Guild Wars 2

Hello everyone!

I have a build I wanted to share with you guys. This is my first time ever posting a build guide like this for ANY class or ANY game for that matter and given that I’m still wet behind the ears when it comes to Guardian please let me know if anything stated in this guide to my build is wrong please feel free to correct me. If you think there is something important that I missed let me know and I’ll gladly add it to the post.

First off here’s the build in action.
(I will edit this post and add in a video focused on 1v1s and 1v2-3s. I know people might be more interested in those sort of odds in testing the build. It is more than capable of those odds it is just difficult to find those kind of fights the past few days)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=zUxr58krwaA

Also, if you like this build or guide and wish to see more from me please let me know!

I main D/D elementalist, but recently(1 1/2 – 2 months) I started playing and leveling my guardian and eventually got it fully geared. Since I got it to 80 I had been looking for a build that would fit my play style. Something similar to a D/D Ele. I love healing power, condi removals and being able to gain ridiculous heals from other sources other than my #6 skill. I’ve tried awesome builds from well known Guardians that aren’t bad but just didn’t really fit the way I wanted to play the game. So I started doing a little of my own theory crafting and testing different aspects of the Guardian.

First off, my build focuses on “Boon Duration”. Why boon duration? Well Guardian has access to more boons than any other class in the game if you ask me so that’s what I decided to focus my attention.

The skills I chose are:

6. – “Signet of Resolve”
Passive-Cures a condition every 10 seconds
Active-Heals yourself

7. – “Stand Your Ground”
Grant “Stability” to yourself and allies.
Stability: 5s
Retaliation: 5s
Breaks stun
Range: 600

8. – “Retreat”
Grant aegis and swiftness to up to five nearby allies.
Aegis: 20 s
Swiftness: 20 s
Range: 600

Elite Skill – “Renewed Focus”
Focus, making yourself invulnerable and recharging your virtues.
Duration: 3 s

For my gear I decided to go with full clerics because like I said before, I love healing power. However I will write out and clarify so there is no confusion.
Also there is no Ascended Items in this build so it is easily accessible to everyone. It is full level 80 Exotics.

Full Clerics
+Power
+Toughness
+Healing Power

Helm – Cleric’s with a Superior Rune of Monk
Shoulder – Cleric’s with superior Rune of Monk
(1) + 25 Healing
(2) + 15% Boon Duration

Chest – Cleric’s with superior Rune of Water
Gauntlets – Cleric’s with superior Rune of Water
(1) + 25 Healing
(2) + 15% Boon Duration

Leggings – Cleric’s with superior Rune of Traveler
Boots – Cleric’s with superior Rune of Traveler
(1) +10 to all stats; +2% Critical Damage
(2) + 15% Boon Duration

…so from gear alone your are getting 45% boon duration. Which is what we are focusing on for this build.

For my Weapons:

To Be quite honest I did not choose these stat choices for this particular build, it is just what I have at the moment, so feel free to change these into whatever you prefer.

Greatsword – Sentinel’s with Superior rune of Hydromancy
Freezes nearby foes for 3 seconds when you swap to this weapon while in combat.
(Cooldown: 9 seconds)

+128Power
+128Toughness
+179Vitality

Mace – Celestial(Shiverstone) with Superior sigil of Life
Gain +10 Healing Power each time you kill a foe. (Max 25 stacks; ends on down.)

OR

Renewal.
Heal Nearby Allies on Weapon Swap
(AoE Range: 300)

You could even go for Bloodlust
Gain +10 Power each time you kill a foe. (Max 25 stacks; ends on down.)
for a bit more damage. It’s all about preference. There is no single “correct” way to gear.

+40 Power
+40 Precision
+40 toughness
+40 vitality
+5% crit damage
+40 healing power
+40 condition damage

Shield – Knight’s with a Superior sigil of Energy.
Gain 50% of your endurance when you swap to this weapon while in combat. (Cooldown: 9 seconds)

-This is the only sigil that I would recommend. Other than the fact you have more dodges which means taking less damage I will explain the other reasons later.

+64 Power
+64 Precision
+90 Toughness

For my trinkets:

Sapphire with Platinum Doubloons(+ 4 boon duration)
+Power
+Toughness
+Healing Power
with 1 Magi piece with platinum doubloon
+Precision
+Vitality
+Healing Power

Amulet- Sapphire with Platinum Doubloon in the upgrade slot
Ring- Sapphire with Platinum Doubloon in the upgrade slot
Ring- Sapphire with Platinum Doubloon in the upgrade slot
Earring- Sapphire with Platinum Doubloon in the upgrade slot
Earring- Sapphire with Platinum Doubloon in the upgrade slot

Backpiece- Magi with Platinum Doubloon in the upgrade slot

This gives us an extra 24% boon duration bringing us to a total of 69% boon duration.

I also run Chocolate Omnomberry Creams.
Nourishment (30m):
+40% magic find while under the effect of a boon
+20% boon duration
+10 Experience from kills

Whether you use Maintenance Oil or Sharpening Stones is up to you.

so now we have a total of 89% boon duration.

My trait lines are:

0/0/30/20/20

NOTE: Because we have 20 into Virtues we gain another 20% boon duration.

-That brings us to a grand total of 109% Boon Duration
What this also means is that our #7, 8, and 9 skills’ effects last over twice as long.
This makes it possible to have permanent swiftness by popping “Save Yourselves!” and “Retreat!”
and permanent Retaliation from “Stand Your Ground” and “Save Yourselves” along with combos from your light fields with Mace #2, and Shield off-hand #5 in addition to GS #4.

Why is Permanent swiftness important?

When roaming you need to have the ability to get out of a fight just as fast as you jumped in.
Out running a zerg is difficult because they can run permanent swiftness EASILY while you, a single person normally cannot. It’s now possible to outrun people with your guardian without the need of a staff.

Why is permanent Retaliation important?

I don’t know why this needs an explanation. EVERY SINGLE PERSON you fight is penalized for laying a finger on you. If a guardian comes up to you and uses GS #2; he has done over 1k NEARLY 2k damage to himself just for attacking you. Now lets add in your own attacks to that. Even the Ranger attacking you from afar is not safe.

EVERY SINGLE BOON APPLIED TO YOU LASTS TWICE AS LONG AS IT NORMALLY WOULD***

Just think about that for a bit…

Zeal – 0
Radiance – 0

Valor – 30

For my Valor Tree I choose
“Purity” the V adept trait,
-Lose a condition every 10 seconds. (we want to tank we need condi removal)

“Mace of Justice” the VII Master trait
-Wielding a mace grants 5% additional damage and up to 250 healing power (based on level).
(more heals anyone?)

and “Altruistic Healing”(AH) the XI Grand Master trait.
-Applying a boon to allies heals you.(Someone said HEALS?!)

Notes from the GW2 Wiki on AH:
-Triggers healing for every boon applied. Applying area-of-effect boons will trigger healing for each ally affected (including yourself) and skills that apply boons repeatedly over time, such as symbols, will trigger healing with each pulse.
-Skills that apply multiple stacks of might will trigger healing for each stack.
-Synergizes well with traits and skills that rapidly reapply boons, such as symbols, Empowering Might, and Empower.

First off is “Valorous Defense” which grants aegis when health reaches 50%. Aegis is a boon which blocks a single next incoming attack of any kind whether it’s a physical or condition type attack. Which ties perfectly with “Might of the Protector” which grants the “Might” boon every time you block an attack. because we have 109% boon duraton we automatically gain 20+ secs of might for being attacked.(90s cooldown)

This also works for our
“Virtue of Courage”
-Grants aegis every forty seconds.
Activate: Grant aegis to yourself and nearby allies.

Mace’s #2 skill which can work a few different ways. If when you activate this skill and you are attacked you BLOCK that next incoming attack and gain 20s of might AND you immediately hit the enemy with an attack that looks similar to a shield bash. If you are not struck u grant protection to yourself AND your allies which means more HEALS.

SIDE NOTE: GS’s auto attack grants might on the third strike. This originally gives 5secs so now you will get another 10+secs of might due to 109% BDuration. Because you can go through the full auto attack cycle faster then the might goes away you can stack more might and therefore gain more healing from AH.
Mace auto attack heals yourself AND allies on the third strike.

and last but not least “Courageous Return” which Recharges “Virtue of Courage” when you rally.

Honor – 20

For our Honor tree I went with

“Superior Aria”
-Shouts recharge 20% faster
More shouting = more boons = more heals = survivability.
or
Writ of Exaltation
-Symbols are larger (50% larger)
Less shouting HOWEVER a larger field for allies to walk through and give you MORE HEALS.

and

“Two Handed Mastery”
-Two handed weapons’ skills recharge 20% faster.
More attacking = more damge
More symbols = more heals and retaliation

You can combine GS’s #2, and #5 which are Whirl finishers with your light fields for “Cleansing Bolts” which cures a condition from any ally the bolts hit.

or you can combine GS’s #3 which is a leap finisher with your light fields for an additional 10s of retaliation.

That’s only from the combos that you are able to create yourself. Think about the amount of boons that would go up in a larger fight with your allies blasting and leaping away.

You also have:

“Selfless Daring”
The end of your dodge roll heals nearby allies(and yourself)

“Vigourous Precision”
Gain 5 seconds of “VIGOR” when you deliver a critical hit. This effect can only trigger once every 5 seconds.
-If you decide to go for more precision than I do, this means more endurance. More endurance means more dodging and ultimately more HEALS! Maybe Sharpening Stones will be of use here.

Virtues – 20

Four the Virtue tree I decided on:

“Vengeful”
-Retaliation last 25% longer

NOTES from GW2 wiki:
Does apply to Retaliation given to allies.(more heals)

“Absolute Resolution”
-Activating Virtue of Resolve removes three conditions. Virtue of Resolve’s passive effect is stronger.
That’s 3 condition removals whenever you want it and 2 passive condition removals from “Signet or Resolve and Purity”. Add in those cleansing combos too. Topping it off you get a stronger passive regeneration from “Virtue of Resolve”

NOTES from GW2 wiki:
Increases passive regeneration effect by 25%.
The active effect removes three conditions from you and allies in the area.(nice support there)

Then you have

“Inspired Virtue”
-Virtues now also apply the following boons:
Justice: might
Resolve: regeneration
Courage: protection

NOTES from GW2 wiki:
The boons are applied only when the virtues are activated.
The boons last for 5 seconds.(10s now)
Allies who are affected by the virtue’s activation also gain the corresponding boon.(more heals)
Activating Justice applies 3 stacks of Might. (AH heals for EACH stack from might)

“Virtue of Retribution”
-Gain retaliation when you activate a virtue

NOTES from GW2 wiki:
Grants retaliation for 3 seconds.(6s now)

With that said I believe that is everything.
If you have questions my in-game names are

“Sheva Alamarr” – Elementalist
“Stella Alamarr” – Guardian

I hope you enjoyed the video and will have great experiences trying out the build.

Just a quick note: you may want to change some things around as boon duration is capped at 100%. Your hero tab will show over 100% but when you activate a shout you’ll notice you’re only getting 100% more. For the hell of it I ran a little over 120% boon duration and activated Save Yourselves and was only getting 20 seconds, even though the tool tip said I should be getting over 22 seconds.

Orion.1678:

Just a quick note: you may want to change some things around as boon duration is capped at 100%. Your hero tab will show over 100% but when you activate a shout you’ll notice you’re only getting 100% more. For the hell of it I ran a little over 120% boon duration and activated Save Yourselves and was only getting 20 seconds, even though the tool tip said I should be getting over 22 seconds.

Hmm, thank you for the feedback. If that’s the case 2 of the Platinum Doubloons on the trinkets can be switched out for actual jewels. Build will still work just as well and even better with the extra stats.

First of all: Great music choice for your video, I really like it

Unfortunately…its the only thing I liked. All you did was make a handicapped version of the bunker mid build used in SPVP
Your DPS is near 0 and your chasing ability is non existent. It takes you 2 min to kill ANYONE REMOTELY competent. (that first engie you fought was a clear nub fyi). Whats worse is that people can disengage from you and u have no way to stop em.

A condi necro or a condi engie will decimate you in WvW. A S/D thief will also own you.

In short, I really see no benefit to running your build, all you do is provide condi removal every 50 sec and that’s IT, your measly regen will not do anything in WvW where condi spam rules supreme.

Its not your build as much as it is the pathetic state of the guardie in wvw right now but your build serves pretty much no purpose. I could go a bunker warrior and have 5x the DPS you have, more CC, and prolly the same sustain

Someone said that boon duration caps at 100% but the wiki says it caps at 90%. http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Boon_duration

Can anyone verify either is correct?

Kudo’s for using shield. I like it.
Double kudo’s for music. Nice choice.

I won’t comment on the build since I usually pilfer others because, well, I’m not exactly great at the guardian mechanics at that level. However, I’m sure others will Nice video though overall. Thanks for sharing.

Video points to exactly why the experienced guardians are shelving their beloved class: We have to spend all our points to get great sustain w/ kitten DAMAGE, whereas the “other” class has GREAT DAMAGE and GREAT Sustain w/ just a measly 20 points into Defense….

And don’t even get me started if they go 0/10/20/30/10 w/ a shout hammer + axe/sheild build.

Re-roll: Warrior.

You didn’t really kill anyone and each person could have ran away whenever they wanted.

This is not to take a shot at your skill…. It’s to take a shot at the idiotic Dev’s who seem to believe the class is just fine.

blur.4873:

Someone said that boon duration caps at 100% but the wiki says it caps at 90%. http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Boon_duration

Can anyone verify either is correct?

Is capped at 100%. I tested. Is 90% only if they changed after I tested it.