Guild Wars 2

I have been playing Ranger since release but I still can’t figure out the usefulness of “Guard”.

Where and when (also why?) do you guys use the “Guard” skill?

Is it a pvp, www or pve (dungeon / solo) preferred skill?

Guard give your pet 33% damage reduction for 10 seconds. You really dont need this in pvp unless your a pure bm and someone is targeting your pet.

But any other time you want to keep your pet alive and you are finding it difficult to do so, it makes sense to take it

With the new 15s cooldown (12s if traited), that means you get to stealth your pet and give it 10s of protection avery 15s/12s. That’s a lot of survivability and surprise. Not sure how much of a difference it’ll make in dungeons seeing the amount of one-shotting going on, but in wvw (roaming) and spvp, it’s a big buff for beastmaster builds. That jaguar can pretty much spam stealth now.

The only time I ever saw a real use for it was for getting pets on walls in WvW.

If the pet stayed stealthed the whole time before attacking and gained a the ability to auto attack anything red when it came within a certain range then I could maybe see it being worth something.

I think it’s only real use is in PvP when defending a point. You can leave your pet behind and run elsewhere. The stealth performs a similair role. In PvE the one second cast time is garbage. Maintaining protection on the pet would be really cool, but the disruption this skill would cause (it’s a pet command so pets will stop what they are doing to fulfil the command, it also causes you to cast it for one second) isn’t really worth it imo. I haven’t tried it since the buff but I still don’t see a PvE use for it even with pet survivability issues.

I use it as a perma protection for my pet in dungeons since the patch. I love it !

Traited, it’s basically 100% protection uptime for the pet…seems great to use in dungeons if you like running cats. It’s also good for positioning the pet for search and rescue, fwiw.

PvE: I use it to get my pet out of the fire immediately (always seem to B line it to the area specified) give him protection, and an aggro drop as I call him back to the safety that is 1000 units or so away so I can heal him.

WvW: Prot has saved my pet a lot, also used to put him far out to the side of the Zerg so he can go into the Zerg from a flank or the side IE: where the AoEs aren’t. Also use it to create the illusion I swapped pets or to get a Sneak Attack drake breathe off, they can’t dodge what they can’t see.

sPvP: to make myself look like a thief if in guarding a point (guy standing “alone” at a point with S/D probably a thief….), give my pet access to stealth (again, sneak attack drake breathes are stupid strong), and to create the illusion I pet swapped.

Giving your pet Protection is great, especially with the cooldown reduction (I was actually 100% fine with the previous cooldown TBH, not that I’m complaining about even more Protection).

The stealth aspect is also useful for first strikes with strong F2 abilities. Use Guard to stealth your Drake, then have him F2 a couple enemies to start the fight, that sort of thing. Stealth won’t break until damage is done, so the animation windup is completely safe and hidden by the stealth (though the patch made it less of an issue since Drakes don’t take a year to windup their F2 any more… still nice to get off an F2 without enemies aggroing or moving, though).

And of course, its handy for actual guarding during dynamic events where enemies come in waves from a specific direction or where you actually need to protect a static point. Throw Guard down and let your pet handle itself. Meanwhile you’re free to climb a rock or something to get out of danger, since while you can’t attack enemies from inaccessible locations if they aren’t in combat, if your pet is on the ground and fighting them the enemies will be completely vulnerable to your own attacks even if you’re on a wall or rock or something.

I’ve found one instance where I’ve genuinely wanted to use Guard for it’s stated purpose in PvE. That’s leaving a pet on the other side of the map to help manage taking out healing crystals on the CoF Path1 boss.

I haven’t found many purposes for the Stealth component.

I’ve found many purposes for the Protection component. But, being brutally honest, it’s gangly awkward to use it that way and it always manages to be useful but rarely actually productive.

cafard.8953:

With the new 15s cooldown (12s if traited), that means you get to stealth your pet and give it 10s of protection avery 15s/12s. That’s a lot of survivability and surprise. Not sure how much of a difference it’ll make in dungeons seeing the amount of one-shotting going on, but in wvw (roaming) and spvp, it’s a big buff for beastmaster builds. That jaguar can pretty much spam stealth now.

Protection is nice, but it’s mostly a buffer.

What kills pets is not single hits. It’s the amount of aoe they walk over like idiots. And this aoe is something not even guardians with protection can stand in.