Returning after 4+ years. Totally lost

Hi all!

I played GW for alittle while when it was first released but left when my friends found other games to play.
Now when GW2 is closing in I decided to dust of my account and start working on the HoM rewards and "get a feeling of GW play again".

The problem is that I am totally lost now.
When I played I managed to level a Ele/Me to 20 but I only have the trainer skills.
I bought all the expansion (15euro so it was an easy choice) and I have been looking att different threads and builds but considering I have like 0 of the skills in the builds I really do not know where to begin.

When it comes to cash I only have like 2 platinum and my gear is nothing to talk about really.

So, I would really apreciate some pointers on where to go first. I guess getting skills from the different expansions would be a good start?
Is it farming money so that I can buy them (and what to farm in that case considering the lack of skills/gear).

Or should I simply start a new char (I have been thinking of starting a Mesmer) and do a "start over"?

Thank you for all your help and pointers.

Regards
Ljungen

I would start a new character to get a basic grounding in the games.
With your old character you have probably forgotten most of how to play them and also since there isn't a missions log will have little idea as to where you were up to in the quest chain.

Money will be your way to getting as much out of the hom as possible because you need to get a fair number of elite armours, buy minipets and possibly buy other items for the hom if your not inclined to do them the regular way.

Keep the other character so you can play that one again later, you should have a few birthday minis which is useful for the hom.
Even though gw2 will be a very different game to gw different skills play style etc, some of the hom rewards will be nice to have.

Expansions are a good way to gain acces to more skills.
doesn't realy matter if you start a new char, don't you have 4 character slots? (have fun with them)
Earning money will come with doing the missions and quests, Join a guild that can help you if you are having difficulties.

+btw if you have a character that is 4years old it should have gotten some Birthday presents, you can sell those or open those to sell the content, It is easy money to be had.

many hom points can be "bought" with pure platinum, so check out youtube for popular farms and check GW PVX for the required builds

If you have 2Plat I'm assuming your at least as far as LA, I tend to get about a plat a day around Aurora Glade, about half that around Gates of Kryta;

If you own Factions,
You can get a little more, and good skills if you do Mhenlo's Request http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Mhenlo%27s_Request
But you will find the level of challange is much greater when you initially arrive and dont be suprised if your stomped the first couple times out. Max Armor and good weapons also available in Kaineng City - Honestly I much prefer the settings and stories of Prophecies, but I wish the challange level was closer to Factions; Also informally I have not really studied this but it seems to me Prophecies skills like feel like nerfed versions of their Factions counter parts,

Say Orison of Healing vs Healing Whisper or Healing Breeze Vs Jamel's Gaze, anyhow if your not happy with the skills pool in Prophecies, I think you'll be much happier with factions. BB.

I would just play thru the missions in each chapter---you remember that prophecies is pretty slow on the learning curve, but it also gives quest rewards of skills (good for unlocking).
Factions is much faster and nightfall inbetween the 2.
You could start a new character in each of those just to get the new feeling of each starter area.
When you are working on the HoM you will want to finish the chapters --which character you finish them with is not relevant as the HoM is account wide.

SO
I would make a new character (or two) to get the feel again, but also keep your old character as well--you may want to play with a few characters to get more understanding of how each class works.

anyways.
play the game--dont worry about the Hom --its not going anywhere. ENJOY the game and the rewards will happen.

Welcome back. I was in the same situation you were a couple of years back (except I had saved a few high value items so money wasn't as big of an issue). I would suggest starting a new character in Nightfall to help you "re-learn" the basics and teach you about heroes. Heroes will become VERY important because, quite frankly getting groups for most missions now is pretty much impossible.

Also, you'll want to carry as signet of capture (or two) on your bar pretty much all the time to help you gain elite skills. Each elite skill you gain on a character can be used by heroes on any character on the account (NOT other characters you make tho). So basically, the stronger you make one guy, the stronger your whole account becomes. Once you've gathered a few, check out PvXwiki for some good builds for both you and your heroes.

As far as money, like the others have said, it will come by just playing through the game. Max armor is super cheap (5plat and some mats) so you should have earned enough by the time you get to where you can buy it. You wont be 50/50 HoM or GWAMM any time soon, but be patient with that and don't really worry or bother with titles until you've played through the campaigns. Familiarize yourself with wiki to help with the missions, and I highly suggest trying to complete the bonus on the first time through just to save yourself a ton of time later (when you'd need the bonus done for a title).

Anyway, sorry for the wall of text. Good Luck!

Welcome back.

Depending on where you are in the game you could reroll but to be honest if you like the character then find an outpost you can get to, get as many henchmen as possible into the group and take a walk outside and see what happens. Worst case scenario is you die horribly, but you won't lose anything and it'll hopefully give you a crash course in the basics and you might even have a little fun along the way!

Heading to Nightfall for heroes is certainly an option but to be honest you can use henchment to complete the normal mode campaigns for propehecies and factions without issue - I did. So don't feel you need to rush off to a particular place for something.

Head over to Great Temple of Balthazar and talk to High Priest Zhang. You'll have to go back and forth between him and Tolkano to register your character and collect your 50 free tournament reward points and then exchange those for 10 Zaishen Keys. You can sell Z-keys for about 5.5k each to players. You can only get the free points once per account, but it should help with your immediate money problems.

Thank you for all your tips.

I did start a new char together with my brother and are now running through Prophecies missions.
I also started a Factions and a Nightfall char that we will run with after.
And when he is not around I took my Ele to EotN and started doing quests there to get the Tapestries for HoM