Guild Wars 2

[PalmTrees]

I thought it was kind of funny that he mentions that they don't want players doing menial tasks then a few minutes later he's describing how you can gain favor with an npc by watering their plants and feeding their cows.

[Nightblade]

I thought it was kind of funny that he mentions that they don't want players doing menial tasks then a few minutes later he's describing how you can gain favor with an npc by watering their plants and feeding their cows.

Maybe they're kick ass fighting cows with action missiles.

[Sky]

Go feed my cows...more missiles.

[birdsguts]

Pretty interesting interview:
http://www.guildwars2guru.com/forum/devs-answer-your-questions-gamescom-t6867.html

Alot of old info but some newish implications here and there.

What's your thoughts about the content that will be available at the time of release to players? How long do you expect it to "last", and is anything else you want to tell us in particular?

    So the biggest thing is that we don't want the experience part to be the driving force on how long it's going to take to play the game. The content that is around should be enjoyable, so however long it takes you to play it to have an enjoyable time is probably how we're thinking it should be like. It's going to take quite a short time to reach the cap.

Random excerpt.
Just interesting to me to see them say "short time to cap" officially.
Bits about crafting nodes and resource availability stuff throughout.
Sounds like some things I've seen in LOTR:O (and other games) with the quest items not de-spawning.


PS: Also it seems this interview is one of the links in their recent wiki drop: http://www.arena.net/blog/link-roundup-gamescom-demo-and-necromancer

[Riggswolfe]

You know, I picked up GW1 at 1/2 price books and while I quite enjoy Nightfall (I found Prophecies to be kind of boring) I still hate that I can't swim and jump. It looks like GW2 is changing that.

Now, if only someone could talk them into bringing heroes back!

Oh, and I finally saw a character creation vid. 3 choices on each screen it looked like. Still, that's a decent amount of options.

[Lantyssa]

There may be more to the final character creation.  They were trying to keep things simple so people played instead of taking the time to make a character.

[LK]

I'll be working NCSoft's booth this weekend at PAX so I'll get a good look at this. All I have is a general sense of quality for this game; I haven't seen nor read any other previews.

[birdsguts]

Water-board them until they tell you about PvP plans.

[Soln]

1.  when is the Beta?
2.  when is the GM?


start with those and be a hero

[Tearofsoul]

Agreed, PvP is what I am concering for GW2.

[Mrbloodworth]

    * Part 1
    * Part 2
    * Part 3

[birdsguts]

    * Part 1
    * Part 2
    * Part 3

I believe it was in part two, when they stumbled across the brood mother. That actually "got" me. Looked fun, felt cool to suddenly see it come charging through the grass at her. Good stuff, thanks for the links.
I was hoping they'd show more when they brought up the topic of class interaction but I understand they were pressed for time. Still curious about collision and all that jazz. Patience...

[LK]

I'll get to play it first thing tomorrow. It's a 40 minute demo. Should be interesting.

[LK]

I got to be the first person in North America to play the game.  

What they are setting out to do is fucking amazing. Too much to go into over iPhone, nerdgasming here. PvP is supported, player vs. Player, Guild vs guild (I think) server vs. server.[/i] No beta or release date announcement.

Felicia Day voices the little female engineering dudes.  

[Lantyssa]

Can you play a Norn at PAX?  I need Norn gameplay.  Sylvari would be nice, too.

[Stormwaltz]

server vs. server.

You mean clustered instances, or something different?

[Soln]

or regional clusters like WoW battlegroups?

[LK]

The jist of what I was able to find is that it is what I said: servers competing with each other. Best comparison I could make is Chromehounds. Imagine if the populace of a WoW server was competin in massive multiplayer fights. More details will emerge but the thought of huge battles fought between servers for prizes makes my gamer bits tingle.

They have accounted for the possibility of one server getting repeatedly stomped, the competition will be mixed. As someone who hadn't played it before I was very excited by their mix of public quests (events) and nonlinear gameplay.

[caladein]

What Lorekeep is referring to is World/Casual PvP:

World vs World, WvW, World PvP or Casual PvP, is a mode of Player versus Player combat which takes place in the Mists. Worlds, or servers, are randomly matched up against two other worlds. Those match-ups will be rotated every week to match worlds against those of similar strength. The combat is open and features many objectives and roles which players can do; "players may decide to fight alone against a supply caravan, join a single group and capture a mine or create a large alliance to assault one of the numerous fortress that could give an advantage in the zone." The battle is on a large scale, where hundreds of people can fight on each side in week-long battles.

Each opposing world starts out with castles, mercenary camps, mines, lumber mills and villages. Separating the starting zones are neutral zones controlled by no one, also containing fortresses, mines, and villages.

The resources gained from mines and lumber mills are used to rebuild walls, create siege engines, and generally defend the team's fortress.

These territories and control points will confer benefits to the world that controls them; "maybe everyone gets increased energy regeneration or healing rate or enhanced loot drop rate." Players can gain experience and level their character in World PvP. Guilds will be able to take and hold keeps.

Players are free to come and go from the battle as they please and there is no limit to the number of players entering. Players enter with a character of any level and use skills they have available to that character. Characters can enter as a sidekick which will allow them to play as a higher level character.

World PvP is intended as a casual form of PvP, designed to be a more relaxed bridging point between PvE and the tactics and pressure of structured PvP. It is hoped that players of any level or PvP experience can participate and be useful.

Really, it seems like if Fort Aspenwood and Isle of Conquest had a baby with one important difference from FA: no PvP-only character analogue ala Structured PvP (aka GvG/RAs).

[Nevermore]

This is shaping up to be the first MMO I might be willing to buy on release since way back when City of Heroes was released.

[LK]

IT'S HOOOOOT.

Weapons determine first 5 skills - all 5 is two-handed, 3/2 if main / off hand, 6th is dedicated healing, unlockable is 7-9, 0 is Ultimate skill, it's hard to describe on iPhone, they want to keep momentum in play, anyone can resurrect, ANYONE, you can fight in a downed state a la LFD when you hit 0 HP, it's awesome and different and positive.

[Fordel]

Anyone resurrecting isn't a new thing in GW. :)

[caladein]

Yeah, this is probably just the same demo they had at Gamescom last month so I doubt we're getting any new info.

To save Lorekeep touchscreen typing: the wiki link.

E: Grammar.

[DayDream]

Alright, time to put at least something negative down.  I'm loving just about everything I'm reading about this game, but I got one big gripe from the videos I've seen.

I think the Elite skills with their 12 minute cooldown are going to be "a balance problem."  At least for PvP.

If the skills are effective enough to be worth the timer and see use, they're likely to be encounter-deciding, barring special circumstances.  That's not good, because people value negative experiences much higher than positive experiences.  So the negative experience of "I jumped a guy and he popped his elite and pasted me" is a lot more important in player perception than "I found this guy farming and owned him with my tornado skill, he never had a chance."

The longest cooldown I'd want to make a skill for a diku combat engine would be the average time between the start of encounters.  As in, I first spawn in with all cooldowns ready.  I go out the usual attack route, use all my cooldowns, then die.  As I spawn in and move forward to where I was, my cooldowns refresh and I'm ready to fight again at the same performance level.

Any longer than that, and the skills become so encounter warping that gameplay suffers.  This is why WoW arenas have the limits on long cooldown skills that they do.  And why many cooldowns introduced with burning crusade and later are in the 2-3 minute or less range.  Because that's the average time between start of encounters.

So it worries me to see 12 minute cooldowns, because then I expect to a third or more of all small scale encounters decided by elite skills, one way or another.  And then because of that, to have player perception, my own included, translate that to "every fight comes down to who has their elite and who doesn't."



Arena.net aren't new to this, however, they've got experience from guild wars one.  Most likely, their designers were aware of this stuff long ago, and have moved beyond this conversation.  So what I'm curious about, is what they've got that works around this?  Are they telling player expectations of skill rarity to fuck off, and these elite skills are actually going to be about average while in effect, and simply not present while on timer?  They've mentioned different rulesets for PvE and PvP, are they going to be reducing both the skill's duration and cooldown by some multiple across the board?  Do they consider the relative value of these long cooldown skills in PvE to be higher than the negative gameplay in PvP?  I doubt their pvp encounters are so murderously boring that 12 minutes IS the average time between start of encounters, but I guess that's possible too.

Anyway, I don't know how PAX is set up, but if anyone there can ask a booth jockey and see if they've got an answer about how these long cooldowns are going to work in PvP, it might be really interesting.

[birdsguts]

They scaled skills and other factors between PvP and PvE in the original Guild Wars. They've already mentioned they balance them differently in this one so I'm assuming they'll use some variation of that same system. It's like a switch that flips when you go into a PvP area or lobby or however it will work. The skill is swapped out for it's PvP equivalent that is balanced relative to whatever else they allow into that particular part of the game. Maybe the cooldown will change, maybe some stats will change... maybe something about the usage or drawback... It was pretty situational if I'm remembering it right.

[jayfyve]

Interesting. I'd use this app.

http://www.massively.com/2010/09/03/pax-2010-arenanet-announces-guild-wars-2-app-for-smartphones-an/

PAX 2010: ArenaNet announces Guild Wars 2 app for smartphones and iPad

The latest news on Guild Wars 2 comes from a direction that most of us were not considering. Part of Guild Wars 2's development is being done by the Extended Experience Team, a group working on game experience that's not strictly limited to your computer.

Today the Guild Wars 2 developers unveiled that team's current project: Guild Wars 2 for smartphones and the iPad. The project isn't completed, but it's already very extensive. Players will have the ability to check their friends lists, follow their friends on the map, message their friends, and move around the world on their characters.

Game Designer Colin Johanson says that the Extended Experience Team doesn't plan to stop with that, however. The team is planning to take the application much further before release, so expect to see even more in the way of Guild Wars 2-on-the-go.

[KallDrexx]

Sooooo many promises.  This is starting to sound way to awesome to be real....

Anyone resurrecting isn't a new thing in GW. :)

I think the new thing is that anyone can resurrect without wasting a skill spot.  Before (IIRC) you had to bring resurrection signet and waste a skill spot, and it kind of looks like in gw2 you don't need to do that.

[LK]

One of their major philosophies with gameplay is to keep momentum and minimize downtime.

[HaemishM]

Holy fuck, that description of World PVP makes me very happy in the pants. 

[Mosesandstick]

Damn, I'm not just thinking of buying the game but pre-ordering!

[DayDream]

They scaled skills and other factors between PvP and PvE in the original Guild Wars. They've already mentioned they balance them differently in this one so I'm assuming they'll use some variation of that same system. It's like a switch that flips when you go into a PvP area or lobby or however it will work. The skill is swapped out for it's PvP equivalent that is balanced relative to whatever else they allow into that particular part of the game. Maybe the cooldown will change, maybe some stats will change... maybe something about the usage or drawback... It was pretty situational if I'm remembering it right.

Yeah, I hope they do.  I do remember them mentioning that elite skills were supposed to be impressive or something in one of the demo videos, so I guess we'll see.


I do find their constant hyping, etc. is triggering all my "that's impossible to make, the game is doomed to failure" responses though.  Seeing pieces of it in gameplay is a little comforting, but who knows.

[LK]

Isiah, Skills Designer, and I paraphrase: Elite Skills are more scatter the battlefield than FUCK YOU guy, they are WELL aware of the concerns.

Human and Charr only at PAX plus 4 classes.

[birdsguts]

I enjoyed this interview about the combat system.

http://www.tentonhammer.com/gw2/features/interviews/pax-combat

"Combat" interview from PAX posted the 9th. Small amount of info dealing with the issue mentioned earlier in the thread... that whole PvP vs. PvE balancing deal.

[Outlawedprod]

http://www.arena.net/blog/rick-ellis-answers-your-extended-experience-questions
http://www.arena.net/blog/live-and-let-dye-kristen-perry-on-the-gw2-dye-system
http://www.arena.net/blog/a-rewarding-experience-john-hargrove-talks-about-loot

[March]

We took the WaR Dye system, loaded it into the LoTRo Customization system and plan to hit WoW right between the eyes shoulder blades.

Love the concept... though I'm a little confused by the planned execution of the customization feature... sounds kida Aion-ish to me... combining Item A with Item B via some sort of (dropped? Crafted? Bought?) reagent does not sound even remotely as good as LoTRo's genius Wardrobe system.  Wardrobe should be the new standard for all customization and iterations should begin there.