New player resources? (I'm finally putting down World of Warcraft)

[Logikiel.5276]

Hey all.

It's time for me to log out of WoW for the last time.

soo......

I'm new. I'm fresh. I'm inexperienced... I'm still currently downloading the GW2.

In the mean time, I'm just going thru youtube for some GW2 guides. Like what are the classes and all of the other content. Strikes? Fractals? Is this just harder dungeons? How does ur pvp work?
I just wanted to know if anyone has any recommended youtube channels or other resources for new players to GW2. (I wouldnt know if the videos I'm watching are dated or maybe just not good information, so i thought id make a forum post to see what help i might get.)
I've read the information on the GW2 Website for new players, but im just looking for something abit more advanced maybe?

Bonus points for WoW to GW2 references.

 

Please assist a newbie. ❤️ I'll give you back rubs. 😘

[Inculpatus cedo.9234]

The Wiki (link above) is a great resource for all things Guild Wars 2.

Welcome to Tyria and good luck. 

[Nash.2681]

Best advise I can give- don't compare GW2 to WoW and just give in to the game. Pick a class that sounds interesting and just play. The core game (and open world in general) is easy enough to not run into any trouble. Any choice (besides race and class of a character) is revertable, so don't overthink things. Once you level'd manually to 80 and started to get the basics of the games, you can still start digging deeper and gather information about the content your interested in.

€: in addition to the before mentioned Wiki (which indeed is a good ressource)- you can access ingame by typing  "/wiki [topic]" or even just type "/wiki" and then shift-click on an item to get more infos about it

Edited August 18, 2023 by Nash.2681

[bruakumfd.4817]

Since you're just starting out, I'd try to see if there's an equivalent to your WoW main. Mine was a Hunter so, I picked Ranger. If that doesn't appeal to you, you can always use the new complexity meter. I would recommend a Guardian, Warrior, Ranger, or a Necromancer since those professions have a score of one. 

Once you've made your first character, focus on learning the basic mechanics such as dodging and rallying. These are important for max-level content since it's either a low chance of being revived or being unable to while the fight's still happening.

 

[Danikat.8537]

Welcome to Tyria! 😃

I can't recommend any videos, I know there are good ones out there but I rarely use video guides and never watch streamers so I wouldn't know what to recommend.

My advice is don't look for 1:1 comparisons to WoW. On the surface many things about the game are similar, but I know that catches a lot of people out. For example GW2 has no dedicated healers, or tanks (and by extension no dedicated damage dealers). All characters always have at least a self-heal skill, all characters will do damage and tanking mechanics are relatively rare and complicated. Support mainly comes in the form of providing boons and crowd controlling enemies, as well as providing some additional healing and will often be shared between multiple members of the group, so a 'support build' might be an otherwise damaged focused one which can provide 100% up time for 1-2 useful boons. Likewise there are no dedicated ranged or melee professions, they all have both choices and it's fairly common (although not required) to have ranged and melee/close range weapons equipped so you can swap as needed during a fight.

Oh and gear isn't as important as in WoW. There's only 6 tiers: common (white), fine (blue), masterwork (green),  rare (yellow), exotic (orange) and ascended/legendary (pink/purple) and all items with the same tier and level requirement are equally good no matter where they come from, crafted level 80 exotics are just as good as ones from a random drop, or a dungeon or raid reward, so you can choose whichever source/s are best for you rather than having to go for the places that give the best items. (Also there's very little stat difference between exotic and ascended and no difference between ascended and legendary, so the higher tiers are largely optional, for people who want the absolute best or a long-term goal.) What does make a big difference is choosing the right stats for your build. You'd often be better off with lower tier/level items that have the right stats than higher tier ones with stats that are useless for you. But you don't need to worry about that until you've been playing enough to know what build/s you want to stick with.

Overall I'd say try to go into it with the mindset that this is a whole new game and you need to figure out how it works, not that it's another MMO and you need to find out what the new names are for all the things you know from WoW so you can keep doing what you did before.

Finally the community is pretty good at helping each other out so if you're ever sure about anything don't be afraid to ask, someone will know or will know where to find the answer. If someone tells you to look it up on the Wiki or another guide it's probably because it doesn't have a short answer and it will be quicker for you to read the existing info than for them to type it all out again, but the answers are there.

[kharmin.7683]

For open world, don't feel that you have to follow the storyline.  There are a lot of things happening on the maps, so just wander around, explore, join in and have fun.

[Danikat.8537]

Oh yeah, one big piece of advice: You cannot really mess anything up, so don't worry too much about making mistakes. If you want to do something go ahead and try it.

You will eventually be able to unlock all the skills and abilities a character can use and then you can swap between them freely so you don't need to worry too much about putting points into the wrong things and any character can play every part of the game. The game is also very alt-friendly so if you want to play a different profession or want to play more than one you can do that.

You can't get locked out of any part of the game or miss anything and the only part which isn't repeatable on the same character is their personal story (instanced quests from level 10-80). There are some permanent choices within the story, the main one being which Order you join at level 30, but it's a fairly minor choice and there's no right or wrong answers, just whichever one you prefer for that character. The main impact is some slight changes to the events of the story, but the overall path is the same for everyone.

[Kaltyn of Torbins Deep.294]

YouTuber Mukluk has some good info for new players.  Really, any of the YT videos for new players have good info, the newer the video the better or more current obviously, but, still good info.  WoodenPotatoes is your go to for lore, deep dives on stuff, as well as good info on eveything gw2.  Dulfy and GuildJen (sp?) have a ton of guides for various things - how to's, achievements, and JPs.

Preach Gaming also did a play through of GW2 a few months back as a WoW player coming to GW2 for the first time.  You might watch his first couple of videos as he talks about what per-conceived notions he had from WoW and where they mislead him.

gw2efficiency.com will allow you to data mine your account for info you never knew you didn't know, but is especially handy for tracking down achievements and mastery points.  FYI, Anet has disabled the API for the next week or so because of the release of SotO, and gw2efficiency pulls everything through the API.

gw2crafts.net is your home for leveling your crafting skills in the cheapest and most efficient manner.  Crafting is not required, but, may be something you want to get into later on.  Whether you want to craft or not, be sure to harvest everything at the harvesting nodes int he world - you can always sell it on the TP.

When you go to a vendor, there is a "Sell junk" button that will auto-sell trash to the vendor.  Nothing you autosell will be needed for anything.  As for equipment that drops, if you can't use it, salvage it with a salvage kit.  if you can't salvage it, sell it to a vendor.  If you can't sell it to a vendor, you have to destroy it to get it out of your inventory.  Some items, when you get to higher levels will sell on the trading post and may be worth more there than salvaging. 

Hero Points and Hero Challenges.  Just leveling a character to level 80 will give you enough hero points to completely train all of your core trait and skill lines.  Do read what you spend your points on as you level so you can allocate them towards skills that will help you earlier rather than randomly allocating them.  But never worry, you will have enough.  You can get more points by doing hero challenges to level your skills & traits faster.  The Hero Challenges in the core game give you 1 point.  Elite Specializations unlock at level 80 (and with one of the expansions).  Elite Specs require 250 hero points.  The good news is that the Hero Challenges in the expansion maps award 10 points each, and there are more than enough available.

Speaking of expansions, the expansions are a big step up in difficulty from the core game.  Don't be surprised if you have difficulties at first.

Lastly, if you have a question in game, feel free to switch to map chat and ask.  Someone will answer.  And, almost without exception, be very friendly and helpful. 

 

[Donari.5237]

For your very first profession (GW2 lingo for class), you probably do *not* want Engineer, Elementalist, or Revenant (unless you know yourself to be very quick at picking up complicated rotations).  The first two are the "piano playing" classes with multiple different skills depending on moment-to-moment stances, the third plays differently from all the other professions due to having a locked-in utility bar that you flip between two versions.  Elementalist is super squishy for beginners, too.

That isn't to say you shouldn't try them.  You get 5 slots to start (in the paid version).  If you keep one slot empty you can quickly make any profession you like in it and go to the pvp lobby to test its rotations on innocent target golems, at full level 80 everything unlocked, to get a feel for how it handles.  You might absolutely adore the risk-reward balance of Elementalist.

But whatever profession(s) you start with, general wisdom through the years has been to take your time leveling up in open pve when you start.  Explore everything, follow npcs after an event to see if they start a new one, rotate through the weapons your profession can use, get things like dodging and weapon swapping into your muscle memory.  Levels 1-80 are an extended tutorial but don't take nearly as long to go through as in WoW.  It's ok to outlevel content, you'll be scaled down to the map's level to keep things somewhat relevant (though you'll still be slightly op if you have more skills unlocked due to level than a starter map is set up for).  These forums see a lot of complaints from people that boosted or rapid-leveled to 80, don't understand the core mechanisms of the game, and suddenly find themselves in level 80 maps full of aggro.

Also, this game is incredibly alt-friendly.  Almost nothing of value is soulbound.  Achievements are account wide so you can swap to whatever character can best work on them.  Leveling is fast, decent gear is cheap, your bank is shared (pro tip:  any crafting station has a bank tab in it.  You don't have to go find a banker npc to access it.  Plus there is a little gear at the top right of your inventory.  If you click that all your crafting mats will go to the dedicated crafting storage tab in the bank and you can craft things without hauling them out of the bank. Very handy for clearing your bags as you adventure.  Also up there is a "compact bags" feature you can turn off if you don't want everything rearranged with one accidental click).  It's very easy to just keep making alts if you can buy the new character slots, and leveling gets faster the more you build up your achievements and collect writs and tomes of xp.  You can end up with multiples of every profession if you want, all 80 and well-geared in multiple builds, without breaking much of a sweat.  So there's no wrong answer to what to start with.  Do what's fun!

[Buran.3796]

11 hours ago, Logikiel.5276 said:

Strikes? Fractals? Is this just harder dungeons? How does ur pvp work?I

   Dungeons were the initial instanced content for up to 5 player groups. They have a easier story mode and 2-3 additional paths. You can start to do them at lvl 30 (Ascalon). Fractals are level 80 instanced content for up to 5 players which scales in difficulty. The first  tier (level 1 to 20-25) can be done with any equipment; after that you need ascended gear to equip resistance to agony (a condition which gradually kill your character if gets hit from some attacks). Fractals are very profitable. Raids are up to 10 players instanced content, with some encounters which end in bosses with oftenly complex mechanics. Strike missions are also instanced content for up to 10 players, but usually involving a single boss fight.

   PvP has unranked matches (in which you can play in conformed teams with up to 5 partners) ranked matches and automated tournaments. Every 3 months you have a ranked Conquest season (Conquest is the main game mode, 5 vs 5 with control points and specific mechanics in each map) and betwen then ranked mini-seasons in 2 v 2 and 3 v 3 arenas. Automayted tournaments happens every few hours. Scoring at that earns you progressioin to weekly and monthly ATs.

   The most important thing in GW2 PvP is that all the gear is normalized and every character has automatically level 80 and all skills unlocked at it. So skill is the main filter. Also, the toxiticy is only 3.6 roentgens... 

[Irastira.8643]

Hello. I have played GW2 on and off since 2014.  Welcome to Time-Gate hell.

The game prides itself on Subversion of Expectation of Speculation.  What does that mean?  Well, when you think Warrior, You probably think of the Big guy, Probably has a Big sword, or like a giga-shield.  Maybe hes all beat up.  Yeah, in GW2, the warrior is a dedicated support class.

If you just want to Win, play Mesmer.  If you like Group Content, play Guardian.  If you want to be like Mid at everything and Situationally amazing depending on the task, play Ranger.  If you want to hate yourself play Thief or Warrior.

Just remember Cloth classes (Mesmer, Necromancer, and Elementalist) Do everything. (Literally everything. Tank, heal, DPS, Support, WvW, SPvP, Fractal, Raid.. Literally EVERYTHING.)

Plate Classes (Warrior, Guardian, and Revenant) Do Nothing.  (on their own)

And Leather Classes are typically just mid.  not great, not terrible.  honestly though, Just play a clothie. You will have infinitely more fun playing this game as a clothie.

Don't even worry about PvP.  Its so bad.  Like, if you think WoW PvP is Bad, Oh, you havn't see ANYTHING.  Gear based combat is a blessing compared to the mental butthole tumor that is GW2 PvP.  If you're not playing the META, you lose. End of story.

World vs World, Which is Gear-Based content is pretty much dead.

Raids are also pretty much dead. Not that it matters, If you geared and tried to enter a raid you would have been told "Gotta have the achievement to participate." Typical Community gate keeping that happens in every MMO.

If I had to recommend a few Youtubers Uhh.... MightyTeapot / Mukluk. 

Might Teapot has a playlist on Youtube I think its called "Zero to Hero"  I highly recommend starting there.

[Zyreva.1078]

10 hours ago, Irastira.8643 said:

Don't even worry about PvP.  Its so bad.  Like, if you think WoW PvP is Bad, Oh, you havn't see ANYTHING.  Gear based combat is a blessing compared to the mental butthole tumor that is GW2 PvP.  If you're not playing the META, you lose. End of story.

sPvP suffers from low population and resulting bad matchmaking, but as long someone doesn't take it too seriously it can still be enjoyable for those who like PvP combat. It is also the best way for new players to learn PvP combat, even if they might prefer WvW in the end. So i would definitely recommend checking it out for everyone who likes PvP, just don't expect a highly competitive "e-sports" like enviroment.

Also, build-wise, pretty much everything works in ranked/unranked, as long it's a build that makes somewhat sense. Chances are very high YOU didn't lose because you weren't playing meta builds.

10 hours ago, Irastira.8643 said:

World vs World, Which is Gear-Based content is pretty much dead.

And that's a straight lie. The WvW population might not be able to compete with PvE players numbers wise (luckily - otherwise queues and lag would be unbearable), but it still has a very active and stable population with lot's of action to be had on pretty much every server (during night/morning it can get a bit quiet, especially on EU servers i guess, but that's just the nature of a 24/7 game mode).

And while WvW uses PvE gear and it is recommendet to get at least full lvl 80 exotics in order to be competitive, the lack of "gear threadmill" in gw2 means, combat is usually not about who has the better gear, so i wouldn't label it "gear-based".

For those who like some sort of "open-world" PvP that offers pretty much everything from duels and 1vX to huge (organised and unorganised) 3-way battles and sieges with over 100 players participating, WvW might very well be the best option there is. It has it's flaws for sure, but i have yet to find a better alternative.

10 hours ago, Irastira.8643 said:

Might Teapot has a playlist on Youtube I think its called "Zero to Hero"  I highly recommend starting there.

It would not recommend "Zero to Hero" for new players, because it's all about rushing to "end game" as fast as possible, while not actually teaching a whole lot about basics (also potential story spoilers!). Might be ok for some new players, but certainly not all.

Teapot has a bunch of very good guides about basic game mechanics tho, which are recommendable for pretty much everyone who wants to learn the game. The playlist for those interested: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VNYIml3uCcM&list=PLb0ISfn3umyNs53eInJmsrcgq8FS3ROTy&pp=iAQB (just skip to whichever topic you are interested in, each video has time stamps). A few details might be outdated, but most of the information is still relevant.

Edit: Also the class balance rant above is complete nonsense. Classes might not always play out exactly as someone might expect (if you want to pew pew at enemies from long distance as ranger, or cast long range fireballs and meteors as ele, you might get disappointed once it comes to endgame, but warrior can very well smash things and is certainly not a "dedicated support class".

Edited August 19, 2023 by Zyreva.1078

[Irastira.8643]

5 hours ago, Zyreva.1078 said:

sPvP suffers from low population and resulting bad matchmaking, but as long someone doesn't take it too seriously it can still be enjoyable for those who like PvP combat. It is also the best way for new players to learn PvP combat, even if they might prefer WvW in the end. So i would definitely recommend checking it out for everyone who likes PvP, just don't expect a highly competitive "e-sports" like enviroment.

Also, build-wise, pretty much everything works in ranked/unranked, as long it's a build that makes somewhat sense. Chances are very high YOU didn't lose because you weren't playing meta builds.

And that's a straight lie. The WvW population might not be able to compete with PvE players numbers wise (luckily - otherwise queues and lag would be unbearable), but it still has a very active and stable population with lot's of action to be had on pretty much every server (during night/morning it can get a bit quiet, especially on EU servers i guess, but that's just the nature of a 24/7 game mode).

And while WvW uses PvE gear and it is recommendet to get at least full lvl 80 exotics in order to be competitive, the lack of "gear threadmill" in gw2 means, combat is usually not about who has the better gear, so i wouldn't label it "gear-based".

For those who like some sort of "open-world" PvP that offers pretty much everything from duels and 1vX to huge (organised and unorganised) 3-way battles and sieges with over 100 players participating, WvW might very well be the best option there is. It has it's flaws for sure, but i have yet to find a better alternative.

It would not recommend "Zero to Hero" for new players, because it's all about rushing to "end game" as fast as possible, while not actually teaching a whole lot about basics (also potential story spoilers!). Might be ok for some new players, but certainly not all.

Teapot has a bunch of very good guides about basic game mechanics tho, which are recommendable for pretty much everyone who wants to learn the game. The playlist for those interested: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VNYIml3uCcM&list=PLb0ISfn3umyNs53eInJmsrcgq8FS3ROTy&pp=iAQB (just skip to whichever topic you are interested in, each video has time stamps). A few details might be outdated, but most of the information is still relevant.

Edit: Also the class balance rant above is complete nonsense. Classes might not always play out exactly as someone might expect (if you want to pew pew at enemies from long distance as ranger, or cast long range fireballs and meteors as ele, you might get disappointed once it comes to endgame, but warrior can very well smash things and is certainly not a "dedicated support class".

SPvP suffers from low Population, because its terrible.  No one wants to be one shot on a 2 second CD. Even if you heal/cleanse, It won't matter. because they're just going to burst you again a second or two later.

I have been trying to find a decent group to do WvW in for the last like 8 months. I havn't even seen one commander.  So, It very much is dead.  I mean, You'll still see people running in like groups of 5. But its a game mode intended to be played in Groups of 40 or more.  2 friends and 3 unassiciated players does not equal 40 players.  I have also been trying to find a WvW guild, But they don't seem to exist ether.

I mean, They probably bought the expantion packs.  If they did they have a free 80 boost.  They might not have gotten EoD, but That series will help them set their account up so they are not making 5 gold for 5 hours of attempted farming.

[Player.2475]

For your first week or two, don't worry about min-maxing or end-game content. Just do whatever you want on your way to level 80.  In essence, just going around the world, doing stuff, exploring more areas, abilities, content and collectibles is more or less the essence of GW2 and you'll always find more stuff to do even when you have every skill and area unlocked.

I wouldn't recommend crafting when you're levelling up, because you can pretty much get all the green equipment you need for very cheap off the trading post. You don't need yellow, orange or better gear till you hit max level. If you want to do dungeons, keep in mind it's hard to get a group for dungeons since there's better content in the game, but they are ok gold and decent unlocks for later. You don't need amazing gear for them, either.

Once you're max level on your first character, you will need gear that will last you for a while. I recommend going for a direct damage build with berserker' gear ( power, precision, ferocity). If you look for 'Named armor' on the official wiki, you will find names very cheap equipment sets sold on the trading post, so you can gear up your character with orange gear for just a couple gold. Damage over time and healing builds are a lot more expensive, to the point that you might as well skip the orange stuff and go straight for ascendeds.

Then, start on unlocking skill points to spend on class specializations and unlocking masteries in the expansions. If you want easier skill unlocks and mounts, skip HoT and do PoF first. If you like the story, progress chronologically, but keep in mind that HoT is much harder and doesn't provide as much utility.

For gold and gearing to the next tier: Open world metas in the expansions, especially Auric Basin and Tangled Depths, can supply you with a decent amount of gold daily. If you have EoD, you can also try to fish for money. There's a lot of different methods for making gold, and you can find them everywhere, but you basically get some gold for just about everything. Since you'll spend a lot of time just exploring, doing events and unlocking mastery points, you should pick up a decent amount of gold along the way.

For traditional "end-game" content: Once you've fully unlocked your specialization and have full orange gear, you can try to join a guild and learn how to do raids and T1 fractals. You can rarely get some ascended equipment this way, but by the time you're done with unlocking masteries, you should have enough gold to max crafting (there's websites that show you how to do it the cheapest) and start crafting your own ascended weapons and armor.  The accessories will come from doing fractals, but you can always unlock some Living World 3 and 4 chapters to make it easier and faster. If you do that, the chapters that unlock Bitterfrost Frontier and Dragonfall would be my top picks.

Your end goal should be getting fully ascended gear so you start doing T4 fractal dailies, which are some of the best gold per time investment in the game. After that... well, it's just a matter of figuring out what you want to do.

Edited August 19, 2023 by Player.2475

[Player.2475]

1 hour ago, Irastira.8643 said:

I have been trying to find a decent group to do WvW in for the last like 8 months. I havn't even seen one commander.  So, It very much is dead.  I mean, You'll still see people running in like groups of 5. But its a game mode intended to be played in Groups of 40 or more.  2 friends and 3 unassiciated players does not equal 40 players.  I have also been trying to find a WvW guild, But they don't seem to exist ether.

WvW strongly depends on the server you're on. Server population in the selection screen is determined by their active WvW population. I'm on a server that has 50+ person queues on half of the maps from Friday to Sunday, and almost nothing the rest of the time, so we're only "Very High"

[Logikiel.5276]

Thank you to everyone for the responses and information!
I have saved many of the links, the use of the wiki while in game has been a great information source, and I've found a few content creators who do a great job of laying out how some professions play.
There are some mechanics that every MMORPG share, so when I say I was looking for some WoW to GW2 convert, it was purely just to help me get seated quickly.

Again, thank you very much for the nice community response to someone new. The responses were meaty and I appreciate the time everyone spent on sharing.
 

I also felt I might just post a follow up on how far I've gotten over the last 2 days with the information everyone has provided and maybe my newbie feedback will help someone else new.

-PvP...
Currently, I am making all the classes. I figured out I can just go to the PvP area and then have full access to the potential of the professions at level 80. This was very nice, because it doesn't time-gate me in possibly not enjoying the level 80 version of my choice. I am also a firm believer that one way of learning to play your class is to play against others. So the fact I can do this right off the bat... Absolute W.

For my expectations and wants from PvP; It seems like a good mixed bag. I'm not looking for the hyper meta competitive E-sports scene anymore. I've gotten older now since my highschool days, I feel abit slower. Not to mention I felt very confused when I fought my first Mesmer. It was the most confusing a$$ kicking I've gotten in a while.

I've also had someone very salty in one of games blame the team and myself for the loss, but its okay, i responded to him with "Mate, we losing because you specialized in downstate." It went over very well and the rest of our chats were wholesome. (it's the best joke i could establish so soon and seemed funny to me)

PvP seems abit easier when I play something with alot more AoE focus abilities. Because jumping into the fray and trying to make sure I am hitting the enemy is abit of a skill issue atm.

-Story...  
It's good. I've been making the classes on different races to experience the start of everyone's story. Some of the stories I don't really feel invested in, but its very impressive the amount of lines that have been voice acted. Big W.

-Gameplay...
It's really really reallyyyyy cool, that everyone holds different attack skills with a 2handed sword or gun. I can play a ranger, but be melee. Or play a basic ele and stick to range. I like the flexibility.

-Meta main...
I... am very much a meta goblin. I got very use to just playing what's the best for what situation because the end goal was winning anything else was a loss; and there was a guild of us, so we all were motivating for each other to deliver the best class for the raid slot.
I have a few fond memories in WoW, but the one thing I eventually lost was character identity and friends along the way. I didn't really feel attached to any characters.

I mention all this because I played all the classes first, before i started looking at all the GW2 meta builds. Some of the top builds just dont appeal to me because i didn't really enjoy the class fantasy. And... its totally okay that i wont play it, its a fresh breeze on the brain that i can actually just play what i want to play. Swap a weapon or a few skills because of a boss fight maybe, but all in all, no wrong choice. So for everyone that said, your profession class doesnt matter, play what you want. Thats a solid bit of information. I can actually just play what i enjoy, which is kinda strange, because I strayed away from that at some point in my life.

 

All in all, GW2 is a good game. I just need to find a guild, get into a discord and make some gamer friends now. I know the game is very much alt friendly, but I will be trying to stick with only 1. I haven't bought the expansions yet. I'll wait till after I'm level 80 or something.

Anyway, that's the end of this post. I'm gonna log in now and play because I'm really enjoying it with Engineer at the moment.