Are loot weapons better than crafted weapons?

One of the major faults of WoW (IMO) is the fact the looted items are better than the ones made by crafters. To me this devalues the whole crafting profession and hurts the overall economy.

So, even though I've played in several GW BWEs, I haven't gotten far enough in the game with any character to see if the same holds true for GW. For the higher level characters, are the looted items better than the ones you can get from crafters?

since all the crafting is handled by NPCs, you really do not have to worry about crafting professions. the best modifiers are randomly assigned, whereas crafted gear has fixed statistics. from what i have seen, crafted weapons have only been introduced recently, but they do not seem like something that compares to a nice rare.

If you consider weapon upgrades as a kind of crafting, then you'll probably craft your own weapon eventually, to get something better than you're likely to come across as a rare drop. Of course, you're just adding components you looted from other drops with a salvage kit...

I just would hate to see the NPC crafters not worth anything and thus trading/selling salvaged items doesn't have much value. But from what I've seen, armor isn't dropped right? It has to be crafted.

armor must be crafted. that in itself is enough to support the materials market. you can also salvage upgrades for weapons and runes for armor. you use ID kits on unidentified items to unlock them for your PvP characters. crafting in this game is mainly for the armor but that may change in the future. the way it is now, i generally ignore the craftable weapons/foci/shields.

I think you might be stuck in the mentality of the miniskills in other MMOs.. it doesn't really matter if the weapons crafted by the outfitter are weak.. It's actually always made sense for me to have the outfitter give you a beginner's weapon as a sort of head start in finding a better one once you get out into the world.

It doesn't really do anything to lessen the value of salvages. People still will salvage in hopes of upgrade material, runes, and rare salvage materials, not to mention the common materials.. you don't need intense crafting at the outfitters for that.

And yes, player armor is crafted at the outfitters (or given to you through mini-quests like in Pre-Searing)..

From my experience the crafted weapon is better than the average drop. So, if you had a run of bad drops you can just craft a weapon. If you had the good drops, then it doesn't matter.

At some point they may have a larger selection of crafted weapons. I see this as a way to get the specific bonus you want. Might not be as good as one you will find but, no waiting.

Can you get any decent crafted weapons in Pre-sear Ascalon? Is North of the wall the only place you can get pelts? What about cloth? I would like to enter the academy with the best weapons and armor I can have for a Ranger/Monk and a Warrior/Monk

i found better bows that dropped off the oakhearts than the ascalon bow you can get through crafters/collectors. a pelt/hide is a random drop off of char normally, so i would assume that you could get those at the northern wall. since i have yet to see armor of any kind drop, i doubt you would find cloth. i think the highest damage warrior weapon i found pre-searing was a 10-13 hammer. just kill lvl 5+ stuff and you might find something.

There is no player-based crafting in Guild Wars. Yes, that's right. You don't have to make bronze daggers five hundred thousand times so that you can make bronze shortswords and then bronze longswords and then iron daggers! If you are "skillful" enough to get to an outpost where a very beneficial NPC resides (such as that of Ventari's Dell), then you can make whatever he has to craft so long as you have the materials and the gold to give to him.
So are crafted weapons better than drops? Well... Sort of. A crafted weapon is better than a mediocre drop, but a good drop easily outdoes a crafted weapon. That's the way it should be.

I hear beyond the North Wall in pre-sear Ascalon is pretty brutal. Is it possible for just 2 characters to survive in there?

You don't have a choice, you can only take one other party member with you North of the wall in pre-searing. You could have 2 Rangers with Melandru's stalkers for a total of 4, but it would still be difficult. I managed to kill all of the Oakhearts their solo with just a stalker for a companion, the Charr and Grawl were a different story when it was more than 3 at a time.

theres a crap load of charr in one of the dungeon/catacombs area in pre-sear(like 20+) all standing around eachother, the only way you would have any chance of surviveing it even with 2 stalkers is to be lev 15+, and its really not worth it to stay in pre sear that long a time anyways.

How do you get North of the Wall solo? I can't seem to keep the gate open before I can get through it.

cant, its meant as a 2 player group mission

Do what I did, ask someone if they would be willing to open the gate for you and let them know they can leave the group once you are inside.

Myself and another player managed to kill all the Charr in Northfields, including the 3/4 bosses around the 'altar'. Although it did take us nearly two hours.

If you die North of the wall where do you ressurrect?

Just a short distance away still north of the wall

What were you and your companion? I have a Ranger/Monk and a Warrior/Monk