Dragon Festival finale...That's it?

Is it just me or is the sky getting darker?

(i'm probebly just being paranoid or hopeful?)

Okay, seriously... if there were some kind of great finale only to happen once, can you imagine how many people actually would be left out? No one at A-Net messed it up when the Final was everytime the Emperor arrived. It was made so that everyone could participate.

It's the greedy Prophecies syndrome. I doubt that Factions-only players would find the finale statement 'misleading' - there really was a finale, and the Kisu event was IT.

You make a very good point there, and I understand that. I'm not trying to bash ANet here... they've done some shady things, but I actually cut them some slack most of the time and am just happy to see that they are continuing to actively support/improve GW (especially when people are so ignorant/intollerant/impatient as to spew obscenities at a NPC, not to mention eachother... "give me my mask now !@#$!$%#$", "the Emperor's gay!", "you're such a nub", "stupid noob", etc, etc.).

I don't think ANet was trying to be misleading -- rather, I think the hype turned more into marketing than actual information... or something like that.

It all comes down to definitions and perspectives:

from GuildWars.com ...
Conclusion
Noun: 1. The close or last part; the end or finish.

In their own words, conclusion surely suggests the "end," and the Dragon Festival refers to the entire "weekend event"... not the mini-event (Emperor's appearances).

And that's not even touching on the "true Canthans" or "exclusive weekend event" part which could seem to imply that it's for Canthan-born characters only.

I enjoyed the event. As for the final event, I am glad they let the Flury and the Fire works happen every time, mistake or not. Wish we could attack the Ghask and Flurry, We could have formed defensive lines and fought for the monastary. Have the end event happen every time the Empour came, let me enjoy something instead of having to stay up all night and not get any sleep. Yes there was bugs, and some issue, but over all did well.

I will Say "THANK YOU AREA NET."

Err why the event is still on? Is it another bug or what?

a couple of points

First - I DO appreciate the fact that the festival was put on and I liked doing the quests to get the masks.

However I did have 3 major problems with the way the Festival was handled.

#1 MANY glitches, I was on for a long time especially on the fourth and experienced many glitches. The worst was within the last few hours of the end of the event. There was a game wide announcement from Rujiyo asking for help in a big battle at the monastary. He had a conversation with another npc about all of us speaking to him for futher instructions, and then NOTHING Happened. I was on long enough to go through two of these same call to arms from him near the end. Both times nothing happened. I went to many districts and nothing ever seemed to occur based on this supposed "last stand " battle.

#2 - the Rujiyo mini missions were a pain - Sorry but they were, I had a very hard time getting groups together to even attempt these missions and they were impossible with henchies.

#3- The supposed great finale - I and many others stayed up hours to see the finale and it was just another mask hand out with presents dropping from the sky. In the future they need to be clearer as to what will happen at the end of festivals. Will there be a real Grand Finale?! or Just another of the same events that have been occuring throughtout the day. I know everyone will not always be happy 100% of the time, but the wording of the official release certainly had many believing that the finale would be a special one time event

The communication, and supply of game information is very poor.
I have always supposed that this was a desire on Anet's/GW's (whoever) part to not spoil any in-game content. However I now believe that it is really more of a lack of communication skill

.

the Mad King event was far more interactive. this Dragon Festival quickly got stale, not to mention a total lack of information dessimination as to what to do with the celestial orbs, what you get from them ... the gift giving dragged on and on and on .... yeah its great getting presents but 15 mins of click farming is stale ...

the Dragon Arena dodge ball was fun though

In response:

#1 - The few glitches happened in districts specific. I just changed districts until I found one w/o. No problem.
#2 - ?? Your kidding? Really. I did all missions 12 times. Never had a problem with henchies our getting a group. Only couldn't do it with henchies on the last two.
#3 - I understood the entire day was the finale. Otherwise not everyone would be able to catch it. This was done for everyone to be able to catch a time. Nice for those who could catch it multiple times.

Overall I loved it. I like the decor and the hard work they put in for events. I look forward to more!!

please re-read my post - While the many general glitches seemed to be random - the final battle announced by Rujiyo near the very end never seemed to happen in any district - at least in the 20 or so I checked. He said talk to him but never had anything to say


Nope - not kidding, Well then you must be a superior player because I was unable to get anywhere with the lvl 3 henchies.

I am refering to the Rujiyo mini missions not the orb quests.

I find it very hard to believe you did any of the mini missions with henchies, but whatever - if you say u did - then ... I guess you did.


I have to agree - at this point it does seem that the whole day was the Grand Finale - however - it still does not take away from the fact that the information was poorly distrbuted- my opinion, and many others I was in-game with - YMMV.

Nope, talking orb quests, my mistake. I apologize.

What is the matter with you all?

I thought the event was great, and I think ANet is great for doing all these EXTRA things for us to make our environment fun and add something refreshing. Who cares if there is a glitch or two, I think we should just be thankful that we have had the opportunity to enjoy the events

I know that some glitches cause some panic, ie. the pets, but ANet can fix all that Pe positive

Agreed. THANK YOU ANET!! I had a blast this weekend and love my new Dragon Mask!

How dare they organise a free event and not have a finale where ectoplasm rains down from the sky, everyone gets free skill points and level cap is raised to 30! ANet doesn't care about players /ragequits

The balls you need to have to complain about the Dragon Festival must exert a gravitational force.

The full range of willfull ignorance ("o noes orbs r droping i cnat figure out wut 2 do") to greed ("stop camping my prizes n000000b!@!!") to just plain unappreciation ("there's 8371569839760198476 emperirs this festifal is CRAAAAAP") seems so painfully apparent as to be sickening.

The only actual bug in the festival were the multiple emperors, which of course was a minor glitch occuring in several (but not all) of the Shing Jea districts. If you're upset that the multiple emperors were breaking the fourth wall of the GW world (which might have reminded you that this is a game afterall) then please have somebody curbstomp your head until you snap back to reality.

(edit: I almost forgot the pet/ranger face bugs, and that WAS a pretty major screwup on ANets part, but I feel they didn't actually have anything to do with the quality of the Dragon Festival which is the sole scope of my post.)

That glitch aside, every other criticism I've heard is just complaints (though there are a few folk expressing thier appreciation for the event - myself included). 9 rings is boring/promotes grind? Then don't play it. ANet didn't spoonfeed instructions to you concerning the invasion minigame? Here's a hint: press "Alt" - those imperial sorcerers weren't there 5 seconds ago! Think ANet should have supplied a program detailing the day's events? Where's the fun in that? Half the fun of these events is showing up, hearing rumors, talking to guildies - figuring it all out. That's what makes it an "event".

I think this event was overwhelmingly positive - the whelp tagging, the dragon arena, new festival items (the cakes and wine), the Rujiyo mini missions, the invasion mini-game, free gift drops, and of course the town redecorations and dragon masks. These aspects of the event deserve accolades and far outweigh any complaints I've heard (both founded and contrived).

If you thought the event was lame, nobody asked you to stay. There must be something in the game you enjoy doing - why don't you go do that instead? Some of us actually saw the event as a little more than another opportunity for by-the-books cash mongering. RAAAAWWWWRRRRRR...now I'm just pissed off. The more I write...urgh...

Maybe ANet should just respond by never making any special events ever again? That'd make all you Scrooges happy right?

-Jessyi

Anet needs to learn to word their writing so it doesn't confuse people.

I stayed up until midnight just for this - a finale is at the end, right? The whole last day doesn't count as a finale...and what was up with the "True Canthans" thing? Oh...and teasing us with that glowing box...

This event doesn't compare to Wintersday/Halloween. The masks were nice...but the confusion and glitches made it horrid.

[QUOTE] hi.

the finale is the end of the event as set up by the people who make it.

it is not a specific period of time, it is not limited to only one performance.

this was a multi day event and they can if they wish have the full last day be the finale as the finale is something extra special at the end.

make a sacastic reply about "waah, i didn't exactly understand what you said".....

But not worth it...

I thought this event and all the other events, especially Day of the Tengu, went well, as in, I had fun, I enjoyed it, I would like to do it again. I don't speak for anyone other than myself....

You make a very good point there too.
i just wonder why some ppl cant understand whats JOKING!
i think the main reason of an event is to gather ppl somewhere so they can talk together and JOKE and laugh together and have a good time (atleast thats part of it!) not to stand there like good boys and wait for emperror to give them their mask (where is the fun? )
i personaly liked some of things ppl said there, and enjoyed. Thank you everyone and Thank you ANet that was a cool event

every time i stayed in whichever district (122-127) i landed in and the people had the brains to drop the orb every time so they got passed by and then picked it up to run some more.

all 6 times we won by 100+ or sometimes double

also got at least 16 prizes (each time) with a high of 22 (got enough orbs from that for a new mask or to sell) the other stuff was nice merchant fodder

I thoroughly enjoyed the event, and I believe that the communication was at the right level in order to not provide any spoilers.

Regarding the mini-missions, I believed that they were the true gem of the festival, providing many the opportunity to fight opponents that they wouldn't normally face unless they visited ToPK. I personally chuckled at those who stated in game that "OMG THESE MISSIONS ARE IMPOSSIBLE!!$!@#!" You really start to identify with the true level that some players are accustomed to playing at, especially in PvE.

Great job A-Net!!!#!#!@

I've once been in a district where we intended to lose just to see what happens :P

We've had a great time there

People running away from those grasps, the emperor who still tought he had won the war against the grasps and the discovery of the /dance of invincibility (the grasps didn't attck you if you danced :P)

PS
Are those grasps not the new touchrangers? 1 hit KO ftw?

I had a blast. I thought that once I got my mask, that would be it. Then I started seeing people run around with Celestial orbs and saw a score board. I was thrilled and immediately jumped in on the fun. After that, I got myself 17 presents that dropped from the sky. I loved the missions for the orbs and everything. I'd say overall, this was the best event yet. :P

QFT

Being EST I stayed up to 3:40am with work the next day to give ANet/GW a chance to impress with this line. Instead, absolutely nothing.

I thought the event was OK otherwise - I dont care about the new titles/raffles and no new items to collect (short of a mask a character) meant my overstuffed storage didn't suffer more. Dodgeball wasnt as engaging as the snowball fight, the rift closing bits I really couldnt get good groups to give it a good try during summer/such a weekend, a couple PUGs run over I moved on.

But what am I really left with? ANet told me not to miss something, and even tho I find they've let me down in this or that way, I'm still part fan. Well that part won over sleep - next time round it's that much more likely sleep will win. At least if they did 9pmPST/midnightEST it'd make it a little easier for the east coast to deal with let downs like that.

since Anet is west coast why should they cater to east coast time?

they already answered that by saying we have to pick someplace as a reference point so why not where we are.

Since GW is an World Wide game why not conform to the rest off the world and use GMT

I liked it. It may have lacked some things, and I did see eight Kisus in one dist, but overall I came out better than I went in.

A few things I might have changed:
Rujiyo missions - Shing Jea during the festival was not only the place filled with low level characters, but also with AFK gamblers and people waiting for the Emperor's prizes. Putting a good group togeather was increasingly frustrating, especially on the last day. Did anyone actually beat all of these?

Prize drops - caused a lot of bickering and "You're in my spot!" comments. I saw the /shoo emote used more during the prize drop more than I had in probably the past 6 months of playing. I'd go back to having them just appear in your inventory.

that one i can honestly answer.

you probably noticed the rash of posts asking how/when/what GMT is?

the majority of US does not even know GMT exists let alone how to use it.

Anet is US so they went with home time

It was the same thing that happened during the wintersday event, so I didn't see much fault in it.

forgetting the glitches that are so ever obvious, the event was best so far, gambling circle games, dodge ball, quests of challenge (oh i'd like to point out i did the first mission with a 2 man team. long time yes, but easy none the less), wack a baby dragon lol game, rainshower of presents and fireworks, along with the game of celestial charges.

one that gets me though, i can never watch the fireworks, cause it happens when the gifts are appearing.. lol its either look at the sky and get nothing, or stare at the ground and get it all. lol

the mask dyes so well, im very happy either way. and i will be getting wasted for a full day on rice wine! that shit is great

Ok for the stuck up people saying we wanted ecto raining from the sky. Shut up. No. Here's an example of a "grand finale" in the minds of many.

At the end of the second FPE (The PvE one) on the last day for the last hour or so, the major cities were invaded by Shiro'ken and Kuunavang.

Note:
-They were there for a short period of time.
-It was at the end.
-It was a shock.
-Absolutely no drops/gift/etc. were involved.

That's what we were expecting, not long running mini-event for a day. Again most of the complant/issues with this are mainly due to poor wording and hype. People liked the festival overall, but don't call something a "grand finale" unless it is "grand" and a "finale."

Now that that's out of the way.

YAY A.Net! ^_^ Still a good festival overall. Rice Wine ftw.

I wasn't expecting ecto to rain from the sky. >_> I was looking around at the sky to see bigger fireworks, or something simple like that...the emperor dance for another example. xD Overall again, I loved it. The games were so fun, Dragon's Nest FTW! I mean even if you're by yourself, you pay 15g (1 ticket) and get 11 orbs no matter what. Good deal to me...playing that game, doing all the quests (not Rujiyo) on my characters, and playing pvp dodge ball I got myself close to 2500 orbs. I gave some away and I sold 1000 for 35k. With the presents and everything over the weekend, I figured I've earned myself about 100k. So the event WAS fun and rewarding, even if it was glitched like none other and misinterpreted.

Bah... hasn't anyone else realized that the endgame, when the badguys won, was a sneak-peek into Guild Wars: Nightfall?

Hmm...please elaborate, that sounds interesting.

Sure... the (level 30) Fury's warning at the end of how his master was mustering forces to destroy all mankind... the Dark Master that was referred to... to me it fell into place.

Should have camped the hench then. I did and never got fewer than 40 prizes, usually 50-60.

W.T.S (btw, I never use that its sooooo gay) 200 Unopened Dragon Festival Prizes 750g each!

Gwen?

Could be, now THAT'S thinking outside the box.

Gaile has been commenting...

Hi,

Here's an update on a bunch of stuff:

• We are aware that the NPCs are still in the towns. Sometimes in multiples. (Never knew Kisu had so many twins!) We will be doing a live build to clean that up.
  
  
• At the same time, the collector will be put in place so that you can exchange your orbs for a mask. (Remember, one per character, as they are customized.)
  
  
• We have a ton of feedback from players on this event, and that will help furnish some points of direction for future events. Difficulty of quests and missions, coolness of the prizes (and ideas for others), appreciation for the decorations, extreme fun factor of the Dragon Arena (alas, it shall not remain, although we surely appreciate how much everyone liked it), popularity of the games of chance, needing more time to achieve the highest titles, a certain dev team member's obsession with Dragon's N... oh wait, scratch that last one. But do know that all that you're sharing is noted and we will do our best to attend to it.

Now, just so we're all on the same page, the finale was intended and designed as an all-day event. We understand that some players, perhaps based on our long-ago BWEs, expected a final hour event instead. Or they expected the finale and then a finale to the finale, I'm not sure. The fact is, with Guild Wars live now, and with our having players in every timezone and on virtually every continent, we want to have our finales be more accessible to the majority of players. This means not having one that runs at Midnight Pacific, which is 3:00 on the morning on the East Coast on a work day, 07:00 or 08:00 or 09:00 across Europe and 5:00 p.m. in Asia, all again during a workday. Having a finale run all day is the kinder and more inclusive plan. It is, I believe, what we will be doing in the future, and that is primarily based on your feedback. You told us that having the Wintersday Festival finale for just 12 hours wasn't good. That having the end-of-BWE finales made them inaccessible to a lot of players who dearly wanted to attend them. So in response to your feedback and your suggestions, a new plan: More accessibility, more participation, and more inclusive events.

If you were confused by the wording on the website, please take another look and do note that there isn't a reference to anything to do with a final hour or the last minutes or anything but a statement about special events at the end. We're very sorry if someone was confused by that, and that he or she built of notions of a finale that was different, or even a finale of the finale.

Someone posted on another forum, something like this: "I got to meet the emperor, fought grawls for celestial orbs, got a mask, saw fireworks, and presents rained from the sky. That's a finale to me."

I tend to agree with him and I hope, with this explanation, that you will as well.