Guild Wars 2

I’m thinking of doing alot of roaming now as a guardian, i need some opinions of some more experienced guardians, tell me what you think

http://en.gw2skills.net/editor/?fUAQJARSlYgqCnFyvDf4ERVh4h9AjZsjXPcIFZIA-jEzAocI0FA9BiKAkzFGTgKqlNioxGOqSHWvgpOHiqHvIa1CBobMA-w

I am no guard vet I main ele and my first initial impression for guard roaming is sustain. AH is ok 1v1 but it doesn’t feel like it is enough. So far I like AR + SD and Mango pies gives good passive AH is decent heals with group not solo. Meds are better solo.

I like the basic idea of your stats, I too run a build where I prioritize tankiness, then DPS. However, I think your toughness is a bit too high, maybe you can tone it down a bit and get some more DPS.

Give Inspired Virtue a try. It’s a trait that I honestly can’t be ignored. Virtues are too weak without them IMO.

I love GS paired with Hammer too, they give a lot of AoE damage; but both are DPS. Sometimes it’s nice to have a defensive weapon set as a back up to let yourself heal up. You can either use mace/shield set or staff.

If you don’t have the Signet cooldown trait, give Shelter a try; maybe you’ll like it better in WvW situation. I personally don’t like Shelter because unblockable attacks can still CC you out of your blocking stance and will not heal you at all, yet it will still go to 30s cooldown. Traited Signet of Resolve is more rewarding than Shelter if you are tanky, which in this case, you are.

Your AH still need a boost, IMO. You can do this by using Empowering Might and/or Renewed Justice trait. Empowering Might gives a stable self-heal, while Renewed Justice requires a good team, yet more rewarding traited with Inspired Virtue. Using both would not be fair to your enemies. :P

PrZone.4753:

I’m thinking of doing alot of roaming now as a guardian, i need some opinions of some more experienced guardians, tell me what you think

http://en.gw2skills.net/editor/?fUAQJARSlYgqCnFyvDf4ERVh4h9AjZsjXPcIFZIA-jEzAocI0FA9BiKAkzFGTgKqlNioxGOqSHWvgpOHiqHvIa1CBobMA-w

You have simply way too much toughness in comparison to vitality and healing power. Investing a bit more in those instead would have made you tankier.
Same applies to Power, although not quite as much – I would invest just a tinier bit more in precision/critical damage.
I feel like your build would find some more balance with celestial helm&chestpiece, and mayyybee a celestial greatsword(Helm, Chest and Greatsword are the best pieces of celestial gear).
As for Runes&Sigils
Dolyak Runes are plain bad at the moment, with their last bonus being 30 health per second. Given how you are running 3 shouts, I would heavily suggest soldier’s instead(so that each shout is going to remove 2 conditions, and conversing one of them. Not bad huh), which also gives your more vitality and less toughness(great, exactly what your build needs).
Sigils, I feel like Battle is going to be superior to Force. 3 Might stacks is exactly about 5% increase, maybe a little bit less(if you have 2k power 100 is 5% increase, 3 might is 105). But they last 20 seconds at the very least, so they will keep working far longer and on the other weapon sets as well(+ extra heal from AH to your build). It’s definitely better(I’d consider Strength too, but with your low crit chance it won’t be worth it)
Traits – I would suggest some virtues… I don’t know why go all the way down for 3 shouts and altruistic healing and not get any boon duration whatsoever, also (5) in Virtues is perhaps the best of the best points you can choose, while AH is in a pretty bad spot right now…

although i’d like this build (i’m just theory crafting atm), I also like the idea of a meditation dps. any idea’s or builds on that?

May i suggest you check out the builds chapter in the 30 point valor guide. Stickied at the top. There is also a chapter on stats and how to obtain some of them and all builds are fairly optimized stat wise.

You have both medi builds and AH builds there and also builds for both 1h and 2h setups.

But roaming with 2h weapons i would go for 0/25/30/10/5 with zerker/valkyrie in all pieces and rune of speed to compensate for lack of mobility and low healthpool. For one hand weapons you trait 0/30/30/5/5 with the same gear and runes.
Both builds have Stand your ground for stability and stun breaker and smite conditions and judges intervention for connect and disconnect.

Sigil of energy is a must to mitigate damage versus a skilled opponent so add them in 2h and OH.

Having points in honor for roaming isnt optimized imo. When you roam you want to kill fast so you aren’t caught in a fight when the zerg comes running. So kill fast and get out of dodge city.

Food is used based on what you need. I would go for – condition duration and crit chance, you want to max the reliability in bursts.

I would use purity as well, its really nice tbh, and skip fury on meditations. Its enough with the cd and heal on meditations.

i took a look at it, any build (if not completely stupid) would work decent enough in roaming if a completely skilled player played it… I’m just looking for a build that could do 2v1 or even 3v1 when i’m skilled enough. which is why i had more toughness in the build i posted… or should i just go glass cannon and hopefully burn them both down quick.

Actually if you are looking for 2 vs 1 and 3 vs one i would go healway. The issue i have with that build is that i relies on the opponents stupidity since its retaliation based.

It doesnt have the power to finish a fight so pretty much any profession can kite you to regain health.

Personally i dont think a 0/30/30/5/5 build with scepter/focus and hammer is so glassy. Sure you cant be first in in zergs but it has pretty decent sustain with meditations.

1 vs 2 or 1 vs 3 you absolutely need stand your ground in a more aggressive build and skip AH and go for meditations.

I use a number of valkyrie pieces in combinations with zerker in my burst/roamer and i think i have about 17k health with buffs from food and killing 5 npcs.

I can post some pics om my stats when i get home from work when running 0/30/30/5/5.

For me roaming is all about burning stuff down as fast as possible as a guardian, since you have no means to disconnect properly, except maybe judges intervention and the leap on gs and blink on sword. You just wat to avoid being caught my stragglers or an incomingzerg when fighting. If you want to roam i think most people would prefer GS/1H Sword and it would also have synergies with the traits in radiance.

Personally i run with hammer and scepter/focus but if a mess up and don’t pay attention to my surroundings i die due to lack of disconnects.

I am no pro but I am very happy with the build I have now. It is based on Meditations I got a very consistent damage and very good survival. I do not have problem with most of the classes, unless very high condition damage builds even with two cleaning skills when the enemy knows what he is doing I have some issues with the conditions.

My build now is 10/30/30/0/0, my armor is PVT, weapons are Valkyrie (sword and focus always, GS or Hammer, some times Scepter with focus but I dont like it), accessories are ascended Power/Precision/Critical Damage/Vitality, do not remenber the name now.

I got about 3K power, 3K armor and 19K – 20K HP. My criticial chance is about 35% but I use the fury trait for meditations help a lot. Critical damage is about 50%.

I sitll have to work on runes, I am using Soldiers from my old shout build, have to change then… maybe Dolyak or Traveller… I hate how slow Guardian is and I dont like using Retreat or Staff.

I use the oil that increases precision for food usually those that increase critical damage or precision.

It has some flaws but this build has been the best for my playstyle now, I win much more than loose with it.

This a build for havoc or solo play… it works well on zergs too but there are better supportive builds for those cases.

AH is not good for solo roaming. You should take some out of valor and put them elsewhere. Like someone said, 5 in virtue is really important just for the on-demand protection. I personally also find 5 in radiance to be a necessity since on-demand blind is also really good.

Also as mentioned, your dps is way too low. When building for solo roaming, you must have a respectable level of dps and/or secure method of extraction, as you will frequently be deep in enemy territory. Since you are shout guard, you have no JI and you are gs ham so no sword for teleport. GS 3 is not great for extraction because it’s not a true leap (ala ranger or warrior sword), and can be slowed down by cripple/chill. By itself it’s not reliable.

That means your dps has to be respectable enough to kill relatively quickly, be it a 1v1 or 1v2. With a guard, it’s an even bigger issue because you are going to be fairly easy to kite in a 1v2. With your build, which has no teleports, no passive movespeed and 1 source of swiftness, you will not win any 1v2 that has at least a ranger, necro, engi, or mesmer. If they never engage you directly, you will just die to auto-attacks/condi kite. Also, unless you are condi bomb and/or stealth based (so engi, necro, thief, or mesmer), don’t think about a 1v3. As long one of the players is competent, you will never win.

1. Rework your stats. Lose some armor and HP for more firepower.

2. Rework your traits. You don’t need to go that far into valor. Things to consider are 10 into zeal, 5 into radiance, and 5 into virtue (this one I believe as mandatory).

And meditation is probably overall better for solo roam. If you want the same weapon set, then probably look at 0/0/30/20/0, and spend the last 20 as you see fit.

Someone can correct me if I am wrong.

With still a fresh perspective on guardian. I feel like healway is good roaming but you can’t kill anyone with decent sustain. The way the game has evolved and players evolved many classes have some decent sustain even necros with 50% less decay in DS they can stay in it longer at idle. I do like healway but I run that when I don’t really expect to kill anyone that wants to leave.

For shouts I feel like 0/0/20/30/20 is solid you lose indomitable courage but get to keep AR. Gain a bit more crit damage. So far I like 0/0/20/30/20 with Hoelbrak runes. Power goes over 2k with food, toughness is good. Can run purity or strength in numbers, and retributive armor.

I still haven’t decided on a Meds or AH build for myself. I think I like 0/5/30/30/5 but prefer 0/5/30/15/20 with runes of traveler.

For my experience in WvW you would get obliterated with those stats in a few seconds, for roaming most stat you want to use is the critical and the critical damage armor is good arround 2.8 <→ 3k

If you dont make damage your target will not need to kite and take you down armor is almost irrevelant( if you dont make damage).

trunks.5249:

here is a video of a build meant for roaming the guy is useing it with just a helm on lol its crazy https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lA4Vq40Q5cg he calls it the DPS Heal way build he also shows a bunch of other builds for roaming but after watching this you will probably go with that build

Serious troll is serious!

I don’t know… i was once 239 in NA playing as more of an offensive support warrior (i never lvled that character to 80 just played tpvp). Even playing more of a support role with a warrior i feel like i had more damage and tons more suitability than a dps guardian. Maybe I’m playing it all wrong, bc i’ve lost countless 1v1’s against guardians but i’ve also won lots of them. If someone knows of a video on youtube that has a complete breakdown on guardians for roaming or maybe i could play with a more experienced guardian in-game.

Don’t know how much this will help you but he’s covering some basic ideas on how to dps as a guardian. Either way I like it far better than the alternative (that being someone getting excited over 400 condition damage).

Arlette, I think that video is more for PvP and not WvW. Maybe I am wrong.

jman.7415:

Arlette, I think that video is more for PvP and not WvW. Maybe I am wrong.

When you say WvW do you mean running with the zerg or roaming? cuz if it’s the first then yes… it’s not pvp.

You’re likely better off with a more DPS-biased build for roaming these days. If you try to go the bunker route alone or with fewer than 2-3 people, you’re just going to be out-attritioned by condition builds. You’ll also be outperformed by Warriors and be stuck in endless duels with other bunker builds.

Christos de Soufre.3802:

You’re likely better off with a more DPS-biased build for roaming these days. If you try to go the bunker route alone or with fewer than 2-3 people, you’re just going to be out-attritioned by condition builds. You’ll also be outperformed by Warriors and be stuck in endless duels with other bunker builds.

+1^on Christos comment

Probably reduce that armor for more crit and crit damage, but after teh critical rework update duno how will work, at least in theory looks loke bunker builds will be a litle better.