My heroes keep dying?

Hi all. I'm kind of a GW noob, I have only played off and on. I've played Prophecies up to the 13th quest in the Flame Seeker Prophecies. Have not yet played Nightfall or Factions.

I'm trying to do the Eye of the North questlines (right now, I'm doing the one where you have to follow the guys that kidnapped the Ebon Vanguard).

Suffice it to say... the game is really... really hard. I feel like I must be doing something wrong... my whole group of heroes is getting wiped out almost every time I engage some mobs. Just one group of four Charr will usually take out two of my heroes.

I'm using Vekk, Gwen, Ogden Stonehealer, and MOX. I could really use some advice because I feel like I'm just not understanding some basic game concept or something... its a messy slaughter every time I pull a group of monsters. Am I supposed to be finding new gear for them or something? I'm clueless.

Edit: I'm playing a Ranger with Monk as my secondary profession.

Eye of the North was not made for the beginner player. If you have not done factions or nightfall your heroes lack skills (especially if you are still using their default skills!).

It is suggested that you play thru the other chapters before eye--eye was meant to be played by level 20 experienced players.

I would suggest playing nightfall and factions and unlocking some more skills for both you and your heroes before you tackle the eye quests.

It's a combination of two problems, both from the same root cause. EotN is expansion content that was designed for players who have played through the campaigns already. By going straight there you're throwing yourself in at the deep end - you really have no business whatsoever being there at this point in time.

1 - You aren't 'not understanding some basic game concept'. You're not understanding a ton of them. The fact you feel the need to specify your secondary profession indicated that you're largely clueless about how things work* (I mean no offense here, but it's true). As above, you need to learn to to pull properly, how to manage aggro, how to manage energy, how to differentiate good skills from bad ones, how to use your interface properly, how to use your skills / setup your builds properly (see #2), etc. You're pretty much assumed to know these things by the time you get to EotN. Note I haven't specifically pointed out equipment here - it doesn't make nearly as big of a difference as you're thinking it does (though it's not ignorable).

*There is a point in each campaign where you'll unlock the ability to change it at will whenever you're in an outpost.

2 - Lack of skills. Properly set up skillbars (both for yourself and your heroes) are the biggest difference between having a really hard time and 99% of PvE being trivial. Having played only half (if that) of Prophecies you'll have next to no skills unlocked (and certainly no elites) and thus you won't be able to run very good builds.

My advice to you is simply to forget about EotN and follow progress through the games as you were meant to. Finish Prophecies first, then preferably do the other campaigns before returning to EotN. It will be much easier then. Making and playing other characters will benefit you too as you'll be able to appreciate how they work when you use them as heroes (plus it will unlock more skills).

EDIT: One more thing, there are two quests in each campaign (though you can only do the ones from your home continent) that reward 15 attribute points. Your Ranger won't have done them.

Apart from what others already said, I have a doubt.
You said you are using 4 heroes but you didn't specify what henchmen. Just to be sure, you are using those to fill the team, right? Cause if you're going around with a team of 5 in 8men areas having good skills and being good at tactiques won't sure suffice.

Thanks for all the advice, guys. I will definitely go back and finish Prophecies then.

I have another question though, if I play through Factions and Nightfall, do I need to play the same character to unlock skills in them? Or can I make a new character and unlock skills on an "account" basis?

And Mintha... wow... I didn't even realize this place was for a team of 8. I thought I could only bring my 4 heroes... well that's probably going to help a lot...

Which henchmen do you guys recommend I use (either in EOTN, or in the other campaigns)?

1 There's skill unlocking and skill learning. An unlocked skill is usable for your account's pvp characters, heroes, and it can be BOUGHT by any new characters you create. A skill your account has unlocked does not mean you can use it, you'll need to learn the skill first, usually for a fee, at a skill trainer or using skill tomes. To clarify, if you buy Nine Tail Strike with your Warrior/Assasin it has been unlocked to buy at an easier-to-reach location skill trainer for your newly created Assasin/Elementalist.
2. You can see an outpost's party size cap at the party window(p). There's a text like (3/4) or (8/8) and it shows how many players or henchman you can add. Iniatially, with little to no (elite) skills unlocked, the game will be a lot harder if using heroes. You're better off using the henchman, always take the eles and healers (monks) and avoid using melees, their AI is pretty bad.
Good luck.

you can 'unlock' skills on any character, they will be unlocked for your heroes on ALL characters. (if you learn say, empathy with your mesmer character...your mesmer heroes will be able to use it as well, but any new mesmer character you create will have to learn it anew--it wont be available for them).
I would make characters in each chapter--the first time you create new professions in a chapter you will get a few skills with them (some of which are new--so that will unlock a few more skills for you and your heroes).
You will be able to play all chapters with all of your pve characters, so go ahead and experiment with different professions.

It is also best to cap most skills in all camps these are your elites try and save up your skill points for them.I would read the campfire for some builds and guides.

Sadly Heroes are not good when u get them, they will be worse then Henchmen.
U need to indeed upgrade them. Properly upgraded they can be great.

The biggest part of upgrading are their skills (skill build).
So, play the campaigns to get lots of skills, Elite skills also.
Since every little bit helps, u can also give your Heroes better weapons with better weapon upgrades.
And last, put Insigs and Runes on their armors.

I don't really think campaigns get harder as you go; EotN is a cake-walk if you have the right skills. These are skills you can buy, not skills about the game.

To survive any fight by c-spacing (what a lot of GW newbies do, because targeting takes more effort), you should bring a ritualist hero with Soul Twisting and Shelter. Just those two skills will beef your party up immensely. Then add two semi-healers and it's winrar.

You can get Xandra, one of the ritualists, by playing the Norn Fighting Tournament in Gunnar's Hold.

Check www.gwpvx.com for team builds/composition. Also FYI, gear is not at all important in Gil Wors.

Also, you didn't specify, so ....

Are your Heroes properly kitted out - Runes, Insignias, weapons, builds, etc?

Although this helps off course, it is very likely not the cause of the OP failing in EotN. gearing up is imo the last thing to be worried bout with heroes. In my opinion this is the sequence when building your team.

1: unlocking the right heroes and getting them to level 20.
2: getting them all skilled up like you want them.
3: when first two points are done for all heroes in your team, you can start on gearing them up (off course when you get a good weapon or rune from drops, then it is no problem to give it to a hero.)

Half of my characters have finished the game both in nm and hm without having fully geared heroes.

I've been playing for nearly a year now, and asked a lot of the same questions for the first 6Months.

First off not all Lv 20's are created equal, my R/E today walks through NM content that just a few months ago when I first reached Lv 20 just seemed impossible; Better Runes, Weapons, Armor, inscriptions make for a more powerful toon and team.

That said I would still be Curious as to just what Level your toon is now, as any sub Level 20 toon is going to have a rough go of it in EoTN; but IMHO it is also the best place to level up. Are you in a Guild? Guildies might help you with Leveling up, let your Toon accompany them through some challenging area's like the Wardowns; give you advise on builds and help you cap some good weapons skills. There are still GW1 focused guilds adverting daily at embark.

I use this web page as a guide for my own builds;
http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Hench...ll_Bar_Contest.
even if you cant fill out a particular build just now it will give you ideas and goal to work towards overall; so your not wasting plat on skills that never get used.

This 7Hero team is both Powerful and Popular;
http://www.gwpvx.com/Build:Team_-_7_Hero_Player_Support

Again while you wont have all the skills it requires today it will give you some ideas and goals. It is generally better to avoid damage through protection magick than to try to heal it after you’ve been blasted; And while Builds are important Protection runes, Insignias, and inscriptions can have a huge impact on your survivability.

Lastly I noticed you did not mention Livia in your list of Hero's I would very much suggest you pursue recruiting her as a hero, even if you then go back to Prophs; Necro's are powerful Allies, whether you are looking at a Minion Master - which can be a huge help blocking Charr Blade and Axewielders and letting your backliners do their work; Or a Degen/Healer boosting your team while Leetching the badguys.


Feel free to say Hi in game. IGN Claudia de Anar.

You've got this backwards. It's the skills that make the team; equipment is largely supplementary. Unless a build is specifically dependant (for whatever reason) on an item bonus (like ER eles with +20% enchant duration mods) then equipment is more for fine tuning. That's not to say it's ignorable (you certainly don't want to be walking around with armor that isn't max), but if it's a choice between getting more skills for your heroes and perfectly modding everyone's equipment, the skills win everytime. Look at it this way - what's the point of prioritising 40/40 sets for your casters when you haven't got any skills worth optimising in the first place? No matter how hard you try to squeeze efficiency out of crap, you're still going to end up with crap.

The best place for leveling is by doing quests. 3k xp a pop will get to to level 20 in no time, and there'll be tons as long as you aren't in Prophecies (where the levelling curve was much gentler). If you're trying to level up by killing foes you're doing it wrong. I'd personally recommend staying in Prophecies anyway, but if hitting 20 is a priority diverting over to Factions would be the best option. Also, if you haven't even reached level 20 (i.e, finished the tutorial levels) you shouldn't really be in EotN anyway.

A big thing to point out here is that those builds were designed for PvP. In PvE, physicals are handled poorly by AI and would get beaten into a paste with Frenzy, they have Rez Sigs over hard rezzes (and you don't need more than 3 in your team), can be designed around single target damage, can run things like water magic and a bunch of elites that are largely irrelevant in 7 hero builds, etc. gwpvx does have hero builds that are independent, and I'd recommend those over things on that page.

Two final points:

-You're referring to a Minion Bomber, not a Minion Master. They're entirely different things (though MM's are both viable and can be used for blocking, though I doubt they're what you're referring to).
-Health degen sucks, both for healing and damage, at least once you're past level 10 or so.

BB re: I'm not going to waste my time and yours on a point by point counter rebuttal, but lets just take this by way of example. The page I pointed out has a good many well thought out builds in one place; which can be used as a guide - I was not suggesting the original poster should slavishly stick to any of them, and the page itself makes clear they are GvG oriented; but they should give the poster a feel as to what a good build looks like. While the PvX while ultimately more complete is a bit of a Maze and good luck finding something in it that is not dated/nerfed/ or otherwise suspect; unless an actual player should point you to a link to something useful like the 7Hero Build. The Wiki also assumes you've played forever have all the skills, and all the Elites and again is not all that useful to a new player. I still recommend the Hero Contest page as a good place to start looking at builds and learning what a good solid well focused build looks, and feels like; so you can better sculpt builds out of your available skills.

At the same time having an Idea of what the player wants his team to look like in the end of the day; be that the for the 7Hero Build quoted or another should help the player avoid wasting plat on skills that sound good; but have no great use in actual play; while the player is building that skills tool Box; Freeing up precious funds for Runes, Insignias, and scripts which offer a more immedately available way to increase the survivablity of the players team, - perhaps not as good as having a Rit Running Shelter, but if he returns to Prophs right away, hes not going to have a Rit running shelter for weeks, maybe months.

And While in EoTN he can capture inscribable weapons and Staffs. A Staff with Sieze the day +11 Energy will give you one or two powerful spells more, ease energy managment problems and tip the balance in more than a few sharp fights; I dont disagree he wants to finish Prophs, I am only suggesting so long as he has opend up EoTN he get the most out of what is available to him there; Better Loot, Better Weapons, Better Trainers, and some Awesome PvE skills.

Running an Aura of the Litch MM is really nice; never leave home without one; but you cap that skill on the very last mission of Prophecies, so again not of much immedate use to the poster, it does not speak to the immediate problem of team survival. I've run up toons both through killing and Questing now, Questing might be slightly faster but is infiantely more boring (IMHO) while killing is - the fundemental mechanic of the game if you dont enjoy burning down mobs, why play, and killing rewards you not only in experiance, but in plat and booty; so I expect we will have to agree to disagree here.

To the Orignal poster, you've probably reached the point where all your Charactors/Hero's need some sort of Damage Avoidance skill, like Lightning Relex's on a Ranger; or Riposte for a Warrior; as I mentioned above; beyond a certain point it is nearly always better to avoid damage than to try to heal damage.

I hope this has been of some value to you.
Happy Hunting BB.

Edit: I do think perhaps I have made the mistake of presenting the case that Leveling in EoTN is about grinding only; of course there are plenty of Quests that are much more generous in there experiance bonus than anything in Prophs. Nuff said.

I am not going to reply to the post below, it is clear I have allowed myself to be pulled into a converstation with a contrarian who will insist that Left is Right up is down and the Sun is Dark if I should say otherwise and I have no intention of wasting any more time on this individual. Suffice to say my experiance of the game and approach to the game is somewhat different; but I have at this point completed most all of the content; succeed at the post game challanges I've attempted HM and NM and done that in a way I enjoy.

My last piece of advise to you is pursue the game in the way you enjoy it best. BB.

Note: Point by point makes it easier for me to compose my thoughts. Whatevers easier for you.

These two paragraphs contradict themselves somewhat. You're saying you don't want people to waste time/money on skills they'll never use, but then recommend they look at a page with several things that are only really useful in a PvP context, like water magic, melee builds, single target damage/shutdown, etc. PvP is entirely different to PvE. I appreciate your 'look at how good builds are constructed' point, but for translating into PvE I wouldn't consider it the best place to start. I'm not sure why you think the 'look at good build x and try to make it work with what you've got' technique won't work with PvE builds. It'd be a lot easier, in fact, and help to make sure you're understanding the principles for the format you're working with. Being able to construct a really good interrupt/snare build for a ranger is fine, but it ignores the point they're largely unneeded and would better serve the party by focusing more on damage.

One thing those PvP builds do have in their favour though is that they don't have PvE skills in them, so they'll be a decent starting point for professions that don't get a lot of hero love, like warriors (though there's a good reason for that). However, the sticky in the Heroes and AI forum (scroll down to section 3) covers this point better than the PvP build page, so I'm still unconvinced you've got the right starting point.

PS: Perhaps it was only an example, but arguing equipment over skills due to the relative difficulty in assembling an ST bar is poor. A few monk prots here, a few mesmer shutdown spells there, and you're already making solid progress towards better hero builds. ST is overkill, and arguably only a necessity for HM DoA and UW. It's a wasted slot for NM.

PPS: PvX navigation is pretty straightforward (follow the links on the main page or use the search box - it's the same as any other wiki) and the builds are kept up to date.

First off, I'd advise against using the word 'capture' to describe getting new equipment. It's potentially confusing when you consider elites.

Secondly, you've got this backwards too. More energy is NOT the same as energy management. Sure, seize the day will let you pop out another spell or two, but after that you've screwed yourself by taking longer to get it back. Energy management is about sustainability. The aim is to balance the amount of energy you're expending against your ability to regain it (via natural regen, e management skills, etc) such that you'll get through to the end of the encounter (and preferably to be able to roll through to the next fight without having to wait for regen). The only time you should consider +e/-eregen items is when you've run completely dry on your normal set and NEED to get a spell off (and even then, it's possible to get a staff with +20e without needing to lose any e regen). That's really a PvP matter though; if you're relying on that you're probably trying to put too much on your bar in the first place. This is a fundamental GW principle, and you really don't want to get it wrong. Sure, having an energy pool large enough to burn mobs down in one go might work now, but if you were to go to DoA (for example) where fights can be sustained for long periods, you're screwed.

Lastly, by the point you're able to access EotN (LA), the difference in equipment isn't that great. Diligent explorers / quest doers could possibly be close to having enough disposable cash to be able to buy a reasonably decent green without having to go to EotN at all.

Questing isn't 'slightly faster'. It's massively faster. Going by numbers on the wiki, you're going to have to kill about 100 foes just to match a 3k xp quest reward. Nonetheless, that's pretty much irrelevant - you're neglecting the fact that most quests involve combat anyway, so the difference between going out and randomly killing things and doing quests is really just that quests give a reward at the end. More xp, more cash, skills, reward tokens (imperial commendations and the like, which mean free id and salvage kits for a really long time), etc. If the op was capable of properly farming something it'd be a different story, but I doubt the op is at that stage yet.

Also, you'll get plenty of opportunity to randomly kill things later when you vanquish. Doing quests now to get on your feet and vanquishing later to satisfy your need to randomly kill things seems to be a win win, at least as far as I'm concerned. Better loot that way, and quests offer a plot aspect too. This point is pretty subjective though (as you've pointed out), so there's little point arguing it. Do whatever makes you happy.

You'll generally only want to run Riposte against the doppelganger. You're correct in saying that preventing damage is better than healing, but each character does not need to be completely self sufficient. A warriors job is to kill things and a monks job is to keep things alive. Throw prot spirit and shield of absorption on the monk (or any midliner, really) and you're set. No need to water the warrior down with the generally obsolete tactics attribute. It screws with your adrenaline too, which would be a pain.

Ironically, I recall... Calista, was it, who said multi quoting wasn't allowed? :P


(mod edit--Calista is not with us anymore, and I think we would rather you have a multi-quote than a huge bunch of posts right after one another--mod edit)