raid/fractal guardian tank question

[weaponwh.9810]

is firebrand viable for tanking boss for raid/fractal? if so what gear and what build. also tips on how to stay alive.

[Dreamreaver.4908]

If you mean tanking as in having everything focus you to take otherwise detrimental damage away from squishier allies, there's no such thing in fractals (except for maybe the annoying CC spam golems in Chaos).

If you mean just general sustain, maybe in the instance where you're trying to solo/ carry bad groups along to finish a boss in fractals while being the only one left standing; no.

As for raids, no idea, but doubtful. Someone else can enlighten on that as I haven't touched raids (to a serious extent) in years.

[WindBlade.8749]

In raids, you can do a tank firebrand, but it's rare and rarely used honestly, chrono is just better at tanking and is the most to go for most of lfg since it's do not ask a special build other than the boon chrono build you already use.

[Expertus.5746]

In gw2 we dont rly have real tank mechanic. If there is one, it can be taken by anybody due to you only need to moove the boss, and for that you only need a toughness infusion (or 1151tg if u have a slb in ur group). Tank is usually taken by druid/rene. The only encounter in the game where you actually need a "real tank" is SH. In better groups its taken by druid/condi Chronos with some toughness, in worse groups you can take double healbrand as tanks, (we also do that, its totally fine).Qadim2 also hits hard, and if you dont have enough dps druid cant take it without the risk of dieing. Most groups needs there a second healer anyway, so alacheal can do this job. Q2 is the only encounter where minstrel chrono is semi viable due to the 10 man quickness, and chaneling block, but you will see minstrel chrono in trashpug way too often.Im gonna guess you are a newbie in raids. So for you, yes, you can easily "tank" everything with hfb, even without toughness (but make sure you have higher than everybody else in the group).But if you like that tanky playstyle with a lot of toughness/healing/vit wvw is the place for you. HFB is very good here.

[TheDeafGuy.4519]

I tank HFB for my static and just act as the secondary healer for my static. Unless your static is extremely decent or meta with all above average players , one healer is gonna give your group several wipes in a full clear run. Having a secondary healer will give you the most consistent full clears without barely any loss in time IF the other group was also able to full clear without any wipes with only a druid healer. Tank HFB is better than Tank chrono IMO as it has the self sustain and still able to provide boons and heals for their subgroup.

Anyway, you don't really need to be tanky to be a tank for most encounters, however if you wanna be the main tank for your group just run HFB and be the other main support which brings SYG for encounters that require it (sloth, gors, etc.) You can also bring sanctuary for bosses that require a lot of cc (sloth, sam, sh, and sabir)

The bosses that you want to be ideally a tanky tank to have a smooth run is souless horror, QTP, largos, Xera. This is in a more casual scenario than hardcore.

Also, having higher vitality and toughness makes you the last person to go down if an accident happens like Sab bomb on group so you can focus on healing your allies than going down and needing to be healed.

My static is very casual and not hardcore at all, (even having a player who still skill clicks), and if everything goes smoothly, we can full clear in about 4.5 hours.

[weaponwh.9810]

@TheDeafGuy.4519 said:I tank HFB for my static and just act as the secondary healer for my static. Unless your static is extremely decent or meta with all above average players , one healer is gonna give your group several wipes in a full clear run. Having a secondary healer will give you the most consistent full clears without barely any loss in time IF the other group was also able to full clear without any wipes with only a druid healer. Tank HFB is better than Tank chrono IMO as it has the self sustain and still able to provide boons and heals for their subgroup.

Anyway, you don't really need to be tanky to be a tank for most encounters, however if you wanna be the main tank for your group just run HFB and be the other main support which brings SYG for encounters that require it (sloth, gors, etc.) You can also bring sanctuary for bosses that require a lot of cc (sloth, sam, sh, and sabir)

The bosses that you want to be ideally a tanky tank to have a smooth run is souless horror, QTP, largos, Xera. This is in a more casual scenario than hardcore.

Also, having higher vitality and toughness makes you the last person to go down if an accident happens like Sab bomb on group so you can focus on healing your allies than going down and needing to be healed.

My static is very casual and not hardcore at all, (even having a player who still skill clicks), and if everything goes smoothly, we can full clear in about 4.5 hours.

thanks, so basically use HFB to heal through dmg? do you do stability or other skill against certain boss attack? do you use harrier or minstrel or mix?

[TheDeafGuy.4519]

@weaponwh.9810 said:

@TheDeafGuy.4519 said:I tank HFB for my static and just act as the secondary healer for my static. Unless your static is extremely decent or meta with all above average players , one healer is gonna give your group several wipes in a full clear run. Having a secondary healer will give you the most consistent full clears without barely any loss in time IF the other group was also able to full clear without any wipes with only a druid healer. Tank HFB is better than Tank chrono IMO as it has the self sustain and still able to provide boons and heals for their subgroup.

Anyway, you don't really need to be tanky to be a tank for most encounters, however if you wanna be the main tank for your group just run HFB and be the other main support which brings SYG for encounters that require it (sloth, gors, etc.) You can also bring sanctuary for bosses that require a lot of cc (sloth, sam, sh, and sabir)

The bosses that you want to be ideally a tanky tank to have a smooth run is souless horror, QTP, largos, Xera. This is in a more casual scenario than hardcore.

Also, having higher vitality and toughness makes you the last person to go down if an accident happens like Sab bomb on group so you can focus on healing your allies than going down and needing to be healed.

My static is very casual and not hardcore at all, (even having a player who still skill clicks), and if everything goes smoothly, we can full clear in about 4.5 hours.

thanks, so basically use HFB to heal through dmg? do you do stability or other skill against certain boss attack? do you use harrier or minstrel or mix?

If you know you're going to be the Main tank, I would just go full minstrels, its extraordinarily helpful in fractals too with certain instabilities. Don't fall for meme harriers to push your group dps by 2k or less lmao. If your group is ready for more damage then just go full berserk after. Stability (stand your ground) is useful for slorhosaur and his fear, sabetha for prevention of getting knocked into her flame wall, gorseval when he slams, Cairn for no greens, samarog, largos, Conjured Amalgamate, both qadims

Neat trick with syg is you can proc your Trait to give 10 man ~3s quickness if you haven't casted stab or aegis recently and take the middle trait of the 2nd row ( too lazy to look up the name )

[Henry.5713]

They tank just fine while providing everything they always do when used as a second healer. As in, decent healing, group Quickness, a group damage modifier through the use of Signet Sharing, okeyish pulls and of course group Stability. They are able to swap to Bow of Truth for more healing, Wall of Reflection for easy reflects, Stand Your Ground for squad-wide Stability, Mantra for cleanses and so on depending on the boss your are facing. They may not be the META and be rarely seen as tanks in pugs but some statics use them. Other statics experiment with them from time to time.

Think about why Druids or Alacritygades are made to tank in strong groups. Basically, if you are going to have everything (boons and all) covered already and you need to bring certain supports suchs as Druids and Renegades no matter what then you might as well make them tank instead of "wasting" an additional slot on a Chrono. You are able to adjust things slightly if there is anything else you miss. It is a way to min-max the squad damage output.

Similar with Firebrands in weaker groups. If you are going to insist on having a second healer then you might as well make this healer tank. There are quite a few runs I have seen where people use a Minstrel Chrono and a Druid and an Alacritygade and then also a Harrier Firebrand as a second healer. The only thing they would really have to cover after losing the Tank Chrono is group Quickness. This can be done by using a cQuickbrand. Or you may even run an offensive Quickness Build on the old Chrono. Either way, you gain quite a bit of additional DPS over having a Minstrel Chrono alongside a Harrier Firebrand. Most likely a good thing with groups which already struggle with staying alive and all that.

[Fangoth.4503]

@weaponwh.9810 said:is firebrand viable for tanking boss for raid/fractal? if so what gear and what build. also tips on how to stay alive.

raidwise:

its viable on pretty much all bosses. Most bosses do close to no damage so you can tank as qFB with 1005 toughness.For SH and Q2 you might want to go hfb and get the toughness you need to survive.Largos you may encounter some issue as it's often done as split. But you still can hFB if doing portal strat.

[weaponwh.9810]

@"Henry.5713" said:They tank just fine while providing everything they always do when used as a second healer. As in, decent healing, group Quickness, a group damage modifier through the use of Signet Sharing, okeyish pulls and of course group Stability. They are able to swap to Bow of Truth for more healing, Wall of Reflection for easy reflects, Stand Your Ground for squad-wide Stability, Mantra for cleanses and so on depending on the boss your are facing. They may not be the META and be rarely seen as tanks in pugs but some statics use them. Other statics experiment with them from time to time.

Think about why Druids or Alacritygades are made to tank in strong groups. Basically, if you are going to have everything (boons and all) covered already and you need to bring certain supports suchs as Druids and Renegades no matter what then you might as well make them tank instead of "wasting" an additional slot on a Chrono. You are able to adjust things slightly if there is anything else you miss. It is a way to min-max the squad damage output.

Similar with Firebrands in weaker groups. If you are going to insist on having a second healer then you might as well make this healer tank. There are quite a few runs I have seen where people use a Minstrel Chrono and a Druid and an Alacritygade and then also a Harrier Firebrand as a second healer. The only thing they would really have to cover after losing the Tank Chrono is group Quickness. This can be done by using a cQuickbrand. Or you may even run an offensive Quickness Build on the old Chrono. Either way, you gain quite a bit of additional DPS over having a Minstrel Chrono alongside a Harrier Firebrand. Most likely a good thing with groups which already struggle with staying alive and all that.

never heard alac tank. whats the build and gear for that?

[Fangoth.4503]

@weaponwh.9810 said:

@"Henry.5713" said:They tank just fine while providing everything they always do when used as a second healer. As in, decent healing, group Quickness, a group damage modifier through the use of Signet Sharing, okeyish pulls and of course group Stability. They are able to swap to Bow of Truth for more healing, Wall of Reflection for easy reflects, Stand Your Ground for squad-wide Stability, Mantra for cleanses and so on depending on the boss your are facing. They may not be the META and be rarely seen as tanks in pugs but some statics use them. Other statics experiment with them from time to time.

Think about why Druids or Alacritygades are made to tank in strong groups. Basically, if you are going to have everything (boons and all) covered already and you need to bring certain supports suchs as Druids and Renegades no matter what then you might as well make them tank instead of "wasting" an additional slot on a Chrono. You are able to adjust things slightly if there is anything else you miss. It is a way to min-max the squad damage output.

Similar with Firebrands in weaker groups. If you are going to insist on having a second healer then you might as well make this healer tank. There are quite a few runs I have seen where people use a Minstrel Chrono and a Druid and an Alacritygade and then also a Harrier Firebrand as a second healer. The only thing they would really have to cover after losing the Tank Chrono is group Quickness. This can be done by using a cQuickbrand. Or you may even run an offensive Quickness Build on the old Chrono. Either way, you gain quite a bit of additional DPS over having a Minstrel Chrono alongside a Harrier Firebrand. Most likely a good thing with groups which already struggle with staying alive and all that.

never heard alac tank. whats the build and gear for that?

snowcrow build with some toughness, ren is super resistant so no need to modify anything