Game updates:November 2007

November 2007 updates

• Thursday 29^th of November (talk)
• Wednesday 28^th of November (talk)
• Wednesday 21^st of November (talk)
• Friday 16^th of November (talk)
• Thursday 15^th of November (talk)
• Tuesday 13^th of November (talk)
• Thursday 8^th of November (talk)
• Thursday 1^st of November (talk)

Update - Thursday, November 29, 2007

Bonus Mission Pack

The Bonus Mission Pack has been enabled for those players who made qualifying purchases in the online store during the Bonus Mission Pack promotion.

• To access the Bonus Mission Pack missions, speak to Durmand [Historian] in any of the major port cities: Lion's Arch, Kaineng Center, or Kamadan.
• For each mission, you will receive a book that tells the story leading up to the mission, along with any weapons your character will use during that mission.
• To launch the mission, equip any provided weapons and click the "enter mission" button found inside the story book.
• The Bonus Mission Pack missions are all single player adventures where you play as the characters from each story book. You will become that character for the duration of the mission and your normal skill bar will be replaced with that character's set of skills.
• Upon completing a Bonus Mission Pack mission, you will be returned to the port city you were in previously or to your character's home port city. Your story book will have three new pages added at this point, summarizing the events that occurred during the mission as well as the effect those events had on the Guild Wars world.
• You can take completed books back to Durmand to have the stories authorized. You can then trade in authorized stories to one of the four story scribes (located next to Durmand in each port city) for a customized weapon from the historic period you witnessed during the mission. However, you will no longer be able to keep the book in your Xunlai storage once it has been authorized.
• Completing each mission also unlocks “Discovery Mode” for that mission, adding three hidden, bonus goals for you to discover. For each bonus goal you complete, Durmand will give any one character on your account an additional authorized story. The additional stories can only be earned once for each account.

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

• Deadly Paradox: increased Energy cost to 15.
• Shadow Prison: increased recharge time to 25 seconds.

Mesmer

• Clumsiness: increased recharge time to 7 seconds; decreased duration to 4 seconds.
• Cry of Pain: decreased recharge time to 12 seconds.
• Empathy: increased damage to 10..55.
• Overload: increased non conditional damage to 5..40.

Bug Fixes

• Fixed a bug that caused Black Lotus Strike to fail if the target was not Hexed.
• Fixed a bug that caused an improper error message to appear when Signet of Return or "Finish Him!" was used against an invalid target.
• Fixed a bug that caused Magebane Shot to disable non-spell skills.
• Fixed a bug that caused a character's tattoos to disappear and skin tones to appear altered when wearing the Ritualist's Opulent Raiment, Scale Leggings, and Beaded Shoes.

Miscellaneous

• Siege Devourer Feast now shows the proper error message when there is no exploitable corpse within range.
• Replaced the oozes and rats in Lion's Arch, Kaineng Center, and Kamadan that were removed at the end of the Halloween Event.
• Added effects for the skill Spectral Agony when used by Mursaat.
• Updated an old version of the Diessa Icon to use the most current statistics for that item. The earlier version contained a +10% enchantment-lengthening bonus that is not supposed to exist on focus items.
• Updated Automated Tournament map rotations.

Guild Wars Wiki notes

• Added a Zaishen Chest to the Isle of the Nameless. This chest could be opened for free and gave a random gold drop or tome. It is unknown if this is a bug or not. After a second (undocumented) update, this appears to have disappeared.

Update - Wednesday, November 28, 2007

Miscellaneous

• Added support for the Guild Café’s: Rawr Cup tournament.

Guild Wars Wiki notes

• Observe list, specifically Top Guild Battles and Top GvG Tournament Battles, now presents recent 10 games.

Update - Wednesday, November 21, 2007

Guild Wars In-Game Store Updates

• Updated localized strings for the In-Game Store.

Update - Friday, November 16, 2007

Guild Wars In-Game Store Updates

• Updated wording in the In-Game Store to clarify that players must own either the corresponding campaign (the original Guild Wars campaign, Factions, Nightfall or Eye of the North) or the PvP Access Kit before they can purchase the skill pack.

Bug Fixes

• Fixed a bug that allowed players to exploit their pet's corpse.

Update - Thursday, November 15, 2007

Guild Wars In-Game Store Updates

• Added In-Game Store support for both the Holiday and the Unlock Pack promotions. For more information on the promotions and the new Unlock Packs, please visit the In-Game Store or the Guild Wars website.

Imperial Herald

• The Imperial Herald located in the Great Temple of Balthazar has been updated with new announcements about the Xunlai House, the Unlock Pack promotion, the $100,000 Tournament series, new Guild Wars merchandise, and the Wintersday contest.

Bug fixes

• Fixed a bug on the second level of the Bloodstone Caves dungeon that caused a large group of bats to spawn on top of a resurrection shrine.
• Updated Confessor Dorian's model to correct some graphical errors.
• Fixed a bug that allowed Glyph of Swiftness to give its 25% recharge bonus to more than 3 spells; fixed a bug that prevented some projectiles from receiving their proper speed bonus.
• Fixed a bug with the Asuran Scan skill that prevented some damage types from being properly multiplied.
• Fixed a bug that prevented some visual effects from the Healing Springs [sic] skill from matching the in-game effect.

Miscellaneous

• The Xunlai Tournament House NPC now has rewards for the October Tournament.
• Reduced the healing attributes of Forgotten Priests in the Thirsty River to compensate for the increased effectiveness of their Word of Healing skill.

Guild Wars Wiki notes

• The text descriptions when calling status effects like conditions, enchantments, and stances have changed.
• The text description of Hypochondria has been re-worded.
• This update introduced a possible bug where many in-game NPCs have new (and sometimes incongruous) voice files.
• The total size of the update is about 34mb using the -image shortcut command.

Update - Tuesday, November 13, 2007

Play Balance Updates

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

Assassin

• Black Lotus Strike: decreased Energy gain to 5..18; this skill now counts as a lead attack.
• Expose Defenses: decreased duration to 1..11 seconds.
• Horns of the Ox: decreased damage to 1..11.
• Impale: increased casting time to 1 second.
• Trampling Ox: decreased damage to 5..20.

Mesmer

• Ineptitude: increased recharge time to 20 seconds.

Monk

• Word of Healing: decreased unconditional heal amount to 5..130.

Necromancer

• Soul Reaping: no longer gains any benefit from Spirits.

Ranger

• Barrage: increased damage to 5..20 damage.
• Energizing Wind: decreased duration to 1..31 seconds.
• Magebane Shot: increased disable time to 10 seconds; decreased recharge time to 5 seconds.
• Player Pets: no longer leave exploitable corpses.

Miscellaneous

• Changed the elite skill used by the henchman Mhenlo in Eye of the North to Word of Healing.

Guild Wars Wiki notes

• Many Korean accounts were permanently banned.

• The new description for Black Lotus Strike states that it is now possible to hit a non-hexed foe, but not gain energy. In reality, the attack will fail if used on a non-hexed foe.

Update - Thursday, November 08, 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

• Recall: when this Enchantment ends, it now disables all of the caster's Skills for 10 seconds.

Dervish

• Mystic Healing: decreased heal amount to 5...53...65.

Elementalist

• Shell Shock: decreased recharge time to 8 seconds. This Skill now has 25% armor penetration.

Mesmer

• Conjure Nightmare: decreased Energy cost to 15.
• Shrinking Armor: increased Health degeneration to 1...3...4.
• Signet of Illusions: fixed a bug that allowed this Signet to stack with itself.

Monk

• Blessed Light: increased heal amount to 10...114...140.
• Cure Hex: now affected by Healer's Boon.
• Glimmer of Light: decreased recharge time to 1 second; increased heal amount to 10...94...115.
• Healer's Boon: instead of an upkeep cost, this Skill now has a duration of 10...46...55 seconds and no longer ends after a number of Spells are cast.
• Healing Breeze: increased duration to 15 seconds; increased Health regeneration to 4...8...9.
• Healing Ribbon: now affected by Healer's Boon.
• Heal Party: increased heal amount to 30...78...90.
• Light of Deliverance: increased casting time to 2 seconds; decreased heal amount to 5...57...70; now affects all party members regardless of Health.
• Restful Breeze: increased duration to 8...16...18 seconds.
• Vigorous Spirit: decreased casting time to .25 seconds.
• Word of Healing: this Skill can now target the caster; increased non-conditional heal amount to 25...125...150; decreased recharge time to 3 seconds.

Necromancer

• Oppressive Gaze: conditional effect now only triggers on foes who are below 50% Health.
• Weaken Armor: decreased Energy cost to 5; decreased casting time to 2 seconds; decreased recharge time to 5 seconds; changed the skill type to a Spell; functionality changed to: "Target foe has Cracked Armor for 5...17...20 second(s)."

Ranger

• Energizing Wind: increased Energy cost to 15; decreased duration to 30...78...90 seconds; decreased Spirit's level to 1...5...6.
• Fertile Season: increased Energy cost to 15; decreased Health bonus to 50...130...150; decreased armor bonus to 8.
• Magebane Shot: functionality changed to: "If this attack hits, it interrupts target foe's action. If that action was a Spell, it is disabled for 5 seconds. This attack cannot be blocked."

Ritualist

• Ancestors' Rage: this Skill is no longer considered an Enchantment.
• Spiritleech Aura: fixed a bug that swapped duration and effect time.
• Weapon of Warding: increased duration to 5...9...10 seconds.
• Splinter Weapon: functionality changed to: "For 20 seconds, target ally has a Splinter Weapon. Target ally's next 1...4...5 attacks deal 5...41...50 damage on up to 3 adjacent foes."
• Sundering Weapon: increased duration to 5...17...20 seconds.

Warrior

• Body Blow: now works properly with scythes.
• Symbolic Strike: now works properly with scythes.

PvE-Only Skills

• Winds: fixed a bug that caused Winds (a Vanguard skill) to affect allies as well as foes.

Miscellaneous

• Added a trophy to the Great Temple of Balthazar to commemorate the current winners of the 2007 $100,000 Tournament Series.
• Removed the Celestial Tournament season PvP trophy from the Great Temple of Balthazar.
• Fixed an exploit in Regent Valley that allowed players to kill pet bears repeatedly to obtain multiple ale rewards from the Bear Hunters.
• Moved a patrol of Stone Summit Dwarves who often traveled too close to the entrance in Duncan the Black's level of Slaver's Exile.
• Fixed a bug that allowed Necromancer minions to count as kills for the Blessing of the Luxons and the Blessing of the Kurzicks.

Guild Wars Wiki notes

• The update notes are ambiguous about whether the duration increase for Sundering Weapon affected the duration of the Weapon Spell itself or the Cracked Armor condition inflicted by it. The duration increase was for the condition.
• The skill type of Ancestors' Rage was changed from Enchantment Spell to Skill.

Update - Thursday, November 01, 2007

Team Arena Map Updates

• Temporarily added Hero Battle maps to the Team Arena map rotation. We will be evaluating the addition of these maps over the course of the week. Additional adjustments may be made during that time period.

Bug Fixes

• Fixed a bug that placed some players in an English language district upon leaving a PvP mission even though they had previously set their district to a non-English language. (Note that in order to save a language district selection, players must first log out of the game while in their preferred language district.)
• Fixed a bug that prevented some players from completing the Factions quest "Little Creatures" on Shing Jea Island.
• Fixed a bug that displayed Pekk [Collector] as a Sentient Vine Collector rather than a Fungal Roots Collector.
• Fixed a bug that removed several NPCs from Lion's Arch.

Miscellaneous

• Updated the Automated Tournament map rotation.

Guild Wars Wiki notes

• Halloween decorations and NPCs have been removed.
• The Imperial Herald no longer mentions the Bonus Mission Pack. This is because the final date to become eligible for the pack was on October 31st.
• The Hero Battle Maps have been introduced into the Random Arenas as well.