(edited by Aanitis.3084)
warrior class help?
At lower levels the attribute points you get are often more important than the actual traits so start with Strength and Arms to gain Power and Precision; any leftover points go into Discipline for crit damage. Those attributes are also the ones you should focus on when choosing gear.
As your main weapon set Axe/Mace is good, and you can increase their damage by 5% once you have 10 points in Strength. As a second weapon set you could try Longbow or Rifle; not because they are good but because it allows you to fight from afar when you think going into melee is too dangerous.
At lower levels Healing Surge and Healing Signet are about equally good healing skills, at higher levels you gain access to traits that get better the more adrenaline you have and thus Healing Surge gets better.
Banner of Discipline and Signet of Rage (Elite) are imo good skills for open PvE; you can pick up the Banner and gain new skills, and between Banner #2, #3 and the Signet you should have almost constantly Swiftness and Fury up.
The ideal leveling build for a warrior is Greatsword/Longbow, Power/Precision gear, all signets for healing, utilities, and elites, and at least 10 points in Arms for +40 precision pure unused signet. I like 10 in discipline for 25% movement speed too.
That said, play whatever you prefer. That build is a min/max build for leveling and wont actually help you learn the game because of the playstyle. Just pick a weapon you like, and then go power/precision/toughness as your main stats. The only exception is a sword, in which case you’ll want to swap out power for condition damage.
Healing Signet, Mending, and Healing Surge as heals are all viable. Use whatever you prefer.
For elites, Signet of Rage is the best, and the other ones aren’t really that useful. Rampage is fun though.
For utilities, they’re divided into 5 categories. Physical, Signet, Banner, Shout, Stance. For leveling, you probably want a good mix of defensive and offensive ones. So taking Endure Pain (5s of taking zero damage) or For Great Justice (might and fury boons) is good.
For weapons, you can divide them into some categories:
One-hands:
Mainhand/Offhand Axe is almost entirely damage orientated
Main/hand/Offhand Sword is a mixture of physical and condition damage, primarily being a condition weapon (conditions are DoTs)
Mainhand/Offhand Mace is a defensive natured weapon with a lot of CC in mind
Two-hands:
Rifle: Strong single target ranged weapon, physical damage mainly
Longbow: Strong AoE ranged weapon, is viable for physical or condition damage (about the same, maybe a bit in favor of physical)
Greatsword: Very high mobility and damage
Hammer: Medium damage and high CC
Off-hand Only:
Warhorn: Good utility and support for allies and self
Shield: Good CC and defensive utility
Basically, for all weapons but swords, you want power. Even with power, swords are okay for leveling. So, my suggestion is to have these stats (a good mix of them) as priorities: Power/Precision/Toughness. Vitality is a possible replacement for Toughness.
Stat explanation:
Power: Increases direct damage
Precision: Increase critical strike chance
Toughness: Decreases damage taken
Vitality: Increases health pool
The rest are very obvious. Crit damage is critical strike damage, condition damage is more damage from conditions (the DoTs), condition duration increases the length of conditions, healing power increases healing, etc
But again, it’s really irrelevant. My first character I leveled was a warrior, and I did this really silly Longbow/Axe burning build, but it was plenty effective. Leveling content just isn’t hard enough for build min-maxing, at least at the first half. Once you get to 70+ the zones are much harder.
(edited by Larynx.2453)