So Then... What's Coming Up Next?

With the Winds of Change storyline hitting the final third part and thus, coming to a close, I have to ask. What's the next thing coming up?

From what I've seen and heard:

- An update toward Hero AI, more importantly the functionality and changes toward melee heroes, Warrior & Assassin more importantly.
- A continuation and possible conclusion for the Halloween storyline about the Lunatic Court.
- A "GW Beyond" storyline for Nightfall, most likely mentioning about Palawa Joko and his overlord-type conquering of Elona.
- Assorted new Zaishen Bounties such as Marnta Doomspeaker, Chazek Plague Herder and Elsnil Frigidheart.
- Skill changes to Paragons and possibly a few new added ones to the Motivation and Command attributes.
- Skill changes to Rangers and possibly merging some Beast Mastery with Wilderness Survival and have one single attribute.
- Skill changes to Elementalists, primarily non-elite skills and more skills that can cause armor ignoring damage.
- New green items for some Prophecies bosses, mostly those on the Ring of Fire Islands and Crystal Desert.

What i'm hoping for is an update for the Para and Rangers. That to me seems to be the most important thing right now. Secondly would have be new content, Nightfall/ Halloween.

As for hero ai, does anyone and would anyone use warrior heros?
New greens? if they are the same skins we can just pass on those.

But maybe we should give them a week off after WoC ... but then straight back to work!

Really? Where did you hear that?

I thought they said they wouldn't add any new skills to the game for players (like they didn't with Dervish, despite the limited skill selection)? Though I could definetly see them moving a few around, perhaps doing something with all those unlinked Paragon skills and making them have linked effects.

As for combining Beast Mastery and Wilderness Survival, I find that almost impossible to believe. Other than being a little unfair on players who already have armours with associated Runes for those attributes, wouldn't that mean the Ranger would be the only class in the game with only three attribute lines (Marksmanship, Beast Wilderness, Expertise)? Every class has at least 4, and some have 5.

But then I suppose if some classes can have one extra, it's not too farfetched that if the need was desparetly seen, one class might get one less...
(Heh, maybe they'll go and move Spears to Rangers instead then, and leave Paragon a pure support class. Ranger is one of the many classes that can use a Spear better than a Paragon can anyway ).

I'm not saying you're lying, I'm just curious where it was heard :/.

I want straight forward Endless, random waves of all enemy types o.o

and...and.... another hero that can be anything like Razah! <3

and they mentioned monk's smiting line

as for rangers: yea, i would like to see pets and traps being more useful in PvE
paragons should be able to use their spears better imo

and yes PLZ make melee heroes AI being useful....

btw, about paragons, its weird they once nerfed mending refrain to 10 energy cost from 5 energy cost, as its not much in pve now, imo

thats about it, except for the ele's non-elites, but they might be closer with those by now

the next elona content will take a while, as they just finished WoC, so i wouldnt think about it for now

ps. i dont care if it takes long, all of this, as i wont be in GW2 early, if i will at all, as i have enough personal reasons not to buy any other MMO, so i will stick around in GW a long time
(yes, its about needing too much help (and the small income i'll have), and not being able to get much, as people wanna do their own stuff too, i mentioned it before i think)

anyway, for now i'll wait and enjoy what GW has now, and hope alot more will come even after GW2 release

sort of like the secret cow level in Diablo?

Guild wars 2 imo, im already sold on it

ah right wrong forum for that,

yea for guild wars 1 well i think they will do palawa joko taking over elona or something?
yea as mentionned all those skill revamps just like eles and dervishes were. i have to say anet is improving in some aspects

also they might get a chance to explain dominion of winds or is that later on in tyrias history?

Where did you hear these?

I've been taking notice of local chat ramblings and the GToB to comprise what seems to be brought up or repetitively mentioned at various times. From all major cities and outposts, to the usual Zaishen Mission location.

For Paragons, some people believe that if some classes can have "duplicate" skills (such as the Mesmer skills Sympathetic Visage & Ancestor's Visage), then allow extra skills for Paragons too. Two skills brought up were Energizing Finale & Zealous Anthem.

The Ranger attribute combination, go figure, were brought up by many Pet users as they figured combining spirits and pets to make a lethal mini-team. Elementalists, strangely, also have mentioned similar ideas.

Also, green items are green. Those who collect things have new things to collect while being able to do things in Prophecies. I mean, most of Factions & Nightfall have many, if not all, bosses with a green, so why does Prophecies get the cold shoulder? (More than just Grenth's Footprint/Sorrow's Furnace)

As for ZBounties, well, with so many bosses in some obscure locations, why not add more?

That's what I know and have heard.

Melee hero update, pretty please ><
I don't like to use the same team on all my characters, so I'd like some warriors/assassins to tinker with (and I like the hero assassin ladies )

I like my paragon, and would love to see it more generally useful in pugs, instead of being pushed into one build. I think paras have decent physical type boosts and defensive support, but the heal/caster support is lacking. Healing on paras shouldn't be too strong, as monks/rits are dedicated to that, but some caster support in motivation would be nice (energy regain, faster casting/recharge or something like that). And of course some type of damage dealing for those who focus on spear mastery.

Extra greens for proph, no ty... I like SF and grenths footprint^^

I find my ranger fun to play as is, don't see why it needs much of a buff... I might sound absolutely ignorant for saying this, but isn't the ranger one of the more decently balanced classes?

Also would like to see something similar to the wanted quests for WoC, just to give us something more to do daily

So in short, those four were just things some players wanted but aren't actual planned upcoming changes.

That's in some ways disappointing. I'm not on-board for all four of those, but some of them would certainly be nice. Though, I'd prefer WoC bosses get bounties before the ones you named do.

The rest of the ones in your original post actually are/were at one point planned. We probably won't see them all, though. Like the Beyond content in Elona. And at this rate, maybe the melee AI update, too, since that was supposed to happen I think a year ago (wasn't it originally planned to be part of the dervish update?)

One update that you didn't mention that we probably also will never get is the fix for the extra mods issue from the Halloween mausoleum quest. The CMs posted frequently then to say they were going to do an update to fix that problem, and posted every few weeks or months saying that they hadn't forgotten about it and were still working on it. Now, more than a year later, I still have a triple modded wand from then. I think they gave up trying to find a way to fix it. Kind of odd, though, since they were able to retroactively change everyone's old school Nolani fire wands years ago.

The only things you can go on are things the devs themselves have said they're looking at, and the test krewe and to a lesser extent, leaks.

There hasn't been a legitimate 'surprise' regarding skill updates in quite some time, as they anet is usually very forthcoming about what they are working on.

My opinions are in bold.

I suspect that the Lunatic Court storyline will be merged with the Elona GW:Beyond ("Sands of Time"?) content, starting in the Summer and building up over the second half of the year. It makes sense, considering the history between Thorn and Joko. Completing it will reward a Mesmer hero.

I do no want to crush all your hopes but...

-GW:Beyond is done with Woc atm. Not enough resources to build the elona content, and not enough time before GW2 release anyway (which should be in a 6-10 months).
(Quote of Anet dev that can't find atm)

-New greens outside new content (like were the WoC ones) are very unlikely.

-Lunatic court storyline may be brought up both with Elona beyond or 2012 Halloween: but first won't come out as said, and latter will take place when GW2 should already be released and populated, maybe with his own event to take care. In other words, not probable.

-New skill and lines merge aren't going to happen, expecially at this stage of the game. Just saying.

-New bounties aren't needed, as the rotation is almost the same since Z Bounties came out.

-It's like over 1 year that they're talking about revamping meele hero/pet AI. Lost hopes on this.

-Rework of regular ele skill is the only thing they've truly talked about. Other changes they mentioned are revamp of non-imbagon Paragons, Smiters, maybe Rangers. (not necessarily in this order).


In other words, collecting rumors of ppl in GotB isn't what i'd use to set my expectation about upcoming changes.

I'd like to learn where you heard about the bolded things.

I have never heard of such. Skill changes to those professions, yes, but not the specifically bolded parts. Especially since, as said in this thread already, I've heard that Anet will not add new skills for players to use (other than quest-only skills).

Oh, so this (what I bolded above) isn't what is rumored to come about, but what you and other people want to come about.

Duplicate skills existing seems no reason for Anet to add more skills (if anything, I'd expect them to remove skills from the core profession - reason being is that there are so many skills it's hard to balance them all).


Since we're posting hearsay, one thing I've heard, and note this is unconfirmed in every way from my part, is that the Live Team has the Elona beyond arc planned out (outlined out? written out? I've heard both), but they don't have enough art assets to get it going. Which is sad if true... and also means that the Lunatic Court's story is most likely next to see its conclusion.

Before that though, I'm expecting one of the following:

• Elementalist normal skill update
• Paragon skill update
• Monk skill update

Beyond this, there's also the Evennia mystery and Ebonhawke arc(s) for Ascalon - though that might have been scrapped when Stumme took over, since that was a project from Linsey's time.

I'd like for new ZBounties though. They'd be easy to add and can give players a good amount of things to do. Just no more new lines like the Wanted was (I'd rather see expansions onto the ZBounties).

Edit:
Please do find this quote, I've heard this once or twice and follow most news, but don't recall seeing this from a dev.

And it doesn't matter when GW2 is released. Beyond will continue after GW2's release.

Disagree with Elona beyond, as it seems to be fairly unconnected to any Beyond story. Palawa Joko does hold ties to it, but that seems to be side banter stuff for laughs.

It may come before Halloween 2012, though unlikely. Wintersday 2010 gave hints that it's sharing the Lunatic Court's story ("dark forces are gathering" bit).

And again, GW2's release will have no affect on GW1. GW1 will stop getting its updates once there's not enough players to merit continuing the updates (GW1 will see a drop when GW2 releases, but it won't be dead to the point of cutting servers, imo).

I'm looking down for that quote (i've seen the link on Guru some time ago) but can't find atm. Btw, he just say: "We've already written Elona Beyond conten,t but we haven't resources to run it in a near future" or something like that.

If the team doesn't get more funds/ppl to work, you're going to see it when they'll announce GW3. Ok, apart jokes, the problem is that with limited team and resources it's going to be hard to complete that content.

Last quest of Halloween where Mad king kick Palawa's face made me think those 2 things can be related. Personal opinion tho.



Actually, he already did. No more expansions. Skill updates rarer and rarer, Major ones taking 8-10 months. Embark beach has been last new feature implemented, and nothing has been done to fix the fail of it in 1 year (it's desert apart to craft cons and jump to elite areas). PvP updates to title and boxes+envoy stuff, but that's not a great deal.

That's why i'm not that confident we'll see more GW:Beyond stuff. In a near future at least.

http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Guild...cite_note-FB-0


After Winds of Change, there will be "things people are going to be surprised by" that the Live Team will not currently discuss.[1]

I really hope you're wrong. This is the one update I've been looking forward to since it was first mentioned. I just want to be able to load up my party with Koss and Jora and Zenmai and not have to feel like I'm wasting three character slots.
The last mention of the melee hero update I've been able to find is from last October:

Fingers crossed.

GToB is full of people who rant and say this and that honestly most things they say are just what they "want" to see rather then what A-Net says will concur. Rather I do not see anything special being updated anytime soon especially with GW2 oh so very close to release it just seems like a waste of time on their part.

In my opinion, WoC was probably the last major content update GW1 has seen. I don't know where it was, but I also remember having read something about that the Live Team has outlined the story for Elona Beyond, but don't currently have plans to really implement it. With GW2 on the doorstep, the resources for the GW1 live team are probably moved away, so only the essential maintenance can be kept up.

This would be:
- skill updates and balancing, getting less over time
- running the events
- housekeeping like giving the capes for MAT winners

The live team might even be working on automated tools that let GW1 run fully automated without any manual tasks. The flux was the first of these tools: shake the pvp meta every month a bit to compensate for the lack of meta-shifting skill balancing updates in the future. There is a new build every month for the new flux, but I expect this to get automated.

There is probably something in the queue for the 7th birthday, and probably also some new Aprils' fool joke (although I look forward to a revisit of the Moahawk from last year). And the hom link to GW2 must be created. But beyond that? Perhaps a big farewell quest or event or something like that. The ultimate last final GW1 quest, which directly leads to the events in GW2. A bit similar to the Great Destroyer battle and the ending video of EOTN perhaps, which already was trying to lead the way to GW2, but much too soon.

I expect GW2 going live at the time, so all Arenanet resources for operating and supporting their games are probably shifted to the newly released game. It's about invest and return: it is not expected to get much return out of new investments in GW1 once GW2 is released.

Merging BM and WS, wtf? No, nonononono, rangers do not need anything that crazy. Just make spirits worthwhile to bring in PvE (they did it with rits, they can do it with rangers) and make traps nonstackable and much powerful so they're useful in general PvE without making trap farming ridiculous.

Paragons need imbagon to get nerfed and motivation/command support shouts to get buffed (probably necessitating a splitting of either their primary attribute or many shouts and chants to prevent PvP from getting stupid again), to increase build diversity. They're already ridiculously powerful, their problem is they only have one build because everything else sucks (especially in comparison).

Smiting...really doesn't need much. It works very well where it works (ie, undead areas), RoJ works goddamn everywhere, and if you're not trying to do crazy damage it's a nice supportive line. No, you can't nuke like an ele or necro or mesmer. Grab some PvE skills if you want to do that. If smiting gets anything, it should be some AoE on some of its essential damage skills, nothing more.

Ele skill changes are likely already in the works. Frankly, I think they're fine. They have an astonishing amount of build diversity now. Water and earth could use a bit more help in the damage department, but that's about it.

Melee AI would be much appreciated.

The storyline I want them to pursue is Ebonhawke. Elona can wait. Lunatic Court is non-canon and non-essential as far as I'm concerned.

New greens will likely be ignored, unless there's something special about them (like the sword-wand or the bo-scythe).

@Silmar: I fully expect GW1 to make ANet some profit after GW2's release, if only through new players looking for old GW lore (or more likely, HoM items).

An update to melee hero AI would be my top of the list, in hopes it'd open up more opportunity in hero team build diversity. Like, I really want to make use of my Assassin heroes, they're so lonely. Also, I would really, really like to see a Monk skill update for their smite tree.

In the end I'm happy with anything. I really enjoyed GW:B, though frustrating at times. I'm excited to see what else they have in store

Here you go:
http://guildwars.incgamers.com/blog/...inds-of-change

I don't know about everyone else, but I'm ready for Adelbern to recall the Ebon Vanguard(maybe 3-6 short missions) to get them back to Ascalon City, and to have a (short 3-6) quest chain to get Keiran and Gwen to that place called Ebonhawke and establish the outpost.

Updates to skills, AI, and such are great. But I'd rather have storyline IMHO.

So Then... What's Coming Up Next?

Guild Wars 2, that's what coming next.

:P

The Guild Wars 2 facebook page says an announcement tomorrow, so here's hoping for a release date or beta access.

How about, an arena-like challenge mission.

Hard mode only.

Waves:
Game randomly pick a class.
Game randomly picks a non-boss (Lich, Tagachi, Mallyx, etc) creature type of that class.
Spawns three groups after each other of those types, in a 5/10/15 order.
Level = 20+1xWave# (first wave 20, second 21...so on)

After every wave, the NPCs get an armor buff of 1xWaves complete, and a health bonus of 10xWaves complete.

Every 5 waves you get a boss-like foe wave (Lich, Mallyx, etc) who gives moral boost on death.

Rinse/repeat for 50 waves.

That'd be sweet :3

I think I'm mentally transitioning to the point where I think GW2 release date is going to be announced soon (perhaps the announcement coming tomorrow). I'm hoping, optimistically, that it's closer than it would take the Live Team to start another major project. Maybe there are a few last items they could get out, but it's full-court press with all resources to get GW2 out.

May be totally wrong about this. In which case, then on to Nightfall GW:B