Guild Wars 2

Excellent change to mighty blow, i love it, hammer is now valid as a primary weapon.

No need to add or change anything else on this weapon, the cast times are nice and powerful stuff like ring of warding and blow out should be either stationary when placed or long casting which require timing.

Great job

Edited by Moderator Reason: Staff call-outs

Primary? You must be joking.

Yes, this ‘hammer love’ was a joke as I see. Useless leap and useless trait, great.

then you havent figured it out, there are so many synergies in the traits with hammer thats its astounding.

Just check out what some critchance, altruistichealing and vigourus precision really do on an aoe mighty blow or the symbol.

I play with a berserker jewel and mighty blow rules now every 4 second, i hope you realise that mighty blow has the best dps of all skill we have and its aoe and 300 ranged now.

With traited symbols, size and duration, and 2h mastery this is really nasty and the more opponents you have the better it becomes.

As i said, it takes a bit more skill to hit with the chain, circle and banish but if you have that this is a menace to society.

You cant be for real when you say that leap is useless!!!

The trait is meh, i give you that, but my only concern with the hammer was lack of gapcloser and mighty blow being stationary. Both issues solved.

And you, sir, haven’t figured out about this synergies are much better with other weapons. Did I say something about bad skills we have right now? No, I said about bad changes for it. And what with your ‘I want gapcloser for hammer’? If you want gapcloser with hammer why are you not a warrior? Gapclosers is not what guardian needs at all.

Vlad.2769:

And you, sir, haven’t figured out about this synergies are much better with other weapons. Did I say something about bad skills we have right now? No, I said about bad changes for it. And what with your ‘I want gapcloser for hammer’? If you want gapcloser with hammer why are you not a warrior? Gapclosers is not what guardian needs at all.

Well i played over 200 tournements so far and been thru beta so i think i have a grasp on what synergies there are. I was an addict to scepter/1h but i just removed the scepter, the hammer is superior and critting for 4k with mighty blow 50% of the times is just to good, and it just turned ranged.

Play warrior, what does that have to do with anything? Is there a contradiction in being a guardian playing with a hammer and lacking a gapcloser in the hammer? Should only warriors have gapclosers on hammers?

And yes it has to do with skill when people think banish and the chain are to slow. They are slow but when they hit they are very powerful. People need to check out the dps on the chain, really check it out and compare the executiontime with our other chains, i think they will be suprised.

It was what the hammer needed, not guardian in general. The hammer is fine now, if i get faster animations on banish and the chain it will turn OP. Dps is really nice and cc is great. Im satisfied.

Brutaly.6257:

Well i played over 200 tournements so far and been thru beta so i think i have a grasp on what synergies there are. I was an addict to scepter/1h but i just removed the scepter, the hammer is superior and critting for 4k with mighty blow 50% of the times is just to good, and it just turned ranged.

Play warrior, what does that have to do with anything? Is there a contradiction in being a guardian playing with a hammer and lacking a gapcloser in the hammer? Should only warriors have gapclosers on hammers?

And yes it has to do with skill when people think banish and the chain are to slow. They are slow but when they hit they are very powerful. People need to check out the dps on the chain, really check it out and compare the executiontime with our other chains, i think they will be suprised.

It was what the hammer needed, not guardian in general. The hammer is fine now, if i get faster animations on banish and the chain it will turn OP. Dps is really nice and cc is great. Im satisfied.

I agree, the hammer feels “fluid” now. Good changes.

Brutaly.6257

It was what the hammer needed, not guardian in general. The hammer is fine now, if i get faster animations on banish and the chain it will turn OP. Dps is really nice and cc is great. Im satisfied.

I love the small leap they added to Mighty Blow, it’s actually much more effective to land the MB damage against targets that tend to move a lot in PvP.
With that said, concerning the quote above, who cares if it would make it overpowered or not, this is just from a FUN factor standpoint, if they speed up the chain and it ends up doing too much damage, it’s a matter of changing the numbers, not hard at all. I’m by far not the only one that thinks the main chain feels too slow.

I’m anxious to try it, love the hammer….have to wait until night….. But just one point to Vlad, when you say “play a warrior”, you already know that this statement doesnt work here right? Classes changes arent the same idea on GW2 as in other mmo’s. The end of the trinity also impact all classes. I have a guardian and it means I can play as a dps, tanker, support, at every situtation I think its better.

Good, but not enough. The chain really needs to be sped up and the damage reworked to accommodate a faster attack animation. That or put the symbol on the 2nd chain hit.

Hammer IS a better weapon because of this leap, it still might need a few minor tweaks (nothing wrong with speed; it’s a hammer not a 1h sword, it can’t get faster.) to be a bit suitable for PvE aspect of the game, but we’re getting there.

Vlad.2769:

If you want gapcloser with hammer why are you not a warrior.

Wow, did you really just use this argument?

im still kinda meh about the changes, Trait is meh, Im happy with the leap because it just plainly makes the hammer more fun. But that third attack X_X…still makes it hard to pick.

Khenzy.9348:

Brutaly.6257

It was what the hammer needed, not guardian in general. The hammer is fine now, if i get faster animations on banish and the chain it will turn OP. Dps is really nice and cc is great. Im satisfied.

I love the small leap they added to Mighty Blow, it’s actually much more effective to land the MB damage against targets that tend to move a lot in PvP.
With that said, concerning the quote above, who cares if it would make it overpowered or not, this is just from a FUN factor standpoint,

I agree from a very shortsighted perspective, read further down and i will try to explain why reduced animationtime on step three actually is a nerf and not boost.

Brutaly.6257

Brutaly.6257

It was what the hammer needed, not guardian in general. The hammer is fine now, if i get faster animations on banish and the chain it will turn OP. Dps is really nice and cc is great. Im satisfied.

I’m by far not the only one that thinks the main chain feels too slow.

Well they/you havent played enough with it to understand the genious with the hammer. Read on and i will try to explain it.

Good, but not enough. The chain really needs to be sped up and the damage reworked to accommodate a faster attack animation. That or put the symbol on the 2nd chain hit.

Sorry, no. Its simple has to stay the same and a reduction to animationspeed or applying the symbol of the second step infact is a nerf.

Before they added the leap (or is it a blastfinisher???) i would have agreed but now hitting with mighty blow is much easier and that is crucial to the use of the hammer.

Aven.7295:

But that third attack X_X…still makes it hard to pick.

Its actually the third step that makes the hammer good.

Her it is:

If you use 2h mastery you get 4 sec cd on mighty blow and with that cd you can start a combofield with the third step every chain and finish it with every time with mighty blow even though its has to be applied right away. Do you see it?

Retaliation and protection on every chain and if traited, and geared for it, you will have infinite retal and protection on your team. This is beyond nice, not just from a boon perspective but also from a survivalperspective. If you add in altruistic healing, vigorous precision and empowering might we apply 4 boons about every second with the hammer, in a 300-600? radius. and every boon applies 70-76 heals.

With 3 teammates and one opponent in radius (more opponent means more chances to crit on aoe and more boons and heals) and 50% critchance it means about 400-700 heals every skill 1 and 2 rotation. Yeah you read it right, that is how good this is.

If you reduce animation time, even if you dont adjust the uptime on symbol of protection accordingly, it would mean that the cd would be to long on mighty blow so you wont be able to apply a finisher to every symbol you put down.

This would mean that if you have a faster animation you need to do either two full chains or 1,5 chains, missing out on one symbol, and 2 mighty blow, missing out on one finisher.

So you miss out on:
Retal
Protection
Burst
In combination with each other or one or the other exclusively.

Well you get the point, its not by chance that the animation on the chain is corresponding to the cd on traited mighty blow.

If you trait larger symbols and longer duration (duration wont make it possible to get two combofinishers, for that the chains has to be faster then the 1h sword chain) the loss of the extra finisher will be even more severe.

I hope this will actually make you see the hammerchain in a new light, its friggin great if you just learn to hit with it.

Hammer is by far the best support weapon we have, nothing else can apply protections and retaliation as effective as this weapon, there isnt a single weapon/skill in the game that even comes close to it.

And people that hasnt hardly used it, or even understood this, wants to nerf it because they dont understand how it works.

The leap was a massive buff to the above and made the weapon superstrong.

Once again i like my 4k hits and constant protection and retal on me and the team.

You guys want to give away either our burst or our capability to support just because you want it more convenient or less demanding.

Sorry, i cant support this at all.

Specc altruistic healing and empowering might, then you play hundred games with it and then say that this weapon is any way weak or not on par.

Its the best support weapon in the game and shortening animations times or add the symbol to step 2 is infact a nerf, even if you might have difficulties understanding it.

Sorry for broken or blunt english…..

I just played around with hammer today in structured PvP.

OMG!!!

Make a fiery spirit weapon build and use a hammer and you are nearly unstoppable. The spirit weapons chase down kiters. They deal constant damage. The spirit hammer ability can stop someone long enough for you to catch them. Then you have the CC of the 2H hammer itself; allowing you to snare and trap opponents. Once they are in the ring with you, just blast away with the hammer smash, and spirit weapon attacks and they will drop down 75% health instantly. from there you just have to hit them a few more times with your combo or class abilities.

The other build was the fiery retaliation build. No spirit weapons just 2 H Hammer and reflective dmg and fire. People basically kill themselves hitting you then pop in a few well placed hits from the hammer and its victory.

I had huge doubts with hammer skills before, but when placed in builds that focus all of your damage in the abilities, the hammer just becomes an insane secondary damage CC item that delivers better than any other weapon.

Urrelles.4018:

Make a fiery spirit weapon build and use a hammer and you are nearly unstoppable. The spirit weapons chase down kiters. They deal constant damage. The spirit hammer ability can stop someone long enough for you to catch them. Then you have the CC of the 2H hammer itself; allowing you to snare and trap opponents. Once they are in the ring with you, just blast away with the hammer smash, and spirit weapon attacks and they will drop down 75% health instantly. from there you just have to hit them a few more times with your combo or class abilities.

This isnt specific for hammer gameplay, its a spiritweapon thingy and can be done with all weaponsets since those are selfplaying pianos or more or less i win buttons.

The solution to ring of warding is easy, its called stability, something any selfrespecting pvpplayer should have in their skillset, if not you are asking for a cc-lock to death.

I
The other build was the fiery retaliation build. No spirit weapons just 2 H Hammer and reflective dmg and fire. People basically kill themselves hitting you then pop in a few well placed hits from the hammer and its victory.

I had huge doubts with hammer skills before, but when placed in builds that focus all of your damage in the abilities, the hammer just becomes an insane secondary damage CC item that delivers better than any other weapon.

Yepp, its a great weapon, if you just can hit with that third step in the chain. The combination of damage, control and support is just supernice and as such a versitile weapon it has to incorporate some skill which i do find that the animationstimes do, ofc besides having synergies between the chain and mighty blow ofc.

Ive tried the Spirit weapon build with many other weapons. People tend to dodge the sword AE ability. Using a scepter is still really good with spirit weapon build, but the hammer is far superior if you want to kill people with extreme amounts of speed.

BTW there are a ton of people without stability in structured PvP. I’ve trapped so many people using the spirit hammer & trapping ring combo.

I’ve also tried hammer with the burning retaliation build. It is also the best weapon there. It’s a difficult weapon to time hits with but it pays off greatly. Mezmers are no problem now because I kill there pets in 1 or 2 hits. With the greatsword I was still getting swarmed and being forced to run in circles fighting and army of clones.

Also Brutality, I like how you elevate yourself by making your standards and tactics seem like the pro tactic that every “selfrespecting pvpplayer” should know. It’s that mind set that always allows people like me to come into the scene with an unorthodox weapon, like the hammer, and completely wreck your world.

Brutaly.6257:

lotsa words

I agree wholeheartedly with this, though I still wish #3 and #5 could be tweaked a bit more. I’d actually love it if wards got a minor trait to boost their effectiveness, kinda like how line of warding reflected projectiles as well during beta if traited. I think glacial heart would’ve been better off being applied if someone runs into one of our wards as well as knockdown, rather than a hammer critical.

Hey guys, Sorta new player here, recently rolled a Guardian, and I’ve ALWAYS loved being a 2H Hammer-Class player (LOVED the Bear Shaman in AoC and the Warrior-Priest in WAR), the Guardian fits my playstyle perfectly! However, I can’t seem to put together a good trait build, or one that makes sense. I see alot of you guys talking great things and I was wondering if you guys would be kind enough to link a solid Hammer Build, as I STILL can’t find one with PvE in mind.

I tried looking for what “Brutaly” was mentioning with “altruistic healing and empowering might” but I cant put together anything that synergizes well, or the Spirit Weapons Build (Which is pretty self explanitory until AFTER getting the Spirit Hammer & Sword, then what?), or even the Burning Retaliation Build sounds good, but I have no idea where to even start with that.

Im sorry to derail like this, but with all the Hammer talk, I figure this may be the best place to ask.

I really appreciate it guys!

Try this webpage. It has a lot of facts that will give you all the standard builds people have been using. Most of this stuff revolves around the skill traits you choose. The spirit weapon build requires you to put trait points into burning weapons, duration, reusability, and power.

http://guildwars2grandmaster.com/guild-wars-2-builds/guardian-builds/

Faction.4013:

Hey guys, Sorta new player here, recently rolled a Guardian, and I’ve ALWAYS loved being a 2H Hammer-Class player (LOVED the Bear Shaman in AoC and the Warrior-Priest in WAR), the Guardian fits my playstyle perfectly! However, I can’t seem to put together a good trait build, or one that makes sense. I see alot of you guys talking great things and I was wondering if you guys would be kind enough to link a solid Hammer Build, as I STILL can’t find one with PvE in mind.

I tried looking for what “Brutaly” was mentioning with “altruistic healing and empowering might” but I cant put together anything that synergizes well, or the Spirit Weapons Build (Which is pretty self explanitory until AFTER getting the Spirit Hammer & Sword, then what?), or even the Burning Retaliation Build sounds good, but I have no idea where to even start with that.

Im sorry to derail like this, but with all the Hammer talk, I figure this may be the best place to ask.

I really appreciate it guys!

I’m running a 10/0/10/30/20 atm, with increased symbol radius and duration, -20% 2handed weapon cooldown. This is the most important part of the build, which lets me chain area retaliation and protection. If you’re using the hammer, remember that you trade off burst damage for group utility (kinda =p ). The GS can strip conditions, but the hammer can apply much more in terms of boons with its blast attack.

I find consecrations to be the best thing to use with hammers, so I’ll run Purging Flames, Wall of Reflection, and Save Yourselves. This gives me a nice protection boost off the bat, so I can survive a bit longer until my prot/retaliation chain gets going. I also find Renewed Focus to be a lifesaver, giving me a long time of invulnerability and letting me spread out my virtues without having to worry about cooldowns.

I think the most important part of using the hammer, though, is know how to switch weapons at the right time and having a good secondary set. I love the mace/focus combo to switch to when I’m feeling a little pressured. I lose the area protection, but I get 4 blocks, a mass blind, mass retaliation, and a nice bit of healing to go with it.

I’ve thought about going 0/20/0/30/20, which, if you use the signet to heal, can give you an incredible 5 condition removal when combined with Absolute Resolve (Resolve active also removes 3 conditions. To me, the hammer is a bit less aggressive than the greatsword in that you can afford to not deal the most damage in the shortest amount of time. Align yourself right, use your utilities at the right time, and earn the thanks of your allies as you turn them all into prickly tanks. =D

You guys kickkitten Thanks VERY much!