Guild Wars 2

Played a Guardian since launch, because I’m a tank, I’ve always played a tank in all games. We all took a long break and came back for HoT. GW2 feels like Asheron’s Call did to me, where there was no artificial aggro mechanic like in a lot of modern MMO’s. No trinity as ANet says. I know at launch there was aggro, maybe it was hidden and seems to have been nerfed now, because I built a high-Toughness Guardian and I would pull bosses out of fights without hitting them, just by running past.

Anyway this time round I’ve created an extreme ‘tank’ build, see attachment, I wanted a max tank/survive/heal group/boon group/condi removal for group build. I went all Minstrel/Ambrite, I’m used to playing high mitigation/low DPS tank builds, I have no problem with it.

Except my guild says they really don’t notice much difference when I’m in the group. A little more boonage, a few condis removed, a bit of healing, but nothing game-changing where they are saying “This will be a tough fight we need Chazcon to tank”

Seems all classes here are basically DPS with a smattering of their own boon/condi removal/healing (again I suspect by design with ANet focused on killing the trinity).

I guess I’ll give up on the tank/group support mindset and add in DPS on a new build, and create more of a rounded build. A hybrid. Sounds so boring, I love my extreme tank builds really.

Some light classes have more health sustain and damage than a sturdy guardian, with that you will loose all your damage in exchange of a few boons that almost for sure your friends also have, guardian is not a tanker (there are far better tanker in game than guardian, guard tanker even on pvp only works against terribad players), a bit surdy but far from being a tanker, also sturdy guard on pvp also only works against really bad players.

In pve anything works so all u and your freinds need to go is fully optimized for damage output being in condi or phisical.

My first suggestion would be to switch out your signets for shouts. Shelter or Receive the Light are good choices for a tank/healer. Signet of Courage’s passive is not very strong without the trait and the cast time makes is pretty difficult to use well. You will also want to take Purity of Voice over Force of Will, both because of the AoE condi clear it provides and you’ll want the CDR when running 4-5 shouts.

The other option would be to switch a traitline (Valor, but possibly Virtues) for Radiance so you can get the signet trait. This would also let you spam Justice active for aoe blind, aoe might and additional burning for your team. While this option is less ideal in terms of tanking and healing you would be able to keep your signets and provide strong offensive support for your party.

Swap out Smiter’s Boon. It provides no support, no healing, and amounts to 1 condi clear every ~30s. Strength of the Fallen is an automatic condi clear every 10s, making it three times better. Focus mastery is also a strong choice if you choose to take focus over shield.

Water runes are a good choice. Monk runes would provide more healing, while Leadership runes would provide more boon duration+condi clear. Ultimately any of the three are good choices.

Thanks all, good info, things I haven’t thought of.

Yes this is much better: