Guild Wars 2

I recently came back to GW2 after a 7 month hiatus and just wanted some input. Which class would does well in sPvP and would do better in WvW doing mostly solo/2 man roaming?

Charlie.1726:

Yep, warrior is relatively easy to play.

But if played right, many other classes are stronger and shouldn’t have any problem whatsoever with Warrior in PvP (D/D Ele, Necro, Thief, Guardian, Mesmer…)

bad warrior is usually better than a bad <any other class>
good warrior is on par/weaker than many good <any other class>
(this excludes Ranger and only Ranger… Ranger is awful (in PvP – PvE Sword they rock) and I hope they get some good loving.)

So what I get from this thread is, you crybabies are all terrible and need to learn to play.

Can’t tell if trolling? Warrior is definitely THE strongest class right now, all around.

Bad warrior is usually the equivalent of your average player.
Good warrior is usually on par or slightly worse than a very experienced player on another class

Class with most forgiving mechanics, lowest-risk for highest-reward game play and you are trying to tell me a D/D Ele should have no excuse for not beating that?

Xernth.8561:

WhiteRose.6934:

Warrior is ridiculous right now, accept it.

The only thing ridiculous about warrior right now is the amount of energy a few people spend complaining about them.

If it were just a few people complaining, that would be one thing. Maybe you should check your professions forums again and see there is a consensus among the entire community about this. The only thing ridiculous about this is how heavily a few warrior players are defending their class just so they don’t have to be back on a level playing field with the other classes.

Some time soon you might be required to have skill in order to play well! Won’t that suck.

Burnfall.9573:

connieboy.9840:

Burnfall.9573:

Warrior risk their lives (without having no access to Stealth whatsoever), for battle whereas Thief having access to Stealth can walk through a full army without any risks whatsoever and still survive.

Does this sound reasonable to you?

Example; how can someone not wearing any bulletproof armor (thief) and only carrying a wooden stick, can absorb every incoming bullets and still able to walk up to his enemies and kill them with a single blow?

Seriously, who came out with this Ridiculous idea and Absurd design for this class?

What kittening game are you playing? I guarantee you that if you try running through an enemy zerg, you are still going to get hit by every AOE that is being dropped.

Heimdallr.7021:

It would be nice to backup claims like with my warrior after “5 hours max i wreck faces with it”.
I could say i wreck faces after half an hour with my elementalist in pvp.

Except you never see this argument from other classes. I started a warrior the other day. First time warrior, did the PVE intro and nothing else, immediately went to the mists, copy and pasted first build I saw online, and was top scoring player in my TPVP match and won. Hmmm

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y6XUJjGTUJk

I am playing the same kittening game as you

Lol. I am sorry, I was assuming when you said “Thief having access to stealth can walk through a full army”, you meant stealthing, and walking through a full army. Not using Daggerstorm and dodge rolling through. You might as well have a Warrior pop Endure Pain and use Shield Stance and send them through.

And check that out in comparison to your “thief killing someone with a single blow” QQ

Burnfall.9573:

Warrior risk their lives (without having no access to Stealth whatsoever), for battle whereas Thief having access to Stealth can walk through a full army without any risks whatsoever and still survive.

Does this sound reasonable to you?

Example; how can someone not wearing any bulletproof armor (thief) and only carrying a wooden stick, can absorb every incoming bullets and still able to walk up to his enemies and kill them with a single blow?

Seriously, who came out with this Ridiculous idea and Absurd design for this class?

What kittening game are you playing? I guarantee you that if you try running through an enemy zerg in stealth, you are still going to get hit by every AOE that is being dropped. Also, Warriors “risking their lives for battle” is a completely absurd argument. There is almost no risk element in Warrior gameplay whatsoever. Highest armor, health pool, insane regeneration, and best mobility in the game.

Heimdallr.7021:

It would be nice to backup claims like with my warrior after “5 hours max i wreck faces with it”.
I could say i wreck faces after half an hour with my elementalist in pvp.

Except you never see this argument from other classes. I started a warrior the other day. First time warrior, did the PVE intro and nothing else, immediately went to the mists, copy and pasted first build I saw online, and was top scoring player in my TPVP match and won. Hmmm

redslion.9675:

connieboy.9840:

killahmayne.9518:

connieboy.9840:

killahmayne.9518:

connieboy.9840:

And as far as the “just learn how to roll” comment that was made, tell me how rolling helps me at all when almost every warrior in PvP brings longbow so they can just spam combustive shot on point.

Where as classes like Necros can spam mass wells and marks, Engis mass grenades so I don’t get your point with combustive shot.

Read the rest of the thread. I’ll bet you that Necro is still in light armor and that Engineer in medium, and neither are regenerating around 500 hp/s.

Signet of rage paired with Cleansing Ire, Furious, Sharpened Axes, Inspiring Shouts, Versatile Rage, etc. and the basic way adrenaline gain works ensures that you won’t have difficulty building it back up.

Yeah, and Necro has Death Shroud, and with all the water blasting an Engi can do they can heal well over 500 HP/S. We might have heavy armor but it is something like 14% compared to light and 7% compared to medium. And an Engi has decent access to protection which more than makes up for it.

And Signet of Rage is rarely used for the passive so you can’t really count that as adrenaline gain. I would also hope in tourny play they would carry Battle Standard instead.

Nobody carries sharpened axes (let alone uses axe), furious rarely sees a whole lot of play, shouts aren’t really used in PvP.

It is really only one build that is causing people so much grief and that is the hambow build. Most other builds are average at best and can be easily countered.

Death Shroud is nothing with the out of control burst going on. Minor inconvenience at most.

Engineer healing certainly does not calculate to 500 HPS, I would love to see your math on that.

You are saying 14% and 7% like that is nothing.. lol… I’m just going to chalk this up to your signature and assume you are going to defend warrior to the death.

You can do that with a medkit if you use all your skills off cooldown (kinda).

Or with Healing turret if you drop it, overcharge it and then pick it up + Alchemy IX (if you spend most of your time with a kit)

Drop Bandages from Med Kit:

Drop a pack of bandages that provides a little healing.
Healing: 1,000 (0.5)

So lets assume the 1000 base healing of the 3 drop bandages skills, each with a 12 seconds recharge rate. Assuming you drop one bandage and wait 4 seconds before dropping the next (this will ensure that one of the 3 is always off CD and give equal spacing between them), you are only receiving 250 hp/s. Adding in the regeneration from backpack regenerator, you are still only at 367 hp/s, STILL about ~40 hps less than the base healing from Healing Signet.

However, I suppose you are assuming use of Bandage Self every time it is off CD. So factoring in a base of 4,920 healing every 20 seconds, you can add 246 healing to that. So around 613 hps.

Now… what is wrong with all that?
First off is the obvious fact that it is not healing per second, it is in fact ALL initial healing. So for those claiming that Engineer’s can regenerate this much… you are wrong. On paper, dividing the initial heals out over time results in this much hps, but you would have to be stupid to even compare it to Healing Signet because of two factors.

1) Unless you are a robot, you probably are not going to activate/use these skills at the exact intervals required.
2) They should rename the game Stun Wars (again, the main culprit being warrior) because of how long I find myself not having control of my character. Not sure about anybody else, but I find it pretty hard to heal myself when I’m hugging the dirt. Warrior’s Healing Signet is going.. always.. even during stuns.

killahmayne.9518:

connieboy.9840:

killahmayne.9518:

connieboy.9840:

And as far as the “just learn how to roll” comment that was made, tell me how rolling helps me at all when almost every warrior in PvP brings longbow so they can just spam combustive shot on point.

Where as classes like Necros can spam mass wells and marks, Engis mass grenades so I don’t get your point with combustive shot.

Read the rest of the thread. I’ll bet you that Necro is still in light armor and that Engineer in medium, and neither are regenerating around 500 hp/s.

Signet of rage paired with Cleansing Ire, Furious, Sharpened Axes, Inspiring Shouts, Versatile Rage, etc. and the basic way adrenaline gain works ensures that you won’t have difficulty building it back up.

Yeah, and Necro has Death Shroud, and with all the water blasting an Engi can do they can heal well over 500 HP/S. We might have heavy armor but it is something like 14% compared to light and 7% compared to medium. And an Engi has decent access to protection which more than makes up for it.

And Signet of Rage is rarely used for the passive so you can’t really count that as adrenaline gain. I would also hope in tourny play they would carry Battle Standard instead.

Nobody carries sharpened axes (let alone uses axe), furious rarely sees a whole lot of play, shouts aren’t really used in PvP.

It is really only one build that is causing people so much grief and that is the hambow build. Most other builds are average at best and can be easily countered.

Death Shroud is nothing with the out of control burst going on. Minor inconvenience at most.

Engineer healing certainly does not calculate to 500 HPS, I would love to see your math on that.

You are saying 14% and 7% like that is nothing.. lol… I’m just going to chalk this up to your signature and assume you are going to defend warrior to the death.

killahmayne.9518:

connieboy.9840:

And as far as the “just learn how to roll” comment that was made, tell me how rolling helps me at all when almost every warrior in PvP brings longbow so they can just spam combustive shot on point.

Where as classes like Necros can spam mass wells and marks, Engis mass grenades so I don’t get your point with combustive shot.

Read the rest of the thread. I’ll bet you that Necro is still in light armor and that Engineer in medium, and neither are regenerating around 500 hp/s.

Signet of rage paired with Cleansing Ire, Furious, Sharpened Axes, Inspiring Shouts, Versatile Rage, etc. and the basic way adrenaline gain works ensures that you won’t have difficulty building it back up.

Harper.4173:

Rezzet.3614:

diference between guard to warrior is you dont have to build for healing power as healing signet base regen is 405 hps then theres the adrenaline regen of 360 hp and there ya go 760 hp/s without healing power armor nor trinkets

So sad. Doesn’t even know the skills.

You are getting a base of around 400 per second just from your healing signet alone. Factor in another ~40 to ~120 per second from Adrenal Health (125 – 360/3 seconds based on adrenaline (not to mention, its a passive MINOR TRAIT)), and you know every warrior is taking both of those. So basically we are looking at a base of 440-520 healing per second, combined with damage mitigation provided by heavy armor.

Now let’s look at another class. Engineer’s BackPack Regenerator. Master level skill that not all engineer builds use (must choose between Cleansing Formula 409, Fast Acting Elixirs, Potent Elixirs, etc.) that heals for a measly 117 per second while in kits.
So not only must you choose between other traits for this, and not only does it not heal for anything, but you must also be in a kit to receive the negligible healing.

Thief’s Shadow Rejuv – a nice ~300 per second !BUT!. Thief must be in stealth, which is a joke. Warrior will just spam CC where you stealthed and down you 90% of the time, otherwise spam combustion shot which will do the trick. Not to mention it is a Grandmaster trait that mostly only D/D thieves will take.

And as far as the “just learn how to roll” comment that was made, tell me how rolling helps me at all when almost every warrior in PvP brings longbow so they can just spam combustive shot on point.

Harper.4173:

The fact that you didn’t even respond to my whole post says a lot.

Still – why do you insist on breaking a class instead of fixing other classes? Would it make you feel better to know no class is doing ok?!

I don’t know what else to say, I responded to your entire post except the part where you stated I had no proof beyond my personal opinions.

I have not stated yet in this thread that I wish for warrior to be so broken into ground it is unplayable. I just feel it had way too much going for it and needs to be brought down to the level of the other classes. Warrior is literally the jack-of-all trades, and the master of them all too. The point of my bringing Ele into the thread earlier was to display how there is such a wide gap in balance. It just isn’t ideal for those of us that don’t want to jump on the warrior bandwagon, or just enjoy to play their other classes.

Harper.4173:

Yes – you’ve got it right connie – the " you agreed with me so your feedback is constructive and good while the people that disagreed are all warrior scum that deserve to be nerfed until they quit the game" attitude is much better.

Perhaps you can’t comprehend, but TheGuy is giving very constructive criticism and is not agreeing with everything I am saying. So again, throwing around words like malicious and narrow-minded just make me think you aren’t actually reading the entire thread, but are just looking at tidbits that you can use as ammo against me.

And as far as going to the Ele forum and posting there, I think you’ll find there are plenty of threads already asking for work to be done, and then all we get in the December 10th patch was reduced base CD on attunement swap, which means nothing because you will still have to go far into the Arcana tree. And Diamond skin, which is honestly just an insult. Conditions can’t be applied while you are above 90% health, which is approximately up until the first hit. So I think it is pretty clear the state of Elementalists won’t change very soon, the devs would rather just continue polishing their most polished class instead of bringing it down to a reasonable level.

Lightsbane.9012:

EVERLASTING ENGINEER
until conditions.

Cleanse from Healing Turret
15 point Minor trait in Alchemy
Super Elixir

That’s more than most classes out there already, but you can freely switch out Kit Refinement and go 30 into Alchemy for Automated Response.

But thanks for the constructive feedback.

Seras.5702:

Accelerant Packed Turrets just for Supply Crate? Just goes to show I don’t PvP. Never woulda thought to do that.

Accelerant Packed Turrets is used on Healing Turret, your main heal.

@ Snorcha and TheGuy

I appreciate the constructive feedback, rather than the “I play warrior, so that automatically makes everything you say wrong” attitude rampant in this thread.

The state of this game is just extremely sad when there are classes like Elementalist, which is probably the most fun to play but also the weakest, but then there are classes like warrior, where someone like me who has never played it can create one, get past the intro, enter mists at level 2, copy and paste the first build I looked up (happened to be double sword condi build) and boast the top score in the first tourney match I entered.

Why is Armor of Earth on a 90 second CD, but Balanced Stance on a 40 second CD?

Why is Endure pain on 60 s CD, and Mist Form on a 75s?

Elementalists almost have to take Caltrips because of their squishy nature, losing out on lots of damage in the process. Warriors can take fully offensive utilities, and will still have heavy armor and best mobility in the game, in addition to insane regeneration.

Two of them on point, imagine all of them rushing orb at start

Justin ODell.9517:

RaynStargaze.6510:

so i will always get on the least played class to get a fast q pop / get on the good team and then swap before match starts?

Yep, we’ll definitely have to worry about things like this. My hope is that we can find and solve these things together. Really looking forward to it.

Bumping this thread…

This is getting god kitten ridiculous.. How can ANET allow things like this to happen.. especially in tournaments.. You need to hire somebody who has a god kitten clue and can fix your match making system.

Every single one of them was a MM necro, including the one on my team

Coldtart.4785:

You do realise that warrior was the most played class even when they were garbage right? Even now most ‘how to beat a warrior?’ threads end with someone effectively saying that when you know what you need to dodge you should never lose 1v1 against a warrior.

LOL, you are saying the secret to beating a warrior is learning to dodge.

Ok

Flissy.4093:

Qaelyn.7612:

I can deal with a hambow warrior just fine if it’s only 1 of them. The problem is that this class is now seen as such a ‘no brainer’ that you routinely run into teams with more than 1. They can very quickly overwhelm anyone, leaving you just standing there like a fool waiting to die.

The game isn’t balanced around hotjoin lol.

Go play Solo Queue tourneys. Every other team will have 3 warriors and two other random classes. This isn’t just hotjoin crazy occurrences.

Face it. Warrior is the most face-roll, forgiving class. Such a high-reward for low-risk gameplay, it’s no wonder 3/5 people that run by on my screen are a Warrior. Probably couldn’t handle the thought processing the other classes require, would rather just take the easy route.

This one is especially good

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/Guardian-vs-Warrior

Provides all that video proof Harper was requesting on the last page.

XerreX.7196:

this is by far not the most bunkerish engi spec : D

you can check my stream build collection for the actual spec

Never stated this was the “most bunkerish” spec. In fact, there probably is no single defined “actual spec” for absolute best results, it will depend on a person’s comfort with the build and their playstyle. I just wrote up my build for those looking for a bunker build because I feel it performs well and there isn’t an abundance of bunker builds written up on the forums for people to check out.

NevirSayDie.6235:

I like the build. A couple of thoughts:

—movement speed bonuses don’t stack past 33%. You really don’t want to use power shoes and speedy kits at the same time, because it’s no faster than just speedy kits.
—the shield trait won’t give a toughness bonus while you’re using a kit. You might decide you want to use the trait just for the reduced cooldown, but consider that you won’t get much use out of the extra toughness. Protective shield is a really good trait.
—with healing turret and elixir gun, you’ll probably have the regen boon up pretty much permanently. You might want to consider runes of the forge or melandru instead of dwayna.
—you should definitely at least try the build with cleric’s or settler’s amulet. Remember that you can customize your jewel, so you could use cleric’s amulet with soldier’s jewel or at least put a cleric’s jewel in your soldier’s amulet. You might like the way settler’s plays as well, it’s an insane armor rating.

Good luck!

I don’t use both speed modifiers. I only use Power Shoes. The 10 in inventions is for Kit Refinement.

Btw, just take a look around in other forums. You will see TONS of players, even those who play/played Warriors themselves admitting to how broken Warriors are.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/engineer/Engineer-yeeha

Made me lol.

Tomasmxmf.9403:

Some things will always be top tier, some things will always be really good no matter how you work it, either adapt to it or just go play something else.

Adapt to Warrior being most played, strongest class in the game or GTFO. That’s a fair ultimatum.

cat.8975:

Here’s my variant of a bunker build:
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fcAQJAqelIqicX3ynF17IRoH2/+qVkC9b5PKkbaB-TsAgzCtIuRtjbHzNyusdNa40w8DA

I take a Cleric’s amulet with a soldier jewel (Jewel for a little extra health and power)

I didn’t bother swapping out the sigils, but you can change the sigil of life to something like +5% damage if you really want, it’s not too important

This build relies on spamming bomb abilities while standing in super elixir for max healing (over 1k hp/sec), though you can also just tool kit #4 while standing in super elixir to stall your opponents while your team arrives. Not so heavy on the knockbacks in this, but I personally find bomb kit to be too good to give up to flamethrower, and bomb range/cd is too important to get a trait that will only work every 20 seconds for 1 extra knockback.

I take a mix of 3 different rune types so I can keep protection at an almost 100% uptime if CC chained, on top of the 20% decreased damage while CC’d meaning 53% total damage decrease to tell those warriors to kitten themselves.

100% regen uptime, 25% faster move speed at all times (not perma swift, but oh well), fantastic regen and aoe healing, can give allies good regen durations/condi cleanses (don’t forget about elixir gun #3!!!!), smoke bomb is too OP

Really, your biggest weaknesses have already been mentioned. Ele, mesmer, warrior, and SOMETIMES thief.

Oh, and btw, the map with the capture point underwater….you should NEVER lose that capture point with this build lol, bomb autos are faster underwater (the same bug that used to happen with grenades, but they never fixed the bombs), so you have HUGE regen/aoe damage/aoe control while underwater. The extra bit of power in this build goes great with harpoon gun #2 for finishing someone off.

Maybe it’s just me, but I don’t enjoy bomb kit in PvP at all. It can be alright for holding a point, where they have to be on the point to cap and thus in range of your bombs, but otherwise they can just kite you all day.

Phineas Poe.3018:

Soldier amulet over Cleric?

As explained above if you read, I said personal choice. I enjoy the vitality it gives, but you can do either.

Harper.4173:

Stx.4857:

You make good points and I do not disagree with you. I am just frustrated by many personal experiences on my Necro where a warrior can literally retreat whenever he wants by GS 3 away from me, then GS 5 out of range. Both of these remove any roots or slows I may be tagging him with.

I do not expect the entire rebalancing of warrior GS or anything to be done really, but I am just tired of games where the tanky heavy armor class can outrun cloth and leather classes. It makes no sense at all to me.

Because he has traited to remove those. It isn’t free – the skills by themselves don’t do that.
Thieves can also stealth and escape, mesmers can blink, eles can do the same.

Necro is pretty decent at mobility but you can’t expect to be good at everything. A warrior that has a GS on cannot CC that much, so he’s trading that off for the mobility. Also if he’s running away you’ve won that fight. You’ve achieved what you wanted to achieve – if sPVP you’ve won the point, if WvW you’ve driven him off.

Victory =/= kill.

Sorry it took me a while to reply, but I had better things to do than to reply to someone who lost their credibility when they said Engineer’s turrets were tough to deal with. Anyways, here is a video I took of a PvP match where a naked Warrior (yes, NAKED Warrior), was still able to outlive my damage as a fully decked out thief. Apologies for how terrible the video quality is, and also don’t bother commenting about how I was just playing terrible. I had to scramble to get my phone to record it with, and then I had to play with one hand holding my phone up and on on my mouse, so I pretty much could only stand there. However the video does serve its purpose in that I am hitting the warrior multiple times for 2-4k, and not only is it BARELY doing a dent to his HP (don’t forget, he’s kittening NAKED), but he is actually able to regenerate most of the damage.

Cribbage.2056:

I like your build. It’s probably up there with other decent bunker builds I have seen and tried. However, engineer as bunker at the moment has some real challenges.

I would imagine you will be able to outlast most necros, thieves, and rangers and probably exclude them from the node.

Bunker Guardians you will likely stalemate on. Neither of you will hurt the other and your knockback will be countered by his blocks and stability.

Warriors will be a challenge. You’ll likely survive if you are lucky, but it will be hard work. Their CC is stupid and of course they have no worries about health with the definitely-does-not-need-nerfing-warriors-“are-in-a-good-place-right-now”-healing-signet. You will not be able to exclude them enough to cap a node due to their high stability uptime and it is possible they will have you running around so much you’ll concede it to them.

Mesmers and elementalists are your real problem. On the right build, either one of them can kill you with very little chance you will stop them. Eles have an attack chain that applies so much damage so quickly, you die before you can react. Only good eles with the right build can do it – I reckon I meet about 1 ele in 20 who can do this.

Mesmers can keep you dazed for 2-3 seconds and in that time take your health from max to zero. They can’t do it every time, because it depends on damage from their illusions, but they do it often, and I meet about 1 in 3 mesmers now doing this attack chain.

A few weeks ago, I would have said you are mad for not including Automated Response in your build. However, despite not seeing anything in the patch notes to suggest it is worse, it feels to me like it is way less effective than it used to be.

Also, having only one stun break and no immobilise escape (rocket boots) would make me feel vulnerable on a bunker spec, but you can’t have everything, I suppose.

Just out of interest, does the super speed from kit refinement act as a stun break? The one on slick shoes toolbelt does.

To be frank, after playing a bunker engi for most of my time in game since launch, I no longer find them viable enough.

Yes, I mostly found (bunker) Guardians and Warriors (but who doesn’t) gave me the most trouble. Elementalists have actually yet to pose a threat to me. That isn’t to say that they won’t, but apparently I haven’t gone against a competent Ele yet. Mesmers could be a nuisance, but I can normally outheal their damage.

I have not gotten the chance to try out SuperSpeed as a stunbreaker yet. Tooltip does not list it as one, but that’s not to say it isn’t. I use it more for a speed boost when running between or back to my node.

I partially agree with your last statement. I feel bunker Engi can leave much to be desired, but its a fluid gameplay style that if played right can hold off multiple enemies until your team arrives. It’s disappointing, because a regen warrior can bunker just as well but still do massive damage.

Cero.5132:

It´s amazing how bunker-ish builds with the same utilities can be so different.
I also use tk, ft and eg but my Traits are 0/0/20/30/20 with no big surprises like “Kit Refinement” build in.

Your build definitely inspired me to try Accelerant Packed turrets in my build.
I´ve been in love with the trait for a long time now but somehow never used it in a serious build

Definitely give it a try. It’s another knockback on a short 20 second cooldown, tied in with your heal. Would love to hear some feedback on how other’s like the build

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/engineer/PvP-Bunker-Engineer-Build/first#post3427422

PVP Everlasting Engineer Bunker Build

Skills
Pistol – Noteworthy Skills
1 – Auto Attack -The pistol is an all around great weapon, but as a mentioned, dps is not your job. However, the autoattack has a respectable range, and explodes at the end of its travel. If you find an enemy with low health trying to hide behind an object until they can regenerate, spam your autoattack. It will hit them on the explosion and keep them in combat.

2 – Poison Dart Volley - Poison dart volley is a little disappointing in that all the shots are not a guaranteed hit. However, I have yet to miss ALL shots on a target, making this a great skill for quick condition application to keep an enemy in combat or to reduce healing on a regen warrior, guardian, or downed player.

3 – Static Shot - Static shot is my favorite skill to spam. Travels quick? Check. Blinds enemies? Check. Quick applications of confusion? Check. All around great skill.

Shield – Noteworthy Skills
4 – Magnetic shield – is an awesome defensive skill. Use it as a reflect against a ranger or pistol thief shooting at you from off point, or use it as a knockback to peel melee or clear your node. Also use it as a blast finisher on your healing turret.
NOTE – Mesmer great sword auto attack does not seem to be reflected by this skill

5 – Static Shield 1.5 sec block, also stuns nearby enemies for 1 second if triggered. The secondary effect of the skill dazes foes, so use it to interrupt healing or obvious choreographed skills.

Tool Kit Skills
1 Negligible
2 Box of Nails - Great for dropping on node if you are waiting for other skills to be off cooldown. Bleeds and cripples.
3 Pry Bar - Applies 5 stacks of confusion. I usually combo this with Static shot to quickly apply lots of confusion to an enemy.
4 Gear Shield - One of the best blocks in the game, take absolutely no damage for 3 seconds.
5 Magnet - One of the best skills in the game IMO. Use magnet pull to drag an enemy out of position, off ledges, into the broken glass on Skyhammer, etc. Usually follow this up with Pry Bar.

Elixir Gun Skills
1 Tranq Dart * Not the strongest auto attack, but great for stacking quick bleeds and weakness.
*2 Elixir F - Grants swiftness to you and allies, and cripples opponents. Decent skill.
3 Fumigate - Probably the best skill from elixir gun, this sprays in a cone and removes conditions from allies as well as poisoning and applying vulnerability to enemies.
4 Acid Bomb - Use this as a gap closer, or combo it with Super Elixir for retaliation.
5 Super Elixir - One of the reasons to take elixir gun, heals on impact then a great heal on pulse afterwards.

Flame Thrower
I am only going to mention the last 3 skills of flame thrower,
3 Air Blast - Great knockback on a short cooldown, also applies burning.
4 Napalm - Applies burning to foes that pass through, also gives allies a field to use
5 Smoke Vent - 180 radius blind, great to avoid burst or also used for stomping
NOTE – You can start the stomp, then switch to FT and use #5, all while still channeling the stomp.

ELITE SKILL
Supply Crate -
One of the best elites in the game, this will stun enemies for 2 seconds on drop (also a Blast Finisher), then continue to be a pain in their kitten after. Net shot applies almost as soon as it drops, and will help make distance as the fight continues. Bandages are a GREAT heal, don’t underestimate them. I usually switch to tool kit after using Supply Crate, then collect the bandages while using Gear Shield.

TOOL BELT SKILLS
Regenerating Mist from Healing Turret. Nice little heal, stacks regeneration. Water Combo Field

Healing Mist from Elixir Gun. STUNBREAKER – heal is pretty small

Throw wrench to gain endurance for dodge rolls

Incindiary Ammo – use in conjunction with Poison dart volley, static discharge, and pistol auto attack to quickly apply conditions, to mitigate a warriors regeneration, etc.

MISC
Combos
Healing turret >Cleansing Burst > Magnetic Shield > Detonate Healing Turret > Regenerating Mist
basic healing combo

Box of Nails > Magnet > Pry Bar > Static Shot > Magnetic Shield
to apply quick stacks of confusion, bleeding, immobilize, then send them back on their way

Magnetic Shield > Magnet > Pry Bar > Vent Air
_sometimes I just like to kitten people off. knock them back, pull them in, and knock them back again. pry bar for extra kitten-baggery

Supply Crate > Box of Nails > Gear Shield > Static Shield
box of nails to slow down melees on you, use both shields while collecting bandages from supply crate

Runes
I use Runes of Dwayna. This is a personal choice, they could be swapped out for Melandru or another defensive rune, but I find the extra healing from the runes unsurpassed. It also meshes with team play very well, as it will grant near allies regeneration.

Sigils
Pistol – Sigil of Life
The great thing about playing bunker is that you should rarely die. When you see an incoming, call it out and let your teammates come and do the killing while you distract that thief who is wondering why his 2222222222 spam isn’t downing you. This let’s you easily rack up the stacks from this sigil, giving you a nice bonus to healing power.

Shield – Sigil of Energy
When you swap back to your weapon set from kits, this will activate the sigil, giving you another dodge roll on an ICD of 9 seconds. This is a phenomenal sigil.

Accessories
Soldier’s Amulet
Again, this is personal preference. I enjoy the vitality from Soldier’s amulet. The toughness is also great, but the power is negligible. You could swap this out for Cleric’s for healing power, but I find the vitality loss to be too much.

Explosives
5 – Evasive Powder Keg
This is a decent minor trait, but your job is not to be dealing damage. However, the damage on dodge throws in a smidge of damage here and there, and is boosted with the Superior Rune of Energy we will be using on our shield, giving us another dodge roll when we swap back from kits.

V – Accelerant-Packed Turrets
This is an amazing bunker trait. Again, the damage from the trait is negligible, but the knockback is a great source of CC. The great thing about this is how it is packaged in to your heal. This trait can do so much, from peeling melee off you, to knocking players off a ledge, out of a node, etc.

Inventions
5 – Low Health Response System
This is also a decent minor trait. The only downside is that I find by the time you are caught at 25%, it is too little too late. It helps in those close fights when you need to regen immediately after, or when you are low and going for the stomp.

IV – Stabilized Armor ~ VI – Cloaking Device
This is kind of a personal choice trait. With stabilized armor, you get damage mitigation during knock downs, the trait has no CD, and it stacks with Protection Injection. However, with so many classes having an immobilize, I sometimes switch it up with Cloaking Device. The short stealth is amazing in that it gives you time to reassess the situation, and throw off your attacker.

15 – Automated Medical Response
This minor trait is fantastic. Upon reaching 25% hp, all of your healing skills recharge immediately. This includes your stun break from the elixir gun toolbelt skill, the healing mist from your Healing Turret toolbelt skill, and your Healing Turret itself.

VIII – Power Shoes
I cannot force myself to take any other trait in this tier. Movement speed is just too good. It helps you if you need to switch to another node, if you have died and need to return to your node, and just get around in general.

25 – Performance Enhancement
Not much to say here. Extra power is always nice, but in a build not meant to focus on damage, it doesn’t affect us much.

VII – Reinforced Shield
This is another great skill. The toughness it gives is sort of a bonus, but we are taking it for the reduced cooldowns on shield skills. Look to skill explanations for why this is important.

Alchemy
5 – Hidden Flask
A nice little boost, made even better by the fact it triggers so early in health depletion. Upon reaching 75%, you gain might, fury, retaliation, and swiftness. Retaliation is probably the best stat from the lot, but this trait can also be unfortunate. Some classes (necromancer or boon steal thief) have skills that do more damage based on how many boons you have. Watch out when facing these classes as to when this activates in the fight.

VI – Protection Injection
Amazing, amazing trait. Gain 3.5 sec of 33% reduced damage upon Stun, Daze, Knockdown, Knockback, Fear, and Launch. The trait is only on a 5 sec internal CD. This is a great trait to have when facing terror build necromancers, stunlock warriors, etc.

_15 – Transmute _
Nice little condition removal/boon applicator on a 15 sec cooldown. Extremely good for a minor trait.

IX – Backpack Regenerator ~ IV – Self Regulating Defense
This is kind of a toss up as well. Backpack regenerator is nice to have as we will have kits out a majority of play, and in situations where a fight has just ended, you can swap to a kit to start regenerating health immediately. However, with how many passive skills we have that activate around 25% health, Self Regulating Defense is a viable choice because it allows these skills to run their course, as well as give you a few seconds of OH kitten, to reassess the situation and maybe gobble up some bandages from supply crate.

Tools
5 – Adrenaline Pump
DO NOT FORGET ABOUT THIS. Most players don’t utilize this enough. If you need to dodge, but don’t quite have enough endurance, throw your wrench or use one of your healing toolbelt skills. Great for a little boost to endurance.

IV – Kit Refinement
Fire Shield, Glue trail, and Superspeed are effects we will gain from this trait.
Fire shield is a nice little might stacker, and causes burn on attackers as well.
Glue trail is a great immobilize, gives you time to break from melee and heal up.
Superspeed is not a significant effect, but if you are running to a node and need a little boost, it works great.

Link to build:
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fcAQJAqelIqicX3SrF1LJxoCfO0D7ffDLSh+t8nC0F-TsAA1CtIuRdj7GzNybs3Ma40w8DA

After having a hard time finding a decent bunker build, I played around and created one that I found to be extremely effective. I just thought I would share it with the community to try out or share thoughts on.

INCOMING WALL OF TEXT
I went very descriptive into my reasoning behind everything

Build is 10/0/30/20/10

Edit for clarification: The reason I do not go full into Alchemy is because the minor grandmaster trait gives extra % damage for each boon on you, which is not worth the investment, and there really are no great traits left in the line that justify leaving out Accelerant-Packed Turrets or Kit Refinement.

This build excels at knocking players around and off cap points, with 3 forms of knockback and a long range pull. The survivability is great, and I often find myself in 1v2 or 1v3 situations, and can hold off until my team arrives. This build features 2 forms of block, 2 blinds (one that is an AOE), a stunbreaker, and lots of condition removal.

You will be sitting around 3075 armor and 2400 health.

Harper.4173:

You clearly don’t understand how this game works. Mesmer clones aren’t " easy " since you have to split your effort between killing them or killing the mesmer.
Same goes with engi – he throws turrets – you’re stuck either fighting him or them.

Well for one, I stated that Mesmer clones were 1) Easy to kill and 2) Easy to tell apart from the caster. I suppose if you are idiotic enough to waste your time running around playing whack-a-mole with the Mesmer clones, you could have a pretty tough endeavor on your hands. Personally, I watch for the subtle giveaways and go after the real Mesmer. To each their own.

And Engineer. I actually LOL’ed at that. I would love to play against the Engineers that you are that are using the entirety of their utility slots for turrets. They are admittedly (after Ranger pets) the second worst mechanic in the game. Turrets currently don’t scale with stats, are EXTREMELY easy to kill, and once the breeze rolls through and knocks them over you are left with an Engineer with very little options.

As far as Guardian, I have no qualms with them. They can bunker… so what. They aren’t dealing unbelievable damage while doing so.

Listen to Luto. Its frustrating when thief is advertised as king of mobility, when in actuality chasing a warrior is futile. You will never catch him, and he will regenerate to full while you try. But also if we are speaking by your logic of “every class has their gimmick” to make up for armor/HP differences, Warrior gets heavy armor, and should be burdened by it. They should move slower than a Thief in leather armor, when “mobility” is supposedly the thief’s “gimmick.”

Also, please stop with your dead-end “You just don’t understand how things are and how this game works” arguments.

Harper.4173:

connieboy.9840:

Medens.4960:

It’s more like Warrior is balanced, but the other classes are less balanced.
Warrior needs it’s damage to have a purpose in the game. Ever seen a warrior in movies/other games that doesn’t fight like a beast?
Warrior needs it’s high health in order to survive. Along with thief,s who have stealth, they’re upfront most of the time. That’s what they’re supposed to do.
And warrior armor is pretty obvious. A warrior with leather/cotton clothes is just a farce.

So you are saying warrior’s need both high health and high armor to survive, but other classes have to trade off one or the other? Engineer has decent HP pool, but has to trade off for leather armor (shield quite doesnt make up for the difference, and not everybody runs shield). Thief – lowest HP pool, again leather armor, and please don’t argue that stealth makes up for this, because any form of AOE should be enough to deter, if not down, a thief that just went invis.

I could go on with this for the other classes, but its hard to argue against the fact that warriors have a low-to-no-risk (highest hp, highest armor) high-reward (insane damage, insane regeneration) aspect to them that just quite doesn’t make sense. Any other class has to trade off their damage to achieve a bunker build. Warrior just seems able to do it all.

You forgot a few parts.
Warriors don’t get : Clones ,Invisibility, reflects, protection. That’s why we have high armor and high HP. Because we can’t mitigate as well as other classes.

An invis thief can stealth up and you have no idea where he is.
Mesmers spam so many clones that it’s insane.
Guardians have access to protection and reflects.
Engis just drop tons of stuff all the time.

You lack proper understanding of how things are – in a game where every class has a gimmick mechanic the one class that doesn’t needs to have something to make up for it.

Besides the fact that Mesmer clones are extremely easy to kill and tell apart from the caster, and “Engis just drop tons of stuff all the time” is hardly a valid sentence, let alone valid argument, Warrior’s have tons of mitigation through their regeneration, Shield Stance, Endure Pain, etc.
As for the other junk you wrote, thief “stealthing up and you having no idea where he is” is not quite game changing. He isn’t able to defend nodes stealth, if he attacks it reveals him, there from which it will take any warrior with half a brain one second to spam the multiple forms of CC at their disposal, effectively either killing the thief or at least rendering him unable to reapply stealth. Although even the most glass cannon thief will be hard-pressed to even put a dent into an average warrior (albeit the idiot warriors that run full berserk) , and even then the warrior will most likely have regenerated the HP while the thief is in the process of waiting for stealth timer to wear off, reapply stealth, and position for another backstab.

Every class has a gimmick mechanic, so warrior needs to have compensation? I take it by your overly defensive attitude that you play warrior.

Medens.4960:

It’s more like Warrior is balanced, but the other classes are less balanced.
Warrior needs it’s damage to have a purpose in the game. Ever seen a warrior in movies/other games that doesn’t fight like a beast?
Warrior needs it’s high health in order to survive. Along with thief,s who have stealth, they’re upfront most of the time. That’s what they’re supposed to do.
And warrior armor is pretty obvious. A warrior with leather/cotton clothes is just a farce.

So you are saying warrior’s need both high health and high armor to survive, but other classes have to trade off one or the other? Engineer has decent HP pool, but has to trade off for leather armor (shield quite doesnt make up for the difference, and not everybody runs shield). Thief – lowest HP pool, again leather armor, and please don’t argue that stealth makes up for this, because any form of AOE should be enough to deter, if not down, a thief that just went invis.

I could go on with this for the other classes, but its hard to argue against the fact that warriors have a low-to-no-risk (highest hp, highest armor) high-reward (insane damage, insane regeneration) aspect to them that just quite doesn’t make sense. Any other class has to trade off their damage to achieve a bunker build. Warrior just seems able to do it all.

Kagamiku.9731:

P Fun Daddy.1208:

Also, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HixNwGVDOb4&list=PL_tvolwEnBwTwGF1IKeI7QLRaNLsqvsXm&index=5
There’s a link to these for every class in the description for the video you posted.

The fact that every class is capable of this speaks words on its own. If you’re a good player you can make sue out of a harder to play class. Just ebcause a warrior is easy to play does not make it overpowered. It gives an advantage when two average players are fighting each other.

---

And the funny thing is, people complain about healing signet but warriors are one of the easiest classes for me to take down (as a warrior) — Healing signet is completely shut down by the condition build that I use. Most still run hammer and the damage is pathetic.

My whole team was against two warriors today on a point in a pvp match. 5vs2. Warriors were regenerating so hard yet were still able to put out so much damage they downed our entire team without us even getting one down (team even called target, so we had focus). Regenerating beyond all the damage we put out (we even had a condi necro (which brings up another point, Warriors even get a fear, which is unbelievable)).

Your move.

kyubi.3620:

warrior was meant to be played as a weapon master. therefore it would be unlogical if it was ’’weaker’’ as a ranged weapon user. Ranged weapon war are just defrent build. The way the game should be played ALL weapon should be on equal therm, you said the guardian sacrifice its range for good melee dps what you fail to realise is if spirit weaponry was actualy any decent scepter would become a somewhat deadly ranged build not to mention that its aoe still do a good amount of damage. I see a lot of guardian in SPVP using scepters and it actualy work.

Wait… did you basically just say that weapons were only created and can be put to full use by warrior?

And though I know nobody at ArenaNet will read this, and even if they did they won’t give two kittens because they have no sense of balance, I just want to add that warriors in general are about the equivalence of a thief who spams heartseeker. Annoying how a class can use one skill that hits for an upward of 4k each time, highly spammable (seriously, most the thieves I meet don’t even use their other skills), lock-on gap closer, yet ArenaNet sees no problem with this.

Lord Pain, how is a warrior regenerating health faster than I can dish out damage balanced at all? As well as having more mobility than a thief. That sure makes sense.

C’mon Setun. There has to be a reason when I click on any random character that passes me by, at least a generous 75% are warrior.

Edit: I agree CMstorm. When I face a Necro and lose its a l2p issue. Don’t understand the class at all. When I face a warrior that rolls his face across the keyboard or can range me down faster than a ranger can, its gotta be something else.

To ever balance this class? Most damage, most CC, highest healthpool, highest armor, best mobility, better ranged class than a ranger. Or perhaps they are just going to give warriors stealth and eliminate the other classes from the game?

Checked “Items I’m Buying” tab which should show all pending orders, it was not there. Gold still gone though

Transactions order shows no mention of the rune at all, so I’m just out 3 gold with no proof I ever even looked to buy it.

I am new to the game, just hit 80 today and went to buy a single Rune of the Scholar (3g 18s) from my Trading Co. The transaction took my gold but I never received the rune; not in the pickup tab, my bank, my inventory, etc. This is my first 80, just dinged not twenty minutes ago, and I just spent 1/5 the gold I have on a rune and don’t even receive it… what is going on? Is this a bug?

Regarding the vigor change..

From your Guild Wars 2 Professions page, description on Thieves
“Thieves practice an agile, acrobatic fighting style…”

From patch notes
“We have also somewhat reduced the effectiveness of high evasion thieves”
Is there any other kind of thief? We rely on evasion in order to not get stomped after a few hits. If the intention was truly to nerf the “high evasion thieves,” why not adjust it to to “Vigorous Recovery. Reduced Vigor duration to 4s from 8s while wielding weapon X.” Hit the build you are aiming for, instead of spreading your collateral to the whole profession.

after you factor in that your target will ALWAYS be moving, dodging, pushing you away, putting you into stuns, etc., … won’t the base regen increase actually be beneficial?

Thanks for the opinions everyone. @Triwhirl, I gave mesmer another shot. Had to delete my asura and make a charr mesmer and am enjoying it a lot more now. I can appreciate the animations and armoring/weapons a lot more on a bigger character, perhaps that is why I did not enjoy it before.

Still a fairly new player, I have an engineer I got up to 70 but decided it wasn’t what I wanted in a class. Too much ground targeting and continual spamming of one button took too much away from the game. Sure, kits were fun, but I felt like I was switching to grenade kit to spam “1”, or switch to bomb kit to spam “1” (of course throwing in other skills, but you get the idea).

My main focus is going to be WvW. Roaming will be around 75% of my focus, solo flipping camps etc. but when I do join a zerg, I would like to feel useful.

I really do enjoy Ranger, if it weren’t for the clunky pet mechanics and forums full of negative comments filling me with doubt it would be my #1 choice. I enjoy hitting them from afar with longbow, then leaping in with GS #3 and suddenly enjoying melee combat.

Thief feels weak to me so far. Squishy as to be expected, and not much damage, but that may be lack of traits/gear I have acquired. I don’t like the gimmick of stealth, but thief was the closest thing to Ranger element of ranged/melee swapping so I gave it a chance.

Mesmer.. I really wanted to enjoy Mesmer, but the skills from every set of weapons seem dull and after I got over the fascination of clones the class just seems dry. I only mention it because I only have gotten it to lvl 25 so perhaps I am missing something, but feel free to fill me in.

So basically these are the classes I am stuck between, but essentially it is really just between thief and ranger, unless you can really sell me on mesmer.

I appreciate the quick responses, they are what I wanted to hear.

@gennty, are you saying Mesmers are lacking in WvW or that they are only lacking until a certain level?

I would like to be able to viably roam solo, but also benefit a large group when I encounter them. I refuse to play thief or warrior, but is there a class better suited for this than Mesmer?