Guild Wars 2

I have mained an Engineer since release, but I love the look and concept of the hammer as a weapon. I looked through a build editor and then some through the warrior and now the guardian sub forums.

I also love shields. One of the original reasons I went with the engineers was the pistol/shield combo. So I want a shield in my other weapons set. Most likely want to use a mace with that.

I know nothing about good trait combinations for a build like this, nor do I know enough about Guardian utility skills and what combinations of them mesh well, particularly with the weapons sets I have in mind.

I would like to ask the guardian community for some direction on this. Do traits tend to be work together for this weapons combination? Do you have suggestions of that I may want to try in combination with the hammer other then mace/shield? Are there some solid hammer/mace+shield builds out there now?

Any direction on this would be greatly appreciated, as would any links to related builds. Thanks in advance for your help.

What facets of the game are you interested in?

For instance – the shield is pretty worthless in 98% of the PvE content of the game, useless in WvW zergs, ok in sPvP and pretty darn good in WvW roaming. The hammer on the other-hand is a generally useful weapon.

I would argue the Warrior’s shield is more appealing aesthetically. I only say this because they use their shield in a more traditional sense (they actually
Block and shield bash).

If you are going to try a guardian hammer build try 25/25/0/20/0 and take all the symbol traits you can. It also lends well to signets but those can be kind of selfish. Up to you.

Tarsius.3170:

What facets of the game are you interested in?

For instance – the shield is pretty worthless in 98% of the PvE content of the game, useless in WvW zergs, ok in sPvP and pretty darn good in WvW roaming. The hammer on the other-hand is a generally useful weapon.

I’m kinda in the same boat as OP. Been playing Mesmer and now I’m in interested in Guardian. Currently levelling one up and having a blast.

I’m pretty interested in a hammer / whatever wep sets build although my preference is probably hammer / sword + focus or sword + shield (I’m open to anything else as long as hammer is the main wep). What sort of trait would you recommend and what utilities synergize well together? My focus is mainly in sPvP and WvW roaming.

Also what sort of armor/trinket sets would you recommend if I’m mostly interested in dealing the hurt but still be able to withstand a moderate amount of damage?

Thanks in advance.

Tarsius.3170:

What facets of the game are you interested in?

For instance – the shield is pretty worthless in 98% of the PvE content of the game, useless in WvW zergs, ok in sPvP and pretty darn good in WvW roaming. The hammer on the other-hand is a generally useful weapon.

Good question, I should of clarified this originally. I spend about 60% of my time in WvW, about 35% in PvE and 5% in sPvP.

Klat.5846:

Tarsius.3170:

What facets of the game are you interested in?

For instance – the shield is pretty worthless in 98% of the PvE content of the game, useless in WvW zergs, ok in sPvP and pretty darn good in WvW roaming. The hammer on the other-hand is a generally useful weapon.

I’m kinda in the same boat as OP. Been playing Mesmer and now I’m in interested in Guardian. Currently levelling one up and having a blast.

I’m pretty interested in a hammer / whatever wep sets build although my preference is probably hammer / sword + focus or sword + shield (I’m open to anything else as long as hammer is the main wep). What sort of trait would you recommend and what utilities synergize well together? My focus is mainly in sPvP and WvW roaming.

Also what sort of armor/trinket sets would you recommend if I’m mostly interested in dealing the hurt but still be able to withstand a moderate amount of damage?

Thanks in advance.

I don’t think the hammer would be the best choice for sPvP as the symbol is what does the most damage and good players would probably just walk out of it. Its fine for WvW though as it will hit multiple targets and banishing them off a cliff is fun Either way the build I put before was for PvE. For WvW you could try an AH/EM build. Should work fine with it. I believe there is a sticky at the top of the forum that has details on it.

I forgot though… hammer is fun on skyhammer in spvp :P

So you guys recommend a “symbol” build for hammer thus far? Any utility suggestions or specific off traits (by off traits I mean ones not effecting the main focus, in this case, “symbols”) ??

trait into symbols for hammer bashing. you really only need to use skill 1 with any regularity. spam that protection symbol and everyone else in melee rests easy. If your symbols are traited, they are larger, do vuln, and heal allies as well as doing more damage.

some guardian hammer tricks:
learn to love consecrations. using hammer skill 2 while standing in hallowed ground or any other fire ring style skill will product an Area Might burst. you can also do this with hammer skill 5 or any other symbol you produce for an Area Retaliation burst as well.

I almost never use skill 4 unless its to watch an enemy fly like a golf ball. It is hilarious.

as for a second weapon set:
if you are traited into symbols a mace is always a welcome addition. sword or scepter won’t benefit from your trait line at all. shield is a somewhat lackluster weapon on paper but does have it’s uses. you can reflect, heal, and crowd control all with one skill, and do cone damage / protection with the other. It also provides with some good combo fields for any class with a greater range than you, which is everybody

hammer is all about pressure. you are a slow, heavy attacker but the damage will never stop ticking. ride skill 1 and use others sparingly as the situation warrants.

as for other traits, I recommend the radiance line up to at least 15. you apply vuln on blind, F1 does blind (and vuln now) and F1 will recharge on each enemy death.

add a paltry 5 points into Virtues and you can add area stacks of might to the above. with this you can still trait full 30 into symbols line and 20 into Zeal for some extra damage. You miss out on the 25 symbol damage boost trait, but the extra might you will be generating more than makes up for it. Ive played it both ways and the extra 5 in virtues just does more damage for everyone and increases survivability. everyone wins.

roachsrealm.9284:

as for other traits, I recommend the radiance line up to at least 15. you apply vuln on blind, F1 does blind (and vuln now) and F1 will recharge on each enemy death.

add a paltry 5 points into Virtues and you can add area stacks of might to the above. with this you can still trait full 30 into symbols line and 20 into Zeal for some extra damage. You miss out on the 25 symbol damage boost trait, but the extra might you will be generating more than makes up for it. Ive played it both ways and the extra 5 in virtues just does more damage for everyone and increases survivability. everyone wins.

To add to this, if you are not going to go 25 deep into zeal for more symbol damage, you only really need to go 15 deep for the vuln so you have an extra 5 points to play with.

So in a symbol build, what gear do you suggest? DO we have a target amount of cirt chance or power or any other stats?

coglin.1867:

So in a symbol build, what gear do you suggest? DO we have a target amount of cirt chance or power or any other stats?

In PvE, all zerker. Something like this is what I’d run: http://gw2buildcraft.com/calculator/guardian/?3.0|2.5g.h2.0.0.0|b.5g.h2.d.5g.h1j.0.0.0|1g.7e.1g.7e.1g.7e.1g.7e.1g.7e.1g.7e|3s.0.2s.0.3s.0.2s.0.3s.0.2s.0|p20.p29.0.k37.0|39.j|v.18.1a.1b.1i|e

In WvW you will generally want at least 40% crit chance to proc EM every second so Knights is a good choice. Toughness and Vitality are the next primaries. Power and Crit damage are good too. Avoid condition damage like the plague. You could potentially try to mix clerics and magi if you want to make a healer/tank but if you are gonna go down that route I would skip the zeal line all together. Maybe something like this http://gw2buildcraft.com/calculator/guardian/?3.0|2.5n.h2.0.0.0|6.5c.h8.0.0.0|1c.7x.1c.7x.1c.7x.1c.7x.1c.7x.1c.7x|4u.0.21j.0.31j.0.21j.0.31j.0.2u.0|0.f2.u45b.k37.5|39.7|v.16.1a.19.1i|e

You could argue for dropping 10 points in zeal and picking up PoV as well as the passive 10% when endurance isn’t full.

In a zerker build you’ll be dodging a lot anyway and it’ll affect all your damage, not just the symbol. Plus you get extra group condition removal as well.

varena.1362:

You could argue for dropping 10 points in zeal and picking up PoV as well as the passive 10% when endurance isn’t full.

In a zerker build you’ll be dodging a lot anyway and it’ll affect all your damage, not just the symbol. Plus you get extra group condition removal as well.

I don’t like that on a hammer build as the hammer symbols reward you for not moving too much… But its all preference…

Sorry, but I am not familiar enough to know the abbreviated terms, PoV ???

coglin.1867:

Sorry, but I am not familiar enough to know the abbreviated terms, PoV ???

Pure of Voice. Grandmaster in honor. Converts one condition to a boon when you use a shout. Affects all party members.

There is a whole thread stickied at the top on AH -altruistic healing – and Hammer. gear, traits, etc… everything explaimed thouroughly.

Relentliss.2170:

There is a whole thread stickied at the top on AH -altruistic healing – and Hammer. gear, traits, etc… everything explaimed thouroughly.

Yes, I am aware of that, thank you. I wanted to have a more personal discussion to ask questions to other posters about specific gear, traits, and weapons and how they may benefit how I want to play, so I made a thread on it, but thank you.

coglin.1867:

Relentliss.2170:

There is a whole thread stickied at the top on AH -altruistic healing – and Hammer. gear, traits, etc… everything explaimed thouroughly.

Yes, I am aware of that, thank you. I wanted to have a more personal discussion to ask questions to other posters about specific gear, traits, and weapons and how they may benefit how I want to play, so I made a thread on it, but thank you.

The thread already exists.

First to get things straight, in spvp and wvw the chain skill isnt the main contributor of damage, mighty blow is. Hence why 2h mastery is a must in any pvp/wvw centric hammer build. The chain is is a way to get protection and retaliation going.
So when you invest in symbol traits you invest for the team, not damage.
Valid and competitve builds for wvw
0/30/30/5/5 (Hammer+focus bursting, Meditation)
0/25/30/10/5 (Hammer and GS bursting, meditations, 5 points can be moved from honor to virtues)
0/5/30/30/5 (shoutbased with PoV or meditations and combine two symbol weapons for frontline symbol bombing.)
0/0/30/30/10 (zerg build with boon duration and triple shout)
10/0/0/30/30 (support centric with some really impressive boon duration.
EDIT: förgot this one 0/0/10/30/30

In pve investing in symbols is a damage enhancer but you dont really need more than one trait in honor. Longer lasting symbol for stationary npc/boss and larger symbols for aoe targets and moving targets. 10 points give you larger symbols but having power of the virtues fully compensate for you not being able to get longer lasting symbols.

10/25/0/10/25 (with boon duration runes to max uptime on boons which has great synergies with 25 points in virtues or rune of the scholar. Add in hallowed ground and purging flames and you will als add lots of might to the team on very long duration)

Altruistic Healer + Hammer = you NEVER die

you can pick a might-stacking build using altruistic healer and you will be able to tank 99% of the game and deal some sweet crits, also Hammer AoE damage is really strong

I’ve been running 15/25/0/20/10 with hammer. You get vuln on blind and from symbols ticks plus longer lasting symbols. As most boss fights in dungeons are stack n smack this keeps 5-8 stacks vulnerability up solo. For PvE, I can’t see how you don’t run at least 10 virtues for master of consecrations. WoR is useful in nearly every dungeon and Purging Flames gives those zerk warriors the removal they lack. Just my 2 copper

PraetorMortis.8610:

I’ve been running 15/25/0/20/10 with hammer. You get vuln on blind and from symbols ticks plus longer lasting symbols. As most boss fights in dungeons are stack n smack this keeps 5-8 stacks vulnerability up solo. For PvE, I can’t see how you don’t run at least 10 virtues for master of consecrations. WoR is useful in nearly every dungeon and Purging Flames gives those zerk warriors the removal they lack. Just my 2 copper

Agreed with this. Writ of Persistence is your go-to talent for any hammer build in PvE. Also, consecrations and shouts vastly outperform almost every other utility skill Guardians have in PvE and you can get the cooldown reduction for both of these with this build.

In PvE, Altruistic Healing and Pure of Voice are both defensive overkill and come with a high cost to your dps. If you’re new to the class and new to dungeons, Altruistic Healing can be some good training wheels for you while you learn the fights, but Pure of Voice will almost always provide more condition cleansing than your group needs.

coglin.1867:

Any direction on this would be greatly appreciated, as would any links to related builds. Thanks in advance for your help.

Roll a Warrior, mate. Save yourself a lot of heartache.

korelg.7862:

Altruistic Healer + Hammer = you NEVER die

you can pick a might-stacking build using altruistic healer and you will be able to tank 99% of the game and deal some sweet crits, also Hammer AoE damage is really strong

This is reference to Dungeons I guess? Because if you Solo Roam in WvW with that build, I will put you in the grave faster than you thought possible.

Okay, so I am beginning to see some builds, and see some of the reasons the builds work, and their purpose. What type of gear is suggested with some of these builds ??

@Brutaly
I am going through your stickied guide atm but it is a lot to take in and a bit over whelming when I am so ignorant of the facts and workings of the profession, so I appreciate the redundant explanations here from you as well as the rest of the community.

What are you going to do with this build in WvW? Zerg? Solo Roam? 2-5 man Roaming? Havoc Squad?

Give us more details to figure out what kind of build you require.

I Do a lot of havoc squad, almost never solo, but may often be part of the “wall” when zergs clash.

I appreciate that it is hard to help me without more information. I have mained an engineer since launch, and the difference in the two classes is vast.

I am more then happy to answer any questions I can to help you help me.

I suggest a 0/15/30/20/5 build. Basically pvt armor with speed or travellers runes. One set of knights and one set of beserker trinkets. This isn’t the optimal build for either, but its pretty good at both.

Run AH, shouts and hammer when with the zerg. Knights

Run Monks Focus, Meds and 1h weapons when roaming. Beserker or Celestial

Havoc squad… depends on the make up of the group. The AH build might be more the go. I usualy like to run GS with the Havoc Squad.

I am not a big fan of hammer for roaming. It is handy to use either 3 or 5 and JI to a foe. But most of your attacks are slow and easily avoided. In zergs it rocks for blasting combo fields.

Guardians need to be flexible to be effective. While the hammer is an awesome zerg or pve weapon, it is not as effective as other weapons in havoc or roaming… particularly roaming.

I am not specifically concerned about what is optimal. I simply like the concept of the hammer, and it is part of what drew me to the guardian. Thanks for the advice. I appreciate it.