Impacting Changes: Guardian Update

By: Martuk

Guardians of Middle-earth have been patiently waiting for news of their coming update in Book 12. They recently got just that as Vanessa "Saffron" Price, Online Community Specialist for The Lord of the Rings Online posted a new Developer's Corner update detailing all the changes coming to the Guardian class in the "Month of the Guardian" update. The announcement is still resonating within the Guardian community as some are enthusiastic about the new changes, and others are a little dismayed.

One of the most controversial changes coming to the Guardian class involves the skill Deep Breath. This skill allows the Guardian to use it to reset the timer on some of their skills allowing them to be used again immediately. The current timer for this skill is five minutes and two and a half minutes if you use the Strong Lungs trait. When the month of the Guardian update goes live, this skills timer will change to fifteen minutes for the untraited version and seven minutes and thirty seconds for the traited version. This is a huge change and will affect all Guardians to some extent as this was a highly used skill that could save a Guardian in a pinch. This change has not been the most popular of the list and there is a debate raging on the forums even now.

Deep Breath aside, the Guardians are receiving several new skills and a new stance during this update. These new changes will aid the Guardian greatly as some not only improve upon the Guardians defensive capabilities, but they also can increase his damage output and reduce the damage to his armor. That alone is a noteworthy aspect of this update. Let's take a look at how these new skills will impact the Guardians of Middle-earth.

Shield Wall

Shield Wall is possibly the best new defensive skill the Guardian will be receiving. This is essentially a panic button that will allow the Guardian to use himself as a shield to protect a single target from all incoming damage. There is however a downside. When a Guardian enters this protective form, he is unable to mitigate any damage from the attacks directed at his protected target, so he will take the full brunt of that damage. The Guardian will also suffer from a power drain as long as he maintains this skill. The overall purpose of this skill is to be an emergency utility to save an ally about to fall. While it certainly has its downsides, this skill will be a useful component in many difficult encounters. It could be the deciding factor in a wipe or a near wipe turned into a victory.

Fray The Edge

New skills will aid in offense and defense.

Fray the Edge is a new ranged taunt ability that will allow a Guardian to try and pull back a creature that may have left their melee range. The range on this is said to be 25m (Corrected: Thanks Hakai.). This skill also has a few extra benefits that makes it useful in other situations. Aside from being a strong single target taunt, this skill will allow the Guardian to increase the chance that a random Fellowship Maneuver can be started on a signature or higher creature. This will prove to be a very popular skill in difficult encounters and even raids. You can never go wrong with an increased chance to trigger a conjunction at a key moment. Again, this is a skill that could bring about the chance to pull victory from the jaws of defeat. If you have multiple Guardians it gets better as the effects of this skill will stack to increase your chances of a random conjunction even further.

Defense is not the only order on the books for the Guardian. The offensive powers are getting a work over as well with a new stance called "Overpower." The new stance will increase the damage output of the Guardian by 15%. However, this skill and increased damage comes at a cost. The Guardians Block skill will be disabled, evade will be reduced by 5% and the power cost of each skill will be increased by 20%. The biggest issue I can see with this will be power. With a 20% increase and the fact Guardians are not really built for power may lead to the need for fate and will based gear or even a juggling of various traits to increase power regeneration. This tradeoff may in the end be too much for the Guardian to sacrifice for a little extra dps, but time will tell the tale. There will be some new skills that can be performed while in Overpower stance only.

Continue to Page 2>>>