Donations for Taiwan Wintersday Event

Players have asked us about the plans we mentioned a couple of weeks ago for sharing Wintersday presents with players in Taiwan, where an earthquake prevented some players from attending the Wintersday Festival.

We're happy to say that we managed to retrieve a significant number of presents, and we will be distributing those to players in Taiwan this coming weekend. American and European players have asked about donating a Wintersday gift or two, as well, and we will be happy to accept donations of unopened Wintersday gifts, if you care to donate. Now, keep in mind that we gathered many presents during the event, so please don't feel that you are obliged to donate. (The mini-event in Taiwan is assured to be a success already.) And of course we want you to enjoy your presents, so if you do donate, a small donation is more than fine!

Members of the Community Teams of ArenaNet and NCsoft will be gathering Wintersday presents in Kamadan districts tomorrow, Tuesday, January 23, at 10:00 a.m. PST (18:00 GMT). You will find a rep in the American, English-UK, French, German, and International Districts, most likely in District 1 of that region. We will try to swing by the International and American Districts (AD-1 and ID-1) of Kamadan again at 6:00 PST (02:00 GMT) that same day.

Thanks to those who showed an interest in this mini-event, and we know that NCTaiwan will be posting about it on their site after the weekend, so you can catch some news then!

P.S. We'll be posting this info on the European sites, too!

Good. But what about opened gifts? I have no use for fruitcake and tonic and would rather they go to someone else rather than the trash bin.

By "their districts", you mean Lion's Arch or Kamadan?

Don't go to LA dist1 too many spammers etc the place would be full within a few minutes. Would be better if you opened a district that was for donations only.

I can see scammers turnig a profit on this one. hopefully they won't be able to pose and get naive players to donate to them rather than NCsoft reps.

I find it strange that Anet reps need to garther donations for other region players. Even if the idea is nice and promotes generosity and community awareness, i find the idea strange since techinically there should not be any problems for Anet to "spawn" items for them.

unless of course:

1) Anet adopts an anti item generation policy from its employees and to its players.

2) Cant spawn specific patch related items post patching of servers.

Not really seeking an answer, just finding the whole affair strange.

I think it is that Anet doesn't allow them to just "make" things. I believe Gaile has said the only additional power that she has is being able to map anywhere without actually having to run there.

Thank you for catching that! I meant Kamadan. (Edited original post)

As to the question of "why?" We cannot spawn items or gold or anything like that. But we have a means to assure that players in Taiwan do get gifts, which is why this is not a plea for donations, but rather a response to those who asked about it and would like to present a gift or two. (And sorry, only unopened are needed, but thanks for the thought.) Truly we do not need the donations; the event will be ok without them. But if folks want to donate, or have collected in order to do so, we want to furnish an opportunity for them to make sure we have them to pass along.

Hope that helps!

Haha.. I suggested this in some wintersday topic, but thought that you didn't like the idea.

But already donated all my gifts through the DVDF donation.

There will be no scammers taking advantage of this. Anet handles their business affairs well. These supposed scammings need to be out of mind and tries to take away from the heart of the offering.

Anet will make the event a splendid one I'm sure. They don't need anyones presents and have the easy button to do what they want.

Even if scammers were there I hope they are showered by a million presents in the hopes 1 child affected by the tragedy gets a few.

Before I read Gaile's post in detail I just grazed over everyones comments and was almost started to believe this was some sweep of peoples presents. So glad I have a few brain cells left and decided to read her posts in detail before jumping to conclusions led on by others posts.

I didnt care to get many presents during the event and have none to give as a symbol of empathy. All I guess I can offer is to say to those affected by the tragedy that my heart is with you.

I'll be there 10 am to see what else your guys will accept.

I got a number of Candy Cane Shards in my storage. They are equivalent to Wintersday Gifts (5 for 1), but I didn't bother to convert them at the collector, and the collector has been removed. Can I donate the Shards?

Hi, there,

I did the same thing. Forgot to exchange my shards and now will store 'em for a year in hopes that next year's commodity of choice is the same.

We are handing out unopened gifts, only. Thank you very much for asking, though!

Thanks for my storage space back

Please share our Happy Wintersday greetings to the players in Taiwan!!!

Thank you for your kindness!

To those who asked, I'll swing by ID#1 of Kamadan this evening at 7:30 PST. Please know we have a lot of presents, and there is absolutely no need to donate unless you wish to do so.

I don't have nightfall but i want to donate to this cause. Any chance you will be somewhere else gaile?

Off-topic: I like the fact that you have no way to spawn items. It makes the game corruption-free. Plus, it makes the items more valuable, as those from Taiwan will know these presents come from other players, instead of merely /spawn items.

Unfortunately, I haven't saved up any presents, opened them as soon as I were getting them. Good luck though, and hope their event can be as nice as Wintersday, as they missed it