Guild Wars 2

Morbyd.3761:

Just curiously, based on achievement points, what do you consider new vs vet?

0-1000 is new. I wouldn’t do any fractals or arah with these types. Most people in this range are on their first char, will have substandard gear unless they have outside help. They will most likely not have experience with most dungeon runs.

1000-2000 is moderately new. Most likely have gone through story mode once, probably not fully geared and moderately knowledgeable about some of the dungeons. If they listen to feedback can get through any dungeon without much trouble. Probably not high fractals since they probably won’t have enough agony resist.

2000+ is experienced. Probably ran most of the exp dungeons a few times, fairly experienced. Should have at least full exotics on one of their chars at this point. As long as they listen to feedback on encounters they haven’t done any dungeons can be done easily.

4000+ is vet. Probably ran all dungeons and maybe even have world completion. I very rarely see any bad players in this group, maybe just a few with bad attitudes. Everything these people do is like clockwork, they rarely if ever need to be told what to do since they already know what to do.

The above is my estimation of how people are according to their achievement points and my own experience with grouping with people.

Having said that, my expectations for pugs is simply that it doesn’t fail. I don’t expect very much from people and I am rarely ever disappointed.

Guanglai Kangyi.4318:

DeathPanel.8362:

Ghotistyx.6942:

In some of the Dungeons and Dragons DM guides, they talk about player types. They mention that player has a portion of min/maxer in them (the power gamer min/max, the social butterfly min/max, the non-combatant min/max etc)

I think Anet is going in a very right direction with what they’re planning. I’d like to see less posts of Zerker for everything all the time in PvE.

Also, considering every trait line is probably getting anywhere from 1-5 changes, I think we’ll see a lot of new builds crop up to compete., which is a win for me

It’s irrelevant. So-called Min/Maxers will always use the best possible build at the present.

Even if they nerfed zerk gear into the ground and made a bunch of cookie cutter builds unplayable Min/Maxers will always find the next best thing and that next best thing will become the new cookie cutter by definition. That’s why nerfing to balance is a slippery slope and usually not a good idea.

The point is, some people make the best of what they are given, while others complain and want to tear them down just because they aren’t willing to put the time and effort into doing the same.

Don’t confuse minmaxing with convenience. In fact, from a minmaxing perspective, 4 warriors/1 mesmer isn’t even remotely a contender for best damage output.

I like how you made a ridiculous assertion and then changed the topic before supporting it.

So if 4 warriors/1 Mesmer “isn’t even remotely a contender for best damage output” what is?

One could argue that the 1 Mesmer in the equation has gotten questionable after the quickness nerf but to argue that the setup is not even remotely a contender for dps is ridiculous.

No class in any setup out dps a zerk warrior, that’s a fact. If it wasn’t people wouldn’t be running zerk warrior setups for fast farm runs.

If you got some magical build that somehow only you know about that can outperform zerk warriors in dps then post it and we’ll take a look for ourselves, otherwise it’s just unsubstantiated talk.

radenblazed.3704:

So I spent the last 3 hours making this build and I would like to know what you think. Please tell me if you think something would be better and explain why.
I made the build with PvE/WvW in mind, but mostly PvE.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fUIQJARWlYgiCnFyvDf4ESWhCE7hGlRf01DHiiYIA-jAyAotARECUWsIasV3g0ImGr6cR1aVA3BRUNA-e

i copied everything from my build to this build editor, so everything is exactly like my build. This includes Armor and all.

~~INFO~~

Zeal: 0
Radiance: 0
Valor: 30 – V – VI – XI
Honor: 30 – III – IX – X
Virtues: 10 – I

Power: 1625
Precision: 1330
Toughness: 1870
Vitality: 1355
Attack: 2725
Critical Chance: 29%
Armor: 3081
Health: 15195
Boon Duration: 25%
Critical Damage: 45%
Healing Power: 909
Guardian: 10%

Weapons: Greatsword/Staff

Skills:
Signet of Resolve
“Retreat!”
“Hold the Line!”
“Save Yourselves!”
“Renewed Focus”

~~Whats going on in my head~~
Basically I tried to balance survivability with damage output.

Survivability:
I heal from boon, symbols, dodging, and skills.
I get rid of conditions with Purity (Valor V) and Signet of Resolve every 10 seconds.

Damage:
I deal 45% damage at a 29% rate. (probably not the best :/)
I do damage with Might and Aegis (I don’t think Aegis is reliable, but should give me at least 1 solid hit :P)

I recommend:

Take out writ of the merciful for pure of voice. The healing is not good and rarely do you ever get to heal anyone with symbols since people are moving around at all times anyway.

Take out writ of exaltation for superior aria. Larger symbol is a good thing but not as useful as having 20% less CD on your shouts.

Unscathed Contender with Vengeful. You will rarely ever get the bonus from that since Aegis has long CD and you will be hit often enough where you won’t ever really have that on you for long.

It looks like you are trying for a full support build with the cleric stuff.

In that case you should skip the emerald orbs and go 2 sup water, 2 maj sanct, 2 sup monk for max boon duration increase.

The problem with cleric builds is healing doesn’t scale very well so unless you go all the way with gearing towards it you won’t really see much difference while it hurts your survivability and damage.

If you are content in being in a fully support role I’d recommend go all clerics with the rune setup I stated above. If you go half way with healing stat you will have watered down healing and vastly decreased dps so it’s not going to be very effective.

If I were you, I’d stat all knights with the traits I mentioned and the rune setup and put in sup sigils of bloodlust in order to maximize your survivability, dps, and boon duration instead.

Obtena.7952:

DeathPanel.8362:

I’ve backed my opinions with structured reasoning and facts.

I don’t think it’s unreasonable to have your opinion on mixing challenged, especially since it’s an obvious option that exist for a good reason with very well understood impact to the builds. Mixing allows people to find builds they are comfortable with and adjust to their situations. If your mix is ‘None’, fine, but don’t think it works for everyone. The ‘best’ build is going to be the one that a person gets the most performance from, not the one that spills the highest numbers at you on a spreadsheet.

Your main problem is you don’t back up what you “think” by any facts or statistics. Not every opinion is equal. The only thing that makes someone’s opinions worth listening to is how factual it is.

That’s the main difference between my “opinions” and yours. I back up mine with observable facts while you don’t.

Obtena.7952:

I’m not here to prove you wrong since I don’t regard your opinion as facts.
The best advice in this thread so far is this …

No because you are here to troll.

I’ve backed my opinions with structured reasoning and facts.

The OP is asking for discussion regarding AH and zerk equipment, and all you can offer is useless drivel.

SSalp.6423:

I’ve been running a lot of dungeons with my guardian lately and have been using Clerics armor because i like being support, but I feel like I’m missing out a great deal of dmg. When running with another guardian on my mesmer I saw how much damage a guardian can do while still giving some support. Sadly I forgot to ask about his build and armour.

So I thought I came here to ask. I don’t have too much experience with guardians because it is not my main but I enjoy playing it.
I tend towards Knights because I like having some toughness but I don’t know how well that works in dungeons vs. berserkers.

I think I can figure out a build after having the armour set, but tips would help

Dungons with exception of high fractals are easy and beatable by any exotic gear choice.

It ultimately depends on your trait build since the gear choices revolve around your trait choices.

Jaga.2084:

What I expect from PuGs? People who have no clue where their own nose is. Guys who pull everything and wipe the group as often as they can. 1-4 people running full MF gear and expect to be carried. Don’t forget the watch-every-video-and-don’t-vote-people. Or people who started the dungeon and try to relog to their lvl. 20 twink at 2% final boss hp. If you don’t care for your time, armor and fun, play with pugs.

Those types can be easily dealt with or avoided though. The key is to look for signs of it at the beginning so you can either kick them or leave in order to not waste time.

Generally you can tell what gear they are wearing by just looking at them.

There are few exceptions where people like to customize their skins by transmutation, but in those cases you can easily see they are vets or new by looking at their achievement points.

I usually don’t mind people that leaving and rejoining at boss if they let your team know first in the beginning. If they didn’t just vote kick them when they try it.

sorrychief.2563:

just did SE exp P1 P2 with a few random people. they were nice and laidback we got through after maybe. . . a dozen or so teamwipes in total (LOL). we only had 2 people quit and 1 guy had to leave at the last 2 champ golems.

overall it wasn’t easy but it wasn’t incredibly hard. think we spent over 2 hours in 2 paths. do organized groups that run dungeons achieve overall faster clears or does that come down to skill/classes?

also yes we were carried by a guardian with wall of reflection.

I’ve done that dungeon a ton of times with many different combinations as well as different alts of mine.

You must’ve just gotten stuck in a team with bad players and\or new players.

A good way to tell is to look at their achievement points. If it’s only in 3 digits it means they are probably totally new and/or under geared and don’t know what they are doing.

While a good group can carry someone like that if you get more than one player like that in your team then it will become very hard.

Dexlmentia.7391:

I’m happy to have an embarrassment of riches in slots 7, 8, 9, but now that I’m approaching level 50 and have some punch I think it’s time to focus.

The goal is a 10/25 or 30/30/?/? build primarily for PvE with the focus on dps. My inclination is to go full meditation skills, e.g. smite condition, contemplation of purity, judge’s intervention, but stand your ground seemed so indispensable as I leveled.

It’s great fun to fly in with judge’s intervention, hit zealot’s defense, and then lay more burn on with my torch, but I keep thinking one of my meditations needs to go in favor of stand your ground at higher levels.

I’m psychologically married to smite condition, but contemplation of purity’s longish cooldown makes me wonder if that should go in favor of stand your ground? Does my plan to go nearly full zerker gear make contemplation of purity a better option? Thoughts?

Meditation build is fun and very good damage and the first build I started off with my first character. (Guard) I’ve played since day one of GW2 with a meditation guard, and have switched to AH build at some point due to my new focus on WvW but I still believe meditation is a very good alternative, if built right.

At your level it’s probably not really that beneficial to build towards your end build since you will not have the appropriate gear and traits for them.

If I were you I’d focus on leveling, then once you hit 80 you can respect your traits to your final setup, and start doing dungeons for gear. (Or craft yourself some, depending on what stats you want. )

Take a look at this build: (Look at the gear, runes, and sigils because they are important)

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fUAQRAsd7elUgSDHHyNEfIFRuArHC8g+DXw1DISxGC-j0xAorBRTQCNJKQZvioxWJLiGryGTDTEVDA-w

Here’s the explanation:

Full soldiers armor with full knights jewelry in order to bring your hp up since if you went zerk or knights or only splash a little vit in you will only have around 12k life and be squashed pretty quickly if not totally careful.

At the same time I compensated for the precision and power with the runes of the pack and the trait that gives 15% more crit chance.

I had setup both weapon sets to be 1 handed in order to take advantage of the trait.

I had both with sigil of bloodlust on the offhand in order to consistently generate bloodlust as you fight. At 25 stacks you will gain 250 extra free power, which brings the damage up by a lot.

Sigil of strength is self explanatory.

The true crit chance is at 59%. While that is not as high as some of the pure glass cannon builds out there this build is far more survivable in all situations and the damage is still high due to this setup and your hp is far higher and your armor is through the roof.

Also, the added benefit here is that all the gear except for jewelry can be farmed from dungeons like AC, which makes this the easiest path for you as a new guardian.

Note: bloodlust sigils can get a bit spendy so be prepared for that…

Ghotistyx.6942:

In some of the Dungeons and Dragons DM guides, they talk about player types. They mention that player has a portion of min/maxer in them (the power gamer min/max, the social butterfly min/max, the non-combatant min/max etc)

I think Anet is going in a very right direction with what they’re planning. I’d like to see less posts of Zerker for everything all the time in PvE.

Also, considering every trait line is probably getting anywhere from 1-5 changes, I think we’ll see a lot of new builds crop up to compete., which is a win for me

It’s irrelevant. So-called Min/Maxers will always use the best possible build at the present.

Even if they nerfed zerk gear into the ground and made a bunch of cookie cutter builds unplayable Min/Maxers will always find the next best thing and that next best thing will become the new cookie cutter by definition. That’s why nerfing to balance is a slippery slope and usually not a good idea.

The point is, some people make the best of what they are given, while others complain and want to tear them down just because they aren’t willing to put the time and effort into doing the same.

Obtena.7952:

Mixing isn’t a terrible idea at all. Any given Guardian build fits on the spectrum with defense and offense at the extremes. Ideally, you choose gear to put you where ever you feel most comfortable on that spectrum. Luckily, doing that works well in this game because of the mechanics:

1. The increases you get for many stats with the exception of toughness translate linearly to your capability.
2. The tradeoffs feel well balanced. If I give up ‘a chunk’ of heals, HP and toughness for an equivalent ‘chunk’ of power, crit and crit damage, or vice versa, it feels like a fair trade.

1. No it doesn’t. Top guardian builds revolve around focusing on 2 to 3 different stats, not all of them.
2. Well balanced doesn’t mean good. The best builds in gw2 are focused builds.

It’d help everyone if you actually back up your posts with some facts like gear builds or trait setups rather than spewing unsubstantiated misinformation. Of all the times I’ve visited this forum and read your posts I haven’t seen a single post with any concrete facts in them.

I don’t know if it’s a learn to play issue or you are simply trolling, but you definitely aren’t being constructive.

You’re welcome to prove me wrong by actually posting your equipment and trait build on this thread as a response to the OP regarding AH builds or zerk gear since that is what the actual topic is.

I’ve asked you to do this before and you’ve never delivered.

Kharel Arhew.1437:

DeathPanel.8362:

Everything that he mentioned as an advantage in his post are achieved by gear and rune choices, not trait choices and therefore can easily be achieved by any AH variant plus the AH build has far higher survival, and more damage.

Not trying to bring up an old argument here or anything; DeathPanel and I disagree very strongly on how necessary AH is. That being said, the quoted text is not exactly correct. AH builds lack the condition removal, perma-swiftness without staff, 33% uptime on every boon in the game, and the VoJ spam combination that I use. Thus, it trades a very significant amount of mobility and groupwide condition removal for increased durability.

Incorrect.

0 0 30 20 20 AH build with x2 monk x2 sanct x2 water grants perma swiftness as well as perma retaliation. As long as you spec for shouts, which AH is based around anyway.

I also find it either extremely uninformed or extremely dishonest of you to assert that AH lacks condition removal since variants of it has access to pure of voice trait. (The same trait line that your build has, so if AH has no condition removal then by your own logic your build has no condition removal either.)

The tradeoff in this case would be 10% boon duration but that is not too relevant as long as you go x2x2×2 runes on your armor. (If you choose to go 0 0 30 30 10)

Your problem is that the advantages you tout in your build in form of boon duration is in the gear and runes, not in your traits. Therefore using the above setup an AH build can easily achieve the same 100% uptime because that advantage is not tied to your build.

I’ve already pointed this out months ago to you yet you seem to have some sort of fact free personal shield that intercepts and bounces all facts and statistics.

The only thing your build has is 150 more precision due to traits and some minor effects that let you more efficiently cycle retaliation over the AH build which doesn’t matter anyway since you can maintain 100% uptime with the above mentioned trait combo with AH.

The problem is you’ve sacrificed 15 trait points to get renewed justice, which is totally useless as it only procs if you get THE KILLING BLOW on people. You would’ve been better off just simply going 0 10 0 30 30 if you want to stick to your build.

You also have 5% more in boon duration, which is trivial.

The AH build on the other hand has 300 toughness and 30% crit severity as well as the AH trait itself as an advantage. (Not to mention the precision gained from retributive precision from the toughness is 114 with full knight gear which far mitigates your advantage in precision in the first place.)

Meanwhile your build is far inferior in survivability due to the lack of AH and 300 less base toughness.

Nothing is new here. I’ve simply restated exactly what I stated months ago and my statements are simply factually true.

Your build isn’t totally bad it’s simply not as good as you make it out to be nor is it as good as the mainstream AH.

If it was better than AH I’d be the first one in line to respec to it. I have no qualms about abandoning builds that are sub optimal.

Cipher.5472:

Hey, and thank you for reading. I am returning to gw2 and could use a hand building my guardian proper. I main an engineer although raced to level a guardian before I left and would like to play the guardian. My focus is world vs world and I will be focusing on roaming and flipping camps.

Can any one help me with a good dps build and a also a good support build. Was looking to use possibly great sword/sword+shield if viable. I have good sets of armor and weapons just lacking the build.

Since you are new. Focus on one type of gear and build and don’t try to mix because you won’t know what the right mix is for you.

The most consistently performing combination if you want to do group content is AH.

I recommend against using Kharel Arhew’s build since that is basically an AH build without the AH, and really sub optimal.

Everything that he mentioned as an advantage in his post are achieved by gear and rune choices, not trait choices and therefore can easily be achieved by any AH variant plus the AH build has far higher survival, and more damage.

That has already been thoroughly discussed months ago in another post but it seems like he is stubbornly holding on to his “rogue” build against facts even now.

Go either full zerk or full knight gear with 0 0 30 30 10 or 0 0 30 20 20 and your performance will be very consistent.

Key traits are Altruistic Healing, Retributive armor, Superior Aria, two handed mastery or empowering might, pure of voice. (if you run soldier runes you can choose to not use pure of voice but keep in mind it stacks so it will remove 2 condition on every shout)

Rune choices x2 sup monk x2 maj sanct x2 sup water(boon duration) or 6x sup rune of the soldier(cond removal) or 6x sup rune of the pack. (power, crit, and chance to buff yourself with 3 buffs on being hit)

Alternatively you can try a meditation build, those are fun as well but not as supportive and it would be too long for me to get into that here.

MaiYun.3147:

Hey,
So I recently decided to go with Knight’s Set (PPT) instead of Soldier (PVT) due to money issues ;p

I need some advices on guild build (purely for WvW) where I’ll have some survivability and damage as well

+ what Trinkets, Runes/Orbs and Weapon stats (GS+Staff – unless you recommend something else) should I get?:)

Well, I just got my first Guardian to level 80 that’s why I’m asking

Thanks

Since you are doing full knights you can do AH build to make up for lack of hp.

Go all the way knights with the jewelry as well.

0 0 30 30 10 or 0 0 30 20 20.

Either full runes of the soldier, or 2x sanct, 2x water, 2xmonk.

GS or Hammer + staff. (sup sigil of bloodlust on both weapons)
Alternatively you can scepter + shield as well if you want to fight from a distance. (bloodlust on shield, energy or strength on sceptor)

You’ll end up with 15-16kish hp, very high defense, and very high damage (if you have bloodlust) and excellent condition removal.

CptAurellian.9537:

DeathPanel.8362:

AH build with zerk gear in wvw is not really too good since you’ll be too squishy. You’ll have some mitigation with the knights gear with toughness but without raw hp you’ll still die pretty fast.

Erm … no. AH, knight armor, soldier runes and zerker weapon/trinkets work pretty fine in ZvZ, unless you lose your orientation in the enemy zerg. But in that case, you will probably die anyway, no matter what kind of gear you use.

Mixing like that is a terrible idea. If you go zerk go full out or not at all. Going partially zerk just nerfs your def/hp while not really providing you with any real benefits that zerk gear provides.
When you add in a little zerk you aren’t going to get any real measurable increase in dps since it just means a little extra crit severity and a tiny bit more prec. Meanwhile your toughness and hp suffers.

CptAurellian.9537:

I’m sure it will be mighty changes like the one yesterday :P

Just hope that’s the case, because otherwise it would mean major nerfs.

Jaakko.4759:

Why aren’t rangers able to wield rifles? Isn’t it logical for an ranger that roams the forest and hunts down deers for food, being able to use an rifle? Im satisfied with the current weapon selections, but isnt it just obvious that rangers could use the rifle if warriors can too, engineers of course. but why not rangers? I ask you,arenanet to get working on this if you may?:)

Because fantasy game rangers are not the same as Walker, Texas Ranger.

Dand.8231:

Banners: Powerful but clunky and requires you to babysit them. They get left behind, lost, stolen. You waste time picking up and dropping them constantly.

My (reposted) suggestion?
Have them work using a toggle on/off system, somewhat like engineer toolkits. When toggled on, the banner is displayed on your characters back, and provides its passive bonuses to allies within range. Your #1-5 remain unchanged however, instead the F3 and F4 buttons become available. F3 is Inspire (functioning exactly like it is now, banner #3), and F4 is the banner specific skill (currently banner #2). Only one banner may be active at a time, and toggling off/swapping banners will incur a 30 second cooldown. Banners can no longer be dropped, lost, stolen, etc.

For the elite banner, which functions slightly differently…
F4: Nearby downed allies immediately rally, CT 2, CD 240, Uses Ground Targeting.

Personally I’d prefer your way but it would be way too powerful since it would essentially make banners into a much more powerful version of a signet passive, and if they were to go that route they will probably have to nerf down the effect.

Also, under your system banners can no longer be stacked. (ie you can’t throw down 2 different banners by yourself and get 2 sets of bonuses)

mPascoal.4258:

Hi everyone
Well I’ve a lvl 80 Guardian for quite a while, and I enjoy the class, but recently I don’t feel good playing it, I think is it because of my build, since I’ve allways used the same since I reached lvl 80. It’s similar to an AH build but with focus on Symbols (one friend helped my with getting the build, and at the time I loved it), I go with 0 – 0 – 30 – 20 – 20.
Because of that I decided to swith build, but sinc I only started to came to the forum, does today a weak, I’ve seen that I problably don’t know much about my class at all, I only figured out today what AH means.

Anyway, I’ve seen here some topics talking about AH builds with Zerg or Knight gear, but I wondered why? Is that only for PvE, or WvW too? How it goes for WvW if, with AH build with all Zerg or Knight gear you only have 300 healing power, which I think is low for a Guardian.

That all I wanted to know
Sorry some english mistakes, I’m very tired from worked to think properly :$

AH build with zerk gear in wvw is not really too good since you’ll be too squishy. You’ll have some mitigation with the knights gear with toughness but without raw hp you’ll still die pretty fast.

Shaterz.2703:

hello. does anyone know if anet is planning to do anything for the guardians? feel like first half of the games life was spent nerfing us. aaaaaand then they havent touched us since really.

half our utilitys suck and are kinda useless. 2 of our trait lines are kinda useless. 3 some say even. a lot of our utilitys kinda suck aswell. i mean. a 4sec freeze on 50sec cooldown? really? xD

aaaaaand were kinda forced to play meditation or shout build. NOTHING else is viable.

thnx and sorry for my bad english

I’m sure more nerfs are incoming.

Escher.5342:

20 Fractals level 26-38. Not a single ring. Not a single fractal weapon. This game is a joke. They can’t push out updates fast enough, unless they discover an exploit that might affect their bottom line, of course, and the fact that I can’t purchase any infused trinkets besides rings (in fractals) is a testament to the lack of universal consideration the devs are taking to the risk/time/reward system GW2 has. The only “instance” that requires any skill is the least rewarding. BTW, Renewed Justice is broken. Is it too late to request a refund?

My full bank tab of extra unused fractal rings and weapon skins disagree with you.

ilr.9675:

DeathPanel.8362:

aophts.9862:

I want to start a new char, but last time with my lvl 50 RANGER i had a hard time with groups for dungeons. Do i still need to choose between WARRIOR or GUARDIAN to not be kicked from a party?

You should probably hold off until 80 to do dungeons. A lvl 50 is not going to do well in any dungeons that you can join. It’s more your level than your class.

My own guildmates swore up and down that the reason we were failing explorables when I was on my GUARDIAN (level 40, & then again at 65 @ the time) was because he wasn’t 80. Guess what happened the instant I started pugging with people who actually played the first game and understood Anet’s Gimmicky nature…. We passed with flying colors. I can do the same thing on my Ranger. Unfortunately most people can’t b/c they don’t have those rote reflexes ingrained by GW1 or other action/arcade style gaming . …. or the other big factor that’s also a learned response: DONT PANIC, just focus fire and keep your skill rotations in order. The reason most groups fail is not Team composition, or Gear and it’s not always skill either. It just getting ahead of themselves & panicking instead of falling back / regrouping and actually getting eachother back up.

There’s never ANY case where something can’t be beaten by sub-par builds so long a people focus and work together. Anyone who says “this is the only way”, “that’s useless here, do it my way only”, or just calls everything and everyone stupid —- Should just instantly be put on ignore and avoided completely for the sake of your own health. It’s a wide world out there, and there’s a lot more to “success” than just number-crunching.

No one said it’s impossible. It’s just less likely and more of a pain that’s all.

When you are sub 80 doing a dungeon that is scaled to lower than yourself, like a lvl 50 in AC for example your gear will almost always be subpar of lvl 50 so when that gets scaled down to 35 not only are you nerfed in terms of less traits you are nerfed by the scaling system.

While a new lvl 80 may have the same gear problem he won’t have the same trait problem, and will have an inherent advantage.

Besides it’s always better to get more experience with the game before going into a dungeon, a first time lvl 40-50 character shouldn’t be going anywhere near pub dungeons as that is a disaster waiting to happen.

aophts.9862:

So, i just ignore healing power? I go PTV or PPT or a mix of both??

It depends.

Here’s the breakdown.

WvW: Cleric Gear (healing) or PVT/Knights mix.

Dungeons: Cleric Gear, PVT/Knight Mix, or Zerk gear.

As long as your traits setup is good you can do well in dungeons with any of these setups. But never mix gears from different setups, it will just make your build weaker. If you are going one direction, go all the way. (With exception of the pvt/knight mix, as that combination combines into one setup)

aophts.9862:

My guardian is lvl 80 full cleric exotic gear – 0/0/20/30/20.

But still i get kitten d in dungeons sometimes, like CoF path 1. I’m new to dungeons and i have done just AC SM and EM and CoF path 1 and 2.

I use sceptre/shield + staff, i try mace/shield sometimes, but the enemies are so kittening powerful that is impossible to melee them.

I use 2 superior runes of the water, 2 superior runes of the monk and 1 superior rune of the guardian and 1 major rune of the monk. I’m using the guardian and the major monk just temporary, i’m looking for the sanctuary ones, but i need to do HoW dungeon. I focus on shouts and i always use food to get 14% boon duration. I have like 64% boon duration and 3200 of armor. Only 15k HP though.

But i still feel weak and i see warrios full DPS or glass canon, taking more damage then me and surviving.

Is my build broken? Did i kittened up my char? Also, it is wise to use 2×2×2 runes or should i go for 3×3?

Well it depends on what exotic gear you have.

If the stats are scattered all over the place then you will need to consider redoing your gear with more focus on certain key stats. (clerics for full support, knights/soldiers for offense/tank, zerk for dps)

It sounds to me based on your weapon and rune choices that you are trying to be a support/boon guardian.

The problem is you only have 20 in valor, and that’s the line with altruistic healing grandmaster trait that you won’t have.

So you essentially look like you have an altruistic healing build without the altruistic healing, which practically doubles your survivability at the minimal.

Make sure to have at least x x 30 × 5 if you want a support build. Where x is whatever points you want.

Most people go 0 0 30 30 10 or 0 0 30 20 20 or 0 5 30 30 5. That trait combo can be used with any gear combo I mentioned above.

Thorson.9218:

loseridoit.2756:

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Temporal_Curtain

the curtain doesnt pull you off the wall if you cannot attack the people below the wall. It only pulls you to the edge. If you can attack the people below, then be careful because the curtain will pull you off the wall

I play a focus mesmer for wvwvw

As another poster already noted, you CAN be pulled off a wall even if you can’t attack those below you. I just had this happen for the first time in WvW last night. Maybe it’s a new bug???

Not sure what happened exactly, but I was manning an AC along the back edge of the wall when all of a sudden I got pulled off the AC (not by a Guardian, I was never in LoS for his chain) to the front of the wall (one that has a little ledge) then pulled again right down into their zerg. Maybe 2 mesmers in a row got me? Anyway, I was shocked, but being a thief, I still lived…..then caused havoc among them w/ CnD, so maybe theirs wasn’t such a good idea, LOL.

It does pull off if they are standing on edge. I’ve done it many times in wvw with my Mesmer.

A bit too squishy for WvW. It will not be able to win fights that tankier variations of guards would otherwise win.

And instead of precision stacks why not do bloodlust stacks? Full zerk gear plus traits already give more than enough crit chance anyway.

aophts.9862:

I want to start a new char, but last time with my lvl 50 RANGER i had a hard time with groups for dungeons. Do i still need to choose between WARRIOR or GUARDIAN to not be kicked from a party?

You should probably hold off until 80 to do dungeons. A lvl 50 is not going to do well in any dungeons that you can join. It’s more your level than your class.

Diva.4706:

So I already did Molten Weapon Facility with my guild, and to be honest it was fun till the end fight, where I was dead for about 80% of the time.

But I digress. Tonight I asked a few friends, who have not finished it, if they wanted to go run it and the response was unanimous : no its too hard, and not fun. This got me thinking, because these same people would run dungeons in our previous MMO all the time, and sometimes even raid. That was an MMO with trinity.

So my question is, are dungeons not for casual “fun” play in Guild Wars 2, and is it because of the no trinity system.

No.

Trinity system would make things far more difficult and less “casual”.

No Cleric? You’re hosed.
No Tank? You’re hosed.
No DPS? It’ll take forever.

Bloodstealer.5978:

DeathPanel.8362:

Oxstar.7643:

Is it me, or is socialising in guilds all but dead? Everyone always says they are “busy”, I mean c’mon, am I the only one here who can bend my mind more than one way?
The entire POINT of guilds is to bring people closer together and form bonds so that you don’t have to play games alone, but let me tell you, if you consider yourself too busy with farming for that, really, useless legendary skin to even say HELLO, then you are doing it WRONG. Really, I don’t care how busy you are – It takes you like, 2 seconds to type “hi” if someone says hello – You ALWAYS have enough time for that, it works for me, and it can work for YOU too.

And don’t tell me I just have to find guilds using vent or mumble, some of us are not too comfortable using voices with people we’ve never seen and hardly know. I always show a bit of humanity towards my fellow guildes, and not only that, towards ANYONE who makes my game fun – Don’t forget the MULTIPLAYER part in “MMO”

All I ask for is to see some actual care, like I try to show others. Because at the end of the day, MMO’s is about having fun with others, if all you want is the best shinies then you might as well play single player games instead.

Sincercly, a person who cares.

People in game are there to play the game, not to spend their time chatting.

If you want to socialize, call up some real life friends. Game is for gaming.

Then why join a guild in the first place.. you don’t need a guild to play your game, especially in GW2… even guild missions negate the actual need for you to be a genuine guild member.

Plenty of reasons. Wvw, dungon runs, guild missions. (all of which takes communication)

Chatting just for chatting’s sake in an online game is a pointless waste of time in my opinion. The are more appropriate places to socialize, and that’s not in some online game.

Erasculio.2914:

Conclusion

Guild Wars 2 failed. By ArenaNet’s own definition of success, “Is it fun?”, the answer often is “no, it’s not”. Good for them that the community of grinders that fill this (and all other) MMO are not really interested in fun.

My advice is: play through the tutorial, and then go explore the world. Do all the interesting dynamic events you find, admire the beautifully crafted world, listen to all the ambient dialogues, dig through all the lore you can find; do that from the starting areas all the way to right before you enter Orr. Ignore hearts, the personal story, dungeons, and definitely ignore the “lesser” aspects of the game (trading, crafting, item acquisition, etc). Once you have explored everything other than Orr, leave the game and never look back.

That massive block of disgruntled diatribe you tried to pass off as a “review” is not really convincing.

There isn’t any substantive claims anywhere in your “review” and nearly all of it is based on your own warped opinions.

I recommend you follow your own advice here and just leave the game and never look back.

Oxstar.7643:

Is it me, or is socialising in guilds all but dead? Everyone always says they are “busy”, I mean c’mon, am I the only one here who can bend my mind more than one way?
The entire POINT of guilds is to bring people closer together and form bonds so that you don’t have to play games alone, but let me tell you, if you consider yourself too busy with farming for that, really, useless legendary skin to even say HELLO, then you are doing it WRONG. Really, I don’t care how busy you are – It takes you like, 2 seconds to type “hi” if someone says hello – You ALWAYS have enough time for that, it works for me, and it can work for YOU too.

And don’t tell me I just have to find guilds using vent or mumble, some of us are not too comfortable using voices with people we’ve never seen and hardly know. I always show a bit of humanity towards my fellow guildes, and not only that, towards ANYONE who makes my game fun – Don’t forget the MULTIPLAYER part in “MMO”

All I ask for is to see some actual care, like I try to show others. Because at the end of the day, MMO’s is about having fun with others, if all you want is the best shinies then you might as well play single player games instead.

Sincercly, a person who cares.

People in game are there to play the game, not to spend their time chatting.

If you want to socialize, call up some real life friends. Game is for gaming.

Son Of Suns.6593:

What do you do when you have 9 characters (8 of them level 80 w/ multiple weapons some multiple gear sets and cultural tier 3 armor) and you’re getting stomped in wvw, you have no need for dungeon running because everyone’s geared, and there just isn’t anything you really want to do but you still want to play.? I’d think farm for the chance of a good drop. As if you haven’t killed this game enough with the drop nerfs, you slid a few more things in there. I just wonder where it’ll end. The chances of getting an exotic drop with 130% MF are 0 .0000000001% but if the sky falls and you do get one, it’s one of the “many” 1 gold one’s that you added (worthless). Now I can’t press ctrl to view my missed drops. lmao. You sincerely want me to miss the few drops that I do get ? Come on guys. I’ve been a good player. Spent 500-600 US $‘s in the gem store and I’m just one player. You guys can’t be hurting for gem sales that bad. Bad enough to ruin the game.? Just killed an orr boss and didn’t get the daily. Not sure if you took daily chests out and I don’t wanna know. I look forward to playing this game when I get home and I play it so much that I need to switch things up. I need to farm every now and then to refresh. I know you’re relying on new players but they’ll run out eventually. Think about the guys that have been here since beta and head start before it’s too late. PLEASE.. Don’t kill the best game I’ve ever played so soon

Hard to believe you played 2500+ hours since that would mean playing approximately on average 11 hours+ a day since launch.

I’m going to assume that you don’t have full ascended infused jewelry/backpiece on every one of your characters. (Given the time restrictions on laurels/guild bounty tokens) That would be something to do going forward.

Also, if you are getting stomped in wvw, find a good guild to run with and improve your own strats.

penatbater.4710:

DeathPanel.8362:

penatbater.4710:

Has anyone tried a symbol/AH build? I just bought my new hammer so I don’t have much time to practice hitting people (This is mainly focused on wvw).

Utilities are still all shouts coz of AH as well as me having 6/6 s.soldier runes. I use soldier armor and cleric trinkets (mostly exotic anyway). Hammer/staff for the symbols. Then I run

5/0/30/30/5 build. the Valor trait line is pretty standard, AH, purity and something else. Honor is superior aria, Writ of merciful and either writ of persistence or pure of voice. My main goal for the build is to be one of the first few people to rush into the zerg head-on, so I tried to be a bit tanky (with the clerics) but still have a bit of good damage (although i can say, at the moment it’s pretty crappy =/).

I tried out this build after (at long last) realizing that the end proc of hammer is a symbol so I kinda heal myself with each AA chain. (cast time seems a bit too long imo though, but at least it doesn’t stop even when you’re kiting). What do you guys think?

That’s actually nearly identical to my build. However if you are planning on diving into groups of enemies you might want to go 0 0 30 30 10 for extra retaliation duration.

Ahh retaliation. I forgot about that. But without GS how do you reliably stack retaliation on yourself? I just went with the 5 for the emergency 25% symbol. Sure it grants a small heal, but hey, a heal is a heal. One thing though, do symbols work with AH? I mean since all symbols provide buffs, does every pulse/buff application trigger AH on me?

There are shouts that grant retaliation. If you have boon duration+ items it will extended them further. Retaliation isn’t too useful in pve but at least it’s imo more useful than what you have currently.

All buffs you apply triggers AH.

Rok.5074:

An additional “limitation” of Altruistic Healing builds is that it’s not just locking you down to those 30 pts in the Valor line…

To maximize AH’s benefits, most will also choose to spend 20 pts in Honor to grab Empowering Might, which is certainly the most efficient way to maximize AH procs and boost both your own and your group’s damage via might stacks.

So most solid AH builds have actually committed 50 of their total trait points. This doesn’t leave much wiggle room.

Empowering might is not neccessary for AH variants. It has an internal cooldown so you can’t proc it too often anyway.

Obtena.7952:

DeathPanel.8362:

Sorry but you fail again. Anyone can simply scroll up to see your words so your denial is irrelevant. You deliberately misrepresented the facts and I simply called you out on it.

OK, you win. AH is the absolute pinnacle of support builds because you continue to belabour your comprehension issues with my post. :BIG ROLL EYES HERE:

The only one having comprehension problems here is you. Between the two of us only I have demonstrated knowledge of the guardian class/traits/gear setups while all you’ve done is post pathetic personal attacks and never supported any of your statements.

Adam Of Awesome.7802:

The “Unkillable” Build
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fUAQNApeWlUgyC33RKEf4ESWBDE7BG9Rb01jESiYIA;TkAqbM3Iuxej7G5NrPGNMdA

This build is a tank/support build that focuses on toughness and healing power.

Healing is key to this build and when you get good with it, you’ll wonder why you ever used skill 6 in the first place. There is nothing in this game that you can’t tank/kite with this and it pushes survivability to the breaking point of which some may say the class is plain broken. But I beg to differ since you will do some of the MOST PATHETIC DAMAGE seen in this game.

You’ll be using exotic CLERIC Armour with SUPERIOR RUNES OF DWAYNA. The old version of this build used to recommend runes of the monk but it turns out that runes of dwayna are more effective since they give regeneration bonuses and regen will heal you a little over 1.5khp/sec so as you can imagine just a few seconds of regen will almost top up your health(13k-16k) to full. So any extended healing duration makes a huge difference.

By the end of it you should have anywhere over 1.4k healing power. I have 1.6k since I have some ascended but the difference isn’t too noticeable.

Now for your weapons you have to have mace/shield as your main set.

The secondary I recommend a staff, but a greatsword is fine if you want to do a bit more damage(Not much more lol). On your CLERIC’s mace you’ll want SIGIL OF SUPERIOR LIFE and on your shield SIGIL OF SUPERIOR RESTORATION. Getting kills with the mace will add to your healing power as well as the shield gives you a small burst heal each kill you get credit for. For your staff use SUPERIOR SIGIL OF ENERGY. When you swap the the staff you will get half your endurance back providing you with another dodge-roll and skill 4 which heals you like a boss and buffs allies with 12 stacks of might. Also the ally heal is noticeable as much as night and day.

And before anyone asks, YES! It works out very well in World vs World.

You can tank A LOT and your elite and 6 come in handy more times than not. But the only thing I would change to be more survivable in WvW would be “hold the line!” to Judges Intervention. For when escaping a zerg of enemies chasing you down (when you get good, you can mostly get away even if you run half way across a WvW map regardless if there are more than 20 enemies).

So try it out! or if there is anything you would change to improve or your current build, comment away

EDIT: Thanks to Lexiculus.5296, Sigil of Energy is a much better substitute for Sigil of Water. Thankyou for improving the build!

You obviously never tested this build in wvw as you’ve claimed because most of what you said is patently false.

For instance regen will never ever heal you for anywhere close to what you claim (1.5khp/sec).

Symbol of Faith does not remove conditions.

You have no condition removal of any sort.

You have sub optimal runes setup.

Bottom line is this is basically a bad variant of the AH build and nowhere close to being “unkillable” nor can you dish out any non-trivial amount of damage.

This post needs to be renamed, “Totally inefficient build that melts to any conditions”.

Barricade.3210:

Try Sigil of Fire, with Staff hitting multiple targets and a decent crit chance you’ll be triggering Fire Blast every time internal cd is over.

Sigil of fire is actually very bad for wvw for guardian. (Or really any other class for that matter)

The aoe range is not all that good and the damage is not stellar and there isn’t any guardian skills that can hit consistently and repeatedly enough to proc it often, not to mention the internal cooldown the proc has and the requirement that you have high crit chance which limits your build and gear choices.

Bloodlust or perception sigils are the best things for guards in wvw depending on their build. (bloodlust for zerk builds, perception for heal and soldier builds) This is because as a guard you have survivability and range enough to be able to get 25 stacks fairly quickly in a large zerg v zerg battle and keep it.

In case of dual wield weapons, it’s best to have either bloodlust or perception on main or off hand and maybe energy on the other for more dodges which procs your trait heal.

Obtena.7952:

DeathPanel.8362:

No, you are the one that misrepresented the facts. You said you had to remove from one if you have the other, when obviously there are variants of AH that can have both and don’t require that.

I never said that at all because that would be a stupid thing to say (Obviously you can match any traits you want to). Your comprehension is lacking. Hopefully the third time is the charm:

Better support builds are available by by removing your Valour trait points that give AH and putting them into anything else that gives support. That doesn’t mean I am saying you can’t combine points into different traits.

Sorry but you fail again. Anyone can simply scroll up to see your words so your denial is irrelevant. You deliberately misrepresented the facts and I simply called you out on it.

Indure.5410:

DeathPanel.8362:

Indure.5410:

It’s fine to only have stacking on one weapon, but you need to make sure you switch to your staff once the enemy goes into a down state. I’m not sure if you need to auto-attack once.

You can tag stacks with staff #2 and #3 easily in zerg v zerg as well.

You’re right, but the point I was trying to make is that you need the weapon out during the death in order to get the sigil stack. If you hit someone with the staff and then finish them off with a sword you won’t get a stack.

The point is you won’t need always get to pick what weapon you have out at the time they die if you are in a large fight and constantly switching weapons, so having sigils on both guarantees the stack.

Indure.5410:

This has always been an argument about maximizing support. Your very first post was that AH is the best build period and my post directly underneath you is that it is not the best at many things, just a very good all around build. Which it is, but if you are specializing in either damage or support then there are better builds.

Wrong.

Notice how even in your interpretation of my statement I never said it maximizes support. All you’ve done is create a strawman argument.

I already stated before, 10% boon duration does not make a noticeable difference in support, while not having AH, 30% crit dmg and 300 toughness makes a huge difference in everything else.

Your simplistic view that blindly stacking support trait lines would achieve better overall support is totally unfounded and naive.

You would have a build that would have a tiny fraction of survivability of AH builds, less damage and be trivially better in support ON PAPER only but not in practice and the following statement explains why.

Your support is ZERO when you are down or dead, and frankly you will be down/dead far more than any AH build in any type of content that is remotely challenging.

You are free to post a build here if you think it’s better than AH instead of talking in unsubstantiated theoreticals. If you think I’m wrong then there’s no better chance to prove it than to post your own build and prove how it’s better.

Indure.5410:

FACTS:

• 30 Valor gives you very little to no direct group support.
• 30 Honor gives you great group support.
• 30 Virtues gives you great group support.
• You cannot be 0/0/30/30/30, because that equals 90 points.
• You cannot go 30 deep in both great support lines and still pick up AH.
• You don’t need any survivability traits in order to be effective in a pure support role.
• You don’t need any damage traits in order to be effective in a pure support role.
• Since 30 Valor has almost no direct support traits and no support attributes, it has no reason to be mentioned in an argument about MAXIMIZING a support role.

---

Is AH a great build? Yes. Does AH give more survivability in group content than any other build? Yes. Is AH a better group build for most content? Maybe.

Is AH the best pure support build? No.

This is NOT an argument about maximizing support. It never has been.

Also, your support is nonexistent if you are down or dead.

There’s very little to no difference in support between someone with 30 in virtue and 20 in virtue since guardian support effectiveness comes mostly from gear and runes. (AH variations with more support will run 20 in virtue)

However there’s a huge difference in having AH and not having AH as well as having 30% crit damage, 300 toughness and not having it.

Indure.5410:

It’s fine to only have stacking on one weapon, but you need to make sure you switch to your staff once the enemy goes into a down state. I’m not sure if you need to auto-attack once.

You can tag stacks with staff #2 and #3 easily in zerg v zerg as well.

Deathmond.7328:

I said that stuck sigils I use with Staff.

You mean “stack”?

You should use the stacking sigil on both the weapon swaps since you tend to get kill tags with both.

Tinboy.7954:

DeathPanel.8362:

Tinboy.7954:

Lol, buddy. I know how FOTM works. But my knowledge of FOTM doesn’t even matter in this case cause all I did was use your logic. It is either retaliation works well along with AH, or neither works. Do you even read what you type?

Since you didn’t get it the first time, I guess I’ll have to spell it out for you. Your argument was that retaliation is trivial because mobs 1-2 shot you meaning you only get a couple reflect off. From this, if you die in 1-2 shots anyways. How does a lot of mini heals help in any way if you still get 1-2 shot; it is not like the mini heals will do an instant 10k heal.

Basically, it is either retaliation works well along with AH or neither works since retaliation is based off of how many times you get hit.

Wrong. You failed to understand my logic and by extension failed to leverage it as part of your argument.

You also show you know nothing of higher lvl fotm.

I already pointed out that you can only dodge so many attacks and that you WILL be hit. I’ve already pointed out AH makes the difference between dying and surviving when your main heal is on CD.

Between the virtues, shouts, and staff #4 you can easily heal from 10% to full even while not using full cleric setup so you either don’t know much about AH build or you are purposefully not being honest when you talk about “mini-heals”.

Also, you’ve failed to provide a better alternative build as I’ve asked. Is your purpose just to troll and be contrarian?

Lol, it is quite clear to me you are just being a troll. You basically ignored everything I’ve said and just changed the subject.

Project much? Everything you said here you are guilty of yourself.

jazzllanna.1278:

I am wondering if I should trait to have retaliation for dungeons. It seems like you should be avoiding damage so maybe it is not really used in dungeons?

No. Mobs have a ton of hp so the damage to them through retaliation is trivial.

Vayne.8563:

Except that ten levels in Guild Wars 2 could take like a day or two. Leveling at high levels really goes fast. If they open new zones, you might level just exploring them normally.

It’s not the levels that matter. It’s the trait points that comes with those levels that matters.

Also, the trait tree can be expanded with a new tier of traits and create new variety of builds.

The biggest downside of course is I’d have to farm for a new set of exotic/ascended gear for my 8 characters.

MF is not useful in any situation.

Farming mobs in open world doesn’t give you anything of real value not to mention the speed at which you kill those mobs is vastly decreased due to having the mf stats nerfing your dps which negates your mf in the first place.

MF does not apply to chests of any type and the real valuable items comes in chests.

penatbater.4710:

Has anyone tried a symbol/AH build? I just bought my new hammer so I don’t have much time to practice hitting people (This is mainly focused on wvw).

Utilities are still all shouts coz of AH as well as me having 6/6 s.soldier runes. I use soldier armor and cleric trinkets (mostly exotic anyway). Hammer/staff for the symbols. Then I run

5/0/30/30/5 build. the Valor trait line is pretty standard, AH, purity and something else. Honor is superior aria, Writ of merciful and either writ of persistence or pure of voice. My main goal for the build is to be one of the first few people to rush into the zerg head-on, so I tried to be a bit tanky (with the clerics) but still have a bit of good damage (although i can say, at the moment it’s pretty crappy =/).

I tried out this build after (at long last) realizing that the end proc of hammer is a symbol so I kinda heal myself with each AA chain. (cast time seems a bit too long imo though, but at least it doesn’t stop even when you’re kiting). What do you guys think?

That’s actually nearly identical to my build. However if you are planning on diving into groups of enemies you might want to go 0 0 30 30 10 for extra retaliation duration.

koldvico.4097:

I’m trying to make a build that involves a Mace & Shield, Touchness-style, and I have seen on spec websites armor called “soldier” which add +power, +toughness, and +vitality, but I’m not seeing anything specific towards that on the Trading Post or in the crafting menus. Anyone know where I could get some of this style armor?

Karma vendors at the god shrines sell pieces of this. (Except for the helm)

A more consistent way is to just run AC for tokens to trade for gear for those stats.

Iconoklast.2389:

I feel like this is a good build and was looking for some constructive criticism and also some weapon suggestions. I know I want to use the GS but am unsure as to what to use for my 2nd set.
Thanks in advance

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fUEQNAS7flUgiDnGyNEf4ESlC8JewUQgw31DIiiaIA;TEBA1yvEOJ1StlyJKnMOJcy6kzJpTrLGFcqYTyDDA

I would definitely take out the points from zeal since that adds no useful traits for you and the stats can be geared for rather than traited.

You need at least 5 points in virtue for inspired virtue since that is one of the best traits for guards.

Since you are building AH build I’d recommend one of the following:
0 0 30 30 10
0 0 30 20 20
0 5 30 30 5

Since you want to focus on wvw, you need a form of ranged attack for protracted zerg vs zerg fights and sieges.

You should also at least carry a staff with you for traveling and utility.

Shield/sceptor would be good for your second set.