I love Guild Wars but I'm really starting to hate everything about Multi-player

I'm so aggrivated right now... and I'm considering just uninstalling the game and returning it to the store or selling it.

I'm sick and tired of failing missions and quests not once or twice, but upwards of seven and eight times because people haven't figured out the most basic aspects of PvE...

Mainly idiots who charge into large groups of monsters then run back to the party looking for help, now aggroing a ton of monsters for everyone. Or these stupid eles who use AoE spells in aggro-sensative areas, effectively ruining our pull and setting off a horde of angry monsters!

I try to explain over and over but people just don't care, are too stupid to understand, or have no self-control whatsoever, and it's ruining the game for me. I suppose I need an experienced guild, but it seems without some shiny 15k set or a 100k axe, any good guild will turn their nose at me. I really miss when I could get things done with hench...

Recently I have taken to going into most missions with hench.....

I think it is a shame if people have no options but to get into a really 'good' guild or play with just npcs. If only we could solve the leaver problem - I just spent 2 hours going into the first two levels of tombs and having people get nasty, fall out and leave. It's so frustrating.

But there's nothing that can be done but get on with it .

I understand the frustration...

you should consider at this point using Henchies for the bulk of your missions... in more cases then not in the majority of the missions henchies work as well if not better than most pugs...

this allows you to move at your pace and explore your character more... the henchies have some controlability...

before giving up try alternative means...

as far as returning the game... it wont happen game has to be sealed in order to return it... or else everyone would be doing it to get multiple account access keys for free

Some missions really just can't be done with henches if I want to get the bonus, which I do for all missions. Right now i'm doing the Crystal Desert missions and I don't see how I can do it with henches. It'd be possible if I had the right elite skills, but in order to get those I have to progress further and beat these damned missions! It's like a catch-22.

I really wish Anet wuld consider a 7-15 day downloadable trial of GW- via credit card even if the trial version were always a chapter before current... aka trial versions of Prophacies... then of factions when chapter 3 comes out...Not only would this benefit the comunity it would benefit Anet... i could be wrong but it doesnt seem like a bad idea...

this would allow people to get their friends at the least to try it out... its hard to find people in a virtual world that play like you... easier to get friends that you already get along with to come try the game out...

reason i say credit card trial is to not leave too much room for hack accounts... can track them by CC and only allow one trial per CC and the card can automatically be billed the retail price if not cancelled within the trial period

I don't know, PUGs get a really bad rap on the forums. I've pugged my way through both storylines several times, and haven't had too many problems. Once in awhile you get in weak groups and have to repeat a mission a few times, but not that often in my experience.

Yeah, that's true. I have used PUGs for all my characters and made it through and had some great experiences. I hate people who call others noobs because - face it - we have all been new.

But people who deliberately leave a whole party high and dry because they have a minor problem with one player or because they are a jerk really make things tough. It is a futile complaint - but I still feel the need to air it from time to time.

Yeah I have done a lot of missions with PUGs, very few with henchies. I do quests and cap, and basically everything outside of missions with henchies.

But some missions you need a certain build, and a PUG MM is going to be better than your N henchie.

I think the only missions that are (nearly) impossible to do with just henchies is everything in RoF.

For what reason would I have to lie or exaggerate? Not every PUG is terrible, however for missions that don't require just following a path and killing monsters, then yes I end up failing many times. I make mistakes sometimes too, but at least I'm able to recognize I made a mistake and learn from it. Not continue repeating it every time we restart and messing the entire mission up.

Not to mention I can't stand the impatient and crappy attitude I come across with most PUGs. When I try to explain something important, everyone just wants to run ahead and not listen, and then they can't understand what happened when the mission is failed, and they leave thinking that everyone else sucks and nothing was their fault.

I've PUGged through every mission in both games multiple times. Since I'm in a rather small guild, a full-guild group is a near-impossibility.

I've found my share of good groups and terrible groups, but I usually have fun. The only thing that really upsets me is when people leave at the first sign of trouble, especially since my favorite GW moments are when we snatch victory from the jaws of sure defeat!

i think you should join a active PVE guild.

now, i hardly ever do missions with random people. i go with henchman or with my guildies that are always happy to help, because i do same when someone needs help. when u playing with guildies its a copletely diffrent and better PVE experience then what you have seen so far:

1-u enjoy playing with NICE people,
2-you COPLETE mission,
3-you have fun makin friends and chat.

when we dont have 8 guildies avalble for a mission, we take rst henchman. with 3 good players and rest henchman its better then 8 bad players who keep flkaming each other.

Hennnnnnnnnnchmen.

Absolutely everything in this game, both Factions and Prophecies, can be done with henchmen.

For the inevitable person who will post after me and say "lol wut about fow and uw and urgoz/deep" henchmen aren't even available there so just shut up.

Alternately, yes. Join a guild. There are several good guilds out there who will take pretty much anyone--you just have to find one which doesn't suck.

RoF is a joke. I henched the bonus and the entire mission by myself before now that they have had 3 pieces infused ever since long ago. Now if it was like before with uninfused henchmen, your statement would be true.

Also as far as not being able to hench any bonus, that is also false. I killed Glint with henchmen easily using the right build. I suppose it could be more difficult without all the elites but it also depends on your class.

Hell, I henched my way through ALL of Cantha during the prelaunch and killed Shiro. The only mission that was too hard to hench was Vizunah square because you can never ressurect the other team.

The only time you should ever do a pug is if you can't beat a mission without, or your mission agenda can still be completed if everyone else dies.

There are luck instances when Pugs fit.

But the basic guidelines for pugs are as follows:
-Pugs will aggro to much.
-Pugs will heal to little, or to late, or both.
-Pugs will argue which direction to go as both patrols close in.
-Pugs will generally have two people who find they hate each other and bicker while in combat.
-Pugs will have a rude little noob who draws immature things on the minimap and pings every action.
-Pugs will have 1-2 quitters (Brand new feature!)
-Pugs will attack the wrong targets in the wrong order at the wrong time, in the wrong way.

Solutions to each problem in order.

-See it coming, mentally manage the attack vectors of every mob near the ones you plan to aggro. Be twice as tactically adept as every other person on the team.

-Be prepared to pick up healing slack any way you can through bodyblocking, protection, enemy debuff, etc. Assume your monk will choke until they prove themselves.

-Make the decision for them, start running at one of the patrols, most of the time the rest of the team will follow the most decisive person. It's better that a quick decision be made then no decision at all.

-Tell them to shut up and get back to fighting, and if they don't get the message the first time, threaten to leave. (Most of the time it puts them in their place.)

-Warn the immature player, then threaten to leave if it continues.

-Figure out by personality assesment which players are most likely to panic and bail at the first sign of trouble. Then assess yourself and figure out which parts of their roles you can fill in, in a panic situation.

-If no one chooses to be caller, you tell the group you will call. Then if they disobey the call you remind them to focus fire. Other then that there's little you can do except pick up their slack.

That's the real problem nowadays, everyone has a "role" and if that "role" goes missing no one knows how to compensate. There's no generic combat training anymore.

For intance W/Mo can effectively play as half monks with one, yes, one healing spell. If you already have a heavy dmg output player in your group, then it's alright to bring Word of Healing. Lo, behold instead of your energy taxed monk letting that one extra player die, or having to chase down the stupid player that strayed to far, you wait till they're below 50% health and boom. 5 energy, you saved your teammate's life and let the monk do his/her job for everyone else.

Now what is the best way for any R primary character to help a caster that's under attack gain energy?

If they're a necro fine, Blood Ritual, etc.

But what if they're not? No go right? Wrong. Cripple the pursuing enemy or interrupt the caster. Now while most archers get the inturrupt, the idea of crippling a melee to give the caster time to escape never seems to occur.

Have a tough boss spamming Reversal of Fortune and don't have any mesmer, ranger or interrupt warriors? Get an Assassin with Shroud of Silence.

Nasty type of monster casting an ugly spell? Bring a Arcane Thief Mesmer, with the copy skills Arcane Thievery and Larceny they have two shots of disabling the nasty spell from those creatures and then throwing it back at them (if they so choose to do so.) Heck, Me/Mo, Mo/Me can steal enemy monk spells and help party members.

There are so many obscure, unforseen uses for skills in bad situations, but no one knows how to use them. It just makes me ill comparing the quality now to quality then.

Not to be a contrarian or anything in this thread (because I agree that the lvl of proficiency of many puggers I've played with has been far less than adequate) but I have had some excellent pug groups in the last couple of weeks in several different areas.

As my Warrior I led a great pug through Gayala Hatchery mission...they all listened perfectly and played their professions just as well. We saved all five hatchlings and got the Masters reward for the mish.

Have had a few excellent groups in The Deep that have gotten to and killed Kanaxai...this was mostly due to the party leader who's extensive knowledge of that elite mish really made a huge difference but we were successful each time he led.

Have also led (again as my Warrior) several successful Forgemaster runs in FoW.

In general you do get bad groups here and there...they are each bad for their own various reasons. Sometimes people get Error 007 or lag at the wrong time and run haphazardly into an over-agro situation.

Frankly I will always try story based missions with a pug until I get familiar with it and am certain a hench crew will cut the mustard...if I'm lucky I get past it the first time...if not then hey, I have to do it again.

Quests that I get from NPC's I always do with henches just because they do what I tell them dammit!! :P

Hopefully you can find a group of skilled players to adventure with but if not, use henchies or try starting your own groups where you can hand pick the players you will be playing with.

Tzu

Quoted for the truth!

Though I've had mostly good PUG experiences with Factions, I'd take three or four of my guild mates and henchmen over 8 PUGgers anyday.

Are you mad! That way GW will be infected with trial noobs.

pug pve is frustrating when you're used to organized pvp.

Hand Of Ruin: do you have a partner that you hunt with often? My friend and I do practically everything in GW together, and controlling henchies is a *lot* easier with 2 humans than with just 1. With 2 humans and the rest henchies we have gotten all bonuses (and all quests) done with no problems. We have done this on 3 sets of characters now, with all 8 professions being represented in some form or another (so you don't need the "best" combos or anything like that).

Regardless of mission completion, GW is just much more fun when you are playing it with your best friend!

The desert missions can be done with henchies with a little practice. The desert missions are low end imitations of PvP style of play (timed, rez after 2 min, etc). The trickiest desert mission with the henches is Thirsty because you often have to run really far back to control the melee henches. You also have to get a rhythm for the rez timer.

In Tyria if you want to do the bonus I would highly recommend doing the mission first and then going back and doing the bonus after. Some missions like Elona's work good in combo with mission and bonus, but really if you are having a hard tiime with a mission or bonus just focus on one or the other.

PUG's can be really good or really frustrating. It can depend on the area you are trying to beat too. Some areas seem like a freak magnet. Pretty soon you get to know what pug's to join and what to ignore. It's hard to describe but you do get a feeling for it. Mostly it doesn't matter how great a person plays their class but how well the whole group works together. A group of 6 mediocre players will do much better than a group of 2 great players with 4 others and no one is working together. I was helping a guildie with Boreas Seabed. We finally just got the henchies so we could finish it because the pug's didn't want to work together and were rude.

It really helps to read the wiki strategy guides for the desert missions. They do a great job of pointing out nifty tricks which work great.

Finally find yourself a good guild. This bears repeating again and again:
Guildies > Henchies > Pug's

I completely understand your frustration. Here's a few tips, on top of the ones already posted, that helped me out back when I was experiencing a similar problem...

- Post a LFG message like, "Doing mission/bonus with henchmen - anybody else interested?" In my experience, the players who do respond or that are open to taking henches are usually worth grouping with.

- If starting a group yourself, fill some slots with henches first. If someone joins and makes a stink about them, simply say it isn't going to work after all and kick them.

With both of the above situations, I'm using henches as filter. There are times that I've had to go in alone, and times that I've ended up with a full group of real players, or been invited into a group. Once I was invited into a Guild's group who was taking henches in the remaining slots, and ended up being invited to join the guild after the mission.

- The type of player one encounters can change depending on the time of day. There tends to be a more mature crowd late at night.

- If you see a "Mesmer LFG..." or a LFM message from Mesmer, invite/join them. Every mesmer I've grouped with was either a pretty good player or fun to have along. And a group that already has a mesmer will likely be an open minded one. This isn't a steadfast rule of course, but it's what I've noticed.

- When joining a group or starting one, be very communicative before going in, like say hello and ask lots of questions (relevant ones of course). If they get annoyed by that or simply ignore you, just leave or kick them.

Good luck!

Are you mad?

little high and mighty aren't we... oh sorry u must be one them folks who skipped pasted being a new player...

players make this game without players the game wouldnt exist...

get over yourself..

get real tire of attitudes like yours... part of the reason many players dont have an enjoyable experience in a game...

your statements make you an ignorant newb

*Brush*

And they all will stay in pre-sear forever. I don't see the problem here.

elona reach is better with players but with a bit of practice you could probably get through it with henchies. henchies tend to slow down your pace just a bit as you have to control them more and elona reach is timed, so youll need to practice at being efficient about it so as to make it inside the 30 min timeline.

dunes i think is probably the easiest crystal desert mission to complete with henchies as all you have to do is fight to the pedestal, defend a few minutes, and then wait around while the timer passes by.

thirsty river i think would be the most difficult to do with henchies; i usually do it with mostly PUGs, but you can do it supported by henchies if your group isn't *too* bad.

anyway, to the OP: look me up in-game if you'd like some help.

eudas

good call...

exactly enough to get them attached to GW and away from the high and mighties...

The only problem I have with your examples is that Forge Runs, and The Deep are not average missions, they are special areas which are usually populated by 80% intelligent players. Gyala Hatchery, while a normal missions is the THK of Factions so eventually enough people get stuck there that you end up with a group of decent players.

For the record I've gotten Masters twice on that mission. ^_^

However, the general intelligence of players in the normal storyline missions is, well...we have a thread like this every week chronicling the general spiral downward of player apttitude. Nuff said.

I think player attitude has change how we view PvE aspect of Guild Wars. I mean half the time you either are in a great pug that are helpful and respect you. Or your pug is full of loud mouth badass who think they're better than any one.

I have soloed each of the desert missions with my W/Mo without henchmen, so that should tell you that each SHOULD be able to be done with henchmen.

The bonuses are definitely another story, however.

I find PUGs good as long as you know how to filter them.

Examples of bad PUGs:
1. The group has 3 or more Warriors (this usually works, as there are few places where more than 2 warriors are needed)
2. The group has all one type of profession, either all casters or all physical.
3. The group has no monks as of yet. If they haven't managed to find a monk, then how can you expect them to be good? (this only works if the outpost has a good amount of monks)
4. Attitude upon entering the group. If they just yell things like "you MM? becus other necroz sux", I doubt they have much common sense.
5. They're not sure what is going on. Sadly I've seen this before. Half the people, sometimes even the party leader, will be totally confused.

Examples of good PUGs:
1. They have a well balanced profession mixture. (not the best filter)
2. The group has monks or healers of some sort. (still not very good filter)
3. They take time to ask you about your build, figure out what you can contribute and request reasons if your build differs from the one they disire.
4. They plan what they are doing before entering the mission/explorable area.


Not all the best examples, but you get the idea. Some filters work better than others, others almost always work.

For bad PUGs, I agree with all but #3. And I'd add;
#6 - They think they need 3 monks.
#7 - They're afraid to use henchie monks when no others are avaliable.
#8 - "gogogogo"

For good PUGs:
#5 - They have a Mesmer in the group. (it doesn't mean that it's a good PUG, but it is a good sign - shows that the party has more than a cookie cutter mentality)
#6 - When you join & say "Hello" other party members actually respond!

all i have to say is welcome to the world of online gaming and playing with *gasp* others... though unlike other orpgs you don't really have the options of henchies so i'd be gratefull for that... but yes everyone is frustrated at one point or another.

I've recently done a bit of Factions pve *shock, gasp*. While I mainly did missions/quests with one or two other friends/guildies and hench, the missions I did do with PuG were surprisingly largely very easy going. People were co-operative and didnt do anything particularly silly and I was even on the American Server!

Perhaps it's just me or perhaps I'm lucky, but I was really surprised given the terrible groups I can remember from my FoW/Ring of Fire days.

Our guild is happily a PvE only guild and there are several missions that I will only try as a guild group. If we dont have enough that night I would usually wait for another time or take henchies instead of trying to fill with pickups, mainly for the fact my patience level is just too low lately (I hate PUGs the most when I am monking).

I was hesitant to add #3, but personally I have had groups where they completely forget to get a monk. Or they don't uninvite people after they have gotten what they want, and so that person ends up accepting (sign of not being too bright).

Almost forgot; I don't quite agree with your #7. Some of these missions you need real monks to even out the occasional dumb action. From my experience, the hench monks do three things: have a "heal delay", wont heal if someone else is moving, and like to drain their energy. As well when you have 2 player monks, if one of them isn't very good, you have some way to blance it out a little.
So hench monks are only good for so much.

you're looking at the wrong guilds. you might also want to reconsider what you consider a "good guild."

I really wish I could agree with you there but unfortunately...80% is extremely generous. If I was 80% successful with adventures in the more elite PvE areas I'd be very happy and have little to criticise...but I'm afraid that's just not the case.

Fact is it only takes one inexperienced player to cause a wipe in these types of areas and you seldom know beforehand if you have a potential Nub-bomb on your team.

When America has Favor, everyone flocks to ToA to go pugging in FoW/UW. Many of those players are skilled veterans as far as those areas are concerned and yet many of them are not. I agree that there are generally more skilled players but I think its more like 60 or 65% with newer players making up the difference.

There are a lot more inexperienced players in the story-based missions however and they are far easier to get grouped with there.

Tzu

I personnally enjoy some of your non-standard PUG. It gets a bit boring with the usual 3 Warriors, 2 Monks, 3 Rangers groups. I like seeing Mesmers and blood or curse necros (so many blasted MM), non-nuker elementalists. Non-standard PUG may not be the good ol' tried and true team builds, but they can be more fun. Unfortunatly these types of groups are very few and far between. It's really hard to get away from the typical cookie cutter teams. Of course, as I am writing this I realize that I myself play a W/Mo, R/Mo, N/Mo and Mo/Me........

More specifically, no good guild will deny you access because you don't have the best items. I would recommend posting here:

http://www.guildwarsguru.com/forum/s...ead.php?t=2289

That has always gotten me to good places.

To the OP: I don't want to be blunt, but there is a reason why it's called Guild Wars. Most PUG's can't really be trusted to do anything beyond the most basic of maneuvers, or trusted at all. If you find yourself failing the same mission multiple times, it's probably time to reach out to your guildies for some help. Guildies will at least listen. If you're not currently in a guild, it's probably a good idea to find a good one to join asap; otherwise, you can always trust the henchies, at least their behavior is expected...most of the time.

Also you may want to consider why you keep failing certain missions. It may or may not have to do with other people. You may want to look at your own playing style and modify it a bit to see if anything improves.

Anyway, just my $0.02.

EDIT: Oops, didn't see what you said about finding a guild, sorry about that, please ignore what I said about guilds >.<

Henchies are the only option if you play pvp a lot you dont want to go newbie groups in pve.