Addicted to Guild Wars PvP

I haven't played LOTRO in about a week. Guild Wars immediately captured my attention as soon as I got the hang of it. They are completely missing the boat, they have their staple as PvP, why make money solely on PvE expansion packs? Most of the veteran players, however, do get into the PvE more than I expected.

I had one multi-year veteran named Dylan show me the ropes to using my Ranger in PvP. The concept was simple yet difficult to pull off. The first part is easy, spreading poison throughout the enemy team. The second part not so easy, using special skills to interrupt "rupt" caster/healers/mages so those power houses have less effect. Dylan and I went to a 1 on 1 area where we could test out my rupting skills. All I needed after that lesson was testing out my fast-twitch reflexes in real combat over and over.

Different PvP Types

Random Arena (RA) - This is where a wiiiiiiide variety of skilled players meet up and are randomly given teams of 4. If the team wins their match, they can stay together until next match. You can stay with your team as long as you keep winning. If one leaves, a random player will replace them next match. Most of the time it's fight to the death until one team is eliminated. Other times it is to see who gets the most kills and you just keep respawning a few seconds after you die.

Codex Arena - This is the basic arena style match 4 on 4. You get to pick your team in the waiting area before the match. There are a lot of pickup teams looking for people. This is a competitive zone and is where I happened to start, bad idea. Go to this arena when you have plenty of RA matches under your belt.

Guild Vs. Guild (GvG) - I haven't had enough experience nor am I good enough to do real guild on guild action. These battles consist of 8 vs. 8, much different than your 4 on 4 matches. There is an observe option where you can see the current GvG battles that are going on in Guild Wars. This shows you what it takes to start really competing, it looks fun.

Alliance Vs. Alliance (AvA) - Interesting setup here, there is 3 teams of 4 vs. 3 teams of 4. Each guild has the option of joining 1 of 2 factions. Depending on your faction you can travel to a certain place looking for a team of 4 which didn't appear to be difficult, it was quite crowded. The objective in this mission is to get 500 points before the other faction. You gain points by killing opposing faction members but more importantly is capturing bases. There are supply stations to capture as well as this sort of castle base that I think gives more points if your faction is holding it. I've only done 2 of these matches so far.