Guild Wars 2

Hi everyone.
I’m relatively new to Warrior, I used to play a Necro for a very long time, then moved to Thief and now considering to master the Warrior.

I have to say, I’ve never played it that much. I’ve played just few match in PvP ages before, just to try it out.

I have to say that I’m aware that people consider Warrior as overall weak in PvP, but as far as I’ve tried, I can’t understand exactly why.

In PvP, I usually run a Mace+Shield/Hammer build, 10/0/30/0/30 and soldier amulet.
I find incredibly ilarious on how effective this build is against any player, bunker or whatever you’d like to say.
I can easily stunlock people to death while having great survivability, good condition cleansing (not that awesome, I have to say), 2 stunbreakers and 2 burst mitigation skills (Defy Pain and Shield Stance).
Not to say how Earthshaker is a wonderful skill in point holding due to AoE massive damage + Stun.

I’d like to know where people think the warrior lacks and why, because I can’t understand where the real UPness is.

Warrior don’t have easy access to protection, regeneration and other “bunker” boons. Also to deal with conditions easily Warrior need to spec to do it (soldier runes, warhorn with Quick Breathing, invest trait points into tactic line).
IMO Warrior shouldn’t have easy access to “bunker” boons because that will change warrior into Guardian. I also accepted that that conditions are hard counter to Warrior.
Also you need to remember that people like to cry and it happens all over the forum.
Glad you enjoy warriorhood. If i may suggest: discipline trait line have nice traits but 3% to burst damage is a sad joke that all warriors don’t laugh at anymore- invest only 15 points for fast hands and take unsuspecting foe from arms line since you run weapons with stuns, also sigil of paralyzation in nice for longer stunlock.

Opynn.2936:

Also you need to remember that people like to cry and it happens all over the forum.

True…

You used the word player. Warriors fine vs one player but when up against multiple players the warrior drops within seconds while every other class has survivability 10x better than the warrior.

Opynn.2936:

Warrior don’t have easy access to protection, regeneration and other “bunker” boons. Also to deal with conditions easily Warrior need to spec to do it (soldier runes, warhorn with Quick Breathing, invest trait points into tactic line).
IMO Warrior shouldn’t have easy access to “bunker” boons because that will change warrior into Guardian. I also accepted that that conditions are hard counter to Warrior.
Also you need to remember that people like to cry and it happens all over the forum.
Glad you enjoy warriorhood. If i may suggest: discipline trait line have nice traits but 3% to burst damage is a sad joke that all warriors don’t laugh at anymore- invest only 15 points for fast hands and take unsuspecting foe from arms line since you run weapons with stuns, also sigil of paralyzation in nice for longer stunlock.

I don’t think Warrior were supposed to have access to bunker boons. There are several professions who have poor access to protection and I don’t think it is a problem considering that Warriors have a nice amount of damage cancelling skills, defensive CC and toughness stacking traits. They have also heavy armor like guardians, but with a considerable higher HP pool.

About conditions, I usually bring “Shake it off!” and Mending, which I find them more then enough to deal with any form of condition. Considering that Warriors have an huge HP pool, bleeding isn’t that much of a problem, I just use those skills when I realize bleeding stacks are getting too high.

I spend traitpoints into Discipline for a simple reason: Destruction of the Empowered. That trait is a bane on any from of boon-bunkers. I also like the faster weapon swap, because I usually do that often to properly stunlock targets.

BossFi.6917:

You used the word player. Warriors fine vs one player but when up against multiple players the warrior drops within seconds while every other class has survivability 10x better than the warrior.

This isn’t true.
A warrior with soldier amulet is capable to hold on 2 people easily, obviously with the right selection of traits. 30 points in defense and Mace+Shield is capable to give quite a good survivability in groups, not less then any other profession in this game.

Plus, I’ll never stop saying how good Earthshaker is. People should use it more often.

Opynn.2936:

Warrior don’t have easy access to protection, regeneration and other “bunker” boons. Also to deal with conditions easily Warrior need to spec to do it (soldier runes, warhorn with Quick Breathing, invest trait points into tactic line).
IMO Warrior shouldn’t have easy access to “bunker” boons because that will change warrior into Guardian. I also accepted that that conditions are hard counter to Warrior.
Also you need to remember that people like to cry and it happens all over the forum.
Glad you enjoy warriorhood. If i may suggest: discipline trait line have nice traits but 3% to burst damage is a sad joke that all warriors don’t laugh at anymore- invest only 15 points for fast hands and take unsuspecting foe from arms line since you run weapons with stuns, also sigil of paralyzation in nice for longer stunlock.

I agree with you..we should leave the broken warrior class as is..

/sarcasm off..as for people ‘crying’ about the warrior..how come the other classes recognize how weak it is? Are they ‘crying’ as well?

For the OP -weak troll?- , wait till you run into players in higher end tourneys before judging.

I think anyone thinking that a class is fine based on hot joins against weak pvpers should seriously rethink their general outlook at life.

sorrow.2364:

Opynn.2936:

Warrior don’t have easy access to protection, regeneration and other “bunker” boons. Also to deal with conditions easily Warrior need to spec to do it (soldier runes, warhorn with Quick Breathing, invest trait points into tactic line).
IMO Warrior shouldn’t have easy access to “bunker” boons because that will change warrior into Guardian. I also accepted that that conditions are hard counter to Warrior.
Also you need to remember that people like to cry and it happens all over the forum.
Glad you enjoy warriorhood. If i may suggest: discipline trait line have nice traits but 3% to burst damage is a sad joke that all warriors don’t laugh at anymore- invest only 15 points for fast hands and take unsuspecting foe from arms line since you run weapons with stuns, also sigil of paralyzation in nice for longer stunlock.

I don’t think Warrior were supposed to have access to bunker boons. There are several professions who have poor access to protection and I don’t think it is a problem considering that Warriors have a nice amount of damage cancelling skills, defensive CC and toughness stacking traits. They have also heavy armor like guardians, but with a considerable higher HP pool.

About conditions, I usually bring “Shake it off!” and Mending, which I find them more then enough to deal with any form of condition. Considering that Warriors have an huge HP pool, bleeding isn’t that much of a problem, I just use those skills when I realize bleeding stacks are getting too high.

I spend traitpoints into Discipline for a simple reason: Destruction of the Empowered. That trait is a bane on any from of boon-bunkers. I also like the faster weapon swap, because I usually do that often to properly stunlock targets.

BossFi.6917:

You used the word player. Warriors fine vs one player but when up against multiple players the warrior drops within seconds while every other class has survivability 10x better than the warrior.

This isn’t true.
A warrior with soldier amulet is capable to hold on 2 people easily, obviously with the right selection of traits. 30 points in defense and Mace+Shield is capable to give quite a good survivability in groups, not less then any other profession in this game.

Plus, I’ll never stop saying how good Earthshaker is. People should use it more often.

Mending and shake it off won’t help you against a good condition engy. They will eat you alive. I don’t think you ran into one, yet.

Destruction of the empowered against boon classes? Did you read any of the discussions regarding it after it was added?
It can’t even break through protection. Try it on a good bunker guardian and see if it helps you when they boon up. You will still get destroyed if you are on them.
It is a TERRIBLE ability..look at what the thieve’s got..boon ripping on a weapon skill with zero cooldown AND they evade while doing the 1st portion of it
Mesmers have an AOE boon ripping/condition removal
Necros can rip all boons
And you are happy with increased damage that can’t even break through protecition with ALL the guardian boons up? Imagine how much damage it will do against eles …not much..and you will have increased damage from retaliation as well

The way to combat boons is not to increase damage -since it is still negated by protection- but to rip the boons off. A necro can destroy a good guardian but you can’t. I encourage people to try these ‘amazing’ traits against good players before judging.

Soldier amulet won’t help you against one good player so how about two? toughness/power won’t help against spike damage. protection does.

XII.9401:

I agree with you..we should leave the broken warrior class as is..

/sarcasm off..as for people ‘crying’ about the warrior..how come the other classes recognize how weak it is? Are they ‘crying’ as well?

For the OP -weak troll?- , wait till you run into players in higher end tourneys before judging.

I think anyone thinking that a class is fine based on hot joins against weak pvpers should seriously rethink their general outlook at life.

I like how you avoided to bring something useful or any reasoning into the discussion.
I think that saying “try touneys” isn’t a valid argument to prove me warriors are weak tbh.

Don’t forget that people thought Elementalists were weak as hell for a period, so, probably, people are wrong sometimes.

XII.9401:

Mending and shake it off won’t help you against a good condition engy. They will eat you alive. I don’t think you ran into one, yet.

Destruction of the empowered against boon classes? Did you read any of the discussions regarding it after it was added?
It can’t even break through protection. Try it on a good bunker guardian and see if it helps you when they boon up. You will still get destroyed if you are on them.
It is a TERRIBLE ability..look at what the thieve’s got..boon ripping on a weapon skill with zero cooldown AND they evade while doing the 1st portion of it
Mesmers have an AOE boon ripping/condition removal
Necros can rip all boons
And you are happy with increased damage that can’t even break through protecition with ALL the guardian boons up? Imagine how much damage it will do against eles …not much..and you will have increased damage from retaliation as well

The way to combat boons is not to increase damage -since it is still negated by protection- but to rip the boons off. A necro can destroy a good guardian but you can’t. I encourage people to try these ‘amazing’ traits against good players before judging.

Soldier amulet won’t help you against one good player so how about two? toughness/power won’t help against spike damage. protection does.

I did met an HGH engineer.
I just used Mending and Shake It Off to remove the right conditions.

About Destruction of the Empowered, protection is a boon that usually lasts few seconds. Most the times, bunkers will have boons like Might, Fury, Vigor, Regeneration and Retaliation up, which means 15% damage boost. Not worthless.
I agree that Flanking Strike is too much, I’ve already opened a topic in the Thief forum. About boon ripping, they are usually on high cooldown. You can’t strip Protection always, it is better to let it ends.
Also, Retaliation does not inflict damage based on how much damage you deal. It is a fixed amount scaling on the caster’s power.

You know what helps against spike damage? Endure Pain and Shield Stance, not protection.

sorrow.2364:

BossFi.6917:

You used the word player. Warriors fine vs one player but when up against multiple players the warrior drops within seconds while every other class has survivability 10x better than the warrior.

This isn’t true.
A warrior with soldier amulet is capable to hold on 2 people easily, obviously with the right selection of traits. 30 points in defense and Mace+Shield is capable to give quite a good survivability in groups

Holding 2 players off is one thing but being able to kill them as well is a different story.
Other classes do it sooooo much better.

Warrior vs 2 rangers – yeah id like to see that fight!

BossFi.6917:

Holding 2 players off is one thing but being able to kill them as well is a different story.
Other classes do it sooooo much better.

Warrior vs 2 rangers – yeah id like to see that fight!

And, exactly, which profession is capable to HOLD AND KILL two professions at the same time all by himself? I think none (obviously excluding the case that both the enemies’ you are facing are bad as hell).

sorrow.2364:

BossFi.6917:

Holding 2 players off is one thing but being able to kill them as well is a different story.
Other classes do it sooooo much better.

Warrior vs 2 rangers – yeah id like to see that fight!

And, exactly, which profession is capable to HOLD AND KILL two professions at the same time all by himself? I think none (obviously excluding the case that both the enemies’ you are facing are bad as hell).

Full berserker Mesmer can take 2 enemies down and survive longer than a warrior.

BossFi.6917:

Full berserker Mesmer can take 2 enemies down and survive longer than a warrior.

Ok, let’s say Mesmer can.
Who else can do that?

First of all @ the OP.
Against normal/good players (even in sPvP)
1) You got a build that is almost CC. If you get some enemy with stability you will do nothing to them (you should have also stabilty otherwise its you you are stunlock to dead by other classes, but now thieves can steal even that from you).
2) Gap closers – Warrior gap closers are afected by snares (and they miss a lot of times). If you try to use earthshaker or any other movement skill when you are snared you wont reach your target, so you will spend most of the times chassing (and never catching) your target. Other classes can do way better.
3) Condition removal – you clean your snare and you are snared again in 1, 2 sec max. And the other conditions will eat you alive.
4) Damage – Warrior can do some good damage but as i said above he will never reach his target to land enough damage to kill him. Landing the damage a warrior can do is a big chalenge.
5) High risk/Low reward – Warrior needs to be in mellee range to use almost all their weapons skills, puting the warrior on the fields, marks, traps other players left there. Once you enter probably you wont get out of there. (just for spaw point of course)
6) defenses – Having a good health pool and high thougness without invulnerability, blinks, clones, ports, protection is just a way for last about +5sec (endure pain can give you +4 sec of life if you dont have contitions only) in battle. You cannot escape a battle when you are in disadvantage, you will die and give points to the enemy.
7) Conditions damage – Warrior dont have enough conditions to be viable as a condition damager class.
8) Warrior dont have good healing abilities. (they are between weak/average). This with the low escape abilites and the low damage avoidance is truly bad)
9) Warrior fights against multiple enemys at the time (ranger and his pet, necro and his minnions, thieve and his guildies, mesmers and their clones, Guardians and their spirit weapons, enginier and his turrets) All of them only have to worry about one target only – The warrior)
10) Weak elites in PvP (warrior dont have a single elite that can use to give him advantage in a fight like other professions have).

There are more points but these should be enough to clarify some things about warriors in PvP.

sorrow.2364:

BossFi.6917:

Full berserker Mesmer can take 2 enemies down and survive longer than a warrior.

Ok, let’s say Mesmer can.
Who else can do that?

Engeniers
Rangers

silentnight warrior.2714:

Engeniers
Rangers

False. Prove me that.

silentnight warrior.2714:

First of all @ the OP.
Against normal/good players (even in sPvP)
1) You got a build that is almost CC. If you get some enemy with stability you will do nothing to them (you should have also stabilty otherwise its you you are stunlock to dead by other classes, but now thieves can steal even that from you).
2) Gap closers – Warrior gap closers are afected by snares (and they miss a lot of times). If you try to use earthshaker or any other movement skill when you are snared you wont reach your target, so you will spend most of the times chassing (and never catching) your target. Other classes can do way better.
3) Condition removal – you clean your snare and you are snared again in 1, 2 sec max. And the other conditions will eat you alive.
4) Damage – Warrior can do some good damage but as i said above he will never reach his target to land enough damage to kill him. Landing the damage a warrior can do is a big chalenge.
5) High risk/Low reward – Warrior needs to be in mellee range to use almost all their weapons skills, puting the warrior on the fields, marks, traps other players left there. Once you enter probably you wont get out of there. (just for spaw point of course)
6) defenses – Having a good health pool and high thougness without invulnerability, blinks, clones, ports, protection is just a way for last about +5sec (endure pain can give you +4 sec of life if you dont have contitions only) in battle. You cannot escape a battle when you are in disadvantage, you will die and give points to the enemy.
7) Conditions damage – Warrior dont have enough conditions to be viable as a condition damager class.
8) Warrior dont have good healing abilities. (they are between weak/average). This with the low escape abilites and the low damage avoidance is truly bad)
9) Warrior fights against multiple enemys at the time (ranger and his pet, necro and his minnions, thieve and his guildies, mesmers and their clones, Guardians and their spirit weapons, enginier and his turrets) All of them only have to worry about one target only – The warrior)
10) Weak elites in PvP (warrior dont have a single elite that can use to give him advantage in a fight like other professions have).

There are more points but these should be enough to clarify some things about warriors in PvP.

I play a Necromancer and about mobility, they are way, way worse then warrior. I’ll answer all you points.

1) I use stunbreakers, not stability. Few people bring stability over stunbreakers.
2) Every gap closer is affected by snares. It is a problem of every melee class, not only warrior.
3) Shake It Off is on 25 seconds cooldown. Mending is on 25s cooldown. Average Chill (I don’t believe you consider Cripple as an incredibly hard snare) is on 4s. Just wait till it finishes or use your condition cleansing and carry on. 2 condition cleansing on 25s is quite much for every profession.
4) Read above.
5) Rifle do sweet damage too, I heard.
6) It is the same about Necromancers, with the only difference warriors have some invulnerability and blocks.
7) Sword has the longest lasting autoattack bleed in the game. Warrior have also the longest lasting “bleed on critical” trait. Impale and Riposte also gives some sweet bleed stacks. Rifle’s Bleeding Shot’s bleeding isn’t also that bad. Warrior have also access to burning (quite reliable also), despite Necromancers.
8) Mending and Healing Surge doesn’t look that bad to be honest. What do you mean with “bad”?
9) I don’t think anyone is running with pets in PvP. I still have to see any Guardian with spirit weapon or Necro with minions. Also, 30s of thieves guild every 180s is that gamebreaking?
10) Is Signet of Rage weak? :O 30s fury, might and swiftness is weak?

sorrow

I think that saying “try touneys” isn’t a valid argument to prove me warriors are weak tbh.

Hot-join heroes make me laugh. sPvP is full of low rank players, the inexperienced, the casuals and the downright skill-less and quite frankly, even poor players can have a limited measure of success here. Any class playing in these random rabbles, (as they mostly are,) can look good as there’s no real coordinated tactics, no communication and mistakes frequently go unpunished. It’s like a group of hooligans on a messy, free-for-all rampage. Sure, the Warrior can be fine when you’re surrounded by allies and when the enemy you’re facing has as much chance of being a rank 5 as a rank 35, but to use hot-joins to kitten a class is crazy.

Tournament play is where we should be looking if we want to critically appraise a class, and the fact that Warriors are so under-represented in tournament play and in high-end tournaments speaks volumes. In tPvP you’re generally facing more experienced players who know their class very well, know their role and are often well coordinated. Mistakes are more often punished. In short, there’s a higher standard of play here and this is what we should hold the Warrior class against, not the random free-for-all of sPvP.

So the question is, if there’s no problem with Warriors in PvP, why aren’t they wanted or used by experienced, high-end teams?

EDIT:

I don’t think anyone is running with pets in PvP.

What can I say?

Enmity.3428:

Hot-join heroes make me laugh. sPvP is full of low rank players, the inexperienced, the casuals and the downright skill-less and quite frankly, even poor players can have a limited measure of success here. Any class playing in these random rabbles, (as they mostly are,) can look good as there’s no real coordinated tactics, no communication and mistakes frequently go unpunished. It’s like a group of hooligans on a messy, free-for-all rampage. Sure, the Warrior can be fine when you’re surrounded by allies and when the enemy you’re facing has as much chance of being a rank 5 as a rank 35, but to use hot-joins to kitten a class is crazy.

Tournament play is where we should be looking if we want to critically appraise a class, and the fact that Warriors are so under-represented in tournament play and in high-end tournaments speaks volumes. In tPvP you’re generally facing more experienced players who know their class very well, know their role and are often well coordinated. Mistakes are more often punished. In short, there’s a higher standard of play here and this is what we should hold the Warrior class against, not the random free-for-all of sPvP.

So the question is, if there’s no problem with Warriors in PvP, why aren’t they wanted or used by experienced, high-end teams?

EDIT:

I don’t think anyone is running with pets in PvP.

What can I say?

I like how you take out a sentence from the context and build you own glass castle over something I’ve never said.
Please, tell me where I’ve said I play only hot-joins. In the name of god, please, TELL ME.

Do you want to know why there aren’t so many Warriors in tPvP? I’ll give you the answer: meta.
It is all about on how people fell about the class, not how the class effectively is.
Once upon a time, Warrior ran full glass cannon with GS/Axe. That was an horrible choices, but it was that popular to the point people linked that build to Warrior itself, then they start to become considered weak from the community to the point nobody wants them. This is the meta.

Did you remember the old times where tPvP was full of Guardian bunkers, Mesmers and Thieves with no Elementalist at all? Well, how did the Elementalists get so popular all of a sudden, then? They did not received any buff, as far I remember.
The answer to my question is the answer to yours.

well all i can say is i hope anet know what they are doing i don’t think they play every class before nerfing and buffing them this balancing will take 2 to 3 years just like gw1 and i’m losing patience. just fix the rush and BC that’s our only gap closer and it’s bug always find myself passing the enemy oh and if only anet can change our rush skill to blink like the steal of thief life is so much easier or make us invulnerable while using it like the mesmer sword skill. rifle? i don’t know why in the world they give us rifle if they can just give us great axe rifles are for musketeers not for warrior

sorrow.2364:

I’m relatively new to Warrior

For me that enough to not even listen to u. New vs someone that have played close to 2k hours on warrior( i can even show ss). If u think that everyone was running nothing else than gs/axe+shield with 25/25/0/0/20 then i feel sorry for u, i don’t have anything else to say.

Just came to say:

Anyone with stability boon = ur done
Anyone with high condi burst = ur done
Anyone with high burst = ur done
Anyone with decent sustain dps = ur done, as mending has crappy healing

Hope i helped as its was my first and last post here, play against premades and come back with results

Warriors have some of the best mobility in the game especially if you specc for Mobile Strikes in the Discipline tree.

I agree with the person who mentioned Balanced Stance or other stun blocks. If you like CC chains thats great, but I would suggest a little diversity to accompany it. Maybe a Hammer/GS build? This build is fairly common and easy to master.

Mending benefits from having a shorter CD than Healing Surge. Most people don’t quite understand how to use it. You got to use it early, around 75%. This is about the time your enemy will have their first stacks of conditions on you, if they are condition build. Mend at this time. Average fights last 30-45sec so you can estimate 1 Healing Surge per fight if you are like most average players and pop it around 50% hp, or the “oh kitten!” barrier. If you Mend early, you will be surprised at how beneficial the reduced CD is, and you can fit another heal into the fight which can save your kitten . Combo Mending with Shake it Off at appropriate intervals and you are looking at pretty good condition control.

If you plan to use Mending exactly how you would use Healing Surge, then yes you will come away from the fight thinking, “man that heal sucks”. If you retool your playstyle and make some adjustments to work to the skill’s strengths, then you will see significant improvement in it’s utility.

Drek Thalon.5490:

Warriors have some of the best mobility in the game especially if you specc for Mobile Strikes in the Discipline tree.

Mending benefits from having a shorter CD than Healing Surge. Most people don’t quite understand how to use it. You got to use it early, around 75%. This is about the time your enemy will have put their first stacks of conditions on you, if they are condition build. Mend at this time. Average fights last 30-45sec so you can estimate 1 Healing Surge per fight if you are like most average players and pop it around 50% hp, or the “oh kitten!” barrier. If you Mend early, you will be surprised at how beneficial the reduced CD is, and you can fit another heal into the fight which can save your kitten . Combo Mending with Shake it Off at appropriate intervals and you are looking at pretty good condition control.

If you plan to use Mending exactly how you would use Healing Surge, then yes you will come away from the fight thinking, “man that heal sucks”. If you retool your playstyle and make some adjustments to work to the skill’s strengths, then you will see significant improvement in it’s utility.

I prefer healing surge so I can get up to 100% adren before a fight even starts and have my healing cd reset.

However, I like to focus on builds that surround adren / F1 skills.

Scoobaniec.9561:

For me that enough to not even listen to u. New vs someone that have played close to 2k hours on warrior( i can even show ss). If u think that everyone was running nothing else than gs/axe+shield with 25/25/0/0/20 then i feel sorry for u, i don’t have anything else to say.

Just came to say:

Anyone with stability boon = ur done
Anyone with high condi burst = ur done
Anyone with high burst = ur done
Anyone with decent sustain dps = ur done, as mending has crappy healing

Hope i helped as its was my first and last post here, play against premades and come back with results

I really don’t know what has been done to you guys, did you got kitten d by someone or what?
I came here asking why you consider Warrior weak, saying that to me it doesn’t looks like weak.
I got some nice posts, like the one of silentnight warrior, but overall I don’t understand these kind of posts saying “Hey, you are new to warrior, you know nothing” or “ugh, go play turneys”.

Seriously guys, I came here seeking for a peaceful discussion, not some forum trolls.
If you like go rampant and elitist, then YOU have nothing to say here.

sorrow.2364:

I like how you take out a sentence from the context and build you own glass castle over something I’ve never said.
Please, tell me where I’ve said I play only hot-joins. In the name of god, please, TELL ME.

Do you want to know why there aren’t so many Warriors in tPvP? I’ll give you the answer: meta.
It is all about on how people fell about the class, not how the class effectively is.
Once upon a time, Warrior ran full glass cannon with GS/Axe. That was an horrible choices, but it was that popular to the point people linked that build to Warrior itself, then they start to become considered weak from the community to the point nobody wants them. This is the meta.

Did you remember the old times where tPvP was full of Guardian bunkers, Mesmers and Thieves with no Elementalist at all? Well, how did the Elementalists get so popular all of a sudden, then? They did not received any buff, as far I remember.
The answer to my question is the answer to yours.

Warrior had a niche role pre-quickness nerf. Massive AoE direct damage, a bit more beefy than a thief so he could stand in midfight AoE a bit longer. Due to that the targets usually dropped before he did. But even then warriors were a rare pick in tournas and it required you to play it very well to compete. You always required another roamer to support you to do anything though.

The reason why meta has steered towards what it is now is due to the fixes to a lot of other professions that involved survivability, pathing and hit detection on some skills, ranged attack fixes and minor trait tweaks over several patches and of course the meta focus from direct damage dominance to AoE and condifocus.

This was quite directly related to the fall of thief burst dominance when pistolwhip and D/D build damage was nerfed, people adepted to read bursts better. People didn’t drop in an instant anymore and this in return started to favor AoE and conditions to single target hardhitting bursts to increase the damage output to targets. There were always very successful ele and engy players and due to the meta change and profession fixes engy and ele have successfully established a place for themselves.

Ele is favored due to his thief like mobility, condi cleansing abilities and having very good sustain even in glass specs. Engy due to the ability to put out great CC, pointcontrol and great access to numerous conditions including high burning upkeep (which is the strongest damage condition imo). Only professions that can compete with such condipressure are trap ranger and necro, which were both very popular at one point.

Since condition cleansing focus is insane atm thanks to guards and eles, the only one who can successfully pressure is the engy (burning dura > bleed stacks, great uptime on boons and doesn’t rely on getting close to pressure). Excellent mobility, control and reliable AoE conditionpressure, while still remaining quite beefy make him the primary choice over trap ranger and necro.

Warrior has no place atm, they don’t have the escape/sustain mechanics to compete with eles, mesmers or even thieves in midfights.

They obviously can’t bunker aswell as a guardian due to lack of defensive boons, long cooldowns and low heals and obviously have no place as a homebunker since they can’t 1v1 aswell as BM ranger or bunkerengy. They could fit the role of roamer before, but since other roamers can sustain themselves independently and warrior’s ability to deliver his burst is nerfed hard it’s not wise to build your team around a warrior at the current state.

Your soldier lockdown warrior serves no purpose in a team setting, you lack damage and mobility, are the most easily focused down profession and all of your CC is completely negated by stability which turns your role completely useless on its uptime. That whole niche CC role can easily be replaced by an engineer who is not even focusing on it and still deals out good pressure and team utility.

Sorrow,

Warriors are weak because it simply comes down to one missing piece of the pizzaz puzzle.

Warriors don’t possess the ‘clutch’ ability to turn the tide of the fight past simply dealing high damage.

Unfortunately, in a high end tPvP environment, burst damage is easily mitigated by thorough planning and awareness of enemy placement.

Mesmers are often talked about on the forum so I’ll use them as a comparison:

The use of clones, blink and invisibility provide Mesmers with a high amount of survivability that doesn’t require them to build for toughness. When it comes to being ‘clutch’, such abilities like Portal and Blink allow for unique styles of play.

Example: While stomping you can blink to an enemy that has moved their downed state body.

Example 2: Using portal to provide rapid team movement across the map.

These ‘unique’ (to say the least) abilities evade the Warriors toolset. When teams look at us they say “what does class X bring to the table” all they see from Warriors is damage. Yet damage is something most classes bring to the table ontop of their existing extensive toolset.

Once you factor in Warriors susceptibility to conditions, lack of protection boons and their lack of a ‘clutch’ factor – other classes are chosen in our place.

What you said looks pretty much like it is a problem of some classes being too much powerful in something more then Warriors being weak, but probably they are two sides of the same coin.

Actually this is exactly how I feel when I play a warrior. I don’t think I’m underpowered, I just think everyone else is overpowered.

sorrow.2364:

What you said looks pretty much like it is a problem of some classes being too much powerful in something more then Warriors being weak, but probably they are two sides of the same coin.

That’s pretty much exactly it.

If warriors had a couple more easy to access ways of reducing conditions, possibly factoring in a way to trade adren for a protection boon. Ontop of other classes getting toned down slightly in their abilities – things would balance out (hopefully).

Personally, I think that Hammer warriors should be the future of the class but that would take some changes to the weapon mechanics (increased attack speed, resistance to blinds etc.).

sorrow.2364

I play a Necromancer and about mobility, they are way, way worse then warrior. I’ll answer all you points.

1) I use stunbreakers, not stability. Few people bring stability over stunbreakers.
2) Every gap closer is affected by snares. It is a problem of every melee class, not only warrior.
3) Shake It Off is on 25 seconds cooldown. Mending is on 25s cooldown. Average Chill (I don’t believe you consider Cripple as an incredibly hard snare) is on 4s. Just wait till it finishes or use your condition cleansing and carry on. 2 condition cleansing on 25s is quite much for every profession.
4) Read above.
5) Rifle do sweet damage too, I heard.
6) It is the same about Necromancers, with the only difference warriors have some invulnerability and blocks.
7) Sword has the longest lasting autoattack bleed in the game. Warrior have also the longest lasting “bleed on critical” trait. Impale and Riposte also gives some sweet bleed stacks. Rifle’s Bleeding Shot’s bleeding isn’t also that bad. Warrior have also access to burning (quite reliable also), despite Necromancers.
8) Mending and Healing Surge doesn’t look that bad to be honest. What do you mean with “bad”?
9) I don’t think anyone is running with pets in PvP. I still have to see any Guardian with spirit weapon or Necro with minions. Also, 30s of thieves guild every 180s is that gamebreaking?
10) Is Signet of Rage weak? :O 30s fury, might and swiftness is weak?

I didn´t say necros have it better than us.

1) All i said is true, if you find a target with stability your build (CC build) wont do anything. We have a stunbreaker that gives stability. The others stunbreakers we have dont protect us form being stunlocked. Its good to take two stunbreakers.
2) Every melee profession has some “sort” of gap closers but warriors are the most afected (no ports, steal, push). Thieves and guardians dont have many problems with this point.
3) Do we need to talk about Conditional removal on warrior? Its already know the we have the worst of them. (its intended to be so). Still its true what i said. Some classes have easy acess to snares and a good amount of them. The problem is (see point 2).
4) while rifle does good damage we dont have spamable/instant killshots to kill on instant or ports when things go bad. Rifle is single damage (it could Pierce but its not a guaranted AOE weapon).
5) Necros are beter bunkers than warrior without those two things. That depends on the build and how they play. Warriors dont have a single invulnerability skill. Shield stance can be removed with fear (Its easy for necros to fight a warrior, just put snares and other conditions till he die)
6) I tried to make a Condition warrior and even with burning and bleeds you do more damage going full berserker. Long lasting conditions wont take you anywere if the other class have good access to conditional removal.
7) Our heals dont heal enough for the damage we usualy take/cannot avoid.
8) Are you talking in TPvP? In SPvP there are lots of pets, minions, spirit weapons, and turrets. I didn´t say thives guild was gamebreaking. I said that warrior has to deal with lots of enemys even if it only fights one person. Other classes just worry about the warrior only.
9) Signet of rage is used manly for the speed. Imagine warrior with:
Thief – Guild of thieves; Dagger Storm
Guardian: Tome of Courage; Renewed Focus
Engenier: Supply Crate (this one is realy strong you need to dogde/block lots of things)
Ranger: Entangle, Rampage As One (Entangle is also very strong)
Elementalist: Glyph of Elementals; Tornado
Mesmer: Mass Invisibility, Moa Morph,Time Warp (moa morph makes the duel so much easy to the mesmer)
Necromancer: Lich Form, Summon Flesh Golem (Lich form hits very hard)

So signet of rage is prety weak imo.

XII.9401:

Opynn.2936:

Warrior don’t have easy access to protection, regeneration and other “bunker” boons. Also to deal with conditions easily Warrior need to spec to do it (soldier runes, warhorn with Quick Breathing, invest trait points into tactic line).
IMO Warrior shouldn’t have easy access to “bunker” boons because that will change warrior into Guardian. I also accepted that that conditions are hard counter to Warrior.
Also you need to remember that people like to cry and it happens all over the forum.
Glad you enjoy warriorhood. If i may suggest: discipline trait line have nice traits but 3% to burst damage is a sad joke that all warriors don’t laugh at anymore- invest only 15 points for fast hands and take unsuspecting foe from arms line since you run weapons with stuns, also sigil of paralyzation in nice for longer stunlock.

I agree with you..we should leave the broken warrior class as is..

/sarcasm off..as for people ‘crying’ about the warrior..how come the other classes recognize how weak it is? Are they ‘crying’ as well?

For the OP -weak troll?- , wait till you run into players in higher end tourneys before judging.

I think anyone thinking that a class is fine based on hot joins against weak pvpers should seriously rethink their general outlook at life.

You must have misunderstood me.
I don’t think Warrior is on the same level as other classes I just accepted that devs won’t do anything to make him better. They gave warrior highest armor and highest hp pool- armor does not reduce condition damage so combined with warriors poor condition removal conditions are the best weapon against warrior. I think they designed the warrior to be like that- it was not mistake done by someone along the way.
Its been 9? months and they still haven’t changed Brawn our awesome burst damage (srsly arenanet – tell us are you plan to do something) I’m not happy with state of warrior I want Warrior to be at same level as other professions. But instead of writing about my grief on forum I rather play the game and try to be best warrior I can now.

As for people “crying” I wasn’t thinking about Warrior forum alone. Wvw forum, spvp forum, all professions forums, living story forum people QQ. People QQ on forum-en.guildwars2.com

I wont deny that I´m a noob with the warrior, but lack of gap closers? O.o
Every melee weapon except for mace (that should be fixed) has a gap closer. That means a common minimum of 2 and a max of 4 only with weapons, which really shine with the “mobile strikes” trait. (axe 2 and 5 should be affected by this trait 2 in my opinion)

I have felt that warriors biggest problems are: no condition removal and no effective healing. Being as offensive as they are by concept I have always felt that a lifesteal mechanic is one of the best ways of solving the sustain problem. It can even be attached to the burst mechanic, giving you more LS with more adrenalin and making more meaningful spending/recovering it. (OFC some lackluster burst attacks should be fixed)

Naurgalen.2374:

I wont deny that I´m a noob with the warrior, but lack of gap closers? O.o
Every melee weapon except for mace (that should be fixed) has a gap closer. That means a common minimum of 2 and a max of 4 only with weapons, which really shine with the “mobile strikes” trait. (axe 2 and 5 should be affected by this trait 2 in my opinion)

---

I have felt that warriors biggest problems are: no condition removal and no effective healing. Being as offensive as they are by concept I have always felt that a lifesteal mechanic is one of the best ways of solving the sustain problem. It can even be attached to the burst mechanic, giving you more LS with more adrenalin and making more meaningful spending/recovering it. (OFC some lackluster burst attacks should be fixed)

Mobile strikes works with immo. Not with chill and criple.
You can have a ton of gap closers, if they dont put you in your target they are useless. Warrior is the class that fell this the most. We dont have blinks, ports, push, steal (i know we have a underwater push) and our mellee skills range are 95% at 130. So you will not get to the target and you will not hit him.

silentnight warrior.2714:

Mobile strikes works with immo. Not with chill and criple.
You can have a ton of gap closers, if they dont put you in your target they are useless. Warrior is the class that fell this the most. We dont have blinks, ports, push, steal (i know we have a underwater push) and our mellee skills range are 95% at 130. So you will not get to the target and you will not hit him.

I know, but cripple is normally weak, and only chill should be cleansed. The real problem is that with the few condition removals we have removing those CC can make you very vulnerable to focus of condition damage.

PS: Idea for CR mechanic that has synergy with the life-steal idea: Removes 1 condition for every adrenaline bar you spend.

XII.9401:

I think anyone thinking that a class is fine based on hot joins against weak pvpers should seriously rethink their general outlook at life.

I think anyone who feels someone should change their general outlook on life based on a video game should change their general outlook on life.

That being said, Warrior is in a rough spot for PvP. The problem stems from a heavy penalty to damage for protection trade offs, more so than most classes in the game. High health pools are nice, but can only get you so far when your healing is only “so-so”.

There is also a trait you guys are forgetting about: http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Restorative_Strength

It is also on a good traitline spot.
I think it is there for a reason.
Mending+Restorative Strength is capable to almost cleanse you all, unless you are completely overwhelmed by conditions.

sorrow.2364:

There is also a trait you guys are forgetting about: http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Restorative_Strength

It is also on a good traitline spot.
I think it is there for a reason.

If you have to use a heal to get out of a snare then you’re going to get slapped down even harder because now you have no heal to fall back on.

I consider that trait to be counter productive to the Warrior class in general. Along with causing confusion on interrupt.

Defektive.7283:

If you have to use a heal to get out of a snare then you’re going to get slapped down even harder because now you have no heal to fall back on.

I consider that trait to be counter productive to the Warrior class in general. Along with causing confusion on interrupt.

You are going to heal up anyway, obviously you are not going to waste it to remove a cripple. For that purpose, there is “Shake If Off”, which, I think, it is a skill that most warriors should run.

If you have more than one condition, you probably need to heal too, so…

I run full http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Superior_Rune_of_Melandru + Dogged March trait.

I run Greatsword/Sword+Warhorn.

Conditions don’t last long on my Warrior, and if I want to move, I can move, and it doesn’t hamper my damage too much.

While restorative strength + mending is nice it uses the only heal that the class and that is is a heavy limitation. FE: someone applies chill, you “Shake it Off”, now he unloads his full burning, poison, whatever… you “mend” and now he has 25 secs where you have no means of sustain (healing or preventing damage) except for endure pain (that doesn’t work for conditions). You go into a “kill or be killed” situation.

When I go to warrior forum, I see:

people who say warriors suck

people who say warriors are fine and that other warriors just stick to sub-optimal builds.

The only thing I don’t see is people actually talking about BUILDS.

All build threads sink into 2nd page pretty fast.

redslion.9675:

When I go to warrior forum, I see:

people who say warriors suck

people who say warriors are fine and that other warriors just stick to sub-optimal builds.

The only thing I don’t see is people actually talking about BUILDS.

All build threads sink into 2nd page pretty fast.

This is what I have been running in WvW with quite a bit of success. I didn’t list food, because frankly I don’t use it when I play (so it can actually perform better than listed).

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fIIQNBhYDbkzJ5N2R4hJSggKohGFFBQcUAFMhSRbUHA-j0yAYLBZCCE9BmIAk8UWTgCilxioxqrxUuCpq4IbwLiWNA-w

Nothing roots me, I deal enough damage, and can take hits to survive most Glass Bursts long enough to react to it or escape.

Here is what I’m testing in spvp.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fIAQNAsZTjcOxwZPCPMxCAsAThiuMoaKli2sLVIMA-TsAA1CnIKSVkrITRyisFNsYZxkAA

My goal is to obtain a great stat optimization: I have high attack, high crit chance (80% with sword/mace), high crit damage (40% with banner), high vitality and high toughness.

Only problem is sword is a bit disappointing as a damage weapon.

Depending on how much I’m awake, I thing this could make a strong front line roamer. And seems really strong against other warrors (I just outlast them), but I am still not able to take down bunkers or strong 1v1 classes alone.

I don’t play Warrior all that much but when I do, I play this;

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fIAQNAneUjcO5uBPyQMxBEjiiIIOPAwAsJUKsj6A-ToAg0EFpKyVkpIZR2iGcssYaB

That awkward moment when you watch someone evade your killshot only to follow up with an eviscerate right after.

Dirame.8521:

I don’t play Warrior all that much but when I do, I play this;

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fIAQNAneUjcO5uBPyQMxBEjiiIIOPAwAsJUKsj6A-ToAg0EFpKyVkpIZR2iGcssYaB

That awkward moment when you watch someone evade your killshot only to follow up with an eviscerate right after.

Kill shot 1500 range
Eviscerate 300 range

PVE?

shimzor.6057:

Dirame.8521:

I don’t play Warrior all that much but when I do, I play this;

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fIAQNAneUjcO5uBPyQMxBEjiiIIOPAwAsJUKsj6A-ToAg0EFpKyVkpIZR2iGcssYaB

That awkward moment when you watch someone evade your killshot only to follow up with an eviscerate right after.

Kill shot 1500 range
Eviscerate 300 range

PVE?

PvP, where most fights are around points and people run in your face half the time.

redslion.9675:

Here is what I’m testing in spvp.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fIAQNAsZTjcOxwZPCPMxCAsAThiuMoaKli2sLVIMA-TsAA1CnIKSVkrITRyisFNsYZxkAA

My goal is to obtain a great stat optimization: I have high attack, high crit chance (80% with sword/mace), high crit damage (40% with banner), high vitality and high toughness.

Only problem is sword is a bit disappointing as a damage weapon.

Depending on how much I’m awake, I thing this could make a strong front line roamer. And seems really strong against other warrors (I just outlast them), but I am still not able to take down bunkers or strong 1v1 classes alone.

I would never use it in tPvP, but in WvW it gives huge mobility and awesome slows against opponents trying to run away while you beat them to death with Greatsword auto-attack.

sorrow.2364:

Hi everyone.
I’m relatively new to Warrior, I used to play a Necro for a very long time, then moved to Thief and now considering to master the Warrior.

I have to say, I’ve never played it that much. I’ve played just few match in PvP ages before, just to try it out.

I have to say that I’m aware that people consider Warrior as overall weak in PvP, but as far as I’ve tried, I can’t understand exactly why.

In PvP, I usually run a Mace+Shield/Hammer build, 10/0/30/0/30 and soldier amulet.
I find incredibly ilarious on how effective this build is against any player, bunker or whatever you’d like to say.
I can easily stunlock people to death while having great survivability, good condition cleansing (not that awesome, I have to say), 2 stunbreakers and 2 burst mitigation skills (Defy Pain and Shield Stance).
Not to say how Earthshaker is a wonderful skill in point holding due to AoE massive damage + Stun.

I’d like to know where people think the warrior lacks and why, because I can’t understand where the real UPness is.

lets roll a bunker guardian and do what you said 100 times better
or you can roll a zerker guardian that has amazing blocks, amazing teleports and gap closing skills so you can catch up enemies with insane speed,aoe blinds,aoe burns,aoe cc, amazing condition cleansings and stun breaks and high damage skills that actually hit without the need of using 2 utilities and all of these without the need of using specific runes or sigils

McFribble.2349:

redslion.9675:

Here is what I’m testing in spvp.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fIAQNAsZTjcOxwZPCPMxCAsAThiuMoaKli2sLVIMA-TsAA1CnIKSVkrITRyisFNsYZxkAA

My goal is to obtain a great stat optimization: I have high attack, high crit chance (80% with sword/mace), high crit damage (40% with banner), high vitality and high toughness.

Only problem is sword is a bit disappointing as a damage weapon.

Depending on how much I’m awake, I thing this could make a strong front line roamer. And seems really strong against other warrors (I just outlast them), but I am still not able to take down bunkers or strong 1v1 classes alone.

I would never use it in tPvP, but in WvW it gives huge mobility and awesome slows against opponents trying to run away while you beat them to death with Greatsword auto-attack.

Aye, I realized that too. I don’t need that much mobility. I could try almost the same build with a greatsword:

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fIAQJARTjcOxwZPCPMRCAjiiA6ygKm0HaLVIMA-TkAA1CnIKSVkrITRyisFtsA

Maybe putting bolas to land 100 blades.