Can I pick just one class?

Well? Can I?

I read that...
"Are all characters dual-profession characters?

No. You may choose to be a single-profession character if you desire. There is no innate advantage or disadvantage to being a single-profession character, but the option is provided for those who prefer it."

So this theorectically answers my question. But what I mean is can i play a single profession charater and not be gimped? I simply haven't heard anyone going on about their pure Monk or whatever.

As an example I plan on being a Mesmer. Period. I was considering primary of elementalist for more energy, but then I can't use runes to raise my Mesmer attributes right? Mesmers can steal lots of energy anyhow.

Quick summary: Will I suck without a second profession? Has anyone done 1 profession only? Do you have any recommendations for a Mesmer's 2nd or 1st class?

EDIT: Typos make me sound foreign.

Welcome to mesmerhood lol. My main character is a mesmer and like you I ran into the difficulty of a 2nd profession. My problem was I couldn't decide which one. The beauty of this (if your PvE) is that you can try on which shoe you like in the tutorial type Pre-Searing Ascalon. Okay, take me for example, I thought I'd like a necro to add more hexes... nope didn't work (so when I went back to the nice necro lady.. I was like I don't like necro thanks anyway), then I went as a monk thinking healing myself would come in handy (didn't enjoy this one at all, so no the nice monk man). Then elementalist for a bit more dmg (bingo, I picked elementalist). Testing these areas took me literally 8 hours of gameplay before I found what I liked. SO you can try on different professions and see which one's you like the best (also to answer the last question, the one's listed are the most used 2nd professions for mesmers esp Ele and Mo). And no, you wouldn't be gimped for picking a 2nd profession... you will just be a dedicated Mesmer. My recommendation is to just try out different secondary professions, if you don't like any of the flavors just stick with you (Mesmer has plenty of skills to fill the skill slots). In shorty, have fun and build your character the way you want to. Now in PvP, someone else will have to say, I have no experience

Lansing Kai Don

Some people will argue that some of the best "builds" are when you combine the skills of two professions for the best "combo". I have created many "builds" basically ideas that use mainly all of the primary proffessions skills but then i use one skill from the secondary and thus serving its purpose. For example, have a ranger with 5 or more bow attack skills with decent recharge time, then just have the Warriors elite skill Flourish, to recharge all of those skills and fill your energy back up to 25. Id say a great skill without putting any attribute points into your secondary proffession. So I would say would get bummed out by not getting a secondary because there will always be at least one skill that could better the other 7 significantly, and also while going through PvE yyou wont find any other skills than your primary if that is your only class.

For PvE, there is nothing wrong with being one class. My R/W is mostly ranger with one warrior skill, and my E/Me is completely elementalist.

For PvP, you should have a secondary class even if you don't use it. It provides a little more surprise to your opponents while they guess what possible combinations you can be.

If you are a PvP player type...having a secondary profession on your PvE will help your PvP character out as well. IT will allow your PvE character to attain and unlock skills for your PvP character.

Doesn't mean you have to use them on your PvE .. just that it will benefit your PvPer.

Hi mbecker, good to see you here. I'm not sure if I can give you any good answers but I would say that having the secondary class options can not be detrimental in any way. If you focus on only your primary class that is fine, but I think you will find that some skills from your secondary class are certainly worth taking.

I played guild wars quite a ways back and at the time I played you had to choose your primary and secondary skills on character creation. Now it sounds like you get to play around with the secondary classes in the starting area or perhaps not choose one at all? The first time this was mentioned somewhere I wasn't sure what exactly was being implied. Can someone shed a little light on this?

Every NPC that offers you the option of a secondary class will give you a quest to perform using those skills they offer. Upon completion and returning to trainer, you will get your experience reward and them asking if you want this option to be your permanent secondary. If you decline or just exit the NPC chat screen you will not be "stuck" with that secondary class and still have option of talking to another to try a different one out before settling on your secondary choice to be made permanent.

Neat, I like it.

Hey Doc!

Thanks for the replies everyone. I'm going to look over my build and see if there's anything that I'd like to add. The problem I'm imagining is sorting through 500 skills for the 1 or 2 that I want to add. :-)

There's no reason not to take a second profession - it just adds options to your character that aren't there otherwise. Find a skill or two that's appealing, and drop it into your build as neccessary.

If there's nothing particularly appealing about any of the secondaries to you, just go Mesmer/Monk for a Res. It's always a boon in PvE, and Fast Casting has great synergy with the long casting times. There's also stuff like Infuse Health which you can use as an emergency heal without dedicating many attribute points to the class. Personally I think this is the deepest Mesmer secondary, and for a new PvE character to explore the game world it gets my whole-hearted endorsement.

Both Ranger and Warrior have some nice stances that can be snuck into a build quietly - Serpent's Quickness helps you deal with your long cooldowns, and Warriors have some crazy defensive stances and shouts in Tactics now that work with any character. Mes/War also sets you up nicely to go into an Illusionary Weaponry build, if you're into that sort of thing.

Mesmer/Elementalist is a silly beast - I've never seen Elementalist as just a splash, rather people used this combo to Fast Cast Elementalist skills like Flare. The sad part is that because you lose out on runes, you don't actually improve your damage output much at all.

Then there's the Mesmer/Necromancer, teacher of bad habits. I rail on this combination because it's so prone to overthinking and trying to do everything, and as a result 99% of Mesmer/Necromancer builds are these confusing blobs of random hate that don't actually do anything. That said, I don't think the combination is worthless, *if* you're playing a near-pure Mesmer. Just grab Malaise, and maybe Rend Enchantments, and ignore the rest of the class. If you start looking over the skill lists of the Mesmer and Necromancer and try to find cool combos you will find them, and you'll be tempted to use them, and you'll have made another awful character in the process.


So my recommendation would be to make a Mesmer/Monk to buff up your defenses a bit and help your team for general use. If you just want to hunt Monks, you might want to try a Mesmer/Necromancer with a bunch of Mesmer skills and Malaise - just don't give in to temptation and indulge your inner scrub.

Peace,
-CxE

Anti Caster

Attributes

Fast Casting – 9 (8+1) Rune
Domination Magic – 14 (12+2) Rune + Mask
Illusion Magic – 0
Inspiration Magic – 11 (10+1) Rune

Domination Magic

Backfire - For 10 seconds, whenever target foe casts a spell that foe takes 35-119 damage.

Diversion - For 6 seconds, the next time target foe uses a skill, that skill takes an additional 10-47 seconds to recharge.

Power Block (E) - If target foe is casting a spell, that spell is interrupted. The interrupted spell and all spells of that attribute are disabled for 3-13 seconds for that foe.

Power Leak - If target foe is casting a spell, the spell is interrupted and your target loses 10-22 Energy.

Inspiration Magic

Energy Tap - Steal 8-13 Energy from target foe.

Leech Signet - Interrupt target foe's action. If that action was a spell, you gain 3-13 Energy.

Power Drain - If target foe is casting a spell, the spell is interrupted and you gain 1-25 Energy.

Spirit of Failure - For 30 seconds, target foe has a 25% chance to miss with attacks. You gain 1-4 Energy for each miss.

************************************************

That's my build as it is. No one should be getting off a spell ever. The one thing I can think of is remove one of the energy steal things for yet another interupt. Technically there's 4 interrupts.
-or-
Remove an energy steal for a hex/enchantment breaker. Anyone? I know I'm really playing up the primary role of the Mesmer as anti-caster. Is there something I should have because I also fall under the support class category? I love you for helping.

Ah, the fairly standard interrupt storm Mesmer.

Your best bet would be to pull a couple points out of Fast Casting and Inspiration (Fast Casting does virtually nothing to interrupts so it isn't helping too much), drop Spirit of Failure, and add Malaise. You don't need a bunch in Curses, just 7 or so should be fine.

Leech Signet is your weak link, so if you need to make room for something else that's that first thing to go. I'd consider dropping Backfire for Shame as well, as Backfire really isn't all that exciting if you can't back up the damage. Of course a lot of people kill themselves on it anyway so it might not be a bad idea to keep it around.

Peace,
-CxE

Fairly standard, yes. I haven't played yet so I don't know how most of this worst. But hey, it's so soon until BWE I thought I'd get prepared.

The thing with Backfire was, if you'll notice, I have very few spells that I can use anything unless the enemy is doing something. I think Backfire will be fantastic, preventing a monk from doing anything but suiciding. At 14 rank Dom it does something like 132 damage. I can check, but it's really high.

Spirit of Failure were to reduce damage from rangers + warrs on my party and gain some free energy in the process.

I can agree with Leech Signet being pretty much useless. Steals 12 energy, it was mostly for emergencies if I'm out of energy, but if I'm good that shouldn't happen.

How about I take out Leech Signet and put in Power Spike?

Power Spike - If target foe is casting a spell, the spell is interrupted and target foe takes 97 damage.

That would back up my Backfire (let me check the damage) which does 132 damage. So 229 dmg from 1 casting... neat.

Please tell me more about why you don't like Spirit of Failure, does it not fit the build? Or could I add something better? I looked into Malaise and I see how it would be better for multiple casters, but Spirit of Failure is good for taking an edge off the melee. Personally I think it rounds the build out a bit. Your opinion?

One last question (I know, sorry!) how much life does the average person have at level 20?

480hp without any ruins