WHAT IS YOUR PROFESSION!

[JJ Styles]

Video games offer players the chance or opportunity to do a particular role within a game. These roles vary in their tasks and purposes for the team when it comes to certain missions. Also, each role has their own strengths, weaknesses, and specialties. This is very much apparent in team based video games were every role is important in making sure that the player and whoever he/she is playing with can accomplish the mission or be victorious in the match.

Here's a basic rundown of each role or specialty that one can be. Be sure to click spoilers to fully read each description.

Assassin

Spoiler:

The Assassin. One shot, one kill. Your job is to eliminate enemy targets as fast as possible, often having a very high damage output in doing so, while quickly getting out once the hit or the assassination has been accomplished. Surprise attacks and quick getaways are your specialties.

Strengths:
- Very high damage output to eliminate enemy targets. One shot, one kill.
- Very good mobility to quickly get out of sticky situations upon elimination of a target

Weaknesses:
- Usually squishy. Getting caught is a death sentence
- Positioning is a must. You don't last long in a straight up fight

Examples of Assassins:
Talon from League of Legends
Zed, also from League of Legends
Kha'zix, from League of Legends
Nyx Assassin from Defense of the Ancients
Lanaya, also from Defense of the Ancients
The Scout (Hero) from Heroes of Newerth
The Scout from Team Fortress 2
Rogue class from World of Warcraft
Thief -> Assassin Job line from Ragnarok Online (Thief, Assassin, Assassin Cross, Guillotine Cross)
Zer0 from Borderlands 2

Marksman

Spoiler:

The Marksman. Dealing damage from long range is key to both your survival and the enemy's elimination. You possess some lovely sharpshooting skills and sick Micro and APM (Actions per minute) to make sure that you're able to devastate the enemy from a distance. Guns ranging from Assault rifles to Anti-Material Sniper rifles, Long Bows, Crossbows, Thrown Spears, Lasers, Throwing Axes, Energy balls, you name it, you're throwing some ballistic fury.

Strengths:
- Long range obviously
- Sikk DPS (Damage per second)

Weaknesses:
- USUALLY VERY SQUISHY. You don't want to get caught in melee range at all
- The team would usually blame you for losing the mission/team fight if you didn't do your job in damaging the enemy at all.
- This is one of those roles that people want to be, but it takes so much to be a REEL DPS machine.

Examples:
Widowmaker from Overwatch
Hanzo, also from Overwatch
The Sniper from Team Fortress 2
Ashe from League of Legends
Caitlyn, also from League of Legends
Traxex from Defense of the Ancients (DotA)
Kardel the Dwarven Sniper
The Archer class line from Ragnarok Online (Archer -> Hunter -> Sniper -> Ranger)
The Demon Hunter from Diablo 3

Mage

Spoiler:

What sorcery is this? Hopefully I won't ever get to use that old (and now bad joke) ever again. The Mage is the character role that specializes in the use of the magic arts. With the power of whatever elements you mostly desire, be in the form of either the elements of nature, the arcane, or even "Magical tech", your job is to deal both damage and control the battlefield with your abilities, and at times weird magical call out names.

Strengths:
- You usually stay in the backline throwing spells while watching your mana or resource bar
- Potentially high to even destructive amounts of damage
- Elementalist Lux is best Lux

Weaknesses:
- Mages are usually gimped by having cooldowns or downtimes in their abilities after usage
- Like marksmen, usually squishy unless certain abilities are learned.

Examples:
Lux, from League of Legends
Ryze from League of Legends
Vladimir, also from League of Legends
The Invoker from Defense of the Ancients
Kaelthas from Warcraft (especially his incarnation in Heroes of the Storm)
The Mage job line in Ragnarok Online (Mage -> Wizard -> High Wizard -> Warlock)
The Warlock class from World of Warcraft
The Wizard from Diablo 3

Fighter

Spoiler:

The Fighter. The brawler, the scrappy, the slayer. Whatever you want to call them. The Fighter is the role who dives into combat in order to deal as much damage as possible before being forced to retreat or at best, wiping out the enemy force itself. You love head to head confrontations and aren't afraid of doing so. Challenging the enemy's front line or flanking the enemy's backline is what you love to do. The job of the fighter is to either be part of the team's attacking force where you fight alongside your tank(s), or your provide yourself as a powerful enforcer for your backline in case the enemy's assassins try to get close.

Strengths:
- At the right timing, you are nearly unstoppable. You combine having the damage output of a DPS class and a little bit of survivability and resilience of that of a typical "tank".
- You feel like a man playing this role.

Weaknesses:
- Once you're in to the fray, there is almost no way out. You have to fight like a man.
- Playing this role often has a nasty side effect of what I like to call Leeeroy jenkinsyndrome. You suddenly develop the natural urge to just "FIGHT FIGHT FIGHT!" with reckless abandon.
- Usually in most video games, unfortunately Fighter type characters cannot possess the extreme qualities of a DPS (Marksman, Assassin) and a tank class at the same time for gameplay balance purposes. In many video games, Fighter/Slayer type characters are often subject of debate to nerfs/changes/buffs discussions.

Examples:
Xin Zhao from League of Legends
Jax also from League of Legends
Master Yi, again from League of Legends
Yasuo, from League of Legends
Darius, from League of Legends
Illidan the Demon Hunter from Heroes of the Storm
Salvador, the Gunzerker from Borderlands 2 (even though he uses guns, his most effective range is at short to medium range like a melee DPS)
Graves, from League of Legends (Same thing with Salvador. Even though he uses guns, his effective damage range is almost melee range)
Samuro, the Blade Master, from Warcraft (also now having his Heroes of the Storm incarnation)
The Warrior class from World of Warcraft
Swordsman job line from Ragnarok Online (Swordsman -> Knight -> Lord Knight -> Rune Knight)
The Barbarian from the Diablo series
Genji from Overwatch

Support

Spoiler:

The Support. The job of the support is to help the team survive through healing, providing offensive and defense buffs and enchantments, providing assistance, map control, utility and even morale uplifting. Another role of the support is to also provide some debuffs and disenchantments against the enemy, thus helping your team deal more damage. When the team knows it has a support that they can depend on, it motivates the team to do well and accomplish the job. As the support, you usually aren't the star of the show compared to that of the Fighter, the Marksman, the Mage, or the Assassin, but you enable these other roles to succeed. At times, without a good support, there is no team.

Strengths:
- Supports usually have very high survivability on their own because of their healing abilities but you obviously want to heal your teammates.
- Supports carry different kits and means to do their job.

Weaknesses:
- You usually deal very low damage compared to all other roles. Direct Combat is your last resort
- If your team goes down and you're the last one standing, you usually do not possess enough damage to help the team back up. Basically you're screwed so make sure to keep your team alive!
- You are running around with all these different buffs and auras, wishing that you could be dealing all that delicious amounts of damage, but its for your team.

Examples of Supports:
Soraka from League of Legends
Sona, also from League of Legends
Rhasta the Voodoo Shaman from Defense of the Ancients (example of an offensive support)
Maya the Siren from Borderlands 2 (when spec'd in her Harmony Tree)
Mercy from Overwatch
Lucio, also from Overwatch
Acolyte job line from Ragnarok online (Acolyte -> Priest -> High Priest -> Archbishop)
The Medic from Team Fortress 2

Tank

Spoiler:

The tank. The initiator, the frontliner. The tank's role is to charge through enemy lines in order to threaten the enemy through sheer amounts of force and crowd control through stuns, taunts, knockups, knockbacks, and other forms of crowd control. The tank is usually a very resilient character, often taking a sheer amount of firepower before going down. You help your team fight through the objective by protecting them from damage while drawing the enemy aggro. Armed to the fray with a beefy amount of health and resistances, you are more than prepared to be a meaty kind of damage sponge.

Strengths:
- Very high health and resistances. It would take a while for you to go down
- You can also feel like a man in playing this role as you laugh at the enemy's attempt at damaging you while you smile in glee as you watch your DPS allies deal some damage.

Weaknesses:
- You usually don't possess enough damage to be a "DPS" class so don't fight without your team.
- Even though it would take a while before you go down under enemy fire, you'll still go down. If you went in without your team, you'll probably screw them.
- As a damage sponge, you usually have arguments with your healer if you died.

Examples:
Reinhardt from Overwatch
Roadhog, also from Overwatch
Rammus from League of Legends
Leona, also from League of Legends
Centaur War Runner from Defense of the Ancients
The Paladin class from World of Warcraft
Crusader job class from Ragnarok online (Swordsman -> Crusader -> Paladin -> Royal Guard)

BY RANDOM DEMAND! New roles for the Opening Post:

Engineer

Spoiler:

The Engineer is the character that constructs a construct that assists him/her in battle, and often this construct is the central part of this character/class's ability and gameplay. Often times, you have this need to take care of said construct so that you do not lose the most important aspect of your kit. But with share and care, the engineer is the character that can terrorize the enemy and have a snack while doing it as he/she's that construct just deal damage, zone out the enemy, and even greatly aid in pushing to the objective.

Strengths:
+ Builders offer so much for the team, whether it be on the defensive role of the offensive role.
+ You don't have to fight within the front lines since you have that construct to do your dirty work.

Weaknesses:
- Engineers are often very weak in direct combat since its the construct they build that is actually more powerful than they are.
- Most of these characters are short ranged fighters to balance them out with the powerful constructs that they build.

Examples:
The Engineer, Team Fortress 2
Torbjorn, Overwatch
Heimerdinger, League of Legends
Engineer Profession, Anarchy Online
Engineer class in Hellgate London

So alas fellow users. We discuss what are your favorite in-game roles and what you love and even hate about playing them. Remember that while this topic is heavily rooted from League of Legends, do remember that there are several games that showcase different roles and jobs. The examples I posted out are decent ones.

 

[EC]

Probably "fighter". Like in FPS games, I rush towards the enemy with no regard for my life.

 

[Nah]

I tend to either like being a sort of all-rounder or an assassin. This is largely because I mostly play solo. The former class basically allows you to be self-sufficient and at least partly capable of handling just about anything, as specializing while going solo can sometimes have to up against something you cannot handle that well and you have no one to back you up. With assassin, it, if done correctly, lets you kill almost anything with one sweet shot while staying safe. Cuz again, it's just you vs the world.

I have always though liked and wanted to play support. It's just that I can't cuz support is typically not good at fighting, and I'm certainly not leaving it up to the AI to be the damage dealer. If I even have AI party members or any party members at all.

The only exception to all this is Xenoblade Chronicles X, where I'm more like "how many different ways can I make myself some broken as fuck god-slaying monstrosity".

 

[Somewhere_]

It depends on what Im feeling, but I generally gravitate towards fighter or assassin classes. Sometimes support or tank.

 

[Nah]

Tank
If you went in without your team, you'll probably screw them.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yOMj7WttkOA

 

[Altaria]

Definitely Assassin/Thief. Just like Rabi said; I love being able to sneak around, take people out quietly and quickly, go unseen, etc. It's definitely my favorite play style.

However, Support is a fun role, too. Contrary to popular belief, being the healer can actually be quite rewarding. Lmao

 

[Satoshi Ookami]

Won't most of us be the class we chose for the Legend of PokeCommunity? =D

I'm a mage and will always be mage. (Another reason is that Ragnarok and Diablo are the only games I actually played from the listed :P)

 

[JJ Styles]

OP Post updated: Added some spicy banners for the Marksman and Fighter Roles. Placeholder images were used for the Mage (Elementalist Lux splashart) and Support (Mercy picture). Assassin and Tank banners are WIP to complete the spice.

I thought I forgot something, A FEW MORE ROLES that didn't make it in the OP but will definitely be there once I get in the mood in creating their banners.

Builder = Basically the class/role for the likes of Engineers or the kind that likes to sit back, build something like a turret, and let that be its contribution to the team. Usually the kind of character that isn't a threat on its own but its built in partner does.

EX: Engineer from Team Fortress 2, Torbjorn from Overwatch, Symmetra from Overwatch as well, Mechanician from the defunct Pristontale MMORPG, Heimerdinger from League of Legends

Heavy Gunner = The class that loves to defend key areas of the field by deploying itself as a powerful anti-personnel weapon, usually limited in movement but definitely unhinged when it comes to firepower.

EX: Bastion from Overwatch, Heavy Weapons Guy from Team Fortress 2

Summoner = The character that creates its own minions or henchmen to help do its bidding.

EX: The Necromancer from Diablo 2 (Also now available in Diablo 3), The Witch Doctor from Diablo 3, Yorick from League of Legends (Doubles as a Fighter), Keeper of the Grove hero class from Warcraft 3

Trickster = A special role to those who love tormenting the opposing team through endless trickery, deception, and sheer annoyance. While this class usually lacks in brute force, durability, high damage output, and ally utility, this class/job/role's duty is to cause grief and despair to the enemy. These characters/job classes are known for their obnoxious abilities and oppressive skill sets that often induce anger and impatience to the enemy's feelings.

Examples:

• Shaco from League of Legends
• Teemo, definitely from Defense of the Ancients.
• Rubrick the Grand Magus, actually from Defense of the Ancients
• Alternate Thief route from Ragnarok online (Thief, Rogue, Stalker, Shadow Chaser) => If you ever faced these fiends in PvP, you'll know what they are capable of doing.
• Sombra from Overwatch => I list her under the "Trickster" Role as most of her kit is centered on annoying the enemy rather than straight up killing them. Her very low damage and lack of effective range boots her from being an assassin or a marksman, but her entire kit aside from her gun gravitates towards the trickster role.

 

[TheCobaltComet]

In terms of role, I tend to gravitate towards Marksman, with Support closely following. There's just something satisfying in crippling an enemy before they can even get close enough to hit you, isn't there? Especially when lowering stats or poison is involved. I'm not sure how many people here have played as a Bard, but any bard class with ranged skills in addition to the typical support is usually a perfect match for my playstyle- a little squishy, but still viable for any situation. As an example of this: Aura Kingdom's bard class comes with 2/3 of its damaging moves being long range, the third being an AoE stun effect, and the rest of the moves grant Regeneration and healing.

 

[Hands]

On games like Battlefield 3/4 I almost routinely play Engineer. Being able to keep enemy vehicles off my team's back whilst repairing our own is a huge advantage. If I'm not playing engineer I'll usually play support and throw down a lot of covering fire whilst keeping team mates freshly supplied. I seldom play more lone wolf classes because there's no point doing well yourself if the team score tanks badly.

 

[Desert Stream~]

Magic is always fun, or marksman/Assassin. I've been perfecting my aiming skills, and gotten pretty good.

 

[Arsenic]

Hmm... marksman for when I'm sniping people from 1.2km out. : D

Normally in any RPG I'm some combination of fighter and tank. I enjoy shrugging off dmg, but also, yknow, being able to defeat an enemy.

In FPS I normally play either an assault type class (fighter) an engineer smg class (support) or my new favorite, SUPPRESSING FIIIIIRRRRREEEEE!!! I mean heavy gunner. Also with heavy gunner, I'm the only person I've seen who correctly plays their role and doesn't just run around like an assault with extra bullets!

Also Xin, you forgot Tachanka from RSix for heavy gunner example.

 

[JJ Styles]

Ok my mandatory input.

TLDR: The three roles i often assume are:
Fighter
Tank
Assassin

For the most part, i actually play the Fighter class in most video games (Surprise SURPRYZE!?) and with proper context. I'll start out with some games:

1) Killing Floor => In Killing Floor, I always played the Berserker (Fighter) spec when i played with my friends since they were actually better shots and marksmen than I am. As a berserker, my job is to make sure that i protect my squishier teammates by fighting in the frontlines and taking advantage of my higher than average health. Also, Killing Floor (especially on higher difficulties) is a game that requires a modicum of finesse and admittedly, I'm a klutz compared to my friends.

2) Diablo 2+3 => Barbarian. Barbs are just too fun for me to play as. DPS, resiliency, and a whole lot of that lone wolf gungho gameplay? Right on. Since i have the tendency to go ham and berserk all the time, the Barbarian was the perfect fit for me in Diablo 2 while my friends played their Amazons, Sorcs, Necros, and Paladins respectively.

3) Ragnarok Online => I used to be a Knight (Fighter) main during the good ole days since in the much much MUCH older versions of Ragnarok Online, Knights were often deemed and seen as easy to play and very overtuned characters in almost every setting in the game, whether it was just basic PVE or even PVP. Of course, that was the good ole days.

4) League of Legends => I'm obviously a teemo main that's why my current username is Xin. Fighter type champions in League are simply my favorite ones to play as since they are able to deal damage and still take a few hits if they have to. Some of the game's most powerful end-game carries are devastatingly powerful melee DPS fighters in the likes of Jax, Fiora, Tryndamere, Master Yi, and of course Xin Zhao. The feeling of taking out squishies and contributing to your team by simply being a devastating force that can dish out damage and take hits is just so satisfying, and at times really mindless.

5) DotA (kek) => The first character who i started to be somehow competent at the game was none other than Sven, the Rogue Knight. I thought he was the perfect character for me since he was a Strength Hero, so along with damage, he would get a decent amount of health, and he had a stun skill, which was so useful at hacking the enemy to death while using the power of God's Strength. I think i played a heckton of Sven before i eventually switched to my actually best character in Bloodseeker.

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Now me as a tank? Well its a given. My tendency to go gungho would often mean that I need to have a lot of health and armor to actually survive. Not to mention, playing a tank and actually protecting my team by being this big bro that zones out threats and laughing at the enemy's attempts to damage me is just as satsifying, and at times, even moreso.

1) League of Legends => well that's pretty much a part of it. At times, I felt that playing mindless tanks was the way to go especially if i needed to climb the rankings if i was having a difficult time climbing up with my own champion pool. Fortunately, many of the tanks in League are characters that I DO enjoy playing a lot such as Sejuani, a character i mindlessly mained along with Xin Zhao, and currently, I'm playing Nautilus.

2) MMORPGS in a nutshell => If i didn't want to play the Fighter and i was told by a friend of mine that a better character for me to play would be that game's tank class, then there would be a 70-30 chance that I would believe that and play the Tank class instead of the Fighter.

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Assassin. Well everyone likes being the Assassin and I can't blame them : D. Assassins in many games are just made to be so fun in terms of gameplay design, mechanics, and even aesthetics. I will be 100% honest here that one of the main reasons why I would play Assassin type characters is for the aesthetics.

Now for something different:

Now that you've mentioned the roles you play, what are some of the roles you AVOID PLAYING AS. The reasons can vary, such as not fitting with your preferred playstyle, not liking the aesthetics, etc etc. Basically, you can tell us why you would NOT want to play a certain role or job class for your reasons.

 

[Arsenic]

Magic is stupid. The end.

Spoiler:

in other words I don't play dedicated mages. I will sometimes specialize in a little magic (ala the Templar Knight in DAI) but relying solely on that doesn't sit right with me.

"I solve practical problems..."

 

[Arsenic]

Haha, whereas I'm the opposite! I tend to avoid direct combat as much as possible, generally using archers or mages to assassinate/strike from long distance so I never have to worry about being up close and personal.

As much as I love removing threats from far away, there is always one tried and true way to solve a conflict of interests...

Breach and clear!

Magic (or space magic, or whatever other kinds it gets disguised as ) just doesn't have the same effect for the most part.

Again, fine with archery/sniping. LRRs are what got me into guns and are a fun part of games!

 

[TY]

For the main games I play (mainly RTS), I see myself more as a Trickster than anything else. Capturing buildings, dropping your base right into theirs, tricking opponent into a safe feeling then coming from the sea with 10 million hover transports... done it all and with succession too. I just enjoy straight up doing weird builds and weird strategies to throw someone off.

 

[Reyzadren]

I don't choose an aesthetic profession whenever I play games, it really depends on the mechanics of the role itself. That being said, usually none of the usual professions describe my choice. Probably the closest to my playstyle would be the shutdown toolbox, but even that is somewhat deceptive - I have been called a healer too many times!

Shutdown: Someone who prevents the opponent from doing things (punshing actions, disrupting magic spells, deleting energy, reversing damage, negating attacks, shattering defenses)
Toolbox: Someone who does almost everything else the team needs like extra damage, healing and reviving whenever it is needed.

 

[Hands]

Hmm... marksman for when I'm sniping people from 1.2km out. : D

Normally in any RPG I'm some combination of fighter and tank. I enjoy shrugging off dmg, but also, yknow, being able to defeat an enemy.

In FPS I normally play either an assault type class (fighter) an engineer smg class (support) or my new favorite, SUPPRESSING FIIIIIRRRRREEEEE!!! I mean heavy gunner. Also with heavy gunner, I'm the only person I've seen who correctly plays their role and doesn't just run around like an assault with extra bullets!

Also Xin, you forgot Tachanka from RSix for heavy gunner example.

Yeah it's always kinda annoyed me that people can run around with a massive MG as if it was an SMG or something. In my eyes you should have to go prone to use the sights. I used to love racking up in a window in BF3 and just laying down a hail of bullets whilst my squad moved up. The suppression mechanic on that game was great

 

[JJ Styles]

Alright, my mandatory input.

In case of roles that I never play as or rarely ever play as:

1) Healer => Never assign me as a healer because of my tendencies to prefer fighting or going for bloodthirsty plays than actually saving teammates who are dying. In overwatch, I never play Mercy because i feel that i just waste the pick but I do play Lucio since honestly Lucio is so easy to be good with that even those who don't main healers can win games with him. In league of legends, I never ever play any of the healing supports like Soraka and Sona because again, my tendencies to prefer fighting or bloodthirsty plays. That's why if I go support which is my secondary role in League after Jungle, I pick the likes of Alistar or Nautilus. Also, Ragnarok online, I never enjoyed playing as a healer in a group setting.

2) Sniper in Team Fortress 2 = Just no. I'm just bad playing him. I know that the Sniper can be a strong role but I'm just a poor shot. Which is why I main Scout or Demo instead. However, in Overwatch, I found myself to be playing Widowmaker when the situation arises, like when the enemy is seriously defending their base with Bastion and Torbjorn and no one wants to switch to Widow in my team..

In many cases, it pays to actually at least try playing roles that you never played as in order to understand how they work. Eventually, that knowledge is used to further enhance your main role(s) when it comes to taking down the other roles in player vs player environments : D

 

[Arsenic]

Yeah it's always kinda annoyed me that people can run around with a massive MG as if it was an SMG or something. In my eyes you should have to go prone to use the sights. I used to love racking up in a window in BF3 and just laying down a hail of bullets whilst my squad moved up. The suppression mechanic on that game was great

See Hans knows what's up. Set up in a wide open area and put down some mg bursts to suppress the enemy.

You'd probably like how PAYDAY 2 handled lmgs.