Guild Wars 2

how good is a guardian with a staff?

Very good in a support role. I wouldn’t suggest solo levelling with it.

Broad question. Why do you want to use the Staff? What are you going to use it for?

I use the staff just because. It is a melee range support weapon, so I couple it with mace/shield for my build.

Far from optimal, but I like it. I run with a tight group on voice chat, so I consistently heal and apply might to everyone, as well as swiftness and condition removal/area retaliation.

I never use auto attack or #5 tho.

You should be switching weapons according to situations, each guardian weapon has its role.

In PVE i hold Sword+Shield and Greatsword, when I jump into WvW, I swap the Sword + Shield with a Scepter or Staff.
When I didnt have my shouts build I had Staff in my 2ndary slot for PVE for its symbol of swiftness.
I always have staff on sPVP 2ndary slot for symbol of swiftness to cap points.

Might and Swiftness (3 and 4 I believe…I rebound them). Depends if you have homies that want these buffs. Mostly it is about swiftness, might is a bonus. Are you the only person that can provide group swiftness? Do you just roll around solo? In PvE and sometimes in solo WvW, I will switch to Greatsword / Sword-Focus for more dmg. I think Greatsword / Staff is the best combo for most sPVP though.

it’s good in WvW, great force multiplier with number 4 skill, also heals a good amount at the end, at least it does for me since i use of the cleric gear. The number 1 skill is too weak for combat but its good for safely hitting people sieging your keep/tower through the gate. I tend to use it to get around with swiftness and for big pushes with the number 4 skill. If i get a guy alone I like to use the number 4 to get the full might stacks up, swap to greatsword, pop save yourselves! and virtue of justice for even more might, port on them with judges intervention and whirl them into the dirt.

It needs work overall but it works well enough for now.

staff/scepter/torch and consecrations all synergize very well, and are very very strong in WvW and PVE, and quite strong in spvp as well.

Staff is excellent if you play support. Not only can you grant 12 stacks of might to EVERYONE in your party, you can also heal with the orb and give swiftness with 3. Also, if used correctly, your 5 ability can be amazing as well! Example, an engineer with mortar…you can trap the mobs in an area with 5 and the engineer/ranged can bombard them before they even touch you. Not to mention that your auto attacks hit in a large cone.

don’t bring a staff to spvp. It will do nothing for you, and even if you do manage to get an empower off in the middle of a fight, only like 2 people will get the boost, one of which will cower away.

I use a staff, I play mainly a support roll in groups and everyone who has grouped with me loves it. Might, Swiftness, Keeping Heals up etc. I like the Auto attack because it ensures I’m doing SOME amount of damage in between healing, burning and buffing

The only thing I dislike is how Empower makes us stand still to cast =/ It would rock if it would create some type of protective shield for the duration of the cast time. Just some sort of damage reduction. It seems like the mobs KNOW when I’m casting it and thats when I get pounded with AEs

I use Staff as my secondary. It has reasonable range as a ranged weapon, good AOE spread, and situationally good abilities. Damage wise it’s kind of meh, not as good as the Greatsword. I use the AOE heal when all my other stuff is on cooldown and it heals for almost 3k.

I found the staff to be the most bland and unfitting weapon in our arsenal, even worse and more boring than the scepter. Every single ability feels lackluster to me and simply not fun.

The staff is a close range support weapon and close range support is something the Guardian is definitely not lacking. I don’t see the reason why somebody would pick the staff over better combinations that are more fun and efficient.

I also have no idea what weapon combination might work with a staff.

Tecnically the staff is a supportive weapon, but it doesn’t works…
In my opinion they have to change a couple on skills on it…
Wave of warding (autoattak)
Orb of light (damage and heal)
Symbol of swiftness (buff speed)
Empower (good heal)
Line of warding (cc)

Wave of warding doesn’t support… you can combine it with the sigil of weather if you want, you got just the 30% chance to heal a small amount.

Orb of Light simply sucks. 1 times on 4 it disappear on the ground, doesn’t detonate (even if i make it explode on my self!) and miss direction (no matter if I’m aiming in the right place).
→ Make it a target spell (friendly target too) , or a target area effect (it detonate when arrive in the area that you selected)… but not a direction spell.

Symbol of swiftness sometimes is helpfull, some times no… you can combine it with the traits that allow all the symbols to heal, so you can cast it continuosly in the fight. But is pointless to use one traits just for it.
Usefull if you have to run away.

Empower is a good skill. A little bit slow… but it works.
This is the best staff skill in my opinion.
→ Be able to cast it in movement should be great… but maybe it is too much. :P

Line of warding is a good idea… the problem is that some times enemy cross it (jump and roll)… and it is pointless because it is the last weapon skill and should be one of the strongest one.
The second problem is that this skill has slow cast time and you have to stay still for cast it… so if you are running away and you want to block your enemy behind you, they can catch you when you stop…
In a fight there are not too much occasion for cast it, expecially in the fray.
Too mutch CD for a low performances skill.
→ Increase the performance (for exepample if a friendly target cross it, all the condition removed)… or reduce the CD… or make it castable when you move.

So… at the end, if you want tu support your party during a fight (not for run away), you use just Orb of light (and it doesn’t works), Empower and then you switch shield… :\

2 on 5… and sometimes just 1 cause Orb sucks…
NICE SUPPORTIVE WAPON! lol

Leeain.2431:

Symbol of swiftness sometimes is helpfull, some times no… you can combine it with the traits that allow all the symbols to heal, so you can cast it continuosly in the fight. But is pointless to use one traits just for it.
Usefull if you have to run away.

It also damages enemies in its radius. Though I’d prefer a Cripple effect.

True. It deals so little damage that I forgot it. Lol!
It does not change the tide of battle. :|

The point is the same… staff shuold work better… and Orb of Light and Line of warding are usefull like a second an*s on the elbow.