Guild Wars 2

Preface: I do mainly WvW.

I really want to like my Ranger. And I did, until I leveled some other characters. I used to think it really wasn’t in terrible shape until I saw what other classes could actually do. I’ve currently got a lvl 80 Ranger, Guardian and Necro. Out of the three, Ranger is by far not only the least effective in combat, but provides the least benefit to my group. Even my necromancer performs better.

In the rare small group fight, the Ranger does alright. But as long as WvW continues to be so zergy, the Ranger will always be sub par.

I tend to agree. Zerging is the worst aspect of WvW. Now I don’t mind getting melted by a zerg because when something like that happens, it’s usually my fault for not getting out of there. What I hate is that the mindset of zerging is backwards. The game rewards players for balling up inside of enemy aoe attacks. You should punish players for standing in AOE under any circumstance.

If they just removed the aoe cap or even just upped it to 10 instead of 5, I think you’d see a lot more interesting gameplay that rewards actual intelligence and tactical play.

I’m loving 30/25/0/0/15 for my power build. I run a mix of Knights/Berserker/Soldiers gear so it’s not full glass cannon, but it MELTS people. The trick is to use your immobilize and fears to keep them in your wells and they’ll be down before they know it. Running Dagger/Warhorn with the traited 4s daze and staff. I initially thought survivability would be an issue but it’s really not as long as you play smart.

The one thing I miss is greater marks. I spent a long time trying to figure out how I could work it in, but I couldn’t find something else I was willing to sacrifice for it. For running with the zerg, you can swap out the warhorn trait for area targeted wells which helps to make up for it a little bit.

That and I can’t stand the jagged horror from speccing into Death Magic.

Kaleban.9834:

Point is, a dumb player rushing into AoE SHOULD be crushed, rather than counting on a lame game mechanic to save them from their stupid decision.

And as I and others have said multiple times, the balance to AoE is to simply not stand in it. Meteors could do hundreds of thousands of damage, but if no one was dumb enough to sit under them, the skill would effectively do zero damage. Besides, as a couple others have noted, in what other game is rushing INTO AoE an effective tactic to cut down on total overall damage, much less the question of whether it makes any sense rationally.

This. This. A thousand times, this.

John T Hall.3574:

There is one thing that your forget in your logic. The zerg doesn’t think, it has no ability to comprehend anything beyond devour and breed. They won’t care if they are going to be killed, they will just regroup. I can understand the AoE cap, it would be kind of silly if a single person could hold off an entire zerg, but the cap is quite low. Choke points are useful if you think about it, setting up a trap at a cliff can easily kill off a zerg(Since most back up instead of looking behind.) The AoE cap should be a little bit more(Maybe 7-10) but there should always be a cap. If your smart, you can overcome 50+ zergs with 10 people, you just have to think and place siege equipment in spots where they can’t go around.

Granted. So if the zerg doesn’t think, has no ability to comprehend anything beyond devour and breed (lol) and don’t care if they’re going to be killed, why should they be successful at what they’re doing? If they don’t think and just ball up in a giant cluster they should be punished for it, not rewarded.

Behellagh.1468:

Simple. It would make a single character wielding AoE attacks insanely powerful if they can hit everyone in the target region. Get a couple of such characters together and they can recreate the fight in 300 anywhere.

That’s why there’s a cap on number of affected by an AoE attack.

Only if all of your targets stand in one spot for you.

Everybody thinks AOE would be OP because of the current zerg tactics. Remove the cap, and the tactics will change.

-People will spread out instead of stack up to help against AOE. This not only makes more sense, but would also lead to much more interesting fights that encompass a larger area of the battlefield.

-Exploiting weak points in your enemy’s formation would become extremely important (as they are now spread out instead of one giant zerg) leading to more tactical fights. This is a huge plus.

-It’s much less likely that people would get insta-gibbed as the combat would be more spread out. In short, you wouldn’t get hit by 40 people at once.

-Flanking, among other tactics gains importance leading to more interesting tactical gameplay.

-Choke points actually become useful and dangerous.

-Skill begins to matter more than numbers. 10 smart players can hold off a zerg of not so smart ones.

The list goes on. Removing the AOE cap would get rid of this silly zerg mentality that predominates WvW and make people actually think. I can’t begin to describe how much more interesting and engaging it would be.

Copy and paste into browser – vimeo.com/55868710

Rest of the video is meh. But skip to:

0:53 – Using Sanctuary to trip up fleeing enemies

1:22 – Using Sanctuary to res commander by myself in the middle of an enemy group.

Sanctuary is extremely situational. But useless? Hardly. You can also throw it down behind you to lose pursuit.

When it says “healing skill”, does it also proc on things like empower? If so, then I might check it out.

Depends on your build. Pick sigils that synergize with your play style. Personally, I love me some sigils of Hydromancy. Can’t get enough AoE chill in WvW.

I’m pretty sure it’s just “Take no damage from attacks.” When people hit you, it shows as “-0” as opposed to the “Invulnerable” text that comes up when someone has invulnerability.

I’ve also noticed conditions still being applied. Sadly, I think this is working as intended. One of the reasons I stopped using signet of stone as half the time I used it, I still died anyways from conditions.

Some clips of DA in action!

http://www.vimeo.com/57143447

http://www.vimeo.com/52354996

And a fun one: https://vimeo.com/59469540

For those wondering, some of these clips are from before we transferred back to JQ. But this is our permanent home now.

I really want to play without AH/EM. So much so that I’ve gone lengths with different gear and builds to try and find something else viable. While I’ve found a number of builds that are certainly useful, it’s hard for me to argue at this point that AH/EM isn’t the best way to go for a WvW Guardian. Which saddens me because I have more fun with ground targeted consecrations, but I just feel so much more useful to my group with AH/EM and a shout based build.

Back on topic, if you think 1h sword sucks, try it with either a focus or a shield and GS for your swap. You can close distances scary fast with the GS leap and sword teleport. Not to mention both are aoe blinds. Combined with the virtue that makes justice cause blindness and renew each time you kill a foe, your enemies will be seeing a lot of, “Miss”

It looks pretty fragile for WvW in my opinion. But worth trying out at least.

There is some good critique here, but a lot of it is related to playstyle in my opinion. You have to play guardian with a different mindset than other classes.

- Defending Sieges (Guardian 2 × 2 Elementalist)
You’re right that guardians are limited here with scepter attacks, but if you change your strategy from trying to damage enemies on siege to just trying to keep them away from it, your effectiveness goes up dramatically. With ground targeted consecrations and staff, I can keep enemies off of a siege build site for about 12 seconds. Which is more than enough time for my team to nuke it.

2:37 in the video: http://vimeo.com/52354996

- Skirmish Battles (Guardian 2 × 3 Elementalist)
“Guardian: You can push enemies alone, though if they’re a coordinated group you’re probably dead if you get focused from 5~10 at once.”

This depends entirely on how you trait and equip. I routinely soak up focused fire through use of high toughness, altruistic healing, healing dodge rolls, and protection. Granted you can only take focused fire for so long, but that’s a far cry from saying you’re probably dead if you get focused from 5-10. Not to mention how much damage you do in those situations by keeping retaliation up.

- Massive Battles (Guardian 2 × 4 Elementalist)
“Guardian: You’re limited to ranged weapons or support (healing) with a Staff. "

Support, yes. Healing, no. Support is not just healing. It’s throwing up consecrations, keeping buffs up. Empower as often as you can for the aoe might stacks. I would say that in this game, healing is almost just a side effect of support.

You’re never going to compete in ranged damage with other classes. This is by design. Can you imagine how OP wall of reflection would be if we could throw it up then stand behind it and dish out massive ranged damage? So when you’re at range, swap to a staff and something with a shield offhand for your 2nd set. Keep buffs up and use your consecrations strategically. You can hold off a choke point while your allies bombard it with siege. (1:05 in the same vid – http://vimeo.com/52354996) Not to mention sanctuary is basically a free res

http://vimeo.com/user13950464/da-nov-dec-wvw-vimeo

0:53 – Using sanctuary + line of warding to slow down fleeing enemies so teammates can catch up.

1:23 – Using sanctuary for a res in the middle of a med/large group of enemies.

- 1v1s (Guardian 2 × 7 Elementalist)
Pretty accuarate critique here. You won’t be running many people down with a guardian unless you’re using a GS and a Sword/offhand for a teleport, leap and snare.

- Running Around (Guardian 2 × 8 Elementalist)
This is true. Devs have even gone on record stating they want the guardian to be slow.

- Underwater Combat (Guardian 2 × 9 Elementalist)
Accurate again. Although I tend to thing the trident is pretty solid for supporting allies. But you’re not going to outdamage anyone here.

- Trick and Deceive (Guardian 2 × 10 Elementalist)
-Accurate, but the criteria is not fair. Guardians would be insanely OP if they had the kind of ability to trick and deceive as an elementalist or a thief. We would be impossible to kill.

As you’ll see from the two videos, I’m far from the best player out there (there’s some spots in both where you see me make some pretty bad mistakes. Having the wrong weapon set near the end of the 2nd vid almost gets me embarrassingly killed). And my build has actually changed quite a bit since those we’re taken. They’re just an example for some out of the box thinking when playing the guardian. Is it an easy class to play? No. But I can’t agree that it falls short no matter how you play it. You just have to play it differently. Get out of the mindset of having to do large amounts of damage. (You can see I do pretty sad damage in those vids acually. Again, build has changed since then though and I hit a bit harder now.) Think of the battlefield like a chess board and your consecrations as the pieces. Make your objective to control the pace of the battle instead of just killing enemies, and I think you can definitely say you’re useful to your team at the least.

Also depends on what you plan on spending most of your time doing. Knights is always a safe choice, but I went with the power/vit/toughness karma gear for WvW. The extra durability helps quite a bit there.

To be fair though, I pretty much only WvW. So I’m sure there are better choices if you’re doing things like dungeons and such.

Churros.7196:

Sanctuary (on enemy portals) and wall of reflection.

Even if we only had these two skills, it would make the guardian worthwhile in wvw.

This. As well as buffing as often as possible and condition removal.

Throwing up a sanctuary on an enemy portal turns a portal bomb into a wipe. Well placed walls of reflection can save your group from wiping, or aid an aggressive push into the enemy.

One of my favorite things to do that I don’t seem to find many other guardians doing is use your sanctuary aggressively. It’s not just for defense. Cast it in the middle of the enemy zerg (with ground targeted consecrations) and watch all the knockdowns and interrupts. Not to mention putting it in the middle of an enemy group usually makes them think it’s their sanctuary, so they all try to run into it and get the knockdown.

Lately though, I’m having a blast running a built that focuses on durability and buffing. Run the trait that grants might to all allies on a critical hit. Jack your precision up and go full shouts. The result is nearby allies rarely have less than 10 stacks of might. Now carry a staff and coordinate with another guardian on empower just before charging into the fight to start off with 24 stacks or might. You can’t tell me that isn’t valuable.

The best advice I can give you though is to be ready to change your utility skills on the fly. I feel like that goes for every class in WvW though if you want to get the most out of it.

Well I was running Honorable Shield for the added toughness and shield skills cooldown (I usually go sword/shield and GS or Staff depending on the situation). But I’ll probably take 10 points out of valor again just because I want the first 5 of virtues. I would leave valor at 15, but I think you get better use out of extended consecrations than you do from Courage being recharged when you rally. So all things considered, I’ll likely go back to 0/30/10/20/10.

But having 15 in virtues is so tempting for the retaliation… I’m really stuck between getting that or leaving the points in valor for the extra toughness, crit damage and precision (from retributive armor). What I wouldn’t give for 5 more trait points.

My build is slightly different than yours in terms of gear though. I run all power/toughness/vit gear with knights jewelry. I sacrifice a bit of damage in order to make myself a little more tanky. My reasoning being that my job is to keep myself up as long as possible so as to keep buffing my allies. Damage is secondary for my playstyle.

0/30/20/20/0

Left off the 0 in my last post. Only 20 valor. I lose some boon duration, but the increase in toughness allows me to stay in the middle of the fight a bit longer and keep proccing might for my allies. Not to mention the extra 20% to crit damage goes great with the high crit rate on this build. I do miss my extended consecrations though.

Edit: And I just realized I lost the first minor trait in virtues that makes Justice give might. So probably going to take at least 5 points out of valor and put them back in virtues. >.<

After further testing, I’ve actually gone the opposite direction. I’m currently running 0/30/20/20. The toughness is just too tempting to pass up for WvW.

Nike.2631:

Shaftronics.8651:

So I got interested and gave this build a shot with a set of rares and I’m happy to report that it’s working better than I expected it to, although with quite a few personal tweaks, with a full set of Knights on all my armor pieces and accessories and using a hammer as my off-hand. In PvE situations, as well as being a Charr, using Battle Roar, a blast finisher though Purging Flames and VoJ from the get go means an easy 8 to 10 stacks of might to start a fight with. With a Staff, it was just absurd how easy it was to maintain a great stack of might without losing too much combat effectiveness’ though getting tripped is an issue.

I’m thinking of branching away from your one-handed approach in favor of using a Hammer/Staff just for Empower and to use blast finishers through Purging Flames, and possibly try a tweaked 0/15/10/25/20 instead, using Purging Flames, WoR and Judges Intervention for WvW and maybe PF, Battle Roar and JI for PvE.

Can’t wait to try it out later.

Glad it inspired some experimentation .

I’m on a Norn with my main Guardian, so about the wackiest thing our racial skills allow is sliding past a certian humungous Karka in cat-stealth .

I’ve been tinkering too, and think I’m getting a bit better personal damage output with 10 Valor/10 Virtues. It loses half a second of might, but gains crit magnitude and toughness (70% crit, 22% damage).

It seems the Sigil of Generosity has changed since Wintersday – it now lists a 10 second cooldown on condition transfers. Probably a good change for balance, since when they came out I don’t think it had an internal cooldown. I’m still liking it, but its less central to the crit-engine.

I came to the same conclusion actually. I think the 10 points in valor are more useful than 20 in virtues for this build. Especially if you take the trait that gives 5% of toughness as a bonus to precision. Increases your crit rate even higher.

I never bothered with sigil of generosity though. I think you get more benefit out of sigil of accuracy to get as many crits as you can. I run a sigil of hydromancy on my offhand, but that’s just a personal preference of mine for wvw. Gotta love aoe chills in zergs.

I also tweaked this a bit and went with 6 soldiers runes and a shout based build. Occasionally I’ll switch in a consecration as the situation calls for it, but for the most part I’m running save yourselves, stand your ground and hold the line. Hold the line is what I usually swap out if I need purging flames or wall of reflection.

The only thing I really miss about having more points in virtues is the minor trait that grants retaliation when activating a virtue. With as often as you hit F1 in this build, that trait gives you almost constant uptime of retaliation when combined with save yourselves and stand your ground. But i decided the extra points in valor were more worthwhile due to the increased toughness, crit damage and precision (with the trait that grants a bonus to precision). After some more testing though, I may pop 5 points back in virtues just because that constant retaliation is so tempting.

I won’t say healing guard is useless. But I used to run full Clerics and for WvW, after switching to Power/toughness/vit armor (kept the clerics jewelry), my usefulness to my team has dramatically increased. Here’s where I feel the biggest difference is:

In smaller groups, such as dungeons and small scale pvp, healing can be very useful and even be the difference between winning and losing a fight. In this situation, a full clerics guard is invaluable to a team.

In larger battles, such as wvw, it’s not that your heals are bad, it’s that you can do other things that are more helpful. IMHO, consecrations and buffs are infinitely more helpful than heals in a large scale fight. The reason being that usually healing your teammates for an extra 1-2k (above your normal heals without cleric’s that is) is not going to be the difference between them living or dying. But keeping might/protection/retaliation up on them can be. I’ve found that keeping those buffs up while contributing to the damage output and strategically using your consecrations is simply more helpful than healing in big fights.

It also depends what you’re trying to do. For instance, having run a full clerics build, I’ve come to the conclusion that there are better stats to boost in WvW. But full healing might work better for PvE

I’ve been running a variation on this. I used the basic trait setup but changed most of the utilities and sigils. Had a blast with it in WvW and ruined many a thief’s day.

I run sword/shield and GS. Sigil of accuracy on the GS to help with the crit chance. Right now I’ve got a sigil of life on the sword and shield, but those are really just left over from my old support build, so I may swap those out for something else as I don’t really need to stack healing power anymore. Stacking perception might be more beneficial.

I also run different utilities. I find Purging flames, save yourselves and stand your ground to work pretty well with this build.

I think anyone who was on SBI v Blackgate v IOJ during the Garrison battle can attest to this. Was worse than ever. Folks just running around aoeing blindly and dying for lack of being able to see any enemies. It’s usually just an annoyance but last night it was a game breaker. Took all the fun out of what would have otherwise been a great fight.

In 3 way PvP, someone will always be getting double teamed or hit in their undefended areas while they are focused elsewhere or on another team. It is rarely intentional and something people need to just get used to.

Similar to how enemy aoe effects appear as red circles, would it be possible to make enemy consecrations appear red? It’s near impossible to differentiate between an enemy wall of reflection and a friendly one without firing into it. Same goes for other consecrations and wards like sanctuary and line of warding.