ArenaNet Interview over at Korean GW Site

The link is up on our front news page, or you can get it directly here, it is about a 15.8 mb download.

My powerful yet respected nemesis Patrick Wyatt (who believes the Kitty Ears are a strange 'fetish') seems to be preoccupied with something to his lower left. And the little part at the end gives me hope that the rumors of an ArenaNet based Barbershop Trio that sings in Korean may yet come to pass - so go ahead and check it out.

pretty cool interview. I thought the end where they started speaking in Korean was a little gay..lol.


bobert

I forgot all about the Neko Mimi idea. They should definately put that in, would look really neat on my N/W girl.

If you have not seen the interview yet, go to the Home Page and look at the latest news. There is an interview from Guild Wars Korea (its in English) that is about 6:30 minutes long and reveals some nice information.

It tells a good deal about Worlds at War and how it will work. But it's only enough to raise more questions along side the ancious await for the new and awesome sounding addition. It says that a guild from, say, a Korean server that gets to the Hall of Heroes will open up new opportunities and cool items and missions and quests for the other people in that server for as long as they hold it. What this means I am not quite sure except that the opportunity will be changing hands quite rapidly because of the quick rate of Tombs PvP. It also says that there is only one Hall of Heroes and so only one guild holds the one Hall at a time. Which is interesting to know that you are the best in the world for at least a moment. I forsee problems in the way this system works though, because of things like internationally grouped teams and of countries that have very few gamers and most of which may not be any good. Some things could come out unfair but I guess A.Net have thought of this. Let me hear your thoughts.

Aye, the first thing that came to mind for me was: "What about Australia? Are we going to be grouped with another country or area, or is this special content going to be denied to us simply because we have a low population?"

I think the idea of making PvE content available to those whos area happens to win PvP at one time is a bit silly, particulary if this content is notable.

Unless it is easy to get to the top and the title is changing hands regulary, giving everyone a chance to access this extra stuff, then it sounds like a bit of a stupid idea, and contrary to the idea of easy accessibility for casual players.

I think the idea of grouping people based by country of origin is just not a very good thing to do. Aside from curtailing player choice it also fosters racial tensions.

It would be MUCH better, IMHO, to set a few game world 'alliances' or 'kingdoms'. Guilds would then choose to declare alligance to one of these groups, and would compete under that general banner, rather than that of "USA", "Europe", or "Korea".

I think this would allow for just as good competition, as these set groups would probably divide along similar lines to that of world regions, but as it would not be a direct division it would allow minority groups to find places within the system to contribute (and recieve benifit), as well as removing a bit of that racial division.

Guilds wouldn't be locked in to one group either and would be able to change if they wanted. Then if one group got too powerful and was winning constantly you would probably see some good guilds leave that alliance and try their hands with the 'underdogs'. This would also promote balance.

Only a formative solution, but I think a reasonable one.

Right now when you create a new character you either make a korean one, or a US/international character. Those are the two worlds I think. Korea, and everyone else

I don't think too much racism should come of this. I mean, having a bit of a rivalry would kind of be fun. Unfortunatly it's too focused on Korea. It's like "Rest of World vs Korea" and that's not exactly something you want to promote in a game like this because as the genre suggests, its a competitive RPG and competition brings on some bad side effects. Unfortunatly, the whole idea is kind of annoying - especially if it would split me off from my friends in Europe (they're grouped the same now... but later?) The smaller countries like Aurstralia/ New Zealand are alright for the moment - being grouped with the rest of the world. I feel that this will spark a Western vs Eastern world sentiment though. Perhaps we can only hope that our fellow gamers are more mature than that.

...not likely.

So there's no way for me to unlock this bonus content for myself - the only way for me to experience it is to join the same 'world' or whatever as good teams, so that I can access said bonus content when they're winning?

Brilliant.

Peace,
-CxE

It's not so bad as you put is Ensign. The game (suposedly) won't be separated into many worlds, 3 or 4 I guess. There should be enough good players in each world to make quite a few winning teams. Furthermore in your day/evening time mostly players from your world will be playing, so the chances that your world holds the HoH are even higher.

And there is a way (although a nasty one) to open up those areas for yourself - get a team, win in the HoH, leave the tombs and you have ~10 minutes to get to the new areas. I doubt that you'll be kicked od of them as soon as a different world captures the Hoh.

Want to get bonus features ? Learn how to speak Korean.

Arg! The WaW concept isn't a bad one, IMO. I refuse to believe that Koreans will dominate the Tombs or any part of the game, for that matter, constantly and consistantly. I'm sure everyone will get an opportunity to experience any and all bonus material at one point or another.

I think WaW is a great idea, gives PvPers a mint goal.

Except that the big PvP'rs don't care that much for the PvE from what I've heard. I think it's stupid. DAoC had a dungeon like this and it drove me crazy. It was only available to whatever realm was winning at the time. I think the idea of content being available to me or denied to me based on what someone else does is stupid.

Now I wouldn't mind seeing those who win the hall of heroes open up some other pvp maps for only those victors who have won maybe a set amount of time or something, but I don't like this.

I personally think Lamaros is onto something here. I think seperating in to "your" choice of alliance or kingdom (maybe 3-5) would be an excellent idea. This would give Anet a far better base to build content and story on.

i think basing it off some in game region would present even more problems than basing it from the real world.

What makes you say that? Give me some examples please.

yeah i was going to but i'm lazy... i guess now i have to:


First of all, if you could change this regularly, then people will be flying around from group to group trying to be on the winning team.

Also, 20 bucks says a favorite will emerge. And I agree with it. I think that there will be one town that everyone wants to side with for one reason or another, and it will probably be the winning team. If it auto-assigns a team for you, then that avoids no less problems that basing it off where you live.

One of the problems I forsee (that they've probably already fixed), is what about parties made of international groups? This is both a problem in virtual areas and in real life.

At least if you base it off of reality, you can be moving to Korea so you can win, but the way we have it now is pointing to a bit of racism. It's going to be hard to find a good solution that is fair and fun for everyone.

You could definitely prevent people from constantly jumping around, by forcing a person to stick with a team they choose for a month or some arbitrary time that is deemed fair. You also need to remember that some players look for a challenge, so they will automatically join a team that is less desirable... not say that this is a fix

Random auto-assign IMO is great way of creating the kingdoms/alliances at first. In fact I think its a better way to mix the GW community. Also when you register a guild it should be auto-assigned to your current allience or kingdom for the first X period of time, and if you join a guild that does not belong to your current allience then you become part of the guild's alliance overriding the one you had. Also if you leave a guild your allience stays as that guild's allience until X period or until you are able to join another guild of a different alliance. Of course there would be exploits to this method, and they would need to be addressed (similar exploits to the ladder incident for the DEC BWE).

EDIT: I just thought maybe even if you join a guild of a different alliance/kingdom your alliance is not changed to the guild alliance until a certian time has passed since joining that guild. It would be similar to say proving your alligence to the new alliance or kingdom. This would definitely prevent people from jumping around so rapidly. Maybe if an entire guild decides to switch that alligence period should be longer. Think of as the kingdom/alliance needing more proof to build trust in a large group because they could be seen as a trojan to the alliance a larger force to reckon with if they should decide to rebel. You could also make it so that individuals/guilds that decide to change alliences are blacklisted for that X period and can not take part in any bonus content provided by alliences or kingdoms. This would definitely force people to think about disbanding their current alliance.

I definitely agree with you that its going to be hard to find a fair solution.

I just find the idea of having access to game content tied to something that is effectively arbitrary to be more of an annoyance than an actual feature.

You want to try out the 'bonus' levels? Oh, damn, looks like you don't have access this minute. Better sit around for (anywhere from ten minutes to a couple hours to never opening up tonight) until it becomes available. Then once it does open up you have to rush everyone there before it slams shut on you - I hope that your friends aren't in different worlds because as far as bonus content goes they might as well be shards.

What exactly are they trying to accomplish here? To make the Tombs matter more? Let's say that I'm holding the Hall of Heroes. My friends are likely also in the Hall of Heroes with me, since I like playing the game with my friends. So we don't get to experience the 'reward' for good play. Which means, basically, that by holding the Hall I'm unlocking content for some large segment of people that I don't know, and denying that same content to some other large contingent of people I don't know. Why am I supposed to care about this?

The way you get access to the bonus content is to be in a world with the most good players, to maximize your access to said content. In addition, to access this content you must currently be losing. That's about the limit of your control over access.

Now, you can try and convince me that it isn't as bad as I think. And, You're probably right, it's not maddening but it is at the very least inconvenient. In a game that's trying to minimize grind and lets you travel around the world instantly to maximize convenience. But does it really matter how bad a 'feature' is? 'Least bad' isn't exactly a sterling design goal. I want good features, things that add to the game, not detract from them. Maybe this does actually add to the game, but I don't see it, and there's an awful lot of negative baggage associated with it.

So why is this an addition to the game, instead of 'not that big of a detraction'?

Peace,
-CxE

In it's current form (from what I know of it at least) I think the "reward" of access to the new content is something more for the thousands of other gamers that can't get to the HoH than it is for the people that are actually in the HoH. I mean, if you're holding the top PvP map in the world then you probably aren't thinking about PvE content to much. I think the typical gamer would be thinking more along the lines of "OMFG my team is the best in the world!!!", while the thousands of other games in your "world" would be thinking, "Alright team soandso is holding the global HoH! I'm so glad that such skilled players are here, and that becuase of their hard work I get to experience special content." If you're opening up new content to others, then there's a good chance that you'll feel good about that, right? Plus when you factor in the fame and whatever bragging rights you and your buddies gain already from holding the HoH I think having 8 players not be able to access the special content until they lose is an alright tradeoff.

yeah it does seem like a pain in the ass. but it's probably going to be one of the coolest things in the game when it is refined and all our annoying questions and rants have been answered.

If people were doing that, it would demonstrate pretty clearly what they thought of the Worlds at War 'feature'.


Well of course every PvE player wants to be in the town with the winning team. You *need* to be in the world of the winning teams if you want access to the bonus content - and if the items and missions in that content are worthwhile, then the choice is a no-brainer. You join the world that gives you best access to it.

If every player acted in their own best self interest, a game universe with N worlds would quickly collapse into a universe with 1 world, as everyone quickly realizes that they'd be better off in the 'best' world and moves there. Granted, in the real world not everyone is going to think about this that much, but the people who actually care will.


Except that joining a 'bad' world isn't a fix for you at all. You don't control your access to the content, other people in that 'bad' world do. Sure, you might try to cast yourself as a 'savior' of that wreck of a world, but that has no effect on your ability to compete (it's still just Tombs), just which other people benefit from your winning.


It sounds like a bloody terrible way to do it to me. So my two friends and I all sign up for Guild Wars, log into the game, and are all assigned to different 'worlds'? Or what if I'm already in a guild, and all of our members sign up and are divided up among all of the different possible worlds? Is this really going to be anything other than yet another hurdle that we have to jump through, to get everyone on the same page?

Geographic location is incredibly tacky as a way to divide people up at first, but it is close to optimal. Assuming that people want access to the content, they want to be in a world that will tend to be winning when they're playing. If they have typical gaming schedules to other people in their geographic area, they'll have a better chance of having access to that content when they're in the same world as those nearby, as the raw number of people in any given geographic region ebbs and flows throughout the day. So, really, the best way to divide people up would be by time zone, at least until they started jumping around.

Peace,
-CxE

Okay Ensign I'm not going to argue with you that this addition is not a big distraction because I completely agree with you. The way I see it is that Anet is possiblely already dead set on adding it to the game. Yes, in may ways it seems as if its going against what they have been trying to achieve with this game....

So my suggestions are merely here to try and even out the playing field for the entire GW community. As far as your concern related to the individuals holding the HOH and not being able to take advantage of what they are supplying for the reset of there alliance, yeah it seems like a huge WTF. But I think there is a solution to this if its not already implemented.

I mean why not give the guild that held the HOH at some point that day (set to GMT time, non stackable or resetable by holding HOH more than once in a day) (completely arbitray) window to access this bonus content/level whenever they want. That way they aren't SOL for all the work they put in, and in fact they get a bit more of a bonus than the individuals that belong to their alliance.

I guess if this Bonus content for holding HOH is going to exist we might as well discuss ways to make it more fair, while at the same time showing our discontent for it.

What I descibed a few posts ago doesn't mean that you will not be able to join another guild if you are currently under a different allience. It just means that there is a period of time that you will have to prove your alligence to your new allience while in this new guild (See My Edit).

As far as how to split up and put people into alliances initially, there are many ways to do it, none will make everyone happy. If you do a Random assignment at first at least no one can say it was unfair, as everyone was treated the same, and it was wasn't a choice as to where "you" live geographically/timezonically "timezonically" heheh If everyone starts off in a random equally dispursed set of alliences, at least everyone started off with relatively the same advantage/disadvantage. In the end some guilds will take advantage of what some consider a disadvantage, and some will do nothing and ride it out, and some will be discontent no matter what. I guess that is what will define our different guilds and how they will cope with such events.

All in all its the luck of the draw and how you decide to take advantage of the situation or ignore it, the playing field will divide out in some crazy manor.

I think that the guiding ideas behind Worlds at War are pretty good, they're just getting bogged down by an implementation that keeps it from being a net positive.

What's the guiding idea? That there should be something 'bigger' than a guild, a larger society that individuals function within - and that the game should have mechanics that effect that entire society. Fundamentally I agree with that, and I think it has a lot of potential to add to the game. The question, as always, is implementation.

I think that instead of breaking up 'worlds' by geographic location or via a choice at startup, they should just be allowed to grow organically. A guild is the people you know and play with often, but your 'world' is composed of people you play with, their friends, some of their friends, other acquaintences you have - basically your entire social circle. One thing we've learned from the whole friendster phenomenon and the like is just how social circles are. That instead of social contacts just branching out forever, they start to loop around at 3 and 4 degrees of separation that we really don't know about. That you'd go to add someone from one social circle, and another social circle that you're a member of would already be on your map, a few degrees away. These 'megacircles' were composed of several thousand people in general, not people that you knew but people several of your friends had likely met through different sources.

I'd use that as a model for a 'world' - think of it as a huge, uncapped, casual guild. Use people's guild and friends lists to figure out who associates with whom, and break people up into worlds - or even better, just make them global invites. Anyone can join any world as long as they know someone already in it. You get the desired effect of large groups of players, but instead of them just being big groups of people, these are people that you at least have an association with. It makes worlds personal, kingdoms within the Guild Wars universe.


As for what sort of rewards and mechanics you put into place for worlds, there is just one principle that should never be violated - the players should always control their own destinies. If you want to tie access to a special area to a world, players should always be able to unlock it for themselves. "Success in Guild Wars is always a result of player skill." That's a great idea, and it isn't incompatible with Worlds at War. Unlocking bonus areas for, say, 6 hours per victory in the Hall of Heroes, for example, would be a decent mechanic. If you need to get access back to your 'champion grounds' or whatever, you get a war party together and take the Hall. Afterwards you have plenty of oppertunity to reap the rewards of your victory, if you so desire. But limiting access to game content is pretty annoying in general, especially for the large number of players who don't PvP. Competitive PvP players don't really want to PvE much, as well. The whole area access thing doesn't really seem to fit it.

Now, a reward I would like to see for holding the Hall - while you're the reigning champion in the Hall of Heroes, your character's likeness appears as a statue around the fountain in Lion's Arch. Eight players per team, eight statues, circling around the fountain with your name as a mouseover. It's a gratuitous vanity move, and lets other teams tell at a glance who they have to topple to win. Keep yourself up there long enough, and you'll actually become famous.

Peace,
-CxE

Yes, you're right, it's going to be cool.

Everybody step back and wait until you know enough to judge this concept. Right now, you're flying off the handle and making all sorts of dire predictions based on a very brief description with only a handful of vague details. You may think this is the greatest thing since sliced cheese. You may think it's just fine, but not something in which you will get too involved. Or you may dislike it, but realize that you will get your full value in Guild Wars without worrying about the inclusion of materials that don't appeal to you.

The inclusion of this idea, like the inclusion of any, isn't a show stopper. If you don't care to participate, no problem. If you do, we think you'll enjoy it. But don't even try to narrow the scope of what we offer in our game to your own laundry list of specifications, for that's just short sighted. It's like a person saying "I don't like to use hammers, therefore I begrudge the fact that there are a ton of different hammer types in the game."

Just hold off until you know more, and forego the postulation about how it will work -- or won't work -- until you have enough information to speak at all.

You seem to have skipped over what some people here have been saying. The main worry is that there will be content included in the game, the game we're going to pay for, that we will not be able to access. No one is complaining that there is some PvP system being proposed when what they want is more PvM, no one is saying the whole idea sounds dull and thus it should be scrapped.

Once again, read above. The complaint isn't about a proposed facet that people don't want to participate in, it's about the fact that facet, as it has been presented to us so far in offical media, raises some questions of accesability for some people who DO seem interested in it.

Saying that we should just not participate if we don't like something in game is terrible customer service. The message seems to be that if gamers playing the game have a problem with something they should just quit and go play something else instead of expressing their thoughts/problems to the game developers. Surely this is not what you meant to say.

If you say "we're going to make missions 10 times harder" players are able to provide reasoned responses without having to see it in game.

Obviously the devs felt like that had enough information to speak to the public about this idea, therefore we have enough information to construct a reply/discuss the topic/etc.

*Removed some loaded language after reading Decoy's post below.*

Thanks,

Pasquale Lazzaro

Lamaros: please don't go down that road. Many a poster has tried to do what you have done, and it has only ended in bad. Gaile is simply trying to say that ANet has things covered, and that people shouldn't go flying off the handle because of what she said in a FF question. We'll have plenty of time to criticize the system (if needed) once we get our hands on it, but until then we just need to assume that ANet knows how to make their game.

I had said things in my original post that expressed my frustration in a way that failed to stay on topic and I realised that and removed them (before your reply). But just to make sure I don't cloud the issue we're trying to discuss I've gone back again and cleared up anything else that could be misconstrued.

My response is directed at a misconception Gaile seems to have picked up reading our discussion on the issue, as well as being a response to the general merit of us having such discussions in the first place.

I am not questioning that Arena.Net is going to do their best to make a fun game for everyone, but to say that we should sit down and be quiet about it until we get the end product delivered into out hands is, in my view, rather silly. As an official representative I feel it is out of place for Gaile to communicate such a viewpoint.

If I caused offence in writing my post I apologise. I hope Gaile can realise that my fevour stems from anticpation and excitement and has nothing to do with any personal disagreement. I know from the other involment she has with the community that she does value our presence and discussion, and that the message she presented here isn't probably one she meant to give, nevertheless I felt I had to respond.

Peace.

About the way the world is divided. I think you all missed the primary reason for using Europe, USA and Asia as regions and not some kind of virtual alliances. From what I have read, the reason is they want to increase game performance, by having local servers that you will log on if you play with players from the same region (if you don't go to international districts), thus minimizing lag.

Really, has Arena.net given us a total let down as of yet? From what we have heard, I can agree with your grievances, but we are far from having the full story. I, for one, can't wait to see how this will be implemented. We would just get a group of our best players togethor, and send the rest to PvE for us. We would be having our fun PvPing ( ), and they would be having their fun PvEing ( ). We would then split the loot like a good little guild, but, for some, Im sure this may not apply.


Who ever said we would just see the final product. They made Beta for a reason . Who knows? You may be testing it this weekend.

to be brief, i am frothing at the use of the words "Korean World" and what that might imply to the social aspects of the game. i will not play a game where all the koreans or any other nationality for that matter is arbitrarily in one "Home world" and are set against the rest of the players. I don't need the hostility that will result.