Guild Wars 2

Hi, I’ve been playing since April but have yet to run a dungeon.

I used to play WoW, and I really loved the dungeon finder tool. So, I guess my first question is if there is anything like that or is it more old school PUG style?

Second, how forgiving are the dungeons for new people? Again, in WoW, I always felt comfortable as a DPS and sometimes healing and tanking, but this game is so different, I’m wondering if not knowing the mechanics of the dungeon will get people killed.

Thanks a lot for any and all tips.

Oh, I’m playing a Mesmer right now at level 40ish.

Guild Wars 2 features no traditional Trinity, everyone in the dungeon will be playing DPS, while class dictates your role (ex: you’re mesmer the party will expect reflects from you), in your friend’s list you can find the Group Finder for every dungeon and fractals. Ofcourse you’re gonna have to learn it, but it isn’t rocket science the dungeons are fairly easy when you know them and can be easily solo’d by an experienced player.

I suggest you ship over to the dungeon forum and look around a bit.
And perhaps look for appropriate dungeon builds and such, maybe a video or two can’t hurt either, good luck.

Edit: Most puggers prefer 80’s in their parties.

General Tips:
Learn to utilize Dodges and Evades, this is an Action game treat it as such.
If somethings unclear, don’t be a sinner and shoot the sin.
There are always those who know more and better
There’s a huge ton of info on these forums free for you to utilize.
Berserker’s is not an exploit.

Press Y to go to your friendslist. You’ll see the LFG (looking for group) tab. It might seem a bit empty, but that’s because groups fill up very fast. Make sure you select the dungeon you want to run to see the parties for it (it’s on Open World content by default).

All you need to do for your first dungeon is:
- Understand the difference between story and explorable. Story is the easy version and gives less rewards. Doing a story mode for a dungeon means you can open the instance for explorable mode on that character next times, so I always think it’s handy to have. If you don’t do story mode you can still do explorable mode, just someone who has done story needs to open the dungeon for the rest of the party. Explorable mode has 3 paths (4 paths for Arah). Rule of thumb is that usually P1 (path 1) is the easiest (this goes for most but not all dungeons).
- Be sure to be on the map where the dungeon is (so for Ascelonian Catacombs it’s Plains of Ashford, anywhere), you’ll get a pop-up to get into the dungeon as soon as someone opens it.
- Be sure to say you’re new! People are usually more than happy to explain everything. If you don’t say anything and plan to just bluff through it, people will expect you to know everything and may get annoyed when you make mistakes (since they think you’re just being an idiot rather than being new).
- Have the right level requirement. You can wiki the level requirements or watch out for the mail you get each time when you get to the right level for a certain dungeon. Story mode level requirements is 5 levels lower than the explorable mode level requirement (example: Story level requirement for Ascelonian Catacombs is 30, for explorable mode it’s 35. So don’t join explorable mode as a level 30 because that usually gets you kicked).

Just as an advice:
Leave TA-Aetherpath for the last dungeon you run, or do it with a party on TS.

Might be a good idea to avoid speed groups or running groups advertising in the LFG until you’ve done the dungeon a few times already. The speed groups will want to do it as quick as possible and can have little tolerance for players who don’t know exactly what to do. The running groups will get you in right before the last boss, so you’ll miss most of the content.

http://gw2dungeons.net/

Honestly as long as you say you’re new to dungeons and find a group that’s ok with that it shouldn’t be a problem.

Even the hardest ones aren’t actually that hard, they just require you to know the mechanics or go carefully to figure it out. For example the Twilight Arbor Aetherblade Path was specifically designed to be a kittene for people who had done all the others, but groups were still able to do it on the first try. You just have to pay attention at each part, read the dialogue and other hints instead of rushing in, attacking everything and hoping that’s all it needs.

I’d recommend either looking for groups that state they’re for new players or creating your own and saying you’re looking for someone to show you the ropes.

Longer term I’d also recommend trying out different types of groups. A lot of players like to do speed runs which involve skipping a lot of the mobs and using stacking and other tricks to make the boss fights easier. Others like to fight everything, or only skip certain things. Then there’s other options like which profession you use and which ones you have in your group.

There’s no absolute best way to do it* so it’s up to you which you prefer.

*There are quite specific ways to get the fastest completion, which is what a lot of players want, especially if they’re just doing it for the gold, but not everyone enjoys that.