Guild Wars 2

Let me start off by saying I have a level 60 human warrior and it felt boring and generic to play so I shelved him. I have a 63 Asura necromancer but I’m a little sick of not having much burst damage and having a small character to show off armor so I shelved him.

At the moment I have a level 10 Charr Guardian but I might reroll Norn because of the armor looks. I have a few super random questions of anyone can lend a hand!

1. Is it viable or slower to kill using a Hammer? I’ve been switching between hammer and great sword and I feel less squishy with a hammer, maybe a placebo effect? But would it be dumb or really slow to level with a hammer?

2. I love the way Norn looks in heavy armor but I hate their cultural armor, are there craftable armor that have a more guardian feel or plate armorish feel? Also if I some day want to go for the legendary weapons do I NEED weaponsmith?

3. What are people favorite dye choices for the guardian look? I am awful at color coordinating (my real life wardrobe is scarey)?

4. And finally, anyone who is level 80 do you still love your guardian and feel its not a pain in thekitten to play? (by pain I mean struggling to tag mobs in events or fun to be support)

Sorry for the mishmash of questions but these are things I’ve been curious about with guardian and I have yet to get a character to 80 since playing since head start and I’d love to commit to one character I love!

Crabsy.8637:

1. Is it viable or slower to kill using a Hammer? I’ve been switching between hammer and great sword and I feel less squishy with a hammer, maybe a placebo effect? But would it be dumb or really slow to level with a hammer?!

If you can get past the slow speed of the hammer it does good damage and alot of people seem to like it.

Crabsy.8637:

2. I love the way Norn looks in heavy armor but I hate their cultural armor, are there craftable armor that have a more guardian feel or plate armorish feel? Also if I some day want to go for the legendary weapons do I NEED weaponsmith?!

What I would do to be able to make a norn guardian that could wear human protector armor. If you want to make weapons then yes. If not then just buy them.

Crabsy.8637:

3. What are people favorite dye choices for the guardian look? I am awful at color coordinating (my real life wardrobe is scarey)?!

Pink/Lime Green. Can`t go wrong and everyone will envy you. Men will both respect and fear you and women will desire you whether they be asura or charr.

Crabsy.8637:

4. And finally, anyone who is level 80 do you still love your guardian and feel its not a pain in thekitten to play? (by pain I mean struggling to tag mobs in events or fun to be support)!

You have your symbols that will tag mobs. And they still fun to play however you decide to play them.

Crabsy.8637:

Sorry for the mishmash of questions but these are things I’ve been curious about with

It`s ok. We will give you a pass just this once.

The first thing i noticed is that you’re sick of not having much burst damage. Guardian for the most part, are very lacking in burst damage. If anything, they have high sustained damage.

1. Hammer is more than viable. You feel less squishy due to the protection your auto-attack gives. Give the guide up at the top of the guardian forums a read. It’s very well written and very informative.

2. I can’t say I can help you with the look of armor. Everyone has their own preference on what looks cool. And yes, you will need weaponsmithing. http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Legendary_weapon
Follow the link to what materials you need for the legendary weapon you want.

3. Same goes with dye; it’s personal preference. I tend to gravitate towards lighter colors on my guardian for some reason. Maybe it’s the blue flame:P

4. The guardian is a lot of fun imo. It takes some getting used to, since it plays differently that a warrior. You’ll need to learn how to use your mitigation skills properly to survive, since we don’t have the same health pool warriors do. The utility you can bring to the fight is also second to none. Mob tagging is usually not an issue, since you have some pbaoe and aoe attacks with our weapons(mighty blow/whirling wrath).

Bleh, i feel like i was all over the place with my post, but i hope it helps!

1. The third hit of a Hammer offers a Symbol of Protection which gives gives you the Protection buff which decreases the damage you take by 33%. That may be the reason why you feel less squishy with a hammer. There’s often a comparison of the damage between the Greatsword and the Hammer and so far it’s known that the auto attack of the Hammer does more damage but I haven’t seen a conclusive post which compares the damage output when all weapon skills are used.

Oh wow thank you guys you helped me tremendously! I think I will settle on Norn guardian with a hammer, that cultural armor still sticks in my craw tho so maybe I can buy new armor every 5-10 levels like on my other characters.

Another random question, is the guardians support abilities more passive or active? I notice a lot of passive things, like the virtues and hammers protection symbol.

I respect the opinions of the guys above me, however I would strongly urge you to start using greatsword as your main weapon. The hammer is just so slow. You do become less squishy, but in all honesty I’ve never had a problem being squishy, even with greatsword. We have enough skills to mitigate damage that it offsets the benefits of the hammer.

I’m sure there are specific situations that a hammer would be better than a greatsword, but you can’t compare the pure dps of the GS.

You can’t get cultural armor until level 40/60/80 anyway, and it’s very expensive.

You have PLENTY of options for armor looks outside your racial.

I agree the last attack of the hammer does feel really slow but I do love everything else about it, I’m just not sure what to use now

1. Hammer feels slower, but with good application of its attack chain plus Mighty Blow, actually deals a lot of damage. It’s a perfectly serviceable alternative to Greatsword for leveling, and I recommend you keep one in your pack at all times anyway. (The control options for Hammer do come in handy in many situations.) Broadly speaking, you can level just fine with most weapons (staff might be difficult—but keep one for Dynamic Events.)

2. Here’s a suggestion. Press H and go to the PVP section. Head over to the Heart of Mists. Go to the Gear Locker. (It’s a lot like your collections tab in your bank, but it’s only for PVP gear.) You’ll find a massive list of all available armor in the Heart of Mists. You can right-click any armor/weapon icon and click preview. This will let you see many of the game’s armor models at any point in your character’s development.

3. I like blue and gold. I’m a bit of a buff for good outfit design (played City of Heroes for several years).

4. I love Guardian. I went all the way to level 80, leveled up again about ten or twelve times, and then decided to go another route and rolled my second Guardian yesterday. I….I may have a problem.

5. Most Guardian support abilities are active, not passive. Very few are truly passive. Even Signets and Spirit Weapons require activation. If you’d like more information on Guardians, I’ve got a rough but comprehensive guide for beginners in my signature. We also have a lot of discussions going on our forum, so keep an eye out!

Good hunting!

Oh wow I can’t thank you all enough for the help. I am super anxious to get home from work and make my Norn hammer guardian. I am having a hard time looking at traits on my phone but I have a question. If I want to do lots of damage of with my hammer but beef up he symbol which trait lines would work best for that? Also are there traits that make the hammers symbol actually help wih damage?

<3 you all!

3 words sum up how I feel about the power trait line. I hate Zeal. I find that the guardian benefits much more from Radiance/Valor/Honor.

For the hammer, you can add points into virtues to increase boon/retaliation duration, since mighty blow applies AOE retaliation when used with a light combo field.

For the record, I recommend looking at traits as a way to enhance your desired playstyle, instead of by what weapon you use. Try not to feel like you have to spec into +% weapon damage because it’s the weapon you use the most. there are many options to choose from:)

Crabsy.8637:

Oh wow I can’t thank you all enough for the help. I am super anxious to get home from work and make my Norn hammer guardian. I am having a hard time looking at traits on my phone but I have a question. If I want to do lots of damage of with my hammer but beef up he symbol which trait lines would work best for that? Also are there traits that make the hammers symbol actually help wih damage?

<3 you all!

A great way to deal damage with any build is 15 Radiance and 10 Zeal (for Fiery Wrath). Along with the modest boost to Precision, Power and Condition Damage/Duration, this build gives you a stronger Virtue of Justice and lets you activate it at least every fight (multiple times per fight if you’re up against multiple enemies.) Optionally, another 5 points in Virtues gives three stacks of Might whenever you use Virtue of Justice. This is a pretty popular set-up because it’s reliable and useful while leveling, and it’s also weapon-neutral.

For beefier symbols, you want some combination of:

• Zeal
  • Symbolic Exposure (Symbols Apply Vulnerability) – 15
  • Symbolic Power (Increased damage of Symbols) – 25

• Honor
  • Writ of Exaltation (Symbols are larger) – 10
  • Writ of the Merciful (All Symbols heal allies) – 20
  • Writ of Persistence (Symbols last longer) – 20

If you want absolutely every Symbol Trait, then you’ll need 25 Zeal and 30 Honor. Unfortunately, this doesn’t leave you with more than 15 Trait points to spend anywhere else. Incidentally, this is exactly as much as you need to go 15 Radiance for Renewed Justice (this lets you spam Virtue of Justice).

If you want more breathing room, you could go 25 Zeal and 20 Honor, and just get Writ of Exaltation and Writ of Persistence. That leaves you with 25 points to put wherever you like.

Remember to look at the entire Trait line though. Unlocking a Trait line lets you switch available Traits on the fly, so don’t feel like you’re required to go deep Zeal or deep Honor.

I really like those traits a lot. I will admit and I am being more selfish about it but I may only take the damage/radius increase traits for symbols for leveling. I love the 15 point zeal listed. Guardian just got a whole lot more interesting because of this symbol jargon

The only problem I see with Eveningstar’s latest post is this: I’ve never seen the need to have VoJ renew that often.

I always keep VoJ on cooldown in dungeons or WvW because its active ability is just that good, especially with allies all around me, but in normal PvE I rarely feel the need to use it because the normal PvE content is already easy enough as it is.

The problem then becomes, in the aforementioned dungeons and WvW, that people/silvers/golds don’t drop fast enough to proc the instant renewal in a time that makes having the trait more useful than anything else.

Of course, I am saying this as a level 80. But I feel that for non-level 80s the other trees are still more useful.

I have to say also that I hate that Zeal looks so good on paper but in practice is just so much less so. The stuff with the symbols? Miniscule to the point of almost not noticing the increased damage/size when you’re playing.

Of course, I am saying this as a level 80. But I feel that for non-level 80s the other trees are still more useful. I have to say that I hate that Zeal looks so good on paper but in practice is just so much less so.

This is a good point. In fact, at level 80, I saw far less frequent use of Renewed Justice. If I’d ever use it, it was probably just prior to killing an enemy for 3-stacks of Might and an instant refresh.

Leveling up though, it was invaluable. Everything from general solo to Dynamic world events. But yeah, at 80, you’ll see less use out of it, especially in situations where enemies don’t die in ~5-10 seconds (i.e, WvW, instances). As always, depending on your playstyle, YMMV.