Guild Wars 2

Will stronghold be guildgroup only (atleast for the LB’s)? As in no soloq, duoq, etc.

Are we going to be able to queue for PvP and Stronghold outsides of the hearts of the mist like we used too? If not, will the team work on making the HotM less boring for when we have longer than usual queue times?

Marcos.3690:

Note: I wonder why Anet always hosts pve streamers after their shows, and never PvP players

Always? This hosting’s only been a thing for 2 weeks or so. And it only makes sense to host PvE streamers before and after a PvE livestream. Of course ANet may still consider hosting some PvP players around the time Ready Up airs, but I imagine that’d make a big part of the community accuse them of favoring certain players/teams.

KhaidaG.5098:

Marcos.3690:

Note: I wonder why Anet always hosts pve streamers after their shows, and never PvP players

Always? This hosting’s only been a thing for 2 weeks or so. And it only makes sense to host PvE streamers before and after a PvE livestream. Of course ANet may still consider hosting some PvP players around the time Ready Up airs, but I imagine that’d make a big part of the community accuse them of favoring certain players/teams.

They should still host a pvper. They won’t favour any particular team, they will favour their own game

Will there be a separate queue for stronghold, or will SH maps be added to the current ranked/unranked rotations? Will we be getting build templates with the SH release? Will SH and other PvP-related expansion bits be playable by those who do not purchase the expansion?

Please don’t make SH another boring 5v5 mode. Also, do you expect matches to be longer and more dragged out like they are in Mobas, or short like conquest.

Will Stronghold encourage more offensive / burst builds than the current meta for conquest?

Apparently they said somewhere stonghold will be 5v5, so the only difference I guess will be it will be open to 5 man guild teams only in basically a pve/spvp hybrid map, and hence how they can call it ‘gvg’.

I predict a big spike to start with and then six months from now a relaunch when it’s basically a dustbowl.

I’m not even sure who it will appeal to. Purist pvp’rs won’t like the pve mechanics, wvw’rs won’t like the pve mechanics, guilds will mainly laugh at the thought of 5 people playing for a 500 man guild’s ‘honour’, current pvp teams might try it for a bit and then avoid it, and pve’rs and pve guild won’t be interested past the first few weeks unless the rewards are amazing.

Opportunity missed. What is missing from the game are what the game mechanics push towards, which is 10, 15, 20 man guild teams competing on a variety of maps where being a 20 man zerg is auto fail, as well as interesting battles like the kurzon/luxon battlegrounds.

Victory.2879:

Apparently they said somewhere stonghold will be 5v5, so the only difference I guess will be it will be open to 5 man guild teams only in basically a pve/spvp hybrid map, and hence how they can call it ‘gvg’.

I predict a big spike to start with and then six months from now a relaunch when it’s basically a dustbowl.

I’m not even sure who it will appeal to. Purist pvp’rs won’t like the pve mechanics, wvw’rs won’t like the pve mechanics, guilds will mainly laugh at the thought of 5 people playing for a 500 man guild’s ‘honour’, current pvp teams might try it for a bit and then avoid it, and pve’rs and pve guild won’t be interested past the first few weeks unless the rewards are amazing.

Opportunity missed. What is missing from the game are what the game mechanics push towards, which is 10, 15, 20 man guild teams competing on a variety of maps where being a 20 man zerg is auto fail, as well as interesting battles like the kurzon/luxon battlegrounds.

This!

:(

nah, once people get into pvp a good percentage of them stick with it for good. it’s the entry barrier that is scary to most who have never played competitively. if Anet can get a large amount of WvW and PvE players in, a lot of them will stay for a long time.

unless of course the game mode sux, but anyone who is saying either way is purely speculating and means nothing.

Solstice.1097:

nah, once people get into pvp a good percentage of them stick with it for good. it’s the entry barrier that is scary to most who have never played competitively. if Anet can get a large amount of WvW and PvE players in, a lot of them will stay for a long time.

unless of course the game mode sux, but anyone who is saying either way is purely speculating and means nothing.

I hope it succeeds. Conquest never WAS that popular, sure the rewards helped, but let’s be honest. It’s slow paced, & all you do is capture points, I mean I still play it, it’s fun but I understand why people didn’t fully embrace it.

Anet can only do so much with one game mode.

Victory.2879:

Apparently they said somewhere stonghold will be 5v5, so the only difference I guess will be it will be open to 5 man guild teams only in basically a pve/spvp hybrid map, and hence how they can call it ‘gvg’.

I predict a big spike to start with and then six months from now a relaunch when it’s basically a dustbowl.

I’m not even sure who it will appeal to. Purist pvp’rs won’t like the pve mechanics, wvw’rs won’t like the pve mechanics, guilds will mainly laugh at the thought of 5 people playing for a 500 man guild’s ‘honour’, current pvp teams might try it for a bit and then avoid it, and pve’rs and pve guild won’t be interested past the first few weeks unless the rewards are amazing.

Opportunity missed. What is missing from the game are what the game mechanics push towards, which is 10, 15, 20 man guild teams competing on a variety of maps where being a 20 man zerg is auto fail, as well as interesting battles like the kurzon/luxon battlegrounds.

Someone will always feel burned by designed choice, but we do know for a fact that guild wars 2 becomes unbearable to watch when the number of participates is greater than 10.

We don’t need another hotjoin.

1- What will happen when the match time runs out, will Guild Lords go to the center of the map to face each other (Victory or Death!)? That would be epic.

2-Assuming that stronghold become far more popular than conquest, what will happen to WTS? Will WTS be a pure Stronghold tournament or a mix of game modes?

If I want to focus exclusively on Stronghold sPvP and ignore Conquest entirely, would I be forced to use hot-join maps or will there be some sort of unrank/solo queue to jump in?

Also I support lower playercounts in this mode and would prefer this resembles old school gw1 gvg but updated.

initial thoughts are

• how are points scored in this map and what is the final win condition?
• what are the rewards and reward tracks here and will it impact your existing pvp ranking?
• how are leaderboards split, e.g. team, solo, all together?
• can we solo queue to this as a merc?
• can we build siege in this as it looks a bit like wvw mechanics are involved here?
• the trailer shows skritt that look like moba creeps what are these?
• for guild groups goin in what is the benefit to their guild beyond being the best, does this feed back to guild halls perhaps? (wild speculation appears)
• the reward tracks and unranked have been great at pulling in lots of PvE centric players to the mists. Will it continue with an unranked mode in this or are you looking at other ways of broadening the demographic this appeals to ?

1_how will work the leaderboard and the matchmaking for stronghold? A guild will have a single mmr?

2_ It will be possible to play stronghold without guild hall or you need it?

3_ Stronghold will have the same spvp infrastructure has conquest now ? (Practice, unranked, ranked)

4_ what about rewards and seasons? It would be possible to exp pvp tracks in stronghold?

5_ how much is the time limit for a stronghold match? Who will win the game if both of lords are still alive at the end of time limit? (I mean, how score is calculated)

2 questions that burning for me.

- ammount of people in each team 5v5?10v10?

- influence of pve content on pvp side of a map.

Being able to build only 2 types of infantry doesn’t seem like enough for serious strategic decision making. It would seem to me that you would need access to at least 3 different units that rock-paper-scissors each other for the rts elements to be deep enough for competitive play e.g. bombers are invisible and can break the gates, sentries can strip invis and kill the bombers, shock troopers can kill the sentries and bombers can sneak past the shock troopers.

I’d like to hear the pvp team’s thoughts on the matter.

I think for me as well the biggest question will be the allowance of more than 5 players on each team. As they mentioned in the article they considered it a condensed version of WvW, but I dont want it to be too condensed either. I think 8v8 players or even 10v10 could be alot of fun, so I hope those team sizes will at least be considered and tested during beta!

JTGuevara.9018:

I hope it succeeds. Conquest never WAS that popular, sure the rewards helped, but let’s be honest. It’s slow paced, & all you do is capture points, I mean I still play it, it’s fun but I understand why people didn’t fully embrace it.

Conquest is non-stop killing, rotating & action from the very start to the very end…

Stronghold will be much slower-paced, I’m sure, with the ability to stop fighting, enlist Skritt Bombers, Guards, Archers, and utilize supply.

Pace =/= popularity, capping circles or killing lords is irrelevant, whether Stronghold is a hit or not actually has very little to do with those. It’s going to come down purely to if the mechanics and tasks are fun.

hypehypehyehypehypehypehyehypehypehypehyehypehypehypehyehypehypehypehyehypehypehypehyehypehypehypehyehypehypehypehyehypehypehypehyehypehypehypehyehypehypehypehyehypehypehypehyehypehypehypehyehypehypehypehyehypehypehypehyehype

You most likely will see a transformation over the next few month from what was once an eloquent poster into a burbling incoherent fanboy.

oh wait that just happened.

Screenager.7804:

initial thoughts are

• how are points scored in this map and what is the final win condition?
• what are the rewards and reward tracks here and will it impact your existing pvp ranking?
• how are leaderboards split, e.g. team, solo, all together?
• can we solo queue to this as a merc?
• can we build siege in this as it looks a bit like wvw mechanics are involved here?
• the trailer shows skritt that look like moba creeps what are these?
• for guild groups goin in what is the benefit to their guild beyond being the best, does this feed back to guild halls perhaps? (wild speculation appears)
• the reward tracks and unranked have been great at pulling in lots of PvE centric players to the mists. Will it continue with an unranked mode in this or are you looking at other ways of broadening the demographic this appeals to ?

Some of the stuff you ask is already answered in the PC gamer article. You may want to read that.

Hello,

My questions are where will you queue/set up for matches and will there be something in place like guildwars1 where an officer had to be in the party to start a GvG? If guild record is going to have a leaderboard I definitely don’t want random guild members starting matches without higher ranking members giving the okay. My suggestion is to create an option under the ranks section of the guild and have a checkbox for “Start Stronghold Matches” or something.

my question is why did you make this gamemode, which in an interview you basically said it was for bads at the game, instead of making a few 2v2/3v3 maps which are fairly simple to make and a feature lots of people have been asking for for a long time.

BlazinFyre.2410:

my question is why did you make this gamemode, which in an interview you basically said it was for bads at the game, instead of making a few 2v2/3v3 maps which are fairly simple to make and a feature lots of people have been asking for for a long time.

2v2 is not a competive game mode and gw2 is supposedly balance around a team of 5. DeAth match has never been a good competitive format. Also 2v2 would favor certain classes infinitely more than others.

silvermember.8941:

BlazinFyre.2410:

my question is why did you make this gamemode, which in an interview you basically said it was for bads at the game, instead of making a few 2v2/3v3 maps which are fairly simple to make and a feature lots of people have been asking for for a long time.

2v2 is not a competive game mode and gw2 is supposedly balance around a team of 5. DeAth match has never been a good competitive format. Also 2v2 would favor certain classes infinitely more than others.

it actually is a semi competitive game mode in this game because mistapedia puts on weekly 2v2 competitions and they are sponsored by Arenanet so it’s not like they are ignoring the concept of it. the only death match ArenaNet has officially introduced into the game is 5v5 which is absolutely terrible. death match needs to be small numbers like 2v2 and 3v3 so it’s not an absolute clusterkitten

i guess the only questions i have are these:

*Can i que up solo or do i have to form a team beforehand?
*About how long would an average match last?

I am fairly excited about this new map. After reading the article, i keep picturing Skritt with dynamite strapped to their backs running to a gate and blowing up. I have not watched any trailers yet. i should do that at some point.

EDIT: 1 question was answered

A lot of the questions on here have been answered in the past already. So let me answer a couple for you so they don’t waste time during the cast; double stating what they have already told us.

1: Yes, you can solo Q into the game mode.
2: Yes it will have its own Q’s
3: Yes it will have its own leader board
4: When time runs out, if both lords are up, the team with the most points wins. This is how it already works in the event of a tie and how it will continue to work.
5: No, this is not GvG so stop saying that. It is sPvP.

GhOst.4019:

4: When time runs out, if both lords are up, the team with the most points wins. This is how it already works in the event of a tie and how it will continue to work.

This is bad as kitten

Hi Josh,

My question is: Will you be adding new maps in the future with their own unique mechanics, like with the conquest maps?

Looking forward to the show tomorrow

Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!!!!!!

Btw it seems a mix of many conquest map mechanics

supply = Orb (spirit watch)
Lord and guards = Foefire
Trebuchet = Khylo
Heroes (chance to come back) = Temple buffs

Luckily no skyhammer mechanic (i hope)

MarkPhilips.5169:

Btw it seems a mix of many conquest map mechanics

supply = Orb (spirit watch)
Lord and guards = Foefire
Trebuchet = Khylo
Heroes (chance to come back) = Temple buffs

Luckily no skyhammer mechanic (i hope)

Duel hammers over the supply depo. Well named as “Strong hammers”.

My questions …

1. Will the map be included in the standard rotation for unranked or is it a separate queue for this game mode?
2. If it is the same queue, this mode would seem to require different builds than conquest but you discourage switching characters at game start … build templates??
3. Although you’re testing in 5v5, you seem open to different team sizes. How will larger team sizes work with the current party queuing system?
4. Communication seems very important in this game mode, more-so than in conquest. Are you concerned that pre-formed groups with voice comms will have an even more distinct advantage in this mode?

silvermember.8941:

Victory.2879:

Apparently they said somewhere stonghold will be 5v5, so the only difference I guess will be it will be open to 5 man guild teams only in basically a pve/spvp hybrid map, and hence how they can call it ‘gvg’.

I predict a big spike to start with and then six months from now a relaunch when it’s basically a dustbowl.

I’m not even sure who it will appeal to. Purist pvp’rs won’t like the pve mechanics, wvw’rs won’t like the pve mechanics, guilds will mainly laugh at the thought of 5 people playing for a 500 man guild’s ‘honour’, current pvp teams might try it for a bit and then avoid it, and pve’rs and pve guild won’t be interested past the first few weeks unless the rewards are amazing.

Opportunity missed. What is missing from the game are what the game mechanics push towards, which is 10, 15, 20 man guild teams competing on a variety of maps where being a 20 man zerg is auto fail, as well as interesting battles like the kurzon/luxon battlegrounds.

Someone will always feel burned by designed choice, but we do know for a fact that guild wars 2 becomes unbearable to watch when the number of participates is greater than 10.

We don’t need another hotjoin.

How do we know it becomes unbearable to watch? That’s just your opinion, personally I don’t mind watching larger battles, although as with any pvp I’d much rather be doing than watching.

Edit:

Just read the description, sounds like a pve map with some players thrown on it. Way too many gimmicks detracting from the pvp elements. I laughed when I counted the number of ‘roles’ they described as it appears there are more roles than permitted players.

I’m really not sure who exactly this game mode will appeal to longer term (depends on the rewards of course, make them high enough pve’rs will flood it).

Can you shift supply with mesmer portal? Kappa

Victory.2879:

silvermember.8941:

Victory.2879:

Apparently they said somewhere stonghold will be 5v5, so the only difference I guess will be it will be open to 5 man guild teams only in basically a pve/spvp hybrid map, and hence how they can call it ‘gvg’.

I predict a big spike to start with and then six months from now a relaunch when it’s basically a dustbowl.

I’m not even sure who it will appeal to. Purist pvp’rs won’t like the pve mechanics, wvw’rs won’t like the pve mechanics, guilds will mainly laugh at the thought of 5 people playing for a 500 man guild’s ‘honour’, current pvp teams might try it for a bit and then avoid it, and pve’rs and pve guild won’t be interested past the first few weeks unless the rewards are amazing.

Opportunity missed. What is missing from the game are what the game mechanics push towards, which is 10, 15, 20 man guild teams competing on a variety of maps where being a 20 man zerg is auto fail, as well as interesting battles like the kurzon/luxon battlegrounds.

Someone will always feel burned by designed choice, but we do know for a fact that guild wars 2 becomes unbearable to watch when the number of participates is greater than 10.

We don’t need another hotjoin.

How do we know it becomes unbearable to watch? That’s just your opinion, personally I don’t mind watching larger battles, although as with any pvp I’d much rather be doing than watching.

Watch GvGs that are streamed. There might be a lot of people into that, but if you actually watch them you cannot tell what all the players are doing skillwise. It couldn’t be presented to a general viewing audience with detailed casting.

Syndarin Eledhwen.6513:

Can you shift supply with mesmer portal? Kappa

Mesmer is going to be top tier

Moa the lord
Moa the heroes
timewarp hero cap?
OP portals to swap lanes
portals to get supply
portals to repair trebuchets
Mass invis for the bomb npcs
Remove boons (stability) to deny caps
etc

Syndarin Eledhwen.6513:

Can you shift supply with mesmer portal? Kappa

Mesmer is going to be top tier

Moa the lord
Moa the heroes
timewarp hero cap?
OP portals to swap lanes
get supply
repair trebuchets
Mass invis for the bomb npcs
Remove boons (stability) to deny caps
etc

Marcos.3690:

Syndarin Eledhwen.6513:

Can you shift supply with mesmer portal? Kappa

Mesmer is going to be top tier

Moa the lord
Moa the heroes
timewarp hero cap?
OP portals to swap lanes
get supply
repair trebuchets
Mass invis for the bomb npcs
Remove boons (stability) to deny caps
etc

5 mes team confirmed.

Nabrok.9023:

My questions …

1. Will the map be included in the standard rotation for unranked or is it a separate queue for this game mode?
2. If it is the same queue, this mode would seem to require different builds than conquest but you discourage switching characters at game start … build templates??
3. Although you’re testing in 5v5, you seem open to different team sizes. How will larger team sizes work with the current party queuing system?
4. Communication seems very important in this game mode, more-so than in conquest. Are you concerned that pre-formed groups with voice comms will have an even more distinct advantage in this mode?

Will be interesting to see what the say. But if you think about it as an expansion, and since they called it a different game mode, I am beating its not mixed since you need to keep the people with and without expansion separate. Just a guess till we get the real word. Good hunting!

TheGrimm.5624:

Nabrok.9023:

My questions …

1. Will the map be included in the standard rotation for unranked or is it a separate queue for this game mode?
2. If it is the same queue, this mode would seem to require different builds than conquest but you discourage switching characters at game start … build templates??
3. Although you’re testing in 5v5, you seem open to different team sizes. How will larger team sizes work with the current party queuing system?
4. Communication seems very important in this game mode, more-so than in conquest. Are you concerned that pre-formed groups with voice comms will have an even more distinct advantage in this mode?

Will be interesting to see what the say. But if you think about it as an expansion, and since they called it a different game mode, I am beating its not mixed since you need to keep the people with and without expansion separate. Just a guess till we get the real word. Good hunting!

you need to keep people with and without expansion separate?

so if I don’t buy the expansion, then I won’t have to face Revenants in conquest?

lol yea right even if you dont BUY the expansion, your client will still DOWNLOAD it – it just won’t let you actually ACCESS any of the new features until you’ve paid.

GhOst.4019:

A lot of the questions on here have been answered in the past already. So let me answer a couple for you so they don’t waste time during the cast; double stating what they have already told us.

1: Yes, you can solo Q into the game mode.
2: Yes it will have its own Q’s
3: Yes it will have its own leader board
4: When time runs out, if both lords are up, the team with the most points wins. This is how it already works in the event of a tie and how it will continue to work.
5: No, this is not GvG so stop saying that. It is sPvP.

What’s the GvG then? All I hear is Stronghold being the new GvG?

Terrorsquad.2349:

GhOst.4019:

A lot of the questions on here have been answered in the past already. So let me answer a couple for you so they don’t waste time during the cast; double stating what they have already told us.

1: Yes, you can solo Q into the game mode.
2: Yes it will have its own Q’s
3: Yes it will have its own leader board
4: When time runs out, if both lords are up, the team with the most points wins. This is how it already works in the event of a tie and how it will continue to work.
5: No, this is not GvG so stop saying that. It is sPvP.

What’s the GvG then? All I hear is Stronghold being the new GvG?

they are saying that because along with it will come a guild leaderboard

Solstice.1097:

Terrorsquad.2349:

GhOst.4019:

A lot of the questions on here have been answered in the past already. So let me answer a couple for you so they don’t waste time during the cast; double stating what they have already told us.

1: Yes, you can solo Q into the game mode.
2: Yes it will have its own Q’s
3: Yes it will have its own leader board
4: When time runs out, if both lords are up, the team with the most points wins. This is how it already works in the event of a tie and how it will continue to work.
5: No, this is not GvG so stop saying that. It is sPvP.

What’s the GvG then? All I hear is Stronghold being the new GvG?

they are saying that because along with it will come a guild leaderboard

I’m still amazed that WvW people “created” their own version of “GvG” completely ignoring the official gamemode established in GW1, and when that gamemode gets a successor in GW2 they say “it’s not real GvG” because it’s not the zergfest they created. I’m just speechless.

witcher.3197:

I’m still amazed that WvW people “created” their own version of “GvG” completely ignoring the official gamemode established in GW1, and when that gamemode gets a successor in GW2 they say “it’s not real GvG” because it’s not the zergfest they created. I’m just speechless.

Chaith.8256:

witcher.3197:

I’m still amazed that WvW people “created” their own version of “GvG” completely ignoring the official gamemode established in GW1, and when that gamemode gets a successor in GW2 they say “it’s not real GvG” because it’s not the zergfest they created. I’m just speechless.

witcher.3197:

Solstice.1097:

Terrorsquad.2349:

GhOst.4019:

A lot of the questions on here have been answered in the past already. So let me answer a couple for you so they don’t waste time during the cast; double stating what they have already told us.

1: Yes, you can solo Q into the game mode.
2: Yes it will have its own Q’s
3: Yes it will have its own leader board
4: When time runs out, if both lords are up, the team with the most points wins. This is how it already works in the event of a tie and how it will continue to work.
5: No, this is not GvG so stop saying that. It is sPvP.

What’s the GvG then? All I hear is Stronghold being the new GvG?

they are saying that because along with it will come a guild leaderboard

I’m still amazed that WvW people “created” their own version of “GvG” completely ignoring the official gamemode established in GW1, and when that gamemode gets a successor in GW2 they say “it’s not real GvG” because it’s not the zergfest they created. I’m just speechless.

I think it is because most MMO’s GvGs their GvGs are like the GvGs we see in GW2..
When I heard about ‘GvG’, I was thinking about the ‘Annihilation Deathmatch’ aswel.. Since all other mmo’s I played were annihilation as GvG..

Ofcourse, I never played GW1 so I don’t have this ‘GW1 GvG should be respected in GW2’ kind of thing

It just depends what MMO’s this current playerbase played in the past

https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/stronghold-the-battle-of-champions-dusk/
At this point, many will still disagree with me…I strongly believe that this game mode will bring forth a golden age for GW2 PvP. My opinion is based on these three points:

- You don’t need to hold or capture points( making bunker builds less omnipotent)
- Huge variety of role to fill and different play styles available( this will create a different meta from Conquest)
- Very PUG friendly, less optimization required, therefore everything is more accessible for the average solo casual player( like me)

If you don’t agree then please do contest my points and let me know what you think, I may be missing something, Cheers!