Guild Wars 2

Hello Guild Wars 2!

My Guardian’s name is Aarrgon and I am a frequent commander on the SBI server. I’ve been playing with my build 2 trait points at a time for months now and, after running this build for the past few weeks commander, I think I’ve got it. Side note: COMMANDER’S AREN’T SUPPOSED TO DO DAMAGE. Sorry to any who disagree but.. a commander has two jobs:
1. Command
2. Survive
Nothing more. The dps comes from the zerg, not the commander.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fVEQJASWlsApVoNDxfH8DNRCRl1Mg9HECl51BwCcAA-TlSDABOcBA+V9noU+9lSwe1BonmgjPCAQt/AGHCAAeAAAA-w

So, now for the explanation:

Weapons:
Hammer: This is the front line Guardian’s bread and butter… Decent auto attack (1) with a protection symbol every third hit, which is outstanding for addition damage mitigation on your front line (I believe hammer also has the highest dps auto attack, which is a nice bonus of course). Mighty Blow (2) is used on cooldown for everything from your opener to might stacking to just killing kitten in combat. Zealot’s Embrace (3) is a nice ranged pull if needed (1200 range) which immobilizes everything in it’s path (up to 5). Imobilize is a form of CC, as it controls the crowd (in this case in terms of movement), and CC is always good for a tank. Banish (4) is again more CC… nice for interrupting revives, or even better, just smacking the downed body around in the zerg. Finally Ring of Warding (5) is just amazing. Once in combat, any warding ability is great for splitting zergs (those that have stability pass, those who do not are stunned), as it’s not like a Banish or Earthshaker. Its a continuous stun in a set location.

Staff: I would bring staff for the auto attack (1) alone… AMAZING cleave ability. 2 skill for some extra healing. Symbol of swiftness (3) for hps ticks (AH trait) and swiftness along with Empower (4) for 12 stacks of might to the party along with insane AH heals. Line of Warding (5), same explanation as Ring of Warding (see above).

Armor:
Is there much to talk about here? Three stats for survivability in GW2: Toughness (armor), Vitality (health pool), Healing Power (health pool regeneration). Nomad’s has all three with a primary in toughness, arguably the most important and most desired trait for a commander.
I fine runes to be player preference… Dolyak works for toughness, vitality, and hp regen… Melandru for CC mitigation (I feel this works better for warriors)… However I take Water for the healing power, condition removal, 20% boon duration, and additional 1,000 heal each time I use Shelter. Dolyak would be my second choice.
WHY NOT TROOPER?!
Well, simply because I don’t run shouts that I would use for the condition cleanse. Stand Your Ground is strictly for stability, and Save Yourselves (I’ll get to this later) is for the boon gain for a little extra “umph” in your overall performance for 11 seconds. I would NEVER say “Oh wow, I have poison on me” and pop stand your ground, therefore I find the 6 ability on Trooper to be a bit of a waste. Even if party-wide cleanse is taken into account… it still shouldn’t be used for the purpose of condition removal.
Soldier trinkets for toughness and vitality.

Traits:
6 in Valor – This one isn’t up for discussion, sorry. Altruistic Healing is MUST HAVE for a Guardian commander. With my healing power, each AH tick is 82 healing. This results, in a zerg setting, in an additional 410 healing per second for every second I’m providing boons. Symbol of swiftness ticks for 4 seconds, hammer auto ticks for 2 seconds, Stand Your Ground gives 10 boons total (820 healing), Save Yourselves gives 7 boons. This doesn’t include blasts finishers with your Mighty Blow every 4 seconds. Enough said. Now we’re left to fill the line. Purity for condition removal, Strength in Numbers for an additional 150 toughness in combat.

6 in Honor – Major props to Arena Net for implementing Force of Will. 300 Vitality translates to 3000 hp, which, with guard stacks and everything else, brings me to nearly 30,000 hp as a Guardian. Battle Presence is also strong, however I feel the additional vitality outweighs 150 additional healing per second to your party. Again we are left to fill the line. Two-Handed Mastery as we run two two-handed weapons, hammer and staff. Superior Aria as we run two shouts, Stand Your Ground being the more important of the two. The more often you have stability as a commander, the better.

2 in Virtues – Master of Consecrations… <3 This allows us to bring Purging Flames into the setup, which is our emergency >AoE< condition cleanse. It instantly removes 3 conditions and reduces the remaining conditions’ duration by 33% on yourself and 4 allies, it burns 5 foes, and it’s a fire field for combo finishers, which provides healing due to Altruistic Healing. Lasts for 6 seconds on a 28 second cooldown. Sold.

Utility Skills:

Heal: You are the big guy in the front with the hammer blazing and the blue over-head triangle shining. You’re going to get CC’d and focused to hell. You need something that will stop incoming damage, heal you up, be a guaranteed heal every use (no chance of getting interrupted), and on top of all that have a short cooldown. Shelter it is.

Utilities: Stand Your Ground is self explanatory… you need it. I raved about Purging Flames above, also a solid choice. Save Yourselves is where it gets iffy. No it’ not the best choice.. but it’s what I bring. Let’s talk shouts and consecrations as you’re traited for both. It would be a bit silly to bring three different types of utilities (although Signet of Judgement could work). Retreat just isn’t worth it… you have swiftness already, and ONE Aegis isn’t worth a utility slot. Hold the Line would be my runner up choice, but for me it just doesn’t do enough… 28 second cooldown for 5 second of protection (which you have already, hammer 1) and a 1600 heal over 7 seconds? I feel like I can get more out of utility slot. Hallowed Ground isn’t really needed as you have Stability from Stand Your Ground, and usually you pop stability to move THROUGH CC… HG is stationary. Save Yourselves isn’t your “Oh kitten” button, if you use it that way you will die. It pulls all conditions from your party to you. Here’s how I use it:
A) When I do need an “Oh kitten” button, Save Yourselves —> Purging Flames always works
B) When you are either restacking for another push or about to initiate the fight. Conditions will have been cleared at both these times, so SY can be used for the amazing boons without worry of suicide.
Now, putting aside the blaring cons, why bring SY? BOONS Protection, Regeneration, Swiftness, and Vigor along with some extra dps (Retaliation, Might, Fury) all for 13 seconds. Like previously stated, popping SY before moving in definitely gives you more general… how do I describe it.. horsepower for 13 seconds. It puts you into supercharge mode and gives you almost everything you could want (aside from stability) for a substantial amount of time. Oh, and it’s a stun break. Again, if you use it the right way, sold. 48 second cooldown.

Elite: I run two elites… one may seem noobish but, hey, I like it. It’s good.

The default – Renewed Focus. Virtue of Justice is generally used on cooldown. You should avoid using Virtue of Resolve as you lose the hps, and Virtue of Courage is generally used on cooldown or in times of need. Renewed Focus offers invulnerability for 2 seconds, similar to Shelter (our heal). THIS is your “Oh kitten” button. It allows us to reset our virtures. Generally Justice and Courage will already be on cooldown, but while channeling RF you should use Resolve for the 3,600 heal (including the regeneration is provides), as the passive will be instantly reset after the 2 second channel time. Again, you want to keep this passive up. Virtue of Resolve is like a mini Healing Signet for Guardians. The mechanics work the same way, only use Healing Signet or Virtue of Resolve is you absolutely NEED the small burst heal to survive. Otherwise, the passive regeneration far out weights the usageof the skill in healing.

When I have been running for hours and SBI fights the same zergs over and over and we are winning, I can go a bit more offensive. I often switch out Renewed Focus for the Human elite “Reaper of Grenth” (again, only when I have experience with who I’m fighting and KNOW they won’t come close to wiping us). This ticks (ticking is good as it’s resistant to condition clear… conditions are just reapplies) poison and chill for 15 seconds on 10 targets and is unblockable. Poison reduces healing effectiveness by 33% and damages foes while chill reduces movement speed and skill recharge rate by 66%. This is EXTREMELY GOOD. If I don’t need the survivability that RF offers, opening a fight with ticking chill and poison on the enemies’ 15 man melee train, which again cannot be cleared as it TICKS, is pretty kitten good. Bonus: makes you look kitten and it’s something that can and should be used every fight while using it, not just in times of “oh kitten” button spamming like RF. Sold!

(Please realize I run with Renewed Focus. Again, only if I’ve fought the same zerg 3+ times and know we will win the fight do I switch to the Reaper elite)

Food: Another factor that I believe to be player preference. I run Bowl of Lemongrass soup for condition-heavy fights, Mango Pies for the heals per second when I’m just doing whatever, and always whatever form of Sharpening Stones you can afford.

If you made it to the end of the wall of text, thank you for reading Please leave any comments on what could be improved or changed, however unless its a fairly minor change I will be keeping my current build.
>>I DO NOT DIE<<
I am ALWAYS in the fight and ALWAYS the last to die. Respective reasons being: because my god-mode tank build allows me to be and I only die when I stop receiving Altruistic Healing ticks.. this happens when the rest of the group wipes. I have ZERO complaints about this build. Works extremely well if you know how to not kill yourself with Save Yourselves (ha xD).
Thanks everyone! (x-fer to SBI. We kitten)

in this build you can clean the conditions only with purging flames once every 28 seconds and from 3rd water rune 1 cond every 30 sec with 25% chance + 1 cond with purity sigil with 30% chance …

so with this build you depend your survivability from conditions from other guardians to use trooper rune + pure of voice to clean your conditions ….

+ that you use hammer for the alter weapon and not mace + shield that is way better for healing specs or a second staff with different sigils …..

personal if i wanted a commander build with new armor i should use …. a warrior

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fJEQNAseSjMd05ZlHOewJagqgC9iHANgqhI9J01pAA-TVRWwAzV/Bw+DFU+NRJYc9BBAQAuZb2m3MwRP6RP6RPa38m38m38mlBgZBA-w

a class with 3760 armor , 31000 HP , 1760 POWER , 15% critical chance + 700 healing power + almost perma stability ….

p.s. your build was in the past but with 2 of each 3 healing runes to stack up maximum boon duration (total +45% boon duration ) . this can be now only if used full virtues trait + boon duration food + , +15% boon duration from runes. but for boons better use on staff the luck sigil

Other guardians are nice but I don’t really rely on anything for condition clear. What I have is enough for me and keeps me alive when the necro pops power signet. With the amount of survivability I have, a stack of bleed or something is pretty negligible in the long run. Also, I actually notice A LOT of cleanse come from whirl finishers in the massive amount of light fields I throw down.

On the topic of the weapons, I will have to disagree. The staff/staff with different sigils is a BAD idea, you need a melee weapon to be able to get in there and lead the charge. Also, Mace/Shield… I agree that it’s a better healing set. If you want healing, go M/S. I want survivability. Keep in mind this is WvW, not PvE. The hammer offers me a decent bit of healing with both finishers off my auto attack symbol, 410 hps with AH, and BY FAY the most important, the control. Ring of Warding in the smack dab middle of a battle is way better than a shield knockback. So again, healing, M/S. WvW commanding, I’ll stick with the hammer

That warrior seems pretty nice, but the thing is it’s stand alone. There’s not much that improves when you get into a zerg setting. I bring guardian because it pulls ahead of the warrior when you start running with 50+ people. Look at it this way. Healing: healing signet op. 400 heals per second give or take some depending on healing power. When I’m in the zerg, my hammer auto attack, symbol of swiftness, hammer 2, and just about everything else I throw out gives me 410 heals per second. Adding virtue of resolve to counter the warriors toughness 3 trait bonus, I match the heals per second of a warrior if not go over it while in combat. Oh wait, I still have a 2 second block and a 6,000 heal (5k from shelter, 1k from water rune bonus) on a 30 second cooldown. 1 vs 1 and theory crafting, the warrior is far superior to the guardian. However when you get into a zerg setting and realize how much the guardian shines, the guardian pulls ahead for sure.

Also, water runes give +20% boon duration, not +15% xD

soz typo for the difference of boons duration ( total 20% , not 15% ), but i have both guardians and warriors and for front-line zerg battles is selfish but better “driver” than guardian while guardian is better boon manager .

with warrior now , i can jump inside zerg without problem , while with my guardian i need stay in boon/heal range to not destroyed from burst damage. before April’s patch i could do the same with guardian but now , i have not find a way to do it without destroyed from zerg conditions .

the selfish part of warrior is not bad , because his mistakes or from his allies are not so much affect him as much affect guardian.

+ that the “kitten.ing” tab always choose guardian , not warriors …… check it

ok , it is your opinion and i accept it , but for me better “driver” was , is and will be the warrior .

Sounds interesting. Might craft some nomad parts.

Mace/shield is not a good frontliner; hammer is indeed a superior choice. A lot of people will tell you mace/shield isn’t good for anything in wvw , but I think it has its place as a mid-line healing build where your symbol of faith won’t screw with people’s water fields and you can heal the true frontliners with your autos.

Mace/shield cannot compare with the hammer’s easy blast finisher, or the immobolize or the ring of warding. All you have going for you is the shield knockback which is better than banish but that’s going to be nulled by stability too often and turns you into a sitting duck. It is inferior for AH to hammer. It lacks the mobility of greatsword. It just doesn’t have what it takes. to pin people down and absorb damage. It’s nice in more static fights, but in mobile zerg fights, it just loses out.

Anyhow, with that out of the way, I am on SBI, so I guess I have a vested interest. :p

Regardless, I do think that healing power is not that good on an AH build. Your AH healing is at 77 with 844 healing power, and the base is 69! You do have very high dodge heals. (they heal already for 973 heal a piece), so how about a sigil of energy? I don’t know if the heal sigils benefit from that much healing power though.

I do think this sort of condition removal is better than trooper/POV. Your argument against it is becoming true and more true every day I play— and why I ditched my trooper runes long ago. When you blow multiple cooldowns just to remove conditions, you’re not exactly using the shouts to their full potential at all not to mention futile in this day and age of conditions flying everywhere. I’m not just talking about enemy condition builds, necros and engineers regardless of builds could easily overwhelm you with tons of junk conditions that would waste your shouts.

Not to mention SY! isn’t particularly good with it due to it drawing conditions, and taking retreat is just silly. Popping stand your ground to remove a condition is just… not smart. The only complaint about purging flames is the cast time which aren’t instant like shouts are, but if you can manage it it should be fine.

I do see Signet of Judgement over SY! to be another good idea due to it being the lowest stunbreak cooldown not called SYG, but yea, using SY! to provide oomph as well as pushing conditions onto your large health pool is pretty sound.

How do you get Nomad weapon Recipes now? I keep seeing it saying random chance online, but i’ve bought nomad recipes in the past.