Guild Wars 2

I am a newcomer to GW2 but not to MMOs. I am in a pickle regarding which profession to choose to begin my journey through Tyria. I appreciate any and all responses given to the following information.

I typically enjoy playing melee roles, however there have been exceptions in the past. My main reason for deciding against spellcaster types is I do not enjoy waiting for a lot of casting times during combat. I also don’t like that most spellcaster archetypes are very squishy. So that having been said I am also looking for survivability in a profession.

Mobility is a must. I like to have flexibility with movement during combat as well. In the past this has always been a benefit when playing PvP.

I am a big fan of PvE play as well so I will be looking for a character that a group of people would enjoy including into their ranks to go dungeoning, questing, etc…

Lastly, damage dealing is also important. I don’t ever have to be the best dmg dealer in the party, but I like to add a reasonable contribution…

The most mobile professions are the squishiest. However, if you dislike magic/casting in it’s entirety, you’re pretty much stuck with Ranger, Warrior, and Engineer.

KEEP IN MIND, though, that GW2 has a very fluid combat system. Unless you’re playing in Earth Attunement as an Elementalist, your cast-times are ridiculously short and smooth (with almost all spells allowing mobility while casting).

And, while the Scholar archetype is very squishy in regards to their base armor level, they end up being very, very tanky. Here’s why:

Mesmers have massive amounts of damage mitigation. From reflecting projectiles back to enemies, to simply evading everything on a 20% uptime, they can seriously slow down the hurt they receive. (They also have invis to make you lose sight of them, albeit a lot of low duration invis.)

Necromancers have a very high base health pool. They also have a secondary health bar as their profession mechanic. One of the standard builds with them revolves around getting a lot of Toughness in addition to other stats (essentially armor) making them a very tanky profession when played so. (They have little access to lifesteal, but they do have some. Note: Lifesteal in GW2 isn’t very much compared to any other game. It’s like a bonus little heal versus actual sustain.)

Elementalists have ridiculously high mobility. A good Elementalist can run full-squish and never die (they might not get a kill, but they have the capacity to escape).

Currently, people want: Mesmers, Guardians and Warriors. However, this is mainly for the max-level dungeon runs (which will most likely be nerfed by the time you get there).

I would highly suggest making one of every profession. I don’t care if you don’t want to be a caster, don’t like the color pink/purple, don’t want to be flamboyant, or don’t like the idea of using this weapon versus that. Just make one of every profession (hear me out, I know you only have 5 character slots).

From there, play the tutorial (as slow or as fast as you want, you’ll need to do it on all your characters), and then head to the Heart of the Mists (accessible from the Crossed Swords at the top left of your UI).

There, you’ll have access to every skill and weapon for free. You can play around with every class to figure out how/what you want to play. Fear not, although it is a PvP zone, there is no PvP until you want there to be. It’s simply a giant lobby to setup for PvP, which is why you have everything unlocked. Play around with skills and attacks against the Training Golems. That way you will see what you do and do not like.

When you’re done, go back to PvE and enjoy your new profession.

Final note: if you join a guild, which you should, they most likely won’t care what profession you are. If they do, leave them and join another. Playing dungeons with a guild is much better than playing dungeons as a PUG.

I say this with 7 months of PUGing (the past 7 months, I used to run with guilds in 2012, but I stopped due to the fact that I tend to cause or worm into drama).

Here is a rundown of the classes and what they do best and what they do not so well.

Elementalist – Versatile, can heal, can do heavy damage. Fast play with many key clicks, can be tanky. Does not remove enemy boons but gives out many boons.

Thief- Heavy single target burst damage, can remove boons, fast play style. Does not tank well or remove a lot of conditions. Does good condition damage, stealths self and allies. Minimal group support.

Mesmer – Good burst damage, condition damage is ok but was nerfed. Good cc and group utility. Stealths self and allies. Fast play style, steals boons and makes clones of itself. Does not tank well. Little group healing

Warrior – Heavy burst damage. Very tanky. Slower play compared to ele and thief. Heavy cc dealt. Condition damage is minimal. lacks some condition removal and group healing.

Guardian – Lower avg damage. Super super tanky with good group heals. removes conditions well, ok condition damage. slower avg play style. Good cc and mob control.

Necromancer – Pretty tanky. Best condition damage in game. boon corruption and condition removal. Less group support. Slower play style compared to ele.

Engineer – Multi-versatile class, higher learning curve, fast play style, can be tanky-ish, good heals and condition damage, average damage dealer.

Ranger – good single target dps, ok group healing. Good condition damage and some good burst dps. Range class but some good melee. Less tanky. Slower play style. Good aoe.

Every profession can go range or melee. Many people use a setup to handle both and swap weapon as needed.

Most spells are pretty quick(at least compared to other games). One of the longer ones is Meteor Shower and even that is only 3.75s. Also unlike most games there is no need to stand still while casting most of the time. Some will still require you to do it(like Meteor Shower, moving will weaken its effect rather than fully cancelling it).

As for spellcaster squishiness, Necromancer is probably one of the most survivable professions.

The wiki has the base HP and armor for the various classes so that is fairly easy to compare.
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Health#Base_Health_by_Profession
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Armor#Defense_rating

You can pretty much create the character you described with any profession. They won’t be equals but they’ll meet the criteria.

As for dealing damage. It is slightly less straightforward than ‘how big are the number when I swing my sword?’ since Might and Vulnerability acts a damage multipliers.

I would recommend making one of each profession and trying it out in Heart of the Mist. You can play around with all the skills, different trait and weapon combinations, rune sets and sigils for free. It won’t be exactly the same as what you can get in PvE but it’s a very reasonable approximation. You can get there by clicking on the cross swords icon on the top of the window.

TL;DR
Go play a Guardian.