30 replies to this topic

[Tal El Hawkins]

I would like to hear the community opinions about the ease of leveling to 80 from the easiest to the hardest. In addition, do provide reasons in to your ranking.

For a start, I have 6 level 80 professions and hence have some experiences in leveling them (except for warrior and elementalist, leveled without doing crafting).

Ranger - When using double bears, I believe ranger is the easiest to level
Warrior - Their high armor and dps allow them to level the next fastest. Very tolerant to mistakes
Guardian - They are so difficult to die. Just dun get too ambitious to challenge Champions at lowbies
Necromancer - After getting the flesh golem at level 30, you basically faceroll most mobs
Engineer - Will be tough at low level but once you some kits, things began to look bright. AOE king with bombs kit at earlier levels
Thief - Squishy armour coupled with low health means a tight control over your initiative. Good at 1v1 or even 1v2. Problem arises when facing more mobs
Mesmer - Hell when leveling from 1-40 and almost made you want to give up. After level 40, you starts to see sunshine.
Elementalist - You need tons of coffee for this profession. Almost any mistake will cost you your life. Need eagle eye ability to play well

Do share your thoughts!

[matsif]

easiest for me was by far the warrior.  up until like level 60 you can literally just run 5 signet GS build and faceroll everything without trying.

hardest has been mesmer as I haven't truly gotten the hang of the profession yet, and I kinda benched him to level my ele recenty.

[Coren]

matsif, on 20 December 2012 - 03:08 PM, said:

easiest for me was by far the warrior.  up until like level 60 you can literally just run 5 signet GS build and faceroll everything without trying.

hardest has been mesmer as I haven't truly gotten the hang of the profession yet, and I kinda benched him to level my ele recenty.

It's well known that mesmers are quite hard to level, until you hit level 45 ish. Phantasms don't die as much and your traits make a huge difference.

[B3aT]

Don't have first hand impressions on all of them, but the order sounds right (for first character ofc).

[Featherman]

The order seems about right, although I would put necromancers above guardians since necros get access to minions very early and health scales better than armor when using random loot for equipment.

[Xunlai Agent]

Warriors and Guardians are definitely top of the pecking order when it comes to leveling

[Arquenya]

1. Warrior
2. Guardian/Ranger
4. the rest

Warriors do so much damage that you usually can kill everything before you run out of hp.
Guardians are extremely survivable and do decent dps.
Rangers are .. ranged, lots of kiting skills and have pets that can "tank".

Eles have (extremely) low hp and about average damage
Thieves - same. Melee range can pull additional mobs and its ranged dps isn't all that great.
Mesmers have a little more survivability but don't have warrior dps or guardian survivability.

Haven't tried the rest (necro/eng).

Edited by Arquenya, 20 December 2012 - 04:44 PM.

[Loperdos]

After starting on a thief and leveling up to 80 first then switching between classes to figure out which one I wanted to play next, I was COMPLETELY taken off guard by how incredibly easy it is to level up on a warrior.  It makes most of the content a complete joke between the damage as well as the high starting health pool and heavy armor.

So I would say:

1. Warrior (by far)
2. Guardian
3. Thief (due to their versatility, mobility and ability to take on any number of groups of enemies, though the squishiness gets annoying sometimes)
4. Ranger/Engi
5. Necro (starts off kinda slow, but once you get into it, the big health pool is quite nice, plus the damage from some of the skills, like the Wells)
6. Elementalist (all of the above sentiments I agree with, the LEAST forgiving class of the ones I've played)

The highest I've gotten a Mesmer up to is all of lvl 11, I just couldn't stand how...awkward they are at early levels.  Perhaps at some point I'll come back around to it, but...yeah.

Edited by Loperdos, 21 December 2012 - 09:54 PM.

[Gilles VI]

Elementalist was so easy to level for me.

D/D for the couple of times I went outside combined with the heal signet = impossible to die.
Staff for dungeons.

I got from lvl2-32 in Queensdale & Plains of Ashford and other levels with crafting.
32-80 with staff in explorable dungeons (mostly AC).
Was so incredibly easy & fast.
Result is a lvl80 with 11% world completion though.

[McGinnis]

I don't have a level 80 yet, but I've got four characters in the 50s and 60s (I can never decide what my main should be, so I keep switching - ah well). Characters I've leveled into the 50s are (in order from easiest to hardest):

1. Warrior - I just wanted to try it... the 5 signet + greatsword combination. It's rather amazing how fast stuff dies. I would say it gets boring occasionally, but other times it's fun blowing stuff up. Because leveling is relatively easy as a warrior, sometimes I go for personal challenges like rounding up more mobs and whatnot - this is the one class where I feel more bold than on any other character. Even if I don't play carefully at all I can get out of most situations alive (most ). Currently level 57.

2. Guardian - My first character. I died a LOT in the first 20 levels, but that was also because I was learning the game etc. After you get some traits (Renewed Justice, speficically) and utilities, things just get so much easier. I used several builds, most of them at the very least effective. Spirit weapons did good damage and offered nice control. Shouts gave yet more amazing survivability. And with renewed justice it's so easy to keep blinding enemies. Level 58 at the moment.

3. Ranger - I play as a melee focused ranger, so that makes it a bit more challenging. But with my pets (I use cats instead of bears), it's generally not that difficult even against a small group. Conditions destroy me if there's too many (which can be helped with a brown bear), but other than that, I found this easy enough. I learned how to make use of the Counterattack on the GS to defend and I keep axe/warhorn on the switch. Definitely kills slower than the guardian or the warrior, though I find tough veteran bosses easier to solo than on my warrior, even in melee range. This is the character I died the least on till now, but I also play more carefully. Level 54.

4. Elementalist - Whereas the above three were fairly easy, I'd consider the elementalist as a hard class to level. VERY unforgiving of mistakes in the first 20 or so levels. I died so many times during personal story missions I almost gave up. Right now it's my favorite profession. I mostly played as D/D since I enjoyed that playstyle best. This is the profession I tried the most builds with (I think I retrained my traits at least 15 times). After you do get some traits, things get better. Mostly, though, I got better as a player. Level 64 now and this will likely be my first 80.

I have a low level Mesmer as well, and I'm sort of experiencing the same thing as with my ele. Unforgiving and takes a while getting used to. I'm guessing this will get better once I get some traits and once I learn to use the shatter mechanic beyond 'lol F1 is up - smash it for damage!' like I do currently.

Haven't played the other three yet.

[Eon Lilu]

Considering you can complete lvl 10 storyline at lvl 4 as warrior, warrior just facerolls all pve.

[Liquidzoil]

Funny how the top classes in PVP are difficult to level in general PVE, except for the warrior and guardian.

[AzureRogue]

I actually found my elementalist "easier" to level by virtue of the fact that it was FAR more enjoyable.  My warrior was my first 80 and was "easy" in the sense that I put little effort into the actual playing, but often times running through PvE felt more like a chore that I had to do to level up.  With elementalist I had to work slightly harder (as stated above, D/D with Signet makes PvE pretty silly as long as you run around while attacking - maybe even without that) but I had a lot more fun.

That could just be a personal factor, though, and I'll admit that.  Ele is definitely the only class that has "clicked" for me so far and I have a hard time getting motivated to play anything else anymore.  My other 80s just sit and rot while I run around on my ele

[Xenomortis]

Guardian or Necro are I think, the most durable.
The Necro suffers from being a little slow when it comes to killing, but you can take fairly obscene amounts of punishment when leveling.

The other casters suffer from 'made of paper' syndrome. They do have the tools required to survive most engagements, but they can't stand up against the odds as well as the Necro.

The Warrior is pretty tough and can kill pretty quickly. Not as durable as the Guardian but playing one is pretty straightforward for most of the game.

The Ranger isn't as durable as the Guardian or Necro, but being ranged and having a pet puts him around the Warrior's level of survivability whilst leveling. Unfortunately for him though, the Ranger doesn't do as much damage as a Warrior, so why bother?

[julystork]

Is it more accurate to rank easiness by the profession's squishiness pre-level 21?

[Alex Dimitri]

1.Mesmer  (got two of this beautiful babies, so easy to level and they rock on max lvl too)
2.Guardian (easy to level to a point of "godmode" )
3.Ranger  (hehe this class is perfect for laid back easy level up, charmingly nice to get to max level with no or very little trouble)
4.Necro   (also part of big four, easy effortless, and after guardian hardest class to die)
5.Engineer (this i leveled first, maybe more people were around...maybe it`s just better at leveling then on max lvl)
6.Warrior  (it`s easy to a point somewhere around lvl 60 starts to get terribly squishy if you got to "zerker" crit build)
7.Elementalist  (fun on early levels, later on it`s just pain in the but)
8.Thief  (i tried once and i failed, i tried second time and i quited in rage, i simply hate this class !)

[The Shadow]

Elementalist is the easiest to level due to AC being the most popular leveling method outside of crafting. Ice bow > AC so go figure.

[cmerc]

1. Ranger (pets are pretty good at keeping aggro so keep them alive and everything dies fast)
2. Mesmer (they don't have the highest dps but it's almost impossible to die if you keep spawning clones/phantasms).
3. Guardian (pretty obvious why, awesome armor and tons of healing skills)
4. Warrior (probably requires the least amount of skill/focus to be good at this, but you have to make sure everything dies fast or you can get into trouble).
5. Engineer (can be squishy but so many amazing control and support skills mean you will rarely die)
6. Necromancer (awesome survivability but I found I had more trouble with multiple mobs aggroed than with the classes listed higher).
7. Thief (I rage a lot while levelling my thief because let's face it, it's hella squshy and doesn't do well at healing or condition removal)
8. Elementalist (basically what everyone has been saying, really fun and demands the most skill, but squishier than anything. one wrong move and it's res at waypoint time)

Edited by cmerc, 30 December 2012 - 12:29 AM.

[Khlaw]

It varies a lot depending on level.  Early on, mesmer and engineer can be kinda rough, but once they are in their 40's, they're a cake walk.  I've ranked them below based on my experience, and indicated what level my character of the given class is to provide context.  Honestly, an argument could be made to shuffle the positions of several of them.

1.  Ranger: bears, plenty of ways to keep things away from you. Trade-off:  kind of boring to me (32)
2.  Guardian: nearly indestructible, solid DPS.  Trade-off: not much in the way of ranged DPS (80)
3.  Warrior: great DPS, decent survivability. Trade-off:  none, really(34)
4.  Engineer: lots of ways to stay alive, escape combat. Trade-off:  can get into situations where the "wrong" set of skills is equipped (80)
5.  Thief: extreme burst and mobility. Trade-off:  getting focused by a boss can be bad news depending on current initiative state (45)
6.  Mesmer (post 30):  able to stay at range, control skills. Trade-off:  super-weak early in the game, learning curve (80)
7.  Necromancer:  high HP, able to call a mulligan with death shroud. Trade-off:  most suited to longer fights where DoTs shine, minions are idiots (80)
8.  Elementalist:  lots of versatility, good DPS from range. Trade-off:  Learning curve, can get locked out of an attunement you suddenly need (80)

Really, the "difficulty gap" for leveling isn't very big.  Specced right and played right, everything levels quickly and without much frustration.   Necro would be higher up the list, if it was better suited for killing low HP mobs quickly and if minion AI was better (flesh golem is a beast, but he'd much rather go grab that pack of wolves down the road than wait for you to attack that ettin in front of you.

Edited by Khlaw, 30 December 2012 - 12:54 AM.

[Murderer]

1. 80 Warrior
2. 80 Guardian
3. 80 Necromancer
4. 80 Engineer
5. lvl 35 Mesmer

Warrior was so easy compared to the rest. I just started lvling the mesmer and so far it is horrible compared to warrior.

[Br0th3r6r1m]

I probably played this game backwards...I started with Thief.  Thief taught me the importance of dodging and timing, this would prove useful later. I would test myself and see how many mobs I could pull and still walk away unshaken.  I then moved to Mesmer.  WOW, I rocked at this even more...people probably looked at me suicidal jumping into huge mobs.  THEN I moved to Necro.  Necro seemed "tanky" compared to what I had played earlier, coupled with a second life bar...wells + Condition Damage...complete ownage.  So for me:

1) Necro-easiest
2) Mesmer-only edging thief by a hair
3) Thief

[Sir Moak]

I think all of the classes have uses in teaching different tactics and gameplay mechanics. I have levelled a few professions and in terms of ease of levelling major differences only appear in lower levels (<40). I can't really make up an ordered list as from the point of having a decent build all professions are relatively easy to level. However, here's a list of what different professions taught me:

- Mesmer (80): "selfish" utility. Tons of skills to handle different situations directly. Levelled with staff + sword/focus, had a blast controlling the battlefield. The downside is I did not learn to dodge properly as there always was some kind of teleport or other utility to get me out of trouble.

- Necro (80): damage control and kiting. Played with a condition build and learned how to switch between targets to maximize damage/control utilities.

- Warrior (80): switching between ranged and close combat. I play some kind of healer/condition hybrid with dual swords and longbow. The healer aspect also helped in improving team awareness and positioning relative to my teammates. Having some low cooldown combo finishers also helps improving combo field awareness.

- Ranger (80): didn't find much to learn at first, but once I went the trapper way and started switching to close combat more frequently I learned quite a lot about CC. Also having to pay attention to the pets helps to get rid of "tunnel vision" (by that I mean paying attention to only my character and only noticing 3 minutes later that half my team is dead).

- Elementalist (71): advanced group utility. Planning ahead with CC, combo fields, finishers, auras, weapon skill heals. Also using the staff can train your dodging skills quite a lot.

As my other characters haven't reached 40, I cannot comment on what those proffessions can teach in terms of gameplay.

[jthamind]

i've leveled an elementalist and thief to 80, a necro to 14, and a warrior to 20.

the warrior is by far the easiest. high vitality, high armor, high damage, and a plethora of weapon styles. right now i have 90%+ critical chance and almost 50 critical damage in all blues/greens. plus i have good survivability. on top of that, it's really fun. i love the greatsword and hammer, and double axes are great too.

[Red Intensity]

From limited experience:

1 - Mesmer. This was probably because it was my first character to be made on release day, when the game wasn't as much of a chore as it currently is today. I did have a tough time leveling.

2 - Engineer. My second level 80, and it was tougher to level because of waning interest, lack of damage, turrets took more aggro than I did, flamethrower missing 90% of the time, etc. Crowd control options are nice and kept me alive most of the time.

I must be a masochist if I can stomach leveling these classes.

[Ren]

Based on my experience, I found the following;

1 - Warrior (80). I've been playing Warrior since BWE1, so I was quite familiar with the class by the time release rolled around. Aside from that, being a good all rounder meant that there was no situation I felt like I couldn't handle.

2 - Guardian (80). The experience is pretty similar to that of a warrior, just with a more defensive focus. Easy as pie, really.

3 - Mesmer (80). Alright, I'll admit, the first ten to twenty levels are hard. But once you start filling out some traits, the Mesmer becomes an incredibly easy and fun class to level.

4 - Ranger (80). Rangers are also easy, for the reasons mentioned by previous posters. I found sticking at the back and peppering the enemy with crossfire to be a rather tedious experience though. And Sword/Dagger as an off set is great fun for dueling in WvW, but the autoattack on sword can be absolutely maddening.

5 - Necromancer (12). I know it's early days yet, but honestly, thus far I really like where necro is going in terms of accessibility and ease of play. The minions are as thick as two short planks, but they'll still sponge up damage handsomely before you need to step in with your enormous health pool.

6 - Elementalist (25). I had a bit of a false start with my ele as this is actually my second one. My first one only made it to 14 because of his stupid ponytail that clipped through just about every bit of gear in existence. Once that was over though, I managed to start to enjoy leveling ele a whole lot. It requires an active playstyle, sure, but I feel that they're tough in a way that their paper thin armour and low health wouldn't suggest and are very good at multiple mobs.

7 - Thief (42). These guys... Oh boy. I've tried everything to bring myself to level my thief, but doing so would just mean me either getting killed or spamming unload. Death or tedium. Stealth is cool, but you have to know when to use it. And the rest of the time, your defenses are even more paper thin than an ele's.

8 - Engineer (18). I don't dislike my engi at all, it has to be said. He's good fun to play as and the skills are varied and a laugh. But leveling the guy is another story, I just can't do it. Pretty much any mob I come across is a tough sell because of the large amount of pre-fight setup I feel like I'm going through with turrets and kits.

[beadnbutter32]

Based on my experience with Warrior, Mesmer, Ele at 80, and a few stalled or deleted others.

1. Guardian (now at 21). 10 times the survivability of any other class even warriors.
2. Mesmer enjoys endless illusion spamming plus a full toolset to deal with any scenario.
3. Warrior, damage yes, but tanking no, Ok if you love twitch combat.
4. Thief, damage yes, twitch yes, one trick pony, yes. (deleted to free slot to start Guardian)
5. Engineer sort of like a Mesmer with turrets instead of illusions, long cool downs
6. Elementalist, nuke and kite, but too squishy in tight quarters, only good out in the open.

Have not tried ranger or necro, but since rangers seem to be botters 1st choice, it may be worth trying if you are looking for fire and forget.  Necro, sounds interesting, I may ditch my Engineer to try one.

[Evans]

1. Guardian
Was most definitely the easiest one. Not the fastest, but it was very hard to die. For starting out and learning how to dodge etc. the guardian was very much the best one to start with
2. Warrior
Warriors are much like guardians, but easier to kill, yet faster to make the kill. If you have some dodging and placement skills, it is a good second.
3. Engineer
If you have a good sense of placement from playing the heavy classes, the engineer is a very good next one to go for. The engineer is the epitome of crowd control. It feels a little less natural so it might be harder if you don't have any experience with the game yet.
4. Necromancer
Necromancer and engineer are quite alike imo. Necromancers are sturdier though, but have less variety. Could very well be on 3th spot together with engineer.
5. Ranger
I would say that the ranger has a high rate of survivability with it's ranged combat and pets. However, sword suffers from silly auto attack jumping. Damage output isn't all that high and imho it gets stale to play quickly.
6. Mesmer
Much more interesting, but very unnatural feel with illusions and phantasms. Needs some getting used to. Gets far better as you reach lv. 40.
7. Thief
Squishy and gimmicky or spammy. Not my sort of profession.
8. Elementalist
And yet I still place the elementalist as last. I love the profession, but I can't bring up the patience to level it. Extremely squishy and yet still subpar damage output. Said to be the king of versatility, even though the attunements all have a very defined purpose to them spread over different weapons which you can't swap in combat. Thus suffers from being stuck in one weapon because unlike the engineer who can use kits to change range in combat, the elementalist is also stuck in the range his weapons offer. No swapping from close range dmg output to long range support in combat for the elementalist.
It's quite a shame to be honest, imo this profession needs some balancing.

Edited by Evans, 10 January 2013 - 02:11 PM.

[Geeri]

I started with an Elementalist and didn't do anything else until I hit level 80. I must agree that I find levelling other stuff easy bordering boring; this may be because the Elementalist is just difficult (which I find fun) but also because I simply know more about this game now.

I find that most people having issues levelling an Elementalist just haven't found out how one works for them yet. The only issues I had was when I was playing staff in the world, or scepter/focus. When I switched to scepter/dagger around level 15 I've never had anymore issues, ever, bursting everything down.

I haven't found an Elementalist to be squishy at all as long as you constantly keep moving, using blinds, dodges, stuns, knockdowns, teleports, etc. But I suppose that people who are used to a Guardian's survivability might find Elementalists too squishy for their taste :-)

Anyway, I can't really compare to other classes as I haven't gotten a single one past level 15 yet (everything is so BORING compared to a D/D Auramancer Elementalist -.-), but "hard" or "difficult" are not the words that come to mind. It's just that you need to find the combo's and that might take some time.

[Khaal]

Easiest to hardest to level of the toons I have played a significant amount.

Guardian (80) - The survivability and versatility of the class made it really easy to level.  Sometimes slow as the DPS often isn't as high as other classes, but slow and steady can win the race.

Mesmer (80) - It really didn't take me long to get having my illusions control the field.  At that point the success rate goes up big time.

Warrior (80) - There were a couple of points where I found my warrior somewhat difficult to play.  My wife has had the same experience at similar levels, so there may be a couple of bottleneck points if you can't figure out a good build.

Thief (60) - I haven't finished levelling my thief and part of that is that it can be very frustrating.  Having said that, I have never been particularly good with rogue style classes and glass cannon builds.  I think I'm starting to get the hang of it somewhat, but I think it is just going to be a challenging playstyle for me.

[Arquenya]

Thus far my ratings according to my experience:

1. Warrior (80). You do so much damage and everything goes down so quickly, it's almost like you play another class with downgraded exotics, it's really that easy. Used mainly GS/rifle (although longbow also has great AoE dps). Really no competition for the top spot.
2. Guardian (80). A bit like the warrior, less DPS but more survivability. Used GS and shield/wand for levelling.
3. Ranger (80). She was my first lvl80 character. Pet and so much kiting skills (longbow/shortbow) makes it really easy. DPS less than melee classes but survivability is really excellent.
4. Necromancer (27). My newest class. Didn't expect it but thus far no deaths and a sturdy minion "pet" that takes all the aggro (even if you don't intend it to). No problems with mobs 3 levels above me, even with subpar gear, I was really surprised. Good health pool, least squishy of the caster classes.
5. Mesmer (80). Reasonable survivability and medium DPS, levelled her mostly in dungeons using staff/GS because doing areas go rather slow. Time Warp is one of the best dungeon running elites in the game.
6. Thief (57). With elementalist the lowest hp in game. Very squishy, rather vulnerable to ranged attacks and AoE.
7. Elementalist (66). Extremely squishy and low dps. Suffers from the same issues as thieves, only even more squishy. You only have to cough at her and she's down already. A bit the reverse of a warrior: you feel like you're upscaled to lvl80 while you're wearing starter gear.

I haven't tried engineer yet, I'm out of character slots.

Edited by Arquenya, 21 January 2013 - 03:42 PM.