Guild Wars 2

It’s painfully clear how the shield skills don’t met the standard set by the other off-hands for Guardians. Just use google or the search function on the forums and you will see how many people complain about Shield not being viable in most of the game content and just slightly niche in WvW.
To fix this situation, I have an idea: consolidating the Shield identity while trimming away at unneccessary or overlapping powers to keep it balanced.

Shield Identity
What role does the Shield fill in in the pool of Guardian’s off-hand weapons? Well, you will inevitably get different answers from different players, but if we compare that to the Torch and Focus, we can see that each weapon holds a pattern and is more useful in certain situations: With Blocks and Blind,Focus is an excellent defensive off-hand, and is more effective in melee due to bounce mechanic Ray of Judgement and the potential damage from the Shield of Wrath .
On the other hand, torch is good for both condition builds and condition cleanse.
So, where does the Shield fit in? Shield already offers a protection AoE boon for up to 5 players, and a anti-projectile shield, so what I propose is to enhance Shield as a supportive anti-ranged off-hand.

Proposed Changes

• Trait- Stalwart Defender When allies are affected by a Shield ability, they also gain Vigor. Shield ability recharge is reduced.
  Vigor is a boon that is not so common for a guardian, and moving it to a supportive off-hand make sense
• Shield of Judgement is Unchanged.
• Shield of Absorption Channels for 4 seconds, creating a Dome that destroys projectiles and heals. Can be detonated earlier pushing enemies back.
  We basically fix the 4 seconds duration and swap the heal with the pushback. Now the heal is stronger, but requires the Guardian to channel, and the pushback is still present but you have to sacrifice the dome and projectile shield.
  I think it makes more sense: if the shield is anti-projectile, it makes little sense to push enemies away, considering that if they are melee all they have to do is walk back in and hit you during the channel.
  Also, the dome and healing are a good way to grant vigor to nearby allies, which, again, make sense for a supportive off-hand. Gives a brief respite from enemy ranged attack while granting them vigor to dodge again when the shield goes down.

Any feedback is appreciated. ^^

Not much of an overhaul, but definitely more appropriate than most other suggestions.

I have to admit . . . I was really skeptical clicking on this thread but I think the idea of reinforcing the Shield roll fits really well. Leaving aside the fact that it feels kind of like the devs should have just swapped the focus skills with the shield skills way back before the game released . . . I’d be pleased to see the shield get changes like this.

I have to say a big yes to the idea of Shield Skills granting Vigor. It seems very much like a Guardian to have a skill that roots them while granting Vigor to allies and creating a barrier against ranged attacks. I wasn’t sold on the idea of the push being on the skills activation, but the way you explain it actually makes a lot of sense. I think I would rather personally like to see the bubble function like Sanctuary and keep enemies from entering, but I don’t see that being likely to happen and it would also invalidate push on activation. Then again, I’m just thinking that a change like that could make running Consecrations with a Shield an excellent way of supporting allies and creating actual bunkers for the sake of guarding allies haha.

I like Shield of Judgement but still think maybe it need a little more oomph! to get it right. I don’t think a damage increase is the way to go though. Perhaps just increasing the range of this skill or giving it a quick 1s block duration on first activation would make it infinitely more useful.

But still . . . Vigor from shield skills would be pretty great.

xinkspillx.3914:

I have to admit . . . I was really skeptical clicking on this thread but I think the idea of reinforcing the Shield roll fits really well. Leaving aside the fact that it feels kind of like the devs should have just swapped the focus skills with the shield skills way back before the game released . . . I’d be pleased to see the shield get changes like this.

I have to say a big yes to the idea of Shield Skills granting Vigor. It seems very much like a Guardian to have a skill that roots them while granting Vigor to allies and creating a barrier against ranged attacks. I wasn’t sold on the idea of the push being on the skills activation, but the way you explain it actually makes a lot of sense. I think I would rather personally like to see the bubble function like Sanctuary and keep enemies from entering, but I don’t see that being likely to happen and it would also invalidate push on activation. Then again, I’m just thinking that a change like that could make running Consecrations with a Shield an excellent way of supporting allies and creating actual bunkers for the sake of guarding allies haha.

I like Shield of Judgement but still think maybe it need a little more oomph! to get it right. I don’t think a damage increase is the way to go though. Perhaps just increasing the range of this skill or giving it a quick 1s block duration on first activation would make it infinitely more useful.

But still . . . Vigor from shield skills would be pretty great.

Yes, I think Vigor fits in quite well.
Dodge are also quite effective against ranged projectiles more than fast activation melee (usually you stun/root the enemy anyway before using an ability with a long wind-up time).

I think that Shield 4 might need some love, but I guess the most useful things it could have is an increased protection duration, or a shorter cooldown. I’d rather go for the shorter cooldown, considering that the ability is designed to not be particularly strong. Reducing cooldown/Increasing duration it’s a good way to fine tune the efficiency of an ability, assumed it’s doing what it’s supposed to do.
For how I see it, Shield 4 should work as an opener when allies get in melee (Damage to enemies and protection to allies) or a way to further aid your allies after Shield 5 ends.
An effect like Sanctuary or Ring of Warding on Shield 5?
Not that I didn’t think of it, but it would skewer the balance. It should have a >60 s cooldown to work properly (Projectiles cannot enter, projectiles can go out, and allies are healed for the duration… it could be a little too strong).

Better than what we have, but I still wouldn’t use it.

I suggested having skill 5 function more like Sanctuary just based on the idea of having it heal allies while the bubble is up because at that point the only effect it wouldn’t share with Sanctuary is keeping enemies out.

I think it’s the 5 skill that’s the tricky part. Skill 4 is definitely modest, but if skill 5 was significantly more useful I think 4 would be a non issue with its current balance.

I’d put some mobility on it with Super Speed on SoJ or on the trait on skill use.

Heimskarl Ashfiend.9582:

I’d put some mobility on it with Super Speed on SoJ or on the trait on skill use.

Well, it would make sense to have super speed on Shield of Judgement, but you are standing still while channeling shield of absorption.

xinkspillx.3914:

I suggested having skill 5 function more like Sanctuary just based on the idea of having it heal allies while the bubble is up because at that point the only effect it wouldn’t share with Sanctuary is keeping enemies out.

I think it’s the 5 skill that’s the tricky part. Skill 4 is definitely modest, but if skill 5 was significantly more useful I think 4 would be a non issue with its current balance.

That’s what I was thinking .
Let Shield 4 be a more “carefree” ability while putting more “oomph” in Shield 5.