Guild Wars 2

Greetings,

I am a “veteran” WoW player, so I tend to lens all other MMO/RPGs through that.

I really like the feel of GW2 so far, but I’m still not clear on which class I’d like to pursue.

So far – I’ve played an Engineer to 19, Thief to 21 and Ranger to 12.

Can’t really compare the engineer to anything except maybe a WoW Druid? Seemed very versatile, lots of cool stuff, and seemed to be good to group with.

The Thief was a fun class to play, but I never really got into it.

Ranger feels like a WoW Hunter, and I enjoy the play style. I’ve read not-so-encouraging things about the Ranger class, but I’ve realized that people who tend to complain about a class tend to be responding to a recent incident rather than an over-arching problem.

I’m trying to figure out which class would be the best for me to solo the world with?

Guardian was going to be another choice, but I feel they would be slow and clunky to level alone, but have superior durability in combat.

Points I’d like addressed please:

1) Are all classes capable of the same level of soloing, if we hold player skill and experience constant?

2) Are there some classes that will have a longer “build up” before they become awesome?

3) Is there a rested XP mechanic? Or just log out anywhere?

Many thanks!

Hi there and welcome to GW2. I have zero experience with WoW so I don’t quite understand the comparisons but I will try and answer your questions.

1) All classes can solo, yes, in the open PVE environment. Some classes have a greater learning curve than others. For example, levelling is fairly straightforward with a warrior. You just run around and kill things. It doesn’t really matter what buttons you press. It will however take some time to get your head around a class like the mesmer. They die more easily compared to warriors until you get the hang of phantasms and clones. But if player skill and experience is constant then you should have no problems picking up any class and going off on your own adventure.

When we get into dungeons – well, no one does dungeon runs solo unless they want to make a point – some classes are more preferred than others. Warriors, Guardians, Mesmers and to a lesser extent Thieves and Elementalists are preferred for dungeons. Necromancers and Engineers are fairly unwelcome in most PuGs and Rangers are kind of seen as pond scum. That said, I main a Necromancer and I don’t feel completely unhelpful in a dungeon party – I just don’t bring as much to the team compared to when I use my Guardian instead.

2) You get to try all the weapons out fairly early on so you know what your main attacks will be. All the classes unlock more useful skills later on culminating with the elites but by the time you’re level 30 or 40 you should be on par with all the other classes. There are no ‘late bloomers’ per se. Most people who exclusively do PvE content don’t fully comprehend their class and all the different builds they could use until they’re level 80 with 30 skillpoints to spare so I wouldn’t worry about it too much.

3) I don’t know what this mechanic is but you can log out anywhere and you won’t lose EXP or anything. You’ll log back in right where you logged out and won’t be reset to any waypoints or anything.

There is no rested XP in GW2. That said, the game gives you xp for just about everything you do — harvesting, crafting, killing, exploring, hearts (sort of like quests), dynamic events, reviving players and npc’s, and so on.

Ease of leveling:

1. Warrior: high health pool, passive regeneration, good damage, limited mobility
2. Necromancer: high health pool, death shroud is an extra life bar, health siphon and minions to absorb damage if you want to roll that way; damage is not top tier but an be surprisingly good with the right spec, good mobility; minions are a bit twitchy — the melee ones will sometimes not attack, and sometimes will Leroy…
3. Guardian: low health pool but lots of damage mitigation, mediocre damage, limited mobility
4. Thief: low health pool, squishy as heck, high burst damage, and stealth, which can be very useful
5. Elementalist: low health pool, squishy as heck but can be built to be extremely resilient — just don’t expect to be tough early in leveling; high learning curve on this class because to maximize results, you must learn and use all of the elemental attunements
6. Ranger: easy soloing, pet + bow + melee of choice + traps and you can handle large groups, but also squishy unless specced for toughness/vitality, which will lower your medicore damage output considerably
7. Mesmer: high learning curve, and extremely squishy at low levels, once you get over the hump, the class puts out excellent damage, has lots of utility and can be vvery fun to play
8. Engineer: some people find it fun, but ANet has relegated this class to near or at the bottom of the heap with a design philosophy that says that engineers sacrifice damage for versatility, then build a class that — while versatile — brings nothing to the table that other classes cannot; while soloing, the lower damage can be hindering; you can work around it, but you have to go out of your way to get results that are almost as good as other classes get by just showing up

• Disclaimer: the above are the opinions of this poster, and may not be representative of every individuals experience

I just want to add that while speccing for damage on guardian is less usual, if properly designed they can output great damage numbers.

Classes like the engineer and elementalist have a steeper learning curve, more cooldowns to keep track of in the background.

Though I can’t really say since they are my mains, every other class is just boring :p

1 ) pretty much yea the difference is play style

2 ) Yes the Mesmer is probably best example . its more of a Mehsmer pre 40 but once your past that your golden

3 ) No but i wouldn’t suggest just logging out anywhere you may log back into getting beat on by a lot of mobs . Remember GW2 has DEs so you never know when one might spawn on top of you

Guardians are a great one for beginners. I’m currently only level 37 on mine, but it’s very easy to play. Damage with a great sword is fine for leveling, and doesn’t feel slow at all — he kills faster than my elementalist did when I was still learning how to play her :P

Adine.2184:

3 ) No but i wouldn’t suggest just logging out anywhere you may log back into getting beat on by a lot of mobs . Remember GW2 has DEs so you never know when one might spawn on top of you

Yeah you gotta remember that, i sometimes go afk for a pee or something shortly in an outpost, with lots of friendly NPC’s around, forgetting this fact, and come back a minute or 2 later to find myself dead and a champion and some vets maybe or similar on top of me. So the ONLY place you can be sure to be safe is the major towns