For crafting purposes, I have chosen 4 characters to start with at launch. They are as follows:
Guardian
The Guardian was my first profession and favorite profession. I love the class mechanics this one offers – the symbols being smashed in the ground, the consecrations, the healing and support, and the wide range of utility. I played over 40 hours on this character and it will definitely be my main. The guardian at times feels like a cleric, other times it feels like a strong warrior. It’s a great profession to explore the game with as it solos well and strengthens any group it joins. My Guardian will be a noble human who worships Dwayna.
Ranger
This was a slow cooker for me, but I certainly won over by now. I really enjoyed the feeling of the axe, war horn, short bow, and longbow. I found battle-trapping to be a devious way of handling opponents in a guerilla fashion. I know many players used the great sword to great effect and I’m sure this weapon will be a mainstay in PVP. The Pet AI greatly improved since the first beta, but still need tweaking for survivability. Collecting pets, summoning nature spirits, and having great single target DPS are some of the highlights of this profession. I’m looking forward to roleplaying a Norn Ranger who reveres the Wolf Spirit.
Warrior
I was impressed with the damage and the feeling of impact the melee skills gave me. This profession truly felt like its namesake and will be among the professions I play at launch. It wasn’t until BWE3 that I really dug into the character, but it’s really enjoyable. If you love weapons, action, and strength, this profession is the way to go. One of the most recognizable features was the use of banners. Being able to carry a banner into battle, use it as a weapon, and then commence to fighting was a great experience. It’s pleasantly nostalgic to see the return of many Guild Wars 1 skills and adds to the enjoyment of the meat-and-potatoes profession. I am between playing a Norn and a Charr on this.
Elementalist
The elementalist is a staple a profession, as is the Warrior, but that doesn’t diminish the splendor and variety of the skill used. This profession exhibits the dedication given to the spell animation. It also is boasts a wide variety of skills. The elements make up for the lack of weapon switching and allow the elementalist to easily switch functions. Of course, fire is AOE damage. Air is single target damage, earth is defense, and water is control and support. The elemental summons, teleportation skills and weapon conjures add a bit of flavor to an already bombastic profession. I plan on playing a Sylvari with this profession.
I also tried the following professions:
Mesmer
I wanted to love this profession. I played 300+ hours on my Mesmer in the first game and was ardently looking forward to playing profession in the more open setting of Guild Wars 2. Sadly, it wasn’t enjoyable for me. The skills seemed ineffectual to me and I felt like the clones and phantasms were just fodder. The whole illusion mechanic needs significant work for this class to be enjoyable for me. It is noteworthy that many of my guild mates enjoyed the profession when they hadn’t played Mesmer before.
Necromancer
It’s an all around solid profession with a high amount of survivability. The class feels like a ranger at some points, particularly with axes, and can overlap the role of the ranger ( conditions, pets, etc.) but provides more support options. I was happy to see the return of minions, wells, and some other legacy skills as well excited to see the new core mechanics. I do plan playing this profession, just not at launch.
I played every class over the betas...got most to at least level 7, some significantly higher. Here are my thoughts...
Warrior: Extremely versatile master of weapons, both melee and ranged. Definitely the class for you if you like having tons of different options in how you put together your weapon combos in a build, as it has more weapons available to it than any other class. Can perform several roles very well, burst DPS with greatsword, great defensive abilities with mace/shield, ranged DPS with bow or rifle...the list goes on.
Thief: Unique initiative mechanic makes this class a very flexible assassin. Unlike other classes, you don't have cooldowns. Instead, you basically have an energy bar (initiative) that is used to feed all your skills...and you can mix them up however you like. Need to shadowstep away twice real fast with shortbow? Go for it. Need to burst the hell out of an enemy with your highest damage skill? Feel free to spam it. This is a great class if you like to jump all around the map with teleports, and trick your opponent with things like stealth...which brings us to...
Mesmer: The master of deception. People seem to have a love/hate relationship with this class. Players either love the Mesmer, or think it is totally gimped. Well, I played one to level 15 in PvE, and did a lot of WvW, and I do not think it is gimped at all! You have soooooo many skills that are designed to confound your enemy, and they can be very amusing to use. There is also a cool Mesmer "flavor" on all of your skills. Thief may be able to stealth, but you as a Mesmer have a skill that not only stealths, but also leaves a clone of yourself in place where you were before you stealthed...how cool is that!
Mesmer also does pretty decent damage, and has a lot of skills (like Blurred Frenzy) that increase its survivability. I would say that this is a great class to play if you like messing with your opponents minds and EVADING getting hit at all costs rather than mitigating damage.
Guardian: Supportive powerhouse. These guys really seem like they have it all, great damage and great support. They are probably the best class at protecting their team-mates, and removing conditions. Heck, they have tons of skills that put down a Combo field light, and that makes any finisher that passes through it remove conditions. They also can do a crap ton of damage. Their staff has a skill that puts I think a stack of 8(!) Might buffs on them. That basically doubels your damage output. And to top this all off, they have decent AoE as well, and their AoEs all tend to support their team as well as harm the enemy. This is a class to play if you want to support your team while still being a damn fine warrior yourself.
Necromancer: King of survivability. I really think that no class can take punishment like a necro. Why do you ask? Oh because you have TWO HEALTH BARS with your death shroud mechanic. And you also have lots of abilities that lifesteal. Top this off with the ability to have pets that are constantly ruining everyone's day, and you have a pretty bad ass class. If you like being hard to kill and/or being able to have lots of minions that do not require micromanagement, then this is a great class for you.
Ranger: I will be honest, I didn't play ranger much because having to constantly revive my pet annoyed me lol. That aside, they seemed to have very strong melee and range capabilities...can't say much more than that.
Elementalist: The master of skills. Elementalist is another class with a mechanic that totally changes how its played. Instead of weapon swapping, you have four attunements and you can switch between them on each weapon, but you can't change the weapon itself. This means that you have TWENTY weapon skills that you can swap between for each weapon, making the class incredibly versatile. Ele has a lot of very painful AoEs, and really has a spell for almost any situation. The trick is that you can't switch to another weapon, so if you are fighting with a long range weapon (staff), you will really want to keep your opponent at bay because you can't switch to a shorter range weapon (daggers). Ele is a great class if you love having tons of skills at your disposal, and you have no problem with memorizing what all four of your different attunements do for each weapon.
Engineer: The tinkerer or the king of versatility. Like the elementalist, the engineer's mechanic changes the way the class is played in a big way. As an engineer, you have no weapon swapping. Instead, your utility skills and/or healing skill (specifically kits) can basically act as weapons. So if you have a "flamethrower kit" using it replaces your weapon. This really opens up a lot interesting build combinations. You can decide to have five "weapons" for swapping, or zero. I think there will be a lot of "tinkering" with engy builds as the game goes on because of the way this works.
The engy also has a good deal of stationary defensive capabilities in their mines and turrets. I think that a skilled engy/necro combo holding a control point would be incredibly difficult to dislodge. The engy's defensive capabilities and versatility, coupled with the necro's survivability would be ridiculous. Play this class if you love tinkering around with builds or just playing with cool toys as opposed to using magic...its versatility makes it suited for almost anything.
Pro - Amazing AoE potential with GS, hits hard with hammer, pretty beefy potential in mace/shield provided they're good enough with dodge and have utility skills to keep defenses and hp up while removing debuffs/dots.
Con - Get focus fired pretty heavily because mob aggro favors closest people (when it's not going after AoEers). Ranged skills are lacking compared to other classes, only found them helpful as utility and when bosses are too dangerous up close. Melee skills can be a chore, because enemies run out of range of AoEs (intelligently), which means any mesmers/eles/necros on the team will have the Warrior constantly chasing monsters around the room.
Mesmer:
Pro - Awesome. Extremely survivable when played correctly. Throw points in toughness for HP and slot illusions as escape mechanics and you'll almost always be the last man standing even in dungeons.
Con - Difficult class to play, very high skill cieling. People are used to outright damage, but the Mesmer's only source of spike damage is through illusion shattering. As illusions (and phantoms) are fragile, it's difficult to get them all shattered correctly before they're destroyed. Mesmer damage comes from the stacking of conditions like Confuse, Vulnerability and Daze, but most people don't have the patience to win by attrition. Even for people that like this kind of playstyle, Mesmers are a HIGHLY mobile class, I found myself forgetting where my fingers were on occasion trying to do too many things at once. I kind of like that kind of thing, though, but it's not for everyone.
Guardian:
Pro - Goddam! Phenomenal damage, great survivability, amazing utility skills...plus all their skills are so damn pretty!
Con - Hard to think of one, honestly. All their weapon skills are soooo useful, and I was shocked at my damage output. The only con I can really think of, and this is reaching a bit, is that their ranged weapons cut heavily into the DPS potential. Staff has some nice skills, but it's definitely more support, and scepter + torch combo are just kinda...meh....It should be noted that in prior betas, Sceptar was incredible, but it was 'balanced' to be inline with other ranged weapons (range is safer but doesn't hit as hard as melee) so now it doesn't really stand out.
Necromancer:
Pro - It sees dead people.
Con - I'm going to be rolling the real pro into the con with this one, because that's where Necromancers stand right now. In the beta forum, a dev admitted that Necros need the most love right now, and they're working on it. In prior betas, Necros were AWESOME, but they've been nerfed to shit because of said awesomeness. Their outright damage skills were nerfed pretty heavily (pbaoe Axe skill was only hitting about 30dmg on crits at level 10), their transformation damage is absolute crap now and mainly only serves as an escape mechanic, and their drains no longer back the oomph to make them the more survivey of the cloth classes (that goes to Mesmer now). Where the combined pro/con comes in, is that now their utility and condition skills are fricken ~uber~. Despite my lack of damage, battles ended 100x faster when I joined them. Why? Because I could stack so many conditions and DoTs on a target in such a short timespan that, while I wasn't doing much damage, everyone else's doubled and tripled. Vulnerability, Weakness, Freeze, Poison, Bleed, Blindness, etc., etc., etc. Bottom line, if you wanted a debuff/controller class, Necromancer is now the class for you. It's debateable however, whether that's what they should have been in the first place. Also, minions are kinda fail atm.
Elementalist:
Pro - I didn't play Ele this beta, but I leveled one in BWE2. The Ele pro, at least then, was in the damage output. They are easily the highest damage class in the game. Yes, Thief has the ability to spike some incredibly crits, but they sacrifice huge amounts of survivability to do it. Ele has range, and further their damage doesn't rely on just one or two skills. During longer/boss battles, their damage easily outshines everyone else's. By miles.
Con - EVERYONE WANTS TO BE ONE. EVERYONE. So don't pick this class if you like feeling special. Also, they're squishy as all hell. Stacked toughness and an Earth specialty will help, but if you're looking for that infamous Obsidian Armor tank from GW1, you'll be disappointed. Whether or not this remains true for endgame when you have your full traits unlocked and best armor, remains to be seen. From 1-30 at least, you'll want to stay as far away from the enemy as possible. I.e., don't use a dagger, unless you enjoy exercises in frustration. Or are in a party.
Engineer:
Pro - Utility, utility, utility. Engineer's kits give them more skill possibilites than even the Elementalist, which is a lot to keep track of but also gives them the ability to adapt to nearly any situation. In BWE3, my Engineer was Rifle with Med, Grenade and Flamethrower kit equipped. Goddam, not only was my damage ridiculous (grenade kit is just asking for a nerf) but Rifle skills kept me at a distance and Flamethrower made me invaluable during boss/champion fights.
Con - Dual pistols suck damage-wise. The only viable weapon for them at the moment is the rifle, you'll feel like you're firing pea shooters if you go with guns, and likewise shield skills are ineffective in most situations. In past betas, the Engineer damage was all around a bit low, that's no longer the case, but guns/shield still need some love.
Thief:
Pro - Very mobile, high damage output, surprisingly good support. Thief comes equipped with a variety of blinds and smoke screens. If you run across a thief that doesn't have one or the other (preferably both) slap them and tell them to stop being so goddam selfish. A thief that uses their blinds (and stuns/cripples for that matter) effectively can single-handedly save the team from a wipe.
Con - Ultimate glass cannon, but that's not entirely the fault of the class itself. Not only are Thief's ranged skills effective, but with toughness and effective use of dodging/utilities they can actually go toe-to-toe with Champion mobs and bosses. Unfortunately, doing so is similar to Mesmer in terms of skill ceiling, and the skill involved seems to elude people if forums are any indication.
Ranger:
Pro - Pets no longer suck! Not only do they take aggro well (almost too well, just having a pet out will make most monsters ignore you entirely even if you're spiking the hell out of them) they're much more durable and their damage is just about mediocre now. Which is good. They don't need to hit super hard, that's what you're there for, they just need to not be useless. Which they aren't. Now. Then of course the pro that they're ranged and hit hard, can knockback, stealth, cripple, blind, etc. Incredibly useful and fun class to play, I'm surprised I don't see more of them around.
Con - Pets! Yes, I know, I just said it was a pro. It's also a potential con. While they're useful now in general PvE, they're still going to fold quickly in dungeons and large scale events, so you can't rely on them when the going gets tough. That's probably working as intended though, otherwise Rangers would be a little OP. Other than that, I didn't find an issue with them, I thought they were balanced extremely well actually.
"Forums aren't for intelligent discussion; they're for blow-hards with unwavering opinions."
Con - Dual pistols suck damage-wise. The only viable weapon for them at the moment is the rifle, you'll feel like you're firing pea shooters if you go with guns, and likewise shield skills are ineffective in most situations. In past betas, the Engineer damage was all around a bit low, that's no longer the case, but guns/shield still need some love.
Just want to point out that dual pistols was engineers most damaging option if you specced correctly for it. You could basically have permanent burning, large bleeds, and a good amount of poison on the enemy.
Also, shield was bugged and it's skill 4 wasn't working properly (just like guardian's staff 2).
Comments
Warrior: Usually not my class, but in this game is awesome. Warrior with greatsword is a destroyer. Great skills and animation.
Ranger: Played in the last stress test. Pet is a problem. Would wander while I kept pressing the attack button. Hope they fixed it.
Thief: Was not impressed by the thief. Probably better at higher levels.
Engineer: A great class and one I will play at launch...brutal with duel pistols. Something always up their sleeves.
I played every class over the betas...got most to at least level 7, some significantly higher. Here are my thoughts...
Warrior: Extremely versatile master of weapons, both melee and ranged. Definitely the class for you if you like having tons of different options in how you put together your weapon combos in a build, as it has more weapons available to it than any other class. Can perform several roles very well, burst DPS with greatsword, great defensive abilities with mace/shield, ranged DPS with bow or rifle...the list goes on.
Thief: Unique initiative mechanic makes this class a very flexible assassin. Unlike other classes, you don't have cooldowns. Instead, you basically have an energy bar (initiative) that is used to feed all your skills...and you can mix them up however you like. Need to shadowstep away twice real fast with shortbow? Go for it. Need to burst the hell out of an enemy with your highest damage skill? Feel free to spam it. This is a great class if you like to jump all around the map with teleports, and trick your opponent with things like stealth...which brings us to...
Mesmer: The master of deception. People seem to have a love/hate relationship with this class. Players either love the Mesmer, or think it is totally gimped. Well, I played one to level 15 in PvE, and did a lot of WvW, and I do not think it is gimped at all! You have soooooo many skills that are designed to confound your enemy, and they can be very amusing to use. There is also a cool Mesmer "flavor" on all of your skills. Thief may be able to stealth, but you as a Mesmer have a skill that not only stealths, but also leaves a clone of yourself in place where you were before you stealthed...how cool is that!
Mesmer also does pretty decent damage, and has a lot of skills (like Blurred Frenzy) that increase its survivability. I would say that this is a great class to play if you like messing with your opponents minds and EVADING getting hit at all costs rather than mitigating damage.
Guardian: Supportive powerhouse. These guys really seem like they have it all, great damage and great support. They are probably the best class at protecting their team-mates, and removing conditions. Heck, they have tons of skills that put down a Combo field light, and that makes any finisher that passes through it remove conditions. They also can do a crap ton of damage. Their staff has a skill that puts I think a stack of 8(!) Might buffs on them. That basically doubels your damage output. And to top this all off, they have decent AoE as well, and their AoEs all tend to support their team as well as harm the enemy. This is a class to play if you want to support your team while still being a damn fine warrior yourself.
Necromancer: King of survivability. I really think that no class can take punishment like a necro. Why do you ask? Oh because you have TWO HEALTH BARS with your death shroud mechanic. And you also have lots of abilities that lifesteal. Top this off with the ability to have pets that are constantly ruining everyone's day, and you have a pretty bad ass class. If you like being hard to kill and/or being able to have lots of minions that do not require micromanagement, then this is a great class for you.
Ranger: I will be honest, I didn't play ranger much because having to constantly revive my pet annoyed me lol. That aside, they seemed to have very strong melee and range capabilities...can't say much more than that.
Elementalist: The master of skills. Elementalist is another class with a mechanic that totally changes how its played. Instead of weapon swapping, you have four attunements and you can switch between them on each weapon, but you can't change the weapon itself. This means that you have TWENTY weapon skills that you can swap between for each weapon, making the class incredibly versatile. Ele has a lot of very painful AoEs, and really has a spell for almost any situation. The trick is that you can't switch to another weapon, so if you are fighting with a long range weapon (staff), you will really want to keep your opponent at bay because you can't switch to a shorter range weapon (daggers). Ele is a great class if you love having tons of skills at your disposal, and you have no problem with memorizing what all four of your different attunements do for each weapon.
Engineer: The tinkerer or the king of versatility. Like the elementalist, the engineer's mechanic changes the way the class is played in a big way. As an engineer, you have no weapon swapping. Instead, your utility skills and/or healing skill (specifically kits) can basically act as weapons. So if you have a "flamethrower kit" using it replaces your weapon. This really opens up a lot interesting build combinations. You can decide to have five "weapons" for swapping, or zero. I think there will be a lot of "tinkering" with engy builds as the game goes on because of the way this works.
The engy also has a good deal of stationary defensive capabilities in their mines and turrets. I think that a skilled engy/necro combo holding a control point would be incredibly difficult to dislodge. The engy's defensive capabilities and versatility, coupled with the necro's survivability would be ridiculous. Play this class if you love tinkering around with builds or just playing with cool toys as opposed to using magic...its versatility makes it suited for almost anything.
Are you team Azeroth, team Tyria, or team Jacob?
Whee, tl;dr potential incoming
Warrior:
Pro - Amazing AoE potential with GS, hits hard with hammer, pretty beefy potential in mace/shield provided they're good enough with dodge and have utility skills to keep defenses and hp up while removing debuffs/dots.
Con - Get focus fired pretty heavily because mob aggro favors closest people (when it's not going after AoEers). Ranged skills are lacking compared to other classes, only found them helpful as utility and when bosses are too dangerous up close. Melee skills can be a chore, because enemies run out of range of AoEs (intelligently), which means any mesmers/eles/necros on the team will have the Warrior constantly chasing monsters around the room.
Mesmer:
Pro - Awesome. Extremely survivable when played correctly. Throw points in toughness for HP and slot illusions as escape mechanics and you'll almost always be the last man standing even in dungeons.
Con - Difficult class to play, very high skill cieling. People are used to outright damage, but the Mesmer's only source of spike damage is through illusion shattering. As illusions (and phantoms) are fragile, it's difficult to get them all shattered correctly before they're destroyed. Mesmer damage comes from the stacking of conditions like Confuse, Vulnerability and Daze, but most people don't have the patience to win by attrition. Even for people that like this kind of playstyle, Mesmers are a HIGHLY mobile class, I found myself forgetting where my fingers were on occasion trying to do too many things at once. I kind of like that kind of thing, though, but it's not for everyone.
Guardian:
Pro - Goddam! Phenomenal damage, great survivability, amazing utility skills...plus all their skills are so damn pretty!
Con - Hard to think of one, honestly. All their weapon skills are soooo useful, and I was shocked at my damage output. The only con I can really think of, and this is reaching a bit, is that their ranged weapons cut heavily into the DPS potential. Staff has some nice skills, but it's definitely more support, and scepter + torch combo are just kinda...meh....It should be noted that in prior betas, Sceptar was incredible, but it was 'balanced' to be inline with other ranged weapons (range is safer but doesn't hit as hard as melee) so now it doesn't really stand out.
Necromancer:
Pro - It sees dead people.
Con - I'm going to be rolling the real pro into the con with this one, because that's where Necromancers stand right now. In the beta forum, a dev admitted that Necros need the most love right now, and they're working on it. In prior betas, Necros were AWESOME, but they've been nerfed to shit because of said awesomeness. Their outright damage skills were nerfed pretty heavily (pbaoe Axe skill was only hitting about 30dmg on crits at level 10), their transformation damage is absolute crap now and mainly only serves as an escape mechanic, and their drains no longer back the oomph to make them the more survivey of the cloth classes (that goes to Mesmer now). Where the combined pro/con comes in, is that now their utility and condition skills are fricken ~uber~. Despite my lack of damage, battles ended 100x faster when I joined them. Why? Because I could stack so many conditions and DoTs on a target in such a short timespan that, while I wasn't doing much damage, everyone else's doubled and tripled. Vulnerability, Weakness, Freeze, Poison, Bleed, Blindness, etc., etc., etc. Bottom line, if you wanted a debuff/controller class, Necromancer is now the class for you. It's debateable however, whether that's what they should have been in the first place. Also, minions are kinda fail atm.
Elementalist:
Pro - I didn't play Ele this beta, but I leveled one in BWE2. The Ele pro, at least then, was in the damage output. They are easily the highest damage class in the game. Yes, Thief has the ability to spike some incredibly crits, but they sacrifice huge amounts of survivability to do it. Ele has range, and further their damage doesn't rely on just one or two skills. During longer/boss battles, their damage easily outshines everyone else's. By miles.
Con - EVERYONE WANTS TO BE ONE. EVERYONE. So don't pick this class if you like feeling special. Also, they're squishy as all hell. Stacked toughness and an Earth specialty will help, but if you're looking for that infamous Obsidian Armor tank from GW1, you'll be disappointed. Whether or not this remains true for endgame when you have your full traits unlocked and best armor, remains to be seen. From 1-30 at least, you'll want to stay as far away from the enemy as possible. I.e., don't use a dagger, unless you enjoy exercises in frustration. Or are in a party.
Engineer:
Pro - Utility, utility, utility. Engineer's kits give them more skill possibilites than even the Elementalist, which is a lot to keep track of but also gives them the ability to adapt to nearly any situation. In BWE3, my Engineer was Rifle with Med, Grenade and Flamethrower kit equipped. Goddam, not only was my damage ridiculous (grenade kit is just asking for a nerf) but Rifle skills kept me at a distance and Flamethrower made me invaluable during boss/champion fights.
Con - Dual pistols suck damage-wise. The only viable weapon for them at the moment is the rifle, you'll feel like you're firing pea shooters if you go with guns, and likewise shield skills are ineffective in most situations. In past betas, the Engineer damage was all around a bit low, that's no longer the case, but guns/shield still need some love.
Thief:
Pro - Very mobile, high damage output, surprisingly good support. Thief comes equipped with a variety of blinds and smoke screens. If you run across a thief that doesn't have one or the other (preferably both) slap them and tell them to stop being so goddam selfish. A thief that uses their blinds (and stuns/cripples for that matter) effectively can single-handedly save the team from a wipe.
Con - Ultimate glass cannon, but that's not entirely the fault of the class itself. Not only are Thief's ranged skills effective, but with toughness and effective use of dodging/utilities they can actually go toe-to-toe with Champion mobs and bosses. Unfortunately, doing so is similar to Mesmer in terms of skill ceiling, and the skill involved seems to elude people if forums are any indication.
Ranger:
Pro - Pets no longer suck! Not only do they take aggro well (almost too well, just having a pet out will make most monsters ignore you entirely even if you're spiking the hell out of them) they're much more durable and their damage is just about mediocre now. Which is good. They don't need to hit super hard, that's what you're there for, they just need to not be useless. Which they aren't. Now. Then of course the pro that they're ranged and hit hard, can knockback, stealth, cripple, blind, etc. Incredibly useful and fun class to play, I'm surprised I don't see more of them around.
Con - Pets! Yes, I know, I just said it was a pro. It's also a potential con. While they're useful now in general PvE, they're still going to fold quickly in dungeons and large scale events, so you can't rely on them when the going gets tough. That's probably working as intended though, otherwise Rangers would be a little OP. Other than that, I didn't find an issue with them, I thought they were balanced extremely well actually.
"Forums aren't for intelligent discussion; they're for blow-hards with unwavering opinions."
Just want to point out that dual pistols was engineers most damaging option if you specced correctly for it. You could basically have permanent burning, large bleeds, and a good amount of poison on the enemy.
Also, shield was bugged and it's skill 4 wasn't working properly (just like guardian's staff 2).