Guild Wars 2

From the beginning of Guild Wars 2, I’ve loved the lack of a trinity and that all classes can basically ‘be their own tanks’. However, with this being the case, wouldn’t Warriors and Guardians have a pretty big inherent advantage since they are the only classes which may use heavy armor?

Until recently I didn’t see this as a problem with party formation requests. However, on GW2LFG.com now I’m seeing for (at least) Citadel of Flame speed runs that some groups only want Warriors and Guardians due to their heavy armor/increased survivability.

Sure, you can say ‘just go Warrior or Guardian’ – but if this trend continues then a clear balancing issue is present that ANet will need to address.

What do others think about this?

I dont really care about dungeons, so for me is the same anyway i can do cof without war and guardians.

Heavy armor: 5%-15% less damage depending on toughness.

And do you really think they have first balanced classes and then added heavy armor without any thought?

‘And do you really think they have first balanced classes and then added heavy armor without any thought’?

Whether or not they put thought into it is irrelevant provided there is a balancing issue present.

Perhaps I should have asked – from those that have played heavy armor and other classes – are Warriors/Guardians just ‘that much better’ due to their heavy armor?

As someone who has a Guardian and a Ranger, the difference between the armor is huge. I love my Guardian cause well, I can actually survive longer and not be a ‘glass cannon’. Having said that, I 100% agree with only Guardian and Warrior parties. I first played Ranger but now I have my Guardian as my 2nd level 80 and obviously my first melee class. Being in front of a enemies faces, you start to notice things a lot more and are aware of your surroundings better. So, I notice how others play to. Most ranged classes I’ve seen in dungeon just stand in one spot and spam skills. Um yeah, that’s helpful I guess. No movement, just standing there doing damage. Aka no skill whatsoever and expecting the melee character to do all the work as far as tanking and aggro goes. Furthermore, MOST ranged ‘glass cannon’ squishy characters I’ve come across on my Guardian expect TO BE CARRIED. Especially in CoF(AC too). Because they are all those things I listed they don’t feel like they need to any work at the lava part in CoF path 2, expect warrior and guardians to do it. This mentality really pisses me off. I’d go with a Guardian/Warrior group over any other group, faster and less deaths.

it’s not so much the heavy armour thats the issue, it’s that these 2 proffesions are far better at the current pve metagame than any other proffesion.

there is no reason to bring other proffesions if you can bring another Warrior or Guardian.

Some of this could be specifically a CoF issue too. There’s a part during path 2 when many parties kite and tank while waiting for the Asura to put his kabloomium on the door instead of batteling the mobs the way nature intended. Warriors and guards have a definate advantage during this part of the dungeon.

The armor and health of certain classes has no logical explanation or balance. Melee cannot be the explanation because there are dozens of melee builds in the game, why should a dagger dagger elementalist have the least health and lowest armor? Then there is the fact that almost every class has ranged builds as well. Surely it isn’t damage either because warriors do not slouch in the damage department.

The fact that base armor/health is unbalanced is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to class imbalance. The classes needed a lot more development before launch and they simply did not get it. Now with only 2 devs balancing and the game being live, nothing major will be changed. It should be quite evident with the last major “balance” patch that did absolutely nothing about the insane burst damage. Even the most glaringly obvious changes that need made will take a year.

This game could devolve into guardian and warriors only and engineers would still get nerfed. If that doesn’t say it all then I don’t know what will.

I have five characters: Warrior, Ranger, Thief, Elementalist, and Mesmer; all around level 50 (I am leveling them up simultaneously).

Bluntly, the warrior is BY FAR the easiest to play; the ranger second easiest.

Why? Simple reason; the mechanics in the game are ANTI- kiting and it is pretty much essential that you are able to kite when you play thief, elementalist, and mesmer (not so much the ranger because certain pets can effectively tank).

The game mechanics, as poorly as they are designed, essentially force lightly armored characters (when not in an organized group) to stand toe-to-toe with opponents… or they reset.

Add in the fact that there is ridiculous mob density in many areas with ridiculous respawn rates (you cannot effectively clear a path to get to an objective location in many areas of the game without a group unless you get lucky, even burning all of your skills on cool down), and there is a significant problem with non-heavy armor classes.

10%-15% better armor protection, someone said? BS. My warrior can stand toe-to-toe with most mobs and take little to no damage in the period of time that the medium ad lightly armored classes would be demolished… and does as much damage to the mobs during those encounters as the heavier more-DPS oriented classes do.

Sorry; in actual play I find the game’s classes are poorly balanced, and that’s just for PvE.

I find the game is at a late-Beta level of completion. It has not been balanced yet. There are a LOT of problems with the game’s mechanics.

I really, really want to like this game, but if this was a subscription game I would have already cancelled my sub.

Not ready for prime time…

The problem here isn’t that Warrior or Guardian are so much better than other classes, it’s that they’re so much -easier- than the others. You can look up build after build of videos on youtube of people playing any other profession, and I guarantee it’ll make you jealous of how good they look.

@Lord Kreegan:
“10%-15% better armor protection, someone said? BS. My warrior can stand toe-to-toe with most mobs and take little to no damage in the period of time that the medium ad lightly armored classes would be demolished… and does as much damage to the mobs during those encounters as the heavier more-DPS oriented classes do.”

You do realize Warrior is capable of 1-shotting anyone in WvW, right? 21k+ Hundred Blades? And I’ve seen many people break 30k. Warriors do some of the heaviest damage in the game, with Thief being the only other thing I’ve seen that can stay up with them. If we were to call anything about the Soldier classes (And this has nothing to do with Guardian) OP, this would be it.

There is a holy trinity in this game any who doesn’t think so hasn’t ran alot of dungeons sure you can do dungeons as just Full dps but when you get a Tank guard, Support ele and then the dps your see it go alot smoother

I have a guardian and I thought the armor was pretty much worthless. Stacking toughness however does improve survivability.

I had the opposite thought when I started which was “what good is having heavy armor?” Seriously it’s like tissue paper.

The armor difference is pretty minimal. Noticable, but minimal.

Was comparing my Guardian’s current level 80 exotic chestpiece to a level 80 exotic light armor chestpiece I saw on the TP. 314 armor to 363 armor. That’s only an armor difference of about 50. And that’s on the armor piece that gives the most armor/stats. Honestly, most of your “armor” comes from the toughness stat. I’ve also seen some pretty impressive Light/Medium profession tank builds.

Mediave.5132:

The problem here isn’t that Warrior or Guardian are so much better than other classes, it’s that they’re so much -easier- than the others. You can look up build after build of videos on youtube of people playing any other profession, and I guarantee it’ll make you jealous of how good they look.

@Lord Kreegan:
“10%-15% better armor protection, someone said? BS. My warrior can stand toe-to-toe with most mobs and take little to no damage in the period of time that the medium ad lightly armored classes would be demolished… and does as much damage to the mobs during those encounters as the heavier more-DPS oriented classes do.”

You do realize Warrior is capable of 1-shotting anyone in WvW, right? 21k+ Hundred Blades? And I’ve seen many people break 30k. Warriors do some of the heaviest damage in the game, with Thief being the only other thing I’ve seen that can stay up with them. If we were to call anything about the Soldier classes (And this has nothing to do with Guardian) OP, this would be it.

Anet has this mysterious disease that makes them incapable of balancing offensive power with defensive power. Combining the two in one class never seems like a bad idea and never gets addressed when others point it out.

Pretty sure my signet/aura elementalist can tank better than the average warrior. My necro is definitely a better tank than any warrior and as good as most guardians.

Build and stats matter far, far more than armor. Personally, I think warriors stink as tanks, and beside which, why would you want to give up all that DPS potential to turn your warrior into a tank. Guardians are pretty awesomesauce, tho, espec as much of their tanking ability comes from boons that they can pretty easily apply to the entire group.

The only class that truly cannot tank is thief. And it’s not so much that you can’t build a bunker thief as it is the fact that part of thief defense is stealth which is ver-bad for holding aggro.

I do wonder if it comes down more to “ease of play” than out and out better performance. warrior and guardians seems better able to mix in support with their offensive actions, while most of the others have to dance in and out of “modes” to mix support and DPS.

I suppose “tank” is classically defined as the “stand-still-and-take-it king of mitigation”. In that sense, maybe guardian is the only tank in the game.

From my experience however, the best character that I can use to run into the fray, damage and slow enemies while mitigating and self-healing is my dagger/dagger elementalist with a cantrip build. It is an innately mobile build that lets you evade most damage and quickly heal yourself if necessary. If you’re looking for a mage profession to fulfill a close-range tank archetype, definitely give the dagger/dagger elementalist a look.

I can take 8-10 Orrians at once on my glass cannon specced Guardian, I can take 2 on my Ranger maybe 3 if anymore add i’m dead.

There are huge imbalances in the classes its insanely broken, Everything feels so easy on a Guardian or Warrior, on an medium or light Armored class everything is stress and frustration, big differences in my opinion.

As the proud player of a lv80 Guard, lv80 Ranger, lv80 Ele, and soon lv80 Thief, the difference between the Armor classes are minimal and almost unnoticeable.

The imbalance lies in the class itself, not the armor they are wearing.

Someone above mentioned that d/d Ele has the lowest armor and health, calling it an imbalance. My Ele can tank circles around any encounter, and any class but a Guard, which he is nearly on par with.

The health differences balance the classes. not the opposite.

A good d/d ele can tank better than a guardian ever could hope for, imo.

That said, any group that has a guardian in it that won’t use a hammer, and an elementalist who refuses to use anything other than fire for max dps, is not an efficient group. A good ele should be throwing out fields left and right, allowing classes to take advantage of free boons. So really, I’d rather have 2 war, 2 guard and 1 ele for an “ideal” class for ease of use.

This again is a player skill problem rather than a profession problem. Most wars and guardian do better because they have to be more active in battle as well as in close range. This hones their player skill much more and as a result, most of these players know the timing, dodges and what to do to maintain high survivability while doing decent/good dps. Now, i’ve seen bad guardians and warriors in my days too and these are detrimental to the group while i’ve also seen very good mesmers, rangers, thieves and engineer who contribute effectively to the group.

So learn to play your class well and not just be standing still and spamming skills and expect guards and wars to “hold aggro” and people wouldn’t always be asking for wars and guardians.

Although there is no trinity, you can’t expect all classes to be equal in everything

Lord Kreegan.8123:

I have five characters: Warrior, Ranger, Thief, Elementalist, and Mesmer; all around level 50 (I am leveling them up simultaneously).

Bluntly, the warrior is BY FAR the easiest to play; the ranger second easiest.

Why? Simple reason; the mechanics in the game are ANTI- kiting and it is pretty much essential that you are able to kite when you play thief, elementalist, and mesmer (not so much the ranger because certain pets can effectively tank).

The game mechanics, as poorly as they are designed, essentially force lightly armored characters (when not in an organized group) to stand toe-to-toe with opponents… or they reset.

Not ready for prime time…

I leveled my elementalist with Staff (switched later to s/d), but while playing staff, I had no problems whatsoever kiting, aside of the occasional reset. playing an s/d Elementalist changed my play-style a bit to a more ‘dart in, dart out’ style.

My s/d Necro? I can kite six or more mobs with that toon and not break a sweat. Easy to do in Orr. While I wouldn’t argue your assessment on mechanics being not what they should be, I’d have to add to that I don’t think they’re quite as broken as you’ve suggested.

I’ve got 80 necro and 80 warrior.

I built my necro tanky and it performs easily as well as frontline character in dungeons as my warrior does.

Heavy armor is nice and all, but the necro has death shroud.

Day Trooper.3605:

From the beginning of Guild Wars 2, I’ve loved the lack of a trinity and that all classes can basically ‘be their own tanks’. However, with this being the case, wouldn’t Warriors and Guardians have a pretty big inherent advantage since they are the only classes which may use heavy armor?

Until recently I didn’t see this as a problem with party formation requests. However, on GW2LFG.com now I’m seeing for (at least) <strong>Citadel of Flame speed runs</strong> that some groups only want Warriors and Guardians due to their heavy armor/increased survivability.

Sure, you can say ‘just go Warrior or Guardian’ – but if this trend continues then a clear balancing issue is present that ANet will need to address.

What do others think about this?

Though armored classes have an advantage, you’re only looking at speed run LFGs. I haven’t played much other than Guardian, but being heavily armored comes with a lot of risk because we’re melee focused, you’re right in the thick of battle. You’re also in the middle of a billion spell effects and its hard to time your dodges, blinds, and blocks.

What this topic is about is the issues presented when removing trinity mechanics…

You have class divisions by functionality, flavor, strength…but they are not balanced by a system that is the backbone of many traditional, modern MMOs.

The problem here is a lack of roles. They designed off of concepts that worked on paper, but not in action with social interaction taken into account.

GW2 is trying to please too many types of people in an attempt to maximize revenue, but this hurts the direction of the development. They retain some mechanics and systems of trinity based design, but they deviate too far from the fundamentals which creates many problematic instances.

Things that the lack of roles and trinity effects negatively in this game…

- The ability of the developers to design with balanced, stable, and consistently scaled combat difficulty ( and engagement by association) to encounters.

- Group integrity, team play depth, practical combat depth.

- Build tangibility, individual effectiveness, role specialization.

Things that, when compounded with the aforementioned, create fundamental design issues…

- Content delivery in the form of dynamic events and hearts is too shallow to encourage meaningful player engagement.
– Can leave players feeling alienated or under-engaged, especially in a MMOG.
– With FoTM and Legendary grind, most zones are empty making progress grindy.
– The reliance on rigid content structure leaves little room for flexibility. To quote another user from this board,

" Think about it. Arenanet can’t give you, the player, a personal quest to assemble your Legendary. They can’t put in a drop from say, Lupicus, that then begins a quest that sends you to the depths of the Citadel of Flame to talk to a Flame Legion turncoat who will help you forge the mighty dagger Incinerator. "

-Galen.9042, “Legendaries: Why Grinding Is The Only Option” 2012

- Grouping and Guilds are largely redundant outside of dungeon running or unless you need an extra chat room.
– Single-player feel.

- Builds are not solid or tangible in most cases, making the meta hard to define or purposefully deviate from for most players. Furthermore, there is absolutely no way to efficiently communicate them to other players in the game.

- Combat, encounters, and player identity feels like a backdrop to a casual-focused cash shop operation, whereas it should be the centerpiece.

- The reliance on lazy content design through the use of the mystic forge and grind as a game-play principle.

Put this all together and you’ve got the core problems for GW2 as an MMO in a nut shell. You can agree or disagree, but this has been my observation through discussion with hundreds of players.

Until recently I didn’t see this as a problem with party formation requests. However, on GW2LFG.com now I’m seeing for (at least) Citadel of Flame speed runs that some groups only want Warriors and Guardians due to their heavy armor/increased survivability

You’re basing your opinion on the silly requirements of some silly kids on the internet? Seriously? The only reason these people want a Guardian or Warrior is because they themselves are squishy glass cannons. The naturally higher Armour of the aforementioned will make them more likely targets by the mob, while the glass cannons sit back and pew pew.

Somebody mentioned COF P2 door event. My full Berserker Engineer can kite for the first 35-40%, while at the same time I’ve seen Warriors and Guardians drop by 20%.

I think the advantage of guardian/warrior is their superior AE ability, not their survivability. When you’re trying to plow through content as quickly as possible, you want to do all your damage to 5 mobs not just 1.