Guild Wars 2

Revamped Post
After reviewing my original post, I think that I was more concerned about wintersday losing its feel, rather than it not being wintersday at all. I want there to be changes, and I am willing to give this new style a chance, I just hope that the original soul stays. The warm fires, the snow gently dancing downwards, the dark lighting and the snowmen. In game in gw1 I could feel myself colder while walking around, and feel myself warm up as I stood next to the fires. That romantic atmosphere of sleeping winter with rays of hope, that is the wintersday I grew up with. Now that the gods are gone, we have tixx, and I hope he can provide the same feel. I’m going to trust that anet knows how to make their game, and hope for the best. Sorry for the angry post earlier, I was just upset.

What I’d Like to See

• Candy Cane Weaponry
• Snowmen
• Eggnog
• Snowball Fights
• Wintersday PvP mode
• Ice Skating on Lions Arch’s frozen shores?
• Presents dropped by monsters
• Soloable Wintersday dungeon

What I’d like to Avoid

• Chests that drop special Wintersday items at low rates, bought from the gem store
• Wintersday Minis not available through direct purchase
• One time events
• Commercialization of Wintersday

Note; It’s Too Late Now
As of now, ANet has their patch pretty much planned and ready to go, so all of my concerns, suggestions, and etc will probably not matter all that much. All I am really doing at this point is worrying about something that is already set in motion, so really all we can do is hope for the best from this holiday.

edit; changed the title to match the thread.

This is an international outreach program by Asuras to impress other races with their skill and generosity without actually handing out anything valuable (i.e., weapons), who are taking advantage of Human culture.. I think it fits in perfectly with GW2 lore.

The Halloween event didn’t look like much either on paper, but once we were playing it was fun and lore-relevant. Please wait until something’s actually started before whining about it OK?

Gilosean.3805:

This is an international outreach program by Asuras to impress other races with their skill and generosity without actually handing out anything valuable (i.e., weapons), who are taking advantage of Human culture.. I think it fits in perfectly with GW2 lore.

The Halloween event didn’t look like much either on paper, but once we were playing it was fun and lore-relevant. Please wait until something’s actually started before whining about it OK?

But in lore Asura are not nice! They aren’t! They are power hungry, devious little geniuses with the desire to control all of Tyria! The Halloween event showed the mad king and his tower, that was enough to please me, but having Santa Asura does not please me. AGHH

In the section where you claimed this event does not makes sense, you explained in a clear and simple way why this event makes sense (or better, why the old one doesn’t anymore).

Okay, the gods have left Tyria, (which is a real let down…) so Grenth and Dwyanna can’t come back to duke it out. However, how does a holiday based around two gods fighting it out change into a toymaker floating through Tyria handing out presents? How does that relate to the Snowman vs Grentch warfare that’s been happening for hundreds of years? AGHHHH WHYY?!

Not the first time a holiday has been cheapened over the generations by shallow materialism. =P

arrownin.3128:

Gilosean.3805:

This is an international outreach program by Asuras to impress other races with their skill and generosity without actually handing out anything valuable (i.e., weapons), who are taking advantage of Human culture.. I think it fits in perfectly with GW2 lore.

The Halloween event didn’t look like much either on paper, but once we were playing it was fun and lore-relevant. Please wait until something’s actually started before whining about it OK?

But in lore Asura are not nice! They aren’t! They are power hungry, devious little geniuses with the desire to control all of Tyria! The Halloween event showed the mad king and his tower, that was enough to please me, but having Santa Asura does not please me. AGHH

Of course they’re not nice. That’s why they need to build up some goodwill! And what better way to lord their innate superiority over their neighbors than to provide lovely, magical toys? All part of world domination.

I hope there’s some kind of in-game conflict between the Toymaker and the religious Humans. That would be awesome, but also probably too sensitive for ANet to want to take on this year. Any RPers up for the challenge?

Plus, who else can you see giving away mounds of stuff? Norn and Humans don’t care about other races, Sylvari don’t care about material things, Charr wouldn’t bother spending resources on non-violence.

Besides, the asura idea has already lead to awesome artwork and screens. Watching the huge golem-baloon in the skies was impressive in the official site.

DiogoSilva.7089:

In the section where you claimed this event does not makes sense, you explained in a clear and simple way why this event makes sense (or better, why the old one doesn’t anymore).

I guess I meant, how did this holiday which was tradition for hundreds of years, become interpreted into asuras giving out toys?

arrownin.3128:

DiogoSilva.7089:

In the section where you claimed this event does not makes sense, you explained in a clear and simple way why this event makes sense (or better, why the old one doesn’t anymore).

I guess I meant, how did this holiday which was tradition for hundreds of years, become interpreted into asuras giving out toys?

Because a random Asura genius decided to revolutionize what this holiday meant for Tyria? :P

Let’s wait first to see the backstory and personality behind him. Am I the only one who truly thinks that the Asura has an evil smile in his artwork?

DiogoSilva.7089:

arrownin.3128:

DiogoSilva.7089:

In the section where you claimed this event does not makes sense, you explained in a clear and simple way why this event makes sense (or better, why the old one doesn’t anymore).

I guess I meant, how did this holiday which was tradition for hundreds of years, become interpreted into asuras giving out toys?

Because a random Asura genius decided to revolutionize what this holiday meant for Tyria? :P

Let’s wait first to see the backstory and personality behind him. Am I the only one who truly thinks that the Asura looks plain evil in the artwork?

No. No, you are not.

Ooh – evil thought. What if the toys will all turn to weapons throughout the cities after Wintersday, and the cities get turned into temporary dungeons? That is probably not going to happen. It will probably all be in the instanced ship. But it would be awesome.

On second thoughts, Tixx looks an extremely nice and humble guy in the in-game screens…

I was wondering if Toypocalypse was some sort of evil scheme, but it looks like it’ll just be a typical asura accident of epic proportions. It might be fun, though. We’ll be fighting against toys, afterall.

Part of the problem is that the Wintersday you know and love arrownin is a human holiday. We have 5 races now. How does a holiday about Grenth and Dwayna with their big fight between snowmen and grentches have do with Asura, Sylvari, Charr or Norn? Now mind you I think the Asura thing is going a bit far and a little too commercialized if you ask me, but how else you have a holiday that can be not about one race or the other? A holiday that is about the spirit of the season and not about a battle between 2 gods that I might add are becoming less and less involved with the world as a whole by the minute.

If you ask me this is the best way to do it. Minus the arrogant full of themselves Asura mind you. But, still probably the best way to go about doing it. Besides we don’t even know how the Humans are going to be celebrating their part of the holiday once we get to them in the series of events.

arrownin.3128:

DiogoSilva.7089:

In the section where you claimed this event does not makes sense, you explained in a clear and simple way why this event makes sense (or better, why the old one doesn’t anymore).

I guess I meant, how did this holiday which was tradition for hundreds of years, become interpreted into asuras giving out toys?

Ever heard of Christmas?
(Sure, 2000 > 200, but still…)

The reason Wintersday is like this is that the human gods who previously ran the event, Grenth and Dwayna, are along with the other gods, much less influential on Tyria than they were in GW1. So, Wintersday has slowly evolved into “toy season”, much like our Christmas.

As for why it’s Asura that are running it now, well… Asura are arrogant little kittens, and they’re using this to prove their superiority.

A couple of points:

1) Christmas itself went through exactly this sort of change. Heck, Christmas as we know it didn’t exist for a very long time, basically until the church decided they were tired of people celebrating the pagan yuletide holiday and made the season about Christ instead.

2) Commercialization happens. Heck, it’s been 250 years since the old festivals. The gods are gone, and the Tyrian races are EXPONENTIALLY more connected than they were that long time ago. If anything, the commercialization of the holiday seems both saddening and completely intentional by the staff. C’mon, the comparison to the modern Christmas is so obvious it has to be intentional. I’m even expecting a Dr. Seuss-like moral at the end of the event.

Bonus Point: This change probably didn’t simply happen in a single instant. It’s not like 249 years passed full of Grenth/Dwayna goodness, and then all of a sudden BAM! 250 hits and it’s gone. A lot can change in that time span, especially with the relative globalization of holiday traditions amongst those of different faiths or cultures.

It is ANets lore, they can do whatever they want with it. Just like WoW made it’s lore into complete crap, mostly. Deal with it, imo.

Well thank goodness GW1 is still up and running… since This is Not Guild Wars 1.

First of all, just wait out the event before you start bashing it… Getting really tired of all these people who read a small amount of text and suddenly think they know everything, while the actual event hasn’t even started yet.
Secondly there are still elements in Wintersday that they announced so far that were in GW1, e.g. there will be a Snowball Fight PvP thing and I’m sure there will also be more subtle reminders of what Wintersday meant in GW1.
And finally, you’ll just have to accept that we are now not only following humans, but also 4 other races and new lore has to be created to let every race in the game enjoy festive events. You can’t expect a simple remake of GW1, you’ll have to accept that the story continues to evolve and be glad that it didn’t just freeze after GW1.

I played GW1 for a very long time too (over 5 years) and I think this new wintersday sounds brilliant.
It was obvious it would have to be different, the gods are gone, the other races have taken in the celebration too. Or they may have had variations of it that we didn’t know of before, just like Scandinavian countries had a sort “yule” celebration of the returning light, before becoming christned. Modern Christmas is really a mishmash of different traditions from different countries anyway. And we still celebrate it in different ways still depending where we are from.

Things changes in 250 years, simple as that.

And what is this thing with asura not being nice. Sure it is not what most asura is. Most asura may be arrogant, genious, menaces. But they are capable of being nice. Professor Gorr is nice. That asura in Ghosts of Ascalon was nice. Just saying.

It would be hard to have classic Wintersday considering Grenth and Dwayna have frakked off to who knows where for whatever reason.

arrownin.3128:

P.S

• Since the patch isn’t actually out, I am just speculating on what little information I have. So if things are different and awesome in game, please just ignore this thread and move on, thanks.

Done.

On the side of making it more like GW1 Wintersday.

Perhaps you should look at it from another perspective.

This year, we have an Asuran Toymaker, and a focus on presents and commercialism. Since he’s an Asura, things will go haywire (is that racist? Because it’s statistically pretty valid), and it might threaten to Ruin Wintersday!

Cue next holiday. The humans want their festival back, and they know that revenge is a dish best served cold. The snowball-toting monks return with an icy vengeance, exacting their merry reprisal through a combination of guilt-tripping carols, sappy stocking stuffers, and visions of spirits of Wintersday past, present, and future telling Tyrias to change their ways. Wintersday is saved!

Or is it? Next year, the Norn decide it is their turn! The jolliest giant rallies his trained griffins to pull his massive warsleigh full of gifts. And what better gift than monster eggs to grow up and make the children strong fighters? Or perhaps a few Charr have decided that this time of the year is really about the Festival of Smites, a time when an Iron Legion squad thought they only had enough fuel to continue a siege for a single day, but it lasted ten? Or perhaps Sylvari begin growing mistletoe in very….unfortunate places.

Relax. It’s Wintersday. Don’t worry about it too much, let it happen, then judge whether or not you liked it. If it is good, it’s all fine. If it can be improved, holidays come once per year.

AnthonyOrdon.3926:

While I understand the potential for disappointment as a fan of the original game, I also believe Guild Wars has room for both old and new traditions. We seized the opportunity to appeal to the classic Guild Wars fan with Halloween, so it feels right to me that Wintersday will cover some new ground.

It also makes a lot of sense given the fact that not only have the human gods been missing for some time, humanity itself is rather beaten back to a relatively smaller corner of Tyria. So I hope you’ll reserve your judgement until you see what the new version of Wintersday is all about.

Thanks for the response, I made this post after i saw the video and was sad that there wasn’t any grentch or snowmen, I know that theyre connected to the gods but the human ancestor in me hoped they’d be here. It does make sense that theres a change, and I am willing to give it a chance. I am just concerned for it, as going on wintersday in gw has been a tradition for me since i was 12. It’s part of my holidays. I’ll trust you guys, just please dont take advantage of it, and keep the wintersday, wintersday.

AnthonyOrdon.3926:

While I understand the potential for disappointment as a fan of the original game, I also believe Guild Wars has room for both old and new traditions. We seized the opportunity to appeal to the classic Guild Wars fan with Halloween, so it feels right to me that Wintersday will cover some new ground.

It also makes a lot of sense given the fact that not only have the human gods been missing for some time, humanity itself is rather beaten back to a relatively smaller corner of Tyria. So I hope you’ll reserve your judgement until you see what the new version of Wintersday is all about.

I never played the first one that much just here and there, but I understand where Anthony is coming from. In the last 250 Tyria has changed the gods have left us and with that the human influence isn’t as strong as it once was. The world changed and with it some traditions, as long as the content is good then I’m satisfied. Though I would like to see the six return and impact Tyria again.

arrownin.3128:

But in lore Asura are not nice! They aren’t! They are power hungry, devious little geniuses with the desire to control all of Tyria! The Halloween event showed the mad king and his tower, that was enough to please me, but having Santa Asura does not please me. AGHH

All Asura? The world isn’t black and white.

Lutheran.9687:

Part of the problem is that the Wintersday you know and love arrownin is a human holiday. We have 5 races now. How does a holiday about Grenth and Dwayna with their big fight between snowmen and grentches have do with Asura, Sylvari, Charr or Norn?

It doesn’t, but just like in real life we can have different cultures with different holidays. Just like in real life people from differing cultures can choose to honor their friend’s traditions and holidays. I see no reason why humans can’t get Wintersday largely to themselves, and in other months the other races get holidays crafted towards them. It would also give reason to actually visit the capital cities.

I’m looking forward to the new content, but I also wouldn’t mind holidays that are celebrated primarily by one of the five races.

Why would you want the same GW1 event to be in GW2 ??? Just pointless.

NEW GAME, NEW EVENTS. Makes sense.

Anet doing a great job, other mmo games I literally do not remember ANY halloween/xmas events, if there even was any lol…

Yea, new game…

Just logged in GW1,
Opened my birthday gift,
Got a little mini freezie. Smiled, cried, thought of how minies are handled in GW2, and
Logged off.

Here’s a thought? Why not have both? I know me and as many guildies as I can round up will be enjoying quite a bit of fun throughout both Wintersdays. Why? Well it’s simple. GW2 Wintersday is new and I want to experience as much of it as I can. And GW1? Well, Simple nostalgia will suffice. I’ve played through 4 Wintersdays with my friends and it would feel wrong not to take part again. Plus I still need that darn drunkard and sweettooth title tracks , lol.

Wintersday is so commercial now. I miss the old days when it was just about drinking eggnog and bashing people with snowballs.

Signet of Forums.4397:

Wintersday is so commercial now. I miss the old days when it was just about drinking eggnog and bashing people with snowballs.

Eh, from the video I’d say yeah it does look commercialized, but I’m going to leave judgement for the live game.

So, anyone have locations on the rich candy cane nodes yet?

arrownin.3128:

Signet of Forums.4397:

Wintersday is so commercial now. I miss the old days when it was just about drinking eggnog and bashing people with snowballs.

Eh, from the video I’d say yeah it does look commercialized, but I’m going to leave judgement for the live game.

You’re going to make me ruin the joke by spelling it out, aren’t you?

Signet of Forums.4397:

arrownin.3128:

Signet of Forums.4397:

Wintersday is so commercial now. I miss the old days when it was just about drinking eggnog and bashing people with snowballs.

Eh, from the video I’d say yeah it does look commercialized, but I’m going to leave judgement for the live game.

You’re going to make me ruin the joke by spelling it out, aren’t you?

:P

I only have one concern/gripe with the GW2 version of Wintersday.

The GW1 Wintersday revolved around the battle between Grenth and Dwayna, god and goddess of death and life. Now, this is pretty smart because it’s reflective of the world. The end of winter and beginning of spring, the end of the Season of the Colossus and the beginning of the Season of the Zephyr, moreover, winter also represents the death of plant life and spring the rebirth. Just as seasons, nature, and the calender ended (died) one cycle, so another came to life.
It’s a pretty smart concept and coincided with our Christmas while still being fresh and creative.

My concern is that GW1’s entirely unique view on something typical has been replaced with something not so new. In GW2 Wintersday is about a toymaker going across Tyria, spreading joy and cheer. Not to mention handing out presents to all the children of the world.

That is my gripe. ANet had something so inventive to build upon and rather than being innovative, instead we now have something utterly generic. A very interesting event in the world of Tyria has been replaced with an overly familiar concept that mirrors our world far too acurately.

Therein lies my disappointment

Azjenco.9425:

I only have one concern/gripe with the GW2 version of Wintersday.

The GW1 Wintersday revolved around the battle between Grenth and Dwayna, god and goddess of death and life. Now, this is pretty smart because it’s reflective of the world. The end of winter and beginning of spring, the end of the Season of the Colossus and the beginning of the Season of the Zephyr, moreover, winter also represents the death of plant life and spring the rebirth. Just as seasons, nature, and the calender ended (died) one cycle, so another came to life.
It’s a pretty smart concept and coincided with our Christmas while still being fresh and creative.

My concern is that GW1’s entirely unique view on something typical has been replaced with something not so new. In GW2 Wintersday is about a toymaker going across Tyria, spreading joy and cheer. Not to mention handing out presents to all the children of the world.

Actually the concept you mentioned for GW1 is even older than christianity itself. ^^ Maybe not two gods fighting, but all this starting the circle of life again.

Azjenco.9425:

That is my gripe. ANet had something so inventive to build upon and rather than being innovative, instead we now have something utterly generic. A very interesting event in the world of Tyria has been replaced with an overly familiar concept that mirrors our world far too acurately.

Therein lies my disappointment

Exactly this…. lost potential.

The one thing I was convinced ANet would do exceptionally well and better than any other MMO was the event part so far I’ve been pretty disappointed.

But how exactly do you expect a world with no gods to continue the battle of the gods in their absence? It would be like if Santa showed up physically every year, and then just vanished and forced the parents to buy toys for their own kids. Not to mention the races. I mean you have a race that would prefer to punch the avatar of dwayna in the face rather than fight for her. One race that would prolly just stare at the avatar for the whole event in awe, one that would run experiments on them, and another that would just drink egg nog until they pass out. In the end it really wasn’t possible to keep the theme of the battle of the gods alive at all. So where does the world go from there? Well they remember some traditions, egg nog, presents, and snowball fights (all of which were important to the holiday, and all things in which all the races would enjoy) and presto you have GW2 Wintersday. I do not doubt that in Divinity’s Reach we may see some flash-backs to Guild Wars 1, like perhaps Carolers of Dwayna and Grenth battling through song, or perhaps people dressed like the avatars to keep tradition alive.

On a side note, let’s not forget people, commercialism is the buying and selling of items, and in the case of GW2 Wintersday, it’s just giving (from what we can tell). Which makes it much more like the inception of Christmas gift giving traditions, and not the modern day adaptation.

with all the available lore i don’t understand why these events all need to be slightly altered versions of christian holidays. this is a world wide game. can’t we have holidays celebrating each race/god/battle instead of having halloween and christmas and (probably) easter?

i get enough christmas bombardment during the holidays. i don’t need anymore of it in a game that should have its own holidays and avoid real ones. i usually really love ingame events, but i probably won’t log in for this.

vespers.1759:

with all the available lore i don’t understand why these events all need to be slightly altered versions of christian holidays. this is a world wide game. can’t we have holidays celebrating each race/god/battle instead of having halloween and christmas and (probably) easter?

i get enough christmas bombardment during the holidays. i don’t need anymore of it in a game that should have its own holidays and avoid real ones. i usually really love ingame events, but i probably won’t log in for this.

I’m extremely excited for this event, and I will definitely be participating… but I actually do agree. While I do love the story behind it, it certainly isn’t anything exceptionally unique. As a fantasy writer myself, one of the most difficult things was coming up with new holidays for the world – I’m surprised that rather than using the uniqueness of added races, they’ve just headed over to common human tradition.

If you consider that with five races all sharing the world of Tyria that eventually (and I hope this happens) every race will have some form of celebration going on at any given time. I’m not overly concerned with this even being similar to our Xmas, so long as they can come up with many many more race related holidays as the years go by.

arrownin.3128:

DiogoSilva.7089:

In the section where you claimed this event does not makes sense, you explained in a clear and simple way why this event makes sense (or better, why the old one doesn’t anymore).

I guess I meant, how did this holiday which was tradition for hundreds of years, become interpreted into asuras giving out toys?

“Tradition for hundreds of years”? Where does it say that they’ve been doing the same things they did in Guild Wars (1) for the last 200 year leading up to Guild Wars 2?

I am sick of seeing people complain that Guild Wars 2 isn’t Guild Wars (1). It’s a different game with a large enough time gap for just about anything to happen/evlove.

AnthonyOrdon.3926:

While I understand the potential for disappointment as a fan of the original game, I also believe Guild Wars has room for both old and new traditions. We seized the opportunity to appeal to the classic Guild Wars fan with Halloween, so it feels right to me that Wintersday will cover some new ground.

It also makes a lot of sense given the fact that not only have the human gods been missing for some time, humanity itself is rather beaten back to a relatively smaller corner of Tyria. So I hope you’ll reserve your judgement until you see what the new version of Wintersday is all about.

Anthony,

First of all thank you so much for answering so many questions in this thread. It really does show a lot about you good people at ArenaNet who do really care for us and care for making these events enjoyable.

That being said, my personal all time favorite event in any MMO – no, any GAME – was the Wintersday in GW1. I’m actually playing it as we speak waiting for the GW2 Wintersday to release.

From the preview, it looks like you guys did a good job in capturing some of the soul that went into making the GW1 Wintersday so nostalgic, memorable, and fun. I won’t know until I play it, but assuming there are snowy cities (which there are), Wintersday Music similar to how GW1 has it going, Snowball fights (Thank you for bringing these back!), I feel like the game will match up to the GW1 counterpart.

I can’t wait to see what’s in store for us in GW2’s Wintersday, and while the GW1 Wintersday will always hold a special place in my heart and I’ll always remember the atmosphere of it, I am hoping that GW2 takes the torch and runs with it for years to come.

Vasham.2408:

It would be hard to have classic Wintersday considering Grenth and Dwayna have frakked off to who knows where for whatever reason.

I love your post, lol.

arrownin.3128:

AnthonyOrdon.3926:

While I understand the potential for disappointment as a fan of the original game, I also believe Guild Wars has room for both old and new traditions. We seized the opportunity to appeal to the classic Guild Wars fan with Halloween, so it feels right to me that Wintersday will cover some new ground.

It also makes a lot of sense given the fact that not only have the human gods been missing for some time, humanity itself is rather beaten back to a relatively smaller corner of Tyria. So I hope you’ll reserve your judgement until you see what the new version of Wintersday is all about.

Thanks for the response, I made this post after i saw the video and was sad that there wasn’t any grentch or snowmen, I know that theyre connected to the gods but the human ancestor in me hoped they’d be here. It does make sense that theres a change, and I am willing to give it a chance. I am just concerned for it, as going on wintersday in gw has been a tradition for me since i was 12. It’s part of my holidays. I’ll trust you guys, just please dont take advantage of it, and keep the wintersday, wintersday.

I agree. It’s been part of my Holiday celebrations as well, and like I already said, the GW1 Wintersday is my all time favorite event in any game and I cannot commend ArenaNet enough for their work on it. I even got a Polar Bear last year and got myself, my brother and my girlfriend 50/50 and we almost have GWAMM too!

I do hope they keep the spirit of the event the same and keep it fun and memorable and I am hopeful that they will do that. We’ll see when the event goes live tomorrow!

vespers.1759:

with all the available lore i don’t understand why these events all need to be slightly altered versions of christian holidays. this is a world wide game. can’t we have holidays celebrating each race/god/battle instead of having halloween and christmas and (probably) easter?

i get enough christmas bombardment during the holidays. i don’t need anymore of it in a game that should have its own holidays and avoid real ones. i usually really love ingame events, but i probably won’t log in for this.

Haloween isn’t a christian holiday.

vespers.1759:

with all the available lore i don’t understand why these events all need to be slightly altered versions of christian holidays. this is a world wide game. can’t we have holidays celebrating each race/god/battle instead of having halloween and christmas and (probably) easter?

i get enough christmas bombardment during the holidays. i don’t need anymore of it in a game that should have its own holidays and avoid real ones. i usually really love ingame events, but i probably won’t log in for this.

right…. so most people dont feel the same way.

I just hope the event will be less “in you face” than Halloween was. The whole brawler part of the Halloween event really disturbed me and I thought it didn’t fit at all into the GW fantasy world, but more into Disney World.
One thing I liked about the Halloween event was the Minstrel, because that was something I did not expect and the songs he sang were really cool and appropriate to the setting of the GW2 world.