Need a little push in the right direction.

So, I have a little "problem". I've been playing Warrior for the past month or so and had some fun with it, Not a big fan of Spellbreaker but Berserker is still pretty nice. Sounds like the wrong forum section but hear me out. I played Guardian aswell as Warrior since I started playing gw 2 but there was always somethings about those two that I really disliked. For Guardian as example, I hate low HP classes, I know Aegis and blocks make up for that but it feels kinda bad to me to have less than ~18k hp.

Warrior on the otherside has some nice HP pool, can maintain 25 Stacks of Might, Fury and so one pretty easily + he has a passive movement speed boost. BUT I hate the fact that Hundred Blades is stationary, GS 3 feels kinda buggy sometimes aswell as GS 5. And I love GS, it is my fav. weapon. Guardian has awesome GS skills but lacks (afaik) the self might. I played Firebrand a few months back but I cant really remember if FB can maintain might by himself so sorry if I am wrong here. I hate being a banner slave and afaik thats the only purpose for Power Warrior atm besides maybe boonstrip.

The lack of the passive movement speed on Guardian is a rather big thing for me aswell since I mostly play open world and sacrificing a utility slot for that sucks.

I'll come to and end here now, the problem I mentioned is that I can't really decide which one I prefer as a main class. I like to play Power builds but want the possibility to go for a condi build aswell. I like to solo champs here and there, I am not into raids. PvP rarely aswell as WvW. Mostly open world and Fractals here and there. Please give me your opinion on both sides, I know this has been asked a lot but most of them didn't help me decide. What is your experience in those sections. I know Guardian is at the moment pretty good metawise but I am not asking for what is best at X. I want to know why you play Guardian over Warrior. What you dislike about Guardian and how do you "ignore" those aspects. And maybe help me see Guardian in a different way.

I am a player that wants to main a class so multiclassing or whatever it's called isn't really fun for me, I tried that aswell. I am only having fun when I can main a class. Even though my last main profession (necro) feels nowadays like a failed experiment to me and so I moved on.

Sorry for this kinda weird post but I am frustrated about this at the moment and that takes the fun away for me. Please help me out with this one.

:)

Guardian usually adds vitality with gear. Power uses marauder, Condi uses dire or trailblazer. Both give around 20khp which is adequate. Passive movespeed is available in dragonhunter traitline or traveler runes. Greatsword is viable in most guardian builds, pulling mobs into a clump makes short work of most content.

Guardian doesn't really need might stacks, you'll have some, but your damage comes from percentage increases in certain situations like you having retaliation or aegis or the enemy being on fire or crippled.

Good place to start: marauder (power) or dire (condi) with travelers. Radiance, virtues and dragonhunter. Slot your beloved greatsword, also a sword then shield or focus for power, torch for condi. Then, pick out the right traits based on power or condi. Do not hybrid, pick ALL the traits that compliment your gear choice.

Now grab a few traps, test of faith works great with greatsword and shield, it does damage whenever mobs cross the perimeter but is for power only. Procession of blades works with both, it's a lawnmower. Dragons maw destroys break bars. A fun burning combo: purging flames (it's a consecration fire field) around a group of mobs, do your greatsword 5 pull then whirl combo with greatsword 2. As a former necro main that combo should seem familiar, it's just as lethal on guard.

One last thing I almost forgot: Save a utility for Stand Your Ground. It's an instacast shout which breaks stun and gives stability. That's your panic button.

Thanks, those informations helped a lot so far. One thing I noticed though on metabattle the builds use full berserker besides one FB build with a bit of concetration in it. Isn't marauder more for people that aren't familiar with berserker stats, while marauder lowers your dps. Ferocity is around 190% with 45-50% crit with marauder and even with half marauder half berserker it doesn't seem to be a lot better. Are those % dmg increases enough to compensate or is it really just a safer option?

@"Fluxxar.3692" said:Thanks, those informations helped a lot so far. One thing I noticed though on metabattle the builds use full berserker besides one FB build with a bit of concetration in it. Isn't marauder more for people that aren't familiar with berserker stats, while marauder lowers your dps. Ferocity is around 190% with 45-50% crit with marauder and even with half marauder half berserker it doesn't seem to be a lot better. Are those % dmg increases enough to compensate or is it really just a safer option?

There is not one ideal build, especially when you say:

"I like to play Power builds but want the possibility to go for a condi build aswell. I like to solo champs here and there, I am not into raids. PvP rarely aswell as WvW. Mostly open world and Fractals here and there. "

I think you covered about nearly every possibility, except maybe support/healer role. :)

So, you are going to have to either work toward an acceptable compromise for all these modes, or have multiple configs that you swap between. There is no ideal build for all these disparate modes.

I know there isn't one setup for everything. I just like to have one (most of the times berserker) and build new ones after that but that takes a lot of time since I do this in a super casual way. Mostly I was looking for open world builds with the possibility to do Fractals up to lvl 50-60.

With what I said above I basically meant Berserker = Marauder on Guardian or is it either or. As example, on my Warrior I can have 60% crit, 250% crit dmg + % dmg from Peak Performance (20%) and Berserkers Power (up to 21%) and 17% dmg from Berserker traits. Afaik Guardian has 20% while Aegis is active which is kinda hard to maintain + 7% to burning foes + 10% while inside of a symbol and a bit for Retaliation. So Warrior does more damage while Warrior has more HP but less group support even as Berserker (stat) build. It just sounds like Guardian really lacks damage compared to Warrior even though I know Guardian can do a lot of damage aswell.

If I am thinking about what is important for me when it comes to professions it is basically nice Power damage, being a good solo class but also not the worst at group content. Which is basically Warrior AND Guardian. I really can't decide which one I should play, both have their big pro's and con's

Yeah I gave you a good start. As in, how do I learn guardian basics without being a corpse too often.Once you know what you're doing, what to equip/trait should be self evident

I am thankful for the help you gave me but I am not new to Guardian, I played Guardian atleast 300-400 hours mininum. It's been a while since I played Guardian and I know some things about it but I don't want to go for another Character that costs me like 150 hours before realising that this profession isn't fun for me. I only have 5 Char slots with 2 Bank chars so just keeping the Char for later isn't really an option aswell. And I don't want to be impolite now but I know that traits become easier to understand while playing and progressing until "lategame" but I want to know if the damage is still high enough with marauder gear compared to full berserker, I tested it in PvP lobby but since I am not used to Guard anymore I can't really tell, besides PvP lobby damage always feels off compared to open world damage.

In the end I guess I keep playing Warrior since it seems the more brainless profession atm. But not sure yet.

And btw, even though I am unexperienced with a class/profession however the f you wanna call them now, I am not the kind of player that dies a lot, I know how to dodge and how to utilize defensive mechanics to the extent that I won't die every 10 minutes. :) Oh and if some of the above sounds dumb, I know that 150 hours is a damn long time to realise a class isn't fun but sometimes it is fun until a specific point and then it is 0 fun no matter what I do. That's why I asked for help to get a new point of view in a best case scenario.

Still thanks for the help! :)

I main Guardian (Core), it's what I play in T4s and in LS content, and recently I've started playing Warrior, so I think its funny to see things from the opposite perspective.

My Warrior has more health than my Guard, but he is knocked on his behind more times than I can count, while my Guard just shrugs it off with Aegis.My Warrior with Greatsword has good mobility with GS 3 + 5, but it's got nothing on Guardian G3.My Warrior has nice cleave with Arcing Slice, but it's nothing compared to my Guard pulling in mobs with GS5 then melting them with GS2.My Warrior has to worry about keeping up Peak Performance + Berserker's Power, while my Guard only has to worry about Aegis being on or off (I have 100% retaliation), which is far less taxing.

The more I play my Warrior the more I am enjoying it, but I seriously doubt I will be swapping out my Guard for a BS Warrior in T4s any time soon.

@Turkeyspit.3965 said:(I have 100% retaliation), which is far less taxing.

Do you have any sort of boon duration for that? Why do you prefer core over DH or FB? Btw that was insanely helpful, that was what I needed. :)

Edit: I fucked the quote up lol, I decided to play Guardian for now, let's see how that works

@Fluxxar.3692 said:

@"Turkeyspit.3965" said:(I have 100% retaliation), which is far less taxing.

No, I run Core Guardian Zeal/Virtues/Radiance , so in addition to the usual ways of getting retaliation, Symbol of Wrath, Healer's Retribution, etc, the Virtues Trait "Virtue of Retribution" (https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Virtue_of_Retribution) gives me retaliation every time I active a virtue, so my rotation looks like this:

F1 - Virtue of Justice - gives retaliationHit targetIf target dies, Renewed Justice from the Radiance trait line resets the cooldown on Virtue of Justice (https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Renewed_Justice)move to next target, wash, rinse and repeat.

If you're fighting a boss, Virtue of Retribution also increases the duration of your retaliation by 25%, and between your virtues, symbol and healing skill, you can keep ret up for most of the fight, although you only really need to make sure it's up for GS2 which is your burst skill.

I don't run FB because I love Guardian GS.I choose Core over DH for a few reasons: I don't like traps, the DH Bow is jank, and because I now have a slot available to run Virtues trait, I bring utility in a group setting (eg fractals)

Virtues Trait:https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Inspired_Virtuehttps://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Indomitable_Courage

and with https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Unscathed_Contender, as long as Aegis is up, my damage is about on par with a DH's. True that only applies vs. golem, but I've seen the impact a group stunbreak and condi cleanse has, so I'm ok with doing a bit less damage if I can support my group more.

I decided to play Guardian now, he is lvl 13 atm and it has been fun so far, now I do have one last concern about Guardian/FB. If I do play fractals as example and have full berserker equip + traits and I'll play Firebrand to give my team some support through boons and or condi cleanse + a bit of heal, how much damage do I sacrifice? Or is this kind of thought totally dumb because it is a useless hybrid build and I should play either for damage or for boon/support? I remember vaguely hearing about celestial being good for Firebrand is that still a thing?

@"Fluxxar.3692" said:I decided to play Guardian now, he is lvl 13 atm and it has been fun so far, now I do have one last concern about Guardian/FB. If I do play fractals as example and have full berserker equip + traits and I'll play Firebrand to give my team some support through boons and or condi cleanse + a bit of heal, how much damage do I sacrifice? Or is this kind of thought totally dumb because it is a useless hybrid build and I should play either for damage or for boon/support? I remember vaguely hearing about celestial being good for Firebrand is that still a thing?

Quickbrand is the new thing for Fractals, and I have to say as a Core Guard, I love having them in my group.metabattle.com/wiki/Build:Firebrand_-_Quickness_Support_PowerDPS(Fractal)

I have to say I'm tempted to try this, as one of the reasons I've held back from playing FB was I wanted to keep using GS.

This helped me alot when I was new on guradian and had little confidence of running around with 11k HP

Thanks a ton for all the help, I really appreciate it. <3 The video helped aswell thanks for showing me. :)