Guild Wars World Championships 3: A Movement

/totallysigned !!!!!!!!

To clear up some common ideas here people seem to be throwing out, I'll answer with what I think to be my ideas on the matter.

The game may be different then it was when the game was released, but there certainly still involves skill, skirmishability, and finesse. My post should not be read to assume the current state of guild wars, in fact, I think at least to a small degree Anet has done a decent job at taming some of the more overpowered skills and metas, if handling them the wrong way (eg. waiting for their abuse before taking action. However, in all, I think that if greater interest were taken in the PvP, in its most skill-inducing (I asserted earlier) form GvG, the game could see a fresh new batch of players, in addition to perhaps many old players coming back to a game that now has an incredible system of automated tournaments. Like Josh (Myth Axiom of Team Quitter) said on the QQ forums, imagine a world where the AT system had existed since the beginning of prophecies, how amazing the game would have been. The problems the game face now result in a stale player base, and unfortunately the same teams clashing heads every 30 minutes every night, which is leaving little incentive for teams to become competitive, bar the monthly tournament. In my opinion, with a larger base of players set to make names for themselves, this game could reform itself and become interesting again. I have seen the creation of many grass-roots ground-up GvG oragnisations recently in light of helping to educate those who simply are confused by GvG and its complex mechanics. I look forward to seeing how Anet addresses a movement taken in part by both communities, because in reality it is you here, who have a voice with ArenaNet. We are simply trying to encourage you to help us reinvigorate the community which separated Guild Wars from other previous MORPGS.

Thanks,
Matt

PS. 400+ in Two days! Keep up the great work, we should definitely be able to make at least some kind of case for a discussion of some sort with ArenaNet, or maybe as Ekeleon or other players have said, the forfeiture of monthly prizes for something like airfare to a tournament where sponsors could be sought after by a team of players who were devoted enough to volunteer to help. I for one would love to help coordinate such an event, if ArenaNet only give us the word to go.

I don't want to spoil the dreams everyone is having here, but seriously, does anyone signing either of these threads think that it has any use? Don't get me wrong, I would love another championship, but there are people making it sound like a championship will save the game and bring it back to the old days. And that is skipping the fact that doing another championship is completely unrealistic. Players paying for their own travel and things like that might sound nice on paper, but you are talking about +$1000 per person.
And I actually looked it up. A ticket to Seattle from the Netherlands on a random day in day week in April (just picking something) and coming back a couple of days later costs me 650EUR. My hotelroom will cost another 750EUR or so. Including food and drinks. And then I have to do with a very cheap hotel I guess. 1400EUR for a trip to a championship per person. 8 people per team, 6 teams, makes 67.200EUR to get the players there. Someone will have to pay that. And I think it is a low estimate. Add all other costs that need to be made and you and you will easily get to more then double that. Far more probably. You aren't going to bring 48 people to the States just to play some games in a random room without public of course. They could have just stayed home then and play from there. So add marketing (marketing that won't pay itself back, no new game to market this time), a room that allows for the playing and the public, all hardware needed to host it, etc, etc. You probably easily pass the 500.000 point. And that is without any prices.
You can bring the costs down by finding sponsors of course. But which company is going to sponsor something like this? The organization that did the WoW championship (and some other games like Guitar Hero) stopped because it ran out of money. If you can't find sponsors for a game as big as WoW, can we really expect to find them for a game like GW?

So what I want to know is, except for the fact that a championship is fun for the players, why would a company that wants to make profit do a championship like the one we are asking for?

/signed

I'd love to see another Championship, but need big skill balance so we can see different things ran, like the first two GWWC's

/signed

I'd gladly donate to the cause.

/signed

although I'm not a pvper anymore, I really enjoyed watching the previous world championships.

/signed again
/signed and again
/signed and again...

Exactly. The money that would be wasted on this by Anet would pay for another expansion that THEY make money from.

What do you want another shit expansion like GWEN?
/signed a thousand times

Don't EVAR say that stuff again, you n00bZ0R! Insulting ANET is like insulting my Mom, you just don't go there!

/unsigned

PvP is for n00bZ0Rz!

/absolutely signed.

Heads in the clouds tbh.

Hey guys,

I just wanted you to know that this is something I am pursuing, and I hope to have a response to share soon.

Thanks alot Andrew, I'd love to help out if possible, however small or large that may be.

I will PM you my email, but my IGN name is above.

Thanks,
Matt

thanks andrew

/signed
It would help to call the community back to GW, since its kinda died atm =/

High end PvP ... wasn't the bulk of the community. This won't help to slow the mass exodus away from gw. The other day got to watch a guy selling "silver trim cape memberships 20k" in LA. Given the spam rate of his ad ... nobody was buying. Sissy Boys got killed for that when pvp was still fun .. granted it was on Ebay but same should apply to anyone selling memberships. Those are the people we are supposed to want to emulate?

PvP has killed itself with Anet catering to the "elite" it keeps new people outside looking in because at this stage of the game it is almost impossible for them to get into a top guild. All those lame fotms that were nerfed because of the crying of the "elite" is what killed pvp not a lack of contests. People want to win. Those fotms gave the unranked pugs a fighting chance .. slim but a chance at beating the better players. That is what the "elite" didn't like .. not that they were facing the same builds a lot. Those lame fotms brought NEW people to pvp that would grow tired of the fotm that gave them a way in and move on to other builds and eventually to gvg. You took away that stepping stone and wonder why the gene pool is drying up.

I hit rank 10 long ago .. before you think it is rank envy that is driving this post. I left pvp out of simple boredom, gw is a great game but if I want high end pvp I play a FPS. The money wasted and yes it would be WASTED on this would be better spent keeping the bulk of their players happy till gw2 comes out.

Although the bulk of the community wasn't in high-end PvP as stated, a high percentage of the bulk of the community liked the WC's, liked talking about PvP, liked having something to work towards, and liked seeing 'celebrities' in Guild Wars. Right now, anyone can buy into a gold or silver cape guild or get top 100 on the ladder in a day. Now that I think of this, there were thousands of PvPers that have left, and that is a large number of players, possibly larger than the PvE'ers that left just because they got bored.

/signed
Thanks Andrew for they reply, hoping for the best.

so very signed

/signed, gogo andrew!!!

First, this is about GvG, not HA so being r10 isn't relevant. It has nothing to do with rank elitism. Also, the fact that you don't like high end pvp - by which i mean gvg- is not relevant either. High end GvG is different than other PvP games. GW provides an excellent high end pvp experience which is preferred by a lot of people, so telling people to go play something else when GW itself was a great PvP game is pointless. Go FPS if you want, but don't assume that somehow you're better for doing so and that people who want GW high end pvp should just give up.

You can GvG and enjoy this game while not being at the top. Of course people want to win. But not everyone can. If this game were such that anyone could have an equal chance to be at the top regardless of skill level then it would be a shitty game. The power creep of the expansions fostered this and so nerfs were rightly called for. If people want to win, they should learn to play.

No one says you're supposed to emulate the actions of the players in terms of there behavior outside of matches. Emulate their playing.

/signed

I love tournies.

Thank you for proving my point. Emulate their playing not their behavior? That sadly describes the primary thing that drives new people away.

All "elite" players start out as noobs been like this as long as gw has been around. They start somewhere .. hence the relevance of ha in my post since many start there. I never said I didn't like gvg I just found it to be more of the same aka not much different than ha. Yes, I came from real pvp leagues CAL CPL but that is not what I was basing my post on. My post is just your generic .. Anet please get a clue this will not help the shrinking friends lists. A tourney for those that have already established their place will not bring fresh meat to the arena. It will only help to reward your mentality and keep it two tiers.

The nerfs came LONG before there was an expansion. Only true pvp nerf that was ever needed was the original spirit spammer nerf .. being able to wall off the stairs in hall with 50 spirits wasn't about skill. The rest have been to keep the "elite" happy. I just find it hilarious that Anet didn't have the foresight to see long range how this would kill the pvp side of the game by cattering to the chosen few they excluded the very thing ANY competitive field needs .. new people.

If you want to get better at PvP, its better to watch how good players play. I don't see whats wrong with that. This proves your point how? Why does that drive new people away?

The game, if competative, will always have tiers and there is nothing wrong with that. There is still a lot of fun to be had at various levels of the game and players should be rewarded for the time they put into getting better.

I really don't see what your point is Leprekan, but I agree with the response that Winstar provided, in that, PvP is something unique, that I tried to distinguish from FPS shooters. You really can't experience the real time strategy involved with the combination of skills and intelligent decisions that are required in Guild Wars. It's like comparing chess and checkers. The two are completely differnet, but i guess the two both involve a board?

This really isnt going to happen no matter how many times you sign it. If Anet had something like this planned they would have made it public ages ago. Why dwell on the past? Or maybe you are all in denial that things have changed.

/unsigned

spirit spam nerf was the only nerf needed? so the hexes and sf nerf were useless is what your saying. How is anet "cattering" to the high end players? because idk if you have gvg'd recently but playing hexes atleast a decent one will wreck you, there are around 40 some odd hexes which will accumulate degen, which you should know being rank 10 and all, needs to be countered OH WAIT sig of humil on your lod well your boned. Look leprekan all you're doing is theory crafting and it isnt effective why rain on our parade why would you not want to see another GWWC like seriously what would be so bad about having another GWWC? are you worried anet will waste their money on this? and if so why? because only good could come of this.

I guess you completely missed the post in this thread from Andrew Patrick, an
ArenaNet employee? I'm not even gonna quote it for you, learn to read before posting.

Just interjecting a little common sense. The cost of this would be better directed at keeping their player base which is slipping away. If you believe Anet coughing up cash for a TINY percentage of it's player base will bring players back you are in denial or believeing your own press (MANY of those accounts were already SOLD).

Not theory crafting .. just a perspective you don't like. Anet is "focusing on GW2" their budget and developers are concentrated on GW2. Them throwing money and time at a TINY percentage of the playerbase instead of addressing concerns and needs of the masses is corporate suicide.

Signation ... www.thecpl.com
If you get them to hold a gw event I will be impressed. Then it can be called pvp till then it is just product promotion and Anet doesn't have a new product to promote at this time.
Not trying to be rude but any FPS in high end competition requires A LOT more skill than gw. Hand eye .. aim .. actual physical skills not just learning skills and counters to them. Don't take that as I don't love gw .. 30 months played and counting. But gw is what it is.

He is pursuing it, doesn't mean its going to happen, He hopes to have a response to share soon, doesn't mean its going to be a positive one.

Don't try to be a smartass.

O_o You, sir, are the one trying to be a smartass here, pretending to know more than anet themselves.

Are you living in the clouds, do you know how much it costs to have a glorious championship like this? They even said they are concentrating on AT's and monthlys about 5 months ago. Let alone GW 2. There just aren't the funds.

Let Andrew be the one to say it. You don't have any inside information to share, or anything that can be considered valuable or credible.


Just say you don't like it and go back under your rock since you don't care anyway.

Just because Andrew says he is pursuing it, doesn't mean it has any chance it is going to happen. I'm sure there are many things he is pursuing. Gaile has been pursuing to get a hairdresser, as far as I know that one isn't in the game yet.
Anyway, with my last post I covered the cost part. With this I will cover the benefit part. It will keep the current top GvG players happy and will make some of the top GvG players that left come back. So we are talking about less then 1% of the players that will be directly involved. Add some people who will observe the matches and you might get to 1%. Even if it is 5, it is still very low.
Now what it won't do is getting new players into the game. Why would they suddenly start playing the game now while they didn't do that for the last 2 years? Don't say the tournament will be the reason, we already had 2 of those before when getting into the game was a lot cheaper. The list of reasons not to get into this game is long. Very long.
A new tournament can only be a real success from Anet's point of view when they get something out of it. Something more then a small percentage of happy players. If you want to discuss anything here, then try to think of something that will do that. Try to think of a reason for Anet to do a tournament. And while doing that, keep in mind how the game is now. And also realize the amount of PvPers is low and isn't going to grow.

True.

The current PvP playerbase isn't worth it to start a new championship. It may be very vocal and caring (albeit very autistic) but it has become marginal and not profitable enough. GW might have had the best potential for a balanced PvP game but with the current state of an upcoming GW2, I wouldn't support Anet in investing more money into it.

I'm not sure your reasoning is complete. Firstly, it could bring a few new players simply because of the videos (the GWFC videos were really awesome) and the word of mouth (there's a thread not too far from here about GW being better than Fury, which is a new MMO purely PvP, which has an ex-member of Anet onboard btw). Secondly, the income for Anet could also be to keep existing GW players happy, not only the PvP that could be (highly) motivated by this event, but all the other ones. It may even entertain the idea in people who, like me, haven't got into PvP that it is still doable.

Prestige? Playing with friends and long lost competitors? Big prize?

Well, I really hope this thread will be overloaded with /signed, because a few pessimistic messages can give the impression that it is a "minor" number of people interested (yes I know that GWG is only a small %age of the GW community, but I may ask how you get these 1% numbers? everyone around here seems to know better than anyone the 100,000s of GW players ... I'd trust more Andrew that anyone here for that matter).

Not grow a lot, unless some "Big Change (TM)" is coming, so to say. Tbh, the PvE side of the game is also "smothering" PvP, as there is a lot more to do with 3 campaigns and one extension. This has made a reverse on the balance PvE/PvP more difficult, but not impossible. Though I have the feeling this may not really happen before any major announcement on GW2.

Another thought: PvP guilds should be more "educational", taking onboard newbies and teaching them. I feel (that's just a feel since I'm not yet in PvP, but looking around) that there's more support for new PvE players than for PvP, in a sense PvP may look from outside an "expert domain" reserved to only a few (I've read several times "get some builds and play RA", not extremely useful, though it's true you have to go through that)

So? its not gonna happen

The barriers to enter this game are that high that a tournament isn't going to get any new people into this game. That include the cost to buy the games, but also the timecost to get the weapon/armor unlocks and the time it takes to find a good guild. IF you actually manage to find one. I know Fury isn't an alternative, but just because there isn't an alternative doesn't mean you should try GW. I wouldn't advice any PvP player to buy this game.

There is only a minor number of people interested. Just look at the amount of pages this thread has. If it was about something for pve (some kind of special event) we would easily have 30 pages by now. Also the 1% is based on the amount of people in a gvg guild compared to the amount of accounts. So that is still more then 10.000 people. And even if it is 10%, it still is a minor amount of people compared to the pve mass.

There is no reason for a PvP guild to be educational. In a GvG match, taking a newbie usually means you lose. In PvE you can easily get away with it, as long as (s)he isn't too stupid. PvP being an "expert domain" has more to do with game design then with guilds not willing to help. Like even if a guild wants to help newbies, there is no way to find them ingame, except for spamming "GUILD LOOKING FOR NOOBS". And even then, why would you want to face an almost certain defeat just to be educational?

.
(1) I agree a GWWC3 likely won't draw in too many new players It may generate some interest but its a 2 year old platform at a time when other new games are going to be coming out. Yet there still is a lot of time between now and GW2, and its not clear that the alternatives are going to be very good for competative pvp between now and GW2. GW1 can still be a lot of fun, and I would still recommend it. But what it will do is draw back more players who have since left the game and breath some life back into the pvp world. Which is good for the game and its players. From a business standpoint, since they already have the money from all these players (no monthly fees) this isn't going to be a financial boon, but it is in the interest of players who want to make GW1 as good as it can be between now and GW2 or whatever game people move on to.

(2) Most people interested in PvP don't bother to come to this site anymore since it is a pretty much useless for those purposes, so its not surprising this thread isn't longer. This movement orginated on another site and the thread there is much larger.

(3) There are guilds off the ladder and the worse end of the ladder looking for people to play and willing to let the learn so long as they are willing to learn. On your own you can RA, TA, HA, meet people, build a friends list etc. This is the same thing everyone had to go through and its not impossible at all you are at all interested in making a go of it.

You misread me: I didn't say to bring newbies (and not n00bs, at least to my knowledge they are two different races of GW players) in GvG, but educate them. Isn't it possible through RA? TA? (here I'm a newbie, rather than a n00b, as I'm not sure if this applies, but as soon as I get corrected or confirmed I'll learn rather than make a stupid comment or a useful contribution). I'm sure it's also possible through simple talking on a forum or via ventrilo&co.

You sort of confirm my feeling that PvP may have become elitist and will not consider "passing the flame" to others, you're (almost?) on your own if you want to learn. (maybe the "educational" guilds are too busy educating, rather than being on GWG ). But Winstar's message sort of infirms that, it's hard to tell from "outside".

I want personally to get into PvP at one point, but it seems that the learning curve is not only very steep (due to 2 years of experience not very well communicated to other players and lots of history, from nerfs to complex power plays) but not facilitated for those that, at this point in time, are not part of the "PvP family".

I'll go and spend some more time (after Halloween event) in GWG's PvP forum. (I don't know if it's semantic misreading, but most ads in the PvP guilds recruiting forum are not as friendly as the ones in the PvE guilds recruiting forum ...)

Oh and by the way, regarding Anet's investment, it has to be seen on two sides: short and long term. On the short term, it may not be a big thing, but in the long term, if they want to stay in the PvP arena with GW2 (while other games may be coming to fill this slot, cf. Fury) they may want to "motivate their troops".