I have to agree with Adzy. I tried most of the other classes to around level 10 and found that the warrior was easily one of the most versatile and well made classes. Everything feels like it can work really well with the right play style.
I found that the thief didn’t have the damage I imagined it would. After playing around with the different weapon sets I could have, I found that the short bow was grate for damage with the exploding arrow skill, just time it so you detonate it over your targets head. But apart from that I think the thief needs a bit of a buff to damage.
The ranger has been the class I have played the most of so far as I simply like the play style. I tend to switch between the short bow and the grate sword. A bit like the thief I tend to keep to my short bow and get to the side of my target and bleed it to death or group up my mobs, set a trap and swing like mad with the grate sword. The long bow is very useful for keeping people behind cover when attacking a keep.
Honestly I could not get past level 7 with the Mesmer. So I’m not sure if my experience with this class can be of that much help to you. But even after I got all of the skills I found that it simply did not have the damage I wanted. I battled a mob with health regen for about three minutes one on one with the scepter and I’m not getting into melee range of a target when I am wearing cloth armour. Other people can probably work really well with this class, I just found it to be a bit of a pain.
Engineer is a bit lack luster. All your weapons are ranged (with the exception of kits obviously) and they don’t seem to do that much damage at all. I had been hoping to level by switching between the rifle and flamethrower and I did have fun doing this. The flamer might not be the best way to AoE in game, but I found it to be very fun. Its just a shame that my warrior is so much better at dealing with groups with a main hand sword and off hand axe. Still, the engineer is just fun with the flamer :P
Eli needs more damage. I expected this class to be my main. There are lots of tools for AoE damage and support, but with a bit of lag and a few hits, you go down (or at least I did anyway)
The other classes I havn’t played so much. I think I got a guardian up to level 3 but then had to delete it so I could play with the character creator some more and my Necro hasn’t seen much action. It might seem like the warrior is over powered, but IMHO, the other classes need some more work, at least in early PvE. Also, I guess the warrior does so well as it has a large amount of play styles that can be adapted to work with it. The other classes seem to have those playstyles available, but they aren’t viable.
TLDR
Warrior awesome, so many ways to play it, all of them good.
Other classes, have other ways to play them, but only one or two play styles are a viable option.
