Guardian Hammer Rework/ buff

[Bullgar.6519]

Ive been playing guild of wars since it came out and the hammer is one of my favorite weapons because it looks great on a tanky player like the guardian. The hammer guardian was my main until i changed it to the fire brand. i changed it because the hammer guardian even though it was tanky did almost no damage to enemies in pve even though ive made a full damage build the hammers combo and skills are just too weak and slow for pve. in pvp i had no problem with him it was supportive to other players while keeping them and my self alive but when playing in pve, it wasnt good when i played it by my self with no team mates

[CptAurellian.9537]

For open PvE, hammer has never been really good, since it was a weapon for sustained damage, while most trash can just be bursted down with other weapons. In that aspect, it never will be good unless there's a total rework. What I'd love to see again is a viable (not optimal) spot for instanced content. That would require some damage buffs, so that it ends up a bit below the standard GS/ScT build.

[Stand The Wall.6987]

i would love it if mighty blow got a distance + dmg boost and banish hit 3 ppl at 1/2 sec cast.

[Obtena.7952]

Hammer does what it's intended ... it's a protection spammer for the group. That's very inline with the theme of the core. I'm not sure what's being suggested here, but I'm certain that the flavour of what hammer does won't change and it's unlikely much will happen with hammer to unbalance it's currently intended theme with a large damage boost.

To be fair ... I do think the intentional theme is much more relevant than it ever has been ... spamming prot in core is a rather useless skill to have. Spamming prot grouping through HoT/PoF/LS3&4 is much more useful.

Also, I'm not sure it's fair to quantify Hammer's damage as "no damage" considering what it does for you. It's just not a big DPS weapon and it never was. If anything, any hammer buff should be around it's theme; it's big CC and capability, protection and lots of self-contained, frequent condi cleansing. That doesn't scream big damage to me.

[Kikk Dorr.5341]

if you have a "full damage" build, and you're finding that hammer is lacking damage. Have you tried only using your auto attack and changing your traits for all the damage multipliers?... if you're not doing damage with the autos alone, you're doing something wrong.

[Aeolus.3615]

All the buff i request to hammer is hammer-shield setup option O_O

[CptAurellian.9537]

@"machinarium.3054" said:if you have a "full damage" build, and you're finding that hammer is lacking damage. Have you tried only using your auto attack and changing your traits for all the damage multipliers?... if you're not doing damage with the autos alone, you're doing something wrong.

What will a hammer build end up like? 24-25k? Not competitive with GS/ScT when the protection role is already usurped by druids. Without stone spirit (and, to a lesser degree, chaos chronos), hammer would still have a place in PvE. With them, it's pointless.

[Aeolus.3615]

@CptAurellian.9537 said:

@"machinarium.3054" said:if you have a "full damage" build, and you're finding that hammer is lacking damage. Have you tried only using your auto attack and changing your traits for all the damage multipliers?... if you're not doing damage with the autos alone, you're doing something wrong.

What will a hammer build end up like? 24-25k? Not competitive with GS/ScT when the protection role is already usurped by druids. Without stone spirit (and, to a lesser degree, chaos chronos), hammer would still have a place in PvE. With them, it's pointless.

Damage is not the solution...

[CptAurellian.9537]

Damage is the only solution in a certain game mode.

[Obtena.7952]

@CptAurellian.9537 said:

@"machinarium.3054" said:if you have a "full damage" build, and you're finding that hammer is lacking damage. Have you tried only using your auto attack and changing your traits for all the damage multipliers?... if you're not doing damage with the autos alone, you're doing something wrong.

What will a hammer build end up like? 24-25k? Not competitive with GS/ScT when the protection role is already usurped by druids. Without stone spirit (and, to a lesser degree, chaos chronos), hammer would still have a place in PvE. With them, it's pointless.

True ... a prot spamming hammer guardian is pointless ... to a very small number of people that care about optimized comps in raids. Still, it does it's job and it does it well. The best part is that no wise druid will ever think they should be shouldering the defensive burden of the whole team anyways. There is still a place for a hammer guardian in a raid if the team is reasonable and not meta-minded.

[cat.8975]

@Obtena.7952 said:The best part is that no wise druid will ever think they should be shouldering the defensive burden of the whole team anyways. There is still a place for a hammer guardian in a raid if the team is reasonable and not meta-minded.

I don't see why it would be a problem for the druid to swap one util to stone spirit if the group needs prot. The role of a druid is to provide offensive and defensive buffs while healing the group whenever necessary. It's especially a no-brainer if you're running double druid (as most pugs do), as they can just split up the spirit responsibilities. Hammer guard simply does not bring enough damage to justify running, as the prot is irrelevant, and the healing/might generation incredibly lackluster.

I'm glad, in a way, that hammer guard is currently a bad pick. A build that does nothing but auto-attack for 90% of the fight shouldn't be very good. They'd have to buff/rework other hammer skills before you could consider giving it more damage (or buff the utility on it so it isn't overshadowed as much by other classes).

[Assic.2746]

I don't think hammer has any serious issues. I have just checked it myself.

Without:

• Alacrity,
• Food & Enchancements,
• Unscatered Contender (+20% dmg while under the effect of Aegis).

I managed to deal 22-23k damage every time. Pretty good damage when you consider permament protection.

https://imgur.com/a/YqvX3ag#WDRbLL2

[Flintbrow.7985]

Yeah, the dmg isn't terrible...but the auto chain could use a speed increase to make it viable/fun in PVE. Maybe lower the protection uptime?

[Josif.2015]

@Bullgar.6519 said:Ive been playing guild of wars since it came out and the hammer is one of my favorite weapons because it looks great on a tanky player like the guardian. The hammer guardian was my main until i changed it to the fire brand. i changed it because the hammer guardian even though it was tanky did almost no damage to enemies in pve even though ive made a full damage build the hammers combo and skills are just too weak and slow for pve. in pvp i had no problem with him it was supportive to other players while keeping them and my self alive but when playing in pve, it wasnt good when i played it by my self with no team mates

What is this Guild of Wars you speak of?

Joking aside, I don't think that the hammer needs a rework. First it was the staff which is justified, then the scepter which I don't think it's necessary and now the hammer. Neither the scepter, nor the hammer need a rework. The hammer is fine as it is and does its' job as a tanky weapon used for defending. The staff is the guardians' weapon that we can all agree it needs a rework. Doesn't matter what game mode you play, the staff is abysmal and it needs to be changed.

[cat.8975]

@"Assic.2746" said:I don't think hammer has any serious issues. I have just checked it myself.

Without:

• Alacrity,
• Food & Enchancements,
• Unscatered Contender (+20% dmg while under the effect of Aegis).

I managed to deal 22-23k damage every time. Pretty good damage when you consider permament protection.

https://imgur.com/a/YqvX3ag#WDRbLL2

Wrong build, alacrity wont affect much in a build that primarily auto attacks, and you had Assassin's Presence active.

22-23k dps is trash-tier, even when you factor in prot (there are much more efficient ways to get prot in a group, namely stone spirit or chaos chrono)

It's like saying a build that does 25k dps is fine because it provides 15 might stacks. The might is irrelevant, as the support classes are already providing it.

[Snowjob.7245]

The dps of hammer is bad, but the burst is amazing. You should have no issues playing open world / story stuff with hammer.

[Obtena.7952]

@cat.8975 said:

@Obtena.7952 said:The best part is that no wise druid will ever think they should be shouldering the defensive burden of the whole team anyways. There is still a place for a hammer guardian in a raid if the team is reasonable and not meta-minded.

I don't see why it would be a problem for the druid to swap one util to stone spirit if the group needs prot. The role of a druid is to provide offensive and defensive buffs while healing the group whenever necessary.

No? I don't see why it's a problem for a Guardian to run Hammer either ... for the same reasons ... because people can play a hammer guardian with specific role too.

[Ojimaru.8970]

I don't think the Hammer's DPS is an issue, as I don't think every weapon has to be a DPS-centric weapon, nor have their usefulness be measured by that single metric.

If anything, I'd love to see Symbol of Protection be made more consistent with every other Guardian weapon, and be decoupled from the chain attack. Maybe there is an argument for having it apply off Mighty Blow, although that would come at the cost of a Blast finisher.

Finally, I would love to see them redesign Glacial Heart to be a more proactive proc, rather than an RNG proc on top of RNG proc.

[Arcaedus.7290]

@Ojimaru.8970 said:

Finally, I would love to see them redesign Glacial Heart to be a more proactive proc, rather than an RNG proc on top of RNG proc.

^ This, please.

[Kiroshima.8497]

Personally instead of GLACIAL Heart I'd make it trigger on Blast Finisher so it is consistent (Hammer 2 instead of RNG every 10 seconds). It also plays well with hammer being a team weapon since Guard can only really do Light Fields, but it still works on its own.

Rename it to I dunno, Virtuous Heart (since it's in the virtue line).

It would still do unblockable damage (lower due to reduced CD on Hammer 2 relative to its current 10 second RNG cooldown) but it would gain an extra effect based on the field instead of always chilling. Additionally, the attack gains 100% crit rate if you are comboing on a teammate's combo field.Dark: Steal life.Ethereal: Apply Confusion.Fire: Apply Burning.Ice: Apply ChillLight: Apply Vuln.Lightning: Apply Daze.Poison: Apply Poison.Smoke: Apply BlindWater: Apply ???