Player vs Environment (PvE)
The World
Guild Wars ‘world’ is broken into 3 world maps. Although the actual Guild Wars world is known wholly as Tyria, the worldmap in Guild Wars prophecies is also known as the continent of Tyria, comprising of the regions Ascalon, the Shiverpeak Mountains, Kryta, the Maguuma Jungle, the Crystal Desert (which is part of Elona) and the Ring of Fire Islands.
The worldmap of Guild Wars Nightfall is known as Elona, which is actuall a part of the continent of Tyria, which connects to Tyria at the bottom of the Crystal Desert – which is also a part of Elona. Guild Wars Factions takes place on the continent of Cantha, far to the south across the ocean. Tyria, visually, is very European. Elona is based on Africa and Egypt, while Cantha is themed very much on Asia.
Quests
The majority of the PvE content is based around quests. Each campaign contains many, many quests, which offer a variety of goals and rewards. Tyria’s quests offer a lot of skills as rewards, which saves you from having to buy them from skill trainers. Cantha’s quests offer more gold and an increased rate of experience gain so your character levels up faster and gains more skill points for buying skills. Elona’s quests are much like Cantha’s, with very few offering skill based rewards, and more experience, gold and rewards to trade in.
Missions
Missions are the way Guild Wars progresses it’s story. Each campaign has a full story based campaign to play through. Each mission has in-game cutscenes to help progress the story without making the player read too much text, though these cutscenes can be skipped if everyone in the party decides to skip them. Missions are also how Factions and Nightfall will bring you to new areas, as they do not allow you to run through the entire continent like prophecies does.
Prophecies does not require mission progression. It is possible to visit nearly all of the worldmap for Prophecies without completing a single mission. This sort of freedom has it’s advantages and disadvantages, however. New players can be run through a part of the game thinking it is normal, and end up confused as to why they are suddenly in an area not designed for their current low level. Still, although not required to progress through prophecies world, they are necessary for progressing the story.
Boss Creatures
Boss creatures are not normal creatures. They will have a specific name, with a few exceptions, and all of them will have a coloured aura around them. The colour of the aura is dependant on the primary profession of the boss. Although they are tougher enemies and present more of a challenge than regular enemies, boss creatures offer something normal enemies do not – elite skills.
Boss creatures will use these more powerful skills against you, as well as offer the one of the only ways for role-playing characters to get elite skills – capturing. When a boss creature has been beaten, stand near his body with a signet of capture and activate it. When it has been used, you will get a menu of skills that the boss had, and you can select one to capture – even an elite skill.
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