Guild Wars 2

The suggestion is a generic lost-companion-animal statue, in an out of the way place (at least my contribution is to make it out of the way).

I would recommend against an inscription that subscribes to any particular faith, however. The statue itself would be enough, if it comprised a small grouping of animals using GW2 existing models such as drakehounds, cats, and birds (ravens?). Those who need it would know what it signifies and it would be more timeless without a particular plaque.

Devata, it’s clear you want open world as strongly as I want instanced. However, I can see you’re trying to find ways to fix the many problems that go with open world. To me, there’s so many hurdles to overcome with that and so many benefits to instancing that instancing simply outweighs open world. But if you can devise an open world system with all the benefits of instancing, I shall bow before you.

One thing concerns me with your proposed fixes so far: you’ve a couple of times mentioned losing the plot and having to find another one. This is a huge no-no to me. There is simply no way to make every open world plot exactly equal in desirability. There will be terrain preferences, views, convenient travel access, zone preferences, and so on. Guilds will take their location into part of their identity (especially role play guilds).

Do you have a solution that lets a plot be permanent once acquired, doesn’t make guild hall areas into cookie cutter subdivisions in isolated areas, and makes every site equally “cool” to guilds placing a hall?

I’d be for a general pet memorial. Much as I sorrow for Chris’ loss, I think previous forum discussions have come down against doing specific homages.

A statue in a peaceful section of woods with sunlight shining down on it would be lovely. People going through what Chris is could go there to be reminded that others understand their pain, and to just sit and meditate. Maybe make it an instance so only those you bring with you can be there (I hate to think of nude dancing aoe spammers mocking the mourners).

When you do the Personal Story and join an Order, you get to pick one of three sub races to investigate. Once you’ve done that and gotten that sub race to sign on with the Pact, they show up in your home instance. You can get fountain quaggans, lawn hyleks, or alley skritt in the Salma District.

Humans who join the circus get some street performers as well.

The page bug rears its ugly head!

Hmm, that will tie into the upgrade revamp you’ve posited for discussion. I don’t envy the balancing headaches involved in making sure that every size guild can get something deeply satisfying without feeling the big guilds are the only ones getting the “cool” stuff.

I’m not qualified to make substantive suggestions on upgrade rearrangement. I’m not a theorycrafter or game designer, and I’ve barely used the system as it is. From my narrow point of view on it, the only thing I can note is that bank vault size increases should be easily available to even the smallest guild. (I am a pack rat and the only guild I’ve made is a personal one for storage overflow). That’s sort of an across the board feeling for me in all games — the harder it is to get more storage space, the more frustrating the game becomes for me.

Moreover, it does seem likely that guild storage may be where undeployed customizations are kept. The more room there is to hold those, the more flexible the hall design becomes. Don’t like your tile pattern? Swap it out, but keep the old one available. Unless, of course, all the customizations are freely applicable unlocks that don’t need any physical space except while in use.

On scaling of costs:

How do we keep it fair given that guilds change size? As Conski asks, would this system encourage people to make a small guild, create a huge hall, then invite in all the other members waiting?

I don’t want to limit small guilds, but with scaling it might be vital to have a hall size limit based on membership, so when you get more people in, you can build more space but at the increased costs. (And then we worry about inactive members bloating costs just as afkers scale up events). Contrariwise, guilds that downscale should not have their large space demolished. Remember my adamant stance against decay, here!

Zoso.8279:

…instanced maps that are linked to WvW. …

Cutting your text for space, not because it’s a bad read.

My issue with this would be queues. If the only way to “walk up to” the GH entrance is via WvW, then either pure PvE’rs end up getting only a UI button click for entry, or everyone in the world tries to enter WvW just to get to the hall and suddenly the maps are clogged.

So it could be interesting for the WvW land claimers to have a bonus GH entry, with extendable permissions, but the same functionality needs to be available to those who don’t step into the borderlands.

Alethia.3597:

Donari.5237:

What resources are saved if all the data is still there? Are you assuming open world halls? With instancing, the data is there, but no instance is created unless a guild member goes to it. Thus there’s no need to “decay” the hall, your proposed function is seamlessly integrated already without anyone having to redeploy anything.

Think big on customisation until we are told otherwise. A guild could choose to invest in a three storey 40 room main hall with 6 outlying smaller buildings each with their own orientation, colour channels, decorations on all surfaces, lighting colour scheme (I love that idea for whomever brought that up several pages back). My guild might choose to invest in 50 trees, half of which are altered to have purple leaves and 200 floating rocks to make jumping puzzles between the bank and the repair NPC.
Instead of having to store the individual placement and orientation of everything those 200 rocks could revert to being the equivalent of 200 crafting material in a bank tab for the servers. Same with all the items and rooms added on.

I see, that does make more sense. I think we’d need the devs to tell us how much space saving that would actually accomplish, and how important it is to save it. For instance my SSD holds far less than my regular HD, so I’m not installing a 30 Gig game on it I don’t intend to play a lot — but 30 Gig is a drop in the bucket on the regular HD so it really doesn’t matter if I toss a lot of games on it I may never play.

Would it in fact reduce server load to “stack” unused guild halls while maintaining full information on the contents and ownership, or would that be an additional operation/data list that counterbalances any savings? Would it be safe enough that no guild halls get accidentally “eaten,” as it were? Keep in mind that if someone’s gone long enough to count as inactive, it may be far past any restoration point by the time they notice their stuff is gone if the stacking goes wrong.

But if tons of deployed guild asset info causes loss in game performance, yes, this is a form of decay I could support. So long as all that is lost is the time it takes to set up the hall structure — no prized location gone, no upgrades undone, etc, then I can see the value in compacting data that isn’t in use.

This supposes that setting up the structure will be easy and fluid, rather than a cuss-fest as items stubbornly refuse to move just one pixel and cracks are left at wall seams or other alignment issues rear their ugly heads. The harder it is to do in the first place, the more annoying to have it undone.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Hi All,

I was going to jump in today but this morning I took our Golden Retriever to the vets this morning and he had to be put down.

We are all very upset and i need to spend time with my family. Hopefully this will be the end o the issues we are facing and I will be able to give you my full attention.

Sorry,

Chris

Oh, no, I am so very sorry It’s the curse of having loved family members who happen to be furry and short-lived. I remember every pet I’ve lost in my 5 decades, and how they went.

Please take all the grieving time you need. I don’t know if you’re the hugging type (I’m not, RL), but internet hugs are their own special thing, so

/HUG

This sounds fun! I’m assuming EU, though, given your time choice?

Alethia.3597:

Proposal Overview
Guild hall decay
Goal of Proposal
Save some resources culling unused halls.
Proposal Functionality
Have guild halls revert to the basic starter form when a guild is inactive.
Guilds don’t deserve to lose what they have worked for, so all upgrades and built items essentially go into a guild wardrobe so the items and NPCs could be redeployed if the guild meets activity criteria again.
Associated Risks
Getting the timing or criteria wrong for active and alienating guilds putting away all their toys.

What resources are saved if all the data is still there? Are you assuming open world halls? With instancing, the data is there, but no instance is created unless a guild member goes to it. Thus there’s no need to “decay” the hall, your proposed function is seamlessly integrated already without anyone having to redeploy anything.

That’s marvelous! I’m sharing it with all my GW2 friends.

As I understand it, it’s mini pet battles.

As I understand it yes, if one key press accomplishes more than one action. So if you push to move forward and both characters move, that’s bannable. If you swap controls between them, it’s not?

I am surprised by this. I really thought the Volunteer option was there for maps low on people, not simply as a timer. Hopefully they can fix it to work that way; there’s no reason to ask a full map to move on.

You need to use Google, not the broken in-forum search feature

Yes, there have been a number of recent posts about this, especially in the Black Lion subforum. ANet will not help with private trades that turn into scams; the TP is there to smooth out a lot of the hazards of private trading, and to act as a needed gold sink to prevent massive economic issues.

I believe John Smith has been quoted in some of those threads. You are unlikely to get a repeat dev comment.

That said, yes, you can trade privately. You just have to trust the other person to deliver their side of the deal.

While getting a lot of discussion going now is grand, it appears from Chris’ comment above that there will be a CDI on Guild Raids once the current Guild Halls one wraps up. So maybe in a week or two? Be prepared to repeat yourselves in that thread, preferably in the proposal format that’s been used in QoL/Logistics and Guild Halls. That will be the best place to make sure your ideas are heard.

For what it’s worth, I’m pretty sure I’ll have some ideas and comments to make myself once the focused discussion is going. I do love large-scale teamwork at times.

As a CE buyer I have no issue with later upgrades getting the things they have gotten. Not only did I get some cool stuff, I got a whole lot more game time and the chance to see the world when it was new. I did have some buyer’s remorse, as I didn’t really care for the physical stuff in the CE beyond the nice artwork in a frame. I don’t collect statues, and managed finally to mail my Rytlock statue to a friend to get it out of my computer room. The item that really swung me to getting the physical box was the promised sound track — and that turned out to be maybe 5 minutes of sample music, not the full 4 cd set I ended up buying separately before Soule’s company proved complete crap for those attempting purchase.

That doesn’t mean I’d never fret about later incentives. ArcheAge founders have very legitimate complaints about much better starter packages getting offered at launch when they were selling founder packs up to a couple of days before. ANet didn’t do that. They gave us tons of game time post launch, items that every alt gets forever (not just the first 6 created), and access to everything in the new upgrade version as we piecemeal desired it.

Part Two
How could we get the benefits of instanced guild halls in a system of open world guild halls?
Permissions. Set up layers of permission to enter and/or alter various parts of the hall. So the public can come see at least parts of it but the guild retains control of the space. There could even be a block feature so if someone is a jerk spamming particle effects on guild meetings or spewing filthy comments and emotes, s/he can be summarily blocked from entering the property. (It should be made impossible to set up a chain of guild properties that block anyone from crossing it).

Locations. Restrict what parts of the open world can support guild halls. Use the Mists, or a new zone, or unused edges of zones. That leaves the devs the option of changing the world. It does raise the specter of housing tracts, or the feeling of isolation where sure, your guild is in the world, but no one will just happen on it; traveling to see it will be a deliberate and perhaps tedious venture not integrated into game play.

Map Spawns. When someone travels to a zone, they get put in a map containing the hall of the guild they are repping. They do not get the empty-map-closing feature, they can stay there as long as they like, at least while within the guild hall property lines. The guild hall won’t appear if no members are in the map, so abandoned halls won’t be a thing. (Problems: 500 people won’t fit in a map – this may be a problem in instanced halls as well. Lots of maps will have to spawn and persist, perhaps more than the servers can handle. It will be harder for people to randomly spot your hall, especially if they are in a guild that appears in a different version of the map).

How could we get the benefits of open world guild halls in a system where guild halls are instanced?
Keep utilities in the open world. While guild specific things can be in the hall (e.g. setting up for guild missions, GvG, upgrade stations, all the things folks have been discussing), crafting, banking, and mystic forging are so easy to get to in cities that there’s no reason to set up private areas for those.

Many access points in the world. Similar to LotRO’s neighborhoods, have places one can go to reach guild instances. Interact with an object or NPC to “flip” through various guild facades. If you see one that looks cool, enter it (assuming permissions are set to allow that) to look around further. Perhaps have an area (a field of flags? A wall with banners?) where you can click on guild banners to see what they’ve done hall-wise. Guilds seeking visitors could have it set so their banner glows.

Map benefits based on what guilds are there. A guild could select its entry point to be in, perhaps, Brisban. Then, akin to WvW benefits, the achievements of that guild could provide (small) benefits to everyone in the map, or boon stations people could go to and see that a specific guild has provided it – if there are a ton of boon stations it would be just like a ton of guild banners, you can only get the boon once and clicking on more does nothing.

Part One
I’ve held off on the instanced/non-instanced question as I feel I’ve already pretty strongly made my case against open world halls and decay, based on my direct experience of the pain these things have caused in many other games. However, I think I may have something new to add for both sides, so here goes. I believe my bias will show, mind you.

What do people see as the benefits of instanced?
Flexibility. Both for players, allowing a much wider variety of customization, and for devs who might want to rearrange landscape. It would have been a headache to drop the Tower in Kessex if you were going to smash three guild halls in the process. The more open-world spots claimed by players, the less those spots can be changed by living content. Entry points can be set up pretty much anywhere in the world, possibly moveable as the guild desires (I do think there should be some feeling of approaching the GH to enter it, rather than only reaching it by UI button clicking).

Access. Instancing allows every guild access to the hall building content, whereas there simply is not enough open world space for that, especially with megaservers meaning that millions of players are in the mix. We avoid land grabs, flame wars, incentive to cheat, disillusion with the game, and everything else that goes hand in hand with restricting desired content to a subset of the player base.

Persistence. Instanced halls can remain for as long as the guild exists. Breaks from the game don’t destroy invested time.

Privacy. Guilds can have meetings and events free of random trolls and griefers.

What do you see as the benefits of open world guild halls?
Visibility. Guilds can share their creativity without having to specifically invite visitors. They can show off their success and size.

Investment in the world. It would increase the sandbox side of things if guilds could affect the environment. There might be more life to the landscape if wandering it one could come upon a structure that wasn’t there before, or see the hall growing.

Population. The world remains full of people, and guilds can join map chat while in their hall.

Proposal Overview
Protect the GH from accidental loss.

Goal of Proposal
To preserve the GH in the event of leadership changes or mistaken disbandings.

Proposal Functionality
This is similar to my post in QoL https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/CDI-Guilds-Logistics-and-QOL/page/3#post4397009 — I am piggybacking on that.

Similar warnings should pop up if a guild leader is departing. Also, and this may be pie in the sky, the data on a guild should be preserved for, say, anywhere from 1 week to 1 month after disbanding. Reinstatement should be possible. This would give CS the tools to aid players who are victims of hackers or rage quitters.

A GH belongs to the whole guild, not just the GM. Naturally the GM has ultimate control over it. However, if guild members sink hundreds of hours into building something collaboratively, and especially if they have personal space inside the GH, they need some protection against one person’s malice or mishap stripping it all away. So long as the guild remains active, its earned and built upgrades should remain available. If the GM leaves, someone else (preferably from the next rank level) should receive control, and that someone should be one that’s repped the guild recently and thus is likely actively playing and paying attention.

Associated Risks
Data bloat, extra work for CS, issues with proving accident, takes away from the policy of not interfering in guild control. Requires systems not currently in place, as seen in the recent thread about a guild deleted thanks to its name.

JonPeters.5630:

MajorValtiel.6310:

Would also be nice if, within the Guild Halls, players could buy private chambers for themselves. No need to add a physical space for them in the guild hall either, a door titled Private Chambers would lead players to their own Private Chamber Instance. They could also invite maybe a miax 8-10 players to their own PC instances.

What would you want to be able to do in there?

Or perhaps what happens in private chambers stays in private chambers?

I’d want to do the same things I’d want to do with player housing. Customize, make a place my character could call home, and show it off to friends. Though I’d prefer true player housing as an option on top of guild halls, and to let every alt have their own place. My rich old-money nobleman is simply going to have nicer digs than my street rat fighter who hates charity and has terrible claustrophobia …

A personalized space within the guild gives a player a feeling of some control, and allows compartmentalization if you need to reduce chat spam or have separate simultaneous scenes. I do think in terms of RP, that being my main pursuit in most any game. In my guild’s pretend-airship, guild members each have their own cabin with a personalized door and individual keepsakes inside. This works as we are not a huge guild; I’m not sure how a 500-member guild would incorporate individual spaces without being a small village or airfleet.

Hamfast, my purchasing also took a nose dive after the town clothes change. But I have enough alts that each outfit will sorta work with at least one of them. Also, I have an ex-Seraph grunt who makes a living of sorts by taking on bodyguard jobs for people that aren’t actually in any danger but want to impress their friends by having a studly pile of muscle watching over them. They all have odd ideas on how he should dress for the job …

Thus each new outfit becomes a new gig for my lazy selfish Guardian and spurs some smidgen of RP. It sure would be nice to be able to swiftly toggle them, though, so I can do OOC PVE more conveniently sans Outfit.

(Also, I am pleased that dye patterns now persist on the Outfits, less pleased that it’s a global dye choice for all Outfits. I still have to keep out-of-game notes on which outfit uses which dyes for each alt, and changing them takes forever since dyes won’t alphabetize in the hero panel so I have to hunt down the specific hues every time).

Ahhh … you are looking in the bank collectibles that vanish when emptied. I was looking in the hero panel.

When I go to look in the bank, the only mini slots visible are those with minis not yet withdrawn. Withdrawing a few to add to my wardrobe, then going back in the bank, there are still no empty slots. I think you are bugged.

Well, next time you’re in game would you find it and then post where in the list it is? I admit I didn’t preview the ones I have at the top of the list, and if it’s snuck in there somehow rather than being sorted with all the locked ones at the bottom then I would have missed it.

Are you sure there is a preview slot? I just went through every mini I don’t have (and that’s a lot, as I have not been actively collecting), and didn’t see it.

I am on the “no-mounts” side in GW2. It’s just not part of the game design, for all the reasons stated in all the threads that mushroom up on the topic.

That said, I do hope that any new game in the future does use a lot of the AA model. Freely available via an easy low level quest, excellent animations (I’m looking at you, WoW, with your humanoid front legs on horses and wings that flap backwards from the proper direction), persistent presence so you can dismount and still have the mount, some interesting mount-specific abilities to use while riding, a real sense of speed (I’m looking at you, TESO, with your running speed horses that have to be fed daily to get to any sort of sense of motion) … much as I dislike most of AA’s concepts, I feel they got mounts more right than any other MMO I’ve played. If, IF GW2 were to cave in and put in mounts, I’d want them to take all the fun parts of the AA design.

I like the underwater parts of Tyria. Then again, I loved Vash’jyr enough to have it be IC canon that my shy stammering priest belf become self assured and free when down there … it was like flying. It’s even better in GW2 thanks to the no-breath-meter-anywhere. I’d say my only real complaint with the underwater stuff here came towards the beginning when underwater mobs had that annoying tendency to almost kill you, you’d almost kill them, then they’d go invulnerable, run off and heal, then come back to finish you off. Hax!

To a lesser extent it bothers me how uneven the professions are. Engineer feels sloppy, Necro has to melee even with a trident, but Mesmer, ah Mesmer! I actively sought out underwater dailies to do on Mesmer! Still, I think ANet’s done underwater more right than any other underwater I’ve tried, and I wish it weren’t getting so downplayed now.

Tenrai Senshi.2017:

I honestly couldn’t be bothered about Radiant and Hellfire armor. They’re rather generic and cannot be dyed, so in many ways, they’re worse off than many of the far easier to acquire armor sets out there.

While there are imo better looking armors indeed, I will point out that if you preview the Radiant chest and legs from the Wardrobe (or maybe from Dulfy links? I forget where I got the preview), there are dye channels and parts of them can, in fact, be dyed. I’m not sure if Hellfire can, how do you dye a churning field of fire?

Losing your plot/place would be huge. A guild starts to identify with a location, maybe enjoys who it has for neighbors and boom! Sorry, you have to relocate IF you can find space (which, if it’s open world, you won’t after the initial landrush and griefing and flames that go with it — I have seen this is every game I’ve played with open world land ownership).

I continue to adamantly oppose decay of any sort in guild halls or player housing. Nothing can sour one on a game quite like having one’s goodies taken away just because one chose not to play a while. Consequently I equally strongly oppose open world real estate plots. Even in the Mists, if you want every guild to have an island you’ll have an urban sprawl of islands as far as the eye can see. Or airships jostling cheek by jowl to blot out the sun. Or a continent-sized subdivision. It simply won’t work.

DragonWhimsy.6489:

And even then it’s really only the guild officers that will get to customize it.

I wanted to jump on this one sentence (though the whole post has excellent points). YES. This is a problem I noted in my early post containing the highlights of my interests and concerns. If only the guild leader can fiddle with the GH, and worse if only the guild leader can even see the options (as with guild symbol design), then a whole lot of players will lose out on the fun of design.

Understandably there needs to be some control, so not just any fresh recruit can trash the place or steal the furniture. But every single player needs to at least be able to play with the design. Perhaps the guild can set permissions as to how permanently they can do so? So only those with permissions can actually rearrange it, but anyone in the guild can use the interface and see possible alterations. Maybe even take a “snapshot” to submit to the GM so better ideas can be used without leaving all the creativity only to the GM.

In the grand old days of town clothes we could assign a hot key to toggle between armor and town clothes (it was down in Miscellaneous key binds).

Why not give us such a thing for armor/outfit swapping? It takes a lot of mouse clicks and tab selection right now to perform that action.

And while we’re at it … I’d love to be able to hotkey toggle my helm, shoulders, and gloves. I have plenty of key real estate over on my num pad just waiting for such assignments.

That’s fantastic, where did you see it and are there any item links to look at in game?

I was pleased to see that it has too few dots. Not that anyone’s ever peering over my shoulder at home as I log in, but for those in less private play areas why clue anyone in as to exactly how many characters are in the password?

These would all be very nice things to have. As to chairs, apparently it’s technically not feasible in this game design (hence there have over the years been suggestions of a /sitchair emote or a chair bundle that creates a chair to sit in instead of trying to interact with those in the environment).

Adding more rooms behind false doors seems well within the realm of possibility, however.

I continue to disagree with the need for upkeep. It essentially forces people to play (and in the above suggestion, to play repping a specific guild) or lose progress made while playing.

The 100% rep guilds are heavy handed enough now, imagine if keeping the GH depended on players repping.

You can check Dulfy to see it on males. The key difference is a barer chest with piercings holding up straps, and far more severely bent legs that really look like satyr limbs. Though I can see how they might be considered still normal legs, just with a really long foot stuck on — I’ve seen costumers make that effect to walk around cons, it’s like wearing heels without the heel spike.

Anyway, the male version without the hooves would look really strange.

I agree, Torsair. Even my smallish guild has members devoted to various aspects of the game. The ability to modularly include all modes with entering each remaining a matter of individual choice would vastly improve the general benefit and flexibility of the system.

Speaking of systems, how many different new systems are we asking to dovetail under the GH umbrella? Obviously it would be wonderful to have a seamlessly integrated mix all hanging off the GH spine, but I can see associated risks in cross-complexity. This doesn’t mean we shouldn’t ask for the sun, moon, and stars right now, but perhaps we should be looking at a means of expansion. Like adding new rings to an orrery, one needs the support post to start.

So what base mechanisms or systems do we need that can get more added without needing to redesign the base later?

Baltzenger, thanks for that cogent summary. It really sums up the ideas in 7 pages thus far in a concise and objective manner.

Yes, you have more than the base colors available. Even if a new piece of gear uses your initial choices, it’s the work of moments to open your dyes tab and select new colors to suit your current taste.

Don’t even worry about your base set choices. They’re irrelevant given the flexible and free dye system (though you will have to pay for new colors beyond the starter set, via the TP or gem store dye packs or getting Chef up to a level to make dyes). Any dye you learn will be available to all your alts on the account forever.

Oh, I wouldn’t want a forced cinematic. The Grove one has the option of canceling it, though you do get your alt jittering in place with an overhead film reel for a moment when you do so.

I know they can’t show us the current map from above, at least not from angles not designed in such as from mountain tops. There are all sorts of visual sleight-of-hands and false facades (this is why flying just won’t work, any more than it could in pre-Cataclysm Azeroth). Hence I like the idea of a separate map visible from above, that uses the same terrain but at a distance such as to obscure detail and doesn’t show the current player actions below.

Of course a lot of what happens in a guild airship will be inside the decks, anyway. The view is just a bit of polish on the concept. Though having zone-appropriate birds and such fly the portholes and windows would rock.

/sings "Birds fly … over my airship … why ooooh why can’t I…?

A side thought on that, Devata. Boarding/disembarking: what if we got a short cinematic of something carrying us? Be it a dandelion fluff elevator as in the Grove, or a charr ‘copter, or a parachute, whatever. Just something other than pressing a button and getting waypointed. Heck, there could be a few customizations a’la finishers to let guilds or even individuals select their board/debark method.

The way I’m looking at it, this CDI is for brainstorming. It may transpire that some of the ideas are too grandiose or infeasible but that doesn’t mean they shouldn’t be discussed. Even if an idea is too much to implement, it may spark creativity on a smaller scale or inspire a spin-off concept that turns out to be wonderful.

Generally the devs running the thread come back after the initial brainstorms have died down and ask for more focused discussion on certain points. We’re not far enough in yet for that phase, imo.

I have said this before, but if we go the airships route, I totally want to be able to use guild colors to paint them. For reasons*

• reasons being that our guild RPs having an airship, the Motley, painted in our purple and green colors. It would rock to really have such a thing in game. One of my guildies did art of it, even! But I won’t post it here without her permission.

I mentioned this in my highlights towards the beginning but this is the single most important factor to me in guild halls or personal housing. The one thing that has ruined housing for me in DaoC, LotRO, and now ArcheAge.

Proposal Overview Do not allow guild halls to decay.

Goal of Proposal People should be able to step away from the game as long as they wish and return to find everything they owned still there (barring the rare change in or deletion of items due to balance or other issues, e.g. the Flamekissed set).

Proposal Functionality Just leave out rents, taxes, mortgages, tokens that must be regularly deposited, etc. Do not delete or downsize a hall until the guild is disbanded or the guild actively chooses to alter their hall. Side-effect: Do not have limited open world sites for halls that people must fight over. Do not implement attackable options (unless, perhaps, there is consensual GvG and those participating sign on knowing they could lose their stuff). If the guild is removing the hall because they want a different architectural theme, provide an easy way to save the decorations and utilities for reinstallation in the new hall.

Associated Risks Possible accumulation of too much data to store as guild after guild makes halls over the years.

I’ve been pleased at the uptick as well! I do wish we had some more concrete comments on what’s actually coming. Not nitty gritty details, but more like “at some point we’ll have a third heavy profession” or “we do intend to open up a zone the size of Frostgorge.” And then if worst comes to worst and the coding just won’t work or whatever, you can say “We’re really sorry, but you remember how we talked about a third heavy profession? This weird thing came up that made it unplayable as designed, we have to start over when we have time.”

To those claiming toxic forums, well. There’s a lot of unrest, there are occasionally mildly offensive comments. But take a quick scan through the ArcheAge forums to see true toxicity (and even those pale compared to the forums on Dark and Light, an MMO that failed years ago not long after launch, but hoo boy was I shocked by the forum posts). We don’t have rabid racist cussing, death threats to devs, the forum equivalent of tea-bagging, or raging flame wars.

I freaking love the ANet forums.

As to how to tell, just mouse over the item in the crafting window. Not the recipe list to the left, the actual icon of the finished item in the right. You’ll see the stats, including the infusion slots. It works that way for any crafted item. You can even link the finished item in chat without making it first (useful for RP’d picnics, I must say).

For those complaining it would be unfair to move the armor pieces to earlier AP tallies because those with higher AP would have missed their chance at them, there’s no reason they couldn’t be retroactively awarded.

I’m another who’s been playing actively since headstart with few breaks and with a lot of dailies, monthlies, and LS achieves gained (no WvW or sPvP though) and I’m just past 12K. I sort of burned out on the game after the town clothes fiasco, and haven’t tried real hard at the Dry Top achieves (lack of a meta-achieve reward contributed to that), or I’d likely be around 13K.

I’ve been gung ho for this game from the Alpha days, and hope to have that rekindled when the “big things in the wings” come to light. But even I have lost the oomph for regular AP gathering; I doubt I’ll see 18K any time soon, let alone 36K. Imo the skins are just priced out of reach for far too great a proportion of the player base. Sure there should be some rewards for years of play; the birthday gifts can cover that (putting aside the general opinion on the quality of the gifts).

Proposal Overview Aesthetics Control

Goal of Proposal To allow guilds to make a space that reflects their guild themes and looks like a real space, not just an industrial line-up of items.

Functionality I repeat the need for instancing. Those asking for open-world halls may not realize just how many guilds there are in the world. Tyria doesn’t need to become Coruscant or Trantor. Instances also allow for more pleasing building/village layouts than the crowded subdivision grids we’re seeing in, for example, ArcheAge. Mists islands might be a viable means of keeping halls somewhat visible to immediate neighbors. For those wanting random passersby to enjoy the hall exteriors, look to the LotRO model where you can hop into any neighborhood instance you want (though it’s really just picking randomly from a list of number codes, maybe we can do better here) and wander around, but only enter those buildings set to allow public entry. You won’t get random players who aren’t trying to see the halls, but then the random players won’t get urban sprawl in their lovely green (or white or brown) Tyria.

There should be modular building design and floor plans, with exteriors and interiors highly customizable. Tyrian buildings have a lot of detail inside them, let us have that in our guild halls as well. With enough flexibility, some guilds will just have the bare functionality; others will make spaces worth inhabiting. Lecture halls, sparring arenas (for those interested in such), dormitories, common rooms, all with a variety of furnishings, floor/wall patterns, paintings, colors/textures, etc. If we have airship halls, there should be appropriate engine rooms, rigging to climb, smuggler’s compartments, etc.

Associated Risks Those who see no point to a guild hall beyond an ultra convenient crafting center will complain about wasted resources. And, yes, it will take a hunk of development resources to give us a truly robust finely customizable place to call home. (On the other hand the same tools can then be used for personal housing — long ago someone suggested a portable door you can slap on any surface in the world you want that then opens an instance of your personal home, letting you have a DR apartment or a Grove pod or a CM manor, accessed from a logical point, without cluttering the world).