Guild Wars 2

Best advice would be – if you like the look of a profession then try that one. I personally prefer Ranger (with Necro being close behind).

Both Necro and Ranger are good for what you’re looking for so you should be fine with either.

Ranger is a pretty solid choice. Pet handles the mob and you pew pew. I really enjoy my Ranger. I also enjoy Rifle Warrior as ranged though. Fire at range, knock them back when they get close, lots of fun.

Truthfully, any profession that interests you. It is true that some are ‘squishier’ than others and that some are a bit too straighforward to play ‘well enough’. But no profession is too hard to learn for anyone who wants to play it.

Necromancers and Rangers have little helpers to aid especially in the early levels. Thief requires a lot of mobility from the player and elementalist is weaker than most in the early levels, which frustrates many.

Luckily the game comes equipped with five character slots, so you can experiment with different professions. Race and gender don’t make a difference in mechanics, but race affects your Personal Story.

I’d say for ranged start with a ranger, for melee start with a warrior.

In other games I liked ranged so started with a ranger. I also liked sorcerers so my second was an elementalist. I decided to try something new so went with the mesmer as my third one, and quickly became my favorite profession. I never liked melee before but warrior was my 4th. Come to find out I like melee now.

All the professions can use various weapons and most can do both ranged and melee, although not all equally well. Rangers can wield a greatsword or a sword for melee. Warriors can use a rifle or longbow, etc. So go with the professions that most appeal to you. You could look at some youtube videos to get a better idea or how each plays. Or better yet try several of them out.

I would advise AGAINST Ranger as a first character as it has a tendency to teach bad play habits to new players. Later in the game, it becomes very important to NOT GET HIT (at least by big damage attacks and AoE damage) it is not that important early on, but players need to learn how to dodge, block and constantly move early on so they are ready for when it becomes a requirement for survival. Ranger does not need to move because of it’s ranged attacks and built in 2nd target to draw enemy fire (pets) and while this is NOT an issue early in the game you should be learning these tactics as second nature from the very beginning.

Keep in mind, I have a Ranger and love playing the class, but it’s a horrible class to learn to play the game with. Warrior is the most forgiving and has a wide option of weapons and can teach you good movement habits so when you DO play a Ranger you will realize how it promotes “lazy” gameplay habits.

Necro is the best of the casters, but Death Shroud can be a survival crutch (but is less likly to teach bad habits as it is an obvious difference with other classes. Learning (or not learning) how to move properly becomes instinct and follows you from class to class.

Just my 2 cents on a starting character.

I think any profession can be played incompetently, especially if most of a new player’s experience is in games where they remain stationary during combat. So starting with a warrior will not necessarily help.

I would recommend reading the GW2 Combat System 101 (Guide) and watching the videos in the first few posts in the thread stickyed at the top of this forum. The only thing to keep in mnid is that the traits must be unlocked now so acquiring those is not as easy as before.

Lazuli.2098:

I think any profession can be played incompetently, especially if most of a new player’s experience is in games where they remain stationary during combat. So starting with a warrior will not necessarily help.

I most definitely agree but if you look at all the other professions, none of them systematically train you to hang back and let your built in “tank” do the dirty work. You can certainly attempt to play the entire game like this with a Ranger (I’ve seen many, many players “BearBow” their way thru the game), but LEARNING to play this way is a disservice to the player as it won’t work for other professions (or for a Ranger in high end content situations).

Now if you play a Ranger melee from the start, this will not be a big an issue, but dependency on the Pet will eventually bit you (Dungeons for example) as Pets will constantly die and leave you “tankless” and likely low on damage. Just to add, that last part has nothing to do with learning bad habits….it’s just a basic flaw of the Pet system that has to be “worked-around”.