Guild Wars 2

I just want to say I’m no theory crafter or anything like that by any means but I decided to hop onto my guardian for the first time in months and gear him out and build a dps spec. I don’t use torch but I’ve been playing around with in while in Cursed Shore and it IS a nice weapon. However I have a few gripes with it, and I was wondering if these same gripes are the reason I don’t see any other guardians use torch.

Zealot’s Fire shouldn’t increase the CD by 50% IMO. It’s a subpar skill as is and it would be nice to be able to throw the fire and still maintain at 15 second CD.

Cleansing Flame’s cast time could use a reduction from 4 1/4 seconds to 3 3/4 seconds. At the moment it feels way to long for little damage, I could be auto attacking with my sword and do much more in less time.

Would these changes make torch over powered? Sorry, I’m not the best at stuff like this. I was thinking that reducing Cleansing Flame’s cast time might make it better than 100b, but I don’t know if that’s a problem or not.

The way I see torch right now, #4 is like warrior’s offhand sword, first part adds some conditions and the second part hits hard and scales with power. #5 I see it as a condition cleansing skill with some bonus damage so if I use a torch as soon as the conditions are cleansed I interrupted #5 and go back to dpsing

having said that, I don’t usually use a torch, focus is just too good of an offhand

shockwave.1764:

Zealot’s Fire shouldn’t increase the CD by 50% IMO. It’s a subpar skill as is and it would be nice to be able to throw the fire and still maintain at 15 second CD.

Cleansing Flame’s cast time could use a reduction from 4 1/4 seconds to 3 3/4 seconds. At the moment it feels way to long for little damage, I could be auto attacking with my sword and do much more in less time.

Not really subpar. Zealot’s Fire is one of the single most damaging skills a Guardian has, next to the focus #5 Shield of Wrath explosion. I believe it even beats out hammer #2 Mighty Blow. It’s definitely easier to control and will damage 100% of the time, unlike focus 5 which can be broken and requires timing, or hammer 2 where you’ll need to be in melee range.

I agree with you on Cleansing Flame. The channeling is just too slow to be effective for damage. However slower is better if you want to keep up area cleansing conditions. It would be silly to have it burst out quickly and not have a chance to run around and cleanse your teammates.

i’ve been using the torch a lot lately and i reckon it’s a very strong set. i dno’t mind the increased CD on zealot’s fire as mentioned it’s a very strong burst skill.

yea, cleansing flame is not the best DPS. you actually lose out if you were to simply AA with sword or scepter. although, it has it’s uses for condition cleansing. would be nice if it would cleanse conditions on yourself as well.

hmm one small idea. if you took the Torch trait, in addition to shorter CD’s, what if cleansing flame would convert conditions on allies? or perhaps, while cleansing the conditions on your allies, the respective boons would be placed on you? though again, still very situational. but would give the torch a little more reactive play and depth.

I use sword/torch and love it as it is.

Zealot’s Fire is an incredibly powerful finisher, and I can easily make it critical for over 4.500 damage (I’m playing soldier stats). The extra burning and 1200 range is really just icing on the top. It’s a great skill.

Judge’s Intervention>Cleansing Flame is a very powerful move, that always makes an opponent run (unless he’s running a bunker build). You see, the thing that makes the slow channel time of Cleansing Flame so good, is that it’s great for aggressive play. Not only does it look menacing, it also completely covers opponents in blue flames, to the point where they almost can’t see what’s going on.

The only thing I don’t like about torch, is the condition removal from Cleansing Flame. I never, ever, use this to remove conditions on allies, and it simply doesn’t make sense to have on a weapon that is otherwise all about damage. It also doesn’t remove conditions on yourself.

My thoughts on how to make the torch stronger:

Make both abilities act as “sort of” passive damage buff to compliment the damage of your primary weapon. For example upping the duration of the AOE burning on Zealot’s Flame so it provides ~10s of AOE burning before needing to cast on a single target. Or, once Cleansing Flame is activated it channels in the background, but the player is free to use other abilities during the channel. Therefore both abilities up player DPS on use, but don’t interfere with your primary attacks.

I’m sure someone mentioned this already, but I’m going to say it. Torch #5 should remove conditions on the caster. I’d go so far as to say we need it in this condition-heavy meta.

you should be bathed in flame on torch #4 for longer imo

Torch 4 was obviously intended to trigger Inner Fire (Radiance IV)

Fix it and we’re golden.

I’m fine with just the self-cleansing. I get set on fire enough by other Guardians, Dhuumfire Necros, spirit Rangers, scepter/torch Mesmers, Eles, Engis… well, everyone.

I think cleansing fire should also affect the Guardian, but should be put on a longer cd so it doesn’t become too strong.

Nike.2631:

Torch 4 was obviously intended to trigger Inner Fire (Radiance IV)

Fix it and we’re golden.

I agree. The torch is fine, just the #4 should trigger Inner Fire (first time I used I was hoping to trigger – I thought it was a bug). And “maybe” #5 revomal should apply to yourself.

…. Inner fire just needs a tooltip fix, it doesnt need to work with torch #4. And chris GET MORE VIT SON! :P But yeah, the condition heavy meta is really pushing us to a condition removal bunker or die situation. But hey, the burning from every source possible so so nice for my crit chance!

I have plenty of Vit in sPvP.

:l

Torch is perfect as it is.

The only problem I have with Torch as a condition removal is the same problem I have with Healing Breeze and helping out my teammates. Positioning is an issue, and I can never seem to get to the right place fast enough or reliably enough to make the best use out of it.

In theory it’s great, but in practice it always feels like, “well, that was ok but maybe next time will be better”