The following guide will bring you from newbie chef to Master in mere hours, and it’s pretty easy to do. You’re going to have to do some Trading Post shopping if you haven’t collected many ingredients, but the guide keeps gathered material to a minimum.

There are simple ingredients that you can find from the Chef Vendor for karma and copper. These items are Water, Flour, Butter, Sugar, Egg, Chocolate Bar, Oil, Vinegar, Buttermilk, Bell Pepper, Black Peppercorn, Salt and Soy Sauce.

One thing to note: The karma vendor ingredients require you to complete hearts to access. The highest level heart required in this guide is level 69. Obviously, there are other alternatives if you have access to other ingredients.

I know. You’re thinking this title’s crazy. It probably is, but hey– you can’t totally fault me. I was inspired by a piece of in-game architecture! An old pillar in Metrica Province reads “Given asura ‘Place of Ultra-Mega-Importance’ status in 1325 A.E.” When I first found the pillar a couple hours into my Metric Province leveling adventure during Headstart, I instantly fell in love with the area, and everything to do with the asura race– even though, you know, I’m really a tiger-striped lumbering charr. No matter. Awesomeness is awesomeness, right?

With that attitude in mind, I come to you with a brand new Guild Wars 2 Junkies feature. You can call it the Question Box. You can call it whatever you want, really, but what I’m calling it is a “Place of Ultra-Mega Awesomeness.” We all have things we love about Guild Wars 2, places that make us cheer out and say “yes, this is my ultra-mega place!” We all have classes, abilities, and features we’re passionate about, either negatively or positively. This is a place to share all that. A couple times a week I’ll be raising a Guild Wars 2 question to the community– hopefully an interesting one– and we’ll share our opinions.

There are a lot of places in the game where you can follow an event train from beginning to end for multiple rewards and it then cycles back to the beginning. The biggest one we’ve found is in Kessex Hills on the western side of the map. This is an efficient way to level (if efficient leveling is your goal) up through the 40s.

The start point is the bridge at the northwest corner of the lake. Once finished you won’t have to wait very long for the event to start over again. There are also two nearby events (marked off in purple) that might randomly show up that you can diverge and complete during your cycle.

This rotation works extremely well at all level ranges. The experience starts to lag down after level 30, but is still completely viable. It’s a very good way to earn karma and gold as well.
 
 

 
Here is what to expect at each step:
 

• Point 1: Break centaur worker morale to prevent bridge repairs. Reduce morale to 0%.
• Point 2: Dispatch the Harathi Lieutenants. Kill all three.
• Point 3: Kill the Harathi Overlord.
• Point 4: Stop the Risen Krait from building their army. Kill all four, not labeled on map.
• Point 5: The END point has it’s own rotation of events:
• END 1: Destroy the bandit cannons before the ore shipment is ready. Kill five canons.
• END 2: Stop bandits from collecting ore for a centaur supply shipment. Kill all the miners.
• END 3: Defeat the champion bandit foreman before he finishes collecting ore for centaurs. He has two forms: Mech and Human.

There are a few other places where you have a system like this after level 40. We’ll bring those to you as soon as we can.

JUNKIES NATION has a program for all of the leet junkies out there called Premium Junkies where you can subscribe to all the Junkies sites where you will get access to special contests and most importantly no ads!. Not only that, you’ll also help support the JUNKIES NATION network with your contributions to help us grow the network and create more content and expand to your other favorite games!

Here’s what you get:
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Access to exclusive Premium Junkies contests for computer hardware and software and other game swag.

So how much does it cost?
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If you’re a Ranger and looking for a specific pet, go no further, here is a full list of all the Ranger pets and where you can find them. Continue reading for the full list.

Mesmers are a tricky profession; they were one of the last to be introduced and almost universally thought of as underpowered through the vast majority of BWEs. What a lot of people don’t realize is that Mesmer is a very fun profession to play and actually quite powerful if you understand the fundamentals. With the buffs they received just prior to the launch they achieve parity with other DPS classes by the time you achieve level 80, or jump on one in sPVP.

Mesmers are extremely dependent on traits, much more than any other class. For example, using arbitrary, made up numbers, an Elementalist starts off with 80% of its full potential and gain the last 20% of its power via traits as he or she levels up to 80. The Mesmer, on the other hand, probably starts off at 40% of its full potential and their traits give it 60% of its strength. Because a bulk of a Mesmer’s damage is based off of illusions one way or another, there are a series of traits and skills that make them do more damage and survive longer that are essential to almost every build.

Psst, over here! Just in case, you know, you’re taking a break from the game– I’m here to distract you from work, er, chat about Guild Wars 2! Or specifically, headstart. The game’s off to an interesting start so far. I say ‘interesting’ because– let’s face it– not everyone has been pleased with their headstart experience. Despite ArenaNet managing to pull up the servers exactly when they said they probably would, it seems the servers had a hard time keeping up with the player load, and produced quite a large number of issues and game lockups.

Over the course of the weekend, players have experienced issues with logging in, staying logged in, account validation, guilds/guild membership disappearing, the trading post, the Black Lion Trading Company, HoM deliveries, WvWvW, and more. At the same time, not everyone experienced every issue, and in fact, quite a few players experienced a weekend of worry-free gaming. Some players were able to put in about seven hours of stable playtime before problems arose, and for the most part, those same players were able to log in a couple hours later. Not bad, right? Perhaps. But let’s dig a little deeper, shall we?

During the final Beta Weekend Event, I got a chance to play among the trees and frolic in the leaves as a sylvari. While doing so, I explored the sylvari starting area– Caledon Forest. The area is one of the most beautiful I’ve seen in the game so far. If you choose to explore Caledon Forest, you’ll find plenty of lush foliage, underwater treasures, and forts gleaming in the sun along with dangerous enemies, sharp terrain, and swamp creatures. As a bonus, most of the events and storylines are quite enjoyable. I highly recommend a scenic tour– just, uh, be sure to take a few weapons or spells along on the journey.

Now, Guild Wars 2 isn’t really a game where walkthroughs are needed, and in fact exploration and running off the beaten paths is sometimes encouraged and extremely rewarding, but I do think there are times when a rough guideline of sorts can come in handy, especially for players new to GW2 and many of its unique mechanics. With that philosophy in mind, I have created a guide of sorts for the Caledon Forest area. Its emphasis is on the renown heart quests, and suggests a path that branches them together. Players are free, of course, to follow whatever patch they choose– that’s the beauty of GW2– paths can vary quite considerably. I’ve also included a nifty map of the entire area, showcasing points of interest.

Part 1: Tutorial and Introduction

Regardless of your choice of your personal story, as a human, your tutorial level will start you with a quest to protect the people of Shaemoor. Directly in front of you as you start out is Corporal Beirne, he has a green quest icon, and is calling out for your assistance. He will request that you head to the Inn, which is a simple enough beginner task. Just continue south and run to the large green star on your mini map.

I don’t recommend deviating from this goal, because there’s not a lot of value in Guild Wars 2 to grinding mobs. There are plenty of level 1 centaurs that are attacking the village, however they yield approximately 2 exp per kill, and you need 2,000 exp to hit level 2. Also, because you’re in the tutorial level, they do not count as kills towards your achievements. Along the way, however, do be sure to talk to villagers and tell them to go to the inn for their safety. You will be rewarded with 2 Karma points for each villager that you send to the inn.

This FAQ explains what you need to know about gear and how its attributes are distributed. I'll predominantly aim this at level 80 equipment as we can talk about all equipment rarities. The reason for this FAQ is:

• To explain how attributes are distributed at level 80
• To answer some common misconceptions
• Illustrate the methods and difficulty of obtaining equipment

If not stated, the tables in this FAQ are from the GW2 wiki or self made.

Disclaimer: This faq is based on fact or logic based on evidence. Nothing is assumed because we all know what 'assume' does to you and me. As such, there may be other ways of obtaining gear or additional information not known to us at this time. However, I do not wish to speculate as this only causes confusion. If any pertinent information is sent to me that will improve this faq then I will update it.

Reddit user donoftheslum has put together an amazing compilation of armor and weapon models for each race of all the PVP armor sets that you can find in the lockers. So if you’re trying to finally decide on a race, then this collection is for you.

Due to the request of original poster, we have kept the links to the original galleries intact. Thanks don!

Information

There are four different model types:

• Asura Male and Female
• Charr Male and Female
• Human, Sylvari, Norn Male
• Human, Sylvari, Norn Female

I chose Charr Male, Asura Female, Human Male (Norn starting area wasn't working) and Human Female. This should cover all the available armor types.

Want to see what Norn Male armor looks like? View Human Male. They are the same. Sylvari Female? Human Female is the same. Hence the * in the title.

Keep reading for all the gallery links!

As we round the final bend toward Guild Wars 2′s launch, it’s impossible to not notice the rising storm of excitement, anticipation, and– well, there’s no sense in beating around the bush– hype. There, I said it. GW2 is carrying a lot of hype right now. MMO players are eager for something new, something shiny, and most importantly– something different. As most modern MMO fans know, hype can be a risky business, but GW2 has a lot of things going right for it so far. The combination of the game’s dynamic event system, dynamic leveling adjustment system, WvWvW feature, cooperative world system, and non-trinity combat system is a fairly innovative step in the industry, and a large reason for the hype.

Another innovative step is the move away from the classic subscription model. Most MMORPGs these days launch with a subscription model that may or may not prove the test of time, and if the game ends up slipping into a free-to-play model, many players feel frustrated with the model slip no matter their stance. Why? Because the developers will often veil the changes in flowery, positive PR lingo, change the way content patches are added to the game, and in general– change the game dramatically. Gamers prefer their games and development teams at face value– and that’s where Guild Wars 2 comes in.

How do Combo Fields work? When should these particular fields be used in a fight? What happens when you try a finisher in multiple combo fields? Although all of this is interesting, probably my favorite part is the last minute of this video. Listening and watching this fight – 15 vs. 50 – before we push out into the masses for our fourth or fifth time will probably remind you of your own great stories from World vs. World in Guild Wars 2!

Watch the whole video after the break!

Guild Wars 2 is an exciting game with a lot to offer. Skill descriptions and theory crafting just isn’t always enough though – sometimes we need to do some tests to determine exactly how things work. In this video series we’ll be exploring the RESULTS of some of these tests. New videos on various topics will be released every Sunday and Wednesday until the start of Guild Wars 2.

Episode #1 – Mesmer Portals

How long do they last? How far can you go? Can you go through keeps? Check out the answers to all these questions in this video where we test Mesmer Portals. At the very least watch the huge jump before the credits (about 3:45) as we reveal something particular about portal ranges…

To watch the video hit us after the break.

Welcome to This is My Story, a brand new column on Guild Wars 2 Junkies where I’ll be diving deep into the corner pockets of Tyria and showcasing interesting tidbits I happen to find along the way. For the most part, this column will focus on the PvE adventures of a casual gamer with a raiding past who’s a bit of an altaholic and very much an exploration nut. Colorful nuggets to hunt for in the wild and dangerous battles to charge haphazardly into are among my delicious recipes for… happiness? Disaster? A bit of both, sure– but think of the potential! Join me as I bring a little randomness to the GW2 scene.

As we make our way toward the much-anticipated GW2 headstart, I’ll be talking a bit about what there is to look forward to once we’re unleashed in Tyria. If you’re thinking something along the lines of, “Duh– everything!” right now, you’re probably correct, but hey, let’s narrow it down a bit, eh? First up this week, let’s talk about how awesome the different races of Guild Wars 2 are, and what a difficult decision it can be to choose between them.