Guardian monopoly on group stability has to go.

I remember a while back I read something along the lines of "GW2 isn't a traditional mmo with a trinity, where you have to wait for tanks healers and dps."

Except you do. If you don't, and your 50 person zerg attempts to fight another 50 person zerg with only half the parties covered with group stability, you lose. It not only limits what a group can do, lack of group stability availability goes directly against GW2 design philosophy. I realize this went out the window with Heart of Thorns, which is unfortunate. Not only that, Anet has taken the stance that classes will "specialize in a few boons rather then being able to pump out most of them." I agree that boonshare chrono was overtuned, and firebrand still is.

Stability is too important for any one single class to have a monopoly on. Being forced to have 1 guard per party is fine, when people will actually stop being selfish and switch to guard. How many times has a party you're in refused to do this though, resulting in a wipe? Are you always the guy who has to switch, getting stuck in q and dooming your party to be without stab and a man down? There isn't enough noise over this. Revolt, dang you all!

Mesmer, Revenant, Engineer, and Ranger can grant group stability.

There’s a consumable banner that can be used to grant stability to allies.

All classes have access to stability to provide to themselves.

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Stability

@"Ayrilana.1396" said:Mesmer, Revenant, Engineer, and Ranger can grant group stability.

There’s a consumable banner that can be used to grant stability to allies.

All classes have access to stability to provide to themselves.

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Stability

Its true, but they are all suboptimal to the point of useless, either the skills themselves or the class in general when trying to fill in as a support.

@Stand The Wall.6987 said:

@"Ayrilana.1396" said:Mesmer, Revenant, Engineer, and Ranger can grant group stability.

There’s a consumable banner that can be used to grant stability to allies.

All classes have access to stability to provide to themselves.

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Stability

Slotting one of utilities to grant stability does not automatically make the class support.

You wanted more parity which I showed you that there was. You disregarded them as being suboptimal (when they’re comparable to the skills guardian has) or for the class (which is confusing as you’re asking for more parity...). I have a feel that no solution may satisfy you.

It doesn't have a "monopoly on stability". People need to learn positioning, stunbreaks and stability of their own when applicable.

@Stand The Wall.6987 said:

@"Ayrilana.1396" said:Mesmer, Revenant, Engineer, and Ranger can grant group stability.

There’s a consumable banner that can be used to grant stability to allies.

All classes have access to stability to provide to themselves.

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Stability

There is nothing wrong with Defense Field. It's not as good as Guardian stab, but Scrappers far outclass Guardians in cleanses while providing just as good healing and on demand stealth/reveal. They're just as important to a zerg.

It not only limits what a group can do, lack of group stability availability goes directly against GW2 design philosophy. I realize this went out the window with Heart of Thorns,

Also, how can you say this when parties back then needed 2 guardians per party? I mean, aren't scourges most in demand right now?

With SYG affecting 10 targets, I'm not even sure if the contention of 1 per 5 is even true or not, but maybe someone else can comment on that.

@Ayrilana.1396 said:Slotting one of utilities to grant stability does not automatically make the class support.

You wanted more parity which I showed you that there was. You disregarded them as being suboptimal (when they’re comparable to the skills guardian has) or for the class (which is confusing as you’re asking for more parity...). I have a feel that no solution may satisfy you.

No... but more group stability would lead to better fights. They are not comparable in any way to guards stability. For something to even be considered as a viable alternative in terms of group stab I would say the minimum range would have to be 360 and instant cast. The solution is to buff these skills lol.

@"Justine.6351" said:It doesn't have a "monopoly on stability". People need to learn positioning, stunbreaks and stability of their own when applicable.

So with that comment I think to myself that maybe you don't run with zergs all that much.

@ArchonWing.9480 said:There is nothing wrong with Defense Field. It's not as good as Guardian stab, but Scrappers far outclass Guardians in cleanses while providing just as good healing and on demand stealth/reveal. They're just as important to a zerg.

It not only limits what a group can do, lack of group stability availability goes directly against GW2 design philosophy. I realize this went out the window with Heart of Thorns,

No, defense field is pretty good. The range is a bit small but all in all I think scrapper and rev (true nature dwarf skill for stab) are the closest to being viable off meta supports.I'm not sure what you mean when you bring up 2 guards per party as that only supports my argument.Unless we had confirmation as to how SYG handles the extra 5 targets, doing this would be really risky. I imagine some commanders do it anyways when the zerg is low on guards.

No, defense field is pretty good. The range is a bit small but all in all I think scrapper and rev (true nature dwarf skill for stab) are the closest to being viable off meta supports.

Brick Road is kinda sucky, haven't tried REv since those new buffs though.

I'm not sure what you mean when you bring up 2 guards per party as that only supports my argument.

/shrugs. In the past we needed 2 guards per party; now with it being 1 they just don't seem that important anymore. A lack of scourge or whatever would probably be worse if you as me. I guess if you had no guards that'd be bad though.

@Stand The Wall.6987 said:

@Ayrilana.1396 said:Slotting one of utilities to grant stability does not automatically make the class support.

You wanted more parity which I showed you that there was. You disregarded them as being suboptimal (when they’re comparable to the skills guardian has) or for the class (which is confusing as you’re asking for more parity...). I have a feel that no solution may satisfy you.

And not comparable how?

You are forgetting Doliak Stance best stability in the game

At this point in the game, the best way to adress stability is to decrease the need of it. What the different support classes conceptually do (as opposed to fine tuning balance) works pretty well barring a few exceptions. The actual issue comes from the importance of stability in the overall balance. That we have eg., a tome that can spam short stability and the meta is still ranged is a very good indicator of how absolutely broken CC is at the moment. If CC wasn't as impactful we wouldn't be arguing as much over the access to- or mechanics involved with sharing stability. Similarily, overall balance would also be better if we didn't have ludicrous CC leading to ludicrous death.

@ArchonWing.9480 said:Brick Road is kinda sucky, haven't tried REv since those new buffs though.A lack of scourge or whatever would probably be worse if you as me. I guess if you had no guards that'd be bad though.

Its the herald + dwarf true nature f2 skill. Nah a group can do without scourge, firebrand is mandatory.

@Ayrilana.1396 said:And not comparable how?

In every possible way. Range, cd's (amount of different skills that apply stab), duration... The range is probably the biggest, since if that was fixed 2 different stab providers should be able to manage 1 party.

@Stand The Wall.6987 said:

@Ayrilana.1396 said:And not comparable how?

Other than stand your ground, the other skills are fairly comparable as far as providing stability to allies. Considering that most groups would stack and fight together, I don’t see range being that big of an issue anyway. Those that are outside of the range of the other professions skills likely would be outside the range of the guardians (assuming there was a difference in range).

What role do you have in mind for guardian OP?Everything else has been stripped away. Outhealed, outcleansed and as always out DPS'd.Stabobot is what they have, all they have.

@Ayrilana.1396 said:Other than stand your ground, the other skills are fairly comparable as far as providing stability to allies. Considering that most groups would stack and fight together, I don’t see range being that big of an issue anyway. Those that are outside of the range of the other professions skills likely would be outside the range of the guardians (assuming there was a difference in range).

I don't know what else to tell you. If you still think the other skills are comparable to all that guard has to offer then you just don't get it. Rev true nature dwarf f2 is close, its 600 range 2 stacks @ 5 sec. maybe another 1-2 stacks with a cd increase and its golden.

@LetoII.3782 said:What role do you have in mind for guardian OP?Everything else has been stripped away. Outhealed, outcleansed and as always out DPS'd.Stabobot is what they have, all they have.

No nerfs to guard if that's what youre asking. A buff to group stability for other classes so if there is a guard deficit then parties can (hopefully) slot some group stab and not one push, leading to longer and better fights.

@Stand The Wall.6987 said:

@Ayrilana.1396 said:Other than stand your ground, the other skills are fairly comparable as far as providing stability to allies. Considering that most groups would stack and fight together, I don’t see range being that big of an issue anyway. Those that are outside of the range of the other professions skills likely would be outside the range of the guardians (assuming there was a difference in range).

If stability is an issue, guilds can use the two banners which grants it to allies. Those have a 1-1.5K range.

Let's just boil down what OP is trying to say:

Every class should be the same. Each provides the exact same boons with the same duration. The only difference between the classes is how they hold their weapons. GG.

@Ni In.6578 said:Let's just boil down what OP is trying to say:

Every class should be the same. Each provides the exact same boons with the same duration. The only difference between the classes is how they hold their weapons. GG.

Really does seem the case.

@Stand The Wall.6987 said:

No nerfs to guard if that's what youre asking. A buff to group stability for other classes

So leave guard as-is and make them completely redundant, while others keep their fancy toys?

Maybe the problem is that there is too much CC.

Stab wouldn't be such a mandatory boon if everything didn't vomit out so much CC.

@subversiontwo.7501 said:At this point in the game, the best way to adress stability is to decrease the need of it. What the different support classes conceptually do (as opposed to fine tuning balance) works pretty well barring a few exceptions. The actual issue comes from the importance of stability in the overall balance. That we have eg., a tome that can spam short stability and the meta is still ranged is a very good indicator of how absolutely broken CC is at the moment. If CC wasn't as impactful we wouldn't be arguing as much over the access to- or mechanics involved with sharing stability. Similarily, overall balance would also be better if we didn't have ludicrous CC leading to ludicrous death.

Nailed it.

Guardain is force to only play as group stability that the real problem. The guardain class can do far more then spam one boon but because the one boon is so game braking in effect it counters the only thing ppl want from the guardain class is stab. Stab needs to be nerf in its effect and the amount of hard cc needs to be nerf as well. Stun lock should not be a thing and only dazes should be the long duration hard cc that dose not stop you from moving. Any thing that stop you from casting and moving should be a .1 sec duration no 2-3 sec of just keeping ppl from playing the game.

@"Ni In.6578" said:Let's just boil down what OP is trying to say:

Every class should be the same. Each provides the exact same boons with the same duration. The only difference between the classes is how they hold their weapons. GG.

This is pretty much what most "this insert is OP " threads consist of unfortunately. All basically boils down to said class can do this and mine cant or this class version of this skill is better pls nerf. Instead of focusing on what their own class has as a whole and what can be done to improve upon it.

@"Stand The Wall.6987" said:I remember a while back I read something along the lines of "GW2 isn't a traditional mmo with a trinity, where you have to wait for tanks healers and dps."

I think this concept applies to PvE where players should not have to rely on roles to be able to play through the content. I don't think this ideology applies to WvW meta.

That said group stability should be added to Warriors probably in the form of shouts/banners. The class already requires it to be effective and as it is now Stances are pretty much a must take so it would be nice to have some diversity in the trait line. A strong argument could be made for better group stability in the Elementalist/Tempest playbook as well.

@Ayrilana.1396 said:Note that I’m saying comparable and not same. With how fights tend to go, the small difference in range between the skills, of any, would be neglible.

If stability is an issue, guilds can use the two banners which grants it to allies. Those have a 1-1.5K range.

You can say whatever you want, the fact is that the stab skills provided by other classes are an unreliable substitute for what guard has. Getting crippled for 2 sec will knock you out of range of the mostly 240 radius group stab skills provided by others. What banners are you talking about? Turtle banner etc.? You've got to be joking.

@LetoII.3782 said:

@Ni In.6578 said:Let's just boil down what OP is trying to say:

Every class should be the same. Each provides the exact same boons with the same duration. The only difference between the classes is how they hold their weapons. GG.

@Stand The Wall.6987 said:

No nerfs to guard if that's what youre asking. A buff to group stability for other classes

A small buff to other classes group stab and suddenly the world ends. Firebrand would still be best in slot, relax.

@Stand The Wall.6987 said:

@Ayrilana.1396 said:Note that I’m saying comparable and not same. With how fights tend to go, the small difference in range between the skills, of any, would be neglible.

If stability is an issue, guilds can use the two banners which grants it to allies. Those have a 1-1.5K range.

According to you.

Getting crippled for 2 sec will knock you out of range of the mostly 240 radius group stab skills provided by others.

Cripple doesn’t knock you around. Most group stack buffs before engaging so you’ll be well within range.

What banners are you talking about? Turtle banner etc.? You've got to be joking.

They’re options even though they don’t fit the narrative being presented.