Guild Wars 2

Over time, from listening to various comments that Lawton and other devs have made, I believe I have a rough understanding of the general types of servers that ANet employs to run the game. (Of course, I might be wrong, but what I’m going to say should apply in broad strokes).

There are several different classes of servers. At a minimum we have:

• Login Servers, which could also likely be called “Character Servers”. These are responsible for holding all of the durable information about your account and characters.
• Trading Servers, basically, the Trading Post, and likely the Gemshop as well.
• Map Servers. Each of these drive one or more map instances at a time.
• Asset Servers, which are what the client downloads textures, sounds, etc from.
• Config Server, where they are able to do things like disable a trait on the fly, or where gem store sales are turned on or off, etc.

When a character enters a map, they connect to the appropriate Map Server, when then contacts the Login Server, and checks out a copy of the character. The Map Server is in charge of player location, combat, etc. Any changes made to things like inventory are first applied at the Map Server, and then pushed to the Login Server on a frequent basis (details a bit fuzzy here, and rightly so, as this gap is where duplication bugs crop up in other games).

With the API system, they’ve added another set of servers, which I’ll call:

• API Snapshot Servers.

When an API request is made, it looks to see if it already has that information snapshotted. If so, it serves it directly. If not, it goes out and asks another server for that information. In order to ask those servers for information, an internal connection has to be built to allow for that. This can often take a lot of effort, since those other servers likely never expected to have these types of requests asked. Also, extreme care has to be given that these things are done correctly, so that the stability of the main game is not compromised. Thus, many of the delays in getting information are likely a result of coordination with the team which owns those other servers.

The first round of APIs were able to pull things from Asset and Config servers, and as such only gave you global information, which was mostly static. (Though I’m not 100% sure how event information was pulled). Later, we got a connection to the trading post added, which was later upgraded to give per person information. Most recently, we’ve gained access to the Login servers.

This request is about getting information about current location. This is strictly a function of the Map Servers. There’s several issues that come to mind with getting this:

• Update Speed. The API system is set up to take snapshots, and then serve off that snapshot for many minutes. Changing to a direct feed would require some rework.
• Potentially significantly increased load on Map Servers. Constantly getting this information isn’t free. Responding to requests takes resources, especially if many people do it at once. Think of a WvW map, where several of the major guilds are using this to coordinate attacks. Would this be worth it if in response to this side load, they had to lower the max map population by 15 people?

Overall, the effort needed to make this happen is very non-trivial. Meanwhile, there are lots of other things that can be done with the newfound connection to the Login servers, such as Wallet, Unlocks, and Guild info. From the Asset and/or Config servers, we can get things like Skills, Specializations, and Traits.

There’s also the overall question of the right tool for the job. Is a constant stream of pull requests against a REST API the right way to do this? Or should we instead look to expand on the Mumble model, where we’re getting information direct from the client, and thus avoid many of these issue. We’ve already got location and map information kludged into the Mumble API. Perhaps at some later point, we could get a similar direct memory tool which expands on this more cleanly. These things, however, almost certainly would require the effort from people on a team other than those currently working on this API.

Hope that helps.

PS – I’d love to know how wrong I am about your server structure.
PPS – I also understand if you’re not allowed to tell me.

I believe that set is kind of like the Whispers light armor set in that the shoulders aren’t visible; what looks like the shoulders is actually just part of the chest piece. That’s why the dyes don’t look like the dyes you used for the shoulders. The CoF light legs and chest have a similar effect (the chest covers the legs).

Ashen.2907:

Astralporing.1957:

Preacher.9526:

Race change could be done and there have been a million suggestions on how it could be implemented.

I don’t remember even one suggestion that offered a sensible mechanical solution. In fact, most “solutions” concentrated only on how it were to look from the player side.

This.

No player could have offered a mechanical/programming solution because no player knows the inner working of the programming.

Let’s elaborate a bit on that by looking at what is probably the most common player solution, ie. reset personal story on race change. Firstly, this kind of solution faces the same problems as allowing players to replay personal story (because that is what this solution entails) and secondly, there are bunch of minor things the choices in personal story affects, including the state of your home instance (yes that thing you only visit to mine some daily nodes, if even that) as well as numerous open world interactions related to the choice of order to join in particular.

These things seems so minor that they are easy to gloss over from players point of view because they are barely seen by most players. The problem with all of this boils down to the fact that they would have to reset your character state, but also hold partial records of every one of the previous states to an extent (ie. avoid re-earning rewards for example).

One thing to consider, when the story journal was introduced, they wouldn’t or couldn’t (because of it being either technically impossible, or cost prohibitive) allow parts of personal story to be replayed, if they couldn’t do it for the story journal all the same reasons would apply to race change.

Profession changes on the other hand, while probably easier would have a set of their own problems (namely to do with gear, and that one ultimately insignificant choice in character creation).

This doesn’t even touch on any potential design reasons against them, see Jon Peters post about why Hero Points can not be reset on demmand… of the top of my head I can’t come up with parallel for race change but that is because I too do not know how the inner systems interact with each other or have enough information on the desing behind personal story now and at launch as well as how the system accommodates for that design.

I have 20GB allowed to me each month before I go over and have to pay extra. I don’t have the computer on without needing it, but I play the game daily with no problems within the 20Gb.

Here in NZ it’s costly for internet so I can give you a pretty good idea. I’m only on an 80gig per month plan fibre and I can tell you just playing GW gets no where near that limit. It’s mainly my brother doing downloads for his xbox that gets us close and even then we have never gone over. So you have nothing to worry about with 300+gig lol.

Actually we got close this month but that’s only because I had to re download the whole game again (20 gig) as my hard drive was low on space. So I downloaded to a bigger drive waiting and ready for Hot.

Here is a quite from JS the game economist about price inequality of mats of the same tiers:

John Smith.4610:

You don’t micromanage markets to maintain equilibrium. Not only is it an incredible amount of work you can never be wrong in, it’s not physically possible inside a live game environment.

You assume that absolute parity is required inside of tiers, I don’t necessarily agree.

No Walking.6349:

For instance, I should have 3 of the jade weapons, and almost all of the original super blue weapons in my wardrobe, but I lost them all because the wardrobe wasn’t out at the time, and I swapped those skins for others using the old fine xmute stones. Some of those skins I lost are now going for thousands of gold, and the chances I get to get another shot at them are slim.

Anyone else frustrated at this? Any Anet employee want to give some info on if this will ever be rectified, or if these skins will be easily attainable again?

As a simple neutral observation, at the moment you swapped out those skins using transmutation stones, you most likely willingly forfeited that skin. A significant time later you complain that you have lost that skin.

I understand your frustration, but I feel that we all already knew that these skins would be valuable at the time they were released. I know I kept those I got around as weapons. I’m afraid there is little to no way of proving you had them at this point…

I think that taking a Temple should have a reward. Defending a temple successfully should have a greater reward, to stop people claiming ownership of an event over other players.

I bought a character slot back shortly after launch.

I still think the expansion should come with one.

Mooncaller.9634:

Under contract ArenaNet is offering Core + Expansion to every purchaser and only delivering Expansion to existing users.

Actually existing users can get exactly the same thing offered to first time buyers. Both get a new account with both core content and HoT included. The existing user, of course, has the option to forgo, at their discretion, the new account in favor of linking to an existing account.

I wouldn’t expect many existing users to choose not to link accounts, but the option to have exactly the same as the first time buyer is there.

No, I don’t think this will kill the game. Despite all the upset, the opinions we’ve seen don’t constitute the majority of players. It’s possible that the majority are fine with it. Many that don’t like the price will wait till HoT goes on sale in the future and pick it up then. Also, the pricing deal for new players is really good and some of those that leave will be replaced by others.

Do I think their handling of this has lost them money and customers? You betcha.
Do I think it’s enough to kill the game? No, I don’t.

tovadaun.6304:

My first encounter w an RPer on my server (before megas came about) was an off-putting one. I had no idea they were RPing, tbh, I’d never seen it presented in that way in a game before (Yes, I was a noob to GW2) and the response I got was so rude and embarrassing that I would never reach out and make contact with another RPer again.
They aren’t just cliquish to me, they’re xenophobic.
Maybe

That’s a little inaccurate, don’t you think? It’s like saying all dogs are terrible, because I got bit by one once.
Bad first impressions can be killer, but there’s thousands of RP people out there. Don’t let a few bad eggs ruin your experience.

You’re beginning to try to argue like you’re in a court, essentially if you start producing macros and anet detect it you will have your account suspended or banned THEN you’ll need to have this conversation with anet to get it restored (they might not listen).

Decide if you want that risk, take it or just buy the gaming mouse.

No one here can say “oh yes this is definitely ok because you’ve argued your case so well” and force anet to hold to it. The detection and suspension might even be automated and I’m not sure if this thread builds evidence for your defense or the side that keeps you banned.

Whether or not you agree with a 100% rep guild is of course, totally your own opinion. I complete agree with whomever it was that said everyone would be better off just joining guilds that are like-minded. In our case, we’re a fairly laid back guild, mostly 18+, rather salty, we do very large weekly guild missions, have fun and play together a lot.

We ask 100% rep because we want to keep providing the experience and benefits that we provide. The rep rule is the honestly the only rule we enforce on any sort of consistent basis.

Not that I feel the need to defend my guild, but I come from years of loyalty to your guild and guildies, so maybe I’m old fashioned. Maybe my entire guild is old-fashioned, it works out that way.

And as Illconcieved said, question’s been answered.

The short answer is “everything other than keybinding is bannable”.

The long answer is “while every effective macro is bannable, ArenaNet has so far employed a highly subjective and unpublished method of actually handing out bans”.

Use macros at your own risk.

So it moved from 7.6s to 9.3s in the end. I call that a price correction. Basically the previous price was below what the market could support and was prevented from rising due to the undercutting nature of new supply. Once flushed out it is now finding it’s new support price. It’s down 50c from 12 hours ago so the price still hasn’t stabilized yet.

Some will cry that this is inflation or price manipulation but players can still go harvest seasoned logs, convert them to planks and undercut.

Cronqvist.3762:

I crafted a set of assassin’s light armor (exotic) on my Necromancer — who has 500 tailoring — for my Mesmer. I also crafted 6 superior runes of the scholar to put in the assassin’s set. I put the runes into the set on my Necromancer and put the set into my bank, only to discover on my Mesmer that the set had been soulbound to my Necromancer. The assassin’s set is not useful for my Necromancer and, as a result, I’ve lost the gold I used in crafting it (imagine if the set was of ascended rarity).

Ascended remains account bound which means this post wouldn’t exist.

Each time you apply a rune it has a warning so you ignored that warning 6 times.

It would make a great deal more sense if runes accountbound armor instead of soulbinding them. Applying a rune and having it soulbind is unintuitive because typically soulbinding usually happens when you equip an item for the first time. It’s easy to change the value of an item from being accountbound to soulbound so that a set of runed armor can go from being accountbound (preventing it from going on the tradepost) to being soulbound on a character who first equips the set.

It actually used to work like that(although it always said Soulbound) but then they fixed it…

Look at how much precursors sell for on the TP. If there was a decent chance to get a precursor spending only 300 gold, a lot more people would do it and prices would be much lower.

Could you provide a screenshot of your wardrobe showing the human cultural skins?

If you have all 18 skins but the achievement shows as 17/18, one of the following is probably the issue:

1. The T1 chest skin you unlocked was from the level 20 Personal Story rewards. These reward skins don’t count towards the achievement, as you have to buy the pieces directly from the cultural vendor for it to count.

2. You bought more than one of the same piece type for one of the tiers. You have to have one set of boots, leg armor, gloves, chest armor, shoulder armor, and helm from each tier. If you buy two sets of boots from the same tier, just one will count for the achievement.

3. You are an older player who had one of the skins unlocked from the old spvp stuff, in which case that skin wouldn’t count because it wasn’t bought from the cultural vendor.

For those who dont bother reading Evons blog, quite a few armor/weapon skins, tools etc. will be taken out of the gem store in 7 days.

Gem Store Spring Cleaning
With the approach of summer and our pending return to Lion’s Arch, it’s time to clean house a bit and put a few things into storage. The Wintersday weapon set will be removed from vendors in one week, and the following items will no longer be regularly available in the Gem Store until next fall.

Krytan Armor Skins
Profane Armor Skins
Primeval Armor Skins
Zodiac Armor Skins
Quaggan Warrior Backpack
Wintersday Earmuffs
Fuzzy Bear Hat
Fuzzy Leopard Hat
Glowing Crimson Mask Skin
Mask of the Crown Skin
Sailor’s Beanie
Top Hat
Reading Glasses
Frost Wasp Logging Tool
Tireless Logging Minion
Tireless Harvesting Minion
Bone Pick
Fused Molten Logging Axe
Molten Alliance Mining Pick
Fused Molten Sickle

https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/daydreamers-wings-honor-guard-finisher-and-mini-beetle-in-the-gemstore/

McJAC, I took a look at your spreadsheet’s code, and noticed you’re using custom Google Apps Script functions to directly return pricing data from the GW2Spidy API. It’s easy to miss, but custom spreadsheet functions must be deterministic. The price will be fetched the first time the cell loads, but will be cached until you change the item id argument. This means the prices on your sheet will not automatically update as item prices change over time.

I ran into this problem while developing my own sheets and wrote a GW2 API library which will fetch the information into a designated range. Just paste the library key “Mq57i81IlEjI1Kt0fjQAiJVQQbPcGcXLZ” into your sheet’s library list (Script Editor -> Resources menu -> Libraries) and rig it up as described in the documentation, or just copy/paste the source into your own sheet and take a look at one of my spreadsheets I linked in my previous post to see how I have it set-up.

If you have the impression you can “buy it any time” you may never buy it. But if it only comes up twice a year you may be more likely to purchase it, even if not discounted, because you don’t want to spend another 6 months without it.

It still bothers me for 2 years now… Why can’t we adjust the transparency of the windows, for example the inventory…? I tried to clean my inventory today, but it’s hard to do so if the background is full of colors… The bank window seems to be good with it’s transparency though. Wouldn’t it be nice to have an option to change that?

Instead of adjusting the amount of time before you’re kicked, they need to adjust what is considered "participating"in an event, so that it’s harder to passively “participate”, and therefore passively scale the event up, and passively get credit.