Guild Wars 2

Mad King: Are you ready? If not….that’s unfortunate for you.

It will be a great day

It will be great , indeed. I will be doing all of the Halloween stuff first. Then will jump into the expansion after Halloween is over. I am in no hurry with the expansion. I will enjoy it at my own pace.

BUT YAY HALLOWEEN. I have my costume on in game and ready to go!

I just started playing the game a couple weeks ago, I am level 80 and enjoying the game a lot. In each MMO I play Halloween is my favorite event of the year. Why have they decided to begin Halloween and release their first major expansion on the same exact day? This can only be a negative thing.

New players like myself are going to be overwhelmed by the fact that there are two major events taking place literally at the exact same time. They also have nothing to do with one another. Whether I do the Halloween stuff first or skip it and head straight to HoT I’m going to feel like I’m missing out.

I know it isn’t really a huge deal (kind of is for me). I just do not understand how anyone thought this was a good idea?

Halloween is temporary, so if youre not in a huge rush to complete HoT stuff, just spend your time on Halloween. HoT will be there when youre done

Thats what I am doing lol I figure why be in a huge rush for HoT when I can do it whenever. Im doing alllllll of the Halloween stuff first!

I dont know why they are dropping both at the same time, but I am fine with it personally.

And welcome to the game!!! I hope you enjoy your first Halloween.

Aerwyna.2541:

It will be great , indeed. I will be doing all of the Halloween stuff first. Then will jump into the expansion after Halloween is over. I am in no hurry with the expansion. I will enjoy it at my own pace.

BUT YAY HALLOWEEN. I have my costume on in game and ready to go!

Your philosophy is good only issue is that HoT is going to be like an old western land grab. There will be new markets and things opening up and opportunities that open and close in those first few weeks. In the same boat, love the Halloween event but wish it had started earlier this year to allow people to relax and enjoy both versus having to choose between them. But, it is what it is. Good gaming to you!

I agree with you both. When I heard that Halloween was being released on the same day as HoT I was a bit shocked. I had hoped it would be released on October 20th so we had a few days to enjoy it and didn’t have to wait 5 hours for HoT to download when I just want to play the Halloween content. Which frankly I’m more excited about Halloween seeing as most people missed out on the original Halloween and much of it looks to be like year one which the community has asked for time and again but simply because of this fact I am doing like Aerwyna and playing the Halloween content first since HoT will be there and Halloween will be gone after not even two weeks.

I have to agree with Aerwyna. Halloween is awesome in GW2 and HoT isn’t going anywhere. Don’t be overwhelmed at too much to do in an MMO. Be thankful. This year for veteran players has been anything but “too much to do”. It’s been a drought. Start off doing Halloween stuff. If you like it keep doing it. If not, you have a whole new expansion to play.

Halloween’s always the last two weeks of October in GW2

Plus, if I am correct, doing some Halloween stuff might count towards Tyrian Masteries which are coming with HoT.

TheGrimm.5624:

Aerwyna.2541:

It will be great , indeed. I will be doing all of the Halloween stuff first. Then will jump into the expansion after Halloween is over. I am in no hurry with the expansion. I will enjoy it at my own pace.

BUT YAY HALLOWEEN. I have my costume on in game and ready to go!

Your philosophy is good only issue is that HoT is going to be like an old western land grab. There will be new markets and things opening up and opportunities that open and close in those first few weeks. In the same boat, love the Halloween event but wish it had started earlier this year to allow people to relax and enjoy both versus having to choose between them. But, it is what it is. Good gaming to you!

I guess I will just have to work a little harder. xD

Halloween is the bestest, I’m going to be working on it first myself.

Aerwyna.2541:

I guess I will just have to work a little harder. xD

I am sending coffee vibes your way now.

The answer why halloween release + HoT release are on the same day is easy:

It’s called stress test.

Which means on october 23rd all gw2 players will be totally stressed and probably some devs too. (Of course only if anyone can login )

Showbiz.9725:

I just started playing the game a couple weeks ago, I am level 80 and enjoying the game a lot. In each MMO I play Halloween is my favorite event of the year. Why have they decided to begin Halloween and release their first major expansion on the same exact day? This can only be a negative thing.

New players like myself are going to be overwhelmed by the fact that there are two major events taking place literally at the exact same time. They also have nothing to do with one another. Whether I do the Halloween stuff first or skip it and head straight to HoT I’m going to feel like I’m missing out.

I know it isn’t really a huge deal (kind of is for me). I just do not understand how anyone thought this was a good idea?

It’s for two reasons I guess.

1) To spread out the player base. so the HoT servers do not get slamed on launch day.

2) So the Play for Free folks have something to do also, as lets face it, the maps will empty out quite quickly on launch day.

While I understand the OP’s dilemma, it seems ironic to have seen so many complaints about lack of new/special content and to now see one about too much at once.

Levelling my Revenant via the Halloween content, win win.

It’s not necessarily about being overwhelmed I guess. Just more of not wanting to miss out on one major event because you’re doing the other, lol. I guess it’s true HoT wont be going anywhere, but I’m sure there are daily rewards in HoT that I won’t want to miss out on either

IndigoSundown.5419:

While I understand the OP’s dilemma, it seems ironic to have seen so many complaints about lack of new/special content and to now see one about too much at once.

indeed, for me personally, Halloween all the way, I don’t mind starting HoT content 2 weeks later. It’s not like it’s going anywhere.

Showbiz.9725:

It’s not necessarily about being overwhelmed I guess. Just more of not wanting to miss out on one major event because you’re doing the other, lol. I guess it’s true HoT wont be going anywhere, but I’m sure there are daily rewards in HoT that I won’t want to miss out on either

If there are, Dailies don’t take that long.

Made a similar post at the same time, lol

TheGrimm.5624:

Aerwyna.2541:

It will be great , indeed. I will be doing all of the Halloween stuff first. Then will jump into the expansion after Halloween is over. I am in no hurry with the expansion. I will enjoy it at my own pace.

BUT YAY HALLOWEEN. I have my costume on in game and ready to go!

Your philosophy is good only issue is that HoT is going to be like an old western land grab. There will be new markets and things opening up and opportunities that open and close in those first few weeks. In the same boat, love the Halloween event but wish it had started earlier this year to allow people to relax and enjoy both versus having to choose between them. But, it is what it is. Good gaming to you!

^ definitely this

WP made some good points on a recent video.

1) Most importantly, we can expect a lot of server down-time, bugs and other problems when HoT releases. Having interesting semi-new content to involve ourselves in means that there’s less pressure and frustration directed towards HoT.

2) So that the world doesn’t feel completely bare and barren for F2P guys. It will also be the first “real” content update for many F2P/new guys (apart from the 3 day mordrem invasion). Seeing the quality of the Halloween event might make some F2P-ers upgrade, or decide to stay in the game for longer.

Edit: I prepurchased HoT but I will be focusing on the Halloween events whilst they’re on. These are temporary and I’m an AP and skin hunter- I’d like to make the most of the festivities as I can engross myself in HoT whenever. It’ll be more fun to play HoT when things are running smoothly too. I also missed out on the first Halloween event due to exams, so it’ll be fun to experience the whole package.

they should have launched halloween this week and then let hot have it’s own weekend release.

i think the releases are timed so if hot has massive bugs/login problems/just isn’t very good/is still in late beta stages…oh look halloween ! .

Unless the Halloween content has bugs and needs to be adressed at the same time o.o

If there are log-in problems ‘for HoT’, there will be log-in problems for Halloween. It’s not like we can choose which part of the game to log into.

Now, particular maps may have issues, but getting into the game will either be affected…or not.

I plan to focus on Halloween, as well, though I may check out what’s on offer over in the Heart of Maguuma, as well.

Welcome to Tyria, and happy adventuring, OP.

Masteries and experience on level 80s.

Before the expansion, useless.
After the expansion, priceless.

Just think of how many levels you’ll gain doing Halloween content and all of it going to your Tyrian mastery of choice.

^Indeed. Looking forward to that. =)

To stall the HoT content, that’s all. Might be because anet still doesn’T trust the megaserver system and they dont want 100k players in 4 maps at a time creating 600 instances of 4 different maps, and that way they can spread the population.
It will also help the economy that way the market wont be flooded by all the HoT mats.

Simply put it seems purely an executive decision to lesson the server load for the HoT maps. Split the population between Halloween and HoT for the first few weeks, which puts less pressure on the servers hosting the HoT maps and thus makes a smoother launch.

Not ideal for the player base that want to do both right away, but works from a design perspective and also makes QoL better for players in the HoT maps as they will experience less initial issues. Quite brilliant on their part, though as a player who wants to do both right away I’m a bit torn (though will be doing Halloween as that is temporary).

It is also a safe-guard against things going wrong.

Lets say they released Halloween on Tuesday. Something in that patch broke something so badly that a HoT-launch on Friday would be impossible. That would be a complete catastrophe.

Sure, this might very well lead to MORE issues with the update, but at least the update will launch at the stated date. A rocky launch is forgotten rather fast, a missed launched is remembered forever.

so that they can ahve double events and at the same time, double bugs

Just imagine if HoT was launching on April 1st…..

OBviously so that you can make a Revenant and immediately jump to the clocktower and spend the rest of the week there.

It’s actually pretty smart because it splits the community, relieving some potential strain on the servers handling HoT zones. But it also gives the people who didn’t buy HoT, and the the F2Pers something to do.

Showbiz.9725:

I just started playing the game a couple weeks ago, I am level 80 and enjoying the game a lot. In each MMO I play Halloween is my favorite event of the year. Why have they decided to begin Halloween and release their first major expansion on the same exact day? This can only be a negative thing.

New players like myself are going to be overwhelmed by the fact that there are two major events taking place literally at the exact same time. They also have nothing to do with one another. Whether I do the Halloween stuff first or skip it and head straight to HoT I’m going to feel like I’m missing out.

I know it isn’t really a huge deal (kind of is for me). I just do not understand how anyone thought this was a good idea?

In my opinion, its a perfect marketing strategy, of sorts. They have thousands of new free to play members trying out the game that haven’t purchased HoT. Then they put out one of the most fun events that they implement into the game annually, and when its over, I bet a lot of those new players will commit to HoT.

I remember the last real Halloween event to be some of the most fun I have ever had in gaming, let alone in GW2. On top of all that, I think that it is just a coincidence, and they were not going to skip Halloween.

My recommendations would be to just relax, have fun and don’t rush anything. Enjoy Halloween while it lasts and then jump into HoT. I know a lot of Vets are doing that regardless.

Also, for a first timer like you… Good luck on the Mad King’s Clock Tower… Evil laugh

;)

Seeing as how there are going to be a lot of neat, likely very temporary, skins this Halloween.

Depending on how hard they are to obtain, several of us more hardcore veterans might have to have to put off HoT entirely.

yeh im gonna have to ignore HoT to 90% to be able to get all those epic new Halloweenskins
now IF they require farm or even worse.. RNG
i will have to farm for those skins or money for the RNG to get the skins all the time during halloween

rlly stupid to start HoT at the same time
just 1 week later would have helped a lot

Orangensaft.7139:

yeh im gonna have to ignore HoT to 90% to be able to get all those epic new Halloweenskins
now IF they require farm or even worse.. RNG
i will have to farm those skins or money for the RNG to get the skins all halloween

rlly stupid to start HoT at the same time
just 1 week later would have helped a lot

Yeah I’m grinding gold this week :/

Orangensaft.7139:

yeh im gonna have to ignore HoT to 90% to be able to get all those epic new Halloweenskins
now IF they require farm or even worse.. RNG
i will have to farm for those skins or money for the RNG to get the skins all the time during halloween

rlly stupid to start HoT at the same time
just 1 week later would have helped a lot

Because you will obviously never be able to catch up on the lost time in HoT. The horror!

They already made up their mind, we can’t change it in such a short time frame. Now, the important question is which is better to earn cash: labyrinth or waste =|

I disagree it can only be a negative thing.

I bought Guild Wars 2 and quit shortly afterwards because I thought it was boring. What got me back was Wintersday 2012 because it was special enough to not only make me check out the events but also able to get back into the game proper… which wasn’t going anywhere.

More stuff to do isn’t a problem as long as you manage your priorities. Personally, I don’t mind not being able to complete everything because at least I won’t run out of stuff to do which is the worst.

And there are many people who have left Gw2 for a long while and this event is a good way to coincide with exploring whatever has changed in HoT.

Kal Spiro.9745:

Orangensaft.7139:

yeh im gonna have to ignore HoT to 90% to be able to get all those epic new Halloweenskins
now IF they require farm or even worse.. RNG
i will have to farm for those skins or money for the RNG to get the skins all the time during halloween

rlly stupid to start HoT at the same time
just 1 week later would have helped a lot

Because you will obviously never be able to catch up on the lost time in HoT. The horror!

ofc i will be able to catch up and i dont think i will have any big loss on potential big profits

but the most fun is reaching stuff as the first ones and not when everything is spoiled already
also i wont be able to do it at the same time as my guildies and friends who dont all feel the need to get those skins

i just think they should have delayed HoT for 2 weeks or released 4 weeks earlier than Halloween

The way I look at it, ignore Halloween, or ignore Hot, or ignore both, or work on both. There no reason why this is a bother. Yeah Halloween more limited, so if that mater, focus on that more, easy answer.

Showbiz.9725:

I just started playing the game a couple weeks ago, I am level 80 and enjoying the game a lot. In each MMO I play Halloween is my favorite event of the year. Why have they decided to begin Halloween and release their first major expansion on the same exact day? This can only be a negative thing.

New players like myself are going to be overwhelmed by the fact that there are two major events taking place literally at the exact same time. They also have nothing to do with one another. Whether I do the Halloween stuff first or skip it and head straight to HoT I’m going to feel like I’m missing out.

I know it isn’t really a huge deal (kind of is for me). I just do not understand how anyone thought this was a good idea?

Lately Arena Net haven’t been doing well on good ideas.

But, although its not the bestest thing for them to start the event with HoT, then again its a way to soften the non-buyers into not kinda rage quitting on HoT release when they realize all the stuff they’re missing, also a good way to soften us up when stuff turns out irredeemably broken, with halloween we’ll have stuff to do, and since its old stuff anyhow (for the most part at least it seems so) little odds that its broken.

Me personally i’ll be mixing Halloween with unlocking core masteries, since that was my original plan anyway.

I don’t have a problem with them coming out at the same time. However, I think it’s really weird that Halloween is starting on a Friday instead of a Tuesday, like all the other PvE updates do. It makes sense for HoT, since that is an expansion and not just an update.

This really will be an issue. When ascended weapons were added, we also had SAB. Plenty of people ignored SAB to get the new shiny. Not all, but plenty did. That was for weapon stats, this is a new expansion. A lot of people will get a lot less out of Hallowe’en than they’d like…

Oh well, that’s how Anet’s decided to do it.

I won’t even bother logging in on the 23rd.. we’re going to go have dinner with friends while the game gets update after update of bug fixes and server crash fixes >_>

At least it’s being released on a Friday, most people’ll be able to get some time over the weekend.

Just reiterating what others have said, but HOT is not an “event”. It is permanent content. Halloween on the other hand is a 2 week long “event”.

I’m still disappointed that we will only get ~2 weeks to do all the halloween stuff, but who cares about HOT content. It will be available during halloween for people who have time to do both, and for people who dont it will still be there in 2 weeks.

As far as I’m aware there aren’t any time limited HoT launch things, so you’re not really missing out on anything by just playing Halloween stuff and enjoying the holiday. once halloween is over all the HoT stuff will still be there to enjoy.

Or, you know, if you achieve all of your self-imposed halloween goals you can jump right in to new fun content immediately rather than waiting for the next release.

I rather like this release setup actually. Nothing makes me more sad during an event that going “okay, I did all the holiday things I wanted to, now it’s back to the same old”

Now it’s more like “Halloween was fun, now on to more new fun!”

@ OP

It’s to keep people busy to prolong HoT content.

I worry no one will be doing the Halloween stuff overall since there’s so much new stuff to do and we’ve already seen all the Halloween games before.

It was planned this way so you have something to do when HoT releases full of bugs with stalled events and unfinished areas and such, which is fine with me.