Feedback:User/Rivendahl/Test Play A Character

Background:

One of the issues I have with MMO's is that a player isn't given a good opportunity to get a feel for the type of character they'd like to play. A player reads the definitions, makes assumptions, creates a characters and loathes it because they made poor decisions while leveling up and such due to a lack of understanding, proper tutorials, or explanations. For example, myself. I made a warrior thinking warriors in other RPG's were a good start to get a feel for a game. High health, high damage output, high armor, low resistance to magic. As it turns out, Guild Wars didn't follow the formula. My bad; I made the assumption. However, nothing really ever said otherwise. Then later I found I didn't care for the combination of professions I chose, nor the skills, as I wasn't properly "trained".

Summary:

Provide a staging area where a player can play test a newly created character to see if that character fits the player's style.

System:

After creating a character allow player to either play through a free roam tutorial with guides and markers or to skip it entirely. The tutorial systems in use with Factions and Nightfall are a step closer to teaching a player how to use a character but a player is still stuck with the character afterward and never has a true perception of the character strengths and weaknesses.

Additional:

It would be nice to have a pre-searing like free portion of the game to introduce players to the world of Guild Wars 2. This free area could serve as the staging area for testing characters. From this area (multiplayer or not) the player could either decide to create a new character to test, convert the character to play in the game, or keep testing the current character.