@mmorpg:
Honestly, make a bunch of classes and just go straight to PvP.
That way you'll understand how the classes work as you'll have most of your skills unlocked.
You don't have to even fight people, you can just mess around with the training dummies or the sparring NPCs in Heart of the Mists.
New accounts might need to get to lv 17 (not sure on level, but it's around that) to unlock PvP, but that shouldn't take you much longer than 3 or 4 hours at most.

Warrior is a pretty safe bet if you want an easy class to play IMO.
I'm a Guardian main myself.

And for all the new players, server won't matter unless you intend to WvW,
I would recommend picking between Blackgate, Jade Quarry, Tarnished Coast, Fort Aspenwood or Dragonbrand if you want a big WvW population. (I'm not familiar with EU servers so I can't say)

I'm mainly a WvW/GvG player, so if any NA players want to ask about the state of the servers or just general question about WvW feel free to send me a PM.

What class should I play?

[quote=mmorpg]What server are you guys playing in? I'm downloading the client right now.[/quote]

JADE QUARRY

Another fun thing about the game is that the dialogue with NPCs changes depending on your race/profession. It really was a nice touch.

@mmorpg i'm going to redownload the client latter. I can't remember what server I was on, but honestly it doesn't matter to much since you can party with people and join maps with them from across servers.

What server are you guys playing in? I'm downloading the client right now.

[quote=UchihaNight]Before I throw 15 bucks into this game... any good reviews from people on Basil?[/quote]

I played around release and about a few months afterwards on and off.
I've kept up with it a little bit here and there since then.

The classes are pretty balanced. They have their pros and cons.
Every class has different weapons they can use which alters their main attacking skills.
Builds can very a lot between player-to-player, even people playing the same profession.
Combat is action based meaning you can't really stand around in one spot and spam skills. You have to move around/roll around a bit.
The only real part of the game where combat is lackluster is underwater combat.

Despite what the community says at times, a lot of builds are viable in different situations. (For a while, it was popular for the community to rag on Rangers, the "pet class" due to them being weak and having poor pet AI, but the people that actually played Rangers knew they had tons of potential.)

There are no quests, besides your main Storyline which is pretty much entirely optional if you don't want to do it.
The game puts a huge emphasis on exploring, and the maps are so huge that you definitely will not come close to seeing the entire game by the time you reach level 80.
You earn experience by completing "Hearts" which are little areas that give you different tasks you can do such as interacting with objects or slaying monsters.
You can also just earn experience from exploring.

WvW and sPVP are the two types of PVP.
WvW consists of open-world style maps and is basically one giant game of capture the flag between different servers. (At least, last I played it.)
sPVP is more like arena-style play.

Speaking of servers, your account is tied to a server, but from what I recall servers are merged into different maps to populate them, so the game never feels empty.
(At least I think it was something along the lines of that.)

The game is not really anywhere close to pay-to-win.
Items that can be bought with real money are mostly cosmetic except for mining/gathering tools that provide tiny bonuses.

If you're big into customization, there's a wardrobe system which allows you to apply the skin of an armor you like to the stats of current armor you're wearing.
You can also unlock dyes to change the color scheme of your equipment.

Anyway, there's a lot more to it than that. If you are big into lore and exploration then this honestly the best game you could dream of.

[quote=xYougurtcupx]should I buy heroic or deluxe?
i dont think delux is worth the extra $5 for some other ingame items, thoughts?[/quote]
I bought the $10 one. Here's a post I found:

This was copied and pasted this from a Reddit thread. Because like you I am weighing out the same thing. Hope this helps.

The only difference between Heroic and Deluxe Editions are:

Summon Mistfire Wolf Elite Skill:
I don't own it, but never heard any praise about it. The empty spot among your Elite skills may annoy you, but you aren't really missing out on anything. The Wolf is weak, sadly.

Mini Rytlock:
A mini pet follows you around basically, does nothing. Rytlock looks kinda cool, but there are many more awesome minis.

Golem Banker:
This is a personal golem you can summon, that acts like your bank for 2 weeks after using it. Slight conveniece, though I don't think you would be using the bank a lot in the first few weeks. Currently useful only in key farming, it saves you a minute or two per run at most.

Chalice of Glory:
I think they removed it by now. Spvp had a currency from launch called glory, which you could use to buy pvp stuff. They've been slowly removing glory from the game and this is kinda worthless, if it still exists.

Tome of Influence:
Grants the guild you are representing 1k of influence, which is a currency a guild can use to upgrade the guild. You can buy the same amount for 2g I believe, which is pocket change. Useful at launch when there wasn't much gold and much influence, not really important today. Could use it for your personal guild, that would act like a bank.

should I buy heroic or deluxe?
i dont think delux is worth the extra $5 for some other ingame items, thoughts?

Fun game to play with friends. and the best Mmo imo.

@jordand817: Sweet. (: I might actually try and get it. Aw that sucks. I know exactly whats that like, but it happens.

@zomgitbeandy:

All classes are somewhat viable in PvE, necromancers are viable but not optimal there.

WvW has two main types of fighting, small scale (usually 5-10 on each side) and 'zerg' fights (15+, can get up to 50+ per side)
In larger fights, Guardians, Warriors, Elementalists and Necros are the most used classes.
Mesmers, Rangers, Thieves and Engineers are more useful in small scale, but can be useful in bigger fights by picking off enemy backline.

In SPvP all classes are viable one way or another, though bunker guardian is a bit out of meta right now.

@ShiroNoYami: your wording implies theres a hint of p2w in another context. or am i just overanalyzing? LOL. also are there any really bad classes or are they all relatively good in their own ways?

Not to mention that ascended and legendary stuff isn't that much of an improvement over exotics and not really necessary for most content.
Ascended weapons are nice to have I suppose, and it'll cost you maybe 100g to craft one?

[quote=zomgitbeandy]@SilentXynh Is the game pay to win? I'm too poor to buy more stuff for gw2 on top of the starting fee tbh. also how's community?[/quote]
Just about everything outside of ascended and legendary gear is relatively easy to obtain so if you're talking about P2W in that regard, no. The community is there but if you're going to blaze through the store quests by yourself it'll be relatively lonely since it's all instanced.

@SilentXynh Is the game pay to win? I'm too poor to buy more stuff for gw2 on top of the starting fee tbh. also how's community?

[quote=Hydraxide]All my friends rave about it, their only issue is you get all your skills super early, like MS pizza slice style, so you don't have to play through the class to get your skills. Think of it like being a 4th job class at level 10. You might get bored pretty quickly.[/quote]

Skills you unlock fairly early on, but traits you don't really get to play around with properly until 80.
Mesmers especially pre-80 feel pretty underwhelming.
Heck, I'd go as far as saying the game really starts at 80.

It feels quite different to MS as well, as nearly all your skills barring auto-attack have cooldowns, so you're not spamming everything on CD (at least in a PvP setting anyway)

The progression in GW2 is mostly horizontal, the gear grind is cosmetic for the most part.

There's a bit of everything for everyone really, PvE, PvP and WvW all play quite differently.

[quote=UchihaNight]Before I throw 15 bucks into this game... any good reviews from people on Basil?[/quote]

All my friends rave about it, their only issue is you get all your skills super early, like MS pizza slice style, so you don't have to play through the class to get your skills. Think of it like being a 4th job class at level 10. You might get bored pretty quickly.

Before I throw 15 bucks into this game... any good reviews from people on Basil?

Welp this was what I was waiting for, time to spend on a game that is fairly dynamic

[quote=Candiia]Does your computer have to be good to play that? Just wondering.[/quote]

i have a computer that came out in 2004 and can run it fairly well on low specs ofc... i regret buying this game at launch for 60$ with NOTHING extra wish i wouldd hace waited looking at these sales

Does your computer have to be good to play that? Just wondering.

O the expansion looks pretty good, might come back after 2 years of quitting that game l0l..