When the Celestial Tournament was announced, my guild rejoiced as this was a great opportunity for structured PVP with real world prizes.
Unfortunately due to Anets poor planning and mis-management of timezones, we are forced to forfeit or play at 3 am, essentially impossible for many to make this time - and even if we could, wed be playing at a fraction of our skill level.
With some simple steps Anet could have made this situation alot easier for guilds not in Europe or America.
1) Match guilds in the same timezone/region agaisnt each other. We are an australian guild and were matched agaisnt a European guild rather than another australian guild, which would have allowed both australian guilds to play at decent hours. Or failing that, even a guild from Japan, Taiwan or Korea as these regions have similar timezones and would lead to more guilds actually being able to play they're asigned match ups.
2) More solutions to timezone differences. It is essentially up to the guild who has the easiest access to the fallback time as to when the match ups will be held, as they can have 6 people on at 3 am in the other guilds timezone and automatically win effortlessly.
3) Bigger rosters. If the advice from my previous two points is ignored due to impracticality or some other reason, atleast implement this one. If 3 members on the roster cannot make the time, then its essentially GG, regardless of wether or not any other members in the guild can make it.
Also this is a problem even if the timezone problems are resolved. My only computer capable of playing GW has fried itself prior to the match (which i wouldnt have been able to make anyway. see: timezone), leaving my team with one experienced monk and one who is self admitidley not a particularly good one. If we were able to submit a larger roster, for example one with substitutes for each position maybe, then this problem would be largely resolved.
My intention here is not to flame Anet but to provide feedback and suggestions for the next tournament that they hold on this scale.
And constructive feedback is appreciated.
Goodluck to all who were able to participate in this tournament.
k
