A post to the new players (read, informative)

[ZachDude]

What is guild wars?
Guild Wars is a global online roleplaying game. Players can engage in cooperative group combat, in single player adventures, or in large head-to-head guild battles. Guild Wars is a mission-based game set in a stunning 3D fantasy world that offers excellent support for guilds. Because the team that developed Guild Wars had experience creating successful online game series such as Warcraft, StarCraft and Diablo, the members used their familiarity with the complex issues surrounding online games to create a game that is both easy to learn and compelling to play long term, and yet does not require players to spend hundreds of hours slogging through the preparation just to get to the fun bits.<-best thing about this game IMO

Character Professions(Classes):
Assassin(Factions Only)
Dervish(Nightfall Only)
Elementalist(All)
Mesmer(All)
Monk(All)
Necromancer(All)
Paragon(Nightfall Only)
Ranger(All)
Ritualist(Factions Only)
Warrior(All)

Secondary Professions:
Your secondary profession provides your hero with a second set of attributes and skills to compliment the first. (Your secondary profession does not have access to the primary attribute for that profession.)

Skills:
GW adds a little bit of strategy to the mix. In GW you can only have 8 skills equipped at one time.

Skill Builds:
A skill build is a set of skills and stats that users have made for PvP or PvE. Very useful website below:
http://pvx.wikia.com/wiki/Main_Page
A site where you can put your own builds together:
http://gw.gamependium.com/

Guides/Tips/Quest Help/Items:(pretty much anything you could possibly wanna know)
Official Wiki - http://wiki.guildwars.com
Wikia Wiki - http://guildwars.wikia.com


Trading:
You can trade your items in game like most other games. Just be weary of some players. Pay close attention to what your getting.

Auction Sites:
You can post and sell your in-game items for in-game currency on the following:
Guild Wars Guru Auction Site
GWAuctions.org

Ventari's Corner

* If you would like something added PM it to me. Thanks.

[spyrochaete]

Originally Posted by ZachDude

does not require players to spend hundreds of hours slogging through the preparation just to get to the fun bits.<-best thing about this game IMO

Very well said!

I love Guild Wars because it's so combat-centric. In so many games I put up with boring crap to get to that little bit of good stuff that I love, but in Guild Wars they cut out all the crap.

[Smitty]

good stuff, very helpfull

[ZachDude]

Originally Posted by spyrochaete

Very well said!

I love Guild Wars because it's so combat-centric. In so many games I put up with boring crap to get to that little bit of good stuff that I love, but in Guild Wars they cut out all the crap.

Very well said because it's taken from GuildWars.com.... lol Thanks though :P

Might be good to add http://wiki.guildwars.com/ and http://guildwars.wikia.com/ as well. Good references for lore and some strategy/PvE walkthroughs.

[Smart_Bomb]

Originally Posted by ZachDude

Auction Sites:
You can post and sell your in-game items for in-game currency on the following:
Guild Wars Guru Auction Site
GWAuctions.org

For auctions in Guild Wars I usually just use some of the forums in Ventari's Corner.

[ZachDude]

Originally Posted by Lunarbunny

Might be good to add http://wiki.guildwars.com/ and http://guildwars.wikia.com/ as well. Good references for lore and some strategy/PvE walkthroughs.

Originally Posted by Smart_Bomb

For auctions in Guild Wars I usually just use some of the forums in Ventari's Corner.

Added. I don't know why I didn't add the wiki in the first place. Guess I had a brain fart.

I forgot to mention that http://gw.gamependium.com/ (specifically http://gw.gamependium.com/tools/builds/generate/) is an awesome place to try to throw builds together (although I admit half the time I end up throwing away a build after getting 5 skills together because I saw another skill that I wanted to use instead).

[ZachDude]

Originally Posted by Lunarbunny

I forgot to mention that http://gw.gamependium.com/ (specifically http://gw.gamependium.com/tools/builds/generate/) is an awesome place to try to throw builds together (although I admit half the time I end up throwing away a build after getting 5 skills together because I saw another skill that I wanted to use instead).

Also added, thanks for Sticky whomever.

[Gentle]

Regarding the official Guild Wars Wiki website...

If you type (no quotes) "/wiki SUBJECT" (with SUBJECT being what you want to know about) in the game, your browser will open to the Guild Wars Wiki website and if found, display information about that subject.

For example...

If you wanted information regarding Nicholas the Traveler, you would type...

/wiki Nicholas the Traveler

Gentle

You should probably write some more about how the game works, like how instanced areas, dungeons, campaigns, quests, towns, elite areas, and PvP works.

[Gentle]

I would appreciate a description of what adding this game (non-Steam) to Steam would give you.

Gentle

With the boxed or NCSoft store version of the game, users can launch Guild Wars with the "-image" switch, which will pre-download all game data. (This can take several hours, depending on network speed)

Is there a way for this to be done with the Steam purchased version?

Edit: Had an idea right after clicking "Post"! Yes, You can.
go to C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\steamapps\common\guild wars
and create a shortcut to "GW.exe" and append "-image" to the "Target" so it looks like:
"C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\steamapps\common\guild wars\GW.exe" -image

Of course change the directory path to match your install.

Note: I do not know if this will cause issues with Steam. Will edit once I know if this is 'safe' or not.

[raken]

Steam version -image:

Right click Guild Wars in Steam Library, click properties. Under General tab, click set launch options. Type -image in the box provided.

Start Guild Wars, it will DL all files, and close. Remove -image from lauch options to play the game.

AeSix's method should work, I just wanted everyone to know that Steam provides a pretty straightforward way to add and remove switches to games.

[guildwars111]

the above links are quite dead/outdated: pvx, wikia, pendium, and gwauctions are all dead. replace pvx with gwpvx, wikia with wiki.org, and remove pendium (it doesn't even update the skills anymore) and gwauctions (guru auctions are more commonly used).