Guild Wars 2

In a run last night for AC path 1 we tried splitting the group up into 4 attacking the burrows and me (guardian) protecting Hodgins.

I tried to guard him twice, but could not keep the mobs off him. I know this is possible so there is something I am not doing right.

What is the most effective way to protect Hodgins in this part? Kiting? Use wards? L2P?

Any constructive feedback would be appreciated. Thanks.

Full dmg on burrows. Easiest and most effective way to protect him.

Try to kite the mobs away from Hodgins. If your grou kitten low to bring down the burrows, even a Guardian won’t have enough protections to keep Hodgins alive against all the mobs.

If you didn’t destroy the first burrow to spawn and kept him for 4th as you should, then you certainly had to keep aggro from mobs that spawned from it. This can be done easily by simply walking in front of them while they jump out of the burrow.
About the other gravelings that can randomly attack Hodgins: this is usually caused by your team’s incompetence/mistakes, either because burrows aren’t destroyed fast enough, because breeders/silver mobs aren’t killed fast enough, or because your team walked too close to Hodgins causing him to take aggro of the gravelings that sometimes follow them while they pass from one burrow to another.
Another reason of you having a hard time could be the wrong utilities. Try sanctuary.
Others: mace/shield for heal/knockback, shouts (SY), u.s.w.
So, to sum it up: you might have the wrong utilities, your team is too slow in killing burrows, wrong aggro tactics. All are arguable.
And by the way, there are different tactics that can be used. You can do a burrow and then clean up the gravelings, 5 times (slower but good with a low dps team) or you can simply 5-man the burrows: if you’re fast enough you’ll burn them down in seconds and Hodgins won’t suffer any aggro problem. So it’s not like there’s only one way if it doesn’t work for you…

On warrior Ive got ignore pain, stability, shake it off, and greatsword. I start off by the burrow near the entrance and pick those up. Then I am kiting in the west side of the room away from Hodgins while keeping an eye on him and aggroing any additional mobs that may be getting on him. Always staying away from him as much as possible. Ive seen some Hodgins guards burn the burrow by the entrance down most but not all the way. That might be a good idea as it would make killing it at the appropriate time much faster. Im still convinced by Strifey’s video that 2 players one east side and 3 players on west side is probably best. There is two chains of burrows to kill as far as I know. Killing the first in a chain causes the next burrow to spawn. The problem is that it causes the next to spawn on the oppsite side of the room and alot of time is spent running back and forth instead of burning down burrows. The only time I got a pug to try this we were close to perfecting it imo but some fool would restart it before the downed person was revived and too many quit after that.

Make sure none of your party members are running past Hodgins when transitioning in-between burrows. If they do, the mobs tailing them will just aggro onto Hodgins when they pass by. Get everyone to run in front of the table of where Hodgins is standing, and you should have an easier time defending him.

I’m a Guardian, and I protect Hodgins, so allow me to share.
I stand on the East end of the table and wait for the Gravelings. The rest of the group heads West and starts in on the burrows. I stand there and wait for it. For Utils I use Stand Your Ground, Hold The Line, and Signet of Judgment. Once the Gravelings start to pile up on me I hit Hold the Line, if I see a knockback one it’s time for Stand your ground, and if health gets dodgy I hit a dodge roll left then right (I use +30% endurance food) and get back in my spot.
Prebuff with Empower, switch to Mace/Torch, give em heck, then back to staff for another Empower for the heal. By the time I run out of CDs the group has swooped in and we mop up the last of the mess.
The key is a 4 man team that can focus on burning those burrows ASAP while you hold your ground on the table. Hodgy can’t die if the Gravelings never reach him.

The easiest way to pull the gravelings away from hodgins is to use staff as 2nd weapon. If you hurt them just a little they will immediately come to you and you can continue kiting like its a marathon. As for me thats the easiest way to keep them off hodgins while you don’t have to get close to him.

Thanks for all of your comments. These are very helpful. A couple questions:

What is u.s.w.?
With the +30% endurance food, what is the purpose of dodging left then right? Is that to heal you or just buy time?

u.s.w is a German abbreviation for “and so on”/“and so forth”

[In response to Ellda because I don’t know how to quote on this crazy thing]
It’s both to buy time and to heal. I run 1167 Healing Power before the downscale so it works out alright to dodge a bit and mix in some hp gain.

[To second the notion put forth by Kanako Davis]
The staff is an excellent weapon to have in your back pocket for making things mad. Nice spread and alright attack speed. And it has the 5 which is a great Traffic Jam ability when needing to manage a horde.

Ellda.1930:

In a run last night for AC path 1 we tried splitting the group up into 4 attacking the burrows and me (guardian) protecting Hodgins.

I tried to guard him twice, but could not keep the mobs off him. I know this is possible so there is something I am not doing right.

What is the most effective way to protect Hodgins in this part? Kiting? Use wards? L2P?

Any constructive feedback would be appreciated. Thanks.

Keep in mind that the mobs will choose the closest target and with this in mind, tank the mobs away from Hodgins, typically behind him.

When I use my Guardian in AC1, I used sword/shield combination and a hammer off set. The sword allows me to teleport to a target for better kiting. The shield allows me to be more durable and to push mobs away from Hodgins. The hammer allows me to create a circular ward around Hodgins and home-run-swings away the troublemakers (hint: breeders).

If I am in a group with majority Warriors, I switch my hammer to staff and give everyone a huge stack of might on top of their FGJ buffs — makes destroying the burrows a lot faster.

As far as i know you don’t need to punch the breeders away because since the patch there are none.
I still recomend the staff. Just run around hit 1 and survive and hodgins will have a very cosy place to stand. :]

If you are the only competent player in your party, Kanako Davis advise is sound.

Kanako Davis.5364:

As far as i know you don’t need to punch the breeders away because since the patch there are none.
I still recomend the staff. Just run around hit 1 and survive and hodgins will have a very cosy place to stand. :]

Oh that’s right, I completely forgot that there’s no more breeders. I used to use the hammer just for that part, but I agree that staff is better now since stacking might speeds up the process and less time I have to protect Hodgins.

I know for me kiting the mobs away from H is best. Like others of said it’s very easy to pull mobs off of him as it just takes one hit for them to agro to you. As a mesmer I find it best to stand in front of the table (near the front burrow) and throw clones around to keep the mobs distracted and use my staff to pull anything that agros to H to me on the other side of the table. I keep my utilities full of stunbreakers/clone creators and I move constantly which keeps me alive and helps keep all the agro off of H.

So in short, don’t anyone get too close to H and use ranged to pull off any stray gravelings.

Stand your ground is a must that’s already been mentioned I’d also suggest Concentrated Ground for this task, after the update because of all the knock down potential these little kittens are now capable of.

I use a very similar strategy to NyhilistTheBoring.2674. I stand in the same spot they refer to. The weapons I use are Hammer and GS for this fight because of the crowd control and circular AOE they offer. Ring of warding on the hammer will help you to contain and block them off from Hodge. Binding Blade can pull some of them them away from hodge too.

I also use Hold the Line, being able to throw protection and heal Hodge is useful your virtues will also help with this.

Lastly kindly ask your group not to pull the agro to you by running behind you and hodge when they are crossing from one side of the room to the other. If you are pugging they may not know about this.

If they can hit the burrows hard and fast you won’t have to defend Hodge for long. I regularly defend hodge while my other 3 party members assault the burrows, we usually run AC path1 when we only have 4 players available.

I’ve done it on my condi Thief a few times (since condi is worthless on burrows) – it’s a matter of keeping aggro on you from every angle and keeping vigilant for strays. Just one attack can be enough to draw them away from Hodgins and to you, provided they haven’t reached him yet. I start from the other side of the table, in front of the burrow that first spawns, and then ring around the table to the far wall, dragging aggro from further spawners.

Nikaido.3457:

Split the group in two, one that does one side (and doesn’t move from that side), the other group starting by destroying the mid burrow and making its way into the right side and you won’t have to defend anything.

“Defend hodgins” is what you do when your group has no idea what they’re doing.

Interesting strategy.

And you’re right, but it seems that the perspective of where the advice is coming from is for PUGs and new to the dungeon. Also keep in mind that “defending hodgins” can be a faster way depending on the group composition. Warrior + guardian Might stacking comes to mind, so spliting is not always the best way. Four people damaging the burrow is better than 2-3 people split in some cases.

I’ve successfully defended Hodgins with a mesmer today. The trick I used is to gain aggro quickly and dance around while keeping my distance from Hodgins. Illusions are great for distractions as I can easily switch targets, spawn one and just move onto the next. When gravelings defeat my clones, they immediately target me next. Blink and phase retreat insure that they rarely get close enough to do damage. I also had a sword/focus as backup. Blurred Frenzy is a great panic button when you run out of teleports and dodges, mostly because it recharges fast. Temporal Curtain is a godsend for pulling adds off Hodgins without getting close.

Crossplay.2067:

I’ve successfully defended Hodgins with a mesmer today. The trick I used is to gain aggro quickly and dance around while keeping my distance from Hodgins. Illusions are great for distractions as I can easily switch targets, spawn one and just move onto the next. When gravelings defeat my clones, they immediately target me next. Blink and phase retreat insure that they rarely get close enough to do damage. I also had a sword/focus as backup. Blurred Frenzy is a great panic button when you run out of teleports and dodges, mostly because it recharges fast. Temporal Curtain is a godsend for pulling adds off Hodgins without getting close.

This is the best tactic for a non-coordinated group, if you got a staff just drop the symbol on top of hodgins and any foes attacking him will begin to chase you. Use your line of warding if you become low on health and stability, break stuns and blocks are great for staying alive while dps’ing burrows.