Need help with shield grace wp

[Warnoise]

So I am lvl 35 wp grace with stalker set. I have 1H hammer and shield for the sustain. Even though my damage is low, the healing and survivability make up for it when playing solo.

So I reached a point where I kinda have to group up with other players for pvp and dungeons. Long story short the game turned into a humiliation ritual.

In RVR/PVP I felt absolutely useless. Whenever I tried to attack enemies I get either CC'd to death or burst down in a second. My team mates got pissed off at me because I didn't heal them. I really tried but it was difficult because I had to focus on fighting and healing at the same time.

In dungeons, well, nobody accepted me on the team the moment they heard grace wp. I couldn't do a single late game dungeon in my 20+ hour playing this game because I got kicked for not being a healer wp.

So, for the veterans who play grace wp with shield,
I have some questions:

1-In RVR how do you heal your team mates? Do you stay in the back and wait for enemy tank/melee to hit him to trigger heals? Or just join the fray and hit whoever within reach? Personally I found some success by focusing on enemy summons for the heals but it was hit and miss tbh

2-For grace wp with shield, do you build weapon skill and str or focus more on armor and toughness? If there is any recent guide id appreciate it.

3-For PvE dungeons, is grace wp usually considered as healer? DPS? Tank? How do you guys communicate with others about the expectations they should have from you as a grace wp?

When I played salvation wp the game was chill but since I switched to grace with shield it got pretty stressful ngl

[kpihuss]

The best advice anyone can give you is this: the best way to play a Grace WP is not to play one unless you already have the best gear in the game.

Sadly, that is simply the current state of the build.

Even with the best gear available, you still will not heal as much as any other healer at RR60. You will die a lot, and you will need a Guard on you almost constantly on all game content (oRvR, SCs and PVE)

It is true that a shield WP can be useful in some very specific situations, such as keep funnels, but only because you can maintain a very strong defensive position there. Outside of that, its usefulness is very limited.

[Rydiak]

Check out the guide in my signature for the spec.

[Mvl130]

For scenarios, you need to duo with a tank, ask in /5 channel for a tank to duo with so that you have a guard on you at all time ; install the GuardPack addon if not done already, so you have a ui indicator of guard range on you

[Warnoise]

Thank you all for the great advices. Greatly appreciated during these times of struggle. And especially thanks Rydiak for the guide, that thing is more of a Grace WP Bible than a guide.

As you said, the first thing I need to do is working towards acquiring the best gear possible because I realized I am simply too useless with my current gear. Even when all the conditions are met, I am rarely able to out heal the incoming DPS.

[Warnoise]

So, after following Rydiak's guide and reaching Decent items I decided to try some PVP.

After playing the game non stop I reached RR 51 and managed to get Dominator/Beastlord set with the best hammer/shield RR can buy. So I felt confident enough not to carry but to at least be useful in the team.

I queued for some event scenarios and man...I felt as useless as I was when I had worse equipment. The rare times I got good matches I got even more demoralized when I checked the score. I sweat my ass off during the whole match just to see my healing barely making it past the 100k mark while other healers in the match all healed for 300k+. My dps rarely made it past 30K despite doing my best to target squishy enemies.

Every scenario I die way too much. Even when guarded by a tank I get focused by enemy dps I end up dead because my healing is so low it can't sustain focused attacks unless another healer is healing me. Most of my healing gets easily countered by shields, CC, parries, etc...the stars must be aligned for me to get a decent healing out.

I don't know but I feel there is something wrong with the class design and correct me if i'm wrong. The concept is amazing but I feel the huge amount of risk required to do your job lands insanely low rewards. I don't think the current problems will be solved by getting better gear, my dps/healing will probably go by 20-30% overall and that's it.

So after getting flamed by teammates in scenarios and in dungeons for picking shield WP multiple times I decided to follow kpihuss advice and not play Grace WP anymore. The stress isn't worth it at all.

Thanks all for the help.

[Rydiak]

Playing the spec seems to be like driving a manual transmission. Not everyone can do it, and not many who can do it are very good at it.