Guild Wars 2

So, I’m really not good at this game. Which profession would you recommend for someone who sucks at things?

Guardian and Warrior are a good start. Just keep at it and try to push yourself and try to examine yourself and your encounters and I’m sure you’ll improve. Best of luck.

Not sure how you can be terrible.

You see an enemy winding up to attack, dodge it. If the wind-up didn’t have enough emphasis on it to be noticeable to dodge, it was likely a lesser attack that didn’t need to be dodged.

What problem do you have? Why do you say you are terrible? Treating the illness (getting good) is better than throwing medication at the symptom (give me a class that no one can mess up).

Guardian or ranger. Guardian because they are very tanky. Ranger because you can let your pet hold agro while you stand off at range and shoot it.

Warrior, huge health pool lets you make a lot of mistakes and put more into damage dealing.

Warrior. Thats it. Do not let any other profession enter ur brain. Warrior.

why, the most forgiving class and the most in demand. Evenn a bad warrior can do ok.. being bad at any other prof will be painful. Then the ele and thief just requires too much skill to be average with. Mesmer and engineer have their own probs too.

Dont get me wrong, a warrior can be even better with skilled operator, but a bad warrior is still ok. Oh and dont even think about the underdog classes of necro or ranger… thats just asking for bad news. Unfortunately this is the way the community attitudes and game has developed.

longshot.1397:

Warrior. Thats it. Do not let any other profession enter ur brain. Warrior.

why, the most forgiving class and the most in demand. Evenn a bad warrior can do ok.. being bad at any other prof will be painful. Then the ele and thief just requires too much skill to be average with. Mesmer and engineer have their own probs too.

Dont get me wrong, a warrior can be even better with skilled operator, but a bad warrior is still ok. Oh and dont even think about the underdog classes of necro or ranger… thats just asking for bad news. Unfortunately this is the way the community attitudes and game has developed.

Unfortunately it is. However it is also the class that in my opinion feels least rewarding when achieving dungeon runs, pvp or whatever.

I could go with the flow and say, roll warrior. It is not as fun to play which some other classes can provide you with, but it is easy. For a more rewarding gameplay and a steep learning curve for improvement, roll an engineer or mesmer.

The hardest class to play for a newbie would be elementalist so stay away from them until you’re more comfortable with the game mechanics.

The advantage of the Warrior and the Guardian is their durability. Heavier armor. The Warrior will have more health, and the Guardian will have more healing/protection. Both are advantageous if you are having troubles with dying too often. Add some regeneration when it becomes available to you, and beef up your Healing Power to further “tankify” yourself.

Both are primarily melee, which also forces you to actively pursue your target. This will force you to learn how to DODGE. But when the particle effects start getting out of control, you can have a difficult time seeing both your target AND your own toon. In this case, both Professions offer RANGED options. Not particularly powerful, but easier for you to operate.

I would suggest RIFLE as being easiest for a Warrior, since it doesn’t have all the AoE placement required of the bow. And STAFF or SCEPTER are easy to use for the Guardian. (The staff #1 skill is a cone of damage in front of you that doesn’t even require selecting a target… GREAT for Daily Ambient killing! Just be ready to fight everything in the area, because that cone of damage is wide).

So for easy-of-play (meaning staying ALIVE and little skill required on your end), I would suggest a Warrior or Guardian using ranged weaponry. You won’t take the world by storm, but you’ll be able to stay on your feet and learn the aspects of the game at a more leisurely pace.

EDIT – Race can also make a difference. Charr and Norn have difficulty with some jumping puzzles due to their size. So if JP’s are part of your game, stick with Human and smaller. And if you do any PvP (including WvW), a giant character is also a more obvious target.

I’d like to add an extra vote to Warrior and a downvote to Guardian for teamplay:

Warrior has a high HP-pool, High Armor, on top of that Healing Signet provides quite good healing which you’ll never have to look at. How-ever, most importantly the team won’t rely on you using certain skills (such as reflects or condition removal like the Guardian) at a certain time.

In groupplay people often count on the Guardian to do certain things that change per fight, such as Condition Removal, Aegis, Blinds, Reflects, Stability. It’s not a class I’d recommend when you’re unfamiliar with the fights and mechanics that occur in teamplay because people will count on you to keep them alive to a certain extend.

For soloplay / Openworld-PvE you can’t easily go wrong. Ranger (due to having a pet that can take the heat of you) Necromancer (high base-HP along with Death Shroud providing an additional healthbar) Warrior (see reasons I mentioned in teamplay) and Guardian (heavy armor, quite a few weapons have blinds and aegis is automaticly applied to yourself) will provide easier than Engineer, Thief, Mesmer and Elementalist.

warrior is waaay easier to play than guardian, provided the player is bad enough. I am guessing most ppl choose rangers too because they think its an easy class, their pets will tank everything and they don’t need to do much work. thats why you see so many baddies choosing warrior/ranger as their 1st class.

OP if you are trolling nice one if not just keep at it and practice and play a class that you have fun on at the end of the day GW2 is a game and you should have fun! Also use the PvP training area to test out the class. You will be leveled to 80 and will have access to all skills, traits and weapons.

Good starting class,
Ranger for PvE you can sit back and Pew Pew Pew from a safe 1200 and the pets will tank for you.
For WvW start with a tank Hammer warrior if you want to run with the zerg.

In WvW, pick the dude/dudette who can go invisible (and often). That’s the ultimate crutch. True, a Guardian is tanky, but you’d still be a sitting duck that takes 2 or 3 more hits.

Astral Projections.7320:

Guardian or ranger. Guardian because they are very tanky. Ranger because you can let your pet hold agro while you stand off at range and shoot it.

Watch out for advice like this. Play like this guy, and you’ll be terrible forever. Just how bad are you and how new?

My advice? Play an Ele and gear him/her for the highest DMG output your level can afford. Why? Because you won’t get to lean on Aegis. You won’t get to lean on Healing Signet and a high health pool. You’ll learn to dodge, you’ll learn to use your mobility. You’ll learn to mitigate damage. Do this, and you’ll be a much better player for it.

Then if you do play a Guardian, you won’t be the one who wastes all of his Aegis on himself because he can’t stay alive. You wont be the Warrior ranging any remotely difficult boss because you didn’t learn how to dodge but just ‘face-tanked’ easy mobs. You wont be the Ranger QQing because no group will take him in full PVT/Bearbow.

Let me tell you a little bit about why I suck.

When I first started this game, I made an engineer. Played it up to about 30, I died, a lot. I didn’t understand why there were so many kits that did different things, or how long you were supposed to stay in each kit. So I got rid of all my kits and did all elixirs. That didn’t go very much better at all. Things would get to me quick, and my elixirs would either be on cool down or I’d have to use them all to try to stay alive, meanwhile my 2 pistols were good for gluing someone down or blasting them in the face with fire, but that didn’t do very much damage at all. Hell, you would think if you got shot in the face with fire, you’d pretty much be dead.

So then, I made a Necromancer, got it up to about 25, and realized that putting down wells and kiting someone over them while your pets do all the damage is about as boring as things can get. I didn’t die much, but it just wasn’t super exciting.

So I deleted them both and made a Guardian. I read about everyone saying they’re super defensive and you should never die. Well I died. A lot. I guess I’m just not sure how to maneuver correctly in melee. Because as soon as something punches me, I crumple like wet toilet paper.

Now I’m on a Mesmer, but there’s not much damage and it’s hard for me to stay alive at all. I also have a level 15 Elementalist, but it’s the same problem. I can’t figure out which attunements to use when, and so things just end up running up to me and punching me in the teets.

This is certainly not a troll post, if you played with me for 5minutes, you’d see something you’ve never seen in your life. Someone who sucks at video games apparently. I used to be a pretty decent Resto Druid in WoW, so that either tells you how easy that class/game is, or how different this one is in comparison.

Hmmm you might try engineer again, but keep it simple. I used rifle and turrets on mine and I thought the engineer was weak. Then I discovered bombs and grenades. My engie went from weak to very strong. I use rifle on approach to single targets and grenades on multiple targets. At melee range I switch to bombs. My engie kills easily and dies infrequently.

Hi there, fellow ex-WoWer Like you, I really struggled with this game after the more static combat of WoW. But, I’ve only being playing for a couple of months & have reached 80 with my guardian, and if I can do it, anyone can. (I’m not joking, I’m waaay past the age when I should have stopped playing games ).

Dying in WoW these days is a rare thing, outside of raids. I too died a lot when I started my guardian – and you know what? it doesn’t matter. You go back, & this time you remember to use your virtues, signets etc, maybe change your weapon, and try again.

Or go back & practise some more on lvl 2 wasps – you will still get xp. I’m having a blast in this game, even though I’ve only a vague idea of how some things work; don’t be intimidated by all the ‘pro’ players who have been playing since launch & were probably more skilled to start with.

I can’t help much with the technical side of stats, build etc, but if you’re on EU & need a similarly sucky friend, feel free to add me

I remembered dying quite a lot as Guardian. But it’s probably also the only class that made me think I can probably handle 10 guys at the same time LOL

The thing about Guardian is to bring all the weapon types that you can wield and then use them well and consider using different weapons for different situations.

Also, the use of your utilities. Maybe it’s tempting to use only the power and toughness signets plus Retreat! But maybe you struggle a bit more with the dredges because they can’t be blinded so consider either using a more tanky weapon like the mace/shield & mace/focus and/or using the Wall of Reflection, Shield of the Avenger, Sword…

Kaniro.7809:

Let me tell you a little bit about why I suck.

When I first started this game, I made an engineer. Played it up to about 30, I died, a lot. I didn’t understand why there were so many kits that did different things, or how long you were supposed to stay in each kit. So I got rid of all my kits and did all elixirs. That didn’t go very much better at all. Things would get to me quick, and my elixirs would either be on cool down or I’d have to use them all to try to stay alive, meanwhile my 2 pistols were good for gluing someone down or blasting them in the face with fire, but that didn’t do very much damage at all. Hell, you would think if you got shot in the face with fire, you’d pretty much be dead.

So then, I made a Necromancer, got it up to about 25, and realized that putting down wells and kiting someone over them while your pets do all the damage is about as boring as things can get. I didn’t die much, but it just wasn’t super exciting.

So I deleted them both and made a Guardian. I read about everyone saying they’re super defensive and you should never die. Well I died. A lot. I guess I’m just not sure how to maneuver correctly in melee. Because as soon as something punches me, I crumple like wet toilet paper.

Now I’m on a Mesmer, but there’s not much damage and it’s hard for me to stay alive at all. I also have a level 15 Elementalist, but it’s the same problem. I can’t figure out which attunements to use when, and so things just end up running up to me and punching me in the teets.

This is certainly not a troll post, if you played with me for 5minutes, you’d see something you’ve never seen in your life. Someone who sucks at video games apparently. I used to be a pretty decent Resto Druid in WoW, so that either tells you how easy that class/game is, or how different this one is in comparison.

Hi! Good post. It tells us a lot. I believe you should try a warrior, for a number of reasons. The high health pool and heavy armor being #1. Second, you have the largest range of weapons, giving you the option to melee or stay at range, or mix it up. When I leveled up my warrior I used a great (and popular) mix of axe/mace and rifle. Make sure your armor is as up to date as possible, and go with something like Valkyrie stats, or Knight, or mix a couple pieces of Berserker in there so you have some power. Warriors should kill fast. Armor and weapon type matter. If you’re trying to fight at level 30 in your level 8 gear, you will die a lot.

After playing for some time, you should start to learn the tells of the big attacks from mobs/bosses. Work on your dodging skills. It takes time. It’s worth it. Read the warrior forums. There’s a lot of good info there; even some posts about good weapon rotations and such, as well as builds and general advice.

Again, look at your armor and weapons. Are your sigils and runes appropriate to your level and do they synergize with your weapons and traits? Have you looked at your traits to make sure they synergize with the weapons you’re using? All these things add up and make a difference, even in PvE.

Good luck! I hope you find the game fun overall.

Kaniro.7809:

Let me tell you a little bit about why I suck.

When I first started this game, I made an engineer. Played it up to about 30, I died, a lot. I didn’t understand why there were so many kits that did different things, or how long you were supposed to stay in each kit. So I got rid of all my kits and did all elixirs. That didn’t go very much better at all. Things would get to me quick, and my elixirs would either be on cool down or I’d have to use them all to try to stay alive, meanwhile my 2 pistols were good for gluing someone down or blasting them in the face with fire, but that didn’t do very much damage at all. Hell, you would think if you got shot in the face with fire, you’d pretty much be dead.

So then, I made a Necromancer, got it up to about 25, and realized that putting down wells and kiting someone over them while your pets do all the damage is about as boring as things can get. I didn’t die much, but it just wasn’t super exciting.

So I deleted them both and made a Guardian. I read about everyone saying they’re super defensive and you should never die. Well I died. A lot. I guess I’m just not sure how to maneuver correctly in melee. Because as soon as something punches me, I crumple like wet toilet paper.

Now I’m on a Mesmer, but there’s not much damage and it’s hard for me to stay alive at all. I also have a level 15 Elementalist, but it’s the same problem. I can’t figure out which attunements to use when, and so things just end up running up to me and punching me in the teets.

This is certainly not a troll post, if you played with me for 5minutes, you’d see something you’ve never seen in your life. Someone who sucks at video games apparently. I used to be a pretty decent Resto Druid in WoW, so that either tells you how easy that class/game is, or how different this one is in comparison.

Also, be sure you’re actually applying your trait points in your Hero Panel. You could be missing out on lots of extra key stats that are meant to bridge the gap as you reach the mid-game of the leveling process.

I concur with the player who suggested Warrior. Guardians are easier to play for people who understand the game, its skills, and its animations. Guardians take good timing with blocks and/or knowledge of which boons and skills to use in combination. Would you believe Guardian actually has one of the lowest base health values of any class? It makes up for this with its high usage of boons.

Warrior you’ll be smacking stuff around in whatever way you wish, while still having both high armor and high health. As for melee, NEVER stand still. Seriously, ever. Train your fingers to strafe around every single mob you fight. You’d be surprised how many animations you can just sidestep or weave between combat ranges, instead of having to waste endurance on a dodge.

The fact you actually played several classes already will help you immensely in leveling your Warrior quickly, because now you have a small idea of how the game plays and where things are located in the world. I’m sure you’ll do just fine!

Good luck!

Malchior

Malchior made a very good point about moving. Have you ever tried running in circles around a bad guy as you’re hitting him with your weapon? They usually can’t even do their “big” attack when you do that. Literally run circles around the mobs, whether melee or at range. Are you using your mouse to move, or your keyboard? Don’t forget that you can also reset key bindings to make things easier. My son has never mastered the mouse/keyboard thing. He is still using his mouse to click on weapon and slot skills. You need to train yourself to move efficiently and effectively.

Saint.5647:

Astral Projections.7320:

Guardian or ranger. Guardian because they are very tanky. Ranger because you can let your pet hold agro while you stand off at range and shoot it.

Watch out for advice like this. Play like this guy, and you’ll be terrible forever. Just how bad are you and how new?

My advice? Play an Ele and gear him/her for the highest DMG output your level can afford. Why? Because you won’t get to lean on Aegis. You won’t get to lean on Healing Signet and a high health pool. You’ll learn to dodge, you’ll learn to use your mobility. You’ll learn to mitigate damage. Do this, and you’ll be a much better player for it.

Then if you do play a Guardian, you won’t be the one who wastes all of his Aegis on himself because he can’t stay alive. You wont be the Warrior ranging any remotely difficult boss because you didn’t learn how to dodge but just ‘face-tanked’ easy mobs. You wont be the Ranger QQing because no group will take him in full PVT/Bearbow.

this is exactly what i was gonna say then i read down a few…this all the way. the quote is the perfect advice for what never to do in GW2…ever.

ozmaniandevil.6805:

Malchior made a very good point about moving. Have you ever tried running in circles around a bad guy as you’re hitting him with your weapon? They usually can’t even do their “big” attack when you do that. Literally run circles around the mobs, whether melee or at range. Are you using your mouse to move, or your keyboard? Don’t forget that you can also reset key bindings to make things easier. My son has never mastered the mouse/keyboard thing. He is still using his mouse to click on weapon and slot skills. You need to train yourself to move efficiently and effectively.

this too. your keyboard setup is uber important at a high skill level. i don’t think i have a single friend that uses the default setup. it is garbage. if you’d like an extremely efficient layout for keyboard use get ahold of me ingame or in pm here on the forums. changing up your key binds can instantly launch you months ahead in efficiency just by making the controls easier.

Tman.6349:

Saint.5647:

Astral Projections.7320:

Guardian or ranger. Guardian because they are very tanky. Ranger because you can let your pet hold agro while you stand off at range and shoot it.

Watch out for advice like this. Play like this guy, and you’ll be terrible forever. Just how bad are you and how new?

My advice? Play an Ele and gear him/her for the highest DMG output your level can afford. Why? Because you won’t get to lean on Aegis. You won’t get to lean on Healing Signet and a high health pool. You’ll learn to dodge, you’ll learn to use your mobility. You’ll learn to mitigate damage. Do this, and you’ll be a much better player for it.

Then if you do play a Guardian, you won’t be the one who wastes all of his Aegis on himself because he can’t stay alive. You wont be the Warrior ranging any remotely difficult boss because you didn’t learn how to dodge but just ‘face-tanked’ easy mobs. You wont be the Ranger QQing because no group will take him in full PVT/Bearbow.

this is exactly what i was gonna say then i read down a few…this all the way. the quote is the perfect advice for what never to do in GW2…ever.

Shrug. Not everyone does dungeons. There are many who only solo or at most with one or two friends. Some people have laggy connections. Others have physical disabilities which make fast, twitch play difficult. Others may find ‘right on time’ skills too difficult for them to manage. Many others are just casual players who only like to explore or just run around doing nothing in particular. For these people a ranger shooting at a distance while the pet holds agro fit their style of play.

For example, a person I sometimes plays with is a classic bearbow ranger. She never does dungeons and probably never will except rarely with a group of friends. The bearbow ranger is her best choice because not only is she extremly casual but also because she is in fairly severe, chronic pain and has trouble concentrating on the game.

Not everyone is the same. Not everyone is going to improve or they will only improve slowly. Yet they still want to play. For these people, a easy mode way of playing is the best.

Astral Projections.7320:

Read the post right above me!

This, a 100x this. If someone asks for an easy class for any reason, you don’t recommend the more difficult classes because it will make him a better player. People should challange themselves, yes, but not way outside of their comfort-zone, baby-steps are just fine and more enjoyable for a majority of people. I like how you used the example of a chronic pain-patient, I’m also a chronic pain patient, I chose not to play as casual, but when I pug some daily dungeons, it’s nice to play Warrior, Guardian or Mesmer once in a while if the painlevels are bad instead of my fav; Elementalist.

The times I’ve seen people give up on games since they tried to learn the mechanics of the game on a class that was visually/style-wise appealing to them but too difficult to do anything, it’s countless, neither is it nice for the teams they join, a Warrior struggling with survivability will be more useful than say an Elementalist with the same difficulties. Rolling X-class now, doesn’t mean you’ll never try another class when you get more experienced with the game.

I’ve thought about maybe picking up a Ranger, but I don’t want to add to the negative stereotypes about them bring terrible. There’s too many people trying to set that back in the right for me to tear it down gain. Also, why is condition damage terrible? That stat never seems to work for me. Also why so my traits keep resetting?

Trust me there are baddies in almost every class that add to these ‘negative stereotypes’. Only reason people hate terrible rangers more than other classes is because their pets always draw agro and get them wiped.. and for some reason they like to range everything and won’t stack when u tell them to. People hate noobish 5-signet warriors too, only they aren’t as big a liability except for dying too often. I would also suggest you try warrior and see if you like it. You have lots of room for error on warrior, you can screw up big time and you still won’t down that easy. The reason I wouldn’t suggest guardian is its more of a group support class. if you are a terrible player, you won’t know how to balance dps and support and you will make for a terrible guardian.

It seems the worst choice for you is Ele. Trust me when I say this, when I tried ele for the 1st time I used to down/die on almost every mob. It is a very difficult class to understand and if you aren’t skilled enough or don’t use the right skills at the right time, you are in for a world of hurt. Definitely not for the weak of heart, while its true they deal some of the best DPS.. a skilled ele is rare.

I think your top 3 choices are Ranger, Guardian, and Warrior because of their downed skills. These allow you to recover out of downed state more easily.

It sounds to me like a big part of your problem is having trouble keeping away from targets, especially for big hits.

That reminds me an awful lot of my girlfriend and the way she plays. She plays an ele because she loves being able to nuke things with massive fire AoE, it was always her favorite thing in GW1. So now, in GW2 she stands there in one place and tries to blast everything to hell and back.

That simply doesn’t work in this game (and I haven’t been able to get that concept through to her unfortunately). You must be mobile. Even if you play a Guardian or Warrior with full tanky bunker build, you still have to be mobile. So if I am understanding you right, then you either need to play something that can handle being played with a lack of mobility, or you need to play something that will get you a lot of practice at mobility so you can learn it quickly.

Personally, I recommend the latter. Play something a bit squishy, with ranged attacks, preferably not full max range, and learn to stay on the move. And if you go that route, then you have quite a few options to choose from, I’ll talk about just three. First, you could take a short bow ranger, but use a passive pet (doesn’t matter what pet, just set them on passive mode and leave them there), don’t worry about learning pet management just now. Second, you could go with an ele, and don’t worry about trying to learn attunement mechanics yet, just focus on learning mobility, and then you can either learn attunement mechanics or change to another class that you like better. For that you could take scepter/dagger and stick primarily to earth attunement, and don’t change attunements much until you get better at your mobility. Third, you could go with a necro, maybe axe/warhorn, not a minion master, not a well spammer, and not a vamp. Maybe for necro take spectrals or signets for slot skills.

Again, the idea would be to improve your mobility. If you went with this suggestion, you wouldn’t be trying to make a maximized build by any means. The goal would be to make a fairly weak character, and then manage to stay alive through mobility even though you won’t have much killing power. Learn to stay on the move, learn to dodge, learn to time your dodges well, and learn to pay attention to the environment (where you move to, and the way you move can matter). And remember that you move fastest when moving forward, slower when strafing to the sides, and slowest when backpedaling. While you;re in combat (unless you’re using the combat mode mod), you should have your right mouse button firmly held down pretty much all the time. Rely on movement keys for direction and positioning, and rely on right-click for rotations and angles.

I also recommend looking up some videos on the net about GW2 kiting methods. There are quite a few, such as this one for example (I hate the camera angles he uses for circle kiting, they make me dizzy, but the principles are good, and reasonably well demonstrated).

If you can get to the point where you comfortably avoid damage from normal monsters, then try go solo against a veteran and survive that (you don’t need to kill them, just survive a good long while). You can practice against a couple of veterans in Heart of the Mists.

If you really just want to play and not worry about it as much, then go with the tanky character option (warrior, like most others have suggested). But keep in mind that you will still need to learn to dodge at the very least, and ideally to stay on the move.

Warrior, is the most simple and straight forward profession with lots of room for mistakes.

Engineer, forget rifle pistol and shield and use flamer for short range, nades for long. If you need to run away, bombs.

It is the only really unique and interesting class to play IMO.

Esmee.1067:

This, a 100x this. If someone asks for an easy class for any reason, you don’t recommend the more difficult classes because it will make him a better player. [/quote]

I agree, I came to this game with six friends just a couple months after it started, three of them have quit because of the difficulty of regular PvE. I am the only one of the group who has done more than 2-3 dungeons or fractals, and even I rarely do them because of the difficulty. I still keep pushing my limits (one friend just commented the other day how much better I move and shoot than when I started), but I can still tell my skills are at best average for a PUG in a dungeon.

Some people have much slower learning curves on a fast-twitch game like this, and playing a more forgiving class is a good way to learn the skills to survive on a harder class. And contrary to what you often read on these forums, the average person, at least based on the ones I know, falls into the “slower learning curve” category. I think the people who can practice something like kiting for 20 minutes and get the hang of it, or watch animations and memorize them in a couple of minutes tend to hang out with other players who can do that, so they don’t realize how unusual that ability is.

Kaniro.7809:

I’ve thought about maybe picking up a Ranger, but I don’t want to add to the negative stereotypes about them bring terrible. There’s too many people trying to set that back in the right for me to tear it down gain. Also, why is condition damage terrible? That stat never seems to work for me. Also why so my traits keep resetting?

Your traits will reset every time you get the next level up. There are 3 levels of “books” you get for traits. This gives you an opportunity to reset them. Once you’ve unlocked all 3 levels and set your traits, it will cost silver to “retrain” them. This is often done when switching between PvE and WvW, since most people will want two distinct builds for those two areas (for instance, a Berserker build for PvE and a Soldier/Knights build for WvW). People may also reset their traits for specific dungeons.

OP, you want something that isn’t boring yet has decent survivability.

Would recommend Thief, or Warrior.
Either will be fun, and effective too without too much of a stretch.

Just don’t try to facetank anything, that’s why you had trouble as Guardian.
Would strongly suggest, as you level, not wearing any armour (or just equip as you find). Do try to keep your weapons close to your level tho.

If you want a ranger, just make a warrior instead. If you really want a pet, make a sylvari warrior, then buy the elite skill that lets you have a sylvari hound (dog). You can buy it at level 30 for 10 skill points. The dog stays with you for 60 seconds and the skill has a 180 second cooldown.

Like many here said, warrior is very easy to play. You mash buttons and you win. I’m level 45 and I’ve been playing in areas that are 15 levels above mine since level 12 or so, and I do fine. My personal story now is level 53 even though I’m level 45. With the other professions I struggled even though I was above the recommended level. I did the scarlet knights/holograms and I was level 24. I didn’t die, but on the other professions (who were level 20 something) I kept dying.

Warrior is a lot more fun than I thought. You have a lot of fun weapons and can make all sorts of fun builds. The sylvari skills are good too, so I really recommend it.

Make sure to upgrade your armor and weapons every 5 levels. I buy green gear when I’m level x5 (35, 45, etc), and yellow gear when I’m x0 (40, 50, etc).

You have a mesmer already? If you want to keep it, consider this:

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/mesmer/Guide-Kai-s-Complete-PvE-Compendium/first#post2848334

It’s what kept me playing mesmer, and now it’s my main profession. And I have been known to be quite a terrible player for various reasons until I got a hold of this guide. At least put your mesmer on hold for later. It’s a seriously fun thing to play.

Ranger is also great fun PvE, but you do have to learn your melee stuff if you want to go beyond that. If it appeals to you, make one. Try all the weapons out and go with what you like. Same with the pets (with which you are technically playing Pokémon). Don’t worry about the hate rangers get, because in PvE, it doesn’t matter. It only matters if you intend to go into dungeons, WvW or PvP. And from the sounds of it, that isn’t on the cards yet. Bear in mind there is a learning curve if you want to move beyond the basics, but you should start with those first - e.g. watch your longbow 4 if you’re playing with melee types.

What it comes down to, however, is having fun. If you’re on an EU server, look me up and I’ll run some PvE maps with you. Just simple PvE, nothing else, no stress or expectations. I wouldn’t claim to be an expert, but I may have some handy tips that’ll help you live and have fun, whatever profession you want to roll.

lorazcyk.8927:

If you want a ranger, just make a warrior instead. If you really want a pet, make a sylvari warrior, then buy the elite skill that lets you have a sylvari hound (dog). You can buy it at level 30 for 10 skill points. The dog stays with you for 60 seconds and the skill has a 180 second cooldown.

Like many here said, warrior is very easy to play. You mash buttons and you win. I’m level 45 and I’ve been playing in areas that are 15 levels above mine since level 12 or so, and I do fine. My personal story now is level 53 even though I’m level 45. With the other professions I struggled even though I was above the recommended level. I did the scarlet knights/holograms and I was level 24. I didn’t die, but on the other professions (who were level 20 something) I kept dying.

Warrior is a lot more fun than I thought. You have a lot of fun weapons and can make all sorts of fun builds. The sylvari skills are good too, so I really recommend it.

Make sure to upgrade your armor and weapons every 5 levels. I buy green gear when I’m level x5 (35, 45, etc), and yellow gear when I’m x0 (40, 50, etc).

I’m a proponent of min-maxing and build optimization, but slightly on the topic of race-specific characters and classes….

I recently remade my Warrior as Asuran to play how I want, and playing how I want meant comboing off of RADIATION FIELD!

Yes, racial skills are usually pretty poor so that individual races aren’t gimmick-y, but otherwise, this is the only access a warrior has to a poison field, and what can you do with a poison field? Well, you can totally abuse the amount of Blast and Leap finishers a warrior has to stack Weakness on foes, AoE (blast) or single-target (leap).

eg/ AoE stacking:
Radiation Field (15s of weakness reapplying in increments of 3 seconds every 3 seconds) -> Summon banner of Strength or Discipline (blast 5 seconds) -> Warhorn 5 (applies 6 second weakness + blast 5 seconds) -> Banner 5 (blast 5 more seconds). You have 15 seconds of a combo field to stack as much (or as little as you need) weakness as you can, ultimately generating an easy 35 seconds AoE (plus +30% condition duration from 30 Strength); this is most viable on trash mobs because bosses are Defiant, in which case you should Leap…

eg/ Single-target stacking
Radiation Field -> Eviscerate (leap 8 seconds) -> Shield 4 (I need a reason to use Tormented Shield! Leap 8 seconds) -> Eviscerate (off-cooldown, leap 8 seconds), as well as still being able to utilize Banner cast and Banner 5; with a boss’ 50% condition duration reduction, it amounts to ~27s weakness.

Ultimately, weakness isn’t incredibly impactful (50% chance for an enemy to do 50% less damage, ~25% damage reduction on paper) but I find ot entertaining, and sometimes, somewhat helpful when I feel like adding a layer of light defensive support to dungeon PUGs that are having a really hard time (they really do trash up the place sometimes…).

But since I don’t think OP is a min-maxer by any stretch, he may find this suits his pallette.

lorazcyk.8927:

If you want a ranger, just make a warrior instead. If you really want a pet, make a sylvari warrior, then buy the elite skill that lets you have a sylvari hound (dog). You can buy it at level 30 for 10 skill points. The dog stays with you for 60 seconds and the skill has a 180 second cooldown.

Like many here said, warrior is very easy to play. You mash buttons and you win. I’m level 45 and I’ve been playing in areas that are 15 levels above mine since level 12 or so, and I do fine. My personal story now is level 53 even though I’m level 45. With the other professions I struggled even though I was above the recommended level. I did the scarlet knights/holograms and I was level 24. I didn’t die, but on the other professions (who were level 20 something) I kept dying.

Warrior is a lot more fun than I thought. You have a lot of fun weapons and can make all sorts of fun builds. The sylvari skills are good too, so I really recommend it.

Make sure to upgrade your armor and weapons every 5 levels. I buy green gear when I’m level x5 (35, 45, etc), and yellow gear when I’m x0 (40, 50, etc).

I call nonsense on this one, since you can’t even damage mobs that are more than 9 levels higher than you, no, doing one-digit damage doesn’t count.
Neither does going lucky or outright leeching during world events.
Exaggerating stuff to get a point across is fine, but don’t make up stuff out of thin air.

OP, if you are really as bad as you say and don’t want or think you are unable to learn and progress, Ranger and Warrior are indeed the easiest for PvE, though, for aforementioned reasons.
But in that case, party play will be a toughie, because you will be a drag to your teammates. So trying to get better should be the goal if you actually want to play with other people.
Reading up class and game mechanics on the Wiki can be helpful, too, to find out how condition damage works/stacks, how armor and boons migitate damage, and so on.
Typing /wiki [search term] into your chatbox ingame will instantly open the Wiki and search for the term / show you the corresponding page. It doesn’t get much more convenient than that.

Good luck.

4 way to make your life easy

1. run a necromancer minion master (while managing minions effectively and playing the build to its best is harder then letting them roam freely and auto attacking basic minion mastery like most pet zoo is simple to play and got one of the best sustain in the game (easily around 700 hp+ per second—- 250 from regen 96 per minion with about a maximum of 6 to 9 minion on the field so 96 x ‘’9 or 6’’ + 250 per second). Running a minion master in spvp with a good level of skill however can make you somewhat fearsome (hance the reason so many bad players cry against it while in pve the damage is not enought to make a fuss about).

2. run a warrior with Healing signet in a tankish build

3. run a guardian

4. Run svanir runes so that 1 hit KO moves you fail to dodge dont instantly kill you and you can evade death about once per minute. (svanir also is a wonderfull way to troll in spvp when running MM)

5. Do both run a simple build and svanir runes.

Drake Phoenix.6158:

It sounds to me like a big part of your problem is having trouble keeping away from targets, especially for big hits.

That reminds me an awful lot of my girlfriend and the way she plays. She plays an ele because she loves being able to nuke things with massive fire AoE, it was always her favorite thing in GW1. So now, in GW2 she stands there in one place and tries to blast everything to hell and back.

Your girlfriend and my husband must have been separated at birth! He does that all the time – stands there with an ele or mesmer and gets beat on. Oh well, good for me, when it’s daily reviver!

To the OP, mobility / dodging is important. I find a thief is pretty good, with evades from different weapons, stealth, etc. Note that I’m in no way a good thief but I survive most stuff despite being visually impaired. It really helps that when something is tough, just evade / dodge / stealth, etc.

Kim.4152:

Oh well, good for me, when it’s daily reviver!

LOL, no joke there, I’ve done that more than a few times

I think it’s not about the proffesion but more of the playstyle. In WoW you just sit tight in one spot and you kill mobs by outdpsing them, maybe throw a heal or two once and a while.
In GW2 the playstyle is more dynamic, PvE is more close to PvP than in WoW, meaning you need to constantly be moving, dodging, CCing, kiting, etc. You can’t just sit there and hope to outdps a mob unless you are 20+ levels higher and have pretty decent gear and build, and even then you will encounter mobs that can almost get you do to map level scaling down.
If you played a druid, hunter or warrior in PvP in WoW then it would be easier for you to get into the mechanics of GW2. Warrior’s stance-dance and druid’s shapeshift spam helps alot to get into proffesions like the elementalist.
All in all, always be moving, even if it means running in circles around the mob, never stand still, and your endurance bar should never be full, always dodge when you see a big hit coming. Also make sure you cure the conditions (aka DOTs) on you as soon as possible if you get them, from my experience those are the big damage dealers. Oh and never stand in the red circles if you didn’t figured out that by now .

I’m a casual player that started playing GW2 in Sept ‘12. Before it I played a rogue and a sorcerer in Diablo – D 3 so choose a ranger and then an elementalist here. I got comfortable with them although I wouldn’t say I was good. Then tried mesmer and it is my favorite. Since then I have at least one of each profession. I didn’t think I would like a heavy metal class but I have fun with both the warrior and the guardian. It took me awhile to learn to move more and to dodge and now combat is so much more fun in all professions. 3 professions I like to trait to take advantage of dodges – mesmer, thief and engineer. In the beginning with each profession I just played intuitively, never really learning or taking advantage of its special traits, skills or f 1-4 abilities. (Heck I just tried Firery Great Sword with my elementalist and I’ve had her since the beginning.) Now that I have read up and tried different builds I play each of them better. Some I’m still not that competent with though.

I echo learning to move and dodge as #1. Then read up about the profession you are currently working with in the forums here and watch videos.

P.S. It’s equally frustrating going the opposite way. Tried WoW for the first time recently and am so tired of getting something like “Can’t cast that while your moving.”

Regarding Professions:

I suggest either Warrior or Ranger. Warrior is by far the easiest. High health and armor, along with simple mechanics make it new player friendly. Ranger can be more complex, but the pet ally essentially gives you a meat shield that you can hide behind. The only problem I have with these 2 recommendations is that they can get boring in my opinion. You mentioned that Necro was boring for you so I mention this. However, I think that rolling either Warrior or Ranger will get you more familiar with combat mechanics and then you can try other more complex classes.

Regarding Combat:

Some tips for combat in general, no matter the profession. Be sure to carefully read the tooltips for all of your skills and traits. Too often I see people whacking away with all their skills, not knowing what they do. Save your dodges for telegraphed attacks or red circles. Dodging is the single most important mechanic for staying alive in the game. Stay mobile. Use your cripples, immobilizes, and chills for when you’re chasing a fleeing target or trying to get some space. Make sure your stats and traits complement your playing. For instance, if you’re using a lot of condition skills, make sure you’re choosing the traits and gear that supports that.

OldSomalia.6180:

I recently remade my Warrior as Asuran to play how I want, and playing how I want meant comboing off of RADIATION FIELD!

Great idea! For some reason I thought the radiation field was a ethereal field, not poison.
I like playing hammer + axe/mace, so all the knockdowns/weakness kept me safe and vulnerability made monsters quick to kill. With the radiation field it would be even better.

Sourde Noire.5286:

I call nonsense on this one, since you can’t even damage mobs that are more than 9 levels higher than you, no, doing one-digit damage doesn’t count.

Areas, not level. Each area has a diverse range of level mobs. Though once again I’m victim of not being able to do simple math.

My character’s story has been parked in “A light in the darkness” for a long time now since I’ve been doing dungeons instead.

And maybe you are the kind of player to AFK (boo! shame on you!), but not all of us are. Some of us buy games because we want to play them, not AFK them. But I realize that’s a really difficult concept to grasp for a lot of people, given that even the devs seem to be catering to those kind of players.

If I were AFKing the knights/holograms then even a necro or thief would have been easy. But when I was playing those, I kept dying . On the warrior I didn’t, even though I went melee, swapping to ranged once in a while.

I really do recommend the warrior for a bad player (or as I’d rather say, players with a low skill ceiling). Atleast based on my experience so far.

But then again a lot of people recommend guardian, and I kept dying on it, even playing maps the same level as me. Guardian has all sort of protective buffs but I couldn’t kill quickly enough. On a warrior, even though I feel naked and unprotected, I kill quickly so it’s no big deal.

Staff necro with all the minions. Really, nothing can touch you. You can solo champs.

Ranger. With tanky pets and all spirits available for summon in your utility slots. You can solo champs.

But once you get either of those to 80 I highly recommend you tackle the squishier classes too as a learning experience. Thief or ele.

I agree with wolfpaq – choose a profession, any profession that you’re interested in playing, and find a friend. That’s easier said than done, as I played solo for a long time before finding the right guild or group of people to play with, and we rarely do things together anyway because of time zones. But, persevere because the game is better with friends, and also a friend can help you by offering advice and also keeping you alive long enough so that you get to learn your skills/profession etc.

There are lots of people willing to help out – I am constantly making new alts, for instance, and running them through early game to level them is always better with someone else. There are lots of people in similar situations who I am sure would be happy to spend time levelling with you. If you’re on an EU server and can guest, I’m on Aurora Glade and if you see me on I’d be very happy to go through some easy maps with you.

Good recommendation from wolfpaq and CrossedHorse – to play with a friend. Voice helps. My sister and I play for hours at a time using home phones on speaker (I get free unlimited long distance calls because I get phone as part of my cable). Many guilds and/or servers have voice. But even without voice it’s nice to group up with someone when you are first learning a map and your profession.

Define what you mean by terrible- my definition of a terrible player @ this game is someone who doesn’t take advice, not willing to cooperate, griefs others for their own gain or no particular reason(particularly in dungeons) & unwilling to learn or unable to understand their own mistakes.

I think maybe a guardian for you or a warrior- they’re on a simpler scale but fun. Warrior is literally Hit, dodge- the guardian is Boons, hit , dodge. I’ve seen my share of bad guardians & warriors though, like 1-track & it’s nightmarish because they didn’t benefit in any way, as if they were unable to comprehend what skills to use when & where. Just another body.
Every class has it’s benefits & falts & a learning curve.

I do not recommend a Ranger, to often ‘new’ players play a ranger & are unable to comprehend that their pet is more of a liability because they have yet to truly understand the mechanics of it. Not saying there is this huge mechanic to them just a matter of when & where & timing.

Also, play with a friend- if you don’t have any friends, join a new player friendly guild because that will help you when you need it most on specific things or questions for: builds, gear, weapons, dungeons, quests & all that!

By far Warrior, even if you’re a complete screw up you can just say “it’s your fault I’m dying you don’t have enough DPS” and it’s all good.

Hi, I would recommend a warrior.When I started as an elementalist , I died so many times I almost quit .I still die a lot as an elementalist now but I have gotten a little better so I am having fun.I later leveled a warrior to level 80 and it was so much easier.I wondered why I was not dying as much as when I was an elementalist.I had leveled to 41 when I realized I did not allocate any trait points in warrior yet and I was doing fine.Key points are to play a profession you love to play and have fun.Warrior is definitely more forgiving for beginners.Updating your equipment to the pve levels is very helpful,and I did it every 4-5 levels. The forums on every profession are very helpful for popular effective builds and I found youtube builds and strategies in their gaming section very helpful.I would recommend that you play warrior and learn the game slowly at your pace and have fun.That is what will keep you playing this game!!!