Guild Wars 2

Isn’t the Halloween update supposed to come on the 14th? Where’s the preview vid? A preview page? Where’s the hype?

New PoI episode today, but I don’t think that they’re going to talk about it.

Halloween update is on the 21st, so the preview might come next week.

nottsgman.8206:

Halloween update is on the 21st, so the preview might come next week.

Really? I thought awhile back they announced their upcoming schedule and Halloween on the 14th was a thing. Can you link me your source to check out?

sure can: https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/upcoming-events-in-guildwars2/

Well, snap. No wonder we haven’t had a preview yet.

No Halloween on the 14th because of the stupid WvW and pvp kitten. Might as well just give us living world 2-5 instead and never have Halloween.

If you want Halloween just go back to GW 1 as its been up all month.

Yumiko Ishida.3769:

No Halloween on the 14th because of the stupid WvW and pvp kitten. Might as well just give us living world 2-5 instead and never have Halloween.

If you want Halloween just go back to GW 1 as its been up all month.

Hm?
Both WvW and PvP stuff is over on the 14th, so I find it rather unlikely that it would effect it.

As for the second part that is just blatant lying. The Halloween celebration from GW1 started yesterday (11/10) and will run until next Saturday (18/10).

Yumiko Ishida.3769:

If you want Halloween just go back to GW 1 as its been up all month.

this made me want to check GW1, so I did. says in the announcements that Halloween there starts Oct 18th, so not sure why you think it’s been there all month.

My GW1 closet ranger has been stuck in celestial new year since February. Maybe Yumiko has something like that going on.

Are we going to get anything today? if there’s not an official preview, can anyone from Anet answer questions people have about what will happen?

Well, since they basically said: “Blood and Madness will return” I would say it is a safe bet that it will simply be last years event.

The exact quote:

Later in October, we’ll be bringing back our famous Halloween festivities! Blood and Madness will be returning to Guild Wars 2 on October 21 and remain active until the return of Season 2.

Cool! Then maybe someone can confirm that this is the case. Or say that it isn’t. Or should I just do what you’re doing and making assumptions? I guess Lion’s Arch will be fixed in the next patch also.

Not slamming you, neither of us should be in the position of making guesses about something as simple as this, and this marks at least the third time I’ve asked about this over the last month or so, so unless they genuinely don’t know what they’re going to release next week, I feel like my annoyance is well-earned.

As shown above, Guild Wars 1 players have been given information about what is going to be released even though it’s presumably the same sort of thing. Is it out of line to expect that Guild Wars 2 players should receive the same courtesy?

LA can’t be fixed, because there are a lot of things destroyed. And LA has now a new layout with all crafting stations and other stuff spread over LA.

So Anet has to make a new environment skin for LA for halloween and wintersday ^^

And same question here, no announcement means no Halloween starting the 21st? (next tuesday)

Or the new skins in Gem store is the only thing we get this halloween?

They have announced that Blood and Madness will return, and as such I would assume they don’t feel the need to put a preview up, since it, based on that info, is the exact same event as last year.

https://www.guildwars2.com/en/the-game/releases/october-15-2013/

Whilst this years Halloween event may be the same as last years, I would still expect a preview. Did we not get a preview for the Festival of the four winds, which was basically the same as the previous years events, with a few changes?

With the destruction of Lions Arch, we can assume that the layout will have to be totally different. I still find it strange why the people of Lions Arch would waste time and resources to decorate for Halloween, when the place still lies in ruins for the most part.

I would of like to have seen either LA repaired by now, or to have the racial home towns to be decorated instead, but I guess that would be too much extra work.

Also keep in mind that this will be the first Halloween event for people in China, and for other new players who have joined recently. So to say its just the same as last year, and given no preview, is kinda a let down.

Halloween is my favourite holiday event, and for us to be just given last years holiday event with little to no changes, I would be rather sad. Would love to see the mad king dungeon and reaper’s rumble brought back in some form from the first year.

I guess we will just have to wait and see! o/

Most of last years Halloween did not take place in Lion’s Arch though, but rather in the Black Citadel. The only part that really took place there was Mad King Says, and that could still work out quite well, since he just walks around.

So what’s going on Anet? Is this the only new info we get about Halloween?
https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/upcoming-events-in-guildwars2/

No preview, nothing? It’s kind of sad .

Halloween is my favourite ‘holiday’ in-game, if we only get to replay last years content I’m going to be incredibly disappointed, the lore of it was interesting, but a few minutes of fighting?? it was kinda dull. I suppose it would be so that new players would be able to enjoy it but, I didn’t get to play the content from the first Halloween event so, why should they? if they want to know what’s going on there are plenty of videos from the instances on youtube and lots of information on the wiki so they could just read/watch that.

I really want them to carry on the story, so I really hope they don’t repeat last year but, I’m keeping expectations low I guess :/

Recent comments asking for news on Halloween have been deleted from Facebook.
Granted, this comment I saw was posted on Pink day in LA comment section, but it wasn’t being unrespectful so I don’t really see the reason in deleting it.

I tryed commenting on it as well, asking for some news on the halloween front. Once i checked it again my comment was nowhere to be found.

Not the end of the world but not exacly that good either.
Maybe they want the Pink Day post to remain focused? I don’t know.

Just a heads up, but there is of course the Horrorween community event for all EU players: https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/community/events/The-King-and-Queen-s-Horrorween-2014/page/8#post4488660

(If you are a US player, you can still take part in the art contest and raffle)

I do not know what plans Anet has with the official Halloween, but me and my snowman companion will do our very best to make this the best Halloween yet.

ok they announced there will be some halloween event starting the 21st.

“Later in October, we’ll be bringing back our famous Halloween festivities! Blood and Madness will be returning to Guild Wars 2 on October 21 and remain active until the return of Season 2.”

For new persons be surprised by the ‘famous halloween festivities’. For others it probably wont be a special halloween it will be just like the other 2 we had so far probably. With just a different LA map, which is already a kind of halloween place, just add some pumpkins and done.

Oh no. I didn’t like last year’s Blood and Madness at all compared to 2012’s Shadow of the Mad King. I was hoping for at least new content this year. If they bring anything back they should bring back SotMK instead…

I love how everyone keeps posting that sentence as if it contains any more information than “The Battle of Hastings was fought on 14 October 1066”. You can’t say “bringing back our famous Halloween festivities” and expect that to be enough when there have only been TWO such events in GW2 and the last one was an update to the first one.

When they outright NAME the event which took place last year I would say it is rather clear that it will be that event.

Or if I say that tomorrow The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers will be shown, will you keep assuming they will show something other than The Two Towers?

OK, let’s play that game and extend your analogy. Two years ago, you presented Lord Of The Rings on your fancy new home theater screen for all of us and it was amazing. The year after, you showed us The Two Towers and it was exciting. And now this year, you tell us that you’re going to be showing us The Two Towers again. If I then asked you the question, "Wait, does that mean you aren’t showing Return of the King or did you just mistype? " and you refused to answer at all….. I’d probably be a little annoyed and confused. If I then kept asking you that for a month and every time you deliberately dodged that question, I’d start feeling upset.

Now, now, lets reserve judgement till the Halloween update actually goes live.

wwwes.1398:

OK, let’s play that game and extend your analogy. Two years ago, you presented Lord Of The Rings on your fancy new home theater screen for all of us and it was amazing. The year after, you showed us The Two Towers and it was exciting. And now this year, you tell us that you’re going to be showing us The Two Towers again. If I then asked you the question, "Wait, does that mean you aren’t showing Return of the King or did you just mistype? " and you refused to answer at all….. I’d probably be a little annoyed and confused. If I then kept asking you that for a month and every time you deliberately dodged that question, I’d start feeling upset.

Maybe this is just me, but this is how I would respond to your inquiry, ‘what did I just say?’, and leave it at that. IMO, an answer is an answer, you can’t get anymore black and white than to say Blood and Madness returns…

Well, that would still be an answer. We’re not actually getting any statements on this whatsoever. And at this point, it’s too late/doesn’tmatter/whatever. I hope that when all is said and done, this was a fluke and not the new trend..

I just want Halloween back so I can get some more toilet paper. It is a necessity and I only have 5 rolls!

So unless Anet wants to publish different in NA/EU and China we will get the exact same event as last year. There was an overview of the event on the Chinese site. There will be a collection achievement though (see attachement).

doombreaker.3710:

So unless Anet wants to publish different in NA/EU and China we will get the exact same event as last year. There was an overview of the event on the Chinese site. There will be a collection achievement though (see attachement).

One interesting note on things being different in different zones: People have pulled Black Lion ad graphics for certain weapon sets out of the Western data since China came out when the weapon sets were only introduced to China instead of being brought back in the west. In the summer, for example, the Aetherblade weapon ad popped up in the data since they were brought out in China even though they weren’t brought back or on sale for BL tickets.

The halloween ad for the first set of halloween weapons was recently found in the data and people immediately assumed they were bringing them back. They might, but this also follows the pattern of them sticking the artwork in the data for a Chinese release of an older weapon set and giving us something different.

Oooh, thanks for that tidbit, doombreaker. Looks like we’ll be getting new consumables (crystals, oils, stones) that are Halloween specific, along with possible new tonics. The rest of the stuff are old Halloween foods, most of which are craftable, so supply shouldn’t be an issue.

@panzer: That’s a good point, although I still wouldn’t rule out the old Halloween weapons not returning. It could go either way, but with ANet now, I’ve learned to “never say never”!

MyT.3764:

I just want Halloween back so I can get some more toilet paper. It is a necessity and I only have 5 rolls!

Just use a Quaggan.

I’m sure that Halloween will be mostly familiar but not a 100% rehash.

China doesn’t like skeletons so enemies will have to change. And now that you’ve hired guys to put a new coat of pain on things, why not tweak other things? So, new enemies.

Plus there’s a collection achievement with new items (candy corn consumables?)

Plus the Chinese hype page mentions a Pvp reward track.

But what would be a suitable end reward for a Pvp track? The Crossing/Mad Moon/Arachnophobia? Probably not, thats too much. Candy corn champ bags? Probably too little. My guess is new skins. (And possibly a collection track for te skins).

The Chinese page says that we’d meet the prince and view the conflict of the prince and the king. That could be a rehash or not.

Reddit thinks we may get a formal/vampire gemstore outfit, and new gemstore weapons seem assured.

I’m cautiously optimistic.

ANET really needs to invest more in the halloween and winter’s day events. For me, those are way more fun than LS. I barely even play the LS events and yet when halloween and winter’s day come, I try to get as many achievements as possible.

I don’t think I’ve ever experienced an event since beta with less information prior to launch than this Halloween. I mean, even if it were exactly the same, a preview page or an update to last year’s page to say this year’s dates would be nice.

Maybe they simply forgotten about Halloween? :P

Well, the latest blog post suggests it’s an identical rehash of last year’s content:

https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/tyrias-point-of-no-return/

So we likely won’t see Reaper’s Rumble, Ascent to Madness, the Mad Memoires or old Halloween skins come back. (-sigh-)

We do know from the Ready Up video and leaked screenshots from China that the following things are new:

- New Halloween PvP reward track (unknown if this is permanent or temporary)
- New Halloween Collection (new icons in the screenshot suggest there are new Halloween utility consumables, and a new final reward)