Guild Wars 2

So I’m one of those Guardians that runs around with a shield and a mace but I looked in to things well ahead of time so I’m not the type who thought I was going to be a ‘tank’ nor did I have delusions of being similar to… Well, a class from another game.

I’m about ready to purchase my final traits book for the crazy sum of two gold which naturally resets all my traits. I’ve been using the pretty standard ‘lots of end/vit/toughness’ ect ect.

I have no problems with running around ‘doing maps’ but I pretty much get destroyed in dungeons the same as everyone else seems to. I was thinking that perhaps my shield, armor, and build would keep me in the fight longer but it doesn’t really seem to help that much. Part of this is probably that I just don’t know what I’m doing, or I’m overlooking some critical timing/ability, or something, but nobody else seems to be doing any better.

If it’s not going to really help keep you alive in dungeons, and since you can’t really tank, I’m wondering what the point of having all this toughness and armor is. It just seems like that you’re giving up a lot of damage for marginally better survivability. The trade off seems disproportionate I suppose.

I did notice I could ‘sort of’ tank in a dungeon in as much as I could hold down a ‘gold’ enemy while people killed off the silvers. I almost think if people would just throw out a few of their ‘heals others’ abilities that I could hang in there. Perhaps too many people are focused on having every single solitary skill dedicated to blowing things up. I really don’t know.

Is it worth it to stick with the ‘durable’ Guardian thing? Outside of dungeons it seems to work fine but even there, what are you really gaining vs giving up?

Honestly I’m noticing the same things in pvp. No one is supposed to be able to front load a lot of damage and our mitigation abilities are typically 1 shot and then down for a 20-30 sec cooldown or a very very minor heal that is not noticeable on either myself or my team members.

The flip side of the coin I find that while I can go “glass cannon” and try to stack power or crit/crit dmg, it does not have the same results if I were to go to a more offensive oriented profession, as the guardian is renown for being “defensive” the whole time the games paradigm is to make it so there isn’t really any reliable defense, but situational defense.

Downside to situational defense in pvp is that you are fighting 2 or 3 or more people so you can’t possibly utilize your defensive abilities against all of them spamming various attacks at once and you don’t have the fearful damage to make them back off.

While I have run into numerous people who swear by the guardian profession and excitedly show case how much they can survive, I have yet to “see” any of this in action and in spvp I tend to see the guardians dead or not even a threat.

World pve I feel fine, pvp and wvw I feel somewhat worthless. I want to be as defensive as we are supposedly touted to be and I think the problem lies in our mechanics themselves.

In a game where there are no tanks or healers, and everyone is responsible for keeping themselves healed and alive, but we have a class that is supposedly defensive. It is supposed to survive better than others because of healing/buffing/tanking or it can help others stay alive because of healing/buffing/mitigating. So the result is the guardian profession loses out on damage and has low hp because of this “tankieness”.

I see no positive results because the game ends up defeating the profession as it was built to be something that the game does not want.

The other problem seems to be with no tanks and no real major forms of crowd control dungeons go from a challenge to a chaotic mess that gets everyone killed. In or out of a dungeon if the mob is not actively attacking me in a group situation then all I’m doing is wasting time with poor dps. Switching to another weapon doesn’t really help that much since I’m not set up to do damage regardless.

And due to that poor dps, you’re never going to get aggro. Being tough at the expense of damage is pointless if you can’t get anything to hit you because your DPS is so low.

The only situation where this works out is solo. I can take on things and situations I just can’t do on other characters.

As stated I can ‘sort of’ tank in dungeons in as much as I can hold on to a gold while the party deals with the silvers, but my healing can’t keep up, and nobody seems to care about using any abilities that heal other people. You’re not going to ‘be a healer’ and keep somebody up and alive, but if everyone in the group quit spamming dps as fast as possible and threw out some healing things would go so much better.

I think you guys are playing Guardian wrong.

You’re not supposed to “tank” damage, you’re supposed to avoid it while managing your CDs to reduce dmg and replenish health.
Some bosses need to have their 1shot mechanics fixed, but beyond that I find the Guardian great at staying alive in all pve/pvp/wvw.
It’s really all about timing your defenses, dodging (thanks Vigor), moving, and managing our CDs and their cooldowns.

I use this build: http://gw2skills.net/editor/en/?fUAQNAR5elYgyCHFSPEfIFS2DRCBLJ7DEEmCMKjuFA;T8AA1ynEOJdS9kyJKwMgJAzCmDMJYLCGEsJA

Red Falcon, I know exactly what you mean and that is the typical response anyone gets if they raise these same concerns, and I assure you I am watching big power up moves and rolling to my hearts desire. I am getting out of red rings on the ground and poping blinds/blocks/protection when everything else fails as far as avoiding damage. I also try to save my team mates whenever they are getting ganged up on, I want to heal them or block attacks, or help them run away.

I “want” to do those things they provided for us, but they provided them to us in a I would dare say weak manner.

And a semi counter argument to not “tanking” damage might be the whole idea of warriors having more base HP than us, but we make up for that in our ability to “heal” and “mitigate” damage better than any other class. So theoretically we are more durable than a warrior due to our self heals (namely virtue of resolve is what is often cited as the reason for having less hp). The problem with this is that in any situation where you are worrying about surviving damage, you would want a bigger health pool versus running in circles waiting for regen to tick the whole while you are getting beat on harder than your regen ticks for.

It almost seems to me that they designed a ranged support class around melee oriented abilities.

I do feel guardians perform well in open world pve. I have only done a few dungeons so I do not have good feedback on the performance there, but I played primarly a defensive role and tried to block/blind/heal for my team as much as possible. First time I ran I mentioned it felt like I didn’t do much but the team said that they had very few downs compared to other runs so whatever I was doing must have been helping.

My biggest concern is in pvp/wvw. Our situational abilities become laughable as there are 2 or 3 or 50 situations happening all at once and our abilities only let us respond to one individually.

I think we need some more tangible form of defense or utility/support to bring to the table besides buffing protection or single block or blind every 20 or 30 seconds in a practically point blank range or providing weak healing that the game itself says you are not supposed to be a heal bot.

The one thing we can do well is provide might to large masses of people. Doing that one thing is far from being what I would consider a “support” role.

Initial thoughts on how to improve our defensive plays style would be to change block and blind to provide protection for a 1-3 second window versus simply the next attack. Or lower the cooldowns on blocks/aegis or even protection boons so they are more than a simple gimick.

If you want to play Defensive…. [I just woke up, so I’m going to be a tad short here.]

Sword + Focus. [When you swap to this weapon, regain 50% endurance.]
Greatsword. [When you kill an enemy, regenerate all Endurance.]
10% Damage reduction Sigil.
Save yourself.
Smite Condition.
Shelter or Signet of Resolve depending on the boss.
Enough points into the heal tree to gain ‘heal when rolling.’
Enough points to get 50% Aegis trigger.
Enough points to get purging a condition every 10 seconds.
Enough points to get ‘when you activate Virtue of Justice, nearby enemies are blinded.’
Enough points to get ‘when you kill an enemy, Virtue of Justice is refreshed.’

Start of fight use your greatsword to increase damage on the boss. Use rolls, etc. Minor adds will keep your endurance full as they die and each roll will heal you. Every time you kill an enemy, use Virtue of Justice to reblind everything. Your own blind should be on cool down at all times. Don’t forget to use your pull to interrupt attacks. When endurance gets low and there aren’t any adds to kill to refresh your endurance, switch to your sword. The refreshed endurance + Blind x2 + Three hit block from your #5 will prevent at least six hits of damage. Do everything in your power to keep above 50%, so you can continue to refresh Aegis for free.

So all in all…
Aegis – blocks an attack. Refreshes at 50% Hp, or every 40 seconds. 90 second cd if used, not really worth it to burn the cool down.
Virtue of Justice – Blind every 30 seconds [or when enemy is killed.]
Leap of Faith – Blind every 20 seconds.
Flashing Blade – Blind every 10 seconds.
Ray of Judgement – Blind every 20 seconds.
Shield of Wrath – 3 blocks every 45 seconds.
Shelter – 2 second block + Heal every 30 seconds. [If picked.]
Constant supply of endurance to continue to roll when there are adds to kill.
10% Less damage from every attack.

The level of pure avoidance you have is insane as a Guardian. You can if you want, spec into Runes of Water to gain another blind every 10 seconds.

Agree with Ran 100%. I use almost that exact same set-up, only with a Sword & Torch. The Virtue of Justice refresh & Blind on activation can have me pretty much solo-ing Champions and DEs.

It sounds like from your experience in dungeon/pve with this build has been productive.

I have run a similar build minus the weapon sigils to try to roll/heal as much as possible. While the heal while rolling is one of the best heals per healing power gained, it just isn’t enough and I did not have the needed endurance to maintain to any worthwhile extent.

I did identify the 50% aegis and tested it a few times in the mists/pvp section and it was not triggering on successive attempts while keeping virtue of courage down to not confuse aegis effects (I would let myself drop below 50 and then heal and drop again). This shows that there is an internal cooldown on that 50% aegis even though the tooltip does not state that fact.

If there is one thing guardians can do it is blind the enemy. We do that well, but that is just one attack every 10/20/30 seconds, versus an environment where you have 4 or 5 or 10 attacks flying at you at one time. Saving yourself from 1000 damage only to be hit by another 9000 damage no matter what you do, then having no more answers for being “defensive”.

I do think what is limiting me in the endurance regen in pvp is that players have a downed state, so I don’t get that immediate refresh of endurance as soon as someone hits 0 hp, because you have to keep hitting the downed player or do a finisher move before they “die”.

As I said, in pve I have had great success with the guardian and can do things my other professions can not. PvP on the other than I feel it is lackluster. Not worthless, just not as competitive as it could be.

The advice and responses are good. I’m learning some things and thinking here but I think you’re missing the larger picture. Whatever method you use to avoid the damage isn’t really the issue so much as finding yourself in situations time in again where your mitigation methods don’t matter since the monster isn’t actually attacking you.

I’m willing to flatly state even given my limited experience that there is nothing you’re going to survive against using slightly different builds than I use. The differences are either going to be insignificant or situational. I can take on a Champion for quite a long time too and do so well enough to actually tell others to make a break for it since I can tell when we’re not going to win.

The problem is that if you’re going to go for a survivability spec in a game without tanking then you’ve put yourself in a strange place since you’ve got no method to take advantage of that in group situations, particularly dungeons where it won’t help you that much.

The best fortress ever built is just a pretty pile of rocks if nothing is attacking it and you spent so much on that fort that you just don’t have the army to send out when your fortress isn’t being assaulted.

CMF.5461:

It sounds like from your experience in dungeon/pve with this build has been productive.

He was talking about PVE, so I responded about PVE.

irinawds.9627:

The best fortress ever built is just a pretty pile of rocks if nothing is attacking it and you spent so much on that fort that you just don’t have the army to send out when your fortress isn’t being assaulted.

The talent suggestions I posted leave you with 35 unspent points and two power slots. You’re also equipped with what many consider the best damaging weapon as well. Even without speccing for Toughness/Vit, you’re going to have a tremendous level of avoidance while still having room to focus on Damage or Support. If anything, the fact that you aren’t always going to have threat means you’re able to keep Aegis/Rolls prepared for when you are.

The thing is, with this build… The champion can never kill you. The ability to rotate through blinds/shields/rolls prevents it from ever doing enough damage.

As stated I considered that. I absolutely believe your build would work just fine. Great in fact. I just don’t think it, or any other build, is going to keep you alive in situations that would kill me. The problem is that damage mitigation, whatever the method, just isn’t compensating for the damage when you DO take it in dungeons and even if and when it does you run in to a problem of it only being of use when things will actually attack you.

You’re preaching to the converted. I know what you say will work at least as well, if not slightly better than what I currently use but I don’t think it will address the other issues.

Ran.4261:

If you want to play Defensive…. [I just woke up, so I’m going to be a tad short here.]

Sword + Focus. [When you swap to this weapon, regain 50% endurance.]
Greatsword. [When you kill an enemy, regenerate all Endurance.]
10% Damage reduction Sigil.
Save yourself.
Smite Condition.
Shelter or Signet of Resolve depending on the boss.
Enough points into the heal tree to gain ‘heal when rolling.’
Enough points to get 50% Aegis trigger.
Enough points to get purging a condition every 10 seconds.
Enough points to get ‘when you activate Virtue of Justice, nearby enemies are blinded.’
Enough points to get ‘when you kill an enemy, Virtue of Justice is refreshed.’

Start of fight use your greatsword to increase damage on the boss. Use rolls, etc. Minor adds will keep your endurance full as they die and each roll will heal you. Every time you kill an enemy, use Virtue of Justice to reblind everything. Your own blind should be on cool down at all times. Don’t forget to use your pull to interrupt attacks. When endurance gets low and there aren’t any adds to kill to refresh your endurance, switch to your sword. The refreshed endurance + Blind x2 + Three hit block from your #5 will prevent at least six hits of damage. Do everything in your power to keep above 50%, so you can continue to refresh Aegis for free.

So all in all…
Aegis – blocks an attack. Refreshes at 50% Hp, or every 40 seconds. 90 second cd if used, not really worth it to burn the cool down.
Virtue of Justice – Blind every 30 seconds [or when enemy is killed.]
Leap of Faith – Blind every 20 seconds.
Flashing Blade – Blind every 10 seconds.
Ray of Judgement – Blind every 20 seconds.
Shield of Wrath – 3 blocks every 45 seconds.
Shelter – 2 second block + Heal every 30 seconds. [If picked.]
Constant supply of endurance to continue to roll when there are adds to kill.
10% Less damage from every attack.

The level of pure avoidance you have is insane as a Guardian. You can if you want, spec into Runes of Water to gain another blind every 10 seconds.

I went for this build, utilizing blind, but im finding difficulty in dungeons. Most bosses have passive buff which reduces effectiveness of blind to 10% as well as others that reduces effectiveness of Conditions. Its only useful for clearing trash mobs imo. When taking on bosses, my only friends are block and protection.