Guild Wars 2

First off, they both have 90s cooldowns and grant immunity from enemy attacks, while still taking damage from conditions. Here are the advantages of both side by side:

Endure Pain:
-Takes up a Utility slot rather than an Elite slot.
-Allows movement
-Allows skill usage
-Breaks stun
-Lasts 5 seconds (rather than 3)

Renewed Focus:
-Recharges Virtues.

I myself use Virtues and have them traited for Might/Regeneration/Protection, and I use this elite in most game modes. However, I fail to see how Renewed Focus is superior to, let alone equal to Endure Pain.

In many cases, using Renewed Focus is actually more dangerous than not using it. If you’re low on health, you don’t want to use this skill because it makes you a sitting duck. Endure Pain however, is flat out superior to Renewed Focus in every way except for the Virtue recharge, and is basically a “get out of jail free” card, while Renewed Focus is “put yourself into a metal box on train tracks 3s before the train gets there” card.

I understand that Renewed Focus partially meant to be a supportive skill due to Resolve/Courage, but there are two issues with this. First, the supportive nature of this skill depends on your instant use of Courage and Resolve, putting them back onto long cooldowns. Secondly, the supportive nature of this skill depends on you doing nothing for 3s in the middle of battle while standing in a dangerous spot. Unless you take time to get to a safe place, in which case you’ve just been useless for 6+ seconds rather than just 3.

And meanwhile the warrior brings nothing to a group besides a gimmicky bullsrush > frenzy > HB every 60 seconds while you’re healing, buffing, debuffing, snaring, blinding, rooting, throwing up bubbles, etc etc.

Endure pain is good for prolonging YOUR death, renewed focus can be used to prolong a teammates death (getting another 2 stack of block and another heal for someone in trouble).

Sure you have a point that for that one function endure pain is better but look at how much better every ability our guardians have compared to the sister abilities from the warrior. Shield block for 3 seconds without being able to perform any other action (basically 3s delay on death) OR block while pushing enemies back from a node/teammate, OR while being able to attack (focus 5), OR shooting a ranged cone attack (shield 4), etc.

Shouts? Other than the fear bomb guard shouts are like warrior shouts on steroids, with a bazooka. Etc etc.

It seems you’re trying to use unrelated aspects of each Profession to justify Endure Pain’s superiority to Renewed Focus.

What does healing, buffing, debuffing, snaring, blinding, rooting, throwing up bubbles, bubble knockbacks, focus skills, shield skills, or shouts have to do with Endure Pain and Renewed Focus?

This is not a discussion on the overall strengths and weaknesses, functions and issues of each Profession, it’s about the fact that one of our Elite Skills is clearly inferior to a Utility Skill.

I fail to see why making our ELITE SKILL a stun breaker or allow movement is wrong to ask for, when a UTILITY SKILL can do both with the same cooldown for an even longer longer duration.

LOL. Dem arguments. While it’s true that Renewed Focus has no excuse for making the Guardian immobile for the duration and suffering from more than a few bugs (condition damage still applies, it can be interrupted by cc or movement and goes on full cooldown), even comparing this to a skill from another class is such a bad idea I don’t even know where to begin explaining. So I won’t.

The skill itself is a great addition to Guardians who make full use of Virtues and need the invulnerability. I can’t believe you’re actually asking for ANOTHER stun breaker on Guardian. It’s not like we have a billion already.

Endure Pain is not Invulnerability, it is immune to direct damage and nothing more (CC and Conditions still apply) while the elite for the Guardian “Renewed Focus” is an Invulnerability meaning you cannot be cc’ed nor have conditions applied to you during the process (although pre-existing conditions still apply).

Just wanted to clear things up between Invulnerability and Endure Pain

You can’t compare two spells in a Vaccuum. You need to consider the whole class. And even then, Renewed Focus is a bad elite.

Compare “Stand Your Ground!” to “Balanced Stance”. Stand your Ground! lasts 3 seconds less, but it has 10 seconds less cooldown, gives Retaliation and it affects up to 4 other people. See, you can’t compare individual skills like that, or you’ll always find discrepancies. Certain classes are supposed to do certain things better than others.

I’d like to see Renewed Focus gain Stability for 3 seconds. It’s one of the few elites that are actually completely counterable so as to render them practically useless. You could use it, get 1 second of invulnerability, but knocked back and lose the other 2 seconds of invulnerability and not have your virtues recharged, you then have to wait again.

I’m confused. Why are people saying that you can be cc’d out of Renewed Focus? You’re invulnerable to all types of anything (aside from pre-existing conditions) for the full duration. Looking at “Considering the whole class” argument…Renewed Focus refreshes all virtues. Resolve gives passive regen, and while having the trait can clear 3 conditions while giving more regen. Justice gives 3 might(trait), blind nearby enemies(trait), and 5s burning on next attack. Courage being refreshed means you get a free aegis coming out of Renewed Focus. Aegis on use can possibly heal you for 500~800 at 80, give you retaliation for 10s+, as well as block an attack. You can also use Courage AGAIN for another aegis which heals, gives retaliation, and blocks. There are also traits that give 3s of stability along with 6s of protection on Courage activation.
tl;dr

Renewed Focus:
-Recharges Virtues.
-Virtues
-Justice
-Blinds nearby enemies on use(trait)
-3stacks of might to you and nearby allies(trait)
-You and nearby allies burn next target for 5s
-Resolve
-Passive regen(stacks with regeneration)
-Clear 3 Condition on Activation(Trait)
-Gives yourself and nearby allies regeneration on activation
-Heals you and nearby allies for 1300~2000+
-Courage
-Gives 1 aegis when coming off of cooldown, then every 30/40seconds.
-5s~ of protection on activation to you and nearby allies(trait)
-3s of stability on activation to you and nearby allies(trait)
-Gives Aegis to you and nearby allies on activation
-(Aegis with traits heals for 500-800, gives 10s+retaliation when consumed and blocks a single attack. This applies to the Aegis you give to your allies too.)

Oh yeah, activating any of them gives a bit of retaliation as well, if you have the trait.

The skill itself is amazing and offers much more than Endure Pain ever could. Sure if you’re not specced to utilize your virtues it might seem not so great, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t a great elite, it just isn’t for your build. I see people always wanting to use this at the end of fights right before they die. Use your utility/weapon cooldowns to survive, then your heal/virtues. After all those are gone, use Renewed Focus to mitigate damage or right when you feel burst coming. When that’s done you have all your virtues back, and your heal/weapon/utilities will be almost off cooldown.

Renewed Focus is conceptually a good skill..it’s just barely a step up from a standard utility skill. We’re talking about an elite that is comparable to Staff’s Empower, but arguably offering less support AND having nearly 5 times the CD.

Empower gives you 12 stacks of might for 8 seconds every 20 (16) seconds. It heals for a moderate amount and can be interrupted prematurely to give the heal.

Renewed Focus untraited, gives 3 second invulnerability and refreshes the Virtues (Burn, Regen/Heal, and Aegis). With traits it can also give 5 seconds of Might (3), Blind, Regen, and Protection. If interrupted, it does not refresh for another 90 seconds.

Really the only advantage Renewed Focus has over Empower is the invulnerability, which staying still for several seconds can just delay death, not prevent it.

Definitely awesome, but not really worth the difference in cooldowns of 20(16) versus 90 seconds doesn’t really make up for the meager, limited defensive difference.

Compare Guardian’s elites to Necro. They have a pet that does solid DPS, cripples a target, and is a warm body to soak damage. Plague gives a huge HP boost while spamming poison/blind/bleed/weakness for its duration.

Wasn’t letting me put in bullet format, and wasn’t letting me get to advanced posting/fomatting options..login server crashed mid post and now I can’t edit it.

Back on topic.
This is what Renewed focus gives you a 2nd set of if using the right traits.

3stacks of Might, 1500~2000 heal, 6s of Regeneration, 5s Burning on next attack, Aegis(heals and gives Retaliation on block), 6s of Protection, 3s of Stability, 4s of Retaliation per Virtue activated.

These things are what you give to yourself AND nearby allies even while knocked down or stunned. The range is pretty far too. I didn’t even include the things you yourself get, such as the extra Aegis, or an extra clearing of 3 conditions. It feels like people are only looking at the skill for its 3s Invuln. I don’t know about you, but there is no other elite skill in the game that gives this much to you AND to your entire team. A second time.

Just on a side note here, RF doesn’t break stun, if anything, you’re still suspect to stuns while casting it which is BS

DeanAdamFry.7106:

(although pre-existing conditions still apply).

I really wish invulnerability in RF is actually invulnerability… Essentially EP’s invulnerability is same as RF’s because most of the time you will have conditions on you before activating RF/EP.

Im 50/50 with OP though, RF does look weaker, but its strength is the virtues itself, that is its only purpose imo. Nevertheless, i would like to see a buff to RF, maybe making it a cast instead of immobilize channel or increasing duration because i also use RF as a replacement for “block”.

Just add RF 2/3 conditions removal and stability (AoE?) since I was KD’ed quite often when I was still naive about it’s invulnerability.

You forgot to compare:

Warrior
to
Guardian

If the Guardian had endure pain, perhaps this conversation could go somewhere.
They don’t.
Warriors don’t have Virtues either.

I mean we could go on forever on the differences here –
that is why you shouldn’t have made this comparison in the first place.

So what if a warrior gets a utility with a similar mechanic?
If your trying to imply that makes them better, then play a warrior. If your not, then why are you comparing a warrior skill to a guardian one?

I really do not understand why there are players against what the OP is stating, he is actually correct. There is no justification having renewed focus as a elite. Perhaps it would be if virtues were a lot better but right now they feel sub par.

If virtues were enhanced in some way then I believe renewed focus would look more attractive. But as it stands now, using all of your focuses and using renewed focus does absolutely nothing for gameplay. In fact, it probably makes things worse since you are forced to be self rooted.

RF is one of the most underwhelming and ridiculous elite skills in the game. Why on earth should I ever want to immobilize myself for 3 seconds only to refsh my virtues? I do not need the invulnerability when trying to save teammates, since I am not the one getting focussed. By the time I channeled RF, my teammate already died. If I use RF for myself I am putting myself in a bad position because of the immobilize and usually die anyway right after channelling. If I need to refresh my virtues I usuall don’t need invulnerability.

Why on earth would I want to crowd control myself with my ultimate, again?

If you’re trying to save your allies, you should be using Tome of Courage yes?

Renewed Focus while not without its downsides serves the Guardian well as a elite you can pop frequently and get extremely good mileage out of when soloing. That’s what I use it for at least. The minors that increase the utility of virtues add on to this as well.

Really dislike mine guardian tomes, wasted it already few times for nothing, wanted to heal party started casting it and got killed. Full CD on tome, and got none effect. Thats why I am using Renewed Focus or racial elite, depending on situation. And having guardian with Endure pain would be overkill, would make guardian even more powerfull.
As guardian player I am against having Endure pain, we got enough survivability, and more heals than warrior have. That having lvl 80 warrior and lvl 80 guardian.

I can’t believe people is actually defending the craptastic Renewed Focus. Unless you heavily trait into Virtues (and not even then mind you), it actually applies a self CC/root. A brief regen, prot or blind wont change the course of the battle like other elites do, not even close. Come on guys, just admit you use this elite skill as a panic button to avoid dieing or to try to prolong the most likely inevitable death, just like you would with any other common defensive oriented UTILITY skill.

Add a stun breaker and allow movement (and maybe increase the invulnerability uptime).

Offtopic, but I’m more concerned about Tome’s massive nerf, these no longer have stability. Precasting Stand Your Ground! with +20% boon duration before a Light of Deliverance is almost a must in tPvP right now. Also, Stand Your Ground! is just too good.

Lumines.3916:

If you’re trying to save your allies, you should be using Tome of Courage yes?

Renewed Focus while not without its downsides serves the Guardian well as a elite you can pop frequently and get extremely good mileage out of when soloing. That’s what I use it for at least. The minors that increase the utility of virtues add on to this as well.

Yes, so what’s the point of RF again, then? I rarely activate virtues because their active effects are extremely unspectacular, even if you specced for them, so all I get is brief invulnerability while I crowd control myself? I don’t see where this could be useful other than activating it to not die from falling damage but that doesn’t even work.

I’d use it if it actually was a full heal, but as it is right now it’s just a pathetic joke. Endure pain is superior in any regard

I think a lot of folks are overlooking the fact that RF is an elite skill, while Endure Pain is a standard utility skill.

This means a Warrior can pop Endure Pain while also having access to their various elites. No such option exists on the Guardian. RF should be superior in all regards than Endure Pain. If for no other reason than the fact that it is an “elite” skill, and hogs the single elite slot in our bar.

Make the duration 5 seconds and get rid of the channel would be a quick and easy fix.

I’ll never forget that moment of disappointment when I found out the invincibility on this elite was for the three-second channel, not for a short period of time while you did other stuff.

Of course, that was in beta when I was comparing it to the Tome elites that still had twenty seconds or whatever of stability. I use it now, but only because I’m sick of getting knocked out of my big heal/knockdown. The stability loss was totally not worth the ability to move.

Am I the only person who likes Renewed Focus? With an Aegis and burn heavy build it is ridiculously nice. Plus 3 seconds channeled invulnerability is great against a big boss attack, and you can blow your virtues beforehand to help your allies. Combined with Mace+focus and “Retreat!” you can keep up block and invulnerability practically forever.

The argument isn’t Renewed Focus is bad. It does do some awesome stuff.

The issue is that it is a very lackluster elite that is heavily dependent upon traits to do anything. I can completely understand a utility or weapon skill being that dependent, but an elite?

It’s basically a second Empower with a much longer CD and no real benefit.

Shelter probably saves you more than Renewed Focus.

Our Virtues in generally are a bit mediocre. If the passive effects remained, I think the actives would actually be pretty balanced. 99% of the time, unless you can immediately refresh the Virtue, you do not want to activate it. Similar to many of the Signets, the actives are just poorly designed and far too limited to use.

Just to clarify, I like Renewed Focus. But that doesn’t mean I can’t think it has some serious issues.

Yes, I recognize the fact that if you Virtue spam you can deal significant support if you are traited, but think about what that really means.

It means that to have the supportive element, you have to spam virtues and put them all on long cooldowns. If you want significant support, you need to trait for them. Even then, you either put yourself in danger to deal this support, or you make yourself useless for a period of time (like I said in the OP, 3s minimum, or even more if you move out of harm’s way first).

When comparing Renewed Focus and Endure Pain, many are forgetting that one is an ELITE skill, while another is a UTILITY skill. Even if Rewewed Focus did the same exact thing as Endure Pain, it would be underpowered simply because it takes up an Elite Skill slot.

^ There are other ways to support your team other than Virtue spam. If you don’t like the way that works, don’t get Renewed Focus. That elite skill is tailored for people traited into Virtues. The other 2 elites are better for everybody else. It’s that simple.

Maybe if your alone all the time the self root is a big deal, but for the rest of us you just buff up all your allies with your virtues with renewed focus. The larger the event, the more effective this is.
I don’t like any of the tome elites personally which only leaves racial elites. Racials were always supposed to be sub-par compared to your actual skills.

If renewed focus was disconnected from refreshing the cooldowns on virtues, then it would be in need of serious retooling.

However, with the proper trait investment it becomes just ludicrously good as echra pointed out above. I would like it if I could move while invincible, but it’s a minor quibble in the grand scheme of things.