Guild Wars 2

Does it stack with the movement bonus of sic’em? That would be a 70% movement speed increase for 10 seconds if so!

Gotcha. No denying D/P thieves can be strong, but like most things with this game it’s all the various traits / builds / weapon choices that can determine a fights outcome. For example with my hammer / scepter & torch meditation build D/P thieves don’t do much to me at all. With my playstyle being very much up in your face with strong upfront damage / keep you in place with immobilizes / purging conditions it’s pretty easy to force thieves into at least retreating. Hell, I’ve 1v2’d two thieves before and won. Granted the fights were annoying for sure, but still manageable because of how my build works and all that jazz.

TL;DR
Thieves can be annoying, but it’s your playstyle / build that will determine how well you can solo roam.

Those were some spectacularly bad Guardians, not gonna lie. Good gameplay on your end using pistol 5 to control damage, but Jesus Christ were those terribad Guardians.

Ramiah.5648:

Okay so what I’m hearing is that I CAN use staff/scepter+focus (or torch, as some other posts seem to suggest that for range) and be a holy wizard, but considering Spirit Weapons and Meditations (holy nuke-type stuff) aren’t that great, it’s only marginally effective.
That’s very sad. Well, perhaps after the buffs come through, I can revisit it again.
Oh and the armor doesn’t bother me too much. The chain skirts look kinda like you are wearing chainmail robes which I think is neat.

Not sure where you heard meditations aren’t that good, because that’s complete bunk. Meditations are definitely more for personal survival / condition shedding rather than the usual shout/AH builds everyone gravitates towards. Using monk’s focus each meditation heals for 2k health. Plus Judge’s Intervention (a gap closer that aoe burns), and Contemplations of Purity (converts all conditions to boons) are stun breakers, so you’ll be hard to lockdown in both PvE and PvP. On top of that Smite Condition is on a stupid short cooldown, and does an aoe blast that does more damage if it cures a condition. So if anything I’d say give the meditation build a shot for yourself and judge how it works with the playstyle you’re looking for.

As for spirit weapons I’m not sure how much more useful they are with the recent hp increase, but in pvp sans aoe damage I noticed most people tend to ignore them or just don’t target them at all. I haven’t really messed with spirit weapons much so can’t say much else.

darkchicken.8692:

Ramiah.5648:

I have always wanted to play a “holy mage” type of character. Most games with priest/paladins have either an alternative for damaging (i.e. shadow spells) or simply can’t deal damage.
So, here’s the deal, give it to me straight, can you play this type of Guardian and be effective? If not, that’s fine, I’ll move on and let my dream continue to be just a dream, but if it’s decent, and I can finally be the character I have always wanted, I’d be very happy. I was looking at maybe doing spirit weapons and staff/scepter+focus. Any other suggestions on making this work?
Oh, and are spirit weapons even worth it now that they can be targeted, or should I look into maybe meditations or something instead?

Yes you can. Guardian is the best at healing if spec and geared for. Staff is a great weapon and scepter got decent damage (an got an incoming buff to projectiles speed later down the line). If you take consecration spells, spirit weapons and such ,youll feel like a holy mage.

The only problem youll encounter would be gear look. Its hard to look like a clothy as a platewearer.

HotW (Honor of the Waves) BP and leggings have a clothy look about them, so that’s an option for OP I suppose.

Teamkiller.4315:

Ezeriel.9574:

I’m sure this thread will see a hundred posts from people explaining nothing while telling you how easy it is for them to kill thieves. (no offense, Kronyx^)

You may also get advice like “I just use scepter and altruistic healing” or the standard “guardians do so much self healing thieves are a joke, you must be doing it wrong.”

The fact is, while other classes are spec’ing to kill people guardians spec to run across the map, and then hide being other people.

My newest 80 is a thief, and I am horrible at playing it, but I took the trait to steal boons, because there was nothing else to take…

Long story short I remember that I could steal boons while fighting a guard that had popped Save Yourselves. I stole his retaliation and protection, and it left me feeling sorry for him.

I slaughtered the poor guy without needing to steal any boons, and without even knowing what the hell I was doing.

In recent memory I can only recall one guardian that did enough damage to be a threat, and he dropped like a sack of potatoes.

The 1 on 1 balancing in this game is some of the worst I’ve ever seen, and your chances of beating a thief that off-hands a pistol are non-existent.

You aren’t gonna beat one that used a pistol and off-hands a dagger either.

…you should probably avoid ones using a shortbow too.

TL;DR

1v1 me, we’ll see how your words stack up.

^ This and if dueling ever happens I’d love to see how big your game is vs your talk. Thieves are easy as hell on my Guardian. To answer OP’s question how you build your Guardian, and how you want to play him will give you an idea of how you’ll fair in a 1v1. I.e. support / AH Guardians might have a rougher time than say offensive / meditation focused Guardians.

Sandra Martino.3870:

Problem is that once harder content starts to roll out, a build that allows a player just to stand there and tank it will become mandatory.

Or you know, people could get better at timing dodges, blocks, evades, etc which is what the gameplay is all about: active user input.

The shield is still in high demand for higher level fractal runs, which is nice. I’ve seen a few people here and there that use the sword and/or hammer, but not often sadly.

wads.5730:

blinds are what ruin hammer builds

Or anyone’s build for that matter. They’re annoying no matter what class / build you play.

Aza.2105:

lLobo.7960:

Guardian is not “destroyed”. And there is much more to a guardian than just boons…

Before the patch a thief had nearly no chance against a guardian. Regen+Protection+Retaliation… guardian could just stand still on his GS simbol and the thief would just die…
Now it really depends on the skill of each player.
I can actually think of killing a guardian on my thief now.
And on my guard I actually have to play to kill a thief instead of just waiting for the thief to kill itself.

Oh really? According to anet guardian is all about boons. So how can there be much more to guardian than boons when just about every skill provides them?

Easy, use boons to bolster your playstyle, don’t revolve your playstyle solely around boons. Unless you want to play support Guardian, then your playstyle is buffing your allies lol.

style.6173:

Nah. No point in nerfing this. There are a lot of issues in the game and this isn’t one of them.

99 problems and dodge heal ain’t one. Amirite?

The idea the devs had about the RTL change was that it’s meant to be a initiation move primarily, hence why the cooldown is the same as it used to be if it lands an attack. The distance ‘nerf’ was more of a distance correction as it was meant to cover 1200m, not 1550 like it was previously. As for the ‘it should reduce the cooldown on block / aegis pop’ idea if any of you guys play as a thief if you attack someone with aegis or is blocking while invis your move doesn’t pop you out of invis since it didn’t really do anything, so it’s the same train of thought for RTL.

I can’t really speak for anything else regarding the changes they made for Elementalists, but RTL just has a different function now. Heck, the way it’s setup is almost similar to Judge’s Intervention to me for Guardians. JI you HAVE to have a target for it to work, otherwise you port in place lol. Makes things very intense when you’re trying to find neutral / ambient mobs to target to port to for escapes / catching up.

Riviin.4923:

I’m just gonna put this out there because i can’t find this word anywhere in relation to us Guardians…

Axe??

I’d love to be able to use an Axe or even a GreatAxe, Duel Wield Axes? maybe…
I’m happy with how we are now tbh but yeah… thoughts

If Anet ever releases greataxes in this game, I’d be 150% all over that lol!

Since we’re throwing ideas out there, how about a 1h spear that can used on land? Hell, I’ll take a 2h spear if I can use it on land!

JohnDied.3476:

Grenades will need to be brought down another dozen times before they’re balanced. The other day I was on my ele and an engineer threw a grenade at me. It hit so hard that it uninstalled guild wars and my pc set itself on fire.

Omg this made my night

I think I see way more thieves in wvw and in Lion’s Arch more than any other class. Guardians, Warriors, and Elementalists I see quite often as well.

With varying stacks of might I’ve seen my retal hit up to as high as 450-500 per person in wvw….think it’s affected by that person’s armor rating as well with regard to what kind of numbers to expect.

Anyone else think Daecollo was playing this while he made this post? XD

Being ‘tanky’ in dungeons is tricky business, unless you have access to protection quite often (i.e. hammer chain, shield #4, shouts, etc). If you want to go full on bunker power/toughness/vitality gear is the way to go. If you want to spice up some damage with that you could also do a p/v/t armor setup with knight’s accessories (power/precision/toughness) so that you have some nice crit chance and still keep the base armor pretty high up. Traits I’ll leave up to you to decide though…I use a meditation build for personal survival / damage so I wouldn’t be the one to talk to about shout builds of the overly popular altruistic healing builds that are out there.

Amins.3710

You sound like a pug zerger.

I used to do this too.

Sounds like you mad bro. Actually I mostly solo camp turn, havoc squad, or run in a small group. I’ll join up with zergs only if they need backup, which is why I said Meditation builds are handy in all pvp encounters, or did you miss that part when you were kitten? Nice try on trying to make yourself feel better though! Next time don’t try to belittle someone when they present information that is counter to your train of thought. Just makes you look silly. <3

eldain stenlund.4306:

FloXun.1456:

OP, what name find you more fitting than?

Better fitting name: Boon bot.

Thats what guardian is at the moment. nothing more.

They have one thing to think about.
“do i have all boons up”

Yeah, no. Maybe for your AH support build, but not for me. Guardian’s name is perfect, quit being so mad.

Confusion is supposed to be a condition that punishes people for spamming abilities while it’s on them, but given that even if using 2 skills (a heal and condition removal let’s say) a handful of stacks on confusion would do upwards of 5k damage almost instantly, and that’s not counting whatever else you’re building up. Tell me what other condition does that much damage in such a short period of time. Not even max stacks of bleeding do the same amount of damage that confusion could in a specific amount of time. I’m positive confusion builds will still be viable, they just won’t be insta-gibs anymore.

Nelict.7589:

Sil.4560:

It’s more like “die because you didn’t dodge instead of expecting boons to save you”. Some builds may now scare you – there is risk!

Oh, on the contrary never expected only to my boons to do that. You gain surv by knowing what happen around you, by dodging corectly and be on the edge at every moment.
Basically the problem is that it’s a risk to give your boons. I mean giving boons may be the worst for your party if the party against have many warriors. Image 7-8 full zerk warrior 100blade your full boon party So it’s like Anet tell you "Don’t use boons on the WvW " instead of “Don’t give your boons freely”. Because if you give 2-3 boons it’s already 6-9% more damage… I don’t mind cause I can play only for my self with meditation build/signet build etc but this way you take all the fun and the supporting that one char can give to another. Worse they convert generally good support skills through boons to something like conditions…

PS: You can’t dodge forever mate. Try playing a guardian with 16k-18k life against a
group of 15+ ppl and tell me if dodge by itself helped you staying alive >.<

With Orrian Truffle and Meat Stew (40% endurance regen) and Vigor up you can dodge a hefty amount of damage along in big encounters. Dodging + well timed heals / abilities are what will help sustain you in large encounters (i.e. line of warding / ring of warding to make enemies bop into it trying to chase you helps with damage mitigation)

Raptured.9307:

I mean the only way that can happen is if they use blocking AND renewed focus, which gives them temporary invulnerability like with mist form and elixir s.

Essentially yeah. Those 2 skills combined is 5 seconds of invulnerability, and if you use the vampirism rune set (like I do) the mist form it provides gives you an additional 3-4 seconds on top of that.

Amins.3710:

Harbinger.8637:

Meditation builds don’t really rely on boons. It’s going to hit AH based builds the hardest.

Meditation Builds also don’t rely upon Stability like AH builds tend to do, but more on dodges and blocks (GS + S/F)…. making a might signet warrior pretty much a death sentense in group fights.

- Actually it’s extremely easy to spot signet warriors in group encounters. They’re also the squishiest of the bunch 9 times out of 10 and go down extremely easily. Mark him and burn him. Done. Also meditation builds have some crazy good burst healing, even with little healing power, which is insanely handy in prolonged engagements as that keeps your sustain high even when your heal is on cooldown. GS / S&F is nice, but like the trait choices I address below weapon choices for meditation builds is extremely diverse and subjective to how you want to play. I use hammer, scepter & torch, and sword & shield and I can control the battlefield pretty kitten well and in doing so can keep extremely mobile by denying enemies territory / mobility.

Amins.3710:

This is going to effect our builds, pushing the DPS Mediation build back into 20 Virtues for a another Stun Break/Stability on VoC or Spec’n for Dodge Heal…

- Personal ‘quality of life’ choice maybe, but not necessary, especially if you have Judge’s Intervention and Contemplation of Purity.

Amins.3710:

Before you could spec a 15/15/30/5/5 and focus on blocks/dodging/blinds instead of boons and AH.

- 20/0/30/20/0 is what I use for my meditation build and my focus is more on sustained damage that’s bolstered when someone’s ignited as well as personal survivability.

Amins.3710:

Rarely did I ~ever~ have protection up. I had 1 ability (VOC) that gave it to me and running around w/ a whooping 15k hp and 2700 armor… I just see this build getting wrecked now but 1 class.

- If your hp values are that low then get some valks, p/v/t, or anything with vitality to bolster it. Running with 3400 attack, almost 20k health, and 2.9k armor with 30% crit chance (with maintenance oils) and I hit like a truck with or without crits. If you go mostly / full glass cannon don’t complain about low hp pools or overall squishyness.

Amins.3710:

Will it happen all the time, no. But when 1 Signet warrior comes in w/ a team, it’s going to have a serious impact on this builds survivability.

- Then learn to focus him first. Signet warriors are already easy as kitten to spot, and they have tissue paper for armor 9 times out of 10.

Amins.3710:

The greater issue is that we have basically been pushed into this META build of AH / Support and now they’ve decided it was too powerful and are giving people abilitys to counter this… yet like the D/D Ele vs Staff Ele, our ‘other builds’ don’t compare as good outside of small squirmishes and PvP.

- Only reason why AH is popular is because it’s easy, just like D/D ele. Meditation builds are strong as kitten in any kind of encounter. Also while they’ve mostly dropped off the map I’ve seen a few spirit weapon Guardians running around that do well in small engagements. So there’s other options.

Amins.3710:

Meaning a D/D Ele in a large group setting isn’t as big of a deal as a D/D Ele in a small squad out bombing groups and roaming.

- D/D ele can still be a big deal by just being able to run in to an enemy zerg, pop a few aoe skills / knockdowns, then run back out, giving their zerg / team time to disrupt them further.

Amins.3710:

Whereas Staff Ele’s in larger group play are absolutely amazing and the D/D Ele doesn’t shine as much.

- Staff ele has better aoe for sure, but D/D can still be pretty slippery to catch in a large zerg fight.

Amins.3710:

Same can be said for Guardians… DPS Builds do not shine in large group play because, well, we’re ~super~ squishy, where as AH Staff Guardians and 2h Bunkers do ~really~ well.

- Nope. Maybe it doesn’t work well for your specific build type, but the way my Guardian is built he can get in, deal some great damage, and get out alive. I will agree that the bunker AH builds are mega strong in a zerg / large group setting, but they’re not the end all be all build of Guardians. Catch one of these guys alone and they’re done for every time. Hell, even in small encounters they’re the last to go down typically because they do such sad damage that you can just ignore them and nuke everyone else 1st.

Not trying to mock your opinions, just showing you there’s more than 1 way or train of thought to handle the situations and builds you mentioned.

Boon hate and the 3 unblockable signet ability both need to be traited for, which means those people that do that will have to give something else up in their build just for that. Also you guys are making mountains out of mole hills before actually seeing what the patch will bring, and how the new changes will affect us. I know I’m not the only one who’s unafraid of these changes, just because it’ll be pretty easy to spot who the boon haters / signet warriors will be.

Between Mesmer’s claiming their class is broken due to confusion nerfs, Guardians complaining that boon hate and the warrior’s unblockable signet trait will break our class, and Elementalists saying their class is broken because of the D/D nerfs plus boon hate the forums sound very much like the whole ‘the world is going to end in 2012’ bit all over again. Y’all need to calm down. Until you’ve played with the new changes there’s nothing to panic over. I guarentee you confusion builds will still be just as viable (even at 50% reduced damage confusion will still be mega strong), Guardians will still be able to do what they do, and Elementalists will likewise still be able to do what they do, but just have to be more away of CDs on skills and whatnot.

Also if you’re seriously thinking of rerolling your main just because of a change coming up that hasn’t been implemented yet and/or don’t want to test out the changes once they do arrive and adapt to them is just sad. Fairweather class players ho!

Sandra Martino.3870:

Sil.4560:

Amins.3710:

Sil.

There’s not doubt Bunker builds are the worst enemy for both Guardians and Warriors.

But you cannot argue the fact that a “DPS” type guardian is going to survive w/ these changes.

I suppose we’ll discover how things play out, which is what I’ve been saying across multiple threads. I’m hoping this is beneficial for warriors. Guardians have been high up on the chain of fighting others for some time, so I can’t really feel any sympathy if there’s a month of weakness for them between now and the next patch. It’s part of balancing and maybe it’s guardians’ turn to feel the burn.

And your “No Effort” blocking… is completely unfounded. Your timing / recharge for burst and the amount of burst available to the Warrior class outweights the blocks we have.

I think what you might want to re-iterate is the amount of blocks we have that eliminate your CC (stuns), for which you open with for your “Burst”.

Not the same. Not even close.

That must be why the guardians in WvW can frequently tank and recover from absurd amounts of warrior attacks plus five other people beating on them. Dunno. I see similar arguments from plenty of guardians and yet the actual effects in game are obvious. I can’t really be kitten to get into some petty theory debate with someone on an internet forum who is ultimately just going to resort to “L2P”; that’s always how things go on these forums. We’re just going to have to play the patch and actually see. Not to be rude, but I feel that I saved us some time. Have a good day.

You must play a warrior, and bad as well. If all you get is L2P, why dont you? We both know, heck the forum knows that what you state is utter kitten. Why not acknowledge you are the one that is wrong? Nvm, this is the internet.

The only confirmed 1v5+ win is a d/d ele, which is on youtube somewhere.

…and Mesmers, thieves, and before it was nerfed 100 grenade engies lol.

What Sil is basically saying is just chill the kitten out, wait for official patch notes, and comment after changes have been made. No point throwing all the hissy fits before anything’s happened.

Aisina.4963:

My first choice when I levelled my Mesmer was the Shatter build. Turns out its freakingly easy to play, won a 5vs1 within a few hours of gearing up. I like a challenge, and Shatter just made me feel like I roflstomped, so she got a bit benched. It’s also impossible to run it in my WvW raids, my lack of toughness = insta death, and the overall usefulness of her… Not so great.

Two days ago I thought I’d level a second Mesmer for the Glamour build. Spent ages on a spec, testing all sorts out. She’s level 67 and I figured I’d finish her off today and gear her. Now I’m at a loss of what to do with her, there’s no point speccing Shatter, I already have one haha, no point in two.

Do you guys think it’s worth me speccing her up for confusion still? Or should I wait out the nerf and decide after?

Wait….you leveled 2 seperate Mesmers, just for different builds? You are aware of the respec option the trainers give right? XD

J J.7902:

Entropy.4732:

Honestly, I love this game, but I fear this nerf is a sign of it heading in the wrong direction. Leveling a character to 80 and grinding a ton of gear only to discover that all your work was done under a false assumption, namely that the build you were grinding for would EXIST in the future, is endlessly frustrating. And it weakens my loyalty to the game. When another MMO comes along, I’m gonna be tempted to leave now. Big time.

I think in reading this you have called out the problem. If the reason you leveled a toon, and grinded a ton of gear was for the one trick (confusion) doesn’t that mean you inherently knew it was a bit OP honestly?

I didn’t level a Necro for its ability to fear and certainly didn’t level a ranger for its ability to immobilize. I did both because I enjoyed all around gameplay/mechanics.

If we wanna talk nerfs, have you ever rolled a ranger? QZ got nerfed into nothingness, spirts are a joke, traps and pets are almost worthless without specc’ing into them pretty heavily…etc but what do we do, adapt!

I for one am glad to see all the one trick pony builds getting the hammer. In WvW right now if you see a mesmer its a glamour, if you see a ele its a d/d, if you see a thief its a heartseeking hero. I love variety and my unconventional necro is proof!

Agee 110%.

Also I have to mention that confusion should punish players for not paying attention to it, but when the default tick amount is in the 300-500’s for less than 5 stacks that’s a problem. Even with heavy condition gear bleeding stacks do maybe what, 130 a tick per second? If you’re in a fight and you try use 2 moves (let’s say a heal and a condition removal) with a few stacks of confusion you take WAY more damage than a full duration bleeding effect could ever hope to accomplish in a fraction of the time. Confusion is still going to punish players for spamming skills when it’s on, it just won’t be an insta-gib.

Yamsandjams.3267:

I still use the scepter on my support guardian. The immobilize can be pretty useful, and smite lets you attack people on walls. It’s maybe not that great for open field combat, but I don’t believe that everything needs to be great for every situation. I can see how it would not be very appealing if you are offensive spec’ced though.

Works fine on a offensive spec as well (3400 attack w/ 30% crit chance on my Guardian.) I use it as a combo creator using the immobilize as my opener, with smite and cleansing flame (torch #5) cast back to back while the person is immobilized. The numbers that fly up are wonderful.

The unblockable attacks on warriors is only available by going a full 30 in the discipline tree from what I understand, and only affects the 1st 3 attacks when the signet is activated. As is the boon hate dps add-on, so it’s a super specific trait line add on, which isn’t going to be a game breaker in the least. Thieves will be able to steal boon via sword / dagger wield style, so that also will change up a lot of the d/p or d/d thieves running around. These changes aren’t game breaking in the least.

Make giant smores I suppose!

Dr Acula.3496:

Guildy of mine. All the ECHO vids are zerg busting under our old guild tag. We are now Good Fights.

http://m.youtube.com/user/JDHarris66

Bless you sir for having an amazing account name lol! Man I miss Scrubs…

Anonymous.6935:

Thank you

Atleast this’ll get me away from this game. Started to play it a bit too much now anyways :P

wookie.8934:

It’s funny. I’m betting 90% of the players who claim they will quit will not actually do so… and if they do, will be back in a week.

Wishful thinking I guess! There are other games out there you know, and real world lives to keep people occupied. Thing is with all these nerfs, this game will no longer be enjoyable to play, thus it will no longer be played. Simple as that lol.

…actually the game will still be enjoyable, you just need to change up your tactics a bit. People on the Guardian forums are going bananas as well with the whole warrior unblockable signet thing, but to be honest these changes aren’t going to ‘break the game’ as all the doomsayers say it will. People are resistant to change, and will always throw hissy fits when said change comes around. Lord knows Everquest 2 went through THREE entire combat revamps (1 of which was also a total reworking of my Paladin class in addition to the combat revamp) in my time playing it, and there’s still lots of people playing that game today. Just take a breath, wait for official patch notes, and then try the changes out for yourself. Only real way to find out just how different the changes are.

It’ll have to be a 30 rank trait line for boon hate at least. 3 unblockable attacks isn’t bad at all, especially since they have to use the signet’s active for it to work.

Obtena.7952:

Amins.3710:

But a smart warrior, in TS/Vent, in a solid guild grp, will now shut down a guardian.

I wouldn’t worry about such a low frequency occurrence. That’s alot of ’IF’s in order for a Guardian to get shut down. It’s not like they can ignore the people you are running with either. You would be toast if you got focused in this scenario anyways. One signet won’t make or break it.

Honestly, my biggest concern here is IF I do happen to meet my nemesis in battle and it’s 1 vs. 1, what my chances are going to be … I certainly don’t want to simply feel like I should lay down and die to him every time. I just don’t buy all this doom and gloom, we aren’t the only targets out there with boons and we aren’t always the primary focus for PVP either. Playing smart will go a long way to how much of this affects you.

Agreed with the first part and the fact that most everyone on the Guardian forum is forgetting other classes have as many ways to access boons as we do. Also in a 1 v 1 it would be easier to judge / predict their moves and counter them accordingly.

The fact remains that that specific trait isn’t going to be a ‘all attacks warriors make at all times of the day while traited for this will be unblockable,’ because that’d be kittening stupid. It’s going to be a “next _ attacks will be unblockable,” much like the thief’s signet that their next 5 attacks do 15% more damage, and I don’t hear anyone complaining about that particular signet. Not to mention if they place that specific trait in either a trait line most warriors don’t use, or put it in a trait line where they have to choose that trait vs another they would prefer, then that mixes up Warrior build specs, which in turns provides more variety for combat. I understand everyone’s fear of glass cannons building this, but to be honest signet warriors are so easily shut down that I don’t think this will be that much of an issue. Let’s just try not to blow this out of proportion before we even see the actual patch notes.

Sandra Martino.3870:

You actually might pull it off yes. You do that, you make it back into your zerg and every utility+elite is on a long cooldown and you just stand there. Now what? you dance for 2 minuts and do it again and call that “viable” meleeing in wvw?

If that is how you like to play, be my guest. I prefer ranged capability.

To clarify I don’t do that move set willy-nilly in a zerg. You have to wait for the best moment to strike (like anything else in this game.) Also every time I jump in and wall in people in the ring, a good amount of people from my zerg will take notice and begin aoe-dumping that area, or moving in to melee range themselves, thus taking pressure off you. The heal / invuln combo I mentioned is just a means of guarenteeing escape 90% of the time. If ranged is that important to you then perhaps this profession isn’t what you thought it was.

Sandra Martino.3870:

I dont understand your argument, zergs nuke the ones that are closest. If they suddenly see a red person in the middle of their zerg this person will be focused by 40 people. Even with 4k armor and 25k hp you will not survive. Hence, melee is not viable in my pov in wvw.

Dodges back toward your zerg, Shelter, and Renewed Focus work wonders for returning back to your zerg. Also with ring of warding up and people running into it trying to chase you helps as well. Melee is extremely viable, you just have to play smart about it.

Ring of Warding + Judge’s Invervention = the most fun you can have watching a group of people panic that they’re in an enemy combo field. I jump into zergs and survive all the time. Just a matter of what you bring with you gear / utilities wise.

From what I understand the unblockable hits on the warrior is on a signet (easy to identify), will have x-number of hits that are unblockable (and I guarentee you said x-number of hits will be on a timer that’ll wear off it unused), and have to be traited. Why is everyone having a hissy fit about this? You can spot that kitten a mile away! Hell, if anything it’ll make fighting warriors EASIER just because you can just wait for them to use the signet (it does put a huge signet icon over their heads when anyone uses a signet) then just blind / knockback / heal up / dodge / whatever you have to do to keep yourself up and mobile.

So things to keep in mind about these changes:
1. They’re situational builds for those classes that have to be traited to become usable.
2. These changes were put in place to counter people (not just Guardians) who would pile on boons and just easy mode everything (i.e. d/d ele)
3. Save Yourselves and all the boons we can pile on will still make us extremely viable, these changes will just make some Guardians have more situational awareness now rather than the old ‘hurr durr I hit all my shouts and go where I please’ mentality.
4. Until the actual patch hits numbers and skill effects are subject to change.

Teamkiller.4315:

Again, the only way thieves can take advantage of this is going S/D, which without Boon hate is a sub par build.

And have you ever dueled a warrior? Given equal skill they are laughably easy and I would smack you for losing to one if you two were at comparable skill levels.

Agreed.

Sandra Martino.3870:

There are like 3 or more threads about our lacking ranged viability that sank to the 3th and 4th topic page… really?? All you care about is making topics about changing 1 trait and call it a new build and actually get 20 responds on that? What is wrong with this community??

Videos like: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lSJ0pqRwjuU deserve an outburst to be honest, currently we are only viable in WvW if we are full support. I mean, do you actually walk into the other zerg and start meleeing them? What about PVE?? You actually walk up to that boss that swings for 40k damage?? Any remotely competitive content where your intent is not only support but also remotely dps is deminished and frankly nobody gives a kitten according to these forums. Nice…

You’re 600% wrong if you think we’re only good for support in wvw. I have 0 problems with melee or ranged damage on my Guardian in both pve and wvw. As other people have mentioned before, our ranged is fine. If they beef it up in some way, something else of ours will have to be nerfed in turn. Also if you treat scepter like a combo weapon you’ll have a better time. I use scepter / torch and my combo usually is #3 —> #2 —> #5 —> #4 while 5 is in mid channel, then #4 again to toss the fireball. TONS of damage and at the very least will make most people panic and burn stun breakers early.

9k killshot / eviscerate. Had tons of might stacks on me and vulnerability stacks on my enemy to pull that off lol!

Or you know, you could keep a staff / greatsword in your backpack that you swap to while traveling, then switch back to your primary weapon sets when fighting’s about to happen. That what I do with my hammer / scepter & torch combo and I have no problems getting around.

NANA.2853:

in future they could release, new part off gw2 and just flood all old areas (joke)
I think is good idea because underwater combat is little bit left out on this game.

Just imagine underwater wvwvw map ;D

I’m sure if that happened a ton of people would have an anneurism over it (not entirely sure why, underwater combat isn’t that difficult,) but I for one would be all aboard for that!

It seems a lot of the areas in wvw are pretty barren, with the only decently wooded area being the area just outside blue keep, and behind the red mill all the way up to the northwest. Is there any chance there’ll ever be a heavy forested area like in the sub-zero fractal? Maybe without the visual decrease (although wvw would be much more engaging than it already is with environmental effects like that), but something to breakup the terrain so zergs, roamers, and small groups alike can utilize the environment more to their advantage.

Teamkiller.4315:

Amins.3710:

I run a full Mediation because AH builds are inferior unless using a Staff or Pve’n…

AH build inferior to a meditation build…right you keep telling yourself that

Different playstyles bro. Meditation is super sick if you’re playing an offensive playstyle, while AH is more for group supporty-shout builds.

Guardian elites aren’t as bad as the OP claims they are. Granted I use Tome of Courage for dungeons mostly, but in pvp Renewed Focus is amazing no matter what your build is just because it’s 3 seconds of invulnerability that gives you all your virtues back. What more can you ask for?

azurerogue.9240:

This thread is so precious

The trolling is strong with this thread lol

Actually torch is pretty boss…not sure why y’all are saying it’s bad. The initial action on #4 can be used while other moves are channeling, like a shout that auto-burns enemies around you for 3 seconds (the burning amount on this is crazy strong even with no condition damage as well). The 2nd part to it has 1,200 range, splits the total damage from the 1st half of the skill into direct damage and a burning effect. Purging Flames (#5) is a really good channeled frontal ae that can hit through walls, can’t be reflected, and cures conditions on allies passing through it.

If you want to talk about numbers just using the 2nd part to torch #4 I’ve hit people upwards of 9k with just the direct damage part of it, and the burning damage from the skill deals 2k-ish damage after that. If you have the trait Fiery Wrath under the Zeal tree this offhand weapon is great for keeping an enemy consistently on fire if virtue of justice is on cooldown or hasn’t procced yet. Plus the natural cooldowns on the torch are pretty low, which is a big plus.

As for weapon combos with it I use a scepter with it and using the immobilize on a target, then immediately using smite + purging flames + activating the 1st part of #4 towards the middle-end of the channel of purging flames so I can throw it using the 2nd part of #4 once the channel for purging flames ends. It is a crazy sick combo of multiple damage sources hitting 1 or more targets all at once. Keep in mind every hit of purging flames and smite have their own crit chances, so even with my 30% crit chance some serious numbers can add up (highest purging flames I can remember off hand has been 6k.)

TL;DR – torch is awesome for both straight up damage, and consistent burning damage. I use it in both pve (used scepter / torch combo as my ranged backup weapon set since lvl 7) and pvp and never have an issue with it. Only negative I can say is that the 2nd half of torch #4 is that it follows the ground, so stuff like the harpies in fractals tend to not get hit by it very often.