Guild Wars 2

So I wonder which of these two professions I should roll when it comes to PvE/soloing/WvW. Which are the strongest at the moment?

I guess I will mostly be soloing, exploring and doing world events and won’t do too much dungeons and fractals. So based on these facts, which profession suits me better? I have no idea about any of those, but both professions seems very interesting and fun to play. I might level both eventually, but I want to know what to level first. Will appreciate all answers

Both are awesome.

But mesmers without Runes of Traveller are awful at exploration due to movement speed.

Thanks for your answer! I have a Mesmer at level 22 now and an Elementalist at level 26. Since I personally hate leveling on every MMO, I want to be absolute sure I am leveling the right class (which is either one of these) Also holding onto a birthday booster, and I’ll use that when I’ve decided.

WvW: Mesmer or Elementalist? And why?
Solo PvE: Mesmer or Elementalist? And why?

Hope to hear some answers from anyone

Just make both. They have different uses but I currently prefer ele slightly over Mesmer because of ele’s great AoE damage.

I love both (have an ele and two mesmers at 80, with another ele leveling up). If you want to go for max damage, go for elementalist, although it doesn’t make a difference if you’re only around solo.

In WvW, I find my mesmers more versatile than the elementalist(s). If you don’t run with a guild group, the ele is mostly restricted to zerg support/aoe damage, while the mesmer is easier to play solo and in small pug groups there.

In solo PvE on the other hand, the elementalist has a much easier time getting loot and credit in large-scale events, since they have some high-damage aoe skills. Mesmer damage depends on clones and phantasms, which are sometimes difficult to use with large mob groups and high-damage aoe bosses.

Personally, I enjoy mesmers a bit more at the moment, but both classes have interesting playstyles and many options to explore, so you can’t really go wrong with either.

Elementalists are pretty much the strongest class in PvE, and pretty much the weakest class in any form of PvP content, WvW included. They’ve the highest damage potential, but they rely on your targets being stupid in order for the most powerful ones to hit – and Artificial Idiocy fits the bill, but human players won’t. Well, some will, but against those kinds of players it doesn’t matter what you use anyway. Elementalists have the highest active damage mitigation but the lowest passive damage mitigation – so against mobs with infrequent powerful attacks they never die, but against players with frequent attacks they’ll always die. Comparing the mythical ‘players of equal skill’ anyway.

If we’re talking zergs… elementalists pretty much only deal damage, give zergs perm swiftness and raise water fields – none of which are particularly unique. A mesmer who knows how to use Feedback, Veil, Mass Invisibility, Time Warp and Portal in the correct situations, however, can single handedly turn a full zerg wipe to a successful golem rush against competent worlds. Against incompetent worlds you’ll win anyway, so no difference there.

Therefore, since the greatest domain of the elementalist (high level dungeons, fractals and other ‘somewhat’ challenging PvE content) isn’t something you said you want to do, pick a mesmer or there’ll be no end to your dissatisfaction about how bad elementalists are in WvW (because they kind of are). Mesmers aren’t half bad at most content in PvE either. A full damage phantasm build can break 6000+ damage per second – not as much as a zerkwar’s 8000, but you’ll be unkillable except by heavy repeated AoE condition damage, and you’ll be able to strip boons repeatedly, so you end up superior against any target that uses Protection or the like. Like dredge. They’re slow as heck, though… so Runes of the Traveler are pretty much compulsory.

Wow, people are so helpful! ^.^ Thanks for all the detailed posts, I think I’ve decided now. Mesmer it is, time to level!

Mesmer is still my favorite profession due to playstyle, but Elementalists have one thing going for them that Mesmers can’t touch, nor any other profession in my opinion: they are exceptional mob taggers.

I play regularly with a friend of mine who runs a Mesmer and when I’m on my Elementalist, I’m literally pulling in twice the loot drops that he is due to almost non-stop AoEs. I run a Staff build that has increased AoE size and I’m able to tag just about everything within a 1200 range by cycling through each of my different attunements. It may sound like a weak reason to run a profession, but it made a huge difference to me in terms of money and gear.

So, like I said, I think Mesmers are more fun to play due to their complexity and their subtlety, but I can’t think of a single build that stands up well in a large group, at least not in terms of loot payoff. And one other thing, as someone above mentioned, Runes of the Traveller are almost a necessity for Mesmer’s now and those things, last I saw, where selling for over 13g EACH. A full set will run you almost 80g. That’s a lot of scratch for a new player. Solid Elementalist builds can be created using much more diverse, and cheaper, sets. Might be worth while building up an Ele as a farming toon in order to finance your Mesmer with the larger loot hauls you’ll be getting. Just a suggestion.

Finally, I won’t speak for either forms of PvP since I don’t run them.

Elementalists in WvW aren’t “unique” in what they give, but uniqueness is overrated. They are one of the best professions out there to give on demand water fields. They chuck out awesome AoE in group fights and choke points.

Not only that, the Air group stun is one of the best stuns in the game. And the Earth attunement is very useful when used correctly.

The Veil, Portal, Null Field, Mass Invis and Time Warp are all great when used correctly so a group without one Mesmer does suffer quite a bit. But if you scale them quantitatively like in a zerg environment, more Eles would be more useful than having more Mesmers.

In Dungeon speedclear environment, Mesmers are also in low demand except for dungeons where if you care about speed can use the Portal to a great effect and Arah runs.

And in the open world, Mesmers suffer the ability to tag mobs like in WvW and Eles excel at it as much as they excel in WvW. But other than this, no class in unviable so just go with whatever appeals to you more.

Blacklight.2871:

I play regularly with a friend of mine who runs a Mesmer and when I’m on my Elementalist, I’m literally pulling in twice the loot drops that he is due to almost non-stop AoEs. I run a Staff build that has increased AoE size and I’m able to tag just about everything within a 1200 range by cycling through each of my different attunements. It may sound like a weak reason to run a profession, but it made a huge difference to me in terms of money and gear.

Regarding the leveling phase: As long as the illusions and/or the Mesmer have the aggro, the Ele can shine. When the Ele gets the aggro of all the mobs, then it’d be a rather unshiny performance I guess. I also prefer the Mesmer over the Ele, especially when soloing. Larger groups are not a big problem for a Mesmer using GS+Staff. Larger groups for an Ele or fast respawn are very dangerous when he’s on his own.