Symbol of Punishment

Symbol. Create a symbol on the ground that strikes foes and grants might to nearby allies. — In-game description

Symbol of Punishment

 

Profession

Guardian (skill list)

Weapon

Scepter

Type

Symbol

Game link

API

9090

“

0.25¼  

10

10

8

 

Symbol of Punishment

Symbol. Create a symbol on the ground that strikes foes and grants might to nearby allies.

 Damage: 73 (0.2)^?

 Damage: 103 (0.28)^?

 Damage: 121 (0.33)^?

 Symbol Damage: 183 (0.5)^?

 Symbol Damage: 103 (0.28)^?

 Symbol Damage: 165 (0.45)^?

₄ Might (5s): 120 Condition Damage, 120 Power

 Number of Impacts: 8

 Number of Targets: 5

 Symbol Duration: 4 seconds

 Symbol Radius: 180

 Combo Field: Light

 Range: 900

— In-game description

Mechanics

• Creates a light field.
• The listed might is applied to allies within the symbol's radius each pulse.
• Causes a number of small fists to strike the target area. Each fist can hit at most one target, can hit enemies that are outside of the symbol, and are not guaranteed to hit anything even if enemies are within the symbol.
• The number of impacts shown in the tooltip is the most that may occur with a single use of the skill. In practice, some may miss. The damage shown in the tooltip is the expected damage per impact, based on the formula (see Damage).
• The impacts are more spread out with Writ of Persistence, making them less likely to hit an intended target.
  • Writ of Persistence increases the number of impacts by 4.
• In PvE the total coefficient for all impacts landing with the symbol ticks is 3.6. With Symbolic Power, this total increases to 4.2. Writ of Persistence will increase the overall coefficient by an additional 50%.

Related traits

Zeal

• Symbolic Exposure — Symbols inflict vulnerability on foes. Deal increased strike damage to vulnerable foes.
• Symbolic Power — Symbols deal increased strike damage.
• Symbolic Avenger — Your strike damage is increased whenever your Symbols hit a foe.

Valor

• Altruistic Healing — Heal yourself when you grant a boon to an ally.

Honor

• Writ of Persistence — Symbols are improved and heal allies.

Virtues

• Inspired Virtue — Virtues apply boons to allies when activated. Deal increased strike damage for each boon on you.

Notes

Bug:

The first pulse of the symbol pulses might, but not the main damage tick. Thus this skill grants 5 stacks of might and not only 4 as stated in the skill facts.

Version history

For a detailed skill history, see here.

Patch	Changes
May 10, 2022	Reduced power coefficient per hit from 0.33 to 0.28 in WvW only.
May 11, 2021	Increased cooldown from 6 seconds to 10 seconds in PvE and from 8 seconds to 10 seconds in WvW.
December 01, 2020	Reduced symbol power coefficient per strike from 0.45 to 0.33 in WvW only.
February 25, 2020	Competitive content update: (Competitive split) Reduced power coefficient per strike from 0.5 to 0.45. Increased cooldown from 6 seconds to 8 seconds.
July 16, 2019	Lowered the damage of extra strikes by 25% in PvE.
October 02, 2018	The random damage of this skill has been reduced by 25% in PvE only. Steady pulsing damage remains the same.
October 18, 2016	Skill facts have been updated to display the light combo's field effect.
July 26, 2016	This skill has been renamed Symbol of Punishment and now drops a symbol at the target location that deals damage to the area every 1 second, additionally delivering smaller Smite attacks. The Smite damage interval has been increased from 0.25 seconds to 0.5 seconds and will persist as long as the symbol is active (meaning more strikes when the Writ of Persistence trait is active). The range of this skill has been reduced from 1200 to 900.
October 23, 2015	Heart of Thorns release: Fixed a bug that caused all impacts to fall within a smaller than intended radius when casting this skill.
October 29, 2013	Added a skill fact for the number of impacts, and removed the number of attacks from the damage skill fact.
February 26, 2013	Now displays a radius skill fact.
August 28, 2012	Game release: Smite has been added to the game.

Trivia

• This skill's functionality was changed with the July 26, 2016 game update. Prior to the update, this skill was called Smite.