Category: Guild Wars 2

One really interesting piece to come out of the press closed beta test was this map of the content in Guild Wars 2. It appears incomplete not only with the “??-??” zone, but also because it is clearly missing a level 1-15 zone.  ArenaNet’s Martin Kerstein was nice enough to confirm that there will be 5 starting zones corresponding to each race (e.g., Metrica Province for Asura and Caledon Forest for Sylvari). So take these infographs with a grain of salt.

Continue reading [GW2] Level Flow by Numbers

Been busy this morning, but was drafting a post in my head about the trait uproar. Apparently my mind waves were so strong that it was picked up and written over at Under a Pale Tree. They even stole my pun from my brain jelly! (Although I was going to make it Trait-ourous Trappings.)

From a game design perspective, small fees like this serve a two-fold purpose: Helping the game economy, and instilling a sense of worth to your build.  The first part is self-explanatory, but the second: If you can switch your traits at any time, with no repercussions, then do your trait selections really matter?  Who needs to think about it; just drop ‘em in wherever and don’t worry about it until you come up against something too strong.  Then you might as well just pump all those freely “respecc-able” points into whatever trait will maximize your usefulness against that particular mob, and then do it all over again on the next one.

This is the most important part. People feel they can handle infini-selections, but its been proven time and time again that narrowing choice is extremely beneficial. It promotes better decision making, a better feeling of having made the right choice, and, blazow!, it promotes better learning! I know that all the good people raging are 50 IQ smarter than the average MMO player and could easily handle re-traiting in-between mobs and weapon swaps, and don’t need to learn skritt. Still, dumb people like me appreciate that ArenaNet has signaled that traiting is an important decision, and it would be beneficial to take time considering the decision. Maybe I can actually be beneficial on the WuvWuh field?

–Ravious

In continuance with apologies to Zubon for ending my Guild Wars 2 beta content a little late. Blame it on eye infections and little ones with fevers and gastronomic pursuits.

The End of Beta Game

After “beating” Queensdale, which I will return to in a sec, I headed to Kessex Hills, which is the humans’ second zone going from level 15-25. Kessex Hills is the Wild West warzone to the Queensdale bread basket. The theme of the zone encompasses the centaur battles in the north and mysterious or perilous occurrences ringing around the southern edge. One of my favorite spots was a bit of swamp in southwest Kessex Hills where a sylvari defense force valiantly defends against Zhaitans death minions, the risen. It’s nice to get a bit of sylvari feeling in a “human” zone with their Shadowheart defensive post filled with strange fauna, but the risen bring a new bit of gameplay pervasively found throughout the zone.  The mobs are starting to get more tricks in their “classes”.

There is a brute risen, who appears always crippled. They walk about with one working leg holding a huge 2-handed hammer, and if they get close to player multiple knockdowns are imminent. Any players that have not learned to attack and move will learn to do it the hard way against the brute risen. Then there are some small asura risen. These guys work themselves into a gremlin frenzy and run at the targeted player like a fast zombie. They are glass-jaw attackers, but seeing something running at me at double the pace with an attack buff was a bit unnerving. The quaggan risen, if I recall correctly, were the ranged risen in this area that dealt poison. A bunch of these types of enemies all moving about in one area creates many different tactical situations that I needed to adapt to on the fly. Continue reading [GW2 Press Beta] The Richest PvE Experience, Part 2

“Just play.” That’s been my tagline for Guild Wars 2 PvE, and really all of Guild Wars 2, but PvE especially. MMO PvE is so mired in invisible rules. Don’t kill steal. Don’t help other people. Don’t waste time doing X if there is no quest for it. Pass through these tasks because this task is gated. I don’t know how many times I’ve given up explaining these ridiculous rules to other gamers. I feel even stupider when I try to answer their simple question of “why”.

Right from the start, it’s apparent that strict theme park rides have given way to a big playground. Sure there are still rides, and even a few lines, but at least I can run around! Here’s an account of my run through the Queensdale zone especially in regards to renown hearts and player guidance.

Continue reading [GW2 Press Beta] The Richest PvE Experience, Part 1

Fanfic Warning: the following is part of my actual play in the press beta written “in voice.” I just needed to write something quick in a different way because my PvE article is getting monstrous. It’s a small, early part of the charr zone in Plains of Ashford. I had started there when I found the servers had opened early like my bud, Lewis B at Tap Repeatedly (read his amazing account here). Hope you enjoy, but if you don’t… you’ve been warned.

Continue reading [GW2] Sunrise on the Plains of Ashford

Sign up for the Guild Wars 2 beta for only 48 hours! At this moment it seems the site has been slashdotted beyond the beyond. Still it seems the whole ArenaNet krewe was very excited to see this as the devs were watching possible beta testers slam the site (thanks, Mr. Fries!). Good luck to all! Now back to writing more press beta PvE in Guild Wars 2.

–Ravious

What is Guild Wars 2 without wars. The Closed Beta had two ways to PvP, random arena PvP up to 10v10 with auto-balanced teams, and World v. World (WvW) where we were assigned to a server to fight for it against two other servers. There were two maps in arena PvP and WvW was fully available with the three identical Borderlands maps and the one central map. This is my story.

Arena-Type PvP

PvP is very accessible in Guild Wars 2. Click on the small icon, while in PvE, and players are instantly whisked away. Leaving the Mists, where PvP takes place, sends players back to the real world (PvE). It was a siren song all beta weekend long. It was so easy to just get in to a ten-minute random arena match, but then there was always activity in PvE too. The dilemma! Continue reading [GW2 Closed Beta] War Stories

One whole weekend of Guild Wars 2 was not enough. Last night I had dinner with my mom, and she asked me about my trip to Disney World. How could I explain to her all the fantastic memories from my 5-day trip? I emphatically said it was great. Then we talked about how we could all go down next time. This is how I feel about sharing my Guild Wars 2 weekend. Where do I even start? I didn’t take a terabyte of vids to let it speak for itself.

This is the beginning of a few posts on Guild Wars 2 weekend, and this is the one where I will answer any questions you, valiant reader, have. Ask away below in the comments section. If you want to overdose on information, head to GuildMag’s constantly updated news aggregation page linking to every bit of press impressions and video they can grab. I have many more posts to write, but these are some quick impressions. Continue reading [GW2] Closed Beta Bookends and Quick Impressions

I came back from vacation just in time for a rise and shiny blog post from ArenaNet discussing the particulars of their World vs. World vs. World system (a.k.a. WvW pronounced WuvWuv [says my cold-addled brain]) in Guild Wars 2. To recap: three servers are pitted against each other to fight over objectives on 3 Borderlands maps spoked out from a central Eternal Battlegrounds map. Points accumulate for your server to create server-wide bonuses. Every two-weeks servers are re-ranked and pitted against servers of like rank. So yes, all the RP servers will have the chance to /emote battle since they will all be ranked together. The whole article is great, and really in-depth. It is a must read for any RvR, or the like, fan.

There are a few interesting points. The first is that the WvW holds some “absolutely gigantic” maps capable of holding over 300 players each. It appears that over 400 players can fight for their same server at a time, which gives a hint to possible server sizes. Between all the ways to play in Guild Wars 2, such as PvE, PvP, and WvW, it will be interesting to see what a “healthy” server size will be. Continue reading [GW2] WuvWuv Combat