Guild Wars 2

Frankly I have to agree with the OP. The warrior is just so much fun to play as you can pick up almost any weapon early on and experiment with the skills. I made a second warrior after trying out all the other classes and didn’t realize how much more fun I was having with it then all the other classes. Got a sword and a war horn and rounded up mobs and mowed em down with my burst skill and used savage leap and charge to get around until I had weapon switching. I then used that to level any other weapons I picked up.

The other classes just can’t kill as fast as the warrior can. You can’t get some mobs and heap them all together and then easily mow them down while doging here and there. Everything is just so much slower, even on an eli. I thought, oh yeah, glass cannon, but I found that the best way was to go dagger/dagger and stick to earth…it was also a pain to get a new weapon and level 12 different skills -_-. Can’t they just look at the other classes and see how they can be more fun early on?

Game gets easier and easier each character I create. Hardest thing for me to learn was not standing still. I got used to typicaly MMO skill rotation play until enemy is down.

Does not exist in this game, only works one on one with a single trash mob.

I failed hardcore my first character, thief. tried guardian, engineer, warrior up to 64. Wasn’t until I tried Ranger and started to really look at trait lines and synergy before I took off in the game. There are a lot of online build generators to theorycraft with.

Try thief SB, you can combo 4 and 2 to create AoE weakness debuff 50% chance to do 50% damage. By far one of the most underrated conditions in the game. My D/D syphon necro uses it to maximum potential to outheal incoming damage.

On cover the game looks stupid simple with short skill bar and solo potential everybody does everything playstyle (lack of trinity, good thing IMO) but the more I play I find more and more combos, skill rotations, and strategies to overcome obstacles and enemies.

also beginning content is pretty cheasy and things drop in about one or two auto attack chains. It is a lot of training wheels content to get used to class mechanics to prepare you for latter game. Difficult enough to force you to dodge roll or whatever.

Most MMOs that I lose interest in have the cool stories and that winds up being the only thing that interests me, content never proves to be a challenge. Once I get bored with the story I move on. This, I’ve gotten bored with the story but I’ve yet to get bored running around Tyria with my small guild, there is always challenging content that threatens to plaster me if I make a mistake.

Rakanarshi.5892:

The other classes just can’t kill as fast as the warrior can. You can’t get some mobs and heap them all together and then easily mow them down while doging here and there. Everything is just so much slower, even on an eli. I thought, oh yeah, glass cannon, but I found that the best way was to go dagger/dagger and stick to earth…it was also a pain to get a new weapon and level 12 different skills -_-. Can’t they just look at the other classes and see how they can be more fun early on?

Strange, I played a Warrior up to level 10 and thought it was the most boring class to play. It’s just spam hundred blades and watch stuff die. I tried some of their other weapons, but they weren’t much more fun, and killed stuff slower.
Elementalist and Thief on the other hand are a lot more fun. Sure, they might not kill stuff as fast, but they have mobility, and both classes have plenty of fun skills.
Btw, if you play Elementalist, I’d strongly recommend learning to use all 4 elements in battle instead of sticking to only 1.

Starbird.4029:

Now one thing I like about WoW, for all it’s failings, is that whatever class I want to level, the early experience is going to be pretty consistent. Difficult or easy, the classes are balanced in such a way that nothing is a horror to level early anymore and most dps specs require a similar amount of effort and time to level with.

That wasn’t always the case. Leveling in WoW is certainly incredibly easy these days, perhaps even a little too easy, but for the longest time some classes/specs were vastly better at it than others. That’s not inherently a bad thing, though.

GW2 on the other hand…well, I really would love to level my thief, but I’m so insanely squishy that I have to jump around like a grasshopper on yellowjackets to survive 2+ of even similar level mobs.
On the other hand, my guardian or Warrior can just kerplode enemies endlessly, even if he is a few levels below them.

Interestingly, I had exactly the opposite experience. With my thief, I felt practically invisible after a few levels of developing a decent understanding of the class and the game (the thief was pretty much my introductory class). On the other hand, my first impression of the warrior class was that it badly missed the survivability of the thief: as a thief, you have so much mobility, easy access to condition removal, and (through off-hand pistol) an AoE blind that makes it incredibly simple to avoid most damage. For me, it took a little while to adjust to my warrior, although I grew to really enjoy him quickly enough.

So no, I really, really don’t think the differences between the thief and the warrior (or any other class) justify any homogenization whatsoever, at least in the case of leveling. Rolling different classes feels cool precisely because each class feels vastly different.

Baeyne.9584:

I had a similar experience when playing a thief as my first character, it was so squishy that I would die every time a monster so much as looked at me.

That’s the reason why I played a Warrior, and it was the first toon I got to level 80.

After three months into the game, I decided to level my thief again since I really wanted to play that profession in the first place.

My thief is now my main toon.

Looking back, I think it was because I was spoiled in that “other game that must not be named” that I had trouble with the first few levels of gameplay as a non-heavy armored profession.

That, and this game being on a slightly different level in leveling experience than that “other game that must no be named”. GW2 kind of requires you to know your class when you play a non-heavy armor profession.

As for leveling a thief, you can find a lot of guides in the thief forum.

Having said that, I CAN recommend playing a dual pistol thief. I myself am playing one and I’m having fun with it.

BUT, I find the dual pistol build to be at a disadvantage when leveling. Dagger/pistol or sword/pistol tends to be MUCH better due to the fact that your number 5 (and number 3, if your D/P) skill can keep your opponents blinded (and unable to hit you) for 4 secs. It is also does not have a CD (except for its cost in initiative).

You can also pretty much face tank every kind of mob below the level of champion with D/P or S/P.

I really hate the ‘blind with black powder and autoattack’ style of play :|.

Have you tried leveling P/P since they changed stealth not to reset aggro? Your main defensive tool costs so many resources that you can’t do anything besides autoattack, which does virtually no damage (P mainhand is abysmal) and you have no AOE at all.

D/D does less damage single target and aoe than my guardian at low levels. Significantly so. And that is dumb, for a glasscannon class.

I agree with the OP – it’d downright goofy how much better some classes are in introductory levels than others.

Thieves in particular are awful. They have a melee focus with bad defense (MH Pistol is terrible), stealth doesn’t work right as a defensive tool, and their downed state is the worst in the game for solo PvE.

Thief is comin’ up a lot in this thread, so I gotta weigh in here. I agree with people about learning your class limits and requirements early on. My first class was the Thief and boy is she her own kind of squishy, but I’m glad I had to learn that in my first ten levels than find that out 30 levels later.

It’s also a big issue about skill – and that’s somewhere this game is different from all those fire and forget MMOs. You learn real fast with that Thief that dodge, move, strafe, flank, etc. are big deals in this game and that combat takes more than just thinking about how much damage a power does.

Thief isn’t necessarily harder than any other class in the game, it’s just different and you want to find that out early in if you’re coming off of another class. Just like I want to know how well a Fighter tanks vs a Guardian, and want to see Engineer kits in action. The first ten levels really are your “is this class for me” period, so the best and worst need to jump right in your face there.

I know Thief is no harder to play at low levels than an Ele, because I’ve gone back and leveled a thief a bit in another race … and knowing how to use the class I died no more than I did with any other low level character. (though I had more fun) It’s all about knowing -what- to do, and the tutorial zone/levels is the place to find all that out.

Oh and on the side of that, Thief is a class where sticking to one thing – melee or range – early on isn’t generally a good idea. So use those Pistols on melee guys and then jump in with a Melee weapon on ranged dudes. (and use Blind and Smoke Screen against ranged guys) Weapon swap or combos with distance closers are a good friend for the class. What with that all said, I level using mostly Dual Pistols until level 30 – so it can totally be done. (circle strafe and dodge, circle strafe and dodge)

Starbird.4029:

Have you tried leveling P/P since they changed stealth not to reset aggro?

THIS is probably a valid point. ::looks meaningfully at Anet:: One thing that always balanced a Thief’s squishiness while leveling was, if things got really hairy, she had an escape clause; even if she had to drop aggro completely and run away. Without that a hard pressed Thief isn’t going to be able to take those seconds to rest and regain initiative or stamina while fightin’ groups of monsters.

Jack of Tears.9458:

Starbird.4029:

Have you tried leveling P/P since they changed stealth not to reset aggro?

THIS is probably a valid point. ::looks meaningfully at Anet:: One thing that always balanced a Thief’s squishiness while leveling was, if things got really hairy, she had an escape clause; even if she had to drop aggro completely and run away. Without that a hard pressed Thief isn’t going to be able to take those seconds to rest and regain initiative or stamina while fightin’ groups of monsters.

This was a horrible, horrible change, one that no matter who throws out what defense, I can’t see the logic in whatsoever.

To the OP. The reason why you’re seeing this is because of class balance. Plain and simple.

The main emphasis on balance is to bring everything down (except for guardian or warrior) to a specific level but not tweaking the normal PvE mobs to match that decrease in power.

My Thief is only level 23 right now, but I don’t find him much harder to level than I found my level 80 guardian to level at the start! Guardian used greatsword mostly when leveling.
Thief mostly dagger/dagger so far. I can take on 3 creatures of equal, or even slightly higher level and usually beat them fairly easily just by using Death Blossom skill and sometimes tossing Caltrops and/or Needle Trap in. My traits so far are into condition damage and some into precision. The massive bleeds from using Death Blossom a few times is enough to kill a lot of stuff.

Jack of Tears.9458:

Thief is comin’ up a lot in this thread, so I gotta weigh in here. I agree with people about learning your class limits and requirements early on. My first class was the Thief and boy is she her own kind of squishy, but I’m glad I had to learn that in my first ten levels than find that out 30 levels later.

It’s also a big issue about skill – and that’s somewhere this game is different from all those fire and forget MMOs. You learn real fast with that Thief that dodge, move, strafe, flank, etc. are big deals in this game and that combat takes more than just thinking about how much damage a power does.

Thief isn’t necessarily harder than any other class in the game, it’s just different and you want to find that out early in if you’re coming off of another class. Just like I want to know how well a Fighter tanks vs a Guardian, and want to see Engineer kits in action. The first ten levels really are your “is this class for me” period, so the best and worst need to jump right in your face there.

I know Thief is no harder to play at low levels than an Ele, because I’ve gone back and leveled a thief a bit in another race … and knowing how to use the class I died no more than I did with any other low level character. (though I had more fun) It’s all about knowing -what- to do, and the tutorial zone/levels is the place to find all that out.

Oh and on the side of that, Thief is a class where sticking to one thing – melee or range – early on isn’t generally a good idea. So use those Pistols on melee guys and then jump in with a Melee weapon on ranged dudes. (and use Blind and Smoke Screen against ranged guys) Weapon swap or combos with distance closers are a good friend for the class. What with that all said, I level using mostly Dual Pistols until level 30 – so it can totally be done. (circle strafe and dodge, circle strafe and dodge)

Again, I’m fairly sure you leveled P/P pre stealth not dropping threat change. My issue isn’t that my thief requires a bit more attention to play early level. My issue is that it’s flat out worse early level because a ton of stuff unlocks much, much later. Elemental is definately not as hard – damage is insane, as is healing. Thief gets barely any AOE until later, and almost no self healing. Initiative only gets it’s major regen/interaction traits way later.

If I want to do well, I’m pidgeonholed into 1 or 2 weapon specs, neither of which I consider fun.

Leveling shouldn’t just be ‘grrr make it ultra hard so people L2P asap’. It should also be a time when people are free to experiment and find their own style with the class.

Lpfan.3578:

My Thief is only level 23 right now, but I don’t find him much harder to level than I found my level 80 guardian to level at the start! Guardian used greatsword mostly when leveling.
Thief mostly dagger/dagger so far. I can take on 3 creatures of equal, or even slightly higher level and usually beat them fairly easily just by using Death Blossom skill and sometimes tossing Caltrops and/or Needle Trap in. My traits so far are into condition damage and some into precision. The massive bleeds from using Death Blossom a few times is enough to kill a lot of stuff.

No offense, but then you are probably playing Guardian wrong.

At lower levels (say, sub 20) Guardian damage with a greatsword is flat out higher than a thief’s, plus the various defensive/healing tools they have baked in from the get go.

Thief does get some neat stuff, but it comes later. Much later.

Starbird.4029:

Again, I’m fairly sure you leveled P/P pre stealth not dropping threat change.

Leveling shouldn’t just be ‘grrr make it ultra hard so people L2P asap’. It should also be a time when people are free to experiment and find their own style with the class.

Well, I’m biased – I found leveling other classes boring, honestly. BUT, yeah I did that leveling before the change to Stealth … horrible, horrible change Anet – no donut for you until it’s fixed!

Jack of Tears.9458:

Starbird.4029:

Again, I’m fairly sure you leveled P/P pre stealth not dropping threat change.

Leveling shouldn’t just be ‘grrr make it ultra hard so people L2P asap’. It should also be a time when people are free to experiment and find their own style with the class.

Well, I’m biased – I found leveling other classes boring, honestly. BUT, yeah I did that leveling before the change to Stealth … horrible, horrible change Anet – no donut for you until it’s fixed!

Haha yeah, I can imagine it being a lot more doable when you have a get out of jail free card.

Nothing quite like mobs continuing to plug away at me through stealth :|

I found the inconsistencies with levelling between classes as well. Of particular note for me were the Mesmer and Elementalist. Whilst I find both of these classes exceptional, if not OP, in PvP and WvW, I found them to level really slowly. Point and click to see big crit stat classes like warrior, ranger and thief seem to excel in PvE. But the inconsistency with mage caster type classes didn’t seem to extend to Necro who seemed to level quite well as they seem quite good at farming mobs.

I honestly found ele fairly quick to level, especially as a melee spec. The self healing is amazing.

Mesmer…I may not have given a fair chance to, but I found it clunky and unappealing.

Thief just didn’t do the damage to justify it’s squishiness early on.

I agree, it wouldn’t hurt to make the early levels (up to 15) a little easier on thieves, engis, maybe eles too. If that character is your first brush with GW2 you’re going to think the downed condition is the game.

There is also the fact that you are not limited to a single weapon set through out your gaming experience in GW2.

For the longest time, I could not get my head around the fact that my warrior SHOULD use his rifle in certain situations and that he can pretty much be a ranged class if you want him to be.

Not being limited to single weapon set is an assest in this game. In fact, it is a MUST.

Again, let us take our friendly neighborhood thief as an example. You should not limit your play style with just P/P. There are situations where an SB would be muh better since your no. 1 skill hits upto three targets. Or a D/P combo would be better for more survivabilty on a specific fight.

Granted that you can allocate your traits and equip armor to a SPECIFIC play style. Still you must not limit yourself to it.

There is techincally no auto-attack in GW2. If you stop thinking about your no. 1 skill as your auto-attack, it will make a whole world of difference.

Take a look at it for a second, you will find it it deals about the same damage as your other weapon skills on a per strike basis.

The only reason we mandatorily set it as our auto-attack is because it usually does not have a cooldown and can be chained. But it is not an auto-attack in the sense that it only deals “white damage.”.

There is no “white damage” in GW2. All your weapon skills do “yellow damage”. The only advantage is you can set one of your skills to auto-cast.

Cameirus.8407:

how do you die on a mesmer? seriously, how?

I levelled mine and the only issue I had was finding enough mobs to round up to make it interesting.

You can faceroll multiple vets and champs on a mesmer.

Not sure about thief, I’m not a fan of that type of class, but maybe you need to adapt your playstyle.

Guardians can to an extent just tank stuff, other classes have to move more to avoid dmg.

Yeah, I have to admit my Mesmer’s theme song was u can’t touch this leveling. The damage wasn’t overwhelming but the profession is pretty untouchable and therefore it was possible to take on pretty much anything. The thief is different though. It really doesn’t start coming together until the mid-40’s or so. There were many points where I wished I just had a bit more initiative or a bit more something. I can see a case being made around problematic leveling and the thief. Not impossible, obviously, but not as smooth as other professions.

Baeyne.9584:

There is also the fact that you are not limited to a single weapon set through out your gaming experience in GW2.

For the longest time, I could not get my head around the fact that my warrior SHOULD use his rifle in certain situations and that he can pretty much be a ranged class if you want him to be.

Not being limited to single weapon set is an assest in this game. In fact, it is a MUST.

Again, let us take our friendly neighborhood thief as an example. You should not limit your play style with just P/P. There are situations where an SB would be muh better since your no. 1 skill hits upto three targets. Or a D/P combo would be better for more survivabilty on a specific fight.

Granted that you can allocate your traits and equip armor to a SPECIFIC play style. Still you must not limit yourself to it.

There is techincally no auto-attack in GW2. If you stop thinking about your no. 1 skill as your auto-attack, it will make a whole world of difference.

Take a look at it for a second, you will find it it deals about the same damage as your other weapon skills on a per strike basis.

The only reason we mandatorily set it as our auto-attack is because it usually does not have a cooldown and can be chained. But it is not an auto-attack in the sense that it only deals “white damage.”.

There is no “white damage” in GW2. All your weapon skills do “yellow damage”. The only advantage is you can set one of your skills to auto-cast.

My Guardian can level just fine with Greatsword, Hammer, Mace+shield etc. Constantly having to swap weapons on my thief just because the one useful skill on each comp is needed in certain circumstances makes me want to punch a kitten. It’s clunky, unfun, and dilutes a lot of the thematic strength of playing a pistols thief versus a dagger thief.

Milennin.4825:

Rakanarshi.5892:

The other classes just can’t kill as fast as the warrior can. You can’t get some mobs and heap them all together and then easily mow them down while doging here and there. Everything is just so much slower, even on an eli. I thought, oh yeah, glass cannon, but I found that the best way was to go dagger/dagger and stick to earth…it was also a pain to get a new weapon and level 12 different skills -_-. Can’t they just look at the other classes and see how they can be more fun early on?

Strange, I played a Warrior up to level 10 and thought it was the most boring class to play. It’s just spam hundred blades and watch stuff die. I tried some of their other weapons, but they weren’t much more fun, and killed stuff slower.
Elementalist and Thief on the other hand are a lot more fun. Sure, they might not kill stuff as fast, but they have mobility, and both classes have plenty of fun skills.
Btw, if you play Elementalist, I’d strongly recommend learning to use all 4 elements in battle instead of sticking to only 1.

Fare enough, my point is the warrior can take a bit of punishment and is one of, if not the best DPS class in game. I don’t mind mobility and all but when the other classes rely on it more then the warrior and just can’t kill stuff as quick, they don’t feel as complete. Sure you may find the warrior boring, not everyone will like every class, but it is a complete class. some of the others feel like you need to get them to 15-30 or so before you can have fun with them.

Also, yeah i know with the eli you are supposed to keep switching the elements around but it was more simple to stay in earth and bleed them out. I imagine you could use the scepter really well while switching elements. But that requires ground casting a lot and personally I’m not to keen on it even with fast casting.

Starbird.4029:

Baeyne.9584:

There is also the fact that you are not limited to a single weapon set through out your gaming experience in GW2.

set is an assest in this game. In fact, it is a …

-snip-

There is no “white damage” in GW2. All your weapon skills do “yellow damage”. The only advantage is you can set one of your skills to auto-cast.

My Guardian can level just fine with Greatsword, Hammer, Mace+shield etc. Constantly having to swap weapons on my thief just because the one useful skill on each comp is needed in certain circumstances makes me want to punch a kitten. It’s clunky, unfun, and dilutes a lot of the thematic strength of playing a pistols thief versus a dagger thief.

And that is exactly the reason why you are having trouble with the thief profession. Utilizing different weapons sets for different situations is one of the core gameplay of a thief.

That, and still being in the “other game that must not be mentioned” mentality. There are professions in the game that are easy to pick up, but there are also some that requires you to know and assimilate the basic mechanics of GW2 combat before you can fully enjoy them.

It is also worth noting that the “carebear” mechanic of leveling during the early levels of that “other game that must not be mentioned” is not present in GW2.

You have to unlearn a lot of things that you have picked up in that “other game that must not be mentioned” before you can really enjoy GW2.

On a side note, I would like to think that there are no such thing as a “Dagger Thief” or “GS Warrior” or any other “[insert weapon] [insert pofession]” type in GW2.

There is only PROFESSIONS. What kind of weapon you use is irrelevant, because you must use and master a majority of them to be able to play your profession with ease.

Starbird.4029:

Lpfan.3578:

My Thief is only level 23 right now, but I don’t find him much harder to level than I found my level 80 guardian to level at the start! Guardian used greatsword mostly when leveling.
Thief mostly dagger/dagger so far. I can take on 3 creatures of equal, or even slightly higher level and usually beat them fairly easily just by using Death Blossom skill and sometimes tossing Caltrops and/or Needle Trap in. My traits so far are into condition damage and some into precision. The massive bleeds from using Death Blossom a few times is enough to kill a lot of stuff.

No offense, but then you are probably playing Guardian wrong.

At lower levels (say, sub 20) Guardian damage with a greatsword is flat out higher than a thief’s, plus the various defensive/healing tools they have baked in from the get go.

Thief does get some neat stuff, but it comes later. Much later.

I didn’t say I had trouble leveling my Guardian, it was easy… I just said that I am not finding Thief to be much harder at all. Your first post sounded like you were finding Thief hard to level but Guardian was one of the easy ones. My point was that I have leveled a Guardian and I am currently leveling a Thief and while Thief is harder, it’s not very much harder.
Now, later on, I am sure I will struggle more with my Thief. But I was only talking about early leveling, like your original post said.

Baeyne.9584:

Starbird.4029:

Baeyne.9584:

There is also the fact that you are not limited to a single weapon set through out your gaming experience in GW2.

set is an assest in this game. In fact, it is a …

-snip-

There is no “white damage” in GW2. All your weapon skills do “yellow damage”. The only advantage is you can set one of your skills to auto-cast.

My Guardian can level just fine with Greatsword, Hammer, Mace+shield etc. Constantly having to swap weapons on my thief just because the one useful skill on each comp is needed in certain circumstances makes me want to punch a kitten. It’s clunky, unfun, and dilutes a lot of the thematic strength of playing a pistols thief versus a dagger thief.

And that is exactly the reason why you are having trouble with the thief profession. Utilizing different weapons sets for different situations is one of the core gameplay of a thief.

That, and still being in the “other game that must not be mentioned” mentality. There are professions in the game that are easy to pick up, but there are also some that requires you to know and assimilate the basic mechanics of GW2 combat before you can fully enjoy them.

It is also worth noting that the “carebear” mechanic of leveling during the early levels of that “other game that must not be mentioned” is not present in GW2.

You have to unlearn a lot of things that you have picked up in that “other game that must not be mentioned” before you can really enjoy GW2.

If one profession takes significantly more focus and effort than another for the same performance, something is squiffy.

Starbird.4029:

So I got the game a few weeks ago and have been faffing around trying to settle on a character.

Now one thing I like about WoW, for all it’s failings, is that whatever class I want to level, the early experience is going to be pretty consistent. Difficult or easy, the classes are balanced in such a way that nothing is a horror to level early anymore and most dps specs require a similar amount of effort and time to level with.

GW2 on the other hand…well, I really would love to level my thief, but I’m so insanely squishy that I have to jump around like a grasshopper on yellowjackets to survive 2+ of even similar level mobs.
On the other hand, my guardian or Warrior can just kerplode enemies endlessly, even if he is a few levels below them.

Since the early game experience is really important (first impressions on new players and all that) and can be so vastly different depending on what you choose to play first, I really think that some attention should be given to the fairly long period of time between starting and getting fully traited out and skilled up.

Perhaps the armor/mitigation/healing differential between the classes could be smoothed out early (and diverge more sharply later), and key survive-ability traits unlocked sooner? This would be a simple matter of changing a few numbers around.

Thoughts?

EDIT: For clarity. Also, please read this before jumping in with “L2P”. This isn’t a matter of the game being too hard. It’s more about certain classes/builds relying on tools that are not unlocked until late, versus others who have a solid kit from the get-go.

As a fellow new player I have to second this, I’ve found leveling to be more often then not a frustrating experience on most of the classes I’ve tried.

Ranged Mobs seem to be massively over powered, it’s like they were designed with full action combat in mind – the idea that a good player could avoid 90% or more of their damage. But GW2 is not full action, it’s a hybrid between old hotbar mmo combat and new actiony combat.

On my thief I routinely come upon ranged enemies my level or even a level or two lower that can take off nearly 1/3rd of my health in one or two basic auto-attacks, which most spam once a secondish for what I’ve fought.

Melee mobs are nearly as bad but they can be kited, though it would be nice not to have to run in endless circles just to kill standard mobs.

The whole damage system seems really overtuned at low levels and it’s severely limiting my desire to even try getting certain classes up despite the fact I enjoy them.

Starbird.4029:

Baeyne.9584:

Starbird.4029:

Baeyne.9584:

There is also the fact that you are not limited to a single weapon set through out your gaming experience in GW2.

set is an assest in this game. In fact, it is a …

-snip-

There is no “white damage” in GW2. All your weapon skills do “yellow damage”. The only advantage is you can set one of your skills to auto-cast.

My Guardian can -snip- me want to punch a kitten. It’s clunky, unfun, and dilutes a lot of the thematic strength of playing a pistols thief versus a dagger thief.

And that is exactly the reason why you are having trouble with the thief profession. Utilizing different weapons sets for different situations is one of the core gameplay of a thief.

-snip-

you can really enjoy GW2.

If one profession takes significantly more focus and effort than another for the same performance, something is squiffy.

Because professions are ment to be played differently, and not homogenized across the board?

If you study closely the weapon skills of your thief. You will find out that as early as level 5, you will already be able to “tank” mutiple melee mobs using D/P without seeing you HP globe dip below 90%. S/P offers the same tankiness, with your sword MH doing cleave damage, you can mow down multiple mobs quickly.You are also able to do massive AoE damage AND apply AoE weakness with your shortbow combo. You can also do single target RANGE damage with P/P.

So you see, it’s not a matter of the leveling exerience per se that is different. It’s actually the same but handled differently depending on what profession you are using.

I am also sure that other classes can do the same at level 5 with their respective weapon sets.

Baeyne.9584:

Starbird.4029:

Baeyne.9584:

Starbird.4029:

Baeyne.9584:

There is also the fact that you are not limited to a single weapon set through out your gaming experience in GW2.

set is an assest in this game. In fact, it is a …

-snip-

There is no “white damage” in GW2. All your weapon skills do “yellow damage”. The only advantage is you can set one of your skills to auto-cast.

My Guardian can -snip- me want to punch a kitten. It’s clunky, unfun, and dilutes a lot of the thematic strength of playing a pistols thief versus a dagger thief.

And that is exactly the reason why you are having trouble with the thief profession. Utilizing different weapons sets for different situations is one of the core gameplay of a thief.

-snip-

you can really enjoy GW2.

If one profession takes significantly more focus and effort than another for the same performance, something is squiffy.

Because professions are ment to be played differently, and not homogenized across the board?

If you study closely the weapon skills of your thief. You will find out that as early as level 5, you will already be able to “tank” mutiple melee mobs using D/P without seeing you HP globe dip below 90%. S/P offers the same tankiness, with your sword MH doing cleave damage, you can mow down multiple mobs quickly.You are also able to do massive AoE damage AND apply AoE weakness with your shortbow combo. You can also do single target RANGE damage with P/P.

So you see, it’s not a matter of the leveling exerience per se that is different. It’s actually the same but handled differently depending on what profession you are using.

I am also sure that other classes can do the same at level 5 with their respective weapon sets.

Yes you can, but its entirely reliant on spamming a single skill – black powder – and auto attacking. If you don’t keep BP up 100% against more then 2 mobs you are toast, stealth is virtually useless at the lowest levels since it does not drop your aggro.

I found this method, and while it felt significantly more stable then my previous means of leveling, it also felt gimmicky and decidely not fun. Flipping around using Death Blossom and dual daggers is fun, but any single auto attack hitting you results in massive health loss and this game is not set up for action game avoidance.

Honestly I think GW2 would be massively more enjoyable if it had a combat system closer to a game like TERA, instead of being 50% hot key tab targeting and 50% action based.

I’ve felt all along that if someone melded GW2s world and questing styles with Teras combat and Tors story telling they’d have the perfect mmorpg.

Quxudais.5142:

Flipping around using Death Blossom and dual daggers is fun, but any single auto attack hitting you results in massive health loss and this game is not set up for action game avoidance.

Okay, you might want to take this Thief part of the discussion to the Thief forum, just because I know there are more people there who can help you out even better than I. But, being that I use D/D alot (my two builds I most often run around with are P/P + D/D) I’ll tell you, Dual Dagger can totally be done – and it is fun as all Persephone. You don’t even need Stealth to make it work.

What you do want is “Withdraw” as your healing ability – this recharges twice as fast as “Hide in Shadows” and acts as a dodge when used right. Then pick “Roll For Initiative” as another dodge, plus recover some initiative and cure some conditions. Then “Haste or Caltrops” maybe both. “Dagger Storm” as your elite and if you’ve a skill slot left, either “Signet of Shadows” or “Devourer Venom”. Use your Steal to cover distance quickly and once you can start traiting into it, do so – it’ll lay down buffs on you and your friends as you increase your investment into the trait line. (both the top and bottom trait lines are worth taking for a Glass Cannon style Thief, but I recommend taking the bottom one first, and then some Acrobatics for the “drop caltrops on dodge” mechanic.

Obviously some of those will come available later than others – DS is an Elite – but you should pick up “Withdraw” and “Roll for Initiative” as soon as you can and each only costs 1 point to purchase.

If you want a signet in there somewhere: grab “Infiltrator’s Signet” and “Signet of Shadows” as they come available.

What makes a Dual Dagger Thief so much freaking fun is the high adrenalin you, as the player can get when leaping into fights will it. You need to be on top of your game all the time once you’ve started combat or you are toast. BUT, you are a killing machine. Keep moving, never stop and fight face to face unless you want to see how fast you can taste dirt; Use your mobility to your benefit at all times. As you get higher level you’ll be able to trait some more and soon find that you’ll be getting about 6 dodges a round to everyone else’s 3 or 4.

As an example of a fight I might run: Coming upon a group of 4 mooks and 1 Vet in their camp making cookies,
1) I … steal my way to the Veteran, then Dodge to the side.
2) I use Death Blossom to sweep over the as many of the mooks as you can hit. If you’re not close enough to use the skill, then close distance on them with "Heartseeker " first.
3) Use either “Withdraw” or “Roll for Initiative” to fling yourself clear of your enemies; tossing your dancing dagger at them once you’re back on your feet.
~~ At any point it seems reasonable, use the thing you stole or get rid of it quickly~~
4) Pick another target to Steal from and begin the circuit again – don’t take on the Vet until you’ve got most or all of the mooks dead. (If you have your Dagger Storm elite you may change the second cycle up by stealing your way in, hitting haste and then Daggerstorm to Cuisinart the remaining mooks)
5) With only the Vet left and having taken some collateral damage at that, you toss a dancing dagger at him, then apply your poison if you have one, and close the distance with a Steal – if it has recycled – or a Heartseeker.
6) If you have it, drop Caltrops at its feet and then Death Blossom over it’s head so you are now on flank. Keep him in the trap as long as you can by harrying him from the back and sides – though you may well have to Withdraw, Dodge, and Roll for Init a few times depending on how the fight is going.
7) Ultimately, though, this approach – spiced with a few changes of your own – should get you through many D/D battles.

Quxudais.5142:

Baeyne.9584:

Starbird.4029:

Baeyne.9584:

Starbird.4029:

Baeyne.9584:

There is also the fact that you are not limited…

-snip-

… is you can set one of your skills to auto-cast.

My Guardian can…

-snip-

…versus a dagger thief.

And that is exactly the reason why you are having trouble with the thief profession.

-snip-

you can really enjoy GW2.

If one profession takes significantly more focus and effort than another for the same performance, something is squiffy.

Because professions

-snip-

with their respective weapon sets.

Yes you can, but its…

-snip-

… story telling they’d have the perfect mmorpg.

What you say about the pro’s and con’s of xx/P and D/D may be true. But it doesn’t change the fact that leveling experience is not inconsistent by playing a different profession.

Sure, there are professions that are easy to get into and there those that aren’t. But ALL of them require you to understand how each of them works to better enjoy the game as a whole.

I have just pointed out that (for example) a thief can have the survivability of a guard, just that that survivability is in another form.

If you prefer one play style over another, that is already a personal choice, and how fun or un-fun that play style is, is again entirely up to you. What I want to point out is that regardless of what play style is comfortable to you, it does not make the leveling experience more difficult.

Regardless of play style and profession, you still need to understand the game and its mechanics to better enjoy it. You have to unlearn some things that you have picked up in other MMO’s because those things may not be applicable when playing this game.

New Character Yo.6487:

I do agree with you that some classes faceroll too easily early game (warriors especially) and some have more trouble. Yeah, warriors are OP in both armor and damage compared to a thief, which makes the thief less attractive to begin with, but my main is a thief, and i love it, regardless of the obvious difference. My warrior facerolls mobs 4 levels higher then him sometimes, which is kind of hilarious. I guess it doesn’t really bother me because i love mobility so my 2 lvl 80s are ele and thief while my lower levels are guardian and warrior, but I can see what your concern is. In the end, what’s in game, is in game, and I wouldn’t count on balancing early game damage and survivability on the top of their list.

It would take a minor tweak of some numbers That’s all. For a massive quality of life increase. I’ve actually got several PMs from new players thanking me for making this…so it may actually be a bigger issue than you grizzled veterans think!

Well, I know anecdotes are a dime a dozen, but I wanted to give you my experience as well.

I leveled a thief as my first character from 1-80. I’ve played with D/D for a short time, S/P for most of the early game, and D/P for most of the late game leveling (I switched to D/P when pistol whip got nerfed so hard), and of course shortbow as the secondary at all times. I never had much trouble leveling. I did feel squishy at the beginning but I quickly got used to the game and using stealth, blind, and dodging to make up for this. Pistol offhand #5 is especially OP in PvE, you can stand in this and wreck stuff without taking barely any damage. Not to mention you can use this and/or the smoke wall to shoot through with SB or pistols to keep an opponent permanently blinded.

I found that during leveling with my friends I actually ended up being the “tank” of the group since I would shadowstep in and pull most of the aggro, and then tank through blind and dodging.

I think the thief is harder to level just because he is a harder character to play. Guardian and Warrior are just easy classes. It’s not like the thief suddenly becomes easy at level 80 and Warrior and Guardian become harder.

Also, P/P is largely considered the worst of all the thief weapon sets. It’s not a matter of “you have to use this specific set,” but it is a matter of “user any set but this one.”

I think people underestimate the first impression a game needs to make to have players keep playing. WoW changed the starting zones drastically to have a less steep learning curve compared to release. They made all the mobs neutral for the first 5? levels. The first few times you play a brand new game you are not learning to understand your character, you are learning to understand the interface.

Ofcourse it would feel silly and dumbed down for us, as we already understand the game and interface, and that is also the feedback WoW received from their playerbase. It was now considered too boring and too easy. However, they have new players try the game for longer after those changes. Those changes were not aimed at their current playerbase but at people picking the game up for the first time. We will play through the first few levels in such a short time anyway, it does not even matter all that much.

Before the changes only about 10% would play beyond lvl 10 after picking up WoW. A steep learning curve being one of the biggest factors according to the exit surveys. I do not know how many play beyond lvl 10 now, but it does give a picture of how many players will quit based on the first impression.

Esya.3427:

I think people underestimate the first impression a game needs to make to have players keep playing. WoW changed the starting zones drastically to have a less steep learning curve compared to release. They made all the mobs neutral for the first 5? levels. The first few times you play a brand new game you are not learning to understand your character, you are learning to understand the interface.

Ofcourse it would feel silly and dumbed down for us, as we already understand the game and interface, and that is also the feedback WoW received from their playerbase. It was now considered too boring and too easy. However, they have new players try the game for longer after those changes. Those changes were not aimed at their current playerbase but at people picking the game up for the first time. We will play through the first few levels in such a short time anyway, it does not even matter all that much.

Before the changes only about 10% would play beyond lvl 10 after picking up WoW. A steep learning curve being one of the biggest factors according to the exit surveys. I do not know how many play beyond lvl 10 now, but it does give a picture of how many players will quit based on the first impression.

if you would go out to the starting zones you would see that about first 5 levels mostly only feature yellow mobs anyway.

Maybe an actual tutorial mode, instead of or in addition to what exists now. Something to teach the game, that’s optional. Maybe that would help.

Vayne.8563:

Maybe an actual tutorial mode, instead of or in addition to what exists now. Something to teach the game, that’s optional. Maybe that would help.

Terra did a tutorial island that you can chose to go to before entering the first leveling zone. I don’t see how it could hurt

Mirta.5029:

if you would go out to the starting zones you would see that about first 5 levels mostly only feature yellow mobs anyway.

That is not the point I tried to make. It was only part of the things they changed. They made the overall content of the early levels drastically easier, in order to have players try the game for longer. A first impression is really important for games like these.

I have to agree about mesmer, it was the easiest for 1 to 80 for me. Easier than guardian, hunter and ele. Thief I have not gotten a good feel for so it is lagging at 50 and prob will for a long time.

Cameirus.8407:

how do you die on a mesmer? seriously, how?

I levelled mine and the only issue I had was finding enough mobs to round up to make it interesting.

You can faceroll multiple vets and champs on a mesmer.

Not sure about thief, I’m not a fan of that type of class, but maybe you need to adapt your playstyle.

Guardians can to an extent just tank stuff, other classes have to move more to avoid dmg.

Quinci.5968:

Well, I know anecdotes are a dime a dozen, but I wanted to give you my experience as well.

I leveled a thief as my first character from 1-80. I’ve played with D/D for a short time, S/P for most of the early game, and D/P for most of the late game leveling (I switched to D/P when pistol whip got nerfed so hard), and of course shortbow as the secondary at all times. I never had much trouble leveling. I did feel squishy at the beginning but I quickly got used to the game and using stealth, blind, and dodging to make up for this. Pistol offhand #5 is especially OP in PvE, you can stand in this and wreck stuff without taking barely any damage. Not to mention you can use this and/or the smoke wall to shoot through with SB or pistols to keep an opponent permanently blinded.

I found that during leveling with my friends I actually ended up being the “tank” of the group since I would shadowstep in and pull most of the aggro, and then tank through blind and dodging.

I think the thief is harder to level just because he is a harder character to play. Guardian and Warrior are just easy classes. It’s not like the thief suddenly becomes easy at level 80 and Warrior and Guardian become harder.

Also, P/P is largely considered the worst of all the thief weapon sets. It’s not a matter of “you have to use this specific set,” but it is a matter of “user any set but this one.”

Firstly, as far as anecdotes go – did you do this before or after Stealth was changed to not drop aggro in PvE?

Secondly, P/P is the set I really, really want to play. As I’ve said, the iconic gunslinger archetype is what brought me to the class. It’s always what I try to play in games like this. Without it…the class just loses a lot of it’s appeal.

i guess in your case. due to the heavy armor of warriors and guardians and both of them have heavy aoe skills. they pretty much face roll the game.

i play a necromancer and although im not tanky. my pet gives me cosistant regen. as long as i keep it alive.

i will agree that when i played theif, and elementalists. they were squishy and required more skill in the extreme early levels. i just moved to other starting zones and quested.

Rakanarshi.5892:

Frankly I have to agree with the OP. The warrior is just so much fun to play as you can pick up almost any weapon early on and experiment with the skills. I made a second warrior after trying out all the other classes and didn’t realize how much more fun I was having with it then all the other classes. Got a sword and a war horn and rounded up mobs and mowed em down with my burst skill and used savage leap and charge to get around until I had weapon switching. I then used that to level any other weapons I picked up.

The other classes just can’t kill as fast as the warrior can. You can’t get some mobs and heap them all together and then easily mow them down while doging here and there. Everything is just so much slower, even on an eli. I thought, oh yeah, glass cannon, but I found that the best way was to go dagger/dagger and stick to earth…it was also a pain to get a new weapon and level 12 different skills -_-. Can’t they just look at the other classes and see how they can be more fun early on?

Bingo.

And it wouldn’t be a massive change at all.

Let’s look at the thief, for instance. A simple increase to damage early on (why oh why does my guardian do about double the damage initially?), making Signet of Malice do a bit more early game and perhaps making the aoe trait for Pistols more effective and available sooner, as well as the initiative boosting ones?

Right there, massive quality of life improvement.

I’m not asking for blanket nerfs to anything, just a buff to make the …say, 1-40 trawl a little bit more entertaining/forgiving on certain classes. The second you have numerous people advising others to level early on through crafting, it needs a look.

Esya.3427:

Mirta.5029:

if you would go out to the starting zones you would see that about first 5 levels mostly only feature yellow mobs anyway.

That is not the point I tried to make. It was only part of the things they changed. They made the overall content of the early levels drastically easier, in order to have players try the game for longer. A first impression is really important for games like these.

Mm.

Without trying to plug WoW (I’m sick of it, but lets face it – it’s a bloody good game for a lot of reasons) the first 20 levels are really focussed on teaching gradually and on having fun, getting people into the lore and helping them choose their playstyle. Not making them feel like their build/set isn’t viable until later/at all. That kind of min/max crap has plenty of time at endgame.

20-58 is very much a gradual difficulty curve. BC and WOTLK are…wonky, but Cata starts to ramp things up nicely and MOP has some very challenging leveling areas that require you to know your class. By the time you hit 90, you have a fairly good idea of what works, what doesn’t and what to do/not to do, at least as a dps.

Just an old lady’s perspective:

I would rather that things stay the same as they are now. Professions SHOULDN’T be the same to level.

If your play style is an “in your face” style, then warrior or guardian is for you, and thief or ranger is not. On the other hand, if your style is to hide behind the big tanky-looking melee fighter and take potshots, then maybe the Plate Wearers aren’t for you.

Thief specifically takes a special kind of player. One who may possibly be one of those types who have 3 tvs running, reading a newspaper, and playing an MMO all at the same time. I love them, but the simple fact is, I can’t play them well. On the other hand, I rock as an ele.

TL;DR:
Don’t change the leveling process. Take a look at your class choice instead.

Cameirus.8407:

how do you die on a mesmer? seriously, how?

I levelled mine and the only issue I had was finding enough mobs to round up to make it interesting.

You can faceroll multiple vets and champs on a mesmer.

Not sure about thief, I’m not a fan of that type of class, but maybe you need to adapt your playstyle.

Guardians can to an extent just tank stuff, other classes have to move more to avoid dmg.

Please link a video of you soloing a champ on a Mesmer before lvl 40 with blue gear.

I am fairly new to the game. Have only played 3 classes – Warrior/Guardian/Thief. I was totally clueless going into this game, I refuse to watch youtube or read forums. I just went along.

*We are not talking about which class has the easiest leveling time right? Just the experience.

My experience is that even with my Warrior/Guardian; there is no “consistant experience” because I have to change their skills/weapons/traits etc multiple times. My Guardian recently hit 80 and I am still changing my setup/playstyle. My impression of my Warrior and Guardian changed much during my journey to level 80.

Coming from traditional MMOs where class improvement are mostly linear, I welcome this experience.

Side note: Use the Trading Post. I always use the TP to keep my gear up to date; low level gear is dirt cheap. My thief at level 16 standing in a level 10-15 area kills enemies (1 vs 1) very fast. Okay, so I cannot charge a group of enemies like my warrior could nor can I facetank like my guardian but hey I can take down single monsters very fast if I empty my initiative on them.

Squishy, devastating and tactical is my 1st impression of a Thief. Have to think, analyze the situation, know when to run and when to strike.

I see a lot of friends get disheartened by the leveling experience with similar complaints, and honestly, I’ve never really understood it.

Personally, when I see red mobs higher level than me, I know to avoid the area and find somewhere else to ‘quest’. It seems a pretty clear sign that I should not be in that area.

When I die to an event or a type of mob, I find a way to rework my tactics to succeed, be it reexamining my traits, or trying out a different set of skills.

On the subject of class balance: I found my mesmer and engineer difficult to level. The funny thing is? They were my first and second characters ever, respectively. I later made a new mesmer and found it so much easier to play once I knew the game a bit, you know, learned to play.

It just seems to me that other MMO’s have gone down the route of ‘dumbing’ down the gameplay experience. Which I guess, is why I find myself here. GW2 in my opinion finds the right mix of ‘casual’ pick up and play, and combat complexity.

Edit:

My experience is that even with my Warrior/Guardian; there is no “consistant experience” because I have to change their skills/weapons/traits etc multiple times. My Guardian recently hit 80 and I am still changing my setup/playstyle. My impression of my Warrior and Guardian changed much during my journey to level 80.

Coming from traditional MMOs where class improvement are mostly linear, I welcome this experience.

This is what I was getting at. You have to constantly look at all your options as a profession, to learn your class in and out. And with the depth of each class, there’s always something seemingly new you haven’t thought about, or tried yet.

It’s part of what keeps me so engaged.

I have 6 80’s. In my experience my Mesmer/Ele were the hardest at low levels. Once I hit about 40 on my Mesmer I was able to tear through just about everything without a problem. Once I hit 60 on my ele it really got easy. My necro was about the same throughout the leveling process. My Ranger/warrior/guardian were faceroll. I don’t think I died once leveling any of these classes.

I agree there is a huge disparity between leveling different classes. I don’t mind it, the only class that made me rage while leveling was ele, the rest were manageable.

Starbird.4029:

So I got the game a few weeks ago and have been faffing around trying to settle on a character.

Now one thing I like about WoW, for all it’s failings, is that whatever class I want to level, the early experience is going to be pretty consistent. Difficult or easy, the classes are balanced in such a way that nothing is a horror to level early anymore and most dps specs require a similar amount of effort and time to level with.

GW2 on the other hand…well, I really would love to level my thief, but I’m so insanely squishy that I have to jump around like a grasshopper on yellowjackets to survive 2+ of even similar level mobs.
On the other hand, my guardian or Warrior can just kerplode enemies endlessly, even if he is a few levels below them.

Since the early game experience is really important (first impressions on new players and all that) and can be so vastly different depending on what you choose to play first, I really think that some attention should be given to the fairly long period of time between starting and getting fully traited out and skilled up.

Perhaps the armor/mitigation/healing differential between the classes could be smoothed out early (and diverge more sharply later), and key survive-ability traits unlocked sooner? This would be a simple matter of changing a few numbers around.

Thoughts?

EDIT: For clarity. Also, please read this before jumping in with “L2P”. This isn’t a matter of the game being too hard. It’s more about certain classes/builds relying on tools that are not unlocked until late, versus others who have a solid kit from the get-go.

IT’S NOT. let me tell you why. the classes are different. you can’t play a thief like a guardian or vice versa. if you play style is tank and spank don’t play a thief. for a thief to survive you must learn how to move simple as that.

I play many classes and have not found any do be more difficult to lvl then the other through same content.

you don’t want anyone to respond with L2P yet what I read is what you must do. the vast majority don’t post this issue because they have spent the time to learn there class. took me awhile to learn theif. I practiced how to use what was given to me to survive before I put my self in tough positions.

the argument would be better if you we’re talking about time it might take to lvl a class, or how long it takes to learn.

but sorry I just don’t agree

Ashabhi.1365:

Just an old lady’s perspective:

I would rather that things stay the same as they are now. Professions SHOULDN’T be the same to level.

If your play style is an “in your face” style, then warrior or guardian is for you, and thief or ranger is not. On the other hand, if your style is to hide behind the big tanky-looking melee fighter and take potshots, then maybe the Plate Wearers aren’t for you.

Thief specifically takes a special kind of player. One who may possibly be one of those types who have 3 tvs running, reading a newspaper, and playing an MMO all at the same time. I love them, but the simple fact is, I can’t play them well. On the other hand, I rock as an ele.

TL;DR:
Don’t change the leveling process. Take a look at your class choice instead.

You remind me of people who support Shamans in WoW doing 30% less dps than everyone else ‘because of flavour’.

As I said in the other thread, let’s stop this whole WoW style “if you don’t like the class, get out” style of arguing. If someone doesn’t like something (quite a lot of someones, it seems) then it at least needs a look.

Its Balance 101. If one class/race/spec etc. requires significantly more skill and investment to perform at the same level as another, then balance is squiffy and needs to be changed. The reason being, in a situation where skill is equal, the other class will probably have an advantage.

‘Flavour’ is never an excuse for imbalance, in a good game.