Rant on Mad King

Summary: Game mechanics of Mad King are unsuitable and excludes some players.

As you can tell from the summary, I am not too pleased on the Mad King arrival and hat giving ceremony. Why:

Premise 1:
Halloween is at the end of October/first November (this of course cannot be changed) and therefore a busy time for those in the Southern hemisphere particularly. Many have exams, long work commitments etc.

Premise 2:
To have only 9 visits and spaced three hours apart results in less opportunity for one to attend the Mad King's arrival especially when a few are during the 12:30pm to 8:30am time bracket in Adelaide. To obtain both hats would require visits to both towns and presumably at different times because server-jumping doesn't work.

Premise 3:
The Mad King goes on and on for such a long time. Repeating the same stuff over and over is aggravating and annoying for those with limited time.

Conclusion:
The Mad King's visits are poorly designed. Why do we have decorated towns for an entire week beforehand and then have the Mad King visit relatively few times? I am not arguing the decorations are up for too long, rather the Mad King visits too irregularly or for too short a duration (i.e rather than 24 hours with a visit every 3 hours how about 48 hours with visits every three hours, or 24 hours with visits hourly?)

I know for many of you time is no issue. You can easily visit both towns a few times, remain afk for hours etc but not everyone has this "privelege" (i.e have other commitments).

You will probably argue increasing visits would result in all sorts of horrendous evils, like people obtaining too many virtual bags etc.

That's all folks.

Doesn't take any commitment to afk, can hit every event (providing no dc) if you had 2 mins during that 24hour time period you could even switch towns, get both hats and a bunch of free ToT bags. Not too bad for afk and maybe a 2 min commitment.

lion's arch first, then go to a higher number server in kamadan if they do not change the visiting timing/frequency in the future.

I do agree that a hat npc should be left behind for at least a week, like the one in shing jea's monastery once, if not mistaken for the dragon mask.

I turned my computer on...went to bed, when I got up in the morning I had tot bags and 2 masks.....I did nothing but sleep.....I see no 'time commitment' outside of those people still on dial-up.
Also he shows up for a whole day thats 9 times. You need not do anything to get the hat unlike some other events where you have to accumulate stuff for them, just BE there and you get it. Having to sit thru 28 minutes of lame jokes...oh well.

You are lucky that there is a festival hat guy, when the whole thing started 3 years ago we had to get each of our characters there if they wanted a hat at all....this is a vast improvement of what there was, sorry our holiday is not convenient.

edit..oh yeah its very close to mid terms here as well....so we have that here as well, no different up here.

AFK alone gets you the hat from one city but then you need to move to the other city. If you are using your laptop/desktop for work its not really viable to afk for long time periods.

That didn't work for me. As soon as I got Lion's Arch hat, I switched to the highest Kamadan server (that wasn't full) but the NPC had already left.

There is no time commitment if you afk but that only gets the hat from one city. You would need to change city to get both hats. And a "whole day" isn't really that long at all considering the towns etc are decorated for a week. A "whole day" is a long time for those who log in everyday, but for those who don't its easy to miss.

classic QQ rant

plenty of time to afk BOTH towns and get BOTH hats...

Solution: afk in one town for a few hours, go handle your biznezz, come back and jump to other town and afk for a few hours, then rezume your biznezz..

laptop, desktop, sidekick w/e.. if it loads GW and stays connected, you can always minimize GW and do your excel spreadsheets (GW only takes up 2 inches of space on your screen when minimized)

The 2 hats in one visit trick worked for me , on his second visit to LA (3am pacific time,thats 10 am in the UK where i live)i immediately mapped from LA to Kamadan international server 14 as soon as the LA visit was over and i turned up just as the'mad king says' part of the visit started, in all from that 1 visit i ended up with 40 tot bags and both masks :P

I spent like 5 minutes setting up AFK and moving from one town to the next...lots of ToT bags and both masks with a minimum of effort...Sounds like someone has a case of "He got the BIG cookie, Mommy!" Dude, I'm sorry you had a lousy Holloween, but all you missed out on was a bunch of ones and zeroes...it isn't real, it doesn't matter, and when you die you won't care, 500 years from now no one will remember and getting extra goodies in an online game won't get you laid...it's OK, we still love you *hugs*

Seriously?
Knock Knock...
Whos there
Boo
Boo hoo

/laugh

"One way or another, my jokes always slay the audience."

If its that important to you, make time... If its not, make an excuse.

Call the waambulance.. I got 30 ToT bags from LA then jumped to scamadan highest int dist and got another 30 more Bags (hardly a waste of time)


Some of us like to farm Halloween items the whole week before the event.. All the decorations to is offer a friendly reminder that we may do so..
In case you didn't know , most people do put up their Halloween lights early in October and and Christmas lights right after thanksgiving. Whats the BFD?

Its called the Main event. It lasts a whole 24 hour period, anybody can make time to schedule 1/24 hours to get both masks. If its soo important to you, set your alarm clock to wake yo up 10 minutes before the arrival of the mad king.

Get a tissue

I think ANed did a superb job of Haloween. I enjoyed the Mad King Says game and i beat him in rock paper scissors one time. People are too picky in a free to play game. There will ALWAYS be someone who will find a way to complain about ANYTHING. that's just the way it is.

Well it's just a hat, that don't have any purpose..heck at the Halloween event after Nightfall was released I did not cry over that I did not have Nightfall, its was the same with Wintersday. Also as others have told you it's easy to go afk or quckly switch towns..however you should do some investigation before, since the mad king won't arrive in districts that was created AFTER the event began.

Your suggestion to extend the Mad king visit seems silly to me..it would be the same to whine about not being able to come online new years eve to see the ingame fireworks, so it should be extended for 1 week so everyone could get a chance....NOT...after all the event is just a game, you don't get any special benefits for having attended the mad kings visit, you don't pay to be allowed to play, I think thats two very good reasons not to extend the mad king visit.

After reading the thread all I can say is "So." Where is the problem with AFKing? Or jumping towns? I guess in the end what I am saying is; Would you like some cheese with your whine?
Mods please close so Evil does not get QQed too much more.

I second that notion. This is a pitiful crythread. It is wasting peoples braincells to waste time reading to the boo hooage

compliment: i do have to say that it is a well organized Whinefest. It has a summary, premise and conclusion.

What if your work network doesn't have the ports open for GW and therefore you cannot connect? If the Mad King visited for a longer time period, then more people would have a chance to grab both hats without significantly altering their plans.

Yes I agree: if it was very important to me, I would have made time. Fortunatley I have more important things to do in life than play games. My point is a matter of constructive criticism and discussion: if the devs are able to make a event more accessible to everyone at no harm to others, than why not?

I don't see how this is relevent to what I posted at all. If the Mad King visited for:
a) every hour for 24 hours, but for half as long, you could still get your bags and more people could get both hats.

Grats mate on insulting someone on an online forum. You must feel special.

Precisely. This is why I did not significantly alter my life around the game on the 31st of October and 1st November. I made this thread to:


Good to know it worked for you. Didn't for me.

You read a thread, post a number of times and then complain it is a waste of your brain cells? Sorry mate, sounds a bit hypocritical.

I agree with the OP. I know a lot of people say that AFKing is a soution; but why run a festival at all if all the players are going to do is...something else?

While I don't play festivals much due to un-manageable ping (depends what computer i'm on at the time - my home computer is fine, but the uni residence ping is appalling) when I do log on I would like to be able to participate without having to schedule my already hectic exam timetable around it. And I do mean participate and not AFK.

I do find the entire event rather inaccessible, and fully agree with the irritating repetitiveness of it. Constructive criticism is welcomed by Anet, and I do think that festivals could easily be made a time that people could enjoy; instead of just afking for the sake of easy cash.

Then take an hour after work, either interrupt your busy life or your sleep if its that important to you.

Maybe they have a good reason for not making it every hour. and maybe we would know what the reason was unless they explained it to us.

Basically all i was saying is that i was able to get both hats and 60 ToT bags, the event wasnt at all too long. And all it took was an hour then i went to bed.

Dont get insulted, i was illustrating that all this thread is, is a sob story. Not worth the carpal tunnel. Ok so maybe a couple people were not able to catch the mad king. So what? Once again, if it was so important to have to whine about then you should have made the time.

Then


I am at work and i work the night shift, its dead here and Halloween night. Honestly i have nothing better to do so i will mildly entertain myself by posting in a crythread (yes i may be pitiful)

Some of these comments are a bit niaeve. You don't know his circumstances, he might not be able to get to his computer for the whole of the 24 hours? Its just unfortunate that whatever he was occupied with fell on the same day that King Thorn comes. This is the same for alot of people not just the OP.

So before you judge him and criticise him for not going afk just use your heads and think?

I agree with the OP i think the days when King Thorn arrives should be extended to at least 2 to cater for the people who have really limited time.

This still works.

1. 16:55 Park your character around the spawning point of the mad king.
2. Go afk
3. 17:25 come back, the Mad King will start his last game
4 17:30 You get his hat now
5. Travel to Kamadan Dis ~60+
6. Go afk

So u have 2 masks while playing 5 mins?

Id rather write congress to try to get them to make halloween 2 days long so the people who are too busy to celebrate it on the 31st dont feel left out. And

we should make new years 3 days long because im usually to drunk to remember anything the first time, and hung over the next day. so on the 3rd day of new years i can celebrate it at Shing Jea Monestary

that works, or you can park at LA before work then when you get home from work you will have like 3 zombie masks, you can schedule 5 minutes at xx55 to grab the second mask from scamadan...

Im sure 5 minutes is not asking too much from the busiest individual to make time.

Like I said before:
This "argument" is flawed, not worth explaining why.

I did not say it was too long and don't care how many virtual bags you got.

Don't you see an irony it telling someone that their thread, which is titled "Rant on Mad King", is a "Sob story". I am well aware many forumers would perceive it as such which is why I titled it so. Like I said before, this thread also is constructive criticism for the devs.


You complain about "waste of brain cells" and "carpal tunnel" and justify it by saying you have nothing better to do? Sorry that argument just does not hold up.

How about instead of everyone attacking the man, you recognise the system could be improved?

It is anologous to a shop being open for a week, but only selling goods on 1 day. Maybe it is the shop that is flawed and not the people that are working on that 1 day?

Considering that these e-hats are completely useless, it seems abit silly to complain.

What would you do if you didn't afk? Stand around while reading the mass amounts of spam in local chat?

Hang on this guy is complaining about a FREE event provided by A.net for everyone to enjoy?

Its not JUST about the Mad King's visits, in fact for me the visits are least important for me, as the hats are just pointless.

For me just enjoying the decoratations and the minigames available is much more fun.

To be honest this whole rant thread is fail.

Like i always say, You can either make an excuse or find a way. This pertains to every challenge in life..
You can make an excuse not to ... or find a way to..

The system worked fine for me and 99% of other GW players who decided they wanted a mask. I refuse to get drawn into an argument since you are totally misquoting me. Or maybe i wasnt clear on a certain point
The point is maybe ANet had a reason for making the events more than an hour apart, especially since if you count LA and Kamadan, each event lasted an hour each (30 min LA and 30 min Kamadan)
And maybe if you asked one of the minds behind the event creation you might get a very good answer as to why it is 3 hours apart.

And common sense would say that The main event should take place on the holiday only. back to my point where people put lights up weeks before the holiday but they only celebrate for 1 day.

All i have to say at this point is good luck next year. Im off work now so take care. and i hope you have better luck on Christmas.

Just finally modify the Hat Maker to start accepting hats that aren't customized for the character that presents it. Solves a lot of other issues not just the one at hand.

This is certainly the biggest issue that affects GW at the moment, it should be fixed with extreme urgency.

If you have access, log in to GW the night before the hat/freebie giver comes and afk. There's a 24-hour window where you can come back, say after work/school/fishing and switch districts (may have to log back in again). This changed from just a one-time finale so that more people around the world would have a chance to attend.

Do that and you'll have at least two hats.

If you don't have access to GW then ask a friend to log in for you or cry about it on forums and be ridiculed.

Its always a busy time for someone somewhere, you are not special as there are just as many if not more with equal or more commitments than you. As has been said, if you wanted them, you would have made a way available.

This is the same as for every other major "End Event" and Guess what? there are just as many during the period 12.30am*(I think what you meant) to 8.30am for EVERYONE else (that why they do it for 24 hours - so you are not compromised there either).
The fact that anet gave you fair warning along with the times on their website gave everyone (including you) ample time to plan ie. if it started @ 12.30am, then afk your computer before bed, if it started in the day, then afk the comp before leaving for work etc.

If something aggravates you, then go afk - the limited time does not come into it. Interesting to note that you only know he repeats the same thngs over and over of you had the time to watch so therefore you had the time to swop over at the end of the LA event to Kamadan and afk therefor the next event.


Conclusion: the Mad Kings Visits are well designed as an end event. Decorated towns are the same as being decorated for Xmas - There are halloween decorations in RL for long before the day - why should it be different for the game? To make it 48 hours takes away from the END EVENT - be thankful its not just a single visit @ midnight anet time! I also do not want to see it as an hourly event as I prefer to play the game or do RL things in the two hours between.

If you cannot "afford" 5 minutes to set up your GW to be afk (which takes no commitment apart from a little background memory on a computer - then maybe you need to look at your own life rather than getting everything else to revolve around you...

As opposed to you not getting your 2 hats?? I somehow think you would be the first in line to complain how everyone else had more virtual stuff than you..(oops, you already did...)

lmao +1 (and 12 chars)

Question, what makes a crythread so amusing/captivating?

I had to log on again when i got home from work just so i may see the rebuttal offered by the OP.
Maybe its like looking at a nasty car wreck, you want to continue watching the road, but you have to stare at the ugliness.

Or maybe its the same reason people like to watch Jerry Springer or that other guy.

Its been like that since 2005 I cant see them changing it now.

If they were to extend it over 2 days then were would it stop, what if someone goes on holiday with some friends for a week every year? should they now extend events over a week and a half? 2 weeks?

Very often during Christmas i visit Hong Kong for 3 weeks, with no computer or internet access can i ask Anet to extend wintersday to one month?? sorry it just wouldn't work.

as for having it every hour, didn't you say you were to busy for the whole day to make any of the visits how would this change anything if they were to change it to 1 hour?

It could have been designed better, but it was a blast when we first saw the Mad King. That design might have worked 3 years ago and one can argue it works a bit less today, but the point is - Mad King rocks. \o/

I'm quite happy with the way the event's set up, even though the 31st was one of the busiest of dates for me. Payday, a work day and a friday means I have little time at home to log into game

Out of the whole day I had perhaps 3 hours when I wasn't working, out and about or asleep. I just work round it.
With a little afk, and a little time management I managed an LA mask, 2 kamadan masks and about 65 ToT bags.
Not bad since I'd missed 3 quarters of the event

Server hopping may not work, but district number hopping most certainly does, So even if you only managed one visit time, if you plan for it you can get both masks with very little problem

I'd rather NOT have the events closer together. As it is, you get 2-2.5 hours between events to actually play the game - time enough to do a mission or two and some quests. Shortening that down actually means that people who would like to play the game find that they can either do the event finales or play the game - but not both.

Given also that the event finales started at 5:30pm Friday night and ran all day Saturday until 5:30pm in Adelaide - I'd say people in Australia actually got more access to the finale events than many people worldwide (it was a weekend rather than a business day for us), so I really don't see that there is any good cause for complaint. In fact, it was actually better than normal, since events usually start Sunday evening and run through Monday for Australia!

If you can't log in once on a Friday night, then again ANY time on a Saturday to change districts....that's a problem with your time planning, not ArenaNet's.

This is ridiculous, the hat is for being at the event. You can't make the event you don't get the hat. WTF don't you understand? Also in a 24 hour period you can't be arsed to go afk in a given outpost. But you somehow have the time to post this nonsense? Get a life.

Since you can AFK it and then come back and get the hat, map to Kamadan and get the other one, it's really only five minutes of playing time to get both hats. So if both hats aren't worth five minutes in his busy after-work schedule, why complain?

I actually...you know...participate. When the mad king appears there are some things to do. Granted they're not very interesting; however that is part of what the OP is suggesting - to make it more interesting.

I agree with OP

Sure there are ways round it if you have no life and can leave your PC on 24/7, but why should game design be based on that premise?

Maybe ANet could just read a thread like this and take it as a bit of feedback on how they can improve things in the future? Or do the fanboy sycophants think ANet/GW is soooo so perfect that no change could be tollerated?

I also think the rock/paper/scissors sections should be dropped, or at least made so that everyone plays rather than a single player. And bring him on every two hours for a 15-20 min slot. Or stagger LA/Kamadan appearances every other hour.

I must agree with the TC, Halloween is an excpetionaly busy day for me, i have always been one to collect hats for the heck of it. But i was not able to be at home from at least 7am to 10pm, no way i was going to leave my computer on all that time and risk frying it! The event should be more excessable, let it run one more day, they have nothing to lose from it.

I thought they already spaced out the appearances between the two locations (3:00, 3:15)- it was surprising that this one wasn't included.

Hang on, you were made a moderater and can't even read?

I am not complaining about the event. I was providing a criticism and suggestion that it could be improved to be more inclusive of people with busy schedules by extending the dates of the King's appearance, or having the King appear more frequently during the 24 hour period.

And your point about the event being "FREE" is worthless. The whole game is free (in the sense of no monthly fee) and always has been. This is not an excuse for not improving upon an event: the improvements I suggested do not make it not free.

Again you completley miss the point. I could have access if the event was designed slightly differently, e.g: Mad King visits for two days or more frequently for one day. This goes for future events as well.

This is my point: a lot of people are busy. I am by no means unique. Therefore the system could be changed to be more accomadative to people who you admite are busy.

Your conclusion doesn't follow from your premises. I did not have time to watch it: I noticed at one point the NPC was talking and a fair while later I checked back and he was repeating himself, which was what aggravated me. However, this was not the central issue but just a minor annoyance in my mind. Like I have said many times, the central issue was a few design differences could allow the game to be more accomadative for more busy people. For your information, I have already said I tried swapping from LA to Kamadan and it did not work.

Again you miss the point. I do not care that others obtained the hats and I did not. My annoyance of missing out was entirely indepedent of other players: i.e I am annoyed because I did not get both rather than others got both.

Changing it to hourly intervals would give busy people greater flexibility, e.g instead of having to have Guild Wars open for two to three hours waiting for the next visit (even if you are afk during this time it still requires a computer, internet access and open ports) the maximum wait time would be around 40 minutes (if I'm not mistaken).

I don't really see the problem: you have the option of going to the Mad King's visits the twice the amount of times as you do now (if it was implemented). How is more choice a negative? Essentially your saying its too much choice (if it was implemented) and that's a problem because you want both?

I am well aware of this and am merely suggesting design changes could make the game more inclusive for a greater number.

Instead of being rude, how about you find:
a) Where I said I did not attend the event at all in the preceeding week.
b) Look at all the people saying "just go afk". Surely they are the ones guilty of the crime you accuse me of?
And please don't tell people to "Get a life" when they are the ones too busy to structure their life around a computer game.

Like I have said a few times before, I tried mapping to Kamadan after Lion's Arch and it did not work because the King had already left the highest district I could find.
Why complain?
Maybe because something could be better with minor design changes.

I have yet to see anyone provide any valid reason against the proposed changes, except dawnmist who complained increasing the frequency of the Mad King's visits gave him/her to much choice. I am sorry to hear you would find the prospect of not being able to visit the Mad King and play the game at the same time so disturbing.

Why do I consider everyone's reasons invalid?
1) The majority of the posts address what I can do to change my schedule or play the game etc rather than why the proposed design changes are unsuitable.
2) Other posts are fallacious ad hominem attacks.

I hope you are all familar with John Stuart Mill, an early advocate of utilitarianism. This ethical suggests what is good is what leads to the greatest happiness for the greatest number. None of you (bar dawnmist) have explained why the proposed design changes effect your happiness. Surely a few design changes that would maximise happiness for the greatest number are good? Your outright refusal to empathise is completely alien to me: perhaps I am used to associating with different kinds of people.

Anyway goodnight all, I will just leave you with the posts of one forumer for your amusement.

So in one post your "at work" and 35 minutes later your "off to work"? And then 54 minutes later your back "home from work". Do you actually have a job? Sounds to me your a 13 year old pretending to be grown up.

Oh okay.