Wow, things have changed

I haven't played in 4 years and as a recent (maybe not for long) returnee, I'd like to take a look back and remember the "good old days".

5-6 years ago, in PvE:
Factions and Nightfall were far away and all that mattered was getting an FDS, no matter the stats, just getting the FDS!

Necros were considered useless. If the forum hasn't pruned it all, I bet there still are the complaining threads. Blood and curses were considered weak and minion masters a gimmick. The only way to get into a team was if you could BiP the monks and elementalists.

Mesmers were for PvP only. Mesmers with full FoW armor were bold people. To me, end-game sightings of mesmers demanded respect. Some people were open minded or even smart (?) and accepted mesmers in their teams, but those were like people helping an old blind lady cross the street.

Elementalists were nukers, they did the damage.

Nobody liked rangers, well, some things don't change huh. Well, the rangers obviously liked rangers but the game seemed to be more tank-nuker-monk. Also, they still used traps back then!

Warriors were required tanks. Every team needed one. Wammos with mending were abundant but the smart (?) ones were stance tanks with dolyak signet and armor of earth. I don't think there was an AR limit back then.
Warriors with a vamp weapon never got heals by the monks. It was how it was done.

Monks were the gods who called the shots because without monks, you had to take the healer henchman of deaths.

People worried mostly about having infused armor against mursaat and farming gryphons and minotaurs in the desert. 55monks were rich and people still made big money from common crafting materials.

Droknars was the place to be, next to Lions Arch. Ascalon was for nooblers.
People knew who prince Rurik was.

Running to droks was big business for pros who had their own expensive schools.

Warriors all still wore one piece of knights armour.

You could still see what the stats of armour was just by looking at what the guy was wearing.

Noobs struggled in unity as they died to wave after wave of mursaat and fat things in thunderhead keep.

Frenzy was the first skill you got, and everyone knew about it, except the warriors themselves.

PvP players all kind of looked the same.

GvG world championships were a big deal

War Machine used mending

Guilds had less goofy, more memorable names and recycled themselves less.

Becoming Ascended made you feel like awesome.

We never really killed Glint.


Then Factions came along.

Nobody liked having assassins in their PvE teams unless they came to prophecies. Assassins pwned Prophecies. They were not the new warrior.

Necromancers had already become accepted by then, but really went mainstream after the Flesh Golem.

Warriors tiger stanced and dragon slashed and triple chopped their way through everything. They also got batman armour.

Rangers were ok, I don't think rangers ever really evolved... except, that devolution to the touch ranger. Suddenly rangers were necros!

Monks were still Mayor of town but felt threatened by ritualists, the progressive party.

Mesmers could change their outfits more often.

Elementalists still were nukers.

Alliance battles and faction runs were races against the other alliances to get the urgoz or deep towns. Getting the highest faction was key and even though the boss door didn't open yet, we tried anyway.

We bought a lot of discount keys.

Victory road made you feel heroic, but also a little empty inside.

Kurdicks and Suxons!

Unwaking Waters brought us all back together again.

Nightfall came and brought us more dudes with skirts. Then GWEN came and we brought her flowers.

And here we are today.

"Warriors are bad"

Elementalists aren't the damagedealers anymore.

Necros necros everywhere. Monks share their kingdom with the rest of the people, like the lame duck kings of today's European monarchies. Hero monks are just fine.

Mesmer, come join us.

Rangers still are lonely, that's why we give them pets to keep them company. (jk, I like rangers, I like everything)

Dervish dervish everywhere, spinning and spinning and spinning...

People actually play Jade Quarry now.

And they know what to do in Fort Aspenwood!


Ah, the good old days. How things have changed, some for better, some for worse. All in all, it's still G.W., ever changing, ever evolving, ever eating itself and growing back to compensate.

For Ascalon!

Rangers are awesome, who thinks they are lame o_O ??

I think: "Super cool story, bro!" is totally applicable here.

5-6 years ago, in PvE: Most enjoyment in a game i ever had.

*slow clap ...........to Large Applause*

Don Zardeone it was a good read today! honestly them good old days. when people just played and PvP.

For Ascalon!

Victory Road? Too much Pokemon?

A post celebrating the good ol' days as well as appreciating the new aspects of the game! Refreshing to see in these parts

AWww nostalgia..not like it used to be!
I always forget Droks exist until i might do the wintersday quest.

For me - post of the day. Learned some things, remembered others. Nice lecture!

Love the post Don Zardeone! Your memory is better than mine.

How mysterious it all was the first time through! And the horrible PUGs! Until I discovered that if I just spent most of my energy on keeping Alesia alive I could go the rest of the game with just hench. Darn hard those last missions.

What an amazing adventure it was getting to Piken Square for the first time.

Yes, everyone hated Rangers; but I played a Hunter in WoW so I just laughed. And went out R/Mo and did whatever it was solo with hench.

Didn't even know about runs to Droks. Used collector armor mostly and was proud of that armor! Weapons too.

GW has improved a lot since those early days. Fond memories tend to edit out a lot.

1. Droknars run weren`t the big deal in my own eye, cos everyone was able to do them if he/she spends the time to learn how to do it right. I have made some easy money back in those days, just to loose it in Droknars when i have bought items just to check how they look on me.

2. The Batman armor still makes me laugh.

3. Ele nuker sounds boring. Echo ele nuker sounds even more boring.

4. Share the same opinion about rangers.

oo yey *claps*. Wonderful to read made my day :P

Worst development ever . Luxon used to own FA because they simply rolled the NPC's.
Nowadays it's kurzicks turtlefest (pun intended). Monks pop out of nowhere healing the npcs, and if there's already 3 monks healing them they start healing eachother. Next ot the ritualist with their defensive spirits of course. And the occasional no-dmg-tank to hold the turtle into oblivion at the first gates.

Snif .

I was reminded of the report in "Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure":

"Everything is different, but the same... things are more moderner than before... bigger, and yet smaller... it's computers... San Dimas High School football rules!"

Just kidding. Thanks for an interesting post about the old days.

That depends on which side of the fence you are looking at it from. I and many others think it has gotten worse and many have left because of it. It's turned into a romper room solo game now and half full of players who just don't know what they are doing. The other half is full of players who "think" they know what they are doing.

Made me smile.

Is there a "Like" button? Lol

Hehe i enjoyed this post Although i don't agree with everything, a lot really made me nostalgic.

Remember when superior absorb rune cost 100k?

aww the good old days...also I remember when the economy crashed!

Warriors aren't bad. They still get used. (See 100B in FOWSC, Earthshaker... PvP shock axe and about every PvP match running triple melee)

AR is now limited to +25 stacking (+24 from "I am unstoppable!" which stacks with everything) but that doesn't matter due to "Save Yourselves!" giving +100 armor. Dragonslash bars were the ones spamming it before Imbagons got popular.

I was remembering when i started out, factions and nightfall came out , but all i had was prophecies. I felt so ineffectual, none of my elites were good, many areas didn't even have bodies, minions were weak shit that got clobbered. I had to run bip as my elite when i went minion master!

I got eye of the north before factions and nightfall. lol. heroes with shitty skills along with me though the 3x hax pve skills sure did help me a lot. Things were hard, things were fun and god forbid I play pvp, which I did in ra. Lol, I think I was a better player then, I had less power in my skills, and I had to compensate with tactics and trickery. It was a fun time, albeit frustrating. I eventually succumbed and bought the rest of the factions.

Anyone remember how chests used to work pre-faction days? I swear they were compeltly different

Yep , remembering old days is actually more enjoyable than playing GW , especially PvP , today. Hardest thing was maybe droks run , now people complete UW HM in less than 30mn and the deep in about 10 mn. So fun game wooo

for Ascalon!

Update - Thursday, August 11, 2005

* Improved traders so that they maintain more stable prices and closer spreads between buy and sell prices.
* Improved traders so that traders from all regions (America, Europe, and Korea) now buy and sell from the same stock and charge the same prices.


and also reading through my prophecies manual...Atttribute Refund points...what the heck was that about

Great thread, made me do a lot of looking back to which I have some to add.

So from now on people might as well add some of their own.

This was the biggest that stood out as being mostly wrong. The great days for the Necro with the addition of Sorrows furnace and the largest minion partys of all time.

Don't forget

Charr hunting in pre felt like it meant something.

While most people in pre where looking to get out of pre asap : as soon as you crossed over and experienced the searing for the first time ....most wanted to get back to Pre asap.

Hundreds of wammo's yelling "test run to drok's" and failing BADLY - Daily

4 Char slots ... My main char never felt so lonely on the Character screen.

Bring on the second accounts!

The only reason why wammo's existed : taking advantage of foe AI and holding aggro.

The +5 Energy short sword that was a random drop (white version), plus the light blue version

The pre Crystalline sword that everyone tried to pass off as the real thing.

Marhan's Grotto was awesomely annoying. Let alone getting there! Grotto Parties!

Fow parties that usually just went to the Temple of War and crapped.

The only reason for going so far in FoW - armor

Wow you have enough money for FoW armor? Wait..thats WARRIOR FoW armor? WTF?

Finish Underworld? just so I can say i did it once? ok once.

Ecto values 15k+


Arborstone officially became the most annoying mission ever.

Eternal Grove unofficially became the most annoying mission ever when it came to pugs.

Chest running Raisu palace explorable

After entering Vizunah square, and asking for a human team on the other side? silence? back to town xD

Confused about why there was two Vizunah squares...always feeling like I was in the wrong one.

Theres an undercity??? wait its not on the map? Im so confused.

Runners from Marketplace to Kaineng city charging 500g-1k?? then always yelling you can just walk there..wtf???


But the biggest thing....

Waking up...starting the computer...going to the bathroom...grabbing a little something to nibble on...logging on/doing a quick mission...going to work...thinking of GW....going home...starting the computer.. get a shower...log in...start playing..(eat when everyone agreed on a break) back to playing.... Looking at the time....crap (only 4-5 hours of sleep ahead of me)..sleep those hours.. Wake up.......Repeat!!!

thats all i got for now

Lmao back when I just had to get my warrior Elite Charr Hide... still one of my top 5 sets in the game.

I love these threads, the memories come rushing back every time.

Same for me...i guess this is the effect on a 1-year-old player like me.

great OP, summed it up pretty much for me...brought back a lot of memories! The ranger hate I felt made me a little sad, and everytime I'm forced to think about how much time I spent daily playing this game in the real grind phase makes me wish I would have gone for a Ph.D, or at least learned another language fluently (yes, I think 5k hours would enable you to do that)

I liked it a lot. All the memories. Thanks for bringing those back. Was fun to read. You made my day! Like someone already said.

I loved reading this...shared much of my thoughts..though ranger was my first character ever in GW.

Great post, really fun to read, also for a bit more nostalgia look at this,



1 Storage tab, old dye flasks and a leet ammount of money :P

no costume slot etc eiether..they changed the runes image a few times too and i recall the amount of health they change too

Lol love the screen shots....ohh man what a great post...


Made me smile the whole way through reading it...

I need to look through my old screenies too...

Oh boy!

I can remember that lol, I even remember the night Nightfall went out live I only slept 3-4 hours before going to work.

Anyone remember the bug where everyone could add heroes in AB (4 humans + 3 heroes each!!!)? It was really nice steamrolling those suxons (j/k) that night!

Things weren't that easier back then but I'm sure as hell that people were more laid back.

I remember the green farming in TOPK and how hard and time consuming it was back then.

I love that armor too!, add a militia shield and a heket axe and you're good to go

omg this post brings back memories!!!!

i just came back to gw a few months ago. GW has changed!! ( in a good way)
I stopped playing gw right after EOTN came out.

back then

DOA full run took over 6+ hrs haha. Did so many runs pulling all-nighter!

who said rangers were bad, THEY WERE STARS b/p run anyone?
and they were the faster droks runner imo

That made me laugh...ha


I rolled into Augry Rock with my warrior for the first time this week and it reminded me the good ole days of desert runs and people getting to the desert for the first time ala 5 years ago. I feel very nostalgic as I explore the latter half of Prophecies for the first time in a long time.

For Ascalon!

lol good times!
Don't forget about farming Ettins for sup vigor and absorption

As a fairly new GW player(3rd year), I've always thought of Dreadnought's Drift as a strange place, a pretty small zone without any real significance, "protected" by two large areas full of what I presume were difficult foes at the time of Prophecies.

Then I learned about the Lost Strongbox and Frozen Chest.

D: