Guild Wars 2

Kaizoku.1298:

Removing cast times would be too strong, I’ve recently had some 1v1s with my DH and I really think their cast times are perfectly fine, F1 is so fast it’s almost impossible to dodge if not predicted. F2 can deal damage, heal, immob and be used to travel. I don’t think it really needs buffing. F3 can last for an entire 7 seconds and refresh it with your elite making it 14 seconds frontal block.
Instant cast time is just too strong for DH

Have to agree with him. They are more than fine as they are now.
The only thing I’d change is F3 and make it UN-CCable. The meta since HoT is spam every skill including CCskills and you can get F3 interrupted which, as a stun breaker if properly traited, shouldn’t occur.

OriOri.8724:

kitten every one here (presumably DH themselves) is only talking about whether traps are overpowered or not and OP just wants them to function like all other skills in that their CD starts when they are triggered, not when they are cast. Is consistency that big of a problem to you guys? OP didn’t say one word about traps being too powerful, he’s just rightfully annoyed that the cooldown starts prematurely allowing DH and rangers to annoy him more than they should be able to with their traps.

Just because it isn’t OP doesn’t mean it shouldn’t be addressed. Likewise, since traps are apparently so useless according to y’all, you shouldn’t even care if they get “nerfed” because no one who is “good” will be taking them anyway.

To explain my point of view I have to adress why I think the skill mechanich is fine as it is. To be able to listen to others opinion you have to read what said opinion is based upon. I stated my point on why they are fine as tehy are now.

Moreover, let’s just imagine the CD only applies when someone triggers it….
Ops wrong button while leaving base, stored a trap in my base…. GUESS I’LL BE WITHOUT 1 TRAP UNTIL THE SKILL RESETS.

gee…

We could also add a nice healing towards the enemy so they do damage but completely heal the oponent. But 0,5 secs daze may bring some complaints… I know, remove daze completely and let it inflict chill, cripple and burn on the DH when someone activates it plus a free interrupt when casting F3.

IF the class has nothing to offer in team play you should at least expect it to do damage on its own.
DH traps are set to do damage because they don’t inflict condies or any particular effect. It’s just damage + boon to the caster.

Test of Faith only deals initial damage. The damage overtime you get by standing still in it is minimal. If you were to nerf this trap EVEN MORE there would be no use in taking it. I’d rather lose the 0,5 sec cc and gain more protection or stability with a shout.

Procesion of Blades: Longest start up of all the traps. After the daze you have aprox 3-4 seconds to get away walking from it. If you receive damage from this trap you are either stun locked by a party or you’re literally brainless.

Reveal Trap: Fine as it is. Wasting 1 utility with this trap justifies its use. A bit of counter to engies and thieves. Then again, useless in decent pvp onwards.

Faith Trap: Fine as it is. The instant casting time was made so as to have another stun breaker which could sinergise (weird in DH) with DH rune allowing you to lose a damaging utility but gain damage overtime with might.

Dragon’s Maw: Second longest time to act trap. IMHO it’s fine as it is, since if you use it, you just carry it for the LOW cc it offers (yeah I’m talking higher divisions and competitive play)

SO… ALL IN ALL

It’s fine that they have their cd started upon placement given the nature of the traps now. I think this is more of a L2P issue. If you see a dh guarding a point alone and you go to melee without invuln or dodging you’re brainless.
PLUS decent DHs would never carry more than test of faith and EVEN if they activate 2 at a time the damage they do is irrisoy.

Again… L2P

Ezrael.6859:

Saiyan.1704:

Tomiyou.3790:

Darknicrofia.2604:

spoiler: literally every single decent/half good guardian do not use the elite trap.

I’ve seen 90% of diamond guardians run elite traps. They sit on a point and use traps, mostly avoid condi reapers and that’s it. Actually, the ones that use the meditation elite are usually the ones that are the easiest to kill, since they have very little counter-pressure to enemies, as the elite trap cc is one of the best thing trapper has to offer.

I’m sorry but this accusation of yours may be true in lower tier pvp but far from truth when it comes to competitive play.

Those Guardians grinded their way to Diamond, praying they’ll get a good team that can win over 1 or 2 nodes while they try “camping”.. something that Rangers do twice better in.

Necros don’t counter DH.. can out play us, sure, but definitely a 50/50 match for us. Those who can’t beat them are probably trap Guards.

Lastly, Trap Elite is not at all “counter pressure”. Counter pressure are instant burst skills like Smite Condition+ToF+Hydromancy, used immediately when some one pressures us. Maw has a cast time, making it very inefficient against 2 or more classes who focus burst+cc. Thieves alone can stun you from 100-0 health if you have no cds making Maw, again, an inefficient skill to use.

And Renewed Focus can’t be used when stunlocked by a Thief, so you’d still die in your scenario. Good job!

Sure thieves can stunlock you but if you think in advance you can anticipate their bursts and get away with it. If you happen to think what your enemies moves will be, Renewed Focus is still better than Dragon’s Maw

An autoattack like druid’s staff or ele lightining scepter would be nice. The problem lies in the description though “Fire a SLOW moving orb…”. Hopefully it gets looked at, or made an offhand which probably won’t happen.

Please do not take my next comment as a kitteny argument but the skill gap between divisions is real. I’ve done some pvp with friends who were in lower divisions and it’s true… most of them die to traps alone, have no memory of where they saw the dh put a trap and just simply can’t outmanuver a dh.
That’s the reason DH are unable to get proper balance (The thing that needs balance is guardian core, not the dh though). If you left traps to do higher damage, all unexperienced players will die to the trap combo as you said hence making trap elite (dragon’s maw) a good choice.
In higher pvp, that trap is lackluster, does not offer good CC, no good damage, and the 10 might stacks will get corrupted by an autoattack. That’s why meditation elite (Renwed focus) becomes the best choice.

Sry but I agree with Saiyan on this one.

In season 2 I got a tie and both teams earned pips. Don’t know if it helps you.

73% win rate
Hammer (hidromancy + leeching)
Longbow (Air + Fire)

Marauder
Pack Rune all the way till legendary
Same build as yours but instead ToF instead of CoP

I’d like to post in here too as I’m looking for the same thing.
I’m experienced in wing 1 and 3, have discord and mumble, plenty of experience with guardian but have a warrior aswell.
Got a kill on Sabetha if it helps.

Thank you, I’ll try to see what I can do from there and announce it in the spanish forums.
Thx again!

We identified the problem back there. It was a node called “Dallas X( something)”, but the fact that up to this day it still remains is infuriating. I think it is out of jurisdiction from my internet provider. Isn’t the pathway of data set by Anet corp?

Ok I need to post this here since no one at Anet responded on the “spanish” forum.
Please guys fix the lag, most ppl outside the USA are getting terrible and permanent lag.
Sry for posting this here but it’s getting unbearable. It’s not a conection problem as was stated in the spanish forum.

Please, DO something. It’s been over a month.

Are we really going to argue about this post?
C’mon!

You know what also? I helped a friend some matched while he was in emerald…. Ppl literally walked on and off Test of Faith till they got killed… trap is op nerf it…

This is why the game never gets balanced at all.

Guardian here since the release of the game. Played ranked for only 5 days and got to diamond t3 ONLY with guardian as solo queue. MMR is about 72%

Guardian is crrently in a really bad state. Yes we can counter necros very easily, just staying out of range and longbowing them out. However we lose the point we contest, we just take it back later. Same applies to warrios, we can kill them but we will lose some minutes while we do that. Ergo, they will get help and we will not be contributing to the team.
In divisions where ppl are dumb, Ruby and lower, queueing with a dh will not alter the result as someone previously stated. In fact ppl still die to ToF (amazing). On diamond and higher you start to have problems because ppl are better at rotations and teamplay.
I started carrying hammer instead of s/f or gs for more CC but the cooldowns on its abilities are off the charts. The condi cleanse is really poor, the team support is really poor and most of the time you only shine as a dh if you stay ranging, which given the projectile hate of eles and engies makes it twice as hard.

All in all.. Current state of the dh: Garbage Tier.
Doesn’t mean you can make a difference in the game as I have done (not trying to boast my playing as I do stupid stuff too). IMHO get good with guardian now, if you strive for the higher lvls of pvp with a kittenty, underpowered, outdated class, IF it gets balanced you will make a difference in future pvp.

P.S (Edited): My opinion was on DH, bringing core guardian to pvp is just a suicide. Plain and simple suicide. Maybe you can try the bunker but if you go with ele/tempest you will contribute more.

Raids can only be done with the meta build atm. Due to the enrage timer, there’s only one stat you should take and that’s zerk, anything else will result in a dps loss.
Your “build diversity” reilies on traits and currently the most effective build given the support and heals the guardian has to offer is the one shown in metabattle.

So basically…. no diversity, follow metabattle’s raid guide and you will be fine.

I once created a similar build to this. However i changed the dh mid trait for the auto stability and added a trap as a heal (so first trait also changed due to the CC and lower recharge on heals). I tried staying in the back with the healing elite signet since effectively landing wings on a teammate can get really hard.
The build is not bad but lackluster. You will be able to contest but you will contribute little to nothing. Might work in Ruby and lower divisions.

Won’t happen because of ANET.
Aegis needs to be looked at. But since they are not going to do it you might as well ask for the chance to stack aegis and be it only accesible through guardian/dh.

That would make shield … something?

I’ve been playing guard/dh this season. MY mmr is about 72% and am currently in diamond. Haven’t been pvping exclusively since torturing myself with guard is not healthy.

During ruby and lower divisions dh is ok, specially with hammer instead of sword focus. The matches i’ve had in diamond were ok. 1 on 1 I could kill the oponents, however in team fights DH doesn’t have much to offer.
You can get to legendary, it is possible. You just have to play really good, get luck with your team and a bit of RNG gods. To be honest I’ve never felt so useless with a class in pvp like I feel with DH, compared to revenants that can kill you in 1 full burst (yeah this happens if the reve is good and you’re out of dodges).

Anyway…. If you like the class play it. I’m doing that.

Lol.
I have a question too. Guardian do damage while they attack, shouldn’t their auto attack be replaced with a healing towards the enemy?

Traps NEED the daze and instant cast given their crappy damage.

See, guardian is the test subject….

This has already been solved. An example is the guardian skill “Renewed Focus”. It was nerfed to NOT contribute to point cap.

Then again, guardian invulnerability (Which doesn’t make you invulnerable because condis keep hitting, DUH ANET) is the ONLY one which doesn’t contribute to point cap.
Expand that common sense to the rest of the blocks and problem solved.

EDITED: We do NOT need more unblockable skills.. Aegis as it is is a joke and as you said, if you were to further expand it’s uselesness it would be a sick joke to the guardian.
I repeat. PLEASE DO NOT ADD MORE UNBLOCKABLE SKILLS

Ryou.2398:

holychampion.7386:

I’ve read most suggestions for this thread and most of them are nonsense as they would leave the hammer as the most OP weapon in the whole game. The main problem with buffing damage or attack speed would be that in raids guardians would become the highest damage dealing class. If i recall correctly it was the third most dpsing class over time. Imagine with a higher symbol damage or less casting time between symbols it would be insane (I would love it though, yet not viable)(…)

You didnt actually read suggestions thing considering people did not recommend simply buffing speed without toning down the dps? Are you saying warriors hammer is op since its really fast to then? You might as well. The hammer is boring and slow, and it does need help being faster because of pvp you can hardly bring that third strike down at times.

The problem is you’re not analizing the skills each class have. You’re comparing apples and oranges. The warrior’s hammer IS faster but their skills are different so the fact that you’re trying to bash me from that point of view is useless.
What I’ve said was that modifying the hammer’s attack speed without taking into consideration its damage would imply a general imbalace in pve content so as to say raids. In pvp if you try to use the autoattack a thief will store 11 pulmonary strikes at you (At least in the pvp lvl I participate).
Do not get me wrong, I do like hammer as a CC weapon but since the balances and tweaks are general and not play style – based it is hard to get the proper modifications. I do agree that this weapon needs to be looked at… like torch and scepter aswell, among others.

Before posting or disliking someone’s opinion you have to take into account what said modifcations would bring to the game. It takes 10 seconds to think in advance. Being sensible while posting is critical

I’ve read most suggestions for this thread and most of them are nonsense as they would leave the hammer as the most OP weapon in the whole game. The main problem with buffing damage or attack speed would be that in raids guardians would become the highest damage dealing class. If i recall correctly it was the third most dpsing class over time. Imagine with a higher symbol damage or less casting time between symbols it would be insane (I would love it though, yet not viable)
Now the only possible buff we could get would be a damage increase to #2, and casting time and/or reduced cooldown on #3,4,5. The dynamic of hammer skills are fine as they are the problem as was stated before was the duration/channeling/cooldown. That is what we have to aim to get Anet to modify.

On a side note though… hammer aa in spvp is not viable, do not try to make it happen because it will not happen. GW2 pvp is fast paced, the hammer swing is slow and since it’s attack speed won’t likely change we might as well forget it.

The way of thinking you have actually makes you a noob. What you’re proposing is plain stupid. Plus how do you encourage build diversity if you’re shouting to anyone who has a different build from the meta.

Not going to happen.

You’re right, didn’t read the full name.

There’s a problem with the Radiance trait, 1 handed mastery. The trait is the one that gives all one handed weapons a 15% increase to the crit rate.

However this boon only applies to main hand weapons. If i’m not mistaken torches/foci/shields are listed as 1 handed weapons.

Why the hate for them?
Shouldn’t the bonus include all 1 handed weapons since we’re sacrificing 1 trait?

The idea of Save yourself was to use it while standing next to a necro for the condi mobility, or to use it with contemplation of purity, cleaning your party from condis and becoming the ultimate buff.
The problem is that Anet never solved the problem on the boon stacks after converting the condis. Example if you somehow swalloed 25+ stacks of bleeding from your party and used contemplation of purity you would only get 5 secs of regen (broken). So you don’t become the ultimate buff, you just increase the boon duration from save yourself by 5-10 secs (OMG SUPER OP, DH NEEDS A NERF!).
Leaving that aside and considering that contemplation of purity has a high cooldown due to it being a stunbreaker, the adittion of resistance could be a nice idea. However you should never use Save Yourself unless you can cleanse yourself off, so I don’t see a point in adding resistance to it.

Actually that would be really nice. Like saving some preset builds?
I remember i used to swap builds for Courtyard and remember the struggle of having to change everything.

I support this idea.

P.S: the resign button DOES NOT have to appear. Ppl would throw the game instead of fighting till the end. I do not agree on that.

The title speaks for itself. I Wanted to know how players were able to deal with the paradox this skill itself represents.
Given the condi spam meta play at the moment I would like a serious, non trolling answer, of why this skills which makes you “Invulnerable” while channeling allows you to die due to condis placed on you beforehand while channeling.

I know the guardian has a lot of inconsistencies in terms of useless traits, useless weapons, useless running speed, useless hp pool but it’s not the issue here. Just refer to the elite skill.

Ty for reading.

Cyanon.1928:

Im going to put it the same way ANET did.

“After we make changes, we need to give ppl time to discover the gems we put on the game and let the metta settle” That being said. Instead of reading and copying metabattle, be original.

Learn from good guardians, make your own builds, test them, make changes, adapt. Or you can just quit. That’s what the majority of ppl do when something requires effort from them.

And btw, guardian nerf was to req the player to actually use bow3, bow 4 and bow 5 instead of only spamming traps and bow 2.

Again, adapt or quit.

I’ve tried different builds believe me I did. But the guardian was intended for bursting or bunking. That’s how it has always been, 2 different aproaches. The burn guardian, while tempting because of its high damage could only store 1 kind of condi, 2 as much. ANY condi cleanse will get rid of your full condi burst. Warriors, necros, engis, mesmers, rangers, thay can also stack you with a set of 4 to 5 condis.
Spirit weapons are a joke, and since the traits and skills are outdated the bunker guardian is not as viable as it was.. the low cooldown on condi spams makes the shout healing lackluster and you end up dead anyway. So if you can’t be defensive nor offensive nor develop a hybrid build, the problem needs to be looked at.

P.S: If you manage to attack someone with symbols on pvp while the other player is moving you’re my new hero. Necro symbols are way way wider than guardian symbols. Moreover if you say you can combo longbow 5 + 4 you’re very wrong, the #4 skill is a slow shot, and they reduced the cooldown on the barrier so again.. not viable. I always liked #3 basically because you can shoot it backwards but the damage is the same as an autoattack.

Ok I would like a word here. First of all I’ve mained guard since the release of the game so I get the basics of the class and I have reached far in ranked season 1 and 2 with guard alone (past Diamond t4) while only playing 3 weeks of the total ranked time.

The nerfs have been severe as to say the less. I agree with whoever said that the class mechanichs were outdated. The healing on guard relied on the medi heals which now are not sufficient given the heavy condi pressure and the heavy CC which requires guards to use stun breaks.
Right now a build I developed which worked better (imo) to the “meditrapper” was to swap Judge’s Intervention by Contemplation of Purity. I also gave up on the knockback trait with the longbow to get a bit more condi cleanse and damage reduction. Not using marauder amulet either, swapped for the demolisher i think it was which gave toughness instead of vit and trapper rune. The problem is I no longer do any damage and once i’m in the cooldown phase i’m like a rabbit… The only class I can hurt with true shot are thieves IF i manage to hit them. Engis (which still remain heavily OP due to their low cooldown and high versatility) and eles reflect proyectiles almost all the time. I’ve managed to defend spots and take spots but then again I managed to outplay those classes. On equal ability I would stand no chance.

The main problem with guard atm is that basically ALMOST ALL utility skills are outdated and it’s the only class with problems in the weapon skills (such as torch 4 and scepter auto attack tracking. The proyectiles will go anywhere) and CONTRADICTORY TRAITS (DH trait 2 and 3: one requires you to NOT use F1 virtue and the other one to have it on permanently – big game hunter. It’s not the only pair which contradicts each other, even on the same trait line). Given this situation ppl can’t develope new builds since Anet only supports 1 viable build atm. For example the shield sucks and will never be used… Anet kept decreasing the cooldown on its skills yet they are wrong since their conception and haven’t been updated 1 Aegis with shield 4 while mesmers, reves, warriors can block 5 seconds on a low cooldown. As an example the only proyectile reflect the guard has is a wall which stands in place making you suceptible to AoE, lasts 10 seconds and has 40 secs cooldown; compared to the engi reflect which can be set up every 20 secs and lasts aprox 7 secs and surround you enabling you to ress freely (Also when combined with the hammer block makes it kinda invulnerable to proyectiles). PLUS, sword autoattack counts as a PRYECTILE… WHY?!??!?!!?!? you can’t auto attack engis, you can’t use sword 3, you can’t use focus 4, you can’t use longbow…. Engi > DH

The current “meta” in the game is: Spam conditions and skills, use CC as soon as they become available. When incased in the meta build, DH have no efficient condi cleanse, nor efficient stunbreaks. Their damage has been halved, their dynamic has been nerfed.
Before anyone says this stupidity: “Dh have F3 which gives them 5 secs of block, then renew focus and 5 more secs, git gud mate”. I ask you: Yes 13 secs… and then? Even if you don’t believe it DH don’t have a good Aegis upkeep time and it’s gone in 1 autoattack it’s not that powerful…

“Dh can cleanse 3 condis with F2 and heal 4k buddy that’s OP” Oh really? Well much to your surprise when you get condi bombed and you press F2 to get away. Did you know you get killed in mid jump due to condis? Did you also know it has a cast time of 2 secs aprox (the jump duration) which is so amazing for a CC to show up?

I do agree that the DH is now garbage but that’s because within the current meta and the outdated traits and skills only 1 build has become viable and that’s the longbow meditrapper. Now that the longbow has been nerfed it is no surprise that DH can’t actually do any good since they are supposed to be a “selfish” class.
The solution to this is not buffing back the DH to HoT release, I agree that a sheep could play a DH and kill 5 ppl with 1 opening strike (I’ve done it and it felt awesome) but it’s not the answer. The answer to the trash bin which DH now are is rethinking their utilities, updating the skills.
For example, NOBODY carries any skill other than Dragon’s Maw or Renew Focus. But the healing signet has such an amazing potential; it can turn a fully tired party back to 100%. However it has a 4 secs casting time (CC fest for thieves) and it ROOTS you (Would be like shouting in the middle of a hall hoping no one would notice you… imposible). True shot still roots you while doing the equivalent of damage to 2 autoattacks. The auras and passive auras (in traits) of the guardian have a 240 radius, that means only ppl in melee range from you benefit from it. The greatsword autoattack only deals full damage if you’re merged with your target (You didn’t know that one did you?). The condi heals while blocking has a 1 sec internal cooldown, that means almost no condi cleanse. The greatsword autoattack gives 5 seconds of might on the last attack while engi gets 10 seconds might on a hammer swing.

There is a lot more of what I’ve posted just above. Can make a full post about it and probably will do.

But you got the gist of it… DH as it is now is NON VIABLE as it has very little party support (healing team players with F2 while they are moving and running away is not as easy as it seems), has very little damage (If someone pops up Test of faith on you, don’t move you will only receive 1k damage TOTAL from the trap). Plus the meta now is just condi which have been and will almost always be the counter to guardians.

Thanks for reading.!