Guild Wars 2

Hi have decided to either make a ranger or warrior but stuck on which one. I want good damage in pve and not rock hard to lvl and something that doesnt die every two mins which is fun. Any recommendations? Thanks in advance

Both Ranger and Warrior will cover the things you want.

In terms of being fun to play, that’s a subjective thing, but generally:

Warriors are tougher and have higher health and armour than Rangers, so they might be a slightly easier option at the start. However, Rangers have pets which can tank for them and they can stay at range.

Both have ranged and melee skills. Personally, I find the Ranger’s melee to be better than their range (same with Warrior), and better than Warrior – or at least more interesting, as Rangers have this whole “nature magic” element to their attacks which makes them look cool. Warriors just do straight up attacks.

Both will do decent damage in PvE. If you are wanting to play dungeons later, then you may find that Warriors are more welcome than Rangers. That’s not to say a well-played Ranger can’t hold its own, but the assumption will be that if you are on a Ranger you will at the very least slow down the party. So it will be easier grouping with a Warrior, but don’t let that stop you rolling a Ranger if you find that class more interesting, as plenty of people don’t mind at all.

The best thing to do is to create one of each, then head to the Heart of the Mists where (after a short and easy tutorial), you can go through to the PvP area, which upscales you to level 80 and unlocks all your skills and traits (just for this section). Then you can try out different builds, weapons, skills (and also take a look at armour in the PvP locker) and see which you prefer.

For levelling, both are very easy and fairly quick to level.

Edit: Personally, I prefer Ranger as I just find it more interesting to play. Have tried a Warrior a few times, but never really got into it. But take any recommendation with a pinch of salt, as preference can only be personal.

Ok thanks will try that. Really stuck on which to play just wanna settle with one so I can enjoy game etc

I know how you feel! I make so many characters because I’m always stuck for which to stick to. But really, the only way to work these things out is to test them yourself

Generally, if you had the patience, I’d recommend testing both to at least level 30, as you’ll be more familiar with how they (and you) play and will have unlocked a decent amount of skills/weapons etc to test out. This is, I find, a bit more telling than going into the Heart of the Mists, just because you won’t unlock everything (like you do in the PvP area) for a while on your character. So it’s good to test it with limitations.

But I hope you have fun, whichever profession you decide on!

Thanks so fed up just wanna pick one. Could I go to heart of mists and try it or doesn’t it unlock everything? also when I try delete chars on char selection it won’t let me lol

HotM unlocks everything for you to test.

To delete you have to select the character, click the delete button, and then type their name in the box as confirmation.

As for my recommendation, I’m with the other that say try em both. I rolled a ranger way back at launch and it was fun for a time but got boring and lacking any variety. It took me probably 3-4 different attempts at rolling warrior before I liked it enough to stick with it. But once I did, I realized I like it better than ranger due to more variety.

They’re both easy to level. Warrior will feel sturdier but ranger has a pet that can tank for you. The ranger pet is often both the source of joy and hate for a player. It’s cool hunting down new animals to tame and working side-by-side with them. However, in dungeons and PvP you’ll need to micro-manage them more, which can be frustrating.

Either are really good first professions to roll. But I’m an altoholic, and have 4 80s and 4 others 45+. I rolled both lol.

Wari0r, bcuz evry1 knuwz that rangers sux!!1

But on a more serious side..
I main a ranger and, although I really do love their mechanic and they truly ARE strong in their own way (though sadly I could describe them as a ‘Jack of all trades, but master of none’), DO NOT play them if you’re planning to just range it out with a bear and not assist your teammates or just not ever control your pet in general. Pets AI is stupid, sadly that’s a fact, but it doesn’t meen you should just let it sit around.

You need to play for the both of ya and once you master that, you’re on your way

Everyone should have a warrior in their back pocket. Warriors are awesome.

Roses are warrior
Violets are warrior
I love warriors
Warrior warrior warrior

I stole that and it said something else before I changed it to warrior.

I will say that it’s taken me a good 4-5 times of rolling a Warrior before I decided that I would try and take a char to 80, and 1-2 with a Ranger. But I have come round to the feeling that a Warrior is a good char to have to hand, should you need one … more useful than Ranger, at any rate.

But, definitely try both as you may suddenly find beyond all expectations you don’t even like either and want to roll a Mesmer! Mostly go with what you find fun and what you can see playing for a long time. Yes, you can always roll other chars, but it’s good to play with some sense of investment in your char, so if you can’t stand one, play another and maybe come back later (like I say, rolled 4-5 Warriors and deleted them all before I decided I was enjoying it).

Rangers excel at skirmishing and condition damage. They have access to every condition in the game with the exception of torment and can apply bleeding on crit. A condition ranger with rampager’s can do more dps than one with flat berserker. If you want a class with excellent medium range aoe that is also capable of holding their own in melee, ranger is a great choice. They are also the best kiting class in the game if you build for it.

Warriors excel at raw physical damage and are arguably the highest damage class in the game. They are also the standard berserker wearers. They are much easier to play than rangers, but aren’t quite as flexible in terms of build diversity. They are capable of being the tankiest class in the game if built for it, and aren’t bad at support roles either.

what about elementalist and thiefs? what r they like? i have a lvl 25 ele and everyone says their weak do they get better and what r thiefs like thanks

Both are pretty squishy at early levels.

Elementalist requires a higher level of skill to play well than any other profession in the game, imo. The attunements you cycle through, rather than switching weapons, gives you access to 20 weapon skills at any one time (cooldowns permitting) and you should be familiar with them all and switch between them frequently to get the most out of the class. Elementalists are capable of very high DPS bursts, can cleanse conditions better than most of the other professions and can, when played well, out heal almost any other profession as well, but, as I mentioned, they are squishy, so you need all of that. They are extremely mobile, and if you want a very active profession, the elementalist is a good choice.

At the moment, in terms of PvP, elementalists have fallen out of the meta, but there are still very skilled players owning others on their elementalists, so if you become a skilled player, don’t let that put you off.

Thieves are also pretty squishy, but have access to stealth which, depending on who you ask, is an interesting mechanic – and if you ever play WvW or PvP, guaranteed to make people rage against you, lol. They have a unique aspect of initiative, rather than cooldowns on their weapons skills, so you can spam various attacks very quickly, which can make them powerful, but you do need to monitor your initiative levels carefully. They don’t have access to many weapon sets, so you may find this limiting, but their weapons synergise well between main hand and off hand sets, actually changing the skill #3 depending on what you have equipped. They are capable of extremely, extremely high DPS against an individual target, but can be easily overwhelmed by groups. Elementalists have access to a lot of crowd control skills, which makes groups easier to deal with.

I am not an expert on either, but both are interesting choices .. very different from your initial two of Ranger and Warrior, lol! If you are sticking to PvE, then Warrior and Ranger will allow you to level and progress through the maps very quickly, whereas you will probably be slower with Elementalist and Thief, particularly at first, but PvE allows you time to build your skills. If you are heading straight into PvP, then you will have more of a buffer with Ranger/Warrior to get to grips with the system.

i want to play either elementalist or thief but dont know which. i have a level 25 elementalist and have just created a thief to try but not sure which to main

You’ll hear people saying Ranger is the worst profession in the game.
The reasons are (including but not limited to) Ranger is the 2nd most played profession, and unlike Warrior (most played) you WILL notice a bad Ranger while a Warrior gets away with a lot of stuff and is overall easier to play.

Also, pets, forget about them, NEVER rely on them, they’re slow to catch up to moving targets, won’t get off an AoE and more often than not their special ability won’t trigger and go into full cool down.

Having all that said my favourite profession is Ranger.

melimoo.3249:

i want to play either elementalist or thief but dont know which. i have a level 25 elementalist and have just created a thief to try but not sure which to main

I’d suggest getting them both to 30 at least if you can bear it (shouldn’t take too long) and seeing how you feel about them both then. Also, try taking them to the Mists and testing them out at level 80.

Make sure you unlock every weapon combo you can, which you can do relatively quickly – very quickly with the thief, takes a little longer with the elementalist as you have more skills to unlock per weapon. Sometimes ppl find they can’t stand, say, a dagger/dagger ele, but they love a scepter/dagger or scepter/focus or staff ele. So test them all out.

Dean Calaway.9718:

You’ll hear people saying Ranger is the worst profession in the game.
The reasons are (including but not limited to) Ranger is the 2nd most played profession, and unlike Warrior (most played) you WILL notice a bad Ranger while a Warrior gets away with a lot of stuff and is overall easier to play.

Also, pets, forget about them, NEVER rely on them, they’re slow to catch up to moving targets, won’t get off an AoE and more often than not their special ability won’t trigger and go into full cool down.

Having all that said my favourite profession is Ranger.

If the pet ability doesn’t fire, it’s because you’re spamming the key or the pet gets interrupted. Pressing the key while the animation is in effect will cancel it. Pet abilities won’t begin to fire until it is finished with the current ability or animation. If you’re using a melee pet in a dungeon, NEVER keep them in melee constantly. Send them in to use their ability, then recall them afterwards. It’s user error, not a bug or design flaw. That is why 90% of rangers are terrible.

Rangers are fantastic in PvE and good in sPvP but they are crappy for dungeon runs, WvW and most end-game content. Warrios are good everywhere. If you are going for the most effective class, the Warrior is the stand out. If you want to run around Tyria doing map completions, the Ranger is pretty fantastic.

Listen to the people here.

If you want to have a better experience overall, just roll a warrior. ESPECIALLY if this is going to be your first character.

I have rolled all the best professions by “accident”, but you probably don’t want to be in a state of crying for your profession to finally be decent to finally be able to enjoy the game as 1. it may never come, 2. it would take too long.

At this point of time, the consensus agrees that Ranger is the class that needs most fixes.