Guild Wars 2

Hello all,

this isn’t another “which class is better” thread, but I’ve been leveling my warrior and I need a class that will be a good main.. But I feel like I die all the time. Maybe it’s cause I’m low level, or maybe I just suck, but I’m wanting to know which is better (warrior or guardian) just for sheer survivability regarding dungeons/pve? Can anyone give me some advice?

Thanks.

warrior is definitely better in term of survive than guard, since warrior almost have twice guardian HP pool and warrior utility and weapon skill in term of survivability also IMO far better than guard ( since guard’s utility and weapon skill more to give other peeps support )

Cicada.3596:

warrior is definitely better in term of survive than guard, since warrior almost have twice guardian HP pool and warrior utility and weapon skill in term of survivability also IMO far better than guard ( since guard’s utility and weapon skill more to give other peeps support )

Highly debatable, and almost entirely wrong. Yes, a warrior has a higher base HP pool, but that is the furthest the warrior goes in the comparison.

When built for it, a guardian has far greater survival times than a warrior ever could. Aegis, stability, protection, regeneration, retaliation, healing, and CC. A guardian has all of it.

thats why i said IMO,

and warrior too, When built for it, have everything u mention except aegis , but hell who need aegis when u get block like shield with 30s CD , or Sword #5 Block or Mace #2 Block with low CD ?

Of course a Guard has all of that when you build for it but standard DPS a warrior will have more survivability than a Guard. The Guards standard HP pool is really, really weak. They don’t seem to have an overall armor advantage either and aegis is good but it’s on a pretty terrible cooldown. It just matters on how you play.

Aidan Savage.2078:

When built for it, a guardian has far greater survival times than a warrior ever could. Aegis, stability, protection, regeneration, retaliation, healing, and CC. A guardian has all of it.

A guardian has Aegis. A Warrior has Blocks on Maces, Swords, and Shields, endurance recovery for more dodges, and outright “Nope!” cards in its utilities. And constant passive in-combat health regeneration.

A guardian has Stability. So does a Warrior.

A guardian has protection for 33% reduced damage some of the time. A Warrior has almost twice as many hit points for 50% greater survivability all of the time.

A guardian has regeneration some of the time. A warrior has Healing Signet and Adrenal Health all of the time.

A guardian has healing. A Warrior has Lots of Hitpoints, Healing Signet, Healing Surge, Adrenal Health, Damage Immunity, Condition Cleanses, and Condition Immunity.

If a Guardian goes down, there’s a good chance it’s staying down. It might be able to provide a few boons for allies after a while, but it’s prospects aren’t all that great without someone to help or the enemy already nearly dead.

If a Warrior goes down, unless it’s stomped (PvE enemies don’t do this) or overwhelmed by heavily applied conditions, it’s getting back on its feet and kicking kitten at full capacity again in a matter of seconds with most conditions cleansed, a few skills off cooldown, and possibly even a few on-rally boons. And usually when it goes down again for good, it would have been defeated anyway – and it’s MUCH easier to take out enemies and rally when you’re cleaving through the entire horde with all weapons and skills operational under durability/DPS-increasing utilities than lying on the ground trying to tickle-laser a single target to death.

Ultimately it comes down to player skill with the class between the two. I’ve seen Guardians that are basically the equivalent to Immortal. Likewise I’ve seen some very hard to kill Warrior’s.

I’m biased towards Guardian, having played one since 3 day head-start. As a guardian I rarely ever die, and if I do go down I rarely have trouble getting back up. (Unless it’s a champion mob beating on me and I’m all by my lonesome.)

That said, I’ve seen plenty of Warrior’s get kitteny and rush in to a situation where they get absolutely melted.

For PvE dungeons and fractals, it’s almost always easier to survive on a warrior, as long as both play a good (= DPS-oriented) build. 18-21k health vs. 11-13k make the warrior forgive a lot more mistakes than the guard.

Lol. I remember the times when I ran my warrior “Ultimate Anihilation Build” with Greatsword and Hammer. I once killed 3 level 80s and an uplevel with it in World vs. World. Nothing they could do, I just cleaved right through them. In a duel I was nearly unbeatable, as long as I used my abilities the right time. Funny thing though was that I ran full zerk, so offense was really best defense.

On the other hand, a tanky warrior can be interesting to play when 1vX, but the problem is that it’s dps will be so low you can’t take targets out fast enough. In 1vX it all comes down to speed for me. If you’re a face-tank, you’ll still die from pressure, but if you’re all dps, you can kill them off one by one.

I die more as a guardian than warrior. Maybe a l2p issue on my part but I find using warrior more “stable” than using guardian. I press less keys on my warrior.

Warrior PvE, I don’t use heals (Signet passive alone keeps me alive), I don’t use anti CC, I don’t know, I just survive.

Playing Guardian on the otherhand – I need to use Focus. I need to use Aegis, I need to use a condi-removal – just to survive. Heck I need to use heals too.

I like both classes though.

For Dungeons, where you eventually will want to run with Zerker Gear because they’re the most effective, wether Warrior or Guardian is the better choice is really debatable.

Guardian will shine when the Boss attacks Slow, slowly enough for you to never run out of active defenses (Aegis, Dodges, Invulnerability). The Guardian is also Resonsible for most of his team’s defenses, no matter the gear.
Warrior will shine against Bosses that has a few Weaker but more Frequent attacks, as their HP will allow you to facetank the Few weak hits, allowing you to keep on DPSing and save your dodges and fewer Active defenses for their big attacks.

In short, it could be said that Guardians reward an Active Gameplay, while Warrior reward a Perceptive Gameplay. With Guardian, you need to actively react to just about everything the Boss does, while a Warrior needs to make a split-second decision on wether to Avoid the attack (Dodges or Blocks), Facetank through it or Kite around the boss to avoid the attack.

But Guard main play style is pretty much defensive buffs and interaction with a team.

Warriors, their play style is mainly attack and damage before enemy kills them, thus the self applying survival skills.

Warriors have high base-line survivability. That means they are durable even without investing into it.

Guardians on the other hand get most of their survivability from cooldowns, traits and proccs. Overall they are much more durable in practice since those cooldowns are far more valuable. But you do have to make a few trade-offs to get them.

I main a Warrior and I can tell you a Guardian has higher survivability if you are active and not a lazy player. In best DPS setup a guardian will out DPS and out survive a warrior and also helps the group stay alive in the process, playing a warrior is more forgiving because of a higher HP pool. Comparing aegis to warriors block ability is pointless, those weapons are out of the way and not optimal for DPS and, while aegis is free albeit at a long CD but it effect your whole group. Guardians also have one of the best, nearly spammable defense skill, blind, all 3 of their weapons for DPS has access to it, they have access to it via natural DPS trait, and it is off CD every time a mob is killed.

If you are looking for faceroll easy, then just wear soldiers/knights on ether of those class and it won’t make a difference. But if you’re an active player pick up guardian and get good with it.

Sartharina.3542:

A Warrior has almost twice as many hit points for 50% greater survivability all of the time.

lol

A DPS warrior is more tanky than a DPS guard, a tank guard is more tanky than a tank warrior

Tank characters are completely useless in the type of content the OP is talking about.

Personally, I die the least on my thief, but I’ve got her built to constantly be regaining health in combat. Sometimes it isn’t the class, but rather how creative you want to get with their build

Survivability is for WvW and I can say that guards and necros do well in WvW.
In PvE, as op says, tankiness isn’t a thing.
PvE is only about stacking stacking stacking, dps dps dps with berserker sets.
No role trinity in this game, sorry.

From the answers, it looks like I chose the right class for me. Thanks everyone for detailed replies.

Good discussion! My main is a Guardian, but now I want to try Warrior for variety. I’m glad the HP pool being smaller is a recognized vulnerability of Guardian, because I’m still learning how much punishment I can take to protect the squishies. I do like having so many “panic buttons” and features that help others I’m around, despite less personal survivability.

Ykfox.3825:

As a guardian I rarely ever die, and if I do go down I rarely have trouble getting back up. (Unless it’s a champion mob beating on me and I’m all by my lonesome.).

Obligatory song reference (theme song for Norn Guardian?):

I get knocked down
But I get up again
You’re never gonna keep me down
I get knocked down
But I get up again
You’re never gonna keep me down

kittening the night away
kittening the night away
He drinks a whiskey drink
He drinks a vodka drink
He drinks a lager drink
He drinks a cider drink
He sings the songs that remind him
Of the good times
He sings the songs that remind him
Of the better times