Thursday November 13, 2008 - update notes

I'd accept it if there was no other choice. This is deliberately unfair. I have the right to criticize it.

Why are the guardian and vanquisher title owners angry again? I couldn't bother reading through all the posts. Because of money or faction they didn't recieve ? Or are they just bitter because the new players will get more rewards?

Just a little quote.

Just remember, there's a right way and a wrong way to do everything and the wrong way is to keep trying to make everybody else do it the right way.
~M*A*S*H, Colonel Potter

Mostly good points, and you're one of the few people that are actually discussing this with any reasoning at all involved. Well, except for that comment about the magical doubling of the population -- where did THAT come from?

Like you I don't have access to the actual numbers so all I can do is speculate. But, economical damage would most assuredly be done with a large and sudden influx of new gold. As far as gold accumulation over time as people complete missions and fill books I would guess it would be comparable to the gold accumulation that happened with HFFF. At least now the accumulation won't be done with bots.

Oh well... That's exactly what's going on here. Some people feel a bit let down for such a late change. What do you do? You try to convince them that everything is ok and they have no reason to complain.

I can stop replying here, I'll still consider this an half-baked update with some debatable and unfair approach towards older players. Great for bringing new players in. Who care about the older ones anyway, Anet got they're money...

Mind you, this could never stop me from enjoying this game. To me it was just a matter of principle. Funny to see how people can be off-putting when they've nothing to loose, and nothing they're interested in is involved.

I'm playing just like I did yesterday, I already completed a new book, I'll get a grip.

WTS NEW GUILDWARS! NOW WITH BOOKS!


Yeah I can see new players already queueing up as we speak...

This sentiment ignores those of us who are close to finishing a guardian title, but haven't, and now would have to repeat at least some number of missions (particularly ones that we might've just finished earlier in the week) in order to turn in even a partial book. This also ignores those of us who want to play with more than one character but now have to grind those SS/LB titles despite having finished NF on those characters. Nevermind the fact that we can't view any of the filled pages for missions we've already done just from an art perspective. Looking at them on wiki doesn't count. I could care less about the gold/xp rewards for the stuff I've already done, but I can't get any of the improved rewards for the stuff I haven't done without repeating stuff that I did not long before the update.

The flooding in of both Luxon + Kurzick faction simultaneously without removing the penalty for cashing in one side's points wasn't very graceful either. I actually had enough faction coming in where I could've gotten my first Luxon rank and my next Kurzick rank, but instead had to balance them out to minimize the waste and got neither.

Speaking of Kurzick/Luxon faction...the additional faction for kills in AB is not very significant. AB is about capping, not just killing. In fact, focusing on kills instead of capping is a pretty good way to lose. The time spent waiting for an AB match + actually playing through it makes ABs seem quite inefficient for faction gaining.

While I appreciate the other changes (<3 account-wide treasure/wisdom), I don't like the fact that I'm basically punished for having completed some HM missions toward the title (which I have not yet achieved) just two days before the update. And with drunkard and sweet tooth reflecting the use of items that do have an effect on PvE (drunk skills, consummable-type sweets), this update isn't really going to allow me to get the full benefit out of any characters other than my "main".

Well for NM books, you'd be getting about 19k per character per campaign you beat. I'm not sure if you could separate them to get both NM and HM book rewards, but if it was possible then you'd be getting probably 25k per character per HM campaign beaten. Now most people would make about 95k just like that, within 10-15 minutes. Wouldn't affect the economy that much.

You'd also get 60k Faction for Kurzick or Luxon per character NM and 120k per character HM. For some (like myself) that could be 360k faction just like that. Again not that bad.

The only other thing I could think of is what that person quoted above, them not being able to hand it out retroactively, which wouldn't make much sense considering they can see which missions we've done and haven't done, HM and NM.

I finished the Proph book today on my warrior, who's done those missions numerous times and it was fairly fun going over them again with him, gained 8k and 80k experience.

I'm so RED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GOing tired of hearing all of the "you play for fun, stop complaining" posts. It's like they don't even understand or care to listen to others. No duh people play for fun, but tell me exactly what is right with ANet not giving older players the same rewards as newer players? It's one thing to make things easier for new players because that is inevitably how online games work as they evolve, but to say that older players don't deserve the rewards for the same work is bullshit plain and simple. The point here is showing that ANet isn't caring about their older players as much as pleasing newer players, and that gives me little hope that the HoM is going to show ANet's thanks of those that played GW1 and choose to continue to support them by BUYING and playing GW2. This update helps newer players/character get a good ranking in their titles by the time they beat the game; unfortunately it does little to help with grinding and does little to acknowledge players who have already been playing and supporting the game through the YEARS that Guild Wars: Faction and the later releases have been out. If a company is going to make older players work harder for the same rewards that newer players get, it gives its community little faith that they are being appreciated for supporting the company for the years they've been involved.

You know, that's actually quite insulting.

What possibly could make you believe that people that are arguing for the current implementation have nothing to lose? Do you really think that Risky Ranger is new to the game or has never completed a hard mode mission? Gimme a break... Yes, I would have profited had they chosen to make the storybooks retroactive. I'll wager 10k that Risky Ranger would have profited too. But at what cost to the economy? We can have something to lose and still disagree with you and the others that refuse to be satisfied by the explanation that was given for why it was done this way.

I like how there are more pugs forming again. That scene was dead for months. Good for casual pve'ers like me.

This looks like a pretty good update, which is kind of unexpected. More ways to cut down on grind is always win.

What is expected though is the number of completely selfish people turning up who want all the books to be retroactive. Anyone with Legendary Guardians does not need the gold, they do not need the experience, and they do not need the faction. There is absolutely no reason for the books to be retroactive other then "because I want it that way or else I'll cry!"

People need to grow up.

I have a few gripes with how this update was rolled out.

The argument that making books retroactive would have some sort of adverse effect on the economy is a bunch of crap. Every month, the xunlai tourney introduces a shitload of 'free money', more so I would imagine than everyone turning in their retro legendary guardians and handfuls of protectors for each campaign. Personally, I'm not too concerned about the money aspect, but I feel the reason Anet gave for withholding the money was bs.

The suggestion/implication that the alliance reputation titles would be less grindy is complete and utter bullshit. 10 million motherRED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GOing faction is still 10 million motherRED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GOing faction, regardless of the other methods of obtaining it. It still is likely going to take hundreds of hours to obtain, with similar repetition. Granted we now don't have to do hfff 25 thousand times, however, hundreds of vanquishes or 80 odd hm mission runs thru cantha still qualify as grind in my book. No other 'playable' pve title comes even close to the insanity that the allegiance titles require. I guess in retrospect, I'm the dumbass cause I could have botted the title way back when and felt no repercussions, like the plenty of people who I know did as such. Silly me for not taking advantage of the gray area that Anet had concerning macros for however many years and for trying to play fair and adhere to the eula. I'll know better next time, but I digress.

Going back to retroactive book rewards, personally, I'm for getting credit for having completed legendary vanq/guard/whatever as far as allegiance faction is concerned. That's one or so fewer runs (out of the 80 something) that would be required for the title, depending on how many toons people took thru the campaigns. And as far as crediting people for having previously accomplished things, umm, when I look at my map, I can see which toons have completed which missions. I'm sure there is a way that the devs can figure out what each toon has accomplished and allow them to individually buy pages for their books based on how far along they managed to get thru the respective campaigns. Like I said before, the money doesn't bother me, so if that part were scrapped, I'd be fine. The idea of taking umpteen toons yet again thru the missions another 80 times is crap. I still don't favor taking any of my 10 toons thru an additional 70 times, had I completed factions on each of them and the books did happen to be retroactive, but at least the veterans would feel as something resembling a bone had been thrown at em.

The other thing that continues to be ignored, which continues to dick over veterans, is the survivor title. People who are kind of attached to their original character and wish not to re-roll a new main end up getting the shaft here, and the indifference Anet has towards veterans on this matter saddens me. I don't have any problems with making things easier for new players, I just am getting a bit tired of bending over and taking one for the team, when it comes towards Anet's attitude towards veterans.

I'm sure Anet's apologists on the forums will be quick to flame me, and that's fine, I'd expect nothing less. I feel that I give Anet a lot of credit where its due, and that I'm not in the wrong for expressing my sentiments on the things that disappoint me, for those who would be quick to make assumptions and suggest that I'm some sort of woebegone asshole. Overall the update wasn't a bad one. I just feel that the fact that the faction aspect of the books not being retroactive was a bad decision, and the fact that the allegiance titles remain as a giant grind and continues to suck. Maybe I was under the wrong impression when I heard that 'hfff wouldn't be the optimum method of obtaining the title' (or whatever the quote was), that I read into it as being reduced grind to achieve the title and it would take significantly less time to max it. I guess I wasn't expecting it to be 'instead of 400 hours or mindless grind it's now only 350 hours of different, slightly-less-mindless grind.' Wishful thinking on my part, I suppose.

I pretty much agree with everything there. Well said cluebag. Almost makes me want to buy the new expansion for a certain other mmo. It's a shame though because i really do like guild wars. Though non ot the updates affect me personally since i don't care too much about titles and stuff but I certainly can understand and tend to agree with those that are upset.

1. agree
2. agree
3. are you RED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GOing out of your mind?

Anyways, cluebag summed everything up pretty well. Overall a very nice update, but it could've been fleshed out a bit more.

Very good sounding update. I have already logged into all characters.

The only problem was throwing away almost 32000 Kurzick because I was closer to a Luxon title upgrade
Oh well.

I look forward to playing this update and seeing how it goes.

I think Cluebag nails it. Anet has obfuscated the grind, but the assertion that it has been removed is absurd. I know I'm not playing through 800+ hard mode missions to max my Kurzicks title. 10,000,000 faction is just as much grind now as it was with HFFF.

to cluebag: what do you want anet to do for the "veterans" then? do you honestly want anet to retroactively activate survivor for your old characters? if so, consider this:

there are already tons of people who got their legendary survivor the normal way. retroactively activating survivor for older characters would be a huge kick in THEIR nuts. if that is to happen, are you prepared to say to those people: "sorry, too bad, suck it up princess"? if that's the case, how can you possibly complain in this instance?

i commend anet for producing such a good game. but please, whatever you did to attract such asinine players such as cluebag, with senses of entitlement bigger than a sperm whale... please do not do that for GW2. attracting such players will only ensure that you can NEVER please them no matter what you do.

to players like cluebag: anet is not obligated to please you. the game is what it is, and for the majority of players (novices and veterans alike), the game is now in a very good place. if you want to stay, then shutup and play. if you don't want to stay, then don't let the door hit you on the rear on your way out.

I don't totally agree with your post. However, I will say that survivor is easiest in Nightfall...So? I started with Prophecies and don't sweat it. I play to enjoy the game. The titles are a plus, but really I only care about the titles that have tangible benefit to PVE - which Survivor doesn't. I think those that make max Survivor are either great players that hang back (not lack of participate but unlikely they are trying to tank in the midst of melee) and always have good pugs or are run up by guildies...

<flame bait that that statement is it is my opinion>

I will wait and see on the decrease in grind, but from my first impression it will make it less AB only or grind, just as awarding points by getting the blessing from the priest made it more interesting for me. I don't really care for the PVP too often. It is fun distraction, but I generally have to be able to walk away for awhile to deal with real life and PVP is NOT conducive to uncontrolled interruptions.

so... our skill update will be coming when?

and what about those changes to hero battles izzy was talking about...

Glad for the update. Good to see Anet wants to keep GW from getting too stale. To those who feel slighted: I can empathise, but as a daily player for 22 months these changes wil freshen up my Title options. Still have 2 years{sic} to max all...I plan on being around for the move.

Great that we still getting support for an End of Life product that is already paid.

Crap that I needed to pay for being a beta tester...


All in all the game is starting to be what it should have been. So good work.

Next fix - get the inscription system in prophecies and factions. There is nothing worse then getting that skin you want for you character to use, ID it and then "there goes another xxx item to the merchant". Don't care if that makes all the weapons worth 100g or less either.

Hmm, i knew it was a kind of a Title update.. But as said above, i tought they where talking about some HB , and maybe TA + some GvG / skills buff update.. Suppose we'll see that later:/

I wanted to see some serious skill updates, maybe even some new skills?

Woot. Great update.
'Cept they should have made the EoTN titles account based too; save lots of grinding and QQ'ing over the points you have to farm. :3

Just imagine the horror. All those blazing wing wands going for 100K +xx ectos. All because Anet rewarded those players who have already completed the campaign.....

Wow, because there's no other way to obtain faction points, gold, and EXP in this game without books being made rectroactive.

I don't get it. The reward doesn't match the complaining. Not even close.

Let me repeat: faction points, gold, and EXP, THAT'S IT! No new weapon or armor skins, no new items or consumables, no new emotes or tonics, no nothing. Just faction points, gold, and EXP. The same faction points, gold, and EXP that can be obtained 9598184515681251 other ways in this game.

Is it just an issue of principle, maybe?
Because it is just a game after all.

How about you stop making stupid assumptions about what people want, why they want it or what their reactions will be?

I have completed most HM missions on a character however I have some who are for example 16/18 out of 25 HM missions complete and doing them all again with H/H is not something i really want to do while I have such a large amount of other things I do want to be going on with instead.

I also don't care about the money , it can be money neutral or even cost a bit but I'd like the faction or even just the pages filled in for the characters that are partially through a campaign so i can continue on my way and turn in a full book at teh end.

Retroactive books would not be a problem for either money or faction in my view, everyone getting 50-100k (number plucked from thin air) would have no impact in the grand scheme of things in the GW economy. The faction wouldn't either as 1 book only gets you 1.5% of your way towards Rank10.

Other than this and the dual faction gain at the same time mess, it was a very good update.

First of all, Survivor is a sad joke no matter how you look at it.
Those who got it with effort already got a "kick in the nuts" when we were introducted to things like Kilroy's boxing dungeon, HFFF and other easy EXP sources, every new character can get this title with minimal effort.
Those who got it through these methods... well, they don't have much to lose, it was easy.

But veteran players who missed the title because it was made AFTER they died suffer the most, not giving them the title is a bigger "kick in the nuts", why should Anet make the most loyal players suffer?
No matter how you look at it, the situation with this title is Bad, but the "Bad" we have now is much worse than the "Bad" we'd have once they finally fix it.

So yes, he can complain, everyone with a bit of knowledge of the situation can complain, this title is broken.

Now for the second part, "senses of entitlement bigger than a sperm whale"? He just gave a fair review of the situation, what exactly is your issue? some sort of elitism?

If faction, gold and exp is so meaningless to players, why did they even waste the time making the books then?

Oh, I forgot. People who have Legendary Guardian titles are automatically rank 12 in the faction they want and have unlimited gold. You're right, none of that is needed to someone who put the effort into Legendary Guardian. Well I must be bugged, because I don't have unlimited gold and I'm only rank 4 in Kurzick title, but I guess maybe it's because I have 2 LG chars...

People need to get a clue before they speak.

I actually laughed out loud at that. Seriously, a true story.

I'm not even going to point out how many ways Anet has failed to give a crap about the economy, since they're so flipping obvious that if anyone can't see them, they don't deserve to know. For a start, how hard would it have been to make the retroactive book not give any cash reward. Not very, if it was design by a monkey with half a brain from the start. But it wasn't. Instead Anet seem determined to make players spend ages in the most hated (amongst players) campaign by quite a large margin.

Ironically, the retroactive books wouldn't really have helped me, because most of my toons tend to start in Shing Jea and jump to LA or Kamadan and never complete Factions.

PS good job rewarding all the botters for almost 3 years worth of botting. Bet the RTM people are a bit miffed. Pity you screwed over everyone else too.

Oh, and don't give me that VQ bullshite either. Not all of us are in uber-leet guilds or are willing to stand the failure which is most pugs. That leaves us with h/h and (almost inevitably with h/h) consets.

So bye bye goes any hint of profit from this title, and hello to another "buy it now, if you are rich enough" grind fest. Truly inspiring .... come on Stargate, where the hell are you..

on a similar note...but slightly different...


is it jus me...or has the majority of the updates been geared towards pve?
and increasingly moreso as time moves on

i didnt pay for this kind of game
i spent $50 3 years ago for a game that emphasized pvp
and team-oriented pve that was in likeness to pvp
and most of all, skill > time

i really wish i could still be able to play that game i paid for 3yrs ago
but unfortunately...i cant...since that game is pretty much gone


i dun like the direction gw is heading
and i've been feelin that way ever since the announcement (not release) of nitefall

and wit updates like these
it doesnt really give me hope that the pvp situation will ever improve

by fair, you mean he gave a review of the situation with his own (and evidently yours) interest in mind? unfortunately by its very definition, that is not fair at all. my second statement merely puts what i'm observing in his post into words, and i believe it's actually quite accurate.

people need to realize that the game does not owe them anything. or rather, the game does not owe anything to it's players past the right to play it in any way allowed for within the game. the game, and its developers, are in no way obligated to bend itself to anyone's whims. in fact, anet has already bent enough under the pressure of its players, and has done a great deal of damage to the game as a result.

so to conclude, you are not entitled to anything the game doesn't allow you to do. the update has brought about many good things, and anet is in no way failing their duties to you as a player, when all you want is some frivolous change that won't make much difference.

Take your religious voodoo magic and be gone! WITCH I SAY! WITCH!


On a side note. Update had no effect. That is all.

The update was definitely a step in the right direction on a couple accounts, namely fixing the huge problem known as HFFF. I love the increase to faction in Fort Aspenwood seeing as I used to mess around in there quite frequently.

My only complaint at this time is the greatly decreased time given to Luxons to conquer the Kurzick fort. The time was decreased by such a good amount it seems, and that puts alot of strain on the Luxon offense to keep pushing, but seeing as it's a fort with 8 Kurzicks + NPC's, it's almost too much to do. I do agree that the time needed to be decreased, but I think it was taken a bit too far.

This update got me playing again. And apparently Avarre and Faer were PvEing.

ANet did an amazing job.

I played a few rounds tonight and here are my thoughts.

Yes, it is a little too fast. The Kurzicks won every single time but one(and I'm on the Kurzick side) and that one time it was close, like 99% completele close, and the only reason the Luxons managed to win was a sync job by several guildies that were playing a variety of rits and just had so many spirits that we couldn't deal with it, and we didn't have a monk. If we'd had a monk and not just my ranger spamming Healing Breeze we might have won that one.

On the flip side though, it seems that it's now very difficult for the Kurzicks to actually take and hold any of the mines. Actually, as long as I've been playing the game, I've only ever seen them take the far mines a handful of times. Now though, it seems that they might get a few people to the near mines, but that only lasts for a few minutes, and then they're overrun to the point where they have to hold off wave after wave of luxons and can't even think about the mines.

Perhaps if it were a little easier to access the mines, then they could extend the clock a fair amount. As it is, yeah, the timer could use a couple of extra minutes...

I love the smell of QQ and Whine in the mornings. (from apocolypse now). you got what you're going to get it's all you deserve and Anet owes you nor any of the others anything. This is a start from scratch right now implementation, Regina gave you the whys and what fors and that's that, so stop crying and whinning.

I agree. They don't owe us anything and, in the end, this whole complaint won't solve anything anytime soon. That's it, take it or leave it.

If devs are supposed not to care of players, stop asking being "grateful" for what they did. That's what they're paid for, that's their job and they're offering support for a product we've paid. We don't owe them gratitude, we paid for what we got and, quite frankly, I'm disappointed and expressing my disappointment. I don't care if they've spent 7 days a week to work for this update, it's their fault not having addressed so many issues before. Backlog of work for them, that's their problem.

On the whole I liked this update. The changes to luxon/kurzick faction were well overdue. I might even venture into Urgoz again in the near future.

There is no doubt Anet know how to program a great game. Because GW truly is a great game.

The comment by the community relations manager about the effect on the economy to retroactively give players books is just plain silly. And given my comments above about great programmers etc, this does not necessarily mean the ones making these decisions have much in the way of common sense.

e.g say for example you get given 100k for a book. what do you think this player who has been playing for 3 years or so going to do with this money.
Do you think he is going to inflate the prices on common items. He has no need for these things. I would estimate the 80% or more of this money will go on gold sinks(9 rings, lockpicks, sugar, alcohol, other comsumables). i.e. a very limitied effect on the greater economy.