Game updates/20080206

Canthan New Year

 * Made preparations for the Canthan New Year's Festival, which begins at Noon Pacific (-8 GMT), February 8, 2008, and runs until Noon Pacific, February 11, 2008.

Party Animal Title Track

 * Added the Party Animal title track and support for it in the Hall of Monuments. Players can gain points toward the Party Animal title by using various festive items, including Bottle Rockets, Champagne Poppers, Sparklers, Ghost-in-the-Boxes, Squash Serums, Snowman Summoners, Beetle Juice Tonics, Yuletide Tonics, and Transmogrifier Tonics.

Skill Updates
We will evaluate the following changes this week. Additional adjustments may be made during that time.

All

 * Decreased the variance in trebuchet impacts in GvG by reducing the target deviation and increasing the area-of-effect.
 * Health sacrifice now displays as a skill cost.

Victory or Death

 * Victory or Death: increased the damage to 25%.
 * NPCs receive an additional 5% damage bonus each minute after Victory or Death.
 * Added "Victory is Ours," a new GvG feature that activates at the same time as Victory or Death, giving players on the team with the most NPCs a 15% damage increase.
 * Archers now stand farther apart at Victory or Death.
 * Trebuchets no longer work after Victory or Death.
 * The Bodyguard and Guild Thief now receive a smaller damage bonus than other NPCs at Victory or Death.

Mesmer

 * : decreased target foe's Energy loss to 1..5.
 * : increased casting time to 2 seconds; increased recharge time to 10 seconds; now affects adjacent foes.
 * : increased healing to 20..50 Health per Energy lost by target.
 * : changed skill type from stance to skill.
 * : decreased duration to 4 seconds.
 * : decreased duration to 4 seconds; increased casting time to 2 seconds, increased recharge time to 10 seconds; increased damage to 10..92.
 * : decreased Energy cost to 5 Energy; decreased Energy gain to 8..13 Energy.

Necromancer

 * : decreased casting time to .25 seconds.
 * : increased number of enchantments removed to 1..2.
 * : increased number of conditions transferred to 1..3.
 * : decreased Energy cost to 1.
 * : decreased Energy cost to 1.
 * : decreased Energy cost to 1.
 * : decreased Energy cost to 1.
 * : decreased Energy cost to 1.
 * : decreased Energy cost to 1.
 * : decreased Energy cost to 5.
 * : decreased Energy cost to 1.

Monk

 * : decreased casting time to 1 second; increased recharge time to 10 seconds.
 * : decreased casting time to 1 second; decreased healing to 30..75 Health.
 * /: decreased Energy cost to 5; decreased casting time to 1 second; decreased recharge to 15 seconds; decreased healing to 15..60 Health.

Elementalist

 * : now affects the next two spells.
 * : decreased casting time to 2 seconds.
 * /: decreased Energy cost to 5.
 * : decreased recharge to 7 seconds.

Warrior

 * : increased Health gain to 62..152.
 * : increased healing to 40..100 Health; increased Health gain per Tactics rank to 7.

Ranger

 * : increased duration to 13 seconds.

Dervish

 * : duration increased to 10..90 seconds; functionality changed to: "For 10..90 seconds, you cannot be blocked by enchanted foes, and your attacks deal cold damage. This skill is disabled for 120 seconds."
 * : Health regeneration is now capped at 3 enchantments.
 * : increased activation time to .75.

Paragon

 * : decreased Energy cost to 5; decreased Health regeneration to 2..3.
 * : increased healing to 45..90 Health.

Ritualist

 * : decreased recharge to 15 seconds.

Bug Fixes

 * Fixed a bug with a pathing issue in The Dragon's Lair outpost.
 * Fixed a bug with a pathing issue in the Eastern Frontier.
 * Burol Ironfist in Boreal Station will no longer display his Hero tutorial dialogue buttons when he is offering or rewarding his tutorial quest.
 * Fixed a bug that caused the skill Meditation of the Reaper to not remove itself properly from Heroes.
 * Fixed a bug that caused Devona to spawn in Pockmark Flats after the Replacement Healers quest had been completed.
 * Heroes and henchmen will now properly target themselves with the skill Zealous Benediction.
 * Heroes and henchmen will now properly target themselves with the skill Dismiss Condition.
 * Players will not die because of life loss from a vampiric weapon during the Rollerbeetle Racing festival game.
 * Fixed a bug that caused a Hero to cancel and then re-activate a skill if manually ordered to use it.

Miscellaneous

 * Corrected the crafting costs on two of the Elite Canthan Masks sold by armorer Koumei on the Divine Path.
 * Changed the item boxes in Rollerbeetle Racing to only be collectible once per player.
 * Added additional base defenders to the Alliance Battles.
 * The Xunlai Tournament House NPC now offers prizes for January and can be found in the Great Temple of Balthazar, Lion's Arch, Kaineng Center, and Kamadan.

Guild Wars Wiki notes

 * This update introduced the energy cost of 1. It did not exist beforehand.
 * Lunar Fortunes from 2007 were renamed to Lunar Fortune [Year of the Pig] in an earlier update.
 * Skills which have a sacrifice cost at cast time no longer state the sacrifice in the skill description but only display it similar to other costs like energy, activation and recharge.
 * had its duration reduced to 4 seconds and its healing increased to.
 * Some players had to re-accept the EULA after this update.
 * PvP characters now start at the Isle of the Nameless instead of the Great Temple of Balthazar, yet the Great Temple of Balthazar does not appear on your map automatically. This means if you ever want to access the Great Temple of Balthazar on that character, you must go through the portal before mapping to any other outpost.