Returning old player: Rev or Guardian? Or maybe Engineer?

[Xdmatt.3958]

Hello, and welcome to the "returning old player thread" #4713248! Congratulations, you are the (flash code)10000th(/flash code) visitor! Click here to see what you've won!

Ahhem. Anyway.

I haven't played since Heart of Thorns. Still have a level 80 Mesmer and a level 80 Ele stashed somewhere. Thinking of coming back. Possibly want to try something different, but having trouble choosing. I have an unused max level boost.

My playstyle is 90% solo open world PvE, 5% dungeons and fractals (until whatever guild I glum on to gets tired of me and kicks me out) and MAAAAAYBE 5% WvW, where I run about with the general mob and try to find someone worse than me to kill. Usually that doesn't happen before someone better than me (that is, anybody) finds me and kills me first. I know that theoretically any class can do OW PvE, but I am old, slow and bad, so I want something more or less easy.

I am tired of being squishy. Always was partial to battlemages/tank mages. Want to play something that can take a few lumps and dish out, too.Will not consider: Necromancer (hate the flesh critters, hate the whole death magic thing, look bad in green); Warrior (I know they are perma-FOTM, but in the world with dragons and monsters I want to be something more interesting than "a strong guy with a big stick"; Ranger or Thief (neither is my style).

So this leaves: Guardian, Engineer and Rev. Rev concept appeals to me because it's a guy in armor that magics up magical powers and weapons and such. But I heard it's permabroken and bad in every aspect, and everybody hates it. Guard is also appealing because it's a magicked-up armor guy, BUT I guess it's a heavily support-oriented class so the damage output should be expected to be piddly? Finally Engineer, it's just such an oddity, I've never played anything like it and don't know what to think of it.

I guess I could go back to being an Ele or a Mesmer too, IDK, but like I said, I'd rather try something new.

Thanks for any advice.

[Biff.5312]

I enjoy them all so it's hard to say. BUT, from what you say I'm guessing you'll like engineer best. It's a pretty versatile class in terms of how you can play it, and it's very different from mesmer/elementalist. I WOULD have said guardian (which is pretty much unkillable if you aren't terrible) but yeah the tradeoff of dps is substantial. That only bothers me though when I'm fighting something that I know will take me another 15 seconds to kill, and some hotshot breezes by and finishes it off with a single blow. Nevertheless, it's nice to be able to cozy up to a boss in a fight without being one-shotted.

[ReaverKane.7598]

Well, Mage tank = Chrono... That's pretty much the current Go-to tank, but Firebrand is starting to win some terrain. Just don't hold your breath for serious damage.Revenant is recovering slowly, the latest changes to off-hand sword for example improved it a bunch.

Just pick one you like and have fun. I'm partial to Guradian since it was my first character, and you can dish out quite a bit of pain with Radiance Dragonhunters while keeping enough skills to take out some punishment.The thing is you either do massive damage or get lots of tanky/supporty. I guess you can try to min-max for both, but from my experience that ends up in a build that isn't really great and doesn't contribute much to your party.

Having said this, if you wanna go open-world solo-play and be able to take on most content that isn't a HoT champion (although you can still handle a couple of those, but man it will take a while) a Soldier's/Berzerker Dragonhunter will do you well. Although it's far from a very efficient build for high tier fractals.

[Tarasicodissa.7084]

Condi revenant is actually pretty good, but it's difficult to gear and the rotation isn't super simple, so I'd say focus on either guardian or engineer. Both can be currently run as full zerker, both have very solid DPS and they also offer some nice utility when needed. Be wary that if you ignore mechanics and don't dodge, you'll die regardless of your class or build, every class is "squishy" in this sense. The whole premise of this game is you're supposed to watch enemies and react to their actions quickly. I think guardian would be slightly more forgiving, though.

[blambidy.3216]

I would just get chrono and get the elite for your mesmer. Chrono is like a main class everyone wants. But if you don't want that i'd go for guard for more versatility in people needing you. If you ever want to do raids too, engis, and revs arent really wanted. for Guard, people will more accept then them three. Same thing with dungeons and fractals. Once you have a gaurd you have really good support. But thats if you dont want to keep your mesmer. IF you do just get chrono and the mirage, and find a diff class then those three to use.

[bearshaman.3421]

Guardian into Firebrand. No question. You want a tanky battlemage feel, that's your go-to.