Well you are a warrior using heavy armour and natural high health I used a melee mesmer and now lvling a dagger wielding elementalist but it's because both of those use light armour and at 80 they have less health than a warrior when hit your hp goes down very fast.
On mesmer I lvled as melee sword/pistol and at first I tried meleeing in dungeons but once you get the aggro of the mobs/boss you are pretty much dead unless you manage to kite which I am good at since I'm forced to range now. Keeping on getting downed will make you a nausiance in the group so I was forced to use the greatsword and sometimes I would go melee just for the heck of it.
Now with elementalist being unable to equip 2 types of weapons if I enter a dungeon I have to decide if I'm staying with dual daggers or switch to a staff which I really don't want to do.
Now before you say I have low health on my 80 mesmer I has almost 20k with greatsword equipped and on 18k with sword/pistol without any food. I had to switch from gear with power precision to others that had vitality and/or traits that increase vitality to increase survivability since this game has no means to hold aggro, if you do too much damage prepare to kite.
Maybe it's because you are grouping with good people but since I know no one who plays this game I'm ultimately forced to ask in chats.
So to conclude, sure you can melee most bosses but this may make you the black sheep in the party if you keep on getting downed unless you are using some class which is naturally durable like warrior or guardian.
Mesmers do massive damage at ranged so there really isn't a need to melee with them. Still if you want to melee with a Mesmer you can easily stack toughness and reach 2800 armor which is close to tanking level. Mesmers actually have pretty high base health for a scholar class too. The sword also gives you avoidance with invulnerability. You can melee as a Mesmer, you just need to build your gear completely around it. Most Mesmers are going to go with ranged weapons though because they don't really suffer from the lower damage of other ranged classes with their ranged weapons.
Same with Elementalists, though they are more a support class than a damage dealer (despite being a scholar class) because if you spec into dagger/dagger with pure toughness/vit you won't be doing much damage. Still, they have way more survivability options than the other Scholar classes and are actually one of the best damage sustainers in the game, yet they can't really tank at high Fractal levels due to never being able to get their armor high enough to hold threat to begin with (see paragraph below), but they provide awesome support and have great sustainability. If you want to do damage I highly recommend not playing an Elementalist (or Ranger or Necro).
Also I already mentioned how you can hold aggro in this game. Threat is primarily based on armor rating. Higher armor rating players generate more threat. I tank for my group (as a Ranger) because I have the highest armor rating and everyone else keeps about 100-200 armor below me. Proximity is also a factor, but MOBs will stick to you primarily based on armor rating and unless MOBs have special aggro tables (Cave Troll in AC, Giganticus) I face tank in every dungeon and never lose threat. Damage is typically not a factor.
I tried playing warrior but none of the weapon styles picked my interest, I was really surprised how the great hammer skills have so few knockdown skills compared to the risen that use hammers knocking you frequently, dual swords while it could be fun I knew in advance thanks to couple of google searches that bleeds will be a bitch when almost every class has some skills that inflict bleed and they stack all together. Then the warrior charr was using the great sword which has good skills overall but still felt kinda boring then I saw an elementalist fighting in melee and their animations peeked my interest on trying it out and I LOVE their animations it's like a thief that uses magic :P
Guardian reminds me too much of wow's paladins so I never bothered trying it out. (I did check what attacks they have with each weapon tough)
When I started I wanted a sort of melee character capable of doing some magic tricks and people suggested mesmer (Tough now that I have tried elementalist in all honesty that would be it when dual dagger specced) anyways I liked the clones idea eventough they died when the monster dies, the problem arised at cap doing dungeons several times for tokens.
With elementalist currently lvl 63 I deal a high burst damage with fire, I usually like to see the enemies die from the burn and see them shout haha. (Unlike the first time I leveled mesmer this time I'm not focusing all my gear on power precision only but power, conditional damage, precision and vitality)
What to say, I like playing classes that provides a challenge. It's quite fun trying to survive to most possible dangers while the rest of the party suffers, it gives me a great joy somehow specially when I was doing arah vs lupicus eventough I would waste minutes explaining what to do and what not to do.... but that has nothing to do with this thread.
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Since you mentioned ranger, you're saying rangers can't be very durable? Cause after finding out they have throwing axes as a weapon style I made a character and was going to make him like a medieval viking or a cavemen IF and I say IF there is any medium armor that resembles this style and using bone weapons which I already found a couple.
I just started playing yesterday, having a lot of fun so far. If you could offer a new player some advice, like common sense stuff that you wish you had known when you first started playing, what would you say? Thanks in advance for your replies!
Slow play the game. Going in and treating it like any other MMO will leave you feeling as if the game was pretty shallow in quests and story.
Take your time, pay attention to what the NPC's are saying and doing. The story isn't getting delivered in a chat box or purely through cutscenes. The story is happening around you in real time.
Play slow and pay attention and the stories flesh out and become pretty deep.
For some breaking away from the bad habbits MMO's have pushed for so long has proven impossible. For others its been a welcomed change.
cheapest way to travel to main cities is using asuran gates (not waypoints). if you're in the middle of an explorable area, go to your WvW Borderland (queue permitting) and use the asura gate to Lion's Arch.
Going to the WvW Borderlands will also give you access to Armor Repair and Crafting Stations and Bank (accessed via Crafting Station). This is also a good way to "save" your location in an explorable area. If youre in WvW and you want to go back to your previous location, just log out from your character, log back in, and you're back.
Comments
Mesmers do massive damage at ranged so there really isn't a need to melee with them. Still if you want to melee with a Mesmer you can easily stack toughness and reach 2800 armor which is close to tanking level. Mesmers actually have pretty high base health for a scholar class too. The sword also gives you avoidance with invulnerability. You can melee as a Mesmer, you just need to build your gear completely around it. Most Mesmers are going to go with ranged weapons though because they don't really suffer from the lower damage of other ranged classes with their ranged weapons.
Same with Elementalists, though they are more a support class than a damage dealer (despite being a scholar class) because if you spec into dagger/dagger with pure toughness/vit you won't be doing much damage. Still, they have way more survivability options than the other Scholar classes and are actually one of the best damage sustainers in the game, yet they can't really tank at high Fractal levels due to never being able to get their armor high enough to hold threat to begin with (see paragraph below), but they provide awesome support and have great sustainability. If you want to do damage I highly recommend not playing an Elementalist (or Ranger or Necro).
Also I already mentioned how you can hold aggro in this game. Threat is primarily based on armor rating. Higher armor rating players generate more threat. I tank for my group (as a Ranger) because I have the highest armor rating and everyone else keeps about 100-200 armor below me. Proximity is also a factor, but MOBs will stick to you primarily based on armor rating and unless MOBs have special aggro tables (Cave Troll in AC, Giganticus) I face tank in every dungeon and never lose threat. Damage is typically not a factor.
I tried playing warrior but none of the weapon styles picked my interest, I was really surprised how the great hammer skills have so few knockdown skills compared to the risen that use hammers knocking you frequently, dual swords while it could be fun I knew in advance thanks to couple of google searches that bleeds will be a bitch when almost every class has some skills that inflict bleed and they stack all together. Then the warrior charr was using the great sword which has good skills overall but still felt kinda boring then I saw an elementalist fighting in melee and their animations peeked my interest on trying it out and I LOVE their animations it's like a thief that uses magic :P
Guardian reminds me too much of wow's paladins so I never bothered trying it out. (I did check what attacks they have with each weapon tough)
When I started I wanted a sort of melee character capable of doing some magic tricks and people suggested mesmer (Tough now that I have tried elementalist in all honesty that would be it when dual dagger specced) anyways I liked the clones idea eventough they died when the monster dies, the problem arised at cap doing dungeons several times for tokens.
With elementalist currently lvl 63 I deal a high burst damage with fire, I usually like to see the enemies die from the burn and see them shout haha. (Unlike the first time I leveled mesmer this time I'm not focusing all my gear on power precision only but power, conditional damage, precision and vitality)
What to say, I like playing classes that provides a challenge. It's quite fun trying to survive to most possible dangers while the rest of the party suffers, it gives me a great joy somehow specially when I was doing arah vs lupicus eventough I would waste minutes explaining what to do and what not to do.... but that has nothing to do with this thread.
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Since you mentioned ranger, you're saying rangers can't be very durable? Cause after finding out they have throwing axes as a weapon style I made a character and was going to make him like a medieval viking or a cavemen IF and I say IF there is any medium armor that resembles this style and using bone weapons which I already found a couple.
Slow play the game. Going in and treating it like any other MMO will leave you feeling as if the game was pretty shallow in quests and story.
Take your time, pay attention to what the NPC's are saying and doing. The story isn't getting delivered in a chat box or purely through cutscenes. The story is happening around you in real time.
Play slow and pay attention and the stories flesh out and become pretty deep.
For some breaking away from the bad habbits MMO's have pushed for so long has proven impossible. For others its been a welcomed change.
cheapest way to travel to main cities is using asuran gates (not waypoints). if you're in the middle of an explorable area, go to your WvW Borderland (queue permitting) and use the asura gate to Lion's Arch.
Going to the WvW Borderlands will also give you access to Armor Repair and Crafting Stations and Bank (accessed via Crafting Station). This is also a good way to "save" your location in an explorable area. If youre in WvW and you want to go back to your previous location, just log out from your character, log back in, and you're back.
Have fun storming the castle! - Miracle Max