Guild Wars 2

As the title says. I’m looking for a discussion on what the best all round setup would be for a tanky guardian that goes into the thick of things.

I play in a guild that goes up against much bigger numbers pretty much all the time. So we have to run tanky!

Current setup:
4 * PVT Armor with Duration Rune Mix (2 water 2 others (monk?))
2 * Berserker Armor with Rubies
Jewelry mostly Valkyrie or Celestial (where I can afford them)

Weapons: Berserker Staff (always) and GS/Hammer!

0/0/30/20/20 (AH + shouts)

What I’m looking for is 17-20+k health combined with high armor. About 500-1000 healing power! While keeping my power and crit up as high as I can!

As I’m sure many others have gone this route or something similar (or even something different you think might work for me) I’m posting here.

Let me know what you guys have come up with!

And lets discuss rune options as well.

Is boon duration worth it?
How about Lyssa Runes?
Soldier Runes (I think that with enough other guardians and warriors, its not essential for me)?
Any other nice ideas around?

I would say go for Soldier runes instead of boon duration. Assuming you are going to be mainly in zergs and small skirmishes, there are 2 things that will kill you:
Spike dmg when 10 people tunnel you
Condition spam when you have 20 stacks of bleed, poison, chill and now torment.

In both scenarios, 3 extra seconds of prot and 6 extra seconds of regen will not make much a difference, however, the ability to clear 2 conditions at a time will. In addition, rolling with soldier runes will alleviate the need to run signet at all, and you can use shelter, which will safe your life more often than you imagine.

There are no tanks….you just survive longer when people spike auto atack you, it will be needed toughness and health for that.

Health+toughness > healing power, check invaders if you want a armor with less power and better vitality, might help when in a large group.

Hi, i run full PVT armor, 4 pieces of ascended PVT jewelry and 2 pieces of ascended zerker jewelry. Coupled with zerker greatsword and PVT staff. This gives me a very sturdy tanking mix while still retaining great damage. Right now i got something like 22k hp, 3.1k armor 64% crit chance with max sigil stack + fury and about 55-60% crit damage.

I use 0/5/30/30/5 trait build with SY, contemplation of fury and SYG. With this i can get rid of aoe conditions and give myself a giant pack of boons keeping me alive even more. I use traits to give both shouts and meditations a 48 sec cooldown, coupled with AH and 20% less cooldown on 2hand weaps.

This will keep you alive very well in zerg v zerg and make you feel like you`r still adding a good mix of damage (i still crit for 6-7k on a full WW) and survivability and support.

I run full knights armor with soldiers runes. I then run all PVT acessories/jewelry/back. 0/0/30/30/10 build. I smash into zergs and don’t die. Quite enjoyable actually.

I also run Knight set and Soldier runes 5/6 of them my stats
3775 Toughness (Food and Trait) have hit 3996 Toughness with warrior
21k HP
1968 Power
Crit and Crit Damage are 30%
Healing Power is 780 (1030)

Edit: 0/5/30/30/5

There is no “tanky” in WvW unless you mean the small scrimmages. It is usually trait for condition removals and also have shelter + renewed focus ready. Usually, I am one of the first people to rush in and I do burst damage. After this, I quickly run out using shelter + renewed focus back into our zerg. No amount of “tankiness” is gonna help you in this case without these 2 skills.

For runes your best bet is Soldiers last piece removes conditions not to mention you get more HP with it removing 2 conditions every 10 sec is nice also with shouts removes 2 conditions if you have Pure of voice Renewed Focus is i think the best elite skill guardians have combined with virtues

Vet.3726:

I also run Knight set and Soldier runes 5/6 of them my stats
3775 Toughness (Food and Trait) have hit 3996 Toughness with warrior
21k HP
1968 Power
Crit and Crit Damage are 30%
Healing Power is 780 (1030)

Edit: 0/5/30/30/5

Would be cool if you posted a link with a build on those stats.

I consider this a rather “tanky” build for both zerg and group roaming. It’s what I’ve been using since Chris posted the build.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/external?l=http%3A%2F%2Fintothemists.com%2Fcalc%2F%3Fbuild%3D-7%3B4NFV40M3FG-90%3B9%3B69TT%3B41%3B018A18BU-F8%3B2TudbUytb30ka0-k7%3B2Vl-sWv1-Z5_B58g0QF0J-9V-19cT

If I wanna go even more tanky I switch GS for mace/shield and swap stats to 0/0/20/30/20 taking II, VII, II, IX, XI, II, IX.

Works like a charm and my guildies appreciate the support it provides.

Vet.3726:

I also run Knight set and Soldier runes 5/6 of them my stats
3775 Toughness (Food and Trait) have hit 3996 Toughness with warrior
21k HP
1968 Power
Crit and Crit Damage are 30%
Healing Power is 780 (1030)

Edit: 0/5/30/30/5

Say what?

zTales.4392:

Vet.3726:

I also run Knight set and Soldier runes 5/6 of them my stats
3775 Toughness (Food and Trait) have hit 3996 Toughness with warrior
21k HP
1968 Power
Crit and Crit Damage are 30%
Healing Power is 780 (1030)

Edit: 0/5/30/30/5

Say what?

^my thoughts exactly. I’m actually more curious about your reasoning for using 5/6 solder runes instead of 6/6. why forego the sixth rune for the condition cleanse on shouts?

Puz.8529:

As the title says. I’m looking for a discussion on what the best all round setup would be for a tanky guardian that goes into the thick of things.

I play in a guild that goes up against much bigger numbers pretty much all the time. So we have to run tanky!

Current setup:
4 * PVT Armor with Duration Rune Mix (2 water 2 others (monk?))
2 * Berserker Armor with Rubies
Jewelry mostly Valkyrie or Celestial (where I can afford them)

Weapons: Berserker Staff (always) and GS/Hammer!

0/0/30/20/20 (AH + shouts)

What I’m looking for is 17-20+k health combined with high armor. About 500-1000 healing power! While keeping my power and crit up as high as I can!

As I’m sure many others have gone this route or something similar (or even something different you think might work for me) I’m posting here.

Let me know what you guys have come up with!

And lets discuss rune options as well.

Is boon duration worth it?
How about Lyssa Runes?
Soldier Runes (I think that with enough other guardians and warriors, its not essential for me)?
Any other nice ideas around?

How about -50% condition duration and +50% boon duration with ~2800 attack, 55% crit damage, 33% crit chance, ~3k armor and ~700 healing power (more with precision, blood or life stacks), and 17k HP? Using 0/0/30/20/20. You can easily achieve something like that, I’m pretty happy with my hybrid actually.

Some nice reactions here already! Would really love to see some of your Armor/Trinket setups. Especially how Vet.3726 and Khenzy.9348 actually reach those numbers!

Our groups usually have plenty of Warriors and Guardians to cleanse condis, would you guys say Soldier Runes are still the way to go?

^A mix of Celestial and Berserker trinckets (always put crit. damage on the jewels), a mix of Magi and Cleric Armor, Knight weapons, 2x Melandru Runes, 2x Monk Runes, 2x Water Runes, -40% condition duration food, sharpening stone.

Well, something like that, I’d let you figure the combination for yourself.

With Purity+Absolute Resolution x2 (Renewed Focus)+ -50% condi duration is more than enough condition protection, you don’t need Soldier Runes+Pure of Voice at all, so you can get AH for imba sustain with the Staff and get more boon uptime (=more regen, proc, retal, perma swiftness, etc.) with +50% boon duration.

Sandra Martino.3870:

Hi, i run full PVT armor, 4 pieces of ascended PVT jewelry and 2 pieces of ascended zerker jewelry. Coupled with zerker greatsword and PVT staff. This gives me a very sturdy tanking mix while still retaining great damage. Right now i got something like 22k hp, 3.1k armor 64% crit chance with max sigil stack + fury and about 55-60% crit damage.

2 pieces of beserker gear and 1 beserker weapon you have 64% crit and 60-65% crit damage – well sign me up!

You don’t have sigils at max all the time – you die sometimes unless you win every encounter which is either unlikely or boring and less applicable to roaming groups. You don’t have fury all the time. Only Save Yourselves gives it to you 25% of the time. I have 2 magi pieces of jewelry with jewels, a 5% crit sigil and maintenance oil and I get around 15-20% base crit.

I’m not trying to be confrontational but there are tradeoffs and the picture you paint is a bit too favorable. There are no free lunches.

my setup is a combine of Knights gear, accessories are a mixture of stuff once i get home i will let you guys know what i have the reason i only use 5/6 Soldier runes is i remove 2 conditions every 10sec plus i run 2 shouts with pure of voice last piece in armor is crest of soldier which gives me 20power 14 vit and 14 toughness i can hit over 4k toughness once i get my one ascended ring everything else is only exotic gear as for trait skills it all depends on who i run with since i have another guardian that runs full heal i work around that we can take waves of groups with no problem

Also for healing power on my side i have sigil 25 stacks of 10 healing power plus i run mace and shield and healing signet but once i get home i will post more