User:SylvXIII/Class Identity

Preface
Back in the early days on Guild Wars, every professions in the game were pretty unique in their genre: Warriors did 3 second kds, Rangers were dshotting spells, Monks were healing, Elementalist were packing loads of ranged damage and utilities, Mesmers were e-denialing+Shame+diversion and Necromancers casted anti-melee stuff. As more expansions of the game were released, we discovered than Assassins could spike pretty damn well and shadow step, Ritualists would hold ashes and spirit spam, Paragon used chants and shouts and Dervishes used aoe melee attacks. Eventually, some of those barriers were broken as effective builds were discovered. Nevertheless, some characteristics of every professions have always been carried over team, leading to what can be regarded as class identity. This mildly-serious article (a serious one would be exhaustive) will introduce characteristics of most professions in the form of "What a Profession is" and "What a Profession is not". As usual, this is written from a PvP point of view and is a simple list rather than a block of text.

Is

 * High damage Spikes
 * Shadow Steps
 * Vulnerability
 * User of many conditions (Deep Wound,
 * User of enchantments
 * Melee damage dealer
 * Master of critical hits
 * User of chain attacks (easily disrupted)
 * User of knockdowns
 * User of few hexes
 * A minor spellcaster
 * Qknock user (in conjunction with an ias from another profession)

Is not

 * A healer
 * A utility character
 * Naruto
 * Versatile
 * Owner of IAS

Is

 * A master of enchantments
 * Low to Heavy survivability
 * Decent self-survival
 * A Moderate to Heavy damage dealer
 * A possible healer
 * Unique user of Forms
 * Owner of the Scythe, dealing damage to up to 3 adjacent units to the target
 * Versatile physical damage dealer
 * User of many conditions

Is Not

 * A Tank
 * A user of Damage spells (some exceptions here)
 * Capable of Knockdowns
 * Interrupting
 * User of Hexes

Is

 * A Primary Ranged Spell Caster
 * User of 4 unique elements
 * Fire Magic as raw damage spells, commonly inflicting the burning condition and Area of effect spells.
 * Air magic as armor penetrating damage spells, IMS, knockdowns and master of the blind condition.
 * Water Magic as a combination of damage spells, hexes (defensive and offensive) and snare hexes.
 * Earth Magic as a Defensive magic to protect you and your allies as well as armor-ignoring spells.
 * Medium to Heavy damage dealer
 * Profession with the highest energy pool (This)
 * User of many energy-intensive skills
 * Only Spellcaster with the Exhaustion drawback of some of its spell
 * A profession with high spike damage
 * A versatile profession within itself
 * User of Area of Effect spells
 * Owner of Glyphs
 * User of Enchantments
 * Average survivability
 * A profession with many long casting times
 * User of many Energy Management skills

Is not

 * User of Signets
 * User of Physical-based Weapons
 * User of degeneration Conditions/hexes (exception being Burning)
 * User of Deep Wound

Is

 * General anti-everything profession
 * User of many hexes
 * Interrupter
 * A specialist at shutting down healing characters
 * The only profession that can disable skills without necessarily interrupting them (Diversion, Signet of Humility, Arcane Thievery, many others) (Shield Bash is an exception)
 * A Master of energy denial
 * A versatile caster
 * User of many long casting time skills (2-3 seconds)
 * Master of Signets
 * A profession with many energy management skills
 * Poor survivability
 * User of degeneration hexes
 * Owner of many survival stances
 * Uses enemies' actions against them
 * User of armor-ignoring damage
 * A profession that can steal and copy enemy spells
 * User of some snares
 * Dangerous

Is not

 * Physical damage dealer
 * A spike character
 * A tank (shield set when pressured, ty)
 * User of many enchantments
 * User of many conditions (blind, deep wound, crippled on self, cracked armor (1 source) anything else?)

Is

 * A healing character
 * Profession with many cleaning abilities (hex removals, condition removals)
 * A character that can prevent damage (prot)
 * The best healing class in the game
 * Versatile healing character within itself
 * A minor Signet user
 * User of Enchantments
 * Very low to average casting times (1/4 to 2)
 * Minor damage dealer as well as armor-ignoring damage
 * Only user of sustained enchantments (Holy Veil, Healer's Covenant for instance)

Is not

 * A tank
 * Viable damage dealer (PvP-wise)
 * A condition dealer (RoJ aside)
 * A physical damage dealer

Is

 * Master of Life Stealing
 * Primary user of hexes
 * Typical anti-melee/anti-physical profession
 * Master of Minions
 * A character that takes advantage from death (spirit, pet, ally, enemy, anything that dies)
 * A class with many enchantment removals
 * Average survivability
 * A class with condition control (plague touch, foul feast, plague sending, plague signet, contagion,...)
 * A class using health sacrifice as a mean to cast many spells
 * Overall a support character
 * User of degeneration hexes and conditions
 * Owner of many AoE hexes
 * Short to average casting times
 * A Class with many cover hexes
 * Only user of the Disease condition

Is not

 * A primary damage dealer
 * User of many enchantments
 * A Mesmer
 * User of the Deep Wound condition
 * A spike character

Is

 * An Average profession
 * Average to heavy damage dealer
 * Ranged damage dealer
 * Not versatile
 * More effective with large parties (Leadership)
 * Unique user of Chants
 * Master of Shouts and Chants
 * Supportive class
 * User of many conditions (dazed, crippled, deep wound, bleeding, etc)
 * Has many self-synergies
 * User of IAS
 * User of Party buffs

Is not

 * Able to finish targets very well (especially without cripple)
 * A Primary Spellcaster
 * A Healer
 * A melee damage dealer
 * Viable interrupter

Is

 * Extremely Versatile (mainly because of this)
 * An interrupter
 * A User of many conditions (poison, bleeding, crippled notably)
 * A condition spreader
 * A Character with High survivability
 * A Beastmaster
 * Primary Bow User, with an advantage from being uphill
 * User of many different weapons
 * Trapping (not very viable nowadays, only recommended in very specific HA setup)
 * A below average to heavy damage dealer
 * User of stances
 * User of IAS and IMS
 * User of Spirits (FW, NR, Fertile Season for instance)
 * A class with many self-synergies

Is not

 * A Primary or Secondary Spellcaster
 * A melee shutdown class (other than 2 sources of blind)
 * User of enchantments/hexes
 * A reliable user of knock downs
 * User of the Deep Wound condition

Is

 * A primary spellcaster
 * User of Spirits
 * Unique user of Weapon Spells
 * A possible healer (that can deal consistent damage via weapon spells such as Xinrae's Weapon, Vengeful Weapon and Weapon of Remedy)
 * A user of (offensive) hexes and (few defensive) enchantments
 * Relies heavily on Spirits (like Dervishes and enchantments)
 * A typical Flag Runner (Weapon Spells cannot be stripped by any ways)
 * More effective with other Ritualists using different spirit(s)
 * User of Blind
 * Good spiking ability
 * A profession that has many effects on a whole party
 * Unique User of Item Spells
 * Support Character
 * Average Survivability

Is not

 * Versatile (highly dependent on spirits and/or weapon spells)
 * A Monk, the playstyle is completely different
 * A physical damage dealer
 * User of many conditions

Is

 * A primary melee damage dealer
 * User of Deep Wound
 * A knockdown specialist (3sec kds)
 * Qknock user
 * User of IAS and IMS stances
 * Hard to kill
 * Minor interrupter
 * Average spike damage
 * Owner of many useful block stances
 * Versatile
 * User of Adrenaline

Is not

 * A user of the skill Flare
 * A healer or utility character
 * Invincible (use rush to cancel frenzy before getting spiked please)
 * Ranged profession
 * A character that should aim for enemy warriors all the time
 * An easy class to play
 * A tank

End Words
Every profession in the realm of Guild Wars has its own specialty, although some uses generally reserved to one can be intertwined with another's primary attribute to maximimze its effectiveness in specific situations. There's a point where a PvP player will make links in his mind as to what does a certain profession bring to a team. I tried to depict many of those links that most PvP players don't actively think anymore. The article could be a very exhaustive list but I tried to state the main points regarding every profession. I am open to suggestions and will most likely change this page every time I'll re-read it. My personal favorite professions in this game are Rangers and Warriors, for their high versatility as physical damage dealers which I prefer over spellcasters because of their high disruptive abilities (knockdowns, interrupts) which typically requires you to be good at the game to be effective more than what spellcasting requires you to do. I do however love Elementalists. On another subjective note, I believe that Paragons and Ritualists are the weakest and least versatile Primary Professions in the game (except for some OP rit spells). In the end, as long as you play what you like best at its best, things should go well. Despite what many claim (overpowered broken skills break it, but can be dealt with in larger scaled battles (8v8)), there is a nice balance in the game.