Guild Wars 2

May we never forget our fellow gamers and good friends we’ve lost.

Thank you Anet.

Yeah we saw this yesterday – it’s a nice touch and quite unique as well. I haven’t played another MMO which does this directly in game. With the other decorations available, I’m sure players will make some exceptional monuments or memorials.

This is one upgrade I hope to never use for its intended purpose mind you!

Statistically over 30000 people who played GW2 at one point have died already, so this is cool to have

I saw the notes about this addition yesterday, and I thought it was so great of Anet to add this option. I’ve seen something like it requested many times by family/friends/guildies of players who passed away, and I really love that Anet has made it a reality.

On a lighter note:

It’s a great thing Anet has done, and even greater that it has uses beyond the somber.

Yes! I’ve experienced, in a couple of guilds, the loss of a comrade — someone that I knew in game but not IRL. It leaves an emptiness that seems hard to deal with in the context of gaming.

My most memorable case was in Brand X MMO. We were halfway through a raid when a familiar character popped on. We all said hi, made pleasantries. The player turned out to be the son of our guildmate, logging in to tell us that his father died.

This new feature is most welcome and I while it saddens to think of using it, I think it does provide an outlet for sorrow. Many thanks, Arenanet.

A very nice touch. Kudos to Anet.

I think it would be a nice continuation of the admirable sentiment to reduce the costs so that members of smaller guilds can commemorate the lives of those they have lost as readily as can larger guilds. Grief over the loss of a guild-mate, and the desire to commemorate his or her passing, can be inversely proportional to the size of a guild.

When guild halls first came out, we used one of the commemorative statues as an informal memorial for a guildee we lost back in 2013 to epilepsy. This morning, I was able to add his name and information in front of that statue.

Thank you for giving us a way to do this.

I thought this was a wonderful addition. While not a gamer, two weeks before the initial start of GW2, my mother, knowing I loved GW1, bought the game for me and gave it to me, out of the blue, not for a specific reason. I played early release, showed her, tried to show her how to play. She laughed and tried to play, I laughed and tried to show her how, she was 63. A few short weeks later, I was playing when I got the knock on the door in the early evening..“your mother has been involved in an accident with a drunk driver…she did not survive.” by two policemen and a clergy. I lived with my mother, we shared an apartment. One of the only things that got me through those dark, ugly days was to be able to log onto the game she had gotten for me, GW2, and disappear into another world for a time…and remember who gave me the world to disappear into in order to deal with a devastating blow that no one knew would ever be. One day, I hope to find a guild that I can be in that I can place one of these memorials for her. Though not a gamer, she knew her daughter was…and so gave me this world to play in, turn my jagged grief into a brief smile at one of the darkest times of my life, and now yet as time passed its getting less jagged. I am still enjoying the world she gave me to escape to today. One day, I would like to place one of these memorials for her. It was an awesome touch to add these memorials as options.

Thanks Gaile. She made a “tree lady” she called her, a sylvari, the only thing she did with her at the time was dance her around the fountain in Lion’s Arch and tried to do the same in the apt…it was so much fun she said, I said "its not all about dancing Mom…she said “oh yes it is”. I should have kept the character but I wasn’t able to do it, she named it after herself. I’ll dance my sylvari around the fountain sometimes even though its now a different city, imagining those times and yes its all about dancing.

Laurie.1698:

Thanks Gaile. She made a “tree lady” she called her, a sylvari, the only thing she did with her at the time was dance her around the fountain in Lion’s Arch and tried to do the same in the apt…it was so much fun she said, I said "its not all about dancing Mom…she said “oh yes it is”. I should have kept the character but I wasn’t able to do it, she named it after herself. I’ll dance my sylvari around the fountain sometimes even though its now a different city, imagining those times and yes its all about dancing.

This post made me smile. I’ll be sure to make my Sylvari dance near the LA fountains, in memory of your mom.

Having not lost a gaming friend yet, I have to admit my first impulse was to get the upgrade to create a grave marker for Taco Bell’s quesalupas to tease a guild member with an obsession. It was worth the 100g for his reaction and my guild loved me for it.
Having read the comments by those affected by player deaths IRL on Reddit, I felt a bit disrespectful in retrospect. But then I think about a send off we had a couple of years ago for a forum admin for a community I was part of for many years. He lost to the struggle of depression – no, not getting upset that you don’t have the latest iPhone, proper clinical depression. He wouldn’t have wanted us to mope, he would have wanted us to laugh and carry on with our lives. So that’s exactly what we did along with us all getting a ‘named’ bottle of Diet Coke and taking a selfie of us with it to honour him. We actually crowdfunded his funeral as he had no insurance and raised over £3k in 24 hours. After reflecting on that, I didn’t feel so bad about using the grave marker as a light-hearted joke. So while there is a serious and deep use to the markers, please remember that you can still use them for something humorous without being disrespectful

This is so awesome!! Thank you for incorporating this ArenaNet!!

I’ve seen suggestions for these things a few times, and am impressed that they were implemented.

Why I love the addition of grave markers itself, I’m deeply disappointed by the way it got implemented.
I was so looking forward to set up some kind of memorial for the co-founder of our little guild (back in GW1) who passed away 6 years ago. My wife and I carried the guild over to GW2 despite most members either didn’t buy GW2 at all or stopped playing shortly after release. There’s always an obituary pinned in our guild news and we’re slowly progressing our guild level (11 at the moment), which was fine until I read the patch notes:
“Guild Hall Monument Decorations will be available from the Guild Market once your guild has obtained the Guild Hall Decorations Merchant 2 upgrade”. That means guild level 22 and a kittenload of materials / gold for the upgrades.
Great, so small guilds are not allowed to raise a stone for their beloved ones that passed away way too early.
I mean, I understand that guild hall upgrades and decorations have some more or less tight restrictions so guilds have a goal they can work towards and adds some kind of progression, but this explicit feature should have been excluded and be available right away if you have claimed a guild hall.

I can’t tell you how grateful our guild is for this. We lost a dear friend and guild member and being able to honor her this way is deeply appreciated.

Of all of the quarterly additions, ultimately for my guild, this will be our favorite. Thank you ANet.

Do anyone have links to pictures of the actual monuments?

I’ve often times wonder if there was a way to memorize players that have passed away. It’s good to know ANet did this. To bad there isn’t a more public place for viewing a statue of the player’s favorite character with a plaque. Sadly I’m sure that would take up a lot of resources eventually. I wish there was a way for players to flag their primary character and make it where it couldn’t be deleted.

What happens to accounts of people who pass away?

It’s indeed a nice touch and addition and reading this thread made me warmly smile, despite the sad news and subject. It’s great to see a game giving a way for players to pay homage for fallen comrades or beloved ones.

However, I haven’t seen the stuff in game yet then I don’t know how it looks like, but as someone mentioned above it might also be used to other things other than remembering the fallen ones. Why not use it as remembrance of the great moments that guildies had together, like winning things? I think these Monuments fit that category as well

Also, as others mentioned, it bothers me to see it’s “hidden” behind an upgrade wall. Such feature might be available in lower levels at least (maybe 10) instead after a higher upgrade tier. Small guilds will have some more hard time to get this available

This is a beautiful feature. I had to get it immediately for our guild. I am curious though… Why is the text field so big? With only 140 characters allowed, having such a wide field is odd. Please, please, please at least center the text to the field. Or allow us to do so. It just looks a bit wonky. I tried giving it it’s own centered look, but this wastes characters on spaces and still looks weird. http://imagizer.imageshack.us/a/img922/3291/lgR8QV.png

Currently I am only making an RP site for fallen characters. Still a work in progress, but this is an amazing addition to our hall. http://imagizer.imageshack.us/a/img922/4761/JDpVD7.png

Also, are there plans to add these basic gravestones into the scribe recipes? I’d love to be able to have nicer stones. Or even just a variety.
Our guild has lost a member though, and I’d love to give her her own spot with a much nicer gravestone. Please let us upgrade them

Thank you for this feature!

Is my guild the only one that is using the signposts to get information out to guildies (since the guild message is so limited).
e.g. we have a signpost next to the notary, which has the materials listed that are needed the most for upgrades.

A really good way to immortalise fellow friends and gamers our own way in a game we love.