Guild Wars 2

[Furiously]

That upgrades require time to complete means there's a big advantage for the two most powerful sides to continuously flatten the weaker third before they turn to their own combat rather than two weak forces aligning against a strong. The strongest sides will tend to maintain a larger group of warriors, since everybody loves winning, and will be able to turn around and recapture whatever they need... the weakest side will never be able to complete its upgrades, so spending money on them would just be a waste.

Except the next two weeks you go against a different realm don't you? Granted, if you are in one of the two "top" realms, you are going to likely alternate between two different realms every other week. But other than that there should be enough movement to keep it... different.

[Typhon]

Very inventive answer to the population imbalance problem.

[Ingmar]

It kind of loses you the whole rivalry aspect where you're going up against the same people, but that might be a small price to pay if it really does actually solve population imbalance.

[Draegan]

WvW is exactly like Warcraft's arena matches.  Except it's 24 hours a day matches.  Seasons last 2 weeks.  And your Arena team is your server.

Seems like an incredible system.

[tazelbain]

There are still rivalries in football despite the fact you don't play the same team everything.  And think the rivalries will be better because there is are definitive winners and losers.  The is going to be a server that can claim to be best server in the world. That is going to be a powerful motivator.

A critical element that still hasn't reveled is: how your world is selected and how you stop bandwagoning?  I like that you didn't have to select a server in GW1.  I fear that goes away.

[Draegan]

What do you mean by how your world is selected?  You mean at character creation?

[Ingmar]

There are still rivalries in football despite the fact you don't play the same team everything.  And think the rivalries will be better because there is are definitive winners and losers.  The is going to be a server that can claim to be best server in the world. That is going to be a powerful motivator.

A critical element that still hasn't reveled is: how your world is selected and how you stop bandwagoning?  I like that you didn't have to select a server in GW1.  I fear that goes away.

I was talking more about the little intrapersonal rivalries that develop when you fight the same infiltrator at the milegate every day for a year, rather than the larger team vs. team sort, I do expect those to exist.

[Cadaverine]

There are still rivalries in football despite the fact you don't play the same team everything.  And think the rivalries will be better because there is are definitive winners and losers.  The is going to be a server that can claim to be best server in the world. That is going to be a powerful motivator.

A critical element that still hasn't reveled is: how your world is selected and how you stop bandwagoning?  I like that you didn't have to select a server in GW1.  I fear that goes away.

This.  What is to stop people on low ranking servers from just bailing to go re-roll on the high ranking servers? 

[01101010]

This.  What is to stop people on low ranking servers from just bailing to go re-roll on the high ranking servers? 

Gate servers. Yeah, I know all the bullshit that goes along with it, I played FFXI with their World Pass system. However, if you want servers to be relatively even, you release the monster.

[Draegan]

Nothing.  Probably won't even matter if they do ranking properly.  Single players rerolling on other servers won't make a difference.  While you get boosted to 80 in WvW you still don't have the better gear an established player would have.

[Furiously]

Unless they do the gw1 thing where you have max gear 10 minutes in.

[Ingmar]

I have my doubts, what with the level 80 cap.

[01101010]

Nothing.  Probably won't even matter if they do ranking properly.  Single players rerolling on other servers won't make a difference.  While you get boosted to 80 in WvW you still don't have the better gear an established player would have.

Ugh. Prettier gear...ok, but fuck the gear=win bullshit.

[Draegan]

I haven't heard of any hating for gear.  There are no raids that ive heard of outside world type events.  They keep saying that they want to make your experience the same at all levels.

[UnSub]

GW2 on Consoles post-PC launch via Massively

Given the fate of every other game that's announced a console version, I'd think companies would be starting to get superstitious.

DCUO is reportedly doing a lot better on the PS3 than the PC, so it isn't an impossible thing to pull off.

Plus GW2's revenue model suits consoles perfectly.

However, this is one of those things that we should wait and see if it ever happens before getting too excited about it.

[tazelbain]

What do you mean by how your world is selected?  You mean at character creation?

Not having to select a server at creation and basically being able to play with anyone you want is a killer feature of GW1.  Hate to see that go.

[Zetor]

I seem to remember reading from some dev that players can switch between servers freely (though it probably won't be as smooth as gw1 districts). However, after you switch you can't participate in WvWvW until the current round is over, or sommat.

[Tyrnan]

I seem to remember reading from some dev that players can switch between servers freely (though it probably won't be as smooth as gw1 districts). However, after you switch you can't participate in WvWvW until the current round is over, or sommat.

Yeah I vaguely remember something like that too, although I wasn't sure if it was as you stated or just a cooldown on how often you could transfer.

What happens when the next WvW round starts though? Say a load of people transfer to the top ranked server then the next round they have a huge population advantage. I know numbers doesn't equal skill but it could still be unbalancing.

[Kageru]

DCUO is reportedly doing a lot better on the PS3 than the PC, so it isn't an impossible thing to pull off.

This is not remotely surprising as it was written specifically targeting consoles. That doesn't mean it was a good MMO or that the decisions they made to make it console friendly helped.

[Furiously]

There will be a fourth realm no matter what. (the people who move to whoever is winning)

[Threash]

That WvsW article made me cancel my WZ queue and log out of swtor and not come back since yesterday.

[Kageru]

Sounds excellent. Actually putting a bit of thought into mechanics rather than just building it and assuming it will work.

A large map with a variety of targets, home ground maps for a semi-protected staging point, server versus server so you have a large population to draw from for battles and allies which will do wonders for building server community, and a ranking system so that uber and high population servers will be matched with each other. And unlike Eve it has a reset switch so that it doesn't stagnate with some elder power squatting on the space. And while it is tricky if they get it working it can be fun for a long time rather than leveling content which is consumed and done. Very promising.

Hopefully they'll also avoid massive power differentials due to gear progression. But there's probably not many groups who understand that better than they do.

[Zetor]

I seem to remember reading from some dev that players can switch between servers freely (though it probably won't be as smooth as gw1 districts). However, after you switch you can't participate in WvWvW until the current round is over, or sommat.

Yeah I vaguely remember something like that too, although I wasn't sure if it was as you stated or just a cooldown on how often you could transfer.

What happens when the next WvW round starts though? Say a load of people transfer to the top ranked server then the next round they have a huge population advantage. I know numbers doesn't equal skill but it could still be unbalancing.

Honestly I'm not that worried about pvp server hoppers... they don't have any incentive to server transfer anywhere other than the top 3 (unless they're a huge guild like the goons who may decide to do it for the lulz, but that's abnormal). They'll probably keep migrating between the 'big 3' after leaderboards start to solidify ~6 months after the game launches and leave the population of the other [100+?] servers alone.

[luckton]

That WvsW article made me cancel my WZ queue and log out of swtor and not come back since yesterday.

So...what're playin' in the meantime?

[luckton]

Dammit, I fucking did it again.  I read one really good snippet about an upcoming MMO, and then I deluge myself in information about it and get all hyped up.  SWTOR just seems dull compared to this now.

As much as I love this genre, I almost hate it equally so 

[Tarami]

Dammit, I fucking did it again.  I read one really good snippet about an upcoming MMO, and then I deluge myself in information about it and get all hyped up.  SWTOR just seems dull compared to this now.

As much as I love this genre, I almost hate it equally so 

Don't worry, it hates us right back.

[luckton]

We really should just call this "DAoC 2".   

[caladein]

I'm completely opposite.  The more information they release/I read, the more I realize that they're not making a game "for me".  Everything on the PvP side below tournament play makes pretty significant departure from the first game that I find to its detriment, which is annoying as that's what I liked about the first game.  (And Nightfall PvE wasn't terrible at the time.)

Maybe Structured will not turn out to be a series of pub-stomping games and the maps turn out varied enough to make up for there being only one game type.  Maybe. 

[Hawkbit]

Kotaku plays in press beta, too many people cause screen lag to a crash

I'm super psyched about GW2, regardless of the performance in that video.  I've been going back through GW1 lately to finish off some stories and such.  I can't believe how deep that game is, and how brutally tough it is until I started fleshing out my heroes a bit more.  Fun!

[Fabricated]

sb.exe

[HaemishM]

What PVP game would be complete without it? 

[Threash]

That WvsW article made me cancel my WZ queue and log out of swtor and not come back since yesterday.

So...what're playin' in the meantime?

I bought skyrim :)

[Kageru]

I assume there is no NDA on the weekend beta tests.

Because there's a pretty substantial amount of information being put out by the participants (Guild Wars Guru,Kotaku)

[Shatter]

http://www.incgamers.com/Previews/38...st-impressions
http://massively.joystiq.com/2012/02...awns-thoughts/
http://massively.joystiq.com/2012/02...eths-thoughts/
http://www.gamebreaker.tv/mmorpg/gets-it-right/
http://www.destructoid.com/guild-war...e-222175.phtml
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9V6Ck...ature=youtu.be
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W-YKm...06FAAAAAAAAAAA
http://kotaku.com/5886430/ten-things...2-beta-weekend
http://www.guildwars2guru.com/guild-...test-coverage/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6SMYW...02FUAAAAAAAAAA
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature...v=l9vArH8fZjU#!

[luckton]

I'm getting the general feeling that things seem to be a bit more positive about this game than some other recent releases.