[Suggestion] Guardian Focus rework

[Flani.3468]

From a PvE perspective, I'm sad that the guardian focus fills no roles whatsoever when it comes to instanced content.

Even staff fills a role in PvE for supportive firebrands. The guardian's focus is a very selfish weapon with uncontrollable condition cleanse in a group setting, delayed and unreliable power damage from the burst from an uncracked Shield of Wrath, and no redeeming method of support for Shield of Wrath since tomes obstruct the use of weapon skills so the water field from Tome of Resolve will never be blasted. Blind is also undervalued in instanced content and will never truly compete versus the other off-hand weapons.

What I suggest:

• Ray of Judgement:

1. Make it a ground target skill for more control and reliability while at the same time giving enemies a chance to maneuver around it or have the caster miss as a counter. This eliminates the chance/RNG factor of the skill and makes the focus more delectable to use via good placement rather than a slow and boring homing projectile with a mind of its own.
2. Blind and/or burn enemies who pass, condition cleanse allies who remain within its range at an interval.
3. RoJ was a popular skill in GW1 and I recall people asking for it to be similar in GW2; a beam of light, like "Pillar of Light" from the trident. It fits the theme of a guardian focus and would be pretty clear in the battlefield.

• Shield of Wrath:

1. AoE barrier after having it cracked in contrast to the AoE damage from not being destroyed. Barrier scales with healing power so it shouldn't benefit those who aren't supporting in the first place.
2. Apply some form of debuff along with the AoE damage from not being destroyed. Vulnerability, a knockdown, anything at all to make it worth avoiding it from being destroyed.

I want the focus to thrive in PvE and by adding burning, more reliability with placement, supportive and offensive rewards for Shield of Wrath I think it can compete with the other off-hand weapons. Like I mentioned before with staff, focus is really at the bottom when it comes to PvE at the moment.

[Azoqu.8917]

We have a defensive offhand in the Shield, and an offensive on in the Torch, meanwhile Focus is trying to be half and half. I personally believe they should go all in on Torch and make it the Condition offhand and then go all in on Focus to make it the Power offhand. Keeping Shield of Wrath as is is fine since it's pretty much the only reason to ever touch Focus right now, but changing Ray of Judgment to being the Jesus Beam of Doom again would be a welcome change. I know Ray caused burning in GW1, but they could just make it hit hard while blinding/cleansing and on a relatively short cooldown. Then for Torch, make the direct damage for #4 not be as high but with slightly more burning (maybe just keep the burn buff even on throw) and make #5 cause burning per tick.

It took Shield a ton of changes to become a good weapon, we can get Focus back to being good in PvE as well (along with Staff, Bow, and Mace).

[CptAurellian.9537]

That would be quite nice, making focus a power offhand while torch would become more condition-focused. It's not as if torch was in a particularly good spot right now - there's just no alternative.

[InsaneQR.7412]

The debuff on Focus 5 you would be looking for is weakness. It fits the theme and reduces the dmg you get.

[RabbitUp.8294]

This is what I've suggested in the past. Keep focus 5 the same, and just copy paste trident's Pillar of Light into focus 4. Mechanically, it's a ground-targeted aoe field that does power damage and pulses blind.

Ideally, focus 5 could also have reduced cooldown in pve, something like 30s.

The problem, though, is focus' trait. It's in Valor, which you would never pick in pve. And since Valor already has the shield trait, it could be swapped with Glacial Heart in Virtues.