Guild Wars 2

I just want to chime in and say:

I hate grinding dailies for laurels with a passion. 3 months I’ve spent luring skelks into rivers for underwater kills or slaying moas and deer for kill variety. kitten that kitten.

TheDaiBish.9735:

I don’t think Arthur and Excalibur is an appropriate example, since Arthur was chosen by divine providence (aka RNG), and didn’t have a quest to get it (rather, it was a sign to show who would undertake the quest for the Grail).

I think aedil meant Exclibur in the lady of the lake legend, not that sword in the stone bullkitten.

In that tale, Arthur embarked on a epic quest against the Sable Knight where he was sorely wounded, took refuge with a hermit, met the lady of the lake who gave him Excalibur, and had a rematch which he finally won. The Sable Knight later became one of the knights of the round table (King Pellinore). I believe he also met his wife (lady Guinevre) somewhere along the way. So yeah, that’s pretty epic.

Trixie.7614:

Wait. Is there even rare food?

Depends on how long you cook your flank steak. I like mine medium-rare.

Grinders gonna grind.

It just goes to show you can take the gamers out of WoW, but you can’t take the WoW mentality out of gamers.

I thought the no-monthly-fee part would help draw a more casual crowd…instead, it’s the same standard MMO grinders, measuring the success of a dungeon run with stopwatches rather than how much fun they have.

As a PvE player that do dungeons with a combination of knights/PVT, I agree zerker gear is much more efficient.

However, sometimes I feel GW2 is starting to resemble old arcade sidescrollers like Contra or Raiden more than an RPG. A role playing game where you only have one role to play (moar deeps!) is like an FPS with only one type of gun, or a racing game with one car model. Imagine playing counterstrike with only sniper rifles. It gets old pretty fast.

You can’t really blame zerker fanboys for stating the obvious (though they do like to rub your face in it), the onus is on Anet to create more build/gear diversity if they don’t want their game to eventually die out when everyone gets tired of playing glass cannons 24/7.

swiftpaw.6397:

The reality is that unfortunately for you, zerker set is the better choice in dungeons.

Of course. But there’s a fine line between choosing a suboptimal build and being selfish.

Your friend from europe must have awesome telekinetic powers because I find it hard to dodge attacks when I see the animation 2 seconds after the hit. But whatever, that’s not the point.

The point is if DPS builds become the norm and everything else is considered “selfish”, GW2 will cease to be an RPG and turn into a modern day version of Raiden. A role playing game that doesn’t allow you to play actual roles in combat (except wearing silly outfits), does that sound like fun to you?

@brazil:
Kind of an unfair example, don’t you think? For enemies that initially have low damage but increase their damage throughout the battle (risen giants and that champion risen abomination), I agree finishing the battle quicker is better. Fortunately, most enemies aren’t like that

On the other hand, I challenge you to play this game on an unreliable 3G network (I travel alot) and see how well-timed your dodges are.

lol sorry, that wasn’t directed at you personally, but zerker elitests in general.

The PvE zerker trend is due to a terrible miscalculation on Anet’s part, and I refuse to believe that’s how they intended for GW2 to be played. It promotes a passive and reactionary style of gameplay where dodging red circles and recognizing animation sequences are the most valuable skills a noob can master.

Recent living world events such as the aetherblade retreat and queen’s pavalion have been trying to remedy that, but as long as the traditional dungeons are still full zerkerfests, nothing will change.

Kirschwasser.3972:

I just want to re-iterate that I support people that want to play gear other than Zerker’s, I just accept the reality that it’s less overall efficient.

I agree wholeheartedly. But please stop treating people in PVT like they’re hitler.

Kirschwasser.3972:

And I’m saying that I personally feel I do notice it when fights are dragging on for way longer than usual.

It wouldn’t be such a problem if bosses weren’t such atrocious HP sponges.

No you don’t. You think you do, and assign the blame to the one PVT pug on your party.

Let’s run the numbers. Say for example a typical 12-min dungeon run. Now usually half the time will be spent running from place A to place B, skipping through cut scenes, dodging rolling stones/standing on pillars or whatever puzzle the dungeon has. All this has nothing to do with PVT armor. So you spend around 6 mins in a typical 12-min run actually fighting, where DPS makes a difference.

Then let’s say the PVT guy does half damage of your typical full-zerker (for those of you who think PVT can’t even do half damage, https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/guardian/Best-PvE-tank-bunker-build/first#post2508972 ), and that’s being very stringent. Since you have 5 members on a party, that constitutes a 10% drop in DPS. 6 min = 360 sec. 360 divided by 9/10 is 400. So instead of finishing a run in 12 mins, you finish it in 12 min 40 sec, a 5.3% increase in time spent.

If you’re running dungeons religiously 4 hrs a day like a second job, you end up wasting 12 min per day because you took on a PVT pug. Bathroom breaks take longer than that. The time you spend posting wall-of-texts on zerker elitism in this thread takes longer than that. Are you seriously suggesting your time is so precious that taking 12 extra mins per day is going to kill you? Do you have to be at the gym in 26 mins? If time is so precious to you, shouldn’t you not spend 4 hours a day playing video games?

All those anecdotes cited by zerker fanboys about how a 12 min run dragged into 30~40 mins because one guy had the gall to wear PVT are simply lies. No gear has that much effect in the game, unless you’re constantly dying and requiring others to spend time rezzing you. Which you will, if you’re a noob wearing zerker because everyone on the boards say you should.

Seetoo.9316:

As for games specifically, they are therapeutic. Society has only just begun to discover the productive effects of games because they have been labeled for a long time as useless.

Shooters have produced more skilled surgeons due to the increase in their hand-eye coordination.
Games with fast moving objects (MMO’s come to mind) have been discovered to help improve eye disorders
Games specifically catered to address fears have helped cure those fears (Make a game specifically to slowly introduce an arachnophob to spiders).

lol, yeah keep telling yourself that. I don’t know about you, but I’m pretty sure most of us aren’t blind, arachnophobic surgeons.

We play games because it’s fun. We choose careers as social workers or wear clerics armor because we like helping others. We join the army or wear PVT because we have the urge to protect and serve. We get a degree in liberal arts or run around wvw naked because we are free souls.

Not everyone is going to do things your way, whether in gaming or in real life. Get used to it.

@Seetoo:
Do you NEED to play an MMO? So why aren’t you spending 100% of your time studying to become a scientist, engineer, doctor, or mathematician?

Horribly selfish of you.

It has been proven beyond a shred of doubt that studying science, technology, engineering, and mathematics…the STEM fields… have the best prospects for future employability and lifetime earning potential. For society as a whole, the STEM disciplines contributes the most to human progress.

Therefore, the STEM professions should be the only professions allowed in human society. Sure, plumbers, teachers, social workers and baseball players still find ways to contribute, but they don’t contribute as much as they could have had they chosen a STEM profession! It is so obvious I don’t understand why people can’t see it.

So obviously, anyone who isn’t in a STEM profession is consciously choosing to be selfish and leeching off of society. It is precisely because so many pugs/noobs/kids choose non-STEM professions that humanity has not advanced as quickly as it should have.

What’s worse, these selfish leeches use up precious resources that could be more efficiently allocated to STEM research. Teachers? Leeches. Firemen? Selfish. MMO gamers? Lazy kittens who contribute nothing. When I rule the world, the first thing I’m gonna do is to kill…er…kick all non-STEM members out of society. Only then can a perfect world exist.

I agree offensive stats are the best stats in the current PvE meta (Anet, please make dungeons harder for speedrunners, please!), and if you’re running CoFp1 nonstop 4~5 hrs a day like a second job, occasionally seeing a pug in PVT armor probably annoys the heck out of you.

However, defensive stats can actually contribute to DPS too if you’re doing it right. For example, in HotWp1 last week I was paired up with a zerker guardian who had to dodge out of combat EVERY SINGLE TIME the butcher did his whirly thing while I facetanked like a boss. The DPS he lost by constantly dodging and breaking his attack train meant I did more sustained DPS than him and therefore was able to hold aggro 95% of the time. This in turn anchored the boss to the center of the room while everyone else attacked pillars or pew pewed from afar. For the party, that ended up being a faster battle than if everyone just kited him around every which way.

Or back when molten facility was a thing, I tanked both of the end bosses (well, sequentially not altogether), rendering them completely immobile so people in my party were wondering if we ran into a bug.

But I admit tanks are totally useless in CoFp1, where bosses hit like a wet noodle and mobs are simply avoided.

@Oxxy:
Since your very first post in this thread was to refute mine, I have no idea what “your way” is (I gather it has something to do with hammers and staff?). If you think your way is the most effective way, then good for you!

I do take issue with people that try to force everyone to play the game their way. Accusing people of selfishness for not dressing in full zerker, requiring armor checks and achievement points to run dungeons, kicking non-DPS builds etc is simply raising the barrier of entry and making things needlessly difficult, imho.

Oxxy.7068:

So you don’t think providing your group with control (hammer/staff #5), reflection, aegis, might, protection, regeneration, stability, retaliation and cleansing is supporting? Support doesn’t always means that you have to sit in the back healing while nobody can kill you (and you can’t kill anything), i’ve always played as a tank/guardian archetype and to be honest i have no problems with having high dps while actually supporting and not just tanking or sitting in the back thinking i’m being helpful, even if i am not.

My question was rhetorical. Of course guardians support. If you are using hammer/staff instead of GS, you are already making the conscious choice of sacrificing DPS for more support.

Even if you were able to prove beyond all doubt that your way is the only right way to play this game, it would be a very boring game if everyone ended up with the exact same build and exact same equipment.

If DPS zerker is the only way and support/tank are for noobs, why does the guardian class even exist? Other classes have way more DPS than a guardian can ever hope to achieve.

Better yet, why not petition Anet to eliminate all classes but one, all armor but one, all weapons but one, and all traits but the ones that contribute to max DPS? No more confusion for noobs, no more selfish players. Everyone is exactly the same with the best build and max DPS.

My latest build:
http://gw2buildcraft.com/calculator/guardian/?3.3|2.1n.h2|2.1n.h1|1n.a7.1n.a7.1n.a7.1n.a7.1n.a7.1n.a7|31j.e16.31j.e16.21j.e13.3v.e16.2v.e13.2v.e13|0.a2.u46b.u27b.0|54.k|v.1b.16.19.1i|e

Same effective power as strife, better effective health, better damage reduction, more heals-per-second, and cheaper.

Ah, it appears that I have been trolled by Anet.

I had based all my DPS calculations off of attack (power+weapon damage) shown on the character sidebar in-game, so I was a bit confused at the wiki formula you posted. Of course, the formula was correct:
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Damage

Then I searched for attack:
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Attack_%28statistic%29

So basically, attack is a meaningless stat !!! It could say “1” or “1,000,000” or “2d6” and have absolutely no effect on game mechanics. It boggles the mind why Anet would insert a meaningless stat onto the character page, especially a stat used in 99% of RPGs to signify the amount of damage dealt per hit.

It doesn’t matter if my build’s damage is 52% or 47% of a proper DPS, that’s just arguing over schematics. Anything anywhere near 50% is absolutely unacceptable…a build that has twice the DR and deals half the damage? What’s the point? Therefore, I’ve wasted 3 hrs theorycrafting a build based on a faulty mechanic, and blew my entire savings on a divinity rune. That kinda sucks.

tl;dr: Trolled by Anet. Build is rubbish.

Thank you for taking the time to insert my build into the GW2buildcraft calculator, and to show me some good DPS builds. I will consider those builds as reference points in the future.

I’ve used the GW2buildcraft calculator too, but there are some troubling mistakes in their calculation, namely:

1. Their effective power only takes power into consideration, and excludes the innate weapon strength. Since weapon strength is the same across the board whether you use DPS build or tank build, by taking a fixed attack from both builds (well, before damage multipliers that is), it artificially inflates the ratio of attack DPS builds have over tanks. Example: Build A has 10 power +10 weapon attack. Build B has 20P + 10WA. Taking weapon attack into consideration, Build A has 66% of the damage of Build B. But if you take out WA, Build A suddenly only has 50% the damage of Build B.

2. It appears that they’ve multiplied multipliers. For example, go to your DPS build and swap out fiery wrath (for…blinding jeopardy or something innate). You will notice the damage % go down from 53.73% to 39.76%. How does a 10% damage increase increase your damage 14%, unless the 10% was multiplied by the rest of your multipliers (40%)?

3. The damage reduction is all wrong. I specifically calculated my build to be 50% DR of 2k armor, there could be no mistake. 3478 armor + 150 SiN = 3628. 3628/0.9 = 4031. (4031-2000)/4031 = 50.38%….yet it shows 48% of 1.8k armor. If the DR is wrong, what else is wrong?

But I admit, your builds are quite a bit superior to korval’s. I will try to do DPS calculations on them when I port them into gw2skills. Thank you.

@CptAurellian:
I’m confused. You say a hammer AH zerker can facetank most stuff, but how do you maintain proper DPS with a hammer AH build? AH means 30 pts in honor and therefore only leaves 40 for radiance and zeal combined. Hammer means not utilizing zealous blade, which is another 5% drop in DPS. With all those drops in DPS, your effective attack is gonna be somewhere in the vicinity of 5.5k (instead of the theoretically maximum 7k, more on that later), which isn’t that far off from my tank build (4k). Of course, I’m just taking clues from what you said, so I could be wrong. If you have such a build, would you mind posting it so I can do the calculations? Thanks.

On the second part of your comment, yes, I admit I’m fairly unversed in what a typical DPS build looks like, so if korval’s build is junk then I apologize. However, imho there is nochance that my 4k effective attack is lower than 50% damage output of a proper DPS build, since the theoretical maximum effective attack is 7k unless you’re hitting a persistently-burning, constantly-conditioned enemy at night with persistently low endurance (but dodgerolls decrease DPS) after stacking up on might (and not with empowering might, since that would mean 20 pts in honor).

If you’re constantly fighting under those conditions, then yes, your effective attack can go above 7k. Otherwise, the best you can do is probably a bit lower than this build I made for theoretical purposes (which I already mentioned in my DPS post):
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fUAQJARWlYgyCXFSKEf4EhNDCawaGx7eYKwYGB-jQyAYrARfgoCAJvioxWcLiGruGT5SEVbvHimNP1xAoH-e
which is 6.7k effective attack. My build, as I’ve mentioned before, is 4k, or 60% of the theoretical maximum. Whether that is good enough for PvE is up to interpretation, but I would really like to see what your version of a “proper” DPS build looks like so I have something non-theoretical to compare with.

Anyways, I’m not trying to defend this build against criticism. I’m actually seeking criticism since I’m making the decision whether to drop 100g into sentinel armor and divinity runes. But actual numbers would probably be more welcome than opinion, since we all know how much opinions are worth on the internet XD

Thank you for your criticism, you are obviously a very experienced GC player. I’m currently in the process of theorycrafting a DPS build, and would wish to seek your input when it’s done.

Last thoughts
Sorry, the “manufacture stat points out of thin air” bit was to keep you reading. So was the trollish topic title.

What I actually did was realize how much stat points I was missing out by mixing and matching (“oh, I’m using knights gear so I lack vitality! Better take some soldier runes!” “huh, now I lack power…better get some soldier gear”) In the end, none of my 4 main stats fell below 60…so why not just start construction process with divinity runes, and fill out each stat from there? That’s 35 extra stat points, extra 60 heal points, and 12% extra crit damage right off the bat! (compared to other runes).

Next was the SoJ signet. Because armor becomes progressively less effective the more you take, a flat, 10% damage reduction becomes the equivalent of 365 toughness at 50% DR! To put it another way, you’re gaining 365 toughness at the cost of a utility skill. And the skill isn’t entirely useless as it’s a good stunbreaker and applies weakness and retaliation with a short cooldown.

Last of all, retributive armor is incredibly good when you have 2400+ toughness (counting strength in numbers)…that’s an extra 120 precision you’re getting at the cost of an adept-tier trait.

Edit: Oh, and strength in numbers, another trait that gives you (and your allies!) 150 in toughness. Before the patch (when it was 70 toughness) this trait was rubbish and not worth taking over purity, but 150 toughness is just too good for a adept-level trait.

So in the end, this build is getting an extra: 35 points in random stats, 515 points in toughness, 120 points in precision, 12% in crit damage, 60 heal and 60 condition damage. This is how it was able to tank like a boss while still dealing passable DPS.

Again, sorry for the trollish title, please critique my build!

Disclaimer
This build has never been tested in-game. Unfortunately, I don’t have the 100+ gold for divinity runes and sentinel gear, nor have I finished collecting ascendents. But it sure looks good on paper, doesn’t it :P

(cont’d)

DPS
I think the reason people hold such animosity towards tanks is because their typical experience with a “tank” involves some random schlub in terrible armor standing around not holding aggro and not dealing damage. Well, this build can! (sorta)
First of all, the formula I’m using for effective attack is as follows:

Effective attack = Attack × [(1 – Critical Chance) + (Critical Chance × Critical Multiplier)] × (1+ damage multiplier 1 + multiplier 2 + ….etc)

Which is basically the same formula used by GW2buildcraft for effective power, except I didn’t make the mistake of multiplying multipliers, and took qualifying instances into consideration (your enemy is unlikely to be burning non-stop throughout the entire fight).

My build does 3992 effective attack under this formula. To put it into perspective:

The maximized guardian DPS build I came up with was this:
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fUAQJARWlYgyCXFSKEf4EhNDCawaGx7eYKwYGB-jQyAYrARfgoCAJvioxWcLiGruGT5SEVbvHimNP1xAoH-e
Which deals 6703 effective attack, and my tank/bunker build would be 60% of that. However, it is quite unlikely to be actually playable, or if it did, it would spend 90% of its time running away from mobs as with 2k armor and 12k health, a couple of hits would bring it down.

A more typical DPS zerker build would probably look like the one korval made on this forum (sorry, would you mind letting me borrow it as a point of reference? ):
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/guardian/PVE-DPS-build
which deals 5363 effective attack, of which my tank/bunker build deals approximately 75% of that.

Now 25% less damage may still sound like a lot, but a typical zerker don’t just stand there and facetank…if they’re dodging or running around avoiding attacks 25% of the time, then my build is essentially dealing the same amount of DPS as a zerker. Of course, in my experience zerkers do stand around dealing all that sweet, sweet DPS…because I’m the one taking the aggro.

Edit : Build uses a meaningless stat (attack). It is rubbish and should not be attempted .

The build:
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fUAQJASWlYgqCnFyIEf4EhVBCi9AjesjXPoYCZIA-jAzAYLIMGAhBg+AlzTU2TYNBCW1KiGryGTDTEVbvTtJfIaA-e

What this build offers:
50% damage reduction (compared to 2k armor)
another 33% damage reduction from perma-protection
17k health
620 heals-per-second (possibly more from AH and procs)
2 stunbreakers, many condition removals
buffs your allies
75% damage output of a full-zerker DPS build (calculation and comparisons further down)

Foreword
After this discussion:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/guardian/Are-tanks-viable-or-does-DPS-reign-supreme/first#post2490927
with some more experienced guardians on the forum, I’ve come to recognize the importance of DPS to any tank/bunker build. Namely, you need DPS to hold aggro, and pure tanking is not very useful to a group if you’re not also dealing out decent DPS. So, the problem I was presented was how to maintain great tankability while dealing out decent DPS ?

Why, that’s impossible! You’d have to manufacture extra stat points out of thin air! And that is exactly what I did. If you want to find out how, read on!

Tankability
50% damage reduction is provided by 2.2k toughness (3478 armor), another 150 from the Strength in Numbers trait, and the Signet of Judgement which provides a flat 10% reduction. SoJ, traited for signet mastery, also serves as a stunbreaker and inflicts weakness on a short 24s CD, which is great for “oh kitten” moments. The symbol of protection, traited for Writ of Persistence, offers another permanent 33% damage reduction, not to mention AH heal for you and your allies with every tick.

17k health prevents spike damage. I could’ve gone for more at the expense of power by switching soldier gear for sentinel, but too much health is wasted and makes your heals less effective, not to mention lowering your DPS. Conversely, you could probably switch to more DPS/less life by simply switching the existing sentinels for soldiers if you feel the build is too tanky.

The strategy behind healing is to increase healing sources without directly putting points in the horribly-scaled “healing power” stat. An extra 300 points in healing power would net this character around 60~70 heals-per-second (not including dodge rolls), while simply putting a sigil of blood in your weapon and munching on omnomberry pies gives you around 150 hps, or the equivalent of 750 healing power.

Heals are provided by the following:
Virtue of resolve: 110 heals-per-second
HtL regen: 35 hps
Sigil of blood: 45 hps (against 1 enemy)
AH from SoP: 77 hps (for 1 person)
AH from SYG, HtL, SoJ and others: around 10~12 hps (1 person)
Signet of resolve: 269 hps
And if you’re eating food: Omnomberry pie: 70 hps (against 1 enemy)

For a total of 618 hps… alone . If you’re running with a team/zerg, the AH goes up exponentially. If you’re facing a mob instead of a boss, the proc heals from omnom/SoB go up. With targets and allies around, heals could easily go up to 1k per second. To be fair, all guardians are pretty good at getting tiny random heals…what makes it special in this case is how well it synergizes with the massive damage reduction.

Stuns are mitigated by Stand Your Ground and Signet of Judgment, both on 24 sec CD through different traits. Conditions are lifted passively by Signet of Resolve, SYG and Hold the Line through the pure of voice trait. Also, by using a hammer, people are gonna shoot cleansing arrows through your SoP all day. Overall, stunbreak/condition removal are not being sacrificed in favor of tankability.

@Guanglai Kangyi:

Hm, I’ve never had any problems holding aggro, usually it’s the opposite…I facetank until everything’s on cooldown, get chased clear across the map, hit until I go down, then the boss would continue beating on my body until I die a final death. Only then does he notice I have teammates XD

Or maybe it’s because I’m usually running with kittenty pugs in full MF armor, and real DPS guys would get more aggro. Isn’t the aggro formula some combination of damage, proximity and toughness? A tank may hit like a wet noodle, but no one can beat him on proximity and toughness!

newish guardian here, I really like your heal-per-second concept, and in fact did the same for my own calculations and arrived at the same conclusion you did (namely, dwayna is the best heal in terms of hps)

However, for the average guardian, your “heal skill”, no matter which one you choose, only comprises approximately 33% of your total hps. For my rather typical AH guardian, my heals include:

Writ of Merciful: 130 hps
Virtue of resolve: 107 hps
HtL regen: 33.4 hps
Omnom pie: 70 hps (against 1 enemy)
Sigil of blood: 45 hps (against 1 enemy)
AH from SoP: 75 hps (for 1 person)
AH from SYG, VoJ, VoC and others: around 10 hps (1 person)
Signet of resolve: 213 hps

for a total of 685 hps, of which the healing skill accounts for only 31%, and that’s not accounting for dodge heals, people nearby for you to leech AH, or more targets for you to proc off of. The extra 12 hps that dwayna has over signet of resolve would account for 1.7% of your total heals, an amount insignificant enough to be virtually ignored.

For that insignificant amount in heal, you can trade it for the condition removal every 10 secs of SoR, which imho is a very good trade.

tl;dr: Dwayna gives you an insignificant increase in hps at the expense of no condition removal.

@CMF:
Yeah, I’ve actually had some pretty positive experiences in pick-up groups doing CM, MF, HotW, and Arah. I tanked, held aggro, buffed teammates and didn’t die…therefore I must be awesome, right?! It was only when I got myself in a “dedicated” party doing speed runs on CoF p1 that I started noticing deficiencies in my build.

So it’s a great wake-up call. I would never have realized I was playing the game entirely wrong if I’d stayed with pugs and became self-satisfied with a sub-optimal build.

As for the shortcuts and tricks, I hate those too. I feel those things have an effect of stopping newbs like me from trying dungeons at all because you either have to beg experienced players to walk you through a dungeon the first time, or spend half an hour reading up wikis and youtube videos online beforehand.

@Lord trejgon:
4k armor is possible, although my character used more of an equivalent of 4k armor by adding the 150 for strength in numbers to a base armor of 3464 (for 3614), and the 10% damage reduction of SoJ (which translates to 361.4 armor for a total of 3975, and goes over 4k once I finish my ascendants)

I played around with the build editor and the best I could come up with is a “true” armor rating of 4.1k, which goes over 4.5k if you include SoJ (please add 150 for strength in numbers):
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fUAQNApeWlYgqCnFyIEfIFRuAbBYPwoH/41jEKRGC-jwyAYLIMWAJMBi2AmALiGbZjIashjqtx0wER127UbyHiWQA6C-e

But I felt it sacrificed too much in terms of vitality, healing, and condition removal. 4k armor was a nice compromise (or so I thought).

What you said about healing power confirms what I have long suspected: that although it scales horribly for self heals, but becomes far more useful in groups, as each mass heal effectively multiplies your healing power by 5.

I must admit I’m a bit disheartened to learn that inGW2 tanky builds are basically the training wheels for newbs on their way to full zerker. There’s so much more to tanking than simply “not dying”. I know people can play whichever way they choose to, but deliberately choosing a sub-optimal build in an MMO usually means getting kicked out of groups, getting ignored by future class/profession patches, and therefore missing out on most of the content in the game.

So…full zerker it is then. Thanks for all the replies and critique, I’ll post my new build once I work out the math behind DPS.

sorry…it’s 4k armor, not 4k toughness (4k toughness would be kinda crazy lol). And thanks for the replies….I’ve learned a lot in this thread!

So if 4k armor is too much, what would be considered a “balanced” armor rating? I see a lot of builds hovering around 3k, is that typical for front-line melee characters?

lol I guess this is what happens when you try to theorycraft without without any actual in-game experience :P

I was actually aiming for 4k armor because I’ve heard somewhere that the “average” armor rating in GW2 is 2k, and I wanted twice that amount for a 50% damage reduction. My character was able to achieve its equivalent with 2250 toughness + strength in numbers + SoJ. I know the “perma” protection of hammer renders all that unnecessary, but I don’t trust it because bosses move around all the time :/

The sigil of blood/omnomberry pie/ writ of merciful is actually part of a strategy to increase heals without directly putting points in the horribly-scaled healing power. I did the math…an extra 300 points in healing power would net me around 60~70 heals-per-second (not including dodgeheals), while WoM/pie/blood gives me around 280, or the equivalent of 1200 healing power.

This also explains the 44% crit…I need that for the blood/pies. Also, I needed at least some damage to hold aggro.

So theoretically , this build cuts 50~66% of the of damage coming in (compared to a normal 2k armor guy), while gaining approx 6~700 heals per second from a wide variety of sources, while still having enough life points (17K when I finish getting my ascended) to survive spikes and deal enough damage (2770/44%/30%) to hold aggro.

It sucks that I spent so much time crafting this build and then find out all people want are greatsword zerkers. Ah well, back to the drawing board. Thanks for your input, guys.

Hi guys, I’m a newbie guardian that enjoys tanking in almost every RPG I play. Sure, I guess it’s a bit less exciting than dodging and kiting all over the place while throwing spells behind your back, but for me there’s something appealing about standing toe-to-toe with a boss and trading blows without backing down.

Anyways, in GW2 I chose a guardian (after several false starts and some extensive researching), went with a crithammer build I saw on this forum, and made it even tankier to suit my playing style. At lv80, I saved up for full exotics and started collecting laurels for ascendents.

Then I went on my first “serious” dungeon run.

It was a pick-up group at first, but got progressively seriouser as people dropped out a and one guy brought in his guildmates. Anyways, it ended up being me and 4 people from the same guild (a dedicated group, I guess), and I was confused by the speed runs. They hardly fought any mini bosses or mobs along the way, dodging and weaving towards the final boss in an astounding display of dexterity and cowardance.

Along the way, I was constantly ragged on for not bringing enough offense to the table, and being a hindrance to the group because of it. When I explained I was trying to be a tank, it was met with even more mockery, this time directed towards tanks in general.

Yes, I understand the developers did away with the holy trinity, and the almighty dodge roll has rendered tanks irrelevant (except in higher levels of fotm?), but an MMO entirely filled with various styles of glass cannons and semi-glass cannons is somehow supposed to be more fun?

I know I should just stick to the open world and avoid dungeons, but the open world gets boring after a while. So my question is, is there any place left for pure tanks/bunker builds in this game?

Oh, and here is my build, please critique:
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fUAQJASWlYgqCnFyIEfIFRuAbBYPwoH/41DKmQGC-jAzAYLIMGAhJQZvklAHEbltIasqHM1ZS1wCy2bYTeg84KrBBUO-e