Guild Wars 2

For me, I have given a tie between elementalists and mesmers. But from lore bits I have read, I noticed that mesmers are usually some sort of big threat or whatnot. Or just simply powerful because of the fact they can manipulate your very sense of reality.

Take the undead mesmer during the Personal Story for example. That thing alone caused so much trouble for your PC and the Pact.
Digging a bit deeper, even Queen Jennah herself. In Edge of Destiny, the part where she compelled Logan to come to her aid while he was off about to fight Kralky, but in the end, it seemingly looked as if she didn’t even need him.

I haven’t read anything much of great Elementalis feats lorewise, albeit I haven’t read so much into it either.

TLDR: I’m more in favor of Mesmers

Don’t underestimate the other classes so quickly. Very powerful Necromancers are known to prolong their life by unnatural means and can potentially control armies of the undead.
An engineer raised an army of robots, wreaked havoc across Tyria and destroyed Lion’s Arch, almost on her own. Besides with their utility belts, engineers seem to be the Batmen of the professions, give them enough prep time and they find a way to dispose of their adversaries.
Guardians and Revenants also have great potential, but we haven’t seen enough big feats by either of them yet. Rangers, or rather their specialization, the Druids are a force to be reckoned with too, as they seem to be able to become one with nature, gaining a minor deity status.
And while they lack the raw power of the other professions, a good thief or warrior can still slay the most poweful mage in a one on one combat. A prime example would be the fight between Turai Ossa (warrior) and Palawa Joko (necromancer).

BuddhaKeks.4857:

…prolong their life by unnatural means …

Is it possible to learn this power?

Pregnantman.8259:

BuddhaKeks.4857:

…prolong their life by unnatural means …

Is it possible to learn this power?

Not from a jedi

Pregnantman.8259:

BuddhaKeks.4857:

…prolong their life by unnatural means …

Is it possible to learn this power?

If we ever get to Elona, you might have a chance to ask Palawa Joko. However not sure if you want to be a dried up corpse. Alternatively you could go seek out Livia, if she is still alive. She managed to stay fresh for around 200 years, probably with a little help from the Scepter of Orr.

I dont know. It still stands that individually, a mesmer’s chaos magic still trumps over artificial power (Engineer’s gadgets etc.), I mean sure you can put up a scenario that the Engi creates some sort of device that dispels illusions but thats situational and also Its not really power on demand, considering that theyd have to prepare and all. As for the necromancer’s case, I dont know how potent they could be when it comes to diseases but in the numbers department, I can raise a 100 guys to fight you but for all I knew, they’d be punching each other.
It just seems that the ability to warp your perception of reality is a bit too much for any one person to have.

I can see Revenants capable of being stronger though what with the fact they can basically just borrow any sort of power from the Mists and be Dues Ex Machinas but we havent got much lore on the revenants. Hoping for more Profession lore from LW or the Xpacs at least

There is no strongest profession lorewise. It comes simply down to the individual.

But if we were to look at individuals in the lore that caused the most trouble and what professions they had. Excluding op beings like the gods or elder dragons, i would go for Palawa Joko and since he is more or less a necromancer. My vote would go to necromancer.

That said i dont think necromancer is the strongest profession since i dont think there is one.

BuddhaKeks.4857:

Pregnantman.8259:

BuddhaKeks.4857:

…prolong their life by unnatural means …

Is it possible to learn this power?

If we ever get to Elona, you might have a chance to ask Palawa Joko. However not sure if you want to be a dried up corpse. Alternatively you could go seek out Livia, if she is still alive. She managed to stay fresh for around 200 years, probably with a little help from the Scepter of Orr.

You mean Countess Anise (if you accept the theory that Anise is Livia)?

We had this discussion a few years ago – which is not, I hasten to point out, to say that there’s anything wrong with repeating the discussion with new people and perspectives now. However, here is my general impression of the result:

At the top level, the powers of the professions are different enough that you can’t really measure them in absolute terms, and instead have to make a judgement call on which form of power is more useful.

Necromancers and engineers, for instance, have the ability to build armies without relying on the support of a population. The Lich Lord invaded Kryta with an army of undead and was held at bay, and Palawa invaded Elona twice (being defeated the first time and succeeding the second) and now holds Elona in his grip. Scarlet would probably not have been able to become as powerful as she did without her alliances and co-opting of the Watchknights (which I do hope will come back sometime rather than existing only so that Scarlet could take control of them), but even the steam creatures gave her an army that was capable of expanding and maintaining itself. However, the personal presence of even the most skilled necromancer or engineer tends to be relatively weak – they’re still usually quite dangerous one-on-one, but their true power is in the ability to raise armies that can conquer nations.

Mesmers and elementalists don’t have this army-building ability (elementalists can and do summon elementals, but not in the numbers that a necromancer can gather) – but they do have more of an ability to act as a walking nuke, create flying battle platforms, or otherwise swing a battle in their favour. Generally, though, mesmers and elementalists don’t have the ability to form a nation out of their own creations that other professions do: they need to have the support of an existing population of followers if they want to form (or seize) a nation.

A powerful guardian might lack the ability to bend reality or destroy armies that a powerful elementalist or mesmer might, but may be able to compensate for this by giving such protective support to an army that the army is effectively untouchable. This is in the realm of speculation, however, since the most powerful guardian NPC we know is Logan, who is still relatively unimpressive compared to powerful NPCs of other professions: we did see that he was able to make a shield bubble that protected indefinitely against boulders, but that was still relatively small and he was unable to otherwise act. (Mesmers can also act as protectors, at least against magic.)

Warriors, thieves, rangers, and arguably revenants don’t have the ability to build, destroy, or protect armies like the others do, but do tend to be able to 1v1 spellcasters (and likely engineers) once they get to them.

You could think of the various professions as having their power spread across different ranges. A powerful necromancer is likely to have their power spread across a very wide-ranging locus of control: they can build an army that can seize control of a continent, but they themselves are relatively vulnerable, and they have little ability to turn a battle once it’s been joined. A powerful elementalist has a narrower locus of influence, but is more powerful within their range – the elementalist may be able to single-handedly decide a battle, but lacks the ability to directly influence events without being relatively close by. A powerful warrior’s ability to influence things is about the range of their weapon (albeit with some leadership abilities that extend to nearby allies), but their power within that range is highly concentrated, such that they can likely butcher the powerful necromancer or elementalist in fairly short order if they can get to them.

From my own subjective viewpoint, I think being able to just build an army and nation out of your own creations is probably the route that allows for the most power and ability to singlehandedly influence the course of history. Nearly every villain who’s been the focus of a campaign has been dangerous largely because of their ability to create or summon minions: the Lich Lord (undead and titans), Shiro (Afflicted and Shiro’ken), the Great Destroyer (Destroyers), Zhaitan (Risen), Scarlet (Steam creatures, Twisted, and giant constructs, although she’s borderline), and finally Mordremoth (Mordrem) – and you can probably add Joko to that list as the continent-spanning threat we weren’t given the opportunity to stop. (You could even argue Abaddon, but for the most part his servants seemed to be entities that would have existed without him, he just had their loyalty due to being a god…) Powerful members of other professions are certainly able to make for hard fights, but tend to be more of a local problem than the continent-spanning threats that the above group represent.

As a result, I would probably come down on necromancer or engineer being the most powerful… and when push comes to shove, I’d probably go with necromancer over the engineer. After all, the engineer looking to (literally) build their own army needs to at least start with bartering for the materials they need until they have enough minions to do the mining for them: all a necromancer needs to get started is a few corpses. A powerful necromancer is probably an opponent that can hide out anywhere and get started on building an army without help from anyone else, until they have enough to start conquering nations.

However, it is subjective – last time the conversation came up, some people did argue quite fiercely that the ‘walking natural disaster’ form of power was greater than the ‘I can build an empire out of nothing’ form of power.

Draxynic, what about Xera’s reality warping mesmer magic and if I recall correctly Reiko’s ability to not only create clones of herself but also clones of her enemies in Guild Wars (I reckon the large caveat with Reiko would be the number of ministry of purity guard’s she had to her own defence, but her ability was powerful enough to fool everyone except the assassin in your party). Is it not possible for a mesmer to create magic of a more army-like manner like a necromancer or engineer?

I don’t know that Xera counts as a good example, especially since, if I recall right, her skills were due to a strong boost of Bloodstone magic. We do know that a Mesmer can create the illusion of a large army, as per the history of Ebonhawke, but I don’t recall there being mention of the army being any more than a distraction. I have a feeling that the bigger and more grand the illusion a Mesmer creates, the harder it is to make them tangible, though I have no proof of that.

Did Xera’s reality warping make a lot of minions? I know that her phantasms are a part of the Keep Construct fight, but if memory serves they only come a few at a time- more than our characters can make, sure, but not too impressive considering the other things she ended up doing.

And as for Reiko, again, if memory serves she could only copy one enemy at a time. I also interpreted the confusion over which one was the real Reiko as her bringing out a new development on mesmer abilities, that’ve since become the core gimmick of modern mesmers. It wouldn’t be notable these days.

castlemanic.3198:

Draxynnic, what about Xera’s reality warping mesmer magic and if I recall correctly Reiko’s ability to not only create clones of herself but also clones of her enemies in Guild Wars (I reckon the large caveat with Reiko would be the number of ministry of purity guard’s she had to her own defence, but her ability was powerful enough to fool everyone except the assassin in your party). Is it not possible for a mesmer to create magic of a more army-like manner like a necromancer or engineer?

This comes under ‘being able to swing a battle’. From what we’ve seen, mesmers still seem to only be able to create illusions in a limited range within their vicinity (bigger than the game mechanics a PC can do, but probably practically limited to the mesmer’s line of sight) – a powerful mesmer could stand up to an army and fight it through illusions and reality warping, but they can’t sit in their capital while an army of their creations conquers and garrisons an empire the way a necromancer or engineer could.

Labwan the Deceiver could be an exception (she has illusions in Fireheart Rise), but I interpret that as Labwan being nearby in order to mess with the PC, and/or making use of an artifact. Either way, that’s still a relatively limited area, so while it might indicate that mesmers can project across a great distance, it still doesn’t mean they can hold an empire with an army of phantasms.

In short, I’ve already taken Xera’s abilities into account as typical of what a mesmer could do – there doesn’t seem to be anything to indicate that her locus of influence is greater than the mass illusions created by Jennah, Kitah, and Koro.

Reiko, as stated above, is nothing impressive by GW2 standards. One could argue that a powerful mesmer could mind-control her way into power, but this is still relying on subverting an existing population, and we know that members of any profession can rise into positions of leadership the old-fashioned way.

Its hard to point at any one class and say its the strongest lore wise. I think they all have some sort of representation.

Id say across both gw1 and gw2 necromancers are the more represented class despite gw2 abusing mesmers so cheaply.

I think Mesmers/Chronomancers are the most powerful. I mean lets face it… Altering time, space, and reality itself is extremely powerful versus summoning the dead or using Elemental magic.

Purecura.1795:

I think Mesmers/Chronomancers are the most powerful. I mean lets face it… Altering time, space, and reality itself is extremely powerful versus summoning the dead or using Elemental magic.

They’re not actually as powerful as some people are saying. Most mesmers only affect the perception of space and time, not space and time itself, at least according to a few off-hand remarks by devs.

Diovid.9506:

Purecura.1795:

I think Mesmers/Chronomancers are the most powerful. I mean lets face it… Altering time, space, and reality itself is extremely powerful versus summoning the dead or using Elemental magic.

They’re not actually as powerful as some people are saying. Most mesmers only affect the perception of space and time, not space and time itself, at least according to a few off-hand remarks by devs.

Oooooooooooo! So are you saying they make it seem like they are removing themselves from the time line when casting [Continuum Split]? How do you justify the boon quickness? Are you saying mesmers create the illusion of Quickness and alacrity?

How about the famous [Portal Entre]? Do they make it seem like up to 60 people can teleport through a portal, covering vast distances through the use of illusions? Imo after 250 years mesmers have found ways to manipulate the physical world with their magics versus just a individuals mind.

Jus like how dragon hunters manifest their virtues into physical reality.

It has been stated, I believe, that mesmers do have the capability to alter reality to a degree, I mean it was outright stated that the Twisted Castle wkittentered by a mesmer juiced up on Bloodstone magic. That said, they do also do a vast majority of their work with minds. Like speeding up time is a very easy thing to do, you merely have to use mesmer magic to slow down your opponent’s perception of time, which makes it appear that you are moving faster than possible.

In my opinion, mesmer is the strongest profession.

Purecura.1795:

Diovid.9506:

Purecura.1795:

I think Mesmers/Chronomancers are the most powerful. I mean lets face it… Altering time, space, and reality itself is extremely powerful versus summoning the dead or using Elemental magic.

They’re not actually as powerful as some people are saying. Most mesmers only affect the perception of space and time, not space and time itself, at least according to a few off-hand remarks by devs.

Oooooooooooo! So are you saying they make it seem like they are removing themselves from the time line when casting [Continuum Split]? How do you justify the boon quickness? Are you saying mesmers create the illusion of Quickness and alacrity?

The actual dev quote, if you were wondering:

Scott McGough.6897:

For both story and gameplay, actual time travel is a quagmire that has to be handled carefully.

I see the chronomancer as much more a case of manipulating the local perception of time rather than manipulating time itself. The Continuum Split skill text specifically mentions a rift in time and space continuum, but I’m like you in that I take that to mean “continuum” as a perceived possibility that the chronomancer is working with rather than an actual time jump. It visually appears to let the chronomancer rewind time, but functionally it’s a highly advanced, specialized mesmer clone that players directly control for a short duration while their real body is phased out—thus any damage, etc. happens to the Continuum Split clone (who disappears when the skill expires), and the PC resumes control of their real body unchanged from the moment they activated the skill (although they do retain any XP, etc. they garnered while in Continuum Split).

Aaron Ansari.1604:

Purecura.1795:

Diovid.9506:

Purecura.1795:

I think Mesmers/Chronomancers are the most powerful. I mean lets face it… Altering time, space, and reality itself is extremely powerful versus summoning the dead or using Elemental magic.

They’re not actually as powerful as some people are saying. Most mesmers only affect the perception of space and time, not space and time itself, at least according to a few off-hand remarks by devs.

Oooooooooooo! So are you saying they make it seem like they are removing themselves from the time line when casting [Continuum Split]? How do you justify the boon quickness? Are you saying mesmers create the illusion of Quickness and alacrity?

The actual dev quote, if you were wondering:

Scott McGough.6897:

For both story and gameplay, actual time travel is a quagmire that has to be handled carefully.

I see the chronomancer as much more a case of manipulating the local perception of time rather than manipulating time itself. The Continuum Split skill text specifically mentions a rift in time and space continuum, but I’m like you in that I take that to mean “continuum” as a perceived possibility that the chronomancer is working with rather than an actual time jump. It visually appears to let the chronomancer rewind time, but functionally it’s a highly advanced, specialized mesmer clone that players directly control for a short duration while their real body is phased out—thus any damage, etc. happens to the Continuum Split clone (who disappears when the skill expires), and the PC resumes control of their real body unchanged from the moment they activated the skill (although they do retain any XP, etc. they garnered while in Continuum Split).

It’s funny how a fresh face can add to a discussion. These questions and that quote would have been useful two year ago.

Regardless it’s clear from the quote he intends for chill/alacrity to be like depressants/stimulants to whatever role-playing equivalent of cooldowns. And slow/quickness is merely affecting mental speed.

The debate over natural disaster vs manpower is futile without more information. But I can now agree that manpower has always beaten natural disaster. So an ele would have to do something very unnatural (thaumanova level) to defeat the undead.

Here is an npr article about how flies seemingly predict the future. Aka real life “quickness”
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=94110463
I would listen to it rather than read the transcript as the text unfortunately has some typos.

Uvirith.9573:

Pregnantman.8259:

BuddhaKeks.4857:

…prolong their life by unnatural means …

Is it possible to learn this power?

Not from a jedi

Lol’d

The problem with Bobby’s explanation (“you’re only the writer, what do you know” elements aside) is that if you’re downed while chronosplitting, you’re genuinely downed. There are potential explanations for this (maybe the shock of having the clone disrupted prematurely is what renders the mesmer into the downed state), but it does seem to point towards actual time splitting*.

Personally, I take the approach that there is a point where the illusion becomes reality – kind of like how Abaddon created Nightfallen lands by first creating a version of the zone in the Realm of Torment, then projecting it into the minds of dreamers until it eventually replaces the original terrain in fact. While this is potentially destructive, however, it’s destructive to a similar degree to a powerful elementalist that can outright ruin a region through fire, flood, storm and quake.

Time manipulation thus far seems to be limited to speeding it up, slowing it down, or relatively short jumps – at a level that is useful for combat tricks, but not really ‘rewrite history’ level. The Commando quests in GW1 might be an indication that time travel is possible, but their canonicity is questionable.

It’s also worth noting that while Alacrity is associated with Chronomancers, the effect could also potentially be seen as the mesmer helping the recipient to recover from the last time they used skill more quickly rather than actually speeding up time.

*Although, on second thoughts, Bobby’s explanation could also explain what the leftover field that can be destroyed to end a chronosplit is – that’s essentially a magical field that the chronomancer raises before shifting their consciousness into the specialised clone, which protects their real body. When that field is destroyed, the mesmer instinctively switches back to their real body… because nobody wants to be helpless on a battlefield.

my vote is with elementalist. there’s the obvious “walking nuke” aspect, but there’s also the fact that most ecosystems are pretty fragile (as far as i know anyways) and elementalists have the ability to mess with that fragility at probably the apprentice (or whichever hierarchy they use) level with varying degrees of effectiveness. the only real issue with them is that if you take things along the spectrum, you can quickly end up with a god of natural disasters, which kinda takes the fun out of things

Necro: power over life and death and undeath
Elementalist: power over elements
Mesmer: power over the mind and perceptions
Ranger: power over nature and celestial forces

Tough call. This is gonna be VERY situational…

All I know is that my warrior has an axe, and you have a face.

Very few things can’t be solved by an axe to the face.

BuddhaKeks.4857:

Don’t underestimate the other classes so quickly. Very powerful Necromancers are known to prolong their life by unnatural means and can potentially control armies of the undead.

Partly true, but partly false.

A: Necromancers feature the ones that have actually been shown to do it. However…
B: The Magic to extend ones life is NOT profession specific. A monk could live 300 years or an Ele. Anet never said it was only necromancers, just that magic is used to do so.

RyuDragnier.9476:

BuddhaKeks.4857:

Pregnantman.8259:

BuddhaKeks.4857:

…prolong their life by unnatural means …

Is it possible to learn this power?

If we ever get to Elona, you might have a chance to ask Palawa Joko. However not sure if you want to be a dried up corpse. Alternatively you could go seek out Livia, if she is still alive. She managed to stay fresh for around 200 years, probably with a little help from the Scepter of Orr.

You mean Countess Anise (if you accept the theory that Anise is Livia)?

Besides the fact that theory has no solid facts supporting it, and implies that Livia went 200 years without ever disguising herself or her power, then suddenly hiding all her power and her identity and completely using a different tree of magic for whatever reason.

Anise =/= Livia.

Kalavier.1097:

If we ever get to Elona, you might have a chance to ask Palawa Joko. However not sure if you want to be a dried up corpse. Alternatively you could go seek out Livia, if she is still alive. She managed to stay fresh for around 200 years, probably with a little help from the Scepter of Orr.

You mean Countess Anise (if you accept the theory that Anise is Livia)?[/quote]

Besides the fact that theory has no solid facts supporting it, and implies that Livia went 200 years without ever disguising herself or her power, then suddenly hiding all her power and her identity and completely using a different tree of magic for whatever reason.

Anise =/= Livia.

[/quote]I wouldn’t be so harsh on the theory.

The main reason we’ve been given for people sticking to one profession in modern times is that it takes time to master a second profession. Even taking into account the duties of a Master Exemplar, Livia has had plenty of time. It’s also pretty obvious that for the more cloak-and-dagger operations needed to run the Shining Blade in modern times that mesmerism would be very useful (as seen in the human personal story) – likely more so than necromancy. So she certainly has motivation to learn mesmerism when she can.

The delay between showing herself openly in SoS versus hiding her identity in GW2 could be explained by having mastered mesmerism to the point where she could maintain the illusion without risk of it dropping (she probably doesn’t want to reveal that she’s experimenting with mesmerism until it was time to fake her death and assume a new identity, after all). There are multiple reasons why she might want to assume a new identity – because she’s worried that people might think that the immortal necromancer is secretly the true ruler of Kryta, for instance, or that the crown’s enemies might become bolder and thus more easily rooted out if they didn’t think Livia was still around to come down on them with the Scepter of Orr.

We also have Canach discovering Anise’s ‘tender spot’, in her reaction when Canach inquired about Anise’s true age. Is she just hiding that she’s given herself a mesmeric facelift, or was her response so strong because there’s a deeper secret?

That said, it’s also possible that Livia passed on the mantle of Master Exemplar so she could pursue something different elsewhere. Or that her extended life finally ran out and she couldn’t or chose not to take the next step to lichdom. Either way, I expect that what’s actually going on with Livia will be resolved before the plot with Lazarus and the White Mantle is.