In house Guardian guide

Starting this so we can post personal first hand experience on guardians woudl prefer no links inless its a build. Want to compile a good resource that we personally have witnessed and used. 

I personally use Sword/focus and GreatSword right ow so will post on that and what traits/7,8,9 skills i use. If I could get other weapon guardians to write in what they have experienced would be great or any other weapons like mine that want to add or challenge what I say. Preferably launch data if you played it in BW but not now would prefer if u didn't add anythign since stuff has changed and a lot thats out there is from BWs and not compeltely accurate.

Ok for now why I go sword and focus and GS. 

Sword/focus is 1 of the best single target dmg out there.  Once full traited with Renewed Justice,Right handed strength, and Powerful blades its sick dmg. Also focus instead of shield or torch because

1. Shield of Wrath is 3 blocks which is awesome or uber aoe dmg which is ever better.

2. Torch to me isn't viable till they fix inner fire rigth now only works if enemy sets u on fire and not when u use torch set of fire which is what it was intended i think. 

3. Shield while it would seem like the better defense and survivability shield of wrath is just better IMO and this build is more dmg than survive so focus being great defense + dmg thats just awesome.

And I go Greatsword because to me that is our best weapon. Specially for leveling and for aoe ownage. 

What is not to love

1. the auto attack is great aoe +might at the end.

2. Great symbol that provides dmg adn retaliation which in wvw is awesoem against siege.

3. A great aoe whirl finisher that is great dmg and also combos off differnet fields to make some great combos

4. Gap closer and blind in 1 always great

5. Also a combo whirl finsiher, dmg, and a pull again great. Though the 600 range fo the pull is annoying specialyl with it dropping away if they go out of range and its easly blocked.

Ok 6,7,8,9,10 skills

6. Sig of Resolve easily the best heal we have plus the passive condition remove is great.

7. Smite Condition- I have this though it only does 1 condition because the dmg is really good. This is awesome in PvE when u get those annoying chills or the 5 sec of death poisons. Not to mention most mobs cause at least 1 condition so this is basically a free high power attack. 

8. Judges Intervention- Had someone mention why have this when the GS and Sword both have a gap closer and that is for several reasons. 

      A. Always good to have more than 1-2 gap closers specially for pesky teleporting players and mobs

      B. Its got twice the range of the other ones.

      C. Its a disappear and reappear skill so confused enemy's in pvp.

      D. Has a nice aoe his then u land which is a good draw in for PVE so u can aoe them down.

9. Is my change up depending on whats needed. Usually its save yourselves cause it just turns u into a beast. But also Sancuary for bottlenecking and ressing in wvw, Hold the line for wvw if we are pushign through the door, Stand your Ground for boss fights that have pulls or knockdowns.

10. Also depends on where i am playing for PvE its Wolf Form from the norns. Its a great you can't die in PvE whiel its up form.

In PvP I use either Snow Leopard form from the norn or Tome fo courage. Snow leopard because of a 5 sec stealth every 10 secs is great for sneakign into contested towers or bases. And the across the map dash is great if you can find a target way away to run to. 

Tome of Courage is great because it has that massive aoe heal that is great in wvw specially at door pushes.

TRAITS

At my lvl I used 0/20/20/5/5

Zeal a lot of good stuff but not for this build.

Raidance for this build has 4 very important things

   1.Justice is Blind-Everytime you pop Virtue of Justice(which will be every time its off CD) Enemy is blinded which is always good.

   2. Renewed Justice which renews VoJ everytime you kill and enemy which is any enemy u have tagged so in wvw its always up. 

   3. Powerful Blades- 5% dmg is 5% dmg

   4. Right handed str- well 15%crit chance is a must

Valor is for toughness and

   1. Mediations 20% fast which since most of the 7.8.9 skills are meds its a must

   2. Meditations are instant which is If you started casting Zealot’s Defense or Whirling Wrath and your opponent moves out of range, you can use Judge’s Intervention to move yourself right next to your target to prevent the target from dodging the damage. It’s also very useful in conjunction with skills like Ring of Warding- you can start the cast time for Ring of Warding at range and then, just before it finishes, use Judge’s Intervention to move right next to your target. Ya copy and pasted that bit from a notehr guide cause he explains it better.

Honor is jsut there as a trait filler and extra surviabilty

Virtue to me every guardian shoudl have at least 5 in this for its first thing. It just provides to much benefit not to. Everytime u use VoJ u get might, Ever VoR u give an extra regen also, and Every VoC you grant protection and i haven't tested it yet but i'm sure it gives it to every that is effected by it. 

Thats it for me so far will try adn keep this updated with any thing i learn.  And as I said plz add or disagree with anything here.

Maybe it is because I usually use the greatsword. I like it better than any other combination due to damage and surviability. I tend to have more mobs on me rather than singles. I plan to have 30 in zeal for Master trait of 5% greatsword damage and grandmaster trait of greatsword attacks heal you. On Honor at Master level you can get 20% faster two handed weapon skill recharge. Think of spamming AOE damage. I don't know if I will go fully to 30 here since Valor has some nice skills as well at Adept level you get 10% toughness in precision. I still need to figure out where I want the last 10 points. For the other weapon set I usually use Scepter/Torch for range and good damage combo. This is a really good range alternative. I had been using staff in WvW but I found using the Scepter provided a big boost to damage output.

As slow as the hammer can be, I'm quickly becoming inseparable with me hammar. I'm going more of a tanky support build and I love the options I get with having a hammer/staff in both pve and wvw. Feel like smacking that champion mob around a little? Get out da hamma! Ouch, that champion hurts...time to take a step back and use my staff. Same goes for wvw, but with some coveats. I'm having much more luck using a hammer to bring down running foes with my hammer than anything else when running with fellow guild members. Tried going greatsword, but beyond the aoe pull, I'm just not in love with it. Someone doesn't realize I have 20 people with me? Run behind him and knockback into our zerg. He's still trying to get away? Immobilize and then do ring of warding. Enemies will usually try to run and instead are welcomed to being knocked down by the ring of warding wall effect. He's still alive and trying to run? Switch to staff and place line of warding just beyond his path. Doh! He falls down again. Poor bad guy.

» Edited on: 2012-09-10 14:55:59

At this point in WvW I'm trying to find my place as a support role that can also win a 1 vs 1 if needed. Thiefs are especially fond of singling out guardians for some reason and a few have hopefully learned their lesson. Luckily I haven't gone head to head with a 80 Thief yet, pretty sure I would lose that one hahaha... At this point I'm switching between Greatsword/Staff, Hammer/Staff, Greatsword or Hammer/Scepter and Shield. The staff has the symbol of swiftness, which is invaluable in wvw, it has helped me escape more than once. The GreatSword is good in WvW but is down right awesome in PvE where foes will just stand there and take Whirling Wrath. It does pretty decent damage especially Whirling Wrath but a lot more people are learning to dodge it and then it's wasted. You can't overlook Leap of Faith and the blind it inflicts. Then there's binding blade as Nostiger said the range is bad and it is easily dodged but when it works it's golden, it's something that takes a little practice to get down. I have found the hammer useful lately. It has great control not to mention Area Retaliation from the combination of Symbol of Protection and Mighty Blow. My understanding is Power plays a large part in how much damage retaliation sends back, but I'm still testing at this point. The reason for the Scepter is mainly for keep/tower assaults once everything out front has been eliminated. Smite can be used for helping take out defenses. The shield is basically just to knock someone off their feet if they are trying to sneak into a keep/tower. Can't give much input on traits I have gone thru so many different setups I don't know where to start. Right now I'm using a Meditation build for rounding up mats in PvE for epic armor. Build At the moment I'm working on a WvW support build to include larger and longer symbols along with area retaliation and all the stability I can get. That's a tall order but we'll see. Just something to keep in mind you can change your major traits if you want when heading into WvW to suite your situation which might be a little different from PvE.

» Edited on: 2012-09-10 16:45:37

I haven't made a guardian yet, so im going to keep an eye on this post. Right now i have an 80 ele and an 80 warrrior. I havent played guardian yet because Im not sure if the gameplay will just feel like Im playing a 2nd, more durable warrior, but I do want to try it guardian because they're so good to have around in any situation. after 2 leveled characters, I have never once thought "yay, im so glad we have a (necro or thief) in our group". But Im always thinking to myself "yay im so glad we have a (elementalist or guardian) in the group", which is why I want to have both of those classes.

Yep I run a hammer build aswell and swap in great sword now and then , i tried sword /focus our supposedly high dps combo but other then zealot def it seemed weak . Hammer is great and can be off as well as def in nature , and allow the 3rd hammer attack to go off for the proct symbol that helps a lot . Hammer suffers from a gap closer however i run save yourselfs for buffs aswell as swiftness to catch up , then tag with line of warding . I would run Hammer and run either 1h sword and shield or focus or run greatsword as secondary set up to have a closer.

Been trying the build at the top of the thread and really enjoying it, just couldn't get the hang of the hammer so I think I'm going to try for a sword/torch great sword burn build next and see how that goes. Also enjoy the symbol support and consecrations build in WvW for the utility and group support. Just enjoying all of the possibilities the guardian has to offer.

@ Nostiger Excellent post!! I wanted to throw this link in. It has a tremendous wealth of guardian knowledge. http://www.guildwars2guru.com/topic/47278-tome-of-conquest-your-guardian-competitive-pvp-guide/

ya that guide is the start of mine i started my build from it then tested in game and made some changes. And to you hammer guys was wondering if you used Judges Intervention with the instant mediation for ur ring of warding yet. That was always my issue with hammer was it always seemed like you could step or dodge out of the way before the ring actually got set up. The tp during it to get u next to the guy seems like the best way.

and to dirk when u tried sword/focus did u get 30 points into radiance for RHS sword isn't as good till you get that. Thats what makes it the hardest hitting. With that and a popped VoJ for the extra might and burning zealots def becomes crazy and you autoattack is extremely strong.

Great thread! Wanted to echo the comments on the usefulness of hammer. I found it a nice mix of medium DPS + some nice control/buff features, especially in group play. Some of the advantages: immobilize, area denial (so amazing in tight quarters), drops a 3s protection buff on 1 auto-attack which can then be used to do a retaliation combo with the 2- blast ability, interupt and kick with skill 3, good but not great DPS. I'm pure survivability/support. Currently traits are 0/0/20/30/20. The most useful traits I've found are: 1. Consecration skills are ground targeted, 2. All symbols are larger, 3. remove 1 condition every 10 seconds (which I believe stacks with the Signet of Resolve as well) and 4. Allies affected by shouts convert one condition to a boon. I can spam some of the faster recharging shouts and give the shout buff + remove condition + add additional boon, it's very cool. For WvW I've been doing Hammer, scepter or mace/shield, and occasionally swapping to staff for speed buff. I thought I would never get away from the staff in pvp, but the more I used it the less I liked it. The Might buff is nice, the speed is nice, but I can barely even damage anything, let alone kill it. The magic wall has only been good for our 300-style defense of the keeps. The auto-attack barely registers. I've been thinking about swapping out Stand Your Ground for Retreat to replace the staff speed buff. Must have slot skills for WvW: Wall of Reflection (so much fun watching those damage numbers pop up as the ranged folks eat their own arrows), Hold the Line - for my shout. I also like Sanctuary for supporting downed players. For elite skills, the two Tomes are both great and I like to play with the Snow Leopard just because of the stealth and speed. For farming PvE, I go Greatsword and Judges Intervention or Purging Flames for the combo field, and I might swap out to a trait that gives 5% of Toughness into Precision for a little more crit (typically gives +5% or so). I love reading what other folks are doing! Thanks for posting this.