New to Guild Wars PvP or PvP for PvE

Codex Arena might attract many PvE players to PvP. Hopefully it does, because I'm really liking the format so far. If you are PvE moving to PvP this post is for you. I am going to assume you have never PvPed before so those of you who are PvP pros don't feel offended (and those PvEs who already know this stuff great.)

Generally in GW there's two ways to win in PvP, pressure or spike. Pressure does have "spikes" in it, in that individual players will deal a large amount of damage over a small amount of time but for the sake of this post spike will refer to coordinated attacks by multiple players inflicting a massive amount of damage faster than a monk can heal. Spike can be fun in Guild Wars, but usually requires ventrilo or teamspeak, relies heavily on them not "catching" your spike with a megaheal and between spikes does little to no damage and little to no shutdown.

Pressure is a combination of many things. Pressure is knockdown, interruption, e-denial, health degeneration, constant damage. In general pressure is making sure the enemy's game plan doesn't work as they want it -- making sure they're constantly worried and reacting.

So if Codex Arena will generally be pressure, why carry 600 or more hit points? Well for one, some people will try and run spike and 600 or more hit points will stop bad spikes without deep wound that do insufficient damage. But the real reason is hit points are the most versatile form of defense. If you are going for five or even ten wins, maybe you can get away with four players with searing flames and superiors. But if you want twenty five or fifty wins chances are you'll face a team that bypasses much of your shutdown. Then your monk will be happy you have 600 hp rather than 500 giving him the few seconds get get enough energy to heal you.

High priority targets like mesmers and monks should have even more than 600 hit points, around the range of 630 to 650.

The next thing PvErs usually don't understand is the purpose of healing in PvP. In PvE the most powerful healers are healer's boon monks and necromancer ritualist heroes. Both are reactive. You take the damage, then heal through it. In PvP it is better to stop damage from happening in the first place. Block, blind, interruption, shutdown (see below), punish (see below) are all better than relying on your healer to heal through damage. Even for healers, stopping damage from happening in the first place is better than healing through it with spells like guardian and protective spirit.

Shutdown is especially important in four man PvP. Shutdown can be anything that slows or stops skills from activating. Knockdown, interruption, blind and so on are all shutdown. Without enough shutdown, even the best monk won't keep you alive. With a lot of shutdown you can carry an average monk to many wins. Punish is a type of shutdown which punishes players for actions, for example spiteful spirit. Punish generally doesn't stop skilled players since they can cease attacking through spiteful or empathy, but can be useful against uncoordinated teams.

So in summary:

1. Carry 600 or more hit points at all times, even more for mesmers and monks (the exception may be warriors and rangers who can wear one major rune).

2. Teams win with a lot of pressure. Teams lose without enough pressure. The highest pressure teams combine many conditions, hexes, interruption and knockdown with constant damage.

3. Without enough shutdown, even the best monk will let you down.