Guild Wars 2

Hello, my question may seem stupid for more experienced players but ,

I started playing GW2 few days ago, tested all classes until i decided to leave Guardian as my main but lets move to my question.

As Guild Wars 2 doesnt really have tanks or healers i have hard time grasping whats best trait line/weapon for me. Normaly i would go healing/tanking with shield cause its what i do in RPG’s but is it worth sacrifising all that damage from 2h and damage traits for qeustionable benefits of shield and healing in game which doesnt have tanking and healing as whole at all ?

Im level 15 now and already noticed that wearing shield and having 5 points in Honor trait line doesnt make me significantly harder to kill than any other class in game.

Personally I hate using a shield. Others will swear by it, but it’s a matter of play-style.

I use a 2 handed sword and Staff by default. I also carry a scepter-Talisman combination for when i need to fight ranged such as in WvW while defending a keep from the walls. I’m not that stupid to stand in the middle of an enemy zerg trying to melee. Sure I’ll deal some damage before going down, but my philosophy is that i can deal more damage if I stay alive.

Most of my survivability comes from:
Utility skills
-Signet of Resolve (Gets rid of conditions and click for healing)
-Hold the line (6 sec health Regen + 4 sec 33% extra defenses)
-Save Yourselves! (Draw conditions from nearby allies to yourself. Gain multiple buffs for 10 seconds and breaks stun and 10 sec health regen)

Traits:
30 pts in Zeal —> Zealous Blade (Greatsword attacks heal you.)
20 pts in Virtues --> Absolute Resolution (increases passive regen on the skill by 25%,

Like I said this is where I get most survivability out of.

It really depends on your play style as this build probably won’t work for a lot of other players. Often I’ll still be tanking with my 2 handed sword due to my high Defense. For me this means dodging a lot, hitting guerrilla style when bosses are distracted and creating distance again when focus is on me too long as certain bosses hit ridiculously hard even with full heavy exotic armor (For those interested I wear Melandru’s set combined with precision+crit dmg+power accessories). This is why a “Hit and run” tactic is most effective. It also gives me some time to heal up with my shouts, signet and passive healing.

Quite interested to see how other Guardians take care of their survivability

Edit: Fixed some typo’s

FLFW,
Welcome to the game! I hope your stay is as pleasurable as mine!

First, let me say the same theorycrafting that you find in other games is not as clear in GW2. You will find a lot more opinions and a lot less hard standards. So, when you hear someone saying that is the “only” way to go, take it with a grain of salt. There is a lot more room to play as you feel comfortable then what you find in other games.

Second, if you haven’t opened the skills for all your weapon choices, do that first. There is no reason not to be able to use all your tools and many times you may find yourself switching between not just your two weapons, but switching out a third or even forth if the situation dictates.

I run a 0/5/30/30/5 AH/support build. (You might be interested in the AH playstyle from your OP, read up on it in the stickies). I have full exotic karma gear (not as hard as it sounds to get) and use a hammer/staff typically. I do a lot of Wv3 and am clearing the zone maps. Even in the 80s zones, I am almost unkillable. I can engage a veteran mob and, as long as they don’t have a knock back, I can just leave it on auto-attack and sit back. My return heals cover any damage. It is almost silly.

TL;DR: This game allows you to play as want pretty well. There are very few instances that someone can say you are doing it wrong (and most of the time that is up for debate). Don’t forget though, we don’t have a big health pool. Make sure you focus on Defense to protect what you have, otherwise you will be on your back more then you may like.

Don’t think of a shield as a flat piece of armor boosting. It’s all about the skills it brings. If you’re getting enough toughness & vit from your gear or traits, and your utilities give you enough survivability (as they do for me), use torch offhand as a purely offensive weapon. Guardians are very support oriented, so a lot of our skills won’t be straight damage dealers, but rather give boons or something.

As for traiting: read through all of the traits and make your decisions based on them, not the stats you get from the lines. At lower levels you’ll want to build around your weaknesses and playstyle. You have to get out of the heal/tank/dps mindset. You need to think ‘deal damage & maintain survivability.’ Look for traits that synergize well with each other or the utility skills or weapons you like to use.

If you find yourself lacking in a department, adapt your build. Feeling squishy? Equip a focus. Feeling bored? Try a new weapon, traits, utilities. The idea is to have flexability.

Welcome FLFW,

Currently leveling my guardian but I have an 80 Thief also.

I’ve gotta say that this ‘no holy trinity’ system is refreshing but it takes a bit to adapt to it. First priority is to keep yourself alive. The main tools to do that are; Vitality, Armor+Toughness, Dodge, Protection boon, Aegis boon, healing, control and killing your target before they kill you

I’m currently level 53 on my guardian and I’ve found that gear wise Vitality has helped me out a bunch. Toughness is good also but I feel it becomes more important in later levels. AFAIK Precision is better for damage output than Power. If you run blues try to replace them every 5 levels or sooner, greens are OK for about 10 levels.

Weapons for leveling.. I usually bring a Greatsword, Hammer, Mace, Staff, Scepter and Shield with me. However you will want to try all of them. I prefer 2h damage, Greatsword is the king of AoE. Mace/Shield is great for ‘tanking’ with protection and healing. Been reading a lot about sword and focus though so I’ll be giving those a try.

Traits wise I worked to Spirit Weapon Mastery in Zeal at 20. Then at 40 I changed to Two Handed Mastery in Honor and worked up to Radiance 15. At 60 I will start working with this Altruistic Healing build.

With a Greatsword I’ll pull 4-6 targets, rope um in with 5-5, then hit 4>3>2 for retaliation and whirlwind damage. Throw in Purging Flames and Smite Condition utilities for more AoE fun once they’re grouped. Once you get GS down try messing around with Hammer

TL;DR, Grab a Greatsword, Mace, Scepter and Shield. Gear up with Vitality. Try the different weapons and really pay attention to what each gives you.

GL
Blood~