Guild Wars 2

Guardian:

• Orb of Wrath: Increased the projectile speed of this skill by 30%.
• Wrathful Strike: Increased the might duration from 3 seconds to 5 seconds.
• Signet of Judgment: This ability now breaks stuns. Increased the cooldown to 30 seconds.
• Shield of the Avenger: Command: This ability now breaks stuns.
• Chains of Light: This ability now deals a small amount of damage.
• Signet of Mercy: Reduced the cooldown to 150 seconds.
• Bane Signet: Reduced the cooldown to 40 seconds.
• Purifying Blast: Fixed the skill fact damage amounts.
• Refraction: Decreased the cast time from 1.3 seconds to .5 seconds.
• Tome of Wrath: Smiter’s Boon: This trait now applies to the caster as well.
• Sanctuary: Fixed an issue where Consecrated Ground was also reducing the cast time of this skill.
• Virtue of Justice: Updated the skill fact to correctly display the actual burning duration when the skill is activated.
• Tome of Courage: Protective Spirit: This trait now applies to the caster as well.
• Tome of Courage: Pacifism: Daze duration has been increased to the 3 seconds listed in the tooltip.

Honor

• Pure of Heart: This trait now heals for its base amount +25% benefit from healing power, up from 10%.

Radiance

• Blind Exposure: Vulnerability caused by this trait has been increased from 5 seconds to 10 seconds.
• Radiant Fire: This trait now grants a 20% bonus to burning duration, in addition to reducing the torch skill recharge by 20%. Fixed the description text to indicate the accurate recharge reduction.

Valor

• Glacial Heart: This trait now applies 5 seconds of chill on a critical hit with a 100% activation rate (up from 4 seconds on a 50% rate). This effect’s recharge has been reduced from 45 seconds to 30 seconds.
• Mace of Justice: This trait now grants up to 250 healing power while wielding a mace.

Virtues

• Shielded Mind: Courage now breaks stun for up to five allies when activated, instead of just the guardian.

Zeal

• Wrathful Spirits: This trait now increases damage dealt by spirits by 50% (up from 10%).
• Scepter Power: This trait has been increased from 5% bonus damage to 10% bonus damage.
• Zealous Blade: This trait has been merged with Greatsword Power and is now labeled as a Tier 2 trait.
• New Tier 3 trait—Kindled Zeal: 10% of the player’s power is now converted into condition damage.

Undocumented

Valor

• Strength in numbers: Nearby allies gain up to 150 toughness based on your effective level. Increased from 70

im a clerics guy and mace of justice is good.

Scepter is awesome! Also Strength in Numbers is 150 now, but not in notes.

Can’t wait to try out the new and improved scepter! Overall I think these were nice changes, nothing earth shattering for us, but we don’t need anything massive I suppose.

Scepter orbs dont seem faster to me, maybe is only my imagination.

Sweet, can’t wait to check out my Guardian

Honor got buffed))

The only changes that affect my guardian in all of this are radiant fire and blind exposure. The radiant fire looks good on paper until you think about how much of an increase 20% in burning duration is. Twenty percent of 3.25 seconds is nothing. The torch already has a very short cd on skills as well…so that isn’t much either…it wasn’t enough to take the skill in the first place..so 20% of 3.25 seconds burning duration was a waste of time. I think someone posted elsewhere, that that 20% burning duration still isn’t even enough to make voj tick a second time. I appreciate that they wanted to improve the torch, but its going to take more than that. They just keep making GS and hammer better and not really improving the alternative weapons like 1h sword. Blind exposure was a little boost for 1h sword, but I think the existing trait that it competes for a spot with (powerful blades) still outshines it.

Other than the change to scepters, I don’t think these changes really impact my support build that much (if at all). The change to Mace of Justice is certainly quite nice, though. Overall, a pretty underwhelming list of changes.

I’m stupid, it was just the passive of Resolve. Still 25 hp

Purging Flames also got buffed and is not listed in the patch notes. The cool down was dropped from 40 to 35 seconds.

I still say Power of the Virtuous needs a boost.

I’m not really seeing the build diversity they were advertising …at least from a guardian perspective. Honor got buffed, valor got buffed, radiance only got a 5 second increase in vulnerability duration and a tease at buffing the torch. I still don’t see a significant reason players are going to deviate from 30 honor/30 valor builds. I still don’t see a significant reason for players to deviate from GS/Hammer/Mace. Zeal still loaded up with symbols…over half of our weapons still don’t have a symbol…therefore still no reason to invest beyond 10 in zeal. One hand sword, scepter, torch, focus..and maybe more..still have no combo finishers. I’m just saying….I’m not seeing the incentive to branch out to either different weapon sets or previously avoided trait lines.

Overall some good changes, although none of them really affect my build (which is cool).

Leroy Brown.6419:

Purging Flames also got buffed and is not listed in the patch notes. The cool down was dropped from 40 to 35 seconds.

Yay! My conscreation build did get some buffs :O

Zeal just got a very, very interesting 20-point trait for greatsword users. I highly suspect we’ll be seeing a few people spec 20 into zeal for that. It’s not competitive with AH, but it doesn’t have to be—now you can take 20 zeal and 30 valor, with 20 points left for discretionary use, and get an incredible amount of healing on autoattacks (20 honor, for instance: it’s entirely possible to trigger healing from the zeal trait, plus healing from up to 9 boons at once just on the third hit of the GS autoattack). It’s still limiting enough that you have to give up something in order to get that extra healing, but it’s also incredibly powerful over time.

The greatsword trait buff is trash, still only heals for 25 a tick. Definitely not worth it. 8(

Arken.3725:

The greatsword trait buff is trash, still only heals for 25 a tick. Definitely not worth it. 8(

I think it’s pretty good now since it has 5% Damage with GS and now heals all in a master I like it, and it’s pretty much the only trait change for me.

edit: it’s odd i don’t know if it is effected by healing Power or not, even though people say it has no ratio. I always get between 25-27 HP per hit.

Arken.3725:

The greatsword trait buff is trash, still only heals for 25 a tick. Definitely not worth it. 8(

Ofc by itself it’s bad, but you combine it;

ZB
AH or MF
Omnomberry Pie
Sigil of Blood or Leech

Then you got something good going. Plus it’s only 20 points and getting 5% more dmg.

25 a hit doesn’t sound like much, until you consider that WW hits up to 9 times (per target!), binding blade hits up to 5, each autoattack hits up to 3, leap of faith hits up to 3, and symbol of wrath hits up to 5, 5 times. In a group of 5 mobs, chaining off all of your skills and going through one autoattack rotation could potentially heal you for up to 2175, which is by no means inconsequential. Whirling wrath alone contributes over half of that, clocking in at a potential 1125 healing.

Plus, if what I’ve heard is true, it also has a special synergy with weapons like the scepter and longer-duration symbol weapons, since any direct damage dealt while holding the greatsword heals you for 25: throw down an immobilize, smite, and swap to greatsword, then watch as the heals come trickling in as you leap in towards your target.

Zealous Blade is awesome. Whirling Wrath heals for about 1080 now in a full group of mobs. Currently running 20/25/0/5/20 for funsies, love the change. I imagine that if you desperately need the safety net of some additional healing but don’t want to go AH for whatever reason, Zealous Blades is going to be the go-to skill. I wakittenting like a truck in the Aetherblade Retreat and didn’t get downed but two or three times.

Harbinger.8637:

Arken.3725:

The greatsword trait buff is trash, still only heals for 25 a tick. Definitely not worth it. 8(

Ofc by itself it’s bad, but you combine it;

ZB
AH or MF
Omnomberry Pie
Sigil of Blood or Leech

Then you got something good going. Plus it’s only 20 points and getting 5% more dmg.

Meh … Put in a sigil of force and you get 5% damage…
20 points in Zeal is still not worth it to me.

I will stay with 15/30/20/5 to fractals or “hard dungeons” but to farm, general pve or cof1 a power build with ZB is good.

Again, putting in a sigil will solve your problems instead of vesting 20 into zeal. I really hate to say it but the trait is still bad.

My 20/0/30/20/0 zerk build just got better, awesome

The new Zealous Blade is quite nice, especially against trash groups. Tested 20/25/0/25/0 in the new instance and it performed well, even if I missed the condition removal from Pure of Voice. But next time, I simply take Smite Conditions into the utilities, now that I know the mobs …

Scepter is still able to be strafe-dodged. It’s a nice buff but I don’t think it was enough.

Harbinger.8637:

Scepter is awesome! Also Strength in Numbers is 150 now, but not in notes.

Very nice!!! I JUST LOVED THE NEW SCEPTER!!!

Scepter S2 Mikau!!!!

Asomal.6453:

My 20/0/30/20/0 zerk build just got better, awesome

Do u copy me???? :p

I suppose you become some kind of heavy battletank now, with AH and the new Zealous Blade? Didn’t test it that way, but it’s surely an interesting combination.

CptAurellian.9537:

I suppose you become some kind of heavy battletank now, with AH and the new Zealous Blade? Didn’t test it that way, but it’s surely an interesting combination.

I don’t think that would work at all. You don’t apply boons when hitting with the GS(unless third attack) so what healing would you get?

Empowering Might? That’s the one reason why AH works so well with GS builds and not only hammers – and you can easily take it with 20/0/30/20/0.

Arken.3725:

CptAurellian.9537:

I suppose you become some kind of heavy battletank now, with AH and the new Zealous Blade? Didn’t test it that way, but it’s surely an interesting combination.

I don’t think that would work at all. You don’t apply boons when hitting with the GS(unless third attack) so what healing would you get?

EM and a staff secondary weapon, plus GS 4.

The GS symbol won’t do much when no one stands in it. Staff I can see.

Arken.3725:

Again, putting in a sigil will solve your problems instead of vesting 20 into zeal. I really hate to say it but the trait is still bad.

You realize Force stacks with Greatsword Power and all the other multipliers?

The more multipliers you can throw on a DPS build, the better. They’re huge damage increases, comparatively.

I get that foofad, but the problem still stands that it doesn’t stack with healing power. 25 a hit is WAY too low to justify 20 points into zeal when it can be spend elsewhere.

Arken.3725:

The GS symbol won’t do much when no one stands in it. Staff I can see.

It’s no less of an issue than Hammer symbol or Mace symbol. Don’t forget that you get 1 stack of might off of GS third swing per hit, not per attack, too.

Arken.3725:

I get that foofad, but the problem still stands that it doesn’t stack with healing power. 25 a hit is WAY too low to justify 20 points into zeal when it can be spend elsewhere.

1k Whirling Wrath heals in crowds are nothing to sneeze at when you’re also increasing your overall damage. 20/25/x/x/x is a worthy damage spec for Greatsword, 20/x/30/x/x is a worthy defensive spec now as well.

While that’s true, it doesn’t make the concept of symbols ok. This further proves that the skill itself is terrible(symbols).

You’re assuming that you’ll constantly hit 5 people for the full duration which against any skilled player(s) will never happen.

Arken.3725:

I get that foofad, but the problem still stands that it doesn’t stack with healing power. 25 a hit is WAY too low to justify 20 points into zeal when it can be spend elsewhere.

5 % damage and 25 healing per hit (not per attack). That’s pretty fine. If you increased it significantly, the trait would become completely overpowered when fighting multiple targets.

Except it wouldn’t because it would require you to be at the forefront of every fight taking damage from all sides since you can’t fight at ranged.

Zeal is still terrible for tPvP, that much is true. But for everything else, including WvW, I think you’ll be more than fine with it.

Wouldn’t it be worse in WvW? You’d be fighting more players in melee range and 1k healing over the course of a few seconds isn’t going to save you.

Since melee range in ZvZ was not such a big problem before the patch, why should it be now? That trait will fit pretty well, although I won’t go to WvW with such a build. There, I still prefer the hammer and Pure of Voice, both of which don’t fit with such a build.

ODB.6891:

The radiant fire looks good on paper until you think about how much of an increase 20% in burning duration is. Twenty percent of 3.25 seconds is nothing. … I think someone posted elsewhere, that that 20% burning duration still isn’t even enough to make voj tick a second time.

Unless the active VoJ duration is less than 5 seconds now, 20% extra burning duration will get you one more second. The passive requires 100% duration to get a 2 second passive effect, which is possible even without the 20% increase change in radiant fire. Those changes are actually as significant as an extra symbol tick or getting a crit hit. As someone that uses a burning build, that is a very significant improvement IMO.

Bottom line … if you aren’t building for burning, the changes won’t benefit you that much. I can see why that’s a disappointment but on the other hand, I don’t see any logical reason Anet should be improving burning to the benefit of the people that could care less about using it. It’s already a free source of damage. Unless you focus on making a build for it, what would be the justification for making it better?

PS … Just an update. As I always suspected, the tooltip for active burning was wrong … seems like you don’t get the tick on the 0th second. So you actually need intervals of 25% to get a 1 second increase on active burning. kitten it, I knew it!

if you in a situation with many kills you could abuse the voj recharge in 15 of radiance. but if your killing things to have that much recharge are you even getting any benefit of 20% more duration.

how would it stack with allies? would 20% prove usefull with another ally that is stacking some flame as well?

Obtena has a point. I’ve been testing these changes and even the orb or wrath is still broken.

I guess I came back at a good time. I finally have a need to upgrade my scepter from a green. I think my spirit weapon build might actually work now.

Arken.3725:

Obtena has a point. I’ve been testing these changes and even the orb or wrath is still broken.

What exactly is still broken with Orb of Wrath with the new change to its speed?

phokus.8934:

Arken.3725:

Obtena has a point. I’ve been testing these changes and even the orb or wrath is still broken.

What exactly is still broken with Orb of Wrath with the new change to its speed?

That’s the thing, it seems like the exact same speed as before.