The Warrior

This profession guide is accurate as of BWE2.

The warrior is a master of weapons who relies on speed, strength, toughness, and heavy armor to survive in battle. A warrior can shrug off blow after blow to stay in the fight, all the while building up adrenaline to fuel his offense.

-Official Guild Wars 2 Website

Overall Theme

The warrior is the epitome of martial prowess. Forget those awkwardly over-sized magic staves and tiny, little daggers; bring out the hammers, swords, and all other properly-sized weapons. Warriors are the ultimate physical fighters. Their class mechanic is their burst skill: each weapon has a skill that can be utilized to varying degrees based on the adrenaline they’ve built up by fighting. Add to this their heavy armor and sizable health pool, and you have yourself one tough cookie.

Weapons

Greatsword – The greatsword is a highly-offensive weapon that features two gap closers. Whirlwind Attack is the less reliable of the two given its lack of stopping at a target, but it does function as a way to escape if in over your head. The burst skill, Arcing Slice, is good for being able to maintain constant might.

Hammer – The hammer is a great weapon for when you’re already on top of your opponent. It’s hard to get away from a warrior with a hammer unless they push you back with Staggering Blow. Beyond the cripple and knock down, the burst skill, Earthshaker, has not only a leap but a stun as well.

Longbow – The longbow is the more AoE-focused option for ranged that the warrior has. Its powerful burst skill, Combustive Shot, causes a lot of damage over a large area, while even smaller attacks (e.g., Arcing Arrow) have potent explosions.

Rifle – The rifle is a single-target, ranged option for warriors. It’s full of debilitating, condition-heavy attacks to let you weaken an opponent and finish them with Kill Shout. If they get too closer for comfort, Rifle Butt can smack them away from you.

Axe (MH) – The axe gives you a solid single-target auto-attack as well as an AoE attack. You also get a handy, ranged cripple from Throw Axe. The burst skill, Eviscerate, is a strong attack on a leap.

Mace (MH) – The mace has solid defensive skills, capable of inflicting weakness and daze to opponents. Counter Blow also gives a block skill. Skull Crack, the burst skill, also gives a close-range stun.

Sword (MH) – The sword gives a good array of attacks to keep foes in your foes in range with its burst skill, Flurry, immobilizing foes. If your foe does manage to get away, Savage Leap can get you back in the game.

Axe (OH) – Off-hand axes give the potential for a short-lived fury buff as well as a powerful ranged attack with Whirling Axe.

Mace (OH) – Off-hand maces have a strong offensive ability to cause vulnerability as well as Tremor to knockdown enemies.

Shield – As expected, shields have defensive skills. In addition to blocking, shields can stun with Shield Bash.

Sword (OH) – Off-hand sword gives bleeding on both skills with Riposte also blocking attacks.

Warhorn – The warhorn is also defensive, though less so than the shield. Charge is useful for moving around the battlefield, giving swiftness and removing movement-impairing conditions.

Underwater

Harpoon Gun – As the name implies, the harpoon gun is the ranged weapon for underwater combat, with multiple attacks like Knot Shot that keep enemies at a range. The burst skill, Forceful Shot, is a hard-hitting, single attack.

Spear – The spear is a melee, AoE-oriented weapon for underwater combat. The burst skill, Whirling Strike, is a powerful AoE-attack. Many other attacks are also aimed at close-range AoE, such as Tsunami Slash.

Slot Skills

Most of the warrior’s slot skills are about buffing the player or allies, with only one group of utility skills focusing on the enemy. Healing Signet gives the least amount of healing over an extended period of time, though it heals for the most at any one time. Mending heals the most over any period of time and also removes conditions. Healing Surge heals and gives an adrenaline boost, making it the best heal, offensively speaking.

Physical – Physical skills are movement-control skills with (mostly) medium or short recharges.

Signet – As with all signets, each skill has a passive ability that can be put on recharge for an activated component. Two of them are strictly offensive, while the other two are strictly defensive.

Shout – Shouts give instantaneous, AoE boon-based buffs to allies (though “Shake It Off!” just removes boons). “Fear Me!” is the only shout that affects enemies.

Banner – Banners are placeable, AoE attribute buffs for you and nearby allies. Once placed, they can be picked up and carried with you. 

Stance – Stances are limited, short-term, personal buffs that tend to have relatively powerful effects.

Elite – The warrior’s elite skills are varied and powerful. Signet of Rage gives long-lasting boons to dramatically increase offensive ability. Rampage turns you into an extremely powerful, physical form. Battle Standard revive nearby allies and give short-term, buffs to the warrior and its allies.

Traits

The warrior’s five trait lines are all named after aspects of combat. The final trait gives Brawn, the warrior-only attribute that increases burst skill damage.

Strength (Pow/Exp) – The minor traits promote frequent, offensive use of dodging. The major traits increase damage damage with adrenaline, offer a vitality buff, add damage to banners, give extra might, remove conditions on heal skills, add confusion to interrupts, buff physical skills, boost critical damage with main-hand axes, and increase damage for greatswords, spears, and off-hand maces, swords, and axes. The final traits are Axe Mastery and Vicious Might.

Arms (Pre/Mal) – The minor traits add bleeding to criticals, crit chance to burst skills, and damage to bleeding foes. The major traits increase critical chances, buff critical hits, increase bleed duration, give fury on immobilization, give frenzy when hitting foes under 25 percent health, and make rifle and harpoon gun shots pierce. The final traits are Last Chance and Sniper.

Defense (Tou/Com) – The minor traits increase armor at full health, add health regeneration to adrenaline, and boost power. The major traits give adrenaline when hit, projectile reflection with blocking, automatic Balanced Stance and Endure Pain, more health when rallying, higher toughness, longer stances, hammer buffs, and buffs to mace criticals. The final traits are Merciless Hammer and Sundering Mace.

Tactics (Vit/Con) – The minor traits give buffs to reviving. The major traits damage increases to yourself and nearby allies, buffs to longbows, buffs to banners, buffs to shouts, immobilization on cripples, and shorter recharges on the warhorn. The final traits are Inspiring Battle Standard and Vigorous Shouts. 

Discipline (Pro/Bra) – The minor traits give buffs to weapon swapping. The major traits give bonuses with adrenaline, buffs to burst skills, faster signet recharges, a bonus to Vengeance, immobilization breaking to movement skills, and add vigor to stance. The final traits are Adrenal Reserves and Quick Bursts.

Difficulty

Warriors are a very easy-to-understand class without any complicated class mechanics. They’re fairly easy to get into in PvE. But, their limited selection of gap-closing slot skills make the class a little more difficult for newer players in PvP.