Guild Wars 2 Second Beta Weekend: Mesmerizing the Thief

I survived my one month Guild Wars 2 diet and let everything loose at it's second Beta Weekend, brought along a superb machine so I can play on high quality graphics without suffering a bad FPS drop (like ONE FPS on my previous notebook), on this beta weekend I narrowed my choices into two classes: the mesmer and the thief, while I still miss bashing enemies with hammers and axes as warrior the elegant combat from both classes drawn me in more, I'm also not a theorycrafter so I don't delve deep into min/maxing things and stats, it's all more like how I connect with the class, also I'm a through and through PVEr so never expect me to talk seriously about PVP

The Melee Scholar

I once called Mesmer a cross between fun and exhausting, not anymore, I really have no idea what the devs do about the class or the environment itself (or maybe the class is just started to grow on me), the thing is the exhausting part is gone and I can quickly get into fray even without remembering that my class is initially a caster class. Mesmer can use a variety of weapon, it can melee with swords and dual wield, it can also use the common magic weapons like staffs and scepters, mesmer depends on illusions and various clones which can be shattered to gain several benefits to the player.

Of course the class who wears a fancy jacket
can't be missed :D

My choice of weapon is to dual wield sword, although mesmer can use the gun in off hand to create some of the coolest debuff and clone effect, but when I take up an enemy I don't melee all the way like warriors or guardians, dodge is my friend and I usually created two clones before slashing enemies, I can also parried some of the enemy attack with a skill. There's a great system for Mesmer called distortion which means you can't be hit when you are on that state, it comes with limited use and must be triggered by some skill and shattering the clones, I choose the dueling and chaos traits to empower my critical strike and toughness to stand more blows. 

The ranged weapon for mesmer is somehow can be used to create chaotic situation on battlefield, the staff shoot chaos bolts with minimal damage but apply stacking debuffs to multiple enemies, it can also creates a huge dome of debuff field that randomly debuff enemies, self protect shields and so on. The scepter also dealt minimal damage but their auto attack skill creates clones that can be shattered to create a huge burst of damage or divert enemy attentions, the off hand weapon such a focus, gun or a torch complement the scepter and the sword although their choose is also depends on playstyle, I once considered sword + torch to accomodate my needs of stealthy business but dropped it, I like to mix and match based on a whim and I saw that mesmer is easy to master with any weapons.

The downside is on the term of soloing a mob that has two or three level above me, that's when I quickly lost the edge, my swords didn't do much damage and my ranged weapons promised a long fight, especially when the mob joined by a ranged or caster I was bitterly reminded that I'm a caster class and quickly bites the dust, but well Guild Wars 2 doesn't even created to be played alone anyway and the penalty of death is never a punishment,I played it through level 20 and found it satisfying.

The Asassin Without the Oh S*it Button

I played a combat rogue on WOW and I found it to be an extremely fun class, the damage, also the survivability, rogues fights dirty and I have no problem with stabbing an enemy then vanish or activates an ability that parries all the attacks, but rogues on WOW have journeyed a long way, through the various nerfs and buffs and controversial decisions, but it came all right and although I only played it like a year I like it very much.

Flashy suit enhanced my anonimity :P

The Thief on Guild Wars 2 probably a reminder that the melee with light armor can be a pain in the a**, on the term of developing or playing, here's the thing: Thief in Guild Wars 2 has some interesting mechanic but none of them stands out in a real fight, they have steal which not a real steal or disarm, it creates a copy of a weapon in form of a skill that can be unleashed ONCE, also it can be saved until later, thief dodge animation is cool but the vanishing effect didn't do anything to block incoming damage, unlike the other class thief's ability doesn't have cooldowns, it depends on initiative points above the skill bar that recharges through time or by activating certain utility skill so it's up to you to queue several same abilities together as long as your initiative permits it.

Because of my fanatical belief for combat rogue I decided I'll go with the sword+dagger combo for weapon, I tried the dagger pistol and sword pistol before but none of them is too appealing, despite my fast paced attack rate I just DIED too much because yes I can dodge and I can shoot'n stab but it never enough when you faced with two or more ranged class, my heal+vanish ability only can do so little in this situation and random downed vanish can do nothing to improve my gameplay, I feel so underpowered in term of attacks and survivability, one of my biggest disappointment is the skill pistol whip is not a ranged skill and the evade + stab skill do nothing to evade attacks (I still got hit, probably a bug), I once explored a cave alone with a skill point inside and whether the enemies are bugged to spawn fast or my utility skill and vanish sucks, I never got the skill point even when I tried with another player, we just wiped all over again. 

I realized something is missing from the thief ability, it's the oh s*it button, WOW rogues have dodge that evades most attacks, combat readiness that parries all incoming attacks,  and the Mesmer have distortion mechanic, Anet pulled the caster into melee zone with everything clicked properly but thief has no such thing, I feel like a naked warrior, died in one or two hit, I supposed to glorify the shadow and dwell in it, but all I have is underpowered three second vanish+heal and blinding smoke bombs, also traps which is not my utility choice, I have a feeling that I was being forced to play ranged with dual pistol or shortbow (which gives me a huge edge) somehow but I want to play melee while stay away from hits and conditions which in turn probably need some REAL evade skill.

Closure

But as they always says: it's beta and anything can change, I really hope they won't change mesmer since I really clicked with it, on the other hand thief.... needs A LOT of imrovement, probably not along the line I said but I just hope they did something to it, I heard on the world chat that many people are kind of disappointed on the class (probably a whole lot more on forum) I'll be back for BWE 3 and hopes for the best from Anet for the class. Mesmer still my first choice though.