Guild Wars 2

I’m still leveling my guardian alt (35 now), I usually play a thief, and trying to come up with a build that I think I’d like. I enjoy doing a support role as I’m always playing this character with my wife, but I want to also still be able to put out a decent amount of damage. This is what I’ve come up with, most choices meant for dungeons/group leveling, but there are a couple traits and weapons I could swap for when doing wvwvw and I think it would still be effective. Anyone have any thoughts so far? http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fUAQNApdWlcg67WFSLEmIFRuA7DDETBGh/1DKqQGC;TsAg1CooAzAmAMLYOwkgtYYQwkAA

Mainly I’m going for an effective way to keep constant healing up with altruistic healing synergy from symbols, shouts, crits with empowering might, and using virtue of justice for every fight with inspired virtue and renewed justice. I’m not 100% on defender’s flame, but with mace/focus combo I do have lots of methods of blocking (I would probably swap this out for purity for wvwvw). It looks like it’d be a good tanking and support build, while still doing decent damage output from crits and burning.

I’d appreciate any constructive feedback, thanks everyone!

Shoot, nothing?

The problem is at lvl 35 you cannot actually use the synergy that make a good balanced build.

Altruistic Healing is a Grandmaster Valor trait and needs lvl 40 to be effective, and even then i don’t recommend it till you are at least lvl 45 and can go 0/0/30/0/5, to benefit from the additional boons of virtue 5.

If you need an 80 lvl spec, a good starting point is reading the other threads, while there are good threads on support/tank builds, i strongly recommend the Crithammer build, because it is remarkably easier to pull off than a mace/shield build that is ultra-tanky but boring as hell to master.

Can you elaborate on your favorite weapons so far, so we can discuss them properly?

Aha, I know this build would be for level 80 only… I’m just planning for the future I like having a goal to get to, it keeps me motivated to level.

The only reason mace/focus is my favorite so far is because of the amount of blocking/healing/support that it has, but I’m willing to try out other weapons as I level up to see if I like them. I can take a look at the crithammer builds. I did have fun with the hammer in the lower levels, especially since my guy is Asura and the animations make me chuckle the way he holds a 2h hammer. Thanks for the reply (I’ll just do a search for crithammer on the forums to find a good spot that discusses this one?)

It sounds like from what I’m reading, my trait setup was pretty close to the same idea as crithammer. What would you swap for Defender’s Flame? Glacial Heart maybe?

I don’t like Defender’s flame, mainly because of its semi-random targeting that makes it so messy to use.

Glacial Hammer is nice, but only in PvP, because for me is pointless to chill mobs because:

- they’re too weak anyway;
- if they’re strong and you would like to slow them, they’re immune (most bosses).

My crithammer build is 0/0/30/30/10.
I usually go with Purity/Retributive Armor/Altruistic Healing for Valor. I can exchange Purity with Strength in Numbers in Dungeons (it works on you too!).

Honor is more flexible, i like Empowering Might, the other two are situational and i often change them even during a dungeon or WvW escapade. I usually get Two-Handed Mastery though.

For Virtue, i always use Master of Consecrations. If i feel the mood, i can get Consecrated Ground instead. Both of this skills rock with Wall of Reflection.

I think general rule of thumb is valor and honor, definitely get that altruistic healing to cover your toughness/healing balance, then you should focus your other points towards whatever else you’d like—depending on your utilities. If you are a shout person, honor—gs is also good with honor with the 20% skill reduc; if you like consecreations, go with virtues (if you like boons 5 in virtue is a must!—that added effect is so useful) But yeah, think about what weapons you want to roll with for right now and your skill focus, and good luck!

Thanks for the tips guys! This will help me out a lot. For gear, would you typically go for “knight” equipment?

It depends, since I focused a lot on toughness and vit, I went for bersker to make up for the lack of dmg output. Given that you have good skills that give you boons and whatnot, altruistic healing should be your core salvation in saving yourself from dying. But again, if you want to be even moreeeeee tanky, you can go for knight, but crit dmg/chance with multi hit weapons like gs and sword, bersker would be great imo : )

Ok, cool, I’ll focus on precision mainly and go for a balance of berserker/knight depending on how much I’m getting squashed