Guild Wars 2

Awesome, thanks! That has helped a lot.

So there are some cases where a tank would hold aggro, but that is encounter specific, and atypical.

Yeah, the clothyness was also confusing to me @SlippyCheeze but understanding this now it does make more sense.

@Tarasicodissa But it seems like this toughness preferred boss target system is dependent on the specific boss of the encounter, correct?

Also @Tarasicodissa, Indeed particularly since my experience as a more traditional tank in WoW for example seems to have no benefit in gw2. This question comes from a very meandering path of questions that goes something like:
What do I use my 80 boost on?
Mesmer
Why?
They are annoying to level
OK, what can a Mesmer do?
Everyone likes Chronotanks
Oh? I thought there were no tanks in gw2…
Well there aren’t…
Oh, um…

So…
When the encounter does not rely upon a more classic aggro management related, positioning based use of the tank (as it usually doesn’t) it is just that the “tank” is the epicenter of a giant clump of AOEs that are generally buffing the raid (a raid being the only place you would find a “tank” in gw2).

And the classes chosen for this role are those that have generally not great dps because their concentration on raid buffing does not decrease raid damage because their dps contribution was not significant in the first place.

But… the “tank” must be survivable enough to be in the middle of the action… making certain professions/specializations better suited for this role because they are the proper combination of MoreUtilityThanDPS and Survivability.

Hi guys,

I have been reading a lot about group compositions, group roles, and I believe I understand how some roles, like tank particularly, in gw2 are significantly different than in some more classicaly structured MMOs.

However, I keep seeing stuff like “Chronotank” or “Reaper Tank” which leads me to believe that tanks still exist in gw2 maybe just not exactly as they do in those other classic structures, or not as I am thinking of them.

I have read the wiki about Aggro and Tanking and studied the meta builds for these Chrono and Reaper tanks… But I am still having problems with a fundamental question.

What is the role of the tank in a group in gw2? And how is it accomplished?

Thanks very much in advance, I am pretty new and have mostly experienced only open world content.

Hello Everyone,

I am new to GW2 and am looking at my world options.

If I understand correctly, WvW matchups are done by tier so that more skilled/powerful? worlds are matched up with like worlds and those that do not perform as well are matched up together. Not sure what this is based on but I get the point.

My question is, as a new player do I want to be on a highly ranked world or do I want to avoid those highly ranked worlds because their highly ranked opponents will knock me around?

Are the worlds matched up based on the quality of participation of the players or simply the quantity of participation?

lvl 25 now…

Thanks Shade, i noticed they do have purposeful deaths I just didnt think of them as the intention of the minion. I will have to keep that in mind and give them another try maybe once i get a tankish minion i can try a Staff minion build.

Same here Amethyst Im still using D/D and really like both the game play and the look/feel. I thought for a while about going over to a different offhand but the Deathly Swarm is great for practically eliminating the alpha of a spawn while Enfeebling blood does a great job of keeping all those newly weakened mobs on you with the bleeding ticks. And of course D/ is just great.

Im still playing with having a second loadout set up for particular situations. seems like something with focus as the offhand would increase survivability some more maybe tack axe on there for some quick lifeforce generation but right now its staff that I use in group events to through out a bunch of dark fields.

Hi Clyde,

Sounds like the same boat I’m in. I have a 27 warrior and am already getting bored watching him swing his sword around. I wanted a scrappy melee/ability toon and generally dislike “Rogue” classes ( or “rouges” as people seem to think they are called ) so went with Necro.

Have to say at lvl 12 I am really enjoying it.

I am having a blast with D/D and a staff in my back pocket. I tried D/F for a while and even S/D but settled on the D/D. I tried every combination long enough to enable every ability then played with the fifth and I would highly recommend it.

Like you I don’t appreciate the minions and have removed them from my build. I heard they were good for leveling so I kept reserving judgement. But after the bone minion died for the millionth time and the inability of the blood minion to heal itself got annoying and just went over to the wells as a place to start. Of course well of suffering is awesome and I really like Well of … ( the healing one) for events when Im trying to keep NPCs up.