What should I be doing at level 80

[MissPond.3278]

I've been playing Guild Wars 2 for many years, and it took me a long time to will a character to level 80. I have a level 80 Scrapper and now I'm not sure what I'm supposed to be doing. I don't really know where to get better gear, where to find people for dungeons or what dungeons I'm supposed to do. I doubt I'm geared/optimized enough for fractals. I don't understand how to use the mystic forge to my advantage, how to make gold, or what to do with this mountain of karma I've accumulated over 5 years. Are there any tips you guys have for an aimless level 80, or do you know of any good guides for endgame? I have a full bank and I don't know what items are actually super useful and what items can be tossed. I mostly go around the world collecting gear points to fill out my scrapper wheel.

[Blocki.4931]

Now that you're 80 the entire world is open to you. I take that you haven't played the HoT or PoF stories yet, since you can't start them before level 80. That would be a good point to start, no?

Besides that your first step should be getting into gear that is level appropriate. Everything for level 80, be it rares or exotics. Watch for the right stat combination, which is mostly Berserker (Power Precision Ferocity) then throw yourself on one of the new maps you have access to now. You will die. A lot. But it's the good kind of dying, at least for the most part. You'll eventually adapt and get through the content. Once you're done with all of that you should have a better idea.

[Danikat.8537]

What equipment do you have now? Chances are it's good enough for at least some of the things you want to do, but it's difficult to give you advice on improving it when we have no idea what you've already got.

As for what content to play, the way I think about it is that at level 80 GW2 becomes almost free-roaming. There's very little you have to do but lots of things you can do and it's entirely up to you which parts you play and in what order. Here's a short list of some of the options available to you:

• Map Completion - you'll already have done some of this of course, but if you enjoy it you can carry on.
• Finish your Personal Story and play the expansion and living world stories.
• Do dungeons.
• Do Fractals.
• Find achievements which interest you and complete them.
• Find skins and items you like and start collecting them.
• Play World vs World.
• Play Structured Player vs. Player.
• Play through some of the big meta-events in open-world maps and maybe farm them for gold if you like them.
• Probably other things I've forgotten.

If you want to find a group for Dungeons (or anything else) the best way is to use the Looking For Group tool. It has sections for each dungeon and for pretty much everything else in the game. Be aware it's not automated - it won't dump you into a group just because you've selected a dungeon, you need to pick one from the list to join, or if you don't see a suitable one put up your own advert. If it's your first time doing that it's probably a good idea to say so in the group message so people know not to expect you to know where to go and what to do all the time. (Don't worry, most people in this game are pretty friendly and willing to help, or they'll be new too and you can figure it out together.)

Alternatively you can always ask your guild to help with whatever you're doing, or just to come along and figure it out with you.

As for Fractals, yes it does get to be harder than normal dungeons and will eventually need ascended equipment. But at first you don't need to worry about any of that - it's just short little mini dungeons and you don't need any special equipment. Exotic equipment with matching stats is preferable and what people will assume you're using but it can be done in lower tier equipment too.

I wouldn't really worry about the Mystic Forge. It's good for making certain items (there's some which only come from there, but you don't need them, they're just fancy skins), otherwise it's just a dumping group for equipment you can't get rid of another way.

Finally karma has a lot of uses. Depending on what equipment you've got currently one good use might be getting a set of exotic armour from the Temples in Orr. You can also use it to unlock unique skins, crafting recipes, buy crafting materials, and a whole load of other things. I wouldn't be in a rush to get rid of it all because it can come in useful, but don't worry too much about saving it either because you'll always get more.

[Dayra.7405]

You needed 5 years to get lvl 80? Whow, that’s most likely world-record!

[Jwake.7013]

Guild Wars is a very hands off kinda game. You have to figure it out for yourself mostly on what you have fun doing. There's collections to go for, achievement point hunting. Spvp, WvW, Story, raids and fractals as well as just general pve open goodness. I'd say dip your toe into as many as you can and find out for yourself what's fun for you.

There are always guides on youtube and such for gold farming. Honestly there's tons of ways to make good gold. The Silverwates, Istans map metas, t4 fractals, raids, rich nodes and flax farming. spvp during seasons. TP flipping. HoT meta's are still decent if you jump in about 10-15m before each one starts and just cycle through them.

There also several website if your wondering about meta gearing for your class. Also the forum sections on them can be quite helpful if you want to check them out and have any questions. As far as getting people together for dungeons or fractals, there is always lfg (though I do understand how hit or miss that can be getting a good group from) I'd say find a guild that is active and welcomes new/returning players that might not know the ins and outs of those things. The forum recruit section is a decent place to start also you have big guilds advertise in game chat all the time.

You talked about getting better gear as well. Most of the time it'll be easier to crafting armor and weapons. Some collections do give pieces as rewards as well as living world season 3 and 4 maps you can mix and match of ascended trinkets/rings/amulets from vendors for that map currency. If your in exotic gear already, that really is plenty good and can really do everything but fractals above lvl 20 cause you need AR after that (which you have to slot into ascended gear).

Also remember '/wiki' is your friend. If you have a question on if something is worth to keep. If it'll be useful for later and so on. Just wiki it, will explain what it is, what it's for and if it's tied to anything else you might need/want to use it for later.

[starlinvf.1358]

This reminds me of the Warcraft South park episode.

"What do we now?""What do mean? Now we can play the game"

[Redfeather.6401]

@"starlinvf.1358" said:This reminds me of the Warcraft South park episode.

"What do we now?""What do mean? Now we can play the game"

It was a funny parody of humanity. Trudging through something they didn't want to do something they did want. But in the end they don't know what they want.

[Zet.9130]

What should you be doing at level 80? Very simple answer - using your credit card to buy things at the Gem Store. Keys are on sale - embrace the RNG!

[Steve The Cynic.3217]

@Dayra.7405 said:You needed 5 years to get lvl 80? Whow, that’s most likely world-record!

The first 80 I ever saw in GW2 was about 200 hours (about eight and half days) after the game opened. He had, apparently, played the game for 100 of those 200 hours.

[ProtoGunner.4953]

Wait what? you played 5 years and now you have your first level 80 character and you don't know anything about the game? There there is a Wiki, there are tons of youtube videos. Why are people so unresourceful these days?

[Danikat.8537]

Hey some people play games slowly. It took me 7 months and well over 100 hours of actual gameplay to get my first GW2 character to level 80 and for me that was quite fast. It took me 4 years to get my main Elder Scrolls Online character to level 50, which is supposed to be comparable to getting to 80 in GW2.

The reason for both is fairly simple - I wasn't playing every day and only for a couple of hours on days when I was playing (obviously I played GW2 more than ESO), and when I do I play slowly. I like to take my time and look around, I get distracted gathering crafting materials (yes it gives XP but not as much as events), I like to speak to all the NPCs and read their dialogue and I have lots of characters. By the time I got my first GW2 character to level 80 I had 4 others and a spare slot to make random temporary characters to try things out, I had 6 alts and a mule in ESO before I got 1 to level 50.

On top of that because everything gives XP and so much stuff is repeatable you could quite easily get to level 80 having never done anything except map completion. If you really wanted to you could get to level 80 without leaving your starter map. (And for a real extreme I think one guy got to level 80 in the 'tutorial' instance, without using Tomes. But I think they've since nerfed the XP you get there.)

But in spite of that I think the reason we see these "what should I do at 80 topics?" come up frequently is more to do with the difference between GW2 and other MMOs. Look at the OPs post again - they mention dungeons, Fractals, using the Mystic Forge, getting new gear etc. It's not that they don't know what there is to do - it's this fixation on what you're "supposed" to do. In a lot of games there is a big difference between levelling content and 'end game' content. Once you reach the max level you're pretty much done with everything you've been doing up to that point (at least in terms of making your character more powerful) and if you want to keep progressing you have to move on to a new set of previously inaccessible activities, often in a clear order: you do dungeon A until you have enough dungeon gear to pass the gear check for dungeon B, then you do that until you move on to dungeon C...until you're ready for raid A, then raid B....and so on. So you need to know the intended order - which dungeon do you do first and what gear do you have to have to start it?

GW2 isn't like that, but sometimes that's not clear, especially if you're used to that mindset from other games. Even if you know that there isn't a set order and you can do things however you want there's often a feeling (and I know I get this too with other things) that there must be a 'best' order and you'd like to know what it is, even if you decide to deviate from it.

[Klowdy.3126]

Use your laurels to purchase some accessories, too. I've had enough from login rewards to get a few sets. If you have top tier accessories, mixed with exotic gear, you really aren't missing out on that much stat-wise.

[starlinvf.1358]

You could jump straight to the inevitable "I need something to do" list, and start work on collecting every legendary weapon, making one character for each class, and get each of them a set of legendary armor. That should keep you busy for at least a year and a half, even if you completely maximize all the time gated stuff.

[Plautze.6290]

Congratulations, your actual game just started =)

On a more serious note, what @Danikat.8537 said.