Fansite Friday/Tome

Fansite: Guild Wars Tome (site no longer operating)

Date: 4 February

Number: 31

Q&A

Question: Awhile back it was suggested that after continuous victories in Tombs of the Primeval Kings you can unlock possible new areas or items. In the last weekend those who managed to make it to the Hall of Heroes found that their team won a Celestial Sigil. Are there any other rewards that we might notice this upcoming weekend, or that we can expect on release?

Answer: The upcoming Beta Weekend Event is mostly focused on the addition of a new region, that is, The Kingdom of Ascalon, before The Searing. I'm sure that you have seen the screenshots on the official site. We're really excited about this new region, and are looking forward to having people explore this part of Tyria and experience it in full. For release, you should expect that there will be more rewards along the lines of the Celestial Sigil, but at this time we really need to keep those rewards unrevealed for a little while longer. I know you don't care to hear this sort of answer, but it will be worth learning more when we can talk about it, so hold tight for future disclosures! And do read below for some pretty interesting info about PvP. ;)

Question: An issue that has been raised on one of the community forums is that some guilds have experienced problems where members might start a guild battle by accident, and then cost the guild a loss on the ladder. Is there any plan on preventing this by only letting some people start a battle, or should it be the guild's responsibility?

Answer: We've seen the question about the acceptance of guild challenges arise more than once. And it doesn't just apply to GvG, does it? For if someone is a little "start button happy", any match from Arena to Tombs of the Primeval Kings to Guild Battle can begin before a teammate's skills are set, a character is switched, or a player gets back from a food run.

We intend to provide the tools needed to properly manage a guild, but ultimately the guild itself will have some amount of management responsibility as well, such as being sure to select the appropriate leaders and agreeing on policies about challenges and other in-game functions. For some guilds the start up procedure might be having each member say or type "ready" before starting. For others it's simply understood that once you get in the Guild Hall and a party is formed, you don't step AFK for any reason.

So with our intention to provide the right guild-management tools, add to it our ability to stream content to you at any time. This means we can quickly adapt to problems if they manifest themselves. Should it become necessary to make an adjustment to the challenge acceptance, match-making, or combat start-up system, we are fully prepared to do so.

Question: So far over the past while we have seen changes in the Guild vs Guild battles, the latest seemed to be the catapult which can be used. Are there any more plans you have for GvG?

Answer: According to James Phinney, one of our game designers, everyone on the design team keeps in mind that Player versus Player combat, and particularly Guild versus Guild combat, is very important to the success of Guild Wars. We definitely intend to increase the variety of PvP and GvG options and to broaden the impact that having success in those areas will have on the rest of the game.

It is easy to assume that there is a gulf between players type: The cooperative PvM player and the competitive PvP player. But we know that the Guild Wars world will be inhabited with all kinds of players: the type who focus exclusively on PvP play, the type who play PvM only, and those who enjoy both. All of these kinds of players will be able to enjoy Guild Wars, because we're focusing on making it a well-rounded game that appeals to a very broad player base. It's exciting to keep in mind that as you play, your accomplishments in PvM can affect the PvP world, and that the opposite is also true, and your victories in PvP can affect the PvM world.

We have a lot of PvP content that we're working on right now, even given the focus of the upcoming Beta Weekend Event. One of the guild features currently under design and implementation will allow you to choose to attack a Guild Hall or allow you to select from several additional new maps. These new maps will be randomly chosen for you each time you play and each will offer different objectives and will support different styles of gameplay.

Bonus Question: For Fansite Friday #23, players asked about making a new possible trading system. As more and more people are beta testing, Guild Wars has more and more people shouting at Lion's Arch and Ascalon about wanting to buy and sell their goods. Has there been more progress of thinking of an auction system, or a separate trading city?

Answer: You are absolutely correct. There were problems with chat in town and we are examining various options to correct it. There were so many people offering items for trade that it was difficult to communicate with one another.

We are working on a method that will allow you to advertise items that you have for sale or trade, or to locate other players who are offering the things that you are looking for. We think that sequestering people off in a different trade zone wouldn't be quite a fun as welcoming them into the towns. So we will devise a trade system that will function wherever you are, with no travel required.

Welcome to the Guild Wars family, Guild Wars Tome! Gaile Gray