Guild Wars 2

Chewablesleeptablet.3185:

There is no way that they would sell the expansion through the gem shop. Anet took the traditional route and is selling this in stores and digital downloads.

Personally I think so too, but at this point it is really too early to tell. Let’s not forget that, to my knowledge, ArenaNet is the only MMO company that actually stopped selling their game at one point so that the players that had the game could play while they sorted out the problems with server loads .

Phosphia.7813:

Again, spvp and wvw are two very different things.

Just curious what aspects of the WvW progressionis taken advantage of in the WvW GvG? I would think you’d deliberately want to avoid stat buffs and the like. Is siege being used? I guess you have the raicial skills , but other than that I am having hard time picturing what WvW specific this particular flavor of GvG is taking advantage of (not including team sizes because at this point we don’t even know for sure what sort of team sizes HoT might support).

Windsagio.1340:

I… is this about ownership of the term “GvG”?

I would definitely say that it is… to a degree at least, it would be problematic if people within same guild started calling both Stronghold and WvW GvG just GvG (because of personal preference f.ex., though I assume guilds tend to mostly gather like minded people). Not to even talk about more public chats like map chat.

Chewablesleeptablet.3185:

What will happen to players who do not buy this expansion? They probably will not be able to do any future Living Story after the expansion is released.

As far as this bit goes if they are smart they will structure it so that the living story will go in a different direction once it picks back up sometime after HoT (which we can assume because HoT is the direct continuation to the end of S2 storywise, while we may or may not get some fluff like SAB in the interim while waiting for HoT).

The way I see it is that LS will exist to bridge the gaps between expansions and maybe play out some minor plotlines in addition that. Assuming expansions will consistently head after different dragons or to different continents entirely it is safe to assume it would be a long while before there would be a forced “regional overlap” between living story and HoT.

Or they might deliberately make it so that parts of the living story (perhaps some related but otherwise self-contained plots) will require HoT while others will not. To entice purchases.

At the end of the day, we do not know how HoT features will trickle into the base game at all right now. We don’t even know enough about the pricing and release model for HoT to say if for example you can convert gold to gems to eventually by HoT with.

Phosphia.7813:

Where’s the fuss coming from?

Because an already established term describing a game type from GW1 was coined by the community to use as a moniker for a community organized events that are essentially “Guild TDM”.

The title of this topic is “Stronghold isn’t GvG”, well just as valid of a view is that " ‘GvG’ is not GvG".

You are looking at two groups of people using the same name for two vastly different types of activities, one of which happens to be possible in limited capacity right now through community organization. This has been going on so long now that the fact that the current form of GvG inside WvW originally formed as a substitute, because of the lack of an official successor to GW1’s GvG, is no longer fresh on people’s minds.

The player base of this new GvG is also likely changed from those times a great deal but the term stuck with them even if they might no longer be waiting for the old style of GvG to be supported and some likely joined in later and never did to begin with.

All of this doesn’t mean that the people looking for a more Classic GvG akin to the current’s namesake from GW1 necessarily went anywhere. Only that some were willing to compromise and others were not.

Now, Stronghold isn’t GvG in the classic sense either that much is true, however, it certainly is closer to the GvG from GW1 than what we see being played in Obsidian Sanctum now. So people referring to it as or making the connection to GvG is reasonable, these people are just perhaps different people than those who play the WvW incarnation of GvG today.

At the end of the day GvG is a term that ArenaNet could have called Stronghold by and it had been entirely reasonable because the heritage to the official GW1 game mode is as clear as day. However, they chose not to do this because they could seem problems in using that term now from mile away.

Ultimately both sides of this debate are correct. Stronghold is Stronghold with strong influence from classic GW1 GvG. This is more of a debate on who has more right to use the term GvG, and ultimately ArenaNet decided to stay out of this debate and call the new mode Stronghold.

Masteries seem to be highly PvE specific, the specializations not so much from what I could gleam off the stream.

Rainmaker.7594:

But, what is the benefit of going DX11? Being newer isn’t a direct benefit. GW2 looks better than some DX11 games. Also, it’s so much a matter of the hardware as it is the software. Microsoft won’t release newer versions of DX on older OS, so DX12 that someone mentioned is a very bad idea because it won’t work on Win7. OpenGL and 64-bit isn’t controlled by MS.

The benefit is performance. Newer hardware and newer drivers have in theory at least concentrated their efforts to supporting newer versions of DirectX efficiently. Sure they are backwards compatible but the newer the card the more likely it is that there are performance boosts for using a newer version of DirectX.

Muchacho.2390:

True, but it will be called Stronghold not GvG.^^

To be fair, they will probably never use the term GvG in an official capacity about anything because its definition varies so wildly depending on whether you ask someone who played GvG in GW1 or who plays GvG as it is known in GW2 right now.

Knighthonor.4061:

Keep in mind that in the current Gw2 a main map ore main zones consist of multiple zones collectively.

Well a region, such as Kryta consists of multiple maps/zones such as Queensdale.

Can’t really call the three areas of the jungle regions though, since geographically they could even be on top of each other. Their use of the word biome was a smart choice in my opinion.

There is no official source on the number of maps.

The official wording is that there will be one new region (the Heart of Maguuma, if memory serves) with three distinct biomes. How many maps each biome consists of is unknown us.

We do know that the three biomes are defined by verticality and that verticality will be a big theme.

Edit: ninja’ed

butch.8136:

Please clarify ‘formal GvG elements’. There are a lot of definitions these days.
GW1 style? WvW style?

Stronghold is basically Gw2’s iteration.

We also know nothing about Stronghold, for real… we assume the team size is 5v5 but it isn’t set in stone. Same can be said for their “challenging group content” we do not know if that implies open world or not, we simply assume so. This list of things not in HoT is based at least as much on assumptions as the list of features that we know is in HoT.

I have to give props for your fantastic retelling of these history defining moments in the GW universe TheBlackLeech.

Conclusion, trust Mursaat, except that one that swore vengeance on humanity of course. Unless you are Asura of course in which case all is well, let those stupid bookah deal with bookah problems.

Derdhal.6908:

What would be the point of massive GvG? Guilds of 100 members smashing guilds of just 20? Sorry, but it makes no sense, if there is a limit of 10 and you are 60, then play 6 games at the same time.

The voice of reason is lost on this subject :P As is so often the case when people get passionate about something, like GvG or whatever you want to call GW2’s community driven version of it.

Just to point out though: we don’t actually know anything or we know next to nothing about this game mode. It could be 20v20 for all we know.

Also if guilds doing GvG do not have 100’s of players well that doesn’t make his point invalid. If all don’t fit in one match you hold multiple and the one with most wins comes out on top, no?

It will not be free, you will find a FAQ here: https://help.guildwars2.com/entries/105801626-Guild-Wars-2-Heart-of-Thorns-FAQ

edit: ninja’ed.

displacedTitan.6897:

“I want GvG like GW1!!!!”

“GW1 GvG was 8v8”

“I WANT GvG THATS NOT GW1!!”

Seems about right…

The moniker Guild vs Guild was a bit of a misnomer in GW1 in that it did not mean that whole guilds would go against each other, but it did mean that guilds competed against one another.

The two distinct groups using the same term to refer to two wildly different things certainly doesn’t help matters.

Nope, none aside the usual “when it is ready”.

All we know right now is that next event HoT will be part of will be in 6 weeks with a playable demo on the show floor.

Turamarth.3248:

GW1 gvg was 8v8. I wouldn’t expect much larger groups.

Some speculation based on the trailer suggest that they might be doing instanced group content for around 10 players but that is based on counting what is assumed to represent player characters in a scene that is assumed to be outside of the normal open world.

So flimsy at best but better than nothing, I guess. From what I understand the party size limit was at its roots technical and related to instancing so maybe they have managed to work that out or come up with a better solution than what they have right now.

Hardcore.6351:

Don’t you think it’s a funny thing that the game is named “Guild Wars” and the Guilds will only battle themselves 2 years later and have to buy a exp pack for it.

This always gets brought up, so lets do this again… the name Guild Wars comes from the PvE lore not from the game type known as GvG (in either of its incarnations).

What came before when the original base game was in development I do not know, but that is not really relevant. The game is called Guild Wars 2 because it is a sequel to the game called Guild Wars gameplay has absolutely nothing to do with it.

butch.8136:

And the WvW’s iteration of GvG is just a deathmatch with numbers. DM isn’t that great either as a full fledged gamemode.

This, ANet has sort of always been averse to the idea of plain deathmatch, I was honestly extremely surprised we even got Courtyard to begin with (which is hardly a stellar map, quadrupling team sizes and making it guild specific could hardly change that alone).

To be fair, we know too little about this game mode to draw any definite conclusions one way or another. Either way it is a competitive mode for Guilds to compete against one another, so in that sense it is official GvG in Guild Wars 2.

Timelord.8190:

lordkrall.7241:

You didn’t ask anything at all. You claimed something. It is a rather large difference.

It is also extremely unlikely that they would tell us stuff like this on the forums before they release the deep dive blogs in the near future.

So “?” means nothing to you?

To be fair your topic title was not phrased as a proper question at all, it could just as easily be seen as a punctuation mistake and your post itself didn’t really help in the matter.

At best your set up of the question was extremely loaded and your post reinforced this.

Do you really think they would talk about performance or engine changes on stage at an event like the one this morning. The engine is old though, depending on how modular it is changing the underlying rendering technology might be possible, or it might not.

There is also no way they would go out of their way to talk about problems in their game or fixes to such problems at a huge PR event. Because it is not ideal material for drawing in new players or enticing returning players.

lordkrall.7241:

Erukk.1408:

Said 3rd party companies usually have insider sources on the matter though, and in the end of the day only care about their own investors and profits. They wouldn’t publish such predictions if they didn’t have some knowledge on the matter, because if they are wrong it costs them and their investors a huge amount of money.

You mean like the expansion that was released 2013?

^ This, that same company has been repeatedly making similar predictions for each year thus increasing their chances of being correct as time passed.

ekarat.1085:

The financial statement listed significant revenue increase in Q3, so early Q3 would be my guess. The anniversary would also be a good guess.

Is this the same prediction by 3rd party company that has suddenly been made official by the internet or something actually out of NCSoft.

The wait might be long, but thinking about it logically, we know there will be a playable demo in 6 weeks on a show floor in a convention. So it might not be as long as some may fear.

Once we see the state of that demo build we can speculate more on a potential release schedule, however, even now I would say it is unlikely they want to let the enthusiasm of the reveal to go to waste. So it is probably possible to draw some conclusions about how much and how detailed information we will receive in these coming 6 weeks and at the convention and then estimate a potential release window they might be aiming for.

If I was in charge, I would try my hardest to either aim for late summer 2015 or the holiday season for 2015.

This is definitely not all of the sudden… the LS has all been leading upto this, the shenanigans with Rytlock earlier and Marjory suddenly getting a greatsword as a Necro are two plain examples of this.

I doubt they had planned quite this far ahead when they gave Trahearne a greatsword but it must have had a role to play in their choices post launch when they started to work on this.

In terms of story beats for HoT, go watch the last PoI on youtube, this has been coming for quite some time when all of those things are put together.

This is closer to GvG than what GW2 players refer to as GvG from what I understand.

Not saying your criticism is invalid, however, there are two groups of people with two vastly different definitions of GvG. For one of those groups Stronghold seems to hit pretty close to home when it comes to GvG.

lordkrall.7241:

It looks very much like the Mesmer will be able to specialize and become a Chronomancer and use a shield ^^

If there is a specialization dealing with time, Mesmer is the best candidate for it anyways, they already have Timewarp plus the purple coloring and the clock style design of the skill pretty much cement the deal.

I am really happy I just made a Mesmer alt not too long ago. Now to collect resources for the inevitable Revenant toon, wonder how he’ll specialize.

I find it very interesting that they would choose to put the new allies annotation on top of a Mursaat’s shot.

Professions never had any real impact on story progression whatsoever, but like lordkrall pointed out if ANet wanted to they could weasel an explanation in for it.

When dealing with the mists everything is possible.

Kormir, of course… there is a legend and a god in one what more could one ask for :P

Now of course it would likely have to be an echo of Kormir pre-ascension into godhood but who cares about those minor details.

On a more serious note, King Reza and/or Vizier Khilbron could be interesting….

About masteries, sure some of them could probably be global but think hangliding for example that would be potentially game breaking in maps and environments not set up for it.

While this is just speculation right now, it makes sense to assume that most masteries will be primarily region specific if they play into the map design heavily (ie. exploration masteries and ones that focus on unlocking areas), however, combat masteries that we know next to nothing about at this point could easily become more global than just be restricted into the new region (the emphasis being on could easily become)-

They did specifically refer to them as “skills of the jungle” that could mean they are all region specific right now but that doesn’t exclude them from applying to older zones in the future. Or some of them could be global because there is no mechanical reason to restrict them.

CureForLiving.5360:

Mental Paradox.3845:

What’s the point of “specialization” if there only one “choice”?
Should be at least 2.

My thoughts as well, they might just as well have revamped the current classes instead of calling it specialisation.

Maybe they want to set up the ground work and system for additional specializations to be added later as a form horizontal choice. It is hardly likely this will be the only expac for GW2, they are setting precedents here.

At this point I sort of regret not going with my gut at launch and making a Sylvari as my first character. Still don’t have one to this day, gotta pile those skillpoints and tomes up ready for when the time comes though.

Rognik.2579:

They actually said when you were talking to Ogden the first time. Wynne had a golden seal that allowed her to open the door.

Duh, I must have missed this, though I tried to really pay attention.

Although all this does is change the question to, why on earth would a member of then an infantile race have an (presumably) ancient seal of a lost race predominantly tied to human gods.

The cave itself as a setting seems somewhat out of place, I mean it is an interesting setting but it has no clear connection or significance to the events themselves.

…and Faolain & Caithe just waltz into the cave sealed by Forgotten and we had to go through this convoluted ritual of pseudo ascension underneath the priory.

Ogden also makes a point about the ritual not being repeatable (at least not with what the priory has).

I find that this bothers me now that I have had more time to sit down and think about the conclusion of Point of No Return.

Thanks for the tip, I’ll give it a try.

Documenting this here now that the next Nvidia driver is out. In case it stops happening which I hope it does. But since the driver Nvidia released on 23 of December 2014 (347.09) I have had GW2 completely randomly stop responding or crash, sometimes.

This seems to on occasion be preceded by seemingly normal operation of the client but with glitched audio (ie. no sound effects of any kind play, just stuck playing a background music track indefinitely) when the client is closed under these circumstances the process stops responding.

Alternatively, sometimes odd graphical artifacts can be seen on screen or the UI or other elements of the game may begin to flicker. When this happens the client is already in a non-responsive state, however, on occasion Alt-Tabbing to desktop may help to recover from this (assuming this can be done, which is not always the case).

There may be two separate issues with similar symptoms here, hard to say for certain, the problems with the audio as well as the non-responsive state with glitched visuals may in fact not be related at all but in either case these problems are recent.

In both cases the only way to regain normal operation of the PC is to terminate the process from task manager with twist. In this unresponsive state GW2 still prevents all mouse input from going through to anything on the desktop (even if nothing besides an iconized GW2 may be seen on task bar anymore) including an active Task Manager window (the cursor can be moved but it retains the in-game graphic). I used keyboard navigation to set the Task Manager window to be always on top and at that point it accepts mouse input again thus allowing the non-responsive process to be terminated.

I wish I could say there is a more discernible pattern to these issues, however, all I can say is that sometimes high player density and lot of skill effects can make it more likely but not in any way guaranteed.

OS: Win 8.1 64bit
GPU: Nvidia GeForce GTX 675MX

Conncept.7638:

FIX TO CONDITION DAMAGE IN GROUP CONTENT

Amen to this, having played hard condi spec recently, as a Mesmer (dunno if necromancers are better or worse as far as conditions go, but judging from their use or lack there of they might be even worse off), I can really feel the hurt.

I mean the idea of no kill stealing in open world PvE in GW2 becomes just a distant illusion when a Zerker comes along and kills something before your conditions have had a chance to do anything. And as for world bosses and champions/legendaries, while conditions have a chance to tick for most of them because they stay alive long enough the hard cap for stacks comes into play there, thankfully Mesmers have confusion that other professions have less access to so it helps a bit but it is not very effective in PvE compared to standard DoT conditions.

Also, doing Living story as hard condi build solo can be brutal, in a sense that it can take forever in comparison to other specs (especially coming from thief that can cheese some bits with stealth, the 7s mass invis with the trait just feels so lackluster in comparison and lacks creative use potential).

nGumball.1283:

I hate Ellen Kiel and I will be disappointed if such a ’’cool’’ character like E ends up being the old shallow Ellen.

Bit late with this, but Ellen or Evon being E is highly unlikely… unless we assume that the Evon/Ellen vote was entirely fixed. Which would be a shame, and unlikely to remain unconfirmed for this long if it was (as in a company as big as ANet it would have to be a conspiracy of the entire company, and such things have a tendency to come out over time and the enthusiasm about the vote would have been hard to fake convincingly).

The only way either of them would end up as E is if regardless of player choice the one chosen would end up as E, however, they are too different characters to make it easy to keep the story cohesive and planned ahead long term if there was such a potential variable. Likewise if one of them is slated for E regardless of whether they would end up in the council or not would be another variable that makes this setup unlikely as well for the very same reasons.

My personal favorite for E regardless all the above is Evon though, but I don’t think it likely just that based on his short story he would make a good E. That said I don’t think the letter necessarily has any link with the persons first name as it risks being too obvious. Or then it does and they are counting us to think it is too obvious but that hamster wheel of reasoning seems a bit over the top.

Chaialyna.1023:

I was under the impression we were supposed to learn the identity of “E” in Season 2. Did I just kitten and miss it?

Who is “E”??

I don’t think we are supposed to know or find out yet. The only official statements I recall about E are either very vague or basically boiled down to, “We know exactly who he is. We have known since the beginning”.

Jak.8627:

If we are getting an expansion, I do not expect new races or classes. I kinda want them to reserve this type of stuff for a campaign style expansion much the same as Factions and Nightfall were in GW “1”.

Assuming they will ever make a campaign style expansion for GW2. So far nothing points in either direction but seeing as they just recently updated the leveling progression of the entire existing game I find it hard to see a full campaign with GW1 style character restrictions on it happening and them having to build yet another basis for the game.

Not like GW1 style standalone campaigns would ever work in a persistent shared world anyways in my opinion, but hey maybe they can figure out a way to pull it off. We’ll see in a week I suppose.

bird.5920:

3) being able to sit on chairs

My memory might fail me but I believe someone from ANet addressed sitting on chairs ages ago, basically by saying that either they would need to specifically animate sitting for each unique type of chair and bench in the game (Charr might have also been mentioned) or have only one type of chair/sitting animation for chairs in game. Either way without tremendous work relative to just minor cosmetic benefit or making all sitting instruments uniform in the entire game it probably will never happen.

Sorry, like I said the search is hopeless… if it indeed was Felicia Day then all the more power to them I always liked her voice acting during the personal story. I just assumed they must have recast her because she sounded different for some lines, however, I guess that is understandable after having to get back into it after so long.

Probably been asked before, or covered somewhere but with the search so hopelessly broken I am not even going to try…

Who is voicing Zojja now and/or how was the dialogue for her put together as I could swear some of the lines sound very Felicia Day, but others not at all. The voice mostly fits the character though so really I am just curious about it.

Also what is the status of Zojja having her voice back going to be in the future (assuming she isn’t just dead because of Mordy, which seems unlikely at least immediately). I am really happy if this means you don’t have to keep figuring out ways to avoid Zojja’s direct involvement in the story, especially with her involvement with Taimi, which could spark some interesting exchanges.

Another thing that would be nice would be some new cultural skins, I know this is probably not going to happen though.

POLYMOCK

For one I main an asura, and two every time I wonder around in DR I hear the ambient stuff associated about some poor bookah loosing in polymock to an asura I weep a bit inside.

Also wouldn’t mind the other race specific activities that have been referred in the game ambient dialogue and by NPC’s since launch (the Charr one in particular could be interesting).

That said, there are probably ton more important things, but still why do norn get to be all special with their Keg Brawl and you even took Golem Chess away from us. C’mon, it didn’t have to be part of the new heart but not being able to play it at all is a huge shame.

Chrispy.5641:

No one can rightfully call it an endless gear treadmill/hamster wheel if the hamster wheel was removed from the cage way back in 2013. Your hamster’s been getting a little pudgy since then. Its time to put that wheel back in the cage and let the thing exercise a little.

I am not really worried either, but that is because I have three level 80’s mostly with the gear I want. However, despite your great analogy, invalidating the as of right now either very expensive or highly time gated ascended gear, without reworking their acquisition in some way doesn’t seem like a good idea.

Not necessarily because I wouldn’t be okay with it but because it goes against all the things the game was marketed with and the promises made when ascended gear was announced. There is no way new tiers of gear wouldn’t be seen a a net negative by a lot of the playerbase.

If they do increase the level cap I will certainly look forward to how they handle it but let’s just say I will likely stay away from community outlets for quite a while if they do.

The trailer in-game was a sound decision on ANet’s part, it is all about reaching the largest potential audience not eveyone reads the coverage gw2 gets (which isn’t typically mainstream) or follows gaming conventions.

Besides the trailer was beautifully done… what they do with the trailer after HoT is closer or the date on it has passed ie. it is no longer relevant it game is what might make it a negative but for now I think it was the right decision.

Tom Gore.4035:

…coughSCARletcough…

I count Scarlet as part of Mordremoths arc, because she was just setup for this that overstayed her welcome.

Brahmincorle.1264:

If it would have a new landmass to discover, reworked weapons skills (a.k.a at least 3 to choose from for each slot), new dungeons (the Molten Facility kind of dungeons) and new sPvP modes…. I would buy it.

Your weapon skills rework is unlikely, as nice as it sounds on paper three choices for each weapon means 10-15 new skills per weapon set depending on how you count existing skills and on weapon heavy classes or for elementalist this would quickly grow to an unmanageable number.

Personally I will take a game with less variety and better or at least easier to manage balance as well as reduced overlap on skills between professions (since professions should retain their unique aspects).

The last two I can see happening, assuming ANet hasn’t completely abandoned the concept of regular dungeons.

Tom Gore.4035:

Nick.6972:

Hopefully this is the last plant people story arc we’re getting, I doubt I’m the only one who’s rather tired of seeing sylvari in everything.

Well I would assume each dragon expansion (or whatever we call them) will be concentrating on a certain race/theme. Jormag is strongly tied with the Norn, Primordus with the Asura, and Kralkatorrik is currently harrassing the Charr most of all.

If I dare speculate after Mordy we should probably see either Kralk or Jormag, since Primordus deals with the Asura and the Tengu if memory serves. I wouldn’t mind a Charr focused story coming after this to be honest.

Let’s face it lot of the negativity about Sylvari related stories is due to Trahearne, but even then I wouldn’t call the personal story a sylvari story arch the only reason Trahearne is a sylvari in my eyes has to do with the convenient fact that he is/was immune to dragon corruption (and now we know why).

I like the idea of a third heavy armor proffession a great deal. I even think some kind of polar opposite to a Guardian would work well thematically. However, it is going to be hard to make such a class without stepping on the toes of existing professions.

When I think of something opposing a guardian my first instinct is a condi heavy class but we already have professions that lean towards condi specs and condi specs do get the short end of the stick because of condition caps and the fact that a traditional dps spec can mow down an enemy before your conditions have a chance to do their thing. Granted having them develop another condition heavy profession might result in them addressing one or both of these aspects in some manner.

As far as introducing new professions, in all honesty I have always been in the camp that this third heavy profession should arrive with the first new playable race.

perilisk.1874:

Awesome! Hopefully the logo and name implies that we can finally get some content that’s focused on the Sylvari.

Sarcasm, I hope… but honestly I don’t mind the Sylvari angle if they can execute it well and vary it up, there has been a lot of references to humans too in S2, some that could be of great significance.

DarkWasp.7291:

However, in it’s sister language called Negativity, Heart of Thorns means “More Trahearne” in English.

You are wrong, it is not more Trahearne, everything spells it to mean “More Necromancers with supernatural greatswords” So it won’t be the old cabbage but Marjory obviously that will take the role the player can not fill. The whole thing with Belinda screams setup for this. Rytlock will obviously also come back so maybe we’ll see these two butting heads or something.

To be honest Trahearne has sort of grown on me over the past year, it would be shame if he just died though at least let me kill him. But it is pretty sure Trahearne will not reprise his role in the same capacity as he did during personal story.

Nick.6972:

I’m actually quite disappointed, If this is indeed the “big background project” they’ve been working for two years.

I wouldn’t be, Colin accidentally blurted about the Jungle Dragon ages ago and Mordy gives them more creative freedom than any other known elder dragon bar “Bubble’s”. If anything it will show that they have always known where they are going with the franchise. Sure an entirely new continent would have been nice GW1 style but we are hardly done in Tyria yet.