Guild Wars 2

Awww, that’s a shame. Oh well, giant rectangle minimap for me then.

I feel silly not being able to figure this out after looking on the wiki and the forums, but I have seen screenshots where the mini-map in the lower-right of the UI is circular instead of rectangular. How do I do this?

I continue to be surprised they don’t split the skills into PvE and PvP versions. Oh well, I still enjoy the game, just think it could be much easier on themselves and us if they did this, just as they have done it in Guild Wars 1.

See, now that’s interesting. I tried a build that went 0/20/0/30/20 and kept Phantasmal haste and ran Sword/Pistol and Sceptre/Focus and it actually downed things faster than the build that dropped Phantasmal Haste for more power and damage from Domination+Phantasm trait. I think it would work better in dungeons, too, because of the reflect on the wardens, but also because you have a ranged and melee Phantasm, not counting the defender, so you spread the love with retaliation on clumped phantasms near the enemy and regen for meleers and ranged teamates.
The speed that the Phantasms attacked actually made up for the fact that they didn’t do as much damage, and the secondary ability of their attacks (like the warden reflect) would happen more often, too.

Dog.1472:

Really, you guys just want mounts.

Ya know, this actually would solve the problem. We are, by a rather large margin, the slowest out of combat profession. Some say guardians are slow, but mine has almost permanent swiftness with a staff and a single trait.
Not sure why some people say it would make us overpowered to move faster, as we would almost never want to take a movement increase over another ability. A signet is a perfect idea, since almost no one would give up blink, or any of our other utilities, just to move a little faster in combat.
We don’t want to be overpowered speed-junkies. We just want to explore a little faster or keep up with our friends or the herd in Wv3 without having to give up all of our rune slots. No one else has to pay that price so why should we?

Interesting. It looks like a vast majority of Phantasm-ers drop Phantasmal Haste. This actually makes sense to me since the illusions line gives us condition damage and shatter recharge, which don’t help much with Phantasms. Also it does make more sense to get those weapon skills since it’s more likely the enemy will die and you will need to re-summon than it is that it will stay alive long enough to make Phantasmal Haste worthwhile.
I find it frustrating that I have to lose at least 1 Phantasm trait to make a Phantasm build. I haven’t had to do that with other builds.

If I had to choose based on looks and ideaology it would be Sylvari. Their concept of the world being a mystical place (they live in a metaphysical dream until they are born, after all) fits in well with mesmer. Additionally their cultural armor is neat with plant wings and stuff like that.
I chose Charr, though. I wanted to be a Charr caster who wasn’t an elementalist (bad flame legion is bad… and I’m not good at switching elements) and necromancy was too cliche imo. I was surprised to find out it actually fits with the story too, the Ash legion is about stealth and subterfuge. Most light armors look pretty bad on us, my lower backside is often showing but our cultural armor reminds me of Ritualists from GW1 and when I summon Phantasms, it’s kinda like “spirits.”

Yea, we no longer dump aggro and enemies that started an attack when you hit decoy still finish it by hitting you. This was a silly change that happened because of the stealth of thieves and we got caught in the middle of it. The purpose of Decoy is to do EXACTLY what it used to, invis you so you can get away while the bad guys hit the clone. It’s a… ya know… DECOY. As it stands now, it’s largely just a clone generator or perhaps a straight invis skill so you can run past things before they actually see you.

So, I am really interested in running a Phantasm build. Been doing the condition staff for a while, and am wanting to make something that focuses more on doing direct damage through Illusions.
I notice you can’t get it all with Phantasms. To get all the Phantasm traits 10/15/0/25/20 is necessary, but that doesn’t allow you to get the weapon traits that actually create those Phantasms. If you want more damage from Phantasms you have to drop Phantasmal Haste in the Illusions line to get more into Domination, etc.
What do you think is the most reasonable choice to drop from the possible Phantasm traits? Did you choose to take them all and just have slower weapon recharges, and if so, do you find that that works well?

I have to say that of the characters I have played, Necromancer does have the most options when it comes to builds that actually work. Even just looking through class forums, there is far more debate in the necro forums as to which build is best, whether it be minions, conditions, wells, etc. For other classes, it’s pretty obvious what works and what doesn’t, and while you can run builds other than the mainstream, they are either far less effective, or have too narrow a focus.

When it comes to Death Shroud, they need to decide what they want it to be. If it’s a transformation, then make it like the others. Frankly, necromancers SHOULD be able to DS rez and stomp, etc. Our class mechanic is this. We don’t have the ability to swap all our weapon skills, or heal/protect a team, or deal extra damage with the touch of a button. We have an extra health pool. What we do with that health pool should be up to the creativity of the necro.

Zovo.7829:

I run with a Scepter/Pistol combo almost exclusively. The combination of the Pistol #5 and Scepter #3 is just plain unfair.

In a one-on-one fight (against mobs or players) it’s almost unfair. Open with Pistol #4 to get some quick fast hits, stun ‘em with pistol #5, Scepter #3 to stack confusion before they recover, then shatter all the clones/phantoms to stack even more confusion, by the time they realize what’s happening their toast. If not, a couple dodges can net you another pair of clones (w/ the trait) which you can shatter fast. If that fails to bring ’em down, the confusion and Scepter #2 should keep you safe enough long enough for pistol #5 to cycle back around.

It really only falls flat in group fights, for which I swap over to Staff.

See, I wanna try something exactly like this, but with a Phantasm build, something like 0/20/0/30/20. Ideally, I’d have focus for group fights as well (temporal curtain cripple+iWarden), and it would hopefully perform decently well in dungeons due to all the Phantasm buffs.
Thanks for the everyone’s input on how it’s working for you. Gives me some new ideas.

Carighan.6758:

The clothies are pretty easy to classify, IMO:

• Do you want a class which can absolutely overload the enemy with the sheer diversity of their stuff? You always have timers at your disposal, everything you do changes all the time, and it becomes a nightmare trying to properly pre-empt you. Play an Elementalist!
• Do you enjoy being the last one standing and controlling the fight to slightly tilt the battle in your favour? Do you like the balance of having some abilities which are dangerous to you as well? Play a Necromancer!
• Do you enjoy a trickster class with lots of random effects, Clones to sometimes make enemies waste timers on? Do you enjoy indirect combat more than direct one? Play a Mesmer!

Carighan, where have you been all my life? Do you know how hard it is to get a basic, straightforward answer about which scholar to play? I have asked this several times (I am very indecisive when it comes to scholars and want a character of each armor type), and get so much opinion instead of basic, straightforward answers. I know you are being facetious, but this is good stuff.

So I rather like the sceptre on Mesmer, but have yet to find a way to use it effectively. Anyone actually use a sceptre in their build? I was thinking maybe in a Phantasms build since it’s on Inspiration line.

Interesting. I was thinking most of our stats transferred to illusions, and wasn’t aware that condduration wouldn’t affect them. Forgetting the iWarlock completely is odd, but I can see how that would help if you are focused on condition damage, since the clones could stack conditions faster and that’s where my damage is.
Thanks for the input.

I’m not really confused. It’s more a matter of what is best. I know how builds can work, but don’t know what works better for the type of playstyle I am looking for.
It sounds like from your videos Samski, I should actually be going at least 15 dueling to add the poissibility of extra bleeds when clones crit. I could also go 20 and get deceptive evasion to shatter more often. I will seriously consider that.

So, I’d like to play a mesmer that primarily summons. I am torn between two builds, the Phantasm build and the Staff condition build, and had questions about each. I will primarily be PvEing, with occassional forays into WvW.

Staff/conditions- staff clones deal damage/debuff enemy, combined with the Phantasmal Warlock, shatter when the Phantasm is just about to come off cooldown. I know I should go 25 Chaos and 20 Illusions, but not sure where to put the rest of the points. Was considering 20 Domination for longer condition duration and possibly taking Empowered Illusions to increase Warlock damage, but should I max Illusions instead for the condition damage and, if so, what major traits do you suggest?

Phantasm build- 25 Inspiration and 20 Illusions for Phantasm traits, but not sure where to go from here. I hear 20 in Dueling for bleed stacking and a faster Duelist summon, but I also have heard 20 in Domination for power to increase Phantasm damage. I also have no idea what weapons to use. I was thinking Scepter/Focus since I can get both the cooldown reducers for those weapons if I go Inspiration 30 and I hear a traited iWarden is very nice (for reflects I assume). Then either Sword/Pistol if I go 20 Dueling, using the sword clone to put on some vulnerability to increase phantasm damage or going Greatsword if I go 20 Domination for faster summon of AOE iBerzerker.

My main problem is that while I understand the basics behind the builds, there are a few things here and there I am not sure are most effective.

I am coming back to the game soon after a long hiatus and want to play a Charr Scholar. I am considering Necromancer but the things I liked abou it weren’t very good when I left.
So, tell me why you enjoy playing your necromancer.
Is it the survivability? The massive conditions you can lay down? That you can switch between melee and ranged easily, or perhaps that you can really mess with people in PvP? Is it because you can summon lots of… um… not-alive things? Is it the scary, dark spell effects?
Why do you enjoy being a necromancer?

I am coming back to the game soon after a long hiatus and want to play a Charr Scholar. I am considering Mesmer but didn’t have much fun with it before.
So, tell me why you enjoy playing your mesmer.
Is it the mobility during battle? The fact that you can both boon/condition at the same time with staff? That you can switch between melee and ranged easily, or perhaps that you can really mess with people in PvP? Is it because you can summon lots of… um… yourself? Is it the bright spell effects?
Why do you enjoy being a mesmer?

I don’t often get angry. I don’t normally care about how designers choose to make their game function, and I respect their choices to balance things however they want.
That being said, it is simply unacceptable to essentially have a mechanic for the class literally NOT function in order to balance things. Necromancer pets are there and they should work. Having them only attack what you are targeting or only aggroing on enemies that are within 500ft of you (perhaps whether you are attacking them or not) is a game balance choice. Having them literally do nothing is not a way to balance them.

I agree that minions are very good, they just aren’t reliable. That’s the frustration most people have. Minion builds (my personal favorite for the necromancer) flow very well, provide decent damage and also help cover a team a bit as it allows enemies something to hit that isn’t your squad.
But sometimes they don’t attack. And for a long time sometimes they attacked something random. Sometimes they aren’t where they do the most good. Sometimes they all die at once to a single AOE putting all but weapons skills on cooldown, completely nullifying the player for decently long period of time.
Most people prefer to have builds that work the way they are meant to at all times, and that just doesn’t happen with a minion build. Minions are great, but you can never expect them to work the way you have built them to.

I have always enjoyed playing the “monstrous” race and having them be a caster. I didn’t like Elementalist because it was cliche (It’s the mage of GW2) and I would prefer to focus on one or two elements for themetic reasons, which isn’t optimal. I would play a Necromancer if the builds I wanted to play- minions and well support- actually worked well.
That left me with mesmer, and I actually quite like it. I prefer ranged, but with all the close-range melee options of Mesmer, I agree that it’s probably the scholar profession that makes the most sense for Charr.
Now, if ever a straight water, air, or earth elementalist becomes viable, or if they fix minions and buff support of wells a bit for necromancer, I will promptly make my charr again as an elementalist/necromancer.

I am really shocked about this. It was what made our pets unique. Now we are just like necromancers… except our pets have limited duration and die when we use their secondary abilities.
And I agree with Alarox. A little piece of what made guardian unique died today, and with it, a little piece of what made Guild Wars 2 unique died as well. How much longer before they remove all the abilities (or parts thereof) that are different than your standard MMORPG stuff?

Here is why I am angry:
I totally understand why they did this. The ability for spirit weapons to just be free damage + Knockback, etc was pretty outrageous. I loved my spirit weapons because they were pretty much fire and forget unless I wanted a specific effect. In PvP I could imagine this was VERY frustrating as once a spirit weapon was headed for you, there wasn’t much you could do but wait for it to expire.
However, this is a terrible way to try and fix this problem, it shows two things that dissappoint me.
1) It seems lazy. Essentially putting back in some code that was removed for the spirit weapons is really drag-and-drop approach to fixing the problem with them. If it really is a problem, rebuild spirit weapons from the ground up. Increase their HP, make them only targetable by CC abilities, have them tether back to the guardian summoner if they get too far away, adjust cooldown times, etc. As it stands they did NONE of that and just made them easily killable. This makes no sense.
2) It removes one more thing that made Guardians unique. Most classes have pets, and each are a bit different. Mesmers can explode theirs, Elementalists have some utility in theirs, Engineers have stationary ones, etc. Guardians used to have unique pets because they couldn’t be directly attacked. Now, Guardian pets are basically exactly like necromancer pets. I really don’t see a difference between the two anymore except graphics… oh AND the fact that ours don’t last indefinately like the Necromancer ones do. So for the same utility slot, Necromancer pets are actually BETTER than guardian’s.
So, the uniqueness of the class, and therefore the game, was reduced today, and that’s sad. One of the great things about Guild wars 2 was that is was rather unique and different depending on class, even if they can serve similar roles. I fear that is slowly dying. Soon, we may have a game with every class the same except with different graphics.

I… I think I heart you. Seriously, the ONLY reasons I haven’t played a Necromancer is because 1) People laugh at me, and 2) I want to primarily summon stuff. Your posts reinforce the negatives, but also show me the possibilities of at least being decent with minions. It gives me a little hope that I don’t have to wait for a patch before being willing to really give necromancer a chance. Thanks for the info and inspiration.

However, your links say Bad Link when I click them. Could you post the actual http: so I could view your links?

It depends on what you are doing. I was trying to level as a Staff Mesmer because I really like the fun staff abilities. On a whim, I switched to Greatsword and was SHOCKED at how much faster things went down… SHOCKED. It really is quite frustrating to realize you have basically been leveling half as fast simply because you chose the wrong weapon.
That being said, for regular roaming/dungeons/etc. Staff is better IMO. Things don’t go down as fast, but Staff is fantastic for it’s ability to quickly and easily turn the tide in your favor. There’s little I can’t handle with a staff. Even if i get ambushed, I have the skills avaliable to quickly get out of it and either get away or immediately take control of the battle.
So for leveling or events, I say greatsword because it just does so much more damage quickly, but for roaming, I’d say staff.

Stormbluff Isle is quite good for the reasons listed above. I have moved around different servers and had the most enjoyable time there. Having a server that is totally packed sounded really fun to me until I started trying to get gold at the higher levels- and started having to compete with people to get it. Stormbluff is high population but not totally cramped. People are fairly good at calling out events and, to agree with Flett, I almost ALWAYS see people LFM/LFG there, and they seem to fill pretty quickly.

I am TOTALLY the same way. I have a tendancy to narrow it down to two choices, at least, but then I can’t decide which to choose. Currently, I haven’t made my main because I want it to be a Charr and a Scholar, and I don’t like elementalist, so Necromancer or Mesmer. But, having made a charr of both, I can’t decide which I want. And, of course, I cannot have two characters of the same race. Why, that would be MADNESS!
So yes I have spent hours (not as many as you though, wow) trying to figure out what I want to play and what race I want it to be… and I still haven’t decided.
Ultimately, what I normally do (when I finally decide I have had enough of my indecisiveness), is let my wants narrow it down, and then logic make the final decision. For example, I had narrowed down my Sylvari to either Guardian or Ranger. After browsing the forums, I realized that Guardian was more rare for sylvari and it was a better starting class because it was more straightforward to play. Additionally, what I wanted to do with Ranger (summon spirits) seems to need a bit of work. Summoning for the Guardian was decent though, so logically, the Guardian was the best choice. And that is what my frist character was.

I have been playing now for about a month and have decided on maining a mesmer (at least until necromancer minions AI is fixed) after getting another character to 80 and learning a lot about the game. However, I generally PvE and only do a little WvWvW.
I was very surprised that they didn’t split PvP/PvE skills, since I come from Guild Wars 1. It worked well enough there, and PvP is completely seperate from the rest of the game, it just seems logical to split them.
I hear some complaints about how the nerfs to mesmer to balance PvP really have hurt us for PvE. What were some of those? Besides splitting the skills, how would you have fixed some of these problems?

Honestly, I think necros are really great… in certain builds… builds I don’t want to play. If everything worked well as a necro I would be playing one right now. If I play a necromancer I want to be a minion necro or well supporter. Wells are okay, but most agree minions still have some bugs. The frustrations I have with mesmer I can rune/trait to get past, but I can’t do anything about minion AI and less effective wells. Ethics was mentioning that for what I want to do, the mesmer is better right now, and I think for me, that’s correct.
Necromancer is an awesome profession, it’s just not the best for what I want to do right now.

Holy cow, the staff clones bounce and can grant boons now? WHEN did that change, or have I just never noticed it? I sat right in front of a mob in the mists and set staff clones on it and didn’t notice I ever got a boon. Man, that makes me so happy to hear as it’s even better support than I thought to go staff.

Ethics.4519:

Here’s my two cents: PvE events become very boring end-game. They might be fun now because they change all the time, but in orr/cursed shore there are only 2 or 3 viable routes to follow. Just from reading your post, it seems like it would be best to have a necro for farming (when you wanna make some money), and make your mesmer your main. The mesmer is fantastic for WvW and dungeons, which I think will hold your attention a lot more than event farming.

This is excellent advice, and it’s very timely. Right now, Necromancer is lackluster for end-game dungeons/etc. They are good at events… and that’s about it. Many necromancers have mentioned as much on their forums. Mesmer will last me in anything I decide to do throughout the game. I won’t level as fast and until I get level 60 and Runes of the Centaur I’m gonna skip trying to get map clearing, but after that, I can do whatever I want with the Mesmer and be effective.
The main reasons I want to play Necromancer (minions and wells) are not effective right now, although there has been some recent talk of fixing pet AI, it hasn’t happened yet. With Mesmer, I can fix the things that are a problem for me, and I can play any content I want, with any build I want.
Thanks for the advice.

Yea, see, that’s the problem. I mostly want to do PvE/events/dungeons. Necromancer is better for the events, mesmer for the dungeons.
I was working on ways to alleviate the problems I have with the classes. Mesmer could use runes of the centaur (it’s at level 60 but maybe I could craft my way to that level), but I am really surprised to hear a suggestion of staff for events. I LOVE the staff, but didn’t use it much because it seemed so bad for events. Still, if it works, that would fix both mesmer issues.
For necromancer, would Death Nova make minions viable in dungeons? That poison actually lasts for 7 seconds and is AOE. For supporting… there’s not much I can do about wells inneffectiveness. I could build a solid healer with Deathly Invigoration/Transfusion and Death Shroud, though.

So, I quite easily narrowed it down to Mesmer or Necromancer for my main, but can not choose between the two.
Mesmer is fun with all the clones and phantasms. However I find the movement speed to be very slow and struggle with events due to lack of ranged AOE damage.
Necromancer is very awesome with the minion summoning and wells for supporting. Sadly, minions are bugged and wells are supposedly not very good at support dispite that being their purpose. So… ya know… no one will want me in their team if I run those builds, which are the ones I find most fun.
So, basically, I have two classes I like but can’t decide which has problems I am more willing to live with.

Well ultimately, Mesmer, Necromancer, and Engineer need a bit of reworking. That makes a lot of sense, though, when you consider that they are the most non-traditional classes this game has to offer. It’s easier to balance a nuker/healer than it is to balance someone who can teleport- both themselves and others. How do you measure the usefulness of a skill like that, and how do you make it balanced against other classes?
I actually LIKE the necromancer for the reasons you said you didn’t like it, though. Necromancer is pretty static, but I appreciate the focus that necromancer has vs an elementalist or mesmer who has many different things they do with the same build.

Yea, I didn’t actually mean I was running them at the same time. I intend to respec for dungeons, etc. Wells seem like they would be good for events as well so I could tag things.

So, I think I have finally settled on Necromancer to play next. I am looking into playing a Minion Necromancer, which I understand is still very frustrating due to bad AI, but also because they die too quickly to AOEs in dungeons.
As such, I had intended to play marks/well for dungeons and run support. However, I keep seeing complaints about that, as well. I don’t really understand them, considering you are able to apply continual AOE support.
Is this idea not viable? Why would that be?

I had the same problem and could not decide for a long time. Mesmer is very fun- porting around the field, setting up combo fields and generally taking the fight into your own hands is very fun. It’s a bit tricky to set up, though, and is frustrating to level. It lacks a few things that help it feel well-rounded, but has great reward for those willing to take the time and effort to get it there.
Necromancer is more foundationally sound. Each necromancer build is fairly straightforward, and there are many different builds that are very solid, including AOE support, melee damage, and minions. Generally, I find necromancer has useful abilities for whatever it is I am doing. It does not, however, have the utility that mesmer has for specific fights.
For example, necromancer has more accessable run speed buffs, which is useful for leveling and traveling the world, and also has wells and marks for AOE support and tagging mobs in events. Is fairly straightforward and can be used for many different aspects of the game. It can’t, however, shut down specific bosses with specific utility skills like a mesmer can (feedback on a major projectile they know is coming, etc).
Overall, necromancer will serve well in whatever general purpose you are looking for. A mesmer, on the other hand, will dominate any battle he is prepared for.

I couldn’t figure out why you thought a shatter would be good for Dynamic Events, and then I realized, the Greatsword clone appears right next to the enemy, and then can be immediately shattered. I was having a problem with the staff clone/phantasm needing to run to the enemy. That is brilliant and might be the missing piece of the puzzle for me. Since you can shatter every 10 secs, and the cooldown for the clone is even shorter, it’d mean at least one shatter on each pack in events, and that might be enough, with the PhantasmBerzerker and the bouncing of Mirror blade and small AOE of Mind Stab.
Man, I’m gonna have to be on top of my game to pull all that off, though.

I have always liked bestial races in games, especially MMORPGs. Anet’s allowing all professions for all races sealed the deal for me. There’s a strong tradition of warrior-types in monstrous races, and I find that dissappointing. This tradition is continued here in the Charr, but not as tightly. The Charr society allows for roles that are outside the traditional fantasy ones normally assigned to races like this.
As such, I really wanted to play a Charr Mesmer or Necromancer (I still can’t decide which), as my main. It is interesting to me that Anet managed to get the “monstrous” mentality in the Charr, and yet refine it to the point that they are both intelligent and caring.

Thanks. What you read online is not always based on personal experience. I can look up the AOE of Mesmer vs. the AOE of other classes, I can hear people’s opinions on how things seem to work, but what I really wanted was personal experiences from those who have played the class- do you feel effective in events, at least enough to be fun?
Mesmer was so very fun for me when I played one, but the things that hold me back from really spending time leveling one are the movement speed (which I got great advice for, thanks to this forum), and Dynamic Events. Honestly, I don’t care if I get a lot of loot drops, although it would be nice. But to play events and get very little from them because you get bronze, that’s… well… that’s not what I’m looking for.

I just wanted to ask how your experiences have been in PvE as a Mesmer, specifically Dynamic Events. I see a lot of frustration over the AOE capabilities of Mesmer and I realize this makes us less than optimal for DEs. I also felt very frustrated with DEs when I kept getting bronze on them, but I believe I was using the wrong weapon (staff).
Honestly, how bad is it? When traited for Greatsword, is it difficult for you to get Gold ratings in DEs? How bout drops?
For those of you who have other characters, do you notice it’s a very large difference in your effectiveness in DEs? Do you simply use other characters to farm gold/etc, and use your mesmer as your main?

Well that just is very sad to hear. Oh well, my other characters can do events, then.

good to know. Thanks for the info.

Okay I’m really confused. Why does the nerf to Shattered Strength lower our ability to tag mobs in PvE and get the loot/credit from events? All I saw was mention of Greatsword, and I’m not sure how the two correlate.

DestregA.5314:

If you havn’t been pvping on your mesmer you missed out.

It’s never been good at pve, play a warrior for that. You actually get loot.

You know why I still haven’t really played a mesmer, even though I find the actual gameplay incredibly fun? This. This right here.
And the slow movement across Tyria, but mostly this.

So, I was playing around trying to learn some things about my mesmer, mainly how I could make it possible to actually be decent at tagging mobs in events.
I was pleasantly surprised to discover phantasms, if they have begun their attack, actually persist after the mob used to generate them has died, until their attack has ended. That opens options for using the iWarden to tag things in events.
However, I couldn’t figure out if shattering was similar through my experiments. If you shatter, but the enemy dies before your illusions can reach it, do they still shatter at the location it died? I don’t think they do, but couldn’t really tell when I shattered right as the test golem died.
It’d be a shame if they didn’t, considering my shatter still goes on cooldown.

Do boons gained from Runes get boosted by the rune itself and from Concentration? For example, if I use Superior Runes of the Centaur x 6 with a 30% concentration, would I get 15 seconds of switness? (10s base +20% from the 4x Rune of the Centaur ability + 30% boon duration from concentration)

I think it comes down to why you play the game. I don’t really PvP that much and prefer to play a well-rounded profession, so the necromancer fits my needs (traveling speed, support build, AOE for events). There are some very glaring holes for my playing the game in the Mesmer profession that aren’t easily remedied. I see necromancer as more solidly built.
I totally understand why so many of you guys complain (my necromancer was only level 20 and even with only 2 pets sometimes one of them didn’t attack, Wells are generally less powerful and versatile than others’ support, etc.), but the core profession mechanics are there, they just need tweaking. Necromancer, in my opinion, does not need any major reworking, just a few number changes and it’s good to go. Other professions need some serious changes to how their abilities work for me to really be happy with them.
In a perfect game, all classes would be viable for any wants the players had. Unfortunately, that’s pretty much impossible and for my primarily PvE playing, and needing movement speed and AOE tagging, necromancer is just better.

My first level 80 was a guardian and the uptime on the swiftness was much less frustrating. Someone already posted here, but Guardians have higher base AND traited swiftness uptime, so mesmer really IS the slowest profession in the game. Additionally, staff helps assist with the reason I want more movement speed- AOE tagging. I just want more movement speed to explore the world more and get to events for Exp/Kharma/money.
Additionally, that brings up a good point in that most other professions have multiple ways to get more movement speed in the profession itself. Mesmers have only one reliable way and that’s with a focus.

Are you kidding me? I HATE playing my Mesmer. Sure, it’s really incredibly fun for short bursts in certain battles, but the basic mechanics of the class annoy me to no end. No consistent run speed buff, summons tied to a creature and that wipe as soon as the enemy is down, long recharges on any of our AOE, and a lack of it to begin with.
Honestly, Necromancer is a JOY to play when I run one. I level more quickly as I can get to events/hearts faster, I die less because I can hit Death Shroud and either finish off enemies, or run like the screaming banshee I become. I can summon my minions whenever I want, not just when an enemy is around and alive. AOE is fantastic with Marks/Wells.
Oh kitten it, I think I just convinced myself to play a necromancer…
I see what you did there Sheobix, you evil genius.