Guild Wars 2

Glaciate.3901:

I use it in a combination with sigils of hydromancy and intelligence and it hits like a truck, never really used it for the chill effect, but for the AoE dmg.

Sigil of Intelligence is pretty clever. I must give that a try.

Apart from that, the main problem with that trait is the randomness. If we want to reliably keep someone near us, a random proc just won’t do.

Harbinger.8637:

That “bug” fix, which has been around since day one, is a huge nerf to bunker guard that use shield. I could write a huge rant on why it was so important, there’s really almost no reason not to go Focus now. Shield was already a very niche weapon, and they just keep diminishing its use.

As I said before, the bug didn’t even work for me and the knockback alone can be worth it. The Shield remains in a bad place, but it isn’t as apocalyptic as people make it out to be.

That was a bug-fix, not a nerf. The bug wasn’t even all that reliable, since it hardly ever went of with me, meaning I’ve been playing effectively with this change already.

Slightly more useful and gives us an extra source of Vulnerability. I approve.

Fashion Mage.3712:

Harbinger.8637:

Can’t believe I’m say this, but the bow is good. They actually listened. It scales with healing power now.

Oh god, yes, finally. * – *

Why don’t they mention important details like that in the patch notes?

A lot of game-designers try to hide the numbers behind the game to increase immersion. This works great for single-player games (where it doesn’t matter as long as the game is fun) but for any game with a competitive element this is useless. For one thing, the players will figure it out anyway and it just increases the barrier to entry for newer or less math-savvy players.

I’ve opted for simple, realistic armor and weapon skins. These tends to be lower-level skins, so a lot of people don’t actually pick them (because they infer lower status). It has a rather unique look, compared with the higher-level, more intricate skins.

SaintSnow.6593:

Ynna.8769:

adozu.6398:

even if guardian buffs were:

- base hp increased to match warrior’s
- all blink skills are now ground targeted (with no restrictions or conditions)
- halved cd on all virtues

people would still find ways to complain

With good reason too.

That first change is unnecessary, the second defeats a core aspect of the profession and while there are some problems with Virtues, the cooldown certainly isn’t one.

You blow my mind with your clear mental illness. That’s like someone saying “Hey man want some cake?” And replying “No it’s unesessary and it’s not my birthday.” That really is complaining for the sheer sake of complaining. No reason at all.

No. Continuing on your analogy, I’m getting cake. But I don’t want cake. Sure, cake is nice and all, but I was really craving for some licorice.

I’ll take the cake, I’ll eat the cake, but it wasn’t what I asked for.

Harbinger.8637:

Just make it usable while moving, just like they did with Line of Warding.

Ring of Warding is significantly more powerful than Line of Warding, as it allows actually trapping other players. (Plus it’s on a better weapon, which is also an upside.) It needs to have a drawback.

Short answer: No.

Long answer: While Merciful Intervention might gain some extra niche uses, it remains rather useless relative to any of your other skills you might put in its place. Meditation Guardians are focused on dealing damage, not healing allies and will generally keep the other Meditations. Support Guardians will probably continue to gravitate towards Shouts (while Shouts aren’t buffed, they continue to be very strong with good trait support) or maybe Consecrations.

The most useful I’ve found Merciful Intervention to be is to set up a combo of MI —> Ress with knockback, but that’s not worth missing out on Judge’s Intervention or an additional Shout.

It might become useful for running around a map.

CMF.5461:

was just thinking that merciful intervention was pretty much nerf/buffed.

Previously you could use it as targetless instant secondary heal (monk’s focus + skill heal was something about 4-5k heal on one button).

Now we can’t activate it WITHOUT an ally nearby, thus nixing some of that sustain it previously provided BUT giving us a shadow step IF allies are in range.

I’ve been using Merciful Intervention lately, and I believe the heal doesn’t go off without an ally nearby. So that didn’t change. (Correct me if I’m wrong.)

adozu.6398:

even if guardian buffs were:

- base hp increased to match warrior’s
- all blink skills are now ground targeted (with no restrictions or conditions)
- halved cd on all virtues

people would still find ways to complain

With good reason too.

That first change is unnecessary, the second defeats a core aspect of the profession and while there are some problems with Virtues, the cooldown certainly isn’t one.

Obtena.7952:

Black Box.9312:

Obtena.7952:

Julie Yann.5379:

Obtena.7952:

Please identify what Guardians really needed that they didn’t get ..?

uhhhmmm…. mobility? That’s the only thing I would really want.

What you want isn’t what is needed.

… No, it’s definitely needed. Maybe not so much the mobility itself as the ability to stick to a target without them being able to get away so easily.

That’s definitely needed.

That’s a matter of opinion. What is needed is determined by the devs and the class concept. There are other ways more inline with the concept to achieve what is lacking.

Let’s go at this another way: Obtena, what do you think is needed for the Guardian? (Or was needed before these changes were announced?)

Also, you’re very keen on reminding people that the class concept for the Guardian is to stick to melee combat, but we have no real ways of sticking to a target. You have a way of dismissing arguments that can be used to counter literally every argument. And if you can counter every argument, it’s as good as being able to counter none.

If this discussion is to go any further, you’ll have to chime in with what you think is needed, exactly what you think the announced changes mean and what you think the class concept of the Guardian is intended to be and how and why it’s being actualized right now.

Could we please keep the discussion for the announced changes in one place? There’s no point in saying the same thing in multiple threads.

ventusthunder.5067:

You freaking kidding me?

Medi guard buffs are massive and will make us far more viable in any state of the game. I’m excited especially for MI, but RF buff is even larger.
!

The Medi Guardian buffs are okay, but at the same time they make all the changes to the Tomes useless. Renewed Focus remains comparatively better in most situations (although Bunker Guardians who go in Virtues might enjoy Tome of Courage a bit more.)

Anyone other than Medi Guardians has little reason to be excited. Spirit Weapons have been improved but are comparatively still worse than Shouts or Meditations. The AI on Spirit Weapons can be unreliable and timing their activated skill can be hard. The Hammer’s new Blast finisher will only be useful by accident.

Signets haven’t even been touched. They are by far the most boring thing about a Guardian and have never been viable (Although during Beta there was a high mobility build that used two Signets, but that’s not important.) And by making Meditations better, there is even less reason to take a Signet.

Shout builds were already in a good spot, compared to other Guardian builds, so it’s normal there are little changes to it, but that also doesn’t give a reason to be excited. If there was a good weapon change, Bunker builds might be happier with these changes.

Bringing us to weapons. Glacial Heart isn’t enough. If Guardians are intended to fight (almost exclusively) at melee range, we need more ways to keep our foes there. Without structural changes to our weapons, we’ll continue to struggle keeping intelligent opponents in the battle. (Plus the Scepter is a terrible, boring weapon.)

These changes aren’t bad, but they also don’t address of other issues.

• Tomes having Stability should have been baseline from the start. The skills are useless if you don’t have Stability. It’s good that we can now trait it, but it really should have been like that from the beginning.
• The Glacial Heart change is also necessary, but remains unreliable. Guardians need a way to keep people in melee range and this isn’t enough.
• Spirit Weapon changes are okay, I guess. They should be more useful, but still have some of the problems they always had. AI-driven stuff is always gonna be sorta unreliable. I mean, how often is the Hammer’s Blast finisher going to land when you want?
• The Merciful Intervention chance is a creative way to get around the issues involved in it. I’m afraid it might be hard to land in frantic battles, but it’s better than what we currently have.
• Renewed Focus being a Meditation is an interesting change and should be welcome for Medi Guardians. The Fury doesn’t matter too much, but the other traits should be useful. But by making Renewed Focus even better, the Tome changes are a bit more useless by comparison.

These changes aren’t awful, but doesn’t fundamentally change the Guardian in any way. Not having access to ways to keep our enemies close will continue to drag us down.

Obtena.7952:

Ynna.8769:

I don’t think a ranged weapon is inherently against the Guardian’s concept. And even if it was, I’d take it as evidence that the Guardian was designed badly in some way or another. I mean, look at the Scepter. We have a ranged weapon, so why are we arguing about whether or not the Guardians should have one?

I’d prefer if they’d just improve on the Scepter. That would be less work and wouldn’t bring us closer to feeling like a Warrior.

But the need for a ranged weapon is there. WvWvW remains a pain without a ranged weapon, especially at lower levels.

And let’s not argue about the aesthetic. Everyone will feel differently about it.

What you think and what Anet has outlined for the class concept in the video update a number of months ago are clearly two different things. Perhaps you didn’t see it but they were pretty definitive; They WANT Guardians at the front; part of the approach to make that happen is a weak ranged component. It’s also why you can likely bet that if there is some improvements to the weapons in the class, it won’t be giving ranged awesomeness unless the devs do a 180 on the class concept.

I have indeed missed that video, as I only recently started playing. I’ll seek it out.

And I don’t think anyone is asking for ranged awesomeness, just for a viable thing to do when engaging the enemy up close is impossible or lethal.

If Arrowcarts would be reflected by Wall of Reflection, Guardians become mandatory and will be forced to use Wall of Reflection and trait accordingly.

To anyone saying that professions should be different, therefore Guardians shouldn’t get a Longbow: I encourage you to play two professions that share weapons. You’ll notice that those professions play widely different, even if you use the same weapons.

There are good arguments to be made against giving a Guardian a dedicated long-range weapon (such as a Longbow or a Rifle), so please make those arguments.

I don’t think a ranged weapon is inherently against the Guardian’s concept. And even if it was, I’d take it as evidence that the Guardian was designed badly in some way or another. I mean, look at the Scepter. We have a ranged weapon, so why are we arguing about whether or not the Guardians should have one?

I’d prefer if they’d just improve on the Scepter. That would be less work and wouldn’t bring us closer to feeling like a Warrior.

But the need for a ranged weapon is there. WvWvW remains a pain without a ranged weapon, especially at lower levels.

And let’s not argue about the aesthetic. Everyone will feel differently about it.

I hate it when traits (or talents, or perks, depending on the game) are so good that they drag other traits (etc.) down.

Yes! I was waiting until this was going to brought up again.

I’d say the knockback is a no-no. Guardians are intended to be in the thick of battle and a ranged weapon with a knockback works against that philosophy. What would be cool is a ranged weapon that has a pull. That way it works well together with our weapons.

Second point of criticism: Symbols are Light fields. We all want an easily accessible Fire field, but that’s just not what Symbols are.

But I agree that we need a decent ranged weapon. I’ve been saying that since launch. I personally prefer the aesthetics of a Rifle, but I understand that not many people share that idea.

The easiest way to get us a better ranged option is to make the Scepter a better option. One-handed weapons are probably easier to balance and we already have a Scepter.

Random idea: What about a Pistol?

Are we really expecting perfect balance for 1v1? Because that’s a great way to wreck any game.

Guardians aren’t perfect, but if all you expect is to be good at 1v1 you’re not doing anyone a service. If you want to talk balance, talk so from a team perspective.

1v1 is only important in as much as roaming and bunker builds are a thing.

I like the idea. Virtues are a rather boring mechanic. Having more interesting traits attached to them would be fun. I don’t like suggesting specific things myself, but your suggestions look interesting, although I don’t think they’ll change the way the Virtues are actually used.

Oh, and combining two of your ideas: Let Virtue of Justice apply a chill instead of burning with a Grandmaster trait.

The increased mobility is very unlikely, since it’s very clear that Guardians are intended to have very little in way of getting away from a fight.

TrOtskY.5927:

I agree with some of what you say but you clearly don’t play pvp so I can’t take this feedback seriously, sorry.

Feel free to write up your own feedback on the PvP perspective. I’d do it myself but I haven’t played any decent PvP since way too long.

I have yet to see large impacts of Supportive builds, despite trying them out frequently.

I’ve laid out my reasoning in the long post above, but I’ll reiterate:

In PvE, defensive support doesn’t keep people alive because the enemies hit too hard. Some tricks with Wall of Reflection are fun, but not enough to call it “support.”

In sPvP, support has to be incidental. You can’t focus on support, because it means (a) being totally reliant on other players and (b) not having the necessary power to handle threats on your own. If the Guardian was changed so that they only granted boons to themselves, they would be about equally viable.

In WvWvW’s zergs, you’re not bringing anything that nobody else is bringing as a support Guardian. Healing isn’t strong enough to make a meaningful difference. Stability is sorta useful, but there’s no need to go all-out on support for and a zerg will not be stopped by a couple of knockdown effects.

The only place where support actually shines is in small group vs group PvP which only occurs in WvWvW and only very occasionally. A “guerillia” roaming group in WvW can benefit from a dedicated support player, but only in as much as they expect to run into similar groups.

Lorin.9564:

I would love Rifle with 1200/1500 Range als Damage-Weapon and Staff with 1200/1500 Range for Guardians.

Best Regards from Germany

I’ve been thinking about the Rifle as a Guardian weapon (because I really like the image of it in my mind) and I think the real problem is that our profession is centered (in theory) of staying close to our enemies. A Rifle wouldn’t fit that design.

Although what they could do is something similar to the Engineer, where the Rifle is a sort of shotgun. Make the first attack 1200 range and the other attacks either very defensive or with a lower range. Give it a Symbol and maybe another X of Warding and it’ll never be very strong offensively, which I think is important.

I’ve also thought about a Pistol for Guardians, but the aesthetic doesn’t work in my mind. It would be easier to balance.

What’s the point of this?

Teshtestyes.5419:

Remember: Guardians are a defensive class that support their team by directing the flow of combat through the use of boons and hard cc (Lines/rings)

This is great in theory and I believe this is the intent behind the Guardian, but it just isn’t true in reality. A lot of Guardian abilities are made a less useful just by the way the game design.

See a power Necro coming in to do a life transfer? Counter it by giving your team protection or retaliation.

Protection and Retaliation don’t counter anything, they mitigate. During Beta and right after launch, Retal was able to counter quick attacks. This made Guardians very strong without effort. Currently, the best Retaliation can offer is some incidental damage. No-one is going to hold off using an attack because of Retal anymore.

Thief focusing your buddy? Put a Ring of Warding down and trap him. Dead Thief.

In practice what happens is: Thief either dodges the (very telegraphed) RoW or stays in the RoW and fights there.

Engi/Necro bombing your group? clear those condis with a purging flames!

Purging Flames often puts allies at a disadvantage since they can’t move much to get the most out of the effect. This hurts us the most, since they can’t switch to a good ranged weapon to make up for it. Guardians generally don’t run a lot of Consecrations in PvP for that reason. (Also, Necros can apply condis faster than any Guardian can remove them.)

Your Staff Ellie is about to eat an eviscerate? Pop Virtue of courage to block it for her.

This only happens in the best-case scenario. In reality, Aegis is often popped by random damage, such as AoE. I’ve used Aegis effectively as well, but we shouldn’t pretend it’s a good solution to a problem in PvP.

From my experience Guardians are supposed to work as sort of a force multiplier, able to survive burst damage AND sustained damage in order to better support you team. Thats why I think guardians are in a good spot right now

Here’s the thing, Guardians can’t survive both burst damage and sustained damage and in order to just survive anything we need to work hard. This is good game design, but doesn’t allow us to do much else.

Conditions mess us up hard, so we’re forced to build around being able to remove them all the time. You can fix this by taking more Vitality, but this makes you lose so much Toughness that burst damage becomes a problem again. This strongly limits our viable builds, since we come with that in-build restriction. (And before you say that every class has those build-in restrictions, in my experience none are as limited as the Guardians. I don’t have experience with every class, so feel free to call me out on this.)

And our team support is indeed great. It’s why I chose this class and remains a big reason why I prefer to play it. But the truth is, support is basically meaningless for most aspects of the game.

In organized PvE Guardians are expected, like any other class, to bring damage, not support to a fight. And bosses hit hard enough that any support is useless. Survivability is a personal responsibility.
In world PvE, you’re on your own, so no need for support. Most events can be solo-ed and when they can’t, survival depends on dodging and position, making it so that defensive support has no impact. The best support you can offer there is probably ressing people.

Organized PvP differs little. Team fights occur frequently and we can help a team survive longer. However, Guardians in PvP mostly come in two roles: Meditation and Bunker. Medi Guardians offer little in terms of support and most of their support come from incidental boons on their weapons. Bunker Guardians are expected to survive on their own, so any support in a team fight is, again, incidental to their main goal: Staying alive. Theoretically we could do a lot of team support, but the meta doesn’t demand it and it makes us ineffectual when fighting one on one, which remains important.

That leaves us with WvW. The most common form of play in WvW is the zerg, where the most important thing is just being there. You can support, but nobody is going to notice and the impact isn’t going to be all that big. If it is what you like doing: great, but you’re not making a greater contribution to the fight by doing so.

Roaming in WvWvW with a small group is basically the only place where a Support Guardian can shine.

TL;DR: Support isn’t important enough to balance a class around. If Guardians are balanced around it, it means they’re ineffectual at most content in the game.
I don’t think Guardians are in a bad place. They’re in a good spot right now, but not, I believe, because our skills are good, but rather because we have a couple of abilities that fit well in the meta.

I don’t run Dungeons, so I’m not quite sure, but it could be they want the Wall of Reflection because of the Light combo field.

AoE damage generally isn’t classified as range, although some AoE could be projectiles(?)

Damage-prevention is indeed not awesome with Retaliation, but I don’t think Retaliation is all that useful in PvE to begin with.

Maybe they were counting on Burning being more important than it actually ended up?

Thanks for writing this up. It seems similar to something I wrote closely after launch. Because of the length I won’t be doing a direct response.

• You seem to have a big problem with what you call “selfish” traits. These are actually perfectly fine. Purity, for example, does a lot of work in PvP. Plus, most professions only have “selfish” traits or need to go out of their way to take group-traits. Additionally, there need to be traits for solo content.
• Any trait that just gives a flat increase in damage ([Weapon] does X% more damage) is stupid. Traits need to change things up. If those traits need to exist for some balance reason (doubtful) they should at least modify the weapon in some interesting way.
• Traits that have anything to do with the downed state are a waste of space.
• I’m okay with Radiance being the One-Handed line.
• Traits concerning One-Handers are at a disadvantage and should probably be compensated in some way.
• The Spirit Weapon traits are mostly useless because Spirit Weapons themselves are horrible. If they are improved, the traits might be more useful. That being said, the traits for Spirit Weapons are too widely distributed along the trait lines.
• Inner Fire has the additional problem that it is counterintuitive with the Torch, since that weapon “sets you on fire”.
• I’m okay with some passive traits. Right-Hand Strength for examples is pretty good, seeing as it allows us to gear for more survivability while still having a good crit-rate.

They change.3526:

I’m having a hard time understand what a guardian is supposed to do. I keep hearing mixed things and it all sounds like a load of crap from actual gameplay. I hear we’re the priests of the game and buff allies. Then I hear we are tanks but warriors are the true tanks? We have healing magic and so forth. How are guardians supposed to be played.

There are several ways to play a Guardian and all of them well end up with some form of Support.

I mostly do sPvP and there Guardians excel at defending points. You take on a slow playstyle and prolong fights over the point so your allies can come and help you. This is a bit of a tank-y playstyle and you use a lot of defensive and healing abilities to make you sure you don’t die. You also use your CC to control the movement of enemies.

You could also focus on doing more damage. This playstyle is completely different, because you have a lot less passive defenses and need to actively work on not dying while dishing out the damage. You should be able to 1v1 players, but you’ll shine in team fights (if you have a competent team) because of all the incidental support you offer.

Less useful in sPvP, but nice in WvWvW is playing a support role. With this, you throw around boons like it’s Christmas and become a power-multiplier. Your presence increases the effectiveness of everyone around you. Your team will live longer and be able to focus more on doing damage themselves. You still do damage, but less so.

These are a couple of examples of what a Guardian is “supposed” to do. Not all of these work perfectly, but they’re all viable options. Not everyone finds the same role as rewarding, so be sure to experiment with builds, weapons and professions.

I haven’t played with that Warrior trait, but having on-demand, unpredictable (for the enemy) reflection sounds more useful that a static wall in most situations. I’ve done some cool things with a quick Wall of Reflection, but that relied on quick reactions, so the Warrior trait would have been equally useful.

zefaistos.2601:

Shield is a good off-hand. Has a protection buff for party and skill 5 absorbs projectiles. I just hate sometimes when skill 5 pushbacks enemies.

I think the pushback effect should be added with a major trait, and cooldown a bit reduced.

Surely you’re joking? The pushback is currently what makes the Shield worth using.

kasoki.5180:

Shield makes no sense since it has less defense than my boots or gloves. It defeats the concept of the shield because it offers limited protection and doesn’t block melee

The Shield is a defensive weapon. The Guardian is a magical fighter. The Shield offers magical defense. The concept shouldn’t be that hard to grasp.

And sure, the Shield isn’t a great weapon for us, but it seems a lot of people can’t get past the tangible detail of “waaah the shield doesn’t even block” that they can think further and see how the Shield can fit our class and still be improved within the parameters that already exist.

1) Drop some AoE on them. CC the Guardian (Who sacrificed any combat ability because in your hypothetical, they have all the right traits for resurrecting people.)

2) You can kill of downed people with incidental damage most of the time. Any sort of AoE or Cleave helps you kill them. It’s not hard to do.

3) If an entire team is busy rezzing someone, they’re not doing anything else. Burst them down.

Fergus.4208:

Concerning sigils. I believe sigil-focused builds should be good options for newbie players, but weak options for any averagely skilled player. What’s frustrating, is that the easy-to-play warriors have access to strong sigils.

I personally find that a horrible design philosophy. There shouldn’t be a major skillgroup dedicated to newer players. Sigils should be easier to use for new players, but not that effective, but in the hand of a good player, they should become even more powerful. Making the trade-off between the passive and the active should be a hard decision.

I was talking about the “Platonic ideal” Guardian. What a Guardian should be, not what it is. A Guardian should make a difference to its team with defensive abilities.

In PvP we can sometimes already make that difference.

This has happened to me as well.

Is it something that other Leaps have as well?

Relentliss.2170:

I think each class needs more unique features to help define them. Guardians are very overshadowed by Warriors, who just seem more effective in the role of frontliner because their different buffs last longer, are on shorter CD and do more things at once. Not to mention their huge health pool gives them much better gear options.

I saw Warriors are more offensive-focused, and to an extent, that is still true. But Warrior are very capable of staying alive in the front line and and have plenty of options to retreat and switch to ranged combat. After playing a Warrior for a bit (only level 20 and only in WvWvW) I think the biggest difference is that the Warrior has a lot more mobility than the Guardian. Which is fine. Warriors should be different form Guardians and mobility is a decent way to differentiate professions. But Warriors can be effective pretty much all the time, while Guardians need to work hard to make sure their blows land. (Based on my impression playing both professions.)

I’d advice to try out everything that strikes your fancy. There’s no better way to discover what works and what doesn’t than trying out things yourself. (Although for leveling up I can’t recommend a Shout build.)

Apolo.5942:

My advice, stick with the necro.

Don’t be such a downer. And if you’re going to be a downer, at least use actual arguments.

Not enough information to provide accurate feedback. We need details before we can really comment.

Saiyan.1704:

Perhaps make one of the Grand Master traits in Zeal offer cripple, so that a medi would be forced to go 6/-/6/-/-

I just feel that Cripple (assuming it procs quite often) would break the Guardian one way or another..

I don’t think this discussion (What is a Guardian? What should they be?) works for deciding how a certain issue should be solved. You can use it do decide what should be done (Guardians could use a Cripple), but not to decide how it should be done.

I think the case can be made for a Cripple (or a Chill, but that’s significantly stronger) by looking at the Guardian as a frontline fighter who should have ways to keep others in combat. This is a trade-off for not being able to escape a fight.

If you want to talk implementation, which I kinda want to discourage here, I would tie the Cripple or Chill to our Symbols or something. This fits the “tactician” by giving the Guardian an extra way to decide where the fighting goes on and makes applying it harder. (Symbols are often very telegraphed, can be dodged out of and can be easily avoided if you’re not in them.) The Staff might be somewhat problematic with this approach though, but I don’t think it would be bad enough because the Staff has enough other issues preventing it from becoming a premier PvP weapon.

This might seem like a stupid question, but I think it lies at the core of a lot of debate and can resolve a lot of questions about what should happen with the profession.

I think there are two sides to this, a thematic and a mechanical side.

Thematically Guardians are Magic Knights (leaning towards Paladins, which are a subset of Magic Knights). They combine melee combat with some sort of magic. Our magic is of the defensive kind, protection both ourselves and our allies. There is a little offensive magic available to use, but it pails in comparison to our protective options. I think this focus on defense fits our profession pretty good and shines through in most of our abilities. This is something that will probably make me disagree with people who want to play something like what D&D calls an “Avenging Paladin”. I don’t think that fits the theme of a Guardian as well as protecting your allies.

Another core theme is that of a tactician. I don’t mean actually leading a group (although that can be part of it, as evidenced by pretty much every commander in my realms’ WvWvW being a Guardian), but that we have the feel and flavor of someone who directs the flow of combat. This shines through with our area-denial skills (Line of Warding, Ring of Warding, Symbols, Consecrations…) and our Shouts, which are clearly flavored after someone giving orders and supporting a team.

Mechanically, I think there are a couple of things that define a Guardian (but aren’t necessarily exclusive to our profession):

• We should direct the flow of battle (area-denial)
• We should have less ways of escaping a fight (frontline commanders), but enough ways to enter a fight and keep our opponent there.
• We should protect and help our team.
• We should be better in the thick of combat than looking at it from afar.
• We should be able to survive a brawl to make up for our low chance of retreating quickly (This also means we are allowed to retreat slowly and inefficiently).

Looking at it in this ways, it’s easier to answer some questions that people have been discussing.

Examples:

Q: Should Shield of Judgment be swapped with Shield of Wrath?
A: Not necessarily. While Shield of Judgment has it’s issues, the Shield is mainly a defensive weapon. Guardians are magical warriors that protect their allies and this is shown in Shield of Judgment. Shield of Wrath is more offensive and fits the Focus better, as it’s main use is offensive with some “selfish” defense as a bonus.

Q: Should Merciful Intervention be ground-targeted?
A: Making Merciful Intervention ground-targeted gives the Guardian an easy way out of combat, which Guardians shouldn’t have. Merciful Intervention needs to be changed, but not in that direction.

The main benefit of taking this approach is that you stop talking about individual skills and abilities and start looking at the bigger picture. It also makes it easier to see the meta-disagreements that bog down arguments in here.

I’m not saying that this is the only way to see a Guardian. It’s how I see the profession and it influences what I expect from it and what I want to see changed. Your view of the Guardian can be different, but it can be helpful to spell it out in a disagreement to avoid being dragged down in arguing in the margin.

(Apologies for the rough post, I spend a significant amount of time finetuning this post and then something bad happened to my browser so I just typed up what I wanted to say.)

Sunshine.4680:

The shield doesn’t even block.. >.>

Mimimimimimimimi…

It blocks projectiles and offers Protection (which is actually more like how an actual shield protects you than straight up blocks). Apart from the longish cooldowns, it’s perfectly functional weapon and widely more defensive than any of our other offhands.

The Guardian is a magical fighter, it makes sense that he uses his defensive weapons to provide *magic*based defenses.

Exxcalibur.6203:

Arnath.2319:

I would really like to see the LongBow added.

What? Shocking…even a crossbow for a guardian would be a stretch…

This discussion has been had before, and it’s a very difficult issue to tackle, because some people think it fits really well thematically and others think it would ruin the character.

I personally like the idea of a Rifle.

(Mechanically, I think Short Bow would be the best idea, but thematically it’s not that great.)

Not this discussion again. (I swear to god, this forum just repeats its discussions every two weeks. Has done since beta.)

I like the Shield. It does what it does okay, but the cooldowns are way too long.

Unlike most Guardians, I think the skills on the Shield are a decent thematic fit.

Be aware that you cannot keep up a point forever. You can only delay. You need your team to come in and help you.

Other tips:

• Use the Hammer to prevent players from coming onto the point in the first place.
• Conditions mess you up. Be sure to have some ways of removing them and keep them available for when you need them most.
• Continuing on the above, be sure to remove poison before healing up.

What weapons and skills do you use?

One must keep in mind the competitive advantage of Guardians. While they can do a DPS/Roaming role, they are just (A) generally better at bunkering up and (B) generally worse at DPS/Roaming than other professions. The main reason not to bunk as a Guardian is because you have an awesome player in that role and you don’t have enough competent players to fill other roles.

We really don’t need to recycle topics to talk about every week.

Anyway, I’d like some traits to be modified to be actually useful and I’d like reliable access to a chill or cripple effect. That’s pretty much all. A couple of extra ways to keep us on top on of an enemy is all I desire.

Although, since we’re rehashing this discussion anyway, a Longbow has been a long-time dream of me.

FAMISIL.1579:

It was mainly for the Empower ability.

Not worth it. You lose out on a lot of damage potential if you drop the Greatsword for the Staff. The Empower won’t make up for that. In the sort of content you plan to run, the heal from Empower shouldn’t matter.