make pvp free to the public?

since there are so many pvp arenas in gw that are deserted, make it open to public may attract potential pve buyer to buy the pve content.

and opening pvp to the public will create more incentives for players to pvp.....than waiting forever for party forming in organised pvp..

what's your thought?

It wouldn't address the issues that caused the PvP population to vanish.

No it wouldn't. Not the previous PvP population anyway. However, why focus on them, not a potentially new PvP population?

You know, it wouldn't change things a lot on american hours and on euro hours new players would get frustrated, even in most basic format such as RA for obvious reasons we mentionned everywhere....

Basically, it would eventually make a population increase for 2-3 weeks but then things would go back as they were before...

On a side note , i doubt they will care a lot on PvP in the future(apart of GvG)... just check in any forum the number of posts/threads/views about anything concerning PvP and the number concerning anything, even minor, about PvE...

I don't understand why you are purposely ignoring the biggest market, and one with the "best" gamers, the Asian market.

The Asian market would jump at the opportunity, any opportunity for any game actually, to play for free.

I think it is possible, as playing for free without any limitation is different from buying and owning a game.... you can see team fortress 2, and lol.. both are populated....

perhaps only open a few certain desserted arena, like HA and CA ...especially ca.. because skill unlocking is already not a concern...it can be a good testing ground...and test play..

it is also possible to limit the number of access like allowing 250-500 people to the free content..if the server cannot hold too many people...and that is also a barrier lift for them if they buy the game...

in asian markets, sg, korea, tw.. etc.. most of them like to play competitive games.. such as sc, dota, lol, on lan server.....also the fact showing that there are so many free online games in tw... there are huge potentials....

better than wasting the well-designed format of the game (aparted from the skill balance) to those sync-player to farm not according to the purpose of the game.....

concerning about the weapon skin and item from strong box etc.. perhaps maybe not allowing free player to trade with paid player....and free player only allowed to use the pvp skin etc..as to mainly attract the really skillful free players..

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codex arena I think is the only arena that is less limited by the "bad skill balance"...

so the meta arguement and eliteness have the least effects to the new players in there

Its not the worst idea I've heard.
As long as they have no access to any faction(well they can earn balth faction, just not turn it in for zkeys, only pvp unlocks) and strong boxes until they pay for a copy.

Otherwise you will only make Zkey + strongbox farming worse. (free accounts + multi loader = $$$$$$$)

pretty much this.

Basically Balth Faction for unlocking skills/upgrades/runes only.

Honestly could work well IMO.

Looking from anets point of view:
1. increased server burden (not sure if is a problem)
2. The possibility they purchase the game( a slim chance, if it f2p why purchase anything)
3. The store would have little to no impact as everything can be unlocked in game.(why pay when it is free)
4. Increased attention towards gw2

I really don't think new pvp population is benefits anet as it brings not much revenue. For the most part it will boost ra population and maybe codex. Ha and gvg will be left because they do not have skills and items unlocked to participate.

Potential mass influx of bot usage, no thank you.

As HB said, i doubt it would sustain many new players anyhow. Competitive PvP is very difficult to get into, let alone start playing with existing barriers such as the stupid unlock system.

If they reduced the skill & item packs to maybe £5-10 complete unlock then it could work. The way it is now wouldn't work. I would suggest just free unlocks but if you're making the PvP section free that'd be completely unrealistic.

No, Arenanet will never give away their product for free. It is their business, not their charity. You can buy the full trilogy at walmart for like $20. Another thing to consider.... this games graphics are 6 yrs old. People aren't flocking to buy that. Instead A net needs to focus on what matters (PvP). The only part of the game that offers TRUE re playability. Give us some meaningful updates. For example: fix the monk problem in RA. Dont allow more than one monk class (or Rt) per team. I really thought they fixed this issue with the Hero Batttle maps in RA but too many retards cried. Codex... Give us some decent skills or.... remake Team Arenas and give us a TA ladder. I have no thoughts on HA because I hate that format.

Not having to pay £40-50 to be instantly competitive would be nice but I'm not sure how much it would help: given the age of the game I suspect most people who have looked at GW with interest have tried it and even if a bunch of new people did join; the nature and state of the game (particularly HA and GvG) make it very unforgiving for new people.

And thats absolutely a good thing, u only get better by learning from ur mistakes.

i disagreeas theres 2 sides to this if your going for the f2p option.
1 - its free which means if players get put off pvp via abuse of being newb vs veterans there isnt anything to make them return.
2 - If the game is paid for and a player gets the above they are more likely to carry on as they paid money for it.

Thats where the difference is - ive played a few free mmo`s and tbh i lost interest because of players abuse in many different forms - like spawning high lvl monsters outside towns and watchin most players die.

Also consider this - the new free players would be an open market to account sellers who deal with stolen accounts and we know its bad enough atm but do we want to give hackers the chance to offload to innocent suckers ?

Except when you can't learn from your mistakes because if you make one a group will kick you and potentially blacklist you.

The only way to breathe life back into PvP is to completely change the format of HA and GvG thus making it more new player friendly than elitist. The problem with HA and GvG is the game can't recycle into what it was in 2005. Not to mention there's not a live team who could handle that. PvP is in the state it is in because of bad management.

Wooohoooo I would make mutiple accounts for all the good stuff......10 free keys (idk if this would apply to new accounts), z guide quests, free extra storage...and I wouldn't play pvp on it after the z-guide quests.

I'm sure many many others would do the same......I'd rather exploit it than actually play pvp with it...so unfortunately......./notsigned

This is a good idea it would bring thousands of players to the pvp arenas. As well as make anet plenty of money from pvp unlock packs.

All these problems listed can be fixed so very simply by making it so free accounts would not be able to trade.

Like most MMO trial/free accounts.

They would be offered the option to upgrade to a full account where they would be able to trade and have pve chars.

then people must stop crying about and either suck it up or not join it if they don't WANT to improve.
When u WANT something, then u'll do just about anything for it.

Don't think this will fix pvp....pvp is dead because it is considered by the majoriy of players as not fun. If something is so un-fun you got to make it free to get people to even consider playing it... its not a good product to begin with... its arguable that the people that do still play it are doing it for in game currency and/or e-peen.... thats the only reason id step into pvp myself... I don't enjoy the exploitive and discrimitive formats anet has offered us... it was more fun and less complicated when there was no fame, rank, or faction, or pvp titles...

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This happens because the objective isn't just play and have fun... its to get e-peen and currency.... which makes the time value of taking you along greatly outweighed by the value they'd get by taking someone that knows what there doing...

Which causes people to act in a manner that is discriminatory and enocourages exploitive behavor like syncing... which brings me to the next quote.



key word is WANT.... u can't expect people to WANT to play when the the vast majority of the pvp community acts like you do.... just because you have the time to practice and was fortunate enough to find a nitch that was willing to take the time to educate you on pvp.... doesn't mean the others have the time to practice pvp like a sport and be lucky enough to find someone competent that will consider taking that player along....

sorry not only are there better uses of people game time in guild wars... theres better person vrs person video games out there with people with better sportsmanship...

its collectivly anets fault and the players fault why pvp is dead.... anet handed them the knife (discrimitive and exploitive formats) the community stabbed itself by acting in a discrimitive and exploitive manner. (rank discrimination, poor sportsmanship, syncing, rupt botting). The greed stemming from e-peen and rewards made pvp community consume itself. Its not a matter of not wanting enough... its a matter of a pvp format not existing for people that just want to play casually.

Hopefully all this was not done in vain and Anet learns from its mistakes in gw2.

People must "stop crying about and either suck it up or not join" if they want or not want to deal with the problems inherit in the game's design. It is not the people's fault, but the system itself that motivates new players to dislike the format, and is very effective at doing so at various levels (unrewarding, unforgiving, and annoying with a community that doesn't wants to help).

Wanting something won't make your rank magically pop up to high levels. And if your rank isn't high, you won't even be given the opportunity to try. And even if you were, should you ever do a mistake - something fundamental to learning - and they kick you out.

The very high-ranked elitists that play HA were, when they started playing it, no more than newbies too, that at their time, because the game was new, were given more opportunities to try and fail, fail, fail until they got better at it. It is thus unfair that new players can't have the same privilege, and it isn't surprising that HA's community is so closed at the moment.

The problem however is that Asians are usually interesting in very competitive games( warcraft , starcraft, etc....)... Now they removed Hero Battles, the only competitive stuff left in Guild Wars is GvG....but this fits 2 major problems :
- Meta is really terrible... People used to play in 2005-6-7 because it involved tactics and there was no build that literally killed you in 3 sec.. Here, except on some maps, there's not much you can do and learn by facing those kinds of builds
- AT/MAt hours are close to impossible for Asian... MAT is like around 1-2 am there....

Eventually ,a big influx of players ( although it's hard to believe it will happen) could fix inactive hours then, i'm pretty sure players would then come to ' farm ' those players like some do today....( HA especially....)

Also , 2 posts above are completly true

Once again I get trolled by people who don't want to do the required sacrifices in order to get anywhere in pvp formats.
Sorry to say, but things are how they are.
The suggestion will do NOTHING good for the game in a LONG term(short term yes, but u need to aim for long term), it will only makes things WORSE.

I disagree ... because if there is 1 honest group really want to fight according to the format... the botting, syncing... will never work.. because the bot and sync group will always encounter the honest group...which discharge the effort for syncing.....

and making the free account non tradable with paid account will not affect the economy...


I don't think so, because most of the time, the current pvp, or old pvp players are distracted by pve, where the HOM thing sucked a significant percentage of pvp players to pve.. which affects the whole pvp community... the free system will spring life back to the pvp with only free pvp players in concern who cannot be distracted by pve unless they buy the game.


yea then just only open the codex arena....which the meta, and eliteness affect the least to new players as I have mentioned..... codex can be made into competitive easily if there is just one competitive group playing..

even the very early form pf magic the gathering: online, has a free trial room for players to play . where always has player really playing but not abusing...because there is no benefit for abusing..



there are players who cannot access to credit cards or buying the game but want to play some fun/competitive game......or even some friends who want to play with another friends who doesn't have an account for 1 or 2 causal games etc....

fixing the skill balance/format will only affect the old players.. but not tapping into the new market as efficient....

Careful to whoever you call troll. Last I know, I haven't insulted you yet.

The "required sacrifices" you call are actually very artificial, and weren't supposed to be there in the first place. They are negative consequences of the design.

Those "required sacrifices" are even counter-produtive to the very idea you try to defend. You say it should be hard to get to the top? Of course it should! And how do you get better? You yourself have stated that it is by making mistakes and learning. And guess what? The elitism present in the format does not let you try and learn. I'll repeat in different words because this is the core of this issue. A new player is NOT allowed to get better.

ok.. the eliteness arguement.. I think it is more correct to say how much time is required to become an elite, than how the elite affects new players.. elite of course will always be better than new players, period..so it is better to invest time on caring the time required to become an elite which is accorded to the pvp elite base...that is the number of elites.. and leads to the main problem in concern of not enough pvp population

as far as I remember.
I'll give u an example that most people will not like, but I'll bring it on table anyway.

rawr never did any good in tournaments back in the day(they hardly got bronze capes in the past).

They WANTED to improve and they did so after getting wrecked a lot in the past untill they DOMINATED the pvp community for quite some time.

What dedication and being honest with yourself and your other teammates can reproduce, right?

Many people should take them as an example how high one can reach if only the passion and willingness to get better is present.

So my message to all of you is: have a clear goal and work for it and don't just give up when things get tough or when your taken out of your comfortzone.

GW pvp lost this game long long time ago and not even a VERY late F2P move can change that. Look at the competition and how it crushed GW:

http://pc.gamespy.com/pc/league-of-l...1184273p1.html

What is gw pvp peak population now? 5000? That is 1% of LoL. Lol?

There is some hope for GW2 though but so little is known about it, we don't even know for sure that it is real. If it is real, I say any serious upgrade/change to gw1 could potentially hurt gw2.

Your statement requires pvp and pve to be mutually exlusive to make since... Sorry to break it to you PVE is the end game now... you dont have to step into pvp for any kind of reward besides pvp titles... PvP accomplishments wont mean jack shet next year. Peoples attentions are looking foward into to GW2

I wouldnt even go as far to call pvp-ers elite just exlusive... there just a small club of knowlegeable people that play with themselves.. that expects new players to learn by getting there ass kicked constantly by them and "suck it up", but are absolutly unwilling to take a loss themselves and "suck it up" by taking someone thats not high rank for the sake of a healthy community....

So you want to spell out these "required sacrifices" step by step for people and where they can find a team to make these sacrifices with so people can have a clear path?.... Why don't you stop trolling and "suck it up" and volenteer to teach someone something even thou its probable that you might lose?

Fact is unless that new players finds someone that can get them into a decent team... And the way pvp-ers behave i find it highly unlikley. Theres no clear path and that new player has almost no chance of entering pvp with a meaningful reward yeild and finding it fun. GW1 pvp will continue to die off because of the current community's unwillingness to accept a few losses.

It's not so much that new players can get better, it's more that they have to get substantially better to enjoy themselves. Truly popular "competitive" games have plenty of space for people to suck all day long and still enjoy themselves without any dedication towards reaching the top. That not only keeps player numbers large, but also provides a solid baseline for new and potentially competitive players to gradually climb, and alot of hype to draw said players into the whole mix. If you need to be near the top to have fun, then your "top" players just keeps diminishing as everyone short of that quits, till you end up where we are now.

The whole structure of GvG and HA is pretty much against casuals by simple virtue of needing to form a team and wait for a similar team, and as noted RA (or rather, the game's class structure) is a poor alternative for jump-in gaming. (Yet nonetheless, remains the most popular format throughout the game's lifetime.)

At this point I think giving away the GW PvP experience for free would do more to stain their name than anything else. It would provide a little more activity in RA and some more purchases, but alot more people swearing off GW2 after suffering through RA and the barriers to HA/GvG. So I don't see it making much business sense for Anet, even if it helped GW1 a little.

P.S. GW did pretty badly in Asia, I don't think even free play will change that.

lol is successful only because there is a constant update of skills and heroes input with all those cosmetic micro transaction holding the players to stay..

there is nothing improvement on competitiveness level in comparison to dota... it is the marketing that makes lol competitive.....

as long as the skill update is less superior than dota.. lol will die in the competitiveness level..

you see.. hon, lol and dota. are 3 similar games.. only lol is free...thats why they dominated the player base.

making a certain arena free.. is making part of the pvp mutually exclusive.. but not the whole...if pve is the end game now, there is nothing to lose to make a smaller part pvp free to be honest....and that is the point actually if there is efforts being put in pve by the developers, meaning certainly it should be something more expensive than pvp that requires money paying from the players....

your whole point of unwilling suck it up is all from the old market.....taping into the new market and making the player base bigger.. will result more game happening.. it has nothing to do with newbie unwilling to suck it up...

the point of opening the game free is not to train the existing purchased newbie.. into super elite.. it is used for letting the current existing pvp players has some players to play with....than playing with the same old bot farming everyday especially in codex dead hour....with much of other marketing benefits.

the new player will always be new, if there is no games....

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how about codex?...

the skill balance/meta affects the number of players playing in the arena for the existing market...

only if you have a super bad balance and open it to the public will affect the name more.....which I don't think now is the super bad balance situation...

and even in codex...the skill change every day... it has little effect from the skill balance/meta...

I think... gw did pretty badly in asian, mostly because the marketing is poorly done at that time.....

if there is nothing satisfying the old market player...it will even harm the gw brand more and the transition to gw2.. because they are the voice of gw reputation...

I was refering to the implication that PvP-ers abandoned pvp for pve....

I don't think you can argue away the bad buisness strategy of making the most probalamatic part of the game free is not going to sell more copys of guild wars... it will actually have a negitive effect when people get slammed by experianced players and ppl say "ok not worth my time".

Making a bad movie free to watch doesn't make the movie any less painful or more desirable to watch.... it just might give the ppl that paid for it some short term company....same applies here...

Id agree with that statement in any other condition exsept this one... PvP problems are abundent and massive... HA being dead, GvG dying, Gold cape sync teams in RA... should be clear that those pvp formats have problems that are not lack of player effort related, when you can compair moderatly successful ones like JQ, FA, and AB exist because of low discrimination and explotation problems.... people are playing these because there fun and easy to group into.... not because they have to get there @$$ kicked to get to the top so they can have fun.

If the only reason someone would play a game is because it's completely free, how does that translate to people buying the game? Anyone with any interest in purchasing it but wanted to try it first is able to do so with the free trial.

problem of pvp..

1) lack of players
2) eliteness
3) bad skill balance
4) pvp is not the end game..should not put any effort to improve it, and let it die like polymock...
5) etc.

which one is the most major I think you can see is obviously the first one...if you argue the players from the free circle will be less elite than the current paid circle, you may try to have a second thought...especially most people left in the paid circle now are pve players ..

if the format is for the elites.. it should be open to more elites...not just a few...and especially the elites are usually found from the free circles....

for 3) bad skill balance, codex will less likely being affected by it, as there is skill update everyday....

4) horribly wrong if pvp is not being addressed...because gw2 sales is on pvp too...if not they wouldn't do the strongbox update.

whether a movie is bad or not is subjective, some people may find the movie you think is bad good...

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the free trial is not focusing on pvp.....the problem is that there is a lack of pvp population focus.

if you make a free trial just focusing on pvp.. it will be the same as what I suggest...but if the free trial is open into pve, and pvp, there is a distraction from pve...and besides the current free trial is base on time limit...how much pvp you can play in that trial limit? time is very important in pvp....

if a person only play it because it is free, there of course requires reason for them to purchase, it can be

1) to have unlimited access..if every moment only allowing 250-500 free accounts to access the arena, once the limit is reach, no free accounts can be allowed, and if you want to play you have to buy it..
2) the pve attraction
3) weapon cosmetics
4) access to more competitive arenas, like HA or gvg
5) access to full skill sets.. which codex cannot give.

what is more important is not attracting new potential buyers, but springing life into pvp...to have an enough number of players to initiate the pvp wheel..

@ OP I think making PvP free for all as a sort of trial mode for guild wars would definitely help revitalize the scene, assuming there will be frequent balance updates.

Definitely a good idea. I'm not sure it will happen.

Firstly, the bots, free keys, zboxes, balth faction, gold whatever etc arguement is a rubbish one. Like pretty much all trial accounts (in many games) they will not be able to trade until they upgrade to a paid version due to too many channels of abuse. So this arguement is pretty much null.

However, I really can't see much of an uptake on the full version at all because theres little enjoyment for free trial players due to the trash state of pvp. As many people stated in this thread its a short term solution to pvp population. Maybe this is enough to keep pvp stimulated for a while longer - but with little benefit for ANet why should they bother...

It would be much more effective for them to produce extra revenue through bundling the game with a graphics card (near GW2 release), specials etc.

Random thought that imho doesn't deserve its own topic - how about fueling the eliteness beast so that it devours itself?

Highly ranked players don't want to play with lowrankers. If R6 is the current 'acceptance level', introduce a subarena of HA, available only to players of R4 and below (yes, NOT R5). If elitists don't want to play with newbies, let's make it official - people R0-R4 may only group with other people from that group and are faced against other such parties. They can't get to Halls, but they can get strongboxes and HA points normally. Normal rules, just faced other lowranked parties, and with no end chest reward.
People R5-R15 form a group of 'normal' HA.

It would solve some part of elitism by sanctioning it, it would make selling fame impossible for the first 600 points, and it would encourage people to actually try HA without the fear of being paired with an experienced, high-ranked group.

I'm afraid it's a little too late for a change like that, and it requires a tad too much coding... thus leaving it only here (unless someone likes to elaborate on it and quote me in a new thread, feel free to).

horrible talk about... why bother, too hard to coding, no benefit to anets.. all these are bad argument..laziness as an excuse...is hopeless....
good reputation is not a benefit is the first time I heard....
how efficient you can code attributes to the reputation of anet and its future to be honest..I don't think laziness, doesn't care, etc. are good reputation...

and too late?... what is too late...I don't think there is something called too late.who limits the too late factor?.someone died, anet died? the world ended?.if too late.. how about just close down everything...

stop bringing up eliteness arguement, it is pointless....if the game is for elite to play, so be it.. but then at least open up for more elite to have easier access to the game...

Guild Wars 2 release date.

Regarding coding, are you even aware that the Live Team of GW1 is damn limited right now? Look how long it took them to get WoC up, announced as early as December '10 i think - everyone expected it for CNY...
Sorry, but i don't think you even know what you're talking about. You don't even really understand the meaning of 'elite'.

gw1 and gw2 pvp are totally different, period...

as long as it can be done...it takes long to do doesn't mean it is not viable.

gw2 release date? has it been released?... surely no delay like diablo 3.. like 10 years? the last time I heard about the release date of gw2 is when the game is finished.. so it is forever...that means.. too late is not a good argument.

elite?....you don't or I don't?... don't see your point really...
if there are 10 ppl.. 1 elite.. 9 noob..in the arena...the arena won't work
if there are 10 elite... in the arena... still same amount of people.. the arena will work basically..

opening up an arena to the public meaning.. letting more elite to play.....from 1 elite to 10 elites... i don' t care there will be 90 noobs joining.. it doesn't matter as long as there are 10 elites competing.....

however.. if you close it so as to letting only 1 single elite constantly playing...the noob will always be the noob.. until the elites leaves the game.

and beside.. only the paid account will care the rank...the free account won't... they only play for the arena competitiveness..

That is a good example, but then you have the case of many people who do not have a group to work with. Especially those who go there alone, expect to find a party, and no one accepts them because of their low rank.

IMO, hiding the rank and emotes while in HA's outpost would do wonders. If there was no way to prove which rank you were, newbies could simply "lie" about it, show their pvx-build, and get in the team.