New player questions

Hello,

I just started playing Guild Wars and I made an Assassin

I'm currently level 17 and just unlocking all the heroes I can get in Nightfall, Eye of the North and Lion's Arch. I run across a problem, first problem is, I've done a lot of missions in Cantha and Kamadan and I'm still using the same armor I got from the start, how do I make enough money to be able to buy the armor in Kaineng City? Do I just have to keep playing until I get enough? I wouldn't really mind but I die quite a lot, usually in 1 or 2 hits

The other question I wanted to ask is, where can I get weapons apart from the starting ones?


Oh and my main question is to do with heroes actually, I am a A/W and I unlocked A/N and A/M but after buying a few skills they become really expensive, like, how am I suppose to buy skills for my heroes to use? At the moment I'm still using henchman because my heroes are just too weak and I can barely afford to buy assassin skills let alone the other professions. So how do I get more skills for my heroes ?

That's all I can think of for now, but I'm sure I'll have more questions, oh and one last thing, are there any Guilds here? I've switched between EURO and US districts and I haven't seen any recruiting


Thanks very much ^_^

Do you pick up items dropped by foes? they're rather a good source of weapons and money.
also, when you speak to merchants, you can buy and sell items, for example selling weapons/gear your not using or buying salvage kits you can use to gain materials.

this isn't really a trick but they gameplay the game was designed for, to start with, pick up everything you find and you'll be amazed what merchants pay for stuff.

another thing, identifiying items make the value go up^

Hi there

Well to get armor, you need money. And you get money by killing and selling like any other game We went through it when Guild Wars came out, you'll have to go through it too My suggestion to you is to focus on 1 campaign and work your way up the armors. If you have the VERY beginer's armor, then you need to upgrade NOW, but not necessarily max value if you don't have the cash. Just work your way up 1 campaign like we all did:9

Next, heroes have all the skills you unlocked, either by buying them at a trainer, or earning them with Balthazar points (PvP). So you don't need to buy skills for your heroes, they're there as you gain them. You can also unlock skills for them at hero trainers, just look in Kamadan.

As for weapons, kill and loot Otherwise just save up and craft them at weapons merchants.

if you'e level 17 and capable of going to Kamadan, then you're rushing too much. Normally you become level 20 as you arrive in Kaineng center. Rushing too fast will get you litte money. We can do it because we have a lot of money in our storage, thanks to years of dedication

Hope this helps

Hey thanks Coren,

I have been using the identifier tool and the salvage tool, that's how I make enough.

Thanks for the tip on the heroes, what is Balthazar points ? Is it easier to unlock skills through PvP ?

Edit: Which campaign do you think I should do first?

Factions is by far my favorite campaign, if also allows you to access more canthan skill trainers which sell better skills.
As far as making gold goes, kill stuff, collect the stuff they drop and sell it.
If you are short on money one way of trying to making it is called farming, this is a board term which involves killing large amounts of foes by yourself in order to get their loot. There are many guides and builds for this on gwpvxwiki.
http://www.gwpvx.com/PvX_wiki

Balthazar faction is a currency gained through PvP, it is rewarded for almost everything. The thing is that you can use it to unlock new skills or buy Zaishen keys which can be sold to other players for ~5k.
A common and fast way to farm balthazar faction is through something called Zaishen elite Using a trappers and (maybe) nuker teambuild

Regarding which campaign to start in, I think it's quite dificult to answer. Prophesis gives the best learning curve and the starting area is very pretty and quite populated with helpful people. However, NF gives you access to heroes right off the bat.
Still, I'd say create a prophesis character first and maybe create an alt from NF pretty soon. It should be noted that heroes aren't as impactful to new players because you won't have unlocked all the skills needed for decent hero builds yet, which means that henchment will work just as well for the time being.

Edit: Just realised that I know your username, <3 Robin Hobb! : )))

wiki says that:Each account receives 50 Tournament Reward Points by talking to High Priest Zhang(Great Temple of Balthazar) for the first time after the February 19, 2010 update.

10 keys means 50-55k wich i belive is enough for you to get started (armor etc)

I'm not 100% sure if this applies to your account but if not send me a PM i have some extra materials for your first armor.
As for guilds http://www.guildwarsguru.com/forum/g...ment-f265.html

The max armor in Kaineng isn't very expensive. At level 17 you should have enough money. The armors there are 1 platnium a piece plus some materials. Check out Ryoko or Suki for armor.

If you did "a lot of missions in Cantha and Nightfall" and are still level 17, then you probably skipped every secondary quest. Get back to every outpost and do the quests that can be picked up everywhere. The money you get from these quests should enable you to buy the maximum armour, and its XP helps you raising your level and the levels of your heroes, as well.

i've jus started a new char in factions, its level 13 and already has 5k, pick up all itens and sell the white ones, id the others.
on latter levels (foes lvl bigger than 15) also id the white items before selling them.
also do all the quests you can find, you will get a lot of money doing that in Factions and Nigthfall

Failing that, check which collectors give the next lowest from max armour and which ones give max weapons, and grind whatever they collect. This may have the happy side effect of making you a bit of gold, too.

Get the best chest and legs you can afford (if you have 2 platinum and materials, those two max armour pieces are where to spend it), you can go with the next-to-highest level collector armour for the rest for now, and you can get a max collector weapon in any of the campaigns, I think.

I'm struggling as well, as I seem to make a couple platinum per day, sometimes even more, but with heroes, many of whom want weapons crafting (I lucked out on finding a good weapon for myself, and a few good hero weapons), and need to be insignia'd/runed, plus the 1 platinum per skill at a trainer or for a capture signet - it's not easy to get started in this game!

Ah okay, thank you for the tips, I'll just keep playing with henchman for now then.


Oh, I will look into that, I read about this faction, 55k would help a lot to get me started with the heroes build I found on wiki.


Glad to see someone sees my pain, I almost have enough to get the armor now, I'm only 3 plat short but I don't even want to think about buying skills for a while


Edit: Can someone help me with Runes? I'm not sure which to get ?

My amateur guess. Armour level seems to matter more than health, but they're both important, as well as your primary skill. Someone correct me if I'm wrong here!

I'm a dervish and spend a lot of time enchanted. There's a dervish specific insignia called Windwalkers that gives you extra armour whilst enchanted. Only salvaged one of those. But I salvaged two Blessed Insignias (which also give you extra armour whilst enchanted), and two Survivor ones (extra health) - the last two can be used by any class. I'm sure assasins have the same deal - I don't have an assasin hero, but my other heroes have profession-specific insignias.

For runes - since you're not gonna have full max armour for a while, I'd go with minor (most important trait you've got, or one minor each of the two most important - major and superior are cheaper but cost you a lot of health in return, not good if you're not already very decked out). Likely to be very very pricey, so wait til you salvage them or get really rich, you can do fine without uber-builds and all the min-maxing in the regular game. There are also health runes (these are good), energy runes if that's a problem, and runes that will clear conditions or diseases from you like blindness, weakness, and poisoning quicker. Mix n match as the budget allows/depending on what you salvage that's useful. The only thing that scares me is that toon armour can break if you salvage the rune to put on something else later without a perfect salvage kit, which takes EoTN reputation and a lot of money.

Hero armour doesn't break, so you can re-rune and re-insignia those guys to your heart's content. I'm pretty sure you can't put insignias on collector armour but it will accept runes, but still, if you're running around in AL 10 armour, getting AL 50 or 60 is going to be a huge improvement all by itself - monsters like to snack on toons with not much health and not much armour.

Any new players having a hard time getting the cash to unlock skills for their heroes, listen up:

Create a new character in Factions or Nightfall (Nightfall is quicker, though Factions offers some exclusive skills) of a profession whose skills you want. Assassin or Ritualist (Factions), Dervish or Paragon (Nightfall) will make the campaign choice for you.

Play through the profession tutorial quests; they don't take a lot of time, and they get quicker as you repeatedly do this. Learn about the secondary professions, and pick up those skills. See how many skills you're unlocking for free? While you're at it, do any of the quick newbie quests available to you, to get even more money and experience points -- in Kamadan, "Armored Transport" from Mehinu followed by "Missing Shipment" from Kailona being especially important, as the latter awards you a valuable Minor Vigor rune.

• Factions Quests (up to "A Formal Introduction")

1. Choosing to try all the professions during An Audience with Master Togo is recommended.
2. Make sure you do your "insignia quest" after Choose Your Secondary Profession.

• Nightfall Quests: Primary Training and Secondary Training

1. In between the 2 quests, you have to reach level 5. This isn't hard if you've picked up and done whatever quests are available to you around Kamadan.

(Here's a list of the skills awarded, so you can reduce overlap.)

Choose a secondary profession whose skills you want, and map back to your main outpost (Shing Jea/Kamadan). Go see the skill trainer and buy whatever skills you can that don't say "unlocked." As a new character, you pay much less per skill (the price goes up with each skill you buy, but they shouldn't get too expensive before you run out of skill points).

If you have any hero skill points, visit a hero skill trainer and learn any of those skills you don't already have unlocked (hero skill trainers don't tell you if you already have any of their skills unlocked -- you'll have to check the list against the "K" menu of one of your heroes of the primary/secondary profession in question).

Rinse and repeat.

Bear in mind these are not uber skills, but they can be enough to get your heroes by as you and they level, earn money, and travel to areas where you can access better skills.

Note: If you're doing this in Nightfall, it's especially lucrative on Chahbek Village Zaishen Quest day. Just talk to the Zaishen Scout in the outpost before doing the mission to go to Embark Beach and pick up the quest (talking to the [Elona Travel] NPC will take you back). You'll get extra experience, money, and Zaishen Coins.

Second Note: Yes, this does require a time investment. It's up to you to decide your priorities, money or time. Paying for skills at 1p each or using Balthazar Faction that otherwise could be turned into Zaishen Keys and sold (which, at today's Z-key values, actually ends up costing you more than 1p per non-elite skill) is quick, but expensive. Unlocking skills with new throwaway characters is slow but cheap.
I did this when I was new. I had no money and time to kill. And it taught me a lot about the different professions.
But the point here is: Do what's right for you.

If you do this, I suggest you eventually make one of each class in factions and do the quest your headmaster has after you finish the insigna quest as each class has a unique quest to do from them.

Rather than Start a new Prophesies Charactor, just cross over to Lion's Arch with your Lv 17, and pick up the story there, Post Searing Ascalon is Dreary and Ugly, I loved the Shiver Peaks but you'll get there. .. My own Charactors are Lv 17 and do just fine in and around LA, and the farming is good. (of course you might have to postpone collecting a missions title for completing one story line; but I prefer exploring to following a script.)

Also by the time you hit Lv 20 you should know the map well enough to do a little running, and Assassains are clearly the choice of Runners, which is a great way to make money, and sharpen your builds/skills. Actually I'm amazed I never see a Ranger Advertise for Running, you would think someone who lives in the Wilds would have the skill set; but it does not seem to be the reality.

Prophecies was designed long before Hero's crossed the Dev's minds; so slowly building and phasing in a team of hero's wont set you back there. Just few thoughts Noob to Noob

One thing that Prophecies characters do have in their favor though is the amount of quests available that award skills as rewards. Foreign characters can pick up on these too of course, but only after Lion's Arch, thereby missing out on some skills. It does however, take a considerable amount of time.

If you can do what Star Jewel suggests then definitely do that, it's an excellent idea. Don't forget to follow that link given for the skills (list of the skills awarded ) - this will also help you decide if you want to pursue any of the Prophecies quests as well.

Best thing I can offer there is to refer to this sub-forum and check the starter advice for your profession - while much may be outdated, particularly the skills references, the general gameplay advice and how to kit out your character still stands (mostly ).

So if you unlock skills on one toon, they're unlocked on heroes? I'm still not sure quite how it works, but thought that might be the case. I have a baby rit and necromancer and other classes that aren't my absolute favourites to play to do this for heroes, and did pre-searing and a bit of post with a few different disposable toons and profession combinations (my main in Prophecies did all the secondary profession trial quests, too). But I'm running out of character slots - if I delete them, will the skills available go away for heroes?

Here, I think, is where I ran into trouble. The Kourna desert is where all the avatars for dervishes live, and a couple of other nice elite skills, too. I'm still kind of vague on tomes but I had to have (read: really wanted) the avatars for my dervish. Bad, maybe, but they're all useful.

There are some elite skills I'd love to grab for the heroes, but yes - a platinum per cap sig is not cheap, at least not now, and that's what a cap sig costs. I did use the free ones, and got bad advice about Zaishen keys, so so much for that starter bonus.

I'd say that kind of killed the budget, but there's never been that big a budget to start with. Point taken, though.

If you just can't handle standing around Kamadan posting adverts in party search for what you want to sell - I'm bad at that, and all I think I have that may be worth anything is the -50 HP grim cesta my Prophecies toon got for the Cities of Old Ascalon quest (by anything I mean maybe a couple hundred gold, if that), how do you make money in this game? Do you need to be in-game rich to properly play it?

I'm not trying for elite armour, mini pets, party titles, or the like, just want to get the toons and the heroes reasonably kitted out and pay for other essentials that may come up.

The -50 cesta should be about 5k, since it's used for 55monk. Less popular than it used to be, but still a decent farming build.

Also, boss tip for money and runes is get over to factions asap and go to the starter island. This weekend is the festival and a good chance to make some cash. Also, there is a really easy feather farm outside seitung which is in one of the thread on here. That farm also nets a lot of blue armors which contain useful runes and insignia... which are also worth selling one heros are kitted out.

Off topic, Fitz, I have to ask, how is Lord Golden keeping these days? You still planning on carving your own dragon one day?

Best deal I ever did was to get the millenium upgrade that gave me an everlasting supply of hero weapons just by typing /bonus items.
When I bought Eye of the North that gave me even more bonus weapons.

Otherwise its as they say spend as little as possible get weapons and armour from collectors till you reach a place that will sell max protection armour for your character.

There are some treasure chests/buried treasure in Nightfall that you can get some nice items from too, one of them is on the start island.
When I started I could get a gold item from each chest per character now I mostly get purples.

Can anyone recommend a way to start farming Balthazar facftion ?

The fastest, easiest way is to do trapping in the z-elite daily, which should net 6k B-faction per day. JQ is another easy way.

The best ways are HA and GVG, but they're really hard to get into and don't pay real dividends until you're good enough to get a good team.

What is JQ?

Could you tell me where do I go to find a group for the trapping parties?

thanks

JQ is the Jade Quarry and is accessible from Great Temple of Balthazar via the Luxon or Kurzick recruiter.

Finding a trapping party can be a pain, but they form in the Zaishen Elite outpost which is reached by following the PVP quest chain started by The Guide in The Isle of the Nameless.

Thanks,

Can you explain to me what the zaishen pvp quests are?

Is one of them alliance battles? But i heard that nobody does them any more?

You can find the schedule of Zaishen Combat Quests here. Yes, Alliance Battles are a part of the rotation. And because so few people do them any more, your only chance to play is on the Zaishen day, or a double faction weekend. That said, you can pretty much always get into a random format.

But I hope you're not getting "Zaishen Elite," a mock PvP battle against NPCs where trapping is popular, confused with "Zaishen Combat," which is the bonus quest you can pick up in Temple of Balthazar to award you faction and Z-coins for doing real PvP.

Thanks for your response, I meant zaishen combat yet.


Can any one with an assassin tell me if the +2 energy rune is better than +10 health, should I go with survivor or radiants?

Also, is moebius strike still one of the best pve builds? I've been reading threads on the assassin forums but they all seem to be years old.

Most of the builds will require some play for your to understand if they are good or not. Don't get locked into a single build, you should be changing your build to suit your situation as required. This means that in some maps/missions you might need enchant removal or knockdowns or poison ect.. so you can adjust your build to give you the best possible result.

When it comes to insignias I personally think that armor is best followed by health. If you need energy from your armor you might be running an unbalanced build.

Also if your looking for quick Balth faction I suggest Fort Aspenwood.