Guild Wars 2

BobbyStein.2315:

I’m voting for Kiel. You should, too!

I’m happy for you. Now, please, go write something that has nothing to do with merchants, crabs, politics or pirates.

Well, my Inbox was at 9/10 and thanks to the extra mail bug, I only have one of the letters from the candidates as the second one was permanently lost to the aether when I zoned. Guess which letter I still have?

It’s Evon’s! Well played Anet.

Kiel, noble? Please, she does the same thing as Evon in her personal instance, which is sending you to do her dirty work.

I really wanted to vote for Trahearne-with-female-bits, but I think it’s posts like these and the attitude of my server’s WvWers that’ll persuade mostly neutral players into voting Evon. Spite begats spite, after all :P

What if there’s a tie? :0

AnthonyOrdon.3926:

We will not make both fractals.

Another way to see this is “We only have the budget to do one fractals.”

Can we all chip in to do both?

I’m completely torn both ways, and I honestly don’t see any reason to believe that ANet tried to slant this.
Just the way I see it.

The devs are probably all divided just like the rest of us. We have had many updates featuring the Azura including the SAB in April. They seem to be behind recent problems in Southsun Cove. Tixx brought us the airship at the Winter’s Day festivities. So I think the Abaddon fractal would be much more interesting than checking out an explosion at some Azuran reactor.

Democracy is usually a triumph of the candidate that appeals to the dumber end of the electorate. So if Evon appeals to people who are dumb enough to waste money on Black Lion Keys.. well.. he’s going to win.

Banquetto.9521:

Democracy is usually a triumph of the candidate that appeals to the dumber end of the electorate. So if Evon appeals to people who are dumb enough to waste money on Black Lion Keys.. well.. he’s going to win.

Your post is really offensive, it’s like saying that people are dumb because they don’t agree with you, I’m voting Evon because of the fractal, couldn’t care less for WP costs or BL Keys.

Letifer.4360:

Your post is really offensive, it’s like saying that people are dumb because they don’t agree with you, I’m voting Evon because of the fractal, couldn’t care less for WP costs or BL Keys.

I didn’t say people who voted for Evon were dumb – I said that people who bought Black Lion Keys were dumb, and that those dumb people would vote for Evon.

Surely you know the old saying – “gambling: a tax on people too dumb to do math” ?

Konig Des Todes.2086:

And no, my character isn’t siding with Kiel. Kiel is siding with my character.

Trahearne is siding with your character too, why does Kiel get a free pass while Saladbolg gets all the hate?

Banquetto.9521:

Letifer.4360:

Your post is really offensive, it’s like saying that people are dumb because they don’t agree with you, I’m voting Evon because of the fractal, couldn’t care less for WP costs or BL Keys.

I didn’t say people who voted for Evon were dumb – I said that people who bought Black Lion Keys were dumb, and that those dumb people would vote for Evon.

Surely you know the old saying – “gambling: a tax on people too dumb to do math” ?

Thing is, it’s not a tax. It’s one of the primary sources of new weapons now. The interesting thing with the BLC changes is that it’s in the best interest of anyone who ever wants a future weapon from the chest to vote for Evon. Even if you don’t personally buy keys, others will buy lots. This will throw a lot more keys into the economy and result in a large boost of the number of new weapon skins going into the economy (because they can be traded). The gamblers will supply the entire game with access to weapon skins, the cheaper the keys are, the more chests will be opened and the greater the supply of new weapon skins.

It’s hard to argue against the practical value of Evon over Kiel once you are informed on everything they offer. Even if you don’t care about the subjective value of two fractals, the financial benefit of Kiel is very likely to be dramatically less than the financial value of Evon. You can stockpile a lifetime of keys in four weeks and utilise them to create a much greater supply of weapon skins in the future (and sell them to players) but you only have four weeks to make use of the reduced WPs. Evon’s long term pay off is very likely to be substantially more valuable to anyone who ever wants to acquire a new weapon skin compared to the amount of money you save from WPs because the average player probably spends less than two or three gold a month on WP costs. I spent over 40 gold last month trying and failing to acquire an RNG item. Now that others can acquire it for me and sell it on the TP (for less money if they have cheaper keys) I can get cheaper guaranteed access to future weapon skins I want. I suspect it’s in the vast majority of player’s best interests to vote in Evon now.

Is this game (for those that Role play) is it URP or SRP? For all that is said about TC being the “unoffical” RP server it sounds much more like its a SRP server then anything else.

BobbyStein.2315:

I’m voting for Kiel. You should, too!

Seeing the achievements and how the tokens work, I’m curious how the voting actually gets counted…

Is it via the tokens, or what I’m suspecting – the completion of achievements?

Given the system, it doesn’t seem like the Support Tokens would be easily tracked, but completion of the achievements would…

SirDrygan.1823:

AnthonyOrdon.3926:

We will not make both fractals.

Another way to see this is “We only have the budget to do one fractals.”

Can we all chip in to do both?

They’re making three fractals.

Molten Facility (themed?), Aetherblade Retreat (themed?), and Abaddon/Reactor.

Skribulous.3521:

Konig Des Todes.2086:

And no, my character isn’t siding with Kiel. Kiel is siding with my character.

Trahearne is siding with your character too, why does Kiel get a free pass while Saladbolg gets all the hate?

Actually, the PC does side with Trahearne in the personal story.

It’s the PC who nominates Trahearne to be the Marshal of the Pact.

Leablo.2651:

Well, my Inbox was at 9/10 and thanks to the extra mail bug, I only have one of the letters from the candidates as the second one was permanently lost to the aether when I zoned. Guess which letter I still have?

It’s Evon’s! Well played Anet.

Show Spoiler

hide spoiler

Seriously, fix that bug or stop sending these types of mail that jump the queue and then get auto-deleted. Sooner or later it’s going to start costing people more than a support token. Why play with fire?

I had that bug (and reported it) during the Sky Pirates stuff. I hope they are working on it, because the reliance on mail to tell Living Story is too heavy to allow mail to get lost.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

Given the system, it doesn’t seem like the Support Tokens would be easily tracked, but completion of the achievements would…

You put the token into a virtual box that says Kiel or one that says Gnashblade. I’m failing to see how that would be hard to track.

How about I just picked a random person because I don’t give a kitten about this coercive “living story” crap kittening with my gameplay. Even after reading and researching, they both sounded dull and pointless.

Borked.6824:

How about I just picked a random person because I don’t give a kitten about this coercive “living story” crap kittening with my gameplay. Even after reading and researching, they both sounded dull and pointless.

NOOOO!!!! Don’t pick random. If you don’t like the living story crap, boycott it. Don’t support either candidate.

Elbegast.6970:

Borked.6824:

How about I just picked a random person because I don’t give a kitten about this coercive “living story” crap kittening with my gameplay. Even after reading and researching, they both sounded dull and pointless.

NOOOO!!!! Don’t pick random. If you don’t like the living story crap, boycott it. Don’t support either candidate.

… but Evon is paying me 1+ silver for every vote!
I’ll probably be using some of Evon’s bribes for Ellen.

IndigoSundown.5419:

Konig Des Todes.2086:

Given the system, it doesn’t seem like the Support Tokens would be easily tracked, but completion of the achievements would…

You put the token into a virtual box that says Kiel or one that says Gnashblade. I’m failing to see how that would be hard to track.

Depends on how it’s set up, baka. They’d need to track how many times a specific action is performed, when such an act is not tracked in anywhere else in the game. Can be done, or they could be using a pre-existing method to do it…

Given how ArenaNet has a tendency to cut corners when they don’t need to be precise, which do you think?

‘Sides, unlike reality, there’s no box to retrieve tokens from. It’s just an NPC dialogue, and everywhere else in the game, those things reset in no more than 10 minutes.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

I think Anet may be intending for Evon to win either way because of how much more benefits there are to voting for Evon

Have you considered how much more work(i.e. cost) Evon’s fractal is going to be from a production standpoint?

They have to make an new map from scratch. New npcs (Forgotten, Gods) and new enemies(Margonites, Abbadon).

With Kiel’s, they just have to touch up the reactor map. For enemies, it would likely be mostly Inquest/Golems and maybe Aaatxes/Shadowfiends but not much new stuff in the end.

Besides Kiel has the biggest single advantage in being an attractive human and that is probably more powerful than any one thing Evon has going for him. That is just how people are.

AnthonyOrdon.3926:

We will not make both fractals.

Things like this are why ArenaNet continues to fail as a company.

The only real permanent content from this is the fractal and you are making people vote between two, when half the community doesn’t even care about fractals

This alone makes voting unfair. Whilst I share different opinions with certain people on who has more of an advantage, the permanent part of it should be implemented regardless. The way I see it, the one who gets voted for should have priority and the other being developed at a later date.

This is unfair to the community. I am tired of seeing ArenaNet screw over it’s players. Sure, let the community decide for one or the other but don’t do it through content such as this. Don’t it through content that has a list of changes for one candidate and a list of changes for the other.

Set the permanent fractals as a separate part. The fractals community is not the same as your regular GW2 player. Read the dungeon forums. Let the fractal community decide.

With each update I lose faith in ArenaNet. Not because the content is bad, but because so many of the design decisions blatantly disregard the actual players.

tl;dr putting the fractals behind a temporary content decision where a large part of the community will be voting solely on the characters or the temporary content is a terrible game design choice and should be amended ASAP.

While I am in favor of Evon because I dont like asura high tech, I think many people on the forums underestimate the sway of the masses of players that casually do some of this stuff, have no idea of the consequences or what those mean, and just vote Kiel because they already talked to her and because she is a human character.

Also, to get many achievements you need to vote for both. So alot of players will diminish their vote’s weight by also casting some votes for the opposition.

An interesting experiment. I’m really interested how the votes are developing. I hope they are publishing percentages at the end and not only telling who won.

WP cost seams not interesting. Of course the reduced Key price seems interesting. But if you think about it: It is only a few weeks and we might get cheaper prices also at special events like christmas(Wintersday). So might also not be that interesting(IMO this should be permanent or at least a lot longer – and then make other stuff the players can vote for later after this expires).

Aetherblade and Molten Facility are promised by both. Same for the mini games.

I think in the end it will be more about that exclusive fractal and if more players care about Abbadon(there are also a lot of GW2 only players that probably don’t care and then maybe chose Kiel cause she is better known and we had past story stuff that we completed with her).

Regardless of who is winning I hope to see both of them return in the future(and I’d like to work more with Evon… or with both of them). Maybe they could write it so Evon gets a bit nicer and a “good guy” and becoming friends with Kiel… and then Kiel helping Evon and working with him together should he win(or the other way round if Kiel wins) and then we getting story with both of them and maybe more cutscenes and stuff with Evon(while Kiel is still there).

Or maybe… maybe some Asura is creating a golem named “Evon Kiel” or “Ellen Gnashblade” lol.

I’m voting Kiel! She’s virtuous and fought hard for the people of Tyria. She’s deserves some respect and reward for her efforts.

I’d bet the content for both outcomes are already finished and we’re getting both whether we like it or not. The only thing that might change it the order they are presented.

Though, more Char and Asura story, seriously? When are Norn getting more content??? Maybe Anet can redeem poor Eir after slandering her good name with that delinquent mother, bs! #kittens!!!

AnthonyOrdon.3926:

We will not make both fractals.

I’d have to say that this is a bit disappointing from two perspectives.

First, it sounds like you’ve got great ideas for both fractals. While I understand that there’s limited resources and you can’t make both of them right now, it’d be a crying shame for the other to be tossed into the wastebin because it didn’t win. Never is a long time, after all – having the other need to wait a year or two or three until it’s made (or even just until it goes up for vote again!) is still a significant result.

Second, it feels to me like putting too much significance on the fractals is a bit of a… misprioritisation. The result of the election is something that should have significant effects on the Living Story going forth – one candidate will be on the Captain’s Council and in a position to directly influence policy, while the other will be rejected, and possibly feeling resentful or betrayed at the players’ collective favour going to rivals. On a personal note, candidates might remember who voted for and against them, reacting more positively to those who supported them and perhaps negatively to those who supported their rival. That should be all the permanent ramifications you need from the election without needing to toss one of the fractal ideas down the drain permanently – something which strikes me as tossing the baby out with the bathwater.

^ But then again on the other hand NOT limiting it to one of the Fractals would make the choice for Fractal completely useless, since both would be released anyway.

I addressed that:

And my main point is that the Fractal choice shouldn’t be one of the main reasons for people to vote for one candidate or another. It should be whether they want to see the Living Story play out with Ellen or Evon as the new Captain’s Council member.

And that’s something where we’re pretty much guaranteed to never see the other leg of the Trousers of Time.

Evon is the dirty politician type.. maybe they figured they needed to give an incentive to vote for him. Its almost a shame that the abaddon fractal might not get made though. GW2 could seriously use some god lore!

True, but it still is one of the selling points of the candidates.
What would be the point of that selling point if we would get both of them anyway?

Let’s say they had the Fractals as a separate vote, would you still say that we should get both, no matter the result?

Either one of the fractals better be kitten good, or else this will be the most unpopulair decision ever

Not immediately, but I’m not saying we should get them both immediately. Which one we get first is still a result. The other can come (or be put up to vote against new competitors) later.

Thing is, the people who’ve came up with these ideas seem to think they’re both awesome. If they’re so awesome, is the sense of “meaningfulness” really worth discarding one forever, especially since there are (or should be, and I will be seriously disappointed if there aren’t) other permanent results to the election.

And how do you think the playerbase would react if they, for the first actual situation where we could effect stuff, would be kittened over by the fact that the things promised are broken?

People already whine about ArenaNet not listening to the community, and if they do something as big as doing a election and then completely ignore the result people would explode, and I would say that is not really a good thing from ArenaNets point of view.

Somehow, I don’t think people are going to explode over new content being released at some later date rather than being thrown in the garbage.

The spot where we affect stuff is in who becomes the next Captain’s Council member. If that isn’t something that has a significant impact on the story from then on, ArenaNet has bigger problems than a million fractals being created or dangled beneath our noses and then trashed could ever solve.

But I have better things to do with my time than to continue arguing with a known whiteknight who will argue ad nauseum against any criticism, however constructive.

Thrown in the garbage?
How can something that is not even built be thrown in the garbage?
As of this time both the Fractals are simply ideas, nothing concrete has actually been built (unless ArenaNet are lying, which people here seems to assume about everything), it is still however fully possible to actually get said ideas/story/lore/whatever even without it being a Fractal.

That would still add the wanted story/whatever into the game, but at the same time wouldn’t diminish the voting.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

mexay.3902:

The majority see:

Familiar character who is reducing waypoints. Thaumanova is something I understand. I guess I’ll vote for her.

How I see it, the majority see:

Kiel stole my thunder, but Evon has intrigue behind him. Fighting a god would be EPIC! And I can get a better chance at that revolver skin!

How I see it the majority see:
“I’ll be voting fo the kittens”

actually as for now we have 3 different majorities

AnthonyOrdon.3926:

Your tin foil hats need tuning because I’m hoping for Kiel. But I have a vested interest because my team will probably be working on the fractals. I had nothing to do with this content though.

The Cutthroat Politics team tried to make it as even as possible.

They mostly did a good job, except…It becomes a little uneven when microtransactions are thrown in the mix. It would have been more even to affect all players by discounting the cost to place an item on the trading post, I think, and would have easily been within the power of the head of the Black Lion Trading Company.

Not calling you out, but I feel like the team behind this part had some marketing team pressure put on them in that part of their decision. Which is okay, in any other circumstance, except here where the stated intent was to make the choices even.

It’s unevenly set up right now so that those that may not care about the Gem Store will easily ignore Evon, and choose Ellen, or those that may not worry about waypoint costs will easily ignore Ellen, and choose Evon. Another way of looking at it is: wealthy in-game players will have a bias towards Evon, since they might convert their gold to gems to get keys, and more casual players that may not be as wealthy will have a bias towards Ellen, since they want more time to play and waypoints assist in getting as much done in the hour or two they may have to play.

It’s really kind of an ugly affair of pitting two very different sides of the community against each other, if viewed from that angle, which I don’t think was the intent.

AnthonyOrdon.3926:

We will not make both fractals.

Not even eventually?

I’m happy ArenaNet is favoring Evon, that’s as it should be. The limited time offers aren’t really a good reason to pick a choice that will have long-lasting consequences like this. Besides, it’s not like there’s any bit of interesting lore in the Thaumanova facility.

IMO, the issue with making more Asura content is that they are the most bidimensional race in the game. I can’t remember a single one who isn’t extremely egocentric, with pompous speech and somehow linked to a crazy invention. I guess this is a side effect of the writers trying to highlight the Asura racial traits to mark them as different than humans, but it was way overdone in the game. The Norn have some issues with that, too – too many are portrayed as the strong, drunk and slightly dumb giant hunter stereotype, but there are enough notable exceptions to help with this (Forgal comes to mind).

The Thaumanova will, then, be filled with a lot of the same we have seen everywhere in the game – Asuras making a crazy invention and being overly smug about it, something goes wrong with it (Inquest sabotage this time), and chaos issues. The details will be different, and there could be interesting gameplay elements linked to the entire Chaos Energy thing, but it still feels like more of the same.

In other hand, human characters are often the most rich, personality-wise, in the game. Which is likely a side effect of not being artificially forced in a stereotype, like the other races. If all other things are equal, between picking human content and Asura content, I would always pick the former, since I know it will be better written. The Abaddon fractal would also allow us to see new things in the GW2 universe – I’m dying to see the Margonites rendered in the new engine, it would likely be our first and only opportunity to see the real face of the gods, and so on.

(I’m half expecting both fractals to be somewhat disappointing, to say the truth, but even then the lore from the Abaddon fractal would be worth it.)

What the OP fails to realize, as usual, is that not everyone has the same point of view as he does. We know, as ArenaNet has mentioned it a few times, that the Charr are the least popular playable race in the game. Between that, the fact people know the character of Ellen Kiel, the fact she’s a woman, and how most people don’t even bother to read stuff (I would be very surprised if most players even know about the Abaddon fractal in the first place), I expect Kiel to win by a landslide. Evon’s only chance, IMO, is due to how it’s not a one vote per player thing.

Tagus Eleuthera.7305:

Evon is the dirty politician type.. maybe they figured they needed to give an incentive to vote for him. Its almost a shame that the abaddon fractal might not get made though. GW2 could seriously use some god lore!

GW2 could use some god lore? Really? The game’s personal story already has you treading on their former turf at the end. I’d argue that, the Krytan region, and the whole first game chattering about them, is more than enough.

Gmr Leon.1846:

GW2 could use some god lore? Really?

Really. They are a mystery. What exactly are them? Where did they come from? What do they actually look like? How powerful they are, when compared to the Elder Dragons?

And where are they now? Why did they leave? Was it truly because they wanted humanity to stand on its own legs, or did they flee from the Elder Dragons? Or is the Risen Priestess of Lyssa right, and they have been actually devoured by Zhaitan and the others?

We don’t know the answers to those questions, despite how they are mentioned often within the game.

Evon already had my vote, because he is a bit of a shady character. Kiel to me is just a bit bland, as Konig stated before. I like the story to have a bit of excitement to it. So yeah, I’ll vote the shady scoundrel into power.

In regards to the reduced waypoint costs and blacklion key discounts, I couldn’t care less either way. It is only for 4 weeks, and we have no idea how much of a discount we’ll get. Even if waypoint costs were free for 4 weeks, it’s only 4 weeks. But we’re not even promised that.

The dungeons really are the deal breaker here. I would have voted for Evon on personality alone. But I just love GW1 lore. No doubt the Fractals team would make either Fractal something awesome. But with Thaumanova I just fear having to fight more Inquest and Golems, and that stuff just bores me to tears. We already have the Uncatagorized Fractal, and I’ve had my fill of Crucible of Eternity. So I have a strong bias against anything Asura-fractal related. I think we have enough of that.

Anything involving the five human Gods and Abaddon interests me. I want to learn more about the Gods, and about Abaddon’s down fall. I want to see Margonites and Forgotten and avatars. I don’t know if we’ll get any of that, but I’m lending my vote.

Erasculio.2914:

Gmr Leon.1846:

GW2 could use some god lore? Really?

Really. They are a mystery. What exactly are them? Where did they come from? What do they actually look like? How powerful they are, when compared to the Elder Dragons?

And where are they now? Why did they leave? Was it truly because they wanted humanity to stand on its own legs, or did they flee from the Elder Dragons? Or is the Risen Priestess of Lyssa right, and they have been actually devoured by Zhaitan and the others?

We don’t know the answers to those questions, despite how they are mentioned often within the game.

There are equally compelling questions from other races:

Asura: what is magic? How does it function? Where does it come from? What does it look like, unmodified? How powerful can it become?

And how do we (the races) use it so easily, at least some of us? Why does it behave differently from place to place?

Charr: why do we aid any of the other races, when they prove so disorganized, undisciplined, and, generally, weak? Why doesn’t Iron Legion crush the Blood Legion and the Flame Legion for one’s dull brutality and the other’s disrespectful audacity to subvert the proud will of its fellow charr?

Norn: what exactly are the Spirits of the Wild? Where did they come from? Why do those that help us appear often as animals? How powerful are they, compared to the human gods or the Elder Dragons?

Are they still listening and with us as much as on our flight from the Far Shiverpeaks? Why do they aid us and not the other races?

Sylvari: where did the Pale Tree’s seed come from? Are there other Pale Trees? How did the tree give rise to us and the Dream of Dreams? Was it magic, or was the seed special somehow? How do the Soundless remove themselves from the Dream? How are Wyld Hunts decided or formed? Why do so many follow them without much second thought?

Gmr Leon.1846:

There are equally compelling questions from other races:

Asura: what is magic? How does it function? Where does it come from? What does it look like, unmodified? How powerful can it become?

And how do we (the races) use it so easily, at least some of us? Why does it behave differently from place to place?

Charr: why do we aid any of the other races, when they prove so disorganized, undisciplined, and, generally, weak? Why doesn’t Iron Legion crush the Blood Legion and the Flame Legion for one’s dull brutality and the other’s disrespectful audacity to subvert the proud will of its fellow charr?

The “Asura” questions are not really linked to the Asura (magic is not exclusive to them), if anything those questions are more likely based on lore about the ancient races, considering the entire Bloodstone thing.

The Charr questions also have the same answer – they are not that powerful alone and need the other’s help. It’s less a matter of being a mystery than being a matter of politics. If anything, maybe the ancient story of the Charrs would be more interesting.

I would love to know more about the Pale Tree, or about the Spirits of the Wild. The fact GW2 could use more lore about the Six Gods doesn’t mean it also wouldn’t be nice to get lore about those other aspects of the game.

Unfortunatelly, that’s not what the incoming Fractals will be about. Our choices currently are more of the same (Thaumanova) or the answer to some mysteries (Abaddon).

Klonex.4562:

i’m still voting for Kiel
with a picture like this:

how can you not vote for her

That’s just how she looked when that Lion Guard ship blew up. As an armchair expert in reading micro-expressions, I’m going to go out on the proverbial limb and say Kiel’s keel is more than a little uneven.

Erasculio.2914:

Gmr Leon.1846:

There are equally compelling questions from other races:

Asura: what is magic? How does it function? Where does it come from? What does it look like, unmodified? How powerful can it become?

And how do we (the races) use it so easily, at least some of us? Why does it behave differently from place to place?

Charr: why do we aid any of the other races, when they prove so disorganized, undisciplined, and, generally, weak? Why doesn’t Iron Legion crush the Blood Legion and the Flame Legion for one’s dull brutality and the other’s disrespectful audacity to subvert the proud will of its fellow charr?

The “Asura” questions are not really linked to the Asura (magic is not exclusive to them), if anything those questions are more likely based on lore about the ancient races, considering the entire Bloodstone thing.

The Charr questions also have the same answer – they are not that powerful alone and need the other’s help. It’s less a matter of being a mystery than being a matter of politics. If anything, maybe the ancient story of the Charrs would be more interesting.

I would love to know more about the Pale Tree, or about the Spirits of the Wild. The fact GW2 could use more lore about the Six Gods doesn’t mean it also wouldn’t be nice to get lore about those other aspects of the game.

Unfortunatelly, that’s not what the incoming Fractals will be about. Our choices currently are more of the same (Thaumanova) or the answer to some mysteries (Abaddon).

I disagree. On the charr, I’d say it’s subjective, and thus not to drag it out, but I feel they could, organized and unified, be strong enough on their own to deal with their own problems.

As to the asura, again it may be subjective here, but I’m inclined to believe they are the only race with a pseudoscientific enough approach to truly bring understanding to magic, whereas the other races hardly display any similar interest. The closest you have to them in terms of interest of the other races may be found in the Durmand Priory, and even then, it’s only faintly comparable from what we’ve seen.

On the very final point, I disagree entirely. I think the Fractals from a lore perspective are about exactly the same thing, only in different stages and forms. I think the Fall of Abaddon concerns itself with pre-Bloodstone magic, while Thaumanova Reactor concerns itself also with pre-Bloodstone magic, of another stripe. One is of divine magic, and one is of draconic magic.

By the slights of “chaotic” magic, I think it’s fair to suggest that while both are raw forms of magic, each resembles the source. Divine may be more controlled, or tempered, while draconic may be uncontrolled, or unrefined. Either one will answer mysteries of magic, and the simple question left is, which mystery of magic are you more intrigued by?

Frankly, given the direction of the writing, I’m doubtful of either culminating in anything greatly interesting, but I think looking at it from this angle evens the playing field from a lore perspective.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

IndigoSundown.5419:

Konig Des Todes.2086:

Given the system, it doesn’t seem like the Support Tokens would be easily tracked, but completion of the achievements would…

You put the token into a virtual box that says Kiel or one that says Gnashblade. I’m failing to see how that would be hard to track.

Depends on how it’s set up, baka. They’d need to track how many times a specific action is performed, when such an act is not tracked in anywhere else in the game. Can be done, or they could be using a pre-existing method to do it…

Given how ArenaNet has a tendency to cut corners when they don’t need to be precise, which do you think?

‘Sides, unlike reality, there’s no box to retrieve tokens from. It’s just an NPC dialogue, and everywhere else in the game, those things reset in no more than 10 minutes.

Trust me, pretty much every action is logged already. Checking how many times people have interacted (successfully) with each of the boxes is trivial. It’s no more difficult than checking how many people have completed different achievements.
And even if it weren’t logged already, it would be no more difficult than adding a trigger when you successfully interact with it that says something like this:
add_vote_ellen(multiplier)
where the multiplier is 1 by default, and 2 if you have the buff to double it. It’s not a lot of work.

Besides, they’d have to track the votes, considering that’s the stated metric by which a winner is decided, not how many of the achievements are completed. So the whole argument is moot.

mexay.3902:

AnthonyOrdon.3926:

We will not make both fractals.

Things like this are why ArenaNet continues to fail as a company.

[snip]

tl;dr putting the fractals behind a temporary content decision where a large part of the community will be voting solely on the characters or the temporary content is a terrible game design choice and should be amended ASAP.

I wasn’t aware it was failing as a company. From what I understand of business, creating a product that funds normal operation and supports research and development into new products for seven years, tripling your workforce in the last eighteen months, increasing your parent companies yearly profits by 322%, moving three million units in a struggling/highly competitive market (PC MMO), and being relocated to a larger more accommodating facility are marks of a fairly successful and growing company. But I dont have an MBA or anything.

Aside from that, keep in mind you could be getting nothing in the way of permanent content. Anything is better than nothing as there will be a group of players interested in it that will enjoy it. It’s also impossible to make everyone happy, because everyone has different tastes. If this update design conformed perfectly to what you would want, someone could easily adopt your same tone.

I think it’s a stroke of brilliance personally. ArenaNet wants GW2 to follow a living world model where player decisions have an impact on the content. We have an election, both candidates are offering something different. We don’t get the stuff from the losing candidate. Our decision has a very real, very direct impact on what happens in the game from content to story. That is outstanding design and something that game developers have been trying to make work for decades. How do you make player choices actually impact the world and keep the game fluid despite those decisions?

Anet is taking steps in the right direction towards answering that question because of the medium they have to work with. We cant have everything and we cant reload a checkpoint because a decision didn’t give us the meta result we wanted. We can think carefully about the decision we make and try to influence the decisions of other players. And that is kittening awesome.

inazuma.7021:

SpeedFiend.4521:

Kiel gets the shortsighted smartperson votes so everything seems in order here.

So you’re saying Evon is getting all the farsighted dumbperson votes?

No, Evon gets all the Farsighted votes period, smart or dumb, and the shortsighted dumb person. Three to one, totally fair.

What you don’t seem to understand, though, is that the vote is based on how many tickets each condidate gets and they specifically provided reasons for every single person to vote for both candidates multiple times.

Once I’ve taken care of all my Kiel acievements, though, I’m going to put all my tickets in for Evon because I think he is a much more interesting candidate.

Kiel is not a very big deal. She has not actually done much, and she is a soldier, not a politician. She has no business being on the council, she should be lead by the council. She makes boring decisions about boring situations, in a grand scheme. Evon, on the other hand, is a pirate in control of the biggest company in Tyria. He makes critical decisions like he would need to on the council on a daily basis. Also, as a business man he will and able to be far more cut throat that Kiel ever will.

The person that gets onto the council will influence the direction of the Living Story for the next two or more years. Who do we want there, the goodie two shoes, white knight Kiel, or the more sinister, and far more interesting Gnashblade? I want Gnashblade. I’m tired of reactive stories dealing with things that just come up. I want to go out and do things and I think Evon is the key to that.