Guild Wars 2

To make a long story short, I’m just not really finding my groove in my goal to be a decent Tanker. I am hoping to see if anyone(s) out there can provide me some advice/suggestions on how not to suck at what I want to be.

Race: Sylvari

My stats (at level 36) are:
Attack: 759
Crit%: 25%
Armor: 775
Health: 4,648
Healing Power: 107
Boon Duration: 1%

Here are my Traits:
0/5/10/10/1
Valor Skill: Meditation Mastery
Honor Skill: Writ of Exaltation

Additional Info:
Weapon Preferences: Hammer/Greatsword
Utility Preferences:
1. Signet of Resolve
2. Smite Condition
3. Judge’s Intervention
4. Signet of Judgment
5. Renewed Focus

General Game Style:
As the title suggested, I’m really a newbie when it comes to fighting. I’m no Leeroy Jenkins, but I’m all about the attack with wanton disregard for what’s going on beyond the fighting (i.e. I doubt I could even dodge an attack to save my life…literally…). I have been focusing on any stat upgrades that help my Vitality and Toughness, but I get the feeling that’s not good enough.

Since I am a poorly skilled tactical fighter, I am hoping to put together a build which is Tank-ish in design to allow me to be as much a pain-magnet as possible. I figure if I’m taking most of the abuse, my teammates with far more game-based brain cells than I can focus on defeating the enemy and less on having to revive me every couple minutes.

Since I’ve gotten to love the two-handed weapons, I would prefer to keep one or the other has my main tool of destruction, but I’d be willing to work with other options for my second slot if it would help the cause. Same goes for pretty much everything else as well including stat changes, utilities, armor, and such.

I know I’m probably handing you guys lead and asking for gold, but I am hopeful that this isn’t a hopeless situation.

Thanks in advance.

First of all, learn to dodge. Some attacks aren’t worth taking the full brunt of.
Other than that, Mace+Focus prevents a lot of damage, and if you pair it with a Greatsword (or Sword) you have another Blind.

2’nd Ynna’s post for wpn choice while lvl’n.

GS / Mace+Focus

Ya, I really need to work on dodging. If anything, it will make it possible to get the daily… xD;;

Keep the suggestions coming. I’m open for more help.

Soooo…what about utility skills? I’ve started using Save Your Self (Smite Condition) was taken out) which seems to be helping a little, but I don’t know if I should keep Judge’s Intervention or invest skill points in something like Stand The Line.

I should point out that, along with my earlier mentioned problems, I also fail at multi-tasking. I can run around and attack, but buttons 6-0 aren’t getting used as much since I have trouble keeping track of what I’m doing. I figure shouts provide a semi-long term reason to fight without worrying about timing special attacks.

knights insignia gear. 0/0/30/30/10 w/consecration last longer. either bane signet of signet of judgement, wall of reflect or SYG/SY.

tank a little, if its not tons of hp use virtues to heal vs. your main signet heal. use AH trait and use staff as your alt weapon to heal (empower)

At level 36 you don’t have access to some of the great combos of unilities, traits and weapons yet. So don’t be too hard on yourself. Keep in mind that it’s not your job to soak up the hits for your team. If anyone is telling you that they are just looking for someone to blame for their failures.

I am just going to list some synergizes and you can pick and choose the ones you like.
Sword:
Pop Zealots Defense then immediately pop Judges Invention. ZD has a delay so using JI doesn’t interrupt the skill. It’s a tactic used in PvP but it works well in PvE for better burst damage.

Greatsword:
Symbol of Wrath creates a light field. Use the leap after SW to grant retaliation boon. If your fast enough you can use the Symbol of Swiftness skill from the staff on a target then switch to GS and leap into the field for the same result. You could also use Purging Flames then leap to create fire armor which burns foes. Remember that you don’t need to leap into or out of these fields. I generally just run to the target, pop PF then leap. Causes a lot of burning to multiple foes.

Turn off the melee assist (if it’s on). This will allow you get inside the hitbox of a foe. Do this with Whirling Wrath and all the spins plus the projectiles will hit the hit the target. If you’re on the outside then the projectiles may or may not hit the target, lowering your damage output.

Hammer:
Pop Purging Flames then use the hammer’s Might Blow. This grants you and other near you 3 stacks of might boons that have a long uptime. It’s not listed in the tooltip but the hammer’s Ring of Warding creates a light field. Use RW then MB to grant Area Retaliation. Also don’t forget the 3rd attack in the default attack chain creates a Symbol of Protection that grants the protection boon and damages foes inside. When you get enough trait points you even make the symbol heal overtime.

Utilities:
I like the shouts Hold the Line and Stand Your Ground. HL for when you’re feared, immobilized, or crippled. SYG for protection and regen. Save Yourselves does grant a lot of boons but the cooldown is just to long for tastes. I have already listed the benefits for Purging Flames.

I have stayed away from signets and meditations. Signet of Resolve is okay but I like Shelter. Its blocking ability allows you get the full heal. Combine this with Renewed Focus and you can have 5 seconds of invulnerability. That’s a long time in a GW2 fight. Meditations are mostly for soloing and definitely for damage not support.

Everything I have listed is by no means the final word in playing a Guardian. They are my tactics and preference I have learned since the betas. Feel free to carbon copy them or modify as you see fit to match your play style.

Ynna.8769:

First of all, learn to dodge. Some attacks aren’t worth taking the full brunt of.
Other than that, Mace+Focus prevents a lot of damage, and if you pair it with a Greatsword (or Sword) you have another Blind.

mace focus is also 0 dps. no one needs a “Tank” that dishes out 0 dmg. they need a “tanky” guardian that can partially tank but also do damage i.e. GS/hammer/etc..

Ever considered tanking it up, Mace+Focus (gives defense and self healing) with a Hammer (defense and control) as back up. Then trait up fora specific move type, shouts are good for teams, while meditation is good for keeping conditions on your person down. So good trait lines to follow are Honour and Valour I think.

A meditation build is easy to do early on too, not to mention it syncs up with an elite skill. Take the 2 condition removal skills (one removes them and dishes out damage the other converts them to boons) so there is no way you are getting bogged down by conditions. The third skill is up to you, I had a habit to go with the teleporting meditation.

Finally do not be afraid of your virtues the meditation elite allows you to use em up and get em back without fear of being hit, so you can keep em on you and your allies.

Hmmm i never found meditations to be useful even when traited fully.

Honest Debate, My Heal Meditaiton healed for 1.4k HP. This is miserable when compared to Sanctuary (Traited), hold the line, save yourselfs, etc… they also heal for about 1.1-1.4k hp BUT they give much more than just the heal and way less cooldown.

I used to play mace/shield and i was more tanky, but if somethings gonna do 10000 damage, your screwed even with 5k tuffness anyway xD guardians seem tanky enough to use the hammer OR GS for 1 slot, then switch (always) to staff to give team support and urself heals via empower. If its too tough a fight, then scepter in place of staff.

Oh and conditions. I never found any to be a problem on guard, im so tanky i can outheal or outlive any condition (Poison is annoying but semi rare so eh i deal with it)

Grab hammer, spec 0/0/30/30/10 with AH and EM, wear knight’s gear, eat heal on crit food, turn on autoattack, go afk.

Stroper.5134:

So… what about utility skills? I’ve started using Save Your Self (Smite Condition was taken out) which seems to be helping a little, but I don’t know if I should keep Judge’s Intervention or invest skill points in something like Hold The Line.

I should point out that, along with my earlier mentioned problems, I also fail at multi-tasking. I can run around and attack, but buttons 6-0 aren’t getting used as much since I have trouble keeping track of what I’m doing. I figure Shouts provide a semi-long term reason to fight without worrying about timing special attacks.

If you have difficulty remembering to use your utilities, look into Signets. Shouts are also an option, since you don’t have to think too hard about when to use them. Even if you use them inefficiently, you still get a decent use out of them.

JJBigs.8456:

Ynna.8769:

First of all, learn to dodge. Some attacks aren’t worth taking the full brunt of.
Other than that, Mace+Focus prevents a lot of damage, and if you pair it with a Greatsword (or Sword) you have another Blind.

Mace/Focus is also 0 DPS. No one needs a “Tank” that dishes out 0 damage. They need a “tanky” Guardian that can partially tank but also do damage i.e. GreatSword/Hammer/etc..

When you’re just running solo, this doesn’t really matter, and the Mace does fair damage, not 0, like you’re saying. And you never run only one weapon-set.

Imo, anything below lvl 80 should be an “experiment” run. Try to use all weapons, different combination of stats and skills to find our groove. I only found my groove at around levels 60-70, where I started using GS + scep/shield with shouts indefinitely.

since 6-0 keys are far from your hand, it helps to rebind them into keys that are nearer, or get a mouse with multiple keys in them. I have the logitech g300-something (not the high end, only has like 6 extra keys) and they work wonders. All my healing and utilities are on the right hand, and the rest are on my left. :p

Don’t be afraid to try out new builds while you’re at that level. Equipment is cheap and enemies aren’t so tough. You’ll find your groove sooon enough :p it helps if you have an idea of what kind of guard you wanna be. Since you said tanky, you can try to get Hearty equipments.

Yaki.9563:

Grab hammer, spec 0/0/30/30/10 with AH and EM, wear knight’s gear, eat heal on crit food, turn on autoattack, go afk.

Er…you’ll have to forgive my ignorance, but what do you mean by AH and EM? xD;;

AH is Altruistic Healing – grandmaster (30 pts) in the valor line.
EM is Empowering Might – master (20 pts) in the honor line, iirc

check here for all related Guardian Traits:
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/List_of_guardian_traits

so AH is a trait that heals you for a little bit every time you place a boon on yourself and allies (up to 4, so 5 “allies” total).

and EM is a trait where you give might to those around you when you crit. you can see where this is headed. with a decent crit chance build (~40%+), these tow traits work together hand in hand. you crit, you hit hard, you heal, you give dmg boons to ur party, to hit harder, so on and so forth.. and that’s just the beginning of any AH build.

that being said, situational awareness is HUGE in this game. i feel AH is great in that you’re tanky, you can dish out dmg and survive to kill, kill to survive, but it’s still not more invaluable than being able to completely mitigate dmg – dodges, blocks, blinds and positioning.

start practicing being aware of your surroundings, your own position in relation to your allies, as well as to your enemies. and learn to dodge the big hits. at times, when i was solo-ing in the open world, i’ll try to take on a small mob without taking any dmg. then i’ll move on to a vet to do the same. and champs now (though a lot harder). but it’s good practice : )) and REALLy makes you learn how your class works.

good luck!! and keep having fun. i didnt’ start really learning my GUardian until i was post lvl 30 as well. and at 80. i am still testing myself every time i log on.

[added: also, if you’re gonan try or aim for an AH build, or even before that, try out the shouts! they’re super useful. i remember once during a story mission with my wife, we kept getting wiped by these dredge, i swapped in two shouts and we easy moded, with all the broken armor on us lol. bottom line, try out all traits, skills, weapons ; )) find sth you like as well]

Stroper.5134:

To make a long story short, I’m just not really finding my groove in my goal to be a decent Tanker. I am hoping to see if anyone(s) out there can provide me some advice/suggestions on how not to suck at what I want to be.

Race: Sylvari

My stats (at level 36) are:
Attack: 759
Crit%: 25%
Armor: 775
Health: 4,648
Healing Power: 107
Boon Duration: 1%

Here are my Traits:
0/5/10/10/1
Valor Skill: Meditation Mastery
Honor Skill: Writ of Exaltation

Additional Info:
Weapon Preferences: Hammer/Greatsword
Utility Preferences:
1. Signet of Resolve
2. Smite Condition
3. Judge’s Intervention
4. Signet of Judgment
5. Renewed Focus

General Game Style:
As the title suggested, I’m really a newbie when it comes to fighting. I’m no Leeroy Jenkins, but I’m all about the attack with wanton disregard for what’s going on beyond the fighting (i.e. I doubt I could even dodge an attack to save my life…literally…). I have been focusing on any stat upgrades that help my Vitality and Toughness, but I get the feeling that’s not good enough.

Since I am a poorly skilled tactical fighter, I am hoping to put together a build which is Tank-ish in design to allow me to be as much a pain-magnet as possible. I figure if I’m taking most of the abuse, my teammates with far more game-based brain cells than I can focus on defeating the enemy and less on having to revive me every couple minutes.

Since I’ve gotten to love the two-handed weapons, I would prefer to keep one or the other has my main tool of destruction, but I’d be willing to work with other options for my second slot if it would help the cause. Same goes for pretty much everything else as well including stat changes, utilities, armor, and such.

I know I’m probably handing you guys lead and asking for gold, but I am hopeful that this isn’t a hopeless situation.

Thanks in advance.

for level 36

get the highest armor you can find from the following: power>vitality>toughness>precision>healing power>condi

weapons go greatsword and scepter/focus as offhand. you shouldn’t facetank at these levels, better kite with scepter.

for skills:
shelter, hold the line,stand your ground, smite condition, renewed focus.
if you feel that smite condition is not enough, take signet of resolve as healing skill.

with traits 0/5/5/10/5 you should manage better, dont be afraid to use virtues actively and then reset them with renewed focus (10 points in honor for 20% shout recharge)
on level40 when you can get the next trait book, start with 0/15/0/10/5
all your fights should be something like that:

GS3 jump into enemies, GS5 pull them to you, F1- blind them, get might and burn them, GS2 chop them to sushi rolls, if they are not dead, GS4 for symbol and finish them with auto attacks.
as soon as you killed single enemy and virtue of justice is reset spam F1 again.

repeat as necessary.

against veterans:
start the same, but when you used all your GS skills, switch to scepter focus.
scepter 3 imo, roll back, then smite, and run around spamming scepter 1.
if the vet come close and scepter3 still on CD use focus5 .

repeat as necessary..

utilities: use hold the line everytime it is off CD.
use stand your ground vs mobs that like to kick you around (ettins, tramplers, etc)
or if you’re surrounded and all your GS skills on CD.

smite condition if you have more than two damaging conditions etc…

^^^ agree with running x/15/x/x/5 at lvl 40. : )))
spammable blind, burn, might and what else is pretty awesome while leveling.

also, just another note, make use of combo’s! am sure all classes should do this more, but as a Guard, you have a lot at your disposal, even if only combo-ing with yourself (i.e. while solo-ing). light fields and fire fields can net you condition removal, AoE retal, fire shields, more retal, and what not.

Lalangamena.3694:

for level 36

get the highest armor you can find from the following: power>vitality>toughness>precision>healing power>condi

weapons go greatsword and scepter/focus as offhand. you shouldn’t facetank at these levels, better kite with scepter.

for skills:
shelter, hold the line,stand your ground, smite condition, renewed focus.
if you feel that smite condition is not enough, take signet of resolve as healing skill.

with traits 0/5/5/10/5 you should manage better, dont be afraid to use virtues actively and then reset them with renewed focus (10 points in honor for 20% shout recharge)
on level40 when you can get the next trait book, start with 0/15/0/10/5
all your fights should be something like that:

GS3 jump into enemies, GS5 pull them to you, F1- blind them, get might and burn them, GS2 chop them to sushi rolls, if they are not dead, GS4 for symbol and finish them with auto attacks.
as soon as you killed single enemy and virtue of justice is reset spam F1 again.

repeat as necessary.

against veterans:
start the same, but when you used all your GS skills, switch to scepter focus.
scepter 3 imo, roll back, then smite, and run around spamming scepter 1.
if the vet come close and scepter3 still on CD use focus5 .

repeat as necessary..

utilities: use hold the line everytime it is off CD.
use stand your ground vs mobs that like to kick you around (ettins, tramplers, etc)
or if you’re surrounded and all your GS skills on CD.

smite condition if you have more than two damaging conditions etc…

That makes sense. Just to verify, is the order you put the armor/weapon stats in the most important to less important? Does that mean you’re more in favor of higher Vitality than Toughness?

Also, if I read your regular enemy strategy right, it’s okay to be more stationary during the fight? That would save me a lot of time and mental effort if I wasn’t needing to running around fiddling with the camera angle every couple of seconds…

*to Stroper:
for low levels leveling, from my experience, it doesn’t matter, just get the closest armor to your level, you will replace armors each day, it just if you have same armor level with condition or healing power vs armor with vitality and power take the vitality and power.

vitality can be better than toughness, when you fight condition monsters. conditions do more relative damage, also vitality is linear (x amount of vitality will gain you Nx health) but toughness is always compared to opponent power.

toughness gear also more expensive than vitality (if you craft, you notice that on x0 level you can craft power and vitality for 3 crafting material, while toughness and precision is crafted on x5 levels and require 8 crafting materials)

this game actually punish stationary combat, and encourage mobility.
dodges are good, kiting the mob in little circles is good.
staying in one place is necessary evil that can be sweetened by retaliation. (GS4 symbol and stand your ground shout)
for normal mobs, you can win standing in place, but vs veterans you will have to dodge.

in PVE it is always advisable to bring a second set of ranged weapon. Early on in the game there are certain fights you absolutely cannot melee. For melee usage in normal PVE content (level 30+), there’s no need for anything else other than GS.

Just listen to them above and pack vitality or toughness gear since you change them so very often. To be honest though, a guardian is perhaps the most forgiving to go DPS in while levelling, even for a new player of the game. It is that forgiving.

To add to what other posters already have said, I find that greatsword/staff combo works best for me. I keep a scepter/focus in my inventory for those hard to reach, and/or stupidly dangerous up close bosses. Altruistic healing gives you free healing, and a lot of it. If I’m totally out of heals on my weapon, or my utility skills, I can equip my staff, pop off an Empower and it gives me at least half my life bar back, as long as you’re with a bunch of other people.

I’m keeping a mace and staff in my inventory just to be safe, but I have been finding good results with the GS/Scepter&Focus combo for the most part. The scepter gives me might every time I switch to it in combat so that has been helping a lot.

My next question is what types of insignias/upgrades should I focus on. I original thought that Berserker/Knight were the right ones, but now I am getting the feeling that there are other options I should consider.

Okay ladies and gentlemen,

I am a mere three levels away from lvl 80 and now I’m eager to hear a few suggestions of level 80 stat builds and what armors/upgrades I should look into.

I’ve been staying pretty true to Lalangamena’s suggestions on traits (though I’ve been doing guess work on the actual skills gained through traits) and focused on Knight (boot, shoulder, and glove)/Carrion (chest, leg, helm) armor, adding Ruins of the Warrior as the upgrades. My jewels focus mainly on power/vita with one to help toughness as well since it’s been a lot more about vita.

I’m as open as always for suggests on what else I could do to help me be as Tank-ish as possible.

hi,

this is a standard tanking /DPS build 0/15/30/20/5

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fUAQBUSBKLcVI/OKicB2HEImCMmxrHKkiME;TEAA2A

its core defense is altruistic healing,
its core mitigation is spamming blind on F1 on kill due to renewed justice (doesnt work on dredge, be carefull)

i haven’t listed any weapons because they don’t matter, you use what is good for you.
the traits that unswappable are: valor30 altruistic healing and honor10 superior aura.

all the rest should be swapped according to the encounter
for example radiance10 can be swapped for inner fire when enemies burn you.
valor 20 can be honorable shield when you have shield, valor 10 should be purity if you don’t use soldier runes (some use soldier runes for condition removal to be more tankish, some use 2*water,2*monk, 2*maj water for extra 40% boon duration to be more group supportive)
honor 20 can be empowering might, when your group need more DPS etc etc…

you will find out what works for you in the game, there is no “must do” guide except " adapt for the content"

another classic tanky build is: 0/0/30/30/10

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fUAQBUSBKLcVIvwJisCiE7BGh/GveoQKyQA;TEAA2A

this one is less on offence but much more on group support due to battle presence (honor 30).
10 points in virtues allow you to take wall of reflection on lower CD, or 50% longer shield of the avenger when needed, ofc in www you take 25% more retaliation for those pesky thieves.

also, read the healway guardian build ( in this forum section) for a different approach for tanking via healing.

I use kind of variation of healway build 0/0/20/30/20 with battle presence and absolute resolution, because I focus on group support rather than tanking.

I use stamina sigils and not endurance because I am poor and cant spend 5golds for each sigil…

http://gw2buildcraft.com/calculator/guardian/?3|9.1k.h1g.e.1k.hy|b.1n.h1.d.1n.hy|1k.71g.1k.71h.1k.b1h.1k.71g.1k.71h.1k.b1h|2u.0.2u.0.3u.0.1k.68.1k.68.2u.0|0.0.k29.u2ac.k29|e

regarding armors, it is quite a consensus that guardians use knight/soldier/cleric armors and complementary accessories (sometimes slotted with ruby orbs for the crit damage coefficient)
which set exactly? its up to you.
do you want to be more DPS? go knight armor with soldier accessories and ruby orbs.
want to be tanky? soldier armor, knight or cleric accessories.
want to be supportive? cleric armor with soldier or cleric accessories.

I am not a big fan of berserker armor for any class… some people say they can do all content and high level fractals in berserkers, they are probably better players than me…

First of all, thanks so much for all the advice you have given me thus far. I can admit that I probably would not have done so well if left to my own devices and being able to hold my own with my guild (who are mostly level 80s with various exotic/rare gear) has been pretty cool in dungeons.
Unfortunately, the first two links seem to be broken, but I am finding what you’re saying to make sense. I’ll have to fiddle around with what you said and find what works for me.

you copy the link and paste to an open browser.

for some reason anet forum platform doesn’t support gw2skills links.

Ya, that fixed the issue. Thanks again!