Guild Wars 2

I’m trying to decide on zerker or celestial ascended gear for my Guardian in WvW. A quick search of the forums show several opinions one way or the other.

Currently I run either Knights armor for a standard AH build, or Cleric Armor for an even more tanky healing build.

What are people’s thoughts?

after quite a bit of testing in the mist, i come to conclude that:

1) if you build a balance build, the dmg is about the same no matter how you build

2) if you build a skewed build (full zerk for example), you kill much faster like a few swings faster, but you drop like a fly.

3) celestial (all stats) sucks for my AH build.

4) in WvW, there are people who are like upleveled lvl 15 and they kill max80s. player skill counts i guess.

5) i have a few zerk pieces, but i am starting to realise that the few % crit dmg is not worth sacrificing for the other primary stats.

ill copy paste for an indication about my AH build. I use 6 pieces of soldiers in my gear with zerker weaps and 6 ascended zerker jewelry. My stats right now are about:

3200 attack
44% crit
2700-2800 armor (cant remember on top of my head)
18 or 19k health
83% crit damage (93% with crit food)

I run GS/staff with standard AH build. This is unbuffed afaik.. Cant login right now to check facts. I usually play in a guild strike team of 15-20 ppl per session, we wipe 60+ zergs and survive very well

Sandra Martino.3870:

ill copy paste for an indication about my AH build. I use 6 pieces of soldiers in my gear with zerker weaps and 6 ascended zerker jewelry. My stats right now are about:

3200 attack
44% crit
2700-2800 armor (cant remember on top of my head)
18 or 19k health
83% crit damage (93% with crit food)

I run GS/staff with standard AH build. This is unbuffed afaik.. Cant login right now to check facts. I usually play in a guild strike team of 15-20 ppl per session, we wipe 60+ zergs and survive very well

I have same stats except my armor is 3064 18k HP and missing 2 ascended accessories Back piece and ring

back piece is a rare soldier

TooBz.3065:

I’m trying to decide on zerker or celestial ascended gear for my Guardian in WvW. A quick search of the forums show several opinions one way or the other.

Currently I run either Knights armor for a standard AH build, or Cleric Armor for an even more tanky healing build.

What are people’s thoughts?

Go with what works for you not sure what the celestial accessories are

Vet.3726:

TooBz.3065:

I’m trying to decide on zerker or celestial ascended gear for my Guardian in WvW. A quick search of the forums show several opinions one way or the other.

Currently I run either Knights armor for a standard AH build, or Cleric Armor for an even more tanky healing build.

What are people’s thoughts?

Go with what works for you not sure what the celestial accessories are

Celestial accessories are all-stat accessories (like runes of divinity) they provide for a smaller increase to each stat than dedicated accessories, but more overall points.

My instincts say to go with something that has dedicated crit damage (Beserker or Cavalier) because if you are going to have crit damage in your build, it’s most efficient to do it through trinkets (at least ascended ones).

But ascended gear is such a pain to obtain I don’t want to make a mistake.

TooBz.3065:

Vet.3726:

TooBz.3065:

I’m trying to decide on zerker or celestial ascended gear for my Guardian in WvW. A quick search of the forums show several opinions one way or the other.

Currently I run either Knights armor for a standard AH build, or Cleric Armor for an even more tanky healing build.

What are people’s thoughts?

Go with what works for you not sure what the celestial accessories are

Celestial accessories are all-stat accessories (like runes of divinity) they provide for a smaller increase to each stat than dedicated accessories, but more overall points.

My instincts say to go with something that has dedicated crit damage (Beserker or Cavalier) because if you are going to have crit damage in your build, it’s most efficient to do it through trinkets (at least ascended ones).

But ascended gear is such a pain to obtain I don’t want to make a mistake.

Ya dont get Celestial ones to be honest what is it that your looking for and i can help you out i have 2 guardians and been playing them since beta so im sure i can help ascended gear is not hard to come by but let me know what you want your goals are
at work so my typing is horrible

Ascended gear isn’t that hard to come by except that 1. I don’t run fractals and 2. I have too many characters.

I’ve finally settled on a Mesmer and a Guardian for my main(s). I use them almost exclusively in WvW.

For the Guardian, I’m looking for a balance of survivability and damage. I do Zerg fighting but also run with a small group. I generally do not do solo roaming.

Same i do WvW and i also dont run fractals what server you on?

Well for Guardians you want to have about 3k Armor 40% Crit Chance and 65%+ Crit Damage HP can very from 16k+ HP you will survive very well if played well i can run in a zerg and usually down 3 to 4 ppl and run back out and have my friends finish it off we have a group of 5 guardians so its fun as hell we just keep healing each other

I haven’t done much WvW on my Guardian, but I really like this build in FOTM and other dungeons since it is very balanced and can hit pretty hard. This type of build has been posted before and I would be curious if anyone has used it in WvW. Here is my exact build. (Skills vary on Dungeon or Fractal)

http://gw2buildcraft.com/calculator/guardian/?3.4|b.1g.h1f.d.1g.h1|2.1g.h1|1g.71j.1n.71j.1g.71j.1n.71j.1n.71j.1n.71j|41k.d1e.211.d1e.311.0.1j.67.311.d1e.2u.d1e|0.0.u64b.u29b.a1|39.7|v.17.18.19.1j|e

I’m on TC.

http://gw2buildcraft.com/calculator/guardian/?3.0|1.1n.h1b|6.1k.h8|1n.71j.1n.71j.1n.71j.1g.71j.1n.71j.1n.71j|1g.67.1n.64.1n.64.2s.0.1n.61.1a.67|0.0.u65b.u28b.a6|0.0|v.0.0.0.0|e

Based on your comments, I have too much toughness and precision and not enough vitality.

Thanks. That actually helps, a lot. Now I can play around with different options.

TooBz.3065:

I’m on TC.

http://gw2buildcraft.com/calculator/guardian/?3.0|1.1n.h1b|6.1k.h8|1n.71j.1n.71j.1n.71j.1g.71j.1n.71j.1n.71j|1g.67.1n.64.1n.64.2s.0.1n.61.1a.67|0.0.u65b.u28b.a6|0.0|v.0.0.0.0|e

Based on your comments, I have too much toughness and precision and not enough vitality.

Thanks. That actually helps, a lot. Now I can play around with different options.

This one looks pretty good just need more HP
here is my build decent dps and survivability
http://gw2buildcraft.com/calculator/guardian/?3.0|1.1p.a7|6.1k.h8|1n.7x.1n.7x.1n.7x.1n.7x.1n.7x.1n.7x|2s.e14.2s.e14.31j.e16.2s.e14.2v.e14.2u.e14|0.5.u65b.u28b.5|39.1|v.13.19.18.1i|e

I’ve got a pretty unorthodox signet build that makes use of a mix of celestial/berserker/valkyrie gear.

http://gw2buildcraft.com/calculator/guardian/?3.0|1.1g.h2|6.1g.h2|1p.71j.1p.71j.1p.71j.1p.71j.1p.71j.1p.71j|311.d17.311.d17.211.d13.2s.d13.3s.d17.3s.d17|k27.u29c.0.k39.0|0.0|v.1b.1d.1a.1i|e

While you might notice the low-ish toughness, the Signet of Judgement will provide a flat 12% decrease to incoming damage, making my defense quite strong when taking the damage into account. Note that this calculator does not count signets into the final stats on the right-hand side.

I’ve got efficient condition-removal with the signets (it will be better when they fix perfect inscriptions). The trick is to use the condition damage signet first – you can do without that, though it does make your burns noticeably stronger. Next would be the power signet. You’re already quite deadly, so the loss of the Bane Signet is acceptable. You want to keep the Signet of Judgement around for as long as possible, though its low cooldown means that you can definitely use it in a pinch (say you get ambushed by a small roaming party and you’re hit with 20 stacks of bleed, a cripple, and a chill in WvW).

Imo there are three issues issue with celestial trinkets:

1. that you loose out in total stat budget by using them.
Any build with one or more celestial trinket can be matched and surpassed by mixing other setups of trinkets and armor. Any build that has celestial trinkets a player can improve on without celestial.

2. That you limit your self so no stat can be stacked, in short you cant be really good at anything.

3. There are useless stats in the budget, condition damage and magic find which you still “pay” for.

I can see only one reason to ever invest in them and that is if you have choosen gear unwisely and when you are about to buy the last piece of ascended you need an ascended to reach a certain threshold in 2-4 stats.

But with planning this can be avoided so celestial trinkets are imo a result of poor planning on a guardian.

1. Decide the build you what to play and what playstyle you prefer.

2. Determine what stats that are most important for fulfilling your choice.

3. Go to gw2buildcraft and use a couple of hours and figure out how to get the most bang for the buck. Celestial isnt a part of the equation.

4. Get into the game and get the gear.

5. If you are in desperate need of magic find for open world pve you can buy yellow trinkets with berserker/MF stats as back up.

you say that you use AH build/healing build
So celestial
reasons ?
both builds got empowering might
the diference betwen celestial and berseker is 2 might stacks on p attack or 3% more damage compared with extra 40 healing /dodge 1.5% armor 450 hp
you can make comparation betwen divinity runes and ruby orbs, is similar

No im not saying i use AH, cant see where you got that from. I actually play mostly 20/25/10/10/5 atm.

Just saying if you post a build with celestial trinkets i can make a build with out celestials that has better stats. Hence why i think they are a poor investment.

And you cant stack with them which also leads to that you have no freedom to do so if you want and instead you need to get a whole new trinket. They automatically pigeonhole you to a specific stat range.

The difference is that divinity runes hasnt gotten 2 stats that are of little or no use.

Imo celestials (based on the above) are a poor choice. I could consider them on my condi/pow/crit warrior though and just have MF as unneccessary stat.

@brutaly
Op says he use knights AH or clerics
for you i will run AH celestial build vs an AH bersek build
Celestial :
http://gw2buildcraft.com/calculator/guardian/?3.0|1.1n.h8|c.1i.h17.e.1i.h1|1n.71j.1n.71j.1c.71j.1n.71j.1c.71j.1n.71j|211.e13.311.e16.211.0.311.0.211.0.2v.0|0.f3.u56b.k28.5|54.1|w.16.18.19.0|e
power 1811 /Condition damage 426
Critical damage 76% / chance 43.5%
armor 3200 / max hp 16700
Healing power -476
VS berseker trinkets – armor /traits / food /weapons stay same
http://gw2buildcraft.com/calculator/guardian/?3.0|1.1n.h8|c.1i.h17.e.1i.h1|1n.71j.1n.71j.1c.71j.1n.71j.1c.71j.1n.71j|3s.0.3s.0.2s.0.2s.0.3s.0.2s.0|0.f3.u56b.k28.5|54.1|w.16.18.19.0|e
power -2101 -cond damage 210
critical damage 86% – critical chance 50.5%
armor 2933 /max hp 14600
healing power 260
*Pro’s -celestial *:
burning will hit with 54 damage more /second
9.5% extra armor ( on this build)
14.5% more hp ( on this build)
216 extra hp /dodge , sightly better regeneration /healing skill
*Pro’s – Bersek build *
292 more attack (10.5 )
7 extra critical hit chance /10% extra critical power

I use AH and my ascended trinkets are a combination of Cavalier and those altered Knight ones (the ones that max precision instead of toughness)

http://gw2buildcraft.com/calculator/guardian/?3.0|2.1c.h1|0.0.0.0.0.0|1c.7c.1g.7c.1c.7c.1c.7c.1c.7c.1c.7c|41k.d1g.2v.d1e.21k.d1e.21k.d1e.3v.d1e.cg.67|0.a0.u060.u000.0|39.8|0.0.0.0.0|e

@ Rayya
This build was thrown together in about 5 minutes so its not optimized in any way or form but it serves its purpose to illustrate my point.

http://gw2buildcraft.com/calculator/guardian/?3.0|2.1c.0|0.0.0.0.0.0|1c.71j.1c.71j.1k.71j.1c.71j.1c.71j.1c.71j|3s.d1b.3u.d1c.21j.d1a.31l.d1b.31k.d1b.2u.d1b|0.f0.u600.k00.5|55.1|0.0.0.0.0|e

It has higher dps and larger effective healthpool than your build.

Effective power 2802 versus 2809
Effective healthpool 29302 versus 28758

If i had the time i could even out the differences between healthpools and transfer them to power but atm i dont have the time.

The only difficult thing is to handle high crit damage in combination with low power as the celestials offer but it can be done. And with some trial and error it can be possible to transfer some of my crit damage as well to power and toughness, but as i said i dont have the time atm.

I think the second drawback (which is the biggest one imo) is illustrated by your build, you cant squeeze any more dps/toughness/healpower since nothing can be stacked with those babies.

Tbh having 476 heal power in your build is a waste in pvp/wvw and high level fractals, i almost consider that a waste as well.

Brutaly , you are wrong.
there are classes and builds where every point of healing power matter
1. 15 points in honor – minnor traits
grant vigor on critical (5 seconds -0 boon duration) every 5 seconds
heal yourself and nearby ally’s whenever you dodge
that means without vigor you refill your endurance every 20 seconds , with vigor every 10 seconds
selfless darring – heal for 129 + healing power every time you dodge –
at 2 dodges /10 seconds – 429 healing power will provide 5100 hp /minute from dodges , to yourself and 4 nearby ally’s = that can be at maximum 25000 hp
2. regeneration 429 healing power will increase regeneration effect with 54 /second.
on an AH build you get regeneration from
-trait inspired virtues – when you activate virtue of resolve -5 seconds
hold the line – 6 seconds – CD 28 seconds
SY 10 seconds -27 seconds in 1 minute
totaly 429 healing power can provide extra 1460 HP /minute from regeneration(AH build)
2 x shelters or 1 signet of resolve will provide another 600 HP / minute from 429 healing power
Totaly you can gain ( 600 1400 +5000 = 7000 ) extra hp / minute from 429 healing power, i belive is not really an waste since dodges and regeneration heal also 4 ally’s
you mentioned 476 but nvm i made calculations with 429.
power is over rated, and those efficient power /ehp are far from real, everywhere except 1 vs 1 combats.
I run with my guardian full clerics //celestials, base power 2700. every time i am in combat with team mates i got 15-25 stacks of might, provided by me or other ally’s or from fields, fact is even if battle last 10 minutes i can keep those 15 might stacks.
And everything changes if you add furry and 15+ stacks of might on the builds.
the build i use at this moment in wvwvw is -
http://gw2buildcraft.com/calculator/guardian/?3.0|6.1n.h6|2.1n.h1l|1n.71g.1k.71g.1c.b1h.1k.b1h.1n.71h.1k.71h|311.0.311.0.211.0.1j.61.1n.68.1a.68|0.0.u56b.u28b.a3|1.7|w.19.16.y.0|e
i got ridiculous low power, but my i can provide long duration stability /boons to ally’s and decent heals, and i can mentain 15-25 stacks of might.
My Ehp on that calculator is lol 27000 , and i say lol since my dodge roll heals for 5500 /6000 my regeneration last 10.5 seconds and is like 2480 for 10.5 seconds to 5 ally’s from hold the line.

I didnt say healing power was bad.

I said its a waste of stats unless you stack them.
I said that (and posted a build to explain it) that any combination of stats you achieve by having celestial trinkets can be achieved by using “ordinary” gear and trinkets and also be bettered.

And by using celestials you basically deny your self the opportunity to be really good (stack) two or three stats.

recap:
1. You loose out on stats by using them
2. You can be really good at anything by using them.

1. 6* celestials add 216 healing power and if you dodge every 5th second they add 43hps from dodge in a very small area.
216 heal power add 27hps to regen.

Just wanted to clarify your post, its easy to get the impression that celstials actually contribute with the numbers you posted. Feels kind of important to clarify that numbers you use can be achieved and be bettered by using other trinkets that celestials

No need to lay down smoke screens fury/might/protection benefits equally so they can be excluded from the discussion.

power is over rated, and those efficient power are far from real, everywhere except 1 vs 1 combats.

When i do the math on effective power they seem to actually display the “true” dps, at least according to the formulas that can be found on the wiki.

Im not following you here.

Check the build below and compare it to the last one you posted.

Same traits and same food buffs as you and i use exotics in the same spots as you. I haven optimized it though and could certainly squeeze out a couple of more points if i re arranged it.

Higher dps
More armor
More healing
More health
http://gw2buildcraft.com/calculator/guardian/?3.0|1.1c.h1j|0.0.0.0.0.0|1k.71g.1k.71g.1k.b1h.1k.b1h.1k.71h.1k.71h|21k.0.21j.0.2u.0.1p.61.1n.61.1c.68|0.0.u600.u28b.a3|1.7|0.0.0.0.0|e

And this is a kind of build were celestials should excel, “balanced” builds, the truth is they dont. The limit the player when wanting to change build/stat combo.

Each point of healing power provides the same boost as the last. No point is wasted.

Celestial items provide the biggest raw stat boost of any trinkets. It is not possible to achieve the same level of raw stats using other types items. The problem with them is that they give you stats in areas that aren’t as useful as others. For instance, power boosts your dps a lot more than condition damage in most cases. If you plan to use celestial items, you should probably find a way to get extra power somewhere else in your build to keep your damage up: runes, armor, traits, signet, sharpening stones, food, bloodlust stacks etc. Its not hard to use all celestial trinkets and still walk around with well over 2000 power before might.

Celestial items are good for balanced builds that make use of all stats. If you aren’t taking heal on dodge trait, healing power isn’t worth it. If you aren’t using permeating wrath or some other ability to keep aoe burning up, condition damage isn’t worth much.