Guild Wars 2

What profession is closest to the elementalist from gw1? I.E stands in the back, channels slow, high damage nuke/AoE spells and combos? I tried the elementalist in gw2 and it seems to be the exact opposite.

This game isn’t GW1, and you’re not going to find combat situations where you can play similarly to GW1 classes. You also can’t expect to be able to stand in one place all the time in GW2 fights. Even if you opt for ranged attacks only, you’ll still have to be moving and actively avoiding attacks with dodges and such. Eles have tons of combo fields and finishers, as well as high damage aoes. Staff channels pretty slowly, but it’s not always going to be the best option for every situation. Sometimes dagger/dagger may be much better. Or dagger/focus. Or sometimes a scepter might be good.

So yeah, maybe try ele again without the old MMO/GW1 way of thinking. See how you like its playstyle once you mess around with all the weapon combos and attunements and such.

RoseofGilead.8907:

This game isn’t GW1, and you’re not going to find combat situations where you can play similarly to GW1 classes. You also can’t expect to be able to stand in one place all the time in GW2 fights. Even if you opt for ranged attacks only, you’ll still have to be moving and actively avoiding attacks with dodges and such. Eles have tons of combo fields and finishers, as well as high damage aoes. Staff channels pretty slowly, but it’s not always going to be the best option for every situation. Sometimes dagger/dagger may be much better. Or dagger/focus. Or sometimes a scepter might be good.

So yeah, maybe try ele again without the old MMO/GW1 way of thinking. See how you like its playstyle once you mess around with all the weapon combos and attunements and such.

Not what I wanted to hear but thank you. I liked GW1 and I don’t think there’s anything wrong with hoping the squeal would be close to the original

Is there no “Nuker” profession in general any more or is that still the ele, just in a different way?

No, there’s not really any nuker profession. Every class can do high damage, given the right circumstances, traits, weapons, armor, etc. I think the classes considered to be the highest DPS (with optimal gear and traits) would be ele, engi, thief, and warrior. But a guardian set up for damage and DPS can do great damage, as can necros, mesmers, and rangers.

RoseofGilead.8907:

No, there’s not really any nuker profession. Every class can do high damage, given the right circumstances, traits, weapons, armor, etc. I think the classes considered to be the highest DPS (with optimal gear and traits) would be ele, engi, thief, and warrior. But a guardian set up for damage and DPS can do great damage, as can necros, mesmers, and rangers.

Interesting, since im clearly looking at this from the wrong mindset maybe you could help me with this question. (Rereading that it sounds kind of sarcastic but im being sincere)

By what metric do you use to pick a profession?

In GW1 you pick a monk because you want to heal, you pick an ele cause you want to nuke, you pick a warrior cause you want to tank and so on.

If every profession can nuke then why would anyone want to say play a warrior over a thief, or a engi or whatever. Im clearly missing something important.

As I said before, this isn’t GW1 or any other traditional MMO. There is no “trinity” in this game. There are no strict healers, tanks, or damage classes. Every class has heals and condition removals they can use on themselves, and some have heals they can use on others as well as themselves. Every class can do sustainable, good damage. Every class can survive, provided they know how to avoid getting hit over and over again.

People pick classes based on what they like, I think. Using warrior as an example: Most of the time, people will pick a warrior for damage because that’s what they’re best at, really. But there are some people who run warrior shout builds that help heal and cleanse their allies (these builds are usually avoided in pve, though). In the case of ele, there are some people in GW2 who set their eles up as support/healing, but there are others who set them up to be pure dps. People play what they want to play because it appeals to them, either in the archetypes of the classes or the gameplay or any other reason.

I, personally, have at least one of every class because I wanted to try them all.

OP, in Guild Wars 2 the game seems, in my mind anyway, to be more about flavor than just mechanics.

So if you’re focused on just the mechanics, you’re missing a lot of what’s built into the game.

Some people play eles because they can do a lot of damage, but a lot of people play them just because the spell casting they do is fun/cool for them.

Eles are very versatile, and they have a relatively high skill ceiling so they always remain challenging to play.

But since all professions can do similar things (with a few notable exceptions), the really difference between them is how they look and feel to you.

To answer the initial question, if you want to stand back and use big damage nuke spells, the class to pick is probably… Elementalist.

You just want to use a Staff as your weapon, rather than Daggers.

Staff Elementalist mostly sticking in Fire attunement with offensive gear and Fire Magic traits is going to output a lot of damage. It’s going to be a bit one-dimensional compared to what a Scepter or Dagger Elementalist can output, but it’s there to play and it’s certainly very good at what it does.

Elementalist: Uses elements, as good (ranged) AoE damage, AoE CC and AoE heals. Very versatile and mobile. Closest to the Mage archetype.
Mesmer: Uses chaos and arcana(?), makes illusions, can stealth, has unique utility skills (such as a portal that can teleport people). Sort of a mix between rogue/mage?
Necromancer: Typical debuff/DoT class, can use minions, uses undead forces, corruption and whatnot. Has good AoE and good condition damage, but has good power builds too. Selfish and therefore not wanted in dungeons.
Theif: Stealthy, mobile and squishy. Has good single target damage (limited to no AoE? Not sure). Closest to rogue archetype. Can’t say much else, don’t have one.
Engineer: Lots of utility, explosions, turrets and kits like bombs, grenades and flamethrower. Can stealth, condition damage, power damage, AoE heal, you name it, the engi can do it. Has good AoE damage. Does not really have an archetype, but it’s close to a “marksman” class I played in another game.
Ranger: Typical ranger archetype. Bows, has pet companions, nature based. Has good single target damage, okish AoE.
Warrior: Typical warrior archetype. Simple, straight forward, has a lot of HP and can hit hard.
Guardian: Not-so-typical tank archetype. Not much HP but has a lot of heals, condition removal and other skills that make him basically immortal, but can do good DPS too.

Just pick what you like playing best. The only difference with other MMO’s is no healer or tank to choose from.

Melanie.1240:

Elementalist: Uses elements, as good (ranged) AoE damage, AoE CC and AoE heals. Very versatile and mobile. Closest to the Mage archetype.
Mesmer: Uses chaos and arcana(?), makes illusions, can stealth, has unique utility skills (such as a portal that can teleport people). Sort of a mix between rogue/mage?
Necromancer: Typical debuff/DoT class, can use minions, uses undead forces, corruption and whatnot. Has good AoE and good condition damage, but has good power builds too. Selfish and therefore not wanted in dungeons.
Theif: Stealthy, mobile and squishy. Has good single target damage (limited to no AoE? Not sure). Closest to rogue archetype. Can’t say much else, don’t have one.
Engineer: Lots of utility, explosions, turrets and kits like bombs, grenades and flamethrower. Can stealth, condition damage, power damage, AoE heal, you name it, the engi can do it. Has good AoE damage. Does not really have an archetype, but it’s close to a “marksman” class I played in another game.
Ranger: Typical ranger archetype. Bows, has pet companions, nature based. Has good single target damage, okish AoE.
Warrior: Typical warrior archetype. Simple, straight forward, has a lot of HP and can hit hard.
Guardian: Not-so-typical tank archetype. Not much HP but has a lot of heals, condition removal and other skills that make him basically immortal, but can do good DPS too.

Just pick what you like playing best. The only difference with other MMO’s is no healer or tank to choose from.

thanks that’s exactly what I was looking for

Well … one might want to add that the “perfect” class for you also depends on the game modes you enjoy. PvE is usually done with max damage builds whereas team based PvP and WvW (roaming or zerg battles) require different builds and this is where some classes have more versality than others.

The elementalist, for example, will do nicely as a roamer with a dagger/dagger melee build which is also viable in team based PvP and roaming in WvW. In Zerg battles, however, Eles are usually rare and thus more used to be water field generators that Guardians and Warriors will blast to generate AoE healing. Dagger/dagger, however, is a melee playstyle that is very different from casting big damage spells from the rear. You can do pretty well with a staff in PvE because monsters like to stay in place but in PvP or WvW their attack is too slow to be effective against moving and evading targets (but Eles are among the best to clear the walls in a castle/tower in WvW)

In this regard the Necromancer is of more use in my opinion because with marks and wells you can do quite high damage from max range – minion masters, as in GW 1, are not really viable in GW2 although you can play one in PvE (they’re pretty useless in WvW and PvP).

In regard to the above post that did list a lot of possibilities there is one thing lacking: Warriors are very good condition removers as well – that’s why Zergs usually have a few shout warriors with them – heal + condition removal.

Another question is how much time you have to play and whether you prefer to get things close and personal or to fight from a distance.

Thief, Engineer, Mesmer and Elementalist require more time to learn to play, Elementalist and Engineer more than the other classes because of Kit-switching or Elemental-Attunements so that you have to learn what to use in what order and when which skill will be ready again to swap to.

Range depends on the weapons a class can use and the distance those weapons can “cover”:

Ranged classes: Ranger (doh), Elementalist (staff), Necro(staff), Warrior(bow, rifle), Engineer (with rifle and grenades)

Semi-Ranged: Elementalist(sceptre), Guardian, Necro (scepter), Thief

Melee-ish: Elementalist (daggers), Guardian, Warrior, Necro, Thief, Mesmer

Mesmers (if you go for big damage means shattering your illusions and that’s best done when as close to the target as possible)

So … just start playing

Lictor Alpha.3724:

RoseofGilead.8907:

No, there’s not really any nuker profession. Every class can do high damage, given the right circumstances, traits, weapons, armor, etc. I think the classes considered to be the highest DPS (with optimal gear and traits) would be ele, engi, thief, and warrior. But a guardian set up for damage and DPS can do great damage, as can necros, mesmers, and rangers.

Interesting, since im clearly looking at this from the wrong mindset maybe you could help me with this question. (Rereading that it sounds kind of sarcastic but im being sincere)

By what metric do you use to pick a profession?

In GW1 you pick a monk because you want to heal, you pick an ele cause you want to nuke, you pick a warrior cause you want to tank and so on.

If every profession can nuke then why would anyone want to say play a warrior over a thief, or a engi or whatever. Im clearly missing something important.

Reason I pick a main at any given time (I switch from time to time and focus on one for a couple months) is their mechanics, do I enjoy actually playing them. Ele is a very fun profession to play, likewise Guardian has a very defensive play style focused on timing your abililities, engi is like Ele but with more swapping, etc.

Reason I deviate from my main for different content is their actual abilities. Do I feel stealth in abundance would help the group, I’ll go thief. Do I think we need might to optimize our damage output better I’ll likely go Ele, maybe warrior. We we need more defense esp reflects, probably guard, maybe mesmer. It’s rare that I pick a class for a dungeon simply for it’s damage capabilities. Each profession has a different set of roles it excels at and I’ll pick my profession based on that. At least for doing different content, again, the profession I enjoy playing the most will be determined by the play style of said profession.