Guild Wars 2

This is a subject that I have been thinking about. In guild wars 2 PvP there is three armor tiers being light-medium-heavy. However there is also a toughness score.

If In theory I was to use 2 well known and/or popular builds being;

necromancer set to 30/30/10/0/0 focusing on mark size and critical damage, condition duration and used superior runes of undead and carrion amulet, this would give me a toughness score 1710+794=2504

If I use a guardian set 10/30/30/0/0 focusing on sword damage, single hand critical hit increase and meditations and use superior divinity runes and berserker amulet this would give me a toughness score 1276+360=1636

I’ll ignore the fact at this stage as well that when set this way the necromancer will have some where ball park of 20,000 Hp pool and the guardian will have ball part 13,800 HP pool.

This has essentially made the light armor wearer the tank, and the heavy armor wearer the squishy. (Not that it matters whilst conditions bypass all armor and toughness anyway.)

So what is truly the point of armor tiers when a light armor class canon can in fact be more durable than a heavy armor wearing glass canon? Where is the actual heavy armor here?. Essentially why play a heavy armor class in this specific example when you can be out matched in toughness, HP pool, armor ignoring damage and also out ranged at 1200 units to 200 units where your attacks need to be single target focused and their attacks need only be cast in your general location or the immediate area’s in front of you that they need to across to be in viable range and are unblockable.

Is this the intention for heavy armor? That it is for appearances sake only? Considering out of all 8 professions only 2 are assigned heavy armor wearers. That kinda under scores they need to bring a fair amount to the table in order to satisfy their position and people who have an interested in playing the heavy professions. What truly is the point of armor tiers when a light set can be in fact be far more durable and well suied to a heavy armor set that is also well suited to the specific play style associated with both. Should not the light armor truly be light and the heavy armor truly be heavy?

Food for though I guess.

1. everyone will have a low base toughness compared to someone who max it. Try comparing a guardian and a necro again where they just have armor on and no runes nor traits. That is the point of the armor tiers, different base armor.

2. Why complain about a melee weapon being short range compared to a long range weapon? ofc the melee weapon will have a melee range.
If you really want the 1200 range on a guardian go with a scepter.

“Is this the intention for heavy armor? That it is for appearances sake only? "
Most of the things in Gw2 are for appearances sake

Don’t have the answer to your question. I have tried every class in pvp and light armor classes are in fact much easier to play than heavy armor.

The thing that is deceptive about this is that toughness is not the stat that is used in damage calculations. Armor is.

Armor is the base armor of your character + how much toughness you have. Heavy armor classes have a base armor of 1211, medium has 1094, and light has 916. So, if you take two classes with 2k touhness, the light armor class will have 2916 armor, and the heavy armor class will have 3211 armor, making the heavy armor class take less damage.

Effectively, heavy armor has 291 extra points over light armor classes. By default, heavy armor reduces damage more. However, this doesn’t take into consideration that a player may choose to build themselves up to have more toughness or more HP than the other class. Builds trump armor tiers greatly, so if you want to be defensive, you’re much better off sticking to block/evade/control skills, and building stats around being defensive. Armor tiers won’t take the work away from you there.

you forgot about protection, aegis, regen and stability on guardian, boons almost nonexistent in necro