Guild Wars 2

Well, I’ve played a lot of different classes, but I’m really looking forward to starting guardian tonight. I usually play a thief, who could die from someone sneezing on me, so I think it will be a nice change of pace to be able to take a little more damage.

Anyways, I was wondering if anyone had any tips or advice as to what are some good weapons to get familiar with for Guardians, and if everyone enjoys them, that plays them

Thanks in advance.

Greatswords are fun.

Indeed they are.
But I would suggest: Try every weapon and decide for yourself what you really like and which weapon is most fun for you. :-)
Have fun with your guardian, I like mine although she is still a low level (<20).

Haha, I went the other way. I’m sure you will get annoyed at not being able to stealth and de-agro when running from a to b.

On a brighter note, you can faceroll what ever mob you would have run away from while they hit you with their wet noddles.

No idea what is the most effective but am a big fan of great sword (Dps) and then a mace and board (tankish) for when things get cray cray. Keeping a scepter and focus in your bag for any range type scenarios helps but you can shoulder through for the most part. It might be a bit over kill but I like chain pulling multiple mobs so I ran a pretty tanky build leveling, much toughness etc.

Scepter is your own ranged weapon. For PvE you can usually go without one, but you’ll need one for WvW and dungeons. Good to keep one in your bags for world bosses, too.

I think any new profession, it’s good to go to the heart of the mists and get a feel for how things go on the golems and in matches, too, if you’re of the inclination.

If you played a GW2 thief, presumably you learned about dodge and positioning. Timing is everything for a guardian, cuz usually you’re in close where the dangerous action happens.

For example, on my ranger, I pretty-much just try to keep everything on cooldown. With my guardian, ya gotta save your block for when you need it. Combos are important, too.

I didn’t enjoy GS on my guardian at all. It was a boring weapon to me. I had a lot of fun with a 1h sword+focus or shield.

I’ve been using the Greatsword to level. When I used other weapons, I had some difficulty tagging enemies when other players (and bots) zerged events. The #3 ability on Greatsword solves that problem.

sceptre and torch as set 1 is recommended as your default/backup . You can take hits but believe me, you aren’t going to be tanking anything; most of your time fighting bosses will be spent at range, so the sceptre is really useful – it’s crud for damage though its ranged aoe ability is nice and on low cooldown.

sword and torch is fantastic for DPS. Your single target DPS will be equal or better a greatsword, but you have a limited toolset.

Sword/mace and shield is really good for survivability vs 1 mob. 2+ and it doesn’t really make signifigant difference, you’ll still end up having to pop a heal. Also, you aren’t going to be tanking bosses/champs. the shield will allow you to maybe survive 1 extra hit.

Hammer for large events with multiple mobs. You can trait it so you can spam the AOE jump strike every 4 seconds. it has a range of 600 so you can clear quite a good distance between mobs very easily. In large zergs/fights, it’s THE best faceroll weapon you can be using – 2222222222. The DPS over time is equal to or better than a greatsword. For short, quick fights, the hammer will seem very slow.

Greatsword – can’t go wrong here, though the AOE potential of this is nowhere near as good as the hammer though it can finish fights quicker than the hammer. DPS over time is similar or slightly less than the hammer. It has a longer leap than the hammer but on a very long cooldown.

I’ve found the Hammer in Orr to be very effective due to the massive amount of mobs spawned during events. Simply speaking, you’ll hit more mobs for nice spikey numbers more often than with the other weapons. It’s a PITA to level with though.

Guardian is a great class for teaming, but I largerly prefer my Warrior when solo or PvP.
Basically Guard’s best attack deals 3k at most, and they have no pvp-viable ranged weapon, but they are by far the greatest team support characters and the most survivable class.

Someone who mentioned tagging mobs in events… greatsword? ppffft try staff.

Staff is heaps of fun, your spam attack just hits everything in a huge radius around u and it has some funky utility skills like a sprint.

Over all its a fun class, you got access to pretty much everything, some mage-like abilities while wearing heavy armor or you can play like a warrior with better defensive capabilities whatever takes your fancy, or of course mix it up.

I deleted my Guardian because I liked it so much I am gonna invest a few hours in making a serious one, so I need to draw up some character concepts and blueprints when I have time, sigh it’s hard work making a character that sticks. Seems easy with Charr tho they’re all adorable.

Don’t bother with using a shield man. The focus is your true friend.

I’m fairly certain that dieing by a sneeze as a thief means you are doing something wrong. Even though irrelevant to the main point, their survivability is a bit high with the correct tools. (now,you might just be one of those guys kittenfuse to play with the cookie cutters builds, that’s something I would respect)

I hope you get to enjoy the guardian though. Have fun.

Just making a small joke was all it was, lol. Don’t read into it too much.

mar.7103:

Greatswords are fun.

2h Hammer. > All

Welcome to the guardian brigade.
I agree with Navi. Try out every weapon to see what you like. I have a lvl 39 Guardian alt and still feel like I am learning.

I looked up builds because I wanted to understand how to properly do damage mitigation. But do not let the build suggestions hamper you. Do research on the traits, skillls and weapons to understand their pros/cons and uses.

The Guardian is a challenge for me because it is different than any other professions I have ever played. Still have not decided on the playstyle to use but that is what makes it fun and interesting for me.

Also, do not be afraid to be more flexible with the Guardian. What I mean is be open to changing up weapons and traits in Dungeon or PVP encounters. Or even while you are just out in the world. It seems to be the type of profession that encourages change based on the situation.

I’ve played just about every Profession, but I keep on coming back to my Guardian for the sheer fun of it. Incredibly versatile; I carry and use every single weapon regularly. They all have their uses, depending on the makeup of the group. You can sit back and support the clothies with shields and ranged weaponry, or you can get up close and personal with melee. And everyone will be thanking you when you have the trait that throws up a shield when you’re reviving.

I am personally more of a “Melee” type myself, I love being up close so my two classes are a Warrior, and Guardian.

Currently my Warrior is level 63, but here to talk about the Guardian. I have a level 33 Guardian on my second account (Yes I Have 2…), and have tried making one on my “Main” account, I do enjoy the Guardian class, and in some ways more then other I enjoy it more then the Warrior. This is because of the all their skills, and Sigils.

Sigils are an awesome way to buff your party, allies, and yourself, and could make a world a difference in battle, if you want to be able to withstand some hits, I’d say use the hammer, as the last combo in the hammer reduces all incoming damage for like 2 seconds, which isn’t bad, but if you spam the combo you’re gaining gaining a big bonus VS damage, especially if you increase the duration of your sigils within your traits, which I have never personally done, but thought about it, and could possibly make you “Spam” the sigils without them vanishing before you throw another one down.

Of course if you’re going for mad damage, I would be more tempted to go with Great Sword. I’ve heard of people making a “Crit Hammer” build, however, I just can’t see this being more useful then the trade-up of a little damage over massive speed. I personally would say the GS is stronger. I find myself using my skills with the GS like mad, there’s not a single skill wrong with the GS at all, you blind, you DoT like crazy, and all of your attacks are either sweep, or AoE.

As for my secondary choice, it’s a hard decision, I’ve been thinking of the Staff, and or Scepter. I would as most people would, use the staff, and shield/torch for kiting elites/Champions, etc, while I would use the staff for group buffs, and the wall, and speed. The staff is my primary Secondary weapon when I’m not concerned about kiting, due to the speed buff, for ease of transportation, and I even use it in battle, why just the other day in W vs W, I believe I solely made the difference in little “Group” battle I had with some others (Could be over exaggerating it), but the one skill I forget what it’s called, but if grants +12 might to ALL allies around you, which you’d think doesn’t make much of a difference, but when you’re going up almost 300-400 damage per normal hit, I could see that making a major difference in PvP.

I’ve also considered using a hammer/Staff build. This reason is due to almost being able to spam “Wall” skills. There’s a lot of tactics then I would say majority of people believe there is to be had with a Guardian. Having a staff, and hammer, which both have skills that could essentially turn the tide of the battle. The staff will create a wall in a horizontal line in front of you, while the hammer will create a circular wall that could trap enemies inside, or outside of the circle. I believe this will be seen as the “Combo” to go for in PvP, structured anyways, I would have to give this a try personally.

Anyways, all the weapons are pretty well good for the Guardian, the only one I am disliking so far is the Single Sword, and this is only due to the fact it’s normal combo last attack states “Attacks up to three enemies in a cone”, when really it only attacks one enemy once, 3 times, which you’d think is a good thing, however, I see it as bad.

Well, interpret what I said as you will. Enjoy the Guardian, or don’t, it’ll all fall on how you feel about the class.

Enjoy godmode.

As many said before me – you should not only try, but also keep in your bags all the weapons set allowed to our class. Some weeks ago I started doing dungeons, and now I use 5 sets of weapons. I switch between them depending on the situation (often I’d run away from battle, just to swap to more appropriate set, which was in my bags, and then come back with more helpful abilities).

I used to run Greatsword + Staff only. With Altruistic Healing and Shouts turning conditions to boons, I was quite powerful support and at same time offensive Guardian. It’s fun, but sometimes you encounter some bosses that hit hard, enough hard to wipe your entire party. For single target encounters, I strongly recommend Mace + Focus set. Some bosses kill you with single hit, but they take their time to do so, and that’s when Guardian can pretty much permanently block ALL the hits. Using Aegis blocks, using 3rd Mace skill and 5th Focus skill, as well as proper dodging timing – you are able to block everything if you watch your opponent carefully. At same time, you can deal some damage with mace, which wil grant extra heals and regen to you.

It works good on single targets though. When I’m crowded, I prefer Sword+Shield combo, for mass blinding and bouncing back the aggro crowded around me. I think, that Guardian offers powerful variety of weapon sets, which you should be able to use in almost every encounter. I wouldn’t recommend sticking to Greatsword only Use all the sets!

I prefer GS for leveling but other weapons still work wonderfully. Definitely recommend that you have all the weapons in the bag and unlock all the skills. Other weapons I’d recommend are: sword/torch, scepter/focus, and hammer. A guardian can also be built to do anything: damage, defensive, or support.

Stop!
…
Hammertime!

1h mace/sword + shield, get tough/vit/pwer gear till 35 and go to town aoeing everything. You wont see much knocking you down.

If you levelled a paladin tank in wow, its pretty much the same spec. Low single target dps, but high aoe killing and survivability.

Welcome to the brigade! I am quite new to the Guardian too, but I’m enjoying it immensely. The first 40 levels have been great fun and I haven’t found any major drawbacks. Word to the wise: while the hammer is super fun (I have been levelling for the last 25 levels with it or so), it requires attentive gameplay and careful timing. I personally like that, but I understand it is not for everybody.

Tell us how you feel after some levels!

Well, I’m 13 right now, nothing to brag about, but I have been enjoying him a lot. I find I’ve been using the GS/Staff a lot. I was wondering if anyone uses condition damage as a Guardian, I’ve been using condition damage on my weapon, and a few other things, and it’s kinds nice. Opinions?

As far as conditions, Sword/Torch and appropriate traits can get a lot of burning going on.

I leveled to 80 almost exclusively using Greatsword\sword & focus. I tried a lot of different combo’s on the way but the burn build seemed the easiest and most fun while leveling. It’s just felt very fluid and dynamic. As a guardian you will pretty much have no problems with a glass-cannon or condition build until you get into the 70+ zones or go to Orr, then the glass cannon build starts to lose it’s shine since the mobs hit much harder, take longer to die, and use more stun\pull\range abilities on you. Once I got to 80 I switched to a survival build and now use hammer\scepter & focus and it’s much easier to solo things. I wouldn’t bother with shield, focus has much better survivability.