Character choices and Combat options
4 May
A summary of Races, Professions, Weapons and Skills.
Overview
- Introduction
- 5 Races
- 8 Professions
- 16 Weapon types
- 10 Skills at a time
- Conclusion
Introduction
Recently, ArenaNet have revealed the details of the Guild Wars 2 combat system. Race, Profession, and Weapon choices interact to provide players with a set of Skills, in a way that is totally different to Guild Wars.
All of this information is sourced from these pages on the official Guild Wars 2 website:
These articles are very informative and exciting; the system described is complex, yet somehow simple. You should read them!
My goal is to give you a summary, and help you understand how your choices impact your gameplay options.
The depth of this article is limited; visual effects, tactics, movement, individual skill behaviour and interactions between skills have not been included.
Races
There are 5 playable Races, each offering subdivisions for the player to choose from:
Human
Racial heritage:
- Ascalonian
- Canthan
- Elonian
- Krytan
Charr
Legion affiliation:
- Ash
- Blood
- Iron
Norn
Animal totem:
- Bear
- Raven
- Snow Leopard
- Wolf
Asura
College:
- Dynamics
- Statics
- Synergetics
Sylvari
Season:
- Spring
- Summer
- Autumn
- Winter
Race provides flavor and plays a huge role in your character’s personal story.
Professions
There are 8 Professions, roughly categorized according to their armor:
Scholars
- Elementalist
- Mesmer (unconfirmed)
- Necromancer (unconfirmed)
Adventurers
- Ranger (unconfirmed)
- (Unknown)
- (Unknown)
Soldiers
- Warrior (not announced)
- (Unknown)
For Guild Wars players…
Many of these will be familiar to fans of Guild Wars, and some are new.
Secondary professions have been removed.
Profession provides unique mechanics and skill options.
Weapons
Weapon types
There are 16 weapon types, categorized according to how you wield them:
- 6 One-hand weapons:
- Axe
- Dagger
- Mace
- Pistol
- Scepter
- Sword
- 4 Offhand-only weapons:
- Focus
- Shield
- Torch
- Warhorn
- 6 Two-hand weapons:
- Greatsword
- Hammer
- Longbow
- Rifle
- Shortbow
- Staff
No single profession is able to use all of these weapons, and some can wield more than others.
Some temporary weapons are obtained from the environment (e.g. a boulder, a siege weapon), from enemies (e.g. a thrown greatsword) and created by allies (e.g. Conjure Frost).
Weapon sets
A character can equip weapons as these sets:
- One-hand weapon (main hand) + Offhand-only weapon (offhand)
- One-hand weapon (main hand) + One-hand weapon (offhand)
- Two-hand weapon only
Most Professions have 2 weapon sets, which they can quickly and easily switch between.
Weapons give you a useful and balanced set of skills to build upon.
Skills
There are now 10 skill slots on the skill bar.
- 5 Weapon skills
- 5 Character skills
Your available skills are determined by Weapon, Profession and Race.
5 Weapon skills
These skills are determined by your current weapons and Profession. These cannot usually be changed, except by switching weapon sets.
- 3 skills from your mainhand weapon
- 2 skills from your offhand weapon
One-hand weapons used in the offhand (commonly known as dual-wielding) will provide different skills. - 5 skills if using a two-hand weapon
A Warrior wielding any Sword in the same hand will always have the same 3 skills.
A non-Warrior wielding any Sword will have 3 different skills.
Elementalists use Attunements to change these skills.
5 Character skills
You are free to change these skills. Your pool of available skills is determined by your Profession/Race choice.
- 1 healing slot. You choose one healing skill from your pool.
- 3 other slots. You are free to choose skills for these slots.
- 1 Elite slot. You choose one skill from your pool. Elite skills are rarely-used, powerful and visually impressive.
These skills can be altered whilst not in combat.
Choose skills to suit your desired play style and complement your Weapon-based skills.
Conclusion
Race is the spirit, Profession is the mind, and Weapons are the body; combined, they provide a selection of Skills. The way you choose these 4 things, to build upon your strengths and those of your allies, will decide how you play the game.
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