Token Female Gamer

Guild Wars 2 has proven to be a rather difficult game to get acquainted with. It has not really felt intuitive nor has information seem very accessible. Leveling in particular caused me quite a bit of confusion as I consistently found myself under leveled for the only quests I hadn’t completed. Turns out that there are far more ways to get experience in GW2 then simply questing, and the game really expects players to utilize all avenues of experience mining.

Here are some tips that really helped me with leveling.

Map Progress

-Completing the map
In each zone there are five different types of markers that the map keeps track of. Each successfully completed or revealed marker gives a good portion of experience, but you get even more experience and loot rewards if you complete an entire zone.

Reward for completing the zone

The five different markers are: waypoints, points of interest, skill points, vistas, and heart quests. Waypoints and points of interest require you only to walk near them to receive credit. Skill points and heart quests usually involve some sort of combat or skill based challenge. Vistas on the other hand are mostly jumping puzzles.

-Help out
See someone else fighting a monster? Help them out! Contribute to as many battles as you can, because everyone gets experience and loot. There is no kill stealing or ninja looting in this game, so go wild. But be warned, you will have to do a bit more then just hit every target once.

Event marked on the map

-Events
Each zone has its own special events, which are considered group activities. Do these! Really, even if an event doesn’t succeed you get rewarded with experience. If you find a particular one you like, note it, because the events will always occur in the same place.

Gathering tools location in Hero screen

-Gathering
There are three different types of gathering node scattered around the world of GW2, plants, trees, and mines. Each of these will yield a huge amount of experience; I highly suggest that everyone start gathering as early as possible.

But to be able to gather you need to have the corresponding tool equipped in your Hero screen. Plants need the sickle, trees need the ax, and mines need a mining pick. These can be found at almost every merchant in the game, so save up and go buy these right away.

Merchant has gathering tools for sale

A few things to note are that the gathering tools have a limited use value. If you find yourself not being able to gather something, it’s probably because your tool ran out. Also each node is instanced just for you. Lastly, to keep your inventory from getting cluttered up with gathered items, use the gear menu in your inventory to ‘deposit all collectables’ into your bank at any time.

-Crafting
The follow up to gathering is then using those materials. Though I haven’t crafted anything yet, I am assured that crafting is yet another great means of gaining experience.

Daily achievement progress

-Daily achievements
Like most games these days, GW2 has a plethora of achievements. It’s the daily achievements that will help with leveling. They are fairly easy to complete and are a great way to get bonus experience and currency.

-Other lower level areas
Because the game will adjust a characters level down to be appropriate for the difficulty (or ease) of the zone, its really quite possible to gain a lot of experience by going to other low level areas and exploring there.

I have done this a few times now as I seem to explore faster then I level (must be because I’m not crafting. =P). Around level 14 I traveled to the Char starting area. Though it was a bit easier, due to my higher equipment, it was no cakewalk and I gained quite a few levels this way.

Other areas can be reached via the Asura Gates found in everyone’s main towns.

Still having trouble? Here are a few more things to think about. Make sure to spend all your skill points. This really makes a difference and it’s really easy to respec your skills at any point, so don’t be shy. Also upgrade your equipment. Each of the heart quest givers is a vendor who sells very decent equipment for upgrading.

Final note, I’m not adding World vs World or PvP in here because I haven’t tried either and I don’t really know much about them.

Happy leveling. =D

Tags: guide, guild wars 2, levels, loot, medieval, mmog, online

This entry was posted on Thursday, September 20th, 2012 at 10:02 am and is filed under Articles, Computer Games. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.