When was Guild Wars the best?

When do you think Guild Wars was the best?


I think Guild Wars was the best when it was just Prophecies, without titles, rep grinds, heroes. People played for fun. People developed original builds. People didn't strictly use PvX wiki only builds. People were friendlier. People would take time to explain things to new players. People grouped together.

Those were the good old days....

I think I had the most fun playing in tombs just before factions was released.

When heroes were introduced. Customised hench that we can control.

When i first bought it back in 2004... Best ever.

No loot scaling, ursan and heroes.

I enjoyed a good farm anyday.

Lol, I still use original builds. I don't like many of the high ranking PvX builds. Here's my warrior build without an elite:

[for great justice][power attack][sever artery][gash][body blow][rush][shield stance][healing signet]

You'd probably call it nooby, but I like it. Note: I only have Prophecies and EotN and I have no elite skills.

The singular best thing that they added to PvE was hard mode and yet in the same update they added over the top PvE skills which was the singular worst thing for PvE.

I had the most fun around the release of Hard Mode

tons of new farm spots/builds to try...teaming up for missions that used to be easy...new titles to get...game economy went nuts.

My idea of fun in GW =)

Funny, I think it's a lot better now.

Back in the old days, there just wasn't much to do. Once you beat Hell, defeated the Darkness, and broke the Iron Forgeman, that was it. PvE was over. Go play PvP, or farm, which seems like another form of grinding to me. Nowadays, we have dungeons, we have elite missions, we have oodles of quests, we have hard mode to relive everything, and we have all the old stuff as well, whenever we care to enjoy it.

People grouped together for survival, because the alternative was weak, low level henchmen who would fold in an instant. There has been, still is, and always will be rudeness, belligerence, and poor behavior in pugs. Some weren't bad, others were terrible.

Equipment is finally reasonable to get these days thanks to the inscription system. Trying to find a decent caster weapon that didn't come from a collector was a roulette wheel strapped to a blackjack table on the end of a slot machine. You didn't win much.

It's finally easy to gather a party with heroes. I remember getting my monk to Hell, and being invited by seven different groups within five seconds, because everyone was so desperate for monking. While highly amusing, it was a problem; people couldn't gather the parties they needed. If you were a monk, you were a minority that was always required. If you were a warrior, there were three hundred just like you competing for space. If you were a mesmer.....my sympathies.

Finally, I like having areas that have significance beyond being a passage to the next place. The vast majority of the old maps are slim tunnels of terrain, designed to force you to fight mob after pointless mob for no benefit whatsoever. In later expansions, it's wider spaces, with bonuses for seeking out and destroying enemies, namely titles and their benefits.

But it's not all rosy. There's a lot of grind, there's still rude people, and we still have ridiculously narrow party types, the archetypes that people demand in order to allow you to join. Such is life.

But at least I can pick up a friend, equip our heroes, and go out and conquer the world in a myriad of new and exciting ways.

I truly LOL'ed.


When was GW the best? When I sold gold weapons to the merchant, thinking that I was getting lots of gold for it, when I didn't know any better. When playing GW meant enjoying anything I came across. When elite armor was something far beyond what my little 2k storage deposit could get me. When four friends grouped up every cent we had to buy a guildhall.

Yea, back when I was a newb.

when it first came out

Guild Wars gets better with just about every update - so it's the best now. However, due to my having "been there, done that," I'm bored and no longer play. It happens. When it was most fun for me was when I started playing, just after the introduction of Sorrow's Furnace - but not because of how the game actually was, but because it was new to me. Games like this are always the most fun when they are brand-spankin' new, and even moreso when it's new for everyone.

Sorry guys, GW lost it's cherry back in '05, and it ain't coming back. Deal with it. Wait for GW2 and have your way with her.... uhh I mean it. Yeah. Hot, hot virgin GW2.

Take your pants off! Wooo!

Three moments:

When I beat Prophecies for the first time.
When I beat Factions for the first time.
When I beat Nightfall for the first time.

Eye of the North... could have been better...

When I thought pre was the entire game, and when I got out of pre, it was awesome to get "rich" by selling the salvage kits from yaks to people in ascalon for 50g more.

Yup that's an unoptimized build as you could use the elite Auspicious Parry in place of Shield Stance and use it every two seconds for a complete block not just a 75% chance and 33% movement reduction and no energy cost just adrinilin.

"and he takes his pants off and all the girls start laughing hysterically" <grin>

At beginning of 2005 and so on. Before factions

Exactly that. I'm confidant the itch will come back, in my case, as it always seems to. The nostalgia routine around here gets very old.

When I bought Prophecies way back when with two of my personal friends and had a blast just questin, learning more about the game.

Totally agree. Titles and rep grind are annoying

^ yeh.

proph gvg was good fun too

You may like it and all but... like Master Knightfall said... thats an unoptimized build.
You can very much replace any of your skills for an elite version and you will still play the same style.

As an example:
[Crippling Slash] instead of [Sever Artery]
[Bull's Charge] or [Charge] instead of [Rush]
[Hundred Blades] , [Quivering Blade] or [Dragon Slash] instead of [Power Attack]
[Auspicious parry] or [gladiator's defense] instead of [shield stance]

I really liked GuildWars before Ursan Blessing, you had to THINK at HardMode. Now hard mode is just like normal mode with ursan u.u

I agree with the dude who said it was good because it was new to me. Games get old and boring, thats just how it works...at least for me

I think that if a new player just started playing today he/she will have some of the best time of his/her gaming life. See how almost everyone here is saying it was good when it first came out? They should be saying it was good when it was new and theyre just experiencing the new world of GW

the first 3 months of factions coming out. best gvg/ha ever.

not to mention factions has all the best skins for weapons/armor...

Right after factions. I enjoyed abusing all the new stuff like ritual lord and OoA. Then it all got nerfed, but the game was still fun. Then nightfail broke it.

Yeah I remember when Everquest was new. I got so into that game. I mean you could FISH in it. lol I couldn't wait till I earned my first 2-1/2gp so I could buy a fishing pole and a can of worms. So out into the cold of Everfrost I went and hacked n slashed goblins and wolves and spiders for I know a good 2 hours (every drop was like a stinking 1gp if that lol), but, finally I had me 2-1/2gps and I rushed back to Halas to buy me a fishing pole and a can of worms....man I was sooooo excited and you know what happened?
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.
.
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The very first cast that fishing pole BROKE! lmao Ahhhh good times good times as Renya says in the end of Prophecies. <grin>

No offence, but you're one of the horrible players that are joked about in RA/AB. Sure, your build might be 'original' in that not many use it, but it's shit and pales in comparison to other builds like dslash, cripslash and so on.

[Frenzy][Sever Artery][Gash][Dragon Slash][For Great Justice][Bulls Strike][Rush][Resurrection Signet]
[Frenzy][Sever Artery][Gash][Sun and Moon Slash][Youre All Alone][Signet of Malice][Dash][Healing Signet]
[Frenzy][Crippling Slash][Gash][Sun and Moon Slash][Rush][Resurrection Signet] + [Disarm][Bulls Strike][Rend Enchantments][Mending Touch][Healing Signet][Shield Bash][Disciplined Stance] depending on what you want to do with the bar.

all better builds

Was the best? When did it stop?

I still think this is one of the top games, and I'm very excited with each new update to see what they changed.

I know lol. The thing is, I don't have any elite skills yet.

Lol, like I said, I don't have any elite skills. And I don't have Factions or Nightfall. So looks like the builds that you are suggesting are the real bad ones, because they don't exist for me.

Edit: why does everyone assume that everyone else has beaten all the campaigns and unlocked all the skills? Is there no room for noobs? If you follow the crowd, then you'd be truly horrible. The only path to glory is to find your own way.

It's hard to say when it was at it's best, I think its varies from people to people.

Personally I think I have to say pre-factions.
As others pointed out with the addition of the expansions the general player base attitude changed from the friendly to the angry and hostile. Also in my opinion the expansion broke more of the game than they added to the game.
Heroes are a nice feature but they discourage pugging.
Hardmode, whats the point of forcing players to replay the same content just a bit harder, and why make things harder when its made even easier with PvE skills and consumables.
Inscriptions are nice and all, but I liked things more before the addition of it, since it was harder to find a decent weapon. This feature is also the main reason why a handfull of my real life friends have quit the game.
With the expansions the player base got scattered around even more than before and it was harder to get a pug, and it did not help either that less people were playing the game.

The wikis for the game are nice, but the individuality of setting up a build is gone, now everybody uses the so called standard builds, and if you don't have one of those you are noob and won't be allowed to join a group.

You said you don't have elites/F or N after I posted.

People who copy others and don't think for themselves are the true noobs. One day I will create builds that are better than the "standard" builds that everyone else uses

Ok, yeah I did, but that wasn't the point. I showed you a build without an elite skill, and you automatically assumed that I have elite skills but am just too stupid to use any?

Simple: pre-factions.

I havent played GW before all the campaigns and GWEN expansion im sure it could have been fun then but I would say now is the best time to play for the most part all additions to the game have been great improvements and it would seem so boring after a short time without heros, inscribeable weapons, titles, luxon/kurzick faction and the many other features released into the game to date.

Seeing the way a lot of people talk to each other in game and on this board I approached this discussion with caution. I'm also fairly new to the game (started only about 8 months ago) and generally you find older players like to go on and on about how bad the game is nowadays and how its golden age has gone, that can obviously get a bit discouraging to a newer player (nobody likes to feel they missed the boat) so I try to avoid listening, but what a pleasant surprise this thread is.

Its really nice to hear that many people are actually saying the game is still great now. Of course some people had more fun when it began and that's understandable, being a newbie is fun for everyone, but it must say good things about the game that so many still find enjoyment and don't think its got stale.

I think GW has improved a lot over time. The old times were not that golden, see attribute refund points and so on.
I also like Hard Mode and Heroes. But I loathe their faction grind and imba pve skills. PvE skills were are and are great idea... but the implementation started to suck soon after the first set of SS/Sunspear skills, which also had broken skills. Ursan and the tons of EOTN skills show little love or any thought of balancing, rushed shit.

But I agree that they were better in some way than nowadays. We have even more skill redundancy or useless skills, power creep and a ton of questionable design decisions.


The loss or change of their original vision is what makes old players sad.
Of course you can adapt and change, but even ANet does not really seem to be sure which direction they want the game to take. And this poisoned the later releases.

When I didnt have much money and had to save for all my armor, now I just buy it which is abit boring

Before factions came.

Tombs having 7+ Internation districts. Full of people.
Killing the rifts for morale was actually a bit more challenging then later systems
MORE builds. IWAY introduced one of the worst things in GW history...the WAY tag. Now everything is XWAY.
And the worst thing factions introduced was the Assassin class with shadow stepping skills for all proffessions as X/A. Yes I know all you RA and AB chickens love your shadow stepping but it is really just a poor excuse for not learning how to kite and control the map. The few players that actually know how to shadow step right wouldn't drop the benefits a sec class could give you just to "jump" around.

Next Epic fail Nightfall introducing Junundu farming. Another amazing step to kill skill. C+Space calling...

Followed straight by Ursan Blessing for more C+Space calling and consumables. After all, if you suck, your build sucks and your team sucks you can still use consets to survive.

And someone mentioned here that the introduction of inscriptions improved the game...no...

Before inscriptions got added it was fun to find a gold item. You never knew what you get. Nowadays you do not even need to pick up most of the items. ALT over it to check the req and skin...

Example: http://www.guildwarsguru.com/forum/s...ad.php?t=33920

Heavy Mursaat Hammer of Forititude
19-35Dmg(req 10)
+15%dmg (always)
-5energy
+29health
Lengthens weakness on foes

A req 10 Mursaat Hammer sold for 550k or something. I would have bought it for 500k back than. Would you even salvage the mods off it today?

Most of this might sound stupid since a lot of you love your Ursan, consumables and stuff. But really...after 3 years of GW I enjoy every real challenge and though Hardmode was a good addition there are only a few challenges left.

Personally, I'd say just after the release of Nightfall.

We just had a new campaign come out, GW seemed like it had hit its stride, and I personally was wondering whether the next campaign would be a Meso-American or a Native-North American theme. GW hadn't ended, there was something new on the horizon in six months, and the only titles were fun ones that didn't affect gameplay... much.

A month after Factions is when everything went to pretty much shit.
Everyone being spread out, shadow stepping began showing it's true colors, Allegiance grinds began, more and more greens.