Guild Wars 2

There comes a point where a realization is made: Guardians trivialize more than half of the fights of Fractals (and elsewhere). The class is currently better than every other class in the game at Fractals (along with just generally fighting against any boss that is ranged) because of its fire-and-forget, no penalty, long lasting anti-projectile mechanics. Tack on their ridiculous survivability and team-wide buffing, there’s hardly a reason to run anything short of at least two guardians in every group and… this is a serious issue.

The problems are quick and easy to identify:

• Wall of Reflection
• Shield of the Avenger

The combination of these two skills and two guardians, means that bosses like:

• Old Tom & Raving Asura
• Lava Shaman & adds
• Bloomhunger or Mossman
• Any other boss that relies or carries heavy damage on their range.

All get to stand around while killing themselves and, in general, not putting any sort of fight at all. Bloomhunger, for example, can be afk-wanded to death from a zone of complete safety behind two Guardian’s rotating WoR and SoA. Old Tom’s lone dangerous mechanic can be blocked by Shield of the Avenger, Raving Asura may as well be completely ignored. The Lava Shaman and his adds cry at the sight of Shield, and the Shaman will dutifully kill himself AND his adds by shooting into WoR. The biggest dangers of higher level fractals are the powerful ranged attacks that can possibly down you if not leave you hobbling with little to no health (melee can be kited, immobilize cycled, and generally just ranged) unless you time your dodge properly, but with WoR and SoA, you don’t even have to move lest an inconvenient red circle (and only on one of the many bosses does this even occur) show up for a couple of seconds forcing you to step either a step to your right or left.

Mesmer’s can do similarly with Feedback but that cannot be maintained indefinitely by only two mesmers, and even just one guardian properly specced can leave only a tiny window of down time on WoR/SoA. No other class can turn whole encounters into AFK wandings. This applies to just about any ranged boss with only ranged mechanics, can be wholesale trivialized by just hiding behind endless, perfectly safe, anti-projectile walls.

The two skills need to be changed to reward proper timing rather than just layering them behind two guardians indefinitely… of course we could easily just trip into the scenario of just running five guardians layering them (and I don’t really see why you couldn’t/wouldn’t just run five guardians even today aside from a slight slowdown of pace or a terrible fear of winning).

The class is too good in too many fights but its especially an onerous issue with any range-based fight where the mechanics of the fight become: Stand behind Wall of Reflection, Shield of the Avenger.

And just to round this off, I main a guardian and I don’t see why anyone would run anything other than one at this point for dungeon/fractal effectiveness. Have your favorite class for every other activity: gathering, mini games, crafting, exploring, but you may as well just roll a guardian if dungeon/boss is somewhere in the job description.

The core of the game is pretty much dodge what you can’t reflect and reflect what you can’t dodge.

Guardians lack the amount of AoE required for the Grawl Shaman lava adds by themselves or the underwater damage that a couple classes can achieve. Beyond that, I do expect them to nerf guardians in some capacity in the future.

I wouldn’t be surprised if they bring out the Touch Ranger archtype as a staple NPC enemy type to melee drain/condition turtle fights.

The mesmer also can do a huge reflect build with wardens, feedback and another move(can’t remember the name off the top of my head).

i’m a ele fractal 30 player. and while ele is great in fractal aswell ( and fun for that matter). it’s nothing compared to a guardian. the utility is too good. like you say he can shield the entire party at a more then 50% upptime vs ranged. not to mention the guardians amazing ability to “tank”. i like you’r approach " make the abilitys last shorter". make them on par with the elementalists earth aura for example. (lasts 5sec 30sec cd) and make some of the boss encounters more meele. the AC kholer boss is amazing, due to the fact that the boss is very mobile. make more bosses like kholer ( but with more then 1 dodge mechanic every 30sec which can be blocked). the only boss there is with this theme is the cliffside bosses. its less than 15% of all the bosses there is… that boss fight is probably the best bossfight in the fractals. ( jade maw is worse due to undodgeble agony which makes it a gear check)

note i’m making a guardian atm with one purpose; playing fractal. sure, ele is good in fractals but guardians is just plain op.

Shuguard.7125:

The mesmer also can do a huge reflect build with wardens, feedback and another move(can’t remember the name off the top of my head).

The flip-side is you cannot face tank with Mesmers (as this is another problem with Guardians as they are simply too hard to kill even with their low HP), and I’m pretty sure you can never (might get close) reach the area wide, whole team safety of Shield which requires utterly no investment in to be used to great effect. Of course, you bring Time Warp so that’s nice.

The main issue I have with guardian is that because the class is innately useful, you end up with a lot of players who are clueless how to use them even at higher fractals.

I’m actually ambivalent about having guardians for certain fights at this point. On one hand they do have the potential to throw down the right reflects at the right time. On the other hand, most often it’s the guardian in the group that dies first because almost everybody else had to practice their dodging and timing furiously to get as far as they did.

Vena.8436:

Shuguard.7125:

The mesmer also can do a huge reflect build with wardens, feedback and another move(can’t remember the name off the top of my head).

The flip-side is you cannot face tank with Mesmers (as this is another problem with Guardians as they are simply too hard to kill even with their low HP), and I’m pretty sure you can never (might get close) reach the area wide, whole team safety of Shield which requires utterly no investment in to be used to great effect. Of course, you bring Time Warp so that’s nice.

face tanking with a mesmer would require a phantasmal defender and a few other utilities so they probably can’t do both at once, but they can do both fairly well both and could have time warp.
Also feedback is as big as shield of avenger the move i can’t remember is almost the same(little z axis issues) as wall of reflection and if you line of sight yourself with the warden(while he’s channeling) at the bosses feet then mesmer could technically be better at reflecting, not to mention time warp.
Edit: the move i couldn’t remember was temporal curtain.

Shuguard.7125:

Also feedback is as big as shield of avenger the move i can’t remember is almost the same(little z axis issues) as wall of reflection and if you line of sight yourself with the warden(while he’s channeling) at the bosses feet then mesmer could technically be better at reflecting, not to mention time warp.

It may be as big, but it doesn’t last nearly as long. One feedback will last through one bubble of Shield but it bubbles three to four times depending on how quickly you trigger it’s first bubble, Wall + Shield, completely untraited, have a ridiculous uptime that can be maintained indefinitely by two guardians. Mesmer is good at reflecting, no doubt, it just cannot do it so effortlessly while also sacrificing no survivability (as that is all built into the virtues for Guardians).

Yes, Time Warp. Can’t do much about that powerful skill, and this is why groups will run Guardians as well as a Mesmer. :P

See, Cliffside was a good example of a boss where a Guardian can be good when used actively. Walls and Shield don’t do anything for the Archdiviner fight but knowing how to time Retreat + Virtue can keep a whole team up through the Archdiviner’s blanket AoE without having to worry about dodging. This is active playing because you can’t just throw out Retreat + Virtue and hope to accomplish anything but randomly blocking some irrelevant attack. Conversely, using Wall and Shield on a fight like Bloomhunger takes no more effort than hitting the buttons on cooldown.

Also, many fractal boss attacks can’t be reflected, but can be blocked. Again, making guardians (in particular their Shield of the Avenger) that much better. Feedback is awesome, and when traited has decent uptime, but for example Old Tom does not give a hoot about its reflection capabilities.

Guardians need these walls and shields because they suck at ranged combat.

You haven’t seen good guardians. In pvp, it’s a bit difficult to hit with scepter perhaps, but not in pve. It’s very easy for a guardian to hit 3k on auto attack with scepter, which is stronger and faster than my dps ranger’s long bow auto attack, then there’s smite which chews through immobile targets.

I got 1394 hours played on my guardian. I dont even do 3k hits with greatsword auto attack unless I use a crit setup.

Then you are doing something wrong, there’s no other way to describe it. Scepter is great in pve.

It does horrible damage. But maybe thats because I have 4% crit setup usually.

Every weapon does horrible damage when you aren’t built for damage. So yes, that would be why you think scepter is bad. It isn’t.

DancingPenguins.9875:

The main issue I have with guardian is that because the class is innately useful, you end up with a lot of players who are clueless how to use them even at higher fractals.

I’m actually ambivalent about having guardians for certain fights at this point. On one hand they do have the potential to throw down the right reflects at the right time. On the other hand, most often it’s the guardian in the group that dies first because almost everybody else had to practice their dodging and timing furiously to get as far as they did.

so agree with this

Sarcasmic.6741:

Every weapon does horrible damage when you aren’t built for damage. So yes, that would be why you think scepter is bad. It isn’t.

If you build for damage you need the reflects and shields even more. Guardians have the lowest base health of the game (among elementalists).

Malediktus.9250:

Sarcasmic.6741:

Every weapon does horrible damage when you aren’t built for damage. So yes, that would be why you think scepter is bad. It isn’t.

If you build for damage you need the reflects and shields even more. Guardians have the lowest base health of the game (among elementalists).

yeah, maybe you need the shield. but does the entire team need it? if it does it’s a bad team, if they need it to be able to complete the boss they should work on dodging. the shields however makes the bosses AFKable and that’s what the OP think is OP… lol.

despite. if u go for a power, prec toughness build with some vitality. you dont need those shields. your defence should be enough (unless you are going high level fractals where the shields helps alot. but they doesn’t only help you. the help the entire team.

the shields are op in certain fights, like, grossly op. if they should last that long there need to be a maximum amount of blocks/reflections. but the overall fix is just to reduce the time it lasts maybe even reduce it to 5sec and reduce the cd some to make it a more “active” skill. using the shield for a certain attack (like the dredge boss bombs) is what this skill should be used like.

and there is a very good reason why they have such a low hp pool. because they have a TON of heals. see it like this: warrior need a big hp pool because they use it as a timer: “how long i can be in a fight”, once he is out of health he need to go to ranged. the guardians hp pool serve another purpose. “this is how much spike dmg i will be able to take before i die” and if they don’t read the enemies spike dmg good enough they will die.

and if guardians “need” a those shields if he go dps, well, why wouldn’t a ranger need one? or a elementalist or any other profession?

I always cry a little inside when I see my Smoke Screen next to a Guardian’s Wall of Reflection.

Not only does Wall of Reflection reflect projectiles rather than absorbing them it also lasts a lot longer and has a similar cooldown.

Dee Jay.2460:

I always cry a little inside when I see my Smoke Screen next to a Guardian’s Wall of Reflection.

Not only does Wall of Reflection reflect projectiles rather than absorbing them it also lasts a lot longer and has a similar cooldown.

I cry when I don’t see Guardians use Wall of Reflection. Yes, I know some who don’t use it.

here’s a thought:

you guys are dissecting guardian’s wor and soa in terms of fractals and yet don’t realize that asking for a nerf on them will drastically affect their ability to perform in wvw and other non fotm areas of the game.

i’m not fanboi’ing both utilities. i’m looking at them from a wider point of view than those in here that want those abilities to have shorter duration/longer cd.

i also find it funny calling for a rebalancing of 2 utilities based on 1 part of the game. there is only pvp and pve. fotm is pve. you can’t possibly ask for a balance in fotm ONLY. it would be pve-wide.

guardian damage is not on par with a thief’s(single target, anyway). they have to have some sort of calling card that makes parties want to group with them. just like ele’s have more aoe capability(not for long), would you consider reducing their aoe radius or duration because it makes killing the lava elementals that much easier?

guardians are one of the most balanced classes. that’s me defending them as a whole.
try running fotm with 5 guardians. sure, no one will go down. but guess what…it takes longer than if you had a mixed party comp and you could still complete without any deaths if everyone knows their profession. i speak from experience with pugs only.

kiba.2768:

here’s a thought:

you guys are dissecting guardian’s wor and soa in terms of fractals and yet don’t realize that asking for a nerf on them will drastically affect their ability to perform in wvw and other non fotm areas of the game.

i’m not fanboi’ing both utilities. i’m looking at them from a wider point of view than those in here that want those abilities to have shorter duration/longer cd.

i also find it funny calling for a rebalancing of 2 utilities based on 1 part of the game. there is only pvp and pve. fotm is pve. you can’t possibly ask for a balance in fotm ONLY. it would be pve-wide.

i didn’t know they were used that much in wvw :/ i always though there were better utilitys for wvw for a guardian. shouts for example. but more to the point. spells will always have their weaknesses and strengths in different types of game modes. balancing a spell in all game modes. is very hard. but when they make a spell so grossly overpowerd in one game type it must be nerfed even if it means it’s death in the other.

i mean it’s like asking for a buff for a useless skill in pve. but that would make it op in wvw. some skills are meant for different type of content.and in wvw you have potentially more than 10 guardian in a large group. and reducing the time it’s up and lowering the cd would maybe even be considerd a buff to wvw as a battlefield is very flexible as you advance / retreat thus making it have a greater affect in the long run.

kiba.2768:

guardian damage is not on par with a thief’s(single target, anyway). they have to have some sort of calling card that makes parties want to group with them. just like ele’s have more aoe capability(not for long), would you consider reducing their aoe radius or duration because it makes killing the lava elementals that much easier?

funny you mention this as anet have stated they will be nerfing both ele’s ability to bunker in pvp and nerfing aoe in general.

kiba.2768:

guardians are one of the most balanced classes. that’s me defending them as a whole.
try running fotm with 5 guardians. sure, no one will go down. but guess what…it takes longer than if you had a mixed party comp and you could still complete without any deaths if everyone knows their profession. i speak from experience with pugs only.

yeah the are balanced, and yes, maybe even one the most balanced classes in the game. but that does not stop individual spells being OP in certain situations to the point where the content is AFKable.
and nobody was saying that 5 guardians in a group would be efficient.
the reason why a guardian is good in dungeons is because hey know exactly what to do. get up there and be in the face of the enemy or be ranged and protect your allies. and people know that. same goes with warriors but they are more oriented to dmg than support.

but you are right if everybody knows his and hers profession then it doesn’t really matter that much. but no matter how you go around it. 2 guardians will always make most boss fights easier. (as long as he knows his profession)

Anti projectiles is unique for guardian just like portals is unique for mesmer, stealth for theif, pets for ranger, banners for warrior, kits for engineer, attunements for elementalist,wells is unique for necromancer…DEAL WITH IT

tom.7468:

Anti projectiles is unique for guardian just like portals is unique for mesmer, stealth for theif, pets for ranger, banners for warrior, kits for engineer, attunements for elementalist,wells is unique for necromancer…DEAL WITH IT

But its not, at all, unique to them.

• Mesmers have it.
• Elementalists have it.
• Thieves have it.
• Engineers have it.
• Warriors have it.

Problem is, that Guardians have it in spades, requires no investment to be better than every other profession’s version (some professions don’t have it as an utility but is stuck on a long cooldown mainbar (Engineer)), and is too long lasting in comparison to its brethren AND is stuck on the tankiest class in the game. Smoke Screen, Magnetic Shield, etc, all of these last for a couple of seconds at best with cooldowns that are equivalent to the Guardian cooldowns, except WoR and SoA last far, far longer than them. Hence why you can have two guardians layering them indefinitely.

Good luck layering Smoke Screens and Magnetic Fields.

tom.7468:

Anti projectiles is unique for guardian just like portals is unique for mesmer, stealth for theif, pets for ranger, banners for warrior, kits for engineer, attunements for elementalist,wells is unique for necromancer…DEAL WITH IT

how about a simple “no”.

you clearly miss the point of this thread. and anti projectiles isn’t unique to guardians. its the quantity of it. stealth isn’t unique to thiefs it’s the quantity of it, attunement and kits are _ profession skills_ and can’t be compared with skills or effects. wells are simply another name for AOE.

if you want to compare anti-missile skills please do proper comparisons.

Vena.8436:

tom.7468:

Anti projectiles is unique for guardian just like portals is unique for mesmer, stealth for theif, pets for ranger, banners for warrior, kits for engineer, attunements for elementalist,wells is unique for necromancer…DEAL WITH IT

But its not, at all, unique to them.

• Mesmers have it.
• Elementalists have it.
• Thieves have it.
• Engineers have it.
• Warriors have it.

Problem is, that Guardians have it in spades, requires no investment to be better than every other profession’s version (some professions don’t have it as an utility but is stuck on a long cooldown mainbar (Engineer)), and is too long lasting in comparison to its brethren AND is stuck on the tankiest class in the game. Smoke Screen, Magnetic Shield, etc, all of these last for a couple of seconds at best with cooldowns that are equivalent to the Guardian cooldowns, except WoR and SoA last far, far longer than them. Hence why you can have two guardians layering them indefinitely.

Good luck layering Smoke Screens and Magnetic Fields.

well smoke screen is only 30CD but this is really balanced because guardian lack the mobility, decoy, burst,ranged, useful elite skills etc other classes have…

tom.7468:

well smoke screen is only 30CD but this is really balanced because guardian lack the mobility, decoy, burst,ranged, useful elite skills etc other classes have…

I’m not sure what class you’re been playing…

Mobility:
- The Interventions
- Sword #2
- Greatsword #3
Burst:
- Sword/Torch
Decoy:
- You’re the tankiest class in the game, you don’t get decoy like the squisshies.
Useful Elite:
- All of them

They could just make certain projectiles immune to reflection. There is already defiant to trivialise everyone else’s interrupts, stuns, knockdowns and fears, I don’t see why giving boss mobs some abilities to ignore reflection skills would be out of the ordinary. This allows these skills to function the same in every other situation, but prevents them from trivialising boss encounters. You could still have some attacks reflected, but it does seem lame that this mechanic is seeing so much use at the expense of class diversity because other classes don’t have the same abilities.

i just completed fotm 30 in under 1 hr with a mixed comp pug. no doubles of classes. i was the only guardian(don’t look so surprised). i traited accordingly and used my reflections/absorbs and asked for the thief to ss and the mes to feedback when my utils were on cd. no one died.

i see that even though you agree on most of my points, we still disagree on the fact that nerfing anti projectiles on guard for the sake of 1 facet of the game will reduce their effectiveness in other dungeons and wvw. wor is so clutch that i never remove it from my bar unless i’m just running around and want sy for the extra swiftness.

i don’t know if the afk was meant to be hyperbole, but we can’t afk in any fractals, guardian or not.

- shaman floor will kill you. even with regen and regen food
- asura bots will kill you with rockets. they pierce wor
- hammerman’s confusion bolts pierce wor
- bloomhunger’s poison if it misses the wor/soa by a hair, the aoe will still get you
- svanir hail mary of arrows..well i don’t need to say anything about that, do i?

the thing is, if we’re going to plausibly take away or reduce what is arguably the most important thing a guardian brings to fotm, we must take away stealth from thieves, as an example. they can melt the ice wall while everyone else afks. they can deaggro while rezzing.

contrary to what someone above said, guardians do not get stealth while moving. it’s a thief’s/mes’ ability.

Waraxx.4286:

kiba.2768:

guardian damage is not on par with a thief’s(single target, anyway). they have to have some sort of calling card that makes parties want to group with them. just like ele’s have more aoe capability(not for long), would you consider reducing their aoe radius or duration because it makes killing the lava elementals that much easier?

funny you mention this as anet have stated they will be nerfing both ele’s ability to bunker in pvp and nerfing aoe in general.

that’s why i had not for long in parenthesis. as for the wor/soa in wvw…shorter is not better. the fact that you can lay it down and make the battle as flexible as you want is counter intuitive to your argument. btw, when you come across a guard that can stand his own when jumping into a small zerg to disrupt the front line, ask what he’s using. you need to instill confidence in your server mates by breaking their front line and tbh, it’s not easily done without wor/soa, especially when providing cover for retreat after you’ve done your damage or trying to break a deadlock/attrition over a bridge/bottleneck.

one more nitpicky thing- guard’s have target dependent mobility. sword 2, ji and mi need targets. gs3 throws you 600 distance(not sure of the measurement anet uses). hammer does the same thing. i think necros and guards share the same spot for clunky movement.

Shiren.9532:

They could just make certain projectiles immune to reflection. There is already defiant to trivialise everyone else’s interrupts, stuns, knockdowns and fears, I don’t see why giving boss mobs some abilities to ignore reflection skills would be out of the ordinary. This allows these skills to function the same in every other situation, but prevents them from trivialising boss encounters. You could still have some attacks reflected, but it does seem lame that this mechanic is seeing so much use at the expense of class diversity because other classes don’t have the same abilities.

this could work. but then it would TOTALLY ruin all the other similar spells. the magnetic aura for example would be next to worthless because it’s in the boss fights it really shines. why remove things from all the classes just so one class can have an ability that makes all other similar ability’s seem like nothing. yeah i can accept that they have more than other classes to make it unique to them. but when it comes to the point where it’s permanent? then something is broken (unless you have like 4 or 5 guardians).
the points of these reflective spells is because they are great if you have the skill to react ( that’s why other professions don’t have longer then a few seconds.) it’s not supposed to be there as a perma shield for the entire team. and if that was the intent off it then they seriously need to rethink that decision.

@kiba.2768
nobody is arguing about the need of skills. (if u get my reference). if all party members are skilled players then the run will be smoother than if u had 2 bad guardian players in a group.
yeah, ok, the afking was just thrown in there for the umph. but the point that it simplifies the fight to much still stands.
if u have a certain kit called “ash legion spy kit” which everyone should have at fractal 26+ you can do both of the things u mentioned for a few karma points. so if you want to skip the frostbite fractal campfire please feel free. it wont cost you more than how much karma you get from a event.
i’m afraid i can’t find where someone said that guardians go stealth while moving.
yeah i get your point while retreating. but why do u need a 10sec shield for running away? the shield wont be relevant for more than 4 or 5 seconds. at max 8. and 10 of you are reeeealy pushing it. and breaking lines is nothing a single guy should be able to do by himself. bring 5 guardians if you want to break a line. if a single guy can tank a mass zerg for 10+ seconds then something is terribly broken even in wvw.
ok, you know what. lets just look at the math here maybe that can convince you otherwise. 10 seconds is a long time. and just reducing it to 7seconds would probably make it balanced. but whats realy imba here is the trait. 25% extra duration AND 20% cd reduction. adding those together will make all consecrations have a 50% more uptime than without the trait. 50% ! try find another single trait in any other profession that gives so much extra uptime for a spell type. its either increased duration or cd reduction or it’s located over 2 different major traits.
why should consecration be any different? what is it that makes it uniqe so it need the trait to work. it’s a t1 trait for a already quite usefull skill.

Vena.8436:

tom.7468:

well smoke screen is only 30CD but this is really balanced because guardian lack the mobility, decoy, burst,ranged, useful elite skills etc other classes have…

I’m not sure what class you’re been playing…

Mobility:
- The Interventions
- Sword #2
- Greatsword #3
Burst:
- Sword/Torch
Decoy:
- You’re the tankiest class in the game, you don’t get decoy like the squisshies.
Useful Elite:
- All of them

And whats you’re solution to this “problem” ? delete those 2 skills? then they could might as well rename it to noob class or meatshield class. And people would just take a couple extra mesmers to reflect projectiles instead. And it don’t protect against all ranged attacks only projectiles.

Yeah, nerf Guardians, because they can fill their role well and protect the party, as they are designed to do. It’s unacceptable.

The real issue is that encounter design is too one dimensional. You were correct in explaining that In Fractals of the Mist, you have too much emphasis on projectile-based damage. You missed the mark when you blamed it solely on the Guardian.

Boons Are Awesome: Legendary and Champion creatures actually reduce the duration of Conditions. This inherently makes Boons much more useful, which are integral to the Guardian profession. I’ve never seen a Null Field, Corrupt Boon, or any type of Boon removal in any PvE of significance. Nothing in PvE actually does anything to stop Boons.

Too Many Projectiles: Like you said, projectiles are very common in Fractals. My answer to this is: Stop making so many projectile-based encounters! Mesmers actually match the Guardian in their ability to stop projectiles, but Mesmers themselves as a profession are not strong in PvE with their Support or Damage. This makes them much less attractive for groups by comparison.

Bottom Line?: When you put a Guardian in an environment that it is ideal for, of course the Profession is going to shine. There are other environments where you see this happening for other Professions. For instance, Warriors are very popular for every non-Fractal dungeon because their damage is very high and they are a very durable Profession. Four warrior / one Mesmer (for Time Warp) speed-clear groups for Citadel of Flame are very common these days.

My point is that there are ways to make other Professions feel important, and it starts with more diversity in encounter design.

how about reducing the duration by 2sec and nerfing the trait? sounds good to me at least. it will still be very usefull skills and a used trait. however they will be made more situational. witch is the purpose of the skills. it’s not like they will become completely ignored in bossfights just because they are worse then before. in fractals it will still be the most used skill. but they wont be up for as much.

they fill their roll to well. its like giving elementalists alot of combo fields and alot of combo finishers. it would just work to well. if they were to add to combo finishers to staff-ele they would become so much stronger.

Nokaru.7831:

The real issue is that encounter design is too one dimensional. You were correct in explaining that In Fractals of the Mist, you have too much emphasis on projectile-based damage. You missed the mark when you blamed it solely on the Guardian.

Boons Are Awesome: Legendary and Champion creatures actually reduce the duration of Conditions. This inherently makes Boons much more useful, which are integral to the Guardian profession. I’ve never seen a Null Field, Corrupt Boon, or any type of Boon removal in any PvE of significance. Nothing in PvE actually does anything to stop Boons.

Too Many Projectiles: Like you said, projectiles are very common in Fractals. My answer to this is: Stop making so many projectile-based encounters! Mesmers actually match the Guardian in their ability to stop projectiles, but Mesmers themselves as a profession are not strong in PvE with their Support or Damage. This makes them much less attractive for groups by comparison.

Bottom Line?: When you put a Guardian in an environment that it is ideal for, of course the Profession is going to shine. There are other environments where you see this happening for other Professions. For instance, Warriors are very popular for every non-Fractal dungeon because their damage is very high and they are a very durable Profession. Four warrior / one Mesmer (for Time Warp) speed-clear groups for Citadel of Flame are very common these days.

My point is that there are ways to make other Professions feel important, and it starts with more diversity in encounter design.

this awsome souce post convinced me.
but can’t you agree with that the trait is to good though? i mean 50% more uptime is pretty go for a trait no matter what the skill is. or why do consecration need cd and duration in the same trait?

waraxx, i believe someone edited a post an hour after their OP about the stealth. that still doesn’t detract from my statement about thieves being able to break aggro for the entire party when things get dicey. i played the shaman fractal with 3 thieves and an engi a few weeks ago. i thought it was going to be one of the worst pugs ever, but as it turned out, all 3 used ss and when we got downed, each one would use refuge to deaggro and rez. if that’s not op, then i don’t see how wor/soa can be nerfed. if thieves lose their stealthing effectiveness, i can guarantee you the uproar will be much greater than if guards were nerfed.

as for spy kits, sure everyone has access to them. if there wasn’t a consumable that allowed it, then i would see another thread like this to nerf stealth. if there was a consumable for anti projectiles, then i would NOT see a thread for nerfing it. simple as that. but the game designed allowed stealth for all and not reflection. that doesn’t make it right to kill a mechanic that guardians are(arguably, here in this thread) better at than others. because guardians don’t have stealth as a utility, should we punish thieves and mesmers? i think not. it makes their gameplay unique and i am glad when someone with skill uses stealth in a way that benefits the entire party. just like i’m grateful when i have another guard that takes wor/soa so i can use other utilities.

can i get some clarification on why you want it nerfed? it seems that there is only a benefit to using those utils in pve, as there is no competition between players. if you want a challenge, then i can understand that.

as for wrecking face solo in wvw against 6-10, it is totally doable as a guard. i won’t go too much into detail as you can see for yourself in the guardian subs, but a hammer/scepter//shield guard can jump into a line, kill 2-4 and make it out without dying. while everyone is busy trying to focus that guard down(who is btw, taking zero dmg), the rest of his party can flank and destroy the rest of the disorganized zerg. it’s almost basic guard play in wvw. wor/soa is essential to that. you will need the 10 seconds, believe me.

i don’t need 10sec for running away either, but let me iterate again that for attrition encounters, especially with bridges or bottlenecks or setting up/defending siege, wor is a godsend.

i’m getting off topic here as we’re here to talk about fractals, but i hope you see the huge impact reducing the effectiveness of wor/soa in other parts of the game, just to satisfy an arbitrary need for challenge in ONE aspect of the game, namely fractals.

if you want to simulate more challenge, don’t party with guardians. if you’re a guardian yourself, don’t use the utils.

as for traiting for the usefulness of consecrations, i’m not going to disagree with you on that. untraited, i think that wor works perfectly fine in conjunction with soa. but i’d be hard pressed to have 2 consecrations on my bar just to justify traiting for them, unless my party asked for me to play support. there’s much more i can do with those 10 in virtues(i think of as wasted points).

Shield of the Avenger: I’d say Shield of the Avenger is probably too good. When you get the Spirit Weapon Mastery (20% recharge reduction) plus Improved Spirit Weapon Duration (+50%) Major Traits, your projectile blocking uptime is very high. I also find it very strange how the shield’s passive effect is so strong, and its active effect is useless, and never used.

Remember Before Fractals?: Prior to Fractals of the Mist, Guardians were not as popular with groups. Groups all wanted higher damage dealers. It isn’t a coincidence that with the introduction of this new dungeons that Guardians suddenly became “good.”

PvE Diversity: Here are some things which you do not see much or at all in PvE, which would encourage more build diversity. These aren’t crazy ideas either, just abilities creatures lack:

• Deadly Conditions: Most conditions are rather trivial in PvE. I can’t even think of the last time I actually needed to slot this specifically.
• Boon Removal: As I said before, Boons are never removed. There should be more strategy involved with Boons other than applying them on cooldown.
• Interrupting: Interrupting is not very important in this game. The whole concept of “Unshakable” really bothers me too. It should be based on time, not the number of CC applied to it, so it doesn’t punish groups with less interrupts.

the skills are fine, blame the devs for making almost every encounter anti-melee where even thinking about going into melee range will most likely get you killed.

if the devs knew how to not just give every add more damage and hp then we wouldnt be having this issue.

i also agree with the OP:
just for the sake of comparison, just compare wall of reflection with smoke screen:
wall: much bigger rectangle (long+wide) than smoke screen (check)
duration: much over 10 seconds (15 if trained), smokescreen 7, can’t train extra duration

cool down: 40 sec for wall (32 trained), 30 for smoke (24 trained),
instant cast vs 1 second cast
1 is light field other smoke, so on par here…but only here

reflection causes damage to the boss, smoke does not…
So why the hell wall is so much better than our smoke screen? Why?

^. You could say the same with feedback (mesmer) with a very low uptime, even traited (actually, it would be only good to merge both CD reduction and improve duration traits).
However, you seem to forget something. Reflection is stronger as you deal damage, yeah.
Still, it does not only work, where absorb projectiles can work (Old Tom being the best example of this).

just compare: wall of reflection AND smoke screen, and see how OP the wall is

Discussion of moderation is not allowed ~ Dalmarus

I don’t understand why people compare guardian’s reflect skills with those of other professions. You have to sacrifice vital trait points to bring those utilities to the table and make yourself a very weak-hitting character (anyone who disagrees with this and is not FotM 50+ obviously has no idea what they’re talking about), due to the fact that you have to go either 0/0/30/30/10, 0/0/10/30/30, 0/0/20/30/20 or 0/0/30/20/20.

Of course you can go full knight’s for high-crit AH proc or attempt to go 3/4 or full berserker but in order to be successful in these high scales you need to sacrifice A LOT of damage to be able to mitigate damage done to your other teammates and to let them do their job (PVT gear, HP gear also shines if 1000+ and used properly).

There are 2 (or 3) professions that can provide moderate anti-projectile services but don’t have to sacrifice as much dmg as guards:
Thief: SS and guards are NOWHERE near the DPS a thief can dish out
Mes: Feedback/Warden and NOWHERE near the DPS a mes can dish out

And you have elementalists with their Swirling Winds and Magnetic what-nots (Shield? Aura? Wave?), who can also dish out much more DPS than guards or trait themselves for full-support and actually in most circumstances provide better healing/support.

Anyway, what I can’t understand even more is why people blame guardians when it’s clear that it’s the FotM mechanics that are to be blamed here. Making the majority of fights only range-friendly was not a smart move by Anet. Bosses should be more like Kholer or the Archdiviner (pre-patch, now he’s a kitten). So please don’t blame the class, but rather blame the machanics. I’d much rather run around meleeing and supporting with shouts/other utilities and not stand there like a kittentard cycling my reflects.

And to end with – guardians have the worst range combat (PvE, I don’t do/know PvP) capabilities. And before somebody pops out the sceptre – if you’re traited in a way that you’re doing 3k damage with auto-attack then you’re doing it wrong in the end, trust me.

If you want to nerf our defensive skills, buff our offensive skills in return. A warrior can easily do 2-3x the damage of a guardian, while having more health, even in the most offensive builds.

i could be okay with a reduction of like 1 second on WOR. SOA is okay as it is since it does not reflect. anythin gelse would be really sad.

Do you play fractals? The only boss this matters at all on, in any way shape or form, is Legendary Grawl Shaman and that is only because the Lava Elementals are just straight up stupid design.

EDIT:
“The Lava Shaman and his adds cry at the sight of Shield, and the Shaman will dutifully kill himself AND his adds by shooting into WoR. "
—>Never mind, I can see that you don’t play fractals at all lol.

DanH.5879:

So why the [heck] wall is so much better than our smoke screen? Why?

Smoke Screen does more than block projectiles. It also provides a Smoke Field. The reason it’s shorter is because you can give people AoE Stealth using a combo blast finisher, which is actually very strong in some circumstances.

Wall of Reflection is only a Light Field, which is not as powerful or useful by comparison.

Sarcasmic.6741:

You haven’t seen good guardians. In pvp, it’s a bit difficult to hit with scepter perhaps, but not in pve. It’s very easy for a guardian to hit 3k on auto attack with scepter, which is stronger and faster than my dps ranger’s long bow auto attack, then there’s smite which chews through immobile targets.

3k auto attack with scepter? you must be dreaming.
3k is what i do with my GS. my scepter does 300dmg per attack, up to 500 if i’m wearing berzerkers.

you can’t take away guardian’s shields and walls because guardians trully do lack in ranged dps and have no ranged aoe abilities.

also, shield and wall are great counterparts to thief’s refuge and can be used in a similar manner.

Nokaru.7831:

DanH.5879:

So why the wall is so much better than our smoke screen? Why?

Smoke Screen does more than block projectiles. It also provides a Smoke Field. The reason it’s shorter is because you can give people AoE Stealth using a combo blast finisher, which is actually very strong in some circumstances.

Wall of Reflection is only a Light Field, which is not as powerful or useful by comparison.

thanks for the information, but for pve is not strong because you get revealed debuff when you spam clusterbomb and any mob is near…

basically all fields are equal in one way or the other in my opinion

tom.7468:

Anti projectiles is unique for guardian just like portals is unique for mesmer, stealth for theif, pets for ranger, banners for warrior, kits for engineer, attunements for elementalist,wells is unique for necromancer…DEAL WITH IT

Wow Necromancers and Rangers really are lucky to have that ! I would never trade my so ever incredibly useful wells for something else. Oh the times I thought to myself “I’m so glad to have those wells !” You really compared random stuff : from profession mechanics, to type of skills, to skills that have a certain effect, to a single skill.

On a more serious note, wells aren’t that useless. But they don’t come close to being useful as anti projectiles.
Guardians are useful, they simplify a lot of encounters (not too sure about high level fractals) but they shouldn’t turn a fight into afk auto attack while one or two players hit the shields.

Twill.6217:

3k auto attack with scepter? you must be dreaming.
3k is what i do with my GS. my scepter does 300dmg per attack, up to 500 if i’m wearing berzerkers.

you can’t take away guardian’s shields and walls because guardians trully do lack in ranged dps and have no ranged aoe abilities.

Nope, happens regularly. Our guild leader respecs for full glass cannon when he takes a break from 70-80 fractals to help the rest of us progress 20-30, and I’ve watched his damage directly through his stream. Not to mention 8k focus shield explosions and 10k whirling wraths. It’s not quite glass warrior output, but it is frightening.