Guild Wars 2

The result is that Gadget utilities are mostly useless to the Engi, the Tool Kit and Bomb Kit are impractical, and the FT/Grenade Kit will kill you faster than you kill anyone else. In terms of basic weapons, the Rifle’s AoE is limited mostly to the autoattack (good luck using Jump Shot), and their Pistols don’t have the range or volume of conditions to have a serious impact. Shield has little offense, and is mostly for personal defense and combo finishers (not saying that it’s bad, but it’s not helping to offset the Engi’s awkward offense).

What’s left to the Engi is Turrets and Elixirs, and Elixirs are mostly a non-factor due to RNG, limited support capabilities (Toss Elixir R being the exception), and the selfish nature of the buffs outside of the toolbelt skills. The design of turrets is directly related to the third major Engi flaw. Since turrets won’t last for a second in zergfights, Supply Crate is hardly better than a Warrior’s Earthshaker. Sad thing is, it’s still the best option, since Elixir X will paint a target on your head and Mortar is worthless in this sort of combat. A class’s Elite skill usually lends them some sort of unique appeal that can make them worthy of bringing along, but the Engineer has none to speak of. Its chance to specialize at something is being squandered.

What should be done?

Trying to change the Engi from being a jack-of-all-trades class would require huge amounts of work, so I would suggest fixing the second and third problems instead. To address the Engi’s offense, change Retaliation to deal back a percentage of all damage dealt, rather than a fixed number per hit. This is not a new suggestion, and I wouldn’t be surprised to see it implemented eventually, but the Engi gets screwed harder by Retal than any other class in WvW. To fix the Engi’s lack of an Elite for these situations, completely redesign Elixir X into anything else. It’s a lazy skill for using other class’s elites instead of contributing to the Engi’s own identity, and even after it’s been buffed repeatedly, I still don’t know of anyone who uses it. I’m not going to make specific suggestions on what to change it to, but there’s no excuse for it to still exist in its current state.

Anyways, those are my thoughts. Hope I didn’t offend any WvW Engis out there who have had success with their builds in zergs, but I’m of the belief that the Engi needs some retooling before it will be able to truly compete with light and heavy armor classes for a spot in an organized group.

If improved communication with the community is a priority for the devs, may I make a suggestion? After patch notes affecting balance are released, it would be awesome if a representative of the PvP team could make a post in these forums briefly outlining the reasoning behind the different changes. This would lead to much more productive discussion on the forums afterward, since it immediately provides a second perspective for people who disagree with the changes to consider. There would be more arguments about the quality of changes and less whining about them, and based on what you guys have said here about the importance of player feedback to your discussions, it could be mutually beneficial. The community gets a better idea of where Arenanet is trying to direct each profession and PvP as a whole, while the development team gets more constructive and focused feedback to consider during balance discussions. It seems like a win-win situation to me, and all it requires is a post after each balance patch.

I’m fine with this. Pies were a crutch that let people build full glass while staying durable, and they diminished the value of skillful play. There are plenty of other great defensive food options out there, but now if you want to play a glass cannon, you’re going to actually be squishy. This is the way it should be, and we might even see some more build diversity now that building for survival is more important. Definitely a good move on Anet’s part.

I’ll speak from my experience with Vindicated Honor (vH), a former T1 guild which was previously ranked in the top 10 in NA.

It’s probably not the answer you want to hear, but the Engineer was the only profession I never saw vH run with in WvW. A lot of what Deniara Devious said above applied to our group: we made regular use of all light and heavy armor classes, with sparing use of Rangers and Thieves, but Engineers seemed to be the black sheep. To reinforce this, the only empty section on our guild forums was the Engineer section. No guides, no builds, no questions about the profession from anyone in the guild.

Now, I’m not going to go so far as to say that the Engineer isn’t viable at that level of play, but I will say that an Engineer’s profession design isn’t well-suited to it. I believe the reason for this has three major components:

1) The Engi’s nature as a “jack-of-all-trades” class
2) Limited access to AoE damage, and the way Retaliation punishes so many of the AoE skills available to the Engi
3) Their lack of a viable elite skill in WvW

Starting with the first point, Engineers are known for their versatility, and this can be of great use in S/TPvP or small group roaming in WvW, where what you’re able to bring to the table is limited by your number of allies. In organized groups, however, this ceases to be a factor. In a group of 20+, you ought to have all of your bases covered: Stability, heavy condition cleansing, CC, combo fields/finishers, AoE condition pressure, boon-stripping, stealth, DPS, etc. This is where the Engineer’s limitations begin to show, unfortunately. The Engineer can provide many of these things compared to what an individual class can (I imagine you could make an Engi build that has all of the things I listed above incorporated), but the scale they can apply these effects on and the efficiency with which they can apply them often doesn’t match up to other classes. Some examples taken from this thread:

-Toss Elixir R: a great skill, but outdone by the Warrior’s Battle Standard. In an AoE meta, downed allies in the radius of the thrown Elixir R are still prone to cleaving ground-targeted effects that comprise most of the damage in a GvG or zerg fight. Elixir R’s advantages over BS are largely overshadowed by BS’s ability to res downed players immediately under AoE pressure. Its shorter cast and recharge times are easily mitigated with good communication and by having multiple Warriors in a group.

-Bombs/Healing Bombs: In order to use bombs offensively, an Engineer would need to be in close with the frontliners. Engineers lack the Warrior’s defensive stats and the Guardian’s active mitigation, and if you take skills that allow for that kind of survival, you’ll sacrifice most of the utility you bring to a group. Even if you do survive without specifically building for it, you’re going to be putting a lot of strain on the people in your group who are trying to keep you alive, and putting too much stress on these players is the best way to cause a wipe.

Bringing along healing bombs is a nice thought, but the majority of healing in a group is going to come from players dropping blast finishers on Water Fields. Your positioning with your bombs is far less flexible than the positioning of these fields and finishers, and your healing is much slower. Whether you choose to be up front with the heavies or in back with the casters, there’s some disadvantage to your group (they either have to work to keep you up, or you lose the offensive potential of the bombs).

Elixir Gun: A single Ele brings almost all of the utility of this kit and does it much better. Higher healing, more condition cleanses that aren’t all limited to small area, and blast finishers that don’t throw you out of position. The EG’s 1 and 2 skills are useless in large groups, so unfortunately, they’re not a factor.

Water Fields: Eles and Rangers already provide plenty of these. The Engi’s water fields are low-duration (the longest being 3 seconds) and don’t provide supplementary effects with nearly the same power.

And so on. Most of the utility the Engi can pack into a support build is outdone by other classes. Meanwhile, their offense is awkward and hampered by the sheer number of players involved in large battles, which brings me to point 2. Engineers don’t have access to a ton of AoE, which is king in WvW, and Retaliation wrecks most of what they do have (Grenades, FT). Unfortunately, this pushes them in the direction of a support role, where they’re forced to compete with Eles and Guardians. An Engi does have a nice range of single-target damage and CC options, but as zerg assassins, they’re handily outdone by Thieves, so an organized group is unlikely to make use of these.

Continued…

Now that we’ve seen the notes for the Dragonhunter in the next beta, I wanted to put out my own thoughts on the DH and make suggestions for the direction of changes in future betas. In hopes that the devs are watching the forums for feedback, I’ll try to present a clear picture of why so many players are dissatisfied, and potential ways to proceed from here.

I’ve compiled a list of suggested changes in the second post of this topic (basically a TL;DR), but I’m going to start with an analysis of the DH as it stands.

1) Specialization Overview

1. I believe there’s good potential with the DH, but agree with many others that it feels unfinished. Quality of life improvements are needed in many areas, such as letting Longbow users turn around when they try to shoot something behind them.
2. My honest opinion of the most recent changes is that they do not address many of the issues that players raised with the DH, and that boosting numbers was favored over addressing the issues at the root of the complaints.
3. Virtues feel clunky in combat, and their concepts seem underdeveloped. Losing instant casting on them restricts the types of plays we can make and hurts our theme of “active defenses.” Not being able to channel our new Virtues during Renewed Focus also feels like a significant downgrade.
4. Justice is inconsistent, and doesn’t provide enough of a reward for landing the slow cast. The nerfs to the pre-beta duration and the Big Game Hunter trait make it much less appealing, though I do appreciate the recent increase to 1200 range. Condition Guardians will still never want to activate it.
5. Resolve’s benefits are now delayed, leaving you exposed during the leap and making its regular version safer/more efficient. The leap distance also feels short. Just increasing the healing doesn’t fix these issues.
6. Courage has various balance issues. The cast time makes it a spammable stun break. The shield blocks melee attacks for allies, but not the DH (I’m assuming this was actually deliberate rather than a bug, since Guardians don’t need another channeled block/invulnerability skill). It’s lacking polish overall and needs another look.
7. The Longbow seems at odds with the DH’s supportive nature as a Guardian. While the DH was designed to be more selfish than the Guardian, it still has a sizable range of support tools that help to distinguish it from other snipers. Since other Guardian support skills are limited to 600 range, trying use the Longbow’s range to full potential is only feasible when your allies are close and your enemies are far away. This is fine in WvW zergs, but can create conflicts for the DH in other game modes, since we have limited tools for managing our position in fights (few disengages, ground-targeted gap closers, etc.).
8. Lack of mobility/position control is one of the Guardian’s intended weaknesses as a profession, but this makes the DH a ranged attacker that has a hard time kiting. Kiting is one of the most basic defenses for ranged attackers and one of their most sizable advantages over melee foes, but the DH has to rely on inconsistent Cripple skills and the occasional knockback/ward to keep ahead. At this point I’ll be surprised if we ever get a +25% movespeed trait, so if that’s not on the table, we need a solution that at least gives us some sort of reliable position control without giving us too much disengage potential.
9. The Longbow has a number of mechanical issues including Puncture Shot’s slow projectiles, lots of self-rooting on a profession that’s already hurting for mobility, long cast times, and of course, the inability to fire #3 and #4 behind you. These issues only exacerbate the Guardian’s issues with position control, and unlike Warriors, Guardians caught at close range with their Longbow are easy pickings. These issues were ignored in the recent changes.
10. Traps are better now that they’ve gotten cooldown reductions and damage boosts, but they still need lots of work if they’re ever going to do more than fill an empty utility slot in PvE. CDR for Traps should really be baseline, because Traps are one of the least consistent types of utilities, requiring setup, positioning, and often CC on targets to function well. It’s important that Trap builds across all professions have many opportunities to reposition and activate their Traps, and faster cooldowns also have better synergy with Trapper Runes. Activation time for DH Traps should also be brought down to 1/2 second so it’s consistent with other Traps. I’d happily trade some damage for these changes.
11. In PvP scenarios, Traps will remain a gimmick for Guardians until they’re given some form of sustain. Fragments of Faith is nice, but dedicated Trap builds are still going to be hurting for consistent healing, condition cleanse, and stun breaks if they don’t get more support. There are also still issues integrating Traps with Longbow gameplay, but since ground-targeted Traps seem to have been deliberately driven to extinction, the solution here is likely going to have to come back to improving the DH’s position control.
12. Lastly (but perhaps most importantly), DH traits are underwhelming compared to the Reaper’s and Chronomancer’s. Many are too specialized and/or have weak effects. Others are placed awkwardly in the line (e.g. Pure of Sight). There’s also no hint of the themed trait lines that the devs discussed back when they introduced the Reaper, which makes the lack of polish here even more evident. Like its Virtues, the DH’s traits will continue to hold the specialization back if they aren’t revamped.

Specific suggestions for improvement are in the post below.

Speaking from a biased Guardian perspective (no experience playing an Ele, so not going to comment on that):

Yeah, burning probably needs to be toned down, but when the nerf inevitably hits, it would be really nice if Guardians got something to compensate. The popular consensus in the Guardian community right now is that while our burn build is a fun, fast killer, it’s gimmicky and not suited for high-level play. Our power Meditation spec is already falling out of meta, and “Feel My Wrath!” is likely going to be nerfed as well, so if we don’t get any buffs to compensate, we’re just going to be stuck with basically the same bunker build we’ve been running since launch.

I’m well aware that Guardians are still relatively well-off compared to some professions, but lots of us are getting sick of never having any new builds in the meta. Our Spirit Weapons and Signets aren’t viable, there’s no dedicated Consecration build, our Symbols don’t work very well, and until this last patch, we were also struggling to put together a condition build. Regardless of how well off we are in the meta overall, losing a new playstyle like the burn build is going to hurt the profession as a whole and seriously demoralize its community. When the hammer drops, I sincerely hope that there’s some consideration for that fact.

nacario.9417:

Deniara Devious.3948:

This is more than enough proof that the new elite specs are overpowered compared to the base classes.

Or could it be to some extent due to players wanting to play what is new, and turns out to be on par with vanilla classes? Excluding the warrior though.

These are professional players competing for a $200,000 prize pool, and they’ve already had a full month to play with the new specs in casual games. When you’re on a pro team competing in a major tournament, you play what you think is going to give you the best chance of winning, not what you happen to feel like that day. That can even mean switching off of your preferred profession for the duration of a meta where that profession is weak. A handful of pro players do specialize on one profession exclusively, but these players are the minority, and often need to have team compositions built around them to compensate when their profession isn’t “up.”

The results here show that the game’s most competitive players resoundingly agree that almost all elite specs are superior to their base professions, and that Warrior has no place in the competitive metagame. It’s possible that a few regular specs could slip back into the meta if they can be used to counter specific elite specs, but we’re not looking at anything resembling balance between the two. It’s the opposite of what Anet said they were aiming for.

Core Guardian burn builds actually do work a little better than DH burn builds, since you can run Radiance/Valor/Virtues for a good mix of burst and sustain. Dropping Radiance means losing a huge chunk of damage, losing Valor makes you glass, and giving up Virtues keeps you from being good for anything outside of 1v1’s. DH brings Cripple/Vulnerability for control and cover conditions, and potentially better condition cleansing, but unfortunately, it’s just not enough to compensate for the core capabilities you lose when you sacrifice the other lines.

That said, Burn Guardian still doesn’t have the easiest time in this meta. Revenants losing their perma-resistance helped out some, but Burn Guards still hate the abundance of cleansing, Resistance, and CC that the most popular builds have brought along with them. Conversely, condi Reapers and Revenants are bringing along boon corrupts, regular Stability, and a much wider variety of conditions to cover their damage against cleansing, so they don’t struggle with these issues to nearly the same degree. You can have some success with a Burn build, but it’s much harder than it was pre-HoT, and you’re going to struggle significantly more as your opponents get better. Burn Guardian’s biggest advantage, in my opinion, is the psychological impact it has on players with its quick stacking and good re-application of burns. If you can take advantage of that, you can still cut people down who aren’t ready for the build (which is a good number, since it’s all but disappeared from play by now).

You’re also correct regarding bunkers – even with the DH’s capabilities, the sustain is notably lower than it used to be and not nearly as viable in competitive play. My Cele Druid and even Marauder Scrapper feel just as tanky as any variation of Cele/Cleric’s/Magi Guardian that I’ve tried, and they don’t feel nearly as risky to play. If I mismanage my cooldowns on Bunker Guardian, I can be wiped out in short order (especially against coordinated condi pressure), while Druid and Scrapper allow for a number of mistakes before I die (assuming I don’t just disengage first via Ancestral Grace or Stealth Gyro).

Unfortunately, there was a reason why the Guardian/DH was the third profession to drop out of the competitive meta, right after Warrior and Thief. The game’s general power creep has made our build diversity significantly worse than it was in the pre-HoT meta (where it was feasible to run Power Meditation, Burn, or full Bunker builds). While some professions have flourished with the introduction of their elite specs, the DH’s mechanics are too shallow and don’t interact well enough with the core Guardian’s design to open up many new competitive possibilities. Our DH meta build is just our old Power Meditation build with the Zeal line swapped for DH, different weapons (Longbow/Sword+Focus instead of GS/Scepter+Focus), and Purification/Test of Faith instead of Shelter/Smite Condition.

If you’re interested, some further background on the issues at play here:

The Guardian is generally considered one of Anet’s “pet” professions when it comes to balancing, and I’ll grant that there’s a good basis for that opinion. From launch to HoT, we were always meta in every game mode, and I don’t think any other profession can make that claim. The truth is a little more complicated, though. Shouts, Meditations, and Shelter have actually just been good enough to carry us through each meta, despite increasing power creep in the game and the glaring flaws present in many of our weapons, traits, and utilities. As a quick example, 3 of our 5 core utility types have never been viable for dedicated builds in any game mode in the history of the game (Signets, Spirit Weapons, Consecrations), and from these utility types, only 4 utilities are ever used with any frequency in any game mode. To list them, you’ve got:

1. Bane Signet (PvE)
2. Shield of the Avenger (PvE)
3. Purging Flames (all)
4. Wall of Reflection (PvE/WvW).

You might occasionally also see a Signet of Judgment, and maybe a Signet of Wrath in a PvE Burn build (just for the stats), but those are rarities. If you look at all of the Guardian’s utilities, you’ll find that roughly half of them have never been used regularly in any game mode at any point in the game’s lifespan. I’m fairly sure that the Elementalist is the only other profession that’s dealt with such severe utility skill problems, and it should come as no surprise that Eles have also historically struggled with build diversity while riding on the things that make their strong builds so good.

As Ragnar mentioned above, we also have a number of frustrating weapon mechanics that aren’t aging well with HoT, and some traits that should have been obliterated with the specialization revamp (see Wrathful Spirit, Healer’s Retribution, the Zeal Minors, and so on). Many of our trait lines are badly designed in general. Besides the minor trait issues with Zeal, Honor is extremely overcrowded, and Virtues acts as a trait graveyard because of how mandatory Absolute Resolution and Indomitable Courage are for everything but Burn Guard and PvE Dragonhunter.

At the end of the day, what this all amounts to is that we have no recourse once our main builds finally give way to power creep. We have little room for innovation because too much of what we’ve got wasn’t even viable at launch, let alone now. I wrote this much without even going into our specific weapon issues, or how underwhelming our untraited profession mechanic is (3 crappy Signets, basically). Much like Warriors and Eles, Guardians (and Dragonhunters) are in need of a complete revamp to genuinely be “in a good spot.”

I’m one of the people who’s indifferent to the Dragon Hunter name – as long as it can keep up with the other professions and is fun to play, that’s good enough for me. If we’re brainstorming, though, I think that a good alternative name for the specialization would be “Arbiter.”

“Arbiter” conveys the powerful and relentless nature of the Guardian while still suggesting a profession that hunts down Tyria’s enemies. However, it’s less specific than Dragon Hunter, so most people wouldn’t need to be upset about lore or its thematic resemblance to the Ranger. I generally agree with the idea of a “judge” theme for the specialization, since many of its abilities involve trapping enemies and punishing them in some way. A new ward on the Longbow, cripples and knockbacks throughout the traits, and of course the Trap utilities themselves all fit neatly within the concept. It just feels right and sounds professional.

Um, based on the bolded parts of his post, he’s not asking about anything specific to the meta – he’s asking how you go about convincing your team to try different compositions from the current meta, particularly when it may involve players having to change to classes they aren’t familiar with. In his case, he’s saying he doesn’t care if his team wants him to switch from a BS Thief to a PW Thief, because he’s familiar with both and the Thief class as a whole, but if his team needs him to switch his class to something he’s not familiar with for the sake of a new composition (he used Warrior as an example, but it could be Guardian, Ele, Mes, or whatever else), he wanted to know how exactly to deal with it.

The answer really comes down to the players involved. For the first question, if you’ve got a team of players who only know how to play one class each, and who have enjoyed good success with that composition, convincing them to switch things up will probably be hard. In such a scenario, your best bet would be to pitch the idea shortly after balance updates, when lots of players will be curious about new builds and experimenting with different tactics. If you’ve got a more flexible group that knows a wider range of classes, pitching the idea shouldn’t be that hard, and you just need to come up with a convincing argument about how your new comp can counter the current meta. You may or may not be right, but you need to give your team a reason to get excited about something new, and the promise of pioneering “new meta” is often a good way to do it. Finally, it might also help to expand your team past just 5 members, so you have a pool of players you can run different comps with (this also lets you practice at times when some members aren’t online, so it’s beneficial in multiple ways).

As for your second question, where you’re worried that your profession is going to be forced out of a new comp, there are a few possibilities. The first is simple – start learning how to play other professions. Other professions may or may not interest you for their own sake, but learning the details of how they work can be beneficial to your skill on your main profession, and you might even find that you like your new class. Besides being able to bring something new to your team, you’ll gain familiarity with the strengths and weaknesses of these professions, common rotations and tactics they might use, and you might even be able to apply the knowledge to your main (for example, I main a tanky DPS Guardian, and after playing a glass cannon Necro for a while, my positional awareness with my Guardian improved dramatically). If you’ve never played a profession before, your team will hopefully be understanding of the time you’ll need to learn and master it. The second option, if you really don’t want to learn anything else, would be to negotiate with your team and try to figure out Thief builds that could fill the role they’re looking for – presumably, if they’re trying out new team comps, they should be receptive to new approaches and ideas (this may be more or less feasible depending on what role they’re looking for, of course). Finally, if neither you nor your team is willing to budge on the issue, recruiting more players to your team, as suggested above, will allow your team to test new compositions without forcing you to play something you don’t want to – the obvious drawback being that you’re sitting out those games. This isn’t a perfect solution by any means, but it’s probably the best you can do when compromise isn’t on the table.

apharma.3741:

Stilgar.6437:

calm down it was the worst build of all time. not only massively OP but so annoying to fight against, it simply made pvp not fun on any level of play. it ruined the pro league and the league system launch. props to devs for hotfixing it. The build is still OP in a way, but at least it has a major downside.

Mesmer is so strong in general due to alacrity, it will still have a place in the meta. But at least this bunker abomination is dead.

So very wrong.

DD ele after spec patch before they nerfed blinding ashes was the worst build of all time. They literally had to change the ESL rules to prevent people bringing 4 and a thief and dominating any team not bringing 4 eles.

Funny how people forget the way teams stacked 2-3 of guards, engies, eles and warriors at various times but suddenly lose their kitten if 2 of necro, ranger, mesmer and probably thief get stacked.

DD Ele was the worst in terms of single profession stacking during ESL tournies (still never went past 2 Eles on a team at the top levels), but games back then didn’t have scores of 35-0 after 10 minutes of play without a single cap for either team. That’s the difference between DD Ele and Bunker Mesmer. Both were dominant builds, but one at least allowed the game to progress.

Dirame.8521:

Silverkey.2078:

I think you are missing many of the points. Personally my main problem with the new meta, is not even how restrictive it is but how unfun it is. Too much CC, too much invulnerabilities, too much damage, too much healing. The fact that they all balance themselves somewhat does not mean the meta is fine.

Doesn’t the main point come down to “Nerf Condi Rev and Bunker Mes?” Or did I get that wrong somehow?

I think it was more along the lines of “Nerf the huge number of passive procs, instant-cast skills, spike damage, invulnerabilities, evades, blocks, and general skill spam that have been steadily introduced into the game over the past couple years.” Chronomancer and Revenant happen to have a lot of those things, but the problem goes beyond just those two. As mentioned earlier in the thread, if you just nerf Bunker Chrono and Condi Rev, you’re not going to see any significant change, because the other Elite specs are still incredibly overpowered, and they’re just going to move in to fill the void. Maybe Daredevil would see a bit more play, but non-elite specs were still completely shut out even before we saw the rise of those two builds.

As a sidebar, I don’t really understand how some people are okay with a meta where two professions are virtually unplayable, non-elite specs are obsolete, and where the general skill ceiling has fallen dramatically. Just because you’re having success in this meta doesn’t mean that the game is in a healthy state. Similarly, the fact that it’s possible to counter certain builds doesn’t mean that those builds are positive factors in the metagame as a whole.

Setun.4368:

SuperHaze.4210:

Ynna.8769:

Try PvP, Sword and Board works pretty well there.
Also, you have to keep in mind that weapons in Guild Wars 2 correspond to a playstyle, and the Greatsword offers a popular playstyle. This doesn’t mean the Greatsword is a better weapon than all other weapons, just that what it offers is more popular.

So true. I run scepter/torch and sword/focus in my meditation build. The playstyle is very in your face. I have a lot of fun with it and if timed right, you can unload some serious damage. I only pvp though. The only thing missing in my build is an interrupt, but I just don’t want to swap the focus with a shield because of the burst potential from Shield of Wrath.

I run the same setup, only I use sword / shield instead of the focus. The shield skills are extremely handy in pvp for causing disruption (aoe knockback / burst heal on #5 is amazing), and the protection given to you by the #4 shield move is very nice as well. Granted the cooldowns are a bit high, but seeing as how I’ve taken on 2 people in wvw at once and killed both with more than 80% health remaining is super sexy.

Oh! One distinct advantage of sword / x-off hand combo is having 2 sigils that can proc compared to the 1 from greatsword. Something to think about! (I use 30% lifesteal chance on sword, 60% bleed chance on shield, which gives me amazing results)

Just to let you know, all sigils with on crit/on swap effects share internal cooldowns, so your lifesteal and bleed procs are interfering with each other. Every time one activates, the other sigil can’t activate until the first is off cooldown (and if I recall, Sigil of Blood’s tooltip is wrong, and it actually has a 5 second cooldown). It’s the same thing if you’ve got a crit sigil on one set and a swap sigil on the second: if you change to the swap sigil set while the crit sigil is on cooldown, you miss out on your on-swap effect. Because of the way it works, it’s best to pair these sigils with passive sigils, like Superior Force or Bloodlust, so you get a bonus without interference.

I don’t think food effects interfere with sigils, though, so if you’ve gotten attached to the Sigil of Earth, you could use Omnomberry Pies to compensate for the non-functional Blood Sigil. I’d personally recommend something like Sigil of Fire instead of Earth, though, which will be better DPS overall.

Trap nerfs look fine. Protective Reviver change is nice and will help compensate for the indirect nerf FMW is taking with the Quickness changes (same with Shelter not being affected by Quickness). Smite Condition buffs are great for keeping pace with the current condi meta, but frankly, I’d rather them just nerf condition application across the board. There are a few good nerfs in this patch, but from what we’ve seen, it still doesn’t feel like Anet is backing down from the power creep that began in the specialization update. Unless the rest of the patch notes are amazing, I doubt I’m going to start playing again after this update.

I’m mostly disappointed that the preview didn’t include any potential changes to our weak traits and utilities. I’m assuming that they’re not ready to show yet, but how can we provide any meaningful feedback on what might be coming if we don’t see even a single potential change?

George Steel.1804:

Show me how we can cripple an enemy, and I’ll send you in-game gold.

I’m not sure this really counts either, but:

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Affliction

Do I get gold now?

On a more serious note, I’m going to have to agree with most other people here – the Warrior and the Guardian are completely different, and the Guardian only completely outshines the Warrior in a TPvP setting (even then, it’s because the Warrior’s potential roles can be filled better by a variety of classes, not just by the Guardian). PvE goes to the Warrior hands down, and WvW is a toss-up depending on what type of play you’re talking about. Warrior is still a very competitive choice for many roles in WvW.

In general, Warriors have better burst, mobility, ranged combat potential, and CC than Guardians do. That’s not a comprehensive list, but it’s most of the big ones. It’s worth mentioning that some Guardian weapons, like the Hammer, can compete with the Warrior’s CC, but Guardians do not have it spread across their weapons and utilities with the consistency Warriors do. There are also a number of roles that the two fulfill that are simply difficult to compare (e.g. Warrior Banners and Guardian-style support).

Long story short, Guardians absolutely cannot do everything that Warriors can, nor can Warriors do everything Guardians can. The two serve very different roles in most game modes, and for good reason.

hotcarl.8621:

I agree with most of what you said Soryuju, but I just want to add that I’ve found a celestial trapper build that I’ve had great success with. I run honor instead of valor, which helps with rezzing as well as sustain while fighting on a point.. Basically, I have permanent vigor along with an extra 15% endurance boost which really helps me avoid the big attacks.

The burn damage isn’t insane, but it’s extremely helpful against enemies with protection or immunity to direct damage. I can usually deal between 400k – 700k damage in a match, and the sustain is amazing.

Glad to hear it! I think I tried something similar early on in HoT, but never got back around to playing it again. I did read that the 15% endurance boost from Purity of Body doesn’t stack with Vigor (but I haven’t tested it myself), and it’s kind of lame if that’s true. Honor is definitely great for sustain, though, and these days, I usually run it over Valor if I’m trying to play a DH bunker.

If you’re not opposed to posting your build, I’m sure the OP would appreciate the chance to try it out.

With my points above, I didn’t mean that there’s no possible builds left to try on the Guardian/DH, just that it’s an uphill battle and that it probably won’t get better without fundamental changes to the profession, or at least serious global nerfs that change the entire landscape of PvP. With Anet’s track record, those changes aren’t coming any time soon, so if something works for you, run with it.

Rump Buffalo.2594:

i love how everyone is raging about this without having any idea how it will be implemented… as a trait or signet there is no problem with it

also no one stated damage or anything so….can we all calm down until they actually give specifics or we see who gets it and how in 10 days?

Unfortunately, this is the GW2 community, and while it has many positive contributors, there’s an unspoken rule that incoming changes, regardless of the information available, must be greeted with hysteria and outrage. As we can clearly see by the evidence presented in this thread, the fact that Warriors and Thieves are getting a damage boost against Guardians (if they take a certain trait, most likely) is going to ruin Guardian viability in all game modes. They will be unusable in SPvP, TPvP, casual dueling, WvW solo roaming, WvW small group combat, WvW zerging, WvW keep defense, and (apparently), PvE dungeons, because of that extra 10% damage or so. Never mind the incoming nerf to the Thief’s Mug trait or the death of permastealth, or the fact that Warriors are currently considered the weakest PvP class in the game. Full boon duration bunker is also apparently the only Guardian build that exists, and other Guardian builds will be rendered useless by mere association with it, even if they only end up taking 3% extra damage from these classes.

As I stated before in this thread, I’m not completely sure this is the best approach to dealing with the issue, and I think just increasing the amount of boon removal available would be a better fix, but it’s times like these that make me wonder if the Guardian community’s gotten spoiled from the buffs and fixes in recent patches. Guardian and Mesmer are currently the only classes desirable in all major game modes, and giving two other classes the ability to do some extra damage against us if they specifically build for it isn’t going to change that in the slightest.

Anyways, I don’t really expect this post to do anything to stop the stream of angry responses, so carry on.

A Blast finisher on FB would definitely be cool, and it would have the benefit of giving the Sword some supportive elements that it’s currently missing. I’m always going to lean conservative when it comes to Sword buffs, though, and the variety of powerful effects Blast finishers provide make me a little skeptical about whether the change would be healthy for balance. I’d personally put it on my wish list, along with more damage for FB and a 20% projectile finisher on ZD, but it’s not something I’d ever expect to see implemented.

Cat Has Ducks.1982:

Only weaknesses are PvP, Fractals and Raids.

Dragonhunter Bunker is already shaping up to be incredible in PvP, so you can take that off of the list. I haven’t played DH in Fractals yet, so no comment there, and it’s too early to speculate on raids when we’ve only seen one boss in one wing (and when elite specs have received some notable buffs/nerfs since we’ve tried them last).

I’m going to have to agree that this buff was a negative change for the metagame, since the Shatter spec was already the dominant Mesmer spec in tournament play, and one considered almost as mandatory for teams as bunker Guardians. Now the same spec that was already considered top-tier for tourney play is running around with 9+ stacks of Might, so there’s no room for other Mesmer specs in competitive play. I’d love to run a Legion build or something, but if I do, I’m handicapping myself and my team right off the bat, because there’s such a massive difference in power between the specs.

If anything, Shatters needed to be toned down a bit last patch. Not by much, but enough to allow other styles of Mesmer to appear in the metagame (many other Mesmer builds are already strong, and just can’t quite compare to the Shatter spec). Now, even when I’ve gone into Hotjoin recently, I’ve only seen one type of Mesmer build, and that’s the Shatter build. That, in my opinion, indicates that something’s off with balance.

Here’s a topic from the Guardian forums about how to counter Burn Guardians:

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/guardian/good-counter-to-burning-guard/first#post5288922

Thieves aren’t the focus of the thread, but there’s a lot of general advice in there that should be useful (what to dodge, how to pressure, etc.).

Woutan.5934:

No warrior buff mentioned.

Its hard to disagree with op.

Directly from the post: “…warriors will have an option to remove conditions when using burst abilities.”

We’ll see how it’s implemented and what other changes are made, but I’m pretty sure this could qualify as a Warrior buff.

This thread is fairly ridiculous, seeing as there are only a handful of changes mentioned in the post, and they’ve stated that this is going to be the largest balance patch in the history of the game. At least wait until you know what’s actually happening before you call it a fail. It may very well be a fail, but for now, the claims are baseless.

Also, calling Torment on the Mesmer’s Scepter now. Not sure where it will fall for the Thief, but I’m betting on an underused utility or weapon set.

Here’s a reference for the cast times of skills commonly used by Burn Guardians for burn application and/or burst combos. Every skill with a cast time has some associated animation with it to allow opposing players some chance to react.

Zealot’s Flame: Instant
Judge’s Intervention: Instant
Purging Flames: .75 second cast time
Smite: .25 second cast time
Chains of Light: .5 second cast time
Zealot’s Fire: .75 second cast time
Cleansing Flames: 4.25 second channel
Zealot’s Defense: .75 second cast time + channel
Whirling Wrath: .75 second cast time + channel

The only instant-cast parts of a standard Burn Guardian’s toolkit are Zealot’s Flame, Judge’s Intervention, and the same sigil procs that all professions have access to (and alsoVirtue of Justice, though you’ll rarely see it activated outside of securing stomps). The animation for something like Chains of Light isn’t quite as obvious as it is for Kill Shot or Eviscerate, but you actually can react to it if you’re paying attention to the Guardian.

The other part of your argument that I don’t get is that most power-based Meditation Guardians use a very similar burst rotation to Burn Guardians. Immobilize with Scepter and teleport in with Judge’s Intervention while simultaneously casting Whirling Wrath, Zealot’s Defense, and/or one of our other burst skills (e.g. Shield of Wrath). Power Guardians will often also add Smite Condition to the combo which is an instant-cast(!) 3k damage crit if they’ve got any condition on them. Most of the same skills are killing you with the burn build as they are with the power build, and the damage is just coming from a different place. The difference in this situation is that the power build kills you up front, and doesn’t give you a chance to negate the majority of its damage.

Piercing projectiles on ZD would be cool, I have to admit. The small, single-target burst damage that it does right now definitely feels limiting sometimes, especially considering the move’s low accuracy at range. A boost to FB would also be nice, but honestly, it might be overkill, too – there’s really nothing inherently wrong with a blind and a teleport on a 10 second cooldown. It’s a solid defensive mobility spell, so I have a hard time convincing myself that it needs more damage or Fury or something added to it.

Also, I still don’t understand why people think Sword just does single-target damage…every swing of the autoattack chain is AoE. Every part of the chain has a range longer than the GS’s autoattack (#1 and #2 are 150 range, compared to the GS’s 130, and the #3 is 300 range in a cone). I never have trouble hitting groups of enemies all at once with the sword, and frequently kill multiple enemies at a time with it. If you have trouble hitting 3+ enemies with the sword simultaneously, you need to work on your positioning, because the potential is most definitely there.

What game mode are you playing? If you’re talking about PvE, then I can see how you wouldn’t get much mileage out of Staff 5 in general situations, but it’s an extremely powerful area-denial tool in PvP and WvW.

Unlike Shield 5, Line of Warding can CC targets repeatedly if they continue trying to move across the wall (great if you can throw it down in the middle of the battlefield), which lets you peel enemies off of allies when they’re trying to retreat, prevent foes from reaching capture points and/or downed players, and block off escape routes when enemies are disengaging from a fight. Line of Warding is also currently our only ward-type skill that can be ground-targeted at 1,200 range (excellent for interrupting stomps, rezzes, and other long casts from a distance) and it has no limit to the number of targets it can affect, making it a staple of zerg combat in WvW (either to strip stacks of Stability en masse from players or to trap those who have already lost Stability).

Line of Warding and Shield of Absorption may both provide CC, but they serve very different roles in battle, and the current duration/cooldown for Line of Warding is justified. 10-second lines or 5-second lines twice as often (almost 33% uptime if you took the Staff trait) would make it too easy to control entire enemy groups just by stacking Guardians.

Reposting this from previous threads on the subject:

I think that the Sword really only needs simple changes to be in a good spot again:

Sword Wave:

1. Remove the “projectile” classification from the skill
2. Reduce the reach of the cone and instead make it wider to improve accuracy.

Fairly self-explanatory. Not having melee autos reflected, having better accuracy while maneuvering around targets, and being able to strike objects properly are all basic quality-of life fixes that will make using the Sword feel much more natural. Otherwise, this is already a good auto-attack that’s unique for having 5+ hits per chain.

Flashing Blade:

1. Apply the Blind instantly upon reaching your destination.
2. Grant 3 seconds of Fury to allies within a 240 unit radius after teleporting.

Instant-Blind at your destination makes it easier to use this skill as a defensive reaction and can help the Guardian make clutch defensive plays. Right-Hand Strength helps make the Sword a critical-focused weapon, so giving it some source of Fury without help from utility skills or Pack Runes makes sense.

I would ask for a short-duration Symbol at your destination that pulses Fury, but given the usual rate of balance changes, minimal-effort suggestions seem more realistic.

Zealot’s Defense:

1. Remove the root while casting
2. Change the projectile destruction to projectile blocking for better trait synergy.

As it stands, using this skill can sometimes leave you in a worse position against projectile users because it allows them to gain distance on you while you cast. If we can move while using the skill, that also helps mitigate the poor accuracy it suffers from as targets get farther away. Changing projectile destruction to blocking shouldn’t make a huge difference now that our block traits have all been nerfed, but more internal synergy is always nice.

I wouldn’t really ask for much else on the Sword at this point. It’s a unique multi-hitting weapon that can be used in both power and condition builds, and it’s not really weak so much as it’s suffering from quality-of-life issues. Fixing those issues and giving it a couple small buffs would stop most of the complaints about it and make it feel much better to use. Changes of this nature also wouldn’t contribute significantly to the power creep we’ve seen so much of recently, which makes them more practical as long-term fixes.

I also disagree with a leap on the Sword auto chain. As mentioned above, Rangers already have something like that, and it’s almost universally hated because of how hard it makes your character to control. I’d take our current auto chain over having to deal with something like that.

I think that the Sword really only needs simple changes to be in a good spot again, many of which have already been suggested here:

Sword Wave:

1. Remove the “projectile” classification from the skill
2. Reduce the reach of the cone and instead make it wider to improve accuracy.

Fairly self-explanatory. Not having melee autos reflected, having better accuracy while maneuvering around targets, and being able to strike objects properly are all basic quality-of life fixes that will make using the Sword feel much more natural. Otherwise, this is already a good auto-attack that’s unique for having 5+ hits per chain.

Flashing Blade:

1. Apply the Blind instantly upon reaching your destination.
2. Grant 3 seconds of Fury to allies within a 240 unit radius after teleporting.

Instant-Blind at your destination makes it easier to use this skill as a defensive reaction and can help the Guardian make clutch defensive plays. Right-Hand Strength helps make the Sword a critical-focused weapon, so giving it some source of Fury without help from utility skills or Pack Runes makes sense.

I would ask for a short-duration Symbol at your destination that pulses Fury, but given the usual rate of balance changes, minimal-effort suggestions seem more realistic.

Zealot’s Defense:

1. Remove the root while casting
2. Change the projectile destruction to projectile blocking for better trait synergy.

As it stands, using this skill can sometimes leave you in a worse position against projectile users because it allows them to gain distance on you while you cast. If we can move while using the skill, that also helps mitigate the poor accuracy it suffers from as targets get farther away. Changing projectile destruction to blocking shouldn’t make a huge difference now that our block traits have all been nerfed, but more internal synergy is always nice.

I wouldn’t really ask for much else on the Sword at this point. It’s a unique multi-hitting weapon that can be used in both power and condition builds, and it’s not really weak so much as it’s suffering from quality-of-life issues. Fixing those issues and giving it a couple small buffs would stop most of the complaints about it and make it feel much better to use.

In light of the recent nerf/rework to the Guardian’s Tomes, and the general dissatisfaction with our Elite skills, I’d like to suggest enabling movement during the channeling period of these skills or their associated sub-skills.

Let me begin my explanation for this suggestion with the Tomes. The loss of Stability is a nasty blow to each of these, since using a Tome now basically means painting a bulls-eye on yourself when you try to use their big skills. It’s possible to use “Stand Your Ground!”, Hallowed Ground, or even Sanctuary to compensate, but two of these skills have very long cooldowns, and the other packs so much utility that it’s not always easy to save it up for casting a Tome.

That said, I understand why Stability needed to go. The window for disrupting the Guardian’s cast was simply too short, because unless you could strip the Stability, the only way to stop the skill was to kill the Guardian. When you had multiple Guardians on a team chaining these hard-to-interrupt full heals and AoE Dazes, it became more than a little absurd. Taking away Stability makes this sort of abuse much less viable, and that’s a good thing, but the problem is that the longer casts on the Tomes can be tough to use effectively when rooted and vulnerable to CC. Tome of Wrath can speed up its casts via Quickness, but opponents have the option to simply run out of range in addition to CC’ing the Guardian. For Tome of Courage, the odds of avoiding interruption while rooted for 5 seconds are slim to none, especially with the nerf to Pacifism making it harder to protect your own cast.

This is where my suggestion comes into play: by enabling movement during the channels of these skills (and Renewed Focus, which I’ll get to later), you solve lots of problems all at once. Tome of Wrath, as mentioned above, currently suffers from the mediocre range on its Judgment skill, but it’s hard to increase the range without making the skill overpowered. By enabling movement during Judgment’s cast, you make sure opponents can’t just slip out of range while you’re charging up (thus making a powerful skill worthless), but you still need to position yourself carefully to maximize your effect in a team fight. Once Zealot’s Fervor and Judgment are cast, ToW doesn’t bring much to the fight besides some decent AoE damage and control, so I don’t see the skill becoming overpowered from this change – frankly, it’d probably still need some love afterward.

Tome of Courage just benefits in that you can actually avoid some of the CC thrown at you, while still remaining vulnerable to it. Being rooted makes a huge difference in the amount of control that affects you, and at the moment, trying to get off a 5-second channel without setting it up with one of the Guardian’s utilities beforehand is just unrealistic. No other elite skill that I know of needs to be “set up” in such a way for it to work effectively, and making utilities a requirement to use these skills properly just discourages build diversity. Enabling movement while channeling both Pacifism and LoD could also make Pacifism more practical for setting up LoD again – right now, all you accomplish is splitting a 5-second rooted channel into two parts, since Pacifism’s cast time is equal to the Daze time. If I can move while casting Pacifism, though, and I’m not just a sitting duck when using LoD, the Daze starts to look meaningful again.

Lastly, Renewed Focus. The main reason I’m suggesting enabling movement during RF’s channel is simply because it feels fairly underwhelming in its current condition, and because you need to take Virtue related traits to really make it useful (otherwise, the elite consists of getting a couple weak buffs along with a few seconds of rooted invulnerability – not a skill that makes me feel particularly cool or powerful). Enabling movement during the channel would give RF some decent utility, allowing you to use it to wade through heavy enemy fire or to escape from fights that are going poorly, and such a change might help to justify taking it over one of the Tomes.

To conclude, let me just say that since the Tomes were introduced, people have hated the lack of mobility inherent to the Guardian’s elites. There was a collective cheer from Guardians when the Tomes were made mobile, but making us stay stationary while casting undermines this mobility. Enabling movement does not lend itself to the abuse of the skills we previously saw, and is much less powerful in general than Stability, but it gives us a more realistic chance of making our elites useful in tough situations.

I have to admit, the only problem I have with Scepter in its current form is the speed of the autoattack at long range, and I think both Smite and Chains of Light are fine as is. I’m personally in the camp that would like to see the stream of magical tennis balls swapped for something else entirely, because besides the speed issues, it’s kind of a boring/goofy aesthetic. Give me fast-moving blue fireballs, as opposed to slow-moving blue orbs, and I’ll be happy. If the Scepter’s autoattack damage or rate of attack needs to be reduced (I’d prefer the latter) in order to compensate, that’s fine. I don’t even need the fireballs to move at arrow speed – just fast enough to be practical as a weapon at 1200 range.

I personally believe the other skills are fine as is. I don’t really think of Smite as an AoE attack, simply because the area affected is too small for it to serve that purpose. I think of it as either an area control skill that’s good for harassing targets, or as a spike-assist skill when used with Chains of Light. Basic combos like CoL > Virtue of Justice > Whirlng Wrath/Zealot’s Defense already hurt opponents pretty badly, but if you drop Smite under their feet as you chain them down, you can get some really nice burst going even without running a glassy build. In that sense I’d agree with Setun, that part of the Scepter’s use comes in as a setup weapon. I’m not going to say I’d mind adding a combo field to Smite (Light most likely, though I think Fire would be more interesting), but I think it’s already a strong skill, and you’d need to increase its cooldown to 8-10 seconds to keep it balanced if you buffed it.

TL;DR: Get rid of slow-moving orbs, replace with decently fast-moving fireballs at a slower attack rate. I think Smite’s fine, but if you’re adding a Light or Fire Field to it, it’ll need an 8-10 second cooldown instead of 6.

Dirame.8521:

Soryuju.8164:

Dirame.8521:

Silverkey.2078:

I think you are missing many of the points. Personally my main problem with the new meta, is not even how restrictive it is but how unfun it is. Too much CC, too much invulnerabilities, too much damage, too much healing. The fact that they all balance themselves somewhat does not mean the meta is fine.

Doesn’t the main point come down to “Nerf Condi Rev and Bunker Mes?” Or did I get that wrong somehow?

I think it was more along the lines of “Nerf the huge number of passive procs, instant-cast skills, spike damage, invulnerabilities, evades, blocks, and general skill spam that have been steadily introduced into the game over the past couple years.” Chronomancer and Revenant happen to have a lot of those things, but the problem goes beyond just those two. As mentioned earlier in the thread, if you just nerf Bunker Chrono and Condi Rev, you’re not going to see any significant change, because the other Elite specs are still incredibly overpowered, and they’re just going to move in to fill the void. Maybe Daredevil would see a bit more play, but non-elite specs were still completely shut out even before we saw the rise of those two builds.

As a sidebar, I don’t really understand how some people are okay with a meta where two professions are virtually unplayable, non-elite specs are obsolete, and where the general skill ceiling has fallen dramatically. Just because you’re having success in this meta doesn’t mean that the game is in a healthy state. Similarly, the fact that it’s possible to counter certain builds doesn’t mean that those builds are positive factors in the metagame as a whole.

The only reason why non-elite specs are “obsolete” is because we are a bunch of sheep who like to follow instead of see what counters what. Base condi Necro? Easily meta material able to counter all the “OP” specs. Shout Guard? Easily counters condi spam from Revs, DD Ele? that piece of craziness is still hard to kill. We could counter the meta but we’d rather just complain about it because….. reasons.

Post some footage from ranked play with some of these builds, then, and demonstrate how they counter the builds currently at the top of competitive play (or fill the same roles more effectively). If you’re going to make a claim like that, then the burden of proof is on you. But keep in mind, there are lots of players who actually want to play their core specs, and players who are forced to because they didn’t purchase HoT. Support for these specs hasn’t disappeared in the way you’re suggesting.

From my perspective, though, Condition Necro seems like a really bad idea in such a CC-heavy meta, considering the core Necro’s famous weakness to CC of all types. If Reaper’s Shroud didn’t offer an excellent source of continuous Stability, I don’t imagine you’d see nearly as many in high-level play. Many Guardian mains tried Bunker Guard shortly before the Pro Leagues started and got obliterated by this meta’s unique combination of unblockable attacks, boon-stripping, condition spam, and chain CC. And as mentioned above, core Ele actually has seen play at the top level, but its representation has been minimal and more teams are moving away from it as time passes. The new levels of pressure introduced with HoT don’t allow it to have the same staying power that it used to.

And for the record, I’m still running with core Burn Guardian because I don’t really like how the meta DH build plays in PvP. Does Burn Guard work decently (at my level of play)? Yeah, it does. Is it harder to succeed with it than it was pre-HoT? Very, very much so. What used to be a decently tanky build feels like glass against most of the elite specs, and making pretty much any mistake usually means that I’ll be on the ground within the next few seconds. I’m going to stick with it, but I’m also not going to pretend that the game’s been heading in a healthy direction all this time.

Inflames.8026:

C’mon this nerf is microscopic. You guys act like the whole class was ruined. Instead of weeping over a small but needed change think about those who didnt get jack kitten.
Like thief, ele, ranger and warrior.

I feel like the reactions are pretty moderate so far, actually.

I agree that these nerfs don’t seem like that big of a deal, and we’re not the only ones who got the hammer on this pass, either. You can still drop trap bursts on people like this, but it’ll be harder to consistently control points by stacking DH’s. I do agree that Dragon’s Maw is going to face much stiffer competition now, but in a dedicated Trap build (should any still exist post-nerf), it’s still a decent choice.

Were Traps actually OP the way they were before, when people only had a few days to learn to adapt to the style? We probably won’t ever know, and as a Guardian, it does hurt to see new builds at risk of being buried by the Shout/Medi meta once more. I think Traps still have a chance to see some competitive use, though, and I’d still consider mixing both Test of Faith and Fragments of Faith into non-Trap builds for the extra damage, CC, and utility they offer.

Overall, it’s not the end of the world. DH still has lots of potential, and hopefully this shifts the ire of the PvP community elsewhere so that the Guardian’s unused utilities, weak traits, and broken weapons can get some love before Leagues begin (I can hope, right? Right?).

Ezrael.6859:

You’d have to nerf Meditations down to 1k heals and increase Resolve to a level of around 250hp a second traited for this to work.

But you still run into the issue of Guardian hp being balanced on a passive heal per second and are now seriously discouraged from activating it. Terrible mechanics really.

The Virtues Minor Grandmaster trait should make the Virtues retain their passive effects even after activation.
Then we would have the kind of mechanics we could look at using to help this profession diversify and create several usable builds instead of pigeonholing into Monk’s Focus Mediations and Altruistic Healing Shouts Empower.

The problem Guardian has is that so many effects like Shouts and Virtues can also be applied to allies, so they are all balanced to be distributed to 5 people during a group fight. Which makes them utterly terrible when it comes to a 1v1 stand point.

Resolve can be shared with allies so it will never be buffed up to give us better solo survivability and build diversity unless we remove Battle Presence.

The problem is actually even more complicated, because the Guardian has multiple viable methods of sustain outside Meditations (specifically AH and the various healing traits in Honor), so just nerfing Meditations while buffing resolve would consitute a sizable buff to every other Guardian playstyle. You’d need to nerf the Guardian’s healing across the board while buffing Resolve to keep things balanced.

Here’s the question: how exactly do you balance the healing from something like AH (which can fluctuate dramatically depending on the skills you’re using at the moment) with a slow, steady tick from Resolve, while still keeping it balanced with the intermittent burst heals from something like Meditations? You have three completely distinct styles of healing that you need to account for with the Resolve buff, and you also need to factor in the various other sources of healing that can be stacked on top of these (Honor traits, Mace, Staff, etc.).

A Resolve buff would also be much more significant for PvE Guardians than Guardians in other game modes, since PvE Guardians don’t typically use Meditations or AH for survival. They’re getting a free, huge buff to Resolve that they can pass on to allies with Battle Presence, and nerfs to the Guardian’s other healing sources won’t bother them at all.

Lastly, I agree with you that we should be exploring options to keep our passive Virtue effects after we activate them, since too many of our traits discourage the use of our profession mechanic. That’s something Anet has actively worked to avoid with other professions like Mesmer and Warrior (removal of clone death mechanics and reduction in the number of traits that encourage you to sit on stockpiled Adrenaline, respectively), so it shouldn’t be any different for us. However, I disagree that this should be a Minor trait in the Virtues line, because we’re already tied enough to Virtues as it is. If we’re going to keep passive effects, that ability needs to be baseline, so that Guardians can take full advantage of all the traits spread throughout various lines that work with our passive Virtues. I won’t comment on how to balance that type of change, but just trading one design flaw for another isn’t going to help us much in the long run.

Hey all, with beta drawing to a close, I wanted to share a DH Longbow build I had reasonable success with in PvP. This was tested primarily in Unranked matches (mostly because I didn’t want to get grief for bringing a beta character into Ranked matches).

Partial Build setup (excluding DH traits/weapons):

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vVAQFASlsAhahYrQwUIQQEGMEFuCSuR4WsdZAA-TJBFABFcBAEvMQN7PAwDAAA

Other Components:

Longbow (Air/Blood or Air/Fire sigils)

Alternate Rune Set: Soldier, specifically for fighting condition-heavy teams, or if your team is lacking cleansing. I like to run Pack Runes when I’m able, though, because they synergize with AH while giving you almost permanent swiftness and 80% crit chance (which is awesome for Mighty Blow, True Shot, and Hunter’s Ward).

DH Traits: Soaring Devastation, Hunter’s Determination, Hunter’s Fortification

Concept:

This build was born mostly out of frustrations with the new DH Virtues and Longbow, and in the end, I built for the Longbow while turning my focus away from Virtues. My intial tests were with Meditation builds, but I found that Meditations weren’t offering me the setup I needed to compensate for the Longbow’s long cast times and self-roots, and that I lacked the mobility needed to properly kite with the Longbow.

As it happens, Shouts fix most of these issues. They provide Quickness, Stability, and Swiftness for the DH, which work wonderfully with both the Hammer and Longbow skills. The loss of the Virtues traitline gives you less sustain than AH builds that aren’t running DH, but the ability to kite and position freely with the Longbow offsets this and lets you focus on pressuring the opposing team.

It’s fair to ask why you shouldn’t just drop DH for Virtues and run Scepter/Focus instead of Longbow. My answer is that Longbow is devastating in teamfights when paired with Quickness and Stability. I would generally approach teamfights with Symbol of Energy and Deflecting Shot, and then when I was at mid-range, I’d cast SYG/FMW and follow up with Hunter’s Ward. That alone ended more than a few teamfights, since opponents aren’t expecting such a fast cast from HW. Most of their team gets snared while your team receives Quickness, Fury, and Stability, and since Hunter’s Ward is coming off of 75-80% crit chance, it’s also pumping out an easy 4-5k damage to each target. Seeing 3 or more people go down on the final pulse isn’t unusual, and it’s easy to clean up anything that lives with True Shot, your Hammer, and the leap from Soaring Devastation.

That said, good positioning is important with this build, because you need to balance your personal survival and your team support. With the Longbow, you usually want to be kiting around the edges of a teamfight, rather than sniping from 1200 range, since your Shouts won’t reach your allies if you’re beyond 600 range. Dropping surprise True Shots and Hunter’s Wards from 1200 range before entering the fight can be effective, but that’s not how you want to spend a majority of your time. Hammer sustains well enough in most teamfights, but being able to switch to Longbow for kiting, extra Vigor, and Deflecting Shot is always a good fallback when pressure starts rising too high.

To wrap this up, I felt like I had a significant presence in most teamfights using this build along with respectable sustain, damage, and mobility. Feedback on the build is welcome, since I’m sure some improvements can be made, and hopefully some people have a chance to test the build out before the beta ends. Thanks for taking the time to read!

I remember reading here recently that Fire’s damage scales with damage multipliers and Blood’s doesn’t, which is part of why post-nerf Fire is still a popular choice in competitive play. Considering we’ve got potential multipliers from Unscathed Contender, Power of the Virtuous, and Pure of Sight in the meta build, I can understand the choice. It’s also nice for revealing the position of stealthed characters and gives better damage output in teamfights.

I don’t see it used often, but I’ll also point out that the Superior Sigil of Speed/Sigil of Agility has some interesting synergies with the Longbow. Even with the short duration, Quickness on swap can help you surprise opponents with a fast True Shot or make Hunter’s Ward a bit safer to cast. These abilities can be tough to land against opponents who know the timing for when to dodge, so modifying their cast times can shake things up and make them second-guess themselves. Besides the benefits of Quickness, gaining 5 seconds of Swiftness on swap can also help you kite opponents with the Longbow more easily (useful when your Traps are on cooldown).

While I’m glad to see Dishonor finally implemented in some form, I’m confused as to why the vast majority of the profession changes today consisted only of “reducing visual noise” or fixing situational bugs. The game plan that Anet outlined prior to HoT’s release consisted of having a major balance patch two weeks before the start of each season, and then making adjustments to the developing meta in the time before the competition began.

We seem to have skipped the major balance patch, so what does this mean for the time leading up to the start of the first PvP season? Are there still going to be adjustments made in the next two weeks to the meta that’s developed since launch, or is this the final draft for balance this cycle? Are we not going to see any changes to any of the elite specs, underpowered professions, or other problem builds for another three months?

Most of the community seemed to be expecting major changes today, since this aligned with the schedule Anet laid out for us, and there was no developer communication indicating that plans for the balance schedule had shifted (or that they were skipping the balance changes this time around). Could we please have some sort of update regarding the plans for this? Right now, this doesn’t seem to bode well for the future of PvP balance, and I think it’s important that the community not be left completely in the dark about PvP development in the upcoming weeks/months. Communication leading up to HoT’s release had been excellent and had the community in good spirits, and I’d hate to see that disappear again in the future.

Please keep discussion here civil.

2) List of Revised Skills and Traits (specific reasoning for changes below)

Note: The emphasis here is on the changes I’ve made to the skills, so if an existing effect isn’t mentioned, it’s probably the same as before.

Virtues

1. Spear of Justice: Instant cast time, improved velocity/accuracy, keep current 1200 range. Related traits apply at the initial point of impact.
2. Wings of Resolve: Evade for the duration of the cast (still 3/4 second), range increased to 900. Personal heal/traited effects apply at the beginning of the leap, while they apply at the end for allies.
3. Shield of Courage: Instant cast, melee block for allies removed. Effect rework: Create a shield in front of you that blocks enemy projectiles for yourself and allies. If foes inside the area of the shield deal damage to another player, they are knocked back (240 distance, 1 second ICD per target).

Longbow

1. Puncture Shot: Increased projectile velocity. Cripples targets for 1 second if they have 2 or more stacks of Burning (instead of crippling on bounce).
2. True Shot: See traits below.
3. Deflecting Shot: See traits below. Can be fired regardless of character facing, blocks projectiles instead of destroying them, projectile velocity decreases as it travels. Cooldown reduced to 8 seconds.
4. Symbol of Energy: Can be fired regardless of character facing. Reduce current Vigor duration to 2s per pulse and increase cooldown to 20 seconds. Add a chain skill, “Lightspeed,” which causes you to teleport to the center of your Symbol of Energy (1/4 second cast time). Chain resets when the Symbol’s duration expires, but SoE continues to recharge while the chain is active.
5. Hunter’s Ward: 2 second cast time (down from 2.75 seconds). Effect Rework: This skill pulses twice. The first pulse deals damage and Cripples enemies for 2 seconds, and the second pulse damages enemies, Cripples them for 5 seconds, and cages them for 5 seconds (down from 6). See traits below.

Traps

1. General: Reduce cast time for Traps to 1/2 second (the same as all other traps in the game) and switch traited CDR for baseline cooldown reduction to all Traps. See traits below.
2. Purification: Heal yourself and set a Trap that pulses 3 seconds of Blind and Burning to foes in its area each second for 2 seconds when it activates. The full heal is now delivered upon setting the Trap instead of when a foe triggers it. Cooldown reduced to 25 seconds.
3. Test of Faith: Rework the effect to pulse 2 seconds of Cripple to foes within the ring every 2 seconds. Damage targets that cross the perimeter. 8 second duration. Cooldown reduced to 20 seconds.
4. Procession of Blades: Now acts as a Whirl Finisher. Cooldown reduced to 15 seconds (tune damage to accommodate this cooldown).
5. Light’s Judgment: Beams of light spread out and follow nearby enemies after the trap is activated. Duration reduced to 6 seconds, cooldown reduced to 30 seconds.
6. Fragments of Faith: Breaks stun when setting the Trap, cooldown reduced to 35 seconds (Keep recent duration changes & adjust if necessary).
7. Dragon’s Maw: Fixed to be unblockable, creates a Fire Field at its location. 5-second duration (keep 60 second cooldown and adjust if necessary).

Traits

Major Trait Line Themes: Longbow, Virtues, Traps

Minor Traits:

Virtuous Action (Adept): Unchanged.

Hunter’s Fortification (Master): Moved from Grandmaster Major. Now only provides protection to the user (tentative change).

Defender’s Dogma (Grandmaster): Moved from Master Minor. Recharge each of your Virtues by 1 second when you successfully block an attack (1s cooldown).

Adept Traits:

1) Dulled Senses: Moved from Master Major tier. Foes that you knock back, knock down, pull, and launch are Crippled for 4 seconds. Deal 7% more damage to Crippled foes.

2) Soaring Devastation: Unchanged.

3) Piercing Light: Damaging a foe beyond 450 range will cast Test of Faith underneath of them (20s cooldown). Traps deal 10% more damage and apply 5 stacks of Bleeding for 10 seconds to nearby foes when activated.

Master Traits:

4. Heavy Light: Deflecting Shot knocks back foes within 300 range of the user (Distance: 180). Your attacks gain a damage bonus based on your distance to foes. (Damage Bonus from Range: 0-300: 3%, 300-600: 7%, 600+: 10%).

5. Bulwark: Shield of Courage is larger and lasts longer. Increase the knockback distance on foes that inflict damage to 300.

6. Dragon’s Blood (New): Apply 3 stacks of Bleeding to nearby foes for 8 seconds when you inflict Burning on a target (360 radius, 8 second cooldown). Critical hit chance is increased by 10% on Bleeding foes.

Grandmaster Traits:

7. Zealot’s March (New): Channeled skills that would root you now allow you to move at 75% of your normal speed. You ignore all other movespeed modifiers while channeling these abilities (affects True Shot, Hunter’s Ward, Ring of Warding, Empower, Zealot’s Defense, Shield of Absorption, and Signet of Courage).

8. Big Game Hunter: Foes tethered by your Spear of Justice take 10% more damage, and striking them inflicts Vulnerability for 10 seconds. You retain your Spear of Justice’s passive effect after activating it.

9. Trapper’s Resolve (New): When you set a Trap in combat, gain 1.5 seconds of Resistance and begin healing over time. When you set a Trap outside of combat, these effects apply when the Trap is activated (Tentative healing values: 5-second healing duration, 400 HP/second).

The reasoning behind these changes is in the following post.

3) Reasoning for Suggested Changes

Virtues

1. DH Virtues are meant to be activated, and they’re going to be a part of every DH build, so making sure they feel smooth and functional is essential to every player’s experience with the DH. I suggested fixes for any parts of each Virtue that felt unresponsive or awkward to use.
2. Spear of Justice needs to be more reliable to be worth activating, and the slow cast isn’t helping. Making it instant, improving its tracking, and designing a number of traits to help improve Justice’s power and consistency (e.g. Defender’s Dogma, Dragon’s Blood, Big Game Hunter) will help keep it relevant. Some changes were also aimed at making it more practical to activate Spear of Justice in condition damage builds.
3. Wings of Resolve leaves you too exposed, since the slower personal healing/cleansing was prone to getting you interrupted/killed in situations where regular Resolve would save you. Receiving your own heal and traited benefits immediately keeps this on par with regular Resolve for personal defense. The 3/4 second cast time remains because no other leap in the game is instant, so I’m not sure the game’s code is built for that. Instead, you now evade during the cast to offset the massive telegraph and prevent yourself from being sniped out of the air.
4. Giving Shield of Courage a conditional knockback synergizes with DH skills and traits and provides more position control. At the same time, removing the melee block deals with potential concerns about the DH receiving full benefits from its own skill, since there’s now an ICD and more options for counterplay.

Longbow

1. Guardians have been asking for a ground-targeted teleport for ages, but Anet’s stated in the past that Guardians aren’t meant to run from fights. My solution is a slow, telegraphed teleport via the new “Lightspeed” chain skill on Symbol of Energy. This will allow a Guardian to disengage from fights, but not immediately, and opposing PvP’ers will know exactly where we’re heading in advance. Alternatively, it can be used to engage from afar and bring the Guardian back into range for supporting allies with Virtues, Shouts, etc. This solves two problems simultaneously without making Judge’s Intervention obsolete.
2. More consistent control options on the Longbow are also critical to offset our poor kiting. Puncture Shot can now cripple in 1v1 situations while remaining effective in teamfights. We can control exactly when we knock opponents back with the Heavy Light trait, and since it slows down as it travels, it’s more likely to actually block projectiles. Hunter’s Ward is more practical to use with its reduced channel time and the Zealot’s March trait, though it trades some damage and 1 second of duration to keep things reasonable.
3. Lots of DH players dislike the frequent roots on the Longbow skills. Zealot’s March allows us to move when using self-rooting skills (also improving many weapons besides Longbow), but these skills still come at some cost. You also can use the effect strategically to help reduce the impact of Cripple and Chill on you, so it’s not all bad, but Swiftness and other speed boosts can’t offset the drawback. On an aesthetic note, I feel like the slowdown will help preserve some of the “dramatic” feel these abilities have while channeling.

Traps

1. Traps are inconsistent utilities that need consistent sustain and some way to deal with conditions in PvP situations. Trapper’s Resolve is my attempt at a solution. The trait’s activation condition changes depending on whether or not you’re in combat, and this helps ensure that you gain the benefit from it whether or not you set up your Traps in advance. The trait’s effects all stack in duration, so the timing of the Traps’ activation is less likely to interfere with your sustain (e.g. it’s okay to set a bunch of Traps when you’re at 90% HP).
   The Resistance uptime may need to be tuned some, since you can be immune to conditions almost 30% of the time with a full bar of traps. As justifications for this uptime, the healing TR provides is somewhat slow and can leave you exposed to physical burst, you lose access to cleansing utilities for each Trap you take, and using Traps for Resistance in reaction to condi bursts may force you to set them at times/places you’d rather not. The healing each Trap provides is similar to a Meditation heal spread out over 5 seconds, though it can be combined with AH. If you go that route, though, you’re giving up Shout utilities, which will reduce your access to defensive boons and your actual healing from AH. Overall, I don’t think it would be out of line, and the numbers on this trait can be altered in a number of ways to adjust it for balance.
2. Piercing Light was reworked to apply Bleeding up front, since only a few traps actually hit multiple times, and opponents aren’t likely to stand in those for the full number of hits. It can also now drop Test of Faith at range to slow down kiting opponents, and between this and the other buffs to Traps/Longbow, I’m hoping that the two styles will mesh more smoothly. I’m going with the assumption that Anet doesn’t want ground-targeting to be a thing again, but that would definitely be the simpler solution if it’s on the table.
3. Purification needs to offer something to compete with Shelter, like all other Guardian heals. I’ve suggested reworking the healing mechanics to match the Ranger’s Healing Spring, making it much more reliable as an active heal. Adding a couple rounds of AoE blind to people standing in the trap gives the skill some additional damage mitigation and utility. It won’t block an infinite number of attacks in those 2 seconds like Shelter, but it can protect allies and gives you a safe-stomp option in PvP that doesn’t require canceling your heal.
4. Some Traps were changed to have better synergy and flexibility. A Whirl Finisher on Procession of Blades can give condi Trappers a boost with Fire Fields (e.g. Purging Flames, Dragon’s Maw) or provide cleansing with Light fields, while power Trap builds get a flat damage bonus on PoB. Test of Faith can now help snare opponents in your other Traps and actually does something if your opponent stays in the ring. Light’s Judgment is now more useful against stealthing and kiting foes while boosting both the power and condition damage of your other Traps. I’m not sure how these would all fare in the PvE DPS race, but I think they’d have better odds than they do currently.
5. A Trap that can break stuns is important for dedicated trap styles, and it makes most sense on Fragments of Faith.
6. I’m omitting most of the recent DPS boosts to Traps and shaving the duration boost on Dragon’s Maw in favor of combo potential, and a number of other new traits I’ve suggested will help make up the difference. Numbers can always be adjusted.

Traits

1. Longbow, Virtues, and Traps were the main themes of the new traits, but most of the traits in each lines were designed to benefit multiple playstyles. A Longbow build doesn’t necessarily have to run 1-1-1, nor does a Trapper always want to run 3-3-3.
2. New minors emphasize using the active effects of Virtues and gaining personal benefit from them. Hunter’s Fortification actually makes for a rather nice minor trait (especially since DH’s crave better defenses), and while it no longer affects allies in a small radius around you, this change can be reverted if the DH still proves underpowered. Defender’s Dogma now helps you use the DH’s fancy new Virtues more often, which makes it a better fit for the specialization overall.
3. Adept tier has a focus on soft CC to help improve the DH’s position control. It features a condensed Dulled Senses trait that’s suitable for all game modes and Soaring Resolve as a solid choice for most builds. Piercing Light can provide extra DPS for both power and condi Trap builds, but it can also be splashed into other builds that want extra damage, chasing power, and area control on a relatively low cooldown.
4. Master tier helps to improve the consistency of your damage and control. Heavy Light makes Deflecting Shot more versatile and your knockbacks more reliable. While the Longbow changes I’ve suggested help the DH to be more effective when it’s not at long range, the trait’s damage bonus also incentivizes keeping your distance when your allies don’t need you close by (though it gives you some benefit at all ranges, unlike the old Pure of Sight). Bulwark simultaneously supplements your defenses and access to knockbacks, and the increased duration now synergizes with Defender’s Dogma to improve Virtue uptime. Dragon’s Blood synergizes with Piercing Light and provides a straight DPS boost for both condition and power builds, including Trap and non-Trap styles. It combos nicely with BGH spikes.
5. Grandmaster tier offers playstyle-defining traits. The new Zealot’s March trait gives DHs the chance to finally move around while using skills like True Shot, Ring of Warding, and Zealot’s Defense. The benefits to the Longbow are especially notable, with its two rooting casts. There’s no way to offset the movespeed reduction on this trait, but it’ll also protect you from soft CC like Cripple and Chill (but not Immobilize).
   ZM’s got stiff competition from Big Game Hunter, however, which now facilitates both power and condi spikes by giving permanent passive Justice. While BGH didn’t receive much of a direct boost for power builds, the new minor traits make Justice’s active inherently more valuable, and Dragon’s Blood can combine with BGH and Radiance traits to set up a large power or condi spike for up to 6 seconds. Condition cleansing can counter most of the spike, though, and the tether is a massive telegraph that gives opponents a chance to avoid/block the incoming burst.
   Lastly, Trapper’s Resolve is mostly a PvP trait for Trap builds, though PvE Power and Condi Trappers still have good options in this tier (particularly BGH). Traps still have their effects split between two traits, but the needs of Traps vary so sharply between game modes that it seemed necessary.

4) Conclusion

I don’t expect to see these changes ever appear in-game, but I believe these sort of fixes were more in line with what the Guardian community was hoping for from the beta feedback, and I do hope that the devs are continuing to watch the forums and take note of the responses here. Feel free to comment on these suggestions below – what you like and dislike about them, what seems overpowered or underpowered, etc. I’m sure there are things I’ve overlooked, but I enjoyed designing these, and I’d love to hear what the community thinks. Thanks for reading!

Even though FB was nerfed in beta, I wouldn’t use that as grounds to claim that it will never be re-buffed. For example, Ranger Spirits also got nerfed (badly) in beta, and Anet has acknowledged that they need to be fixed. Just because a nerf was warranted doesn’t mean the size of the nerf was.

About the 1h Sword, I feel like it only really needs a couple, very small buffs to help increase its PvE appeal, since it’s already a solid option in PvP. I would say:

Flashing Blade: Leap Finisher
Zealot’s Defense: Better accuracy at range, piercing projectiles, 20% projectile finisher (maybe)
Powerful Blades: 20% CD reduction on Sword/Spear in addition to the 5% damage

I disagree with the idea of letting Guardians use FB without a target. Low mobility is one of a Sword Guardian’s inherent weaknesses, and one of the main things keeping the spec in a good state of balance. A DPS Guardian is a terrifying offensive and defensive juggernaut, capable of easily 1v1’ing most classes. By restricting its mobility outside of combat, however, you balance that kind of power. The offensive Guardian could turn into the next Ele if you give it superior offense and defense with good mobility, and that’s not something I’d like to see happen. For similar reasons, I oppose the idea of adding anything more than a short, occasional cripple onto its skills – being able to kite an offensive Guardian is one of the best defenses against it, and if you lose that ability, the Sword’s high sustained damage will shred you in no time.

I don’t really mind FB not being a damage skill, if only because the Sword already brings a lot of single-target damage to the table, but a Leap finisher would be nice to improve a Sword Guardian’s interactions with its team (as would adding a 20% projectile finisher to ZD). If they were to add damage to FB, I don’t think it should be any greater than that of a basic sword autoattack.

I think the most important changes are improving ZD’s ranged accuracy and allowing its projectiles to pierce. If we were to compare ZD to Hundred Blades and Blurred Frenzy, two other rooting “burst” skills, ZD’s primary advantage is its ranged component, but as we all know, trying to actually hit something at range with ZD is an exercise in futility. ZD’s damage is similar to Blurred Frenzy’s, but rather than perfect invulnerability, it only absorbs projectiles. It falls far short of 100B in the damage department, it’s the only one of the three that’s incapable of hitting multiple targets, and it also has the highest cooldown amongst them (and, furthermore, is the only one that can’t be traited with CD reduction). ZD could have been a skill that fit into a “happy medium” between the 100B and BF, but right now, the skill’s functionality is too limited for that to happen.

Giving ZD piercing projectiles will be a positive step for the sword in PvE by providing AoE damage, and it’ll bring ZD into line with other existing skills. Improving its accuracy at range is simply necessary – it’s absurd that I can’t consistently hit a stationary target with the skill at 400-600 range, let alone one that’s moving. Finally, adding a 20% CD reduction to Powerful Blades brings it into line with many other weapon traits while making the sword a more dynamic weapon, since there will be more chances to use skills other than the autoattack.

I love the 1h Sword, and I’ve been running it in PvP since BWE1. I can’t bring myself to advocate significant buffs for it because, in spite of its flaws, I still see myself and others having a lot of success with it, and I can only imagine how overpowered it would be if its natural weaknesses were addressed. Fix ZD, give FB a tiny buff – nothing else should be changed.

I strongly disagree with the idea of switching the Shield and Focus #5’s, and have since the idea came up in beta. The reason? You weaken both weapons if you do so, for the sake of aesthetic.

As others have stated here and elsewhere, the focus is a personal defense weapon, and the shield is a group defense weapon. They each excel at their role, though by its nature, the Shield is most useful for PvP and high-end PvE play (e.g. Fractals), where it’s important for you to protect your allies as well as yourself. If you go swapping the #5 skills, you’re putting a group defense tool on the focus and a personal defense tool on the Shield, weakening the performance of both weapons at their roles and leaving each as a mediocre hybrid defense tool. The reason each comes out weaker, besides the role mixing, is because the new skill configurations lack synergy. Shield of Judgment and Shield of Wrath do not have any synergy, besides the fact that they both slow down how much damage you take. Similarly, Ray of Judgment and Shield of Absorption work against each other: RoJ loses much of its effectiveness at long range, and SoA is best used for putting opponents at range or fighting opponents who are already at range. In the current state, each weapon’s skills have a much stronger interaction. RoJ’s blinds can be used to absorb hits that would otherwise break SoW, and SoW is best used while in proximity to a target, where RoJ excels. SoJ and SoA don’t interact directly, but the fact that both skills can be used from the mid or rear lines to protect most or all of a group is huge. Sacrificing all of this because you want the Shield to block more than just projectiles doesn’t make any sense to me.

As for the 1h Sword, I feel like Zealot’s defense needs the most attention. It would be nice if the skill actually had a decent chance to hit at range, since it seems to miss even stationary targets that are more than a couple hundred units away, and I’d love it if the projectiles pierced, which would give the Sword more of an AoE presence and drastically improve the its viability in all game modes. The Sword needs the least help in S/TPvP, but the DPS Guardian’s role is relatively small in the current metagame, with bunkers being far more popular, so I feel like this wouldn’t be unreasonable.

Other changes I’d recommend for the Sword would be putting a cooldown reduction on the Powerful Blades trait and maybe adding a Leap finisher to FB. I vote against more damage for FB because with as much DPS as the Sword’s autoattack does, I feel like adding more team utility to the weapon should take priority. I only hesitate about the leap finisher because it may put the Sword a bit over the top when taken with the improved ZD and reduced cooldowns I also suggested, but time would tell.