Update with Tasty Revision

Ok, so the update went up, as several threads mentioned. But, the good news is, in addition to the usual tasty revisions, we've included a delicious dessert buffet! Ok, enough on the silly analogies!

What happened was, we were able to include some additional updates that were hoped-for additions this week, but which we believed may need to be held until next week. However, our excellent programming team was able to get these exciting revisions into place, and that's good, because you're going to love this!

Here are the new update notes, and enjoy!

Update – Wednesday, July 13

* Improved faction rewards in Arenas and the Tournament:

o Arena Victory: 10 in Team/Competition Arenas, 5 in Shiverpeak Arena, 2 in Ascalon Arena

o Arena Bonus for 5 Consecutive Victories: 10 in Team/Competition Arenas, 5 in Shiverpeak Arena, 2 in Ascalon Arena

o Arena Bonus for Flawless Victory: 2 in Team/Competition Arenas, 1 in Shiverpeak Arena, 0 in Ascalon Arena

o Tournament Victory: 20 in the first map, 40 in early missions, 60 in later missions, 80 in the Hall of Heroes

* Corrected faction reward for kills in low level arenas, so that it now matches what was announced in the June 29 update notes.

* Restored XP for PvP games. Players will now receive both Faction and XP for killing an opponent.

* Improved Henchmen movement AI so that they more closely follow the player and avoid getting stuck.

* Added Lina, a level 17 protection healer henchman, to all Crystal Desert outposts.

* Improved staff damage and armor on protection healer henchmen to better match their level.

* Improved minion formations and corrected a flaw that was occasionally preventing them from following or attacking.

* Added new artwork for the Warrior’s ascended Gladiator’s Armor and Ranger’s ascended Druid’s Armor.

* Fixed the following area-of-effect (AOE) spells so that they are no longer cancelled if the target dies while you are casting them: Chaos Storm, Deep Freeze, Desecrate Enchantments, Earthquake, Enfeebling Blood, Eruption, Feast of Corruption, Fireball, Ice Spikes, Maelstrom, Meteor, Meteor Storm, Panic, Phoenix, Plague Sending, Rodgort's Invocation, Rust, Searing Heat, Shadow of Fear, Soothing Images, Suffering.

* Fixed Grenth's Balance so that it does not decrease the target's health by more than it increases your health.

* Fixed wards, spirits, and wells so that players who are resurrected within the area of effect receive that spell's effect after resurrection.

* Fixed bug which prevented the final boss in the Thunderhead Keep mission from dropping loot.

* Updated boss monster spawns in Dunes of Despair, The Frost Gate, Deldrimor Bowl, and Traveler's Vale.

* Updated or repaired flaws in the following quests: "Tower of Courage," "A Gift of Griffons," "Khobay the Betrayer," and "Undead Horde."

* Updated monster locations in North Kryta Province and Fissure of Woe.

* Updated Captain Greywind NPC to level 20 for continuity.

* Added party configuration requirement so that parties containing henchmen or unascended players are now prevented from entering the Fissure of Woe and the Underworld.

Interface changes:

* Added new trader interface.

* Expanded friends list so that you can have up to 50 on your friends list and up to 10 on your ignore list.

* Expanded maximum permitted length of guild announcement to 255 characters.

* Improved vendor windows so they remember their last size and position.

* Improved vendor windows so they show equipped items with a special symbol.

* Improved information displayed in "/age" command.

* Corrected the skill monitor and selection bar so that when they are inactive they no longer interfere with mouse interaction.

* Corrected quest markers on the compass so they update properly after completing a quest.

* Added tags to highlight fellow guild members in outposts.

* Improved several error and warning messages, especially related to guild battle formation.

* Updated icon for Flurry skill.

* Fixed minor update bugs in party formation window.

Miscellaneous:

* Updated Korean and European translations.

* Fixed miscellaneous rare crash bugs.

w00t!!

Thanks for the dessert, ANet!

Good evening Gaile,

Is there any official word, one way or the other, about allowing Attribute Refund Points to be fully restored when returning to town? This will allow it to be in line with what is currently allowed in freely changing our skills and secondary profession when not in a battle area.

Yes i am VERY satisfied with these updates. i was a bit perturbed by the other updates but... you really did come through this time. it made me happy

ooh i guess we'll be seeing that expensive druid armour soon cant wait!

It's a good update, ANet. Still, I'm a little unsatisfied. I was hoping that last week's update skip meant that we'd be seeing the new areas. However, you never promised it, so I guess I can't count it against you.

Great job, ANet.

My favorite updates are:
improved henchmen movement/AI
AOE spells not cancelling
new trader interface
expanded friends list
longer guild announcement (YES!!!)

How come Fissure/UW was changed to not include henchmen? Not like I'd go in there with henchmen, but I'm curious.

Great job. The game is getting even better.

FINNALY YES DRUIDS ARMOR YES... lol i have been waiting for that one. Too bad i can only afford half of the armor at the moment lol. Thanks Gaile and all of the Guild Wars programmers for their great work.

I love Lina. Good job!

Lovin it, thanks anet. Keep up the good work.

I'm glad they didn't leave out the faction problems like it seemed at first. Still though the average pvper has no real way of earning enough faction to matter which is why those arbitrary numbers are rather confusing

I hope they don't implement that.

i think this updates are going in the wrong direction


i hate where this game is going i wish you could P v P an ind.

Thanks again to you and the A-net team Gaile.

I love you Anet.. i really really do

thanks for adding Lina to the desert, she will really help out my healer henchman

I absolutely loved this update...loved it

I don't really see how you can be against something like free attribute refunds in towns. The way I see it, it should just be in towns you aren't even limited to using attribute points, so they don't reset in towns, you can just change skills freely, attribute points would only be earned and used outside of towns. This way people can get quick attribute points just for when they're exploring, and you don't need to farm to build them up for PvP or something.

Yeah probably the best update to date. Now how about those new areas?

Thankyou so much! I was beginning to feel me saying anything here wasnt worth while. But I can see that 2 problems which I found particulary troublesome and which I wrote about have been rectified. I am amazed and hugely pleased with the speed at which these modifications have been made.

Many thanks to Anet and especially those hard working programmers!

This is completely unecessary! I usually gain all my refund points after one mission. So whats the problem? Now refunds have been re-implemeted in PvP theres no need for this here either. IMHO refunds are integral to the game, since they effectively force you to play with a skill set for a period of time.

I mean at the same time why don't we make it so we can reset classes in town too!

Once you've progressed in the game you can reset classes - at least your secondary. They've already implemented that, or haven't you gotten that far in the game yet?

As far as refund points go, they serve no purpose that I can see. At least the cap was raised from a insanely comical 10 to a vaguely reasonable 24. But when you want to re-work your char. for various reasons in a short period of time (from smiter[bit of solo grind] to full heal [assist with a mission] to protection [doing a mission for yourself] in, say 2-4 hours), you don't want to be forced to have to go acquire n xp taking x time just to adjust your points accordingly.

What's the purpose for the delay to acquire xp for refund points?

Since the "Brand The Boss" contest goes on until end of july you shouldn't expect the new areas before august

Actually if I farm with my monk i get enough xp to reskill to full healer setup within a few minutes... Killing 5 mobs should give you about 100 xp at least - so let's say you encounter 3 groups of them in one run --> 300 xp, more then needed for one refund point. If you don't get enough xp from the mobs you are farming then just go to areas afterwards where you get 100 xp or more per creature and you're back in the healing business in no time

I agree you should be able to click on the weapon setup and change not only your WEAPON but also ARMOR and SKILL POINTS. So you can be in a city and quickly change from a Fire Nuker to a Air Ele... in battle a warrior can quickly switch from say hammer to sword to bow and arrow, moving the points around to benefit... I dont get why not after youve ascended and or beat the game. (in fact that would be a nice benefet to beating the game, since there is NONE now...)

And yes ARMOR. If I can afford two/three/four sets of armor each with different attributes why shouldnt I be able to quickly switch between them in TOWN. (not in mission/quests because that would be pretty unreasonable...) I know I could physically do it, but its a pain everytime.

Then again I still think Dual Weilding should be implented, and have reasons for it.. namely the fact they showed us pictures early on of dual weilding characters! They are still on their website!!!!

*sigh*

Gaile, my response to this is on TGH please, read the responses in the threads about this update. (I know you do, just saying).

PLEASE FIX THE FIX TO FACTION

Please read what I write. Refund points effectively force you into sticking with a set of skills. This makes you

a) think about your skills before setting them
b) wait before changing them allowing you to familiarize yourself with those skills.

This re-inforces the focus of the game i.e. the skills.

There are a number of games where you cannot change your skills. For example Diablo2. At least this game allows skill changes. And it honestly does not take a huge amount of time to gain refund points.

The only problem I had recently with refund points was the lack of XP in PvP which meant if you were using a PvE character in PvP you had to go into the PvE world, do a mission and then change your refund points. This however has been rectified in the most recent update and is no longer a problem.

Nice update. I checked and bugs i reported were fixed. LOL.

Srry, had to check.

Very good work.

Keep it comming.

When you are done completing the game i think they should offer you a quest that will allow you to have unlimited refunds while in towns. Ive finnished the game with three characters now. Im getting into the RPG aspect of it playing usualy by myself and sometimes with others. I want to be able to use one skill set for one area and be able to easily change it up without having to grind to get my refund points. Ive unlocked all these skills, i want to use them now. I see no problem at all with allowing us to give us more flexibility with our characters. It will make the game that much more fun.

Doing this will also give us a sense of accomplishment for when we do finnish the game. What else does my character have to do? Make a final quest. Call it know thy self. Make it a nice tough one/long one kinda like villany. Once thats done you get unlimited attr refunds while in towns. That would rock and keep me playing until the expansions come out. As of now... I need to role play.

"Restored XP for PvP games"

thank you.

And this is why we don't need "Full attribute refund points in town."

And great avatar, by the way.

ooh! ooh! /does happy dance
That is a major change indeed!

Speak for yourself. Im a roleplaying player. Its also a major aspect to this game. Ive played pvp only a few times. Its not my thing, not to say i wont get more into it later. Whats this hurt you anyway if we get full refunds in town? You go grind your points back, me i want to role play and use the 250-300 or so skills ive found when i want.

I want a ferarri...and a mansion with two indoor swimming pools...and beyonce knowles as a lap ornament....

Uh....

You sound like a kid that cant discuss. Please tell me how having this would affect you in any way? Also read the post above (#29) explaining a possible way to implement this. End of game quest. I want to hear good points on why this would wreck the game.

the point is I've learned to live with what I have....and not complain about what I don't. The game is about skill and thought...there is no thought involved in changing your skills/attributes often enough that you'd need to remove the refund system. I change my build quite often...from trapper to protector to interupter to beastmaster.....and I've never been in a situation where I needed to spend hours regaining refund points....I always seem to have enough.

I must say I am very, very pleased with this update as a whole. Non-cancelling spells (Oh how aggrivating that was), updated henchmen... All sorts of good stuff.

I have one major complaint, which in part falls on fault of me. The female Druid's Ascended Armour.

Okay, no offense to whoever designed it, but how much porn were they watching at the time? They had to be really horny to design pseudo-amazon-warrioress garb. The Ascended Druid's Armour I bought over a month ago now makes my character look like a *prostitute. I didn't think it'd be that bad, but some of us (roleplayers especially) don't want our characters to look like *prostitutes, especially when the previous druid's armour completely covered you. They aren't even wearing shoes. They have bags holding their breasts in. It looks like the character took a few strips of leather and draped it over themself. Now I understand the logical reason for requiring that many materials is because the crafter would only use the very finest parts of those materials, but really... The top could be done in two leather squares. One cut in half for each breast and a strap around the back to hold it on. You don't need all those materials for it (though I don't really care about the cost, it just seems a bit lacking in continuity). Eh, I just think it should've been a little more covering. Now yes, I do take part of the blame for my frustration in buying the Druid's armour pre-emptively, and I realize that that severely cuts my right to complain, but come on... Not every female has to be portrayed as a sex object, especially when it's the best armour for that class.


*Changed because the censors give another word for a woman of ill repute as... Wtf? Oo;;

Stop the personal attacks.

Well the rangers are supposed to be able to live off the land and blend in, so why shouldnt they wear clothes made from the trees and all that. If they were in the jungle and making clothes from the natural resources around them, why would they make something big and heavy, so they can sit in a pool of sweat ? :P If you dont like it, dont wear it, you can use standard druids, theres nothing wrong with it, it looks lovely tbh.

About every female character in the game being a sex object, apply that to real life, is every woman at the beach in a bikini, who are covered less than the rangers sex objects ? Your taking it way too seriously.