Great Deal & a Question

First of all I have only been playing for about a week but I have past experience with MMOs. I was a beta tester for LOTRO and have been playing DAOC for about 1 1/2 years. I've got to say that GW is a great game.

My son got me into playing DAOC and when he bought Factions and I saw it I thought I would have to try it. Anyway now for the great deal part. I was in a local Sams Club this weekend and they had all 3 campaigns in individual boxes shrinked wrapped together for only $49.95. My son paid $45 just for factions so I couldn't pass this up! And so far I have been well pleased.

Like I said I have only been playing for a week so I am still in pre-searing. I am trying to do ALL the quests there before I go to the "real" part of the game.

So here's my question: I know its a long way off yet but do you think that I should go from Prophecies to Factions to Nightfall or just skip Factions altogether? I'm not a fan of PvP at all and I just enjoy the storyline. Most of the time I just solo and like to explore. I have heard alot of negative things about Factions and I don't want to get bogged down if I really won't miss much by skipping it. I may come back to it later. I plan on taking the same character from start to finish.

Anyway I just thought I would let everyone know about the great deal that Sams Club is offering and just to say hi.

Mac

It is a good idea to do every quest you can, you're doing the right thing there.

Yes, do Factions, it is really not as bad as you hear. It is the worst of the three, but not bad at all. The worst of three good games is still a very good game. The PvE part does not have any forced PvP in it. The story is least connected, but it is still important. The biggest pain is the timed missions bonus's.

I guess my biggest question is the story line dependant on doing the campaigns in order. If I skip Factions will I be gimping myself of the story?

Also I have only installed Prophecies. Do I have to physically install the other 2 campaigns or can I simply enter the cd keys to have access to them. I seem to remember someone saying that you are always getting content d/l in the background while you play and I was wondering if that included the other 2 campaigns.

Mac

You will miss some story.
Nope
You need to go to the login screen and ADD the keys TO YOUR ACCOUNT or else your characters will not be able to travel from prophecies to the other campaigns.
It does indeed.

If I were you I would go through Prophecies Until you reach a town call "Lions Arch", and then go ahead and jump into Elona (Nightfall) to grab some Heroes "SUPER HENCHMEN". Then go all the way through Prophecies (Finish it). Head back over the Elona (Nightfall) and finish that campaign.. Finally you're gonna wanna finish up with Cantha (Factions). You also may want to make a stop in Cantha to get some Maximum armor. Which is easily obtainable in Kaieng Center (spelling?).

You won't be skipping the Storyline because each campaign has its own independent storyline, but I do not recommend skipping it, simply because factions is really fun

Nope, you guessed it... all you have to do is enter the keys, and once you reach Lions Arch you can travel to Cantha and Elona (Factions & Nightfall) via quests.

Welcome to Guild Wars Guru

You will be skipping the storyline, while they are mostly independant, they are all connected, and Prophecies and Nightfall are probably more connected then Factions is (Gate of Madness). You should still go through them in order, except for grabbing a few heroes in Nightfall as mentioned above, I do recommend that.

Meh, They're loosely connected.. >.>

Either way, We're both trying to say the same thing right?

Yes, you should do Factions. There are a lot of very useful skills that are unique to Factions (my favourite Factions-specific skills at the moment are Psychic Distraction and Preservation), as well as two professions that are exclusive to Factions and cannot be created anywhere else.

There are also a number of key points in Factions' storyline that crop up again all over Nightfall. You don't need to have played any of Factions (or Prophecies, for that matter) to be able to enjoy Nightfall, but you'll pick up on more intricacies of the storyline if you do. There is also only one assassin hero available in Nightfall, and to be able to recruit her you need to have a Factions key linked into your gaming account (you do not need Factions to be able to recruit the ritualist hero, although his flexibility and therefore usefulness will be severely limited without Factions available).

There are a few missions and quests that will be MUCH more fulfilling to do if you have completed Prophecies and Factions first. I know of no real reason to do Prophecies before Factions story wise, however do both before Nightfall. The nice thing about prophecies is that it gives skills as quest rewards whereas in the others you have to purchase them all, so Prophecies is better to do first because of game mechanics.

I thought Factions had a decent story line and there are some really nice elites there to capture. Even if you dislike the game (it is my least favorite, though for game mechanics reasons not story, skills, or scenery which are quite nice) it is useful for at least one character to go through it just for elites and story.

As others said - pop over to elona and pick up the first batch of heroes and go back to the other games.