Guild Wars 2

Black Powder is great but it isn’t a perfect defense. There’s plenty out there that will hit you anyway so learning to dodge and shadowstep is important regardless of build or weapon sets. You do that by playing the game, watching for the tells of the heavy attacks, and getting the heck out of the way. You really need to get those down. If you can’t then your trek to 80 and the end of your personal story is going to be a drag. Once you get dodging and stepping down you’ll find that the game gets to be a lot less frustrating.

My sword/pistol high survivability setup is just as viable today as it’s been for the past month. It’s not the highest throw-weight out there but it’s not meant to be the highest. It’s meant to survive swarms of Risen. Which it does.