Guild Wars 2

I have been using a 203020 build that focusing on improved symbols and grabs longer consecration (for reflect wall) and virtue condition removal. also i grab the toughness to allies bonus (i have never had aggro issues with this) and the 20% reduced shield cooldowns…

I love tanking in this game i feel it is engaging and fun. I have tanked fractals 20 and feel i can keep going. also i feel being this tanky makes me an excellent kite aswell and i find that can often be needed.

I wanted to show people what i have so far and ask for any input (also i have now finished my 5 ar for my neck).

You can’t tank in this game. Don’t fool yourself into thinking you can viably tank.

As some guy figured that the mobs have different targeting priorities.

1 . Proximity, the closest target towards them.
2. Downed players
3. Players with the least vitality
4. Players with the most toughness

Though all these and more change depending on the mob, you are in no way tanking fractals, not even migrating the damage thrown by mobs. You simply become a punching bag for a few seconds or for longer depending on all of the above and more. Not on the symbols, skills, consecration ground you use.

Sweet Gear!

That gave me some great ideas on Runes for my own gear, since I am still trying to figure out what does what, or how to make things happen, this has given me some good ideas.

Anyway, the character looks cool too!

Kakeru.2873:

You can’t tank in this game. Don’t fool yourself into thinking you can viably tank.

As some guy figured that the mobs have different targeting priorities.

1 . Proximity, the closest target towards them.
2. Downed players
3. Players with the least vitality
4. Players with the most toughness

Though all these and more change depending on the mob, you are in no way tanking fractals, not even migrating the damage thrown by mobs. You simply become a punching bag for a few seconds or for longer depending on all of the above and more. Not on the symbols, skills, consecration ground you use.

While i understand your point of view, I disagree.

While “tanking” in this game my job is simple.

1: hold the attention of the mob.
2: keep personal movement low so the mob stays on you.
3: use cool downs properly with limited dodge to survive damage
4: begin kiting when necessary (rarely)

I have tanked every dungeon in this game. while your right some involve kiting or knowing what mechanics to dodge.. my definition of tanking in this game is simply “soak damage that would otherwise kill teamates and i keep aggro off teamates”
how i acomplish that feat be it “face tanking” or “kiting” or “cooldown cycling” is irrelevant. I am still keeping things from killing my teamates.

TLDR: i disagree tanking is just different in this game. if you think its not useful then i have no choice but to call you plain wrong.

What I did find is if you do alot of damage and heal. A boss will hate you until you are dead. Or you kill him in which ever manner comes first. I found that out having a 75%25% damage build. I draw a insane amount of aggro even though I’m not trying to tank. I just got used to dodging and surviving. But tanking is very possible under those conditions.

Cool. Have you tried it in WvW?

Also, by 203020, I assume you mean 0/0/20/30/20 ? Or what?

I do find what kootz says in his second post to be true, to some extent. I’m just one of those who thinks going full soldiers like that does not mesh well at all with the guardian class.

With food buffs, my guardian sits at 13.5k hp (this is my sweet spot as I’m a shelter user) and 2.8k armor. However, I have these stats while retaining 49%crit and 92%dmg. I think the idea of building as beefy as possible to actually be a huge detriment to your group since you do no damage.

I do see a lot of “tank” guardians who try to fill the tank/support roll 100% with no complaints from their group though — But I think that just has more to do with groups just wanting a utility bot and not really caring. Maybe it’s just me, but I don’t think these guardians are coming even close to actual team effectiveness as they they think they are.

But hey, if it works for you and you enjoy the hell out of it that’s great

hahahaha such ferocity of ignorant, try ‘tank’ Svanir stage lvl 30 at Light the Stack , tell me how long can you last with your way of tanking. There is no AR required there, just go lvl 30 and try it buahahaha

I use the same build, 0/0/20/30/20
I have two sets of armor, soldier and cleric and two and a half sets of accessories, knight, cleric and ascended soldier.

you can facetank most of the dungeon bosses. (last boss cof story for example is impossible due to encounter mechanics etc, the rifle boss from CM , etc)
you can facetank almost none of the fractals encounters (even under 20)
some fractal bosses (grawl shaman before he jumps ) are impossible to facetank as he instakills you if you’re still close after the knockout.
some bosses require insane amounts of condition removals (chill, weakness, cripple etc), so you become ineffective and lose aggro. etc, etc.

some fractal non-boss encounters are impossible to facetank at high levels like the big fire svanir at the beginning of the frost fractal.

but, it is possible to keep aggro on bosses.
if you start the encounter and other players give you 2-3 seconds to whack on boss before they start fooling around. (like traditional MMO tanking)
if you block or revive (all bosses hate that)
if you have high toughness and low vitality (like guardians have)

best (not face…) tanking set is scepter / focus. as you can keep aggro and kite the boss without getting hit.

why to facetank boss and do minor damage if you can deal some serious damage or provide nice utility for group. In this game any class can take care for themselves so why tank?

rasfo.9358:

why to facetank boss and do minor damage if you can deal some serious damage or provide nice utility for group. In this game any class can take care for themselves so why tank?

Why tank, well because its the best overall damage mitigater/support in the game. It effectively removes damage from the team.

Minimal damage???
3k attack
3k armor
50-60% critchance
70-80%% critdamage

With a competent team you dont have to dress down to be able to tank.

And with that you can infact facetank almost everything in dungeons while bashing away and giving the same support as with any other style of play.

I occassionally face tank to the limit of my tools (aegis/blinds/regen) just to keep a boss in a single location long enough for other melee characters to get off their strongest in-place bursts. But when you heal on dodge, theres just no reason to stick around forever .

Brutaly.6257:

rasfo.9358:

why to facetank boss and do minor damage if you can deal some serious damage or provide nice utility for group. In this game any class can take care for themselves so why tank?

Why tank, well because its the best overall damage mitigater/support in the game. It effectively removes damage from the team.

Minimal damage???
3k attack
3k armor
50-60% critchance
70-80%% critdamage

With a competent team you dont have to dress down to be able to tank.

And with that you can infact facetank almost everything in dungeons while bashing away and giving the same support as with any other style of play.

Wut…
3k attack – useless stat as a reference, try power
3k armor – hmmmmm
50-60% crit chance – No. More like 10%?
70-80% crit dmg – 30% from traits, rest from where?

Are you really talking about his build?

Alvik.4207:

Brutaly.6257:

rasfo.9358:

why to facetank boss and do minor damage if you can deal some serious damage or provide nice utility for group. In this game any class can take care for themselves so why tank?

Why tank, well because its the best overall damage mitigater/support in the game. It effectively removes damage from the team.

Minimal damage???
3k attack
3k armor
50-60% critchance
70-80%% critdamage

With a competent team you dont have to dress down to be able to tank.

And with that you can infact facetank almost everything in dungeons while bashing away and giving the same support as with any other style of play.

Wut…
3k attack – useless stat as a reference, try power
3k armor – hmmmmm
50-60% crit chance – No. More like 10%?
70-80% crit dmg – 30% from traits, rest from where?

Are you really talking about his build?

It is a useless stat! If a person is to stupid not being able to subtract the weapon strength, or the average weaponstrength if using 1h and off hand, and then get how much power there is a in a build. But maybe people are that stupid, i think they are smarter than that.

What hmmmmmm?

Crit damage, gear ofc , its not that difficult.

I have these stats 24/7 in combat when doing dungeons with my team.
3k attack (and an additional 600 (never less then 18 stacks) power from might from the team, 24/7)
3k armor (and ofc 100% uptime on protection to add on to this)
64% critchance (with fury 100% uptime)
64% crit damage
18k health
I could easily convert 4% crit chance into more vitality and more crit power if neccessary, i have no valkyries in my build.

No im not talking about his build. im talking about tanking in general in this game and the 0/0/30/20/20 build i use. I didnt realize the thread was about a specific build but about tanking in a team and in dungeons. Im talking about tanking reducing the dps for the individual guardian. Check out what i quoted initially.

OT, hence why your base crit chance should be considerably lower then your crit damage, as long as you play with a competent team, which makes you max dps when combining the two. Which in return makes you able to invest in other stats that improves aggro/tanking.

There is no reason to not being able to be close and personal and still do some serious damage.

Alvik.4207:

Brutaly.6257:

rasfo.9358:

why to facetank boss and do minor damage if you can deal some serious damage or provide nice utility for group. In this game any class can take care for themselves so why tank?

Why tank, well because its the best overall damage mitigater/support in the game. It effectively removes damage from the team.

Minimal damage???
3k attack
3k armor
50-60% critchance
70-80%% critdamage

With a competent team you dont have to dress down to be able to tank.

And with that you can infact facetank almost everything in dungeons while bashing away and giving the same support as with any other style of play.

Wut…
3k attack – useless stat as a reference, try power
3k armor – hmmmmm
50-60% crit chance – No. More like 10%?
70-80% crit dmg – 30% from traits, rest from where?

Are you really talking about his build?

I think he is saying there are builds with those stats that can fair just as good as the build the OP has mentioned. Basically he is saying why drop the damage or in this case critting mainly when you an easily get away with being DPS and survive with a reasonable team.

Brutaly.6257:

I have these stats 24/7 in combat when doing dungeons with my team.
3k attack (and an additional 600 (never less then 18 stacks) power from might from the team, 24/7)
3k armor (and ofc 100% uptime on protection to add on to this)
64% critchance (with fury 100% uptime)
64% crit damage
18k health
I could easily convert 4% crit chance into more vitality and more crit power if neccessary, i have no valkyries in my build.

No im not talking about his build. im talking about tanking in general in this game and the 0/0/30/20/20 build i use. .

….

I come to these forums to learn, and I would like to learn how can one reach 64% crit and 64% crit damage and 100% protection uptime on a guardian with 0/0/30/20/20 at the same time wearing soldier gear? (18K HP possible only with soldier gear, but then I fail to understand how can you get more than between 5% and 9% crit rate…)

even on full berserker gear we reach only 32% crit rate (though 72% crit damage)

empty build with zerker gear and 0/0/30/20/20 traits (no runes and sigils)
http://gw2buildcraft.com/calculator/guardian/?3|1.1g.0|0.0.0.0.0.0|1g.0.1g.0.1g.0.1g.0.1g.0.1g.0|1g.0.1g.0.1g.0.1g.0.1g.0.1c.0|0.0.u000.k00.k00|0.0|e

I don’t consider having a warrior friend to grant you fury and might as a part of any build…

EDIT:
if you’re talking about different build, like radiance+valor build with AH for some mitigation, then ok, but your numbers are still off…

Lalangamena.3694:

I come to these forums to learn, and I would like to learn how can one reach 64% crit and 64% crit damage and 100% protection uptime on a guardian with 0/0/30/20/20 at the same time wearing soldier gear? [/quote]

-Play in a team that is well composed for fury and might stacking. Eles and warriors are great at this and ofc the guardians hammerblast.

The stats you can do on you own by mixing soldiers, knights, berserkers and divnity runes and ofc food.

Hammer with 20% boon duration is 100% uptime on protection and even more so in combination with HtL, virtues and SY. Btw eles are great at protections as well.

Done!

PS i always consider the team when we are talking about tanking in a team and even if we remove fury from the equation we are talking about some serious dps, in my build fury adds about 13% dps DS.

Sure, I can estimate your power but you didn’t even mention which weapon you are using. I was just trying to get YOU to stop giving us a stat that we can’t use for reference.

I’m sorry but you’re already proven to have exaggerated your stats so much that for me you’ve lost all credibility anyway.

Alvik.4207:

I’m sorry but you’re already proven to have exaggerated your stats so much that for me you’ve lost all credibility anyway.

I haven’t exaggerated anything, check what i have written, in a team that is viable. And discussing soloplay stats when we are talking dungeons isnt relevant. Especially when stating that you give up dps when tanking, which was what i quoted. You dont have to give up anything but your own comfort.

which is what i think of people stating it, they just dont want to play the game to the brim but want an easy ride spamming orbs from a distance and running around with a weak kitten staff and actually think they contribute to the max.

The stats i posted are viable in a competent group and if you cant accept that maybe its your credibility that a bit shaky.

These are my solostats atm, with food:
1949 power (3060 attack)
38% crit chance
76% crit damage (a bit to high and should be dropped to about 65% for a couple of percentage of crit chance and health)
3001 Armor
17725 health (should probably add some)
20% boon duration

lol Brutaly talking about build and then mixing in group composition…. also u cant rly control aggro in this game effectively so if you have another class like Warrior meeleing with you your damage mitigation aka “tanking” is more lottery than something that you can rely on…

Brutaly.6257:

Alvik.4207:

I’m sorry but you’re already proven to have exaggerated your stats so much that for me you’ve lost all credibility anyway.

I haven’t exaggerated anything, check what i have written, in a team that is viable. And discussing soloplay stats when we are talking dungeons isnt relevant. Especially when stating that you give up dps when tanking, which was what i quoted. You dont have to give up anything but your own comfort.

which is what i think of people stating it, they just dont want to play the game to the brim but want an easy ride spamming orbs from a distance and running around with a weak kitten staff and actually think they contribute to the max.

The stats i posted are viable in a competent group and if you cant accept that maybe its your credibility that a bit shaky.

These are my solostats atm, with food:
1949 power (3060 attack)
38% crit chance
76% crit damage (a bit to high and should be dropped to about 65% for a couple of percentage of crit chance and health)
3001 Armor
17725 health (should probably add some)
20% boon duration

This is without ascended.

Now those stats look better to me

To each his own style. Personally I prefer getting just enough defense to not crumble/stop dpsing from getting the aggro to provide as much dps as possible. Though I prefer splitting the aggro evenly as the natural guardian skills help your teammates as well as yourself.

Alvik.4207:

Brutaly.6257:

Alvik.4207:

I’m sorry but you’re already proven to have exaggerated your stats so much that for me you’ve lost all credibility anyway.

I haven’t exaggerated anything, check what i have written, in a team that is viable. And discussing soloplay stats when we are talking dungeons isnt relevant. Especially when stating that you give up dps when tanking, which was what i quoted. You dont have to give up anything but your own comfort.

which is what i think of people stating it, they just dont want to play the game to the brim but want an easy ride spamming orbs from a distance and running around with a weak kitten staff and actually think they contribute to the max.

The stats i posted are viable in a competent group and if you cant accept that maybe its your credibility that a bit shaky.

These are my solostats atm, with food:
1949 power (3060 attack)
38% crit chance
76% crit damage (a bit to high and should be dropped to about 65% for a couple of percentage of crit chance and health)
3001 Armor
17725 health (should probably add some)
20% boon duration

This is without ascended.

Now those stats look better to me

Well tbh i would get close to 19k, more toughness, 64% crit damage and the same crit by just using my vanguard hammer of accuracy, soldier stats.

Amazing that you find that credible when its the same i posted in my first post.

I sit at 75% crit chance without fury, but my build is very different .

(5% for sigil of accuracy and 15% from right-handed strength do not show on the character sheet.)

rasfo.9358:

lol Brutaly talking about build and then mixing in group composition….

And!!??
ofc you need to speak about group composition when we are talking dungeons, its a group objective.

I always laugh when i see people give negative feedback on builds with 60% crit damage and only 30% crit chance and that those stats should be “closer” to each other. The only thing i read when that statement comes up is “He plays with a kittenty team and havent realized how to min/max.”

To many play this game as a solo game already.

also u cant rly control aggro in this game effectively so if you have another class like Warrior meeleing with you your damage mitigation aka “tanking” is more lottery than something that you can rely on…

The only issue i have with aggro in this game is how do i frigging get rid of it! I think this is the reason why a lot of people stand in the back spamming ranged, they cant handle things when they are about to go down, and also promote that way of playing…

Dungeons in this game is just to easy.

btw a shout warrior in full berserkers and regen based on adrenaline and shouts are a great melee companion, just that alone give you 65% uptime on fury, vigor and swiftness and ofc 6 stacks might from one shout and the war horn. And i have no issues with sharing aggro with a warrior, its the perfect set up for it imo. Warrior is btw my second char and i do facetank most opponents with him as well.

Ok then let’s assume we all have a group when we’re discussing builds. I get 25 might stacks for free so my power is 3k. So my build has 50% more damage than yours.
No seriously though, when we’re talking builds we’re talking about what your build gives you and if you want to add in other factors you need to make it CLEAR from the start what you mean. Otherwise, please don’t be mad when people react to your claims.

Make a build you enjoy playing with then play. Done.

@Brutaly this was discussion about build not about best set up for certain dungeon run…

you can build insane bunker build if rest of group will build traits to eliminate your weak points. But this don’t belong to this topic… this require stable group, logging same time running agreed dungeons. Some may enjoy such organized gameplay… and then you have lfg groups and in those you can end up with 4 guardians and one ranger running same build as OP… I would like to see that painfull run. Kill mob will take ages….

Alvik.4207:

No seriously though, when we’re talking builds we’re talking about what your build gives you and if you want to add in other factors you need to make it CLEAR from the start what you mean. Otherwise, please don’t be mad when people react to your claims.

The initial post was about why its favorable to tank and why dps wouldnt suffer.

This was my first post.

Brutaly.6257:

Why tank, well because its the best overall damage mitigater/support in the game. It effectively removes damage from the team.

Minimal damage???
3k attack
3k armor
50-60% critchance
70-80%% critdamage

With a competent team you dont have to dress down to be able to tank.

And with that you can infact facetank almost everything in dungeons while bashing away and giving the same support as with any other style of play.

Are the stats above obtainable without food and boons? Yes they are.

Are they obtainable in a build that works for tanking in pve? Yes they are that as well.

This was questioned and i tried to make an example that illustrated that even a very defensive build can obtain stats similar to my initial post and i used my current build as an example. I was also very clear in that post that my current build, my premade build, had influence from food and boons.

I was also clear that i didnt discuss OP build, i gave feedback on a very specific statement, that you loose dps by tanking, which you dont, infact the team might even gain dps since having a target with higher predictability increases the hit rate from first and foremost ground targeted aoe.

And im not mad, the day i get mad over something as utterly unimportant as a gaming forum will be the day when i drop that game.

rasfo.9358:

@Brutaly this was discussion about build not about best set up for certain dungeon run…

In lfg i run with 10/25/30/5/0 and main tank and still have
3k attack
3k armor
50% crit and i think i have 75% crit damage

No food and no boons included.

I answered to one segment and one statement, that you loose dps by tanking, which you dont, unless you build for low damage. And it doesnt matter if its premade or pug.

This is the build I use: http://www.guildhead.com/skill-calc#mVccMV9cmvbRomvbRo0axx0MVsqcak

I honestly recommend stacking more healing power. The Mace (with Traits in the Honor Tree + AH) scales exceptionally well with healing power. I’ve crunched the numbers and it’s roughly +100 healing a second for every +100 healing power with using the Mace.

Essentially you “out heal” the damage you take and can heal your team mates better than any other class in game. I would recommend having two sets of mace + shield, one with stacking +healing, and another that gives endurance when you kill mobs. Once you hit +25 stacks of +healing, swap out to the Endurance one because you can spam dodge roll heal a lot.

well thanks for the opinions i will keep all these things in mind.

i have to admit i dont like it when people hate on the concept of a player holding aggro in this game.

Do i think i hold aggro constantly.. no.. do i think its helpful to have a tank that knows what he is doing.. yes..

Kootz.3479:

well thanks for the opinions i will keep all these things in mind.

i have to admit i dont like it when people hate on the concept of a player holding aggro in this game.

Do i think i hold aggro constantly.. no.. do i think its helpful to have a tank that knows what he is doing.. yes..

It’s not that people don’t like it, It’s that people have actually done the math an realised it doesn’t exist.

Go try and tank Jade Maw with your “tank” build, tottaly allows you the ability to migrate damage which insta kills you.

Hey if people can crack how aggro works, more to them. But does it matter? I mean 5 glass cannons with some condition removal, CC, and know how to dodge can crush pretty much any dungeon except maybe 20+ level fractals.

I ran full bunker support since beta. I came to finally accept that the Holy Trinity is compressed into each player: bunkers are not optimal. While I genuinely understand where you’re coming from, I think groups benefit more from balanced builds than extreme ones like bunker or glass. Bunkers make the run safer, glass make em faster.

That said, I think Anet designed it so that just flipping major traits and gear you can shift the focus of your own Trinity.

Kakeru.2873:

Kootz.3479:

well thanks for the opinions i will keep all these things in mind.

i have to admit i dont like it when people hate on the concept of a player holding aggro in this game.

Do i think i hold aggro constantly.. no.. do i think its helpful to have a tank that knows what he is doing.. yes..

It’s not that people don’t like it, It’s that people have actually done the math an realised it doesn’t exist.

Go try and tank Jade Maw with your “tank” build, tottaly allows you the ability to migrate damage which insta kills you.

Are you seriously trying to argue that “tanking” is impossible because of a specific mechanic in a specific fight that was intentionally designed to kill anyone who messes it up? Even MMOs that strictly adhere to the trinity have boss mechanics that result in unavoidable death if you don’t don’t approach the fight properly, even for the tank.

I think that in this game, apart from high-level fractals (I don’t know them very much), a guardian can tank everything, obviously dodging the biggest hits. This is useful for the group and only cost a little portion of its dps to the guardian.

And Butaly’s stats seems absolutly realistic to me, if you build your guardian properly.

Well as it stands i had no choice but to take it upon myself.

So i farmed and entire set of power/percision/crit damage.

I have a full exotic set for armor.. 2 exoitic tomes.. 2 pink rings.. and a greatsword.. all increasing the same 3 stats.. power percision and toughness..

I grabed the most popular damage builds. and i have spent the better part of this week testing and feeling out the build.

Between a full soldiers survival build (designed to take aggro off less durable teamates so you can do the kiting/cooldown tanking thus saving teamates from damage or needless kiting)

and the full damage build i used some of you very responders to help me build..

and while i admit the damage is impressive. I feel more useful in my survival spec and soldiers gear.

I honestly think alot of people are underestimating the ammount of damage (non crit) my survival build does.

Because i have tried both and now own and enjoy both.. but survival is now my favorite..

BUT THIS HAS GIVEN ME ALL NEW IDEAS..

so i have concluded the only safe thing to do is farm a full set of every single stat set in the game. that way i can pick and choose at my leisure..

my next investment is power/vitality/condition damage gear.. and yes im going to try a mace/shield/hammer block retaliation burn them into the ground build of doom.

so enjoy your math and spreadsheets.. im going to play the game.. enjoy the game.. and keep playing my best as part of the group..

hell in hindsight… i think you could give me a garbage bag for an armor set and a sheet of paper with the word skills written on it and i would still find a way to make it work for me.

I like this game and im going to play it. I think im done with all the opinion giving and taking.

Your last post doesn’t make sense.

You were able to farm all of that gear and test it out for the better part of the week, but the timeline of this thread does not coincide with that.

And you are right you should play what makes things fun and whats fun for your group.

But understand when you are talking about tanking and holding aggro how is it is relevant and you bring no evidence to the table, then you are going to have people dispute you especially with math since that is the basis of any sort of computer programming.

And if you did find such an aggro mechanic, stacking power/vit/tough is probably still not the way to go. Every class has a mechanic that negates complete damage every 10 seconds when not buffed. The guardians have even more mechanics that completely negate damage. That is why you can survive running zerker’s gear in PvE an dungeons. Not only that you are contributing so much more damage then a traditional tank build. Its fine if you want to believe otherwise, but if you happen to do the math you will see there is a big difference. Even running a support build in full zerkers will bring more to the table because negating damage trumps whatever toughness and vit you can stack and killing something quicker means less chance of someone making a mistake and dying.

@Kootz and others who like the bunker builds:

You’ll have to ignore most of the posters here in this Guardian forum. I’d say the majority here do not think survival builds are necessary due to their own ability to memorize game mechanics. They seem to dismiss that some people: play only a couple hours a week or less; are still learning when to dodge; forget certain areas where dodging and kiting is needed more than staying in melee range; do not have the same reaction time they have and think everyone can dodge just as easy as they do. I could go on, but it’s starting to get stale here in the reply box.

And that’s a shame because those are the types of situations where a bunker build would really shine. I’ve played the game long enough to have 3 different gear builds, playing around the minimum traits of x/x/30/20/x, where the extra points are plugged where ever. One gear setup is an all out DPS, concentrating on maximum power and crit; another setup is all cleric/healing power for bunkering; and the last set is a mix up of Soldiers, Knights, Berserkers, and Valkryie, trying to keep stats semi-balanced, but without extra healing power. I also have a partial Knights setup, which I mostly don’t use.

Anyways, what I’m rambling on about is, the best thing for you to do is to try out the various setups on your own. Find what you like best. Experiment until you’ve found what you’re looking for. If you’re still learning the dungeons and other content, the bunker gear that I use won’t fail you. And in my experience, it’s better for those infamous pugs that you get into on occassion.

If you want to experiment with different gear options, try buying the rare stuff and not exotics until you find what you like best. It’ll save you a lot money.

This is the best way I can describe trying to make your own build.

It’s like buying a house. You see it, you like it, and you want to bring your friends/family along for a second opinion. They can tell you whatever they want, but in the end its up to you to decide if you like it or not.

Everyone on this forum has their own opinions and you have to take it with a grain of salt.

Brutaly.6257:

rasfo.9358:

why to facetank boss and do minor damage if you can deal some serious damage or provide nice utility for group. In this game any class can take care for themselves so why tank?

Why tank, well because its the best overall damage mitigater/support in the game. It effectively removes damage from the team.

Minimal damage???
3k attack
3k armor
50-60% critchance
70-80%% critdamage

With a competent team you dont have to dress down to be able to tank.

And with that you can infact facetank almost everything in dungeons while bashing away and giving the same support as with any other style of play.

How are you pulling off those stats : ( ?

Lalangamena.3694:

Brutaly.6257:

I have these stats 24/7 in combat when doing dungeons with my team.
3k attack (and an additional 600 (never less then 18 stacks) power from might from the team, 24/7)
3k armor (and ofc 100% uptime on protection to add on to this)
64% critchance (with fury 100% uptime)
64% crit damage
18k health
I could easily convert 4% crit chance into more vitality and more crit power if neccessary, i have no valkyries in my build.

No im not talking about his build. im talking about tanking in general in this game and the 0/0/30/20/20 build i use. .

….

I come to these forums to learn, and I would like to learn how can one reach 64% crit and 64% crit damage and 100% protection uptime on a guardian with 0/0/30/20/20 at the same time wearing soldier gear? (18K HP possible only with soldier gear, but then I fail to understand how can you get more than between 5% and 9% crit rate…)

even on full berserker gear we reach only 32% crit rate (though 72% crit damage)

empty build with zerker gear and 0/0/30/20/20 traits (no runes and sigils)
http://gw2buildcraft.com/calculator/guardian/?3|1.1g.0|0.0.0.0.0.0|1g.0.1g.0.1g.0.1g.0.1g.0.1g.0|1g.0.1g.0.1g.0.1g.0.1g.0.1c.0|0.0.u000.k00.k00|0.0|e

I don’t consider having a warrior friend to grant you fury and might as a part of any build…

EDIT:
if you’re talking about different build, like radiance+valor build with AH for some mitigation, then ok, but your numbers are still off…

Its very possible to hit 18k hp without soldiers between gear that gives vit, and rune’s or jewel’s. Im still working on my gear but i’ve included a screenshot. My current hp is gotten only threw rune’s and trait’s. So getting another 5 k honestly is quite simple.

Kahrgan.7401:

Brutaly.6257:

rasfo.9358:

why to facetank boss and do minor damage if you can deal some serious damage or provide nice utility for group. In this game any class can take care for themselves so why tank?

Why tank, well because its the best overall damage mitigater/support in the game. It effectively removes damage from the team.

Minimal damage???
3k attack
3k armor
50-60% critchance
70-80%% critdamage

With a competent team you dont have to dress down to be able to tank.

And with that you can infact facetank almost everything in dungeons while bashing away and giving the same support as with any other style of play.

How are you pulling off those stats : ( ?

My guess is its a mix of valkyrie’s, knight’s, and berserker’s gear coupled with food buffs. So far i’ve managed to hit 2871 attack, 51% crit chance, 55% crit damage, 3032 armor, but im sadly only at 13445 hp. Granted im only knight’s, and berserker’s gear at the moment. Once i add in valkyrie’s you will most likely see the crit drop to 45% or so but hp should go up a few thousand or so.

SiNoS.2147:

Kahrgan.7401:

Brutaly.6257:

rasfo.9358:

why to facetank boss and do minor damage if you can deal some serious damage or provide nice utility for group. In this game any class can take care for themselves so why tank?

Why tank, well because its the best overall damage mitigater/support in the game. It effectively removes damage from the team.

Minimal damage???
3k attack
3k armor
50-60% critchance
70-80%% critdamage

With a competent team you dont have to dress down to be able to tank.

And with that you can infact facetank almost everything in dungeons while bashing away and giving the same support as with any other style of play.

How are you pulling off those stats : ( ?

My guess is its a mix of valkyrie’s, knight’s, and berserker’s gear coupled with food buffs. So far i’ve managed to hit 2871 attack, 51% crit chance, 55% crit damage, 3032 armor, but im sadly only at 13445 hp. Granted im only knight’s, and berserker’s gear at the moment. Once i add in valkyrie’s you will most likely see the crit drop to 45% or so but hp should go up a few thousand or so.

Why would you be upset about that HP? We have enough mitigation and passive healing that low hp is a good thing.

You can tank in this game.
Mobs will usually attack whoever has the highest toughness, with some expcetions here and there.

I run lvl 25 FotM and I can “face tank”, except here and there I need to dodge.

It always hits me why these people say you can’t tank. You can’t like you normaly could do it in other MMO (artificial threat generation), but you CAN and you WILL be able to hold your ground most of the time…

On your build, I believe you are not having enough crit, unless you decide to use some oil.

I mean, don’t you need to crit to make ghost form and empowering might to proc?
Those two, added with AH will keep you up. Even, yes, even, in FotM (25 my highest so far, so no idea how 30 is).

BTW, this is my base build, I change it a tad around:
http://gw2buildcraft.com/calculator/guardian/?3|2.1n.h1|0.0.0.0.0.0|1n.7x.1c.7x.1c.7x.1c.7x.1c.7x.1c.7x|1n.64.3u.d1e.2v.d1e.1n.64.1n.64.3u.d1e|0.5.u65b.u2a8.5|0.0|e

My weapons for boss tanking is mace/shield + mace/focus or mace/focus + hammer.

My midway traits tend to change a lot. (strengh in numbers for example, or even longer symbols if needed).

Tanking is fine in this game I don’t even get where people are hating on it. You just need to look at it slightly different then the normal. I even went as far as make a heal tank spec 4 months ago. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q35NfUVlkEY&list=SPclysCc6lh4S5KkP0zEbMio_7sNAgvpQg&index=5

That was before I knew I didn’t even have to be bothered going that far to do that. But for surely with mace or 1h I could just stand there most times and tank. But if you want ultimate aggro in this game. Heal and do high crit damage the boss will never leave you alone ever.

I think people really overestimate how difficult it is to get mobs to focus on you. It’s not like other MMOs where you can just look at something funny as a tank and it’s glued to you, but as long as I make sure I jump in first and that I keep things near me mobs are almost always prioritizing to my Guardian over my team, and I didn’t even intentionally build my guy to be a “tank,” I just built enough survivability into him to make up for overlooking mob attack animations now and again.

I can’t count the number of times I’ve actively tried to get things to stop focusing on me for a moment and they’d just chase me down, ignoring the people pounding on them. It’s gotten to the point there I just look at it as an easy way to ball everything up for AoE and just set my guy up to be able to take the punishment.

Thz.7569:

SiNoS.2147:

Kahrgan.7401:

Brutaly.6257:

rasfo.9358:

why to facetank boss and do minor damage if you can deal some serious damage or provide nice utility for group. In this game any class can take care for themselves so why tank?

Why tank, well because its the best overall damage mitigater/support in the game. It effectively removes damage from the team.

Minimal damage???
3k attack
3k armor
50-60% critchance
70-80%% critdamage

With a competent team you dont have to dress down to be able to tank.

And with that you can infact facetank almost everything in dungeons while bashing away and giving the same support as with any other style of play.

How are you pulling off those stats : ( ?

My guess is its a mix of valkyrie’s, knight’s, and berserker’s gear coupled with food buffs. So far i’ve managed to hit 2871 attack, 51% crit chance, 55% crit damage, 3032 armor, but im sadly only at 13445 hp. Granted im only knight’s, and berserker’s gear at the moment. Once i add in valkyrie’s you will most likely see the crit drop to 45% or so but hp should go up a few thousand or so.

Why would you be upset about that HP? We have enough mitigation and passive healing that low hp is a good thing.

Because theres very few times i dont have agro, even at only 1.5 – 2 k hits many of those add up and i start to really feel it, and conditions eat me up when i pull them off my allies. I make due with that but i would be much happier to sit above 15k at all times instead of only when im using my off set.