Guild Wars 2

Known timeline:
4 or so weeks till PAX East for playable demo.
March 12-14 at Rezzed, another playable demo. (6-7 weeks from now).
Beta testing soon after (approximately 2-3 weeks, realistically. Less if I’m being optimistic).
I’m expecting around 2+ months of beta testing, which would put the release around August to September this year, at the earliest.

Expansion launching on GW2’s third anniversary would be nice.

Grimwolf.7163:

Like 2.5 years ago? I’ve seen statistics that say otherwise. The large majority of people have been on 64-bit for some time now.
I think right now the percent of people on 32-bit is in the single digits.
They were Steam surveys, I’m trying to find them.

The game launched 2.5 years ago, but was in development since 2007. Around that time, they probably wanted to target Windows XP users, but the problem was, a lot can change in 5 years.

Dawdler.8521:

Lucky.9421:

When they started programming for GW2, it was no later than 2007, possibly earlier.
64 bit systems were pretty uncommon at the time.

Fun fact:

32 bit processors for the PC was basicly obsolete in 2004, none where being made anymore. Just about every processor since has been 64 bit.

The only ones that has been holding back 64 bit and crippling PC memory allocation is Microsoft with their refusal to scrap the 32 bit/64 bit division of Windows. If Windows installed itself as 64 bit on a 64 bit CPU and 32 bit on a 32 bit CPU… No one would have 32 bit.

The CPU probably supported 64-bit, but operating systems were still 32-bit for people who bought prebuilt computers (most did at the time, and still do now). The only ones who probably used 64-bit OS’s were people who custom built computers (which was more expensive at the time). I bought one of the first available quad core CPUs for desktops, and that came with a 32-bit OS.

They already do. The Durmand Priory, for instance, names Sylvari PCs in one book, but there are books in there that name the other racial PCs too. Destiny’s Edge characters also respond differently if your race is different. I think Taimi went as far as to change dialogue based on class/race.

These things are subtle though. It’s easy to miss them if you don’t go through everything.

As for the focus on Sylvari, Colin said in an interview, and it’s the same argument I’ve been using too, that because the Sylvari is such a young race, not many (if any) games have the opportunity to explore the history behind such a race. Mordremoth is the Sylvari’s main story. After that, there are other Elder Dragons and races that they can focus on.

lordkrall.7241:

Oh, so getting lower than 60 FPS = crippled computer?
Heck I don’t even see a difference between 30 FPS and 60 FPS.

It’s the latest PCMasterrace BS – people consider anything below 60FPS to be dirt. While there is a clear difference between 30 and 60, the only real benefit of 60 is frame drops are less noticeable, while at 30, even a drop of 2-5FPS is noticeably laggy. If you were to have a fully locked, 30FPS, with no frame drops, it won’t be noticeable.

What people are actually saying, without really saying it: 30-40 FPS is playable, but I want 60FPS because reasons (I had different wording for this, but decided to tone it down). It’s the same thing with resolution (minimum 1080p, some are even going as far as to claim the minimum is 1440p for a “good” computer).

The main reason for the low performance on high end systems: DirectX 9. ArenaNet is targeting ultra-low end systems without really considering high end system capabilities. When they started developing GW2, that was a valid reason. Now though, DX10/11 compatible PCs are the vast majority. I’d actually like to see them do a proper hardware survey now, similar to the one they did before the BWEs.

Ardenwolfe.8590:

I’m more curious if we can beta test it anytime soon.

ArenaNet will be at PAX East and Rezzed, which will both have playable demos. Rezzed is from March 12-14th, and the beta is supposed to follow soon after that. Depending on how long the beta testing takes, I’d wager a launch somewhere in August/September, maybe to coincide with the anniversary of GW2. Maybe sooner. April 28th would be more poetic, but it all depends on when the beta starts/ends.

Beta testing will start soon after PAX East and Rezzed (mid March), so I’d imagine we’ll see the WvW maps then. End of March to early April is my guess.

Best we have so far. The Golden Cave was also played during the pre-show.

LanfearShadowflame.3189:

Chewablesleeptablet.3185:

Anet’s reason for not adding a new race seemed like they were either lazy or did not have the time or money.

Or maybe it didn’t fit with the current story line?

Maybe they just feel that 5 is enough for now, or maybe we’ll never have another one. They’ve never said they would give us a new playable race, only that if they did, there is a select number of races they would pull from.

Agreed. Adding a new race would mean figuring out how to involve them in the Zhaitan personal story and Living story after that. Season 2 of Living story brought five races together in the fight against Mordremoth, so working a 6th race into that would be a problem. If they had wanted to introduce a new race, that race would have require some involvement (as a primary character, not a secondary one, like the Largos) in the personal story after level 30 to be able to introduce playable characters of the same race later on.

The alternative is to have the new race’s personal story begin with the current large story. So, if they had introduced Tengu with Heart of Thorns, they would need 2 chapters to cover the racial storyline, then have the new race join the Orders, and have a story leading up to the Maguuma jungle where they’ll join the other races to fight Mordremoth. It may even require completely different story missions, which all of the existing races would need to go through, to make it happen.

Either way, it would require a lot of resources. Would make more sense to focus on the existing races and continue their storyline without adding a new race into the mix.

runeblade.7514:

Rashy.4165:

7 Traits for one build. ArenaNet has said that they want to allow for free experimentation of builds. You can’t do that with 7 traits. Free experimentation means having all 65 traits, and no, experimenting in PvP does not count for PvE. Some professions only have one meta build, but others have many different depending on the situation. 7 Traits will not let you switch freely between these different situations/playstyles.

PvP doesn’t count because…?

In the past, I can’t freely experiment because my master, and grandmaster traits are locked. PvP is the best way to experiment either way.

Skills and traits are balanced differently in PvP. As soon as you go into the lobby, you’re using the PvP variants, and your PvE skills/traits don’t matter as much. Since the balancing is different, it will play differently in PvE. You could use the exact same builds in both PvP and PvE and “experiment” on the target golems, but it’ll still be different.

Even if you don’t have your XIII Traits, you can still experiment with the remaining 60, if you were grandfathered in. However, if you create a character after the April feature pack, you’re screwed as you’ll have no traits to unlock.

In the past, you had all of your trait tiers unlocked by level 60. All you really needed was the remaining 20 trait points to allocate, and you had all of your traits. Now, at level 80, you’d be lucky to have 4-5 traits unlocked through normal gameplay, even if you had all of the necessary trait points.

Boob sliders.

On a more serious note, I would like for some limited body customization over the default body types. Not over-the-top Aion customization.

I’m personally super excited for Heart of Thorns, and will almost* always have faith in ArenaNet.

*Minor reasons, really. Not something I’d whine about endlessly on the forums.

Particularly looking forward to the feedback and details from the playable demos. Those will give us a real sense of what’s coming.

Celestial would probably benefit it, but I wouldn’t place Revenant as a purely melee class. Some of its abilities showcased in the trailer were distinctly medium to long range.

Nihilus.3015:

“the biggest playable space we’ve made” that’s the most revealing line and what made me believe its only 1. Even though it has layers, it’s still only 1

“Playable space” is vague. The current map we have is ALL playable space, for perspective.
The Maguuma wastes, where this content will most likely take place, is pretty big already, and with three layers, and the possibility to expand further west, it will be a large playable area.

Besides, you’re focusing too much on the “one” by comparing it to existing zones. If the “one” map was one massive zone the size of Kryta with 3 layers? Perfectly fine due to the sheer size of it. I doubt that’ll be the case though, due to megaservers and number of players per shard.

Thief – Ninja – Sword OH.

MokahTGS.7850:

He says map. Not maps.

He doesn’t say zone, area, region, biome or anything else. He says Map.

Take that as you will of course.

“Map” can singularly refer to the entire world map of Tyria. What you’re calling a “map” is actually called a “zone” in the game. A “region” consists of many of these “maps”.

Either way, it’s a word used in an interview. Perhaps he chose the wrong word in the moment, and could be referring to the entire Maguuma jungle as “map”. The Maguuma jungle is quite a large portion of the world map, and it would be ridiculous to assume that it’s just “one” map.

Wanze.8410:

As far as I know, this only applies to the new precursors for the new legendaries, they didnt state, if the new precursors are also obtainable through forging and rng drops like the old ones, and if the old precursors will be obtainable through collections.
If thats not the case, I dont see how it will have much influence on existing pres and leggies.

So you’re saying current precursors will still have only RNG, while only the new precursors will be the only ones part of the collections? How is that in any way fair? People who want the old precursors will have no way of getting it in a guaranteed way without relying on RNG or paying for someone else’s luck.

The more logical and fair approach would be to combine both new and old precursors: all of them can be obtained through the Mastery system and all of them could be obtained through RNG. For people who don’t want to rely on RNG, or farming gold to pay for someone else’s luck, the Mastery system would be a guaranteed, albeit lengthy, alternative.

The personal story isn’t dependent on Class, only on Race (first 2 chapters), and your chosen Order (remaining chapters where members of different Orders get different missions). Adding a new class won’t break continuity too much, as players aren’t referred to as their individual classes. The only trick is introducing Revenants in a logical way.

Seeing as the Mists are described as “constituting the fabric of time and space”, it’s possible that some form of Time travel is involved allowing Rytlock to go back in time to before Zhaitan’s defeat and introduce the Revenant class, then go back into the future (current time) to continue the fight against Mordremoth. That’s assuming Rytlock IS the first Revenant. It’s possible he was introduced to the class through an unknown Master within the Mists, who was then able to go back into the real world and teach the ways of the Revenant to new characters, while Rytlock appears in the Maguuma jungle.

By comparison, adding a new race would be a lot more complicated. It certainly wouldn’t be able to get an involvement in defeating Zhaitan or the leadup to defeating Mordremoth, since LS Season 2 forms an alliance between 5 races, and no more. A new race would have its personal story start with whichever expansion that introduced it (while current players would also experience that story as a continuation of their past story) – their involvement would start with that and continue from that point forward, in order to maintain continuity.

Zanthrax.6538:

I never understood the QQ about this, they went from a system where you buy your traits….to a system where you can buy OR unlock your traits and people are complaining? I don’t understand….just unlock them with ingame gold if you don’t like PvE. JUST as it was before.

To buy the traits previously costed about 3-5g tops. You purchased an entire Tier of traits at a time. Purchase the tier, have access to all traits freely. Refunding traits costed money, but it wasn’t really all that bad.

To buy the traits now requires a total of 43g AND 360 Skill points. By the time you’re level 80 playing normally, you’ll have maybe 200 skill points depending on how many challenges you did, and anywhere between 20-40g from drops. Problem is, you’ll be using skill points to unlock skills before purchasing traits. Playing normally to level 80 won’t give you many unlocked traits, due to the arbitrary nature of the unlock requirements.

The best part? You have to repeat the whole process on EVERY SINGLE CHARACTER YOU CREATE.

That’s the problem.

runeblade.7514:

All you needed to do is buy a minimum of 7 traits, every other traits are optional and cosmetic.

7 Traits for one build. ArenaNet has said that they want to allow for free experimentation of builds. You can’t do that with 7 traits. Free experimentation means having all 65 traits, and no, experimenting in PvP does not count for PvE. Some professions only have one meta build, but others have many different depending on the situation. 7 Traits will not let you switch freely between these different situations/playstyles.

NaotsuguLH.8915:

9am PST isn’t early :O

I checked their site but didn’t see it.

Not particularly. I usually account for the fact of waking up at around 7AM to be able to go to both Tequatl and Wurm, which is fairly early for most. You can still get into the Wurm map at around 8:30AM, but it’ll fill up quickly as they’re dividing up into 3 teams.

Early morning at around 8:30 to 9:00 AM PST is when they start preparing for Triple Trouble, right after Tequatl. Their schedule is up on ttsgamers.com, and all times are in server time.

They also do another Wurm run sometime in the afternoon after reset.

The early morning times are usually during the weekends.

Edit: 8AM PST is when Tequatl runs, usually. Soon as it’s over, they switch over to Bloodtide coast and start gathering numbers for Wurm, along with finding an overflow. Usually fills up very quickly, so best to join them for Tequatl. Wurm begins the pre-event at around 8:55, I believe.

Colin, thank you for the update! I’m looking forward to the new system.

As much as I would like to see a new race, the issue right now is, how would that new race fit in with the personal story of the other races? Obviously it’ll get the first 2 chapters of personal story entirely to itself, but after that, the races interact with each other to take down Zhaitan, who has already been defeated. It would probably require some changes to the existing storylines to include the new race in the mix. Then there’s also the 5 race leaders coming together to fight against Mordremoth; if a new race is introduced later on, how would that fit in?

By comparison, adding a new class is easier, lore-wise. You could argue that, since Rytlock was in the mists, he was able to go back in time to before Zhaitan was defeated, train someone in the ways of the Revenant, then go back to the Maguuma jungle. New players will then learn the ways of the Revenant through this trainer.

This is going off a rumor based on a Q and A list from the after party, and one of the things that came up was how to work the new borderlands map into the rotation.

Depending on how the new map is set up, it could work out two ways:

1) If the new WvW map is a replacement of one of the borderlands (all of them are identical), then to make things fair, all three borderlands would need to be replaced with the new one for a given WvW week.

This can be done for all WvW matches, or only a portion of them. So some matches could have the new map, while others have the old.

2) If the new Borderlands is a replacement of all three current borderlands, with individual base camps for each server, it can still be approached in the same way as above. What it would look like is having Eternal Battlegrounds in the middle, with the new Borderlands map surrounding it. The other option is, if the Borderlands is large enough, it can eliminate the need for EB entirely, and the match will be decided based on which server controls most of the map.

Questions that come up:
The new Borderlands has some interesting mechanics to it. Would any of those be used to upgrade the old borderlands? The visual style of the current map can remain essentially the same, but at the very least, the core mechanics of the map should change to reflect some of the new features being introduced in the new map.

As with all playable demos at an event, it’ll only be available if you go to the event.
The beta should follow after that though.

Depends. If it’s Assassin’s stats, you could go with that.
The other alternative is to simply use the skin for an Exotic weapon.

Shala.8352:

just my opinion, but guilds in gw2 have much more players than 5. So, calling a 5v5 fight mode a GvG i cant feel it, you wont be the best guild in GW2 leaderboard, you will just be the best party in the game.
Thats why i’d prefer what everyone is asking, an arena deathmatch in 15+ players for each guild, that would be the only way you can call a Guild Leaderboard. Else, is just another PvP where the big group work that Arenanet is aiming to wont exist. Matching for a 15v15 or more like 20v20 rlly makes the guild working as group, and that would be wonderfull.

That’s assuming Guild teams in Stronghold is restricted to 5v5. If they stay true to GW1’s GvG, it’ll be more than 5v5.

Seeing as I dropped $150 on the GW2 CE in a heartbeat, yes.

TheBlackLeech.9360:

The OP hit the nail directly on the head.

Simply because guilds can compete in the new pvp mode does not make it GvG.

Still better than trying to have Guild fights in WvW maps, a far less controlled environment.

Not sure if this was particularly clear, but it’s possible Guild teams could get access to more than just Stronghold as a PvP mode. Guild teams in Courtyard is pretty much the DM that some people are expecting from GvG. The only difference would be team size.

We don’t know the details yet either way.

Breckmoney.6387:

Colin said “complete new maps,” so I assume there will be more than one. But maybe that’s like one underground/ground/aboveground or something.

The entire region could be pretty big too, so the individual maps could be big.
I’m curious to see how the new features will affect the old to be honest. It would be nice to see an upgrade to older zones/maps.

In addition, Windows 7 and 8 users get a free upgrade to Windows 10. Older cards will support DX12.

Thaddeus.4891:

The only profession that have difficulty in dungeon is necromancer. Its not that bad, they can do decent dps comparable to mesmer and guardian. But they don’t bring enough unique things in the moment.

A really good Necromancer in dungeons is the exception. There are very few of those though.

aspirine.6852:

And on another not, I thought opengl was slow as thick kitten? I remember Unreal 1 on opengl, so sloowwwww.

A game released in what … 1998?

Unreal Engine has grown since then, and is one of the first few engines to offer native Linux support with version 4. OpenGL itself has developed a lot in 16 years.

It’s possible the Story portion of HoT will include a Sylvari-specific component where PCs can overcome their “evil” nature before joining the remaining races to fight against Mordremoth. Basically, overcoming the evil within themselves before taking on the evil that’s seeking to destroy Tyria.

The other four races could have a parallel story component focusing on learning to trust Sylvari. -shrug-

Grebcol.5984:

Now i think (im not pro) that OpenGL is much more complex than DirectX. Second thing is that many people have Windows OS…..

OpenGL doesn’t exclude Windows, it includes it. It also includes OS X and Linux, which DirectX excludes. If you want to hit all three while keeping the development process roughly the same, OpenGL is the logical choice. OS X and Linux have a lower market share, but there’s a good proportion of gamers dual booting Windows and Linux with the intention of switching over fully IF their games worked well on Linux. Valve is spearheading that movement currently by rapidly porting games over to Linux/OS X.

I don’t think it’s an issue of complexity. The key difference between the two is that one gets paid support from Microsoft, while the other is community-supported (with many large software companies supporting its development). Functionally, OpenGL Next is the same as DirectX 12 (for the end user).

GW2 uses DirectX 9.0 to support extremely low end systems. Problem is, DirectX 10+ has been fully supported for even the lowest of the low end hardware for several years now.

Living Story set up the necessary background for Heart of Thorns’ main story component.

No love for OpenGL?

Honestly, leveling is easy and quick enough as it is. Making it take even less time takes away from the journey, which is the focus of GW2.

Example:

Suppose you’re in Sparkfly Fen. It can support a maximum of 150 players (not sure if that’s the actual cap, but works for the example).

Once the map reaches the cap, the system creates another instance of the same zone, and starts filling it up. Repeat for as many instances as necessary.

At some point, people will leave the map. When the player count drops below a certain threshold, the map is flagged for closure, and the instance will be removed in an hour. During that time, players still on the instance are given the option to transfer to another instance with a little buff.

While multiple instances of a map are running, players can switch between them using the Party system. Party members almost always end up on the same instance of a map, unless the map fills up and one player ends up on another instance. That party member can still try to join the instance with the rest of their group (assuming it’s not hard capped – which won’t let any more players into the map until someone leaves). On the flip side, the players who are on a full map can switch to any emptier map that one of their party members is on. This is particularly used for switching to Silverwastes maps to redo Breach events a bit quicker than starting a fresh map.

As an aside:

It would be nice if you were able to have a drop down menu where you can simply select the instance you want to join (assuming it’s not full) without relying on taxiing in. Basically the districts system in Guild Wars 1. I think the reason why it wasn’t done was due to differences in how the servers worked in comparison to GW1, not sure if that’s changed since the megaserver system was implemented.

Sariel V.7024:

PvP: Carapace Glove Box (repeatable)

Correction, one time only.

A Massive Headache.1879:

Hey, just because this is briefly on topic, did they ever make a second mention about glory armor obtained via glory?

Assuming the old PvP reward system: only one or two sets were obtainable exclusively in the old PvP reward system, and no mention was made of it being available through PvE in the future.

Windsagio.1340:

The funny/sad thing is that this was pretty clear before Wintersday, but it’s still a struggle to get it to filter through to people.

People are starting to catch on now though, and Copper is going down a lot faster/easier than single-target DPS. It takes a bit of persistence, but it’s possible to get people to change strategies.

The strategy isn’t “It’s fine to AOE at copper”, It’s “AOE copper, and focus down poison before it gets near him”. With 2-3 people focusing down bubbles while the rest AOE copper, he goes down fast.

I started telling people to AOE at Copper until 20% health. At that point, switch to single target. Went down with 2 minutes left on the clock.

lordkrall.7241:

Rashy.4165:

Thief doesn’t. We have one elite skill which only lasts a few seconds on a long 90s cooldown.

Still doable without stability. The trouble I had was with shades smothering the flames. Didn’t realize I had to kill the shades. Did it as a group to get past it though.

Ergo they have access to stability.

Thieves also have a rather massive advantage with the easy access to stealth

The point being, they don’t have EQUAL access to reliable stability.
Stealth doesn’t replace stability.

lordkrall.7241:

I believe every profession in the game have access to stability actually.

Thief doesn’t. We have one elite skill which only lasts a few seconds on a long 90s cooldown.

Still doable without stability. The trouble I had was with shades smothering the flames. Didn’t realize I had to kill the shades. Did it as a group to get past it though.

Her Zojja voice is quite different from her normal voice. Didn’t think it was different from her voice acting in Personal Story, personally.

Might need to turn up your settings. The puff of cloud appears in a straight line, and staying slightly off the center of the room will almost always guarantee that you’ll avoid damage, or see the telegraph and dodge out of it. Dodging through when the rocks appear doesn’t appear to work.

A friend of mine shared this with me, Lord Faren.

Devildoc.6721:

Charr, Norn, and Asura almost never get a chance to shine in story. They’re only ever supporting characters.

All three already have a rich history with Guild Wars 1 and in between both games. Sylvari, on the other hand, being a very young race, doesn’t have much of its story explored prior to GW2.

Before Seeds of Truth, I had 4-6 of each part and ended up getting all 4 spleens and 1 full bladder from it. Made the rest of the RNG more bearable.

Before the next episode, I’m aiming for 10-15 of each, in the hopes of getting all of the mordrem parts without having to fight bosses. 6k Crests would also be a nice thing to farm ahead of time.

Eileane.3845:

-snip-

Since your entire post hinges on it, I thought I’d point out:

GW2 and Gaming in general isn’t to be blamed for the sense of “entitlement” that younger generations seem to have. In fact, games have become easier because of that. Younger generations want an instant gratification, and don’t want to spend much time on anything, and games have become accommodating of that (very few people among younger generations are willing to put in the effort for challenging content). Developers making games as hard as they used to be will probably have a harder time attracting a wider audience (games like Dark Souls, while really good and reminiscent of older games in terms of difficulty, probably don’t bring in the casual majority of gamers into the market).

GW2 aims to be casual-friendly while still providing challenging content for people who want it. There’s still some challenging content in the game (dungeons, fractals, silverwastes, dry top, orr, tequatl, and triple trouble), which have been made easier due to experience. Marionette is another example of challenging content requiring lots of coordination to succeed, too bad it was temporary.

Regarding rezzing near chests – depends on the chest. If it’s in the labyrinth, with a WP seconds away from the entrance and with things that can insta-kill anyone trying to rez, dead players aren’t doing anyone any favours. I’ve tried to rez people in the labyrinth whenever I can, taking a risk every time I do so. I even made a few joking bets with the dead player to see how long I can last before a lurcher got me. If it’s chests out in the open world, then I would agree. Rezzing the player before getting the chest is a nice thing to do (even with 2 waypoints in the map and a skritt tunnel network making it easier to navigate the map – it was fairly easy, albeit time-consuming, navigating the map before both were added).