Guild Wars 2

Hi all,

I’ve been playing for a few days now and after reading dozens of threads and testing classes out I have made my choices.

When I make a character I always have a vision of what I want it to be so extensive weapon or spec swapping is out of the question.

The issue I am having is that all of the characters I enjoy seem to be in the avoid pile when it comes to forming dungeon groups.

If anyone could tell me which of these are ok or even just the least hated in PuGs it would be appreciated.

Staff Mesmer – Condi/Power IWarlock
Rifle Engineer – Turrets
Staff Necro – Minion Master
Staff Guardian – (Probably the most hated dungeon class?)
D/D Thief – Venoms (My only viable choice?)

Staff Mesmer – Condi/Power IWarlock
Awesome in pvp, horrible in PvE

Rifle Engineer – Turrets
If you are willing to replace turrets by nade then you are golden

Staff Necro – Minion Master
Minion is horrible in PvE. Staff isn’t that bad, but not good either, you shouldn’t rely on that.

Staff Guardian – (Probably the most hated dungeon class?)
On par with Minion Necro. You can keep your staff as a support weapons with a Hammer. Use the staff between fight and at the start of a fight, then swap to hammer and keep it for the fight. It will be a good build.

D/D Thief – Venoms (My only viable choice?)
D/D is perfect for thief, but drop the Venoms. Won’t be a that big of a deal if you bring them, but at least don’t put trait into that.

For the Engi even bombs would be an acceptable change. Turrets simply aren’t a reasonable thing in dungeons (you move too far too quickly).

That’s the only addition, what Thad said is spot on as usual

Thanks for the responses,

Pretty much what I expected and not an issue since I do enjoy my Thief.

It just seems an ongoing theme that Staff is bad and it happens to be my favourite weapon.

PhilSRD.1476:

Thanks for the responses,

Pretty much what I expected and not an issue since I do enjoy my Thief.

It just seems an ongoing theme that Staff is bad and it happens to be my favourite weapon.

Elementalist Staff is the highest DPS build in the PvE game. It’s also the only profession that is worth taking 2 or more of them in a dungeon.

Oh I know how well Staff Ele works, I just meant for every other class on my enjoy list.

The Ele build I was looking at was a hybrid which I knew wouldn’t be appropriate since Staff is all about Fire.

PhilSRD.1476:

Oh I know how well Staff Ele works, I just meant for every other class on my enjoy list.

The Ele build I was looking at was a hybrid which I knew wouldn’t be appropriate since Staff is all about Fire.

If by hybrid you mean condi stuff, yeah not with staff I wouldn’t do it. However the other attuenments have some great utility not to be overlooked.

Think about it this way. When you are doing your Ascalonian catacombs for the 999th time, would you want some one bringing a suboptimal dps build so they can extend your run by a min or two?

Obviously min or two doesn’t sound like much but when you combine it with the occasional down or wipe it adds up fast.

There is also the players like myself with limited play time aand saving 10 mins on 3 or 4 dungeons is an extra match of pvp for or an extra attempt at a keep capture in wvw. In group play, imo your personal play style or preferences come second to the overall objective of the group and in dungeons that’s primarily speed.

WvW, PvP and open world events are the places for playing your preferred way because the first 2 rely heavily on skill and the latter your effect is only on yourself so taking 20 seconds to kill a mob vs 10 or 15 is only effecting you.

I would like to direct you to http://metabattle.com/wiki/MetaBattle_Wiki for the heavily tested, and proven to be best dungeon builds. They also have PvP, WvW, and other types of builds that could be helpful.

Cheers!

Necro staff has some good skills but your auto attack is horrendously slow. It’s also very low DPS because of pretty long recharge times. Everything but the auto attack are area of effect spells that inflict conditions, bleed, chill, weakness, fear and #4 which transfers conditions and is an OK support skill. The only real use for Staff is to switch to it when you go into deathshroud as you get a few extra points of power out of it. Beyond that, most necro players would agree dagger/focus or dagger/warhorn is the way to go for direct damage.

If you’re going for condition based damage then there’s only one choice and that’s sceptre / dagger with condition primary stats paired with staff, unless you’re running a more hybrid build.

Necro axe is a bit of a sub par option. It’s pretty meh in terms of what it can do and is a bit of question mark as to what it actually is good for. Definite no no for dungeons.

Vert.5041:

Think about it this way. When you are doing your Ascalonian catacombs for the 999th time, would you want some one bringing a suboptimal dps build so they can extend your run by a min or two?

Obviously min or two doesn’t sound like much but when you combine it with the occasional down or wipe it adds up fast.

There is also the players like myself with limited play time aand saving 10 mins on 3 or 4 dungeons is an extra match of pvp for or an extra attempt at a keep capture in wvw. In group play, imo your personal play style or preferences come second to the overall objective of the group and in dungeons that’s primarily speed.

WvW, PvP and open world events are the places for playing your preferred way because the first 2 rely heavily on skill and the latter your effect is only on yourself so taking 20 seconds to kill a mob vs 10 or 15 is only effecting you.

Oh I agree with you completely which is why I was asking in the first place, I knew that the options I was looking at were mostly sub-par for group play but wondered if there was an obscure build for any of them I had missed.

I’m one of those people who doesn’t go into group content without reading tactics first, even for low level stuff. Not pulling my weight ruins the fun for me.

If you plan on doing a lot of Dungeons, then you will soon be swimming in Tokens of all kinds. Heck, it’ll happen even if you just do it casually.

Eventually, it won’t be any problems at all to keep several Gear setups in your backpack. Sure, I always go for Zerker first and generally always have Zerker trinks, but most of my characters have a Soldier set for World Bosses and quite a few have “Flavour builds” that I play whenever I run casually with PHIW-guildies, such as my Zealot Necro (Come at me, brah) or my Sinister Engi.

Just as the saying goes, “When in Rome…”. When in a Speed run group, Zerk. When in a casual group, do whatever you want.

Alternatively you probably can find groups that will accept your builds as they are. You just need to be aware that most people will assume you’re using more popular builds, and you’ll need to tell them what you’re actually using. Then they can adjust accordingly.

Likewise most people assume, even in casual runs, that you can and will swap skills and traits if necessary or if you’re asked. If there’s any you can’t or won’t change it would be a good idea to let them know.

(This is actually one upside to the trait change, people are more aware that some players, especially low level ones, might not have all the traits and skills unlocked and that they might need to consider alternatives to popular set-ups.)

OP: if you choose necro (Im talking about dungeons) you have to be aware that as condi you will be (probably) disappointed with awful dps. If you choose power and go with one of two standard meta builds (dagger or DS) you will be at least mediocre DPS but you will get bored very fast since DPS rotation of power necro is just spam 1111111111 until something die.