Guild Wars 2

After gear my guardian with full berserk set, and looked at the stats and made some calculation, I just realized that berserk set is the worst choice especially for guardian.
Then what’s the best set ? I can tell you answer 1st — PTV.
Let’s do the calculation here:
1st, Precision is the worst attribute among 4. at lv80, it’s about 20p = 1% crit chance. However, there are so many reliable ways to get higher pre+crit chance other than gears, such as food, oil, buff, sigil etc…. you can easily maintain a +40% crit chance in most of time by not investing any prec.
Then let’s do the math by comparing berserk armor set bonus VS PTV (e.g. karma or AC set):
berserk give u 224 more prec and 16% more crit damage. PTV give u 224 more T and V.
As I mentioned above, it’s easy to get +40% crit chance , so your over all crit chance will be above 60%, so losing 224 prec and 16% crit damage means about 12% damage lost. However, for Guardian, 224 T + V means 9% damage reduction and at least 15% HP increase, which will be a totally at least 25% increase for EHP.
So the result is clear : 12% VS 25% that’s the difference between berserk vs PTV (change from berserk set to PTV set, u will lose 12% damage but will gain 25% more survivability, deadman won’t do damage, 25% survivability can be also considered as 25% more damage out put)
And, this is just the difference of armor ……
I am now so regret that I spent ~30g for the berserk set, I wished I could do this math before I bought them.
So if you have not decided yet , look at my post and think twice.

224 Vitality doesn’t give you “15% more HP.” It gives you a flat rate of 2240 HP. 10 HP for every vitality point.

Percentages have nothing to do with it when adding vitality unless you include the health that you already have, which is pointless, seeing as that number could be anything including or above the flat rate.

Coming from someone who already has a completed Exotic Toughness/Vit/Healing Power build, I can tell you that it isn’t wildly better than any other build out there as far as one on ones. I can beat most people when I fight them in WvW but it’s not because the build is just wildly spectacular, it’s just that the mindset of people in WvW is “do as much damage as possible as soon as possible.” So when my Guardian is able to get through that damage with more than half of her health remaining the other player has no idea what to do.

I have a Power/Prec/Crit Ranger as well. It doesn’t dominate any less or any more than my Guardian, but it has a wildly different playstyle. There are times on my Guardian where I think, “what I would do for a bow that 3-hits people right now.” And times on my Ranger where I think, “what I would do for all of my health coming back with one skill.”

In short, you won’t find a build that is just plainly better (unless you, for example, go condition damage on a class that doesn’t have many conditions) than any other. As long as you stick to a certain build once you start it, youll be fine.

2240 HP = 15% more HP since the fact of most guardian has about ~15k HP.

StevieMJH.9105:

224 Vitality doesn’t give you “15% more HP.” It gives you a flat rate of 2240 HP. 10 HP for every vitality point.

Percentages have nothing to do with it when adding vitality unless you include the health that you already have, which is pointless, seeing as that number could be anything including or above the flat rate.

Coming from someone who already has a completed Exotic Toughness/Vit/Healing Power build, I can tell you that it isn’t wildly better than any other build out there as far as one on ones. I can beat most people when I fight them in WvW but it’s not because the build is just wildly spectacular, it’s just that the mindset of people in WvW is “do as much damage as possible as soon as possible.” So when my Guardian is able to get through that damage with more than half of her health remaining the other player has no idea what to do.

I have a Power/Prec/Crit Ranger as well. It doesn’t dominate any less or any more than my Guardian, but it has a wildly different playstyle. There are times on my Guardian where I think, “what I would do for a bow that 3-hits people right now.” And times on my Ranger where I think, “what I would do for all of my health coming back with one skill.”

In short, you won’t find a build that is just plainly better (unless you, for example, go condition damage on a class that doesn’t have many conditions) than any other. As long as you stick to a certain build once you start it, youll be fine.

CRrabbit.1284:

2240 HP = 15% more HP since the fact of most guardian has about ~15k HP.

StevieMJH.9105:

224 Vitality doesn’t give you “15% more HP.” It gives you a flat rate of 2240 HP. 10 HP for every vitality point.

Percentages have nothing to do with it when adding vitality unless you include the health that you already have, which is pointless, seeing as that number could be anything including or above the flat rate.

Coming from someone who already has a completed Exotic Toughness/Vit/Healing Power build, I can tell you that it isn’t wildly better than any other build out there as far as one on ones. I can beat most people when I fight them in WvW but it’s not because the build is just wildly spectacular, it’s just that the mindset of people in WvW is “do as much damage as possible as soon as possible.” So when my Guardian is able to get through that damage with more than half of her health remaining the other player has no idea what to do.

I have a Power/Prec/Crit Ranger as well. It doesn’t dominate any less or any more than my Guardian, but it has a wildly different playstyle. There are times on my Guardian where I think, “what I would do for a bow that 3-hits people right now.” And times on my Ranger where I think, “what I would do for all of my health coming back with one skill.”

In short, you won’t find a build that is just plainly better (unless you, for example, go condition damage on a class that doesn’t have many conditions) than any other. As long as you stick to a certain build once you start it, youll be fine.

That doesn’t mean it’s accurate to say that 224 gives you 15% more HP. That only is true if the Guardian has 15k HP. If they have the flat Guardian HP it would be more, if they already have 18k, it would be less. If you’re trying to talk about it as value for your money, you have to understand that you’re never going to get any more or less value for your spent trait points or armor stats than you do when you first start adding vitality. You get the same amount for every point whenever you add it.

Yes the 15% is not accurate, it could be more or less, I use 15% coz it’s probably the most common case for guardian. (even u have 18k HP, 2240% is still 12%) Just want to give an example here to prove that investing toughnessVit >>> investing prec+crit damage, especially for guardian no matter what build u r using.

StevieMJH.9105:

CRrabbit.1284:

2240 HP = 15% more HP since the fact of most guardian has about ~15k HP.

StevieMJH.9105:

224 Vitality doesn’t give you “15% more HP.” It gives you a flat rate of 2240 HP. 10 HP for every vitality point.

Percentages have nothing to do with it when adding vitality unless you include the health that you already have, which is pointless, seeing as that number could be anything including or above the flat rate.

Coming from someone who already has a completed Exotic Toughness/Vit/Healing Power build, I can tell you that it isn’t wildly better than any other build out there as far as one on ones. I can beat most people when I fight them in WvW but it’s not because the build is just wildly spectacular, it’s just that the mindset of people in WvW is “do as much damage as possible as soon as possible.” So when my Guardian is able to get through that damage with more than half of her health remaining the other player has no idea what to do.

I have a Power/Prec/Crit Ranger as well. It doesn’t dominate any less or any more than my Guardian, but it has a wildly different playstyle. There are times on my Guardian where I think, “what I would do for a bow that 3-hits people right now.” And times on my Ranger where I think, “what I would do for all of my health coming back with one skill.”

In short, you won’t find a build that is just plainly better (unless you, for example, go condition damage on a class that doesn’t have many conditions) than any other. As long as you stick to a certain build once you start it, youll be fine.

That doesn’t mean it’s accurate to say that 224 gives you 15% more HP. That only is true if the Guardian has 15k HP. If they have the flat Guardian HP it would be more, if they already have 18k, it would be less. If you’re trying to talk about it as value for your money, you have to understand that you’re never going to get any more or less value for your spent trait points or armor stats than you do when you first start adding vitality. You get the same amount for every point whenever you add it.

I don’t want to get entangled in the semantics of how you assessed the awesomeness of Vit. It’s not relevant. What I will say is that the premise of the original post doesn’t make much sense. The best armor set is the set that compliments what you want to achieve from the build you are using on your Guardian … or any other profession for that matter.

As much as the OP think it’s bad armor, simply because of it’s stats, I’m certain there is some build where Bezerker armor is optimal for a Guardian. Guardian is one of the MOST versatile classes in this game. If you can’t find a build that suits your gear (though I wouldn’t advocate that approach to making a build), you aren’t trying hard enough.

Berserker is the best one for damage, no contest here.

So the OP want to discuss at what point the damage is better/worse than survivability?
I’ll save the trouble and say it already: at 50%!

Danicco.3568:

Berserker is the best one for damage, no contest here.

So the OP want to discuss at what point the damage is better/worse than survivability?
I’ll save the trouble and say it already: at 50%!

You mean crit chance? Good to know.

Your assumptions are flawed.

1) Berserker gear gives you waaaaaaaaaay more than 16% crit damage and 224 precision. I don’t know where you’re getting the number from but full Berserker’s gear gives you something like 700 precision and 60+% crit damage. That is something like +35% crit chance and more than a doubling of the damage bonus on each crit. That’s almost a 40% boost in overall damage compared to just power with no precision.

By comparison, a Soldier’s set will give you about 25% damage reduction and an extra 7k health, but you will actually die faster since you’re not getting AH procs from crits. Is dying faster worth not being able to kill anything ever? It’s a judgment call I guess.

Oh, no, wait, it isn’t.

Guanglai Kangyi.4318:

Your assumptions are flawed.

1) Berserker gear gives you waaaaaaaaaay more than 16% crit damage and 224 precision. I don’t know where you’re getting the number from but full Berserker’s gear gives you something like 700 precision and 60+% crit damage. That is something like +35% crit chance and more than a doubling of the damage bonus on each crit. That’s almost a 40% boost in overall damage compared to just power with no precision.

By comparison, a Soldier’s set will give you about 25% damage reduction and an extra 7k health, but you will actually die faster since you’re not getting AH procs from crits. Is dying faster worth not being able to kill anything ever? It’s a judgment call I guess.

Oh, no, wait, it isn’t.

Gotta second this. On my warrior I had a 35% increase in crit damage going from a 50/50 knights valk setup to berserkers. My trait line is on the survivability side so if I wanted to more dps there is still more to get.

Agreed with the two posters above mine.

Gear is just a means to an end, stating that there is one “supreme” gear is just bad and shows that there might be a misunderstanding regarding the itemization and how traits/stats work and how to obtain them.

I could make a similar argument, as OP, that knights gear, or any other gear as well, are supreme but it would also be flawed.

Gear is nothing more of than a reflection of your playstyle and relative skill, terrain and what kind of margins you want and when you want them and, ofc, what task you are set to do and gear is only one parameter of many when trying to find your sweetspot.

As for me i dont need huge margins of error and i have no worries about conditions, traits and runes remove those worries, so i dont need huge a healthpool but i do need toughness for direct damage and crits for max AH. Does that make knights supreme, no its doesnt, it just makes them good for my style of play.

To me soldiers gear are probably the worst gear in wvw and dungeons and the reason for that is that soldiers, no crit, doesnt support my build and choice of traits and weapons and the huge healthpool is just a bigger margin of error which i dont need.

Brutaly.6257:

Agreed with the two posters above mine.

Gear is just a means to an end, stating that there is one “supreme” gear is just bad and shows that there might be a misunderstanding regarding the itemization and how traits/stats work and how to obtain them.

I could make a similar argument, as OP, that knights gear, or any other gear as well, are supreme but it would also be flawed.

Gear is nothing more of than a reflection of your playstyle and relative skill, terrain and what kind of margins you want and when you want them and, ofc, what task you are set to do and gear is only one parameter of many when trying to find your sweetspot.

As for me i dont need huge margins of error and i have no worries about conditions, traits and runes remove those worries, so i dont need huge a healthpool but i do need toughness for direct damage and crits for max AH. Does that make knights supreme, no its doesnt, it just makes them good for my style of play.

To me soldiers gear are probably the worst gear in wvw and dungeons and the reason for that is that soldiers, no crit, doesnt support my build and choice of traits and weapons and the huge healthpool is just a bigger margin of error which i dont need.

In general i actually have to agree with Brutaly here. Best gear really is up in the air. Between play style, traits, and character role it really can change what is best. For example for my self i tend to do better with 18k hp, 45% crit change, 30% crit damage, 2600 attack, 3000 armor, and 500 healing power. While others would abandon the healing power i find that it does make a big enough difference for me that another 300 attack power and 30% crit damage at the cost of 10% crit chance and 300 healing power is not worth it for my self yet others find it is. The biggest thing i have seen is infact toughness and crit chance seems to be the two biggest factors on guardian stats. Without those you will really be shooting yourself in the foot. A close 2nd is vitality and power.

In Orr and outdoors pve i roam with full zerker armor with boon duration to be able to build might and maintain it as long as possible. In Dungeons and any rough content where im called to defend my group, i go with Knights and vitality weapons, scoring around 16.5k HP.

If i wanna be a pure tank with much less damage i switch to Power/tough/vit. By why bother? Knights is the golden balance between DPS and Tanking.

Is Vitality better than DPS stats? Depends on your role in your team. If you do Arah Explorables, one member must be as tough as possible and draw aggro as much as possible to survive. But for the rest of the content, such survivability brings only diminishing returns – imo.

Danicco.3568:

Berserker is the best one for damage, no contest here.

I’m not agree, dead you do 0 damage.

chtiyonki.6284:

Danicco.3568:

Berserker is the best one for damage, no contest here.

I’m not agree, dead you do 0 damage.

Well damage =/= dps. You can still deal out high damage, but yes dps is 0 if you are dead. But no point in speccing in vit and armor when adding 200 toughness or 2000 vit still results in the boss 2 shotting you—maybe if the additional defensive stats gives you 1 more hit tolerance that makes sense, but it’s a wasted investment otherwise (I guess there’s condition dmg and mobs, but a well-balanced build can usually take those on well). There are different cases for everything so I’m just giving you an example.

chtiyonki.6284:

I’m not agree, dead you do 0 damage.

Hint: Don’t die then.