Guild Wars 2

Can it fulfill a role in the PvE end-game meta? Maybe in WvW? I’ve seen a few threads out there which have tried to theorycraft a viable healing support build for Firebrand. Here’s my take on it:

Firebrand’s Support Build
Mace & Shield + Staff as weapons is the most logical choice. Mace is our best healing weapon and Staff can be used for burst healing. Hammer could be used instead of Staff to increase protection up-time since Firebrand doesn’t really pump out protection other than Tome of Courage.

Firebrand will most likely rely on Honor and Virtues. Honor contains boosts to mace, dodge heals and aegis heals. Virtues for AOE healing and Tome cooldowns. Virtues could possibly be replaced by Radiance for a more offense supportive build (Signet sharing & maybe renewing Tome of Justice if that’s going to be allowed).

Stat combo is Marshal’s (Major: Power/Healing Power, Minor: Precision/Condition Damage) or maybe Minstrel for improved quickness sharing.

Utilities: Receive the Light/Mantra of Solace (burst healing or quickness), Mantra of Potence, Signets (offensive support), shouts (defensive support), Feel My Wrath.

Healing Output
Majority of healing will come from mace auto-attack (1200), dodge (1600), Pure of Heart trait (1500) and Battle Presence (700). While Staff #4 (500 x4 + 1500), Receive the Light (1600 × 4) and Tome of Resolve can be used for burst healing. Most of the heals are short ranged and take time to activate which is a serious disadvantage of this build.

Defensive Support
Aegis is the main component of the defensive support. Mainly coming from weapons & Tome of Courage. Mantra of Solace and Retreat could also be used to spread Aegis. This works well together with Pure of Heart which heals for 1500 every time aegis get’s popped.

Offensive Support

• Quickness, Firebrand can keep up permanent quickness which is one of the main elements of their offensive support. Mantra of Potence also gives 5 stacks of might. With 100% boon duration you could keep both quickness and 5 stacks of might up.
• Quickfire Grandmaster Trait. This trait can best be compared to the Druids Sun Spirit. It applies Ashes of Just to players you apply quickness to (ICD of 10 seconds). Ashes of Just burns the target for 3 seconds. Even though Sun Spirit applies 2 stacks of burning of 3 seconds every 8 seconds. Unfortunately this Grandmaster trait also competes with a trait that’s more useful (Loremaster) so it’s probably not going to be used much.
• Tome of Justice. I’d expect this Tome to have more offensive support but it is currently mostly selfish. Only Skill #5 gives Ashes of Just to party members.
• Signets. Swapping out the Virtues specialization for Radiance allows you to apply signet passives to your team mates. Although these signets are relatively insignificant.

Competing with other classes

• In order to replace a magi druid, an active healing role, the Firebrand could potentially use this build to keep up with a similar level of healing. Even though there is limited range and higher response time. However, the druid gives a number of offensive buffs which is impossible for the guardian to go up against. While Grace of the Lands now works on 10 players, there’s still Spotter, Spirits and Glyph of Empowerment which only apply to 5 teammates. Sun Spirit is a much more reliable utility compared to Firebrand’s Quickfire trait. It applies double the burning in a shorter time frame. Quickfire also competes with Loremaster which is currently a must-have with the high cool downs on tomes and to keep the passives active. Bane Signet has potential but only lasts 8 seconds with a 25 seconds downtime. Protection up-time also seems a lot easier on Druid than on Firebrand as the Firebrand will be forced to take a Hammer and sacrifice the heals from Mace.
• We can provide plenty of quickness with the Firebrand. Although the Chronomancer can also give tons of CC, distorts and apply alacrity. So we will never completely replace them. We could possibly divide quickness sharing and both use a DPS build. The range on mantra’s makes it harder for the guardian to apply the quickness though. Chronomancer wells have a clear and distinct AOE on the ground so people know where to stand.

Firebrand Feedback
Give the guardian more offensive support to compete with Druid. For example, make Unscathed Contender apply to the whole party but reduce the percentage to 10%. This will allow an engaging way of defensive counter play by keeping up aegis to boost the offensive play of teammates.

Tome of Resolve feels rather underwhelming. Preferably the cool down should be reduced from 45 seconds to 35. The tome also suffers from long casting times and no ranged heals which is absolutely necessary for a reliable support class. Wings of Resolve is more effective than the Tome of Resolve right now.

Two of the Grandmaster traits are really, really weak. Loremaster will have my preference in most occasions. Rework the Grandmaster traits so that each of them serves a different tome. This allows the Firebrand to specialize into different types of roles: DPS, Healing or Support. For example, give the Tome of Resolve Grandmaster trait instant casting and ground targeting with reduced cool down on the Tome.

I foresee major problems applying quickness with a 300 range cone in front while at the same time trying to deal damage with a 130 range mace or axe. Taking a step back or being forced to stand on the opposite side in order to reliably apply quickness will be a DPS/Heal loss and I have my doubts whether it will work in practice.

Noah.4756:

I foresee major problems applying quickness with a 300 range cone in front while at the same time trying to deal damage with a 130 range mace or axe. Taking a step back or being forced to stand on the opposite side in order to reliably apply quickness will be a DPS/Heal loss and I have my doubts whether it will work in practice.

That’s been consensus since the start of the test weekend. At its current state, support firebrand will be dead on arrival.

My biggest concern with fb healing is the low coefficients on tome of resolve. I feel it should heal more for all the limitations it has (resources, cd of tomes, cds of chapters).

Kuya.6495:

My biggest concern with fb healing is the low coefficients on tome of resolve. I feel it should heal more for all the limitations it has (resources, cd of tomes, cds of chapters).

If we look at the two major heals from Tome of Resolve it looks like not only the coefficients are low, but also the base numbers.

• Tome of Resolve #4 Shining River: 1230 + (0.3 * 1600 HP) = 1710. For comparison, Celestial Avatar #4 can reach 8000+ (twice with Quickdraw) with the same Healing Power.

• Tome of Resolve #1 Desert Bloom: 730 + (0.42 * 1600 HP) = 1402. The numbers are almost equal to #4 Shining River. But since it doesn’t have a cool down it’s better.

Compared to Wings of Resolve: 3890 + (1.2 * 1600 HP) = 5810. Wings of Resolve even contains a leap while the Tome of Resolve heals are short ranged. Although higher base numbers and coefficients does not necessarily make the Firebrand a good healing support specialization. Consistency (due to cool downs), flexibility (no ground targeted heals) and lack of offensive support will force the Firebrand into a DPS role.

Noah.4756:

Firebrand’s Support Build
Mace & Shield + Staff as weapons is the most logical choice. Mace is our best healing weapon and Staff can be used for burst healing.

The staff outclasses the mace in terms of healing in literally every way. The staff’s healing is burst healing, it has a higher hps (I’ve done the calculations, even before the buffs it had higher hps), and it has more range. This is especially true after the recent buffs to the staff. The mace’s healing is 100% sustained without any burst whatsoever, a lot of its healing just comes from regeneration, and the range limit on it makes it useless for healing allies.

The Firebrand needs at least four things to be viable compared to a Druid:

• No activation time for tomes in order to have the same level of reactivity as Druids, or even Ventari.
• Resolve and Courage cooldowns should be reduced to respectively 20/25sec. and 40/45sec. in order to have a healing burst capability as often as Druids.
• Resolve should have a blast finisher (should probably be Azure Sun), just like Celestial Avatar as one.
• Radiant Recovery (Resolve’s second skill) should have a reduce cast time around ½ or ¾.

Reworking the pages and the top line traits would also help.

Then core Guardian should have some buffs, there is already a discussion about Signet of Courage, it should at least tick more often with a larger radius and a decreased heal, and some traits like the new Perfect Inscription should also be buffed, currently you can share your signet passive for 8sec, it should be around 10 or 12sec.

Fashion Mage.3712:

Noah.4756:

Firebrand’s Support Build
Mace & Shield + Staff as weapons is the most logical choice. Mace is our best healing weapon and Staff can be used for burst healing.

The staff outclasses the mace in terms of healing in literally every way. The staff’s healing is burst healing, it has a higher hps (I’ve done the calculations, even before the buffs it had higher hps), and it has more range. This is especially true after the recent buffs to the staff. The mace’s healing is 100% sustained without any burst whatsoever, a lot of its healing just comes from regeneration, and the range limit on it makes it useless for healing allies.

I think that’s the problem with the Firebrand and base Guardian as a whole. The radius on most abilities are low and perhaps we do not get enough compensation for it (as is evident from meta class compositions). Mace skills are limited to 180 radius which covers as much as the front of a large hit box.

I think mace is fine when we’re talking about sustained healing even though I agree the coverage is poor and it doesn’t have a burst heal. The healing from the mace might not be better than staff but it can still provide heals of 1200 every 2 seconds from Faithful Strike and the regen + 250 heal from the symbol in combination with Writ of Persistence every second. When someone get’s low on health swapping to Staff works well to burst heal.

There is also a problem with the Regeneration boon which negatively impacts mace. It is overwritten/blocked by longer duration regeneration from a different source once it reaches the cap of 5 stacks. It doesn’t sufficiently take healing power into account. So let’s say the Mesmer has no healing power and spreads regeneration (Signet of Inspiration) that lasts 10 seconds it will overwrite the Guardian’s shorter regeneration boon of 9 seconds even though the regeneration boon from the healing support Guardian will heal for much more.
Another problem exists for might. Staff #4 Empower gives might but I believe it overwrites the one from PS Warriors which lasts longer.