Guild Wars 2

They were a little bugged during the BWEs however, yes they all have synergy with all the virtue traits.

I didn’t get to play the 3rd BWE but before hand there were certain traits that weren’t working with the virtues. Majority of them weren’t intended and the DH virtues are intended to work with all of the current guardian versions albeit differently due to the nature of the DH virtues.

Absolute resolution applies upon landing with WoR removing 3 conditions where you land except it removes immob upon cast now. Makes sense seeing as the trait removes conditions off allies so having it remove them when you cast the spell and not where you land makes very little sense.

Indomitable courage will break you out of stun instantly the second you cast SoC. The active effect of SoC isnt instant though.

Hope that answers your question!

It’s funny you mention these things chronometria because I really like the look of the druid! I’m definitely gonna play DH and Druid come the expansion. I’ve always enjoyed ranger and I feel like both ranger LB and DH LB offer their own differing playstyles coupled with their class mechanics.

DH has an innate leap which I really enjoy. Love that I can wield a LB and leap away from or into the fray. Ranger LB is much more damage and kite orientated, with a stealth and knockback. In addition I actually really enjoy pets and especially since they announced the new ones (which look fantastic).
DH LB on the other has damage but it is more spike damage from it’s 2 as well as a lot more control. Both offer great and distinct ‘archer gameplay’ but from different angles.

I can see why you might feel that DH might appear a more ‘flashy archer’. I always felt like there wasn’t enough skills shots in particular on the rangers LB which I feel adds a nice ‘archer’ feeling to LB. That coupled with some of the effects of the DH LB skills makes for what might seem like a better archer of sorts, but in actuality is just an alternative to the archer.
While it might seem pretty cool to get rid of some of the Guardian aspects of the DH for more of an archer approach, I feel like that might be encroaching on ranger territory a little too much. I much prefer there be two or more distinct ‘archer’ playstyles or classes rather than one over-encompassing one.

Also it’s just too perfect that I can get my archer fix with the DH and now play my ranger as a druid for a nice change up

Either way hope you enjoy the DH and Happy Hunting!

I’ll add my voice to this thread! Really like the DH’s evolution throughout the last few BWEs and especially its current iteration.

I think my favorite aspect of the DH are the new traits. They give us more visually stimulating abilities but more importantly, abilities that require far more finesse whilst giving guards a skill shot mobility skill (guards have always wanted more leaps and such for in-combat mobility). Shield of courage is really strong if you used correctly and requires that you not only position yourself accordingly, but also time it as well. Spear of justice is more just a very cool looking spell but ZA and and other passives for Spear of Justice make it really exciting and more importantly allow DH’s to kite more effectively.

The longbow is fantastic! I love the fact that playing a DH with longbow really requires that you lead targets to make effective use of so many abilities. Medi guards have always been fairly forgiving as well as up close face mashy. 6 instant cast abilities with so many benefits as well as damage and sustain. DH with longbow and 2 or 3 traps on the other hand REALLY changes up the dynamics and makes for a far more skill based playstyle as well.

While most don’t like traps, I’m actually okay with them. The PL trait helps a lot for one but in particular I absolutely love the preemptive play style required to play with traps. I’d like to see more effort (if any) towards being rewarded for being active with placing traps instead of just holding them and trying to place them on top of people mid-combat.

Either way, really like the post and thread Kain!

Happy Hunting!

I’m in the same camp as those who believe this is just a double buff.

I think the main concerning factor is whether or not we can still detonate the bubble. If it is similar to what it originally did where you could detonate at any point, also healing us and any allies in the bubble, then I really don’t understand how this is in any way not a double buff like others have said already.

Also, I’m curious as to why some aren’t happy about the channeling time. On top of everything else shield 5 does I feel like giving us a bubble we can just walk around in would be a little too much. There needs to be some counter play after all. (aside from walk into bubble and melee which would be trickier considering we’re mobile).

Either way, I really like these changes and I hope to use sword shield with DH in the future. Hopefully someone could shed some light on what exactly the skills can and can’t do.

P.S. not sure why I referred to you as Ghost but it was the first short version of your name that came to mind. Only now noticed how your name is spelt.

Thanks for letting me know Ghost! Yea accidentally linked another build for some reason. Edited my post and put up the correct one.

Diggin the healing build as well. Hopefully DH will be able to support as well as current bunker guards can, well, bunker.

Hiya folks,

Just wanted to post up a build idea I thought would be fun to theory craft over after seeing Karl’s update for the Dragonhunter’s traits. If you want to see the ones I’m talking about, here’s a link to the page (you’ll have to scroll down a bit).

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/guardian/Dragonhunter-Changes-for-Next-BWE/page/4

This build is pretty much based off of Aegis and of course the Dragonhunter’s ability to provide it with Fragments of Faith and the future update for the Hunter’s Determination trait.

This isn’t a final iteration of the build, but it’s something I would really like to try if we get the updated traits Karl posted. I figure it would be fun and interesting to theory craft and discuss the awesome synergy the trait and trap provide (especially with Hunter’s Fortification). Either way here’s the build:

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vVAQNAT8dnsABlChFdCOCBkdil5BrqBsACAy7v+3AMrEtiaRA-TpA4QA2yAg9HAA

FYI, imagine that Karl’s updated traits are in place of the ones in the build editor.
For example: Hunter’s Determination doesn’t give stability after using True Shot, but instead when you get cc’ed it drops a FoF trap at your location.

Mind you this build could easily work alongside traits such as Pure of Heart etc. so
feel free to post your own versions of this build. However, all I ask is that we stick to utilizing the updated Hunter’s Determination trait as well as the FoF trap, and that discussion follows alongside these ideas.

Thanks and hope to hear from you guys!

I might very well use the specialisation longbow skin we get as dragonhunters (the one seen in the reveal trailer). I know I will definitely be using the gauntlets we get.
That being said, I will probably be using the mystic hornbow skin:

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/images/thumb/2/20/Mystic_Hornbow.jpg/384px-Mystic_Hornbow.jpg

I really like that skin, especially with its subtle effects as well as the overall design and colour of the skin.

I really want the azureflame skin though. That looks so dam awesome and I really like the concept of an ethereal bow, specially seeing as the dragonhunter isn’t shooting physical arrows in the traditional sense but light condensed and shaped into arrows or cages etc.

+1

Real glad this thread is getting some traction. Hopefully it gets the attention of someone and they look in to it.
Torch on guardian is a really cool weapon specially coupled with the sword. It makes for one of the more interesting weapon combos in the game.

Torch 4 second active is a single projectile that has a fairly obvious cue animation as well as a very obvious model (big blue fireball). This makes it a fairly easy to counter if you no what you are doing or just by accident.
I like that.
The fact that it is buggy (there is no way this spell is working 100% of the time as intended) makes it far too laborious to land on your opponents.

Either way thanks for creating this thread OP.

Surprised no one has said anything, but I really like the sound of this!

Definitely gonna give this one a try specially as it means playing something other than medi guard or shout for that matter.

What’s even cooler is that come Heart of Thorns, a DH can do an aegis build as well using the Fragment of Faith trap and other traits.

Either way, nice job Revan and looking forward to give this one a try and get some practice with it!

I’m up there with you funkyfuzz. I totally agree with you on a lot of the weapons. In particular, my favourite weapon, the one hand sword along with the shield are pretty lack lustre and I feel are in need of some quality of life changes.
I’m thinking of starting a thread to give my opinion and gauge others on what they think of guardians one hand sword and how its kind of fallen out of use seeing the rise of GS, specially in PVP.

The GS and Hammer I feel are two of the best weapons (design and efficiency wise) the guard has. They both have unique dynamic skills and overall good synergy between said skills. This makes them great for both PVP and PVE.
I’m not a fan of how meta the GS is especially seeing as everyone and their mother who plays guard in PVP plays medi GS. Pretty much every guard I see also runs GS in PVE, with good reason. The weapon is obviously going to be a favourite for people because…well its a giant sword so yeah, but the skills themselves like the Hammer are so dam dynamic and fun as well as being efficient in dealing damage and granting some utility.
Like some people have said already, HoT seems set to give other builds and other weapons a better chance of use. I myself will be doing a LB / Sw & Shield build with my DH using traps. I’m hoping to make a similar build for PVP as well.

T,L,D,R
I feel we are in a good spot aside from Sword and especially Shield, who don’t need any real number changes but some quality of life ones that will hopefully get people to use them more often. Specially considering the rise in GS use.

This is an awesome thread, and I’m really liking all the theory crafting going on here as well.

ApaWanka.2698:

This is a PVP build who could work on WvW changing the secondary weapon.

With the update, symbols will be strongly buffed, so I create a new build based on that with a lot of sinergy with DH

http://dulfy.net/gw2traits#build=AgIBnAR4Brg~

LB + Mace/Focus

Love this idea! It’s nice to see that there are more routes now for direct damage builds other then Med Guardian.
Love the idea of hybrid and pure condi builds as well.

For PVP I’m gonna try go for a soldier or knight build (maybe zerker)

http://dulfy.net/gw2traits#build=AgIFbAL0Brg~

Weapons: LB / Sw & Shld

Utilities: Shelter – Test of Faith, Fragment of Faith, Light’s Judgment – Dragon’s Maw

Lot’s of synergy with the traps such as the cripple from ToF and FoF, in particular FoF synergizes with Unscathed Contender nicely as well as being a good supportive and defensive utility.

I may remove L’sJ in order to put in another stun breaker or defensive utility, but as of now the Virtues line acts as a means of providing defence (as well as UC) and it means with this build that virtues and the choices you make with using them are all the more important.

The sword and shield combo I feel are nice and balanced adding some much needed prot, a knockback with the added benefit of pushing foes back through ToF and adding cripple.
Sword gives some nice melee damage and works well with DH virtues and LB and shield allowing for skirmishing style jump in and out gameplay whilst manipulating your targets movements in order to make the most of your traps and abilities.

I feel like there are a lot of guards looking forward to playing as a DH. The guard players who dislike the DH are a lot more vocal on the forums but honestly, I much prefer that not everyone wants to be a DH or use longbow. Means we’ll have a variety of builds with some people sticking to guard using all the new revamped traits, and others playing different varieties of DH.

Many people have legitimate arguments for disliking the DH which is totally fair as not everyone is going to like it. Then there are the myriad of players who just wanted the paragon class or a name that was just another word for ‘paladin/holy warrior’.

That said, I am totally there with you OP as I am incredibly excited to play as a DH. The fact that we can play guard with less ‘all up in your face’ tactics/physical damage and more skirmisher style play is awesome. I will be playing with longbow and using at least two traps along with Dragons Maw

The DH traits alone are one of the main reasons I’ll be playing the specialization. While effective (while traited), the guardians virtues are very stale and fairly boring, with VoC being the only one that can really be useful without any traits. The new virtues are really exciting and will cull all the guards who just spam their virtues at the same time and then use focus elite to renew them for another mass spamming in order to survive. These DH ones require a lot more tact and positioning then the normal ones and will also play a role in how you use your weapon and utility skills as opposed to just being insta blind, insta condi removal and block for yourself.

I don’t have any issue with the name, especially considering the designers philosophy. I understand why a lot of people might not like it though.

Also, no hate whatsoever to those who dislike the specialization. Understandably, while you don’t have to play it and it isn’t compulsory, many people were going to get the expansion for the specialization (and the new class) so I can understand why they may be upset. I’d say find another class to play alongside guard that you will enjoy. Hopefully if you get some time with the DH or the new revamped traits you may find something you enjoy on top of having another class to tide you over if you aren’t enjoying guard. I love playin ranger and will definitely be tryin’ out the druid spec as I don’t play any caster type classes and I’m pretty excited bout playin’ them. Even if it’s not for me, the new revamped traits will definitely provide me with some new ways to play ranger.

Happy Hunting in the future fellow Dragon Hunters!

Fighting a hambow is always going to be an uphill fight if you don’t have poison or stability, unless you are also a ham bow. For most classes, specially thieves, it only takes one stun to end it all. Your best bet is to burst them while having stability so that they don’t get the crit and damage bonus from stunning you or consistently applying poison.

As a med guard the only time I’ve been able to get the upper hand on hambow warriors is if they’re bad and I have SYG up. I play a GS and s/f med guard so that probably helps make things harder as a 0/30/30/5/5 might have it easier but I play a 0/15/30/5/20.

Like the thief before hand said, blinds are real important and with the build I use I have access to 4 of them and each of them applies 3 stacks of vuln for 10 seconds each. I try to reapply a blind immediately after the last one is used so that the war ends up missing with one of his crucial skills. I try to stall when he uses zerker stance using focus 5 and SYG so that I don’t get cced down and then proceed to blind the hell outta him and get my GS and sword bursts off.

Most ‘decent’ wars though will recognise that I’m a guard with no range and just use their bow against me. Far too easy to kite me even with hydromancy sigils and runes of speed.

Also lack of access to poison means missing any burst or not consistently being up in a wars face means they will out heal and damage you in the long run. Smart wars will see that and just keep planting fire fields forcing you to fight them in it.

P.S sry for the wall of text

T.L.D.R
Get poison and stability, avoid their big damage skills and more importantly their setup skills (pin down, hammer shock, staggering blow etc.) and then you may have a fighting chance.

Hi folks,

Been playing warrior since I got this game and they are easily my favorite class (I’ve done a lot of guardian play and only dabbled slightly in the other classes).

I do both PvE and PvP, more so on the latter nowadays. This is the build I use at the moment.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fIAQNAscTjgOxuxQCPMxBEkCNsKMKGCi48IJmCyD-T0AgyCqIKSVkrITRyisFN6YVxpiZFvKA

I’ve always played with duel swords since i got this game and only recently started using LB over rifle. I was hoping I could get some tips and help with this build. I do all right currently but I feel like a it still needs work and tweaks here and there.

I also hope that some other cond warriors out there could chip in as i get a lot of hate for my playstyle both in PvE and PvP. Are cond warriors really useless? Does anyone else get the same problems? Discuss, and thanks again for your help guys!