So now I remember why I rage quited GW 2 years ago...

It seems I really suck at this game

Please help a desperate soul figure out what to do to improve.

I only have Prophecies and EoTN (will consider getting Nightfall and factions if I get any better at this and if there is a sale) but for now is Pro + EoTN only.

I picked a Warrior and have a secondary of Necro but need it to change asap to ranger (for HoM pet statues) except I can't seem to beat thirsty river so that won't be happening unless I get better (catch 22)

I have regular armor (gladiator) and for weapons I have a Ebon Igneous Maul of death bane 19-35 | a Heavy battle axe 6 -28 | a Fiery sword of fortitude 15 -22 and a Reinforced Buckler of Fortitude. Don't have any attachments to them buts its all I've gotten from drops.

For heroes I have Xanda, Jorda, Vekk, Gwen, Odgen and Pyerce, but so far I've had better luck with a team of Odgen, Jora, and Pyerce and the rest henchman (casters and a second healer)

Current build (that doesnt get me killed in five minutes) Warriors endurance / for great justice / flurry (frenzy is a death sentence) / You move like a darwf / Crushing blow / Mighty blow /Snow storm

Yes it's a "wtf" build but so far I haven't been able to get better ideas/skills.

Money? about 20 platinum

Still with me? wow! either you are a saint or are having a good chuckle with all the noobness

So what's the problem (apart from the obvious) Every mob of more than 8 critters pretty much owns me. if there is poison involve I'm as good as dead, seriously its ridiculous I see the bar go green and I start praying

I'm basically stuck in 2 places: can't beat finding Gadd (not even close), cant beat Thirsty river(for ascension to change to ranger) and I'm having trouble even going back to low level areas (for example to do Gwen's mission from the HoM).

I'm not asking for handouts or something like that, I really want to get better at this game and finish all the storyline and if possible get some (HoM points currently 4/50) for GW2 (Which so far seems easier that GW).

What do I need to change?

Better armor? Better weapons? if I can't buy them from a merchant/collector where should I farm for it?

My build sucks? what skill should I go capping? please remember that I cant get anything from the Asura's or further into Prophecies... also most dungeons I need tons of luck to get trough

I've read a lot of guides/faqs/wiki entries (in fact that's the only reason i've gotten this far) but every time I hit the same problem, builds that I can't get or hero builds that I can't get either. And of course every guide has so many options I feel overwhelmed... I really just want a clear direction so I cant get back on track.

Please don't tell to give up... I'm not normally this bad a player I guess I'm just having trouble figuring out how to properly play this game

Really appreciate your time and help!

A very desperate, very sad GW player.

I glanced through this but didn't read all of it b/c its kinda sad. I don't mean that in a completely rude or bad way either.


You can use http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Main_Page to get some general help on armors and missions and http://www.gwpvx.com/PvX_wiki for builds for PvE.

Your weapons are fine and its sad that you don't have nightfall as thats where all the merchants go (Kamadan/Spamadan) to sell weapons.

I hope when you are entering the missions you are bring healer heroes otherwise ofc you are going to die. Don't get stuck thinking you should only use heroes. if you lack the experience to create good builds for your heroes use henchmen b/c their builds are set and are decent or at least better than 90% of the builds players can make.

First check your armor lvl, if you are a warrior it must be 80 + 20 against physical dmg and you can suse some insignias to boost it (this is the max). And use runes (+hp) and insignias, knights or sentinell, on yourself and do the same on your heroes to. Prefered to play a "tank"+blackliners game. Bring yourself some def skills, like i am unstoppable, or dolyak signet, feel no pain etc, not only dmg. If your heroe or hench setup is fine they could you keep alive and deal enough dmg to kill mobs. Use some tactics, flag back your heroes pull with longbow and block the mobs. Need some practice but this tactics works.

I hope it will help. If you have more questions just ask me ing if im online.
(IGN:Corvus Hun)

If you would like some help with this mission hit me up in game my ign is Odin Gunnar my play time is gmt (UK) around 7pm I'll be on till 11pm

Welcome back in GW !!!

First, just in case, i give some very usefull links :
Official Wiki :
http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Main_Page
Builds :
http://www.gwpvx.com/PvX_wiki

Your heroes :
Try to equip them decently : Runes, Insignia, and most important : Skills, and don't forget to capture some Elite Skills. You will find good builds on PVX_wiki, maybe you will have to adapt because some skills could be tied to Nightfall/Factions. a necromancer would be very helpfull, but you need to finish Finding Gadd first.

Finding Gadd :
This quest is very hard, you should try to avoid Shards of Orr, there is an alternative path, starting from Eye of the North, through Battledepths, then Heart of the Shiverpeaks, Bogroot Growths and Sparkfly Swamp.

Thirsty River :
Focus on Healers first, kill priests as soon as possible to avoid their resurection.

Gwen's Mission and Dungeons are end-game content, you should do them when everything else is done.


General tips :
Consummables can be very usefull when you are stuck :
- Summoning stones (very usefull when your group is less than 8)
- Armor of salvation/Graal of Might/Essence of Celerity : the ultimate combo to roll through any part of the game
- Cupcakes, golden eggs and other sweets can give a boost
- Honeycombs is nice to remove Death penalty from Heroes


Hope it helps ...

I did laugh but only at the part "Still with me? wow! either you are a saint or are having a good chuckle with all the noobness " and was that comment i was laughing at and not you.
In 2 years many things have changed including numerous skill buffs/nerfs which also have an impact on foes skills.
And years no play is a big gap to catch up on in regards of players experiance - and if anyone does say give up - ignore them as they wont be worth the effort of listening to or answering.
Btw this may give you a chuckle but in my 5 yrs of playing i have never done the crystal desert stuff and when i do eventually do it ( my chrs are not prophs born ) im probably going to fail quite a few times .

Too bad you dont have nightfall or else I could have given you my warrior build that has allowed me to go through all in HM and then some. It's also warrios endurance but with axe.
And you might want to get nightfall and factions because also there in lies some great help. Some of the most overpowered PVE skills will make this game so easy.

Now this mission is not that hard if you do not try to rush things and over aggro. Especially easy in the second arena with the 2 bosses.
You as endurance warrior, gwen as panic or esurger, Ogden as unyealding aura monk(because you seem to die in this mission) and it sucks but Xandra cannot be a Signet of spirits hero because you do not have factions and also she does not have splinter weapon which can make you kill entire mobs there.
Try for your monk to bring judge insight because if I remember right the enemies are undead there?

A few remarks. above here are some usefull tips but some are absolutly wrong at this stage. First of all. your build could use some improvement, but it isn't too bad, giving that you don't have access to all skills yet. The most important mistake a lot of people make is that they use heroes too much when starting the game. There is absolutly nothing wrong with using henchman. Heroes are basicly blank when you get them and their quality depends on what you do with them. a good team of heroes can make your gw life lots of easier. however a bad team of heroes can make it harder. Henchman however are desigend for the area you are in right now (so in the desert you find henchman good enough for the dessert while in eotn they are much better cause eotn is much harder).

Now for the part why some above are wrong (though it is appreciated they are trying to be helpfull).

To succesfully use hero's you need to get them skills. given the fact that your stuck on warrior and necro professions, you can only get those skills. To get a decent monk, ele, etc build you need to pass the dessert. Then you can change your secondary proffession and buy skills for your heroes.
The only hero you can outfit properly atm is Jora. however, having two melee in a 6 man party would be overkill in the balance of the team. So my advice is to either get help till after the dessert or use the henchman (one monk, one mesmer, one necro, one ele and one ranger) for thirsty river their names would be Reyna, Alesia, Claude, Dunham and Orion.

So leave your heroes, there is no way they can not suck cause you can't get them a decent build yet. Keep in mind that prophecy's is never designed to be done with heroes. When online you can always aks me for advice and help (ign Akela Rumi).

I'm making you some skill bars using the skills you have access to. If you don't know where to get them, check this links and click on the skill name.
http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/List_of_Prophecies_skill
http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/List_of_core_skillss
http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/List_...e_North_skills

Capture these skills if you want, but you should be OK without:
http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/List_...ure_l ocation
Eviscerate or Cleave
Word of Healing
Searing Flames or Savannah Heat

Anyway, here are some basic builds:

OGDEN Protection build (bring Ogden and Mhenlo)
12 Divine Favor, the rest in Protection Prayers
Shielding Hands
Protective Spirit
Reversal of Fortune
Divine Healing
(empty, not sure what to place here, suggestions anyone?)
Cure Hex
Mend Condition
Divine Boon


GWEN
12 Domination, 9 in Fast Casting, the rest in Inspiration
Power Spike
Power Drain
Empathy
Mind Wrack
Chaos Storm
(Empty. Energy Surge elite when you have it)
Shatter Enchantment
Resurrection skill. Resurrection Signet should be okay.

VEKK
12 Fire, the rest in Energy Storage
Immolate
Fireball
Meteor
(Empty, you can add a strong fire elite later)
Glyph of Elemental Power
Aura of Restoration
Fire Attunement
ResurrectionSignet

You should do the Asura quests in EotN so you can get a Necromancer hero (Lydia), but for now, use Xandra.
XANDRA
12 Curses
(Spiteful Spirit elite when you have it)
Mark of Pain
Barbs
Insidious Parasite
Desecrate Enchantments
Parasitic Bond (change this when you get something better)
Instead of Parasitic Bond, bring Plague Sending if your warrior deals a lot of conditions)
Enfeebling Blood
Resurrection Signet

JORA
12 Axe Mastery, the rest in strength
Dismember
Power Attack
Cyclone Axe
For Great Justice!
Flail
Resurrection Signet


If after getting all these skills you still have money, buy this equipment:
Monk: 2 blessed insignias for chest and leg armor. +1 protection prayers for the head
Mesmer: 2 Prodigy insignias for chest and leg armor. +1 domination rune for the head.
Vekk: 2 blessed insignias for chest and leg armor. +1 fire magic for the head




SOME GENERAL TIPS
* You're a strong beefy warrior, and strong beefy warriors should... kill enemies! Bring lots of damage skills instead of skills that say "I'm a chicken, please don't kill me, I beg you!" Since you're at Crystal Desert in prophecies, you already have some good damage skills.
* In difficult areas, always bring two monks, one protection and one healing.
* As soon as you go attack a monster, attack with CTRL+Space, so your heroes will attack that target too.
* Send me a private message so I can help you through those missions you're having problems with :P I have a character that still needs the desert missions. Mademoiselle Mimi
* I have a ton of good weapons taking up space in my storage box, I'd be happy to part with them for free (Don't feel bad, a lot of more experienced players have a lot of weapons they don't have use for)
* Despite what the person said above, try to use heroes instead of henchmen... in Prophecies. Yes, you should ask for advice on how to make builds for the heroes, since you are new.
Prophecies henchmen have terrible skill bars. EotN henchmen are much better, except for Eve, Lo Sha, and the two warriors.

Again, everyone who is advicing on hero bars. You need to be ascended to buy skills for your heroes. This person isn't so he/she is stuck on upgrading heroes with warrior or necro skills. It is very good your trying to help, but this is only confusing for the OP.

The skills are unlocked account wide. As long as he buys them himself, or gets them from quest rewards, his heroes from every character will be able to use them. So what he needs to do is Ascend. So he should do the desert missions, which I've volunteered to help, or maybe he could go to the Embark Beach and ask for a group.

If he doesn't Ascend, he will be crippled no matter what he does. I thought it was clear that he should do that first.

Damn I could not remember that. Good thing for you to notice.

I agree with akelarumi........use henchmen, not heroes, because you cannot give heroes the skills they need until after you ascend. Prophecies was made before heroes, so it is made to be used with henchmen, anyway. You should get all the games, so that you can access more skills. The heroes will perform better when you can give them proper skills, weapons, runes, and insignias.

Make sure you have max armor (80 for warrior). You can get a set of max armor at Boreal Station in Eye of the North expansion. It may not be the style of armor you want, but at this point, having max armor is more important than style. Or you can get someone to run you to Droknor's Forge and get max armor there. Outfit the max armor with runes and insignias to increase defense and/or health.

Thanks everyone! BTW my IGN is Cancerian Knight (not fixated on the disease, just happen to be a Cancer and Knight of Cancer was already taken)

Thanks for the links and I have read trough the wiki but like I said at some point it was an information overload... still it did help to get me where I am now =)

@Szilafe I'll try to find better armor with those qualities and that's a yes for the second healer I bring 2.

@Thot Ok now I don't feel that bad for failing Gwen's mission. I'm using those cupcakes + Honeycombs so much I fear for my toon's health.

@Lorazcyk I do feel that as a warrior I should be up front fighting and holding the line, that's the thing I don't think I'm making enough of a difference (that's why I bring Jora) basically I've narrowed it down to when I'm able to not die I'm not making enough damage (any mob that heals lasts forever) so I try a more offensive approach but then I get killed easily. Thanks for the hero builds they seem quite reasonable and will definitively try them as soon as I'm able to.

@Akelarumi I'm a "he" and thanks for the henchie tip.

@Spiritz thats Ok I was kinda "sad laughing" too

Finally @Everyone that offer to help me with the missions I really appreciate it and just might take you up on it but will try to get better first (I don't want to be a noob forever) also I'm pretty sure that kinda got me in trouble 2 years ago. Lots of people offered to help me with runs and missions and basically it went like this:

Randomplayer: Hey need a run to Lion's Arch?
Me: sure! whats a run?
Randomplayer: I'll take you there so you cant get better gear and skills.
Me: awesome!

Randomplayer stars running faster than the wind while I try to keep up and die in a matter of seconds.

Me: Sorry for diying back there... you sure are fast.
Randomplayer: dont worry just stand there and wait till the run is over.
Me: ok...
Randomplayer: Ok we are here.
Me: thanks a lot... so you wanna do a couple of missions? what should I try first? wow everything here sure is expensive...
Randomplayer: Your welcome, but sorry I've already cleared everything here. I'm going to help other people with runs.
Me: oh, ok thanks again... guess I'll see you around... you'll PM me later right?

Ok, the last line was made up but the rest is true. I basically leveled and advanced fast but I guess I didn't really learned anything. Not Randomplayer's fault of course I get that it was a nice gesture.

----------

@JaxDarkwing Thanks! Ill head out for Boreal Station I don't really care for style. I'm running half naked through shiverpeaks in a "gladiator" armor just because it had more defense that whatever I was using before... I now can empathize with women complaining that female characters get ridiculous armor, though I still want my female caster's to have Xena like armor (what? I said I could empathize, not that I would change).

I do want to get Nightfall and Prophecies but not sure if I can buy the trilogy package since I already have Prophecies and EoTN in one single key (it was a bundle) I've asked Ncsoft (their FAQ didn't quite cover my case) but no response so far.

If there's a sale later on I'll probably pick them up but right now I kinda spent my "gaming budget" on a GW2 pre purchase.

Still I would like to at least finish the story lines for the ones I got.

Are you a part of a guild? Joining a guild would also help you out. My name is Crimson Swallow in game, I'll help you try to at least get the ranger secondary you want.

Being leveled fast can be a bad thing if either new or an old player returning - and you have said the right reasons - what you miss in terms of own experience ( not game xp ) will take longer to learn and also means when you do face foes they are suddenly alot harder.I`d say a huge chunk of players will take runs but usually its because they have done xx campaign several times and dont want/cba to do those bits again

@Hizke I joined one yesterday [ICBM], They did offer to help me if needed but I didn't ask for anything right away I really don't want to do a mission and feel less "smart" then the heroes/henchies AI... I mean its going to be awkward when deciding between reviving me or Claude they go for the henchie because its more useful o.O

Of course I will eventually ask for help clearing dungeons.

Your absolutly right bout getting help without trying. on the other side there is no shame to it either. If you tried and failed several times there is no reason to not ask help from people who have all the benefits of having all campaigns and all skills unlocked. specially cause, though I said earlier that prophecy's was designed for playing without heroes. there are some differences.

first of all. back then all those mission outposts where packed with people having the same problem you have right now and teaming together.

Second of all cause the uprisde of heroes and more skills from other campaigns, they didn't really bother to keep it playable for prophecy's only people.

For the rest. I'm always carefull for guessing if one is a he or a she (thanks for clearing it up though). People commonly mistake me for a woman in game, while the only reason for me playing a woman is that if I have to watch a butt for hours/day it better be a cute and sexy one.

Last advice. When you have done the frist three missions in the dessert, you need to do the solo-mission. My advice is to do the following quest in preparation: http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Service:_Practice,_Dummy

(not going to spoil you why though -evil grin-)

I'm fairly new to GW also (I joined a bit over a year ago, but I didn't have the time to play for quite a while, until recently). I'm also right at the same point in the Prophecies story that you are: in the Crystal Desert, hoping to ascend. I have not tried the Ascension missions yet, but I have gotten to the start points for each of them. I'd love to play through them with another player(s). Take a look to see if I'm in game when you take your next shot. I'll take a look for you as well. I've had a fair bit of success in the Crystal desert so far (challenging, but not overwhelming), so perhaps together we can push through.

IGN: Gaelwyn of Elisara

@Astraeos Ok then! I didn't get the bonuses so I do need to play trough Elona and Dunes again. I'm GMT (-5) believe that's US central time I was going to try to get better armor and a couple more skill as suggested but I'm willing to skip that for another chance at thirsty river's Monk boss. after today its probably the weekend.

Specific to the mission you are having problems with (Thirsty River)...

Take your time.

Biggest problem most inexperienced players have in first part of that mission is getting caught in the traps set by the rockshot devourers (fire and dust traps can be a major pain if you trigger them). Best way to handle these is to pull them towards you so your party doesn't accidentaly trigger them when they engage. Once the devourers are dealt with it's easy enough to avoid the traps as you'll see small tale tell signs of where they are. Other than the traps there's really nothing that should be too difficult to deal with at the beginning.

PS: with any enemy rangers (including rockshot devourers) you do not want to attack them when they are on higher ground than you. If you can manuever yourself to at least even ground or (better yet) give yourself the advantage of high ground before engaging. For someone that is inexperienced and/or that may not have the best party mix of skills or equipment, this can be real important.

Once you reach the second/main part of the mission (when you cross over that little wooden bridge and gate and talk to the ghostly hero).

The key here is to NOT engage more than one group at a time (IMPORTANT!). This includes making sure you don't accidentally aggro more than one group. Might mean that you need to veer either left or right a bit even if the enemy is right in front of you.

When engaging each group always take out the casters (i.e. the snake guys) first as they can cause some nasty damage (arcanist, followed by illusionist, followed by cursebearers) before you worry about any of the warrior/rangers. But the key with each group is to kill the Priest that is squatting on each base more so than killing the Boss (really secondary).

You have 2 minutes to kill the Priest or he will resurrect EVERYONE that you've killed in that group. So you need to have heroes/henchies that can do some damage or interrupt attempts to heal (very important as this is a big reason why a lot of people have problems with this mission)!

And most definitely need to call targets so everyone attacks one thing at a time. This mission stresses target calling more so than just about any other mission (especially in HM).

Assuming you have enough damage doers you should have enough time to knock out most of the casters and kill the priest before the 2 minutes are up. If you are having trouble killing a priest and the 2 minute clock starts running out (in the famous words of King Arthur and his men in Monty Python's Holy Grail...RUN AWAY!!!). Then wait for the message about "opposing party is ressurrected" and then start again.

If you don't care about the mission bonus then it's basically just repeating this method 5 more times until all 6 bosses and their groups are killed (again, remember, priest most important). The hardest boss is the Monk boss since he helps keeping his priest alive). Anything that can cause knockdown or daze would help (You move like a dwarf, which you said you had I believe, would help). For a W/N, Distracting Blow (proph skill), Disrupting Chop (proph skill), Skull Crack (elite you can cap in EOTN) are skills that you would be able to get access to (if you only have Proph and EOTN) that could help interrupting casters (especially the priest).

From a henchmen standpoint, I'd take the following: Dunham (can disrupt casters), Orion (your best AOE damage doer), Alesia (party wide healing), Lina (condition removal) and Stefan (disruption). If you don't have any access to spells for your heroes I'd suggest henchmen instead.

NOTE: If you have a minion master, be careful with not advancing your party until the 2 minute cycle has restarted as minions have a habit of going beyond what you want them to to attack (and aggro) enemies.

So is it the Monk boss you are struggling with? Granted, I know the one and he's a right pain in the neck.

Not going to go into quite the elaboration as everybody else, but you said you had a Ranger hero, right? But only Prophecies & Eye of the North skills?

A simple solution to troublesome Monk bosses is the Daze condition . The easiest way to apply this is typically Broadhead Arrow, but you can't use that as it's a Factions skill. However, you can use Concussion Shot, which is basically a non-elite version of the skill which you can acquire in Prophecies.

Unlock it using 1000 Balthazar faction, which you can quickly earn on the PvP Battle Isles by fighting A.I. controlled bots in the Zaishen Challenge (or by acquiring a Flame of Balthazar, either from Zaishen Coins, or from another player).

Then give the skill to Pyre and when you reach the boss, target lock Pyre onto him. He'll go down before you know it as Daze will cause any of his spells to fail whenever he's hit.

Energy Management for the empty slot, preferably of the Elite variety (seems you aren't using the elite slot otherwise).
Divine Boon without any energy-management doesn't work. Its too much of a drain on the energy bar.
Infact, even using your Elite slot on it, you generally need two+ energy management skills to make Divine Boon work.
The exception of course being Assassin's Promise, but from what I understand heroes aren't aware how to use it correctly still.

I can answer this for you.

You can buy the Trilogy, which will have a single serial key, and add that right on top of your existing account. The redundant campaigns will be transparent, and Factions and Nightfall will be added as if you applied them individually. It's often a better bargain (especially if you find a deal at an online retailer) to do it that way than to buy Factions and Nightfall separately.

Alternatively, something to consider if you have not made a lot of progress with your existing account, is to keep your Prophecies/North account as-is, to use for storage and accumulating birthday gifts, and buy a trilogy to start fresh on. This may not be the best option for you, but a number of people who come back to the game and want to add the later campaigns sometimes see a benefit to doing it that way.

i think you have alot of good tips now.
but to get better at this game you only should read guildwars wiki.
in your gw screen type /wiki crystal desert.
if you want to know anything just type /wiki (keyword)
so for example if you know the name of the mission just look it up quik.
there are so much usefull stuff there.
anyways goodluck.

@Cancer777 Hey Cancer, Alot of new players actually struggle and ragequit during the Crystal dessert, it seems like your running from one outpost to the next endlessly!

If you need any help or just somebody to ask random questions in game PM away.. /Mercy Wildblood

@Dar Drakor thanks for the tips

@KotCR W/Ne but need to change it to W/R for the pet statues. I've reached the monk boss twice out of 20 something tries. hopefully the new advice I got here will give me the extra push to finish this mission.

@StarJewel that's a relief then now I'll save something on the side to get it (already spent my self imposed gaming budget).

@Anime Divine thanks, I did read the wiki which I how I manage to get where I am but kinda got an information overload form excessive reading lol, so I kinda wanted a clear goal as to what to do first so I can stop going in circles trying one thing then going for another etc, etc.

@MarkusParus thanks! might take you up on that offer.

So basically this is my current plan of action.

Max Norn titles (for HoM) since this is the only area I don't have that much trouble with (except dungeons of course). Get Norn Armor for the HoM and for completing the "get better armor advice", if I'm going to spend the little gold I have in armor might as well buy something that I was going to get later anyway. Get some of the Skill recommended here. Try again.

Again thanks to everyone here! I feel a bit relieved now with a "plan of action" the frustration came from not knowing where to start / what to do.

Just curious if you managed to get through Thirsty River and Elona reach by now.

@Aspi Haven't come back yet since I was farming for iron ingots for the Norn Armor (still am... why, oh, why did I sell all those useless weapons before) and I don't have access to most recommend area in the wiki/forum (in factions I believe) So I'm doing random runs in the Charr homeland (synergy for vanguard titles) and salvaging the few weapons they drop not sure if there's another area with better drop rates for weapons/armor.

This weekend I'm going all out marathon to get the armor + new skills and then beating prophecies and EoTN.

Will start whispering all that offerred to help if I'm not done by noon on Sunday =D

As a recent returner myself, I would advise picking up factions/nightfall and also paying for the skill unlock packs for these. Allowed me to build a team of heroes with builds (e.g. ww.gwpvx.com/Build:Team_-_7_Hero_Player_Support) that just plough through the content....and I'm a fragile Warrior main too

If its any help it took me 2-3 weeks before my war stopped going splat all the time...so its not just you

I have been playing since Christmas as a monk Nightfall character and I am having a blast. I like my hero crew. I'm pretty attached to them and feel bad when I get them hurt. We are getting pretty good in spite of me being a monk, not the best profession for a team leader. I'm collecting my crew a nice set of skills including elites. The GW wiki makes a huge difference in success. I always have it open to look things up while I play. I'm near the end of the Nightfall campaign and looking forward to Eye of the North. I want to get good enough to do PvP next.

So you are a hammer warrior right. With your new armour you might want a new hammer. Any particular skin you like? You're a bit limited with no nightfall and factions I think. So if you see a nice hammer here:
http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Gallery_of_hammers
I will do my best to try and acquire one. I would go for the destroyer one for the HOM but thats just me :P

:cries tears of happiness:

A destroyer weapon would save me a lot of time since at some point I would have had to start farming for it.

I don't really have a preference for hammer, sword or axe. I've been rotating weapons and skills depending on where I am... my current hammer does extra damage to the undead so I switched for the zombies while trying "finding Gadd" and simply stayed with it.

I really don't want to impose but if you happen to acquire one I would love to have a destroyer hammer, sword or axe whichever is easier to get I'll adapt =D

I'm definitively getting the trilogy package but not for a couple of months, so for now I'm trying not to make "plans" for it and just concentrate on current goals.

I wouldnt worry about norn armor or eotn for the moment cancer, there are two Max armor rating armorsmiths in Drokars forge in proph that will sort you out for a fraction of the price.

Relax! theres no rush and dying isnt fun!

I won't be able to join you for the full marathon (Mother's day on Sunday, and that's definitely not a GW day for me!). I can help you get started with thirsty river, though. I've got my ranger there, ready and waiting. I've completed Elona and Dunes of Despair with bonuses (spoiler below*). I can help with those bonuses, too, if you'd like. I'll be on this Saturday and will see where you are at.










* Spoiler: The dunes of despair bonus turned out to be a bit anti-climatic, but far easier than I expected. I went for the bonus on the first pass through, charging back for the bosses during a lull in defending the ghostly hero. I killed each of the boss mobs (getting credit for the bonus), but the ghostly hero was wiped out while I was running back to it (failing the mission). I had credit for the bonus on the map, so tried just completing the mission on the next run through... and voila. I ended up with the bonus and the mission credit. I had no idea that you could get credit for completing the bonus if you had failed the mission. I'll take it, though! That bonus would be nigh impossible, otherwise!

So, I'm completely new to Guild Wars. I started to play maybe 3 months ago now. There's a thread on here of me complaining about the desert, as it sucks. I started out in prophecies, and have played (roughly) in the order things were added to the game. I'm at the end of Nightfall right now, so I haven't gotten in to EoTN yet.

The experts here gave you the answers, but I have a few things I noticed, or tidbits I've picked up in my limited time.

1.) I don't believe you actually have to be a ranger for HoM pets. You can take a ranger hero, give him/her charm, have them charm it and then just bring them to the Menagerie. The trainer will ask which hero's pet you want to donate, and there you go. That said, if you do the class secondary quests around the desert, you can just swap your secondary with a pull-down, so it's no big deal to switch to a ranger temporarily to grab a pet, then go back to whatever you wanted. If you end up going for elite captures, you'll need to do a lot of class switching.

2.) Most of the good skills are not in prophecies. I'm not sure if all of them are also in EoTN or not, but I just know that as I went through the campaigns, I found that 90% of the skills I were using were core or whatever the latest expansion was. Also, assassins and ritualists are pretty handy. For me, as a ranger I guess the Rit is a bit more handy, as I use barrage/shatter weapon pretty often.

3.) Merc heros make everything easier. You don't need to buy the full 8 if you have the EoTN heros, but having extra slots so you can bring 2 or 3 of a certain class for certain situations is pretty handy. If instead you're going to buy nightfall, the it's probably not necessary to buy them, as you have heroes coming out of your ears then. Thirsty River is a good example. It was the first mission I came across which demonstrated the need for mesmers in your group. If you stack 2-3 elem/mes, nec/mes or mes/.. with chaos storm, cry of frustration and some disenchantment. You just stack the chaos storms on the priest. It helps if you slow him or box him in (Minion Masters are pretty handy for that). Anyway, the one gotcha is you need to have unlocked the skills to make them useful. You really don't want to spend your skill points buying non-elite skills for heros. You'll need them if you want to cap skills for the title. So, you can either buy the unlock packs, or run some disposable heroes to unlock. Factions has the quickest starting area, with a lot of skill points, and decent cash. Once you get off Shing Jea, you can run straight up to Kaineng City, which has a trainer that has almost all the factions and core skills. It also has quick quests to jump to the capitols for the other two campaigns, which also have trainers. It takes 2-3 hours and you'll have 6 plat or so at that point to spend on skills.

Hey Astraeos! yeah Mothers day would have stopped me too, except my mom and dad are attending a wedding this weekend in Florida so it's going to a be a call for me.

Thanks for the tip I'm missing both bonuses though Elona's was due to a panic attack pretty sure I could go for it.

A lot of the Prophecies missions are like that, not so in Factions and Nightfall.

So I finally ascended =D woot! I do feel kinda silly now, did it on the 3rd try with bonus and I wasn't even gunning for it, it just happened.

Just want to say thanks to everyone, there is a definitive difference in my play style from before this thread and now. I steel feel like I'm not doing enough damage but at least I'm not dying so much and know what to gun for next: skills!.

If curious, I had 3 pieces of norn armor (run out of money for the guanlets) + a new skill that I found while farming for iron (for the armor) "vanguard sniper support", also had to spawn a snowman that I had leftover from wintersday... and some luck! for whatever reason the monk boss decide to leave the hut and engage my party outside of it, while I was fighting the last group, as soon as I saw that I just ran in there and went for the priest still took about 45 seconds to kill him (since everyone else was being blocked by the boss, I guess).

After that it has been a little bit of a blur, killed some dude that looked like ghost rider o.O flaming skull and all, wasn't sure if I had to kill him or what.. then he started shooting weak arrows (wtf?) so I just cast sniper support + vanguard assassin once... that proved lethal... didn't have time to check anything.

Right now I'm in Droknar's forge hoping to finish Prophecies today.

Again thanks to everyone! and @Astraeos I'm still missing Dune's bonus (can't kill them fast enough) and of course I'll help out on thirsty if you'd like.

I'd say forget about EoTN until you've got NF and Factions.... EoTN is intended as endgame content and you won't have truly decent builds with just Proph and EoTN.

Message me in game when I am finally able to log in and ill help you ascend. I can give you builds based off your prophecies and EoTN. In game name is Xunlai Storage I I I Love Thirsty River. I can also ping your bar for beating the dioppleganger based off proph skills.

If you need further help feel free to message me.