directly at a supply depot.

The cow shot also gets better when upgraded. When you get the 2nd upgrade, then your cows will not only apply poison but also drain supplies from enemy players.

Siege Golem

Siege Golems are the only mobile type of siege in the game. When using it, you will climb into the golem, giving you new skills and allowing you to move around as the golem self. Piloting the golem will remove your access to your regular skills, but also give you a very high health pool.

Compared to the other types of self-placed siege, then Siege Golems does not come in Regular, Superior, and Guild variants. It comes in Alpha, Omega, and Guild variants instead.

The Alpha Golem is melee-only, meaning you have to get all up close and personal to hit anything with it. Where the Omega Golem is ranged, allowing you to stay a bit at a distance. The Guild Golem is like the Omega Golem but requires fewer supplies to build.

The typical use for golems is what is called a "Golem Rush". Golem rushes are when a group of players builds multiple golems at the same time, utilizing Mesmer portals and superspeed to speed up the movement of the golems and then rushing a heavily upgraded tower, keep, or castle. This can be a very effective strategy to get through the enemy defenses quickly due to the damage that the golems deal.

Shield Generator

Shield Generators is a defensive type of siege that allows you to make giant bubbles that will block enemy projectiles, keeping your siege, walls, or gates safe from enemy catapults and trebuchets. When fully upgraded, then the bubble will also grant immunity from arrow cart fire for any of your allies inside it.

Shield Generators are usually placed a few at a time and the players controlling the generators will then take turns to make a bubble each. This is done to decrease the downtime in which enemies have a chance to hit the siege, wall, or gate they're aiming for.

In between using your bubble, which is your main priority, you can use skill one to bounce a large ball of force in the face of your enemies, knocking them down.

Structural siege

Structural siege differs from a self-placed siege by not requiring a blueprint to make one. Instead, these will show up on your upgraded objective.

Burning Oil

Burning Oil is a pot of oil placed right on top of gates. If the enemies come too close you can use the Burning Oil to burn the enemies down below and this can very quickly put a lot of pressure on them. This is why killing a Burning Oil on top of the gate is a very important step if you want to place Flame Rams to get inside an objective.

Burning oils becomes available on towers, keeps, and Stonemist Castle when reaching Tier 2.

Cannon

Cannons are medium-sized AoE damage-oriented siege located at connections between pieces of walls. They are great for adding some pressure to the enemies since they hit up to 50 targets. On top of that, they also do decent damage to siege making them highly versatile.

Cannons become available on towers, keeps, and Stonemist Castle when reaching Tier 2.

Mortar

Mortars are short to medium range siege that sits on corners of walls. The mortars are controlled like catapults and trebuchets making them slower and less precise than a cannon, but also makes up for that in mortar shells that do heavy damage and have the possibility for an alternative mortal shell that will burn your enemies alive. Especially these burning shells can be highly potent if aimed for gates that enemies are trying to breach. This will create an area of fire that applies many stacks of burning, very rapidly.

If you need to knock enemies off their siege then simply using skill 5 will do the trick.

Mortars become available on towers, keeps, and Stonemist Castle when reaching Tier 3.

Conclusion

You just made it to the end and I hope you have a general understanding of the different types of siege and how to use them.

I'm Rediche and I stream Mondays, Thursdays, and Fridays over on twitch.tv/rediche.