Having a lot of fun..need some advice

I'm thoroughly enjoying the game so far. I've created a thief, engineer, elementalist, necro, mesmer, (last slot i just rotated the other classes). The classes range form 14 all the way up to 67 as of today. Last nite I tried the 80 lvl booster on each of them and was surprised by what I've noticed. The elementalist, warrior, and engineer seems to be well rounded in damage and self healing. The ranger is great for distance spam and thief is ok for burst damage but not great and healing is well kind of lacking. I'm still new so I might be short sighted on some aspects of ea class. This is just a beginners observation.

I like the consistent damage that the elementalist deals out. The warrior gives great damage and healing. I like the "in your face" fighting style which also brings me to the engineer. For the last couple of weeks I have been laughing just about every second while playing it. Burn something down and watch it scream! The class brings out the pyro in me hehe. I'm getting really close now with the elementalist (67) so I won't use the booster on it. My engineer is around 50 as well as my thief. The other classes I really didn't get a feel for. Necro seemed kind of mediocre. The lowest class that I have is the warrior and after using the boost, it felt pretty good. I'm not going to push for end game content, but I would like to use the booster on something that can farm and do dungeons. Would applying the booster to the warrior be a good idea? The warrior is currently my lowest class.

I would suggest playing each class until level 80 for the first time. The time you spend on them will teach you how they work better.

Something to note: regularly upgrade your equipment to about your level, as the higher your level, the worse your old equipment will scale.

I myself prefer the reaper (necromancer specialization available with the expansions) for dungeons and farming because it has a high amount of health plus shroud (which is essentially more health) and can hit many enemies (cleave), so you can get more loot bags. Equipping high damage will mow down foes faster.

Thanks you for your reply. I was planning on leveling up a few classes to 80 but the last slot I will leave alone for now. I guess it would be better to wait until I specialize in something. Too bad the Level 80 booster doesn't include the specialization so I make a better determination which way I want to go on builds. So, the booster is really not that great.

While i agree that you should level at least one char to lvl 80 first, i dont think you have to do it with every class. The first leveling-experience will teach you the basics of the game, but after the first one you might aswell do it with the booster since you know the basic gameplay-mechanics by then and can directly start learning the new skills of the new classes.

For your question, people usually like to see a warrior in their group because they can bring unique group-wide buffs (banners) while still doing good damage. So its great for dungeon running (and other instanced content later on, like fractals, strikes or even raids). Cant say much in regards to farming though since ive never used a warrior for that.

Hi! Welcome to GW2!

It sounds like you're off to a good start! Since you seem to enjoy multiple classes, here's a little more good news for you: They're all good! You say you aren't pushing for "endgame" content, by which I assume you mean that your focus will be things like open world/story content. Any class can be awesome for this type of content, provided you can get the hang of the mechanics and use a build that is comfortable for you.

It also sounds like you favor elementalist a bit. Me too! I am currently in love the weaver elite spec! Unfortunately, as you say, you can't play weaver on the boost to try it out, so here's a little video of my weaver taking on a Path of Fire bounty champion solo. In the comments below the video I include a build link.

The cool thing about this, to me, is that it represents about as far a departure from the wizard/mage class archetype as could be imagined. Yet elementalist can still be that class, too, if you want to build for it! That's one of the great things about GW2 class design! If you don't like the feel of a class one way, you can change traits, stats, and weapons and play it a very different way that you might find more appealing. And with elite specs, it takes it even further by altering the way the class works, unlocking a new weapon, and a new set of utilities!

I wouldn't necessarily level grind every class to 80. But I would level grind the first two classes to get a good feel for the game, unlock armor skins, see the story through a couple variations and so on. After that, sure - use a booster if you like. Or blow some of those tomes of experience to speed things up.

Most people have already pointed out the common advice that you shouldnt boost your first 1-2 characters to learn the game, but afterwards that completely fine.

One part of your question that wasn't commented one is your descriptions/feelings of the classes: you described warrior as heads-on with good damage and healing and thief as very bursty with low healing. This is excactly how these classes are supposed to feel, warrior just runs in & hits everything until it's dead. Thief on the other hand bursts 1-2 targets down & then - and I feel like you maybe missed that - needs to vansish again; a Thief's best defense is not getting caught in the first place - using evade skills, blind or stealth.This different approach of classes to handle combat is very much intended (and a big part why you should try different classes to see which one fits you). Guardian for example is a heavy armor class, but has low HP - defense therefore relies on active block skills and (similar to thief) killing things before they get dangerous. The list goes on ...

Generally all classes can do dungeons or (casual) fractal runs. For really high level play people want to see certain builds, which may favor some classes over others, but you shouldn't worry about that now (especially since these builds & classes can change with balance updates).

I have three-level, 80 classes. Ranger, Necro, and engineer. I love playing all three of them and can't pick one as a main.

@EyzKold.8247 said:Thanks you for your reply. I was planning on leveling up a few classes to 80 but the last slot I will leave alone for now. I guess it would be better to wait until I specialize in something. Too bad the Level 80 booster doesn't include the specialization so I make a better determination which way I want to go on builds. So, the booster is really not that great.

Regarding the elite-specialization. While it is true that they are not included in the Level 80 boost, there is another way to try them out, at least in a limited way.

If you enter the PvP lobby you can use all traitlines inlcuding the elite ones (only in the bottom trait line slot), even if you character isn't level 80 yet.Obviously that wouldn't allow you to try the specializations in the open world but there are some npc's in the PvP lobby which you could use to at least test the skills, get a first impression of the elites.One thing to keep in mind that unlike in PvE skills that include any kind of cc don't do real dmg in pvp anymore.

Wow lot of great advice and a lot to think about. Today, I worked on my new warrior to lvl 21. It hits like a truck. Double axes are nice :). I do like playing three classes atm. Warrior, engineer, and elemenalist. I worked on my thief to about lvl 45 but still feels too squishy. Evading damage is pretty hard at times and I like to dish it out. So, I’ll stick with the engineer and warrior for close up work and elementalist for distance.

The only problem I really am having is bag space and no mount at the early stage of the game. I know I have to wait until lvl 80 and pof...but a horse would be great :)

You gotta invest in thief healing to really make the most of it.

I've put a build together for a daredevil/thief that has quite a bit of healing potential but only in PvE.. WvW/PvP nukes the healing potential so hard it's not even worth considering xDI have not built or tested it yet though so it's at best an early concept build and I've no idea how it's going to work out for me, nor how much the level zone thing is going to screw with it.

I have kind of a preference for Ranged,Tank and Sustain builds in Gw2 so the idea was to make a thief that has a decent amount of sustain without giving up too much damage or being too glassy for my tastes.I did something similar with a Warrior/Spellbreaker recently as well which turned out pretty decent, it's probably my favourite PvE Warrior build to date so looking forward to possibly getting something like that going with a thief as well.

As for Necro though, it's one of the tankiest and sustainiest classes in the game if you build it right.It's the one man army class in Gw2 haha I love Necros ^^

@"EyzKold.8247" said:I'm thoroughly enjoying the game so far. I've created a thief, engineer, elementalist, necro, mesmer, (last slot i just rotated the other classes). The classes range form 14 all the way up to 67 as of today. Last nite I tried the 80 lvl booster on each of them and was surprised by what I've noticed. The elementalist, warrior, and engineer seems to be well rounded in damage and self healing. The ranger is great for distance spam and thief is ok for burst damage but not great and healing is well kind of lacking. I'm still new so I might be short sighted on some aspects of ea class. This is just a beginners observation.

I like the consistent damage that the elementalist deals out. The warrior gives great damage and healing. I like the "in your face" fighting style which also brings me to the engineer. For the last couple of weeks I have been laughing just about every second while playing it. Burn something down and watch it scream! The class brings out the pyro in me hehe. I'm getting really close now with the elementalist (67) so I won't use the booster on it. My engineer is around 50 as well as my thief. The other classes I really didn't get a feel for. Necro seemed kind of mediocre. The lowest class that I have is the warrior and after using the boost, it felt pretty good. I'm not going to push for end game content, but I would like to use the booster on something that can farm and do dungeons. Would applying the booster to the warrior be a good idea? The warrior is currently my lowest class.

Glad to hear you're enjoying the game. I still think back to when I first started (back when GW2 was first launched) and the feeling I got from having my level 6 guardian trying to solo the giant tree in Queensdale.

Unfortunately the elite specs for each class can completely change how they feel, and right now you're playing only on core so you haven't been able to experience even more joy the game can offer. Based on what you said you said you like I have a few suggestions I think you'll really like.

First, you mentioned necro was underwhelming - however I believe that you'd really enjoy Reaper. It's a melee, in your face, kind of class that turns into a grim reaper type of death shroud, swinging around a massive scythe. It's actually a lot of fun both in theme and play.

I also suggest Holosmith, which is an elite specialization for engineer which gives you access to photon forge. All I can say is heavy focus on melee, lights, explosions, fiery laser beams, emphasis on burning things to death.

Berserker for warrior is another suggestion, however I liked it pre-change personally where it was more fast paced - your character would build up fury and you'd hit F2 and yell out "I'll destroy you all" while doing massive aoe damage, burning among other conditions, skills that quite literally tear up the earth. Now it's kind of build up your rage, press F1 and burst for a few seconds, then spend another long duration of boredom, then finally be able to re-enter. This one is kind of hit or miss, like I said personally I don't enjoy it as much anymore but who knows you may.

My last suggestion is weaver, the elite spec for elementalist. Big flashy explosions regardless of element chosen - definitely an upgrade from core elementalist you play now. However it's style of attunement swapping may be very complicated for new players, and quite possibly lead to spam - this is primarily because when you attunement swap your next chosen element becomes your primary skills and your previous element becomes your secondary, with the #3 skill being a hybrid of both; this initially seems complicated but it gets easier the more you play it. Avoid spamming at all costs so you don't get in the habit of pressing random buttons. A good way to look at it is fire/air is damage/damage mobility(or cc) and water earth is healing/sustain (this is generalizing but it was how I first grasped it).

Hope these suggestions help, as mentioned in the beginning - these are a few things I believe you'll enjoy based on what you said you like.

@"EyzKold.8247" said:The ranger is great for distance spam and thief is ok for burst damage but not great and healing is well kind of lacking. I'm still new so I might be short sighted on some aspects of ea class. This is just a beginners observation.

Going down the line, I've personally found Thief to have some of the best self-sustain in solo PvE, especially if you're going full Berserker's/Assassin's stat thanks to one of their trait, Invigorating Precision.This trait is even stronger in soloing champions/legendaries if you're speccing to Deadeye, take Maleficent Seven, and equip a rifle. The extra damage from might, crit rate and heal bonus from fury, protection, health & endurance regen helps in sustaining yourself and landing a hard-hitting crit snipe that will basically top-up your health as well. The downside of it is definitely cleaves, or lack thereof, since skill 2 rifle is the only 'cleave' skill (the targets need to line up) and that kneeling will immobilize you. Good thing is that Daredevil is the spec for if you're looking for cleaves, and you still can trait Invigorating Precision if you want to since it's a core Thief trait.

The only problem I really am having is bag space and no mount at the early stage of the game. I know I have to wait until lvl 80 and pof...but a horse would be great :)

You can actually get mount even if you don't have a lvl 80 as long as you have PoF. But you need a level 80 player to invite you into the 'Sparking the Flame' mission, and help your get through to some point of the mission. I could help if you play on NA but I can't play rn, unfortunately! You can try to Lion's Arch or Divinity's Reach and see if anyone is willing to help though.