Antiquary - Shortbow Artifact Duelist

Part of the current metagame

Part of the current tournament metagame

Our curator decided this build is in the current metagame regardless of rating. The community gave this build a rating, making it top-tier: Great

Focused on: Condition damage and Control

Designed for: PvP Conquest

Expansions required:

Difficulty:

Normal

This build was last updated on January 31, 2026 and is up to date for the January 22, 2025 patch.

Overview

A rather obnoxious Antiquary build that utilizes the unblockable skill Choking Gas and Antiquary's high initiative regeneration to control and burn out targets with condition damage. It also uses this high initiative regeneration to move around the map at incredible speed with Infiltrator's Arrow.

It is recommended to use instant ground targeting for this build.

Skill Bar

Shortbow

Spear

Utility

Skill Variants

Utility

• Roll for Initiative over Emergency Jade Shield -- another viable stunbreak option. has a longer cooldown.

Elite

• None: Skritt Scuffle provides far too much value and is the backbone of the build.

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Specializations

Variants

• Scoundrel's Luck over Meticulous Custodian is another viable option. Your individual artifacts have less impact, but each one you use gives you a free Canach-Coin Toss. Difficult to pilot in comparison.

Equipment

Shortbow

Sigil

Sigil

Spear

Sigil

Sigil

Rune

Amulet

Relic

Equipment Variants

Relics

• None, Relic of Agony is a major damage source.

Runes

Use whichever is the most relevant for your situation.

• Rune of Orr - use against condition builds.

• Rune of Engineer - similar stats to Rune of Undead but more weighted towards damage.

• Rune of Mesmer - increased Daze duration, which can technically be counted as defense. Stacks with Sigil of Savagery for 1.6s Choking Gas dazes at the cost of condition damage.

• Rune of Lynx - for when Thrill of the Crime isn't enough for movement speed.

Sigils

• Sigil of Absorption - excellent option against specs that stack a specific boon like Might. Can replace any non-Savagery sigil.

• Sigil of Courage over Sigil of Revocation - slightly more damage

Usage

Basics

• Use Skritt Swipe at the very start of the game to obtain a set of artifacts. Artifacts and information about them can be found below.

• Spear's skills generally cost less initiative and are excellent for applying pressure. Swap between shortbow and spear as needed to deal damage but also disrupt your opponent.

• Choking Gas is the strongest tool in your kit. It costs 7 initiative, Dazes targets in its landing AoE for 1s, and is unblockable; this means projectile hate and blocks don't protect against it. The skill itself deals low damage and is mostly used for the Daze, which in turn triggers other aspects of the build.

• Interrupts trigger Relic of Agony and Pressure Striking. Your interrupts are Skritt Swipe, Choking Gas, Distracting Throw, and Holo-Dancer Decoy.

• Interrupt targets trying to cast abilities with Choking Gas / Distracting Throw and Skritt Swipe. Use Canach-Coin Toss to regain initiative.

• Don't spam interrupts - try to get a feeling for when opponents will be casting skills and focus on timing your own to interrupt them.

• Avoid using Choking Gas / Distracting Throw on enemies with large numbers of Stability. Play evasively or use artifacts / Cluster Bomb while waiting for the Stability to drop.

• On shortbow, Trick Shot is your filler. The arrow bounces between enemies and inflicts Bleed on Poisoned targets, making it a natural pair with Choking Gas.

• Spear's 5th skill, Shadow Veil, should be used after using a finisher skill. A finisher skill is the third tier of your second and third skills. Each time you use one of these skills, the next in the chain becomes available. After completing the chain, Shadow Veil will provide three blocks and won't need to be channeled.

Elite specialization basics

• Antiquarians gain access to Skritt Swipe which functions as their Steal and benefits from all traits that would affect it. Using Skritt Swipe with or without a target will give you a set of artifacts. This build takes Prolific Plunderer which makes your artifact sets consist of 3 artifacts instead of the default 2, and you'll be able to use 3 artifacts from a pilfered set thanks to Improvisation. Your F2 will always be an offensive artifact, F3 is always a defensive artifact, F4 can be either.

• Using an artifact restores 1 initiative.

• All artifacts have an immediate effect and a lingering bonus effect. The lingering effects are applied when the skill finishes casting. They don't need to hit anything for you to get the lingering effects.

• High value artifacts: Mistburn Mortar -- Forged Surfer Dash -- Exalted Hammer. These are your best available artifacts.

• Medium value artifacts: Zephyrite Sun Crystal -- Holo-Dancer Decoy -- Chak Shield. These are situational but still good.

• Low value artifacts: Summon Kryptis Turret -- Metal Legion Guitar -- Unstable Skritt Bomb. Outside of niche situations these should be avoided.

• Skritt Scuffle is your elite. It gives you a fresh set of artifacts every 3 seconds as long as you remain in its radius. Due to the high average power of artifacts & the traits they trigger, you'll want to try and use one from each set you get. Being able to quickly adapt to which artifacts you get from this skill is key to the success of this build.

General

• Use Skritt Swipe without a target during downtime to fish for good sets of artifacts, or during combat on a target to interrupt a key ability.

Mobility

• Using Skritt Swipe gives 10s of Swiftness.

• Use Infiltrator's Arrow to quickly traverse the map. You can use artifacts to regenerate initiative through Enterprising Aristocrat & Canach-Coin Toss.

Defense

• The third skill of shortbow gives 1/2 evasion and is great against telegraphed attacks or if you're out of dodges.

• Skritt Swipe heals you thanks to Mug.

• Enterprising Aristocrat grants ~800 barrier each time you use an artifact. Because of this it's important to fire off as many as you can before acquiring a new set.

• Any Poison will apply 3s of Weakness thanks to Lotus Poison.

• Infiltrator's Arrow can be used to escape.

• Canach-Coin Toss is your primary source of condition cleansing.

• Exalted Hammer is a leap finisher, and using a leap finisher through a poison field will inflict 8 seconds of Weakness on whatever it hits. Utilizing this when possible is important against any strike damage focused opponent.

Advanced

• Combo fields are a way to get more out of your abilities. Abilities that are finishers will gain additional effects if used through combo fields. Your most relevant ones are listed below:

• Leap finishers: Use Exalted Hammer into Choking Gas's poison field for 8s of Weakness on what you hit, or into Chak Shield's light field for 5s of Light Aura.

• Physical projectile finishers: Use your Shortbow's autoattack Trick Shot, its stealth attack Surprise Shot, and its third ability Disabling Shot into poison or fire fields whenever you can for additional damage. These fields can be created by Choking Gas and Mistburn Mortar, but you can also fields created by allies.