Guild Wars 2

BORING. Maybe I’m just using them wrong. Which is to say.. I’m not using them at all. 90% of the time I’m either solo or with a friend and it doesn’t seem worth it at all to put the passive effects on cooldown for a small buff to everyone. For a main profession mechanic, the virtues seem to be quite dull.

I’ve not seen anyone else discuss them to this capacity on the forums so I’m guessing I’m just doing something wrong. That or they really are just very straightforward and dull and everyone has gotten used to it.

Thoughts?

I use Justice on cooldown because my build gives me 3 stacks of Might every time I do, plus the 4 seconds (supposed to be 5) of burning right away. That, and I have +30% Virtue recharge so I can easily afford to be popping it on cooldown for damage.

As far as Resolve and Courage go…those are “OH KITTEN” buttons for the most part.

Without at least 5 points into virtues trait line they are mostly pointless to activate unless grouped. Even when grouped, they are minor to use unless traited.

If you pick up 5 into virtues you get boons for yourself and the group depending on which virtue is activated like Chris just mentioned. Also if you keep going down that line you can gain a 3 condition removal for your whole party and increased passive effect on virtue of resolve. Virtue of courage can gain a stun break and stability with increased passive occurances (30 sec cooldown instead of 40).

Go back up the trait lines and put some points into radiance and now you get an ae blind on each activation of justice. Also refresh justice each time an enemy is downed and you can spam blind on AE groups to increase survivability.

Alone virutes are weak but you can enhance them for situational useage.

The same for me – justice is quite nice, if you have at least 15 points in Radiance, when you can spam it at trash mobs.The other two just serve as “Oh kitten” buttons for me due to the long cooldown, the relatively weak effects and the lack of ways to recharge them apart from RF, which is itself on a rather long recharge.

Ah, I see. Yeah I’m only ~30 right now and I haven’t put anything into the virtues line. I guess for now it’s OK that I’m not activating them.. or really even debating activating them. Honestly, I barely even activate my heal signet.. usually I just pop a “Hold the Line” and it’s enough regen to keep me alive.

The intent was that it is stronger to keep passive for yourself but if you need to activate it, it will help the group.

a burn every 5 seconds versus everyone adds 4-5 seconds of burning. In a full group that would keep burning up just about until justice is off cooldown. If you have points into the virtue line it reduces virtue cooldowns so you could keep burning on a target for the duration of the fight as well as giving everyone might. Tie that into zeal with fiery wrath and radiance with radiant power and you have 20% extra damage you can do to that target.

Conditions are killer and with traits you can cleanse them on your group with resolve AND give them regeneration boons to recover from the condition damage, as well as a minor direct heal.

Courage can provide a block to save yourself and allies as well as provide protection after aegis wears off to reduce the damage after blocking as well. Additionally if you are stunned or knocked down courage could break stuns or avoid knock downs/fears or other conditions stability can avoid to allow you to keep control of your character and maybe roll out of the way and survive that big hit.

If you want to get even more crazy you can trait for pure of heart and provide a heal after your aegis breaks for even more group utility on “oh no” moments.

Renewed Focus lets you do all of that a second time without having to wait for virtues to recharge.

I’m selling virtues pretty hard, and they are REALLY situational, but they are not useless by a long shot

They may not be useless, but to be really useful, you need to invest heavily in them.

Keep in mind VoR and VoC have long cooldowns in the first place. They’re never meant to be activated if you can help it, and you only really do so to pull yourself or your party out of a sticky spot in a last ditch effort.

Having AH (valortrait 30) will make you view them more as oh —-- buttons.

Virtue of Courage is your ‘save your group from this one-shot’ button. Consider using it on things like Kholer’s pull (not the spin, the pull) since having an Aegis randomly proc on yourself once every 45 seconds probably won’t save you, but just block a standard attack you would have preferred to tank anyways.

For a while I ran a build with high condition damage and Renewed Justice (for levelling in PvE) which, combined with the might on VoJ trait, helped me churn through most mobs like they were nothing. I’d recommend it if you want to press that button frequently.

Also, if you’re in a dungeon group, use VoJ every time it’s up. The 25 seconds of burning from your group is going to be greater than the possible burn procs you alone could pull off in that 30 second time frame.

Play harder content

They just a mandatory signets. They’re powerful but I too find their effects to be a bit bland.

Virtue of justice can be pretty amazing, with the right traits, in addition to the burning you’re looking at a blind, three stacks of might, three stacks of vulnerability, and auto recharge when you kill something.

As with the others, I see F2 and F3 to be situational. In a tough fight I may need the healing/regeneration or Aegis/Protection now, but otherwise the CD is too long to see common use.

I do sometimes wonder if the virtue of courage refresh trait (when you rally) could be reworked to something like 25% of life instead. Also there is a surprising lack of virtue of resolve refresh trait. Could be something like after casting a heal speed VoR is renewed.

Put elusive power up on the zeal trait line, zealot’s speed, trait and name it zealot’s power, put virtue of resolve refresh in honor trait line and call it honorable resolve.

Change Courageous Return from refreshing Virtue of Courage on rally to refresh VoC at 25% life. Or maybe even “upon entering combat”, so it doesn’t interfere with valorous defense (aegis at 50%).

If traited for it, Virtues (including all shouts and many weapon skills) will heal you like the bees knees in times if dire need. Respect the virtues and the virtues will respect you. Word.

SplendidDust of AncientSuns.8453:

If traited for it, Virtues (including all shouts and many weapon skills) will heal you like the bees knees in times if dire need. Respect the virtues and the virtues will respect you. Word.

5 points in virtues tree + Altruistic healing is all you need and they’re useful. Boon to your party!

It really feels like Virtues need a rework. Virtues without traits are just more signets. Each offer a passive effect and an active effect. However, the passive effects are far superior to the active effects without points invested into the Virtues tree, and Virtue of Courage’s active doesn’t really get good enough to use it.

It’s a shame really. Comparing the F-key abilities between professions, I found Steal to be far superior as a profession ability than Virtues. Steal on its own shadowsteps the Thief and replaces itself with a random item (unless in PvP, then it becomes dependent on the target).

It functions like a utility as do Virtues. However, adding traits onto Steal have a much stronger effect. Steal can cooldown in about 30 seconds (more than Justice, less than Resolve), but it can be traited to apply might, swiftness, vigor, and fury as well as stealing two boons from the enemy for you and up to four allies on use. With additional traits, it can stealth, heal, and/or recovery additional initiative (the other profession specific ability of the Thief). It becomes something greater.

Virtues just feel like buffed, conditional utilities. The passives are great, and the actives can be something worth investing. Without investing, each Virtue just becomes a passive benefit to the Guardian. I want to see Virtues shine. Even a cooldown reduction would be fantastic. I can invest nothing into Virtues and never feel like I need to use any. But I can invest nothing into Steal and still use it.

And even though I didn’t get to experience it first-hand, I do believe that Virtue of Courage should not be reverted to every fifth attack is blocked.

Lets face facts, the Virtues are amazing little signet buffs while passive. But I get the OPs gripe; if your build never encourages you to pop the Virtues, they can be a bit boring. And on their own, none of the Virtues are worth popping.

With support, certain Virtues (especially Justice) can be worth popping. One trait folks haven’t mentioned, for instance, is the one that recharges Justice upon rally. This can be very helpful for groups against swarms in dungeons. But, yeah, most of the group would rather have you alive with your Virtues in tact instead of weakened with the minor buffs they got from popping the ability.

Yes, please keep in mind, I am not trying to say they’re bad by any means. The passive effects are great. And this is all said without having any traits to help them.

Just compared to the other professions’ F skills, they’re incredibly bland. The F skills usually define the gameplay of the profession.. elements, illusions, pets, tools.. but I’m going on lv35 or so having never touched em.

Maybe they are much more than passive effects once traited, but currently it just makes the guardian feel flat.

Mongo.2490:

Just compared to the other professions’ F skills, they’re incredibly bland. The F skills usually define the gameplay of the profession.. elements, illusions, pets, tools.. but I’m going on lv35 or so having never touched em.

In a way, it is pretty class defining that we can tank through so much, despite having one of the lowest HP pools in the game. Aegis just isn’t available much to the other classes.