Guild Wars 2

Its sound effect changed this patch. :0
It sounds nicer and “cuter” imo, befitting of its healiness.

Edit: Is it just me, or does it move a lot faster too?

I’m expecting “Dark/Death Knight”, since they use a greatsword and whatnot.

guardian.6489:

Anet stated that they didn’t want Guardians to be too powerful with a ranged weapon because of their defensive abilities.

Do you have the source for that?

Found this out awhile ago myself. I know ANet tend to ignore bugs, but this one seems kind of significant considering that the trait literally doesn’t work at all.

^If dervishes are a specialization, I’d expect it to be for elementalists. Maybe something which locks out fire magic and water magic in exchange for more focus in air magic and earth magic.

I’d love to see guardians get a monk specialization. Perhaps something like a “life attunement” could be involved in their profession mechanic.

Nick.6972:

Eh, giving Longbow to Guardian would be pretty boring, too much like Warrior.

Doubtful. If guardians got a longbow it’d likely be themed the same way Bow of Truth is themed (supportive, ranged, magical).

If people can solo entire dungeons then I doubt having effective support builds would “resurrect” the trinity (at least not in the sense that it’s the only viable way to play), it’d just make the trinity a viable thing to do.

An easy way to make other stats and builds viable in PvE is to make certain skills scale in damage with those stats (but only in PvE). Wouldn’t really solve the underlying issues in the actual gameplay though, I suppose.

^I’d love monks too. If guardians get them as a specialization I’ll be more than satisfied.

It’s not like groups need healers to succeed in this game anyway (in fact PvE is mostly just a DPS fest). Guardians and elementalists can already heal allies for very large amounts if built that way, yet you’ll only see such guardians/eles appearing occasionally in WvW or PvP.

I’m hoping for a longbow or trident. A spear would be nice too I guess, depending on its skill-set. I just really don’t want the new weapon to be something completely lame like double axes. >_>

nGumball.1283:

Most people will comment here are going to say no because the title attracts specifically that group of the player-base.

Tsunderes. “I-it’s not like I want to buy it or anything!”.

^Don’t blame the specialization, blame the inherent flaws in the PvE system. :>

I’m expecting the other specialization to use a mainhanded dagger or a rifle.

I’d be good with monks and paragons. Paragons could get an offensive ranged skill-set with a spear, and monks could get a supportive ranged skill-set with a longbow (or a trident). It’d be interesting to see what kind of other skills and profession mechanics they’d have as well.

The niche of Ritualist is kind of filled by the new profession.

Where was it said that the new specializations are for PvE?

It’s unlikely that you’ll notice 84 power missing. Shouldn’t make much of a difference in that regard.

For WvW it depends on your build, but most would just link you to this: http://metabattle.com/wiki/Build:Guardian_-_AH_Frontliner

For bosses, stats can vary, but most of the time you’ll be fine with berserker gear. Some bosses can’t be critically hit, so you can pretty much just pick any gear that provides power but not precision or ferocity.

Gregori.5807:

What do you think of Tome of Courage in dungeons? That one I like and have even used on my Asura Guard.

Works nicely in the right spots and at the right times.

Nice change to the torch, although I do wish they’d increase the range on torch #5. It has the potential to be such a good skill.

yLoon.5289:

Changes on Lithany still as useless as kitten if it doesnt provide Stability Boon through out the duration.

Sounds completely broken to me. :>

Assuming an ele and a guardian have 1000 healing power, and Orb of Light has a 3 second cooldown for its detonation (healing values from healing power are in brackets):

Water Blast:
Healing: 372 (+ 250) = 622
According to the wiki, water blast can be fired off every 1.25 seconds. So in three seconds, about three water blasts can be cast: 622 × 3 = 1866

Orb of Light:
Projectile healing – 271 (+ 200) = 471 (cannot affect user)
Detonation healing – 788 (+ 600) = 1388
Total healing: 471 + 1388 = 1859 (1388 to the user)

They offer almost identical healing. The ele doesn’t need aquatic benevolence/monk runes/benevolence sigils to outheal a 3 second Orb of Light detonation via Water Blast.

Keksmuffin.1450:

So you want a 1,5k heal on a 3 seconds cooldown on a weaponskill? wat

Eh, it’d give a reason to actually keep using the staff after its other abilities are on cooldown (3 seconds is probably too low though). Either way, water staff eles can do about the same just with their auto-attack.

ArchonWing.9480:

It is viable, but there are probably better things you could do. The thing is guardian abilities don’t really scale that well with healing power aside from regeneration and dodge heals.

The traditional weapon for healing is mace, but I think it’s probably better to use hammer to blast water fields. The 4s cooldown on it makes it one of the most effective means of support.

I don’t think there’s a class that scales better with healing power than guardians do (maybe eles).

The staff is the “traditional” weapon for healing, and its healing is also only really effective with healing power (precisely because it scales nicely with healing power). The mace’s healing is pretty terrible imo.

The additional cooldowns of Zealot’s Fire and Orb of Light serve different purposes I suppose. Not using the additional CD on Zealot’s Fire just felt pointless to me because the skill without the projectile isn’t much good. Orb of Light is somewhat different because the undetonated orb is better for damage, while the detonated orb is better for healing. From my experience though, I just detonate the orb for the healing since healing and buffing are the only reasons you’d use the staff. Using the orb for damage is okay I guess, but just switching to another weapon to attack generally seems like a better idea. I’d actually prefer it if they just increased the CD of the skill to 5 seconds and left out the additional detonation CD.

I agree that the staff should be slightly compensated. It isn’t exactly OP.

rajule.8054:

Arena Net doesn’t seem to do skill reworks like other games. if you look at patch notes 90% of the class “changes” are just tooltip clarifications.

There is an exception to this. They changed mesmers’ Mimic skill.

Guardians being able to use longbows. Not a ranger-wannabe longbow though, I’m thinking more along the lines of a long-ranged supportive weapon (with decent damage). Kind of like if the trident had decent values, and could be used on land.

Vizardlorde.8243:

It should make you nearly invincible for the duration if the damage you are putting out is nonexistent :p

If you’re referring to Tome of Courage; damage isn’t everything. Even though that’s essentially the case in PvE, it isn’t the case in other game modes (especially PvP).
If you’re referring to Tome of Wrath, then its damage should be buffed (not that it deals a bad amount of damage, it’s just not Lich Form), it shouldn’t be made pseudo-invincible.

If stability gets made the norm on tomes, I think the Elite Focus trait should reduce cooldown on tomes. Just making tomes 50% longer isn’t good enough for a master trait, imo.

Turtle Dragon.9241:

Right now, entering a tome means instant death if your opponents have conditions, because you have 0 ways of cleansing them(no, #2 of tome of courage does not work that way).

Entering a tome shouldn’t make you invincible (even though ToC nearly does just that, if you’re not focusing your healing on allies), and ToC #2 does cleanse conditions on the user (and quite a lot of conditions if it bounces to the user twice).
As for Tome of Wrath, it’s a long-ranged skill for a reason (same kind of goes for ToC). Although, I wouldn’t mind utility skills being made available in those forms in exchange for less total health/armor gained in each of the tomes.

I think ANet’s plan for Spirit Weapons was to make them the “support pets” (which I love the concept of, very unique), and while ANet actually succeeded in making them just that, they’re still mostly clunky and undertuned. The biggest reasons for their clunkiness are their cast times, the fact that they don’t go on cooldown immediately after summoning, and spirit weapons’ wonky trait placement. They also each have their own individual clunkiness, like how BoT’s active has a cast time when the other spirit weapon actives don’t, and like how controlling the shield’s reflection position is very difficult.

As for the idea of them being redesigned into conjured weapons and their old concept being removed entirely, utility tomes could just be a thing. Utility tomes could also give guardians more reliable ranged options (with trade-offs).

Tobeyeus.9376:

So essentially ANet spent the time coding a trait that will never see use.

Well, at least it’s more useful than Purity of Body. Purity of Body is at most an adept trait in a grandmaster slot, and in addition to that it takes up a valuable virtues slot.

In PvP, as a supportive weapon, it’s utter garbage. As a bunker weapon, it’s not bad (mainly due to its synergy with AH).

I think three conditions would be fine.

creepmatic.9435:

Slight offtopic
Looking by some of the skills that we have on our weapons, mainly the offhands, imply, by Anet’s way of thinking that the guardian should stay in the back with a scepter, while cleansing with torch or giving protection with shield. Is it only me? that thinks this is so wrong…

It depends on the guardian, which I’m okay with. I’ve never enjoyed the concept of a guardian strictly being frontline only. Most guardians don’t build on the squishier side of things though, so most of them typically don’t venture to the backlines (even glassy builds usually stay in mid range). Not that aiming cones to the backline from the frontline is that difficult

creepmatic.9435:

Cleansing Flame

It Pulses 9 times. Make each pulse clean 1 condition from ourselves also.
Similar to Ether Renewal minus the heal

Would probably be a bit broken having something like that on a 15 second cooldown (also just turns it into bunker weapon rather than a purely supportive one).
Personally I’d be fine with it if they just increased the range of the cone to 600 (or higher). Having to chase after and literally breathe down the necks of your allies isn’t exactly practical, especially since the user themselves are also getting AoE conditions because of this.

^Well, the only SW active that requires one not be disabled is Bow of Truth’s active, so stability doesn’t seem that necessary in a SW build to me either.

From my experience with spirit weapons, I think can confidently say that the hammer is probably the best one. The amount of CC it pours out is amazing, and the damage of its command ability isn’t too shabby either.

Ynna.8769:

I must admit I’ve underestimated the Bow of Truth a bit and I’m thinking of trying out a dedicated healing spec just to play around with it.

I’ve used it quite a lot. It’s difficult to aim (in PvP anyway) and people have a tendency to dash out of it, but the heal is very strong for a utility ability. It’s effective when used to heal bunkers since they usually stay on point, and are thus much easier to hit with the heal. It’s not bad when used to heal oneself either, of course.

Personally I prefer using Wall of Reflection in most situations, but I’ll switch to BoT when there aren’t many projectile users and/or my team has a lot of bunkers.

As for spirit weapon traits, I agree, spirit weapons have a bit too many traits. Some of those should be combined into one trait (like expeditious spirit into spirit weapon mastery or improved SW duration). With expeditious spirit combined, A Fire Inside could be moved to the power tree, and spirit weapons would be a lot easier to trait for.

and so is refreshing all your virtues.

I think it’s worth mentioning that AH works with Spirit Weapons.

Actually I don’t think that’s the case in PvP; it’s just that sometimes people make it seem that way because any build outside of the norm is often chastised by the community. Personally I find myself relying a lot on a bunker to hold a point during a team fight, and while healers aren’t a necessity to a team, there are perfectly good healer builds that can be used in PvP.
I do like the trinity though, and I wish builds could be even more specialized in this.

I frequently play a healer/support guardian in PvP, and from my experiences so far, my teammates very much appreciate my guardian, and it’s also the build with which I have my highest win rate (57% or something?).

From what I’ve read on this subject, it kind of seems like the condi-hybrid build isn’t actually bad. It’s just more situational than the normal builds, and it serves a different purpose.

^That.

I wonder what ANet’s logic was when they nerfed shield #4 for PvP. 5 seconds of protection -even in pvp- already isn’t very good.
I think it’d be interesting if shield #5 blocked AoE attacks. It’s unique functionality and it’d probably make it a decent skill.

I like Tobeyeus’s suggestion. Wards are generally fun to use.

There are some things I would change in that build for WvW. I mostly made that in mind for PvP (as I implied, and as was shown the build I linked), but you can keep criticizing it as a WvW zerg build if you want. :0

Tanks and healers typically work well in PvE, but if you wanna heal your allies a bit in PvE, Healing Breeze is a good place to start. Tome of Courage, and/or Zealot gear are also okay.

As for PvP, you’ve already been introduced to the tanky AH build. Healer builds in PvP are less common, but from my experiences they work just fine.
You can try this for a PvP healer/support (probably works in WvW too), it’s kind of glassy compared to other guardian builds, but I don’t really see anything beating it in terms of support: http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fVAQNAW7dl8ApXotDxeI0ENBEBl9JWR8xODT4CXFAA-T5xDABKcACo4ABU8FAAryAPt/AEPBAAOIAAA

I’ve never agreed on the whole “Waterfields > Guardians” argument in WvW.

Just things I thought I should point out:
- Considering that you’re using both a staff and a mace, it’s unusual that you wouldn’t use a cleric amulet.
- Runes of the Soldier serve little use on this build since it only has one shout. Not sure what you would replace it with.
- You should probably add in sigils of energy due to their synergy with Selfless Daring.
- I don’t see Empowering Might being particularly useful in this build. Writ of the Merciful, Writ of Persistence, or Two-Handed Mastery seem like better options to me.
- Ditching two points in honor and radiance each is probably a good idea so you can get Absolute Resolution.

DrDivine.5378:

I keep seeing eles who use staff and has this massive AOE damage with meteor shower

Those are glass cannon staff eles.

I think the two most prominent staff builds are a healer/bunker staff ele (Cleric’s, 0/x/x/6/6), and the glass cannon staff ele (Zerker’s, 6/6/0/0/2, or 6/2/0/0/6 if you use arcane). For the glass build, Runes of the Scholar or Runes of Strength are pretty good.

Something I like about the Silverwastes is that it really encourages build diversity (imo). Too bad dungeons can’t be more like that.

@OP: Tanks/bunkers and healers/supports are more welcome in WvW and PvP. PvE is mostly just a DPS fest, stat-wise anyway.

Rieselle.5079:

I want Tornado to be changed from a Transform to a nuke.
Make it a powerful, wide-area version of Glyph of Storms.

I agree. I always thought that the ele actually turning into the tornado instead of casting a tornado was kind of dumb anyway. A placeable Tornado would be much cooler to me.

I wasn’t aware medi builds were the norm in the first place in PvE.

Thaddeus.4891:

Did I said that ALL your healing skill are personal? Did i say that healing power is only for self-survivability? If you take a good build for the guardian and you put zealot gear on it, then you will have limited amount of group healing. You will have no source of regen, you shouldn’t have a staff, your passive F2 will only be for you, you probably will rarely use the active F2, etc.

You said “Most of your healing skill are personal”, which simply isn’t true unless you’re specifically talking about #6 skills. You also said “so you won’t gonna help your team much, its gonna be mostly yourself alone that you gonna help”, which also isn’t true because scaling on self-healing is terrible, which you appear to acknowledge.
Focus #4, VoR active provide regen (which can be activated more frequently with RF), and I don’t see why one wouldn’t activate VoR (unless they haven’t specced into Virtues at all, which is not the norm).

Thaddeus.4891:

Now, if you want to use zealot gear and change your trait to get more group healing skill then we change the discussion entirely. Then its not a good build with support, its a bad healing build.

Traiting for healing usually isn’t necessary for being able to heal decently. Healing Breeze (with a staff, if a moderate amount of healing power is used) already provides a lot of group healing, and if burst healing is really needed then Tome of Courage can be used.
About the staff’s DPS, I believe it’s about the same as a sword?

^That. I don’t have a problem with trade-offs.

Elite Focus wouldn’t quite fit in Honor (the healing support line) because Tome of Courage isn’t the only Tome. In fact, Tome of Wrath is quite the opposite of something you’d find in Honor. I don’t see Elite Focus fitting in Valor at all either. Even Zeal would make more sense than Valor.
I find Elite Focus to be appropriate in the virtues line (the general support line).

Edit: Regardless, if one is going into the Virtue line and takes Elite Focus, the only traits (that matter) that’ll be affected by a lack of RF are Inspired Virtue and Absolute Resolution. I wouldn’t say the trade-off is build-breaking.

I forgot to mention that I was mainly referring to allied healing abilities, self-healing abilities almost always have bad scaling. Some of my calculations were off though since I did them in somewhat of a hurry.
Regeneration roughly gets an 80% increase in effectiveness.
Orb of Light (with detonation) gets a 57% increase (something which scales particularly well with healing power, considering its CD).
Tome of Courage’s Heal Area scales well with healing power as well, although that’s situational.

Berserker gear alone only provides 39% crit chance, with 206% crit damage. With fury that’s 59%. If you’re going to include traits and runes in your comparison, then you should do the same for when you’re talking about healing.

Thaddeus.4891:

For the OP. Zealot won’t give you a lot of support by itself. Most of your healing skill are personal so you won’t gonna help your team much, its gonna be mostly yourself alone that you gonna help.

Not true, at all. The guardian has two healing skills which only affect themselves, shelter and signet of resolve, which both scale badly with healing power. Their self-healing traits also scale horribly with healing power (as you’ve already shown).
Healing power isn’t used for self-survivability, it’s used for group survivability.

Dahkeus.8243:

But I would very, very strongly recommend against something like Clerics or Zealot. The DPS loss is really massive and healing scales very badly

I wouldn’t really call the DPS loss “massive” with Zealot’s gear.
With about 800 healing power, healing skills can scale anywhere from a 40% to 80% increase in healing value. Not really bad scaling either in my opinion, especially considering that all allied healing is AoE in GW2, and in PvE people tend to group closely.

Without the ferocity that Berserker gear offers, Zealot gear deals about 20~% less damage. So it’s 20~% less DPS in exchange for 40%-80% stronger healing.

Keksmuffin.1450:

“I want Unscathed Contender back!” would be a better name imo.

Lol, this^

“Lead the Way!” would be a nice name for it. It references a paragon skill too.
“Charge” would have the same problem retreat does. In this case, it’d sound inappropriate when using it to actually retreat.

Tome of Courage.

oxtred.7658:

You’re in the wrong. Support also comes from dps.

If you mean direct DPS, then in that case, don’t misdefine support. If you mean offensive support like the things that Tome of Wrath offers, then nevermind.

Edit: Lionheart, if you wanna use healing in dungeons, consider using something like this: http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fVEQNArdWl8ApQolCxXIEENR8QlbK+iVGATAuPRUA-TRCBABVcGAs4BAMomgzUCyqyPs2fAgDBgqq/kneAA-e
Switch out Zealot’s for Zerker’s as you see fit.