Guild Wars 2

Dungeons & Raids, open pve and so on.
What looks good in your opinion?

From the specs I’ve spent the most time on —

Herald is looking amazing, in my opinion. Favourite elite spec so far. Managing upkeeps is fun and rewarding, and the effects / utility provided are great.

Druid might be useful in group content, but that is yet to be seen and honestly I don’t expect healing to actually work in GW2 once people figure the content out. Preventing damage will always be better than healing it. Healing power also scales horribly and gimps your character. Contributing less DPS to the group = monsters staying alive longer = group taking more unnecessary damage than if the monster had just died already.

Dragonhunter, meh. Traps are not useful in PvE and dungeons. The bow feels better this BWE, but is that really enough to justify taking the traitline?

Berserker, meh. Just more of the same dps oriented stuff warrior already had. The class has serious shoehorning issues with existing traitlines / mandatory traits, so the only way Berserker will be played is if it edges out Arms or Discipline. Regardless of viability, it just doesn’t feel any different than an existing warrior, which is disappointing.

Haven’t played the others enough to comment.

#1: Chronomancer. No one will forget the day this class steps foot on tyria. Particularly because that day will happen twice in a row, but twice as fast.

The chronomancer provides a lot. In particular, alacrity, quickness, and the ability to duplicate their entire utility bar and do it again. The end result being oodles and oodles of alacrity, quickness, slow, and other assorted buffs + debuffs. With 50% higher action speed and half the cooldowns, what used to be considered burst is now part of the standard damage rotation.

The others… not so sure. It really depends on the content, but the biggest potential game changers are Herald, Reaper, and Druid.

Druid/Chrono/reaper.

I think Tempest and DH are busted flushes.

Reaper/Herald/Chronomancer

Reaper – Giving Necromancer some melee love was due. Reaper shroud is really strong and enjoyable to manage. I’ve particularly liked not being shoehorned into taking Berserker’s stats since Death Perception is a thing, instead taking Cavalier’s and playing with more tanky/dps roles. Can take some hits and keeps on truckin’.

Herald – Maintaining persistent effects and managing upkeeps is challenging and fun. Definitely feel it gives parties a bang for their buck since you’re a mini-phalanx warrior+a whole bag of chips without having to give up too many trait slots. I also see where Infused Light could be a big thing.

Chrono – I havn’t touched it much, but by seeing the kit I just know it is strong and useful. Slow/Alacrity application in certain scenarios could be sought after if ANET go back to BWE2 difficulty or harder. Chronophantasma is a wicked trait that will see a lot of play. Finally, move-speed increase as a minor is just awesome.

Other mentions…

Scrapper – Too early to say, but Scrapper has got a place somewhere. It definitely fills a gap in the profession.

Druid – Unless ANET fix the difficulty I don’t see much use from anything heal-oriented. Why go that far when everything hits you with a Fun Noodle.

Dragonhunter – Fills a need in having a more impactful ranged attack, but falls short with traps that feel disconnected gameplay-wise when you can easily kill the mobs before they get to said traps.

Tempest – This elite specialization’s traits are a casserole of nonsense. They’re just yesterday’s leftovers from the other core specializations. Some traits don’t even have weight unless you’re in one particular attunement. I really wanted to love the Tempest but it’s the least cohesive of the elite specializations.

Berserker – Nothing too astounding. Xzibit must’ve designed it because they put the zerker in the zerker so we can zerk while we zerk. In any case, it probably just puts Warrior in a better spot than it was before. It will probably see some use, but definitely doesn’t notch up the wow-factor.

Daredevil – Inventive differentiation of the dodge mechanic and welcome inclusion of physical skills. Will see a fair amount of play in PvP, but I find it hard to say whether it will see a lot of notice in PvE. Staff has harder hits than sword to fewer targets, but so does dagger. Staff brings a mixed bag on whether you can survive as well as you could doing pistol offhand. Otherwise, less reliable blinds aren’t positive to group survivability, and fewer smoke fields aren’t terrific either. However, you can dodge for days.

Reaper/Chrono/Herald. These 3 seem to be the most polished and unique all around.

Daredevil is boring and not “new,” DH is just awful all around, Druid can’t deal damage and therefore can’t tag in events (maybe this’ll change with the actual release of HoT), Scrapper hammer seems amazing but the gyros are lackluster, and I don’t know enough about the others to say much. Also this is all from a PvE perspective.

why Reaper? it still does not offer much in terms of party support, or?
I understand that it has really strong damage dealing skills but what about everything else the necro was missing until now?

Dragonhunter/Herald/Druid

Druid gets a little boring because of all the healing:(

rogerwilko.6895:

why Reaper? it still does not offer much in terms of party support, or?
I understand that it has really strong damage dealing skills but what about everything else the necro was missing until now?

DPS and true melee.

I tried the Druid, I used the staff and long bow. It was nice to meet our new pets and to try out the new heals, I really hope the ranger will become more welcome in dungeons after this.
I also tried the Tempest, I liked the Overcharge abilities but didn’t warm too much to the warhorn and scepter combinations but generally I am glad to see new weapons and new abilities.
About the area, I really really dislike the change in direction from the hearts and exploration of the vanilla game to those weird awkward maps and that Mordrem story with Destiny’s Edge. For me personally I don’t like silverwastes or dry top and was really disappointed to see the expansion is going to be more of the same. Having a glider doesn’t make up for the ‘meh’ of those maps.
But I dont regret prepurchasing because Im going to have a lot of fun learning the new weapons and skills. Hope we get new hairstyles too!

rogerwilko.6895:

why Reaper? it still does not offer much in terms of party support, or?
I understand that it has really strong damage dealing skills but what about everything else the necro was missing until now?

It is still missing all those things. People are easily drawn in by flashy animations and cool effects. The dps is still below that of warriors and thieves and eles, and it still offers no group utility. It is a ton of fun to play though, and is quite good in PvP because of its sustain. It is also a very well polished elite spec which makes it stand out above some of the others.

The most promising elites imo are:

1. Herald- great all around, can’t go wrong here.

2. Chronomancer- fun play style, unique buffs, good all around again.

3. Reaper/Druid- Both are fun to play, and both are very good but each lack one important thing. Reaper has good damage but no group support. Druid has amazing group support but lacks damage.

I haven’t seen enough of scrapper or daredevil yet, but scapper looks promising at least.

DH and Tempest are getting better with each weekend, but I don’t think they’ll make it on the list by launch.