Guild Wars 2

Hello all,

So, I was advised by my guild that the best builds to run for the guardians right now is full zerk and a DPS focus (gs/mace and torch or focus depending). All say that but I feel like I’m a glass cannon when I do that. I do lots of damage, but find that in some of the pettiest PvE fights can bring my health down considerably. I understand also that dodge and block techniques improve damage mitigation but my question is the following: is it normal to have a full zerk guardian’s health low almost always? And if there is a way to prevent it, what is it?

Thanks all!

If you play full zerk with a guardian you have more or less 12k hp, that’s nothing. The buidl is right. And if you use the mace you have always regen up, and that’s good.
The only thing you can do with a build like that is use wisely your block/blind skills and use Meditation skills to obtain a little help recharging your hp by 2k every meditation (and granting fury to the team, that’s good).

Anyway you’re a glasscannon with very low hp and low defensive skills (expecially if you play full offensive). It’s very easy die with a build like that.
And yes: if you’re a guardian in zerk you will never have a big health pool to stay alive.

I used to play my guardian with half zerk half knight (or valkyrie if you think you have enough critical rate or use traits to increase your critical rate and obtain frequently fury).

Being PvE, I always just ran my WvW build. Meditation heals help sustain health, and I use some celestial trinkets to put me at 16k health, 2.5k armor, 261 condition damage, and 2.25k power with 50% crit chance. The minor drop in dos is compensated by the quick 1.5k burn tick u get every 5-6 seconds

• Knight/Soldier/Celestial –Mix in a few pieces of gear not a full set. I recommend keeping 3 Berserker’s & choosing 3 others piece from one of the above.

My advice is to really work on learning the mechanics of each enemy/fight you’re having trouble with.

If you know the mechanics well, and know the Guardian well (i.e. how to make best use of all of your blocks, projectile defense, blinds, and evades), you’ll take almost no damage at all. Until then, you’ll feel quite glassy. The first step is learning the mechanics, and the second step is learning how to best react to them.

For blocks, you have:
Shelter
Mace #3
Focus #5
Virtue of Courage’s Aegis
Retreat’s Aegis

For evades you only have your dodges.

For blinds you have Virtue of Justice, GS#3, and Focus #4.

For projectile defense you have Wall of Reflection, Shield of the Avenger, and Sanctuary.

Last, for invulnerability, you have Renewed Focus. Renewed Focus not only is an invulnerability, but if you’ve already spent your Virtue of Courage when using it, you’re going to get that back AND get an Aegis the instant Renewed Focus ends. So, used right, this is an invulnerability + 1x blind + 2x Aegis skill.

Mind you, the Guardian has enough survival ability that you can not use half of this stuff and still have more survivability than some other classes. You can easily drop Renewed Focus most everywhere (For “Feel My Wrath!”) and be fine, just as you can not rely on the Focus for blinds/blocks, and instead just use Focus #5 at the start of fights for extra damage before you swap to Torch.

What fights in particular are you having trouble with?

I’m just generally,and I know this may seem silly and noobish, seen this in some champion and above fights in PvE world. Dungeon runs with the guild are smooth because they know what they are doing. I understand the whole feeling-like-a-glass-cannon then. I had what you guys said, a mixture of knight and zerk an officer in the guild told me to go full zerk.

Pff who cares about the meta? My guardian has almost 30K HP and I still kill things! Eventually. After like several minutes. Preferably with the help of others. Alot of others.

if you think you got problems try zerk ele lol.

What I find helps is strafing around the target to, generally mobs are pretty slow at attacking so constantly moving around them and at max melee range means they will miss a lot.

Also learn to zerk, don’t go halfway with knights, PVT or anything else, it merely gets you used to taking hits when you should be trying not to. Watch the enemy your fighting, watch the way they move, their animations, most big attacks have a tell, learn it, dodge it. All others strafing should keep you healthy.

And if you absolutely have to increase survivability energy sigils instead of your lowest multiplier sigil.

There are two sides of the story to increase your survivability:

• As been said, time dodges, blinds and blocks that comes with practice and time.
• Run with other people who are metabuild users too. If you use the metabuild and pair up with snowflakes expect to always have low health. So my advice would be check out what are your guildmates running because if they’re Sentinnel bearbows you’re being used as cannon fodder.

I guess to increase survivability I can roll focus and pop focus 5. Also, it’s just a matter of time and practice so I’ll work on that. The hard thing is when they throw down AOE’s, those can’t be dodged for too long unless you wait for them to go away (unless I’m mistaken that’s why you guys are here haha).

With full zerk I roll 15k health which isn’t bad compared to 12k haha. With a few adjustments I do like running this build-
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Gj69xQ07is

You could be tankier untill you finally learn the mechanics of the fights you are in. Then you finally can change to full berserker eventually.

SquadLife.2576:

Hello all,

So, I was advised by my guild that the best builds to run for the guardians right now is full zerk and a DPS focus (gs/mace and torch or focus depending). All say that but I feel like I’m a glass cannon when I do that. I do lots of damage, but find that in some of the pettiest PvE fights can bring my health down considerably. I understand also that dodge and block techniques improve damage mitigation but my question is the following: is it normal to have a full zerk guardian’s health low almost always? And if there is a way to prevent it, what is it?

Thanks all!

depends what you do. for pve anything you do is ok, it doesnt really matter. for team oriented play, you need to play to what your team needs. zerker stats are only good for dungeon speed runs. really nothing else.

in spvp, i hate playing zerker guard cause of the ultra low healthpool so i do not. in wvw, if you do this you will become what is commonly referred to as rally-bait, and your prescence will actually be harmful to your team. so if your guild is talking about wvw, then i’m sorry but they are completely stupid.

From a PVE perspective. Powerful Potion (-10% dmg) + Signet of Judgement (-10% dmg) + Protection (-33% dmg) seems good enough to me. I face tank quite a bit of stuff if I’m feeling like it, I’ve never quite felt so tanky on a class wearing all zerk than I do on my Guard.

I run with this build http://metabattle.com/wiki/Build:Guardian_-_Meditation_Celestial
but with staff instead of greatsword and have 4 items carrion but rest celestial. Ends up around 1.7k Pw, 1.5k Th, 1.7k Vi, 1.5k Pr, 500 ferocity, 850 condi (1k with food and potions) and 450 healing. Alomst always 60% perma crit, 20k hp and got burn ticks over 10k sometimes. Lots of ppl say you either go full def or full zerk, bs imo. Love this build, works everywhere aswell, (play mostly PVE, WvW and dungeons, less PvP but sometimes). Only concern I have atm is s burn nerf.

EKAN.4051:

I run with this build http://metabattle.com/wiki/Build:Guardian_-_Meditation_Celestial
but with staff instead of greatsword and have 4 items carrion but rest celestial. Ends up around 1.7k Pw, 1.5k Th, 1.7k Vi, 1.5k Pr, 500 ferocity, 850 condi (1k with food and potions) and 450 healing. Alomst always 60% perma crit, 20k hp and got burn ticks over 10k sometimes. Lots of ppl say you either go full def or full zerk, bs imo. Love this build, works everywhere aswell, (play mostly PVE, WvW and dungeons, less PvP but sometimes). Only concern I have atm is s burn nerf.

I’m really tempted to try it but… why staff? For the might?

Using staff in dungeons where it’s not needed is a good way to get kicked. If you have a phalanx strength warrior or a might stacking ele then there’s no need for staff unless you were using it to kill volatile blossoms in TA.

Of course it’s up to you but like I say you may get kicked from pug groups if you do, use at own risk.

apharma.3741:

Using staff in dungeons where it’s not needed is a good way to get kicked. If you have a phalanx strength warrior or a might stacking ele then there’s no need for staff unless you were using it to kill volatile blossoms in TA.

Of course it’s up to you but like I say you may get kicked from pug groups if you do, use at own risk.

This^

Bringing staff to dungeons is like going to war with water balloons.

honestly, in decent or higher pvp vs anyone, medi guard power spec is a joke.

NumenorLord.6539:

apharma.3741:

Using staff in dungeons where it’s not needed is a good way to get kicked. If you have a phalanx strength warrior or a might stacking ele then there’s no need for staff unless you were using it to kill volatile blossoms in TA.

Of course it’s up to you but like I say you may get kicked from pug groups if you do, use at own risk.

This^

Bringing staff to dungeons is like going to war with water balloons.

Not disagreeing with you but the burning changes makes staff a half decent condition weapon if using Permeating Wrath against trash mobs. And I find it as a particularly useful replacement for IB eles on AC p3 burrows along with FMW. alternating between empower and FMW to melt burrows with GS and beefed up party members.

Mirmil.5074:

EKAN.4051:

I run with this build http://metabattle.com/wiki/Build:Guardian_-_Meditation_Celestial
but with staff instead of greatsword and have 4 items carrion but rest celestial. Ends up around 1.7k Pw, 1.5k Th, 1.7k Vi, 1.5k Pr, 500 ferocity, 850 condi (1k with food and potions) and 450 healing. Alomst always 60% perma crit, 20k hp and got burn ticks over 10k sometimes. Lots of ppl say you either go full def or full zerk, bs imo. Love this build, works everywhere aswell, (play mostly PVE, WvW and dungeons, less PvP but sometimes). Only concern I have atm is s burn nerf.

I’m really tempted to try it but… why staff? For the might?

No, not for the might, I farm alot PVE atm, thats the reson, other wise I use other wepons, like gs.

apharma.3741:

Using staff in dungeons where it’s not needed is a good way to get kicked. If you have a phalanx strength warrior or a might stacking ele then there’s no need for staff unless you were using it to kill volatile blossoms in TA.

Of course it’s up to you but like I say you may get kicked from pug groups if you do, use at own risk.

Ya if its like “7k ach min zerk build meta cheek demands” alright then I guess, but most dungeons are not that hard. And even that, its not like its a primary wep besides if u farm with a zerg in pve or wvw. Never got kicked, even when I brought my staff.