Talk:Fort Aspenwood/Archive1

X8 at last respawn (Luxion Warriors)

What is it talking about? And while I am here: Who thinks 5 seconds is too fast for a respawn rate? Done25 03:15, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

VERY VERY VERY VERY rarely the warriors will respawn 8 warriors instead of the usual 4. This seems to have something to do with a Kurzik player attacking the command post at the same time as the warriors respawning. Five seconds is DEFFINITLY not too long a respawn rate, the turtle is INCREDIBLY easy to shut down as it's seige attack has a long cast time and the turtle moves so slowly. It is also very easy to kill provided there are no monks on the luxon side. The turtle and warrior ai is very frustrating at times as a ranger with a longbow can keep it occupied forever indefinitly. The 8 warrior respawn bug happens maybe once in 50 games its so rare. Almost EVERY game the warrior AI bug kicks in. The turtle will die and the warriors will run into a wall inside the kurzik base, outside of most npc attack rangers and away from the battle. They won't attack kuzik players and often won't be attacked. For as long as they live the turtle and a new squad can't respawn and they don't do anything while glitched. This is a crippleing bug in the arena for the luxon side as it happens almost EVERY game. A luxon team attacking a kurzik team inside the green room with even just one monk can find this a death blow to the match. It's a problem with the arena which seriously cripples many luxon matches and has yet to be adressed by support, who I personally have written many tickets to about it. The last time they "fixed" the warrior ai bug, they changed it from a player being able to glitch the warriors, with some difficulty, to the warriors doing it 9/10 times a turtle dies inside the Kurzik base. At least before players didn't often glitch the warriors, now the game does it for them every game.I'm going to add some of this to the article to make players more aware of it. Dancing Gnome 18:30, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

Sorry about my earlier post I now see what you meant. The x8 at the last respawn was wrong, I changed it. I imagine the person thought the respawn bug was intentional which it is not. It can happen at any time the turtles respawn. Seeing as a squad's respawn is determined based on when all 5 members die, it has no set respawn time and so it is not possible to determine a "last respawn" in advance of it actually happening unless it was 6 seconds before the game was over, which is the last possible respawn and is certainly not the case. I also added a large section onto this article about player abuse. I was careful about formating as I'm not used to using wiki and I'm happy with the way it is laid out. Player Abuse is a prominent feature of this arena sadly and it should be documented here. I also added some small notes to the strategies section. Dancing Gnome 19:37, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

Actually when I was refering to the 5 second respawn I was talking about when the Kurzick have 3 monks and they are able to heal Gunther non-stop due to the fact that if you kill them they just come right back with full energy. Done25 14:08, 9 August 2007 (UTC)

I kinda agree with that, with enough monks on the Kurzik side it's almost impossible to take out gunther because they respawn almost instantly. The only time I ever win in that situation is when you cast meteore shower on the first monk, because he is desperate to heal gunther, he runs to the closest location to cast on him. The same goes for the other healers. By the time they get there the meteor shower starts and they all die. Funny but it only works with a smart luxon team, killing them quickly, and a foolish monk, standing in the same place as the others becoming vulnerable. 58.110.140.124 04:30, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

Leeching and Leaving

I wanted to comment again that both issues -- leeching and leaving -- are being still being researched and discussed by the designers. In fact, I would not be surprised to see them make at least a change or two in the upcoming weeks in an effort to help amend these problems. I don't have specifics or a definite timeline about the matter, but it seems appropriate to note that these are issues that the team considers important and worthy of discussion and resolution. --Gaile 00:39, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

Well I thought I would try to post something contructive for once (shock) even though it's probably too basic anyway. I've seen this discussed often in the Fort Aspenwood outpost and many people have come up with many different ideas of how to discourage this problem, i'll try to summarise the ones I thought were better here.

Possible Changes Against Leeching:

• Auto-kick players which are innactive for a period of time, maybe 3 mins, and replace them with a player in the queue.
• Remove rewards from players who don't leave the starting area of a map or player who don't perform a certain role/action such as attacking another player/npc or healing/buffing.
• Make it against the rules? - We can report them then.

Wow I thought I had more. Possible Changes Against Leaving:

• Cool down timer - maybe 15 mins where they are unable to re-enter any arena - not too extreme as there are valid reasons for leaving a match, however if you did leave for a reason if the reason was good you probably don't mind a 15 min cool down.
• Faction penalty - players lose faction when they leave a match.
• Fixing leeching will get rid of a lot of leaving imho.

I realise a lot of my suggestions can be got around with by making a bot but it's better than nothing, and if they are botting players can identify it and report them. I know some of my suggestions are extreme in consequences and might require programming changes, but I thought any ideas I could throw out there might help. I'd also like to point out common reasons I believe (and have been told) why players leave, it might help plan against it:

• Leechers are the most prominent cause of leavers. Many players leave simply because they don't want to help undeserving "players". Others think being down a person is too big a disadvantage and a waste of time.
• Normal rage quitters - usually against a bonder or a fast luxon team. Also often caused by glitches - if a seige squad glitches some players don't think it's worth their time - not really a problem of the game, rage quitters are their own problem, although the bugs are annoying.
• Because they can, there is nothing to stop them. I know this is a touchy issue as you don't want to penalise people and prevent them form having fun but it's worth mentioning.

Ok that's it. I wish it was more coherent but I want to help as much as I can, hopefully something there does. I will add more if I think of it, maybe someone else will contribute too. Dancing Gnome 06:45, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

Gnome, while your suggestions have merit, they are all punitive. Since Pavlov & Skinner, we've known that positive incentives work better at changing behavior, so perhaps an additional path to pursue might be a system that rewards positive action, and unless I'm mistaken, something along those lines already exists in AB. --Jawn Sno 18:00, 9 August 2007 (UTC)

While you are welcome to disagree with my suggestions I don't see you putting forward any of your own. If you are right and there is a reward for positive action present then consider Pavlov & Skinner wrong as the leeching problem in Aspenwood has only gotten worse this year. All I see is a reward for entering - which is the problem in the first place. Not all my suggestions are punitive. Removing rewards for people who don't participate isn't punitive, it's positive. If you don't do anything, you don't get anything, you don't get punished nor rewarded. If you participate you get rewarded. As it is, all the arena does is reward leechers, lowering the faction for losses only made losing due to leechers even worse, I havn't seen a noticable change since they made the change to encourage more active players. Many of my suggestions make a lot of sense, at least to me, and not unreasonable. Many other online games with random instanced PvP arenas use similair systems and were a lot more fair than this one as a result. I've considered other options such as boosting faction gained from kills but this still rewards inactive players is easily abusebale, doesn't encourage people to play the arena for its purpose and a number of other problems, but the current system can't claim much different.Dancing Gnome 06:38, 11 August 2007 (UTC)

Gnome, read what I said - I am not disagreeing with you, I said you made some good suggestions. And I did suggest a route to go with further ideas, which user Kite below, has taken up - better rewards for kills, end faction reduced, would be positive incentives. Please do not misinterpret what I say and imply that I was deprecating your ideas or saying they were of little value - I neither said nor implied that. Ok, now that's out of the way; I was in a party last night from the Luxon side that included three leechers who were apparently well-known enough that one of my party, Dame Something, left after commenting that 3 well-known leechers were in the group and stating she was taking a screen shot. It occurs to me that a fiendish trick would be for a guild or other affinity group to not only put its team in on the Kurzick side, but also to put a crew in on the other side, whose jobs would be to do nothing, making an easy win for the Kurzicks and helping to garner faction points for their guild. Wonder if somthing like that's going on with these leeches, especially when they come on 3-4 at a time. --Jawn Sno 16:24, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

I, personally, think having the kill faction significantly boosted and the end faction lowered, and making the kill faction gains so that they're dependent upon activity would work. Also, perhaps faction gains based on killing turtles/warriors or the door guards, or faction for running amber(though there would need to be a similar gain opportunity for the Luxons) would work. Kite 20:38, 11 August 2007 (UTC)

I like the idea but if the faction is rewarded to the player who scores the kill then that's all that players will do. They will run around trying to kill Kurzik players instead of playing the arena, maybe if the amount of faction gained for the number of kills of other players/npcs was increased but caped (so you only get boosted faction for the first x kills, maybe 3 at decreasing intervals), this is a problem for healers or non killing characters who don't score kills but support/pressure a lot. Maybe they could reward the entire team but that still rewards leechers. They could reward players for taking mines/command posts, giving faction to the ones who did it, probably include nearby players who fought off opposing team members to aid the mine capper, or the monk who healed the mine capper. This rewards active players, and encourages people to play the arena properly. If victory faction was lessened and faction was rewarded for other things such as kills or taking mines, it would encourage a more active play style from people. Dancing Gnome 07:09, 12 August 2007 (UTC)

I have an idea based on Alliance Battles. How about changing random entry to requiring two separate teams of four for both Luxon and Kurzick sides.

From my personal experience, AB does not have nearly as many leechers as FA. I'm speculating that it has to do with leechers required to be in a team to enter a game. In FA, the leecher does not have to deal with joining a team, so it's very easy for them to get into a game. If FA required team entry like AB, then I believe leechers will have a harder time entering games. The more notorious leechers will probably never get into a group. I know this idea won't completely eliminate leeching, but I think it will lessen the amount of leeching that goes on in FA. It's really frustrating for players when there is absolutely nothing they can do about a leecher. But with team entry, it gives a tool for players to at least filter out leechers from their own team.

There is another reason I like this idea, but it's not related to leeching. It encourages more coordination and a better balance of 8 players. The randomness of 8 sometimes yields weak offense, no one to heal turtles/gate guards, no defense, etc. With team entry, players have the option of building a 4-man team that can escort their turtle and focus on one gate side for the Luxons, or focus on defending one gate side for the Kurzicks.

Whenever I wanted to play FA with friends, I would have to sync-enter with them. Generally, it would work, but it wasn't 100% reliable. Teams of four will allow friends/guildies/alliance members to team up and enjoy FA together. Tedium 11:59, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

I don't know if you understood my idea, Dancing Gnome. Currently, when someone dies(or is killed, I don't know which is more correct), the entire other team is awarded a bit of faction. I think that that kill faction should be boosted up higher, and that inactive players ought to be excluded from the faction distribution.

I hadn't viewed this from the Luxon perspective, however, so I can sort of see your point. All I do as a Kurzick is run around killing stuff until I get to an amber mine. =P Perhaps have the Luxon kill faction bonus scale on how many gates are currently destroyed? So, for example, if four of the gates(excluding the Green gate) are destroyed, each active Luxon would get four faction per kill. 'Course, then you'd have to balance out the Kurzicks as well... Kite 16:46, 15 August 2007 (UTC)

I play on the kurzick side , and I often hear something along the lines of "I've got my other account leeching on the luxon side and you still cant win???" I really don't think just changing the faction rewards will help much.--Teh Uber Pwnzer 06:16, 20 August 2007 (UTC)

I like the idea of organised teams in Aspenwood but it creates a bigger problem than what we already have. I beleive the entire balance of Aspenwood is that it is random, you don't plan who you go in with and you don't know what other people's builds are. As the arena currently is it is possible for one person on either side to tip the balance, (a bonder monk on the kurzick side can hold off an entire team, 4 would = win without chained well of profane), and the luxon side I have seen nukers break down every gate without healers and the gatekeepers with two spells, fire storm and mark of rodgort. This shows how delicate the balance is in this arena, and if you've played a match on the luxon side against 4 Kurzik monks, two bonders and two healers, and then even a restoration rit, you will know that it is too easy to guarantee win with an organised team. Just imagine a bonder, a prot monk with heals, a healer and either a restoration rit or a shelter spammer. Luxon players likely couldn't win. You can enter at the same time but this often fails and isn't too big of a problem, showing the current system with its problems but nothing too out of balance. Some way has to be found to either punish leechers and or remove rewards from them. 58.110.140.124 04:26, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

Can we really punish leavers, though? I know that not all of them are leaving because they dont like the way its turning out. I had to leave Aspenwood once because I had to go somewhere. If we punish people who have no choice to leave, then what? However, I do like the idea of leaving cooldown - just not faction subtraction :3 --Troy Frostwind 16:17, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

yes, we can... but not by actually punishing them, but by not awarding them the faction they've earned trough the match! -- Alexanderpas Talk|Contrib 16:27, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

Leavers already don't get the victory/loss faction, usually loss after a leaver. Sure there are legitimate reasons to leave and we have seen proposed cool down timers on the RA leavers, hopefully they will be implemented here. Faction Penalty I guess is a difficult subject, it might not be necessary, if the cool down timer works then we don't need anything else. Leeching will remain a problem however, and is far more malicious than leavers are. I would like leeching to be at least made against the rules, that requires no programming effort at all and tells players this is not accepted. One of the most frustrating things about some leechers is when they say "I'm not breaking any rules," and they are right. I would at least like to hear the reasoning (and it might be good) on why they don't have a rule against leeching. Dancing Gnome 15:18, 30 August 2007 (UTC)

It's been over a month since Gaile's original post claiming that leeching and leaving are considered "important and worthy of discussion and resolution" yet we have seen nothing. You can say that the launch of GW:EN got in the way of this, but that excuse can't be used considering these problems have exhisted in the arena since launch, way back in the first half of 2006. 17 Months later the problem still exists and still nothing has been done to stop it aside from a very belated and completely useless faction rewards nerf. When will this problem, "important and worthy of discussion and resolution", be dealt with? Dancing Gnome 16:43, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

I have seen an increasing number of leeches recently and i have a feeling that there will eventually be a case that two teams of 8 leechers will eventually be pitted against each other. if this did happen it might help to discourage leechers from doing it again. I was once put into FA and the other 7 in my team were leechers so if the event i have shown hasnt already occured then it will probably happen soon. --The Thunderbolt Guy 20:23, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

Fort Aspenwood as of 8/23/07

Welp. I never thought I'd see the day that FA was changed in favor of a side. I had always hoped, because of the obvious luxon advantage, but never really expected it. Well, today it happened. But wait, its the wrong side. As of todays update, the range of turtle siege has been increased, and the kurzick gates no longer autoclose. Meaning that now, when running amber, we have to take that extra 2 seconds (3 times per run) to close the gates. Forget it once, and the luxon army can simply rush pass the little pathetic defense the NPC's give. Not to worry though, as the turtles range is increased, making them even safer when launching their 250 AoE damage attacks. It may just be a concidence, but the number of Kurzick leechers/leavers seems to have doubled. I just played a nice 7 games in a row, in which a minimum of 3 people, max at one time of 5, left or leeched in the first 30 seconds of the game. I have always enjoyed FA, even enough to keep playing dispite those leechers. But no more. I quit FA, and therefore GW as its the only mode besides AB which I enjoy (and most of my AB buddies hardly play anymore) until GWEN comes out. I will then probably beat GWEN, and, if FA isnt fixed by then, file GW under my drawer of good memories, and go play something else. Its been a rocken 21 months and 2400hrs, but this is the last straw for me friends.--Ryudo 03:57, 24 August 2007 (UTC)

The gates not auto-closing anymore can be a problem, along with the ton of leechers, but the turtles arent really that bad. Imo, its not biased at all. Do you know how incredibly easy it is for a single ranger to completely shut down a turtle? Do you know how easy a game is if we get a bonder or two?(I play on kurz side btw). Everything in FA has a simple counter (including bonders but still). 76.2.19.31 06:11, 25 August 2007 (UTC)

The turtle range increase is in their favour? That's a joke right? Now the turtle wont move so long as there is a Kurzik player on the ledge nearby, 5 second res, 2 second walk to the ledge, even if all u are doing is dieing you can keep the turtle from moving inside the Kurzick base indefinitly - at least long enough to kill it before it does any damage, and I've already seen people who figured this out instead of whingeing they use it to buy time to kill the turtle or simply win. This was in you favour, I would gladly see the luxons have lesser range returned, it means the turtle actually moves inside, forceing the Kurzik defense further in, closer to the target. The above comment is right, its an arena where certain builds are more effective and certain strategies are more effective, but thats why it's random. Without prior knowledge of your team make up and the opposition you take risks, bringing Well of Profane is great agaisnt bonders but with a good offense its insanely easy to stop, without a party which knows you need a corpse it's useless. Without a bonder AT ALL it's a useless skill. Sometimes you win sometimes you lose,its the luck of the draw, the only thign you can control is your bui;d and your play style, make the most of it. Some matches I guarantee you its impossible for the Luxons to win, sometimes its impossible for Kurzicks to win. Dancing Gnome 15:06, 30 August 2007 (UTC)

Second 'strategy' section

Hey, I just want to let everyone know that I've removed the second strategy section that was added at the bottom of the page. If you want to put it back, I'd recommend that you add it into the section that currently exists. it just looked odd having it sit there at the bottom like that. (Terra Xin 01:18, 9 September 2007 (UTC))

Did you remove it completely or did you move it to where it should be? Dancing Gnome 05:14, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Gates not closeing automatically

I removed this from the listing as a bug. It seems intentional to me. It's not drama - just pull the lever as u run through - not much effort, the gate closes faster, players can run in and out freely without running into a wall. More control is what it does, it doesn;t disadvantage you unless you are lazy, and if that's the case you disadvantage yourself. Dancing Gnome 11:42, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

I disagree with the remove. The gate change wasn't indicated in any update notes and is different from what it has been for a long time. Until there is confirmation that it was an intentional change, it is still worth mentioning. Tedium 22:55, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

I also disagree with the remove, for the reasons stated above. Can't imagine Anet doing something like that without noting it....actually I can, but I dont want them to, lol.--Ryudo 01:17, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

Question

Should there really be a build at the bottom? Romina 02:09, 21 June 2007 (UTC)

Today I had the urge to play Fort Aspenwood on Kurzick side. It was a terrible mistake! My team consisted of 3-6 human players. The rest had some clickbots or makros running. They were just standing afk waiting for the real players to win. If nature or the telephone calls it can be acceptable to stop and let the other seven players continue but not if you encounter that the names of the leechers repeat themselves. FA is therefore one of the most anoyable locations in GW and there should be a mechanism to prevent and/or punish this behaviour. Previously I encountered that some Luxons use the save starting point as a location for getting their survivor title up. Therefore, losing a match should involve a "free" death.

• I think there is a report system now. I'm hoping this helps cure the problem, it always annoyed me too. Though I think the faction rewards are a little too low now, if you lose :(. Miss Innocent 17:12, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

am going to aim to provide the skills of all npcs involved in FA anyone willing to help would be appreciated. Masterofthat 19:07, 21 July 2007 (UTC)

THE PROBLEM - Lamers

I'm sick of seing idiot monks who are too inept to win in a "human" way and decide just to bond an npc. People will say that it's enough to attack the monk with a caster; If there IS a caster in the luxon team, which is rather rare as they all love warriors and rangers, the monk can run back for a few seconds and just heal the npc again, as pro spirit only has a 5 sec cooldown. Stripping enchantments doesn't go far as protective spirit is quickly reapplied, followed by a huge heal. Profane Well doesn't appear to work here (thx anet!) and I have to waste an elite (Silence Shroud) just to get past lamers who never miss to be there when i DON'T take it, and often aren't there when i do (i guess i'm just cursed by god). This is the real plague, as a lamer gets in average 3 luxon players to leave (thx!) and puts my team in no condition of winning. I would like all of you to give suggestions as to stop this bullsh*** and make the game interesting. Waiting for replies. Have fun!

Fort Aspenwood - Balanced or Biased?

I'd just like to gather some data from other FA players out there. Namely, do you believe that Fort Aspenwood is a balanced arena? Or is it biased towards one of the factions? If so, why?

My Analysis

Personally, having played both sides of the game, I feel that FA is biased towards the Luxons, for a number of reasons:

1. Siege Turtles.

These Luxon NPCs have amazing damage potential, and good defenses against Kurzick players in the form of their warrior escort, Carrier's Defense and most importantly, their long range that enables them to fire with impunity at defending Kurzick NPCs without fear of retaliation. Left to their own devices, a Luxon Siege Turtle squad can take out ALL of the defenders on its respective side if the Kurzick players don't somehow intervene.

I feel that this needs to be corrected; the Luxons should not be able to sit back and let the Turtle do all the work for them. The siege turtles should definitely make it easier for the Luxons to break through the gates, but they should NOT be able to break through gates on their own.

2. Team Diversity.

The Kurzicks have multiple roles that they must fulfil in this mission in order to succeed. The four most important are:

• Amber runners (for repairing gates and speeding up the timer)
• Damage dealers (in order to capture mines and kill attacking Luxon players and NPCs)
• Gate defense (as stated above, the Kurzick gates cannot stand up to the Luxon NPCs on their own. They need assistance from Kurzick players if they are to hold out for more than 30 seconds)
• Healing of critical NPCs (This overlaps a little with Gate defense, but it primarily refers to healing of the Gatekeepers and Master Architect Gunther. If the Luxons manage to break through the Green gate, you can bet that the match will be over within a minute unless the Kurzicks have a monk or ritualist player (and usually they need more than one!) to help keep them alive and healed.)

In contrast, the Luxon players have only one role they must fulfil: Damage. All of their mission critical objectives involve killing something:

• Kill the mine defenders so Kurzick players can't run amber
• Kill the Gate defenders
• Kill the Gatekeepers
• Kill Master Architect Gunther

The only reason Luxon players have to diverge from a pure damage build is if the Kurzick players either:

• have a bonder (which is far from guaranteed on the Kurzick side)
• have players dedicated to shutting down/killing Siege Turtles

And even for the latter, the only reason why that was important was because the Kurzick players frequently made use of the bug to trap the Luxon warrior escort so the Turtles wouldn't respawn. With the 16/08/07 update, the Luxon warriors do a frontal suicide run that pretty much ensures their demise as soon as their Turtle is dead. This means that it is no longer possible to deny the Luxons the benefit of their Siege Turtles, and thus the need for the Luxons to bring a healer/protector for the Turtles is now almost zero.

The end result of all this is that it is far, far more important for the Kurzicks to have a balanced team. If they are lacking in just one of the four key roles, odds are that they will lose the match if the Luxon team has any level of basic competence. On the other hand, the Luxons can afford to enter matches with pure damage builds and still expect to have a reasonable chance of victory.

3. Diminishing Resources.

The Kurzicks have to deal with steadily diminishing resources as the match wears on. Fully half of their NPC defenders do not respawn after they are killed (the non-Gate Kurzicks). This means that, for the Luxons, provided they score some NPC kills with each foray into the Fort, subsequent attacks become easier and easier. In contrast, the Luxons' Siege Turtle squads respawn at full strength every time the previous squad dies. They remain as viable at 15 minutes on the clock as they were at 0 minutes.

Suggestions for Improvement

So what do I propose be done to level the playing field? I have a couple of options below. I certainly don't expect ALL of them to be implemented; that would grant too great an advantage to the Kurzicks, but I hope that ANet will at least consider putting in some of these changes.

1. Tone down the Siege Turtles.

By themselves, the Siege Turtles are a pretty balanced NPC. They're powerful, but they also have their weaknesses which can be exploited by a canny Kurzick player. However, when taken together, their multitude of defenses and the ease with which they return to the battlefield puts an inordinate amount of pressure on the Kurzick team. Some means by which the Siege Turtles can be toned down:

• Increase the respawn time of slain Siege Turtle squads from 1 minute to 3 minutes.
• Add a 10 second recharge to Carrier Defense. Currently Siege Turtles can spam this indefinitely while on the move, making it impossible for melee characters to deal any damage to them unless the turtles are in place and firing.
• Replace two of the Luxon Warriors from the Turtle's escort with one Luxon Longbow (using the same build as the ones that guard the mines). This will reduce the damage the Turtle's escort can give, but at the same time give them a bit more versatility.

2. Beef up the Gate Defenses.

Currently the Kurzick gate NPCs have powerful defenses against melee characters, but are much weaker against ranged characters and spellcasters (and of course, they're laughable against the Siege Turtles). I suggest adding the following additional Kurzick NPCs to the following gates:

• Outer Gates: Add one Kurzick Mesmer to each of the Outer Gates
• Inner Gates: Add one Kurzick Monk to each of the Inner Gates. These monks use the same build as the ones in the Duel of the Houses quest.
• Green Gate: Add two Kurzick Monks and one more Juggernaut to the Green Gate. Furthermore, change the Juggernaut's build so they, too, have Carrier Defense. (Seriously, how come the Siege Turtles have it but the Juggernauts don't??)

The addition of the monks and other NPCs should make the gates able to stand up to a Siege Turtle squad for a fair amount of time without help from Luxon players. Eventually, the monks will run out of energy and the Siege Turtles will take them out, but if the Luxons want to break through a gate QUICKLY, they'll need to provide the turtle with backup.

The presence of two monks at the Green Gate means that one Siege Turtle squad will not be able to break through it on its own (which I feel is as it should be). TWO Siege Turtle squads will be able to (which if the Luxon players have been playing well and in a coordinated manner, they can easily arrange).

3. Adjustments to the Command Posts

Currently, there's no real reason for the Kurzick players to even bother attacking the Command Posts; capturing the Command Posts does nothing to hamper the Luxons or any existing turtle squads, and the Luxons can easily retake them. I propose making the following changes:

• Add two more Luxon warriors to each of the Command Posts.
• When the Kurzicks capture a Command Post, it spawns with one Kurzick ranger, one Kurzick necromancer and one Kurzick warrior.
• If the Kurzicks manage to capture a Command Post, all Luxon players and NPCs in the mission suffers from a 30% morale penalty. If both Command Posts are captured, these penalties stack to a maximum of 60%. If the Luxons subsequently recapture the Command Posts, this morale penalty disappears.
• When the Kurzicks capture a Command Post, the matching Turtle Squad, if still alive, will immediately start heading back to try to recapture it.

These changes should help reward Kurzick players who decide to attempt capturing a Command Post, while at the same time encouraging Luxon players to devote some attention to defending their Command Posts.

In Closing

I love Fort Aspenwood; it's one of the more unique and exciting PvP modes in Guild Wars. I hope that these proposed changes will not only help to balance the battle between the two sides, but help inject some new life and excitement into it. I look forward to seeing any comments or further ideas. --Zaxares 14:27, 18 August 2007 (UTC)

That was a very thorough, well-written and well-thought-out post. However, I cannot agree. As a player for the Luxon side, I have probably played well over 200 matches of Aspenwood, and I can safely say I've probably lost just as much as I've won, if not moreso.

The balance of Aspenwood comes from the fact that, in my experience, Kurzick players bring builds that are highly effective for what they need to do: run amber, protect/heal NPCs, and above all, stall. They bring bonder monks, tanks, spirit spammers, nukers to retake mines, Ranger amber runners, and so on. Most Luxon players, by contrast, bring a generic damage build. Luxon teams often do not have Monks to heal turtles, or any sort of enchantment removal, which means certain victory for the Kurzicks if there are enough monks to Prot/Bond both gates.

Also remember, this is supposed to be a siege. It makes sense for there to be diminishing resources within the fortress; that's what a siege is. Despite what you say, the Fort is difficult to break into and it's almost impossible to gain a foothold inside unless you have an effective Luxon team. Turtle squads aren't enough by themselves; Kurzicks know exactly how to kill turtles, with hexes and degen, and they will go down in seconds if there's no Monk babysitting them (and there usually isn't).

In short, while Aspenwood may be a place where skill on the Kurzick side probably is more necessary than on Luxon, I couldn't count the number of times a skilled Kurzick defense has led to Luxon defeat, and believe me, it is a very special humiliation to lose Fort Aspenwood on the Luxon side, because it means you had to fail and be shut down repeatedly. I feel it is balanced as is. Just fix the leechers and leavers, please. :P Arshay Duskbrow 17:31, 18 August 2007 (UTC)

"Furthermore, change the Juggernaut's build so they, too, have Carrier Defense. (Seriously, how come the Siege Turtles have it but the Juggernauts don't??)"

The Juggernauts don't have it because it's a Turtle-based skill. It would be interesting for the Juggernauts to have something equivalent to it, though. Besides Juggernaut Toss, I mean. Kite 17:07, 18 August 2007 (UTC)

To Arshay: Thanks for the reply. :) However, I feel that your post kind of vindicates what I'm trying to say; that the Kurzick players must be of a higher caliber (in builds, in cooperation and in general skill) in order to stand a chance of success. If it's a mediocre Kurzick team against a mediocre Luxon team, the Luxons are the ones who will probably win. That, to me, does not suggest a balanced map and as such, I still feel that a few of the suggestions I made earlier would help the Kurzicks have a fighting chance if they do not have an optimal team. (I've noticed that most FA matches I play tend to either run the full duration, or are over before the timer even crosses the 50% mark. I can count on my fingers the number of times I've had matches that were played down to the wire.)

That said, I do understand Fort Aspenwood is a random Competitive Mission, and I know that the vagaries of Fate means that one will certainly have days when one gets a team of 4 assassins and 3 warriors. :P Nothing to do but suck it up and see how long you can hold out in that event.

To Kite: The Juggernauts in Jade Quarry get Carrier's Defense too, so it's not a Turtle-exclusive skill. --Zaxares 10:19, 20 August 2007 (UTC)

Oops, nevermind that then. I've never gotten a chance to go into the Jade Quarry, so I didn't know. o.o; Kite 17:38, 20 August 2007 (UTC)

Before I say anything I will say I'm a Luxon Player. I don't believe there is much of a balance problem here, just bugs and player abuse ie leeching and leaving. I think you tend to be a bit bias towards the side you play for, and that is reflected in your post. The turtle squads are certainly not a big threat to a team that is doing their job to stop them. Degen or just interruptions can stall and kill, or just stall a squad indefinitely. I've seen a ranger keep a turtle occupied in between the inner and outer gates for an entire match because bow range keeps them out of aggro range of the warriors and the turtle doesn't move while someone is in front of it until they die. This last point seems to be worse atm as Kurzick players on the ledge now prevent the turtle from moving until they die, making it very difficult to get the squad inside the base because if players keep running there the turtle won't move until they are no longer there. Sure there are diminishing resources, as there should be. Kurzick players aren't required to take our mines or command posts to win, they just need to stop us. The only npcs we have then is the turtle squads, which are 10 npcs for your entire base. Lets not forget that 90% of matches, no exaggeration, the squads re spawn will stall due to bad warrior bug which often leads to a loss. A good Kurzik team with makes it impossible to win without the turtles in the green room. Kurzik player need to protect 1, or 3, NPCs and Luxons need to kill them. Luxons need to run from outside the base all the way in to the green room before they can start killing them each time a player dies. Kurzik players walk 10 feet and they are there.

The squads are no immune to interrupts so the siege attack is a skill which is often shut-down completely anyway, and warriors are still limited to aggro range before they do anything so until the turtle dies they often do nothing, and when the turtle does die they stall more often than not anyway it doesn't matter. Even if they didn't you probably noticed by now the developers intentionally placed elementalists with Ward against melee spam and necros with reckless haste, all targeted at dealing with melee aka warriors, and the green gate has mesmers to stop nukers. I should also point out many matches are lost because the turtle can be killed by a lone necro or mesmer with degen hexes with three casts, they can die and the turtle still goes down without a healer. Your comment that monks should be put at the gates would blow this arena way out of balance, prot spirit and heals would keep the gate up indefinitely, with pressure from kurzik players even luxon players plus a squad would find it very difficult, not to mention the monk would help out bonders further making them a big problem. The turtle squad doesn't have a healer in it for a reason, the same with gatekeepers. I've seen many matches where players see a bonder on both gates and leave because of it. It is for this reason I strongly oppose organised teams in aspenwood. The juggernaut is a different npc from the turtle and it has its own skills that the turtle doesn't, its function is different from the turtle and so it is different from the turtle.

I could go on and on about this but it would be pointless. The arena may not be exactly balanced between both sides, but its pretty close. How bias the arena is to one side or the other depends on the builds the players bring, which advantages or weaknesses they choose to exploit. When I play the Kurzick side 90% of games the only time anyone will run amber is the first attack on the mine and then they forget it. Kurzick players don't lose because its unfair, they lose because they didnt play well, and it's often the same for luxons. 58.110.140.124 04:14, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

I've got to side with zaxares on this one, Luxon advantage is stupidly apparent, even the luxons I play against admit it when I play them. Yes, the gates can be repaired, but that requires managament of the mines and of the gate status, and of enemy presence in the base. Yes, the turtles can be intruppted, but that requires management of the turtles skills, and of course watching out for anyone else attacking you. The kurzicks could, realistically, be forced to assign: 1 inturrupter per turtle, 1 mine taker per mine, and being generous, 1 stupidly good person as luxon war cleanup. thats 5 people, right there. Whereas 2 good luxons is all it would take to break through a gate (ele nukes first gate, war goes and tanks npc's while ele does AoE around him.

Those turtles are more of a threat than you luxons think. If Kurz team spawns without at least 1 intuppter and 1 prot monk, we normally lose, due to the massive damage that those turtles do (in the realm of 150 damage to wars, and 250-300 damage to casters). Don't forget, thats AoE too. The Luxon hammer wars are strong too, getting hit with 4x renewing smash in the space of 2 seconds is no picnic.

Are these odds beatable? Well, obviously, you just build right. You bring AoE skills and running skills on your ele, as much for mine capping as well as killing annoying SF sins. You stack interrupts on your mesmer, and ranger, and maybe even bring one on your war. You bring tank skills as a melee character. And if your a monk, you be damn sure to bring PS and a 20% enchant weapon. But luxons? If your a monk, your probably healing the turtle. If your anything else, your killing s***. That my friends, is unbalanced.

/signed zaxares. Maybe not that many monks, but defiantly signed. But if it was me, I would make the juggy move faster, and put 3 of em at green gate. That'll be nice. (I really need to remember to sign) --Ryudo 22:25, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

I have to say I agree that the Luxons are overpowered, try going through the first Luxon portal as an 60 armor profession, if a siege turtle is attacking the green gate then you just get clobbered by it's escort and if you try to run away you just get knocked down (how do you spell repeatedly? no matter how I spell it it looks wrong) from "Coward!". further more a Kurzick bonder is not so difficult to take down as everyone pretends all it takes is one ele spamming immolate on you and you are forced to divide your attention which greatly increases the chances of you allowing either you or the gate guard to die, to pile on top of that the fact that the siege turtles attacks hit you half the time I have this happen to me frequently when the npc i am bonding runs away from the gate to pursue a Luxon in order to continue healing them you must move closer to the gate the npc then moves back to its original position and when the turtle fires at it you are close enough to the gate to be caught in the blast radius. as for rangers shutting down the siege turtle they must either stand in a position outside where anyone can attack them to defend the outer gate or in a position where anyone with a ranged attack can attack them for the inner gates, despite my ranting however it is not as unbalanced as i make it sound and i reckon that it could be made much more fair with just a few changes:

1. To spawn a siege turtle the Luxons must convince their commanders that they are making progress and that throwing turtles into the fight isn't a waste of resources, meaning that they must have control of both command points and must bring a refined amber to one of them to spawn a turtle there, (NOTE: there would still be a minimum time delay between a turtles death and its spawn to prevent the amber being immediately handed to the commander upon the turtles death.) The main aim of this is to introduce some order of co-operation into the Luxon team which can actually win a match at the moment with absolutely no co-operation provided individual members of the team are powerful enough. the fact that the Luxons must control both command points would also emphasize their importance much more keenly and would hopefully lead to the command posts being viewed as key strategic points to captured rather than the current attitude towards them which is more along the lines of "There's no one around i guess ill just captured that command post before finding someone to kill"

2. This second change would have very little effect upon intelligent players but would greatly reduce the effectiveness of a "stupid" Luxon team. This would be the introduction of monks to each gate (please finish reading my ideas about the monks before forming opinions) These monks would be equipped with skills along the lines of: Word of Healing (elite) the factions equivalent of heal other healing seed healing breeze and Dwaynas Kiss, the theme among these skills is the fact that (with the exception of healing breeze an easily removed enchantment) they all heal other people rather than the caster meaning the monk itself would be easy to wipe out however it would be able to greatly slow down an enemy who didn't focus immediately on the monk.

I personally believe that these 2 changes would go a long way to evening out FA as well as helping add a new depth of strategy. 79.67.98.122 21:10, 25 August 2007 (UTC) (strange could of sworn i was signed in Masterofthat 21:11, 25 August 2007 (UTC))

i have to agree as well, the siege turtles make things too easy for the Luxons. the siege attack can take over half you health if you are at the center of the radius and can kill you in one shot if you are the target. And the juggernaut is completely useless against it.

For improvement:

• Give turtles a longer spawning time
• perhaps make them require more that one bundle of amber
• Give the Kurzicks 2 juggernauts to guard the green gate
• Reduce damage done by turtles by 50-100 to give Kurzicks a better chance

--The Thunderbolt Guy 20:15, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

• I'm a bonder monk on the side of the Kurzicks and I must say that Fort Aspenwood is indeed biased than balanced. Every time I watched the gates I find out that it's inevitable that they would fall even to a siege turtle unless I'm around to protect the Kurzick npcs. If the Luxon assault on a gate is repulsed, they would return with a much easier task, having permanently killed the npcs who are not assigned to the gate (Kurzick Assassins, Warriors & Rangers). Even if I can keep the gate npcs alive, it only takes a Luxon caster to finish me off.

I know we're on the defensive, but note that in the cinematic with Kommandant Durheim, he also said that he would like to see us attack them as well by taking out their Command Points. The only time I ever see my Kurzick party attack them would be whenever the Luxon party have enough leechers or leavers that they cannot mount an assault on the fort. How many times must I hope for them to have leechers or leavers for us to mount our own assault?

Whenever I join the opposite side to earn Luxon factions for general purposes, I realize that I don't even have to contribute to the battle at all for the team to win. I am pretty much disappointed with ArenaNet for not properly making this Alliance Battle, and for not making any improvements to the Kurzick defense to make our job just a little easier. 165.21.154.76 10:23, 5 November 2007 (UTC)

I fear nothing is ever going to change this, now that GW2 is in the works. Shame that nobody ever bothers with Jade Quarry. Luxons are always on the attack, Kurzicks always on the defense. For a totally newb team, the Luxon objective is easier to grasp, as Zaxares analyzed. I would prefer a set of 5 alternating maps assigned according to wins/losses or on a random basis. Then we would have "Kurzick offense, Luxon offense, Kurzick defense, Luxon defense and a balanced map" with different objectives. But given the time frame that was needed to give Allegiance faction a meaning, I am skeptical. --Longasc 07:36, 16 November 2007 (UTC)

Playing as a ranger on the Kurzick side I set one skill on my bar, Savage Shot, the rest of my bar was empty. With just that one skill I was able to stop a Siege Turtle and it's entire escort squad (for the ENTIRE match) by standing on a ledge interrupting a very slow activating Siege Turtle skill every 10 seconds. Turtle is overpowered? Give me a break.

It must be very nice to be able to simply camp your res shrine and win the match. I can't tell you how many times I have lost becuse the Kurzicks had 3 or 4 monks. All they do is heal/prot gunther...die...res in 6 seconds(AT FULL ENERGY).....run down the hill(about a 5 second run)...and spam heal/prot again until they run out of energy or die, then they repeat. And since they are invulnerable for five seconds after they res you can't snare or kill them before they get back into casting range of gunther. I have broken into the green gate within TWO minutes of the match starting and still lost because of this. Totally unfair.

• • I usually play on the Kurzick side, though I've played some on the Luxon side. I can't say that the Kurzicks require more skill. The Luxon groups need to stick together and stay coordinated, which is difficult for eight random people to do. Also, one really good monk seems to be able to keep Gunthir alive under moderate pressure from eight people if the Luxons don't have any enchantment removal.

• • I think the map might slightly favor the Kurzicks. I'm not completely sure, but I feel like it does. Miss Innocent 17:24, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

This is DEFINITELY in favor of the Kurzicks. It's extremely easy for a ranger to shoot interrupts to a turtle, making it useless, but worst of all, i HATE MONKS! They play the WHOLE MATCH behind a door, keeping up an npc, which is nearly impossible to kill. And if it IS killed, oh well, there is still another door behind. Enchantment stripping often isnt' enough, given to the fast recharge of Protective Spirit, so i decided to use Profane Well..... IT FUCKING DOESN'T WORK!!!!!! Monks are still abnle to cast spells on those stupid npcs. I haven't tryed out Shadow Shroud, but still, you waste an elite just to get past lamers? And hardly anobody ever brings anything to do with encantment removing on the luxon side. I thinks it's ok to HEAL the npcs, but prot spirit like that is just LAME! My solution is, change a Luxon Warrior with a Luxon Assassin who uses Shadow Shroud and FIX PROFANE WELL! I'm sick of people who just make the game boring for 16 (SIXTEEN!) peolpe just to get an easy win. (Sometimes there are 4 monks in a kurzick team -.-)

I'd have to say that Fort Aspenwood is very Balanced, for both sides. The only thing that unbalances this map are the human players involved. I've witnessed all skill levels and an endless amount of diverse builds, ever since factions has been released. It all boils down to the individual player skill level and the builds involved. If people build and play the map for what it is, the map is indeed balanced. One suggestion that would improve the chance of your team playing a tactical game on either side (although I don't know if it's at all possible with this engine), would be to have some sort of a tactical planning screen and an increased countdown (once in game) before the game starts.

• ie, 120 second count down till game time and a screen u can toggle in and out of that shows each member of your party and the build they are running. This seems like the only possible way to ensure balance in FA.

Maybe even a full screen map u can draw on like the mini map with a collapsing player list. Just a thought, maybe we'll see this sort of thing in GW2's world pvp ;) Phunky Town 03:30, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

This mission is obviously biased. They just updated the game preventing the FA gates from closing if a gate NPC were to be behind it. And what do the Kurzicks get in return? Nothing. The Kurzick NPCs in between the gates and in the middle of the fort do not even respawn after they're killed, whereas the Luxon Siege Turtles and Warriors respawn everytime they die. I guess I should understand ArenaNet favoring the Luxons because they're pirates, and Pirates of the Carribean is a big hit among audiences today. 165.21.154.108 01:42, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

Agreed. Fort Aspenwood is biased towards the Suxons. All it takes is a mesmer to have the Spiritual Pain skill to easily wipe out the amber mines. Kurzicks dont even hav any skill that can do such damage like that to the Suxons! 165.21.154.117 03:59, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

• Simply put, this is in favor of the Kurzicks? Why? Because of that little tick on the God's Vengeance bar. Eventually, the Kurzicks will win, as long as they have even 1 monk. Turtles kill the NPCs at the gate easily even with a monk? That's a joke. All the Kurzicks need to do is stall and wait for the meter to run out. Want to balance this? Get rid of that tick. Make the Kurzicks run amber to win. Then you'll see a lot of bonders on the Luxon side protecting the amber mines and the Kurzicks will have to expose themselves outside the gate to win. Of course, you would have stalemates all the time then, so the best suggestion is to shut FA down and make everyone play Jade Quarry. Garrick 05:47, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

Remove "Player Abuse" Section

Leech fix. Misfate 01:48, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

Best leave it in for the time being to see if the report function becomes a permanent feature of the game. --Aspectacle 02:08, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

I agree this section needs to be looked at AND will likely change in the future, but atm I'm happy for it to stay. I think there is a possibility for these abuses to remain, even with a punishment system and that will have to be reviewed when the report system returns and has settled in. Regardless this section will change to reflect changes in the arena anyway. Dancing Gnome 00:28, 11 October 2007 (UTC)

I think it needs to be altered but remain, unfortunately leeching still exists, and it seems many players simply don't report leechers, which is a problem. Maybe altering it to point out players SHOULD report leechers now to "teach" new players they CAN do something. Dancing Gnome 12:43, 16 October 2007 (UTC)

The stupid thing is, even though every1 knows who the leachers are, they leech everyday and in the end no1 is actually bothered to report them because they just reappear after the PvP ban ends since they have bots and auto-clickers. I think there needs to be a severe rethink of banning accounts if they continually leech, because the system right now is just too ineffective. Crimmastermind 06:39, 24 June 2008 (UTC)

"Do not be overly concerned by the loss of a command point"

This quote is the most inaccurate one in the article: "Do not be overly concerned by the loss of a command point"

Why

If you lose a command point: 1. you lose a place for respawning. and more importantly: 2. your' commander dies and thus there is no way of respawning your seige turtle unless you retake the post which gives the kurzicks a chance to repair the gates in the few minutes you are occupied. If anyone has a different opinion the please say. --The Thunderbolt Guy 20:04, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

If you read the line in context it isn't quite as horrendous as you make out. My experience playing shows quite often the command point goes because a warrior is "leet soloing" (IMO wasting time if the game isn't strongly in Kurzick favor). If the Luxon are playing ok I don't think it is a big problem. To answer to your points;

1. If the luxon team is pushing up well they should have or be constantly trying to get the mines to either side of the gates. These are also Luxon spawn points when taken and are *much* better for spawning at than at the command point, especially if a turtle is alive and moving.
2. If there is a siege turtle already alive you should keep it alive first and foremost because it is doing the best damage to the Kurzicks. When (and if) it dies you can go and very quickly take the command post again - the Kurzick are weak as so far from their base. It is a piece of cake to take back especially if there are two people trying to reclaim it. You have to run back to get the turtle moving anyway.

Perhaps tactics have changed and people play differently now. But I feel it best that if you have an advantage in the Kurzick base it is best to push up than get distracted by a backline you may not even need any more. --Aspectacle 22:47, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

I'm pretty sure I wrote that and I will explain my reasoning now. A command post DOES NOT act as a respawn point. Those are mines. The ONLY purpose a command post serves is to respawn the turtle as you said. As this is the ONLY purpose, the ONLY time I beleive you should take it back is when the turtle is in fact dead. The command post does nothing while the turtle is alive. By returning to take back the command post while the turtle is alive, you are wasting the turtle and your time - the turtle becomes vulnerable to attack, the cover you gain from them attacking the turtle instead of you is wasted. Your time is better spent with the turtle than it is spent taking back something that does nothing for you at the time. Quite often the person taking the command point is a "1337" warrior soloing them, or sin, or toucher. Most often it is a nuker, who can solo these points in seconds with 2-3 spells, and thus taking them back is just wasting your time because they will just nuke them again. The problem gets very bad for Luxon teams when 2 assasins and a necromancer try to take back a command post when they are not suited for that role. A nuker once again will take it back for either side in 2-3 spells, many other classes need support which means less people attacking, less pressure and often leads the Kurzicks playing more offensively. That is my reasoning. I will revise it in the context of the article to see if I can make that more clear, but I don't want to use too many words. Feel free to comment again if you disagree. Dancing Gnome 00:09, 11 October 2007 (UTC)

Basically, if the Kurzicks actually took the two command posts, they will take the refined amber mine as well, which is quite deadly if they start running refined amber. The command posts in themselves are not usually that important since your turtles should have long lives (ever heard of monks?), but you essentially want to quickly take back your refined amber mine, so u shud take the command posts at the same time anyway to save time running back when your turtle dies. Also, the "1337" warrior is now much less common, and usually command posts are only captured when the kurzicks have complete control of the game and have pushed the luxons back to their base (blame Leonaidas Spartiat).

Disable Aspenwood Gates from Closing While it's Guards are Inside the Gate

The suggestion is simple. The gates can be closed while a guard runs inside away from AoE or to attack a player. This prevents them from being hit by melee, harder for casters, and the bonder can easily bond the gate guard while out of spell range from people on the other side of the gate. This is essentially GG due to an exploit or cheat and should be changed. Dancing Gnome 23:17, 10 October 2007 (UTC)

this has been fix by ANET, i deleted this section cuz i thought it serves no purpose but someone brought it back so here i am commenting that this suggestion is FIXED.--Ridz16 02:12, 15 July 2008 (UTC)

Disable Walk to Talk on Aspenwood NPCs

One of the problems with Monking in Aspenwood is healing the npcs is very hard if you want to switch targets. It's hard to see their health because they don't appear on a party/ally window and when you click on their health bars to browse through them to check out which ones have more health than others, you run to the person you clicked on. This can be very annoying. If you didn't run to them when you click on them it would be much easier to browse through them to heal. Atm I often end up running to a warrior in a meteor shower when I try to heal him. It would also be nice if they appeared as allys on the screen, kinda like Observer mode in GvG where you can look at the different teams, or in NF where you can "minimise" certain groups. It would be easiest to offer them in three groups for kurzicks, Purple Orange and Green gates, and luxons would have orange and purple squad. Dancing Gnome 12:55, 28 October 2007 (UTC)

This already exists. Options > General > Tick-box Double-Click on interact... mrrr (Terra Xin 02:43, 1 November 2007 (UTC))

Kind of late, but you can also hold the 'shift' key to prevent yourself from moving when you click on an ally.-- 22:27, 30 December 2007 (UTC)

Cutscene

There used to be a cutscene showing Kurzick or Luxon victory but when was it taken out? Barinthus 05:47, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

Yeah it was removed. I think there might have been an entry one as well. My guess is most people got bored of watching the scene over and over, it would be nice to have an option to view it though. Anon

Agreed. Barinthus 00:38, 5 December 2007 (UTC)

It's odd because The Jade Quarry still has it's end cut scene. I don't think there used to be an entry one though, unless you're talking about the one you can view by talking to either the luxon commander or Gunther. Mortsu 15:19, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

Stalling the turtle

So I guess there's another exploit that's getting more popular. Basically, a Kurzick player or a spirit can stand on the ledges of the fort on either side of the gate and get close enough so that they are in firing range of the turtle. The turtle will attempt to shoot the player or spirit, but will be obstructed by the wall. Since the turtle will not move while something is in it's range, it can be stalled for a very long time. This isn't as bad as the Death Nova exploit, but it sure is lame and frustrating. Tedium 08:49, 27 November 2007 (UTC)

Eh. Keep in mind, if the kurzicks do do that, then thats 1 player per turtle, leaving only 6 kurzicks left, vs 8 luxons. Not really an exploit so much as a tactic.--Ryudo 20:02, 6 December 2007 (UTC)

Well like he said a spirit can perform the same fucntion and there are many npcs inside the base + 6 kurzick players, vs 8 luxons - both attack squads. This was an unintentional side effect of increasing siege turtle range. Before they used to fire a shorter distance at targets much closer and would even walk past some targets if they were in the way. Now if anything registers in their aggro range they attack it, regardless of whether they can hit it or not. Turtles attacking something they can't hit is certainly a bug. I would call this an exploit if the player stopping the turtle from moving forward couldnt be hit by other players but he can, most of the time. There is a very small area where he will stall the turtle AND be unable to be hit but most Kurzicks don't know this. 122.104.161.96 11:49, 29 August 2008 (UTC)

More FA abuse! YAY!

Luxons can bait gunther outside of the green room. An assassin class with a shadowstep engages Gunther in melee. Said assassin waits until he is at low health, and then shadowsteps outside of the green room. Gunther will follow. I noticed this first when my aura of displacement sin set an anchor point outside the gates and proceeded to attack gunther until gunther started hitting me back. Then, after I was around 200 health or so, I removed aura of displacement, shadow stepped outside the gates. Gunther chased me out, got aggro from the eight luxon warriors and 2 siege turtles, and died in about 3 seconds. I was since able to replicate this twice. Note that this is only possible if your team manages to get into the "green room standoff" in the first place. Since most of the luxon defeats are horrific massacres that never even get near the green room, this isn't all that helpful. Its only useful if the kurzicks manage to hold to a standoff in the green room after getting pushed back through the gates and the inner walls.

I just witnessed a new bug, when a gate is closed a kurzick player can drop the amber, and another player on the other side of the gate can pick it up if it is close enough. SweetEscape 04:38, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Enchanting Npcs and Trap Spamming

I've had many a game in FA where the only reason the Kurzicks even lasted a minute was because they could spam traps and enchant the npcs to be near invincible. There are too few mesmers, and always will be, to counter the enchantments, and the traps are just ridiculous. My recommendations: 1. Make the NPCs unenchantable, or change protective spirit to target party members instead of allies, as its the main offender. 2. Add an environmental effect detrimental to trappers, or just nerf traps. 3. If the two suggestions above aren't heeded, remove the teleporters allowing out of the Kurzick base to make amber runs more difficult, and to open up weaknesses in the kurzick defense.

I wouldn't mind having the luxon turtles nerfed if these lame kurzick strategies got nerfed. I just want the trapping and enchanting npcs stopped so we can have a balanced game.75.91.37.213 01:36, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

QQ moar... 70.187.194.101 03:46, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

Recent updates have given the luxons a bit of an edge. Their rangers had two attacks buffed( Power Shot and Penetrating Attack), and their wars got buffs too with the adren reduction of Coward and the (very slight) Healing Signet buff. So yeah...wonder if Anet thought of this during the past few updates. (my guess is not)--Ryudo 01:03, 8 February 2008 (UTC)

Dudes, all the luxons need is enchant removers, necromancer and assasins have them. Seriously, if anything its bias in favor of the luxons not the other way around. Mortsu 15:42, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

No, like many above said, it depends on the Kurzick's skill. An excellent Luxon team doesn't stand a chance vs a kinda good Kurzick team. But a bad Kurz team doesn't stand a chance against a terrible horrible awful Luxon team.--Ohnoes 03:38, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

Ohnoes is just plain wrong. To win in Aspenwood for a Luxon Kurzicks need to be bad, or you need to have a good team. To win in Aspenwood for a Kurzick, Luxons need to be bad, or you need to have a good team. If two good teams face off against each other it usually depends on the number of monks the Kurzicks have. If they have 3 or more it's usually not worth playing for the Luxons as defense is way to easy. Otherwise it's a race to be the best. Different roles have different values. The most important class for Kurzicks are healers, ranger a far and away second, for luxons it's simply anyone who can break a gate or take a mine very quickly. The best at this is a nuker. Still, doesn't matter how good you are, against 4 healers no luxon team would win. 122.104.161.96 12:03, 29 August 2008 (UTC)

This has the longest line ups sometimes

Any authoritative reason for why it's so hard to get into an instance of this sometimes? The answer is obvious when one side or the other has very few players, but the wait can also run on for hours when FA has lots of people on both sides trying to join. 65.95.59.186 00:10, 27 February 2008 (UTC)

• I heard that there could only be so many games in progress at a time. I don't know the exact number, but it's like once all the game rooms are full you have to wait your turn. Fort Aspenwood is one of the most fun things in Factions, I hope it doesn't go the way of Jade Quarry (also fun, but nobody does it regularly enough).Miss Innocent 17:27, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

I know that somewhere Gaile posted that there is no server limit, anyone know where it is?--Ryudo 03:27, 7 March 2008 (UTC)

Woot, finally managed to end that stupid rumor.--Ryudo 07:13, 17 March 2008 (UTC)

Well, I'd like to see proof of that because I've never seen a no limit in the game. Sometimes you can wait for 20 minutes before you get into another match and there are plenty people waiting to enter. Please give reference to this. I don't believe it one bit. Maeve 03:46, 15 July 2008 (UTC)

Yeah ive heard there can only be 3 games at once, if someone could cite that arcticle by gaile (if it excists) on notes that would be awesome SweetEscape 02:14, 2 May 2008 (UTC)

oh i see it now, thats cool xD SweetEscape 02:16, 2 May 2008 (UTC)