Guild Wars 2

I’m a warr and interested in building an alt. Anybody here awesome enough to have done all three of these classes(max level/gear in WvW) who can advise?

I used to count necro’s out, but after fighting that sob Ascii I’m rethinking my position.

Everyone will have a different opinion of what they like or dislike. Just play each of those classes to like level 20 which should give you a good idea on what the class is like.

I have mesmer, necro and ele all at level 80. All light armour professions have their places in WvW.

Ascii’s build is not the most useful in WvW, I’m just going to leave that here.

I may not have a mesmer or ele at lvl 80, but I did make the transition from warrior as my first character to necro, and leveled that necro from 2-80 in WvW. I tried the other two classes, and I just didn’t feel comfortable with the level of tankiness they had. Being a warrior I loved getting up close and personal with my enemies, but unless you run a D/D bunker ele, I think necro is the closest you can get to that feeling.

I run a condition tank necro btw. None of that power stuff :P but yes what kuora said, every light class has their place in WvW. Although I feel like necros are sometimes under-utilized compared to the other two.

Elementalist!

Being able to pull out great damage, be decently tanky while being a decent support.

Staff – Mainly support focused.. Which is how I roll. I deal pretty good damage, while being pretty tanky and having good healing power.

Dagger/Dagger – High damage + great durability with loads of boons.

Dagger/Scepter – Basically the same as dagger/dagger. If not better.

if Wv3 is your thing… I’d go with Mesmer… for obvious reasons. Of the 3 it has the most melee potential.

Otherwise I’d take Xavi’s suggestion and level each to 20 or so…

I have all three leveled, but I cannot win 1v1s with my necro at all. Also, I have never had trouble killing a necro with my ele. Just putting that out there.

Staff ele is one of the most potent support classes in the game, DD ele, not so much but they’re tough.

Mesmer, theres a few builds out there using c/dam and mantra heals which is very good in a support/ranged combat role as well, worth looking into if you don’t want to be a portal or single target power spec.

Necro, I personally run a very-high c/dam with high cyclic turnover spec, which I use to overwhelm people with condition removal and utterly destroy anyone who doesn’t. I’m pretty much a bipedal arrow cart.
There’s also the ‘Power/Well Bomber’ which is quite good for groups that roam and do hit/run tactics.

Aside from the DD Ele, most of those do require a group to function to the full potential. Depends what you want to do.

I’ve levelled and geared all 3 and I have to say, all 3 are a blast and they each have their unique set of strengths.

Like you, I pretty much ruled necros out but now I play my necro more than my ele or my mesmer.

Minoru.1237:

I have all three leveled, but I cannot win 1v1s with my necro at all. Also, I have never had trouble killing a necro with my ele. Just putting that out there.

Ive never been killed 1v1 vs an Ele or a thief as a Necro and I 1v1 them regularly. Necro is unkillable 1v1. They have so many get out of free jail cards that you can chain use. Problem is it takes them a long time to get kills, which can be bad in WvW because its rarely a 1v1 for long. They run best as a support/tank build.

Necros aren’t for everyone though. If your the kind of guy who gets a hard on from large crit damage, like most people seem to be, then Necro is not for you.

Well, the necro forum hasn’t really helped me decide on a build. I run the hybrid juggermancer build and have about 1700 toughness, 1800 power, and 1000 condition damage, and I just can’t kill anything at all. Most players on the necro forum seem despondent with the current state of the necro, and I have to concur. I have yet to find a viable build in either spvp or wvw that would enable me to win against any other class. In my experience pistol/dagger thieves stack more conditions faster than my necro.

sostronk.8167:

Necros aren’t for everyone though. If your the kind of guy who gets a hard on from large crit damage, like most people seem to be, then Necro is not for you.

Very true,

They’re also a class that needs a lot of very careful positioning on a battlefield (which mostly comes down to experience and knowledge of the enemy behavior) as there’s very little in the way of an ‘outa here’ like many classes have, you can absorb it longer than a lot of other classes, but currently DPS massively trumps Defence in this game.

I like to stick to the largest hills I can. Jump off the hill and pop F1. 0 damage no matter how far you fall. When I am getting chased down we can chain fears, slows and cripples. I know its not like Eles and Thiefs who have stealth and large gap makers. F1 off a hill is always hilarious. Last time I tried to 1v3 defend a supply point but it got taken, they came after me and I jumped off a hill, they followed and I killed all 3 of them.

if you like group play, and like trolling the other group (enemy in WvW), definitely play a mesmer….

IF you want to help large group/zerg —> Mesmer. Portal + Time warp is probably the best class combo of WvWvW abilties that make a difference.

IF you want to see big numbers over lots of enemies heads forcing them to smash their keyboards —→ Ele

IF you want to roam in smaller groups and be nye unkillable, benefit your allies, and put pressure on ANY class —→ Necro

Harrish.8743:

(although glamour builds aren’t very good for this and I haven’t had much experience with shatter or phantasm builds which probably work better). Mesmers in general lack speed as well, which could also be a problem with a roaming build.

Shatter builds especially work very well for roaming, and are wicked DPS in a group situation too (Perhaps not the best for groups, but constant AOE confusion bombing and burst damage from mind wrack can absolutely decimate whole groups of players if you get even 10-15 seconds to unload on them before they realize why they’re all dying).
Thieves are no problem to a good shatter mesmer,
DD eles are a bit of a nuissance if they’re played really well, they’re the only class I ever get a little nervous about encountering alone.

EnRohbi.2187:

Shatter builds especially work very well for roaming, and are wicked DPS in a group situation too

+1 to this. I have tons of fun playing a shatter build in small roaming groups. It’s actually harder to zerg surf with a shatter build since your options are limited to picking at the edges of a group and taking out stragglers (thieves do this better) or jumping headfirst into the middle of a group, unloading shatters, then immediately taking whatever option you left open as an “exit strategy.”

Got all 3 to 80 in WvW mainly, Necro all the way from 2-80 aside 2 lvls in the late 70’s from CoF runs.
All 3 in full exotics also, and now ran all 3 in dungeons too a fair bit.

What i’d say is, it depends what you want to do.
For zergs, all 3 are very useful, though i’d say of the 3, the mesmer is the least useful in a zerg aside a few of scenarios.

1) Portal bomb
2) Enemy turtles, so you use feedback
3) Time warping golems or something

Necro and Ele are epic in zergs with AoE damage and useful skills. Necro fearing people off siege/repairing gates/defending siege is very good as is ele using swirling winds or static fields depending on weapon set (d/d isn’t really a zerging set).

For roaming, Necro probably falls into last place. The speed the mesmer can solo camps is quite impressive if you do it right, and the ele with a bunker d/d build will stick most peoples bodies 6 ft under.

I couldn’t vote one of the 3, love them all a lot.

Katsumoto.9452:

Got all 3 to 80 in WvW mainly, Necro all the way from 2-80 aside 2 lvls in the late 70’s from CoF runs.
All 3 in full exotics also, and now ran all 3 in dungeons too a fair bit.

What i’d say is, it depends what you want to do.
For zergs, all 3 are very useful, though i’d say of the 3, the mesmer is the least useful in a zerg aside a few of scenarios.

1) Portal bomb
2) Enemy turtles, so you use feedback
3) Time warping golems or something

Necro and Ele are epic in zergs with AoE damage and useful skills. Necro fearing people off siege/repairing gates/defending siege is very good as is ele using swirling winds or static fields depending on weapon set (d/d isn’t really a zerging set).

For roaming, Necro probably falls into last place. The speed the mesmer can solo camps is quite impressive if you do it right, and the ele with a bunker d/d build will stick most peoples bodies 6 ft under.

I couldn’t vote one of the 3, love them all a lot.

Having all 3 geared and played regularly in WvW (also leveled in there), I have to agree with this post. Condition Necros are insanely useful in zerg battles and mesmers/eles are two of the best duelists in the game. Though a crit focused meleeish Necro can be a good duelist and roamer which I’m currently gathering gear to build, I’ve run it in spvp and have a blast.

I play ele and mesmer and thief. Mesmer is my newest 80, kitten I love the toon. He is a machine in every way. I disagree that mesmer are no good in zergs. I love the range any mobility, staff deals decent ae and GS allow you to pick a person and burst them down. I hae a lot of fun on Ele tanking 3-5 people at a time, thief is fun to melt lowbies and bad players. But kitten mesmer has it all, range, burst, mobility , stealth and crazy good group skills like portal and time warp.

I have an ele and mesmer and both are really good for WvW, but they play very differently. I know it is obvious advice but since both are very good and useful it might be better to go to heart of the mists and see which one you enjoy more (ele has a lot of bar swapping which is fun some times, but some people are not huge fans). I have no idea about necros.

But if you just want some of my views:
Ele:
- very mobile
- Kills a bit slower when roaming since they usually need to spec for survivability
- great healing and can fight against lots of people when roaming
- amazing aoe in a siege with staff
- lots of control skills
- up close fighting when roaming
- more adaptable because of attunements

Mesmer
- can do good damage and works better at range, for small fights, than ele
- lots of support abilities if you spec less offensively
- very slow
- portal and TW which are very powerful in raids
- Much worse AOE than a staff ele or necro. Needs to spec and build to get any decent AOE