Guild Wars 2

ok, so I finally have a guild that runs fractals, the only issue is that I have zero AR and I’m tying to pick one of my 80s to gear up to run with them.

The big problem is that I’m a class-A alt-aholic and have trouble picking just one class to do anything. .

My current 80s are: Thief, guardian, mesmer, engineer. All are roughly geared equally for PVE (theif slightly better than the rest) and I really only have the funds to make one of them into a fractal runner.

So, I ask the wisdom that is the forums, can you give me some advice on which of the above classes tend to make the most versatile fractal runners? I’m not always sure what classes we will get to run with, so being able to do a lot of different stuff is going to be of greater value than “teh dps!”

Warriors and eles are good for fractals. Eles are a lot of fun so you may find that easier to stick to.

Bearbow Ranger

All 4 professions you listed are good in fractals (in fact, all 8 are), but they have very different roles.

Thief and Mesmer have some useful utilities like Shadow Refuge and Portal. Many people don’t like Thief for fractals, but I’m always happy to take them, it makes some content a lot easier. They are the most squishy though, and can down you more easily than other professions.

Guardians are always welcome in all partys, mostly due to being a heavy class, their reflects and support. Depending on how you build it, your heals can be very helpful.

Engineers… I don’t know much about them, but they are pretty good. In fact, I think most of Engineers try harder than the rest of professions, and end up being very good players.

What you should really do, it’s try the first 10 levels of Fractals with each profession and see for yourself. You don’t need agony resistance and it’s easy enough to run without exotic gear. See which profession you like the most to use.

Guardian Warrior and Mesmer…..

Consumables can replace the usefulness of thieves….looking at you harpy feathers.

Warrior

Stats berserker on everything with scholar runes on armor.

Traits
Strenght: 30 , V, IX, XI
Arms: 25, V, X,
Defense: 0
Tactics: 0
Discipline: 15, II

Primary weapons ( You will be using this for 95% of all fractals, Might want to use longbow more until you get used to it.)
Berserker GS with bloodlust sigil
Axe with force sigil & mace with sigil of leeching.

On utilities you can chose what fits best and change accordingly if there other warriors.
I like to use Healing signet,For great justice,Signet of fury, Banner of discipline, Signet of rage.

Enjoy

Guardian, if you want easymode for you and your team. Especcially if there is none in your team yet.
If you already have two guardians or love some challenge for your team, it can be warrior.
If you enjoy some harder play for yourself, although correctly played bringing very high value to your team, choose ele.
If you play how you want, bearbow is the way to go.

And if you do not plan on making a new character, it’s definitely guardian.
However, in berserker gear and offensive traits, each profession has it’s uses.

Guardian!

/15 char

Your list isn’t that bad, seriously pick for yourself. I would recommend thief because I like them better out of those profession. Engineer can do stealth just as much as thief, mesmer is good for carrying noobs through portal, guard is good for perma reflects and has good dps.

As others have pointed out Guardian is probably the best profession to do fracs with because of the heavy armor meta going around and dem reflects. Play w/e you want, just don’t play a kittenty build.

All professions using berserker gear + consumables are viable in fractals. Play what suits you best.

It’s not the profession that matters, its knowing which utilities/traits to use, where to stack and when to melee (hint: as often as you can get away it). As long as you stack might, fury, vulnerability, blast finish, spam reflects/aegis/protection, melee, and blind everything in sight you’re going to be fine. And yes, that means you don’t have to play warrior/guardian/mesmer – it’s just harder to learn the other professions because their proper builds are harder to learn and take more intelligence/practice to master.

I’m enjoying my Hammer Guardian at the moment. Symbols dealing r great damage and constantly healing myself through AH.

It really depends on who else you play with.

Having two mesmers in a party is not twice as good as having one, but having one is extremely useful, so if the people you normally play with don’t play mesmer (it’s probably the rarest of the classes you mention, along with engineer), go with that.

Elementalists and guardians are generally the most team-oriented classes (in terms of giving buffs, being able to save players in risk of dying, etc.), so those are great too. I feel more “in control” with those two classes than any other.

Stealth is a bit broken in PvE (some mobs keep attacking cloaked players for several seconds), so thieves aren’t as good as they sound on paper, but they’re still pretty useful when you need to revive a downed player or skip some mobs.

Engineers lack a bit of focus right now. They have a lot of different viable builds, but none of them is amazingly good, and, in combat, they feel less versatile than elementalists (because you need to change your traits to suit your choice of kits, while elementalists can use more generic trait builds).

Ultimately, it’s really more a matter of complementing and (I hate this word) synergizing with the rest of the party than the qualities of any individual class.