Guild Wars 2

@Fenrir when did this become a question about if I was trying to make a bunker build? Paladin build was never supposed to be a bunker build in the first place. It’s good dps with support used correctly. Makes you almost op status in most situations in the game. Like I said I got half a channel proving that with countless gamers agreeing to it. So it’s not like I’m just here making it up. But that isn’t even the post subject.

I was saying this isn’t a dps race game. You can’t stand and dps much less get good connection in this game. And this isn’t a class that has many dot damage options. So that means dps downtime is a lot. Now use logic in this even if you hit double someone else. If you have weaker vitality toughness and lack ways to heal. That means you need to do less dps connecting to survive. If someone else say a bunker has more and can literally stand in longer.

They make up that gap or in some cases will surpass you. Especially if you end up dead more in encounters. Which is why like 90% of the game goes more sturdy builds to combat that. Again not something I made up. The game just merits you be more balanced, unless someone makes up for what you are lacking. And even then this still isn’t the game that has a dedicated pocket healer.

So you now have a cannon that isn’t firing. Not healing anyone not protecting anyone but yourself. Unless you have skills that will. But then again you’re a cannon why are you using those skills? See the problem there? It’s like you’re dead weight in a party almost. Like why is the person even a guardian just for the title? I won’t put myself in that situation on purpose. What makes you a legendary player in any game. Is when you find that balance to be good. And make everyone around you better.

Also to wrap this up no one is right about whose build is better. The end result is to win and that’s it. No one can determine for everyone what is the proper way to achieve that. For each and every person whose playing. That is far too audacity laced and over stepping bounds. You can suggest imply give examples. But when you have guys calling names and trying to bully population. Those dudes we all need to stop. Don’t disrespect a gamer’s right to determine his/her own play.

Silentstorm.7531:

“AH doesn’t heal anyone except yourself. If it was something like “Heal allies whenever you apply a boon on them” it would at least be more useful, and I can also guarantee you no one would ever take it.”

Oh really yea about 20,000 views in the 2.5 post would like to disagree with you on that. Don’t assume never assume in gaming. Because your reality is not everyone elses. Also a bunker Guardian wouldn’t outdps a Paladin 2.5 Guardian already been proved.

I mean you can argue if you like. But I already proved this stuff months ago lol……Which is why it got that used and popular in the first place. I just stop talking because you reach a wall. But pretty soon that said wall will be removed. With the addition of new traits and skills.

Silentstorm, thanks for your contributions to the Guardian community, but flashing your channel/views like its bling is just off putting. Especially when you use it to justify the viability of your build. If the build is viable, it can stand on its own merits (not the merits of over 20K views). Others who have made tremendous contributions to this profession are usually slow to point out their feats.

I am pretty sure that you could do any trait spread as long as it was in multiples of 10 and you could make it work on a Guardian in PvE. Feel free to post one that doesn’t.

No my stance was pointing out you, came into the conversation disrespecting people. Calling everyone stupid to begin with. That had nothing to do with me. You just continued to argue the same way towards me. And I pointed it out and said no point in debating with you. Because you don’t know how to debate beyond acting like a 10 year old.

I’m not defending my build because I don’t have to. It’s already proven for months nothing your whining will do will change that. No one would embrace it if it was bad. Nor would it continue to gain views and likes 7 months later. Let me see you do that, so what you got a post. That by the way you neglected to mention you are fighting 50% of it. Trying to defend what you made, a pro of the guardians shouldn’t have to fight that hard in his own post.

Go check my posts my videos see me fighting anyone? See any haters nope notice the difference there? I didn’t have to defend it just like I don’t need to now. Because people already know it works. One mad my way or the highway troll doesn’t change that. And no one is listening to you anyway for the reasons I said above. You just running around everywhere calling every one bad. Like someone named you Guardian God of Games. Who told you that no one here?

Case in point

“ArchonWing.9480:
I am pretty sure that you could do any trait spread as long as it was in multiples of 10 and you could make it work on a Guardian in PvE. Feel free to post one that doesn’t.
Guanglai Kangyi said
0/20/20/10/20 would be a pretty bad distribution of points.”

I mean this is my point no reason with you. The more you talk the more you expose yourself. Took you exactly one post to show everyone my point again. So I’ll say what majority of the people here probably already said. GK you’re dismissed.

Does everyone forget that having high toughness makes you a magnet? I’ve found the 0/10/30/10/20 stunning styles build to be just as awesome as the 0/15/30/20/5 in PvE in terms of anchoring a team of 4 DPS, allowing them go crazy full out DPS without getting aggro. I can literally take so much punishment that the boss hardly moves and my teams DPS gets to really unload, instead of 5 zerker players juggling aggro, getting downed left and right, etc etc. In PvP the build is downright beastly.

I’m not sure why PVT+support builds get so much negative feedback from the zerker crowd regarding pve – dont you want an anchor to hold aggro who is super tough, so that you can unload your DPS without too much concern? Absolute Resolution + AH is a ton of sustain that doesnt require using dodge rolls to heal, can save them for actually dodging.

I see zerkers being good for a few things, speed runs of dungeons being one of the few. In everything else, they fall over so fast its silly. Specially wvwvw. If I blind/block/dodge a zerkers initial burst, they are in for a world of trouble usually, specially after the retaliation starts going.

Anyways to me the point of going 30 valor isnt for AH, thats just a side benefit. Its for crit damage to pump up dps and toughness to draw aggro to be a better anchor. Having it also reduce direct damage and heal is a side benefit.

@Proteus

I didn’t forget which is why I gave props to Stunning Styles in his post. I respect every ones approach it’s how you learn. And may evolve your own style of play.

Its so strange to see how divided the community is over builds. Why not just have multiple sets of armor and change specs to what fits the situation best? Isnt that what the devs wanted us to do?

I posted a 0/15/30/20/5 build (similar your paladin spec) 9 days before Brutaly posted a crithammer guide back in September of last year. I’ve studied the meta intensely but rarely post. My style of play evolves with the content I’m doing.

I had stop posting because, I became busy with other companies in gaming. But now I learned to balance it all. So I’m paying more attention to GW2 again. Come back and see all this fighting non sense. Over stuff no one can prove is better anyway. It’s all about choice and how you go about winning.

As long as you standing at the finish line with everyone else. Who cares how you get there. As long as you’re happy with the build you got. And you can do the job when called upon. Not me not anyone else’s opinion matters. Last year I was begging and urging people to make builds. Because it seem like just three of us was even trying.

So when new people come a long trying. I encourage them not tear them down on a ego trip. Doesn’t help the community doing things like that. Also doesn’t help anyone grow their game either.

Proteus.6320:

Does everyone forget that having high toughness makes you a magnet? I’ve found the 0/10/30/10/20 stunning styles build to be just as awesome as the 0/15/30/20/5 in PvE in terms of anchoring a team of 4 DPS, allowing them go crazy full out DPS without getting aggro. I can literally take so much punishment that the boss hardly moves and my teams DPS gets to really unload, instead of 5 zerker players juggling aggro, getting downed left and right, etc etc. In PvP the build is downright beastly.

I’m not sure why PVT+support builds get so much negative feedback from the zerker crowd regarding pve – dont you want an anchor to hold aggro who is super tough, so that you can unload your DPS without too much concern? Absolute Resolution + AH is a ton of sustain that doesnt require using dodge rolls to heal, can save them for actually dodging.

I see zerkers being good for a few things, speed runs of dungeons being one of the few. In everything else, they fall over so fast its silly. Specially wvwvw. If I blind/block/dodge a zerkers initial burst, they are in for a world of trouble usually, specially after the retaliation starts going.

Anyways to me the point of going 30 valor isnt for AH, thats just a side benefit. Its for crit damage to pump up dps and toughness to draw aggro to be a better anchor. Having it also reduce direct damage and heal is a side benefit.

Stunningstyles type of play is only for guardians that can use a hack called “dodge”. It’s where you have a key set on your keyboard/mouse that makes you move and avoid all damage.

edit:

Sustain loses it’s value when you can avoid damage. This can happen through blinds/blocks/dodges. If you haven’t learned to do that yet, then yes sustain like AH is great.

So what if you use the sustain AND blind blocks and dodge….Heaven forbid you actually play like a pro lol…….

Silentstorm.7531:

So what if you use the sustain AND blind blocks and dodge….Heaven forbid you actually play like a pro lol…….

I would rather kill someone before needing the sustain to be honest.

Well not sure why my post about the numbers on MF vs AH got deleted. I’m pretty sure I didn’t break any rules, but I will post it again on the off chance it was a mistake.

At level 80, this trait causes meditation skills to additionally heal you for 1960 + 0.1 * Healing Power

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Monk%27s_Focus

At level 80, the amount healed per boon is 69 + 0.01 * Healing Power

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Altruistic_Healing

Assuming 200 hp it would end up with 1980 vs 71 heal. Smite condition is on a 16 second cd, giving me 123.75 health per second. I will use smite condition almost every cd because of the amount of conditions being thrown around. Still I have 2 meditations that I can use for a spike heal if I need to. The heals are there already. Comparing that to AH I would need to apply almost 2 boons a second to myself to equalize it, and then some of that would be wasted. Don’t get me wrong, over healing might be an issue with both depending on the situation.

edit, more info

I’m sure in a zerg setting AH would give you more personal healing, but I’m not playing a support build. I go in, I kill, and then I get out. If I’m defending it’s the same, I’m alone. The only time I can see AH being better is if you are in a group, but this is also removing the offensive effect of the meditations.

Never had a problem killing anyone ever. Over kill dps can be a problem too. If said dps imbalances you other areas just to do it. Just all about finding that balance and the player preference.

Silentstorm.7531:

Never had a problem killing anyone ever. Over kill dps can be a problem too. If said dps imbalances you other areas just to do it. Just all about finding that balance and the player preference.

I completely agree with you. Plus it really depends on what you are building for. I will admit that AH in a large zerg can provide more healing than meditations. In solo play AH just can’t match MF/meditation builds for me. I will admit that it’s based on my play style yes. My problem is people that run AH solo. Just my play style I guess

Proteus.6320:

Does everyone forget that having high toughness makes you a magnet? I’ve found the 0/10/30/10/20 stunning styles build to be just as awesome as the 0/15/30/20/5 in PvE in terms of anchoring a team of 4 DPS, allowing them go crazy full out DPS without getting aggro. I can literally take so much punishment that the boss hardly moves and my teams DPS gets to really unload, instead of 5 zerker players juggling aggro, getting downed left and right, etc etc. In PvP the build is downright beastly.

I’m not sure why PVT+support builds get so much negative feedback from the zerker crowd regarding pve – dont you want an anchor to hold aggro who is super tough, so that you can unload your DPS without too much concern? Absolute Resolution + AH is a ton of sustain that doesnt require using dodge rolls to heal, can save them for actually dodging.

I see zerkers being good for a few things, speed runs of dungeons being one of the few. In everything else, they fall over so fast its silly. Specially wvwvw. If I blind/block/dodge a zerkers initial burst, they are in for a world of trouble usually, specially after the retaliation starts going.

Anyways to me the point of going 30 valor isnt for AH, thats just a side benefit. Its for crit damage to pump up dps and toughness to draw aggro to be a better anchor. Having it also reduce direct damage and heal is a side benefit.

That’s not actually true. Toughness doesn’t affect aggro. I’ve tested it, as have a number of other people, and the general consensus is that pretty much nothing affects aggro except MAYBE order of acquisition.

The toughness = aggro myth was, as far as I can tell, perpetuated based on one guy saying “it sorta feels like I get hit more when I am running AH, you should try it too” and word of mouth turning that into “if you stack toughness you will pull all aggro LIKE A GOD.”

Moreover, even if you could pull aggro, I’d like to see you actually stay alive under sustained hate from a boss without moving or dodging, at least without going full kitten on cleric gear or something.

There are cases where high toughness MAY make you attract a bit more aggro but there are also many counter examples.

When farming CoE with my guild the golem boss targets the berserker ele Every. Single. Time.
Jellyfish boss and Ettins in fractals however, do have a tendency to stick to high toughness members.
Lupicus is interesting, I don’t remember which phases but at some of them he likes the tough ones, other he likes the squishies.

In the end having high toughness to draw aggro in every encounter in the game is like flipping a coin and want it to land in heads everytime.

How did this thread turn into discussion about aggro control anyway? going into the toughness line doesn’t necessarily make people have highest toughness in the group. The majority of the stat points come from gear.
Same with going into a tree for the stat points, traits are there to be used, stat points are just a nice side bonus, not the other way round.

Wukunlin.8461:

There are cases where high toughness MAY make you attract a bit more aggro but there are also many counter examples.

When farming CoE with my guild the golem boss targets the berserker ele Every. Single. Time.
Jellyfish boss and Ettins in fractals however, do have a tendency to stick to high toughness members.
Lupicus is interesting, I don’t remember which phases but at some of them he likes the tough ones, other he likes the squishies.

In the end having high toughness to draw aggro in every encounter in the game is like flipping a coin and want it to land in heads everytime.

How did this thread turn into discussion about aggro control anyway? going into the toughness line doesn’t necessarily make people have highest toughness in the group. The majority of the stat points come from gear.
Same with going into a tree for the stat points, traits are there to be used, stat points are just a nice side bonus, not the other way round.

I think it’s because people were trying to defend AH builds by saying that the lost DPS is compensated by being able to tank, which as I’ve just stated isn’t true in the slightest. If you do get targeted, you might be able to tank the boss a little bit longer without moving, but it’s not like you’ll just be holding him down forever while your team beats on him free.

I think the community is so torn between what is good and what is bad, based off of personal experiences.

That said we have three major game types which will skew personal experiences: PvP, WvW, PvE.

Beyond that you have some subsets within each of those

PvP – sPvP and tPvP
WvW – Zerg, Solo Roamer
Pve – Open World, Dungeons

Each of those areas may emphasize different strengths and weaknesses in various builds.

The reason why “AH/EM is everything” is because it is very versatile and requires little to no switching around, no matter where you are. It even allows you to change over to MF if you want without any cost.

Other builds can accomplish the same effect in different areas, or even outshine AH/EM, but the fact that AH/EM works anywhere helps make it more popular.

Solo, you will not get as many boon applications, which result in less personal healing. You still will get a steady flow of boons and as long as your HP in stays above the HP out, you will survive.

MF has better burst healing, and can survive taking heavy damage suddenly. Better when soloing as far as Heals per second versus AH/EM, but it has gaps in the heals where you are prone to a much lower HP in rate, which creates openings to die easier.

Regeneration is another major sustain mechanic for guardians (and the game in general) This requires more gearing into Healing Power than AH/EM and MF take, since it scales better and you see more return out of it. The other downside is it prone to counter play by boon removal/conversions.

Our weaker forms of combat sustain are Writ of the Merciful (symbols heal), Zealous Blade (greatsword heals), Pure of Heart (aegis heals), and if you really want to dig deep Bow of Truth (activation heals).

Those weaker forms of sustain, along with our built in profession mechanic (Virtue of Resolve) can be useful if combined with our primary sustain mechanics listed above.

You could argue that they should be able to keep survivability up on their own, and that would create more build diversity than AH and MF, but they don’t at the moment.

With that said, now that you have chosen your favored combat survivability, you can build for either damage or support.

Many favor AH and MF for damage based builds because they do not require a lot of healing power to make them work better.

Regeneration can work perfectly well in a DPS build, but you may have to make some sacrifices here and there to find a good balance.

Of course you can always have access to AH/MF and Regen, making it a win-win scenario.

In the end, some areas of gameplay allow player not not get hit very often, requiring much less “survivability”, allowing them to forgo specing into AH or MF. This area of gameplay is typically dungeons and PvE, since NPC combat is very predictable and scripted.

I guess this is my long way of saying: Play what works for you.

Just understand the influences in your decisions and opinions, and try to understand other points of view and how they too can be valid due to differing areas of gameplay.

Again no one is right no is wrong. Multiple ways to reach a path. And multiple ways to think about it. No one can say any one person is incorrect. Because what works for you may not for everyone else. It’s kinda going too far into that audacity realm you should stay out of.

Just now, for laughs, I went full cleric 2 water/2dwayna/2monk, mace/shield staff with a 0/0/20/30/20 setup maximizing healing power, symbols, regeneration upkeep, and VoR.

Survived amazingly well even this late into the meta. If you don’t block and dodge the right stuff you die really quick and it might feel weak. But if you buy enough time our 500 hp a sec keeps you alive.

Pretty much that is why the Healway build works. Mobile, dodges and blinds a lot, and heals while you are avoiding all that damage. It takes more player participation than letting AH tick for you, so it has a slight learning curve.

Healway is a good example of a build that doesn’t need AH/EM.

I will say, that I have regressed back to AH/EM recently in spvp hot joins because of how offensive you can put your stats while keeping some margin of survivability.

It is not top damage, but you can outlast and maintain decent pressure. No 10-30k hits of course, so you have to be satisfied with 5ks here and there.

CMF.5461:

Just now, for laughs, I went full cleric 2 water/2dwayna/2monk, mace/shield staff with a 0/0/20/30/20 setup maximizing healing power, symbols, regeneration upkeep, and VoR.

Survived amazingly well even this late into the meta. If you don’t block and dodge the right stuff you die really quick and it might feel weak. But if you buy enough time our 500 hp a sec keeps you alive.

Pretty much that is why the Healway build works. Mobile, dodges and blinds a lot, and heals while you are avoiding all that damage. It takes more player participation than letting AH tick for you, so it has a slight learning curve.

Healway is a good example of a build that doesn’t need AH/EM.

I will say, that I have regressed back to AH/EM recently in spvp hot joins because of how offensive you can put your stats while keeping some margin of survivability.

It is not top damage, but you can outlast and maintain decent pressure. No 10-30k hits of course, so you have to be satisfied with 5ks here and there.

I’d go so far as to say that even if you don’t block or dodge anything, you’ll still have to go out of your way to die in a full cleric’s build like that. That applies to both PvP and PvE; I see plenty of clerics just afk through boss AOEs all the time. They don’t do much else and might as well have died for all the damage they are doing, but they don’t die.

If you don’t mind being total dead weight and hitting double digits on a 4% chance crit, being Cleric’s is amusing sometimes. I once ran CoF1 with a group of cleric guardians for lulz and we couldn’t even move the Effigy’s health bar. He was out-regening us at 100%.

in pvp, the spike damage that a single player can bring out can be surprising sometimes, the whole point for me going full clerics was mostly to see how good regen really is, and to work on my avoidance/block timing.

Good practice, honestly. Put yourself in a highly contested area on the map and kitten off the other team if you can stay alive with the whole team on you :p

Biggest problem I have is when I get immobilized or stunned, then I can’t dodge and get the evade and huge heal.

As far as damage, yes it does horrible damage and quit pointless to even attack anyone save from getting some healing procs off mace, but that wasn’t the reason for a full clerics build in the first place.

Here is the build if anyone wanted to try to old school bunker it in pvp to practice dodges and blocks

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fUAQNApeWlUgyCXFyvDm4ESmiVCBxegRfUHdpwheIA-TsAgzCmIuR1lrLzNSvseNaY9x8DA

Two things I kept juggling to see what I liked better was Save yourselves versus using maybe a signet of mercy or judgment.

Also you can swap out a knights jewel in the amulet if you wanted a little bit more health. Don’t honestly need it with the high rate of regeneration and virtue of resolve, but gives you more breathing room.

In dungeons I agree, full clerics is going to be a huge waste if the group isn’t getting hit anyway.

Well you have this;
http://gw2buildcraft.com/calculator/guardian/?3.0|2.1g.h15|6.1n.hz|1g.71j.1g.71j.1g.71j.1g.71j.1g.71j.1g.71j|2s.0.2s.0.3s.0.2s.0.3s.0.2s.0|a2.u6ac.0.u2ab.0|0.0|0.0.0.0.0|e

effective power 4.9k

Full zerk with 30 into radiance

and this;
http://gw2buildcraft.com/calculator/guardian/?3.0|2.1g.h15|6.1n.hz|1g.71j.1g.71j.1g.71j.1g.71j.1g.71j.1g.71j|2s.0.2s.0.3s.0.2s.0.3s.0.2s.0|a2.0.u600.u2ab.0|0.0|0.0.0.0.0|e

effective power 4.4k
with 30 into valor to get AH

so that 0.5k EP is the loss compared to a lot of sustainabillity AH gives you.

So get what you need but compared together in my opinion the DPS loss isn’t that big. I seldom change it around for cof runs but it is marginal….

Then again everyone has its own playstyle and i have tried a lot of different builds and when i see other cool builds on the forums i will always give them a try but always end up with my own build or the Healway from Christos. That is why i have 2 guardians 1 berserker and one cleric/healway

Guanglai Kangyi.4318:

so yes, guardian DPS is undeniably better if that is the case. It is basically a toss-up between the two classes when the traits are working as intended, in their current form warriors are actually losing out even to necromancers.

Can you please post your calculated values and the formula you use to get them. Simply stating ‘this is better than that’ is not adequate.

I run the 10/30/0/30/0 and really like it. I feel pretty confident that it can match some other classes dps output, but I can’t state it as fact as I don’t have an accepted formula or method of testing. I can’t say anything about warriors either as I haven’t played one.

Blood~

Fenrir.3609:

I am unsure of quite why anyone would run dps gear with 0/0/10/30/30.

Oh, I know people who advocate that build with zerker gear as a “very good build” …

@Bloodgruve: I recently managed to get my warrior to 80 and to give it almost maximal zerker gear (except the back item, since I don’t have enough fractals tokens). Was a somehow sobering experience afterwards, although I haven’t had the opportunity to test it in a decent group. Right now I have the feeling that her damage is a bit better than my guard’s, but not as much as I thought. Yet I’d love to see any proof for GK’s frequent claim, too.

I have seen some values a while back on guru but after using the formula on a number of different builds I wasn’t convinced that it was painting a completely accurate picture. I have however just dug up an old spread sheet from someone on guru that I really like. Everything being equal GSword was sitting at 3800 DPS and Hammer at 3600 DPS using this specific spreadsheet.

I’ll say it again, I think ANet has a bit more balance between classes than some think. But without values this is just an assumption.

Watch out for that Buildcraft site; because it inflates your dps with 30 into honor due to elusive power. It seems to calculate it as a flat boost.

Slightly sobering situation as far as damage and the build I have been using in PvE.

Currently I have been running an endless might boonway style build 0/15/0/30/25

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fUAQJARWlUgyCXFyvDf4ESOjVCBtPEQYPwoMqjA-jwCB4LBiEJQpRFRjtsNsVXBp8Ka6aYKXBR7Sq2gbI12cRTEAzCA-e

I maintain 20+ stacks of might throughout the duration of combat, and 12 stacks for the group.

In wvw, I have good survivability can outlast most folks, boon corruption and stripping can be a pain though.

With that said, I took it upon myself to solo the CoE event chain just to open up the dungeon for the hell of it.

Every point I did with east except for one of them. This even required you to kill the technician before they finished reprograming the console.

I was running out of time and failing the event consistently. I had to switch to might on crit and put out spirit weapons with hounds of balthazar to get out enough DPS to kill the npc.

Was quite fun challenging myself, but I can see where my build was lacking damage when it needed it.

I like how much survival I have currently, and I like how smooth my groups have been going with the extra might, but I am now thinking of ways to push even more damage out.

I used to do this build with berserker gear until I was able to farm up the magi gear, I just felt like the extra hp would help against conditions a bit, so I switched over.

Short “cool story bro” from me, to help people when considering builds and what they want to do.