Slutty guardqueror armor

Having recently completed the T5 armor set on my guardian, I have to admit it looks a lot less horrible than the infamous abomination we got from T4, but it still merits an obligatory whine post.

I never particularly liked conqueror raid armor in the old T1/T2/T3 days. The skirt is just plain silly, the belt is a like that of a former wrestling champion that is using an overly broad belt to compensate for you can only imagine what, and the most charitable thing you can say about the helmet is that it looks like an old-fashioned chamberpot. So imagine my disappointment when it turned out that Funcom not only doesn’t have the resources to design 12 new sets of armor for T5, it doesn’t even have time to recolor each of the twelve T3 sets, so several classes now have to make do with armor that should really belong to some other class, and among other things guardians now get what is basically a slightly recolored conqueror set. The only piece of guardian armor they kept was the helmet, which is basically the T3 guardian helmet, complete with the silly horns and the can opener in the middle, just slightly recolored and with the horns pointing upwards instead of forward (now that’s progression!).

The only good thing about this set is the chest, which gives you plenty of opportunity to show off your boobs. I always felt a bit sorry when conqs started replacing their old T2/T3 chests with Khitai faction chests and T4 chests, so it’s nice to see that this model is now making a comeback.

 

Tireless Defender? More like tiresome defender 😛

Another annoying thing: in a desperate effort to avoid clipping with hair, the helmet makes your hair disappear completely, even if it’s long enough that it should be visible below the helmet. But then the lower-tier guardian helmets had the same problem.

The T5 conqueror set (Proven Champion) AFAIK looks the same, except in a different color and with a helmet based on the old conqueror helmet instead of the guardian one.

Set bonuses

I like the concept of set bonuses, but for many classes (including guardians) the bonuses you actually get from T5 armor are pretty underwhelming. The guardian T5 set bonuses work as follows: when you perform a certain combo, you get a 20-second buff (called Boon of X, for various values of X). Which buff you get (i.e. which of your stats it will improve) depends on your maneuver or tactic. The buff increases in power depending on how many pieces of the T5 set you have equipped (the first level of bonuses unlocks at 3 pieces, they get improved when you reach 5 pieces, and the strongest buffs unlock at 8 pieces). The buffs don’t disappear if you change weapons, switch stances etc., so in principle you could have two buffs active at the same time.

The following table shows the details. The ‘What it gives’ column shows 3 numbers — the first is when you’re wearing 3–4 parts of the set, the second is for 5–7 parts, the third is when you’re wearing all 8 parts of the set.

Combo	Tactic or Maneuver	Resulting Buff	What it gives
Guard V*	Maneuver: Mental Barrier	Boon of Protection	+100/200/300 protection for 20 sec
	Maneuver: Elusive Daring	Boon of the Spearman	+4%/8%/12% weapon damage (melee) for 20 sec
	Maneuver: Wall of Steel	Boon of Vitality	+2.5%/5%/7.5% received healing modifier for 20 sec
Counterstrike IV*	Tactic: Provoke	Boon of Dissipation	+200/400/600 critigation amount for 20 sec
	Tactic: Defense	Boon of Defense	+1.5%/3%/5% bonus armor for 20 sec
	Tactic: Attack	Boon of Guile	+36/73/109 critical rating for 20 sec

*Or the corresponding version of Deliberate Reprisal.

If you wear all 8 pieces of the set, you furthermore get a passive +350 critigation amount bonus (you don’t need to do any combos etc. to get this buff).