Guild Wars 2

Greetings, I’m an extremely new Guild Wars 2 player, I play as a guardian and am looking for a good setup focused around Healing, buffing, and standard defence, (Damage is not an issue) anyone mind giving me a bit of help?

First and formost, understand that this game is not a standard MMO at all. In that way, healing is pretty much a self-sufficient thing for every non-WvW meta (and in WvW, it’s not really a Guardian thing to do the healing). Hard defenses, CC, and dodging are the ways to stop damage, and stuff like healing/toughness/vitality are largely to help you with the difficulty. Think of them as a difficulty meter, and not as “my role is now X.” Your build will determine your role, and your armor is the way you modify the difficulty for yourself. Your armor is for how hard you are to kill in relation with how much damage you output, and is something that helps push your build along as needed.

Anyways, you’re probably a bit early to really worry too much about builds, and should work on getting used to your class as much as possible. Try out every weapon you can get a hold of, and make sure to try different combinations for the one-handed choices. Try and get used to looking for enemy tells, and dodging the ones that are most important. Once you’ve got the basics down then start looking into your build.

One of the simplest suggestions in that manner is the basic stuffs: Bane Signet for a dps improvement, and the ability to have a lengthy knock-down on use, Wall of Reflection for the ability to deal with projectiles, Hallowed Ground/Stand your Ground if you need to have Stability, Retreat for general running around + an on-demand Aegis, and Save Yourselves for a stunbreak + grab bag of boons.

Support comes from traits and utilities. Mostly, the virtue traitline offers a lot of support ( condition removal on f2, stability on f3). Hammer is also a really supportive weapon for hard hitting bosses or trashmobs that can’t be blind, however it comes with a permanent light field wich will annoy most people, so don’t use it when can live without. Healing is simply a poor form of support in this game, focusing on it isn’t a good idea if you want to be useful. There’s also blinds when you invest in radiance. All of that gives you a base of x/3/x/x/4, and you can orientate yourself with 4/5/0/0/5 for a good all purpose supportive build. Armor would be berserker with scholar runes ( as healing doesn’t matter) with greatsword+ sword/scepter/mace focus. Utilities depending on the situation, as Garth Thurgen said.

You didn’t specify game mode.

http://metabattle.com/wiki/Build:Guardian_-_Altruistic_Healing_Bunker

http://metabattle.com/wiki/Build:Guardian_-_Virtue_Bunker

These are for PvP.

First and foremost: Welcome to the Guardian profession!

Second: This link will provide with good readups for new players such as mmo comparison, basic combat mechanics, and a bit of intro theory.

As a new player your biggest task is going to be learning the game alongside your toon. I encourage you to try out all the weapons, traits, utilities, and everything you can find. Mistakes will be made, but that’s part of the learning process! When you’re hitting higher levels and feel you’re ready to flesh out more concrete details we will be here to help!

Now for the meat of this post.

Here’s what a Guard offers are far as support

Boons

• Aegis – Block the entire effects of the next attack
• Protection – Shave off 33% damage from a direct attack
• Stability – Prevent your team from being shoved around

Buffs

• Extended boon durations
• Reduction on incoming conditions
• Strength in Numbers (Trait): Add extra armor to your team members

Conditions

• Blind – Next attack from the affected target will miss
• Immobilize – Hold your target(s) in place

Mechanics

• Blocks: Negates the effects of an attack (similar to Aegis boon).
• Condition Removal – Excellent access to removal of harmful conditions to the team
• Projectile control – “block” projectiles or even reflect them back for damage
• Wards – Lockdowns for mobs moving in/out of an area.

Now for the different game aspects

Pve
Dungeons, Fractals, “Open World”, and World Bosses fall under this category. With the exception of just a handful of PvE content the general rule for the rest is stacking offense. In this game mode there is little value in traditional tanking. As such most teams will gear up in favor of what dishes out the most damage. As you gain a higher level you’ll start to unlock gear with more stats on it; the most preferred stats are going to be a stat combination of Power/Precision/Ferocity in that order of priority. Your support will come through damage mitigation rather than soaking the hits to begin with. As crutch we recommend running a gear combination of Toughness/Power/Precision and slowly rotate that out as you get more comfortable with dodging and mitigation. The end goal is that you want to maximise your DPS output while understanding the instance you are in so that you can spec according to use your utilities to keep the team alive.

PvP/WvW
The other two game modes are similar in that you will be combating other players rather than the environments/scenarios the devs have crafted. In a generalized description there are two type of roles a Guardian will serve in these two modes: Striker and Bunker

Strikers (called Medi Guards due to the build theme) are used in Havoc and Roaming groups. Their primary jobs are to be mobile and deliver high amounts of burst damage. In WvW they are used for quick point captures or “camp flipping”. In PvP they fill the offensive role when trying to focus attention on bringing down called targets. This roles makes use of gear similar to PvE in that it favors raw damage though there will be times where Vitality and Toughness are introduced into some builds.

Bunkers fill the opposite role in that they are generally the ones that want to be the last ones standing. There are about the closest thing to your stereotypical Cleric/Healer from other games. In PvP, Bunkers will defend a point from being taken or, when overwhelmed, will do their best to hold on to the point until reinforcements arrive. Once they do arrive the bunkers’ roles are to offer support to boost their team mates’ potential and odds of surviving. In WvW, they are the front liners. Bunkers will be the first ones in and their priority is to keep their targets halted with crowd control techniques while being vigil and offering the appropriate supports boons/utilities to keep the team/blob alive. These roles favor use of Power, Toughness, Vitality, and Healing Power.

TL;DR
There’s not really a such thing as a “support” build. The best way to support your team is to understand what you are facing and spec accordingly.