Guild Wars 2 developer Jon Peters has written an interesting article about healing and death in the upcoming MMORPG. Unlike most other games of its type, Guild Wars 2 will not have dedicated healing or support classes. Instead, every class will possess enough healing and support skills to be self-sufficient, and co-operative support actions will also be used to support other players when grouping.

There will also be an added dimension to dying in Guild Wars 2. When a character is reduced to 0 hit points, instead of dying immediately, she will enter a "downed state", in which her action bar is replaced with "downed skills", less-powerful versions of her classes' skills that can be used to attempt to turn the tide in battle. If a character can defeat an enemy with a downed skill, she will rally and be able to return to combat. If the enemy defeats the character instead, she can either wait to be revived by a comrade (all classes will be able to revive downed characters) or pay a small fee to be resurrected at the nearest waypoint. There is no other death penalty in the game.