Guild Wars 2

I’m currently making ascended gear for raids, but everywhere I look it’s only hammer in raids. I have an ascended GS, and I know how to use it well along with longbow. I don’t want to use hammer because I’m terrible at it and I hate using it. Will the DPS difference make or break my group? I can’t use hammer because of the above reasons, and I know I’ll cripple my group if I do use it, but I don’t want to break a group using GS and LB either.

Mind explaining me how you can be terrible at hammer? The “rotation” isn’t exactly hard. :<

Also hammer doesn’t only have higher DPS assuming perma quickness but also gives permanent protection and has more CC. There is really no point in not going hammer.

It won’t neccesarily break your group if you use GS/Lbow instead but there is really no point in bringing a guardian if he does that since all you provide is DPS and other classes can do that better.

That being said I feel you. GS/Lbow is definetly more fun than hammer. :<

Well, if I hate something I am not going to feel motivated to learn it, plus making an ascended hammer is still expensive as * for me.

The rotation is literally just pressing 1. The only thing you need to learn is what interupts your auto chain and what doesn’t.

But can I get away with GS-LB, cause if that’s true I definitely don’t want to use hammer. That sounds soul destroying just pressing one.

SproutJr.4802:

But can I get away with GS-LB, cause if that’s true I definitely don’t want to use hammer. That sounds soul destroying just pressing one.

If you are in a guild, maybe. Depends on the guild.

If you are joining a pug probably not. There is no reason for a pug to take you over a DH that is running the right weapons.

By right weapons I mean the one that brings the most to the group.

GS/LB is good for short fights.

Hammer brings more to longer fights, which is what Raids are.

Sometimes doing different content means you have to be willing to play for the “We” not the “Me”

Great, I’m forced to play something I don’t want to because I don’t have an alternative for sustained dps. I don’t mind playing for the group, but it is silly that the best sustained dps just consists of pressing 1.

I’m not trying to be a jerk and i understand that you find GS more fun because I do as well, but its just for the raid encounter so whats the harm in just using the weapon set that can benefit your entire group? when you arent at a boss and are killing trash mobs you can switch back to GS but for the bosses it’d be ideal to use what benefits the group. Me personally I have every weapon available to my class because it’s good to be prepared for what might come. Just my 2 cents.

Also the meta can change as well so you never know maybe gs will be needed more in the next wing or they might change things. Or you could go GS/Hammer that way you get a weapon you like and a weapon that’s required.

If they would do the following to hammer I and many others would gladly use it.

1: Reduce the cast time of the last AA to 1/2 second and get rid of the after cast, but take 1 pulse off of symbol of protection. (this would effectively keep the damage and protection uptime the same while making the AA much faster)

2: Reduce the cast time of the number 3 & 4, as is their way too slow.

3: Make it so you can move while casting the Number 5.

Until then its just something you have to bring while your bored to death spamming 1.

Ragnar the Rock.3174:

If they would do the following to hammer I and many others would gladly use it.

1: Reduce the cast time of the last AA to 1/2 second and get rid of the after cast, but take 1 pulse off of symbol of protection. (this would effectively keep the damage and protection uptime the same while making the AA much faster)

2: Reduce the cast time of the number 3 & 4, as is their way too slow.

3: Make it so you can move while casting the Number 5.

Until then its just something you have to bring while your bored to death spamming 1.

^This all the way. In spvp, our hammer has really fallen behind the times and needs to be brought up to par with other weapons. I like these changes, but would propose some other changes as alternatives:

#1: Agreed, I like your change.

#2: base damage increase (should be pretty close to true-shot), OR a very slight range increase (perhaps 400 units would put it in a good spot without making it op). Hammer is more utility focused, so I’d prefer the latter.

-Changes aside, this skill should be changed to have the vertical movement component removed (like thief’s heartseaker) so we can combo this with JI like we used to be able to do. No one uses this skill to traverse the map anyways….

#3: Cast time decrease like you said, but also slightly increased projectile velocity and decreased after-cast. It’s fairly unreliable once targets get past around 700 to 750 range. This skill would still be balanced and very dodgeable with higher projectile velocity.

#4: I like the cast time of this skill. I think what could be buffed though: reduce the CD to 20 seconds, and allow this attack to strike up to 3 targets rather than just 1. This skill is too slow to only affect one target.

#5: Agreed, I like your change.

I really hope we get some hammer-love. I think the above changes would be perfect:
-They don’t hurt hammer dps in pve
-They maintain the theme of our hammer being a utility/CC/team support weapon
-They would make the hammer a more reliable weapon in spvp.
-These buffs/changes don’t make the hammer over-powered by any means.

I feel you OP but a huge part of playing a guard well is picking the right weapon for the situation. There is more to hammer guarding than just pressing 1 ps!

Ragnar the Rock.3174:

If they would do the following to hammer I and many others would gladly use it.

1: Reduce the cast time of the last AA to 1/2 second and get rid of the after cast, but take 1 pulse off of symbol of protection. (this would effectively keep the damage and protection uptime the same while making the AA much faster)

2: Reduce the cast time of the number 3 & 4, as is their way too slow.

3: Make it so you can move while casting the Number 5.

Until then its just something you have to bring while your bored to death spamming 1.

I Wish~

Yea Hammer AA is the most dps on guard especially for raids. But there is more than just smashing 1. Like Keksmuffin said, you want to know when to use your traps and your F1 to not interrupt your AA chain. Procession of blades doens’t interrupt your AA chain itself but for example you still want to finish the cast of your third attack of AA chain. There is also some ways to support/help you team with F2 and F3 which are usefull in some situaitons. In addition on vale guardian you can help out the seeker control by using banish and ring of warding at the right times.

In dungeons and low level fractals I would still use GS + LB since it has one of the most powerful bursts in this game!

In concluision, I don’t think there is any super exciting rotation in this game.

SproutJr.4802:

Great, I’m forced to play something I don’t want to because I don’t have an alternative for sustained dps. I don’t mind playing for the group, but it is silly that the best sustained dps just consists of pressing 1.

No one is forcing you to do anything … just do what you like. Just don’t join any meta only PUGs for dungeons … like those even exist anymore.

Frankly, a ‘1’ rotation is quite nice from my perspective; let’s you focus on what you need to do.

Fully agree to ragnars suggestions on hammer improvements.

I need to hurry up and make my ascended hammer… Can’t wait to play on EZ mode

SproutJr.4802:

Great, I’m forced to play something I don’t want to because I don’t have an alternative for sustained dps. I don’t mind playing for the group, but it is silly that the best sustained dps just consists of pressing 1.

Well 2 things here.

1) No one is forcing you at anything. GS + Longbow or GS + Mace and even Scepter build all does decent dps for raid. You can choose to play whatever build you want in those. That said, pug also have the choose to play with whoever they want to. Tbh most of the time, they are not very bright about what they are ok with. For exemple, most raid pug won’t have any problem with a condi Engineer, but won’t allow a GS + Longbow DH. Even if in most situation, the DH will do more dps than the condi engineer because of the difficulty of the rotation. That make no sense, but they still have the right to take the condi engineer over the DH. If you were playing with friends or Guildmate you could argue and present facts to them. But in pugs, you can’t.

2) You are right that pressing 1 build are kind of stupid and anet should rebalance things differently. That said, it’s not just pressing 1 to be honest. You have an important CC role and are using a couple of traps in there. It’s still like 80-90% pressing 1.