Profession Dilemma

T

TheChad1215

Member
I think one or two of you may have been online while I was battling with myself over the Alliance chat about which profession to choose. Basically, I'm trying to decide upon a "main" character to spend most of my time with (cause I don't have too much time to spend), and after much deliberation (again, with myself), I've narrowed it down to either a Paragon or a Mesmer.

It has become very difficult at this point to decide between the two of them. Each has many things going for him. I like the Mesmer philosophy basically screwing with all your opponents and generally causing them to harm themselves for you. But the Paragon's spear has quickly become my favorite weapon, and I enjoy the ties with ancient Greek and Roman heroes in their fighting style as well as the overall archangelic feel about them.

There are also little things such as a Paragon would make me play Nightfall before Prophecies, and I like things in order. On the other hand, Mesmers are a core class, so they'll be around forever, but chapter-specific professions such as Paragons would be more sparse (sparse is good) when, say, we've reached Chapters 7 or 8. There are also even more random arguments such as I like that Mesmers are portrayed as actors cause I'm kinda a theatric person, but then Paragons have many skills related to singing (chants, echoes, harmonies, etc)!!

So you see it's full-scale warfare in my mind about which to choose, and I know it seems like an awful lot of trouble for what is a very small decision in the grand scheme of things, but I do prefer to avoid dividing my time between multiple characters. I tend to concentrate all of my efforts on one thing to get really really really good at it.

I suppose, then, the point of this overwhelmingly, unnecessarily and increasingly long post, besides simply laying my thoughts down on "paper," would be to get some kind of reaction from ye guildies to my confusing train of thought or to offer insight which I may not have thought of to help me make some kind of decision on this hopefully in the near future.

Congratulations to you who have made it this far in the post. I commend and thank you. Later!

-Chadley
 
TheChad1215 said:
Congratulations to you who have made it this far in the post. I commend and thank you. Later!

-Chadley
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WOO! do i get a title for reading it all? :p

i was there when you asked over alliance. I still think that a paragon is the better choice, why? WELL:
Mesmers are really a "solitude" character. paragons can be solitude and they can be spread out. Paragons can help everyone in the party, or they can solo with there spear. I just think that there is more fun and opportunity with Paragon. BUT we all know Mirawyn will defend Mesmer until she dies.

im not an expert on either class. but thats my 4.567 cents :p
 
I enjoy helping more than hurting. I was initially drawn to the warrior class because of the damage sponge/keep everyone else able to do their thing playstyle you can have with that class. However, I'm fast falling in love with Paragon because of their ability to help everyone in the party do their job better.

Playing a Paragon this way is similar to playing a bard in other MMOs. Party buff, try to stay out of the way otherwise.

Keep this in mind: Neither Paragon nor Mesmer are essential to a team, but in an 8 man group, it is terrific to have one of each. A perfect balanced PvE group, to me, would consist of:

1 main tank W/X
1 backup tank/damage dealer W/X
2 Heal monks or 1 heal monk 1 prot monk
1 Paragon buffer
1 Mesmer or Ranger/Mesmer interrupter
2 random damage dealers (I prefer E/X for the AoE, but R, A, D, or smite monk all work well)
 
I don't have a Mesmer but I am told it is the most difficult character in the game to play effectively.

[toj.cc]WildBillKickoff;198783 said:
2 random damage dealers (I prefer E/X for the AoE, but R, A, D, or smite monk all work well)
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I have a nuker, but for PvE, an Echo SS Necro in the hands of an experienced player is the best damage dealer in the game IMO. What is really unique is that I am the only one who can see all those -37 numbers over the bad guys heads (and there is a cloud of them). This skill makes no sound at all. The others on your team just look around and all the bad dudes are suddenly dead and they mistakenly pat themselves on the back thinking how well they just did and wondering why they weren't that good yesterday.......lol.
 
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I like all that's being said. The thing is, I've never really been the buffing type. I love the Paragon for just about everything except its supporting role... but then I've never really taken time to get good at it--maybe it is fun once you figure it out.

All I know now is that I've been playing my mesmer today, and hexes are about the most satisfying skills I've ever dealt with in this game (especially Empathy and Backfire). *sigh* Somehow, though, I'm still not fully convinced.

I've also been second-guessing my 2ndary profession-Necro. I chose it for curses to supplement my hexes, but I still feel I could've chosen better. As this would be my main character and because WildBill mentioned Me as not necessarily being essential to any given team, I would want the character to be as useful as possible in as many different situations as possible, you know? And I feel like GuildWiki can only tell me so much...

Welp, another long post. Sorry I'm dragging you all into my thought processes.

-Chadley

PS - I finally got a little Candycane Wand today, and it immediately reminded me of Harry Potter wands! :p So I eagerly checked GuildWiki for mesmer weapons I could finally be proud to take into battle (scepters/staffs aren't my thing), but alas, there is no wand in the game even remotely similar to those in "H-Pott." Oh well. :rolleyes:
 
Halonic said:
I don't have a Mesmer but I am told it is the most difficult character in the game to play effectively.
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Agreed. I learned it the hard way...as my first MMORPG character ever, and one of my very first customizable RPG characters.

Mesmers are way under-appreicated, even though they can be quite powerful. Why? In part, because it's so easy to play them badly. (Been there, done that. Now I know better.) Paragons get great publicity, on the other hand. (I have one, and she's cool.)

Have you considered a Me/P? :)
 
MaidMirawyn said:
Why? In part, because it's so easy to play them badly.
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Uh oh... how do you play them badly? I feel like, if anything, that's what I'd be doing.

MaidMirawyn said:
Have you considered a Me/P? :)
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I've considered it, but not very seriously because I'm really not qualified to figure out whether or not it would be effective. Anyone know what use you could get out of hexes, buffs and spears all thrown into one?

-Chadley
 
TheChad1215 said:
Welp, another long post. Sorry I'm dragging you all into my thought processes.
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Ok well first off, THE POINT IS TO DRAG US INTO THIS, that way we can help :D

another thing that i always forget is that for the most part anyone could play there secondary character as well as if it was there primary.
like a W/R, sure you dont have the expertise, but you still can play a ranger preety well with it.
E/Mo, ya everyone likes Divine Favor bonus, but with the Energy Storage an E/Mo doesnt sound to bad
Rt/N, no soul reaping but the spawn power helps minions a lot
Me/P, so you dont get energy after each shout (you said you wont use them to buff people too much) but that fast cast could come in handy.

What im trying to say is that sometimes the "special" attribute isnt all THAT important and that secondary can become primary only a tad bit less effective. ALSO most "special" attribute spells are Elite and arnt that great either (tho i dont know about Paragon, havent played them too much)

so again dont worry about long posts, its the point in this thread. and have fun with it, its a game, not ur life (tho it does seem like life at times, then the 8 hr marker comes on and you realize that ur body needs sleep;) )

STC95's work... marvel at it. :D
 
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