Guild Wars 2

Hey folks! Nice to meet ya all!

Short story: looked at some guides, said “naah”. Todey I downloaded the client, ended the character creation 30 minutes ago, 2 levels as a ranger, upgraded to HoT. kitten .

Now, I’m playing ranger, still in the processo of learning. If you have some generale advices (outside the usual “videos”) please feel free to help

Consider that:
- I’m a casual;
- I’m on Piken Square (for what it’s worth);
- I’m a PvE guy, mostly soloing;
- play for social, mostly.

I still have to decide my main, probably this lovely sylvan ranger (I play women to get more favors xD), but I’m still struggling for a caster. Any further hint is appreciated.

kitten .

Welcome to GW2. I’m bad at giving advices but here’s one: Enjoy the ride, don’t rush to max lvl.

Welcome to Tyria and to Piken Square (its where i hang out although with the mega server system, it isn’t as important as it once was).

I also main a Ranger (as much as I main anything being an altaholic) and they are really good for survivability. My main advise is take your time. Unlike some games the journey is as important as end game here, get to know how to play the character your own way, there are plenty of guides and videos but but if you are just doing basic open world pve you don’t need to worry about the meta, so worry about what is fun for you. If you start wanting to do raids or PvP then you might have to look further, but that can come with time.

You have 5 or 6 character slots depending on the version of HoT you bought and more can be bought with gems. Gems can be bought with real currency (pounds or euros) or with gold, but the exchange rate for gold to gems is high so I would make use of what you have and decide what characters you want, the basic slots might be enough. Try out the different classes and see what you think to their play style. Also make sure you try out the different weapon choices, almost all classes have both ranged and melee options (basic engineer being the exception), you might find you enjoy the slightly odd options, Melee Ranger or Ranged Warrior for example.

As far as casters goes, elementalist is generally reckoned to be one of the hardest classes to solo, if you aren’t careful they end up as glass cannons. You also have to remember to keep switching between elements to make the most of them.
Mesmers are a bit of a Guild Wars oddity and don’t really compare to classes from other games I know, so take a bit of getting used to. Although a caster class wielding paired swords is definitely different.
Necromancers are probably the easiest of the casters, they have a good choice of weapons, a reasonable health pool, and minions to help take the damage if you opt for that type of build.
You will also find that Guardian can be classed as a caster even though they are in heavy armor. Revenants also rely heavily on magic for their abilities, and who can argue with a hammer throwing Assuran.

Hope that gives some ideas. I would also suggest you take a look at the Players helping Players forum, there is some wonderful advise on there for newcomers as well.

Have fun.

I’m semi-new too and completely love it! I found the sticky threads in the “player helping player” forum to be extremely helpful. There are some great hints there. Plus of course the newbie videos on YouTube. :-) Really the threads helped the most though.
I don’t know which game(s) you played before but this one is different in that the focus truly is on having fun and not rushing through things. One of the things I liked doing while playing wow (I played for quite a few years) was exploring and finding all the new places. But that was discouraged because of the rush, rush to get new gear and to stay up with everyone else. GW2 rewards you for exploring! Yay!
One of thing biggest things I had to let go of though was the fear of not doing “it” right. In wow if you didn’t gear, gem or etc correctly you got huge amounts of grief. Here I feel like I can truly experiment and play however I want to. Of course I’m sure that would change if I wanted to get into the high end raids or such but for now I’m playing how I like and not worrying about what anyone else thinks. I must be doing something right though because I’ve gotten a few “nice job” comments after some group fights. Woohoo!
Anyway my biggest suggestion is to play however you want and just have fun!

Hey there forgotten realms reader. Good to see you’re having fun. All these advice posts are great so I’m not going to repeat what they said. Instead add me to your friends list and I will be able to answer your questions instantly when we’re both online. I play on the Piken Square server as well and I am a roleplayer. So yeah…

You can add me by using Noodle.2085 as a friendname. Never hesitate to just say hi or spam me with questions.

Don’t use your level 80 booster until you experienced levelling a toon the normal way. It’s a shortcut so you won’t have to do it all over again, but the base game has a lot to offer.

There are many hidden gems in each map, go out and explore.

Stop to smell the roses. Listen to NPC conversations. A lot of events are chained, so don’t rush off immediately after completing one.

Gather all the things for profit and crafting. In the top right of your inventory there’s a gear icon. Clicking that brings up a menu that will allow you to instantly put all materials in your bank.

About that bank; note that there’s a seperate tab for al your materials. It stacks up to 250 mats, which can be expanded upon with gems.

Mea.5491:

Welcome to GW2. I’m bad at giving advices but here’s one: Enjoy the ride, don’t rush to max lvl.

With due respect to Mea’s assessment of her advice-giving…this is, imo, hands down the best advice you will get. Welcome to the game.

Don’t delete your characters, you will regret it later.

CMM.6712:

Don’t delete your characters, you will regret it later.

THIS. Gifts are by character age NOT account age.

Guys/girls/creatures… you’re awesome. Lots of nice advices here.

I’m lvl 10 right now and I can’t stop playin’ xD
I played (and sometimes re-play) lots of online games like FFXiV, WoW (just for the guild, don’t like it that much), NW, PoE (for button mashing istincts)… GW2 is probably the biggest blast I’ve ever got in this 2-3 years of online gaming.

It’s insane. I’m taking my time, for sure. Everything is great in this game. Even jumping around to reach views lol

There are tons of things to take into account tho and I’m a bit scared… But I’m just doing it “natural” and let’s see what happens.

The thing I like the most is the trinity absence, thus you can basically build whatever you want (until high end game raiding, which as you said is obviously another pair of hands).

Anyway, feeling great right now. Exploration is rewarding and that’s a huuuuge winning factor, compared to other MMOs, where it’s kind of a collateral thing.

I won’t waste the level boost… No I won’t.
The ranger right now feels great for what I like, but I’ll obviously try a caster… Necromancer being my first choice (IRL roleplaying games area here xD).

Hope to catch around in the forums for some feedback/theory crafting/whatsoever.

Cheers!

P.S. If you have a veeery social Guild in mind, just let me know and I’ll check.

end game can be a bit boring if you solo a lot. other than that the rest is ok. also halloween in this game is neat.

Don’t worry, its just a high, once it goes away you will learn the truth of the game that it is not as great as you think it is.

I agree with the other folks. Take your time. Enjoy the journey. I never use anything that boosts my level. Got nearly a full stack of books of knowledge sitting in my bank. Try EVERYTHING. Every weapon, every play style. I don’t feel there’s a “right” or “wrong” way to play. I play a ranger for my solo character, a “fire” ranger, axe and torch, but my favorite profession is anything that isn’t close combat. Have fun!!!!

Although, you don’t need to, as leveling is pretty fast, one thing you might consider using the L80-Boost for is, creating a character, like a Mesmer (which is said to only really shine at L80), boost it to L80, and do just enough of Heart of Thorns to unlock Gliding. Then, park the character (maybe at the end of Jumping Puzzle, or a mat farm) until you are ready to use it, again.

Gliding is probably, imo, the only thing (not included) that really enhances the fun of Core Tyria.

Oh, one other thing, don’t vendor or use or trash any item of Exotic rarity (orange) before checking the TP, it could be worth a small fortune. In fact, check all items before vendoring; someone else will probably pay more for it.

Regardless, welcome to Tyria, and good luck!

Guys/girls/things, please… I read Fractals in the wiki, but don’t get a lot about them in game. I’m into Fractal of the Mists and I abosolutely have no idea of what to do… xD

Can you explain them to me as if I was a baby? xD

Fractals = short dungeons

Each fractal is assigned a number which reflects difficulty and rewards. At higher numbers, the same fractal will be more difficult, with added mechanics than it was at a lower tier.

At higher fractal numbers, you require Ascended (pink coloured gear) which you slot infusions (an item you slot into your gear bought from the vendors in the fractal hub) to counter something called Agony, which will damage you during later difficulties of the dungeon.

Mechanically they have changed over the last 4 years, but essentially you grab 4 friends, pick a level and off you go. New players are wise to start from level 1 and just work up.

Welcome!

I alt a lot so I’m not sure which character I’d consider my “main”, but NECRO is definitely one of my favorites. It gets even better once you can get to the REAPER specialization. I found necro to be fun at low levels cause you can have an army of undead minions at your disposal. Necro has high survivability as well…good tanky class.

1.- Don’t ever make a Revenant, if they see you trying to get into a high level Fractal or Raid with one they will kick you, it’s a class which is sadly full of bugs (look at the forum section on Revenant) and the recent nerfs rendered him unplayable for late game content.

2.- Game is fun, but completing the map 5 times with each character can and will make you cry of how old it gets fast, so try to save all the Tomes of Knowledge you get to make leveling the rest of your alts easier.

3.- Maguuma Content (the level 80 expansion area) is tough as nails, the vanilla area is VERY casual and you can do it with any build and solo, but be aware that the expansion is 100% based on group content and you won’t be able to solo more than half of it.

4.- Speaking of point number 3, try to join a guild! There are tons of guilds right now, most focused on PVE content to aid you in your progression on the expansion content, it can be quite daunting to understand as there’s no real tutorial on it and A LOT of stuff changes there.

5.- Right now I main Guardian, but I also enjoy Thief, Ranger, and Engineer. Guardian is a mid-term class, by mi-term I mean that he can dish out quite considerable damage, is also a class who can buff and heal alies to an extent, and has lots of durability. The intro screen says he’s a defensive class, but most players use him as a damage dealer and it does that job SO GOOD. The elite spec of thief, Daredevil, is REALLY fun, but keep in mind he’s even squishier than the casters and hard to play as you need to learn to watch and dodge even on events where that becomes hard with the number of players. Ranger is a very good class to learn and start with, he does “meh” damage, but is fun nontheless. Engineer… well, if you play him casual he’s very fun, play him on late game content and be ready to develop Carpal Tunnel with those skill rotations.

6.- Once you hit max level instead of jumping right away to the expansion story try to do some fractals (explained by a poster above) to get used to complex enemy mechanics, get to know your class and skills, and if you have the cash use the marketplace to get Exotic (Yellow) gear for your character with the stats you need.

7.- Speaking of cash, once on max level, if you have the Sparkfly Den area open, once a day you can go fight a boss known as Tequatl with dozens of players. Just killing him rewards you 1 Gold (which by GW2 standards is a considerable ammount) and a chance to get Ascended (Pink) gear, the highest tier of gear aviable. Also do the Dailies, a list of activities that pops up every day, which awards you several things AND 2 Gold, netting you 3 gold per day.

8.- About Ascended, it’s very hard to get them thru random drops from Tequatl and it’s easier to get them doing High Level Fractals, which I will tell you in a bit. If you want the ascended gear fast you will have to craft it by picking armor/leathersmith or tailor and sinking A LOT of gold into it, by A LOT I mean that it will take you at least 35 gold to max the profession out and another 56 to raft the piece of equipment, and patience, as some components can only be crafted once a day. BUT if you want a cheap way just keep trying the drops, that’s what many do, and you can change the stats of that gear later if you don’t like them.

9.- About Fractals, they are fun, but later levels will start putting Agony on you, a status that can only be avoided by placing Agony Resistance infusions (which you get by completing fractals) on well… Ascended Gear… But fear not friend! You can get enough to farm the high level ones by just having amulets, rings and accesories, which you can buy from Laurels from a Laurel Merchant on Lion’s Arch (the main city), sosave em’ up!

Hope this is helpful

Take it slow. Explore the world, and DON’T JUST DO HEARTS. Do the events that pop up, especially the map-wide meta events. They’re super entertaining, give better loot generally and are more immersive (they tell you the overall story of the map.) Wait around after an event ends and watch and listen to the NPCs; there will often be follow-up events.

Take it slow. Learn your class well. Leveling is the best time to experiment with different builds (weapons, sigils, runes, Utility skills and traits) mainly because Fine/Masterwork gear is much, much cheaper than Exotic; this lets you try out DPS builds, condition builds, support builds etc. to help you find your preferred playstyle without breaking the bank. Try out every weapon combination your class offers, even ones you may not like at first; you might be surprised and end up loving something you didn’t expect to love. For example, when I first made my Ele I expected to hate main-hand Dagger, but now I can’t play without it. Taking the time to learn your class will help you out immensely when you start Orr and especially the HoT maps, and if you ever want to get into PvP or Fractals/Raids.

Take it slow. Harvest every resource node you see! Take a break from exploring every now and then to level up your Crafting disciplines (you can have two disciplines at once for free.) The materials you harvest will help immensely. Alternatively, you can make a good amount of money selling mid-tier crafting materials like Iron Ore, Soft Wood Logs, Seasoned Wood Logs, Cotton/Wool/Linen Scraps, etc., since these are more valuable than high-tier materials like Mithril Ore and Silk Scraps. Although personally I’d hold onto them to level up crafting.

Above all, take it slow and have FUN. Remember, there’s no point in playing if you’re not having fun :p

Hey!! Don’t know what to say… Amazing pieces of advice!! I’m lvl 21 right now but i take my time exploring maps and even repeating events. I’m kinda clumsy with keys lol

I’m experimenting bindings, tactics and stuff. This is a great game. Huge game for my tastes. I don’t ask much and all I ask is here. Relatively low number of active skills, manageable number of stats, insane amount of fun builds for mid-casual play.

Thanks a lot for your help. You are great.

Side note: the general feel is that this community is different from the average MMO population. In a good way.

Aldath.1275:

1.- Don’t ever make a Revenant, if they see you trying to get into a high level Fractal or Raid with one they will kick you, it’s a class which is sadly full of bugs (look at the forum section on Revenant) and the recent nerfs rendered him unplayable for late game content.

Bad advice. Not all characters have to be made or built for usage in end game content – Fractals and Raids. And even if they are, not all are required to have meta builds as there do exist groups that let you play what you want. Especially if you’re in a guild.

Don’t use lvl bosster , Tome of knowledge . Slowly leveling , you will see the beauty of this game before it’s runined after 80 ha ha ha .

The thing about GW2 that stands out against other games is the cooperative element to it. Everything is shared, gathering nodes, mob experience, etc. You’re never working against another player, no mob stealing and what not. That means other players around you are welcome.

As someone who usually plays solo, I love this aspect. It means I can be as social as I want to be without hard grouping. I love running with the crowd to help take down a boss or coming across another player doing the same HP challenge and working together. I think this, more than anything else, is the reason the community is so helpful.

As far as advice, like everyone else said, take your time. Try all the classes, all the game modes. You never know what you might like.

If you want fast gold in game and well… since you are not max level. Go farm the holloween lab would be the fastest way for u to get gold at your current level.

Seera.5916:

Aldath.1275:

1.- Don’t ever make a Revenant, if they see you trying to get into a high level Fractal or Raid with one they will kick you, it’s a class which is sadly full of bugs (look at the forum section on Revenant) and the recent nerfs rendered him unplayable for late game content.

Bad advice. Not all characters have to be made or built for usage in end game content – Fractals and Raids. And even if they are, not all are required to have meta builds as there do exist groups that let you play what you want. Especially if you’re in a guild.

Exactly. Just join a friendly guild to avoid elitists. I never use meta builds or popular professions but I can still do every content with guildies / friends.