Guild Wars 2

I just find it ridiculous that a class being marketed as mostly support-based, with canon lore and iconography descending them from the Monks of GW1, does not have a viable Healer spec in GW2. Why?

True, we have the ability to share passive Virtue of Resolve (complete with 15% endurance buff), Signet of Courage every 10s, and Mace autoattack. This is a VERY effective method of healing, but it is unorthodox to play.

What’s worse, we cannot properly compete with Grace of the Land for buffs, OR Tempest for pure healing. But those are side issues to the main point: We NEED a heal spec.

One change I’d like to see is perhaps Staff as a ranged support weapon instead of a lootstick? One idea I can think of to simply expand the radius on Orb of Light to that of Solar Beam. Perhaps some other changes too. But the Staff seems like a very intuitive candidate for a healing-focused weapon, rather than the weird gameplay with Mace/Shield.

What are your thoughts? Should the successor to Monk get a viable Healing spec at SOME point of GW2’s lifetime?

I always found it strange that since the specialization update, Guardian has been a relatively terrible support class. In PvE, the support is non-existent, in sPvP it’s meh, and in WvW it’s passable because of “Stand Your Ground!” and traited VoC. I believe that staff needs to be brought up to speed by the following:
1 – Heals allies when used like Water 1 for ele on staff.
2 – Increased base CD and area targetted, travels to that area and blows up there.
3 – Symbol should heal or cleanse conditions when dropped (like how Longbow burns when it is dropped).
4 – Remove might, make it heal per pulse instead of at the end, and make it give 5 stacks of GotL at the end.
5 – Heals those who pass through it.

Fixing staff would go a long way to healing out support Guardian. Mace still needs some help (quicker symbol and better auto heals imo), though Shield is in a fine spot. The biggest problems with support Guardian is the weapons suck, the utilities have to long of CD (though Anet has been reducing them at a snails pace) and nothing has DPS support.

Azoqu.8917:

1 – Heals allies when used like Water 1 for ele on staff.
2 – Increased base CD and area targetted, travels to that area and blows up there.
3 – Symbol should heal or cleanse conditions when dropped (like how Longbow burns when it is dropped).
4 – Remove might, make it heal per pulse instead of at the end, and make it give 5 stacks of GotL at the end.
5 – Heals those who pass through it.

Boom, Staff is fixed!

Was that so hard?

Personally, I like the way skill 2 has a short enough cooldown that it works as a substitute long-range auto when needed. I’d probably make it ground-targeted, remove the cooldown increase on detonation, and reduce the healing on detonation if needed for balancing.

Mind you, if skill 2 was able to do current detonate healing with a 3s recharge, that would probably make staff a viable healing option right there. :P

draxynnic.3719:

Personally, I like the way skill 2 has a short enough cooldown

The single problem with skill 2 is its radius.

Try switching between solar beam on druid to Orb of Light on Guardian, you will see what I mean. Allies do not receive heals unless standing exactly inside the orb, while Solar Beam has a wider area of effect.

If they fix that, then Guardians will be able to heal quite well.

Of course, the alternative is to not increase the recharge on detonate. That is a stupid mechanic due to WvW fears.

Don’t worry, we are gettign a mesmer spec next expansion to go with the ranger spec of HoT.

You know devs have no clue on how to handle guardian, when their idea of giving them a support spec is copying mesmer. “That’s a good support, right?”.

Well, I’ve generally regarded guardians and mesmers as being somewhat two sides of the same coin… or at least adjacent sides on a polygon. They have a lot of similarities, and chronomancer moved mesmer even closer to guardian in many ways (high block uptime, more melee-oriented focus, fields that harm enemies while aiding allies). Alacrity is something completely new, of course, and being able to grant perma-quickness to a party is expanding on a capability which was shared between the mesmer (Time Warp) and guardian (Feel My Wrath) beforehand.

If the leak is accurate and one of the main features of the new elite spec is the capability to grant perma-quickness, then I’d regard that as more of a ‘meeting in the middle’ scenario.

Regardless, we’ve apparently been told there’ll be no new healing specs. We’ll see if that means that the druid monopoly will be retained, or whether it’s more of a case of other professions not needing so much of a boost to be able to compete.

The only connection to mesmer are the supposed mantras as skills. Axe has no relation, kit-like virtues are engineer related, initiative pips are thief related, and the rest of the unknown aspects have undetermined relation. Just mantras don’t make for a particularly strong case.

probably when we get aoe shared stances….. like the paragon on a non elite spec…

pistol main with options to carry hammer + offhand XD diablo3 alike

getting all new weapons locked under elite specs w/o having decent roles with some of the weapons we have is very very lackluster..

elite specs should not be locked to weapons, we should get a non elite tied to a weapon and then a elite new trait tied to a role, both per expansion cause the way Anet is doing it is very imba and limited in everything..

Ghotistyx.6942:

The only connection to mesmer are the supposed mantras as skills. Axe has no relation, kit-like virtues are engineer related, initiative pips are thief related, and the rest of the unknown aspects have undetermined relation. Just mantras don’t make for a particularly strong case.

The leaker also said that the new guardian spec was able to provide permanent quickness to a raid group (or at least a portion therof), which is essentially taking (part of) the role currently taken by chronomancer. I think that more than the mantras was what RabbitUp was referring to.

However, this is a chronomancer capability, not a core mesmer capability. So if the leaker’s testimony is accurate, then what you’ve essentially got is two elite specialisations arriving at a similar direction that is outside the capabilities of either core profession.

I’m also expecting that the new elite specialisation will have other things they can do, just as chronomancers can do more than being a source of quickness.

draxynnic.3719, well Anet sucks awfully at class design and game balance… i would not find strange if they gave 100% uptime of same boon to diferent classes…

Personally, I’d actually consider it to be a good thing if that happened. One of the things in the GW2 manifesto was that you shouldn’t have to wait for a specific profession to bring a specific capability before you can do content. Under that thinking, monopolies that are as impactful as 100% group quickness uptime should be broken, either by removing the capability or by granting it to other professions.

Aeolus.3615:

draxynnic.3719, well Anet sucks awfully at class design and game balance… i would not find strange if they gave 100% uptime of same boon to diferent classes…

Giving 100% uptime of the same boon to different classes would be the exact opposite of “suck[ing] awfully”. It would be a (rare) step in the right direction.

CptAurellian.9537:

Aeolus.3615:

draxynnic.3719, well Anet sucks awfully at class design and game balance… i would not find strange if they gave 100% uptime of same boon to diferent classes…

Giving 100% uptime of the same boon to different classes would be the exact opposite of “suck[ing] awfully”. It would be a (rare) step in the right direction.

care to explain?
Cause to me that aplyes if a dev:
-dont know what to do for a class
-dont know how to balance a class that gives diferent things
-need to give 100% uptime of some boon to make players leech some gimmcik?

lets says every one ends with aoe shared allacry, 100% uptime of the same boons… right direction?
That is what kills pvp, some classes start to do much in this design, some classes to be good at somethign that isnt usefull or is easilly underwhlmed since other class can do better with better gimmicks, theres alot of ways to end in a bad gameplay with that.

Chronomancers typically only achieve 100% uptime of quickness in raid situations, with concentration gear, predictable rotations, runes and consumables that increase boon duration, the allies receiving the boon to be appropriately placed, and so on. It’s not something that you’ll ever see in PvP.

I’m pretty sure that any future ‘100% quickness uptime’ spec will be the same. You can do it with a specialised build when spanking a boss, but you won’t see it in PvP situations, where people are usually using a completely different build.

We’re not talking about anything relevant to PvP here, but to raid balance. And in that context, balance would be improved by breaking the monopolies.

Exaggeration does not substitute valid arguments. Every class giving out everything would not be good design for obvious reasons. However, having two or maybe even three classes that can satisfactorily fulfill a given role (e.g. “provide 100% quickness” or “provide banner effects”) would allow for much greater flexibility than we currently have. Right now, the buff distribution means that certain classes are essentially mandatory for teams (like warr/druid/mes in raids, guardian apparently in WvW zergs, etc.). In my opinion, no single class should be mandatory, although a healthy mix of classes should be beneficial for any team.

€: Was too slow. This post is directed at Aeolus.

I have since updated OP with my newer opinions. It seems that Magi Guardian with Mace/Shield is actually a VERY good combo for healing if you share Virtue of Resolve and equip Signet of Courage. For utilities, you have Sanctuary, Merciful Intervention (the shadowstep that heals 4000+ on allies), and Bow of Truth. Take the trait that heals off aegis, too. Valor and Virtues will be glued to your traits, but the third traitline can be swapped with ease, and all augment your healing capabilities in some way. Radiance improves signets and thus your Signet of Courage passives every, while Honor can reduce shield and meditation cd, Zeal reduces Spirit Weapon cd for more bow of truth uber heals.

I was able to successfully heal groups through Gorseval No Updraft and Keep Construct.

The problem when I say “viable” is Grace of the Land, and Spirits. First, despite Grace of the Land being 10-man now, pugs have yet to adapt to a single-druid rotation. Secondly, because spirits are 5-man only, when we run a mirror comp, the second group does not get spirit buffs.

My suggestions would be to add Grace of the Land to Empower on staff, and to simply change Ranger spirits to 10man. If we compromise like alacrity and add Grace stacks to other healers (or remove it from the game, frankly), and allow spirits to be 10man, we will see a new meta where people use a 1-druid meta, with options for second class to be a versatile healer.

draxynnic.3719:

Regardless, we’ve apparently been told there’ll be no new healing specs. We’ll see if that means that the druid monopoly will be retained, or whether it’s more of a case of other professions not needing so much of a boost to be able to compete.

This is the weird thing, druid doesn’t have a healing monopoly, in that there are classes that can heal just as much and even better in the case of Ventari Rev and Aurashare water temp.

What druid has is the unique buffs. And from a design perspective, drud was so focused on healing, that almost every ability had a healing component. So, maybe that’s what’s missing from the next xpac. I mean nobody would ever call tempest a healing spec, but it did add a great healing build to ele.

CptAurellian.9537:

Exaggeration does not substitute valid arguments. Every class giving out everything would not be good design for obvious reasons. However, having two or maybe even three classes that can satisfactorily fulfill a given role (e.g. “provide 100% quickness” or “provide banner effects”) would allow for much greater flexibility than we currently have. Right now, the buff distribution means that certain classes are essentially mandatory for teams (like warr/druid/mes in raids, guardian apparently in WvW zergs, etc.). In my opinion, no single class should be mandatory, although a healthy mix of classes should be beneficial for any team.

€: Was too slow. This post is directed at Aeolus.

Thats all good but how ANet does stuff is arround exaggerations… NO class should have 100% uptime of anything… its a awfull concept sicne ANet does not know how to work arround that unless for some cheap mechanics/gimmicks spam stacks etc.

IF the new class has 100% uptime quickness i hope it isnt shared… WvW for zerg aoe spam with 100% quickness and allacry together will make the gameplay from stupid to the worst mmo ever… wich will make wvw worse and make more players abandon the game..
This is why GW2is the worst pvp game, classes design are pve based…

Anet needs to make a book called “how to wreck your own product for dummies”

Nope, the copyright on that book already belongs to Carbine Studios for what they did to Wildstar.

Anyway, I also wouldn’t mind if 100% uptime on anything was impossible for a single character of any class. Such constraints would probably be a trivial aspect to anything in PvE and I simply don’t care enough about PvP and PvD. However, it’s rather obvious that such restrictions most likely won’t happen, so I’ll continue to ask for 100% stuff being given to other classes in order to break the current monopolies.

guess ncsoft needs to make the 2nd edition of the book loool

well this game is designed for pve only… reason they are doing that, since i cant follow pve on this game i spend all the time in WvW, wich where im not on the pvd side.

Second edition is pretty hard. All of the GW2 kittenups are pretty harmless compared to what happened in WS.

dammn i know some people that played that but didnt know it were that bad

maybe those guys are working on Anet now?

Nah, ANet produced enough fails long before WS went live. Can’t see a big change here, they just went on doing the same bad balance and other stuff.

Aeolus.3615:

This is why GW2is the worst pvp game, classes design are pve based"

Never playd ff14 pvp huh ?

RabbitUp.8294:

draxynnic.3719:

Regardless, we’ve apparently been told there’ll be no new healing specs. We’ll see if that means that the druid monopoly will be retained, or whether it’s more of a case of other professions not needing so much of a boost to be able to compete.

This is the weird thing, druid doesn’t have a healing monopoly, in that there are classes that can heal just as much and even better in the case of Ventari Rev and Aurashare water temp.

What druid has is the unique buffs. And from a design perspective, drud was so focused on healing, that almost every ability had a healing component. So, maybe that’s what’s missing from the next xpac. I mean nobody would ever call tempest a healing spec, but it did add a great healing build to ele.

Yeah, it is more of a case of a monopoly on being able to perform the healing role while also providing unique buffs.

Aeolus.3615:

Thats all good but how ANet does stuff is arround exaggerations… NO class should have 100% uptime of anything… its a awfull concept sicne ANet does not know how to work arround that unless for some cheap mechanics/gimmicks spam stacks etc.

IF the new class has 100% uptime quickness i hope it isnt shared… WvW for zerg aoe spam with 100% quickness and allacry together will make the gameplay from stupid to the worst mmo ever… wich will make wvw worse and make more players abandon the game..
This is why GW2is the worst pvp game, classes design are pve based…

Anet needs to make a book called “how to wreck your own product for dummies”

Again, you’re complaining about the effect on PvP balance of something that simply isn’t done in PvP.

The chronomancer perma-quickness rotation requires stacking your team in a predictable fashion and dedicating basically your entire build and rotation to it, giving you little left to fight other players with. It works in PvE boss fights because the bosses, by and large, do not respond to what the players are doing, but anybody trying this in a PvP situation will get laughed at, outmaneuvered, bombarded with AoE, and slaughtered, not necessarily in that order. I don’t think anybody with any experience in GW2 PvP would even consider trying it.

In the PvE situations, having perma-quickness may actually be better for balance than having lesser quickness uptimes – with perma-quickness, you only need one or two quickness-providing characters to do the job. Without, you’d likely just have people taking additional quickness-providing characters to fill the gap, leaving less room for people to bring professions who don’t provide group quickness.

draxynnic.3719:

In the PvE situations, having perma-quickness may actually be better for balance than having lesser quickness uptimes – with perma-quickness, you only need one or two quickness-providing characters to do the job. Without, you’d likely just have people taking additional quickness-providing characters to fill the gap, leaving less room for people to bring professions who don’t provide group quickness.

I can totally agree with this. I could see that if quickness was only provided by Timewarp and Feel my Wrath (pre elite specs), Guardians would be the only viable DPS bringing FmW and enough boon uptime between them to provide 100% quickness. Since the game would be at a point where quickness is a 50% DPS increase and upkeeping it would outweight other classes that did more DPS. Meanwhile sharing the perma upkeep love lets DPS still be any class and you just swap the buffer out.

draxynnic.3719:

RabbitUp.8294:

draxynnic.3719:

Regardless, we’ve apparently been told there’ll be no new healing specs. We’ll see if that means that the druid monopoly will be retained, or whether it’s more of a case of other professions not needing so much of a boost to be able to compete.

This is the weird thing, druid doesn’t have a healing monopoly, in that there are classes that can heal just as much and even better in the case of Ventari Rev and Aurashare water temp.

What druid has is the unique buffs. And from a design perspective, drud was so focused on healing, that almost every ability had a healing component. So, maybe that’s what’s missing from the next xpac. I mean nobody would ever call tempest a healing spec, but it did add a great healing build to ele.

Yeah, it is more of a case of a monopoly on being able to perform the healing role while also providing unique buffs.

If firebrand can heal (they do have something of a healing build now, and the F2 tome should only add to that) and provide perma-quickness, that would be good enough to replace 1 druid. You would have a cranger take the missing spirits and spotter, and GotL is 10-man.

Alternatively, perma-quickness with good condi dps (something like 25k, which is not high at all) is enough to replace at least 1 chrono, since alacrity provides about 15k dps total when shared among 5. You can still have a chronotank that can bring portal, and share some alacrity among the group, even if not perma. Squads played with 1 mesmer anyway before the herald nerf.

That’s assuming guardian provides no unique buffs, which I hope is not the case. Being only barely able to break through the mirror comp is not a great place to be in, I would like firebrand to be brought for what they themselves offer, not because they do a good enough job matching the opposition.

I’ve been armchair designing what I would love from the Firebrand. I’ll share it once its in a more complete state, but I think I really like where I’m at with its healing aspects and how it plays / builds differently than other traditional healers in GW2 thus far:

The minor traits impact the tomes and the stats you effectively have while using a tome. The tome’s abilities calculate their stats by converting some of your other stats to usable stats:

Tome of Wrath abilities Convert Healing Power into Condition Duration.
Tome of Perseverance abilities Convert Condition Damage into Healing Power.
Tome of Will abilities Convert Condition Damage into Power.

This would allow for the Seraph’s Condi/Crit primary, Healing / Boon Duration secondary, be very usable for all three tomes.

My “kit” loadouts for each Tome are very distinct play styles, each functioning well at 1200 range if needed. I’ve called the initiative-like pip mechanic “Conviction” and you gain Convictions passively at a rate of 1 per second while a Tome is equipped, and you can gain additional conviction for performing specific trait triggers or by channeling some Mantras while traited. This gates the class a bit so it cant easily switch from “full on” healing to “full on” offensive support super easily. That said, the “Elite” Mantra’s active effect is to gain “full Conviction” on use, but thats at the cost of using your Elite of course!

One last thing on Tomes: Each Tome’s 4th skill is a VERY large area skill that is a new class of skill called a “Circle.” Circle spells must be channeled to maintain them (think the casting time of Meteor Shower stretched out to a 5 second cast), but the effect a massive area (think like an area of 900 radius!) and effect up to 10 total allies and 10 total enemies at a time. These are among the most high Conviction costing abilities on the Tomes, but allow a single Firebrand to strongly effect their entire raid/a lot of their warband at the cost of a very high amount of Conviction and the opportunity cost of having to maintain the channeled effect to get the benefit of this extremely large symbol (but not a Symbol for trait interactions as this would be broken as kitten).

for the specifics on the Tomes

Wrath is all about Condi damage and offensive damage support in the form of a new profession specific damage enhancement called Zeal. Zeal is short duration but very powerful damage enhancement that you really have to work to maintain. Traits interact with it a bit as well, but basically it is a 10 stack effect that increases all damage by 2% per stack. Maintaining high Zeal uptime will be hard while just healing, but some traits could make it work. Additionally, the “very high quickness uptime” is built into this tome.

Tome of Perseverance is all about healing, condi removal, and protection and resistance. Unique to the Firebrand, they have a minor trait which allows Precision and Ferocity to effect your healing abilities, allowing them to crit and receive critical multiplies. This can allow for the base guardian’s otherwise lacking heal power ratios to be upscale to quite nice numbers if crit chance can be increased.

Tome of Will is all about control and raw power damage, and “hard light” type spells. It has a wall of light spell that can launch tall-but-not-super-wide moving Ward light field forward that continuously Knocks Back foes along its path and destroys projectiles, and can be reactivated to become stationary Ward at its current location during its flight. It also super focuses on being able to grant large amounts of stability, and to stun foes. Basically, a crowd control dream with moderate power damage potential, which can be supported as a decent control-power build full on with traits.

I haven’t finished all the Mantras yet but they are shaping up nicely.

Pacifism better make a return, that was one of the most visually impresive skills in the game.

Just make AH affect allies as well, in a 600 radius to match shouts and add an aoe heal (SA) to shouts (600 range and about 800 heal) that scales extremely (1/1) well with healing power. Increase the gain from healing power in AH.

No need to change staff at all and it would increase the number of viable builds with a number of weapon choices.

Healing spec done!

Brutaly.6257:

Just make AH affect allies as well, in a 600 radius to match shouts and add an aoe heal (SA) to shouts (600 range) that scales extremely (1/1) well with healing power. Increase the gain from healing power in AH.

No need to change staff at all and it would increase the number of viable builds with a number of weapon choices.

Healing spec done!

That would cause a ridiculous hps when combined with the current healing capabilities.

I’d rather not heal through shouts anyway, warrior and temp do that already, and shouts are some of our most boring skills.

RabbitUp.8294:

I’d rather not heal through shouts anyway, warrior and temp do that already, and shouts are some of our most boring skills.

The heal from the shout would be minor compared to the potential of AH. It was just a suggestion to bring the shouts up to date with other professions shouts.

Remove the heal from the shouts (even though SA is underpowered compared to other shout traits) and you would still end up with a very good healer.

So just make AH heal in 600 range, that would be enough in any game mode. 1700 heals from SyG alone is pretty sweet.

Ghotistyx.6942:

Brutaly.6257:

Just make AH affect allies as well, in a 600 radius to match shouts and add an aoe heal (SA) to shouts (600 range) that scales extremely (1/1) well with healing power. Increase the gain from healing power in AH.

No need to change staff at all and it would increase the number of viable builds with a number of weapon choices.

Healing spec done!

That would cause a ridiculous hps when combined with the current healing capabilities.

Yepp, in skilled squads, in unskilled squads it would be useless.

It would be skill based and as such it should also be very rewarding when executed well.

Suddenly a guardian would be about area control indeed.

AH should certainly not affect allies. It’s not a support trait. It’s a trait purely for self-survival (hence why it’s in Valor), and no trait like that should also offer a substantial amount of support. If it only affected allies, that’d be fine, but that’s a very different kind of trait, ultimately. If it did both, you’d probably have a tanky super healer (in other words, broken).

Kain Francois.4328:

True, we have the ability to share passive Virtue of Resolve (complete with 15% endurance buff), Signet of Courage every 10s, and Mace autoattack. This is a VERY effective method of healing, but it is unorthodox to play.

That’s roughly 600 non-burst healing per second with high healing power (without % outgoing healing), not exactly impressive. Water Blast spamming from eles can beat that just by itself. There are far better ways to heal with a guardian.

Kain Francois.4328:

The single problem with skill 2 is its radius.

Try switching between solar beam on druid to Orb of Light on Guardian, you will see what I mean. Allies do not receive heals unless standing exactly inside the orb, while Solar Beam has a wider area of effect.

If they fix that, then Guardians will be able to heal quite well..

Not exactly. The detonation of Orb of Light roughly heals 4x the amount that the projectile does (probably a bit more?), but detonating it puts it on a 4 times longer cooldown. The detonation is also far easier to hit your allies with. In other words, the detonation is basically there if you choose to heal with it, and the orb itself serves as more of a projectile attack (even though in theory it offers the same healing per second), although it’s possible to get the heal from the projectile and then detonate it to get both heals.
Also, Solar Beam’s healing value is kind of terrible, so not exactly the best comparison.

RabbitUp.8294:

Pacifism better make a return, that was one of the most visually impresive skills in the game.

Hopefully all of the tome skills make a return. :p

RabbitUp.8294:

I’d rather not heal through shouts anyway, warrior and temp do that already, and shouts are some of our most boring skills.

^

Fashion Mage.3712:

RabbitUp.8294:

Pacifism better make a return, that was one of the most visually impresive skills in the game.

Hopefully all of the tome skills make a return. :p

Honestly, I didn’t like how formulaic the old tomes left, so I hope we don’t force the ribbons and cones skills in there. If they can make them work, sure, but I don’t see why the skills between tomes should share a mechanical pattern.

Then, the aoe knockback and aoe daze were overlapping a lot, not every tome needs cc, so I would prefer they give each tome a more clear identity.

RabbitUp.8294:

Then, the aoe knockback and aoe daze were overlapping a lot, not every tome needs cc, so I would prefer they give each tome a more clear identity.

Judgment was more of an AoE nuke than just CC, and it looked a fair bit more flashy than Pacifism, although I liked both skills. Judgment would’ve been a lot better if it was ground-targeted.

Fashion Mage.3712:

AH should certainly not affect allies. It’s not a support trait. It’s a trait purely for self-survival (hence why it’s in Valor), and no trait like that should also offer a substantial amount of support. If it only affected allies, that’d be fine, but that’s a very different kind of trait, ultimately. If it did both, you’d probably have a tanky super healer (in other words, broken).

That arguement doesnt hold up imo.

Both communal defense and strength in numbers are placed in valor as well.

Just as there are at least 5 traits in virtues that enhance the guardians and the guardian alone. Do those traits fit in there.

The reason why (imo) AH is placed in valor and as a grandmaster is that the designers dont want us to combine AH and MF. And this is the reason why a healer build cant be implemented in any other traitline (or weapon) besides valor. A healer build has to be separated from meditation and force us to use other utility skills.

Having a healer build in combinations with meditations is the super tank you are talking about, not AH healing allies.

I dont see how making AH also heal allies would make the guardian super tanky, meditations is a stronger selfheal in almost any scenarion besides when AH is used with five allies and all of them are inside the symbol of mace or hammer.

If the trait that made AH also affect allies was placed in grand master honor there would be no issue what so ever. Wait why not put it in Superior Aria!!!! Then we couldnt have AH group heal in combination with larger symbols and it would also bring SA up to par with other shout traits in the game.

If you and i dislike to play with shouts has no relevance, there is a lot of players enjoying shouts. Shouts are our best support skills atm and it would be easier to implement a healer based on shouts/AH compared to redesigning a entire weapons or trait line.

AH healing allies would also make it some what more altruistic. The more you support the more you heal.

I would like to see an ally version of AH be Signet of Courage’s passive, and leave the trait as is.

RabbitUp.8294:

Pacifism better make a return, that was one of the most visually impresive skills in the game.

Another consideration is that ‘blue mace lady’, the first Guardian concept we saw, had a flock of blue doves in the background, similar to the mesmer’s pink butterflies. While mesmers get their butterflies on a regular basis, the guardian’s doves were only ever in Pacifism.

RabbitUp.8294:

Honestly, I didn’t like how formulaic the old tomes left, so I hope we don’t force the ribbons and cones skills in there. If they can make them work, sure, but I don’t see why the skills between tomes should share a mechanical pattern.

Then, the aoe knockback and aoe daze were overlapping a lot, not every tome needs cc, so I would prefer they give each tome a more clear identity.

I suspect part of the symmetry came about because ArenaNet realised that elite transformations were difficult to practice the skills for, so they gave them skills with similar areas so that practice on one could translate into being able to quickly adapt to the other. While Courage is more defensive and Wrath is more offensive, it probably does help in learning the tomes as a pair when you know that pressing 3 and putting the cone over your allies will be beneficial with either, and so on.

RabbitUp.8294:

I would like to see an ally version of AH be Signet of Courage’s passive, and leave the trait as is.

Would work if the signet just affcted allies and not the guardian. But that might turn out very unattractive that we have to build for both healing allies in one line and healing our self in an other line.

Or affecting the guardian as well but if monks focus healing component couldnt be used in combination with the proposed signet.

Im playing around with druid atm and if we want a healer that is on par with the druid monks focus just has to be out of the equation.

None the less it is a much more simple solution compared to a lot of other stuff mentioned in this thread.

I would like a signet change, it would also open up for more build diversity. Maybe an add on to how signet work to today and they might be used more frequently. Why not make the healing from signet of courage scale progressively based on how many signet you have on the skill bar. That would mean that if you want to heal max you need to replace the medis.

Idle question…

Why do you feel that Monk’s Focus has to be out of reach of a guardian healing spec?

With the exception of Merciful Intervention, and Renewed Focus as a means of refreshing virtues, meditations are all pretty much on the selfish side. Condition removal meditations can synergise with Save Yourselves, of course, but otherwise a support guardian, let alone a healing guardian, is likely to have better things to put in their utility slots than meditations. While a meditation guardian can absorb a lot of punishment thanks to the Monk’s Focus heals, it strikes me as likely that any healing guardian build is going to want enough slots filled with non-meditation skills that the effectiveness of MF will be reduced.

draxynnic.3719:

Idle question…

Why do you feel that Monk’s Focus has to be out of reach of a guardian healing spec?

With the exception of Merciful Intervention, and Renewed Focus as a means of refreshing virtues, meditations are all pretty much on the selfish side..

Being able to have meditations on the skill bar AND be able to heal your allies (you included) would make the guardian totally overpowered.

Meditations alone bring the most survivability and being able to thru weaponskills or traits adding more healing to your self in addition to meditations would make it over the top.

A viable healing spec (on par with a druid for instance) in addition to meditations is just over powered.

If we add in group wide healing from a certain source we need to reduce it from an other source in order to keep the balance.

If we dont we just reinforce the relative strength in meditations.

Hence i think if we want a healing build the way to go (with out nerfing meditations) is to add healing to other utility skills. Like signets, shouts thru AH, spirit weapons (would be great actually) or consecrations.

Add in a 1k aoe heal around the consecration that scales well with healing power is also a route that is doable. That would give us a unique flair with ranged aoe healing.

The only scenario where i think a weapon should be the main source for healing in a guardian is if they revamped the staff and moved all symbols (from the other weapons) to the staff and gave the symbols 1200 range with the same cd as they have now. The present staff skills can be reused with minor alterations in the other weapons that lost their symbols.

This would also make it worth investing in three trait lines in order to maximize the impact of the staff, non of them would be Valor.

With a reduction in healing from Writ of Persistence and a better scaling of healing power in that trait it might be doable.

That would make the staff viable for all game modes and also great with the proper traits for both power builds and condi builds.

This would infact also reduce the “sacrifice” people think they have to do in order to get perma swiftness in different game modes and make the staff less of a gimmick.

So your solution to an overpowered healing spec that features selfish utilities is an overpowered healing spec that doesn’t use selfish utilities?

Mace shield could be the healing/support role but for that we need traited virtues as well.

Wish shield trait could be swapped withhammer trait in virtues, so we could actually mix with whateved spec is added in future. (since players who actually use hammer are usign meditations as usual it would make better sense).

That and some healing increase trait would amazing… cause:

Atm im using the 10% sigil, and the food with 10% both with heal otput, healing power arround 900-1000 and the heal ticks from virtues and mace slowpoke heals that need to be at melee range are very very underwhelming.. in terms of high risk and very low reward,… due how game is being played.

P.S i am also using the vitality trait as well where i get arround 24-27% outgoing heals… the sumatory of all this is wayyyy to low that doesnt make any diference on the most basic heals, 180-200 heals on virtue share.. lol with so much damage sacrifice it should have a better support/healer role…

The healing elite signet is still a burden… id take RF to refresh DH virtues (traited) for suport roles as 2 very good aoe heals and 2x blocks/defense.

DH is even a good support role with traited consectrations…

Symbol design is bad for most fast paced game play. In order to have support specific roles that needs to change. Then there is the passing of boons and what not, well again, those can get taken and removed in most cases. Again, not in favor of support.

Shield, well, overlooked by developers when focus in most cases one could argue is better, same with mace, and then finally others utilities that block and/or reflect. I don’t know, gee devs, a wall of steel or wood and it can’t block – rollseyes. Seems an oversight.

Lastly, the game wasn’t launched with any form of healing / supporting role / tanking meta. It was added late in the game which is also why some would argue other classes can do support better.

You want some quick and dirty changes that will keep Guardian semi-unique? Won’t be a perfect fix for all our problems, but here you go.

First drastically increase the contribution of plus healing equipment to the delve of their healing and regeneration effects.

Second, alter the symbols. Increase the radius of symbols or at least normalise the minimum and maximum radius for all of them. Remove the ability to make any symbol ground targeted.

All symbols become point blank area effect and are changed to ‘auras’ or ‘wards’ and travel with the guardian as per the mobile Berserker fire aura. This is the biggest one- guardian should never be a back line fighter- even as a dragon hunter. They should be front line and have the ability to apply pressure on an enemy while supporting their team.

Symbol/aura/ward talents which previously only lengthened duration, instead lower their cooldowns and this stacks with talents which lower the cooldowns on specific weapons.

In addition talents which apply additional damage to a weapon set apply that extra damage to the damage ticks of the symbols/auras/wards applied by those respective weapon sets.

Every main hand weapon or two hand weapon keeps one symbol ability, at least. And I could see a future addition of short bow giving more than one.

Yes, it could be potentially abused, but no more or less than a group of players Berserker bombing currently in wvw.

With those changes you’d get more healing, you get some much needed mobility to keep that healing on your team where it belongs, and you get to keep a variety of choices for the weapon sets you take.

Which… Is probably why we’ll never get that sort of change.

Crapgame.6519:

Shield, well, overlooked by developers when focus in most cases one could argue is better, same with mace, and then finally others utilities that block and/or reflect. I don’t know, gee devs, a wall of steel or wood and it can’t block – rollseyes. Seems an oversight.

Shield has probably had the most post-release development of any of the guardian offhands, actually. Shield of Wrath got Aegis added to its effect, Shield of Absorption got the ability to move while it’s active (not to mention fixing the bug so that the shield actually lasted the time it’s supposed to) and both got cooldown reductions.

I’d also contest your claim that guardian shield “can’t block”. Shield of Wrath generates an Aegis on the user, which is a block. Shield of Absorption blocks projectiles and knocks back enemies within the area – if you don’t stop at least one attack with SoA, either you’re using it wrong or you’re using it to break a defiance bar or a stability stack. Guardian shield might not have a “block everything for the next X seconds” skill like warrior and chronomancer, but it certainly can and does block attacks. It is, however, a little less ‘selfish’ than other shields, so it makes sense that its self-defence capabilities are a little less.