Guild Wars 2

Want to last more than 10 seconds? Then I’ve got some builds for you!

I should start off by saying that these builds are designed for staying in a group fight and still contributing without dying immediately or only being useful when frenzy is ready to be popped. These builds are also designed after becoming bored with greatswords and axes, so these weapons are not utilized in any way. They are designed for supporting yourself & teammates with heavy healing and condition removal while still dishing out moderate damage and plenty of crowd control effects. After over 950 matches played as Warrior, I found these to be both entertaining and efficient, and I hope you do as well!

Let’s get started:

I’ll go over the key traits, optional traits, and some tactics you can use for each build.

First build: Hammer & Mace+Shield

Defense 10:
V – Missile Deflection. Pretty straight forward, will cause ranged attackers to start destroying themselves while you are blocking (Mace skill #2, Shield skill #5) Particularly useful against rifle warriors, pistol thieves, pistol engineers, phantasmal duelist.

Optional: II – Dogged March. A new addition to our traits, will add some more survivability when you gain regeneration after being snared.

Defense 20:
You have a few options here. I personally prefer IX – Shield Master for more toughness and reduced shield cooldowns. You can take X – Merciless Hammer or VIII – Last Stand based on your preference.

Tactics 10:
I – Leg Specialist. Excellent for setting up Earthshaker or simply chasing someone at low health

Tactics 20:
VIII – Lung Capacity. Self explanatory, you get to shout more often, and thus heal, remove conditions, and stun break more often.

Tactics 30:
XII – Vigorous Shouts. Shouts heal. For a lot. Each of your shouts will heal roughly 2000 health with a cleric amulet equipped. This build utilizes 3 shouts with very short cooldowns, allowing you to recover up to 6k health rapidly, and 12.5k including your healing skill. Any allies within range will also benefit.

Discipline 10:
IV – Inspiring Shouts. Your shouts will grant massive amounts of adrenaline, which is excellent for setting up stun combos, which I will discuss in more detail shortly.

Discipline 20:
X – Mobile Strikes. Fairly simple, any skill – weapon or utility – that causes you to move from your current position will also remove the immobilize condition. (Earthshaker, Shield #4, and in the next build, Sword #2)

Tips & Tricks:

Switch weapons often, switch weapons wisely. Your leech sigils on the weapons activate every time weapons are swapped and transfer health directly from your opponent to you. This effect is made doubly effective with the Discipline 15 trait.
However, don’t switch if you are at low health and there are no defensive or crowd control abilities left on your other weapon.

Chaining stuns. This build has six different stun, daze, and knockback effects at its disposal. Shouting for adrenaline means you can activate your mace and hammer burst skills in a very short amount of time. The flow of a chain stun might look something like this if you already have enough adrenaline to activate one burst skill:

Pommel Bash —-> Skull Crack —-> Shield Bash (switch weapon, use On My Mark! & For Great Justice!) —-> Earthshaker —-> Backbreaker —-> Staggering Blow

Chaining these stuns can spell doom for glass cannon builds, and for anybody else if you are teamed up with a heavy DPS player. Mastering these stun chains are key to the build, they will help you last longer and kill opponents easier. Stuns can be mixed in a number of ways, and be wary that some stun skills cancel others, wait for their durations to be nearly done before activating the next for maximum effect.

Apply weakness as often as you can. the third skill in the auto attack chain for mace (Pulverize), and the Hammer #2 skill (Fierce Blow) will further increase your survivability by causing your enemy to deal glancing blows.

“How do I deal with stealth?”

A preemptive Earthshaker or Staggering blow can catch stealthed thieves in particular off guard. Using your Mace #2 block or Shield #5 block can absorb blows and Basilisk Poison. If you are hit with Basilisk Poison and Shake It Off! is ready, break the stun and then stun them back immediately.

To heal, or to stun? Deciding whether it’s best to heal and cleanse conditions on yourself, or to set up your massive stun combo is another key to mastering this build. Sometimes you can do both, but not always.

That concludes the Hammer and Mace+Shield build!

Now, off to the next:

Second Build: Sword+Shield & Longbow

The first thing you’ll notice is that this build is nearly identical. While it’s true that they share similar play style, I will note the key differences below, as well as more tips and tricks for this altered build.

Condition Damage – this build is more damage oriented than stun oriented, however by utilizing a Shaman amulet instead of a Cleric amulet, you get even further amplified toughness as well as respectable healing power.

Tactics 10:
IV – Stronger Bowstrings. You have no more Eartshaker to set up, and you’ve already got a much more powerful immobilize (Longbow #5, Sword burst) Might as well reach out and touch further away targets.

“I’ve lost my beautiful stun chain!”

We’ll still be chaining burst skills, but in a different fashion. Combustive Shot (Longbow burst) can be chained beautifully with Pin Down (Longbow #5) and Flurry (Sword burst) to deadly effect. The flow would look something like this assuming you have plenty of adrenaline already built up:

Pin Down —-> Combustive Shot (switch weapon, On My Mark!, For Great Justice!) —-> Savage Leap (Sword #2) —-> Flurry

This combo will force your target to be burned alive while bleeding out for heavy damage. Not as heavy as with a full glass cannon condition damage build, but still respectable. Auto attack as needed with Sword #1 for additional bleeds.

“My shouts are healing for less!”

Only slightly less, and the new Life sigil on your shield will make up for the loss in healing power after a few kills.

Travel quickly! Savage Leap can be used to rapidly exit danger or cross large distances. Disable Autotargetting in the options, lose your target, and fly away!

Don’t forget about Sword #3 in the heat of combat, it causes a quick cripple which can make life much easier.

Might! Arcing Arrow (Longbow #3) can be launched into your Combustive Shot to grant everybody in the field a long lasting might effect.

“How do I deal with stealth in this altered build?”

Combustive Shot, Combustive Shot, Combustive Shot

Shield Stance

Combustive Shot is one of the largest and most effective AoEs in the game.

Combustive Shot.

This concludes the Sword+Shield & Longbow build, and the post as a whole.

Enjoy!