What's your first character going to be?

[Draegan]

Oh christ so we have to add yet another balance tier to the mix? PvE, WvW, sPvP?

No.  sPVP is all small scale fighting, and a lot more 1v1.  W3 is all large scale stuff.

Yes, this. Fewer necros mean fewer people complaining that they were soloed in WvW or noticing that triple wells dropped on them as they were rezzing their friends killed them in two seconds. I need to keep going.

All professions can insta gib someone who's retarded and standing still.  Especially in W3 where levels matter.  Well builds, if I remember correctly, are all based on utility skills that have 40s cooldowns?

Also condition based builds are almost useless in W3 fighting.  Conditions are over ridden by other players in larger fights.

[Modern Angel]

I've simply not found necros being ass to be true. At all. Or conditions. Take your 33% longer bleeds plus 20% longer scepter skills plus slows plus poisons plus wells they can't get out of and... no, I'm sorry. It's good. I held off six people singlehandedly last night. I'm not some rad player, either.

(Note I'm not pissy because MY CLASS or anything. Vidya games. Just saying I think you're terribly mistaken about how good necromancers are in group pvp)

[Draegan]

Ok.

But you're also blowing 2? 3? utility skills on a 1 minute cooldown (I assume you reduce this).  Most of the other professions can do something similar, faster with just normal weapon skills.

I'm not saying Necro's are shit.  I'm saying they are the worst off class (except maybe the Mesmer) in the game.

[MediumHigh]

Necromancer isn't about rolling your face on the keyboard and running in circles. You can lock yourself in a role with your 5-8 skills or reek havoc but you have to actively decide the lesser of whatever evil you wish to commit. You can build a necromancer poorly, a facet of the game that Anet tried its best to remove from the game.

[Threash]

Haven't played necro at all but guild was having a discussion last night about wvwvw and consensus seemed to be that guardian thief and necro were the three most powerful classes.

[Ingmar]

Interesting. From my perspective it is elementalists, mesmers and rangers on the opposite teams who cause the most headaches. Lots of AE, distracting extra targets, etc.

[kildorn]

Mesmers win WvW hands down. Elementalists are next up. I think I fight shit rangers, because those arrows simply don't hurt (which is odd, since when I bring a ranger into the mists, they hit training dummies like a ton of bricks)

But feedback/null field/confuse/blind alone are crazy good in WvW. Add in the targeting oddities of phantasmal berzerker and you basically have bullshit that rivals Healers.

[Ard]

When I take my ranger to wvw, people tend to commit suicide on me, if they jump me one on one.  I'm not sure if they're just terrible or what, but it tends to be a very lopsided fight in my favor.  When I'm with the zerg, I tend to run into the enemy zerg, drop entangle, and run out.  This tends to get a pocket of the enemy players dead by being overrun by my side.  I'm however willing to believe there are tons of really really bad rangers.  The one I personally tend to fear are guardians, who I just flat out can't dent usually.

[Ingmar]

Smart guardians go into fights with 3 aegis (fully block next attack) things available - the one they start with, one from firing off a virtue, and one from "Retreat!" They can get another one carrying focused meditiation or wtfever its called, which is a 3 second channeled immunity bubble that resets your virtues. "Retreat!" also gives you swiftness so you can... retreat, so unless you really hang yourself out to dry it is pretty easy as a guardian to hang around the fringes of the front line without getting yourself killed.

[Zetor]

In wvw, the power of (staff - other weapons are much less viable due to the lack of range) elementalists is proportional to the size of the zerg. They're awesome for keep defense or standoffs where massive AOE damage and area denial is needed, are ok in smaller-group engagements where they can act as support (staff's direct burst damage is laughable against halfway competent players who use dodge / know what aoe circles are), and are really bad at killing other builds 1v1 (yes, the elementalist can switch to scepter/dagger for soloing or something... but such weapon-swapping is not always an option).

Currently retaliation is also a very zerg-friendly buff, since if you have retaliation rolling on a zerg (and I believe guardians with the right spec can keep retal up basically 100% of the time?) any kind of AOE that hits the group is going to HURT the caster - and fast / multi-hit AOE like meteor shower or arrow cart damage is going to basically one-shot them. This also means that you can kill siege weapons by deliberately getting your zerg under the trebuchet's target circle with retaliation up...

[Fordel]

Warrior Longbow is really fucking good.

I agree, though I find having greatsword really enhances it a lot. Greatsword 2 is just too awesome not to have in the rotation, using the longbow for f1 and 3, with the occasional 4. Kiting with 5 it pretty nifty, too. Now that I'm running a high crit build, a properly lined up longbow 2 can be decent, it's pretty weak normally imo.

I just use the Longbow in Melee too, the 2 button works really well when something is right in front of yea. I use Mace+Shield in the other weapon swap slot. I mostly only bring those out if the enemies I'm fighting are capable of chain stunning or if I'm getting my ass handed to me, weakness + half a dozen stuns goes a long way to staying alive.

If I'm being really clever, I drop the Longbow F1 and then swap to the mace/shield and use the shield stun so I get a fire shield from the combo. I'm usually too lazy to do that for the most part though, just easier to press 2 an extra time 

[Sky]

I use a signet build, so I've got stability which I think helps with stuns? I don't know, things get mowed down so quick by greatsword 2 it's hard to tell.

[Rasix]

You can do some pretty silly AE damage with a necro (staff, wells, life transfer, explodey dogs).  It's pretty fun.  I don't dislike this class, yet.  Pets don't really seem to be that great, however. Liking this a lot better than mesmer, you still do 0.0 single target DPS, but it doesn't feel as slow.

[01101010]

You can do some pretty silly AE damage with a necro (staff, wells, life transfer, explodey dogs).  It's pretty fun.  I don't dislike this class, yet.  Pets don't really seem to be that great, however. Liking this a lot better than mesmer, you still do 0.0 single target DPS, but it doesn't feel as slow.

I have yet to use any pets on mine. 

[Rasix]

The pet mechanics are bad and the AI is a little wonky at times.  Some times they won't assist.  They don't regen their health.  Their re-summon time starts when they die.  And if there's no way to manually kill them, you can't re-summon at all (from what I can tell).   All mobs make it their first priority to kill you pets.  This can save your life at times, but it ends up being a hassle.

[Mattemeo]

I'm finding it very difficult to get into Necro because of the pets, really. I was hoping to have an awesome menagerie of macabre delights following me around but really, the AI is so flimsy, the damage is so ephemeral and the pets themselves are so fragile that I find all I ever seem to be doing is waiting on their resummon timer within seconds of casting them into existence in the first place. So I've been wondering if making a No-pets Necro is a solid and viable idea. I like the solid support of Staff and got into a good rythm of aggroing mobs then running around in wide circles dropping marks till they all died (and this was generally a necessity thanks to how quickly the pets ate dirt), I'm just wondering what the best heal/utility slot skills would be instead of petageddon.

[Ingmar]

No-pets necro should be perfectly viable.

[MediumHigh]

I'm finding it very difficult to get into Necro because of the pets, really. I was hoping to have an awesome menagerie of macabre delights following me around but really, the AI is so flimsy, the damage is so ephemeral and the pets themselves are so fragile that I find all I ever seem to be doing is waiting on their resummon timer within seconds of casting them into existence in the first place. So I've been wondering if making a No-pets Necro is a solid and viable idea. I like the solid support of Staff and got into a good rythm of aggroing mobs then running around in wide circles dropping marks till they all died (and this was generally a necessity thanks to how quickly the pets ate dirt), I'm just wondering what the best heal/utility slot skills would be instead of petageddon.

 

Old school minion mastery used to be boss back in gw1 until a certain segment of the player base had a bitch fest and changed it. There is a trait that gives you a minion every time you kill something, but gw2 was never designed to be a big on the minion mastery due to crap Anet went through in gw1. Unless you use flesh golem to lead everything.

[01101010]

No-pets necro should be perfectly viable.

I reiterate, I am almost 40 and have never used a pet outside the first 7 levels. Got my healing well and been sans pets since. I am completely viable for being a horrible player. 

[Nebu]

No-pets necro should be perfectly viable.

It's all I play.  After about level 40 the mob density in zones has pets pulling everything.  I prefer petless.

[Nevermore]

The pet mechanics are bad and the AI is a little wonky at times.  Some times they won't assist.  They don't regen their health.  Their re-summon time starts when they die.  And if there's no way to manually kill them, you can't re-summon at all (from what I can tell).   All mobs make it their first priority to kill you pets.  This can save your life at times, but it ends up being a hassle.

You can manually kill your own pets by swapping the skill out for something else.  I don't remember offhand if that still triggers the cooldown or not, since I completely gave up on the pets anyway.

[Rasix]

Swapping skills does trigger the cooldown.  I'm moving to petless, anyhow.  I've just been running the damage well and the devourer, but he'll be ditched shortly. 

[KallDrexx]

The only pet I use or have ever used is the elite golem, and that's mostly because I almost never used my elites anyway so I just put it up there for some extra damage without me having to do anything.

And then I kill it promptly when I run anywhere since he aggros everything like a tard.

[Kageru]

I detest pets in general, but the pets in GW2 are terrible.

[Furiously]

The one thing I LOVE... I totally love about the game....

And this is crazy.. But when my character says, "Thank you." after interacting with a merchant. I think that rocks.

[Kageru]

It would be amusing if that was tied to your RP personality score. So that might be dignified and you'd get something else for ferocious (or silence).

[Threash]

I thought the merchants were saying thank you to me.

[Zetor]

The only pets that work well are the temporary summons. At least for elementalist, the elementals are pretty great and versatile (depends on element) and from what I hear the hounds of balthazar and the asura golems aren't shabby at all either. The only time I switch my elite to fiery greatsword is during a keep siege/defense.

[Fordel]

Dagger Elementalists have some really fun skills, but I'll be damned if I know how to keep them alive.

[sachiel]

Dagger Elementalists have some really fun skills, but I'll be damned if I know how to keep them alive.

A good bit of earth specing; quite a good bit.  earth/air/arcane.  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F2TM9nD2C7Y&feature=plcp (build in the description)

[Ard]

Dagger Elementalists have some really fun skills, but I'll be damned if I know how to keep them alive.

Arcane shield is what I use.  My whole build there is based around arcane though (shield, wave, power), and flipping between attunements pretty rapidly.

I start in air, put shocking aura on if I remember, use ride the lightning to a middlish target, use updraft to knock down everything and back out.
Switch to fire, use burning speed to get back in, pop arcane power, use ring of fire, and immediately pop arcane wave to get a stack of might.
Switch to earth, use earthquake for another stack of might and to knock everything back over.  Start channeling churning earth, and pop arcane shield after you start.
If everything isn't dead by then, cry.

[Signe]

I made a character.  Her name is Signe Zombie.  Thought I'd switch things up a little.  Anyway, I picked the giant race because I'm so tired of being short and not being able to reach the top shelf of cupboards.  So why am I so fucking SHORT???  Everyone, even all the other wimmen are WAY taller than me.  Is it some sort of personal attack on my rl stature?  How do they even know?

[Mattemeo]

Remake with body slider alllll the way to the top?
I purposefully make short Norns for both novelty value and the fact I can deal with the interminable ploddyness of their running animation more as it feels like they're running slightly faster.

I remade my GW Mesmer (a character that has followed me through every fantasy MMO I've played), not expecting much. I certainly wasn't expecting to be able to dual wield swords. Or tote around a fucking great zweihander. Which turns out to be improbably cool, once you get over the whole 'dwahhh?'ness of a clothie flinging a sword that presumably weighs as much as she does around. Fantastic weaponset; massive range, a big-hitting ricochet, a small AE ground target, an awesome phantasm attack, and a 'get the hell away from me!' cone KB. Loving this far more than I expected to.

[Signe]

Aaaah...  there's a slider!

[proudft]

The vast majority of non-Asuras seem to slide that thing alllll the way to the top, too.  I made a human and a norn both slightly-above-average, but next to everyone else in town you'd think I made them midgets.