Guild Wars 2

disclaimer: my main is a Thief.

i’m curious as to what everyone’s impressions of the classes are for sPvP (both 8v8 and 5vt5 tourney). my own impressions are based off of what it feels like to me, playing with and against these classes, and also just my observation of the popularity level of these classes.

Ranked by Perceived Power Level

Top Tier: Thief, Guardian, Mesmer
Mid Tier: Warrior, Ranger, Elementalist
Lowest Tier: Necromancer, Engineer

Ranked by Perceived Popularity Level
Top Tier: Thief, Warrior, Elementalist
Mid Tier: Guardian, Ranger, Mesmer
Lowest Tier: Necromancer, Engineer

thats how I see things. just my impressions.

I’m no expert on Necro or Engi but it seems to me that these classes need some love. They seem unpopular, and alot of that unpopularity is probably due to some balance problems. These are both pretty complicated and subtle classes so I’m sure there’s alot of L2P issues going on too, but it can’t only be that. Players are finding it hard to be successful as these classes and are not playing them as much.

I see Thief, Warrior and Elementalist played very heavily and I can understand why as these 3 classes are the closest fit to your classic RPG archetypes (rogue, fighter, mage). These are the 3 classes I also see people having the most trouble with in terms of simply playing badly. The popular thing for alot of people seems to be to build a very one-dimensional burst damage version of the class (Sword+Pistol Thief, Greatsword Warrior, Dagger+Dagger Elementalist) and run around trying to kill people in 1on1. This isn’t playing well of course but those burst damage kills can be frustrating when the majority of your opponents are specced that way.

My own perception (as a Thief player) is that Guardians and Mesmers are the most potent PvP classes in the game and are the real driving force behind winning a map (as opposed to just racking up kills with your burst damage spec).

I think it’s:

Top: Thief, Guardian, Mesmer, Ranger(?)
Mid: Elementalist, Engineer, Engineer, Necromancer Ranger (?)
Bot: Warrior

Almost everyone that streams competitive tPvP says Warrior doesn’t bring anything to the table any better than any other professions, meaning they’re completely lacking.

Thief and Mesmer bring the heavy burst with at least two solid skill builds, and guardian bunker can be impressively solid.

Ranger lies somewhere in between, some people complain about utilities, most complain about power short bow + quickness. Then there’s the spirit and condition builds.

Engineer has a bunker and condition build that is really solid, and their downed state is complained about a lot. Necromancer definitely has its place, but many teams say it almost needs to be built around. Elementalist also brings damage, can go heavy support (allowing some point holding) but downed state is mediocre.

class tears

(im a warrior)

About Necromancers, people are not building a team around them, they are building a team around one of their skill which is Epidemic.
Throw Epidemic away of the bar and none wants you.

Why would building around epidemic be good in a 5v5 non-zerg fest? jw.

konvay.2157:

Why would building around epidemic be good in a 5v5 non-zerg fest? jw.

It works very well in 3v3, or 4v4 at center. Or even 2v2. After all most teams will mark a target to attack. If your running a condition team than everyone is going to condition up a single target. With epidemic your team will at the same time kill or at least take a large chuck of health out of all the other enemy players in the area, while only focusing on a single target. By the time you have killed the first target the other enemy players are low on health or have had to use their heals (condition removers).

I’d swap Engineer and Ele on your list. Engineer is tricky and much like Necro, largely hampered by a mile long bug list. Ele has some fundamental issues though. All 3 are fairly uncommon in spvp. With Necros probably being the rarest class in spvp.

Whilst any given match will have 3-5 Thieves, Mesmers and/or Warriors.

Why does it matter? So everyone can feel better about themselves by picking the “cool underused hipster class?” PS i play my engi a bit more then my mesmer does this mean I’m a cool hipster?

Derps.7421:

Why does it matter? So everyone can feel better about themselves by picking the “cool underused hipster class?” PS i play my engi a bit more then my mesmer does this mean I’m a cool hipster?

in the long run it doesn’t matter, though I was curious and wanted to see how other people saw things.

in the short run it can help the community get a more holistic view of how people feel about the classes. everybody has a biased perspective based on what they play as a main. getting people to share their perspectives might overcome some of these biases and help us all get a more clear perspective of how things really stand.

Xhaiden.3891:

I’d swap Engineer and Ele on your list. Engineer is tricky and much like Necro, largely hampered by a mile long bug list. Ele has some fundamental issues though. All 3 are fairly uncommon in spvp. With Necros probably being the rarest class in spvp.

Whilst any given match will have 3-5 Thieves, Mesmers and/or Warriors.

maybe its just my anecdotal experience, but i seem to see Elementalists played very commonly. the 3 classes i basically ALWAYS see in any given 8v8 are Warrior, Thief, Ele. definitely different in 5v5 though. tournament teams are more picky about their classes and i definitely see fewer Eles and way more Mesmers their.

How are engis the lowest tier? They have the most stuns/knockdowns in the game.

sorrow.2364:

About Necromancers, people are not building a team around them, they are building a team around one of their skill which is Epidemic.
Throw Epidemic away of the bar and none wants you.

Necro’s are also awesome when going against condition based teams and if they ever fix plague signet will be godly if the metagame actually shifts heavily to condition teams in anyway.
Sure there are plenty of classes that can remove conditions from themselves/teammates… but apart from mesmers arcane thievery on themselves only necromancers are the only ones that can take all of the allied conditions and transfer them to the enemy with deathly swarm, putrid mark and plague signet
They can then spread all those conditions with epidemic!
Oh and then there is corrupt boon. Mesmers are again the only ones that come close to its functionality with null field but thats 6 of one half a dozen of the other (one cleanses all boons in an AoE one changes all single target boons into conditions). Of course it is also bugged to high hell and doesnt work half the time

my impressions for spvp is its not balance,d never going to be balanced, and the goal of the game isnt to balance around it.

Bunker Engi for top tier.
Haven’t seen many decent ones.
Someone who’s played against Cricket back me up here…

uh…

Fenix.4795:

How are engis the lowest tier? They have the most stuns/knockdowns in the game.

i don’t play an engi, so i’m not trying to create any kind of “official” ranking. you’ll note that i labeled the tiers “Perceived”. this is my perception, based on what it looks like to me from the perspective of a Thief that plays in alot of sPvP battles. when I talk to other people in game about this stuff they tell me similar things.