Time investment, WoW convert questions

Hello everyone. I'm refugee from World of Warcraft. Unfortunately WoW eats up too much time. The game is designed to steal away as much time as possible to complete just about anything. I suppose that is the nature of MMO's that have subscription fees. So...I'm looking for a multiplayer game that doesen't require my RL life to get somewhere. I've heard that Guild Wars is a great casual friendly game. I figured this would be the best place to ask a few questions.

PvP
First off, how hard is it to get into the PvP aspect of the game? Are large guilds a must to get anywhere? Do the best PvP skills take forever to get?

PvE
I love the environments of Guild Wars. Playing the PvE campaign on my Factions trial account is candy to my eyes. Is it possible to solo most of the game with henchmen? Are there raid type dungeons that require a bunch of players to complete like Warcraft? Is all high level equipment pretty much equal in terms of stats?

One of the biggest issues I'm having with the game right now (This is on my Factions trial account) is that there isn't a sense of community like Warcraft. Everytime you load into a town there are new players you've never seen before. It seems you go into town, trade, skill up, and go back into the wilds with your henchmen. Players seem pretty rude, actually. The only time you actually see people talking is when they are spamming wares.

I'm sure finding a good guild in the game would alleviate alot of my problems, but most guilds I have seen recruiting seem to be of the younger l33t crowd that have poor leadership/cliques.

Now having said all that I don't want to pass judgement on a game I have only spent a few trial days in. I would like to thank you all in advance for any insight you can provide an Ex-WoW addict.

EDIT: I forgot the most important question of all. Does this game require as much time as WoW to have that same sense of accomplishment?

I congratulate you for realising that GW is superior to WoW in all aspects. here are your answers.

For PvP, ANET has thankfully set it up so you can just create a PvP Character whenever you feel like and they will already be level 20, have max armor/weapons, and will start off with a pre-unlocked set of skills. also, going through the campaigns you will unlock more skills, which can then be used by your pvp characters. Big PvP Guilds arent THAT hard to get into, with a bit of practice and some team coordination, you will be GvG-ing in no time.

As for your PvE comments, yes, many a person in GW is an ignorant asshole, and since you clearly made your way through Shing Jea Monastery a few times, you have probably met most of them. But dont let that tell you that theyre all ignorant, ive met plenty of people who are great friends, helpful and all that whatnot.

PVP nope if you play pve for a while you will have all the skills you need to play pvp. Yes all high lvl stuff is the same expect for the way it looks. You will get the community feeling if you join a good guild as for in towns and stuff your not going to find a lot of people that are "nice". Yes there are high lvl places that require a group to do but the biggest party you can have in the game is 12ppl and that is only in 2 areas, most areas the most you can have is 8. High lvl places take time but with a good group that time can be shorter. For the most part you can hero hench game/mission they make it a lot harder in some spots and a lot easier in some spots.

Getting a guild that shares the same interests as you pretty much solves any problems be it getting into pvp or end game pve areas.

There are a lot of immature people the same as any online game, all of which recruit in a town by spamming. Easy way to avoid such people is to not join a guild you see advertised in game. Instead look on the recruiting guilds sub forum here on guru and pick a guild you think can help you from there. make sure they are willing to accept a new player beforehand as well as play when you expect you will be online though.

For the price of a campaign these days i'd say its worth buying just to try out. The game is definatly casual player friendly as long as you are able to adapt to the different play style compared to WoW. Alot of info can be found online both here and on the official wiki built into the game, a guild however is still the best source of info.

If you do get the game here is a word of warning. If you join a guild whose members belive the best way to play the game is to have a warrior "tank" while others deal the damage then your better off finding a new one, they are the people who failed to adapt to the real mechanics of GW.

tanks are terribad, remember that my friends

Easy to get started, pretty hard to get into the top. To get to the top you do need to be a member of a good guild, yes.

The entire game is soloable, with the exception of five optional high-level areas, where henchmen are prohibited (and heroes insufficient). Team size is never greater than 8 in PvE.
True enough, although it's really bad mainly in the main staging areas (Kaineng Center, for instance). For social interaction you really need a decent-sized guild.

Haha, yeah, any guild which gives out officership like it was candy is probably a guild you should avoid. Fortunately changing guild is quite easy and painless if you should happen to join a guild of dysfunctional leetness.

I would say no, as all the campaigns have very definite endings which it is not all that difficult to get to - but in recent time ArenaNet has been taking the game towards a more open-ended and, sadly, grind-based model. So... I really don't know.

All of the storyline and most of the game can be completed with heroes and henchmen. There are several elite missions that are difficult and/or impossible without other players and/or special builds. These missions are:
[wiki]Sorrow's Furnace[/wiki]*
[wiki]The Underworld[/wiki]
[wiki]Fissure of Woe[/wiki]
[wiki]Domain of Anguish[/wiki]
[wiki]Slavers' Exile[/wiki]*
[wiki]The Deep[/wiki]
[wiki]Urgoz's Warren[/wiki]

*Allows henchmen and can be completed with heroes/henchmen.

Yes, the only difference between elite/expensive equipment and the standard equipment with max stats (which is relatively cheap or common) is the appearance and the prices. Equipment mods can be added to most equipment after being salvaged off of found equipment or bought from a trader or player.

There are two areas where the team size is 12: Urgoz's Warren and The Deep

Correct, my bad; I was referring to general campaign, not the high-end optional areas.

I left silkroad for about the same reason as you and the tons of bots witch are making lvling up impossible. GW is like paradise to me compare to silkroad. Find yourself a good mature guild then turn off the ALL chat whenever your in a town. After going trough a couple of guilds i found one that suit me perfectly.(Freindly, helpfull, no obligation). As for PvP skills you can unlock some pretty easily.

Welcome to GW i hope you enjoy the game as much as i do =)

Welcome to GW.
On PvP:
Skill acquisition can be accomplished in two main ways. The first way is via PvE by buying skills and capturing Elite skills. Any that you unlock for a pve character is also unlocked for PvP usage. The second way is thru PvP. You gain faction for winning in the various pvp arena's. With this faction you can unlock skills for PvP at a cost of 1000 faction for standard skills and 3000 faction for elite skills. They are however only usable for pvp characters. PvE characters only have the skills unlocked for that character. Acquiring every skill in the game does take quite a bit of time but gaining the standard played skills should not. Of note is the fact that you can buy skill unlocks from ArenaNet.
Low end PvP does not require a guild but to advance or play higher level pvp does.

On PvE:
Yes, I have played thru all 3 main campaigns with predominately Heroes and Henchmen(usually referred to as H&H). Heroes are available in Nightfall and Eye of the North and are a general improvement over henchmen. I beat the storyline of both Prophecies and Factions with henchmen though so it can be done.
Eye of the North has added raid type dungeons but most can be done solo with H&H. There are high-end PvE guilds that do group runs on these dungeons also. A well skilled team of players will almost always outperform H&H and is reason enough to join a guild of that type.
All equipment is equal in statistical terms. A collectors ax is the same as a Tormented ax in stats. The only difference is in the appearance, known as the skin. They exist for purely vanity purposes unlike WoW where rarity is mostly stat based and you must grind for the better items.
You are correct in you observation about the GW community. That is an unfortunate downside. Most of the experienced players rarely play with Pugs(Pick up groups) and stick to their guildies/friendslist for playing to avoid those people. Kind, helpful, considerate players exist in GW also but it may not be so easy to find them. Let the people you play with know you are new to the game and ask them for help/suggestions. Many will spout crap like LOL NOOB L2P ROFLMAO but some will be very helpful.
Not taking into account maxing out some of the titles that GW has added there really is no required grind. Missions can usually be done in less than an hour. You can acquire many weapons and items via collectors in the zones you will be playing in which removes the need to grind for gold. Unless you want vanity(looks) items. I recommend to stick to collector items for your first character entirely as most of you gold income will be spent on armor and the materials needed for it.
http://gw.gamewikis.org/wiki/Main_Page is a great site for answering many questions about GW. Almost anything you could want to know is somewhere on that site.
GL & HF