Guild Wars 2

So, I know folks have been asking for a rehash of my old “quick n’ dirty handbook”. This is an UPDATED version, detailing what you can aim for once you’ve hit level cap. Please note that a lot of these things can be done prior to level 80; there isn’t “just” an endgame to Guild Wars 2, and I feel that the game truly does begin the instant you roll your character. With that in mind, here is a categorized, comprehensive list of things that you can do in the game at 80 if you’re ever feeling particularly bored and you’re wondering, “What can I get done today?”

This has been greatly condensed from its original form and should be much easier to read, but if you have any suggestions for new items to include in the guide, post it here and I’ll credit you!

A NOTE TO THE MODS: Please feel free to lock, delete or otherwise remove the sticky of my old guide and replace it with this one! Thanks for stickying the old guide. <3, Runo!

So You’re Level 80: Happy Birthday, Go Do Stuff
(Categorized and itemized in no particular order.)

Category I: ‘Player Versus…’ [PvX] Content
*1. Map Completion!
WHAT: Complete the map, zone by zone. Not only does each zone of the map give a LOT of coin (10-50 silver per, depending on the level range), it also gives two items (typically of rare or exotic quality, again dependant upon the level range) and zone-level material rewards in a stack of 40, plus one rare item that you can usually only get from story steps or the Black Lion Trader, as well as a chunk of story experience. 100% Map Completion is a large sum of coins, XP, exotic items and a crafting material for a LEGENDARY item.
HOW: Run around the map, complete every heart / POI / Waypoint / Vista and Skill Challenge in each zone. Even World vs. World is crucial to completion of this

*2. Farm!
WHAT: Farm! Just farm! Farming involves the repeated slaughtering of innocent monsters such as the valley of grawl within Frostgorge Sound, or whatever your character can handle. You still get level 80 items (greens, blues, yellows…) and any level materials relevant to your farming zone of choice.
HOW: You pretty much just go kill anything in the world endlessly. As much as you want; magic find and gold find gear like [Omnomberry Bars] will potentially exponentially improve drop rate. Magic Find Boosts, such as banners, communal bonfires and boosters are also a boon if you think you’ll be at it long enough to make the usage of such items and boosts worthwhile! You gain coins, items of all varieties/levels and tiers, materials and experience out the wazoo. This can help you acquire etoplasms and cash for whatever you desire to throw your hard-earned coin at, be it gearing out an alternate character, funding a legendary or buying that dye you’ve always wanted for your main.

*3. Dungeon Completionism!
WHAT: Dungeons have Story and Exploratory Modes. Some waypoints and Points of Interest are ONLY available in dungeons and their story or exploratory modes, and Exploratory Mode paths reward fantastic loot and tokens. Both modes have achievement points and XP (for skill points) rewarded en masse. Dungeon tokens can be used for rare or exotic armor and weapons you can transmute or use for stats. Or both! Not to mention the XP (for skill points), item and currency rewards.
HOW: Complete a Story Mode Dungeon, and/or go with friends who have completed Story Mode to run Exploratory Mode. Only one person has to complete Story Mode to unlock Exploratory Mode for all, but you must be at-level for Exploratory Mode regardless if your state of completion of its story (typically +5 to the story, as in Ascalanian Catacombs Story Mode is 30, while its exploratory mode is 35). You can dungeon with players cross-worlds, so you and your British buddies can jam to the same tune! (Wait, what are you doing rocking out that early?!)

*4. Finish Your Personal Storyline!
WHAT: Your personal story has an end to it. Wanna know a secret about the end of the storyline that you’ll wanna know before you run Arah?
Your final story mission......has you actually go to kill Zhaitan. You MUST get to this final story step before running Arah Story Mode or you will have to run Arah Story Mode again to receive your final reward. It will not prevent access to Arah Explorable Mode, however.
HOW: There are five or so level 80 story missions to proceed through as per normal preceding your final mission. Go forth and triumph!

*5. World Bosses & Epic Events!
WHAT: There are tougher things in the world than the champion mobs that can be taken down by a good group. (Credit: Viking from GW2 Official Forums) Some of the biggest events to take down include the Orrian temples to the six human gods, the Claw of Jormag, Tequatl the Sunless, The Shatterer, and even some lower-level takedowns like the Shadow Behemoth and the Frozen Maw.
HOW: Follow the GWTemple Dragon Timer for your server to find exactly when these events are occuring and jump into the action!

*6. Fractals of the Mists!
WHAT: These sets of three to four quick, nonstatic dungeon ‘stages’ are some of the best high-level/endgame content available, rewarding you with Ascended gear that can hold ‘Infusions’, which are unique upgrades that shrug off Agony. Aside from letting you climb Fractal levels by shrugging off mounting amounts of Agony, Ascended gear is a tier above Exotic and boasts the best stats of any equipment.
HOW: Form a group of five players to begin levelling through Fractals. The difficulty will ramp up as you progress, but so will the rate and quality of drops!

*7. Engage in SPvP or Roam World vs. World!
WHAT: World vs. World does get marginally easier with higher-level gear, but it isn’t game-breaking. WvW has exquisite fine and crafting materials, PvE mobs to kill, players to fight against for the obvious added fun of player vs. player combat, structural damage and sieges, and guerrilla combat or mass warfare. The choice is yours! Structured PvP is fun and has unique rewards from Glory, which you can make great use of Glory/PvP Boosters, here. It also seperates your skills, gear and traits from WvW and PvE… it is its own fully-developed game type! Aside from sounding like the name of an awesome electronica band, WvW even gives a lot of karma and are rich with events and kills that count towards your dailies or monthlies, and are the only way to earn Badges of Honor (a PvP currency).
HOW: World vs. World pops up from your ‘B’ key menu (select the Eternal Battlegrounds, or a borderland of your choice) and Structured PvP is accessed from your Hero panel (‘H’) key -> PvP tab -> “Go to the Heart of the Mists.”

*8. Complete your Daily and Monthly!
WHAT: Your Daily is as its name suggests, and rewards you for completing a set of simple but varied tasks from day to day before server reset (at which point progress resets if you have not yet earned your daily). These will be randomized for each day of your daily. Monthlies are also randomized, and reset at the start of each new month. Dailies and monthlies award you with Laurels — these are an amazing form of currency that you can use to acquire various items from packs of unidentified dyes, to tier after tier of crafting materials, components in Mystic Forge recipes or even Ascended equipment.
HOW: You can keep track of both your daily and monthly requirements through either the tracker at the top right of your HUD or your Hero Panel (Achievements tab -> Daily & Monthly). Complete five Daily Prerequisites or four Monthly Prerequisites to earn a variety of impressive rewards; your daily gives you a single jug of karma, a mystic coin, five silver, experience and a chance for a Black Lion Market reward. Your monthly is ten jugs of karma, twenty mystic coins, fifty silver, a chunk of experience and TEN laurels.

Category B: Social and Miscellaneous Content
*1. Achievement Points!
WHAT: Tell your friends you’ve got the most achievements and points! They’re like Steam Achievements, but unlocked achievements also boosts influence for the guild you are representing at the time of the unlock besides fueling your completion rage!
HOW: Access your Hero Panel, click onto the Achievements tab, and start going down the list. Some are account-wide and others are class-specific or gameplay type-specific. Some are repeatable, too!

*2. Acquire Cultural Armor!
WHAT: Cultural Armor & Weapons. They are some of the coolest-looking items in the game and have anything from mid-ranged rares to 80 exotic stats for most of the items. It also gives you achievement points, one batch of points is given once for a single item from a race’s cultural armory (but only once, for example—get a sylvari shoulder, 5 achievement points for a piece of sylvari cultural. But you CANNOT unlock the Emperor’s New Wardrobe achievement with a full set of cultural gear from one race. It must be from all FIVE races.)
HOW: LOTS of gold. All cultural weapons can be bought with karma, but cultural armor cannot.

*3. Craft Legendaries!
WHAT: Crafting a Legendary Item! For the moment, a Legendary ‘grind’ primarily results in epic looks and the right to brag, but a little birdy has informed me that once Ascended-tier weaponry hits, Legendary weapons will be automatically upgraded to match Ascended-tier stats.
HOW: Buy or farm materials, particularly the 80 exotics known as “Precusors”, the tier-six materials, and base materials and farm karma. There are many guides available online! (Thanks to Khalija of GuildWars2Guru.com for the excellent post!

*4. Acquire Ectoplasms!
WHAT: You must have ectoplasms. Ghost Busters! These ectoplasms are invaluable in crafting and infinitely useful for padding your coin count. Ectoplasms help create the creme de la creme of GW2 gear: crafted, exotic level 80 gear—the top-tier stuff in the game comparable to any other 80 exotic-tier item in the game — I.E.: the Draconic heavy armor set — that you can craft yourself or hire a friend or guildy to create for you. The best jewelry and trinkets, weapons, armor, and upgrade components CAN be crafted and DO compete with the best gear available, second only to Ascended-tier gear. Ectoplasms, and these gear pieces also sell for a pretty copper (and by ‘copper’ I mean ‘oodles of gold’), once you’re exotic’d out.
HOW: Forging items in the Mystic Forge, and breaking them down with Master’s (or Mystic) Salvage Kits … or even by purchasing them with cold, hard coins. The formula is below.
#a. Vendor 1-80 blues and 1-69 greens. Visit the trading post to figure out the worth of each 30-69 yellow and 65-69 exotic drop.
#b. combine 70-80 greens for a chance at rares. Save extra greens for future Mystic Forging attempts.
#c. break down ANY 70-80 yellows for ectoplasms utilizing your Master/Mystic Salvage Kits.
#d. sell 70-80 exotics that sell for above 25s. Under 25-silver tends to make them more worthwhile to break down, as they have a higher chance to yield a better threshold of ectoplasms.
#e. Use Black Lion Salvage Kits on any item that has an upgrade (a superior sigil, rune, or jewel for example) for an even greater chance at ectoplasms and an 100% chance to retrieve the upgrade, which you can sell back on the Trading Post for profit!

*5. Acquire 20 slot bags!
WHAT: Are you a bad enough dude to pay 10+ gold in materials to get your space? Multiply it by 4! It’s no secret; storage on a single toon is expensive, and you’re not end-game until you’re swimming in space. (-Futonbot from GW2 Forums)
HOW: They are crafted at a variety of high-end professions. You can also purchase them from the Trading Post or commission them from the Mistlock Observatory for Fractal Relics.

*6. Work on an Alt!
WHAT: Level your >80 alternate characters for extra coins, Achievement Points, and even more. You can earn a lot of karma and coin this way, too, and it gives you more variety when running content in the game. You could do anything from work on a second warrior with a different build to make the elementalist alt you always wanted, and you can fuel their levelling process and pimp out their gear once they’re high-level enough for it!
HOW: Obvious… I’d hope. How’d you get to 80 on THIS toon?

*7. Help People!
WHAT: Helping people across the world map and in WvW can net you karma, coins, XP, materials, a variety of items, and notoriety (as in being known as a nice person!)
HOW: Wander the maps. Run dungeons with guildies, friends and strangers. You don’t lose anything for trying to help people, but you can gain new friends and you may earn some awesome allies to blow up dungeons and have wars with guilds (2!) alongside.

*8. "Acquire Karma!
WHAT: Karma! It’s Karma! You should know this by now. With this ‘currency’, you will be able to purchase Karma Items from karma vendors, Legendary materials, and other goodies you can only get with karma such as jewelry boxes from Orr, which are a karma-only purchase.
HOW: Karma Boosters and completing hearts and events in lower level zones, helping lower-level Fractal groups, World vs. World, repeatable events in Orr and more! Complete your daily and monthly for oodles of karma from achieved jugs, and save them up to chug them down with karma boosts — banners, bonfires, boosters and karma infusions for Ascended trinkets.

*9. Acquire Skill Points!
WHAT: Unlock skill points. Some legendary materials and components crucial to Mystic Forge recipes can be only be bought with skill points or daily laurels.
HOW: Skill challenges on your map in zones, and XP post-80 goes towards a skill point anew. You can also purchase skill point books for 35 Fractal Relics per skill point in the Mistlock Observatory.

*10. Roleplay!
WHAT: Roleplaying is the act of experiencing the world much as an actor might portray a character or an author might write a person, writing from the “in-character” perspective of your own avatar.
HOW: There are many guides all over the internet as to how to roleplay. An excellent foundation for getting started in the GW2 RP community is here, at the Guild Wars 2 Roleplayers fansite.

I don’t always powerlevel to endgame…
…but when I do, I make sure it’s in a game where there’s actually stuff to do.

Stay 80, my friends.
-Runo

Dude,

Thank you so much for posting this. I bought GW2 when it first came out and never played it as I was too glued to WoW. Now I have recovered my account details and cant wait to explore what sounds like an immense game.

This sort of thing should be on the back of the cover of the game, it is that well written.

Thanks, and hopefully see you in WvW in the future

This whole thing is just, Yes! Very nicely done.

Request to add a “WHY” to this guide.
Helps newbs like me choose which means suits the end I’m after.