So, uh. (Elite Missions)

Really that's not what I've meant. I respect the really hardcore gamers in GW, I was impressed by Avarre running Drok with a Mesmer, I love to watch the top guilds in GvG, and I'm sure most of them are nice people... It was not my point. I discussed facts and possibilities but I did NOT say that winners are asses... Why would I?

Must blow for all of the casual players. Whenever I saw the ELITE MISSIONS on the box I was excited, but I guess it was just an empty marketing gimick.

I was looking foward to them too but o well, gj anet.

"Will take someone to elite missions for 25k!"
"New Elite Missions Service charging 50k per visit!"

This sucks. At least with the favor system a large proportion of the player base would be able to enter, with this system i'm pretty sure I (and about 99% of the rest of the GW population) will never see these elite missions.

What I was implying is that you can approach them and offer yourself as a member.
Especially if you're mature, intelligent and capable. Even if casual. 100k ish faction a week for the guild helps.

I hope you all understand that you can't piggyback someone new to the roles, mission or the game just because they pay you 50k.
The mission is titled "elite" because of it being exclusive -and- because of the content.

Also -- there's at least 4 alliances on the Kurzick side challenging The Lotus Alliance and Empire Kurzick.

So, that's at the very least 5 alliances that are -just starting out- that are vieing for it.

You are making this out to be much worse than it is.

This ened up working as If feared it would, at least for now.

I am a one person guild, always have been and always will be. There was no place I was denied access, we got favor and I could go (I wish we had henchies there, but that's a minor complaint). I may not go for a month at a time, I may spend quite a bit of time there - yet I could go. Even things like HoH I could go (even though I wasn't ever competitive enough - I could *still* go if I gave it some effort).

For this - can I go? Nope, unless something drastically changes I'm out. I'll never be able to get enough faction for my guild for me to go - it's not worth it for the top players who control the area. And how about those without a guild? Even worse shape than I am. It's like livelock - it's not that it's "impossible", it's just that I'm always going to be such a low priority that I will never make it (if I'm a level 1 priority and goofing off in the game is level 3 I'll never get picked). It doesn't matter how hard I work, how good I am, I can never contribute enough to be worth their time in this system.

Games generally are driven by the top end players, funded by the middle and lower (a little over 84% of your players are going to fall into this category - that's a simple fact from bell curves or normal distributions and not some number I just made up. Also note that's about the number Anet says has less then 20k in the bank). Thus to exclude (and I'll be generous here ) 60-80% of your player base from playing any part of the game forever is, well, stupid. It's killed games (both video games and real life games) in the past, and it will in the future again.

I wish they had an automated method where small guilds (like me) or people not in guilds, can join (purchase into) an alliance. Heck, you can even set it up where you can't switch but once in a while so you really are a part of that alliance - at least I will know that at sometime I will get into the missions. I'll give it time and see. It wouldn't take that big of a change to make it all inclusive.

Originally, people thought that 20,000 people would have access to the elite missions, and look at how much uproar that caused.

Now only 2,000 people have access, so of course a lot of people are pissed off^^

In reply to many of the above posters here:

It's not *just* that so many people are excluded from content, it's that the whole system destroys the "small guild with close friends" thing. Now we have to choose between a huge alliance of strangers or a casual group of friends.

I guess I was just being a naive dumbass, but when Gaile said, "just wait and see how it is before complaining," I took that as a reassurance that we shouldn't worry, not that she literally meant, "yeah, it's going to be exactly what you don't want it to be, but we just don't want to hear what you think about it right now."

Gee, maybe you don't have a bloody clue what you're talking about? I'm as competitive as hell. Maybe I just don't have the time nor the inclination to be drawn into a huge, time-consuming metagame involving dealing with hundreds of faceless internet jocks. When did 'being competitive' in a game stop being about just sitting down and playing the game?

It's a huge leap from being a game labeling itself as competitive to being a game you can't play to the fullest without immersing yourself deeply in some kind of nonsensical meta-game that has absolutely nothing to do with what's going on on the screen when you're playing.

Yeah, me and my 4 currently active guildies would love to be able to do that as well.

The point is, no matter how skilled and competitive you are, if you're not willing or able, for whatever reason, to play hard and often, and to waste heaps of playing time not really playing the game but involving yourself in doing god knows what it takes to make your mark on some kind of totally uninteresting social stage that exists somewhere outside the scope of the actual game, you're going to be excluded from content. Success is no longer a measure of skill, it's now a measure of how deeply you're willing to involve yourself with the meta-game.

Believe me: the costs to enter the mission will rise to 1000*10000, so 10 mil at least: The massive uber alliance simple hold the faction they have untill all members are loaded and dump it on the same time...

The point above is made clearly: only LARGE factions can enter, the point about degredation is foolish, because 1000 ppl can keep the faction flowing in faster than 100...so they can handle more degredation, so there Steady-state will be much higher...

The favor system was much more fair, because of the time differences: I see america is holding the hall now again more often... In the night and mornings (in europe) europe isnt holding the HoH. the favor system is just more fair, due to its large player base it influences... Alliances only affect 1000 players. So with over an million players... thats an awefull small amount.

But to be honest, I am not bothered a lot by not able to enter elite area's. I think when I really want to enter it, I think it is possible. In fact: 1000 players from an alliance can haven entrance, so in theory 1000 parties...Hopefully those alliances bother in sharing their access. And about money for entry: thats just what the fool pays for it. If the entire community refuses to pay 10k for entry, they will drop in price... and besides that: faction farming is something different than doing elite area's...

Yeah its really not gonna work - say an alliance holds the elite areas , think of all the players wanting to join that alliance. Before you know that guild has 2000 players and no one else gets a look in.

Great idea on paper , but in reality disaster. Like most of factions in all honesty.

That does not make any sense. Please go cool down and rewrite it.
You can play the game to its fullest, but given that it is a Competitive Online RPG there are some things that require <gasp> competition, skill, and playtime.


I'd love to see your 5man Urgoz build. Why would you even try for something you would get no farther than 30 seconds into? Are you really -that- upset you'll stomp your feet over two pve missions in this game?
Maybe you'd like to try WoW or EQ2? Or DD:O....

Again this doesn't make any sense. All I can read is your rage.
The faction that you need to acquire for the guild has nothing to do with a social stage. It has everything to do with accumulating X amount to overcome Y amount.
If you're skilled enough you find ways to maximize your time. You don't want to do what's necessary to be competitive? Cool.
Don't make expectations that because you're not as into the game or competitive the manufacturers and creators have to make adjustments for you.
Your numbers are not backed up. I do see where most of you are irritated with such limited access, but I do not agree.
Guild Wars is a competitive online rpg. Meet new friends, hook up, and start competing. You do not wish to compete with people that are "hardcore" about this game? ($50,000 divided by 8, anyone?) then I don't think a competitive online rpg is what you're looking for.
Ryl maybe?

Cheers man!

Good thing there aren't roll cancels or sidestep cancels in Guild Wars!

I need more invincible frames when doing my spells!

I think this can all be solved if they rework how an alliance gains a city. I would prefer it if they set up qualifying missions that ranked guilds per week by performance in the mission. Each city could have a different goal... survival in a siege, protection of a key strategic point... just all graded and ranked. That way, numbers mean nothing and skill can rise to the forefront. Then, the skilled will get the cities and will gain access to the elite missions. They are more suited to the challange than an alliance of 1000 random players anyways. Just my two cents. Anet really dropped the ball in their design of factions. I'm dissapointed at every turn... good thng it's online and patchable.

So when only 1 team wins the Stanley Cup, Super Bowl, World Series, etc... it's horrible game design? You gotta be kidding me.

I'll probably never see the inside of the elite areas, but I'm not complaining. It gives competitive people something to strive for, and for that it is great game design.

Actually vtrajan, as far as I can see that post made perfect sense.

You seem to be saying that the solution to the 'problem' of elite missions is "you need to be more competative". However there is FAR more to it than that.

Basically, the Elite Missions go fundamentally against the "Guild Wars Principal" of skill-over-grind. Now, if you ever want to have any chance of getting access you must grind away to earn faction. You must also be lucky enough to have a big guild of like-minded people and also be in a large alliance, also of like-minded people. You must invest a HUGE period of time to have any hope of getting these elite missions and you must spend this time GRINDING, which is generally not fun. As said, it's a meta-game in itself which is no longer what Guild Wars is.

I will freely admit that I am not a very competative person. I generally stay away from PvP and play PvE almost all the time because of it's co-operative nature and the fact that it is more relaxed and chilled out.

This doesn't mean I suck, this doesn't mean I am a bad player who'd get crushed in Elite Missions. I have done every quest in 'Prophecies', done many UW and FoW runs with great success, on my first run through the main storyline factions missions I have only failed a mission twice. I play sensibly and can both lead a team and follow orders...

In short I would say I'm a pretty decent PvE player and so are most of my guild. We have done great runs in all of the End-Game PvE content in Prophecies and I fancy we'd do quite well in the Elite missions. Only... we will never EVER have access to them.

This won't make me rage-quit or anything, heck I LOVE Factions and am having a great time on the new missions, exploring the new locations (I love the Jade Sea...) and playing with my new Mesmer (who looks like some kinda Anime pretty boy hero).

However, ANet seriously messed up on the alliance-control system. Cutting out 95% (possibly even more) of the players from some of the missions is just a bad, bad idea. "Favour of the gods" is a bit annoying, but I can live with it. Why not have the Elite missions controlled in the same way, but allow access to them for everyone in the same Faction as the controlling alliance (i.e. Luxons or Kurzicks). Much better! (though this would kinda require the "elite mission" towns to be along the border instead of being the capital cities... wouldn't want Kurzicks flags flyign over Cavalon all the time...).

Anyway, I've gone on enough for now, but basically I'm saying there is FAR more to it than "just be more competative". The vast, vast majority won't ever control a town and many won't be able to do anything about it without seriously ruining the way they play (i.e. for me it would involve leaving my medium-sized, friendly PvE focused guild and trying to join one of sprawling hyper-dedicated PvP alliances... which I just don't wnat to do).

So, in conclusion... bad move ANet.

It makes all the sense in the world and I'm as cool as I'm going to be about it. The fault lies with you, you're just myopic in your point of view.

Competition: check
Skill: check
Playtime: check, though your mileage may vary as to how much is actually an acceptable minimum to be considered a competitive player.

I still fail to see where playing in a small group of friends instead of playing footsie with hundreds of people I never met in my life comes into the equation and puts you on the sidelines.

I wouldn't know if I can't get into it would I?

With a 10k personal faction ceiling my guild won't be able to produce 'competitive' amounts of faction, regardless of how skilled or competitive the individual players are. Even if we 'spike' and convert all at the same time, which some of us wouldn't even be able to do more than once a week or so, it'll be a pathetic drop in the ocean. Being competitive in small groups and in small doses won't be enough. Where's the old 'skill over time played' platitude?

We're very competitive and into the game, but (to repeat the phrase) in small, irregular doses and in select company. That doesn't mean we don't enjoy our 4 man FoW clearings as much as the next man.

What numbers?

Why on earth would I want to go out and try making friends over the internet just to play a damn computer game when I have a guild with real-life friends to do just that? That shouldn't be a requirement of being competitive. It isn't in any definition I encountered before Factions hit the streets.

It's not that I don't want to, it's that there's no room for it. Individual accomplishment and even the accomplishments of groups people who succesfully carved their way through practically all of what Prophecies had to offer has been rendered insignificant.

I have no idea what that means.

whats that? there are only two elite missions?

but there are quite a few outposts you an control, what do they give you ?

For the red engine's sake, I am willing to be competitive, I'm just not willing to sign up with a freaking army to do so.

Is it? I've been playing for a while now, and all I've ever done in this time is cooperate.

Ryl...risk your life. Horrible game. Craptastical..actually.

Well, since "signing up with a freaking army" is, in this case, what it takes to be competitive, I would have to disagree with you when you say that you are willing to be competitive. That's like saying "I want to be an awesome GvG player but I don't want to join a guild." If you want to compete for something on a team level (whether a GvG team or a "team" of guilds in an alliance"), you have to be willing to actually put in the effort. Maybe you don't want to put in the effort. Maybe you don't have the spare time, energy, or sanity to organize or be a part of an alliance. That's fine, real life and other priorities take over, and not everyone is into that sort of thing. But to complain that you don't have access to these elite missions because you aren't willing to be a part of an alliance is downright silly, and doesn't really make sense at all.

OK, putting aside the fact that people have jobs, kids, a social life etc, lets say there are 10 top alliances competing for control of these areas, thats 10,000 players max who have a chance at getting access. On current numbers thats about 1% of the GW population. So even if someone is willing to join an alliance (which I am) they'll have to find one of the top alliances with space to let them in. (100 competitive alliances is still only 10% and that's 10% who will EVER have a chance)

Lets say they get into a competitive alliance anyway, they're going to have to farm faction to get their guys to the top which means hours of grinding missions, a luxury some of us with actual lives do not have.

I know the comeback to this, 'well if you're not willing to do what it takes to be competitive blah de blah...'. Its not that i'm not willing, i'm not able, I simply do not have that amount of time to grind which is one of the reasons I play GW in the first place. FoW armour, 15k armour, top end items, rare skinned items, titles, lower prices at the merchant, I have no problem with any of those kinds of things. If someone wants to grind and farm to get them, thats their choice but there was always an alternative for the more casual player, collectors armour and items, droks armour, common skinned max items. The problem here is that there is no alternative for the more casual player, so much for 'skill over time spent'.

Few weeks before Factions went live i already had fears of such problems and was heavy into disccussions regarding this issue. Instead of crying about it, i made a suggestion. Look at it and sign if you would agree or better yet give better suggestions if you are able:

Give alliances that owns cities the option of offering Elite missions for everyone.
http://www.guildwarsguru.com/forum/s....php?t=3014025


Edit for spelling

No, really, being competitive has nothing to do with joining a huge freaking army. You can't go around rewriting the definition of the word just because ANet released a new game. What we're looking at here is that it takes a huge freaking army to be competitive on a level where there's a reward for it. It's perfectly possible to be competitive without joining a huge freaking army. There's just not a bloody point to it. The problem is with the game, not my competitiveness.

That's just silly. Sillyness never proved anything.

I do all of that, it's just that my team that was more than sufficient for Prophecies, suddenly doesn't cut it anymore. With Factions, Guild Wars turned into a game about numbers instead of people teaming up to have a good time.

Too right.

I'm part of an alliance of 1 guild, and we have a sufficient number of active players to play the actual game. That is, to form a party and go and do well in any area we've encountered so far. Anything above and beyond that shouldn't matter. ANet just arbitrarily raised the bar on us. Now apparently one needs to do things that have nothing to do with actually playing the game. Why the hell would I need to play footsie with other people who play in different instances and have my gaming experience based on their success? All of that is completely artificial metagaming. Even if I did have time to get involved in all that, I don't have the inclination. It's fake. It doesn't add depth or immersion, it adds nothing but pointless complications and irritations. Willingness or unwillingness to participate in that has nothing to do with competitiveness.

How true :P

Great example, lets compare some sports sports. First we have American football and hockey. Both tend to cater to the top end, even in lower level play. Some of that is by necissity - larger and stronger players will hurt the smaller ones. How many social groups of these do you see? Especially American football. In order to play at even the peewee level you have to be fairly large and athletic. A good turnout is 30 or so kids. The exception is places like Canada where they are about the same as AYSO.

Next, lets take baseball. Theres a game where most will accept less than stellar players. It does pretty good in the states. Basket ball is about the same. Good participation.

Ahh, then we have soccer. Anyone can do it - all it takes is a ball. In the US you have AYSO that caters to *everyone*. There is competition for the high end skilled players, but all the rest get to play and have fun.

Ever wonder why soccer has 10,000 kids to footballs 1000? Right there is it - are you going to "play" a game where you sit on the sidelines all the time watching the top 5% play or one where you actually get to participate? Same here - I'm not going to play a a game where the only consolation I get is that someone else gets to play it - not gonna happen. Telling me to "get competitive" results in me quitting (though, right now, there are enough other things in GW that I'm not gonna quit - but the more it moves in this direction the more casual players are going to quit).

Factions and this scheme is football. It's great when you are the person able to play. In the higest levels it is even a popular spectator sport (I enjoy watching some top GvG battles in spectator mode). But if that's all that get to play after the official campaign you can kiss your game goodby. You may feel superior because you got to play where no one else did, but you just lost the war to win the battle. As I said, catering to the top end players and ignoring 84% of your players is a losing strategy: gg

I think the biggest problem regarding this is how you gain faction. Getting favour isn't so bad since it's directly related to skill. You wanna win in HoH and earn favour? You can do that within an hour if you're good and have a good team. Wanna get access to the elite missions? Well, get an alliance of 1000 active members and farm away. There's no skill involved with getting enough faction, you just need to use enough time. I think this goes against the core principles of what Guild Wars is supposed to be about.

I'm not sure what anet should do about it. I think they did major mistakes when designing this factions system, and the best idea would be to scrap the current system and do it all over again, which isn't an option. There's 2 things they can to make it better though:

1) Make faction decrease depending on which city you control. I don't have this confirmed, but I think the alliance faction will decrease with 10% each day. To make it possible for other alliances to get access to the elite missions, they could make it so that whoever controls the highlevel cities will lose a lot of faction each day. Which makes it near impossible for them to continously hold those cities. I'm thinking at least 50% faction loss each day if you have control over a city with an elite mission.

2) Just make the darn elite missions open for everybody and add a gimmicky replacement for those who control the high level cities. One idea would be add the same thing anet did in the end of the FPE. Which is having an option to spawn a dragon to roam inside the city and kill random people.

QFT. In some ways, i think Factions brought the worst out of ANET for some reason that i fail to understand.

I guess it boils down to money as always, give the 1000 strong Alliances rewards and make chapter 3 the same thing to lure them to buy it.

55 towns x 1000 players per alliance x 50dollars each min = 2.75 million USD.

Deverloper A: What about the casual players and guilds?

Developer B: ...hmm lets see if they are dumb enough to buy the next chapter for the PvE content and this time we will make it even harder so they quit right after they bought it, this will save us server bandwidth.

Both Deverloper: hehehehehehe *Rubs palm*

There is an alternative for the more casual player. Play the non-elite missions. They are made for those who don't want to grind for the faction to enter the elite missions. Just like droks to FoW, common skins to rare skins etc.

The elite-missions take nothing away from your gaming experience if you don't have access. Factions is as good as a game can get without them. You will never miss anything if you don't enter. They are a bonus though for those who reach them, just like getting FoW armor is a bonus for those who farm a lot (or are lucky with their drops).

Someone please point out to me the part where Anet said they were going to introduce forced grind for access to content.

There is a large difference here. The article you quoted assumes you actually get a chance to compete.

Lets say i get to compete against you and I suck and you are God. I die in less than 2 seconds - well, I got some work to do. Now, lets say I go to the place where we compete and I try to and it says "No - you suck" - well, I never even get to the point of being a scrub. You don't know if I am or not - never got to that point. If there was even a "newbie area" where I could out of maybe, but there is all or nothing.

It's like requiring a rank 9 or greater to compete in PvP - yea maybe I suck and can't win enough to get there, but at least I get the option to do so. In this event I don't even get the option regardless of if I can or not. I don't have the pre-requisite to get it nor will I ever be able too.

I'm not a scrub - if you beat me then I loose and you are the better player (I would say so even if you are using and obvious bug exploit - I've used them in the past too). I just want the option of getting beat, even if I do every time (at least I got to play). Right now, I will never even get the oppertunity to be a scrub.

Why not make that if you control any outpost, you get to do the elite mission for your faction? It would still be plenty competative, just not absurdly so (which is the real problem). After all, there aren't that many outposts.

I also agree with an idea in another thread about removing the 10 guild cap and make the size of an alliance solely based on the number of players. To do anything in Guild Wars you should only need 8 people. To win favor and hold down the HoH, you only need 8. To be the top rated guild on the ladder you only need 8. To WIN THE WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP YOU ONLY NEED 8. Yet to play elite missions, something advertised on the very box Factions comes in, you need 1000. How does this make sense? The people defending this sytem are completely ignoring the fact that it simply is not possible to control a capitol city if you are in a small guild. Your small guild will never get into a alliance that will compete for control of a city because you simply do not have enough people to generate sufficient faction (the 10k faction cap also works into this) to take control. Such an alliance will always take a big guild of decent players over a small guild of great players. Why should you be forced to leave your small guild with players you've become friends with just to be able to play the elite missions? I'm sorry this totally sucks.

As far as the pro-sports analogy, it is completely flawed. Take baseball. Yes only 1 team get to win the championship. But this system is more like if only the Yankees, Angels, Mets and Dodgers were allowed in the playoffs by virute of the fact that have more money than other teams because they are in LA and New York. Even though the White Sox are better than all of them, they have less fans and therefore less money to qualify them for the playoffs. It's wrong! It's wrooooong!

Yep. At least with favour everyone had a chance. This way most people will never get a look-in. I'm not saying that everyone should get in, but they need to sort the faction thing out. Perhaps have "lockout periods" where an alliance can't control outposts for a period of time after they've been in charge. Or they could reset faction after gaining control - that would give a much better dynamic to the system.

Gaile, where are you when things get hot? I think it's time for you to come in here even though the atmosphere is not all sweetness and sunshine - just to prove a point to the naysayers.

Probably still recovering from the CE delay bashing before the minis are confirmed. I dont expect her to give any ground breaking all problem solving news. This is the new Favor in Factions. Of course please feel free to prove me wrong, i always prefer to be a happy gamer than a unhappy one



Edit for spelling

On top of all the other concerns, I still can't believe there are ONLY TWO elite missions. At least if there were more available even the big alliances wouldn't have the resources to buy control of all of them at once. As bad as the idea was, it's not even taken to the extreme like it could (and should) have. What is the point of buying control of a town other than one of the two with an elite mission? Nothing really, right? To move this border? At the end of the day, who cares? The border isn't all that big anyways. Save up for the miniscule amount of elite mission access instead.

Wrong, the only difference between FoW armour and Droks armour is the looks. The only difference between max common skinned items and max rare skinned items is the looks. The only difference between collector items and other rares is (generally) the looks. All totally superficial differences. The difference between normal missions and elite missions is new maps, new drops, different creatures etc. Not what you'd call superficial.


See above, they take away a part of the content of the game for lots and lots of players.

some of you forgot one important fact:

Anet only wants your best - your hard earned $$

they bring up an expansion for guildwars, giving you good content and telling something about "elite-missions".
people suddenly think about fissure of wow and underworld, and can't wait to enter these missions.
then arena-net tells us, not everyone can enter elite-missions, and again people think "ok, i wasn't able to enter fow & uw all the time, but then and when i was able to engage these missions.

after people spent their money and got in the game, they see that they might never be able those missions they were aiming at - on different reasons, as stated above.

but why should anet care? they already have your cash. we've seen in prophecies that we can go everywhere, this time it may not be the same. but i already bought the game - possibly never be able to experience its full content.

conclusion? the 3rd expansion will not be preordered like prophecies and factions, i will wait and see.
and i am sure, the more people handle it the same way, the faster anet will react on costumers demands... ^^

i don't care about bugs, expensive items, hard missions - but i DO care about not being able to access to whole content of a game.

and don't tell me to join a big alliance, if anet wants me to leave my guild/friends to enter the elite-missions then something is realy wrong with this game...

just my 2 cents

I don't think anyone from Anet wants to burn their hands on this yet What can they say? Be more competitive? We all figured out that it's not enough to be more competitive. You have to be more competitive with 999 other people, that's what. Short from announcing a new system to access elite missions, which is extremely unlikely, there's nothing they can say that will satisfy people at this point.

Why doesn't ANET allow us to pay 5,000 faction to play the Elite missions? For Alliances controlling the town, they won't have to pay. In a sense, you are paying dues to the Alliance controlling the town, except they don't get the faction.

It is the same, you just don't want to realize it. It may only be the difference in looks with FoW and Sephis axes compared to Droks and normal skins, but it's like dangling a carrot in front of the donkey. You may watch all those shiny armors and rare items from far away, yet not be able to acquire them because you don't have the time or endurance to farm and grind. It doesn't matter that they are not better stat-wise, if you want them and can't get them, it's exactly like with the elite missions. A new map is like a new skin, a new drop is like a new skin, a different creature is in reality just an old creature with a new skin and a few new skills (apart from that, there are no new creatures in the elite-missions anyways, just the different aspects).

You are happy with max stat armor and weapons and normal missions -> buy Droks, collector's items and play the game without bothering about grind

You want to be shiny and access special content -> farm, grind and enjoy

You want to be shiny and access special content without grinding -> well, I'd like to be a millionaire, too without having to work for it but life isn't that fair to me unfortunately