Game updates:June 2007

June 2007 updates

• Thursday 28^th of June (talk)
• Friday 22^nd of June (talk)
• Tuesday 19^th of June (talk)
• Monday 18^th of June (talk)
• Friday 15^th of June (talk)
• Thursday 7^th of June (talk)
• Friday 1^st of June (talk)

Update - Thursday, June 28, 2007

Miscellaneous

• Updated the map rotation for GvG and HvH tournaments.
• Added an option for Korean users to turn off the periodic Korea Game Rating Board message displayed in game. To access this option, click on the "General" tab in the Options menu.

Bug Fixes

• Fixed an exploit in The Jade Quarry that allowed Kurzick players to enter the map before the pre-match countdown completed.

Guild Wars Wiki notes

• Fixed a bug where some characters would receive a Code 19 error which would not allow them to log back into the game if they logged out in a guild hall or an observer mode match.

Update - Friday, June 22, 2007

Alliance Battles

To encourage active players in Alliance Battles, we have adjusted the faction rewards, increasing the rewards for winning teams and decreasing the rewards for losing teams. The new rewards are as follows:

• During the battle, players will now earn 1 faction point and 10 Balthazar faction per kill.
• After the battle, players will now earn 1 faction point for each point scored by their team. Players on the winning team will be awarded a further bonus of 1,000 faction points.

Competitive Missions

To encourage active players in Competitive Missions, we have adjusted faction rewards, increasing the rewards for winning teams and decreasing the rewards for losing teams. The new rewards are as follows:

The Jade Quarry

• After the mission, players will now earn 20 faction points for each jade slab collected by their team. Players on the winning team will be awarded a further bonus of 750 faction points.

Fort Aspenwood

After the mission, players will now receive the following rewards:

• Kurzick players will receive a faction point reward of two times the final completion percentage of the Vengeance of the Gods.
• Luxon players will receive 40 faction points for each unique gate destroyed during the mission.
• Players on the winning team will be awarded a further bonus of 600 faction points.

Auto Targeting

• Added the ability to toggle Auto Targeting. To enable and disable this feature, players can use the "Auto-target foes when there's no chosen target" checkbox in the General Options panel (F11).
• Auto Targeting will no longer select an item that is reserved for another player.

Miscellaneous

• Made preparations for the Monthly Automated Tournament Playoff Event.

Guild Wars Wiki Notes

• Hero Battles group size has increased from 8-64 players to 8-128 players. Now 7 rounds are played instead of 6, because of increased group size.
• Gold Charr Salvage Kits now drop in pre-Searing. They are the equivalent of a 5 use Expert Salvage Kit.
• For the GvG monthly tournament two lists are shown, one for swiss round and one for single elimination. Single elimination is implemented for the monthly tournaments.

Update - Tuesday, June 19, 2007

Skill Updates

Assassin

• Critical Agility: fixed a bug that shortened this skill's duration when it reapplied itself.

Elementalist

• Frozen Burst: decreased duration to 3..8 seconds.
• Mark of Rodgort: increased recharge time to 15 seconds.
• Searing Flames: decreased damage to 10..100.

Mesmer

• Conjure Nightmare: decreased duration to 2..16 seconds.
• Conjure Phantasm: decreased duration to 2..16 seconds.
• Hex Eater Signet: decreased casting time to 1 second, decreased recharge time to 25 seconds, decreased Energy gained per Hex to 1..4.

Monk

• Convert Hexes: decreased recharge time to 12 seconds.

Necromancer

• Faintheartedness: decreased duration to to 3..28 seconds.
• Reaper's Mark: increased recharge time to 12 seconds.

Ranger

• Nature's Renewal: increased Spirit level to 1..13.

Warrior

• Crippling Slash: increased adrenaline cost to 6 strikes.
• Enraging Charge: decreased adrenaline gained to 0..4 strikes.

Update - Monday, June 18, 2007

Skill Updates

As a part of this playbalance test week, we’ve made the following skill changes:

Assassin

• Critical Agility: decreased duration to 4 seconds, the duration now increases by 1 second for each rank of Critical Strikes.

Elementalist

• Elemental Lord: decreased the bonus to Elemental attributes to 1.
• Intensity: decreased duration to 10 seconds, increased recharge time to 45 seconds.

Mesmer

• Cry of Pain: decreased recharge time to 15 seconds.
• Ether Nightmare: decreased recharge time to 15 seconds.

Paragon

• "There is Nothing to Fear" [sic]: decreased duration to 4 seconds, the duration now increases by 1 second for every 2 ranks of Leadership.

Ritualist

• Vampirism: increased duration to 30..150 seconds.

Faction Reward NPCs

• Characters must now be level 20 to learn Kurzick or Luxon skills.
• Using the "Raise Alliance reputation" option with the Kurzick/Luxon faction reward NPCs now gives 10,000 points toward the corresponding title track. The cost is still 5,000 faction points, and the reputation gained by the alliance is still 5,000.

Miscellaneous

• Moved the footmen away from the middle teleporters of the Jade Isle to prevent players from targeting them from below.
• Faction gain messages are no longer displayed in the Chat panel when you gain less than 25 faction points.
• Updated the Korean game ratings icons.

Guild Wars Wiki Notes

• The Paragon skill modified was actually "There's Nothing to Fear!".
• This update fixed a bug which caused the skill trainer and skill monitor tooltips for "There's Nothing to Fear!" to erroneously display the skill's healing range as 20...51 rather than 20...52.
• The Assassin skill Critical Agility only refreshes for the base 4 seconds for each critical you land, rather than the full duration granted from having points in Critical Strikes. (This was a bug and has been fixed)

Update 2 - Friday, June 15, 2007

Skill Updates

Elementalist

• Blurred Vision: increased casting time to 2 seconds.

Mesmer

• Signet of Humility: increased casting time to 3 seconds.

Warrior

• Fixed a bug that caused Decapitate to have an incorrect casting time of .5 seconds. Applied the casting time to the proper skill, Agonizing Chop.

Bug Fixes

• Fixed a bug that caused all skills to be removed from the Skill Bar when switching secondary professions.

Update 1 - Friday, June 15, 2007

Skill Updates

We will be evaluating the following changes over the course of the next week. Additional adjustments may be made during that time period.

Assassin

• Beguiling Haze: increased the Dazed duration to 3..9 seconds.
• Expose Defenses: increased recharge time to 15 seconds.
• Expunge Enchantments: now removes an additional Enchantment.
• Hidden Caltrops: now triggers when the Hex ends. This skill now ends when you hit a moving foe.
• Recall: now ends if the target moves out of Compass range.
• Sharpen Daggers: fixed a bug that caused players using Sharpen Daggers to suffer from Bleeding when an attack skill was used against them.
• Siphon Strength: decreased Energy cost to 10.

Elementalist

• Ash Blast: increased damage to 20..65.
• Ebon Hawk: increased damage to 10..100.
• Ride the Lightning: decreased recharge time to 5 seconds, increased damage to 10..100.
• Shockwave: decreased recharge time to 15 seconds.
• Stoneflesh Aura: decreased duration to 5..15 seconds.

Mesmer

• Arcane Conundrum: now affects adjacent allies.
• Clumsiness: reduced recharge time to 4 seconds.
• Conjure Nightmare: increased duration to 2..17 seconds.
• Conjure Phantasm: increased duration to 2..17 seconds.
• Ether Feast: reduced casting time to 1 second.
• Fast Casting: each rank now decreases Signet activation time by 3%.
• Imagined Burden: increased duration to 10..30 seconds.
• Lyssa's Balance: functionality changed to: "Target foe loses one Enchantment. If you have more Enchantments than target foe, this skill has no effect."
• Mantra of Persistence: decreased duration bonus to 20..50%.
• Power Block: now affects Chants as well as Spells.
• Power Drain: now affects Chants as well as Spells.
• Power Flux: now affects Chants as well as Spells.
• Power Leak: now affects Chants as well as Spells.
• Power Leech: now affects Chants as well as Spells.
• Power Return: now affects Chants as well as Spells.
• Power Spike: increased damage to 30..120, now affects Chants as well as Spells.
• Shared Burden: increased duration to 5..25 seconds.

Monk

• Balthazar's Pendulum: decreased casting time to .25 seconds.
• Empathic Removal: decreased recharge time to 7 seconds.
• Shield Guardian: decreased casting time to .25 seconds.
• Signet of Rage: decreased casting time to 1 second, increased conditional damage to 5..20.
• Strength of Honor: increased damage to 3..15.

Necromancer

• Signet of Sorrow: fixed a bug that kept this Signet from recharging properly when near an exploited corpse.
• Soul Reaping: Energy gain now triggers 3 times every 15 seconds (if you are already at maximum Energy when something dies, it does not count toward this limit). You now gain full Energy when a Spirit you control dies; you gain no Energy when other Spirits die.
• Spiteful Spirit: increased Energy cost to 15.
• Well of Blood: decreased casting time to 1 second.
• Well of Darkness: decreased casting time to 1 second.
• Well of Power: decreased Energy cost to 5, decreased casting time to 1 second.
• Well of Silence: decreased Energy cost to 10, decreased casting time to 1 second.
• Well of Suffering: decreased Energy cost to 10, decreased casting time to 1 second.
• Well of Weariness: decreased Energy cost to 5.

Paragon

• Defensive Anthem: increased casting time to 2 seconds.
• "Never Surrender!": increased duration to 15 seconds.

Ranger

• Barrage: fixed a bug that caused it to remove Glyphs.
• Crippling Shot: decreased Energy cost to 10.
• Heal as One: now states that it heals instead of giving a Health "gain," no longer resurrects pets with full Health.
• Melandru's Resilience: decreased recharge time to 15 seconds, increased Health regeneration gained for each Condition to 4.

Ritualist

• Spawning Power: each rank now adds 2% to weapon spell duration.
• Weapon of Warding: decreased duration to 3..8 seconds.

Warrior

• Agonizing Chop: decreased activation time to .5 seconds.
• Battle Rage: increased movement speed to 33%.
• Dwarven Battle Stance: decreased recharge time to 20 seconds.
• Warrior's Endurance: increased duration to 5..35 seconds.
• Yeti Smash: decreased adrenaline cost to 6 strikes.

PvE Skills

We will be evaluating these new skills over the course of the next week. It is likely that we will make play balance adjustments to them during that time.

Players can now acquire twenty new PvE-only skills. There are ten Sunspear skills (one for each profession), and ten Kurzick/Luxon skills (one for each profession).

• To acquire a Sunspear skill, talk to a Sunspear Hero Skill Trainer. Each skill costs 1 Hero skill point. Sunspear skills become more powerful the higher your rank in the Sunspear title track. You must have at least rank 1 in this title track to learn any Sunspear skills.
• Sunspear Hero skill trainers will now convert normal skill points to Hero skill points for a 1 platinum fee.
• To acquire a Kurzick or Luxon skill, talk to a Faction Reward NPC. Each skill costs 3,000 faction points. Kurzick/Luxon skills become more powerful the higher your rank in the corresponding title track. You must have at least rank 1 in the Kurzick/Luxon title track to learn any Kurzick/Luxon skills.

Title Updates

In order to accommodate the addition of Kurzick and Luxon PvE skills, the Friend of the Kurzicks and Friend of the Luxon titles have been modified:

• The number of ranks for these titles has been significantly increased. The faction point requirement for the top rank is still the same, but the faction requirement for the first rank has been lowered.
• The Faction Transfer and Faction Rewards NPCs have been combined.
• Exchanging faction points for amber or jade now gives progress toward these titles.
• The blessing provided by Kurzick and Luxon shrine priests now gives progress toward these titles for kills earned while under the blessing’s effects.
• Exchanging faction points for Kurzick/Luxon skills will also give progress toward these titles.

Targeting Refinements

• Offensive skills and attacks will now identify a valid target on screen if you have no target selected.
• Outside of combat, it is now possible to interact with adjacent NPCs and items with no target selected.
• The Target Display now has a button that clears your target.

Miscellaneous

• Victory or Death is now a Skill instead of a Shout.
• Fixed several issues in the Uncharted Isle that prevented NPCs from getting close enough to the flag stand to fight at Victory or Death.
• The Jade Isle map has been updated.
• Heroes now receive the Victory or Death buff.
• Reduced the rate in which the shrines increase the morale meter in Hero battles.
• The cannon on the Bombardment map now fires every 10 seconds instead of every 15 seconds.
• Teams in Daily GvG Tournaments now require only 4 guild members instead of the previous 8.
• Added a cap of +25 to the armor buff when stacking skills. A single skill can still push the bonus over +25. Bonuses from shields, weapons, insignia, and inscriptions are not affected and still stack.
• Players may now access their account storage by clicking on the Storage Vault instead of interacting with the Xunlai Agent. Xunlai Agents now offer storage upgrades.
• Additional Storage Vaults have been added to several outposts.

Bug Fixes

• Heroes can no longer walk through pets in PvP.
• Heroes' skills now correctly disable when their pet dies.
• The Pet Tamer Nehdukah on the Plains of Jarin will now accept Hero pets.

Guild Wars Wiki notes

• Decapitate was changed to a 1/2s activation. This was rectified in the second update.
• Agonizing Chop was not given a 1/2s activation as per the update notes. This was rectified in the second update.
• A bug was introduced where changing your secondary profession removes all skills on your skill bar. This was rectified in the second update.
• Blessing of the Kurzicks/Luxons: while active you gain 5 faction per kill and 10 faction per kill in Hard Mode. For each enemy killed you get 5 (10 in Hard Mode) faction when killing a boss, maximum 125 (250 in Hard Mode).
• The following PvE only skills were added in this update:
  • Sunspear skills:
    • Whirlwind Attack
    • Never Rampage Alone
    • Seed of Life
    • Necrosis
    • Cry of Pain
    • Intensity
    • Critical Agility
    • Vampirism
    • "There's Nothing to Fear!"
    • Eternal Aura
  • Kurzick/Luxon skills:
    • "Save Yourselves!"
    • Triple Shot
    • Selfless Spirit
    • Signet of Corruption
    • Ether Nightmare
    • Elemental Lord
    • Shadow Sanctuary
    • Summon Spirits
    • Spear of Fury
    • Aura of Holy Might
  • It is important to note that appearance of the Kurzick/Luxon skills is dependent upon which faction they are purchased from.
• The green numbers for Sunspear rank skills correspond to a 0...8 rank range. It is currently not known which title ranks the green numbers for the Kurzick / Luxon skills correspond to.
• The Kurzick Bureaucrat and Luxon Scavenger now offer the option to purchase the maximum amount of Amber, Jadeite or Passage Scrolls at once.
• Only Level 20+ enemies grant faction from Kurzick/Luxon blessings.
• Len Caldoron was added to Lion's Arch, Minister of Maintenance Raiugyon was added to Kaineng Center and Bendah was added to Kamadan, Jewel of Istan. They have no dialogue.
• There are 2 new NPC in Tomb of the Primeval Kings, Rocius (Priest of Balthazar), who has no dialogue, and Sigil Trader. The Acolyte Singpa (Merchant) has been missing.

Update 2 - Thursday, June 07, 2007

Bug Fixes

• Fixed a bug that prevented players from entering a Challenge Mission in Hard Mode.
• Removed inaccurate changes to several skill and attribute descriptions.

Miscellaneous

• To prevent exploitation of the Nightfall starter quests "Take the Shortcut", "Rally the Recruits", and "Never Fight Alone", the gold rewards for those quests were reduced to 25, and the reward for the starter quest "Honing your Skills" was increased to 250 gold to compensate.

Guild Wars Wiki Notes

• Added a bug in Alliance Battles where a Ritualist spirit cast before the starting timer reaches 0:00 will stop the battle from commencing.

Update 1 - Thursday, June 07, 2007

Bug Fixes

• Fixed a bug in Fort Aspenwood that allowed the Warriors to be lured away from their destination.

Miscellaneous

• Made additional preparations for the Alliance Battle weekend event.
• Removed an incorrect +5 Energy Bonus that was added to General Morgahn's Primeval Leggings.

Guild Wars Wiki Notes

• This update introduced a number of bugs, which were fixed in the second update:
  • Players were unable to select Hard Mode in Challenge Mission outposts.
  • The description of Soul Reaping in the Skills and Attributes Panel erroneously read: "For each point of Soul Reaping, you gain 1 Energy whenever a creature near you dies. You may only gain Energy in this way 3 times every 15 seconds. You only gain Energy from Spirits you control."
  • The description of Fast Casting erroneously read: "Fast Casting decreases the casting time of your Spells. Additionally, each rank in this attribute decreases your Signet activation times by 3%."
  • The description of Spawning Power erroneously read: "For each rank of Spawing Power, creatures you create (or animate) have 4% more Health, and weapon Spells you cast last 2% longer[sic]. Some Ritualist skills, especially those related to Spirit creatures, become more effective with higher Spawning Power."
  • All mesmer changes were reverted back to original state. (Many mesmer skills that only work if your foe was casting a spell, such as Power Drain, Power Spike, Power Block or Power Flux, had their descriptions altered to state that they also worked on chants.)

Update - Friday, June 01, 2007

Bug Fixes

• Fixed a bug that caused players to return to the character selection screen immediately after creating a new character.
• Fixed a bug that prevented players from upgrading certain tournament reward items.

Miscellaneous

• Drago Stoneherder now drops a Stoneherder's Flatbow in addition to his other two unique bows.
• Updated some creatures so that they no longer have two elite skills in Hard Mode.
• Increased the survivability of the Seer for players attempting the Hell's Precipice bonus mission in Hard Mode.

Guild Wars wiki notes

• 1 vs. 1 battles in Observer mode have a new icon
• Collector armor now have a text indicating the inability to use insignias
• The command line parameter -email has been added back to the client.