New to GW, population questions

Having only played a trial years ago, I had some questions about the game in its current state. Coming from warhammer where everything is essentially dead and scenario queue times are awful, are the populations in GW still large enough that grabbing the trilogy for the purposes of pvp is worth it? If so, can you guys recommend any strategies and/or resources to help a new player choose useful skills/armor/weapons? Thanks

Having also played Warhammer, let me say that Guild Wars has always had a better population then Warhammer, even during WAR's prime.

Keep in mind Guild Wars doesn't have separate servers like most MMO games. Thus all of our players are able to play together. You rarely run into the same people.

Guild Wars population isn't super like it used to be, but still good. The unpopular area's are normally extremely easy or not enjoyable to play so there will be 0-2 people there because of that.

What I suggest for a good start is to have a friend or good guild you can rely on. There will be times you have no clue what to do or where to go on a simple mission. 24/7 help is always the best kind of help.

I can't suggest a good easy going guild. But if you need help, whisper Zodiac Ele and I'll see if I can lend a hand. Keep in mind I play healer a lot and might not have the time to start a conversation while the team is taking huge damage.

Population is somewhat there still, but the real problem I believe will be integrating yourself into GW PvP. That's been my toughest challenge.

Guild Wars population is crap and with GW2 said to be coming in 1-2 years I don't see it getting better.

Do PvE first (player vs environment, pretty much playing the storyline) and play through a campaign (factions is the quickest/easiest) so you get the basics of the gameplay and mechanics. If you dive into pvp first you will lose a lot and get laughed at.

Why are people so pessimistic about guildwars 2? You or anyone else has no idea what it will be like until its been played.

It's hard to be too enthusiastic about it when (correct me, someone, if I'm wrong) we originally believed we were going to have a full, working game last year and won't even be getting a beta by the beginning of next. Most of us have already spent much of our enthusiasm. Additionally, work on GW2 is detracting from GW, so we not only have no sequel yet, but we have a decaying existing model.

While GW isn't split up by Servers, there's still something called districts, which are essentially servers too. You can switch from one district to the next everytime you are in an outpost. Generally, the american districts are the most populated.

Also, keep in mind that GW has an instanced world, so about 30% of the players are going to be out exploring in any given instance.

Usually there's most people in the expansion, Eye of the North, because of the endgame areas there, like Dungeons and because of faction farming.

All PvP are located on the Battle Isles, which you can acces by boat from Lion's Arch, Kamadan, or Kaineng Center. There's normally a lot of people in the lower end arenas, like Random Arena, Alliance Battles, and the competitive missions. In the higher end you find Heroes ascent and GvG, which are somewhat hard to break into as a new player.

if I were you, I wouldn't buy it.

You should buy it, play it and enjoy it. Don't bother asking people on this website for their opinion because 99% of the time you will get 10 little robots that repeat the same shit from their shitty, biased attitudes about the game and scare you away.

He`s right and he also forgot to mention that all the ppl moaning gw is so bad are still playing it - if it was that bad then they wouldnt be playing or be on here moaning.
Join a guild and take things from there - good guilds will help and offer advice without name calling.

Personally I'd wait for GWII.GW I is decaying and if you buy GW I now you'll still have some fun moments but it won't give the lolwtf dollar each playhour rate you normally get from a mmorpg.

to answer your questions..

character builds pvx.wikia.com
resources wiki.guildwars.com
both guildwarsguru.com

the game is not very populated and some places may be underpopulated, but in weekends and holidays there will be more people playing.

try to look at en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guild_Wars_(series) for an overview of the game

Depends on the time of day but I find the American areas well populated.

my opinion is that as the population shrinks players are beginning to congregate there.

This may well become a problem for none English speakers.

and i think the person you qouted was talking about the population in gw 1 with gw2 so close he just doubts many more people are rushing to the stores to buy gw1.... i myself cant wait for gw2, and i think the current population in gw1 is pretty decent still. SO ORIGINAL POSTER dive on in and if you need a hand with anything whisper "Drunk N Angry" and i'll be glad to help whenever i'm on mate. good luck.

PvP is still very viable in GW. We have Random Arenas and the new Codex Arena for all players and Jade Quarry, Fort Aspenwood and Alliance Battles if you own Factions. Those are all either random team or form team at site.

The higher end Hero's Ascent (8x3) and Guild vs Guild (8x2) are harder to master and will require a guild to make up teams.

The best way to begin is to play through campaigns to acquire skills and knowledge of the gameplay. If you don't remember, this game is very different than others that are all about leveling up and "uber" weapons/armor.

If you are really dedicated to just PvP, then you can start earning Balthazar Faction in the Zaishen Challenges to purchase skills for your PvP-only character, who will start at max level with max armor and weapons.

The game is fun with no monthly fees so you have nothing to lose at this point.

In reality the population of gw1 is naturally going to decline, with really no new content being added. I mean all I have left to do is finish up my hero title for HoM, so really with nothing new coming in its just a matter of finishing up the old content until there's nothing left to do.

Think the reason it's (GW2) taking so long is because when GW2 was announced it was pre-UT3 engine, so maybe we should be thankful that if nothing else it will at least be pretty.

As for deadness of the game, new people starting all the time, fair enough not as much as when it first came out but 150+ districts at Halloween event kinda says a lot, prollly similar at Christmas!


Ps. How i get hat?

Why do people keep mentioning the UT3 engine in relation to Guild Wars 2?