As I get excited about Guild Wars 2, I have been playing a bit more of the original Guild Wars. For me, there are quite a few things that I really enjoy about Guild Wars: instancing, heroes, skill hunting – and I’m making some time to do these things because I still enjoy them even as I look forward to Guild Wars 2. Still, I was quite happy recently that I finally got 30 points in my Hall of Monuments.

I have to admit, that most any game that I play, I end up being my own version of a completionist. Someone who was more hardcore than I am would say, “You only completed 30 of the 50 possible points in the hall of monuments, you’re not a completionist!”. That’s why I say, my own version of a completionist. It’s the feeling that I’ve gotten what I really wanted out of the game, not that I’ve gotten all the rewards the game designer wanted me to have.

For instance, there are a couple of things where my goals are different from those set out from the game designer: There is a statue in the hall of monuments for getting all of the elite skills in the game, but there’s nothing for getting all of the basic skills for a particular profession. For me, this was much more rewarding – I got all the variety I wanted in creating a Mesmer/Elementalist build, and it was just plain fun.

However, there was a fair amount of stuff in the Hall of Monuments that was fun to do. For me, getting through all of the campaigns (and completing all of the missions/master rewards) was quite fun. I also really enjoyed completing all of the Hero Armor pieces, which is probably why that is the only area that I have all the points for. For my own armor pieces, this was an exercise in customizing each of the characters on my account – for instance, Kae has Prophesies elite armor and Eye of the North elite armor, because she is my Prophesies character and my main. Similarly, Jae has the Factions elite armors, and Krae has the Nightfall elite armor (I was planning on getting the Vabbian armor for Krae, but fell short at the expense… …For now).

I had planned on getting through more of the Honor rewards before I got to 30 points, but I found them to be too much of a grind. Still, they are the pieces I am most eager to fill in – Skill hunting and possibly vanquishing being the next ones I pursue. I also considered going after more of the Conqueror titles (since Sorrow’s Furnace seemed pretty reasonable), but after getting kicked around too easily in the Underworld, I haven’t had the guts to try any of the others. I may if I can get some support, however – we’ll see.

In the meantime, my focus has been on content – specifically Winds of Change. I’ve completed all the other Guild Wars Beyond content and (with one character or another) completed as many of the side quests as I could find. I typically went about it with the opinion that Kae (my main) would complete each of the campaigns, where my expansion character (Jae and Krae) would do all of the side quests, and complete the campaign. Now, though, I’m almost always playing Kae to complete all of the Guild Wars Beyond content. As it stands, I’m a little over half-way through Winds of Change, and my goal is to finish that before Guild Wars 2 releases. After that… …Who knows…