I'll guard you. Let them come through ME first! - Guardian discussion thread.

[Vizardlorde]

A spirit weapon build would only kinda work for leveling, AOE/cleave is the bane of spirit weapons and its present in every dungeon, WVW and even Spvp on a smaller scale. Another issue is that they have a significant cooldown even when traited.

[nevermore]

What are you guys' thoughts on DPS hammer builds?

I've been running with it for a few days, my gear is still meh but my damage seems respectable... I really do love the constant protection on my group.
I'm just not sure if it's _really_ worth it over a sword or GS build.

[Meledelion]

I find the DPS hammer highly overrated. The DPS is very lackluster but this is overlooked by most since you get big numbers (that's just how hammers work).

While Fire-fields are handy, why not just use them on a "normal" DPS-guard? Or on another elementalist or on a ranger or...

The main issue is the very low crit chance, with sigil of accuracy and full perception stacks you're still only on 68% crit chance, toss in banner and fury and you get 96% but this is costing you a lot of damage (accuracy is a horrible sigil in comparison to night/force).

If you're in a party that needs extra protection, you'll probably also need extra healing so that sort of contradicts with DPS-builds.

[Lane]

Stacking sigil for a support guardian in WvW, would you go +healing or +toughness?

[Zephyr Storm]

Stacking sigil for a support guardian in WvW, would you go +healing or +toughness?

It's WvW. Basically, build however you want, and just run around with the zerg. There really isn't much strategy to be had in Zerg vs. Zerg.

[Lane]

It's WvW. Basically, build however you want, and just run around with the zerg. There really isn't much strategy to be had in Zerg vs. Zerg.

Well, that'd be nice if my server actually fielded zergs anymore. As it is, it's usually me along with <10 other people against two other servers who do have 20+ player zergs. Which is why I wondered if I should go with toughness or not.

[Zephyr Storm]

Well, that'd be nice if my server actually fielded zergs anymore. As it is, it's usually me along with <10 other people against two other servers who do have 20+ player zergs. Which is why I wondered if I should go with toughness or not.

In that case, I'd go toughness. Healing power is next to worthless in 99% of the cases in this game because of how bad it scales. Toughness really isn't much better, especially in wvwvw, but it's the better of the two choices in my opinion. Health, power, crit, and crit damage would probably serve you better though since guards get a lot of their damage mitigation through blocks, blinds, and protection. And more health the better, because guards have such a small hit point pool anyway.

[Meledelion]

It depends on your style, I personally have both sets for different situations.

If you run with small groups vs small groups (focusing on towers/camps/mercs) healing power is great because you can get lots of it in PvE/WvW. If you play the generic sPvP shout build you become night immortal and can keep up nearly all guards/dolyaks solo, You'll want to use staff/mace+focus.

When you go ZvZ (no matter if it's a fair match or not) you'll want toughness since it's impossible to out heal the damage from zergs anyway (if you want to do that you need water fields and blast/leap finishers). Your job is to give shouts and stay alive as long as possible while doing it + frontlining to keep enemies away, damage isn't all that important anymore so go pvt gear or vpt gear w/e you like, for weapons most people use gs/staff but you can go with gs/sw+focus if you wish.

Pvt gear works in both scenarios though so that's why you mainly see people rocking that, I personally find being immortal in small groups hella fun

This might also be a nice link for you Lane:

[Valeron]

My Guardian is forever stuck at level 65. I just can't get the motivation to level it. Props to those that like the profession but something is just off for me. The only profession that I don't have a level 80 with as well.

[Lane]

I hadn't given any thought to stacking precision. Does precision work on heals (if so, is it worth it over toughness)? I'm really clueless about healing in GW2 in general.

@Doozerjun

Playing staff support is kind of fun. My guardian was gathering dust too because it seemed like a lesser effective version of my warrior. Now that I'm doing something different my interest is renewed.

[Meledelion]

There's no thing such as critical healing so no.

I personally play my guardian like a warrior which looks out for the group a bit more, keeping up defenses against projectiles, putting up stability/aegis when needed all while trying to maximise dps.

[Salech]

What are you guys' thoughts on DPS hammer builds?

I've been running with it for a few days, my gear is still meh but my damage seems respectable... I really do love the constant protection on my group.
I'm just not sure if it's _really_ worth it over a sword or GS build.

DPS hammer builds brings perma protection, medium/good damage, as a guardian always good support, there is a reason why lots of teams in high fractals are always using 1 hammer guardian.

[Lane]

Is there a reason I don't see more WvW support builds using mace + focus/shield? Right now I have hammer as my weapon swap, but I'm not having much success with it. Players move around so much in ZvZ and the range on the attacks is so short much of the time I end up swinging at air. It just seems like I could be doing something more useful than spamming staff #1 like a n00b waiting for things to come off of cooldown.

I know some use GS, but I feel like in Cleric's gear the DPS just isn't worth it and I'm, again, not really contributing anything but minor damage that won't affect most opponents.

[Meledelion]

Hammer guards bring LOW to medium dps.

Mace (and shield) are only going to help you basically and that's why it's not used in zvz but is used in pvp.
You can use the greatsword in clerics gear too, the idea is that you grip people away from the group so your team can kill them.

Your job is to provide support for the melee squad so you run in and try to keep swiftness up, line of warding stability and so on.
Most people start off in staff before combat start to give buffs and then swap to their other set, this way they don't waste line of warding when the enemy has stability and you can later use it to kill the wounded buffalo's with a binding blade pull=> line of warding.

[Vizardlorde]

My Guardian is forever stuck at level 65. I just can't get the motivation to level it. Props to those that like the profession but something is just off for me. The only profession that I don't have a level 80 with as well.

Did you try the greatsword? I can't imagine people leveling w/o it even though i know some level with hammer or sword/offhand as their weapons of choice.