Guild Wars 2

Ynna.8769:

And our team support is indeed great. It’s why I chose this class and remains a big reason why I prefer to play it. But the truth is, support is basically meaningless for most aspects of the game.

I think this is the biggest misconception in the game.

Does it mean that if you have a guardian in a fight, ur going to auto-win it? Of course not. Does support guard depend on your team not being absolutely terrible? Of course it does. But when people know what they are doing, you WILL dominate a team who doesn’t have a guardian. I’ve had so many landslide victorys simply because I decided to play a support guardian and the other team tried to all play bursty, or internally bunkery specs.

Granted, support has severe limitations in PvE. But I personally think the onus on this is more about how the AI functions in the game, and how it can be easily exploited, than anything else.

I have yet to see large impacts of Supportive builds, despite trying them out frequently.

I’ve laid out my reasoning in the long post above, but I’ll reiterate:

In PvE, defensive support doesn’t keep people alive because the enemies hit too hard. Some tricks with Wall of Reflection are fun, but not enough to call it “support.”

In sPvP, support has to be incidental. You can’t focus on support, because it means (a) being totally reliant on other players and (b) not having the necessary power to handle threats on your own. If the Guardian was changed so that they only granted boons to themselves, they would be about equally viable.

In WvWvW’s zergs, you’re not bringing anything that nobody else is bringing as a support Guardian. Healing isn’t strong enough to make a meaningful difference. Stability is sorta useful, but there’s no need to go all-out on support for and a zerg will not be stopped by a couple of knockdown effects.

The only place where support actually shines is in small group vs group PvP which only occurs in WvWvW and only very occasionally. A “guerillia” roaming group in WvW can benefit from a dedicated support player, but only in as much as they expect to run into similar groups.

Ynna.8769:

In PvE, defensive support doesn’t keep people alive because the enemies hit too hard. Some tricks with Wall of Reflection are fun, but not enough to call it “support.”

In sPvP, support has to be incidental. You can’t focus on support, because it means (a) being totally reliant on other players and (b) not having the necessary power to handle threats on your own. If the Guardian was changed so that they only granted boons to themselves, they would be about equally viable.

Well I can’t say too much about PvE because I don’t play it often enough, but I can say that having a support character on any team does not give your team willful abandon of knowing how to dodge. So you’re right; with a team that has absolutely no idea how to play the game, a support guard will only delay the inevitable. It also sucks that you’re putting alot of your chips into the combat capabilities of your teammates. This is true for any support role for any game. However they are absolutely critical when two competent teams are fighting each other. Or, again, a competent team running a support against a competent team not running any support, the one with support should win – no excuses.

I don’t know how to put this other than a team, with support roles, who all know what they are doing against another team who doesn’t have solid support roles, it will be very easy for the team who has support to roll over the other team.

The common guardian spec in tpvp runs with a cleric ammy and does crap raw damage.

Bottom line, you CAN win a random game with Faceless Void + Spectre + whatever. But against competent groups/teams, you’re going to need some support.

I hope Zealous Blade is improved.

The healing is too weak and the damage increase is negligible.

It should be raised to a base of 50 and apply to all weapons.

Remove the 5% dmg for GS.

Ezrael.6859:

I hope Zealous Blade is improved.

The healing is too weak and the damage increase is negligible.

It should be raised to a base of 50 and apply to all weapons.

Remove the 5% dmg for GS.

And where would you propose the dmg % trait for the GS come from?

Lonewolf Kai.3682:

Ezrael.6859:

I hope Zealous Blade is improved.

The healing is too weak and the damage increase is negligible.

It should be raised to a base of 50 and apply to all weapons.

Remove the 5% dmg for GS.

And where would you propose the dmg % trait for the GS come from?

There aren’t a lack of badly designed, under performing or traits that make you wonder WTF was the designer thinking.

So assuming you made Zealous Blade heal for more & made it effect all weapons you could still find plenty of other places for a greatsword trait.
Not that I think it should effect all weapons, but it could definitely use a buff.

Last time I counted there were about 20 traits for the guardian that fit the criteria I listed above.
Could be more or less depending on your personal preferences but still that’s allot of space for merging traits, reworking them & or creating new ones completely.

A “Glacial Heart” mayor buff

Guardian needs buffs to swiftness uptime, and condition cleansing to make dps builds viable. i dont see how a class with low mobility, low HP and low options for cleansing outside of shouts can have build diversity.

Also, shield and torch need to be tuned heavily.

Lots of hate on pve support guards.
Totally agree that in a skilled team you may as well go full zerker but I’ve carried multiple pug wipe fests in fotm49 in ventari gear simply because my team will not die while I want to keep them up.
I used to be a huge zerker fan but there are an awful lot of lowly skilled ones just dying over and over in high fractals who really should just admit they’re not skilled enough for it.

Anyway as mentioned above the effect of shield 4 is great but the area of effect is poorly thought out. Shield 5 is clunky and should be an instant, mobile bubble based on the guardian lasting significantly longer than the current duration.

Torment on scepter auto attack

Artaz.3819:

Torment on scepter auto attack

LOLOLOLOLOL

I’m kinda afraid now and nervous about the Ready Up. So litle time left

Ragnar the Rock.3174:

Lonewolf Kai.3682:

Ezrael.6859:

I hope Zealous Blade is improved.

The healing is too weak and the damage increase is negligible.

It should be raised to a base of 50 and apply to all weapons.

Remove the 5% dmg for GS.

And where would you propose the dmg % trait for the GS come from?

There aren’t a lack of badly designed, under performing or traits that make you wonder WTF was the designer thinking.

So assuming you made Zealous Blade heal for more & made it effect all weapons you could still find plenty of other places for a greatsword trait.
Not that I think it should effect all weapons, but it could definitely use a buff.

Last time I counted there were about 20 traits for the guardian that fit the criteria I listed above.
Could be more or less depending on your personal preferences but still that’s allot of space for merging traits, reworking them & or creating new ones completely.

Hmm, I could see that. Personally, I think the trait is okay, but do agree that it needs bumping up to make it a great trait. Either the damage % goes up, which is okay, or the healing goes up, which is what I think is more preferable.

Awesome CHANGES

Renewed Focus will become a Meditation
MI is ground targeting skill, but it will only port if you use it on an allie. Still really good change. I’m still no sure if I will use in it on my regular Medi Guard Build and Comtemplation is still kinda needed for condi clear, but its still a really nice change for support Guardian

Tomes change are also really nice. I’ll try Tome of Wrath for my offencive build now and Tome of Courage will be an option for support Guardian now with Stability there we can try and cast number 5 a bit more secured (Thiefs will still be able to interrupt it but they will have to pay attention)

OMG I’m really excited for these changes. I don’t think we had such good changes in a while