Guild Wars 2

So.
I filled out my characters a long time ago, near launch actually but only ever got my first character, an ele, to 80. Having started playing again I just got my ranger to 80.
Both of these classes, no real problems.

The ele I did die a bit but that was mostly because I was being silly and didn’t understand the guild wars 2 mechanics yet. The ranger, I rarely died and managed to take on large groups in one try that my friend playing a warrior couldn’t manage.

However, this guardian, this bloody guardian, I just can’t figure it out. I’m only level 15 on it, and I just die. All the time.
Regardless of what weapons I run it just isn’t working out for me. I just need to understand what I’m missing here. It’s mostly just embarrassing by this point.

Not sure what to tell you … at this point you don’t even have much of a build to work with. At level 15, I simply max out my power, regardless of class. That’s enough to get through content my own level. I guess you could go with Valour 5 to give you aegis at 50% health but I don’t think you should be dying that much.

Hi Toasty,

That’s pretty funny…I’ve only been using a guardian since launch, and just started levelling an ele, and I’m dying a lot (but that’s also because I’m so used to kicking butt with my full-powered guard). I also need to learn that I can’t just easily melee a veteran and regular at the same time (running dagger/focus).

I’m not sure what your ele build was, but I’m guessing you handled a lot of ranged attacks between that and your ranger. You pretty much have to melee things with a guard (though you can soften most regular mobs with scepter before switching to melee once you have the option to switch weapons…at level 20 is it?). So your playstyle will have to be different.

While I leveled up, I mainly used a 1h sword and a torch (or mace and shield), and I didn’t have many problems with most things. If you generally attempt attacking multiple mobs at once, I might suggest GS or hammer for the wider degree of auto-attack hit range).

I also tried to keep my gear within 5 levels. That shouldn’t be a problem for you, since you already have multiple 80s and should have plenty of funds to buy stuff on the TP. This is probably stuff that’s already obvious, but I want to make sure we’re not overlooking anything.

If you’re finding that you get hurt too quickly, you may want to target armor with at least some stats in toughness. At 15, you can also start traiting into Valor (toughness) or Honor (vitality). (Other guards, please keep in mind that this is for new guards…experienced guards would do their first run over again with as much zerk gear as possible and just mow through mobs). I would agree with Obtena, though, and Power should be a primary stat as well…the longer you’re in a fight, the more damage you’re going to take. My suggestion, go knight’s gear (pow, precision, tough) where possible.

Finally, I would say that 1 v 1 regular mob at the same level as you, you really should be able to auto-attack with any weapon without thinking. With more than 1 mob, a bit of strafing in circles will help you avoid some attacks, and you’ll have to learn to time dodges well. And of course, you want to make sure you understand the capabilities of all of the weapons/off-hands/skills, and start drilling with them to get used to using them in the correct situations. That goes without saying, I guess.

Not sure if this helps at all, but good luck with your guard…I’m completely happy with mine, and it’s a great class with a lot of flexibility.

You can pretty much sleepwalk 1-80 with a Hammer. Make sure you put 5 points into Honor for Vigor on critical hits, plus Writ of Persistence when you can get it. The rest of your traits can be shotgunned all over the board for all it matters. Pick up Shouts for the boons. Retreat! + Save Yourselves will cut down your travel time a lot, and Hold the Line will give you Regeneration to get back some health and add to your Protection uptime which will already be basically infinite if you have a hammer and Save Yourselves.

You die a lot at low levels because veteran/champion mobs and events are overtuned and you have crappy gear and skills/traits. I found that I stopped dying a lot in the 30’s and beyond iirc. You eventually get to a point where you don’t die any more except in rare circumstances.

Mace, my friend, is low-lvl best friend
and healing power to it
and I died while leveling my guardian rather rarely (mostly on higher-lvl content than I was…)
some higher-than-your-lvl-content is doable by method – atack with scepter, kite around, and stay alive….

I just reached lvl 80 on my guardian.
To tell you the truth, I had some issues myself at first with the veteran/champion mobs.
However: The second I equipped a scepter, so I could fight the hard hitting mobs at a distance, leveling became very easy on a guardian.

Compared to how it was to level my mesmer, I can only say guardian in my opinion was much, much easier.
Scepter turned out to be my best friend combined with focus for Shield of Wrath.