Guild Wars 2

-Shattered Aegis: Do we have an amount on how much damage this will do? I ask because this is competing with Fiery Wrath which is a very nice buff to Guardian damage overall and not just burst.

-Zealous Blade: I honestly think that the changes just aren’t what some of us are looking for. I would like this to be a flat bonus to health gained because it’s something that only affects GS and you must hit your opponent for it to work. Instead of it being per hit, why not per skill activation upon hit and significantly increase the health gained? It would still require you to hit your target and could be countered by kiting.

-Kindled Zeal: Maybe change this from condition to more physical damage or crit chance? As it stands it’s very difficult for a Guardian to spec into Condition damage and feels a lot less desirable compared to power.

-Searing Flames: This is a decent change but unless the changes to Sigil of Nullification are made, I think other options are more viable.

-Powerful Blades: Nice change, This is brought more inline with other professions traits

-Retributive Armor: Maybe instead of making this a flat increase to precision, give it a chance to proc fury at a certain % of health or when a certain conditional effect is applied with a a cooldown. Maybe when health is reached at 75% or when CCed?

Pure of Heart: I think this should be changed from a burst heal to regeneration because in most situations when you lose your first Aegis, you’re already at full health thus you won’t gain any bonus from it at all.

Supreme Justice: This is a nice change to apply more burning but there are more appealing options to the Guardian in its place(indomitable courage, Absolute resolution.) Maybe give it something else besides burning upon a specific amount of hits? The Active of this Virtue is almost always activated thus losing any potential.

Symbol of Swiftness: I think this should be changed back to 8 or 6 initially and then 4 afterwards? I often don’t see myself nor my teammates stand in symbols for more than a second.

Honestly, the only trait I would take with these changes would be Powerful Blades. I just cannot see myself taking anything else since there are better options. (SPVP perspective)

I suggested this a while ago. Make it so each is a stance and the Guardian only has one weapon to choose from(similar to Elementalists). I’d be ok with something like this, even though it would require a massive overhaul. As it stands, it’s a very uninteresting class mechanic with an emphasis on the actives only. The passives from each virtue are terrible, even when traited 30 into virtues.

Possibly, we were really talking about all professions, not just the Guardian.

Kentrey.3251:

Arken.3725:

It’s true, I honestly believe that there should be multiple viable roles for each profession. As I stated in the podcast, each profession should have three viable specs.

I can’t say i enjoy that idea too much. Just 3? I think if they made more things powerful and enticing there wouldn’t be just 3 or 4 viable specs, specs could be mixed and matched and not need to be one maximized build.

Right but what I was getting at was focusing specifically on the Areas of Support, Damage and Bunker. There would be more viable builds outside these in terms of becoming a hybrid. Obviously if you decided to go the route of say a Damage/Support spec, your damage and support should not be that of someone who has traited mainly in one of these areas.

It’s true, I honestly believe that there should be multiple viable roles for each profession. As I stated in the podcast, each profession should have three viable specs.

We tried to keep it as unbiased as possible. If you guys think we can do a better job in a specific area, let us know.

A quick update guys, i’m still having issues with my internet so until I get this resolved, i’m going to postpone the tryouts. Sorry guys 8(

Just a heads up, for those interested, please reply to the thread. I’ll be holding try-outs throughout the week.

Best Mesmer NA?!

Hey guys, we’ll be doing another podcast tomorrow about the current balance in this game since the Oct 15th patch. We’ll be starting around 8pm EDT at http://www.twitch.tv/arken_elric. We’re going to have topics so it doesn’t last as long as the previous podcast.

Also, here’s the 1st thread we put out a few weeks ago prior to the patch and was just an overall view of the balance then. https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/pvp/pvp/State-of-Game-Balance-Guardian-Perspective/first#post2972107. It’s pretty long and we winged it.

I agree that burning is our only real condition but seeing as you can’t really bury it, it just seems useless. I’d rather buff the physical aspect of the Guardian rather than a small dmg burn that’s easily cleansed.

Good man Genyen, good man.

I would prefer Justice to give a boon rather than burning. In tpvp, you’ll never run as a condition Guardian so I think maybe giving might instead upon hit might be better?

I honestly think VoR should have much higher regen attached as a passive. The way it is now, I barely even notice it.

VoC is probably the most useless of them all(passive). I honestly think it should provide protection every certain amount of seconds upon hit or something like it. 1 block per 40(30 if traited) seconds isn’t even worth keeping as a passive.

I honestly think it branches more than just Resolve. As I’ve said before, if you invest 30 into Virtues, your passives become even more useless than they already are. Virtues, by nature, should provide a significant buff to the player and if activated a decent buff to yourself and allies while sacrificing that powerful passive. As it stands currently, the passives are so bad that you’ll always pop the active.

Thanks Ken, appreciate it dude. I’ll let you know Luman, that sounds like a nice offer so we’ll see what happens relatively soon. I’ll talk to you guys in game.

Hey guys, I just started up a team and am looking for four more people. I’ve got quite a bit of experience with the game. I main a Guardian and have played this profession since release. I want to keep the environment serious about working together and form a cohesive team but enjoying each others company and being respectful.

The team comp i’m thinking about is as follows(up for adjustment if necessary): Ranger, Warrior, Mesmer, Thief and myself as the Guardian. If you’re interested, please let me know either in game or through private messaging on the forums.

Except the only burst available is through Smite condition which again, is the only short cd meditation. Four seconds is not nearly enough, especially when given to just yourself. Again, if it were group-wide, 4 seconds could be justified. Not to mention that this wasn’t exactly the problem to begin with.

Going to put my 2cents out here. The fury on Meditations is too short, if it were a group-wide buff of fury then that might make sense but seeing as it only applies to the user, 4 seconds is too short considering 3/4 meditations are on long cool-downs.

The changes to Hallowed Ground aren’t worth taking because the Cool-down is still too long and promotes stagnant game play. I can see myself possibly running Purging Flames but again, stagnant game-play comes into it and makes it that much less desirable.

Just got home from work so i’ll be doing some tests and another Guardian Podcast with Kensuda very soon about the changes. We’d love it if other Guardian’s would partake in the discussion. Let me know if anyone’s interested.

Honestly, that’s amazing the numbers you’ve guys have put out. It’s weird how the defensive melee profession in this game actually heals for less as stated above.

Just to go back to my original point and to those that have spotted the obvious, Virtues are inherently signets. To me though, the passives even when fully specced into are just terrible. In my eyes, the passives should make the user a lot more powerful than just providing an insignificant buff. All three(resolve to a lesser degree) don’t even do much for the Guardian. This is even more apparent when you actually spec into the Virtues line thus improving the active while leaving the passives pretty much near useless.

It’s interesting when I look at the passives for each Virtue and to be honest, they’re pretty sub-par. It seems like the passive should be powerful just to the user but that doesn’t seem to be the case, this is especially true with Justice and Courage. Resolve isn’t terrible but not very strong either. The passives are even less useful when the Virtue trait line is utilized.

I’m actually getting tired of having to stack condi-removal on nearly every skill I have. While this was a nice bug, it wasn’t intended. It’s interesting because even with the bug, it still wasn’t enough against the current meta. I hope something else is done to address it.

We tried to be as unbiased as possible but when discussing about how everything else is currently balanced from a single classes perspective, it slips sometimes.

Indeed, we went off course quite a bit and I apologize. However, I do believe we hit a lot of key points with how the Guardian plays and how it stacks against other professions with multiple builds.

Ken, you’re the man. Awesome job.

There is no ICD.

Just as Ken stated, we kind of just winged it. Towards the end we had quite a few people in the channel with us giving their opinions on the matter. Sorry for the long video, we’ll try to have talk points in the next video.

I’m terrible at the math part of theory crafting so if someone could compare the two classes for damage, that would be awesome. I’ve always thought the Warrior massively out-damaged a Guardian.

Nice interview, it’s always good to see the guardian from another solid players perspective.

I really enjoy CmC, awesome guy and an excellent player. Great music on top of it all.

This is going to be great, can’t wait to see how it goes.

This would definitely help people identify on how they can get better as well as figure out how to improve from a loss. It helps those find weaknesses in their skill as well as gameplay mechanics of each map. This is something that should definitely be considered.

Same, no gift ;(. Hope this gets sorted soon.

Yep, I was getting anywhere between 5-30 second lag spikes with a server disconnect.

I was just in a match against a condition warrior(Sword/Sword and Bow), the guys regeneration was out of this world. There was literally nothing I could do to damage him. I was landing nearly everything I had and avoiding most of his skills but the amount of regeneration was just way too much. This really needs to be reduced significantly. As a Guardian, I need to pop multiple skills to even gain such regeneration but I also give up a ton of damage in the process.

Edit: Also, i’m suggesting that the active play should be rewarded much more than passive. As a Guardian, you don’t gain much passive boons, everything is revolved around critting and shouts with virtues.

Guys, watch this! It’s an amazing montage from an amazing Mesmer. You will not be disappointed.

I can definitely see that. I just believe that the Guardians active play style should be much more rewarding than a more passive style of a Warrior. This isn’t to say the Warrior doesn’t require skill and rotations, just looking at it from a more rewarding style, the Guardian requires more to do to be just as effective if not more.

Definitely going to look over the weapons more closely so we can have a discussion.

I completely agree, this is just an alternative to the current design. However if we’re to keep symbols as they are, I think some of the traits need to be merged.

Not sure if i’d want all of that, might make the profession too strong.

A few things i’d like to see adjusted:

-More access to swiftness

-Symbols turned into temporary Aura’s.

-Access to more burning or a wider variety of conditions.

-More elite skills that are a little more automated. Example would be I place down a symbol that lasts a long while to provide benefit to the team without me having to use up a skill bar.

I would rather WW root us and increase the damage/remove the projectiles. You don’t get very far when it’s activated anyway. It’s true though, while the coefficients are rather large, the slow windup, lack of health and lack of secondary effects(example cripple) hinder the Guardians potential damage.

Something along those lines. I’m exactly sure how you would balance it but that would definitely promote better gameplay.

I’ve advocated for the change of symbols to temporary Auras for a little while. Speaking about the current meta(AoE-Condition), the benefit gained from symbols compared to the damage thrown by AoE’s is negligible. Also, I don’t believe many would stand in these symbols to gain the minimal benefit when the potential to get condi bursted is a lot more concerning.

Obviously you’d have to adjust the symbols(auras) accordingly, but I do believe it would promote more mobile play in a very face-paced and constantly moving game.

I agree with Folly in terms of how conditions are currently ruling the meta but I believe power should either stay the same or be toned down only a little bit. I say this because physical damage takes a little more skill to pull off with their animations. Obviously not all skills have noticeable telegraphs but for those that do, the damage done is deserved if timed properly.

I don’t think we need to beat a dead horse when it comes down to conditions. They’re spammable, in abundance and easily reapplied after cleansed. Some of the problems attributed to this are specific skills/traits that proc long-lasting burning with virtually no effort involved. Another issue is the ability to spec tanky while putting out solid condition damage.

Certain specs within certain professions also need to be looked at. Spirit rangers are the obvious along with Necromancer damage/mitigation. Again, most of us understand this and I believe Anet does as well. To a lesser degree, I think S/D thieves need a modification, perm-stealth, specific traits that offer too much when they’re low in their respective trees and a few more that could use some modifying. Just like what was posted above, if these are toned down enough, CC-Warriors might become a little too strong.

It’s true CMF, I can never find myself without AH in tpvp if i’m running a hybrid or full virtues/honor for any survivability. I do believe that if you would have counted Healing Signet that the numbers would have slightly shifted towards the Warrior. This is all taking into account mobility and effective trait speccing.

Essentially Virtues are Signets that apply a groupwide benefit. The benefits from the passive side each provide very small assistance to the Guardian. Obviously once you activate them it helps a bit more but puts two of them on an extremely long cooldown. I think the suggestion provided by Aza is a pretty good alternative.

I don’t think that’s the case, a bunch of us have suggested a few ideas. However, there isn’t anything wrong with discussing some balancing as well.

I think that’s a decent idea, maybe make it so every time you crit there’s a chance to pop a boon specific to the virtues only for ourselves? I say this because I don’t think a the one second burn, small regen and aegis every 40 seconds are enough for a class skill.

I think more so for our own personal survival. Most of what we do is group-wide support that just happens to support ourselves. Maybe more skills that only affect us but are stronger? Meditations come to mind but As boon-fighters, this doesn’t seem to be enough.