Professions: I assume you mean crafting. Crafting gives you experience (virtually everything you do other than selling gives XP). There are online guides to leveling your crafting. IGN’s is concise and accurate. Basically, gather mats as you explore/level, use them to make stuff. You can craft items your character can use. At 80, it can be cheaper to craft Exotic gear than to buy it if you have all or most of the materials.
CAN I travel anywhere/quest anywhere: yes and no; due to downscaling, higher levels can go to any zone around their level or below and adventure, with some challenge and some on-your-level drops. Low levels are not advised to go to zones much above their level. I can typically handle mobs 1-5 levels up, but much more than that can be challenging, depending on your class. Once you reach level 80, you can go to any zone and be scaled to that zone
GW2 is okay, but it’s nothing more than a grind fest offering no real end game content: endgame content consists of dungeons, group meta events in various zones, dailies and monthlies. Your friend was probably speaking of a traditional endgame with a hierarchy of dungeons and raids, and no, GW2 does not have that. Whether GW2 endgame is any good is up to whether any of the things there are to do will hold your interest. I like to alt, so I do. I like to farm, so I do. I like to do open world events, the harder the better, so I do. ANet is experimenting with a new scaling system for events, and at the moment at least some of them can be quite fun. There is also World versus World, a realm V. Realm PvPvE setting, and Structured PvP if that floats your boat. Grind? There are long term goals: legendary weapons and Ascended Gear (a tier above exotic which offers minor stat boosts). While it does take time and effort to get these, they are in no way necessary. I suppose those who experience grind have to have what they want now or soon. If you can let go of that, there is no grind.
Gear is standard looking: There are armor and weapon skins for each of the 8 dungeons, various skins available while leveling — either through drops or as rewards for the personal story or crafting. So far, I’ve been able to find a look for each of 5 level 80’s. Not to say that I would not want more skins. For instance, male medium (leather) chest pieces that are not a long coat — well, I haven’t seen one; female light armor (cloth) that is not a robe or long skirt or skirt-over-pants is rare. Whether the existing skins are “standard” is a matter of opinion.
It’s just another generic mmo offering nothing new: If all GW2 offered was not having to compete with other players for resource nodes and allowing players to move while using skills, it would have indeed been something new to MMO’s. Fortunately, it also offers many other things, like down-scaling, widespread dynamic events (rather than 1 here or there interspersed with the standard quests), and combat in which choice and skill means something.
90% of GW2 is questing/leveling: I spend as much or more time on my 80’s as on my lower levels, so again, this is going to depend more on individual preferences than on the game.
Best of all, the lack of a sub fee means that my entry fee has garnered more enjoyment per dollar than other games at the same price. Even if all I had done was level one character (~120 hours for my first) I would have been ahead of other comparably-priced games (e.g. SPRPG’s). A t 1200+ hours, it just gets to be a better value.
Thanks ;D