Guild Wars 2

I get you OP, I feel the same about Warriors and Thieves.

Guardian isn’t a bad profession, and the game isn’t centered on balancing 1v1, the main purpose is having fun and Guardians provide plenty of it.

I was bothered by the thought of being sorta useless in WvW so I started a Warrior. And after a short time playing, I understood why is it the most popular profession in the game.

Higher health, I have 26k with a non-Vitality build, my Guardian is a heavy hitter but I have a low crit chance, with the Warrior I can get permanent Fury (seriously, this is unbelievable) and it’s so easy to get Might.
Armor is also high, though I don’t like the Warrior’s Defense Line so I don’t spend any points there. Mobility is as good as a Guardian’s, and I’m using Greatsword, Longbow and Sword/Shield.

The healing is worse, that’s for sure, and also the group healing.
Boons for the group is even better in my opinion, since I pretty much grant Might and Fury constantly every 25 seconds for a (check this!) 30 second duration!

AoE damage is weaker in my opinion, because it can’t beat a Symbol of Wrath plus Whirling Wrath, but you get Hundred Blades for insane burst.

Ranged defense is, of course, worse. Actually, I wouldn’t say worse, because Guardians are the only profession who can grant so much ranged protection with ease and group-wide.

But overall, the possibilities are much more in my opinion.
Thieves are the same, although I don’t like how squishy I am, if you play properly with Stealth and avoid getting hit, you’re in for some great fun. If you’re a sadist, even more, because you can annoy players in so many ways…

However, no other profession is as cool as the Guardians.
Guardians are rank 1 in coolness by far, and coolness > effectiveness to a certain extent.

Eveningstar.6940:

But the biggest draw for Inspired Virtues is that it’s cheap. It’s just five trait points. Nearly every build can pick it up, and it’s useful to nearly every build. For five trait points, it’s well worth the investment.

[…]

TL;DR – You’re looking at Inspired Virtues in a vacuum. There isn’t a single Guardian in the game who plays 0/0/0/0/5. You have to look at 5 Virtues in relation with the rest of the lines, in which case it’s a cheap, efficient investment that works great with a lot of builds and has a great deal of synergy.

This is exactly how I think.
What I was questioning is that I’ve seen a couple of posts (in the forums) of people claiming it to be the must have trait for all builds. And I don’t see why.

That’s not the must have. In my opinion, Altruistic Healing, Renewed Justice, Empowering Might and such are the ones who are on a must have list. Inspired Virtue is just something that enhances these already awesome traits.

The posts I’ve mentioned might be old (I can’t find them), but the latest one that made me think “Am I missing something here?” is the one found in the Crit Hammer build guide:

“Inspired Virtues, to be honest, if you’re not traiting this, in any build in the universe, then you actually missed the whole point with the guardian!!! What this does is that it gives you the same benefits as 1.5 extra utility slot so it’s basically 1,5 extra shout on a 60s cd with huge aoe, teamwide, not squadwide. Trait it and stop making a fool of yourself, it’s as simple as that.”

So, I thought, if there was something terribly useful about it that I haven’t noticed… I’d might go and rebuild my Guardian to get at least 10 in Virtues (I absolutely love Master of Consecrations, but I can’t spare any points… not if the gain isn’t better than what I have already of course).

Yes, that’s why I mentioned Altruistic Healing.

Like I said, aside from the obvious effect, why is it so high rated among Guardians? I still can’t see why people comment so highly about it.

I’ve read and I’ve seen alot of Guardians picking this trait and saying how awesome it is, but I fail to realize why.

The Virtues is something I’d rather never use, unless I really need the effect.

Virtue of Justice passive effect deals more damage in the long run than popping it’s active effect everytime.
Virtue of Resolve heals me for 6000 every minute, if I use it I get a 1600 heal.
Virtue of Courage gives me 2 Aegis during 90 seconds, if I use it I get only one.

Now, I understand it’s effectiveness go up if you pick Inspired Virtue, but it still doesn’t seem worth using them at all.
Justice’s Might has 3 stacks and lasts for 5 seconds. That’s enough to time to hit once, maybe twice since everyone runs away from Guardians.
Resolve’s Regeneration is 5 seconds and heals for 150~, granting a 750 health heal.
Courage’s Protection is 5 seconds, and is the most useful in my opinion because this boon can really save you when used right.

I also understand it’s value go up if you use it with Altruistic Healing in large groups, Renewed Justice or Renewed Focus, but to me it doesn’t mean this trait is essential, but the other way around.

Am I missing something here?

Affects the duration of all boons cast by you, not received.
The boons you receive will receive bonus duration from their casters.

This is great if you have a support build.

You never played Valkyrie Profile before… I feel kinda sorry for you.

And it’s obviously not a joke!
I’ve never seen a RPG game that allows you to create a “Valkyrie” archetype before.
Hmm, that’d be incredibly great…

Now seriously, in terms of “coolness”, Guardians are by far top 1. I just wish they were a bit better at WvW siege/zerg battles, then it’d be the perfect profession.

Although I also like this profession, I don’t think it’s perfect.

For it to be better, they would need to swap Sword skills 2 and 3 for Greatsword skills 3 and 4, give us the ability to use Longbows, it must also have a blue glow when we use it, make Shield of the Avenger a permanent pet that always follows us (but you can nerf it’s ability a little just so it’s not OP), and also change it’s graphics to be 2 shields floating around us all the time, and lastly but not least, change the profession name to “Valkyrie”.

That’d be the greatest profession of all, but probably, complaints would rain over other professions forums stating they’re not as cool as we are.
But I could live with that.

Did they change the length of the Nightmare Pants (Light Armor)?

I don’t remember being able to see that much of your feet with it, and from the mapchat it seems people noticed something about it as well.

We need more dresses in the game, not less!

Rune of the Pack also doesn’t increase your power by 165 as it should, it gives only 115 Power and 50 Healing.

Some skills (Elementalist) don’t benefit from traits that should benefit these skills.
For example the Cantrip type skills, one of them doesn’t benefit from a Trait that says “Reduces the cooldown of Cantrip skills by 20%.”. It should be fixed to “Reduces the cooldown of Cantrip skills except Mist Form by 20%.”.
There’s another one that also should be fixed to “Reduces the recharge time of all Air spells except Ride the Lightning by 20%.

This sorta of thing falls to the bug solving team I guess, but I think they’re on vacation for quite some time now…
Or these are all intended. Could be that too.

What’s your main weapon of choice for damage?

If it’s the Greatsword, I’d suggest dropping the points in Radiance and going Zeal instead.
Symbolic Power increases Symbol’s damage roughly by 25%, which is quite a nice boost even though it has a 16 sec CD, but it’s AoE boost that works great in dungeons.

Blind Exposure if it’s still the same, it only applies 1 stack of Vulnerability for a whooping 1% extra damage. Not really worth it in my opinion.

Radiant Power is a a great damage booster, but it’s so far in the Radiance line that I don’t think it’s worth it unless you’re really benefiting from the Traits.
Those points could go somewhere else, such as the Valor or Honor lines.

Valor increases your Critical Damage, which is something you should stack a bit if you want to do a decent damage.
Honor improves a lot of skills and also damage, there’s Traits here that are comparable to the best damage traits in the Radiance and Zeal lines, such as Empowering Might and Elusive Power.
You can also get some other Symbol boosting traits here, such as longer lasting or larger fields, both great for AoE damage in dungeons.

For gear, if all you plan is doing dungeons or killing monsters, full Berserker set and trinkets is more than enough, you get a bunch of Power, Critical Chance and Critical Damage.
If you trait more in the Honor line your health won’t be so low as well, and with the high amount of crit already you won’t need points in Radiance either. I don’t know the math, but after you have a certain amount of Crit Chance (I’d guess 30~40% is a good value), it’s better to get Crit Damage for better damage overall.

But if you don’t want to use full Berserker armor, you can swap the Berserker set for a Soldier’s for example (Ascalonian Catacombs/Honor of the Waves) to trade 16% Critical Damage for 224 Toughness and 224 Precision (about 10~11% CritChance) for 2240 Health.
Another option is getting Valkyrie if you want to keep your Critical Damage but want to trade Precision for Vitality.

The best armor types for Guardians in my opinion are Berserker, Valkyrie, Soldier and Knight. Just pick which type of Guardian you want to be and focus on that, or build an all around status build, that works too.

The player who was playing the Thief being good isn’t the issue. It’s the non-stealth time after you are out of stealth that is.

Instead of being a 5 second or something, it’s what, 2 seconds? This means you can easily go a bit far from someone, shot him once or twice, and re-stealth. Repeat this forever, annoy players forever.

The amount of skills isn’t the issue as well, any Thief who can understand what a combo is can permanently stealth.

Control the Thief? When he shoots, evade once/twice, re-stealth?

But well, okay, this is a rant, I’m sorry, I’ll believe Anet knows what they’re doing. It was a stupid decision of my part and shows how I still have much to learn, I shouldn’t have tried to stop the Thief and his small group from going to wherever they were going near my server’s keep.
There were plenty of other options I should’ve tried, like running away, calling for more reinforcements to deal with a single Thief, or ignoring their group.

I’m just disappointed to see a profession “favoritism” just like WoW has/have.

And for those who think “The thief was just better than you, learn to play”, you haven’t ever faced a Thief like this, I’m sure of that.
You’d see how fun it is to fight someone whom you can target for a couple of seconds (which he spents the majority of time evading) once every 6 seconds.

We’re all random pugs from WvW.

And yes, the Thief plays well, but what does that mean? That just because you play well you can survive forever against 5? He had 2 friends with him too, but they were a Warrior and something else, so they did die, and he was playing around ressing them bit by bit.

I imagine a group of 10 thieves doing this just to break the kitten out of the balance of this game.
Now, that’d be fun for everyone, right?

Seriously, what the kitten is being done about Thieves?

This is the first time I’ve encountered one with BRAINS, and seriously, what the kitten?
4~5 guys trying to take him down and it was IMPOSSIBLE. He just wouldn’t die.

I was playing my Elementalist, and I wasn’t dying either (though I did at the very last) but he was just running around, shot a few stuff, stealthed. He’d reappear a few seconds later just to shot a few more, and run/stealth again. He did this for 5 min straight with 4~5 guys trying to take him down.

Seriously ANet?

I never thought this game to be so unbalanced so far, even though I know Thieves can have an insane burst if they want to, but insane survivability as well now?

Luckily, he wasn’t backstabbing me after his stealths, probably afraid of getting locked (I was playing Scepter/Dagger), but if he did, he’d discover I was playing a glass cannon and would’ve killed me in a couple backstabs.

Seriously… what the kitten…

akamon.2769:

i guess i’m coming from a “make-do-with-what-we-can” as Guardians. i guess best bet is to pop it when the time is right.

There’s times where it is indeed useful, but the bad thing is that during it’s CD you can’t use Renewed Focus for example, which really decreases your chances of survival if you get in the middle of the enemy mob.
If it weren’t for that, it’d be an awesome skill in my opinion… but I guess if you avoid the front lines and play safer, it’s a great skill to some situations.

akamon.2769:

that being said, what are some other ideas or strategies that other Guardians felt they have been able t contribute and make a big difference? especially in situations such as fighting for towers and keeps, as Danicco had pointed out.

The best I could come with is changing a few traits in my build to suit Spirit Weapons better, and use Sanctuary, Wall of Reflection, Shield of the Avenger and Bow of Truth.

Shield of the Avenger is awesome, borderline overpowered because it absorbs pretty much all projectiles and stays for a long time, it’s flaw is that it doesn’t follow you as soon as you enter combat.
But if you use it on top of a wall, for example, you’ll enter combat as soon as you get damaged or damage someone, and it’ll stay there for 20~30 seconds blocking projectiles.

Though it’s ineffective against ground targeted skills, there’s still a bunch of damage that comes in forms of projectiles, so this greatly helps your fellow casters/engineers to stay a bit more in the edges attacking stuff. I don’t remember if it blocks Engineer’s grenades though, but stuff that bypasses it’s protections are usually Necromancer’s conditions (from Marks) and Elementalists’ AoEs.

The same goes for Bow of Truth. It’s condition removal is terrible, but since you’re standing still most of the time on top a wall, it actually removes one or two. And it’s great when it removes that single condition that was killing you even though you moved away from the edge, such as Bleed or Burning.
And the healing skill from it seems highly underrated, it heals for a really nice amount and can be used twice if you have Eternal Spirits (Zeal 20) and Improved Spirit Weapon Duration (Virtue 10).

It’s positioning is annoying just like Shield of the Avenger though.

Wall of Reflection doesn’t need explanations.

Sanctuary has a really long CD, but I find it useful to use it right on top of enemy rams, which is probably the siege weapon that deals the most damage to gates.
So drop down the wall on top of Rams, cast one, and you buy 6~8 seconds. It’s not much, but it’s something.

Now, if you’re attacking it’s a bit more troublesome because most of these aren’t as effective due to all the moving and AoE raining down, but well, it’s still the best we can do.

Usually that’s what I do, try to protect our casters on top of walls with these skills while granting Empower whenever I can, and healing in general with Symbols (traited) and Orb of Light, though it’s a bit annoying to aim the camera “forward” – it goes to the center of your screen when you don’t have a target – so it doesn’t instantly disappears into the ground after you cast (so you can explode it for the heal).

Well, though we lack the ranged firepower, we excel at these stuff though!

Human Female, and when I first saw the skills I thought “Wow this looks like those Valkyrie archetypes from RPGs!”

Too bad we can’t use Longbows… but Spirit Weapons feels so fitting, and so does Wall of Reflection, Sanctuary, and all the Sword’s Skills!

PvE only is a bit… relative, because all builds are fine for PvE.

So, the question is, what do you want to do with your Guardian? I’m pretty sure with this build you posted you can clear the game really fine, just as with any other.

For PvE only, I’d say the best two weapons are the Greatsword and Hammer. One has the best AoE damage you can get plus great utilities, the other one has great damage as well and can maintain a constant uptime of the Protection boon – insanely valuable (for monsters that don’t move too much, but since it’s PvE, they should be attacking you only).

Second to these two weapons I’d say are the Mace and Sword, for an almost constant uptime with Regeneration and Symbols, the other for damage and utility.

About Traits, you can go anyway you want, but some traits that really shines if you use these weapons are:

- Altruistic Healing, Valor Grandmaster: Each Symbols applies a 1 sec boon, so this gets you a 75 healing every time.
- Writ of the Merciful, Honor Master: Symbols heals for 100~130 each, and ticks 5 times, so it’s great to keep you up!

These two are by far the two most valuable Traits we have in my opinion.

For skills, I’d say it’s:

- Wall of Reflection: Insanely awesome and powerful, you can fight off monsters who have any sort of ranged attack with an easier time, and even solo some group events with it! Against a full ranged monster, if you can keep yourself up during it’s downtime, you get free damage and time to recover.
- Shield of the Avenger: Doesn’t reflect like Wall of Reflection, but keeps absorbing projectiles for a LONG time. You also don’t have to worry if the enemy is inside the bubble, it’s projectiles will be absorbed as well.

Having a great regeneration to stand in melee fighting and focusing on ranged defenses is what works for me, but like I said, pretty much any build is viable in PvE.
I like these because I found it easier to solo some group events with these tools, and they give me an easier time fighting lots of monsters at once.

I’ve read the complaints about thieves as well, but I never had trouble with one.
I also roamed quite a bit and fought 80, not upscaled thieves just to check how terrible they really are, but I found them surprisingly easy than expected.

I use a Greatsword mainly, and though most professions just avoid me overall by running from Symbol of Wrath and Whirling Wrath, melee professions have no choice but to take it on.

So, I think the key to these types of fight is to not let yourself get on the chase, make them feel you’re the “prey”. They will only run away when they see no more chances of winning, and that’s the only time you should chase.
Other than that, drop Symbols, hold your ground, and do the basics and you should have an easy time with them.

A few tips:

1. They hit hard only with backstabs, which if you see them going stealth with about half their health, expect it, and use Aegis or Blind skills (Virtue of Justice with 5 Radiance works great). Don’t instantly dodge when they stealth, wait a few seconds, and dodge (just don’t spam it during the fight since you don’t need to). You might get lucky and have them waste an attack.

2. When they’re stealthed, look for black shadows around, that’s an indication they re-stealthed or shadowstepped, and DODGE immediately! You’ll also have an general idea of their location (either on that spot or really close to you).

3. Binding Blade can be used right after when they stealth, I also suggest not using right at the start of a fight with one, but shortly before you expect the stealth – they’ll always use it after a few hits, around over 50% if you haven’t bursted them yet, or if you did, right after or during the burst.
This skill will follow them and you can have an general idea where they are. If you use it around 75% health, it lasts for 10 seconds, and right when they stealth you can pull them to yourself and Whirling Wrath, it’s almost a guaranteed way to make sure they’ll just use their stealth duration to run, and not to backstab you.

4. Keep spamming auto-attack during stealth! If your attack changes to the 2nd motion, it’s because you’ve hit them, so keep spamming that!

5. Some thieves will change to a ranged battle either right at the start or when they’re about to lose. If they’re full health, avoid them and look for a better location, one where you can get them out of line of sight to avoid their projectiles. Don’t waste projectile negation skills right away, you will need them.
If they’re low on health and started to run, they might still try to kite you. This is when you should use your Wall of Reflection, they might just finish themselves off.
If they’re smart, they’ll stop attacking and run, if they don’t run, prepare to Judge’s Intervention to chase away!

6. If you use Shelter or Renewed Focus, don’t use them when you’re low on health, use them when you expect the backstab. Don’t worry about “wasting” it, because they’d have wasted their stealth if they didn’t backstab you either. Though don’t forget to use Virtue of Courage first for the Aegis boon, but this might be a little riskier: before their backstab, some thieves deal damage with another skill that break your Aegis.
Use any of these at your own discretion.

Most of these are tips on how to deal with Stealth, because you shouldn’t have any trouble on a 1v1 with a Thief generally. Their attacks will be weak and yours will hit for stupid damage since their armor and health are weaker, granting you’re not using a glass cannon build/gear.

If the fight starts with a backstab, don’t worry panic! This is a bit tougher since you don’t want to be lower than 50% health at any time – Thieves have traits and skills that benefit from you having lower health, but you also don’t want to waste a Shelter and Virtues just to get back up to 100% and lose their utilities to deal with stealth, so for this you should think for yourself what’s the best time to use them.
You can use them now, and try to avoid the next backstab with dodges and Binding Blade for example, or you might attempt a burst (basically, Whirling Wrath with or without Binding Blade) to get them to stealth, and then using your CDs to get your health back up.

If you’re losing to Thieves, it is probably a gear/build issue (or you’re upscaled in WvW). On equal footing, Guardians have no problems with Thieves if you deal with Stealth properly.

akamon.2769:

does no one use Tome of Wrath here? given yes, again, we’re giving up all 10+ of our regular skills for just 5. but i’ve done some decent damage just spamming #1. whether it be defending, attacking and or even just pushing enemy lines back. not saying i’m a one man army, of course, i work best with other people as well.

I did, but 20 seconds every 3 min isn’t worth the slot for me. It makes us finally 1200 ranged casters with AoE, but it’s short duration doesn’t justify the long CD. It is unreliable, since the uptime is terrible because of that.

akamon.2769:

run small strike squads. like you mentioned, Dannico, Guards are aweomse at PvP so let yourself shine in those moments.

This is where Guardians shine indeed, but unfortunately, these are the least important battles in my opinion, because every other profession can do just fine like a Guardian does, and not all battles are for camps/roamers.
Sometimes, actually, most of the times, you’ll be fighting for towers and keeps, and this is where you should strive to make the difference and help your group succeed.

This is my opinion, though, because I’m mainly an objective player. I know some players who have a blast just picking fights on the road, but my play style is going for the objective always (and winning!).

Amins.3710:

Doesn’t mean Guardians are in-effective in Massive WvW… just means ~you’re~ in-effective in Massive WvW.

I’m sorry but I can’t see this happening. I’ve been playing WvW only, because I enjoy it and I’ve seen thousands of Guardians already, and I remember clearly that no Guardian has ever showed a significant participation in any kind of massive battle, defending or attacking locations.

I’ve seen too many Mesmers, Engineers and Elementalists significantly helping their team or hindering enemies which always stroke me in awe “Wow, is this even possible?”

Amins.3710:

Clearly you need to work on either Utilites / Defense to keep ‘Up Time’ in combat, if you’re complaining about our “Effectiveness”.

I seriously hope you’re not trolling, but I’m starting to guess I’ve been fooled so far. Well, I don’t mind it too much, except I hate to repeat myself everytime…

I’m not questioning Guardian “effectiveness” in combat, if you’ve read, you’d know it. I’m questioning it’s usefulness as a whole in WvW.
Some people, such as myself, are like this. I can’t help but think “I want to be even more useful” to the point of getting the best of what I can offer. Yeah, that’s min-maxing in a way.

I might have been unclear, so I apologize. I should have explained it better.

Player A controls the overpowered Guardian. Let’s assume he has all utility skills slotted, as well as all weapons equipped.

Player A is attacking a keep with his group of 20. The enemy, who is a little bit smart, will fight them off from the top of walls, simply because it’s more advantageous to do so.

Player A’s group puts up a Ram. Player A is helping build it. The enemies, not so dumb, have an Elementalist who casts two ground targetted spells on the Ram. One deals 1500 x4, the other one 2000 and bleeds 4000 for 8 seconds.
Player A can choose to remain on location or run. He has nothing to do to prevent that damage, or heal the Ram. He has no healing skill that is able to heal that much damage from any players in his group who’ve chosen to stay there.

Regardless of choice, let’s advance a bit. 6 seconds later, the same Elementalist casts the same spell of 1500 x4 and a Meteor Shower for randomly 2500 damage over a large area.
Does Player A stays or run from the area?

Again, regardless of choice, let’s advance. Your group’s Ram has been destroyed from the AoEs (there wasn’t only one, there’s ALWAYS more). The entire group is taking damage from a couple of Arrow Carts positioned a few steps away from the wall’s edges. It deals 1000 damage each second in the area, cripple and bleed, and has a constant uptime. What does Player A do?

Now, let’s advance a little bit. The enemy got reinforcements of around 10 players, and they’re bolder now. They’re visibly standing at the edges of walls casting everything they can on Player A’s group. What does Player A do?

Since he has access to all skills, I’d say the best effective way to participate is to pick the Scepter, and Smite away. It deals 300ish damage with high power, hits an uncertain amount of hits, so it’s relatively weak compared to damages of 1500+ your team is being attacked with.
Another less effective way is to pick up the Staff, and drop a Symbol of Swiftness for 700ish damage on walls.
And lastly and really less effective, Player A can attack gates for 50 damage.

Now, let’s say he wants to “support”. He drops a Symbol of Wrath in the Ram group of 10 players, everyone with Retaliation. All 10 players stand still in an Elementalist’s Lava Font, take 7500 damage each, and assuming the retaliation damage of 350, the Elementalist suffers a whooping damage of 17500 over 5 seconds. He’s down unless he heals himself!

Now, this is indeed useful!
If you have this 10 man group take damage from all Elementalists/Engineers on walls, they can take out the entire wall like this! But oh, wait, do they have enough health or heals to survive at least 2 or 3?

Amins.3710:

… and whose to say you need to stand at the front of the keep and let that “Pesky” Engineer drop bombs on you? There is sooo much more to do.

Such as?
Going elsewhere and taking an open camp? Sure, that’s something you could do. Abandon your group and their squad objective because there’s much more to do, right?

As strong as Guardians can be on ground fighting, so is every other profession. Yet, every other profession has stronger points in defending and attacking keeps than a Guardian.

I simply ask for a change in either the WvW setup (that’s not going to happen), skills (allowing us to defend sieges and AoE weaponry with our shields to make us more valuable defenders/attackers), or weapons (improvements on Scepter, Staff or for god’s sake please let us use Longbows).

Amins.3710:

PLEASE BUFF US.

That’s not what I want, but if that’s what you read, then you missed the point I tried to make.

Amins.3710:

On a serious note however, it seems you’re one of those ‘min/max’ kind of people. I think this is your first mistake in approaching the class.

Indeed I am, but that’s not relevant here…

Amins.3710:

Get in the front line, remove conditions, give boons, lay down Damage Negation.

You say Guardains are sub-par because when you’re taking points all you do is watch everyone…. Um, why are you standing around watching? Is that really how you built your character?

Resuming what I’ve said, Guardians are awesome for PvP. No doubts.
But they have very little participation compared to other professions in WvW massive battles (the most important of them all) because we don’t have a decent ranged or AoEs like other professions do.

Scepter’s Smite is terrible since it’s erratic and unreliable, and it’s auto-attack is a joke. I can only hit people AFK with it.
The other option being the Staff doesn’t hit above or below the area, so it’s unusable either.

Amins.3710:

I do just fine at:

Yeah yeah, everyone does “fine”. You can be just another one running in circles near the gates taking damage from AoEs, or another one running on top of walls casting a slow orb of 1500ish damage every 3~10 seconds (to hit), or one of the suicidal guys who jump down in the middle of a 30+ zerg to give the enemy free bags.

Even the mightiest Guardian can do nothing against people outside their limited reach.

Or you can be one of the guys helping taking these enemies out with decent ranged, AoE and controls.

And just to brag about my stats as well:

Attack 3481 (currently bugged so it’s at 3431)
Crit Chance 21% / Crit Damage 55%
Defense 2465
Health 19365
Healing 300

With 25 stacks of Bloodlust and Sharpening Stones (Mithril because I’m poor) and no Food because I’m poor and have no Chef, I stand at 3800 Attack most of the time.
My Greatsword’s Wrathful Strike averages 1500~3000 noncrit. It’s no wonder people run away from me.

Too bad even with all that power, I can do nothing about that pesky Engineer dropping grenades from the Wall, or the Necromancer raining Conditions everywhere.

Like I said, there’s 8!

You don’t count the target because it could be any of these on the screen (also it can not) so to avoid double counting… just counted the arrows on screen.

Amins.3710:

First, I think a lot of people, for whatever reason, still don’t seem to get how melee is played in this game.

I seriously think that, after 5~6 replies the thread logic is totally lost. Do people even read before replying?

This is totally unrelated to the thread but I’ll reply anyway…

Amins.3710:

Support is damage negation, damage mititgation, burst dps on /assist (yes, we can do 9k in a few seconds), speed, retaliation, etc…. not, sitting back and healing… that doesn’t exist, per say.

Okay, let’s see.
Damage Negation: Guardians are unmatched, no contest here.
Damage Mitigation: I’d say they’re even with other classes. Though I don’t know what profession can keep something like Protection for a group constantly.
Burst Damage: Melee only. Any other profession can do much better burst, and from ranged. And AoE. You can’t melee on top of walls. You can’t melee from the top of walls either.
Speed: Guardians aren’t so good on this.
Retaliation: A boon that deals 450~ damage per hit you take? Seriously that you consider this support?

You forgot to mention Control, one of the most important things to actually get a kill. If you don’t use a Scepter for the Immobilize, how do you prevent someone from running to safety decently?
I can think of only one other choice, and it’s not worth the slot.

If you don’t kill them, they’ll just heal and come back.

Amins.3710:

Um, WvWvW. If you haven’t figured it out, the signle most important aspect to PvP (in general, and even moreso in WvW) is Mobility… If you don’t have it, you die.

So if I have more mobility I’ll be better at taking keeps and towers? And defending as well?

Amins.3710:

Next, imho, Damage Negation / Mititgation (and yes, killing them before them killing you is a form of it, contrary to belief): Blocking, Boons, Utilities.

You know, I tried this, but they always manage to kill me before I kill them. Even using a full bunker build, I just couldn’t melee the gate down in time (these gates need some serious nerfing) before I got zerged by their defense zerg-er, party.

Amins.3710:

If you’re feeling ‘bad’ about the class, or jipped in some way, maybe it’s your peception of the class and you’re trying to fit a round peg into a square hole.

I’m sorry about the sarcastic responses, but I don’t like to keep repeating the original post everytime. If you didn’t read, why reply?

What do you think about Warriors in WvW? In general, for attacking, defending locations, roaming around, 1v1, 1vZerg, skirmishes, etc?

I like both the Greatsword, Sword & Shield and Longbow. How useful are these weapons, and is there a must use weapon for specific situations?
In WvW I see alot of warriors with a bunch of different weapons, so I can’t judge which one is best or not… I also see alot of Rifles, because I assume everyone with a Bow is a Ranger… how useful is the Longbow?

Are there some specific builds considered the best for a role for Warriors?

I’m starting a Warrior mostly for WvW, so any insight you can share is also welcome!

I play a Guardian in WvW but I’m getting tired of just watching people range’ing all the time, so I’m looking for an alternative profession with melee and some ranged/AoE to play in the massive zerg x zerg battles and attacking/defending towers/keeps.
Would Warrior be a good choice? (Other options I’m considering are Rangers and Thieves)

Kita.7819:

I only count 3.

There’s actually 8, he missed one.

I’ve been trying to play Guardian in WvW but I’m feeling the profession way underwhelming compared to others.
So I’d like to suggest some changes to make it more… active and maybe come closer to other professions.

1. “Tome of Wrath” and “Tome of Courage” have a reduced CD to 90 seconds, and duration increased to 30 seconds.
That’d give the Elites more meaning instead of just using Renewed Focus always, and since both of these makes us 1200 casters, we’d have more significant roles defending and attacking locations.
With a 1 min and half downtime, it’d be more worth it. Since we can’t use Utilities during it, I’d say it wouldn’t unbalance PvP because of the limitations it has (no Stun Break for example).
Maybe the skills #4 and #5 of both tomes should be tweaked a bit so it doesn’t feel so OP and obligatory.

2. “Shield of Absorption” should have it’s CD decreased to 30 seconds, 40 seconds it’s a bit too much for such effect. Or it could be changed to affect Siege weaponry, so it’d feel valuable to save 1 hit or 2 from Siege weapons.

3. “Wall of Reflection” could also reflect Siege projectiles… just kidding! Okay, not really. Though it’s awesome to see a bunch of reflects from people, it’s useless against what really destroys locations: Sieges.

Though I feel these two changes would make Guardians really more valuable and totally OP if you get a bunch and get them to alternate, but that’d be wasting 4~5 players to stop a single player on a Trebuchet/Catapult. Wouldn’t be so OP afterall.

4. “Sanctuary” need a slight increase in the area. It’s still too small and can be melee’d. Doesn’t feel like a sanctuary at all.

5. Increase “Shelter” block duration or it’s healing, even though it’s not bad now it’s incomparable to Signet of Resolve. Rare occasions demand the block opposed to twice it’s healing value, and these are usually such huge mobs that it’s not really smart to get in.

6. We need some Trait to give a passive, non-active or active defensive stance. In huge mobs we can get multi immobilized and/or controlled and this makes us just a free kill to mobs. Or just better escaping methods to run from mobs.

7. Give us the ability to use Longbows. A “real” ranged weapon, and so it doesn’t feel so OP fill it with defensive skills as well, such as a “Healing Rain” or something. But we really could use some fast ranged to deal damage and ranged AoE other than Smite.

Really, this would make playing a Guardian much, much more enjoyable. I’d even say you’ll see pretty much all Guardians in WvW carrying a Longbow in their backpacks.
Other weapons are still superior for their role, but this would make the Scepter pale in comparison, so you could change it to be a mid range or long range and improve it’s abilities.
For example Scepter being range 900 and Longbow being range 1200, or vice-versa.
One more suited for damage and control, and the other for support.

I really want to see my Guardian with more active participation in WvW, please do anything to make it more enjoyable!

Shield of Absorption doesn’t absord all projectiles. Anything siege passes through, and they shouldn’t. Sanctuary and Zealot’s Defense block these fine, so this should as well.

Wall of Reflection doesn’t reflect siege too. It should (lol).

Sanctuary needs to have a slight wider area. You can still get melee’d inside of it, and it should absorb projectiles even though they’re ground-based (such as Meteor Shower, but not Lava Font for example).

Signet of Mercy CD is way too long. Other similar skills don’t have such a huge CD.

Shelter needs either an improve in healing or in the block duration. It is “sorta” fine for now because it’s useful for the blocking, but only that. Signet of Resolution is vastly superior in most situations, even in PvP. Shelter is only better when you’re soloing or being focused by more than 3 at once in my opinion.

Tome of Courage and Tome of Wrath needs tweaking. Too long CD and too short duration are minor issues, but not being able to use our Utility Skills or Heal is begging to have it being wasted. Focus fire the Guardian or Control him, and he won’t make full use of it’s already not so great skills.

Traits

Protector’s Impact could be a bit better. Most other professions have a great utility skill attached to it to make it worth using in various occasions (PvP), but this one… I only use it when I know the fall will kill me and I want the shortcut.

Wrathful Spirits is terrible for a Grandmaster Trait. A 10% increase damage in a Sword that deals 600~ damage? Why would I take it?

Strength in Numbers is terrible. No one who understands how much it is worth takes it.

Battle Presence is still bugged. Still.

In my opinion, most Elites from the professions I play/played don’t exactly feel… Elite.

Would you take an Utility Skill in your Elite Skill slot if you could?
Please state your profession and if you want, the reason.

I’ll start:

Guardian: Anytime. Most Elites are too situational with a long CD, and there’s only one I’d pick but Guardians have Utilities way too useful, even more powerful than Elites.

Elementalist: Sometimes, probably no. Utilities don’t feel so much obligatory and 3 slots is more than enough, though the Elites are really underwhelming.

Mesmer: Never. Moa Morph and Time Warp are priceless.

Thief: Never. Dagger Storm and Basilisk Venom are too useful too, more than any Utility.

Crapgame.6519:

The biggest weakness for the Guarding in open field WvWvW is game design. Simply put, you do not earn badges for support. That in of itself is the greatest weakness to Guardians and other melee classes. Range or those who can burst down someone quickly via in and out tactics earn more badges while we, the supporting class, struggle.

That is a flaw, indeed. My build was made with support in mind, but just supporting… isn’t rewarding. Also, with the amount of stuff in the game, just supporting lacks.
By supporting I mean healing, because ressing everyone can do.
For example, with so many Arrow Carts it’s impractical to heal everyone. You use a skill, they’re taking even more damage. That’s how the game was made, no one is supposed to outheal the damage.

So supporting… helps, but just a little. And it’s not rewarding.

Crapgame.6519:

Defending keeps, attacking keeps, and movement.
…
Offense and you.

I did everything you mentioned already.
The problem isn’t that Guardians aren’t viable, they just aren’t worth being in WvW.

After playing with an Elementalist, most of the time I’m in WvW with my Guardian I can’t help but think “If I were with my Elementalist…”
- “…I’d take out those annoying Arrow Carts more easily”
- “…I’d help clear the gates with 3~4 AoEs more easily”
- “…I could’ve made the difference between not losing that keep”
- “…I could’ve killed that down’ed guy that far”
- “…I would not have died back there”
- “…I could suicide run those sieges for more damage”
- “…I could help take down those defenders up in the walls”
(The Scepter aside from Smite is a joke to kill (even damage) people on walls)

Among many, many others.

The only time I ever think it would be best being a Guardian is when I’m using a Ram (because some people just forget about it sometimes) and with a 1800 defense and 15k health and no health regen, things hurt.
But this was my build’s choice so I’m to blame.

Oh, I just remember another one, when I’m running around and either defending or attacking, and I get a 6~7k hit from a Ballista. These times I also think “If I were a Guardian, I wouldn’t have lost nearly 50% of my health” but only after “I shouldn’t been there”.

I hope they change Guardians to have a more active role in WvW, but for that… Guardians would be extremely OP in my opinion if they were given better ranged and/or better AoE.

Funny, I saw a scene almost like that one, except it was in Eternal Battlegrounds, Jerrifer’s Tower, and there were also alot of red arrows around after I combed a Dragon’s Tooth and Phoenix for about… 8~18k damage.
(I saw a 10k crit among all those numbers, and kitten that was beautiful)

I didn’t had to blink in though, I was at a (sorta) safe spot behind some rock.

Now, comparing the same actions to my Elementalist:

I use Scepter/Dagger and Staff, with a build of either Fire 30 (damage), Air 20 (critical), Water 20 (vitality/heal) or Fire 20, Air 20, Water 10, Arcana 20 (extra effects).

Attacking locations with an Elementalist is game breaking. If I use a Staff, I can drop AoEs on top of towers with a pretty nasty range that I hit some Siege weapons as well. People don’t have much choice but move away.
Using the Scepter you can drop skills on top of towers even if you don’t have line of sight, and with a range of 900, it’s pretty decent to break down annoying Sieges.

Defending locations is the Elementalist forte. With a Staff and it’s AoE skills, people can’t stay still and even a single Elementalist makes it hard for people to Siege gates.
The only times I couldn’t properly defend a location was when there were too many at the gates, and ranged professions playing strictly to block me from AoEing their Sieges.
The number of Elementalists defending a location greatly affects the chance of taking that location. The more you have, the less likely the enemy will succeed.

Roaming around with an Elementalist has the advantage of permanent Swiftness for traveling around, but fighting small groups isn’t as strong as the Guardian. With most skills being ground targeted and the only other option is getting into melee range, the Elementalist isn’t as effective in these battles than a Guardian.
It depends strongly on location though, fights on tunnels and other cramped areas are great for Elementalists.
Though even not as effective in my opinion, a Elementalist alone can make 50 or more people retreat or advance at will. Dropping multiple AoE slows in the mob and behind them, and casting other AoE while using some protective skills usually makes a huge group flee. When they don’t flee, they’re taking free 3000~5000 damage.

Chasing people doesn’t exist. People can’t flee from an Elementalist. Having Swiftness at will, multiple slows (Freezing, Cripple, Immobilize, Stun) is a guaranteed way to kill someone fleeing.

Escaping is almost guaranteed as well for the same reasons above. Multiple slows and swiftness, teleports and invulnerability makes you pretty much unkillable if playing safe.

TLDR Version
Guardians are better for small group fights, can survive (take damage) better, but it’s terrible for attacking or defending locations. For 1v1, it’s a fearsome profession to play against with a limited objective (in WvW you can always run) like sPvP.
Elementalists are better for everything else, and even for small group fights they aren’t terrible and can hold their ground.

This is not a rant, I write this in expectation of someone from ArenaNet reading and trying to figure a way to make Guardians at least more useful than they are currently.

Though this should be difficult, since I think Guardians are one of the strongest professions for sPvP, but they’re just not worth their queue slot in WvW.

After some intensive playing in WvW with my Guardian, I’m here to comment my findings.

Guardians suck for WvW.

I played extensively using Greatswords, Staff and Sword/Shield, arguably the best weapons for WvW. I run a build of Zeal 30, Valor 10, Honor 30, focused on Symbols enhancements (Healing and Larger) and Greatsword damage.

At first, I thought it was fun… well, it is still fun, but my Guardian started to lose it’s appeal to me when I started playing my Elementalist in WvW.
Both professions seems total opposites, one being the best in whatever role in WvW, the other being really subpar in almost everything.

Attacking locations with my Guardian is like watching people play while I heal around (this is why I use Staves), and sometimes drop a Symbol of Swiftness on top of towers. With my build, it deals 600~700 damage which is pretty lame, but it stacks with whatever else is damaging them.
The Orb hits for 1000~2000, but if I had to count… I’d say I hit 1 every 20 or 30.
Attacking through the gate with the Staff seems great, but even with all my Power build, I deal about 700~900 damage. It takes quite a time for people to start moving away from it.

Defending locations is a bit better, I stay on top of towers dropping Symbols in the mob, which doesn’t do much damage, but often I Empower myself and go down for a Symbol of Wrath + Whirling Wrath on the gate. When there’s an absurd amount of people, I can get 100% -> Down in a couple of seconds, so I stay away if I notice 50~75 or more at once.
Wall of Reflection in the gate is cool, but most damage to gates comes from Rams and Sieges, which the Wall doesn’t reflect. So it’s more for fun than anything else, because effectively speaking, it doesn’t do much.
Sanctuary near the Rams when it’s not big gates (Towers only) can help your location for 6~8 extra seconds, since people won’t be able to get near Rams. For a 96~120 sec CD… I don’t think it’s worth it, so I rarely use it.

Roaming around is the strong point of the Guardian. Fighting small groups of 5~15 is where you can shine. Being a juggernaut of damage and defense, you can break enemy lines and anyone who doesn’t move away from you.
This makes the enemy more dispersed, but I’m not sure if this is a good thing.

Chasing people is great since I use Judge’s Intervention and either Flashing Blade for a 1800 gap closer, or I try to preempt-block their escape route with Line of Warding. It’s simply dropping the line, swapping weapons and rushing towards them, and they’ll usually try to flee.

Escaping mobs is… complicated. With no extra movement or anything, if I’m being chased by a zerg and I am in combat, chances I’ll die are pretty high. Shelter and Renewed Focus can grant me some great invulnerable times, but they’re just chasing me at a higher speed so I can’t do much if I can’t get to safety.
The exception being if I can target an enemy far ahead (usually monsters) and double teleport away.

[Continued in the next post]

You guys are missing a huge point here.

Remember that Elementalists are not Thieves. This is important.

Why do some of our skills are bugged? Because we’re not thieves.
Why do some of our traits are bugged? Because we’re not thieves.
Why do our Elites are subpar compared to Thieves? Duh, obviously, because we’re not thieves.

ROI? What’s that?

I don’t know what you mean but… prices for skins is dropping fast, I was expecting them to go up to sell the ones I got but I think everyone else had the same idea…

Crafting can be profitable yes, you just can’t sell for the buy orders if you want to make a profit.
Like someone said, people want to pay the least and get the most. Most buy orders price doesn’t even cover the price of the materials, so it’s not worth selling for that price.
But the Sell Price is usually higher, and if you’re smart, you’d put yours at the minimum price instead of lowering it even more. People will buy it in the end.

The profit for crafting is like this probably because it is so easy to level, if it weren’t, prices would be better and people would actually make more profit. But it would be a pain to level and I don’t think that’s what crafting is supposed to be.

You can still make a profit, it’s just not “Buy raw materials, craft, sell instantly and profit”.

He meant, as long as you have the Sigil equipped in anything that you’re currently using (not the unequipped weapon set), the Sigil will take effect in any hit, be it weapon or skills.

It really depends on the monsters you’re attacking… but my damage range from 900~1200 with Greatsword’s autoattack, 1200~1500 with the 3rd attack.

Whirling Wrath depends too much on how many projectiles it hit, but I get from 3000~9000 usually.

Zeal 30, Valor 10, Honor 30.
Crit Chance 20%, Crit Damage 55%
Using Soldier, Valkyrie and Berserker gear, Rune of the Pack.

I think this video is a good reason of why Guardians need a buff. Their opponents are playing with him, and he can’t do anything to fight them off.

Blocking works only whey they’re playing with you.
We need either more control or more speed. Or both.

IV Endu.8920:

In what ways does the trait “Perfect Inscriptions” improve the passive effects of Signet of Resolve and Signet of Judgement?

Signet of Resolve will remove 2 conditions every 10 seconds.
Signet of Judgement is really hard to test, but it seems to reduce damage by 12% or 15% instead of 10%.

@Monki

Shattered Aegis work with any Aegis, be it the passive, active, the Valor minor Trait effect or from skills.

I haven’t tested this, but if you have both Shattered Aegis and Defender’s Flame, you’ll apply 2 burns to the enemies which will result in a 2 second burn duration (burn stack duration).

Permeating Wrath works on the passive, I haven’t really tested on the active… the effect will change and it’s noticeable, but the area is so small that most people don’t think it’s worth it.

“Does zealots Flame works in conjunction with inner fire?”

Sadly, no.

Well dunno if they listen or not… I’ve reported several bugs already and I find it kinda disheartening to come back and see they’re still there.

I’d understand if it there something that seemed really hard to fix, but some are so simple that I don’t know why they haven’t fixed it yet (Rune of the Pack, Elementalist’s Cantrips CD reduction not applied to Mist Form, ALOT of graphical issues of broken textures and such).

But they do listen to us, people complained alot about Elementalist’s down state and they fixed it for the best! Among other stuff…

I think I played almost as much as yesterday and today I got nearly the double of the dyes I got yesterday, but this doesn’t mean anything…

Except it helps my dye identification addiction, I can’t seem to stop for some reason!
I think I’ve spent 20~30g on it already and I still want more!

What? I love bots in WvW, though only if they’re enemies. It’s free badges!

And yeah, WvW is like the endgame for me. Though I don’t participate in a WvW centered guild and I play mostly solo, it’s still kitten fun.

I love defending stuff with my Elementalist… and attacking comes second.
And I love skirmishes with my Guardian, attacking/defending stuff isn’t so much fun because I don’t have much to do when I can’t attack someone…

Server transfers are limited already to once per week, and not only that but if you transfer you don’t get the bonuses from your WvW score for a while (a week I think).
But since people don’t know about it (I didn’t, I was surprised when suddenly I noticed my health going up without any boons, and it kept increasing during the Mad King event), they transfered without second thoughts.

Maybe if there were a notice about it people might have second thoughts about transfering?

For what you want, you might want to consider the Monk Focus build. 30 Valor, 30 Honor (or 20, I recommend 30 though) and 10~20 points wherever you see fit.

Meditations will heal you by 1900ish if I recall correctly, if you use at least 2 it’s a good Healing with great effects as well (Contemplation of Purity/Smite Condition for example).
With the same build you can switch to Altruistic Healing and get a more passive healing which may heal you more in the long run, but you won’t have another healing on demand.
I prefer Monk Focus all the way though, AH heals me for 73ish for every boon so I don’t think it’s worth it… I’d need 26 boons applied in 16 seconds to be worth the Healing of a single Smite Condition with Monk Focus.

Consider Contemplation of Purity for the boons you want too (it’s also a Stun Breaker), depending on how/when you use, you can get Regeneration/Swiftness for a min or so after a Save Yourselves during a siege (use close to the doors where pretty much everyone has a bunch of conditions).
It helps you with both Condition Removal and boons that you want.

Shelter was never stationary.

“A thief who’s running scared of the guardian who can’t really kill him is a thief that is not contributing to the battle.”

But thieves don’t really contribute to the battle… =p

I remember testing a long time ago about the Elusive Power and I’m pretty sure it granted 10% extra damage as long as your endurance is not full.

Which is one of the reasons I started picking 30 Honor in every build I tried, 10% is comparable to Zeal/Radiance best damage traits.

I’m going to test it again though…

Edit: Just tested it again and it is still the same. If you’re anything below 100% Endurance, you get 10% extra damage.

@paperplay
I find it difficult for someone to actually escape me when I’m set up for roaming fights.
I use Sword & Shield / Greatsword for this, Wall of Reflection, Judge’s Intervention and Smite Condition.
Sometimes I swap WoR for Contemplation of Purity, it depends on the mood.

You have a 36 sec CD (I have at least 10 points in Valor) 1200 range gap closer, and two 600 range Teleport/Jump. It’s pretty hard for someone to get away like this.
If you use Hammers or Scepters you also have two immobilizes and 1 Ring of Warding / Blowout for control, so no one should be able to escape you easily.

If you’re still having trouble, try using a Sigil of Hydromancy on your second weapon to Chill your target when you’re nearby… it gives you another tool to not let them escape.

If you check some other professions’ forums, or even the Guardians, some people complain/ask how why they can’t escape from Guardians at all.

@akamon
I only have one, it’s a Soldier set. The only other set I’d use is Valkyrie, but I think 224 Toughness is far better than 16% Critical Damage.
For trinkets I use Valkyrie only because there isn’t an exotic Soldier trinket, but if it did, I’d balance Crit Damage and toughness.

I do keep multiple weapons though (Berserker, Soldier, Cleric) ankittenep switching Sigils/Runes more than I’d like. I try to balance my stats around these only.

Though my only objective in the game is having fun in WvW, so I don’t care about having a glass cannon gear for dungeons and PvE.

Don’t discard Dolyak as an option just because people say the health regen is “meh”.

You should have about 102 Health Regen per sec. With Dolyak, you’ll be at 132 Health Regen per sec. That’s more than if you had Virtues Master Trait “Absolute Resolution”.

Your build is also a bunker one. Dolyak would improve both Toughness and Vitality. It’s a great rune for extra bunkiness.

Avoid condition damage and/or duration.

What do you want from runes? You can either improve something you have little of, or max something you already have lots of.

In my opinion, damage of bunker build sucks so I’d try to get as much Power as I could, but I’m a Power-maniac Guardian. If you want to increase Power, Rune of Strength is great since it also adds damage.
Rune of the Pack is a little less damage (the proc doesn’t count because it doesn’t proc properly) but also adds Crit Chance if you’re low.

If you haven’t changed Orbs in the trinkets you should be around 21~22% base Crit Chance (plus 5% from Radiance) from the gear you mentioned, and though I think it’s a fine number, some disagree and aim for 33% or more Crit Chance.
Rune of the Pack and/or Sigil would boost to 32% or 37%, which is quite an increase in damage.

Sigil of Accuracy is one of the best in my opinion, though it loses slightly in damage than Sigil of Force, there’s plenty of skills that proc on Criticals that could benefit from it. It’s also far more reliable to have a constant effect than something that happens occasionally in my opinion.
The only exception is Sigil of Hydromancy so you don’t let your targets get away easily, but since you’re bunker build, I don’t think killing/chasing targets is your priority (also your second weapon is a staff, not really good for 1v1 or chasing people).

Rune of Divinity isn’t good for specialization as Archmortal said, but it is a great Rune. It boosts everything you have, damage (roughly 20 extra GS damage on auto-attack), critical chance (2.8%), 600 Health, 3 Healing on VoR, etc… but it greatly increases Critical Damage (12%).
If you have lots of Crit Chance already, this is a great increase in damage.

If you’re focusing heavily on Boons you could also try 2x Water, 2x Dwayna and 2x a specific boon or 2x Major Sanctuary for a 50% increase in boon durations. If you use a Hammer, I think you can have Protection permanently up with this, for GS I don’t find this as useful but for Staff’s Empower it does wonders (12 seconds of Might!).

These are the Runes/Sigils I’d use, but it depends on what you want for your build now.

I didn’t think you could twist my post like that.

Now, I can’t unread what I wrote.

+1 Internets to you sir.

It means when you take damage, because when you block it doesn’t seem to proc any effect…

Also, for Rune of the Pack, “when you attack” means “when you get hit and rarely, when you attack”.

I think it’s best if you do a on-case study for better clarification (Heart of the Mists has all Runes and enemies/dummies for you to test).

So, I’m at Malchor’s Leap, I carefully stand at a distance where the Undead Cow won’t want to eat my brains, and I stay there, chilling for a minute. The cow seems fine with me being at that distance, and keeps doing it’s cowish business.

Then, I pull my Orichalcum Pick. The cow looks the same. I lean forward, start hitting the mineral vein in front of me and suddenly, the cow is angry.

Why?

Why do Cows, Spiders, Eagles, Minotaurs, Oozes and some other monsters don’t like me gathering? Is the mineral theirs and they don’t want anyone else mining it?

Rune of the Pack, because I really need some extra damage and my gear has little Crit Chance. The extra Swiftness duration is useful for running around in WvW, and the proc skill seems kinda bugged (it procs mostly when getting hit, not when attacking), and the stats bonuses are also bugged (it gives 50 Healing instead of Power at 6 runes), but overall, it’s one of the best Runes for damage in my opinion.

I tried Dolyak for a while, but I didn’t want to be a heavy bunker build, and my damage was really crap.