Guild Wars 2

Okay, I’m back.

What about this sword trait:

- Increases the range of sword’s attacks.

Sword Wave: 300 -> 450
Flashing Blade: 600 -> 900
Zealot’s Defense: 600 -> 900

One of the purposes for grandmaster traits is to define new playstyles, right? Well, this would allow guardians to opt for an unique sword/ scepter ranged playstyle.

Guardians would still have restricted ranged options, as Anet intends for them to have, because to bypass this and use a build like this, it would require a grandmaster trait investment as such. So I feel it’s a fine balance.

Also, this would not only tone down the lack of ranged options, but also the lack of mobility, with flashing blades teleporting the guardian a bit further away than normal.

Considering how much this trait would offer to the profession, and how it does so in a way that is simple and easy to understand, I think it would make for a good trait.

On a side note, I think Zealot’s Defense self-root should not be removed. I think GW2 needs some interesting self-root skills, like churning earth and hundred blades. Instead of removing whiever remains of them, I would suggest to improve the ones that don’t feel nice. For ZD, it perhaps should pierce naturally. Feels more intuitive this way. I think the skill should be polished, not “dumbed down” (no offense, guardian players!).

Besides, my trait suggestion by adding range to it would (somewhat) compensate for the lack of mobility with the self-root.

even in pvp, if you change the trait to +10% also doesnt changed the fact it ll miss alot.
now see other class,
warrior can perma bleed and cripple with sword
ranger can chase and stay behind you
mesmer can turn invulrable with low cd and still kill you + immobile
thief hit so hard.
so you see, +5% damage doesnt do anything, its our skill mechanic thats wrong.

scepter auto attack move too slow, even when firing moving target in range, they ll miss.
try to play some guardian with specter, you cant kill even if you chase that target so close that orb wont miss.

hammer is quite nice, but we have almost no stun mechanic compare to warrior that can stun lock, so we carry soft hammer ?

shield almost unusable, fix both skill
i play sword shield and my shield just act as fashion . where i use real weapon on offhand.

Why is nobody talking about the most broken aspect about this class: Spirit Weapons.

Guardians are rerolling warriors because they are far superior in every aspect, and all were talking about is 5% sword damage? sigh…

JonPeters.5630:

The change to sword damage from 5% to 10%. I’ve seen a lot of talk that maybe it is not really needed. The fact was this was a lackluster trait and this is a lackluster change to it. I would love to do the right thing here and have a change that MH sword wants rather than just 5% more damage.

Thoughts?

Jon

Honestly, I always thought that this talent was fine. It’s the rest of the talents in the Radiance tree (aside from Right-Hand Strength) that seem pretty lackluster.

I don’t think an extra 5% increase to the talent would break anything though.

Arnath.2319:

Why is nobody talking about the most broken aspect about this class: Spirit Weapons.

Guardians are rerolling warriors because they are far superior in every aspect, and all were talking about is 5% sword damage? sigh…

There are a few jump in here and there were we say other stuff here aswell. But Jon asked us about the sword skill since alot of us are clearly saying that adding a +5% damage would not do anything since you will miss about 50% of all the attacks.

Dahkeus.8243:

JonPeters.5630:

The change to sword damage from 5% to 10%. I’ve seen a lot of talk that maybe it is not really needed. The fact was this was a lackluster trait and this is a lackluster change to it. I would love to do the right thing here and have a change that MH sword wants rather than just 5% more damage.

Thoughts?

Jon

Honestly, I always thought that this talent was fine. It’s the rest of the talents in the Radiance tree (aside from Right-Hand Strength) that seem pretty lackluster.

I don’t think an extra 5% increase to the talent would break anything though.

On second thought…this put the sword even farther ahead of the hammer for any build that wants to bring decent DPS in a PvE build. This would make it even harder to merit bringing a hammer guardian in the current DPS meta.

Arnath.2319:

Why is nobody talking about the most broken aspect about this class: Spirit Weapons.

Guardians are rerolling warriors because they are far superior in every aspect, and all were talking about is 5% sword damage? sigh…

Yes some change to spirit weapons would be nice. Maybe making them like necros demons?

JonPeters.5630:

The change to sword damage from 5% to 10%. I’ve seen a lot of talk that maybe it is not really needed. The fact was this was a lackluster trait and this is a lackluster change to it. I would love to do the right thing here and have a change that MH sword wants rather than just 5% more damage.

Thoughts?

Jon

Hey Jon! I would really like to see Flashing Blade (sword #2 skill) a target location teleport rather then requiring a target for it to work. It would really add to Guardians mobility in comparison to other class’s.

Greek.4396:

JonPeters.5630:

The change to sword damage from 5% to 10%. I’ve seen a lot of talk that maybe it is not really needed. The fact was this was a lackluster trait and this is a lackluster change to it. I would love to do the right thing here and have a change that MH sword wants rather than just 5% more damage.

Thoughts?

Jon

Hey Jon! I would really like to see Flashing Blade (sword #2 skill) a target location teleport rather then requiring a target for it to work. It would really add to Guardians mobility in comparison to other class’s.

Wouldn’t that have a chance to bounce you somewhere or to a target you didn’t intend to hit?

Hamish.1384:

Sylpheed.8163:

Makoto.9647:

We don’t really sacrifice that much for a dps build, I run zerkers with 16k HP and find myself being just fine. The only type of warrior I even struggle to fight against is pure regen tank condi warriors in a 1v1 situation, and it just usually draws out into no one dying. If you want to have pure zerkers with the same amount of survivability we currently have + more HP then what’s the point of playing a Warrior? Our DPS spec is viable, and I addressed the need for more soft CC (Which is cripple/chill/snare/etc if you don’t know the terminology). We have a good amount of leaps and blinks and utilities that give movement speed. (Which we won’t need to use if we get more soft CC). You keep saying that we sacrifice too much survivability to go dps spec but most of our needed traits are in the valor / honor lines anyway, and again.. If you want to maintain the survivability we have now with more damage, that’s just broken. There has to be some kind of give and take balance, you can’t have it all.

I would seriously like to know how you have 16K HP in “zerkers”? I assume when you say that, since you did not specify otherwise, that you mean full zerkers, armor, weapons, and trinkets. If you are running a DPS setup, then you don’t have the extra vitality either, so you “should” have about 13,500 HP. Now, as an example, I can run full zerkers with my Warrior, and Im sitting at about 19,500 HP. That’s with nothing traited for vitality, and I guarantee you, I am outdamaging any Guard on the field by about 3 times what they can individually put out. Now, Guardians have burst, yes if spec’d full DPS I can burst a warrior down to about a third of their health in one go.

However, that means everything goes on CD, what happens next is all too familiar for us, they escape – Bulls Charge, Sword #2, GS #3 or #5 whatever you name it. Yes you touched on the fact we need better soft cc, I posted above I think a good fix for our sword #2 and JI to be more efficient they should be area targetable, but you know what, even then a warrior will gain distance on us if they are using the 25% speed trait, unless we are using Traveler Runes. I’ve run a Signet build on a guardian that maximizes vulnerability stacks and Mighty Blow hits hard but the CC you get from our Bane Signet and…the condition damage one is nice but the cast time is too long on them imo.

You also talk about abilities that provide speed, so you are talking about Retreat, and Save Yourselves which are shouts, and if you are running a “Guardian DPS” build you should be using meditations in which case you won’t have either of those on your bar. Can you have DPS with a shout build? Of course you can, but you won’t be able to maximize your burst potential.

I posted above my thoughts about our condition damage being a Guardian only condition not shared with other classes, also someone posted above an idea in the zeal line that converts power to vitality which I think would be a great idea then my idea of giving us base 3500 HP, which BTW still puts us well below that of a Warrior, only one class in the game has less HP then a Guard and that’s Thieves. I think class balance is great, obviously, but ANET needs to address this condition meta, simple fix, add immunity timers. What is the point of condi removal if it gets reapplied instantly, and for a class like us HP is what saves our you know what’s when it comes to conditions, which as pointed out, are second lowest pool in the game. So all that protection we get, don’t mean jack you know what.

Well full zerker is impossible to run with good survivability with any class.
But i run valkery and zerk gear, with rune of speed runes they are much better than travelers in this meta. Traveler dont give that muc dps, but speed give massive hp.
Then i have a 10/30/30 build. I run with around 16.300hp, about 60%crith chanse with RHS and 80%with fury. I have around 110% critdamage with food, 3400 power.

Hamish.1384:

Sylpheed

Please stop, read lucent’s post as he knows what he’s talking about. If you wanna be a War, reroll.[/quote]

Hmm? Not sure what the problem is I thought this was constructive class discussion did I say something out of line? I don’t know Lucent, nor do I know you, but I know what I’m talking about being as I have played Guardian for over a year and like many have multiple level 80’s (6) and I do WvW with 4 out of the 6 so I can make very solid/sound comparisons between classes. I do have an 80 Warrior and I know exactly what he brings to the table compared to a Guard.[/quote]

I’ve mained Guardian since the the start of the game, more then 4.5k hours on them(I have 2 Guardians). I have a warrior too that i fully geared and I know the class as well. I have about 4 Level 80’s atm. I do WvW with all four of them, though mostly my Warrior or my Zerker Guardian. I know what my Warrior and my Guardian bring to the table in terms of Solo roaming and Small group play. You aren’t the only one :P

JonPeters.5630:

The change to sword damage from 5% to 10%. I’ve seen a lot of talk that maybe it is not really needed. The fact was this was a lackluster trait and this is a lackluster change to it. I would love to do the right thing here and have a change that MH sword wants rather than just 5% more damage.

Thoughts?

Jon

Generic: 5% damage, bleed on crit. Actually works well with trait tree and its a sword, it makes things bleed.

More interesting: 5% damage and-

each hit reduces virtue cool down time by 1 second.

Or-

Transfer condition to target (like sigil of generosity)

Or-

Projectiles bounce sriking nearby targets (3rd attack and skill 3)

JonPeters.5630:

The change to sword damage from 5% to 10%. I’ve seen a lot of talk that maybe it is not really needed. The fact was this was a lackluster trait and this is a lackluster change to it. I would love to do the right thing here and have a change that MH sword wants rather than just 5% more damage.

Thoughts?

Jon

Although the extra damage isn’t terribly great, it’s already a buff to the primary DPS weapon used in PvE/dungeon meta, so I would imagine the buff is still appreciated.

However, I again would reiterate that if you’re buffing damage on 1-H sword to give more options for power guardians, only buffing one option (the meta option for power dps at that) is counterproductive for expanding direct damage options in terms of viable weaponsets when going pure damage. I really think that adding bonuses similar to whatever you decide to do for 1-H sword should be afforded to the other primarily-offensive weapons such as GS and Scepter (ie buffing their respective traits as well for damage). I wouldn’t argue for too much of a damage buff to hammers, as they seem to play a more defensive role in combat with a control role in mind, as opposed to the offensive nature of sword, GS and scepter.

And to reiterate a major request from other guardians in this thread, we need some traitable soft-CC option. This would enhance power builds by somewhat negating our decreased mobility relative to other classes—especially if it were a reason to trait into Zeal.

Reduce scepter to 5% and add cripple on crit. Slow projectile needs a slow target. You guys can figure out duration vs cool down. I would also argue glacial heart needs a 5% hammer damage mod to compete with other weapon traits.

I will repost in this thread.

I’m a little afraid with this slow changes in guardian I know we are in a good place since launch and I played with guardian even before bwes and I know this is the hardest profession to balance. But I think sometime guardian will be in the same spot as ele and mesmer are now.

Let me explain why I’m thinking like that:

1) With other classes gaining acess to break stun and stability more easily guardian is now loosing your style and this is happening because if we compare with other classes like war/eng guardian have huge cooldowns in yours CC skills and this skills only do the CC and nothing else (i.e. Line of Warding, Ring of Warding, SoA) so its easily counter played. Maybe we can add cripple or chill if you go through them?
And for this reason hammer guardians are been instinct huge cds, skills are too slow and banish is hard to hit and now launch was “nerfed”.

2) Elite Tomes are lacklusters but could bring amazing gameplay i think with boon hate/boon stripper and now necros are strong we can have stability back or at least a break stun in some skill inside this elites just to see what happen. And with the recent changes warrior can be more tanky and give a lot of support with shouts and Battle Standard.

JonPeters.5630:

The change to sword damage from 5% to 10%. I’ve seen a lot of talk that maybe it is not really needed. The fact was this was a lackluster trait and this is a lackluster change to it. I would love to do the right thing here and have a change that MH sword wants rather than just 5% more damage.

Thoughts?

Jon

Hi Jon,

I’m going to start off by saying that this change is the one I was most excited about out of all the ones listed. That being said, It probably isn’t necessary. As others have said, We actually have pretty good dps if specced for it. The problem with our dps lies in the fact that it is hard to connect attacks as a guard. This is probably best felt than trying to explain. Soft CC is probably the best solution to add to this trait. If, however, you are planning to do something about that in the unannounced changes, I would say merging it with blind exposure would be good.

JonPeters.5630:

The change to sword damage from 5% to 10%. I’ve seen a lot of talk that maybe it is not really needed. The fact was this was a lackluster trait and this is a lackluster change to it. I would love to do the right thing here and have a change that MH sword wants rather than just 5% more damage.

Thoughts?

Jon

You could probably keep the 5% -> 10% change that was planned if something else was added to the trait. For example apply a condition on a crit. Mainly Torment because it punishes moving, i.e. running away or Chill to keep enemies close. My personal preference is Torment though.

Sword in general needs a better cleave.

The 3rd attack from sword #1 should not be reflectable.

Sword #2 needs to become a leap finisher.

I would also like to see sword #3 allow movement at the same rate as greatsword #2. (Allthough I’m not sure this is even possible as there is not a single moveable projectile reflect / absorb / destroy in the game.) If moving while using this is a no go, it should be a full block that triggers other ‘on block’ traits.

So I have been playing with a sword set-up for pvp and the damage is really good already. Landing the hits (as others have noted) is quite difficult though.

What I would like to see added to Powerful Blades from a PvP perspective is any of the following:

• 2 seconds of quickness on either Flashing Blade or on swapping to Sword to fit the burst completely into the immobilize and knockdown duration.

• More range on the sword skills (mainly the leap). I found that mobility was a real issue even with two leaps, maybe I should’ve gone with Save Yourselves, but it is hard to fit it in.

• 7 seconds of swiftness on swapping to sword. /or 5s attached to the leap.(Mobility again)

Just some ideas for PvP. For PvE I think the sword and the offensive guardian in general are in a pretty good spot already.

Kirito.8796:

Er, where are people getting the notion that guardians base hp is 13k~.. its 10.8k

Low base HP is indeed 10.8k

Jon, I think its about time to discuss the disparity between High/Low HP vs. High/Low Armor. The 291 effective point spread between armor does not justify the 756 difference in effective vitality.

Heavy Armor: 1211
Light Armor: 920
Difference: 291 Toughness

High HP: 9212
Low HP: 1645
Difference: 756 Vitality

Explain yourselves.

I would say that the armor difference needs to be spread out and the HP difference needs to be brought in. My suggestion for doing so would be to reduce the total base armor of light/medium and increase the base HP of low/mid. Across the board.

This would beef the effective stat points of the guard without bringing him out of his designated ‘zone’ as well as make light and medium classes more susceptible to direct damage while increasing their ‘buffer’ zone.

Kirito.8796:

Er, where are people getting the notion that guardians base hp is 13k~.. its 10.8k

Base HP + 30 points in Honor, which is very standard for most builds including many DPS focused ones, gives you 13k and change.

foofad.5162:

Kirito.8796:

Er, where are people getting the notion that guardians base hp is 13k~.. its 10.8k

Base HP + 30 points in Honor, which is very standard for most builds including many DPS focused ones, gives you 13k and change.

Yeas but with traits it is no longer Base HP. And Kirito said ,,people getting the notion that guardians base hp is 13k".

JonPeters.5630:

The change to sword damage from 5% to 10%. I’ve seen a lot of talk that maybe it is not really needed. The fact was this was a lackluster trait and this is a lackluster change to it. I would love to do the right thing here and have a change that MH sword wants rather than just 5% more damage.

Thoughts?

Jon

Suggestions:

• Remove the 5% bonus from spear and reduce the sword skills cooldown by 20%;
• Make apply chill or cripple on critical atks.

The sword #2 should be a leap finisher, both #2 staff and #2 sword (Swap) teleports from mesmer are leaps. Why our sword can’t be?

Also could fix the guardian sword #3 problems. Could also increase the project speed.

Red.3572:

JonPeters.5630:

The change to sword damage from 5% to 10%. I’ve seen a lot of talk that maybe it is not really needed. The fact was this was a lackluster trait and this is a lackluster change to it. I would love to do the right thing here and have a change that MH sword wants rather than just 5% more damage.

Thoughts?

Jon

Hi. The reason most people think ’it’s not really needed’ is because the raw damage on Guardian has never been the issue, it’s the amount of sustain/utility you have to lose as a DPS guardian (which is what I assume you’re trying to fix). Even still:

Powerful Blades:
5% damage increase when using a Sword or Spear. Critical hits gives one condition and it’s remaining duration back to struck targets (20 second cool down).

This would help with some of the sustain Guardians lose when trying to spec as DPS in PvP. Also has synergy with Radiant Power.

More importantly though, I think DPS guardians would benefit from better Hammers and Mace weapons. The last hit of the Auto hit on each takes slightly too long at the moment. Shave that down and these weapons become better DPS options, which are worse damage than sword, but better sustain/soft CC.

So idea:

Mace:
Faithful Strike: 1 second cast —> 1/2 second cast (like sword)

Hammer:
Symbol of Protection: 1 1/4 seconds cast —> 3/4 second cast.

Glacial Heart:
5% damage when using a hammer. Critical hits with hammer chill enemies (100% chance. 10-20 seconds cool down).

This is what I think is more required for Guardians than extra damage on Sword. The damage isn’t the issue.

Red,

I agree 100%, we can all agree that going full DPS (Zeal/Radiance/Valor) and Zerker/Assassin gear or something of the like means we are going to be sitting at around 11k HP which “can” be tough to pull off in the current condition heavy meta. We lose out on a lot, you’re right.

Even still, as full DPS as addressed throughout this thread is the fact that just about any class can “escape” from us. So, to add to your ideas this is what I would say:

“Powerful Blades:
5% damage increase when using a Sword or Spear. Critical hits gives one condition and it’s remaining duration back to struck targets (20 second cool down).”

Change the current 5% to 7.5% increase. Yes to some type of condition damage on crit.

Flashing Blade: Maybe a 1 second knockdown (which would give us a nice interrupt), or a 2 second chill, but I don’t know a lot of people like blinds. Personally to me a 3’ish second blind on Flashing Blade is meh…Being as a larger of our issues is other classes being able to kite us so easily.

“Mace:
Faithful Strike: 1 second cast —> 1/2 second cast (like sword)”

Agreed.

I would also change Symbol of Faith from 1 1/4 to 1 second.

“Hammer:
Symbol of Protection: 1 1/4 seconds cast —> 3/4 second cast.”

Agreed.

Banish: I would also change Banish from 1 second to 3/4 second.
Ring of Warding: Cast while moving (This would help with escape ability for us)

“Glacial Heart:
5% damage when using a hammer. Critical hits with hammer chill enemies (100% chance. 10-20 seconds cool down).”

Couple ways to look at this here, I think if you go 100% chance on crit then the CD should be 15 seconds. If its 50% chance on crit the CD should be 10 seconds. I also think if it stays in valor then it should be a 10% increase because of all the options in this line you would be sacrificing.

Another idea to help out Zeal as previously mentioned a Trait that converts power to vitality similar to what Warriors have.

Lastly I’ve been thinking about this a lot in terms on condition damage. Guardians as we all know use burning damage, I like the idea, love the blue burning flames and what have you, but in the end the burn is the same as any other burn in the game and one of the main reasons Guardians don’t trait condition damage is because the way burning condition is (if a target is already burned your burn just adds duration, so your 1200 condition damage is worthless if the existing burn is from someone who only has 300 condition damage.)

So I propose Cleansing Burn (Frost Burn, w/e). It is a burn unique only to Guardians so its not shared by other classes and we do our own unique burn damage, keep the “burn” aspect of it as is now, but add to the burn a chill affect on every other tick. So, to be clear, every 2 seconds while the burn is there, it chills the target for half a second.

Just brainstorming here…

Speaking of condition removal, I really think we need some sort of buff of it in the radiance line (like was suggested in my post concerning core issues) Right now, in zeal, we have 0 condition removal, in radiance we have minor condition removal, through signet removal, and the improving of SoR’s passive through the 30 point trait (which is actually extremely weak) Part of the issue with why people don’t go deep into zeal/radiance is because we need so much condition removal due to our low health. I would suggest either boosting either signet renewal to 2 per use, or combining it with signet CD to bring in some other trait, possibly even a full fledged torment on crit trait, making a signet crit condition build something possible, and making signet of wrath useable outside of on use CC.

Thanks for responding Jon.

I think alot of the guardians here are happy that we are getting a look at for some of the problems that plaque us. I think the change to sword would be better if we got a reduction in the skill recharge rather rather then a just another 5%

Yet we have other weapons in the same boat. Scepter Is kinda lack luster. Maybe having scepter 2 add a little soft/hard cc would be nice.

Shield 4 could stand to place a offense condition on foes as it places protection on allies. Weakness would be nice, a blind, possible a chill. I would also be nice if it blocked rather then just popped but I woudln’t even mind that so much if we got something added to make it more worthwhile in some instances.

JonPeters.5630:

The change to sword damage from 5% to 10%. I’ve seen a lot of talk that maybe it is not really needed. The fact was this was a lackluster trait and this is a lackluster change to it. I would love to do the right thing here and have a change that MH sword wants rather than just 5% more damage.

Thoughts?

Jon

Wow, the only change to Guardians that I actually agreed with, and now they’re reconsidering it….

This is really depressing.

Red.3572:

JonPeters.5630:

The change to sword damage from 5% to 10%. I’ve seen a lot of talk that maybe it is not really needed. The fact was this was a lackluster trait and this is a lackluster change to it. I would love to do the right thing here and have a change that MH sword wants rather than just 5% more damage.

Thoughts?

Jon

Hi. The reason most people think ’it’s not really needed’ is because the raw damage on Guardian has never been the issue, it’s the amount of sustain/utility you have to lose as a DPS guardian (which is what I assume you’re trying to fix). Even still:

Powerful Blades:
5% damage increase when using a Sword or Spear. Critical hits gives one condition and it’s remaining duration back to struck targets (20 second cool down).

This would help with some of the sustain Guardians lose when trying to spec as DPS in PvP. Also has synergy with Radiant Power.

More importantly though, I think DPS guardians would benefit from better Hammers and Mace weapons. The last hit of the Auto hit on each takes slightly too long at the moment. Shave that down and these weapons become better DPS options, which are worse damage than sword, but better sustain/soft CC.

So idea:

Mace:
Faithful Strike: 1 second cast —> 1/2 second cast (like sword)

Hammer:
Symbol of Protection: 1 1/4 seconds cast —> 3/4 second cast.

Glacial Heart:
5% damage when using a hammer. Critical hits with hammer chill enemies (100% chance. 10-20 seconds cool down).

This is what I think is more required for Guardians than extra damage on Sword. The damage isn’t the issue.

Devs should also make Faithful Strike be able to cleave. Either that or significantly increase the amount of damage it does. Since its single target.

Jon,

You are correct in thinking sword damage is fine already. Honestly once we’ve unloaded the greatsword’s burst abilities what we’re doing right now is swapping to our 1H sword while we wait for the greatsword’s abilities to cool down because 1H has higher auto attack dps even without going 30 deep into radiance.

1H is in a good place right now – it has slightly more dps than the greatsword but sacrifices aoe/cleaves. Boosting 1h sword’s aoe capacity would render greatsword useless, so I wouldn’t dare suggest that. I don’t know what your goal is for GS vs 1H but I assume aoe vs single target.

The bigger issue with the radiance traits is that the +10% damage grandmaster trait is good enough to aim for, but the surrounding major traits are completely useless unless you use 1h. This makes it completely boring if you’re 2h, and promotes passive play if you’re 1h. I would like to see more active mechanics like the refreshed virtue on kill.

Zeal grandmaster minor trait is dire.
+10% dmg to symbols?
That’s not even a 2% overall damage increase on your standard greatsword build, and the other dps (1h), doesn’t even have a symbol! If you want people to consider 30 points in zeal for the spirit weapons or this weird new condition conversion you’re pushing then that minor trait needs to be more attractive. Perhaps a bleed proc, if you’re really trying to push condi guardians.

Finally to promote more diverse specs you need to roll up some of the traits.
We have about 5 spirit weapon traits to pick up before they’re half way decent, and 3 symbol traits (and a bunch of minors) if we want to make our symbols worth paying attention to, and we have to burn our whole valor trait line just to get meditations to be viable.

Is it any wonder the majority of specs are now based around AH (1 trait, defines the build, pick whatever else you want), consecrations (1 trait to make them great) or shouts (1 cooldown trait to make them great, pure of voice isn’t even taken in dungeons anymore)?

While I echo the sentiment on a need for soft CC, I would HATE to see that tied to a particular weapon THROUGH a trait. That’s probably the most build-limiting way to service this problem.

JonPeters.5630:

The change to sword damage from 5% to 10%. I’ve seen a lot of talk that maybe it is not really needed. The fact was this was a lackluster trait and this is a lackluster change to it. I would love to do the right thing here and have a change that MH sword wants rather than just 5% more damage.

Thoughts?

Jon

Besides making it possible go move while using zealots defense (overall QoL fix)i think the specific trait should add cripple, torment and chill to each step of the chain. Similar to warriors untraited sword chain applying condition per step.

thanks for taking the time!

Could you swap the Focus 5 ability with the Shield 5 pretty please? I’d like to use a shield for once, but they suck too much. Can’t imagine playing without the Focus 5 though… hah.

JonPeters.5630:

Symbol of Swiftness
To clarify the new Symbol of Swiftness will give you 4 seconds of Swiftness every single pulse regardless of if you have swiftness or not. This is a improvement in many situations and a slight loss in the situation where you were using the Symbol as just a one time buff. I think this makes it feel more like a Symbol, which is good. We are still discussing the idea of it being 5 seconds, but there is some danger of that going pretty high with boon duration.

While I agree with the analysis that it’s a group buff and it will be very welcome in WvW zerg-trains… I don’t find this a welcome “improvement” for the guardian himself as long as you can now only get a single 4-sec (pre-boondur) tick without stopping in it. Both when on the move and when using Line-of-warding+SoS to get separation. If you’re intent on improving the irritating 1sec stacked limit , consider making it 8sec if no swiftness, 4s stacking per tick with swiftness. You could even double (or hell, more!) the damage on the first tick and remove a tick to keep from expanding the max total swiftness delivered when compared to your current proposal and keep the same damage… without making it so much worse for the guardian personally.

As for the rest of the proposal… Not much to convince me I should play a more offensive guardian yet, but I applaud the goal. Only my 1H sword build got enough of a boost to even really consider dusting it off and trying it again. I think you have to buff the heck out of some of the offensive trees preferably not just weapon dependent skills, and mostly in the middle/high tiers so that you have to trade some of the common support/utility for it…. I don’t think you went far enough here, but the 5% boost to 1H sword trait is the right size/scale of the changes you are seeking IMO.

It’s interesting to note that the pve junkies say dps is fine when specced for it, but the pvp junkies say the dps is there but the sacrifice in getting it mixed with the difficulty to get on and stay on target means it isn’t worth it.

Did we ever get the numbers for the new Shattered Aegis? I’ve looked around and haven’t seen anything…

How about this for keeping to the flavor of the Guardian and solving our problems of keeping up in melee (and most likely make us crazy overpowered)

Justice Served Cold – The passive effect of Virtue of Justice now chills for 1 second instead of burning.

I think this fits perfectly as a Grandmaster trait in the Zeal line, both flavor-wise and as a very good reason (finally?) to put 30 points for going full offence here. Maybe merge Eternal Spirits and Spirit-weapon mastery, put them in adept, move down Wrathful Spirits to master and put this new trait in the empty slot. Would also have the obvious benefit of buffing Spirit-Weapon users.

Unfortunately, with the new buff to Supreme Justice and the fact that you already have +30% duration for going 30 in Zeal would mean we could easily achieve 100% chill up-time. Add in permeathing Wrath and…yeah. Would be immensely fun though!

Maybe some kind of tweak could make it work?

Please don’t ruin the synergy between Shattered Aegis and Fiery Wrath!

EnemyCrusher.7324:

Please don’t ruin the synergy between Shattered Aegis and Fiery Wrath!

I personally never heard of anyone who uses shattered aegis.

Aza.2105:

EnemyCrusher.7324:

Please don’t ruin the synergy between Shattered Aegis and Fiery Wrath!

I personally never heard of anyone who uses shattered aegis.

Agreed. We have plenty of other ways to apply burning including passively with VoJ. Shattered Aegis seems like a waste currently and depending on the numbers we get probably still a waste after december 10th.

The 10% more damage while burning is way more useful at the moment. I’d even prefer the new Shattered Aegis to be moved to a minor in the line if it turns out to be useful.

Better yet! Move firey wrath to the 5 point minor in zeal. Pretty much all guards that go at least 10 in to zeal will take that anyway. This alone should free up some builds.

Khenzy.9348:

By the changes, they seem to want full DPS Guardians to play something like this: http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fUAQNAR8dlUgqCnGSOEf4ESmiC8AtUIQHU1j45e8QA-TsAg0CtIATBmDMDYSwsgNsYVyuAA

Precast SoW>JI>WW… etc. Instakill, stability/blind stomp and get out.

I honestly don’t like this approach, I expected a heavy armor apparently selfsustainable holy (and shiny!) Warrior with few hard CCs but being one who withstands a battle for a while and wittles you down with fierce but powerful strikes with more slower paced and tactical manouvers; not this insta damage spike getin-getout squishy DPSer, it feels like a thief with no stealth and heavy armor (wtf?). I just don’t like how that feels on a Guardian.

Yep, I get this. I think damage is about spike in this game tho; DoT builds are foresaken in favour of spike. This is because of the instant mega-heal that some classes can do cough engimentalist cough and leaves HoT builds out in the cold, funnily enough. The guardian, having in-built HoT (and is therefore penalised by having the lowest base HP) is effectively at a disadvantage from the very start. Even the (supposedly) hardiest class in the game is squishy because lots of opposing classes are able to roll for pure spike AND survivability in one build.

From the ele forums:

Tyler Chapman.1832:

Treborlavok.3504:

just like the guardians 5 trait for vigor on crit… its ok for them to have a 10 second single condition cure at adept…?

The Guardian and Mesmer vigor traits are something that were on the table and will be on the table for change in the future. We don’t like those traits being that easily accessible. While they haven’t yet been changed as long as our thoughts don’t change internally they are part of the vigor rework we want to do.

………. Uh oh….

Aza.2105:

EnemyCrusher.7324:

Please don’t ruin the synergy between Shattered Aegis and Fiery Wrath!

I personally never heard of anyone who uses shattered aegis.

Shattered Aegis’s effect triggers on any aegis that you applied, even if it’s not on you, so it works really well with Virtue of Courage and “Retreat!”. I use this combination to great effect in WvW.

JonPeters.5630:

The change to sword damage from 5% to 10%. I’ve seen a lot of talk that maybe it is not really needed. The fact was this was a lackluster trait and this is a lackluster change to it. I would love to do the right thing here and have a change that MH sword wants rather than just 5% more damage.

Thoughts?

Jon

There are several possible variations that would be both considerable and welcome…

1) 5% Sword damage, Swords have a 33% chance to apply Torment on crit, 0.5s ICD. Conceivably, this would give us a tool that punishes movement away from us. It would vary in potency depending on Guardian build. I have several concerns with this idea:
a) It wouldn’t be enough to truly give Guardians a way to push a condition build.
b) It does not fit the theme of a Guardian as what I perceive that ANet perceives us as.
c) It would likely not be punishing enough to dissuade anyone from NOT running away. This would be primarily due to the lack of pressure we could apply if we were utilizing it well (high condition damage, sacrificing raw damage throughput.)

2a) 5% Sword damage, critical attacks have a 25% chance of granting 1s of swiftness, 0.5s ICD. This very specifically does not say “swords,” this would include all damage dealt by the guardian. This would supplement any build that was aiming for damage in such a way that if they are able to get on a target, the swiftness should – if used adequately – should help them stay on target. This would help to address our incombat sluggishness, by providing us with a subtle boost without relying on external sources. This would also be more reasonable with just swords being able to provide the swiftness.

2b) 5% sword damage, Sword attacks have a 10% chance of granting 10s of swiftness, 30s ICD. This is a less interesting option that has a much less drastic change on our balance as a class. With excessive boon duration (something you likely won’t see on a build focused on damage), you could see close to 66% uptime of swiftness from just this, but you’d probably see closer to 10-12 seconds on average. This provide us a moderate boost during our initial burst, but would not address our “field mobility.”

I am trying to stay within the constraints of the question, so hopefully you guys come up with something interesting. Also, Jon, still wanna know about Shattered Aegis!

Note to most other posters: please stay on topic, many of you are responding with general complaints/suggestions, but the question he most recently asked is very specific. Compare it to effects like Zealous Blade and brain storm from there.

What do you want Guardians to actually do? These recent changes don;t really seem to have any sort of an overarching direction.

Also, do you balance around PvE? I’m saying this because PvP and PvE are completely different gamemodes and I feel that balancing is almost purely around PvP.

Kyle.3856:

From the ele forums:

Tyler Chapman.1832:

Treborlavok.3504:

just like the guardians 5 trait for vigor on crit… its ok for them to have a 10 second single condition cure at adept…?

The Guardian and Mesmer vigor traits are something that were on the table and will be on the table for change in the future. We don’t like those traits being that easily accessible. While they haven’t yet been changed as long as our thoughts don’t change internally they are part of the vigor rework we want to do.

………. Uh oh….

Really…..so on top of having to be a melee fighter class, with the lowest HP, no real mobility and having every other class being able to outrun us you’re going to mess with this trait. Pretending to buff the DPS…yeah….sure…..please clarify Devs what you actually intend to do with the trait….because right now I’m feeling it’s going to impact guardian greatly. i don’t know if I’m overacting or not but that’s really nothing light to take in, that’s pretty heavy.

I like a lot of these ideas! Having the option to change VoJ into a chill (GM trait) and/or lowering the CD on Glacial Heart and affect all weaps is very attractive to me. Heck, I’d take that trait if it only affected two-handed weaps. (staff only chilling one opponent ofc, gotta keep it from being op). If Anet wants us to stay in the thick of battle, then please give us a more reliable way to keep our opponents from LoL-walking away from us.

Obtena.7952:

While I echo the sentiment on a need for soft CC, I would HATE to see that tied to a particular weapon THROUGH a trait. That’s probably the most build-limiting way to service this problem.

Thank you! I was actually just getting ready to ask why are we paying attention to only 1 handed swords? Honestly, I don’t want to be pigeon holed into a single weapon if I go DPS. We have so many tools in the bag to use hence my earlier question about moving torch to main hand. Just seems to fit better so I can use shields.

I see someone posted the armor and hit point hierarchy but is there a option on the table to maybe review how armor works or at the stats on heavy? Or is that too large of a game mechanic? I mean I don’t know how other players play but heavy armor should be at the front or charging blindly in pushing foes back. It seems to me that everything cuts through it like a hot knife through butter and pushing is almost impossible now in large scale fights. Shield 5, Wall of Reflection, Hammer 5, and Staff line of warding come into play of course but people can jump over some. Maybe make them all TALL so they can’t be mitigated? Heck, make Hammer 2 split the ground making the foe stumble or fall so we can land the next attack and they miss theirs.

Anyway. I think we all use most of the weapons available for use (which is why crafting ascended weapons is a bit frustrating for me (I’ve yet to start though)) but just my thoughts.

Glad to see someone sees the problem with the ‘sword’ solution. For me the problem with the ‘sword solution’ is that it’s already top damage but it’s the least interesting weapon we have access to. Maybe giving it some love that isn’t damage would change that but if it’s not done right, it’s just going to be the high damage, least interesting weapon that gives cool effect X. I think at this stage, we can ensure that cool effect X turns the sword into an interesting weapon by considering the following:

Let’s go over things that make sword a very un-Guardian-like weapon

1. Sword builds don’t have symbol access
2. Sword builds don’t have as direct access to boons
3. Sword builds don’t have support effects (or limited ones)

I don’t see that being addressed in one trait but I haven’t really made a significant suggestion here because I don’t see the aspects that I see lacking in the profession being addressed this round of balancing. From where I sit, I feel there isn’t a fundamental change going on with what’s been proposed by Anet. I’m just hoping whatever is going to happen with this trait, the scope goes beyond ‘sword’.

Poweful Blades- I just don’t think this is an area that needs attention. Anyone would appreciate the buff, but I’m sure everyone would rather get a buff elsewhere given the choice.

Zeal- Move two handed mastery here. Honor has plenty of good traits to fill its place, and damage builds would probably like to consolidate their trait lines. The various spirit weapon traits should also be here. Even if they don’t get used immediately it’ll still open up that option a little more.

Currently we’re stretched too thin on a lot of fronts. To do any one job we need two trait lines, and dual purpose guardians can take as many as four. Reorganizing trait lines, is a simple solution that can show pretty dramatic results, and lay a more solid groundwork for future changes.

Obtena.7952:

Glad to see someone sees the problem with the ‘sword’ solution. For me the problem with the ‘sword solution’ is that it’s already top damage but it’s the least interesting weapon we have access to. Maybe giving it some love that isn’t damage would change that but if it’s not done right, it’s just going to be the high damage, least interesting weapon that gives cool effect X. I think at this stage, we can ensure that cool effect X turns the sword into an interesting weapon by considering the following:

Let’s go over things that make sword a very un-Guardian-like weapon

1. Sword builds don’t have symbol access
2. Sword builds don’t have as direct access to boons
3. Sword builds don’t have support effects (or limited ones)

I don’t see that being addressed in one trait but I haven’t really made a significant suggestion here because I don’t see the aspects that I see lacking in the profession being addressed this round of balancing. From where I sit, I feel there isn’t a fundamental change going on with what’s been proposed by Anet. I’m just hoping whatever is going to happen with this trait, the scope goes beyond ‘sword’.

It wouldn’t be a bad thing. Swords could be made an unique weapon by having it such that it provides no support, boons, or CCs but in exchange gives the user a huge amount of pure DPS. The Selfish Guardian isn’t quite right in principle but it wouldn’t be a bad option to go to.