Guild Wars 2

Ok I have one character slot left and I am looking for a prof to fill it. Someday I’ll by more slots but that day is not today! I have a warrior, ranger, necro, and guardian. I am looking for a class that is good at open world pve, maybe some dungeoning. If I ever get into pvp more it would be roaming and zerging I doubt I would ever get into the ranked team play.

I am looking for a prof that is versatile, can dish out damage, and survivability is important. I would like to be able to take on large groups of normal mobs if need be.

So far I have leveled each of these classes into the teens and I like things about each of them. I wasn’t crazy about mesmer but enlighten me if you like. I enjoyed the constant aoe blinds and the teleports of the thief. I really enjoyed all of the aoe damage from the engineer but there was an awful lot of ground targeting. I also liked the toolbelt and how it changed with utilities, and healing turret was pretty nice. I really WANT to love elementalist and I like the abilities and attunements but I die an awful lot, is there a way to lvl in a tankier way with the ele?

All tips and tricks are welcomed, thanks in advance.

I’m not an expert at either thief or ele but re: engineers, if you like the AoE but would like less targeting you might consider using bomb kit instead of grenades, which is what it sounds like you used? The damage is roughly the same, just less good for vulnerability stacking which you don’t strictly need in open world.

My usual open world skill setup is rifle with rocket boots, bomb kit and elixir gun, which gives great mobility between the rocket jump and the kit swiftness, good damage from rifle + bombs as well as a stun breaker and condition cleanse from EG, but it’s very easy to mix it up depending on the situation.

I think engineer is easily one of the, if not the most versatile profession, since you have so many different utilities and different combo fields + finishers. And not only does healing turret give you some of the best burst heals in game when blasted immediately after overcharging but you also have access to two different block abilities + an invulnerability if you use shield offhand, toolkit and elixir S, so you can be very durable.

And if you do decide to go dungeoning, engineer works very well in a party, as they provide tons of vulnerability to make bosses go down faster as well as a reflect/projectile block in case your guardian or thief is on cooldown, fire fields to blast might if your ele’s busy with summoned weapons, stealth fields if no one bothered logging a thief, etc… on top of having very good damage on its own.

Yes I was referring to the grenades ground targeting….but honestly I still loved the grenades and their range, I think the targeting is just something to get used to. Its a lot like my necro’s marks….but much more spammy. Thanks for the information I didn’t even realize that healing turret made a field upon overcharging. So do you thing rifle is better than pistols then?

Oh yeah grenades are amazing and my primary weapon these days, but what I meant is that if/when you need a break from constant mashing buttons (I know I do every now and then), bombs are a very acceptable substitute with an auto-attack that is actually ‘auto’ =P

Rifle vs pistol is situational. In situations where you want DPS and control, rifle is best: jump shot will get 6 vulnerability stacks on top of good damage, overcharged shot is a knockback/interrupt, blunderbuss is damage, net shot will immobilize as well as give more vuln if traited, and the auto-attack is higher.

Pistol is for condition builds, and does that pretty well – double-pistols lets you bleed + poison + burn + confusion + immobilize just by shooting off every attack, it’s just that conditions aren’t ideal for PvE in the current meta. On top of that using pistol will let you use shield off-hand, which has a three-second block that will interrupt any melee attacker on the 5 key but also a projectile reflect and blast finisher on the 4, which is pretty darn useful in some situations.

I mostly go rifle when dungeoning and solo mapping, but I do like using pistol traited for range and piercing bullets when in big events where I want to tag. And I use pistol+shield when in sPvP. Up to you to see what works best for you.

Thanks a ton jackaljag this is exactly the kind of info I was looking for. It’s nice to know there are helpful people lurking around the forums and not just the doom and gloom crowd.

Aww there are a few helpful people around, but you’re welcome! Wish I could help you more with the other professions but I barely play thief and only have a boring DPS staff ele so I’m not sure my input would be that great, though if there’s anything you’re wondering about I can try to answer.

out of the three – the thief is my favourite. i really like this class, although for me it is the most difficult one. i also have an elementalist and in terms of survivability, he does better.

Well if you want an easy time getting into the different content and dungeons, Ele is the way to go. All content can do a little better with an Ele wandering around. However, you will need to learn the rotations and might stacking. Everyone wants the Ele conjured weapons and it is so easy to get 25 might stacks with Ele it’s not funny. You will be squishy as kitten so learn to move…always move.

Engi is a space filler but is still a fun profession. That grenade kit though, not a fan of no auto targeting (makes my hands hurt). It’s a unique profession and bomb kit is so much fun! The Toolbelt skill mechanic was designed well and kit swapping is awesome.

I main a thief. I found I enjoyed the playstyle a lot more than I did other professions. The initiative system allows me to think about my skills, rather than mindlessly going from 2-5 and switching weapons to 2-5 again. You will be a space filler with dungeons (though, because of Shadow Refuge you might be wanted a little more than the others). There is a lot of complaining about this profession because of the stealth mechanics so be ready for that.