Guild Wars 2

Hi, so, i’ve finally put my hands on a good computer, which means i’ll finally be able to play the game without any fps drops, freezes or visual glitches.

That means, i’m finally ready to choose my own profession, issue is that i’m really bad at making such kind of decisions.

During the last two laggy years, i’ve levelled all classes to level 20-35, thus i do know how they feel pretty much.
The issue about that is that i liked almost all the professions, yet none stood upon others for me.
This is why i’m asking here, to people who by now have fully played the game.

Said that, my playstyle is absolutely intuitive and i require to change build really often.

Which leads me to the questions:
1) Which classes have the least “useless” utility and elite (and healing) skills? I’ve never seen a thief using a trap for example.
2) Which classes have access to multiple power, condi, support and bunker builds?
3) Which classes have access to condition removal that is either reliable or doesn’t require utility slots?
4) Which classes have decent access to mobility ?

At the moment, my go-to choices are either ranger, mesmer, elementalist and engineer… to a minor degree thief and necromancer too.

However, mesmer’s out of combat mobility is either limited or hinders build possibilities (hi centaur runes).
Ranger’s condition removal is lacking and as far as i know only one condition build exists (shortbow + axe/torch or sword/torch).
Engineer’s condition removal is lacking too (elixir C looks like a waste to me) and i’m almost forced to run at least one kit.
Elementalist looks alright, but the scepter feels clunky and the staff’s delays aren’t really welcome. Plus i’m not good at bursting enemies (hi fresh air builds!).

As for the thief, while it has sweet mobility and on-demand stealth, i feel it has a lot of unused traits and utilities, plus weapon sets feel limited along with the fact condition clear is lacking.
With the necro i really like death shroud and most of the weapons, unluckily it has no mobility, evades or dodges (or stability).

I dislike guardians and warriors thus they’re no option for me.

So, that’s it. I hope anybody will be able to clear my mind. <3

ButterOfDeath.2873:

…
However, mesmer’s out of combat mobility is either limited or hinders build possibilities (hi centaur runes).
…

I’ve got 3 mesmers (I guess you can tell they’re my fav). My main has travelers runes (a 25% boost). One of the others has a sigil of speed which gives swiftness ( a 33% boost) every time she kills. It stacks in duration so after a big fight she’s speedy for quite some time. If she’s running through a area and is out of speed I just kill any random creature or mob to get a boost. I’m probably going to get a sigil of speed for my other mesmer. I use sword/focus as one of my weapon sets on all 3 so they all have access to speed via focus 4 too.

Lazuli.2098:

ButterOfDeath.2873:

…
However, mesmer’s out of combat mobility is either limited or hinders build possibilities (hi centaur runes).
…

I’ve got 3 mesmers (I guess you can tell they’re my fav). My main has travelers runes (a 25% boost). One of the others has a sigil of speed which gives swiftness ( a 33% boost) every time she kills. It stacks in duration so after a big fight she’s speedy for quite some time. If she’s running through a area and is out of speed I just kill any random creature or mob to get a boost. I’m probably going to get a sigil of speed for my other mesmer. I use sword/focus as one of my weapon sets on all 3 so they all have access to speed via focus 4 too.

Which still limits the runes you use or your gameplay or your build.
(by that i mean i’d not run focus on a condi build, i might want to use runes that don’t provide speed boosts and in case of sigil of speed i’d need to kill mobs)

Not that big of a problem,sure, yet it’s annoying for me.

That lack of out of combat mobility is annoying for memsers, and getting runes just to keep up sucks a lot and limits creativity with the profession. Still, it has butterflies and is the most unique profession I have seen in a game so I still play it. You just put up with the no-speed-signet and slot blink to go to 1200 and remember to use it often.

From what you’re saying I do think engie might be a good choice for you. Healing turret is one of the best healing utilities ingame IMO and it as well as elixir gun both give access to condi cleansing.

And while I’m getting the impression that kits aren’t your thing (they weren’t mine for a long time too so no judging here) having at least one will let you access perma-swiftness and potentially perma-vigor, which are so so nice for mobility and/or survival.

Plus depending on how you want to play or your current mode you have a lot of options and versatility, which also sounds like something you’d like?

ButterOfDeath.2873:

Which leads me to the questions:
1) Which classes have the least “useless” utility and elite (and healing) skills? I’ve never seen a thief using a trap for example.
2) Which classes have access to multiple power, condi, support and bunker builds?
3) Which classes have access to condition removal that is either reliable or doesn’t require utility slots?
4) Which classes have decent access to mobility ?

At the moment, my go-to choices are either ranger, mesmer, elementalist and engineer… to a minor degree thief and necromancer too.

As for the thief, while it has sweet mobility and on-demand stealth, i feel it has a lot of unused traits and utilities, plus weapon sets feel limited along with the fact condition clear is lacking.

1) depends on what you are using them for, but after next patch Eles will probably have the most ‘useless’ elite.. and yeah, traps are mostly useless for thief and for PvE you rarely need to use any at all. Thief still has pretty useful elite (and healing) skills though.
3) Ele has very good condi cleanse, they don’t need utility either. thief has decent cleanse but they usually need a utility slot.
4) Thief is still the king of mobility, eles will probably get their nerfed soon because they relied mostly on FGS for it.

For thief, they might have a couple unused traits/utilities but so does every other class (some on warrior I can think of are battle roar or hidden pistol which I’ve never needed to use). Their weapon sets might be limited but most serve many purposes so you usually don’t need more than 2. they also have a single condi cleanse on their sword which is useful at times.

jackaljag.8637:

From what you’re saying I do think engie might be a good choice for you. Healing turret is one of the best healing utilities ingame IMO and it as well as elixir gun both give access to condi cleansing.

And while I’m getting the impression that kits aren’t your thing (they weren’t mine for a long time too so no judging here) having at least one will let you access perma-swiftness and potentially perma-vigor, which are so so nice for mobility and/or survival.

Plus depending on how you want to play or your current mode you have a lot of options and versatility, which also sounds like something you’d like?

I do believe the vigor on swiftness trait has been nerfed, so it’s no longer permanent.

Aside from that, i am deeply in love with kits, issue is when i’d want to try a elixir/gadget build and i’m forced to swap out a fully traited slot for a kit.
Turret combo + elixir gun’s elixir cleanse 3 conditions in total off myself, which is not that much actually and those two abilities take some time to chain.

Aside from those two abilities and the elixir C the engineer has barely any other condition clear (Aaand the cleaning formula too now that i think of it).

nagr.1593:

ButterOfDeath.2873:

Which leads me to the questions:
1) Which classes have the least “useless” utility and elite (and healing) skills? I’ve never seen a thief using a trap for example.
2) Which classes have access to multiple power, condi, support and bunker builds?
3) Which classes have access to condition removal that is either reliable or doesn’t require utility slots?
4) Which classes have decent access to mobility ?

At the moment, my go-to choices are either ranger, mesmer, elementalist and engineer… to a minor degree thief and necromancer too.

As for the thief, while it has sweet mobility and on-demand stealth, i feel it has a lot of unused traits and utilities, plus weapon sets feel limited along with the fact condition clear is lacking.

1) depends what you are using them for, but after next patch Eles will probably have the most ‘useless’ elite. and yeah, traps are mostly useless for thief and for PvE you rarely need to use them at all. Thief still has pretty good elite (and healing) skills though.
3) Ele has very good condi cleanse, they don’t need utility either. thief has decent cleanse but they usually need a utility slot.
4) Thief is still the king of mobility, eles probably get their nerfed soon because they usually relied on FGS for it.

For thief, they might have a couple unused traits/utilities but so does every other class (some on warrior is battle roar or hidden pistol which I’ve never needed to use). Their weapon sets might be limited but most serve many purposes so you don’t need anything else, they also have a single condi cleanse on their sword which is useful at times.

about point one: I’ve also never seen a warrior throwing a bola or stomping the ground, just like i’ve never seen a mesmer using mimic or illusion of life, search and rescue, conjure earth shield,etc etc.
Every class does have some clearly never used or really rarely used utilities, that’s why i was wondering which one has the least.

thief’s cleanse is reduced to one every three seconds of stealth, three conditions from shadowstep and one on shadow return when using a sword. In my opinion that’s not enough to survive against condition users.

About the ele… fgs’ mobility isn’t hindered.

Battle roar and hidden pistol are charr utilities, not warrior utilities.

Each weapon set is a complete different gameplay, thus i’d need more weapon sets for each role (under this aspect i believe the engineer is the closest with kits).

ButterOfDeath.2873:

Battle roar and hidden pistol are charr utilities, not warrior utilities.

totally forgot that xD

stomp is decent for knockback, but not used as much because fear is better for pushing back (i’ve seen a couple uses in WvW too). throw bolas is a good skill for immob which other classes don’t have as much of, I always use it if I’m doing a dungeon like Arah p1 where you need to keep immob on. they all have their uses though its mostly situational, but I guess in this case it was a bad example to use (thief does have some useless utilites).

For the FGS nerf, I heard from someone that they are having fiery rush require a target now. If this is true, then it might be harder to use it for mobility also.

Right, didn’t want to start a new thread, so I’ll just post here since I’ve got the same sort of question.

I’m looking for a class that is tough to kill (ie high damage reduction, high health regen, maybe evasion), has decent mobility options and preferably ranged. I was looking at rangers, but they seem to be melee for the most part. I prefer outlasting my opponents to bursting them down (kill them through attrition).

Any recommendations would be most welcome.

Moryg.2481:

Right, didn’t want to start a new thread, so I’ll just post here since I’ve got the same sort of question.

I’m looking for a class that is tough to kill (ie high damage reduction or health regen), has decent mobility options and preferably ranged. I was looking at rangers, but they seem to be melee for the most part. I prefer outlasting my opponents to bursting them down.

Any recommendations would be most welcome.

Elementalist, necromancers and engineer all have nice bunker builds (aka: survive while slowly killing your opponents).

One year and half ago, back when i was a complete newbie, i tried a tanky mesmer build and it worked too.

But yeah, i believe every class can play by outlasting opponents (even thieves, yup).

What i’d do is to try all characters in the mists: at first try all abilities on training golems then go bottom-right of the map and try to kill svanir.

If that doesn’t work…welcome aboard!

I roll an illusion/clone heavy greatsword mesmer in ‘Zerker armor with superior runes of Mercy.
I carry my race-specific elite of the hounds of Balthazar, Mirror images, as well as burst condition removal with Null field, and Feedback for a little protection.
In PvE I’m holy crap awesome. In WvW, I can take CP’s myself, and camps with little to no backup as long as I have my elite available, but can’t do much by myself against other players. especially when I’m outnumbered. I die quickly in a zerg, but cause holy hell while I’m up.

I don’t reccommend this if you’re not comfortable with the class, or dislike long walks past stonemist to rejoin your group.

My alt is a pistol/dagger thief in Valkyrie armor with superior runes of the pack. I survive a little more and with Shadow refuge and the traits picked, if I’m outmatched, I can always stealth and run.
I use Skale venom, Shadow refuge, signet of shadows, and thieves guild. Again CP’s and camps no problem. People tend to wear my initiave down after a couple minutes, and I have the bad luck of usually running into caster with ground target skills when I refuge to run. But overall, I do tend to be a lot more annoying and survivable than my mes.

Good point on the vigor, it’s a trait line I barely use so I forgot about the nerf. Still, 5 seconds every 10 secs is still relatively decent for situations where you need it a lot (I’m thinking Mai Trin fractal for example, where that combined with the turret heals & blasts can keep you sustained through the barrage phase even if you mess up a dodge).

Re condi cleansing, I definitely agree it’s one of the profession’s weak point, but for PvE at least turret honestly is enough 90% of the time (and EG will help out the remaining 10, either from the skill itself or the light field it creates combo’d with projectiles) in my experience, whether for mapping, world boss, dungeons or fractals. More of a problem for PvP or WvW, I’ll give you that, I’ve swore enough at annoying condimancers murdering me on home point to do anything but.

And yeah I see what you mean for elixir/gadgets. Sadly I think that’s one of the balancing problems from the fact the profession has been made with kits in mind and so the other stuff is pretty mediocre on their own despite having some cool stuff going on. Handy situationally (rocket boots is super fun and that delishus throw elixir U when the party guardian is slacking or afk and you don’t want to eat boss projectiles <3), but iffy when built entirely around them.

I still feel that despite those problems engie’s the more fun and versatile of classes to play, after getting one of each to 80, but that’s obviously subjective. Hope you find something that works for you!

Ok so i’ve been trying all the classes in the mists against svanir and i’d say the choice is now between thief and engineer.

That’s an improvement! xþ