Guild Wars 2

Fairly similar layout of attacks on these weps from these two different classes…

Autoattack chain, whirl, leap, then two supporting attacks.

Scrapper gets 4 stacks of might for 8 seconds AND 4 stacks of vuln for the autochain.

Guard gets 1 might stack for 5 seconds.

Both do the same base damage over the 3 hits.

ANet: What’s the balance rationale behind these sort of design inconsistancies please? Does guardian make up for it elsewhere? If so can someone point me where?

You’re comparing apples and oranges here. One is an elite spec that grants access to a new set and two different class types.

Apart from other differences:

Scrapper = Medium Armor – Guardian = Heavy Armor

Comparing the two, guardian greatsword’s autoattack speed is about 10% faster (2.5s per chain rather than 2.75s per chain), so in DPS terms that’s roughly another 10% to its base damage.

Going through the other skills, greatsword’s other skills are more DPS-oriented, while scrapper hammer is more about survivability. The greatsword guardian is more about spiking things down quickly, and any might stacks they might build up through autoattack is more of an added bonus rather than part of the greatsword strategy. Scrapper hammer is mroe oriented towards the longer battle, holding out while wearing the opponent down and building up might/vulnerability stacks.

Now, this isn’t to say that there isn’t something off about the balance between the two weapons. ArenaNet is still in the process of trimming back the elite specs that came out of the gate a little too strong, and scrapper is still in that list.

robertjan.2197:

Apart from other differences:

Scrapper = Medium Armor – Guardian = Heavy Armor

They have more 5k health than guard, damage reduction diference from light to heavy is arround 10%-15% damage reduction, so medium is arround 7%, not much of diference, since damage reducers dont stack.
Also Engie toughness starts at 2000, guardian arround 2200, guardian health is to low for the the toughness to be effective, or noticeable, and investing in healing power is a HUGE mistake since will kill the guardian damage, it will end with low damage and still low surviability.

Still scrapper is in much better shape than DH, DH are easy to kill and scrappers are not.
DH cant beat sturdy classes, scrapper in sturdy builds still does good damage, with every good surviability, guardian/dh dont.

robertjan.2197:

Apart from other differences:

Scrapper = Medium Armor – Guardian = Heavy Armor

Scrapper = 15.900 hp
Guardian = 11.600 hp

scrappers gets a passively procced invuln

guardians gets a passively procced symbol of zeal

If a GS Guard and Ham Scrapper stood next to each other and pressed 2 the Scrapper would deal full damage and reflect the Guardian’s damage back to him.

Ragnarox.9601:

robertjan.2197:

Apart from other differences:

Scrapper = Medium Armor – Guardian = Heavy Armor

Scrapper = 15.900 hp
Guardian = 11.600 hp

Armor in this game is a joke: first, the base amount of armor between classes isn’t that big; second, armor is useless against conditions -with the added advantage that condition can rely in one or two stats- so is a lot easier to do damage passively while remaining tanky; and third: armor escalates really bad.

Currently Tempest, Druids, Heralds, Scrappers and probably Reapers are tankier than Guardian/DH, and some classes like condition Crono/core Mesmer doesn’t even need to be tanky to defeat you -try to beat confussion builds-.

Guardians are designed by Karl….end of story

Darknicrofia.2604:

scrappers gets a passively procced invuln

guardians gets a passively procced symbol of zeal

ok bout passives.

Scrapper gets in normal build that everyone and their mother use:
- passive protection when stunned
- protection when use heal
- retalation when attacked
- swiftness when attacked
- bomb when dodged
- 500 hp + regen medical kit on the ground
- invul at 25% hp
-with superspeed + regen + swiftness + food = 850 hp/sec

Guardian gets -
- 3/5 retalation
- 1 aegis
- secured place in a “good spot” club
- stability on stun
- put something
…

Try using guardian gs for mobility, and then try using scrapper hammer to get around.

Scrappers are better off because they have higher base HP and also more passive abilities. Guardians have a class mechanic (virtues) that is utterly garbage unless traited and that greatly limits their choices. It also means that unlike scrappers, they have to pretty much sacrifice offense or defense; currently as everyone knows it’s pretty much the later.

The other thing is the general sadness of something generally associated with guardians— and that is aegis which is horrifically outdated in this day and age.

Ragnarox.9601:

Darknicrofia.2604:

scrappers gets a passively procced invuln

guardians gets a passively procced symbol of zeal

ok bout passives.

Scrapper gets in normal build that everyone and their mother use:
- passive protection when stunned
- protection when use heal
- retalation when attacked
- swiftness when attacked
- bomb when dodged
- 500 hp + regen medical kit on the ground
- invul at 25% hp
-with superspeed + regen + swiftness + food = 850 hp/sec

Guardian gets -
- 3/5 retalation
- 1 aegis
- secured place in a “good spot” club
- stability on stun
- put something
…

- burning every five attacks
- 84 hp/s heal
- might when blocking attacks
- remove conditions when blocking attacks and/or knockback and gain stability when using a longbow at close range every 10s

That said, I don’t think the passively procced symbol of zeal counts. Pretty much every PvP guardian nowadays runs Valor/Virtues/DH, so you’re not likely to see that in the field.

Having played both sides of the coin, the automatic elixir S is a double-edged sword. It can save your tail from a spike or mean you can pull off a fortuitous safe stomp, but apart from stomping it effectively acts as an unbreakable daze for the duration. While on the whole it’s probably more useful to have, there have been times where in a close fight the elixir S proccing has stopped me from finishing off an opponent, given them a chance to recover, and then proceed to finish me off when the elixir S wears off.

Guardian doesn’t have any passive procs with the save-your-tail potential of Elixir S autoproc, but when playing guardian I’ve never sworn in frustration when an autoproc broke what I’d hoped to be a finishing combo either.

(Also: Maintaining the healing from swiftness, and especially superspeed, is easier said than done. It’s useful, but you can’t assume you have it on always.)

Note that I’m not saying that guardian doesn’t have problems, or that engineer/scrapper isn’t currently in a better spot. Still, the grass is greener from the other side.

At least as an engineer you have multiple viable builds.

Guardians currently have more then 50% of their traits in such a bad state that nobody in their right mind would want to use them.
Then another 20% seem like they are in the wrong place or should be merged with other existing traits.

Then to top all that off nothing but 3 of the 4 meditations & 2 of the 4 traps are any good for PvP, Every other utility is crap.

Then if that still isn’t enough failure of design for you practically every weapon has a major design flaw.
The mace – All the attacks are slow & the last AA doesn’t cleave, the 3rd ability the block can also be ended by ranged attacks unlike every other melee block in game.

The sword- The last AA has a narrow cone causing it to often miss vs moving targets, it’s also a projectile so it can be reflected. The #3 is also so slow it can be strafed.

The greatsword- You actually have to be standing inside your target for #2 to hit for full potential, it also lacks any defensive skills unlike every other non guardian 2h weapon in game.

The hammer- every attack on it is slower then a snail in glue & the CD’s are very high.

The staff – Nothing on it is worth using outside of a mass WvW zerg where it does just enough AOE to get credit but not enough to be useful.

The scepter – Can be strafed and is crap outside of melee range.

The torch – Again between long cast times and projectiles so slow they can be strafed it sucks.

draxynnic.3719:

Ragnarox.9601:

Darknicrofia.2604:

scrappers gets a passively procced invuln

guardians gets a passively procced symbol of zeal

ok bout passives.

Scrapper gets in normal build that everyone and their mother use:
- passive protection when stunned
- protection when use heal
- retalation when attacked
- swiftness when attacked
- bomb when dodged
- 500 hp + regen medical kit on the ground
- invul at 25% hp
-with superspeed + regen + swiftness + food = 850 hp/sec

Guardian gets -
- 3/5 retalation
- 1 aegis
- secured place in a “good spot” club
- stability on stun
- put something
…

- burning every five attacks
- 84 hp/s heal
- might when blocking attacks
- remove conditions when blocking attacks and/or knockback and gain stability when using a longbow at close range every 10s

That said, I don’t think the passively procced symbol of zeal counts. Pretty much every PvP guardian nowadays runs Valor/Virtues/DH, so you’re not likely to see that in the field.

Having played both sides of the coin, the automatic elixir S is a double-edged sword. It can save your tail from a spike or mean you can pull off a fortuitous safe stomp, but apart from stomping it effectively acts as an unbreakable daze for the duration. While on the whole it’s probably more useful to have, there have been times where in a close fight the elixir S proccing has stopped me from finishing off an opponent, given them a chance to recover, and then proceed to finish me off when the elixir S wears off.

Guardian doesn’t have any passive procs with the save-your-tail potential of Elixir S autoproc, but when playing guardian I’ve never sworn in frustration when an autoproc broke what I’d hoped to be a finishing combo either.

(Also: Maintaining the healing from swiftness, and especially superspeed, is easier said than done. It’s useful, but you can’t assume you have it on always.)

Note that I’m not saying that guardian doesn’t have problems, or that engineer/scrapper isn’t currently in a better spot. Still, the grass is greener from the other side.

Pls take that 84 hp/sec from meh, it’s too OP I cant sleep now.
You can take burning proc of 100 with every 5th attack too pl0x.
You can take that 1 might when aegis is used or block with 1sec icd.

Take All cause I don’t need it cause it does not make a difference.

edit. I have never lost to DH in a duel with my Scrapper, never, they often leave me at 70% max hp before they die. I will delete this game and give all my money if they make guardian in such state in what Scrapper already is. We need that man responsible of making and designing Scrapper. I’ll build statue of him if he revamp Guardian.

In testing I play pvp often with no traits selected on my guardian. Just my weapons and know how. Sadly I only die around 10% faster due to not having the dh block (which gets shut down half the time anyways). 1s of a boon, a single block from aegis, retaliation, burning, a cleane on block with 1s icd when I can already clear with cop, it all worthless. The only trait I miss is stab on f3 use and that doesn’t even work with dh f3.

TLDR: guard traits do not matter. Try it yourself.

Gwaihir.1745:

In testing I play pvp often with no traits selected on my guardian. Just my weapons and know how. Sadly I only die around 10% faster due to not having the dh block (which gets shut down half the time anyways). 1s of a boon, a single block from aegis, retaliation, burning, a cleane on block with 1s icd when I can already clear with cop, it all worthless. The only trait I miss is stab on f3 use and that doesn’t even work with dh f3.

TLDR: guard traits do not matter. Try it yourself.

Aegis is so op, It just postopne your death for 0.5 sec

the only traits that matter are monk’s focus and the DH traits

Aegis is a very flawed design, in pve like fractals it can be abused to block very high hitting attacks which often 1 shot you however in pvp its next to worthless when there are gazillion of aoe’s going on and faster attacks.

IMO guardian needs a rework from scratch, before they had a defined role of being bunker and support, now they are just meh. Sure a dh can quickly finish noobs but a good player can almost dodge all of their major attacks and finish them 1 vs 1 easy.
I can’t think how someone could lose against a dh as a scrapper, its almost crime.

If Scraps performed as good in skirmish mid fights as they do in 1v1 sustains, I’d say guard needs a total rework to be on their level but that’s not the case. (in casualQ).

phokus.8934:

You’re comparing apples and oranges here. One is an elite spec that grants access to a new set and two different class types.

They blatantly stated the elite specs were NOT supposed to be an upgrade in power or utility from the core specs. But it just was not true, some of the scaling with the elite specs (particularly with boons and power) are just ridiculous when compared to even the most similar abilities found on the core classes.

As a hummer user myself here, my only issue is with the hammer 3rd auto attack…

If it would be just like scrapper or warrior, i wont ask for anything else, i really hope Anet would look into this.

Conncept.7638:

phokus.8934:

You’re comparing apples and oranges here. One is an elite spec that grants access to a new set and two different class types.

They blatantly stated the elite specs were NOT supposed to be an upgrade in power or utility from the core specs. But it just was not true, some of the scaling with the elite specs (particularly with boons and power) are just ridiculous when compared to even the most similar abilities found on the core classes.

Anet @ balance, what to expect -.-# ?

Odin.8270:

As a hummer user myself here, my only issue is with the hammer 3rd auto attack…

If it would be just like scrapper or warrior, i wont ask for anything else, i really hope Anet would look into this.

there is so much more that needs to be done to the hammer than just speeding up the 3rd hit of auto attack.

Darknicrofia.2604:

Odin.8270:

As a hummer user myself here, my only issue is with the hammer 3rd auto attack…

If it would be just like scrapper or warrior, i wont ask for anything else, i really hope Anet would look into this.

there is so much more that needs to be done to the hammer than just speeding up the 3rd hit of auto attack.

Yes iam aware of that to be honest, but not trying to demand much.

I wonder if ANET really reading our comments on this section lol.