Guild Wars 2

Are any of you using these stats? I’ve been using the berserker stats for the most part, and I have just a bit of toughness for those places where it’s needed, but do any of you find a little vitality mixed in to be of benefit to you? I feel like it provides a little more margin for error (be it either because of lag, accidents, kitten moments, not anticipating something correctly, etc), but I’m not totally convinced on the investment yet.

Thus far there’s a surprising lack of opinion and/or input on the subject. I suppose most ares till doing the zerker thing.

I don’t think marauder is needed in PvE so far. Maybe that will change with harder content though since 50% more hp on the cost of arround 10% DPS sounds pretty nice.

As long as we can get away with using zerker gear we should keep using that though.

I’m still doing the zerker thing.

Marauder is not a bad choice by any stretch. For the low HP classes it is definitely passable. However, for guardian you aren’t hearing much about it for the following reasons:

#1: Guards have a lot of active defense. Between Aegis, Courage, Focus, Shield, Shelter, Renewal, Wall, Sanctuary, Retreat, and all the heals they pump out, most guards are more than capable of sustaining themselves.

#2: Raids are a hard DPS check. It is better to wear Zerker and hope for a better run than wear Marauder and have 10% shaved off of your peak performance.

#3: Marauder is expensive and complicated to craft. Zerker is easy and always available.

I would also add that with the new longbow Guardians now have a way of dealing significant damage from range which is almost always safer, alleviating the need for the extra HP.

VanEinstein.5019:

Are any of you using these stats? I’ve been using the berserker stats for the most part, and I have just a bit of toughness for those places where it’s needed, but do any of you find a little vitality mixed in to be of benefit to you? I feel like it provides a little more margin for error (be it either because of lag, accidents, kitten moments, not anticipating something correctly, etc), but I’m not totally convinced on the investment yet.

Toughness= Counter direct damage.
Vitality= Counter conditions applied to you.

As mobs rarely apply conditions it’s not necessary. On the other hand, a lot of players in PvP apply conditions so extra Vitality is always welcome (thereby, current Meta build in PvP uses Marauder amulet).

Im zerker with some valkyrie trinkets so i guess its kinda like partially Marauder.

Stick w zerk. Raid teams will still want you to run it.

I appreciate the feedback. I don’t participate in raids, so that wasn’t a concern of mine, but I do occasionally have trouble in a fractal or two. One example I can think of concerns the opening fight in the cliffside fractal. For whatever reason if that fellow decides to focus me, there’s really little I can do to survive his onslaught long enough for cooldowns to come back up. Perhaps I’ll simply need to adjust which skills I’m bringing so that I can prolong my life there. Typically I only have shield of courage, shelter, and retreat as my life savers. I’ll just have to start being mindful that I may need one more or to change retreat for something w/ a longer uptime.

NumenorLord.6539:

Toughness= Counter direct damage.
Vitality= Counter conditions applied to you.

As mobs rarely apply conditions it’s not necessary. On the other hand, a lot of players in PvP apply conditions so extra Vitality is always welcome (thereby, current Meta build in PvP uses Marauder amulet).

Vitality doesn’t counter conditions, condition removal does. Vitality expands your health pool and is equally effective against conditions and direct damage.

VanEinstein.5019:

I appreciate the feedback. I don’t participate in raids, so that wasn’t a concern of mine, but I do occasionally have trouble in a fractal or two. One example I can think of concerns the opening fight in the cliffside fractal. For whatever reason if that fellow decides to focus me, there’s really little I can do to survive his onslaught long enough for cooldowns to come back up. Perhaps I’ll simply need to adjust which skills I’m bringing so that I can prolong my life there. Typically I only have shield of courage, shelter, and retreat as my life savers. I’ll just have to start being mindful that I may need one more or to change retreat for something w/ a longer uptime.

Haven’t ran fractals in a while, but I remember running Wall of Reflection and Shield of the avenger in that fractal to give yourself solid projectile defense. Might be worth trying.

All that was said above + the fact that guardian is already on the lower end of the sustained damage spread.

Losing much more would keep guardians out of raids due to the fact so many other can support just as well if not better while doing better damage.

Ragnar the Rock.3174:

All that was said above + the fact that guardian is already on the lower end of the sustained damage spread.

Losing much more would keep guardians out of raids due to the fact so many other can support just as well if not better while doing better damage.

That is… disheartening. I’ve noticed that. I’m hoping that arena net actually sees the disparity going on with some of their classes and plans to do something about it. I feel like for a long time they’ve had this image of Guardian that doesn’t really hold true (like their excuses for limiting their mobility options as an example). I know that Warriors feel like they’re in a bad place (although primarily in terms of PvP), and Thieves are having their own low point right now. It’s a shame that I don’t do better with more complex classes that happen to be doing better right now.