WvW Guardian Ideas
Guardians come in handy in two big scenarios; bridges and raiding.
For bridges, it’s a no-brainer: plop down your two walls and give your team a good 5 seconds of breathing room, if not necessarily safe from AoEs. However, I’ve noticed that people tend to unload their most powerful attacks off the bat, which means my wall of reflection (always put down first) is about to give them a world of hurt. I’ve downed three people once, who spammed attacks before realizing my wall had just come up. If you have a full party of guardians, suddenly that bridge becomes invulnerable to being crossed (stability/bugs notwithstanding, of course) for ~25 seconds.
Furthermore, and this applies very well to the ruins in the south of the borderlands map, walls are perfect for trapping the enemy as they try to escape a counter zerg. Just today, I managed to help kill ten people who tried to run away, only to be rebuffed by my line. A few jumped into the river to try and escape, and were quickly downed as well.
As for raiding, being able to keep swiftness on the group, while utilizing empower before engagements, means I am highly valuable to my party. I run with 20 in Virtues, so I can target with my consecrations and have a lowered cd on them; empower gives greater condition damage, so pop that before using purging flames for an added damage bonus from afar.
True, guardians aren’t great on the walls without the use of siege equipment, but in the open field we can be deadly if you choose the right ground to defend. Stay by your allies to act as a force multiplier, and I’d definitely run with a staff/hammer or staff/greatsword to make those pesky warriors pay for thinking they can go toe-to-toe with you. Added bonus: when they try and run away, pop a line of warding. Hilarious.
Build: 0/20/0/30/20
Traits: Signet Mastery, Inscribed Removal, 2handed Mastery, Writ of Exaltation & Persistence, Consecrated Ground, Master of Consecrations
I’d like a Charrzooka that works just like an Engineer kit. Or a wieldable spirit bow or some decent ranged weapon that’s more fitting for a knight than a wand or a staff.
Tennis balls in slow motion, are you seeious?
Guardian weak for WvW??? You gotta be kidding me!
You can help, a LOT!
Some examples:
IMO the best way to go is with Staff / Scepter and Shield.
You can Empower your teams Dmg and also heal.
Use line of warding, very, very fun to use.
Buff speed for allies.
AoE auto attack.
Use scepter 2 for a nice ranged dmg, it is, trust me.
Using shield, do I really have to say how or why?
Using Wall of Absorption in front of gates.
Using Sanctuary to heal up allies.
Use Tomes for a nice utility with dmg.
C’mon, there’s so much to do.
Don’t forget your virtues!!
Umm, In my experience there is both good and bad to the Guardian in WVWVW. Setting myself up now, Im a pure Health and toughness build. Im not ment to deal damage, Im ment to survive and make all my allies survive to.
I have the hardest time surviving in wvwvw. I utalize the staff to its fullest. But in wvw we only have one weapon set for range. The scepter. Which has so little support it kind of makes it worthless. Yet I have to run with it if I want to do anything except sit back and buff allies.
The amount of AOE and damage in wvw discourages Guardians from useing 90% of our equipment. Since Sheild of absrobtion has no protection against a magma font, or metoer swarm. I find that as a guardian I am only best in large groups.
On my own, a theif can gank me without effort. And even with all my healing, rolls, and defensive skills. The theif will normaly always win. I can not get away, and I can not “Sheild” against enough of those aoes to make being anything other the scepter/staff viable. Espeicaly since Ive tried really hard to be a mace sheild guardian in wvw. Even one on one. I threw up a shield of absrob, and an ele just blasted me down with aoe.
Id like more range. If your looking for the class that can walk onto the field and make everyone that much more deadly. I think the guarian is perfect. I like feeling usefull to the armies of my world. But I never expect to be anything better then a support, or protector, or mildly “minor” damage. I think it has ups and downs like every class, and WVW is a very tricky bugger, espeicaly with the guardian since the lack of range places you at a deadly crossroads. “Save your friends and possibly die trying…Or try to run away and possibly die trying”.
Guardian weak for WvWvW? You gotta be kidding me!
You can help, a LOT!
The problem isn’t that we don’t have enough to do in WvWvW.
The problems are:
- Support isn’t properly rewarded.
- We are limited to one specific type of gameplay in WvWvW. (Meaning: not everyone finds support fun.)
- It can be hard to see the effectiveness of your support spells.
- Most of our weapons become useless in sieges.
“Come on, hit me!”
My only problem with WvW is that staves can’t fire upwards.
Outside of hitting people/rams through gates with my staff, I quickly become useless (outside of supporting) when helping with a siege.
And no, I’m not going to carry a scepter. I prefer my mace/torch and staff.
Garillo -Guardian ** Dosbox- Engineer
Garillobot- Ranger * Shilombish Hokoffi- Necro
Ahalaia Afabi Sipi- Thief *
Garillobot- Ranger * Shilombish Hokoffi- Necro
Ahalaia Afabi Sipi- Thief *
As Ynna said – the biggest problem is that no matter how incredible our support is, we get squat for doing it. I sometimes do get a bag or two, if really big zerg shows up and I’m lucky enough that some of them dies from my symbol of swiftness. But to grind badges for legendary as guardian support is annoying to say the least…
What is this great support you guys are talking about?
Support sucks for quite a few reasons:
1. You do not get rewarded for it.
2. Every support ability has rather high cooldowns so you’re spending most of your time hanging around like an useless tool while waiting for your cooldowns to refresh. How’s that considered fun or awesome in WvW?
3. Your ultimates are either useless or turn you into a caster for 20 seconds every 3 minute and are exactly the kind of boring support you can find in WoW, that made people hate supporting. GW2 has plenty of fun and decent support such as combo fields and boons that fit a defensive knight archetyp way more than casting stuff.
The Guardian also desperately needs a true ranged weapon that is fun to use and doesn’t have a pathetic, unfun autoattack! He’s the only profession with no decent ranged combat and it shows in WvW. Some parts of WvW are simply no fun at all for a Guardian. Don’t get me wrong, the Guarian is a blast but there are 2 things that absolutely ruin the fun for me: His lame ultimates and the lack of a true, decent and fun ranged weapon. Heck, I’d swap the ultimates and my first born for the Warrior’s rifle and his rifle abilities.
At least I can take the Charrzooka and have some fun every 3 minutes.
Guardian weak for WvW??? You gotta be kidding me!
You can help, a LOT!
Getting NO REWARDS!!
:DDD
Lame elite skills and lame ranged weapon.
The issue is not getting no rewards for supporting, it’s having nothing useful and fun to do in large parts of WvW due to questionable design choices such as not having a true and viable ranged weapon such as a rifle or a bow or ultimates that don’t let you survive in a zerg.
Quite honestly, I think it’s good that you don’t get warded or being a healbot/buffbot/supportbot in this game since everything is built around combat, doing stuff in combat and using supportive skills tactically in combat while not being a pure supporter. The issue is simply the Guardian being the only prossion in this game that has no fun and viable ranged weapons and people are right to complain about it since this is a huge issue and a massive design flaw imho.
Look at the warrior. While his bow sucks, the rifle is nicely done and extmely fun to use. His abilities work fine in either ranged or melee combat, making him a very versatile and decent profession (that is unfortunately extmely boring to play) but nevertheless, the Warrior is one of th best professions in this game. While the Guardian is fun, he’s too controversial since they tried to combine a knight wirh a caster and it failed. Most of the abilities work best, if you’re in melee which is fine in spvp, but doesn’t work in large scale PvP/WvW. The lack of decent ultimates that complement the Guardian’s melee centered design and the lack of a real ranged weapon is just making this class incredibly difficult to enjoy in WvW and sometimes in PvE, too.
Staff and scepter do not only look incredibly hideous in a knight’s hand, they are also the by far most lackluster and unfun weapons in the entire game! Every class has the possibility to adapt its weapon choices to match the player’s preferrence. Every class but the Guardian! It’s not that we would become imbalanced powerhouses when they handed us rifles or bows. Every weapon is a gain but also a sacrifice to some extent. If you get a focus instead of a torch you lose the fire condition and the AoE cone damage/cleanse, but gain a shield and a blind. The weapon is a tactical choice as well as a matter of preferrence. Bsically we can pick either a lackluster staff with pathwtic ofnaive abilities and mediocre support (that renders you quite useless until your cooldowns refsh) or a mediocre, hideous fairy wand that hast the most ridiculous and undun autoattack in the history of video games. I don’t know about you but I didn’t roll a Guardian to wield a wand or a staff and have some ultimates that would suit a skirt wearing princess much better. I want a real man weapon. A kingdom for a rifle…
(edited by shedim.8504)
Personally I think Guardians are the most invaluable class in WvW.
I don’t care about rewards, I care about winning, about taking a keep or succesfully defending one. Mostly I play with my guild. We never put Guardians on siege-weapons, they’re too strong to be missed.
Wall of Reflection is extremely powerful. Someone else explained how you can block of choke points or bridges combining WoR with the Staff Wall. WoR is also great in defending siege-weapons or dolyaks from ranged fire.
But absolutely most important is defending a gate.
1) Pop Stability
2) Jump down from above your gate right into mayhem.
3) Pop your wall in front of the gate
4) Profit
5) If needed pop your heal that blocks during the cast and use the portal door back into your tower/keep.
6) Profit
7) $$$$$$$$$
8) Get two other Guardian friends so you have the gate non-stop defended against projectiles.
9) MORE PROFIT $$$$$$$$$$$$
The Staff
- 1. Great auto-attack. In zergy/laggy fights I use it as sonar. Foes tend not to load yet so I have no idea how many there are. I just spam my staff and will see damage numbers pop up for every foe. Great way to find out how many enemies there are.
Also the number one skill does decent damage and easily lets you tag a lot of people. Besides you don’t have to target anything, don’t require line of sight and pretty good range. It’s the best no-brain skill which gives you plenty of time thinking about your positioning, tactics and all that kind of stuff.
- 2. Crappy. Combine it with number four on your friends when they are headbutting a gate. The healing helps a lot, esp if you have more Guardians doing it.
- 3. Best swiftness ability of Guardian. Spam it! Movement is everything.
- 4. See 2. Oh and Might makes me right!
- 5. Invaluable. Keep people out of their tower. Secure a retreat. Split up foes in a choke point. Chain it with other Guardians for more profit.
I know that Guardians aren’t that interesting to solo with. They don’t do a lot of damage. They’re crap at range. But if that’s what you want, you shouldn’t have rolled the Guardian in the first place. I rolled the Guardian to play with my guildmates. To use Shield of Absorption to rescue Downed players. To be tough and able to survive in hard situations. To be able to effect the flow of battles by placing walls at the right moment at the right place. To be able to save friends from the brink.
I build for Toughness. I’m a max-sized Norn in shiny armour. Meant to psychologically influence the flow of battle, by fearing my opponents with the sight of a charging Norn and encouraging my allies to join me. Gotta time it right though.
So far I totally like it.
I use the Scepter. It isn’t that good, but it’s ranged. All the skills are useful too, but do little damage. (Doh, you’re a guardian) Tbh the Scepter of the Mesmer is in a lot worse state.
[center]Karn Aanug [KA][/center]
I get that not everyone is is cool with melee being the under dog when it comes to massive battles, but when was this NOT the case? If anything, they improved on past situations by giving traditional melee classes ranged options (albeit limited for the Guardian).
Not everyone wants to run around with a Scepter and I get that, but foolishly thinking you should always be able to run into the thick of things with a greatsword and coming out the victor when it comes to SIEGE WAFARE is just too much of a stretch.
That being said, I don’t get heavily attached to HAVE to use this weapon or so forth all the time. I see how they made the game as an encouragement to bring the correct weapon for the engagement. Scepter/Shield + Staff is great when you need to keep your battlements healthy on the walls but you’d bekittensure I’m switching to Sword/Focus + Hammer when we’re bum rushing the keep.
The Guardian has a lot of neat utilities that are invaluable. You’re the ONLY class that can become a full time healer (by popping tome) for a short while. You also have the most access to retaliation AND AoE Stability. Wards speak for themselves and the amount of hard control effects in junction with all of this makes for a solid class all around in any engagement.
If you HAVE to always melee, then perhaps go for more melee friendly scenarios? Don’t frustrate yourself by standing on keep walls and go assault or defend a supply camp somewhere, you’re not helping anyone standing with a greatsword while everyone shoots balls of lightning and what not at each other. Otherwise, man akittensiege weapon!
They gave you options to adapt to numerous scenarios, its YOUR fault if you aren’t willing to utilize it. The only complain you should have is that WvW and PvE in general shafts less damaging specs in general.
(edited by Lumines.3916)
You’re wrong. I think you do know you don’t get loot or contribution from supporting or playing healbot. The fact that the Guardian can become a full healer in a game where full healers should not even exist speaks a lot for how dumb the very idea of the tome actually is.
The scepter is okay, but the autoattack is not and that is the only ability that you will be using most of the time in ranged combat. It is neither fun nor interesting to play because it is the only option a Guardian has and the orbs are inarguably rather cumbersome and lackluster. While you might be fine or even enjoy standing around hauling magical tennis balls in slow motion with your fairy wand, some people would prefer something that actually looks like a weapon and feels like a weapon.
You’re basically saying it is our fault that the Guardian as the only class in this entire game is lacking in large scale PvP and people aren’t having fun with it?. I think I don’t have to tell you how ill-advised your statement is.
Well, you cant enjoy guardian to fullest in wvw, as i liked aoeing ppl at walls or reverse. That is quite not possible, unless guardian will get some normal ranged weapon. So thats why I am playing roamer and capping camps, or do some little help getting keeps, better to protect siege weapons.
Scepter is honestly fail, number 1 skill useless, number 2 is not even aoe sadly and is best used only while you immobilize target, what is hard as skill 3 range is 900. Against rangers with 1.5k range. Staff is great tool for chasing prey and roam.
You have to find what you like to do, I wont do wvw solo anymore with guardian, will go do it only with guildies and roaming and capping camps around map. Staff speed skill 3, retreat shout gives us really nice roaming around map.
I use the Scepter. It isn’t that good, but it’s ranged. All the skills are useful too, but do little damage. (Doh, you’re a guardian) Tbh the Scepter of the Mesmer is in a lot worse state.
Totally disagree — I have both a Guardian (57) and Mesmer (65). I give the Mesmer scepter the advantage in 1v1 and the Guardian scepter the advantage in group combat.
The Mesmer scepter is very good for the #3 skill alone (confusion kills in PvP/WvW big time). Mesmer Scepter 2 is good for block/blind (AoE blind if in a line). Mesmer Scepter 1 is a clone spammer which can be evil depending upon traits.
Guardian Scepter 2 is good as a general AoE when defending from the top of a wall — but it’s not going to kill anyone outright. Guardian Scepter 3 is good to root a single running foe.
I give the Mesmer scepter the advantage overall because you can ultimately kill someone with it (while also defending yourself). The Guardian scepter really doesn’t feel that way (no 1v1 victory with it, and just minor damage in a group).
Part of me thinks that someone in ANet was thinking “hey, wanna see something funny? Watch this…”
Staff and scepter do not only look incredibly hideous in a knight’s hand, they are also the by far most lackluster and unfun weapons in the entire game! Every class has the possibility to adapt its weapon choices to match the player’s preferrence. Every class but the Guardian! It’s not that we would become imbalanced powerhouses when they handed us rifles or bows. Every weapon is a gain but also a sacrifice to some extent. If you get a focus instead of a torch you lose the fire condition and the AoE cone damage/cleanse, but gain a shield and a blind. The weapon is a tactical choice as well as a matter of preferrence. Bsically we can pick either a lackluster staff with pathwtic ofnaive abilities and mediocre support (that renders you quite useless until your cooldowns refsh) or a mediocre, hideous fairy wand that hast the most ridiculous and undun autoattack in the history of video games. I don’t know about you but I didn’t roll a Guardian to wield a wand or a staff and have some ultimates that would suit a skirt wearing princess much better. I want a real man weapon. A kingdom for a rifle…
Yes because were wearing heavy armor we have to be the manliest of man to ever man the manly men army of man
I for one am glad that the class is unique that its a knight who can use magic. Scepter and Staff just needs to be buffed for better ranged options.
If you wanna be a man, get in there and melee and die for your server. Thats the manly man way for men who are the manliest of all men
I simply use this build and roast them.I down groups of people like mad when working with a little skirmish group.
Nothing funnier than an entire zerg on fire from me freaking out.My burn abilities actually have a lot of burst so it does well. I once ended up alongside 4 other guardians set up the same and we downed about 15 people.
What was even nicer was people set up like Draeka who walled them in for us XD
Burning guardians are like a tanky fire only ele that is actually viable.
My only problem with WvW is that staves can’t fire upwards.
This irritates me to no end, because it’s sooooo noticeable. You see it not only when attacking keeps, but even with the most modest of terrain. Maybe I just got the kitten orb, but it seems like it stumbles on every little pebble, and sometimes even seems to just go off in some random direction completely opposite my targeted foe.
The staff’s 2 skill is very effective for the following:
killing fish in barrels
killing ants walking in a straight line
checking for wind direction
measuring the distance between yourself and the top of the keep
I DID manage to hit someone on the top of the keep yesterday. I was amazed. I tried it again and kept getting the usual “obstructed” message, but thankfully by then all my support skills were back up so I went back to that.
What I’d really like to see is Shield of Absorption and Sanctuary protect against arrow carts. I’m sure ANet thinks this would be too powerful, but I consider it a fair tradeoff for the crapiness of the staff’s retardo-orb. I swear half the time that stupid thing just wanders around like a drunk bum.