Guild Wars 2

Just recently got my guardian to level 80, and I’m trying to decide what kind of gear and build to go – right now I’m focusing on trying to get a high crit mace or sword build that has some survivability (ie no glass cannon). Some things to note:

- This is not for PvP or WvW or dungeons
- Not using ascended gear in my calc’s, as I have none and don’t see myself getting any in the near future
- I’m not rich, so can’t just go switching gear without a thought.
- I don’t use food or other consumables
- not for grouping
- My back item in all builds is set to “Shaman” as I’m using the free backitem from the LS Southsun event.
So here is the current build I use & gear (also note, this isn’t exactly 100% my stats.. as I’m wearing rare quality goods, not exotic.. but there’s no way to show that in the calc):

http://gw2buildcraft.com/calculator/guardian/?3.1|9.1c.a7.e.1c.a7|0.0.0.0.0.0|1c.a7.1c.a7.1c.a7.1c.a7.1c.a7.1c.a7|1g.67.1g.67.1g.67.1g.67.1g.67.1d.67|0.u16b.k67.k28.0|0.0|v.16.18.1a.4|e

Right now as you can see I don’t have +10 in Zeal for the +damage when target is on fire. I personally don’t remember to use my virtues often enough for me to feel like it’s warranted for just the few seconds enemies are on fire every 5 attacks – and yes, I do know I have passives & trait which boosts what I can do for the times I do remember to use my virtue of justice. This gives me high crit rate with decent crit damage (in-game doesn’t seem to show the crit boost I should be getting from RHS). I also get freq stacks of might & vigor, but my only self healing is via healing skill, healing passive & when I remember to dodgeroll.

Switching to sword: http://gw2buildcraft.com/calculator/guardian/?3.1|c.1c.a7.e.1c.a7|0.0.0.0.0.0|1c.a7.1c.a7.1c.a7.1c.a7.1c.a7.1c.a7|1g.67.1g.67.1g.67.1g.67.1g.67.1d.67|0.u1ab.k69.k28.0|0.0|v.16.18.1a.4|e

Thing is, I’m looking to upgrade my armor to exotic level as I can afford it, and “soldier” armor might not be the best option as it’s non craftable and only gotten via karma, dungeons or PvP – which means it’s not really ideal for me as I don’t want to farm dungeons, not interested in WvW and it will take me way too long to get the karma needed. So starting to look at other options – such as Knights or Valkryie.

So, here’s some thoughts, going back to mace/shield.

- I’m not interested in all berserkers as I want survivability (and I don’t consider glass cannon to be that – and have enough issue at times with nearly dying.. yes, I’m that bad :P)
- I guess I like to have a decent health pool… lol
- All these builds are using the +90 toughness with shield trait and not the +5% damage when using mace trait. These can be swapped.

Knights: http://gw2buildcraft.com/calculator/guardian/?3.1|9.1n.a1.e.1n.a1|0.0.0.0.0.0|1n.a1.1n.a1.1n.a1.1n.a1.1n.a1.1n.a1|1g.61.1g.61.1g.61.1g.61.1g.61.1d.61|0.u16b.k69.k28.0|0.0|v.16.18.1a.4|e

Valkryie: http://gw2buildcraft.com/calculator/guardian/?3.1|9.1p.a7.e.1p.a7|0.0.0.0.0.0|1p.a7.1p.a7.1p.a7.1p.a7.1p.a7.1p.a7|1g.67.1g.67.1g.67.1g.67.1g.67.1d.67|0.u16b.k69.k28.0|0.0|v.16.18.1a.4|e

Mix #1: http://gw2buildcraft.com/calculator/guardian/?3.1|9.1n.a7.e.1n.a7|0.0.0.0.0.0|1p.a1.1p.a1.1p.a1.1p.a1.1p.a1.1p.a1|1g.67.1g.67.1g.67.1g.67.1g.67.1d.67|0.u16b.k69.k28.0|0.0|v.16.18.1a.4|e

Mix #2: http://gw2buildcraft.com/calculator/guardian/?3.1|9.1p.a1.e.1p.a1|0.0.0.0.0.0|1n.a1.1n.a1.1n.a1.1n.a1.1n.a1.1n.a1|1g.61.1g.61.1g.61.1g.61.1g.61.1d.61|0.u16b.k69.k28.0|0.0|v.16.18.1a.4|e

Mix #3: http://gw2buildcraft.com/calculator/guardian/?3.1|9.1p.9c.e.1p.9c|0.0.0.0.0.0|1n.9c.1n.9c.1n.9c.1n.9c.1n.9c.1n.9c|1g.61.1g.61.1g.61.1g.61.1g.61.1d.61|0.u16b.k69.k28.0|0.0|v.16.18.1a.4|e

Mix #4: http://gw2buildcraft.com/calculator/guardian/?3.1|9.1n.9c.e.1n.9c|0.0.0.0.0.0|1p.9c.1p.9c.1p.9c.1p.9c.1p.9c.1p.9c|1g.67.1g.67.1g.67.1g.67.1g.67.1d.67|0.u16b.k69.k28.0|0.0|v.16.18.1a.4|e

My main goals:

- have high crit rate @ 50-55+% while also having high crit damage %.
- Have decent highish health pool @ 17-18+K
- Have good/decent/ok Effective Health (EHP) @ 21-22+K
- Have good/decent/ok Effective power @ 4-4.2+K

- Yes I know mace is the lowest damage weapon for guardians. I’m not stuck on it, so am willing to swap… just not interested in a GS or Hammer build right now. Which is why I’m looking at either the mace or sword.

This should give me decent survivability in general PvE (again, not bothered with dungeons or Fractals) while still being able to deal out a good bit of damage (although I know not as much as other glass cannon type builds or other classes)… and not trying to focus on an aspect that I know I am very, very weak on (ie activating virtues… lolz).

But I would still love some suggestions or help in regards to this. Cause as I’ve said, I’m not rich.. so it’s something I want to work towards and then keep for awhile.

I’ll look once I get home from work, but some corrections: Soldiers gear can be bought on the TP, it’s called Sentinel. Mace is not the lowest damage if we are talking 1v1. What makes Mace less viable is groups of enemies, because unlike basically every other melee weapon, Mace doesn’t cleave 3 targets on its last hit.

I’ll help you ou in depth once I get home.

foofad.5162:

I’ll look once I get home from work, but some corrections: Soldiers gear can be bought on the TP, it’s called Sentinel. Mace is not the lowest damage if we are talking 1v1. What makes Mace less viable is groups of enemies, because unlike basically every other melee weapon, Mace doesn’t cleave 3 targets on its last hit.

I’ll help you ou in depth once I get home.

Sentinel is actually slight different from Soldiers, It has Vitality as its main stat, instead of Power like soldiers. It is kind of random honestly but it is slightly different. And I would think that mace would actually be best for groups of mobs since symbol is aoe, and the #3 skill is pretty good damage AoE. I mean, Sword only gets auto attack cleave, and scepter only gets smite which is even more horrible vs multiple targets.

Ah, my bad, I haven’t looked at it since I have a set of dungeon Soldier gear. Sentinel is a bad idea then since Power is so critical to damage. As for DPS, this is true for sword, mace, Greatsword, hammer, and staff – your autoattack is where your DPS comes from. Most, if not all, of the 2-5 weapon skills deal less damage per second given their cast and animation times than auto attacking. Especially when we are talking about single targets. But even when you are attacking multiples, that’s why cleave damage is so important. Whirling Wrath doesn’t out damage auto attacking unless you are hitting four targets or more. I’m going off of memory at the moment, but mace symbol doesn’t begin to out damage auto attacking unless you’re hitting five targets with it. Zealots Defense always does less damage than auto attacking. But we don’t use these skills for DPS, we use them for what they bring to the table in utility. Symbol for regen, ZD for projectile defense, etc.

As for Protectors Strike, it only does useful damage if, again, you hit multiple targets – and that’s assuming you immediately block an attack after using it which doesn’t always happen. It has a cooldown animation like everything else, so it prevents you from continuing to apply damage for a certain time span, which hurts its DPS.

I’m not trying to say mace is a bad weapon. Far from it. But it’s damage is really overestimated.

Okay, having looked at your traits in the first and second builds (mace vs sword) the only major thing I would suggest is dump Healer’s Retribution for Signet Mastery if you’re going to be using Signet of Resolve. That’s a much better idea by a landslide. Also, if you don’t have a sword or a greatsword, your only blind comes from Focus if you use it, or Justice if you use it. You’ve already stated that you don’t remember to use your virtues often, so that’s another trait you can pretty much ignore. So instead, I would recommend Inner Fire or even better, Inscribed Removal. If you’re using a sword, switch to Blind Exposure (Flashing Blade is now a vuln skill) and Powerful Blades.

For sigils, Rubies aren’t the best. Grab a Force sigil and an On-Crit sigil of some sort. Blood is great because it deals damage and heals you, Air and Fire are good as well but naturally Fire is expensive as all get out so you may as well stick to Blood. Since you’re running RHS that will turn your mace into an even bigger self healing tool than it already is. Then you can use a scepter for your off set and be good for melee and range.

As far as the choice between Soldiers and Valkyrie goes, versus conditions it’s basically the same, defensively. Versus direct damage Soldier will be tankier. Your damage output will be better with Valkyrie. Those are your tradeoffs.

All told, for what it is, it’s a fine build. It’s not in the same league as full damage RHS builds, but if you don’t care so much about that, then go for it.

P.s. there’s absolutely no reason you couldn’t take this to dungeons, by the way. They might not take you on CoF P1 speedruns but that doesn’t mean you couldn’t do fractals or literally every other dungeon.

Thank you for the helpful replies so far

Really glad you pointed out the change in traits – I feel silly now that I’ve been using traits that don’t benefit me much. I’ve switched them to what foofad suggested – seeing as I do use a signet for healing (and use it quite a bit when fighting groups or tougher mobs), so the trait changes will benefit me a lot more than what I had.

In regard to switching out the Rubies – this only applies to weapons and shield right? So Blood Sigil on weapon and Force sigil on shield? (the exotic Blood is still slightly expansive (for me! lolz), but your right.. not as expensive as Fire (~1g50s vs ~5g50s))

I know there is an debate/argument weather sword or mace is higher dps, but I’ve not really been following that and right now not too bothered either way with it. I understand for those trying to get the best dps in dungeons, l80 events, etc will be aiming at fine tuning dps and such – and thats fine for them, but right now this is not what I’m interested in.

Most RHS dps builds likely go all beserker type gear right? And likely different traits as well – ones utilizing virtues?

I can see the thinking behind all this, as the faster you kill mobs the less damage they do, and thus the less vit & toughness you need. Also when looking at dungeon boss mobs, they can kill you in 1-2 hits no matter how much vit and/or toughness you have, so pointless trying to go defensive at all (and GW2 aggro has a love affair with ppl with high toughness… as I’ve found out numerious times in group events).

But yeah, as you can gather I’m not trying to be up there with the full dps builds – I know some might think I’m silly, and maybe I am, but I admit I have a thing about hating seeing low health and/or effective health. And also, because I tend to not group that much and have found myself solo’ing eventsa, vet’s, etc and found myself struggling to survive because of fighting groups of mobs… I guess that puts me off going zerker’s & such. I know the ability to cleave is vital for these group situations, and maybe going all zerker would be the best option to kill groups faster than they can kill me… but I can’t get over the hurdle that is my hangups, play-style & what I’ve done in previous games.

In regard to armor (this is with changes traits & sigils):

Soldier – only achievable with karma, so will take a long time to get. Also, deals less damage as you said.
– Power: 2,107
– Effective power: 4,244
– Health: 16,545
– Armor: 2,740
– Effective health: 24,691
– Crit Chance: 56.5%
– Crit Damage: 67%

Valkyrie – is fairly affordable on the TC, so easier to obtain for me. Similar health, though less EH while giving higher damage.
– Power: 2,107
– Effective power: 4,589
– Health: 16,545
– Armor: 2,388
– Effective health: 21,519
– Crit Chance: 55.66%
– Crit Damage: 93%

Knights – push’s toughness up, but loose vit. switch from ruby to Beryl lowers crit % but provides vit.
– Power: 1,964
– Effective power: 4202
– Health: 14,765
– Armor: 2,883
– Effective health: 23,185
– Crit Chance: 65.31%
– Crit Damage: 67%

So in regard to my build, it seems it comes down to what you said – do I want to deal less damage but cope a bit better vs direct damage, or sacrifice a bit of that health and deal more damage. The other thing for me is – do I want to be able to get the pieces fairly quickly, or be stuck farming DE’s for karma for the items. (as it stands, I think I have karma for 1 piece… yay me! lol).

Looking at all this, I’m thinking Valkyrie is probably the best – while it has the lowest EHP, it has a decently high hp figure to sooth my silly phobia… and has the highest damage of all 3.

Regarding dungeons – I said ‘no dungeons’ because at the moment I’m not that interested/keen on them as I’m still working through the world, story, etc. Also, because just about every “PvE” build I see suggested revolves around dungeons – and while I understand that will be the focus of most ppl’s games (those doing PvE, not those interested in WvW, PvP, etc), it’s not my focus right now… so trying/hoping not to get advice/builds/etc stacked in favor of grouping and vs boss fights only. Maybe later when I have more time (busy rl right now) I’ll look into them. I am glad to know what I’m thinking of doing shouldn’t be a problem.

Yeah, leave the rubies in the armor unless there is a rune set you like. Pack is very close to the same damage bonus and it has a cool set bonus. You’d probably get Soldier gear quicker in dungeons than you would farming Karma. A lot quicker. Some dungeons only take 20 minutes to complete, and with this build you’d be doing fine in them. It’s worth considering. They aren’t that hard.

As far as gear and other traits for standard RHS builds go, there’s a lot of variety, really. You see RHS + pure of voice, RHS + monks focus, RHS + power of the virtuous… It’s easy to get creative. The only gear that is absolutely bar none an abysmal choice for Guardians is condition damage.

Sigil of Blood is a really bad sigil across the board. The tooltip says 2s ICD but it’s actually 5. That means that even with 100% crit rate it’ll still only proc every 6-7 seconds on average, which means you’re getting about 75 health/second from it at best. You are better off just using Omnomberry Pies, which have an ICD of 1 second, and heals for 325 per proc, and taking Sigil of Strength (2s ICD) to take advantage of RH Strength buidls’ high crit rates.

Also, don’t get hung up on a set of anything. Lots of folks mix soldier, valk, zerk and knight. Mix and match to get the stats you want, there’s not necessarily a reason to stick to one prefix unless that’s exactly what you’re gearing for. Find a chart (I’d point you to one, but it’s been a while since I’ve seen one) that shows you how many stat points you give up for crit dmg % (eg, boots, gloves and shoulders are the least stat loss for great crit dmg % gain, accessories IIRC are a better deal than rings, etc).

Unless you’re going all zerk…tough to replace that, lol. (Wish I was good enough to run all zerk!)

Does 2 sources of might stack? I ask because Signet of Strength gives 30% chance of applying might, and because I’m also using EM I get might from that whenever I crit as well – would I get more might stacks if SoS procced at a crit, or only get the highest stack of might while loosing the benefit from the other?

Also regarding Omnomberry pies – I don’t use consumables. I don’t have a character with cooking, nor can I afford to buy food to keep it always active. If I was going into a dungeon or such I obviously would consider them … but not for general world PvE.

What about Sigil of Air? It’s cheap.. lolz. 30% chance of added lightening damage.

Decided to compare 2 zerker builds with the above builds… (using the same mace/shield build from above, just switched gear around):

All Zerker w/Beryl gems:
– Power: 2,107
– Effective power: 4,899
– Health: 14,765
– Armor: 2,388
– Effective health: 19.204
– Crit Chance: 64.13%
– Crit Damage: 93%

All Zerker w/Ruby gems:
– Power: 2,107
– Effective power: 5,201
– Health: 13,025
– Armor: 2,388
– Effective health: 16,941
– Crit Chance: 72.42%
– Crit Damage: 93%

Makes me cringe seeing the low health. Using this would require good dodging right? And good use of aegis for when you can’t dodge? Due to bad eye-to-hand co-ordination, I generally don’t dodge very well… and not sure if the default aegis every 40 seconds would block enough hits, esp vs groups. Thought I’d look at it to be fair… and just see how different it was to what I’m looking at doing.

Kamatsu.8206:

Does 2 sources of might stack? I ask because Signet of Strength gives 30% chance of applying might, and because I’m also using EM I get might from that whenever I crit as well – would I get more might stacks if SoS procced at a crit, or only get the highest stack of might while loosing the benefit from the other?

Also regarding Omnomberry pies – I don’t use consumables. I don’t have a character with cooking, nor can I afford to buy food to keep it always active. If I was going into a dungeon or such I obviously would consider them … but not for general world PvE.

What about Sigil of Air? It’s cheap.. lolz. 30% chance of added lightening damage.

Decided to compare 2 zerker builds with the above builds… (using the same mace/shield build from above, just switched gear around):

All Zerker w/Beryl gems:
– Power: 2,107
– Effective power: 4,899
– Health: 14,765
– Armor: 2,388
– Effective health: 19.204
– Crit Chance: 64.13%
– Crit Damage: 93%

All Zerker w/Ruby gems:
– Power: 2,107
– Effective power: 5,201
– Health: 13,025
– Armor: 2,388
– Effective health: 16,941
– Crit Chance: 72.42%
– Crit Damage: 93%

Makes me cringe seeing the low health. Using this would require good dodging right? And good use of aegis for when you can’t dodge? Due to bad eye-to-hand co-ordination, I generally don’t dodge very well… and not sure if the default aegis every 40 seconds would block enough hits, esp vs groups. Thought I’d look at it to be fair… and just see how different it was to what I’m looking at doing.

low health wont be a problem, if any says it does its l2p issue, i run 12k hp on 30+ fractals and tbh thats to much, for open world pve you could run around naked and still be successful

Kamatsu.8206:

- I don’t use food or other consumables

Do use food

Wesnoth.1705:

Kamatsu.8206:

- I don’t use food or other consumables

Do use food

this – especially if your short on gold omnomberry bars will really help you out, they last 30 mins so about 9s//hr you could easily get an extra 50s-1g from that