Elite Mission Available to All ?

I am in a similar situation. I am in a small guild, and I would never trade that for access for a mission. That is my choice, that doesn't mean another choice is wrong.

But still on that note, I would like to mention that I am talking about an alliance, not a guild. A guild will be much more closely knit than the entire alliance will be, and a guild may only consist of 100 members.

Any player, at any time, can join an alliance that has a good shot at holding a city. In fact, many alliances such as TC actively recruit. If you want to get in an elite mission that terribly much, go join one. If you want to stay in your current guild and not gain access, that is your choice.

Once again you are implying that I agree with the current system of the way to earn access. But it is still work, either way. Work does not imply skill. Most of the jobs most people would most hate to have to do are repetative and pretty much anyone can do them.

It may be fast to your standards, but it is nowhere near as fast as running repeatable missions such as the supply run. Making it so alliance battles did not give faction would hardly affect most of the faction farming population.

Why do you make guesses on how I've spent my playing time? I do not farm faction whatsoever. I tried for about 20 minutes and was bored out of my mind. I chose not to farm because I'd rather not farm and thus not have access to the elite missions.

but it does affect it, i didnt say to what degree, but it doies come into play.. making a PvP event affect PvE players.

and im sorry, but even a guild of 100 members loses the personal touch. ive been in gaming squads for some years now .. and been part of very large groups of 40-50.. i cant even imagine 100. the become names on a screen, little more.

justify it however you want, but the simple fact is that if all it takes is mindlessly repeating the same quests, over and over ad nauseum... skill is out the window for certain.. and all you have is the next generation of mindless grinding gameplay and someone is going to write a bot for it, if they havent already.

not to mention EBAYers buying up amber/jade and selling that for faction to save time

however you cut it, its quantity, not quality.. and thats sad to me

Take the luxon/kurzick faction out of alliance battles and the faction market would hardly be affected, I fail to see how that is so hard to grasp.

This comes merely down to personal opinion. I myself agree with you on this matter, I would rather have 20-30 good friends than 100 strangers any day. This doesn't mean that people that choose the 100 are wrong, they are just sacrificing the personal touch for higher gaming opportunity because that is what they prefer.

I'm not sure where you got this from, but you can't buy faction unless you are having people join, deposit, and then leave. The only alliance I have heard actively doing this is TC, although those are donations and not bought.

When did I try to justify it? I have already stated that I agree it takes no skill and that the method of earning access should be changed.

Then choose quality... I don't see what you're upset about.

it isnt hard to grasp, thats not my point, my point is that it does in fact affect it, no matter how small the amount.. though i think your uinderestimating the amout.. either way your statement that it doesnt affect it was not in fact corrent. that was my point, not the amount.

money can be used to buy jade or amber .. and its my understanding that this can be turned in for faction. if this is incorrect then thats my mistake.. if correct it means faction can in fact be bought

as to what im upset about, simple ... i cannot now, nor have any realsitic expectation of EVER accessing these areas of the map, without relying on the kindless of someone else .. even though we payed the same price for the game .. i fail to see hopw THAT is so hard to grasp

i dont mean to flame, i really dont .. and it isnt my inrtention to create arguements .. but i just dont understand how this can in any way be considered fair to all players. if you disagree, fine, your entitled to that, and well agree to disagree... but to me, it just dioesnt make sense that i have to accept the fact that there are the best parts of this map, with the best drops... and ill never see it

I just think the system was so wrong to begin with, what's one more thing that's out of place?

As it is now, it doesn't distinguish between great players or lousy ones, between those who have accomplished great things and those who are farm drones. Considering that, is it such a big deal to bring someone who's not in the alliance?

If the system is a failure anyway, I'd rather that it err on the side of being overly-accessable than being overly restrictive.

Yes, this is incorrect. Jade and amber cannot be exchanged for faction.

It is hard to grasp because it is incorrect. I have already mentioned that it would be extremely easy to join an alliance that has a good chance for controlling Cavalon. If you don't want to leave your current guild that is perfectly understandable, that is the same choice I made, it's just that in exchange for the personal touch you lose access to things that value large alliances such as elite missions. The elite missions are not that great of a sacrifice, believe me.

Them being the best part is something that is up to your personal opinion. If you truely think that they are more valuable than anything else in the game I suggest leaving your guild and joining an alliance with like-minded individuals. It is very easy to do so for any person.

This is true, but it is inargueable that the farmers are dedicated, and dedication should be rewarded. This does not make the faction system right, but it is a minor point.

Perhaps, but this is another matter of opinion. However, I am not argueing whether or not it is currently overly restrictive, I am merely argueing against the opinion that it should be accessable to all, which seems to be the majority's opinion in this thread.

And more out of context: I have been recieving unintelligent flames ingame and I would like it to stop. I debate for the fun of it, and I do not appreciate immature arguements such as calling me a "bkbd fanboi" or "bkbd lover" or any of the other idiotic comments I have gotten. If you would like to state a valid arguement, that is fine, but stay away from this senseless flaming. I would also much rather be addressed on this forum than during a mission.

if my understanding of that point is incorrect, thank you for pointing that out

in thoery, your posistion sounds viable.. but with allainces already over 9 million factions and no sign of slowing... unless there happens to be room in one of the biggest, where can i realistically expect this to happen ? how many allainces even have half that amount of faction ?

they may not be a great sacrifice on quality of mission, ill grant you that, but factor in the fact that some of the best and most expensive items drop there... and the advantage becomes crystal clear

as said ,i suggest we agree to disgaree ... best of luck in game

I know for a fact that TC regularly recruits from the public, and they are not far behind BkBd currently. Also, if you join an alliance with 500+ members in it then it should not be hard to catch up. It only takes 100 members getting 10k faction to gain 1 million faction. As many farmers will tell you, a single player can easily earn 10k faction in less than an hour.

No it doesn't. If there's one thing I like about Guild Wars, it's that weapon skins do not affect a player's ability. A collector's item is obtainable for pretty much free and has max damage and mods. Money is also not needed; 1.5k armor skins and runes can be bought through money obtained through normal gameplay. Having large amounts of money gives very little advantage except bragging rights.

Bear with me, today was my day off, and I've been kind of sick and hungover all day, and I may be getting different threads mixed up.

Does 'accessable by all' in this case mean walking in at any time, or does it mean 'accessable by anyone any time who accomplishes something to earn access?'

I have no problem with doing something difficult to earn access, but I'm very opposed to the 'accessable by only one group of people at a time' idea. I like to play cooperatively with a few close friends, I hate the idea of what I can and can't do in-game controlled by some strangers.

Ah, I'd better go lie down.

In this case it means walking in at any time, for this is what TC are promoting and it is what I am standing against. "Accessable by anyone any time who accomplishes something to earn access" is how I am saying it should be.

Hey, all,

Just a word that we hear you, and are currently working on solutions to this concern. I don't have specifics yet -- the design team is meeting to discuss various options and you know how super-secretive they are! But there will be an alternative means for players to access Elite Missions.

Do remember the devs will devise, discuss, and then test this new means of access. They'll amend, if necessary, or roll out if all is found to be good to go. Basically, nothing is easy, or simple, when you want to do it right. So give us a month or two to finalize this system, and we'll share more with you as it becomes available!

Thanks for your thoughts. To those of you who expressed your concerns so constructively and with such support, an extra-special thanks!

Thanks for the response Gaile.

I just hope you can find a way to incorporate the small alliances and casual players into elite missions while still making it hard to access and maintaining emphasis on cooperation between players in an alliance.

Here's hoping something dumb isn't opted in like:

Paying faction points to get in (yet more faction farming needed);
Paying cash to get in (more farming needed);

Let's hope that access is given, say, after beating Shiro or somthing else (like a new quest for access).

WasAGuest, I was actually hoping that it would be a reward for something alliance or guild related. You wouldn't run the elite mission by yourself would you?

THANK YOU GAILE!

You and the Anet team get a big hug from the GW community.

/salute

Anet and Gaile, thanks for looking at this problem. However, a month or two is way too long for people to wait.
We want a solution YESTERDAY - we are customers and we demand it right now!

Wee-ee-elll...

One way to do it could be to make the elite mission for a side be available for the owners of any town from that side - or at least the more important ones - rather than just the capital. That way you only need one of the prominant alliances for a faction to let people in rather than giving a monopoly to the owners of the capital - if one alliance offers an unreasonable entry price or simply doesn't allow entry at all, players would be able to go to the competition.

lol arwen.... patience please, Anet did not think so many people would be offended by the "skill" it takes to access these mission *cough farm *cough
BUT, now that our voices have been heard they are responding, and making all this happen isnt easy, i take computer programming in 9th grade.. and the simplest shit is so hard lol

I just hope that this new way into the Elite mission requires some kind of skill instead of farming or getting in with no type of challege. My personal solution is to make a really hard mission that you have to beat to get into the Elite mission or quest.

The easiest way to open up access to the elite missions is to allow access to the respective faction's elite from more than just one town. Pick a few towns on each side that alliances can fight over for elite mission access, instead of just one per. Not only does this open up elite mission access a bit, but it also adds incentive for more towns to be fought over, as right now only the capitals are really being sought after.

To keep the capital as the primary place of desired ownership, however, there might have to be extra reward added, such as open gates for all controlling alliance members or something. Just a thought.

The situation has been addressed, be humble with that simple answer.

Switching a big problem for a smaller problem isn’t a fix either. You would still have the same problem just on a smaller scale.

----------------------------------------------------------------------
But I’ll agree with the missions be available to all of there Favor Faction side. Say if you have more Luxon Favor you can’t access the Kuzicks elite mission and vise versa.

Or since there is a global title for friends of the Kurzicks/Luxon maybe they can lower the bar to a reasonable number for the first rank and base gaining access to elite mission that way.

To make town ownership add more discounts NPC’s maybe? and a free ticket for them accessing the elite mission. It should be strictly a reward and not special access to any kind of content.

There are a lot of possibilities that can work the benefit of ever gamer.

My beef here is that this "hogging" of elite mission issue has happened in WoW for eons and anet just copied the concept verbatim into Factions. Do they seriously think that it wouldn't be problematic in GW? Get real. Their game designers should be thrown to the thorn wolves! Anyway, it's their jobs they're mucking around with. If people start drifting away because they are pissed, no more GW3.

Probably in the end a large part of the reason people have been unhappy with the concept of such restricted access to the Deep and the Warren is that, as far as PVE missions go, these are 2 out of 15. It has nothing to do with proportion (1 out of 15 wouldn't have been 2x as good), but rather that with only 13 missions in the Factions campaign it does not take that long for people to run out of engaging PVE content before they have little else to do besides PVP or Faction farm (or gold/item farm as in Prophecies). As a result, people turn their attention to the elite missions quite early on. (BTW I am not saying that PVP, or taking another character through the game, is not fun, but rather that if folks interested in PVE aren't keen on abandoning a certain character who has completed the Factions campaign, they don't care for PVP or replay as options in the first place.)

With regards to people claiming what "ArenaNet intended" with the elite missions and access, that's most certainly a moot point now but really it always had been because a) most folks here are in no position to figure what the designers really intended, and b) ArenaNet is so responsive to the community that "original" intent is actually second-guessed by the designers themselves in order to cater to the fans. So, IMO, arguing "intent" is both pointless and unfair to ArenaNet.

Also, concerning Deep and Warren with regards to PVE rewards: the reward is really NOT *access to the missions* but *control of access to the missions.* Think about it! ^_^

Gaile,

I appreciate the fact you are taking the time to address the issue which has flared up within the past weeks. It is good to see that ArenaNet is attempting to address concerns of some of the player base that wish to have access to the elite missions. I'm also interested in seeing concerns addressed to the many other people who do not share this desire.

I have read the variety of things mentioned about the elite quests, in which the intention was to have them change more frequently. I'm not going to go into specific details, as I believe everyone interested in this issue knows them already. One of the things that intrigued me about Guild Wars: Factions is that a Guild Alliance would actually have the opportunity to have control of a Luxon or Kurzick city. I thought *maybe* there was a chance that my guild could take control of one of the cities. It was quite a thrill to have been a part of an alliance that achieved such a lofty achievement as to be a highest-ranked Luxon alliance.

On a slightly related subject there has been what I consider an extreme amount of animosity occurring. I understand that neither you nor ArenaNet can directly control any individual's behavior in the game. Personally, however, as a player in this game I would like to see a bit more action and enforcement of the Guild Wars Rules of Conduct posted at http://www.guildwars.com/support/leg...sofconduct.php. Many player's conduct over the past weeks has gotten out of control, been taken beyond the game and made personal, which I believe to be too far and has created an environment which is not fun to play in. Much of this hostility has of course involved major Guild Alliances, but it goes beyond that, and it affects the Guild Wars community as a whole.

As a player of the game, I'm requesting that we shift focus OFF this unfortunate situation, and back onto the fact that this game is about Luxons vs. Kurzicks. The hostility and Faction infighting has left a big cloud of gloom, which has soured the game not just for me and the alliance I'm a member of, but for many other people as well. If there are any changes or modifications made, my hope is that ArenaNet finds a solution which will make everyone happy, such as fixing the way faction is obtained, which could be largely through the Alliance battles. As stated on the retail box, page 107 of the Factions Manuscripts, and elsewhere, the elite missions are (were intended to be) "accessible to the highest-ranked alliances on either the Luxon or Kurzick side." I personally interpret this to mean that the elite mission was intended as a reward for the highest-ranked Kurzick & Luxon alliances, so I'm interested in finding out if there will be any special rewards or content available only to highest-ranked alliances, with the elite missions being opened to everyone.

As a member and Officer of The Black Blades Guild, I'm requesting that you consider modifications you make to the game which are fair to everyone concerned... the single players, the small and large guilds/alliances, *and* the highest-ranked Kurzick & Luxon alliances in control. The Black Blades Alliance members are just as unhappy about the situation as most everyone else is, but hope the solution to this problem will also be fair to the highest-ranking Kurzick & Luxon alliances in control, now and in the future.

Emeril Dragon
Ambassador
The Black Blades Guild

one possible solution might be UW like... you need to pay to enter, the reward for the holding alliance is: its free for them

Of course the elite mission of luxon's should only be accessable by luxon's and the kurzick's only to kurzicks...

I agree with sciros that there are relatively few missions, but that is compensated by the challenge missions and the competative missions. But so much is told about the enormous thoughness of the elite mission, i think everybody want to test out their skill to beat it...

Now we wait until the implement the changes... I can see this will take some time: first figure out a more fair way, but preventing every noob from messing up, after that implementing in the servers (easier access also means economic rebalancing, because of the very very high priced drops in the elite mission, the impact on the economy is revised...) I can understand this takes several weeks, although we want it yesterday, I will wait patiently... and simplly get every tiny quest out of faction in the meanwhile (there are a lot... some incredibly though... thats nice!)

Thank you for your response, Gaile, I'm very glad simply to have the issue acknowledged

I have thought about it. It surprises me that you think this point is somehow novel.

Why should control of what other people are allowed to do be a reward granted to players?

I'm quite sure he would not be the only one there after that alternative way in. An alternate way in would be the best solution. It would be easier to program since you wouldn't have to make changes to the current program just add to it.

Just wanted everyone to know...
There are no skills to be tested in the deep. It isn't a challange between you and the computer. It entails a lot more. Such as intangibles and actual real-life EQ and IQ. Its not a slash and hack job. It's not a farming run. More of a struggle to survive, "will bill be okay? how is my energy and health after fighting off that one guy. How am I taking damage? Where am I taking damage from? Can I survive the battle long enough to even help?". Instead of the usual idea of... "how long until I get past this group of monsters?"

Ah, so basically its a challenge? Good, sounds like fun

Blackblades are doing chest farming in the Deep if I understand correctly. Run to the first chest and then zone out, that sort of thing.

As was shown by a lot of PUG:s when TC hold Cavalon, the Deep is not that hard. It's a question of teamwork first and foremost for sure, just like any high level PvE.

Are you in the BlackBlade alliance by any chance?

Not sure where that was going or hinting at, but I don't like soloing much of anything. Probably a hint at solo farming? For the record, I despise farming for anything. It's boring and not at all fun for me. Since before Factions came out (and we had a hint at the farming in the FPE), I've been voicing out against the massive amount of faction farming needed in this game.
I don't care for "uber drops" or green items. I use mostly custom made collector items tailored to my tastes. Farming, again, not my thing.
What I'm refering to in my post is the hope that Anet doesn't set up yet another need to farm faction or cash. You'll notice many posts about people saying "pay the holding alliance something" or "cash in points for...". Enough farming.

Solutions:

Defeat Shiro and you have access.
Defeat a newly made quest.

If anyone has other non-farming related solutions, let's hear em.

PS. I often get a laugh at some of the defense comments on the elite missions. My favorite is "It's only 1% and your not missing anything". If this were true, then the holding alliance wouldn't care if everyone had access.

It is more than likely. A couple of friends and myself, for a bit of a laugh decided to see how far we could get with 3 people.

Easily cleared out all the starting areas right up to the gate (very nice touch that )

Given that a chest often spawns just before the gate or in the area around it, I would say that chest runs are entirely possible, and very likely to be going on.

I was hinting that it should still be earned at something alliance or guild-related, which your proposed solutions are not.

Agree completely. The problem is what, it has to satisfy the faction farmers, while not pissing off the rest of the world. I always suggested funny hats, but I have a feeling the top alliances doesn't see that as an acceptable award for running supplies a few hours day.

Somehow the war between Kurzick and Luxon has to be started for real too.

yeah was a good laugh, really makes the missions seem a lot less elite doesn't it?

Well for one, I was writing in reply to those who feel that the reward they earned for being a top alliance was private access to the elite missions. The reward was control of access, which could be used to keep it private yes. But technically the reward is the *control.* This control can then be exploited however.

As for whether or not control of the game world "should be granted" well that has to do with personal views on game design and how immersive and reflective of the real world games ought to be. You claim my point isn't novel; it wasn't meant to be, but it seemed to be lost on you nevertheless as you countered with one that's neither here nor there. It's really impossible to argue that allowing a select number of players to control access to certain content through whatever game mechanic is wrong in principle. It's how much content it is and the mechanic that people were debating.

I disagree. I commend you on your three man clearing of the staging area, however until I see a screenshot posted from a team that clears the entire map, I will consider it a challenge.

The deep is open for business again! Hat's off to BkBd for giving us a challenging run through the night but we got it back at 8am Est.

I was one of those who decided against buying Factions due to this very issue. Simply put, although I LOVED the original GW, I wasnt interested in purchasing a game that had content which I would probably never get to access. The first GW did not limit me this way. It isnt surprising to see that people who do have access are content with the way things are now. Anyway, I figured I would wait until the game was out for a while and read forums to see what the players had to say about it. From everything I'm reading, not only from this thread but from multiple threads on different websites, I was right not to buy it. I can see many others are not content for the same reasons. I will check back in a few months to see if the devs were able to find an acceptable solution. If not, there are plenty of other games out there.