Guild Wars 2

After playing many races , many class combos to 20 or so (30 for ranger ) finally deleted all and settled on human guardian for my one main I want to level. (Just enjoying GW2 tons everything from PVE to WvWvW and taking my time.)

Anyway as example on warrior , the 5 signet +crit chance route is almost impossible to avoid for initial leveling anyway.

Was just curious if there seems to be a general concensus on your first 10/20 points into traits for all around leveling ?

Not looking for uber build and enjoy experimenting , just was curious if there a low lever trait or two that seems to be “must have” or almost detrimental to not go with initially ?

Thanks much in advance.

All i know of is the general 1st 5 points going to Virtues (for Inspired Virtue) – that seems pretty popular, after that it’s pretty much do what you want.

I went with 30 zeal, 30 radiance GS weilding ball of death.

you can move some radiance into the one trait line that gives 2 handed weapons 20% reduced cooldown.

Renewed justice + more damage to burning is your friend.

For leveling, killing stuff faster is better than winning the battle of attrition slowly with toughness.

I pushed two Guardians to 80. Both times, I went 15 Radiance first for Renewed Justice. It just works way too well with the speed and efficiency of solo/Dynamic Events. After that, I went 5 Virtues.

Edit: Oh. I actually used Sword/Focus, Scepter and Hammer the most for leveling. Sword is actually fantastically good with Virtue of Justice, and it gave me the best balance of defense and kill speed. Hammer was a close second, but benefited more from trait support.

Scepter, though, surprisingly deals a lot of damage when you’re of low level because of the way Smite scales. Use it in melee and swap.

Many thanks already (and for any future). Definitely kind of lower level / leveling tips looking for traitwise.

10-40: Zeal > Virtue > Honor
40-60: Honor > Virtue > Radiance
60-80: Valor > ?

I always though that Zeal was the weakest trait line for Guardians, am I wrong?

Well, Zeal has a place. Well, 10 points have a place.

If you’re looking to level mostly via World PVE, the 15 Radiance/5 Virtues setup (which is really IMO the best, see below) does well being supplemented by 10 points in Zeal and Fiery Wrath. With VoJ Spam you’re looking at a lot of Burning to take advantage of, and depending on your playstyle you can supplement that with Judge’s Intervention and Purging Flames for more Burn sources. In that way, the 10% vs. Burning enemies easily come out to a global 6% or more, regardless of weapon loadout.

However, unless you’re running with other Guardians or Elementalists, I feel the effect is far less pronounced if you plan on levelling primarily via Dungeons. Tougher opponents means less enemies dying quickly and thus less VoJ Spam which means less Burning from that source.

Still, it’s possibly the most worthwhile pick in the entire Zeal line, and only a 10 point investment.

The rest is pretty much a matter of personal choice. There are several established and highly functional Guardian builds and the class is balanced enough that you won’t kitten yourself if you throw 30 points in a single Trait line. While some tiers in some lines have some real stinkers there are also a lot of obvious synergies. Shout builds, Meditation builds, Symbol builds, Spirit Weapon builds, Consecration builds are all pretty straightforward affairs if you look over the Traits. And most will leave you with some wiggle room.

Now, back to the 15 Radiance/5 Virtues setup you’ve seen recommended before. Quite simply, I feel it breeds good habits. Managing your Virtues is part and parcel to being an effective Guardian. Virtue of Justice is a good one to practice. Making it both readily available via Renewed Justice and boosting its efficiency through the roof via Inspired Virtues easily allows you to work on your timing and see the effects in action. It doesn’t do as much for the other Virtues, but I see a lot of Guardians who never use their active Virtues at all.

Which is as much of a mistake as spamming them as soon as they come off cooldown.

Not only is the setup wickedly efficient with its Burn and Might spam (for you and your entire party or otherwise whoever just happens to be near you during an Event), it’s educational. Perfect set of training wheels.

(And a total sidenote: A Warrior who goes for a 5 Sigil Crit build might be doing the popular thing but fails at basic math. “For Great Justice” is a better boost to DPS than both Signet of Might and Signet of Fury, including the loss of 40 Precision for not having a Signet in that slot. So much for popular builds.)

Adrenaline.2854:

I always though that Zeal was the weakest trait line for Guardians, am I wrong?

More like there really isn’t anything else worth taking for Guardians at 10 points. Your only other options at that stage are Master of Consecrations, Superior Aria, or Writ of Exaltation. There are a few other decent 10-point traits but for the most part they’re not that good without other stuff to supplement them. For example, Retributive Armor is good but only if you’re already heavily invested in Valor (+30% crit damage), Honor (Vigor and Might on crit) and have a decent crit rate to boot. Along the same lines, Signet Mastery is only really useful once you get Inscribed Removal.

There really is no cookie cutter build, a lot of the popular builds are dps based, but the guardian is just as versatile if not more so than most other professions. I personally run a more support oriented build with my trait progressions starting in honor and valor then slowly bleeding into radiance. At lvl 60 i’ve got:

20-Honor
20-Valor
10-Radiance

I’ve found these synergize well and provide decent flexibility in terms of providing group support. Equipped with a sword/shield (for blinds, teleport, burst dps, damage reduction buff, knockdown/pushback, and burst healing) on one set and a Mace/Focus (for burst healing, AoE healing, AoE Damage, Blocking/Damage reduction buff, Ranged Blind, Regeneration, Block x4/AoE burst damage) in the other set. For dungeons i might drop the sword and the focus, combine the shield/mace and put a staff in the other set for AoE dps, Burst AoE Healing, speed buffs, might buffs, and funnel corking.

At 80 i’ll probably have 0/10/30/30/0. The survivability and utility of this set-up far outweighs the lack of dps of more offensive builds. I’ve even found some success in sPVP using this general template, but it’s a bunker build, so don’t expect to top the kills chart