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Class Analysis... share your toughs!
cyraeth
Member Posts: 53
I just wanted to gather everyones thoughs in the 4 particular clases that caught my attention during the last beta, im undecided about wich path to take, and maybe some of you could deliver some pros and cons about the subject..... anyways here they are.
- Ranger: a well balanced class, the ramged damaged and usefull distances is excellent, however Pet system seems a little bit lacking in the A.I part...
- Mesmer: the most likely to be playing so far, however i dint had in my mind as my main when i first heard about it, im worried about nerfes and clones A.I (its really easy to distinguish whos the player and whos the clone)....also i dont know about you but i felt that they got a little nerfed on this btw... but at the end of it, its seems that its the class that i handle better...
- Warrior: Great variety of weapons, plenty of room to grow.... a lot of customization... but not a lot of originality, its not a class that amazed me... i see it as a efective class but not sure if i can carry the hack and slash with me troughtout the whole game.
-Necro: my favorite themed class (check my sig 
) love the "double health bars".... the minions seem OK , maybe they need some polish.. but thats all, i liked the theme, i like how they look, love the animations... but in terms of efectivness i just cant get it... also i wanted to be a player with lots of variants, but at the same time focusing on driving my oponont mad with conditions.. necro does it... but mesmer exceed at it...
Well thats my confusion right there, i like those clases but not sure wich would be my main ( i dont have the sufficient time to develop an alt succesfully thats why my main its so important)...
So my question for you guys is...can you develop your personal experiences with those class?, what seems to be lacking?, did you find any of those over/under powered?.... share your toughs! and as always.. sorry for the crappy english!
Comments
Engineer: This guys is one of the adventurer classes and he really does feel an adventurer, always coming with that last trick up his sleeve. Not having a swap feature might lead to some repetition if you don't a weapon kit. The skills fit well with this techno scientist/alchemist. Very steam punk profession (GW2 has a few steam punk elements like the rifle below).
Guardian: Alongside the necromancer, this profession is the most durable profession in the game, even at close quarters. The Greatsword is an incredible PvE weapon and Sword/X+Scepter/X are really strong WvW weapons. Underwater the trident and the spear are bonkers.
Warrior: This guy is a professional heavy hitter - able to fight at every range, he doesn't care much about magic (as opposed to the guardian counterpart) but he knows his weapons. The burst skill mechanic feels very good.
Currently playing: GW2
Going cardboard starter kit: Ticket to ride, Pandemic, Carcassonne, Dominion, 7 Wonders
Nice addition... its true what you say about durability comparing necro and guardian, thats the biggest plus i find ringht know with that class... also i agree with the burst skill awesomeness in warrior, specially weilding a greatsword.... played mesmer this last couple of mins... think i narrowed my search to 3... eliminating the Ranger, not because its not good... but because of the lack of polish in pets A.I
Elementalist :
Jack of all trades and master of AOE damage
Class that is going to be very wanted in groups. Elementalist can heal , summon pets , items , stun , disable - and most of all
do huge AOE damage.
But you will need a protector....
In 1vs1 PVP , elementalist will be tricky. But in WvWvW , especially in sieges - they will be most required class.
In PVE , everyone will want to group with you.
So if you like versatility and AOE ... go ELE
Low level ballance is way off... If everything is ballanced at lvl 80.
At lower levels, Ranger is hugely overpowered, but the pets survivabillity in Events is broken
At lower levels, Elementalist DPS and survivabillity are very very much underpowered.
At lower levels Guardian has great survivabillity and much much better DPS then Elementalists
There is a large amount of work to be done for Arena net, in BWE3 ballance was much much better then in BWE1 (level 1 -20)
Best MMO experiences : EQ(PvE), DAoC(PvP), WoW(total package) LOTRO (worldfeel) GW2 (Artstyle and animations and worlddesign) SWTOR (Story immersion) TSW (story) ESO (character advancement)
Perhaps i am uninformed because i only played Elementalist , Mesmer and Thief ( and warrior to some small extent )
But I think that Elementalist strenght lies in the fact that he can do devastating AOE and variety of disabling AOE effects.
You basically bring Elementalist with when you want to kill lot of bunched up enemies in the same time.
Its just natural that melee classes have higher damage at close range , or that ranger has higher 1v1 damage from distance.
But while you are killing that 1 enemy. Elementalist is killing 10 , from far away.
engineer is the best. most fun i have ever had in a class based mmo. final event was ok but i hid from red and lived.
Greetings dwellers of the net!
I am not one for posting really, but such a topic I felt I could be of some use! Let us proceed with my own input:
The Ranger
Where did your conclusions come from?
I have played every class to level 20, and sPvP'd on all professions.
Thoughts:
On Weapons:
Let us proceed! The weapons I initially started with were the Longbow and Dual-Axes. The idea of sitting 1500 + units away from a group of enemies and just raining down damage on them was very appealing, so longbow was definitely the way to go for me. It does just as it promises. Skirmishes with long ranged foes were almost always successful, pushing them away with the 4 skill, popping Quickening Zephyr and getting a 10,000+ damage combo on them with Hunter's Shot and Rapid Fire.
All in all, Longbow proved to be a lot of fun, and very handy when used with ranged in mind. Personal Note; To me, the Ranger has a very well developed set of weapon skills. On their own, you can bring down a foe. With this train of thought, I used my utility skills do be just that, utilities. They enhanced my weapons and provided passives from Signets. My Ult (Elite, yay for LoL), was the Vines spell.
Dual Axes was my starting Alternate weapon set. They have a slow, a nice bleed and the 1 skill bounces between targets, similar to the Thieves' Shortbow. Critting for about 1,000 - 1,200 per bounce, this was just beautiful for clean up or for causing panic. With the slow, targets I locked onto rarely got away, and if they got too far, well...they died...because Longbow.
Then I tried the Greatsword for the first time. Definitely a different play style! It became very in-your-face...which I was a little hesitant about at first...but much to my delight, Quickening Zephyr combined with a full greatsword combo is completely nasty. I fell in love, and currently rock GS/Longbow.
Be wary of heavy armored foes though, the damage reduction on armor is a lot more than people think, and Warriors tend to have more burst than you will. But that's where mobility and pets come in!
On Pets:
I used the Snow Leopard and the Raven. Idly they were on Passive. They did not engage my targets unless I told them too. There is nothing AI can do about PvP and sometimes PvE AoE madness. If you send your pet into a cluster of people trying to capture Graveyard in Legacy of the Foefire, you can kiss kitty goodbye.
So how did my pet work then? Well, I hotkey'd the F2 skill to my Mouse 5 button. With a twitch of my glorious thumb, my raven would fly down towards my target, which was already being peppered by arrows, and use his skill, which crit for on average 1000 - 2000 damage.
My face when I saw the numbers:
8|______________________|
Let's proceed.
So, pets do nice damage. My snow leopard had a pounce skill that chilled my opponent, hit for 1500 on crit, and he was decently tanky. Hell, I've had my pets solo some careless casters. They were so busy focusing their target that they ignored the angry DoT on them that was animal.
Toss in your heal skill, pluss my Signet which gave myself and my pet 150 Hp a second, they died rarely.
Final Note:
Send your pet into a group of foes, and he'll die. Use them wisely, like you would play an extension of yourself, and you'll get an angry, usefull DoT that does some nice consistent damage.
General Notes:
Ranger seems fairly tanky to me. With the Signet that provides 150 Hp per second passively, 10 points into the Vitality trait line, and some well timed dodging, I found myself able to survive for quite a long time, even against two or three opponents.
Blindness is not your friend. I had very little condition removal, so if I did not land my full combos on a Necromancer, or similar, it was the end for this poor boy scout!
That's all I have to say! I hope this was helpful! Let me know if you want any info on another class!
@ Caiden
Awesome post--You should post a similar review from your experiences with the necromancer!
Remember AoE effects are generally capped at 5 targets.
Currently playing: GW2
Going cardboard starter kit: Ticket to ride, Pandemic, Carcassonne, Dominion, 7 Wonders
That is true! I believe the Axe skill only bounces three times, to boot. Still, it attacked fast enough to make it pretty impacting.
OMG and i though i discarted the Ranger for good.... now your making it moro difficult to me lol.... nice anylisis BTW.....probly going to Rerun Ranger again on pre-headstart.... and check..
I played shortbow / greatsword. In fact i ve never tried longbow...
Shortbow gives u great mobility and both gs and shortbow has positional moves that ends up to a stun.
I was thinking that swrord wil be fun but after i played it the worst weapon for me. Seems like the skills dont land properly.
Sadly even if you have choices for offhands you dont have for mainhand (except swords).
Thanks for the compliments good sirs! It's fun sharing thoughts and expriences on this sort of thing. I'll reply with something similar for Necromancer, also one of my favorite classes, a bit later!
Ah ha! Jolly good! Another reply, as requested.
These are just my thoughts, experiences and opinions! Hopefully they are helpful.
Where did your conclusions come from?
I have played every class to level 20, and sPvP'd on all professions.
The Necromancer
On Weapons
Righto! When I was looking over necromancer I saw it had a few ways it could be built upon; Direct damage, Conditions, and Minions. Instantly I fell in love with Life Siphon/Drain from the Necro trailer, so I decided to Mainhand Dagger. After testing the skills in BWE1, I was surprised how close range it was, but on the other hand, Necromancer has a crazy high HP pool.
So I went with Dagger/Dagger and Staff in Alternate, with hopes to do direct damage/life steal, and then use the staff to 'Setup' my battlefield, so to speak.
Spec'd heavily into Vitality and Power, I literally just dove people with Spectral Armor on. I had tons of life steal from crits, in the trait tree, plus a low cooldown Life Siphon, plus around 30,000 HP, it was very tanky for Moderate/Good DPS.
When I wasn't being rushed, as I was charging my foe I would drop Marks on the ground from the staff, and then switch to Daggers, and fight in those. It gave me a little boost while debuffing my enemies. With the Spectral Walk that gives you swiftness, getting away was rarely a problem. Spectral Grasp knocks down an opponent, and drags them too you. Completely hilarious.
Later on I tried Axe with a heavy power/crit build. It was a lot of fun, heavy hitting with tons of bleeds, but more squishy obviously. Not really as mobile. Honestly out of all the weapons I tried, I think the Dagger/Dagger + Staff was my favorite.
On Minions
Definitely viable, I have to admit. It makes people panic when they are swarmed by a group of undead fiends. The biggest thing I had to change in my playstyle with this was the placement of my opponents. Much the same with a Ranger pet, if I dove in and went for someone in the middle of a fight, chances are the AoE focused people just killed them pretty quickly. I didn't die, being a tanky Necromancer, but all of my damage, in pets, did.
A lot of micromanaging here. You gotta watch their health bars, know when and what to re-summon and so on. Plus balance that with making sure you aren't focusing entirely on the pets, and remembering to do damage for yourself.
It was fun, but not for me!
On Conditions
Slow but steady death. With the right combo of utility skills and weapon skills, you can literally turn yourself into a walking disease and then just vomit it all on an enemy. With skills like Corrosive Poison Cloud, Blood is Power and Plague Signet, you just stack conditions on your enemy, yourself, and then send them away. Toss in the Epidemic skill, that sends all conditions on a foe to nearby enemies, and you have some serious suffering going on.
It's definitely not for someone who likes to see their damage numbers, and bursty DPS. It's slow and calculating, but you just gradually shut down someone to the point of them just dying.
The problem arises with Rangers and Guardians and their crazy condition removal. I had some problems with them, but nothing major.
Final Notes
Necromancer has a lot of Health. I mean crazy amounts. My DPS Guardian buddy was sitting at about 24,000 HP, while I was rocking 30,000+. Toss in Death Shroud and you can last a very long time. The Necromancer gave me a lot of time to 'think' while fighting. With so much going on to keep you alive, it let me plan my skill rotations to fit for my foe, while fighting.
Funny fighting is another Necromancer with Conditions. Just an endless loop of sending conditions back and forth. Pretty amusing.
Well that's my experience! Hope this helped.
I'll start with a rundown of my "main" class, Mesmer...and maybe post on other classes later. I might do one like this for Guardian too. Starting to love Guardian.
Overview of a Mesmer
Like all classes in GW2, Mesmer has a great degree of versatility. It is designed to be able to be a
@ Caiden:
Great posts on the Ranger and Necro! I agree that the ranger is lacking in condition removal, but find it funny that in your necromancer post you claim rangers have alot of condition removal! I'm sure it was just an error, or your perspective change between the classes! I agree that necro and ranger are great classes. I plan on both and a warrior. Cya in game!
CHeers!
MMO Vet since AOL Neverwinter Nights circa 1992. My MMO beat up your MMO. =S
Ok, mate...
As a great lover of mesmer class (my main class in GW1) and someone that planed to play Mesmer from moment GW2 was announced , I really dont see we are playing the same class ...
You talk AOE , mesmer only effective AOE is Chaos Storm. That is amazing. But on long cooldown and faily small in size.
So you could not in honesty call mesmer aoe class. In fact one of big problem with Mesmer is lack of AOE, when most things in PVE attack you in groups.
Mesmer got nerfed to oblivion. To the point its almost unusable anymore.
Sure in PVP people do get bit confused with clones. But it will take a week or two of real game for everyone and their dog to learn to recognise clones from mesmer.
And they die if someone breathes on them. Considering that almost every class is AOEing all around. They have life expectancy of 1 second.
F1-F4 skills are joke. Most clones die before they pop. And they are slow as molases.
And to add insult to the injury , they also do no damage anymore. Nor do they apply conditions.
From super awesome (but hard to master, complicated) class in GW1 , mesmer was transformed to a joke nobody will play in PVE. And class that might have some limited use in PVP , but could easily be replaced by class that actually does something.
I am sad to say.
I will still play it as one of my mains. Because I expect it will be first class to be fixed and buffed. And i just want to play mesmer for RP sake...
But its fubar as class goes
I think we agree on all points re: Illusions.
On AOE....We're weaker on it then eles, yes. Probably even necros. But seriously, try Greasword sometime. The 2 and 3 abilities are both AoE, and have a very very short cooldown. They hit for less than a Ele, but more often. With the right trait loadout they're competetive, although they are surely still stronger in single target.
I did not play my Mesmer much BWE3. I rolled a new one of course, got to 10ish in the Sylvari areas. I played sword+pistol/Greatsword through all of it, and ll PVE. I never felt weak, I never felt like I couldn't play the game.
I agree with you that the class needs a LOT of work, mostly in the mechanics section. Clones and Phantasms need a lot of love. Shatters need a lot of love. Sceptre relies on clones, so that needs it. But most of the other weapon sets are perfectly viable.
On each of the BWE I played I ran into at least one player for each class in spvp that would be a pain in the &*#$%.
I think this says something about balance in the classes and in the games pvp. They were a pain in different ways but I remember them all. There is no one class that can thrump the rest, when played well they can all be very deadly wpns.
For me I played Thief the most this BWE in spvp. At first there was a lot of frustration as they are kind of fragile and I wasn't really trying to drop in and out of combat like I should. By the end of the second day though, I found my stride. With deadly dmg and getting better at knowing when to drop in and out, also understanding when to stay at range things went alot better. Still, I wasn't destroying even though I felt I was doing very well, but I always ran into folks that would play very well and again this says a lot about balance.
I really wanted to like the Mesmer, but I couldn't. Clones that do nothing and weapons with odd abilities that made little sense to me.
The longsword? Is melee. Why not single target range (gs aoe range)? Oh its a backup weapon when someone gets close? Then why does it have clone leap? What is the point of that skill? My clone leaps at the target and I with my melee weapon stands and watches? Oh wait I can change places with it.... So why not just give me a leap? The clone dies after a few hits anyway, so its not going to tank while I switch to a range weapon.
How about it makes me jump backwards and leaves a clone? What if I leap into melee and can leap out leaving a clone?
Those block skills are very weak as well. I stand still and push off 1 or so attacks? How about it blocks a long time? I am not doing any damage or moving.
And the skills a lot of them seem to have pretty long cooldowns for what they do. Oh and the clones poping with the death of my target? That sucks. Its not like the appear instantly either.
I just do not see the usefulness of this class.
The warrior was good....but I found it to be a little boring.
Guardian or rogue will be my main, both were fun and could fight in different ways. dagger/pistol. I didn't care for the 'steal' class skill. I would have ranter seen a burst or survival skill. Guardian I can solo with or group or support, so really nice.
Terrant & Caiden..... you guys are making my day... regarding the mesmer, i gree with you, the combination that best suited me was a full condition driven staff attacks, and one or two incursions with sword and pistol..... a great attack combo that y found, was smaing clones as fast as posible with staff, then the phantasm (great damage), after that y deployd the contidiony cloud and lastly i would change weapond, head to the target (wich now has several conditions in it) and do the 3 secs invulnerability attack... then disapear with blind shot (gave me time to move away) and maybe deploy the 4 pistol ability, the phantasm with the burst shot, if needed...... with that combinetion i was able to handle myself pretty well in comPVP and exced in PvE (the mobs become plain retards when there are clones in the way).... and a tarid that i found most that usefull was the one where you leave a clone everytime you dodge.....
With all of the combination i just said, its very easy to mantain at least one clone and one phantasm during the whole fight...... the only thing i found tricky was to move myself as little as i can in order to blend with the clones animation and mantaining my distance at the same time, otherwise your easy to detect by enemy players.
The clone+leap is fantastic because of how it works. Even if the clone dies, if he gets close to the target, the part that leaps you also immobilizes the target. You use it to chase down runners, stop people from kiting, and generally lock them down. Oh and you don't change places with it. It stays there.
By the block skill I assume you mean Illusionary Riposte, the offhand? It only blocks one hit, that's true. From another perspective: it completes negates one attack, no matter what that attack is. You know those OP warriors builds that have ridiculous burst? Does them no good if you block it. Also, little known secret...they work raged as well as melee. You can use Ill Rip or Blurred Frenzy to avoid ranged attacks from a distance, then close in on the eney a second later. I've done it.
I will however agree again that clones are...ugh.
As to the other traditional melee classes....Warriors are lots of fun, lots of versatility. Rouges are all about speed. Fast moving, fast hitting. Steal is horribly underpowered. I didn't get to try it BWE 3 though, I heard there were some fixes. Guardian has more survival power than just about anyone. Most of BWE3 I spent rolling around with a Greatsword/sowrd+whatever G, and just melted face.Their support skills are a lot of fun too becuase of the unique way many of them work (detonating a damage orb to heal, for instance).
I get your feeling, i tough the same at the beggining... if you settle yoyrself with the initial combination given by the game once you enter the mist, youll have a bad time, however after you mess with the traits and change the runes and accesory in your gear... the viability of the mesmer goes up..... clones dealing little damage its a pain, thats why i chosse the staff.. if i remember correctly and im not worng , they do apply condition (its whats matters in staff build)... please correct me if im wrong.
Wait what? What do you consider low level? I played an ele and a guardian and found them fairly balanced. Guardian mace and shield is really tanky where as well can do a lot of damage even with just spamming their 1 skill.
Ranger pets can be controlled to a degree, just a lot of people don't bother switching them off from attack and avoid combat.
Personally though probably going to make a Norn or Asura warrior. Though something about a little ankle biter with a Hammer is making me reluctant in making one. We'll see though. Was able to be a huge pivotal role in wvw when a group came. Burst skill would stun them, followed by cripples and knockbacks. Could disrupt a large amount of people for a good 10 seconds or so, quickly following it up with another sequence shortly after. Damge wise they might not be as huge as the greatsword warriors but in wvw teamwork is a great thing to have
. Not many fights are won on simple 1v1 battles.
TBH all classes have a little bit of a learning curve. Some higher than others, mesmer is one of the highests. But believe me it will click eventually.