To cut to the chase, until GW2, I was an MMO noob. I played WoW for a negligible amount of time, LotRO for a month or two, and that’s about it.

GW2 is the only MMO that I’ve enjoyed playing, and I’m hoping you can help me keep my enjoyment going. I’ve got a recent level 80, which for me is a huge achievement, given that I have to balance wife/kid time. I’ve had a blast running around Tyria, but now I’ve completely hit a wall.

Here’s my sticking point: Dungeons.

Here’s what usually happens, independent of group: Start Dungeon, get past a few baddies, get to a big bad, wipe, wipe, wipe, wipe, wipe. Run out of TP, wipe with sandpaper.

Here’s what I’ve done to mitigate the shitriver:

I've grouped with many folks; PUGs, I’ve played with two sets of Guildies and mostly my friends on Skype; I’ve done AC Story and Explorable, some Fractals, and the outcome, more than 90% of the time, is we’re all a bit poorer and a little more pissed, and a lot more corpseified.

I’ve tried 5 or 6 builds, ranging from crit-heavy glass cannon to survivable “tank” I’ve tried different weapon combos; hammer for CC, sword board, sword axe, usually with a longbow

I’ve re-geared as much as I can afford (only have 1.5G)

I’ve settled on a middle of the road build -- 10/0/20/30/10, with Death from Above, Turtle’s Defense, Adrenal Health, Stronger Bowstrings, Lung Capacity, Healing Shouts, Melee weapon sprint. It seems to offer a really good amount of survivability, and I’m tired of removing myself off the floor with a spatula.

A lot of this, I suspect, is my own ignorance about how MMOs treat these things, but still ... I'm not a complete idiot. I've been gaming since before I had my own 386, and I've rarely gotten brutalized this badly by anything I've played.

In Diablo (I know, I know), dungeons are simple: You go in, kill the trash, then kill the elites, get loot. In GW2, it seems like everything has a decisive process AND you have to do absolutely everything in a completely specific order to have a prayer, and even that’s not a guaranteed success.

Aren’t these things supposed to be FUN?

Isn’t the end goal the satisfaction of crushing the faces of badass monsters and stealing their valuables? Or am I doing it wrong?

Please feel free to ELI5.

Thanks!

EDIT: Just wanted to say thanks for all the awesome advice! Please keep it coming!