Howdy, Stranger!
It looks like you're new here. If you want to get involved, click one of these buttons!
Quick Links
Save yourself some frustration
freston
Member UncommonPosts: 503
Release date is coming soon and im afraid we are going to see resurgence of one topic dear to this forum, that of difficulty levels. Anyone who has played BWE3 has noticed a steep decline in the mean difficulty of the game (Anet admitted it was due to a bug. Intended difficulty was meant to be similar to BWE2)
That means a lot of people who only played last beta event or who are new to the game are going to discover themselves eating the ground once and again.
I am among the ones who prefer the harsher difficulty levels of the first 2 BWE and dont want the game to be dumbed. GW2 just takes some time to learn the ropes and some concentration to what you are doing, but the first hours can be a bit frustrating if you go in expecting a walk in the park, specially if you choose certain classes.
If you are the kind of player that doesnt mind getting a bit battered till you learn the ropes, please ignore this advice, but if you think it can lessen the experience of the game (at least the starting one), id follow this advice:
1) Pick Guardian as a starting class. Its by far the most user friendly of the 8, and one of the most easy to survive with (many say second only to necro, which is just not as user friendly)
2) Necromancer , Ranger or Warrior are good alternatives to Guardian, and with good survival capacity as well.
3) Avoid Thief , Mesmer or Engineer. All 3 are insanely fun, in all 3 you die a lot till you learn to play them. If you absolutely have to pick one , choose engineer , as is a mostly ranged class and that helps a lot to survive.
Once you have some experience, any class is playable and any class is fun.
Just remember, once dumbed, it stays dumbed forever
Comments
EQ2 fan sites
Hmm not sure if I agree on the classes, guess it's down to what classes you're used to playing, melee vs ranged/caster etc. My beta character I died the most with was my guardian and I only played it during BWE3
BWE1 I exclusively played elementalist (and tried other classes only briefly, taking them to Heart of the Mists to check everything they got and test on the sparring class NPCs) and indeed died quite a few times but soon got the hang of it (the not dying part, still sucked at elementalist).
BWE2 I played a bit of everything but most elementalist and engineer. On my engineer I only died in WvW but not once in PvE (might be a bit due to being used a bit to the combat after BWE1).
BWE3 I played a bit of everything but mainly engineer, didn't die except in WvW, rolled a guardian to check and died quite a few times in the human starter zone.
For the rest I agree with your post that people shouldn't get frustrated too fast because the game has a learning curve.
I must clarify i was thinking only of pve. i guess in pvp things must change totally. I didnt die once as a Guardian in the whole BWE. Not even once. As an engineer, i kept hitting the groun each 5 mins.
Maybe some players are more suited to some classes i guess...
Aye, everyone's different, some understand the Gaurdian, I sure as heck don't. I can play the heck out of a warrior though, or a Elementalist. Two completely different play styles, but I understand how they work and what to do in most situations.
I think the big thing for most people will be the understanding of said classes. Thiefs aren't typical stealth classes, Warriors aren't typical tanks, Ele's aren't typical mages.
And Mesmers are awesome. Confusion confusion confusion. Make them dps themselves.
The "Youtube Pro": Someone who watches video's on said subject, and obviously has a full understanding of what is being said about such subject.
Oderint, dum metuant.
All of my posts are either intelligent, thought provoking, funny, satirical, sarcastic or intentionally disrespectful. Take your pick.
I get banned in the forums for games I love, so lets see if I do better in the forums for games I hate.
I enjoy the serenity of not caring what your opinion is.
I don't hate much, but I hate Apple© with a passion. If Steve Jobs was alive, I would punch him in the face.
Agreed but if you die a lot it might be a good idea to start with an easier class until you learnt the basics so OPs advice is sound.
The only expectation you should go in with is that it will take 20 hours, give or take, of play time for you to start "get" how a class plays.
Reading all the skills on the wiki isn't enough. It helps sure, but its not enough.
I disagree. It was much easier for me to surive on a mesmer at level 10 than a guardian.
It will be far more based on playstyle and how your playstyle meshes with the class. Until a guardian gets his super healing book elite he is tough but not that tough. Its no substitue for good kiting. If you are a person who likes to kite you will find guardian frustarting and some classes identified as "hard" much easier.
At level 10 there is no class that really has the abilities to just take massive punishment of the kind you could actually manage via kiting. Later on at level 30 this can change. But 30 is gonna be a good number of days away for most normal players.
I disagree with this "advice". Everyone new to the game should just try whatever class is most apealing to them, and they can switch if they don't like how it plays.
Also, Guardian as starting class? To me it was the most horrible class to start with. On no other class i died even remotely close as much from 1-5 as Guardian. (turns out, the key for me was to get rid of mace ASAP)
At 10 level you may have already grasped the basics of your class. I did not imply that Guardians were intrinsically superior to Mesmer, just easier to learn.
Again I disagree. Niether one is easier to get to a similar level of performance.
To become optimally good at any class in GW2 will take 50 or more hours of playing.
To attain a decent level of performance by level is not harder on mesmer than Guardian.
The only thing with mesmer is if you want to maximize certain things and survive very well you will have to keep track of a number of things both clone/phantasm management, interrupts and your moblity.
But the same is true for guardian just with different variables like your auras, and using walls and bubbles correctly and swtich from defensive to offensive movements weapon (ie. mace/shield for healing/defense into GS for pulls and leaps).
You can start out a guardian as "run up and smash and stand in regen circle". But frankly that startegy sucks. You do better as a warrior that way because the Guardian just doesn't regen enough to be taking on 3 things whereas at least the warrior has a chance to burn em down with AOE.
There are no simple classes. At BWE1/2 level of difiiculty ALL classes will die fast against a few mobs if they try to simply smash them. All classes must play fairly smart to survive in dicey situations. Some will kite, some will skirmish but no one can just stand there and pound on things at level 10.
A guardian at level 10 can still die very fast. How they get away in a tigh situation differs from a mesmer or a theif or an elementalist. They may use the wall from staff to run away rather than a teleport or stealth. But either way all classes must master mostly the same tactics simply executed differently.
Later on as you get on to about level 20 you may worry more about actual class mechanics and whether you like them. Shatter takes alot of plannign and timing. Elementalist takes a huge amount of micomanagement. By that time though most everyone will have an idea if they like that or not.
There are no easy classes though. If you can't figure out an escape tactic for your class you will get frustrated and every class needs that.
inb4 gw2 is made so easy i can finish it with my eyes closed.
Every game does this at some point and gw2 will be no diffrent.
I also have to disagree with the OP somewhat. I think different people will simply find different classes to be more intuitive than others. Some people seem to find elementalists to be incredibly complex, for example, but all the attunement swapping just made sense to me from the get go.
There are also simpler and more complex specs for each class. So new players can pretty much find something that works for them regardless of which class they play.
i died a lot as a guardian and thief, never died as an engineer tho.
Most memorable games: AoC(Tryanny PvP), RIFT, GW, GW2, Ragnarok Online, Aion, FFXI, FFXIV, Secret World, League of Legends (Silver II rank)