Guild Wars 2

How does it work later on? I noticed with the necro my pets were dropping one by one and I had to constantly re-summon them, sometimes it got pretty close to running out of pets before I managed to get my flesh golem back up with its cooldown. For Ranger, wouldn’t you be able to just keep swapping pets and never be in danger of actually running out? Just wondering, since it seems like you would run out of pets much quicker later on with necro.

Well, I played both up to 35 now. Still having a hard time deciding which to play honestly. I managed to find and drop a champion on my necro, and both classes are capable of soloing the two champ bandits in the human zone (to be fair they aren’t all that dangerous, just massive health bags) so I guess I’m still not sure which to go with. Wish my ranger had been able to hunt down a random champion also, may have to just camp a spot and wait for it to spawn.

Thanks for the ideas.

If it makes a difference, I’m referring specifically to a pet focused Necromancer and a pet focused Ranger. Figure I should mention that since there are lots of ways to play Necromancer. Not sure how many ways you can play Ranger but I know their pets are always there.

Before people gasp and say MMO’s are for grouping, I already have a grouper, a Warrior that I love to pieces. I’m looking for something to do in my down time when I don’t feel like grouping up.

I already have both a ranger and a necromancer in their mid-20’s, the problem is that I enjoy both of them. I want to focus on one or the other and start to make some progress with them and playing both at the same time drastically reduces how quickly they move. It isn’t that I’m in any particular rush to get them to cap (I’m going to be 100%ing the world map on this character) but I would like to be able to make progress with them at a somewhat reasonable rate.

I enjoy pet classes and they both provide me with such in their own way. I would really appreciate some insight on how the two compare for soloing PvE in regards to soloing higher end things that are maybe not meant for solo, or at least harder for many classes while being easier for ranger or necromancer, things like that.

I’m personally leaning a little towards the ranger, they seem more laid back and sturdier than the necromancer, especially since you don’t have to keep an eye on all your pets. Just use 3 sigils, a bear/drake, and sip coffee. Of course that’s only in the mid 20’s, I don’t know how either of them play later on.

This would basically be my character for doing the various holiday events, and unlike my group character, I would be trying to max out crafting and the like for this one as well. Starting with tailor/weaponsmith or leather/huntsman, depending.
Long story short, looking for the better solo PvE class to play in my down time. I was just trying to flesh it out a bit more to see if it helped. Thank you in advance for the ideas.

Thanks for the replies!

Maybe I should do this instead? Sylvari Warrior, Human Ranger/Necro? That at least gives me one of each armor tier, and the heavy armor on Sylvari seems nice for some reason. Still torn but at least something is coming from all this torment. Kind of having a thought about sylvari warrior, sort like a willow that bends but never breaks kind of thing.

Of course, I just prefer to spend time with a character I plan to keep. Nothing quite as frustrating as getting 3/4 of the way to level cap and suddenly wishing you had played something else. At least to me. I’m definitely playing a ranger human or ranger sylvari as my main, I even have them both created, named, everything. I just don’t know which to go with. Hoping the pics help but…who knows?

That is a lot of nice outfits, thanks for showing them off. Not actually sure it helps me (you make them both look great), but it’s certainly some inspiration. Both look so good it hurts. You’re right though, I will likely have both races eventually, just not sure which class to use for which. I like the cultural armor for humans and sylvari and those are the biggest differences. I prefer the human armor a little but you can get some really fancy looking stuff with sylvari also. So much torment, you would think this would be the easy part of playing the game :P

You’re also right that there will likely be many of both. Human and sylvari are my favorite races. Really dislike the kitties (armor clipping from heck) and moles (love their personality and story, just…don’t like playing them), and as much as I like norn, I really dislike the norn cultural gear. I’ll still likely make one eventually but not right now.

These are the current two I’m trying to choose between. Yea, low level, low gear, I know. But I love them both. I just want to play one though ^^;; Halp!

Also, ignore the other chars >.> They are in limbo for bday presents for now.

Yea, I know it’s a silly thing to get stuck on, but for some reason it’s making me a little bit crazy. Even knowing race is 99% cosmetic I just can’t decide which I like better. I got perfect names on both, appearances I love on both, but I really want to pick one and level it. I’ll make the other later on as a different class but picking which race should basically represent my “main” is hard for this game.

Female. I’ve gone through them for hours at this point at the bank wardrobe, I’m pretty much hung on indecision right now.

Made a Ranger, been digging through armor sites for a while. Kinda surprised to see that virtually all the armor is shared. Not really a big deal, was just surprised. Anyway, I like the human cultural armor better for medium, but since I haven’t played much, which race do you think looks better in medium armor in general? It does seem like mixing and matching Sylvari armor might be harder with the unique designs they have. So what do you think? I want to play dress up.
What? I do. Don’t judge me.

Thanks for all the replies. I think I am going to come back, see how the game feels, can’t hurt right? It’s free since I already have the base game purchased anyway.

As far as soloing everything not involving an instance, any opinions on best class for that? I know that every class can do it, but would there be a best for it? I’ve seen a lot of mixed reviews for Ranger with just the last night of hunting around, some still say it’s the best, some say terrible, not sure anymore. I rolled up another one anyway just because but I’m still open to try another class. I sort of like how simple Ranger is though, but again, always open for discussion. I’ll likely try a thief or warrior at some point just to dip my toes in the water as well, but would prefer to actually focus on one character for the time being. Maybe necro? There’s a lot of talk on minion necro vs pet ranger for soloing also.

I don’t really plan to compete with anybody for crafting, I tend to craft purely for my own use/pleasure and for friends/guildies. Profit is a secondary thing.

Thanks for such a long post, and for the other reply as well that popped up while I was posting this. I’ll be waiting for more opinions but these are a really good places to start.

Genuinely surprised the almighty Bearbow is so bad now, might have to give another class a shot then. I remember having no trouble soloing champs before. Long fights maybe, but the bear lived almost forever. Ranger was always the one I gravitated towards, not just for the pet, but because their class mechanic was easy to use. Which is also the pet, I guess. Never understood how you could play thief and never get hit, you can only dodge so many times. Honestly, I think I am just bad at melee in this game, but at least I can admit it :P might need to practice it a lot more. What makes thief so good for solo?

Nice to know race basically boils down to whose butt I want to look at forever, of course I’ll still agonize over it for hours, but that’s just me.

What are generally the best (or at least, ones that will always be useful) crafts to aim for? My ranger was working on their weapon and armor so I could try to craft them both, but I know there are other options. I remember ring crafting being useless because of something you could buy? I forget what they were called now though.

Ok, so no murdering my Ranger. She survives…this time… >.>

It isn’t that I never PvP’d, I would wander out into the WvW map sometimes, I think? The one with three islands and a middle island. But the idea of doing any kind of organized PvP scares the heck out of me. I have nothing but terrible experiences in doing that sort of thing with any MMO I’ve basically ever played, and yes, as you mentioned, LoL. Holy wow is that a toxic community in LoL, even in the lowest learning ranks it’s basically “start game 1 as an expert or LEAVE!” >.> Yea…PvP scares me…honest truth there.

As a note: I know the general idea is “play the class you like” but for me, that is generally the class that solo’s best. I have very little interest in the specifics of the class itself, but the class that will take me the absolute farthest solo tends to be the one I enjoy most. In the rare instances that isn’t the case (DK in WoW for example, I would much rather play the second best Hunter, I really don’t enjoy DK anymore) I am more than happy to play my preferred class. But the solo class tends to be the one I try first and generally enjoy the most. Maybe I’m just weird.

Hello! Haven’t played the game for a while, considering coming back, want to find out some things before I do though. As a note, the last time I played was before the skill revamp.

Is it worth coming back if I don’t have the expansion? I don’t have the $50 laying around right now to pick it up, I might in a month or so, but I don’t right now.

I have a barely level capped character, is it better to re-roll and start from scratch? They haven’t really done anything special at the cap that I would lose (to my knowledge) if I re-rolled. I don’t remember the game being all that complicated but trying to reboot my knowledge after months of not playing tends to bug me.

My general interests in this game: I have virtually zero interest in raids, PvP, or group dungeons. I get my fun from crafting, exploring, soloing things not meant to be solo’d, stuff like that.

Assuming I come back: which class is currently best for soloing the world, so to speak? I always tend to play pet classes in MMOs since they tend to be the best at it, I played a ranger in this game the last time I played. Are they still considered the best solo? I remember them being good at it last time I played. Beware the dreaded Bearbow! /dramatic music. Also, I never used my knockback when in groups Assuming Ranger is still my go to class, I completely forget, what secondary weapon was best for soloing? Greatsword?

Are races still more or less cosmetic? I remember that none of the races really made a huge difference. That said, do any of the races actually lend themselves to my interests? Soloing the world, crafting, exploring, stuff like that.

Any general advice is greatly appreciated, especially in regards to my love of crafting and soloing. I’m installing the game as I type this on the off chance I decide to return to the game. I more or less forget everything about the game, so yea…been a while. I just kind of miss playing, and I remember the community being fairly nice (if a little trolly sometimes, but it wasn’t normally mean trolly…if that makes sense). Thanks in advance!

IGN: sutasafaia.4872

Server is ET, if it matters, which from what I understand it really doesn’t unless you love RvR.

Anyway. my fiance and I are looking for a large friendly guild. That’s really all we care about is having lots of people online at any given time to talk to. Events are a plus but honestly not that important, it’s just nice to have some time to meet with guildies (although we both work odd hours so it’s not like we might be able to attend anyway). I tend to ask a lot of questions so that might bother some people. We both like to solo, we solo the majority of the time. Neither of of us like dungeons and avoid anything even remotely resembling a raid like the plague (with the exception of world/guild events).

We both like anime, pretty much all games, table top games, etc. We’re both hard to offend, we can both be chatterboxes sometimes. I guess that’s about it?

Just a small update, got Ranger to 39, definitely enjoying it so far. Finding my ability to survive larger mobs is getting better as well now that I’m getting used to things. Still interested in trying a second class out for when I don’t feel like playing my Ranger though. Considering waiting on Engineer until I save up enough xp scrolls and insta-levels to bypass the lower level nonsense of being an engineer without any real engineering powers though.

Also finding my ability to play any class without a passive move speed is getting harder. Feels like I’m walking through waist deep mud after getting used to waltzing around the map on the ranger.

Anyway, fairly sure Ranger is my concrete main at this point after being able to stand and basically pew pew down an elite enemy without ever taking a point of damage other than a few stray ranged attacks, thanks for the tons of suggestions and ideas. Could definitely use some ideas for a primary alt though. Of course I know Warrior can still out-solo a ranger (at least from what people say) but I can’t imagine how it could possibly be safer than ranger.

When you refer to matchmaking you talk about PvP, yes? I have zero plans to ever step foot in PvP. I always avoid it in pretty much all its forms in any game I play. The only thing I may do is roam around in WvW and attempt to do the PvE portions of it.

Rolled another warrior to try and give melee another chance, worst case scenario she can gather dust in a city between bouts of trying to learn melee properly.

In the mean time I’ll roll up the engineer, and maybe the elementalist, and see how they pan out. I was doing some research on engineer and apparently their turrets are bad? Kind of a shame, I wanted to drop a ton of turrets. Guess flame thrower could be a close second or something :P

Thanks, I’ll give them a shot, see if I can figure them out since I hear they’re fairly complicated to play. I certainly plan to get into melee at some point, it’s not like I want to avoid that entire aspect of the game, I just wasn’t ready for there to be such a vast difference in how it performed compared to…well…every other game.

So…been playing Ranger for a couple days now. Leveling slowly, taking my time, only got my new one up to ~22 now (yea, I re-rolled my other Ranger for a new race). Loving Ranger, no real complaints, plenty of fun to solo. I get a bit hurt by huge groups but so far I’ve only gone down once (got jumped by ~8 ghosts in the bearcat zone) but I haven’t actually died yet.

Decided to try and play another class for a while, shake things up a bit. Since Ranger starts with pet it feels like a Ranger to me all the way from level 1, the other classes don’t seem to feel at all like their class though. Warrior and Guardian is ok but all the other classes just feel like “generic character #86” since all they get is a weapon and a heal and nothing class defining at all it seems. Obviously this changes as you level them up but wow is it painful to level. Rangers get spoiled starting with their toy from first level.

Anyway, I tried out guardian and warrior, not honestly sure I really enjoy either of them at this point. Once again, likely being spoiled by ranger, fighting vets and higher ranked enemies is just no fun in melee. You get smushed way too easily to me, especially for characters who are supposed to be tanky. Obviously they don’t play the same way in this game as in other MMOs, I’m fine with that, doesn’t mean it isn’t an incredibly jarring experience to get used to.

So, as a change of pace from ranger, any suggestions? I’m leaning more and more towards trying to stick to range in this game, melee feels more like a chore so far. Maybe I just need to get used to the mechanics but for the time being I think I would rather just not get my face torn off. I’m sure I’ll get around to really trying out melee at some point but for now I’ll stick to practicing on my ranger with a melee weapon since I can have a pet as backup while I inevitably fail at my practicing. Are there any other classes that can stay at range the way a Ranger can?

Not looking for anything scary powerful or anything like that, my fiance and I just want to have a leveling duo and figured we could ask for advice on good synergies or ideas.

Guardian/Elementalist is what we were currently planning, greatsword vacuum + aoe sounded pretty funny.

Also considering double Engineers for setting up a small army of turrets.

Any opinions? Alternate suggestions?

Generally, yes. It isn’t speed I’m concerned about, its practicality. I’ve seen lots of video’s with Ranger’s, Thieves, and Warriors (and to some extent, Guardians) doing some fairly crazy things but it always seems to be the Ranger that never dies. Unless they get piled on, of course.

I guess that really does just leave race choice. I know that this is mostly aesthetic but I’m still unsure here as well. Human or Norn is most likely since I plan to play an Asura with a friend, not really fond of the catbears looks or the Sylvari. Of course human and norn are just bigger versions of each other mostly, but…=/

As a side question:
I know with the new wardrobe system you can wear other races cultural armor, but can you purchase a different armor type than the class you are? Could a guardian purchase a rangers cultural armor (and not use it, of course, but just purchase it).

It isn’t that I only found warrior and ranger interesting, it’s that from what I’ve been reading it’s that they are neck and neck as far as being the best soloer for PvE.

For my Ranger I’ve been using the LB and been torn between the GS and SS. I like the GS better in general, even though I love the jump back on the SS. I’ve gotten very good at jumping backwards straight into other wandering enemies though Hi guys! Ranged characters seem (in my opinion) to have an advantage in PvE since many of the worst attacks that bosses throw around seem to be PBAoE powers. Based on my roaming in WvW that seems to be far more balanced since human players will actually use gap closers/wideners where as NPCs just sort of sit there watching their health bar dwindle. I could be wrong of course, but so far Ranger has been far easier than Warrior for soloing PvE, with the exception of getting jumped by the occasional roaming band of centaur where my pet was simply unable to pick up the agro from all of them and I ran out of dodge. Wow that’s a long sentence.

Ranger just seems to be a good combination of DPS and not so squishy (most of the time) and I get the bonus of avoiding almost all nasty AI attacks.

The more I look into things the more I’m likely to re-roll a Ranger and keep it. The problem then becomes race…which will likely slow me down almost as much as picking a class >.> Yay indecisiveness! Unless something spectacular shows up and convinces me that Ranger isn’t the best for soloing, at least. Which it might.

=/

My brain hurts.

Thanks for such a great response. In regards to your very last point, trust me, race is tormenting me almost as much as class Kind of. I know I’m doing human or norn, so not nearly as much to worry about.

I did not know about the mists training, I’ll have to mess around in there. As far as video’s, I’ve done that, and done that, and done that. I’ve been working on deciding my character for a couple days now, I’ve read (most likely) every single thread on every single forum about soloing at least five times, had dozens of tabs up for comparing classes, and watched enough video’s about the classes to likely put me somewhere around the star wars trilogy in time sunk.

I know it sounds crazy to most people, it’s just how I am. I need to research, I need to know things, I can’t stand just diving in. I actually have less fun if I don’t have a game plan before I go into the game itself. Maybe I’m broken, who knows? It’s the reason I always hunt down as many opinions as I can, eventually when you pile enough of them together you wind up with an answer. I know it even sounds crazier to think that I enjoy classes based on their solo “rank” so to speak but that’s always been how I am. For groups or fun I can play pretty much anything but my main always has to be the best for soloing regardless of the class. The fact this game has so many different kinds of “best” is great, I applaud them for having such good balance, but they are definitely making me a little crazy

Also have to say, I applaud this forum in general. Lots of good responses instead of the general trolls or insults. Very nice surprise, that alone could end up keeping me around the game just for the quality of players.

Honestly, a class being boring has never bothered me as long as it’s the best at what it does. DK in WoW was fairly boring back when I played it (blood spec only needed ~3-4 buttons and you basically solo’d the entire game) but I loved it because it was the undisputed solo king for a good long time.

Still unsure if I want to leave Ranger as my main. It’s fairly easy picking up one or two dailies in WvW just roaming around and PvE has been fairly easy so far (picked up the poison bear, it’s ugly as sin but it’s nice until I can get a black bear) but it can get pretty nasty if something decides to ignore my pet and just stomp me in melee. Not sure what causes it, sometimes my pet just can’t seem to hold agro to save my life, even 1v1. Not that it’s a game breaking problem or anything, I can dodge as needed, but it seems random. Ranger is ~26 now and still enjoying it at least.

Still need to level my warrior some more and try that out, see how it compares to Ranger as far as soloing goes. Maybe try out thief as well although from what I’ve read they aren’t quite as good (close though) as Ranger or Warrior. Guardian is apparently up there also but a bit harder since they have longer cool downs and more weapon juggling? At least that is what I heard. Dunno, I dislike the idea of leveling too far and sinking time into classes that won’t end up as my main, but it’s not like anything (mostly) binds to characters so it’s still benefiting the entire account. I would certainly like to make some progress though. Not that I’m in a rush to 80 or anything but constantly leveling characters means I’m only seeing the same zones/events, that does get a little old if you have to do it too often.

Thanks for all the advice.

Currently messing with my Bearbow still pre-20 but I don’t really level very fast, I see no reason to rush to 80. I ran around and got all the capitals/lions to 100% for fun (not sure I would actually call doing that in one shot fun though, never again) and have just been meandering around. I am still noticing some issues with large groups of enemies, especially since they sometimes like to attack me instead of my bear. Situations like that were where my warrior laughed and just cleaved them into tiny pieces. On the other hand, it’s lots of fun beating up veterans and champions with basically zero threat on the ranger where my warrior has to roll around like an acrobat the entire fight.

Still unsure which I prefer, I may keep leveling both but I feel like I’m wasting time when I split focus between multiple low level characters. I would like to make SOME kind of progress after all. It’s certainly nice that all the classes are good at solo PvE but picking the right one is still making me crazy. Can’t help it, when it comes to soloing I like to use the best class for it, always have. For any other game content I’m fine but my main tends to get min/maxed badly and aimed specifically at soloing the world.

I have nothing against tagging along in world events if they happen to have a group nearby, I just never tailor my main towards group play.

Duo is potentially looking like Guardian/Elementalist but who knows, not really ready to roll that group up yet until I figure out my main.

Thanks for the info. I just got 100% Queens on my ranger, had zero issue outside of some centaur raids where I ended up with 8 enemies or so at once.

Considering trying another class through queens to see how they compare to Bearbow (I didn’t even know Bearbow was a thing, I just ended up liking bear and longbow…woops?). In-game was basically suggested thief, warrior, and potentially necro as possible better soloers than ranger. Any truth to it or should I just murder the world on ranger?

Also, going to start a duo with my fiance soonish. Guardian would be good in a duo I figure, what about Engineer? Those are the two I’m considering right now.

Thanks for the ideas, hoping to hear some more, but thank you for what’s been said so far.

Another day of reading, a little bit of experimenting in game finally, it does look like I’m going to end up with either Bowbear Ranger or GS Berserker Warrior. Yea, I know, Bowbear doesn’t teach you how to play the game but I have no interest in grouping with my ranger, I’ll save that for another character, so maybe Ranger is the way to go for my solo? I’ve had zero trouble soloing champions so far (granted I’m level 12, so…yea) but I’ve definitely had some trouble with multiple mobs at once. No deaths but fighting 3+ enemies at a time can get hairy and enemies seem really good at smacking me out of stealth just as I try to go into it.

Warrior, on the other hand, I’ve had zero trouble with smashing everything…except Champions. They out damage my personal healing even when I manage to dodge their big “you should feel bad for breathing in my presence” powers. Of course my warrior loves groups of 3+, just melt them into little puddles of death.

Bowbear has some pretty sad damage when not using rapid fire but it’s pretty safe for the most part. Is their DPS always so low? Maybe I’m just bad but Longbow only appears to have a single DPS power, then it’s just auto attack and situational powers. Warrior wrecks for damage, even at this level, but isn’t quite as safe to play. No deaths on warrior yet either but I’ve had to run a few times when I ended up in the middle of a centaur or bandit swarm by accident.

Not really sure which class will serve me better as my main solo, definitely looking for more ideas here. Thanks in advance.

Planning another character also, will likely be running a duo with my fiance. Pretty much guaranteed I’ll be using a Guardian for that one, so my group friendly character is accounted for now. Just need to work on my soloer.

Also, how does Necro stack up against Ranger/Warrior for soloing the world? No idea if I really want to play a Necro at all but it can’t hurt to ask.

I’ve been reading for the last six hours or so and the tug of war between the classes has been pretty even. Guardian, Warrior, and Ranger seem to be the most prominent but others seem to get in there as well. Problem is that most of the comments are from a year or more ago so they don’t necessarily reflect the current game. Choosing a class in a game is always hard for me, I like to focus on one or two characters and don’t like to constantly re-roll and level through the same areas just because I can’t decide what to play. I try to figure it out as best I can in advance, saves me a lot of grief in the long run. Opinions?

To give as much detail as possible:
I plan to be solo 95% of the time
I have zero interest in raiding
I have almost zero interest in dungeons
I have almost zero interest in PvP (might dabble in WvW sometimes, but that’s it)
I want to be able to solo pretty much anything in open world, including champions (at least the ones that aren’t 100% impossible to solo, assuming there are any) Map completion will also be a factor but I don’t mind if the class lacks a speed buff, that just makes things faster, not easier.
I love to craft (not that I think this matters, but I’ll put it out there anyway)

No idea if this will help, but more details tend to be useful, right? Thank you in advance for any ideas. And yes, I know “all classes are good” and stuff like that but that really doesn’t help me figure out what to play. The class itself isn’t that important, what it can actually do for soloing, however, is.