Helpful Dungeon tips

[Proxus]

Pasted at Arme's request:

"Having raided hardcore in WoW (for many years), as well as SW:TOR and AoC for a few months, I can say from my experience the skillset required to succeed in GW2 is VERY different from other MMO's. Here are some things I've learned...

-You can't play a ranged class (or any class) and expect to stand still, focusing on your rotation. As a ranger I make full use of the 5pt trait passive that gives me 50% additional endurance regeneration. You have to be on the move.

-You don't HAVE to in my experience, but making smart use of combo fields is EXTREMELY helpful. Guardians, Thieves, Mesmers, and Elementalists in particular have amazing combo fields, and Rangers/Warriors are in my experience the best finishers.

-Building traits for pure damage is fine for 1-2 party members, but EVERYONE needs utility skills. Unlike other games, CC isn't locking down one npc the whole time, and having a tank stand there and take hits. The team effort should be on preventing most enemies from reaching you, and the one the melee is on has to be shut down in other ways as often as possible (knockdown, stun, blind, confusion).

-Again, be mobile. If you see an enemy's area effect on the ground, don't finish your ability even if you already incurred the cooldown. DODGE OUT RIGHT AWAY. Most of these HURT, and can take out anywhere from 1/3-2/3 of your life at once. Most area effects that tick will kill you in 3 seconds.

-Pick your targets wisely. This is true in any MMO. Do not focus the melee enemy down first when they can easily be kited by an elementalist, thief, or ranger.

-Choose group oriented heals and elites over personal. Guardians really should only use the Tome that adds healing right now, rather than personal immunity. Rangers should be using healing spring unless the group has sufficient other forms of area heals.

-Make HEAVY use of area denial and snare effects. The guardian staff and hammer abilities that make impassable walls for a few seconds is an amazing opportunity for your team to regroup or your ranged to lay into enemies. Ranger's longbow AoE attack is also a snare, and Muddy Terrain is an extremely undervalued utility skill. Elementalists hardly ever switch to earth aspect, but it has some great control effects there as well.

-Choose AoE and Piercing attacks. The ranger trait that allows bow (both longbow and shortbow) attacks to pierce is AMAZING, especially when coupled with the longbow's Rapid Fire + Quickening Zephyr. Funnel enemies through a door, and watch 7k+ Damage in 2 seconds to nearly every enemy in the pull.

-Allow ranged characters to pull. Often times you'll find that massive group is really only 2-3 enemies (this might sometimes be a bug, but it helps anyway).

-There is no rule that says you MUST fight enemies where they stand; often times pulling back to an area with appropriate setup and safety is the best option."

[Armeggadon]

It seems like one of the biggest things I've seen over and over with people talking about dungeons now is basically to be flexible. There aren't standard healer/tank/dps roles so EVERYONE has to be able to have and utilize some utility skills. Having a couple people be full on DPS is okay, but having an entire group like that will likely not work out terribly well.
There are no repercussions for changing skills while out of combat, so if a skill isn't working out, switch to something more helpful. Being able to stay alive is far, far more important than dishing out a few more DPS numbers.