Forum:New GW2 info

New GW2 info coming soon

From the Guild Wars 2 facebook page: "As you might have guessed by some of the posts we've been making here, the torture is about to end. :-) Some of you are on the edge of your seats. Many of you know that the anniversary of the original Guild Wars is coming up. We have a few things up our collective sleeves that we’re going to talk about this week. We want as many people to know about it as possible. We’re doing our part with our PR and marketing teams, but we need your help in spreading the word! If you like the stuff you see this week, vote it up on Digg! (If you don’t have a Digg account, you can use your Facebook account to Digg stuff up.) We're super excited at how engaged many of you have been through the Guild Wars War in Kryta viral campaign, and we hope you'll like what we've got cooking for Guild Wars 2 (soon (TM)). :-)"

Discuss to your heart's content RandomTime 23:11, April 26, 2010 (UTC)

Omg, I almost care. 23:46, April 26, 2010 (UTC)

Yeah, fo'sho Arenanet has pulled my strings one too many times. I expected a trailer for GW2 or war to finally break out in Kryta on the 24th, the day of the anniversary, but no. At least I can look forward to the end of the anniversary event when something is definitely (mark my words) going to happen. If I'm let down any more, I'll celebrate this anniversary week with my last UWSC before I uninstall the game. Five years is much too long. GW2, you'd better not disappoint. ~ Jujipoo[talk] 01:31, April 27, 2010 (UTC)

You do know the official anniversary isn't until April 28th, right? That's the day Prophecies was released. I have no idea where you got the 24th from. —Dr Ishmael 03:25, April 27, 2010 (UTC)

Finally gameplay info much? --Naoroji 11:04, April 27, 2010 (UTC)

Yes, I am pleased with this Manifesto. I will play once more. :) And yeah, someone told me 24th... but it sucks even more now because I'll be disappointed twice over if nothing happens tomorrow. ~ Jujipoo[talk] 02:00, April 28, 2010 (UTC)

Update: ANet has just posted their design manifesto for Guild Wars 2. RandomTime 17:27, April 27, 2010 (UTC)

Looks good, looks brilliant, hopefully the skill system will work (sounds like it has the danger of becoming complex) - seems like what Warhammer Online was trying to achieve, can't wait for the finished game RandomTime 17:35, April 27, 2010 (UTC)

I especially like the part about throwing jars of bees at people. Oh and firing projectiles through a fire wall? Can anyone say burning arrows? 'Cause I can. Or you know what? BURNING BEES. Survive that. --XT-8147 08:25, April 28, 2010 (UTC)

I think the bees would need to survive that first :P -- Isk8 (T/C) 09:50, April 28, 2010 (UTC)

If they can deliver, and its not clear to me how all this will work out in practise, then it sounds good. If it solves the "been there, done that, what else is there to do apart from getting and staying drunk (in game that is) all day?" problem I'm facing at the moment then GW2 has the potential to be great. Thalestis 11:28, April 28, 2010 (UTC)

Who cares you can't see what the hell is going on, right. --- -- (contribs) (talk) 12:41, April 28, 2010 (UTC)

There are 8 professions in GW2 - Look at the silhouettes behind the Elementalist (which has been officially confirmed on the GW2 official site) ~ Jujipoo[talk]

I generally hate to jump to conclusions like this. Technically they haven't confirmed anything- the silhouettes could be anyone. However, under the circumstances it looks pretty safe to say you're right :) 8 professions multiplied by 5 races equals 40 possible combinations. GW2, so far, is Asura Rank 10. 70.22.90.21 03:53, April 29, 2010 (UTC)

Yep, was just touring the site and found the number of professions under the FAQs section. here Chibi Moon Shadow 16:03, April 29, 2010 (UTC)

The Gameplay

This section covers articles posted on www.guildwars2.com other than articles introducing the professions (see #The Professions below).

Combat part 1: Skills

http://www.guildwars2.com/en/the-game/combat/part-one/

Sounds very similar to GW1's skill system, with one big difference: The skillbar has 10 slots.

• 5 skills are determined by your profession and equipped weapon, you can't pick them directly.
• 1 skill slot is reserved for a healing skill.
• 1 skill slot is reserved for an elite skill.
• 3 skill slots are completely open.

If every character has a healing skill, will there be a dedicated healer profession? Guess we'll find out over the next couple weeks. —Dr Ishmael 03:58, April 29, 2010 (UTC)

I read the one healing skill as saying meaning that everyone gets one skill like Lion's Comfort, Troll Unguent, Ether Feast, etc., but cannot have more than one such skill. Presumably a dedicated healer class would have other healing skills, perhaps among the five default skills or in the elite slot. I think they're trying to still give a lot of freedom in designing a build, while blocking the extreme gimmick builds like 55, 600, or perma-shadow form.

I also didn't see any mention of secondary professions. I'm hoping that Guild Wars 2 abolishes the concept of secondary professions entirely, as I didn't like them. At the very least, it looks like they'll restrict it somewhat, so that you won't have necromancers not carrying a single necromancer skill.

As for depending on both the weapon and profession, I'm curious what exactly this will mean. Will there be rare weapons that give rare skills? I hope not. If it's only the type of weapon, will this mean that every class has several types of weapons available? Will they overlap? Could we end up seeing elementalists carrying swords to get access to sword skills in weird gimmick builds?

What I'm hoping for is that each class has access to a few different types of weapons, with default skills depending on which type of weapon they take, but no overlap between types of weapons among different classes. One can already see something analogous to types of weapons in the choices between a sword, axe, or hammer for warriors here, or longbow, flatbow, etc. for rangers. One could do the same for caster classes by giving an elementalist carrying an air staff different default skills from one carrying an earth staff.

I also like the part about everyone who takes part in a kill getting credit for it, whether grouped or not. I've been playing Champions Online recently, which does this for purposes of quest credit, and it works very nicely. Quizzical 04:22, April 29, 2010 (UTC)

I'm pretty sure the weapon skills are by weapon type, not the specific weapon, judging by the examples they give: "a warrior wielding a mace and shield" vs. "a warrior wielding a greatsword." It also sounds like they've expanded upon the "hammer, axe, and sword" system, too, by including a one-handed hammer type (mace) and a two-handed sword type (greatsword). Wonder if there's a two-handed axe type...

Based on what was said here and on the elementalist article ("most professions can have two different weapon sets equipped and can very quickly and easily swap between the sets." ... "Rather than swap weapons to adjust to new situations, the multi-faceted Elementalist quickly adapts to new threats by attuning to different elements as needed."), eles are one of the professions that don't get weapon-swapping, having attunement-swapping instead, so you don't have to worry about finding a different weapon for each element. —Dr Ishmael 14:30, April 29, 2010 (UTC)

Hopefully Monks get the ability to do that by switching up gods or something. Preferably with a knockback effect of some sort when they switch to smiting. GTFO /kill --Gimmethegepgun 16:29, April 29, 2010 (UTC)

Skills can be swapped out whenever a character is not in combat o_O, plus predefined skills from weapons. I think these remove quite a bit of strategic decisions from the game. --Evenfall 17:54, April 29, 2010 (UTC)

Hopefully each one gets a list of a bunch of skills and you get to pick 5 specific ones. For weapon+shield, maybe weapon gets 3, shield gets 2. Hopefully, also, there will be dual-wielded weapons for warriors, for that I'd say I guess both need to be the same type, you get the 3 that the weapon would give with weapon+shield, but the other 2 would be a pick among dual-wielded stuff Would be nice to see a person able to change up their weapon so they get a different approach to combat, though. IN combat. Hmm.... douche is doing direct-damage protting... GREATSWORD! Needs to be pressured... 2 swords! OSHITRANGER! Sword and board! --Gimmethegepgun 18:56, April 29, 2010 (UTC)

Well, seems I was right after reading part 2: yay dual wielding! --Gimmethegepgun 19:10, April 29, 2010 (UTC)

here says that ele get's shorter range spells when using a scepter, and longer range ones with a staff. so it looks like our skills will be defined both by weapon, and attunement.Akbaroth 11:15, May 1, 2010 (UTC)

Yes, the first 5 skills are determined by your equipped weapon and your profession (or are chosen from a pool determined by weapon/prof). I noted that in my initial post up above. —Dr Ishmael 14:12, May 1, 2010 (UTC)

i meant that eles first 5 also change depending on attunement, not just my weapon and the simple fact that i'm an eleAkbaroth 15:23, May 1, 2010 (UTC)

"An elementalist can summon a fiery sword from the heavens that others in their party can use" Looks like thankfully the only way to get the FDS is to have an ele summon it. THANK YOU! --Gimmethegepgun 15:48, May 1, 2010 (UTC)

Where's the "D" in that, again? What's if it's the fiery gladius instead? :P RoseOfKali 16:29, May 1, 2010 (UTC)

Oh yes, because they're SURE to summon a sword, that's on fire. Yep. Or, maybe, they summon the sword that is essentially a torch with flames held in place magically. Which one sounds more magical? :P --Gimmethegepgun 16:33, May 1, 2010 (UTC)

One that doesn't exist in GW1? RoseOfKali 19:02, May 1, 2010 (UTC)

Elementalists - Beating up monsters with Djinni since 2012. --- -- (contribs) (talk) 19:46, May 1, 2010 (UTC)

Just to be clear...

The "One healing skill slot" is not exclusively healing. I'm seeing a lot of people bitch and complain about that. It's not "Just healing only"(I know he said "replenish health, blah blah", read a bit past that), it's meant for support/utility. Support can vary a lot, one example on the gw2 site is a skill that increases damage of allies, and another example was the new "Frenzy", which instantly charges your adren bar. To put it simply, that slot is reserved for crap that doesn't directly affect the enemy.--99.225.28.182 21:13, May 8, 2010 (UTC)

^maybe

I imagine that's one detail which hasn't been fully sorted yet. I greatly appreciate your sharing of information as it's interesting and quite possible (lolCompanions).

However, is it possible you were viewing old material? Either way, stuff's likely to change before I'm online buying it. A F K When Needed 21:45, May 8, 2010 (UTC)

I've never read anything that linked that sort of stuff to that slot. There were things that weren't direct healing (Water ele life regen to all around them) but I don't recall anything like Frenzy being in there. Got a link? 00:18, May 9, 2010 (UTC)-----

[1] just below the last comic, toward the end. not very old info.Akbaroth 00:29, May 9, 2010 (UTC)

You'd think me saying "gw2 site" would prompt people to, you know, check the site for that info.--99.225.28.182 01:23, May 9, 2010 (UTC)

Read a few lines just above the last comic: "One of these slots is dedicated to healing skills that replenish the health of the character and his allies". The examples after the comic are talking about the last-5 skills in general, not specifically about the healing slot - i.e. Frenzy and Banner of Courage do not go in the "healing" slot. —Dr Ishmael 03:39, May 9, 2010 (UTC)

I can definitely see where you could get the impression that Frenzy is a skill to go in that slot, especially the way they say "A healing slot and an elite slot. Here are some ele healing skills. Here are some warrior skills. Here are some elite skills". But given that it also says "A way to ensure every character has someway to heal themselves or their allies" says straight up that Frenzy isn't included.

I am 110% sure that "Fear me"(Which is between Frenzy and Banner of Courage without changing context) isn't going to be an elite that just inflicts weakness. Unless weakness becomes some kind of horrible, disastrous, insta-kill condition in GW2. It's not exclusively healing. Pretty sure Frenzy and Banner of Courage won't be elite either. Maybe Banner.--99.225.28.182 00:34, May 11, 2010 (UTC)

Oh, and context is changed in the next paragraph to elite skills. He is talking about the "healing slot".--99.225.28.182 00:36, May 11, 2010 (UTC)

Clarification / Traits

Just found some clarification from Martin Kerstein about the first-5 skills:

"The skills available when a particular weapon is equipped only vary based on the weapon type and profession. To further clarify, these skills cannot be changed out."

So: a) all characters of the same profession wielding weapons of the same type get the exact same weapon skills, as I noted above, and b) the skills go directly onto your skillbar and can't be selected manually, as I had initially speculated. Although a) isn't 100% correct, because then he goes on to talk about a new mechanic called "traits":

"The first five skills may also be affected by traits. Traits are passive abilities that are earned and then equipped by the character. Traits can have a pretty dramatic effect on how two characters of the same profession and using the same weapon set will play. We’ll be going into more depth on the trait system in a future update."

So to revise: a) all characters of the same profession, wielding weapons of the same type, and with the same traits equipped, get the exact same weapon skills. —Dr Ishmael 15:25, May 13, 2010 (UTC)

I do hope they can be tossed around at least. So yeah, waiting for the traits treat. --- -- (contribs) (talk) 15:33, May 13, 2010 (UTC)

Combat part 2: Weapons, Professions, and Races

http://www.guildwars2.com/en/the-game/combat/part-two/

Interesting, no secondaries - and class archetypes (scholar, adventurer, soldier). Guessing: Scholar = backline mage, adventuer = ranger/rogue type character front/backline, soldier = fighter/paladin fontline. RandomTime 17:25, April 29, 2010 (UTC)

One could argue that we effectively have the same archetypes in Guild Wars already, as determined by armor level.

Soldier = warrior and paragon

Adventurer = ranger, assassin, and dervish

Scholar = necromancer, elementalist, monk, mesmer, and ritualist

I'm very happy to see the concept of secondary professions dropped. I never liked secondary professions in this game. Quizzical 19:02, April 29, 2010 (UTC)

So... guesses on what the 8 professions ill be? Warrior, Ranger, Elementalist obvious, Monk most likely, but what about the others? There's still 1 more heavy, 2 more mediums, and a light. I saw a picture of what looked like a mesmer skill being cast, though that could be in the Medium by some means, as not having a necro would be incredibly unusual. I sincerely hope that they don't go rogue/assassin on us, those are impossible to balance. Also, could entertain the possibility that the Monk might be a Heavy, a la Cleric from D&D, or a medium, like Favored Soul, also from D&D.

My guess: Heavy: Warrior, Paladin/Cleric/whatever (pick your name)

Medium: Ranger, Rogue/Assassin (unfortunately), Golemancer? We've seen golems in gameplay videos, no clue if that's a profession or if it's just an Asura thing

Light: Elementalist, Necromancer, Illusionist

I'd also entertain the possibility of a race-specific caster in there somewhere, such as Golemancer for Asura, Chronomancer for human, something to do with plants for Sylvari, tank driver (lol) for Charr, beastmaster/dedicated shapechanger for Norn, though that one would be at least Medium --Gimmethegepgun 19:28, April 29, 2010 (UTC)

I'm pretty sure they've already said (a long time ago) that there won't be any race-specific professions in GW2 (actually, IIRC, there won't be any race-specific anything beyond a few skills). So if there is a Golemancer profession, you'd better look out for those Norn Golemancers. —Dr Ishmael 19:33, April 29, 2010 (UTC)

How about Plant golems for sylvari, char effigy for char golenm, beast golems using a system simlar to beast mastery....—The preceding unsigned comment was added by 75.141.184.3 (contribs) .

I'm not sure if you're using "archetype" correctly there (when I think "class archetypes" I think healer, tank, rogue, spellcaster, etc.). Anyway, those are basically just fancy names for the typical light/medium/heavy armor proficiencies originating from D&D. Unlike D&D, where characters can learn additional proficiencies, GW profs are limited to a single armor type.

You can even apply it to GW1, where scholars are the profs that have max 60 armor, adventurers have 70, and soldiers have 80. Thinking of it that way...

• GW1 has 5 scholars (Mo, Me, N, E, Rt), where GW2 will only have 3. If I had to guess, since we already know Elementalist is returning pretty much as-is, I'd say Monk and Necromancer are also returning, with Ritualist getting rolled up into both of those. Mesmer... I dunno. Possibly getting overhauled and returning as an adventurer class?
• Both have 3 adventurers (R, A, D). Ranger is probably also coming back with small changes (did you notice, there's only 2 types of bow now - short and long). Assassin has always been one of the more problematic profs to balance, so if it's not going away completely, I'd expect it to be revamped into a more general rogue-type class. Dervish has always seemed kind of an oddball, so I wouldn't be surprised if it was replaced.
• Both have 2 soldiers (W, P). A medieval RPG wouldn't be a medieval RPG without a Warrior class. Paragon, though, is more than likely being replaced or at least reworked.

Since GW2 is initially set only on the Tyrian continent, it would make sense for them to leave out the Canthan/Elonian professions in any case. —Dr Ishmael 19:16, April 29, 2010 (UTC)

Yay for crazy Wikia - somehow I posted that over Quiz's comment without getting a conflict. —Dr Ishmael 19:17, April 29, 2010 (UTC)

It could be possible that they are rolling the Mo and A into the same class. Monks themselves are disciplined and trained in martial arts. Although, I hope they do not go this way as it appears D3 has gone this way already. Venom20 19:24, April 29, 2010 (UTC)

Somehow I placed my comment despite what should have been 3 edit conflicts. Zomg Wikia did something right! --Gimmethegepgun 19:30, April 29, 2010 (UTC)

Ah yes, the combat monk. I had one of those in a 3rd Ed D&D campaign a while back, and he ended up being able to deal 200+ damage over 8 attacks in a single round, or something like that. As much fun as that was, I honestly wouldn't expect to see any sort of unarmed-combat class in GW2. The overall world-feel just isn't right for it, I think. —Dr Ishmael 19:30, April 29, 2010 (UTC)

So, what about the scythe and spear?

In the list of weapons, they never mentioned scythes and spears. So...if we're putting them in our HoM, and our Charr warrior pulls out the scythe, does he just salvage it for some onyx gemstones or something? I'm curious to see what Anet will do with them, since atm they seem like they've been cut from the game. Maybe we light our spear on fire and call it a torch? 151.196.179.103 01:15, April 30, 2010 (UTC)

According to the FAQ here the developers will reveal how the HoM will work as the launch date comes closer (whenever that will be). Chibi Moon Shadow 01:23, April 30, 2010 (UTC)

Scythes and spears didn't make an entrance into the game until Nightfall (yes, I know, obvious), perhaps they are weapons that will make it into an expansion Venom20 01:27, April 30, 2010 (UTC)

Why do people still assume that the HoM is going to be a "put X in, take X out" kind of deal? Anet has NEVER said that. You will get some unique rewards based on the achievements you displayed in your HoM, yes, but it's not a frikkin' Xunlai Chest. —Dr Ishmael 02:07, April 30, 2010 (UTC)

Ah, I see. I thought I remembered reading in an interview someplace (quite awhile ago, so its entirely possible they decided to change it) that GW2 characters would be able to take out and use the weapons that the original GW1 characters put into the HoM. I knew that it wouldn't function like this for "put minipets/armor/heroes in, take minipets/armor/heroes out" since all of that is being reworked/changed but I could've sworn that I read someplace that GW2 characters would be able to take out and use the HoM weapons. 151.196.179.103 04:27, April 30, 2010 (UTC)

I remember that interview, too. It's very, very old. It's possible that it was the intended functionality, but they've changed quite a few "intended" things since then, like getting rid of secondary professions, for example, so don't look at any interviews prior to 2010 for any kind of semi-reliable information. RoseOfKali 05:43, April 30, 2010 (UTC)

I was actually trying to find it and found a couple articles where Anet staff said beta testing was 2008 and the game would be out by spring 2009 :) Oh, wait. Anet lied? Unthinkable :P But thanks, Rose, it does make sense. And I suppose its one of those things no one will really know until it gets a)posted on the blog or b)the actual game comes out. And they even said in the article that they'll change stuff around if its not working, so who knows? They may decide yet to scrap the HoM all together :) Anyways, they're doing a good job of hyping it up. Lets hope it lasts, looks like a great game so far. 151.196.179.103 06:15, April 30, 2010 (UTC)

Scythes->Greataxes. They haven't specifically stated that there are greataxes, but they've said greatswords and they noted Devastating Hammer, which would be a Maul (Since they've stated there will be maces, would be more accurate to say maul than hammer here), so I'd say it's a valid assumption that there will be greataxes. Especially if the combat heavily encourages weapon swapping, then they could do Hammer, Axe, and Sword (and Dagger? for wars, I mean, I know there are daggers) stat lines rather than W&S(S&B), DW, or TH. And if you don't get those acronyms, you suck. And I really do hope that they have a set of skills for just using ONE single-handed weapon, rather than basically being forced to W&S or DW. You suck even more severely if you still don't get those acronyms, and I will NOT dignify it with a response.

Spears->Pistols. Way better anyway, and now they won't have to make that spear magically reappear in your hand in mid flight --Gimmethegepgun 07:32, April 30, 2010 (UTC)

"The full (!) list of standard wieldable weapons in Guild Wars 2 is as follows:

One-Handed: Axe, dagger, mace, pistol, scepter, and sword.

Two-Handed: Greatsword, hammer, longbow, rifle, shortbow, and staff.

Offhand only: Focus, shield, torch, and warhorn."

So, no greataxes for you..

Also, me sux :P ***EAGLEMUT*** TALK 13:20, April 30, 2010 (UTC)

You were somewhat right before you edited out "or daggers," since the new one-handed dagger will probably play very differently from the dual-wield daggers we're used to. —Dr Ishmael 15:38, April 30, 2010 (UTC)

Perhaps (I sure as hell hope so. That's one change I pretty much demand ;o ). You can likely still DW daggers though. --- -- (contribs) (talk) 15:52, April 30, 2010 (UTC)

Dual wield scepters!

In A Tale in the Desert, which doesn't have combat at all (or weapons, for that matter), one player circulated a petition to add dual-wielding to the game anyway. Quizzical 21:20, April 30, 2010 (UTC)

How could they be dumb enough to have a greatsword and a maul and yet NOT have a greataxe? When someone says "two-handed melee weapon", the FIRST weapon I think of is the greataxe/poleaxe. Quite frankly, they're much more practical than the other 2 anyway, since they're typically designed to be able to grab an enemy's weapon or shield or whatnot with the jutting out blade. A massive sword really doesn't seem that useful except if you can run the ENTIRE BLADE across them while swinging. A hammer... well, at least a hammer doesn't really get affected by armor that much, since it's just blunt force trauma, not a slice --Gimmethegepgun 00:42, May 1, 2010 (UTC)

Gimme, with a bigger sword comes more mass, and thus more force when you hit your enemy. You just gotta be strong enough to wield it.--El_Nazgir 06:36, May 1, 2010 (UTC)

Axes and hammers have more mass (Axes generally have a larger and/or wider blade and a larger haft). The difference between 2h axes and swords isn't that big compared to hammer vs. sword, but it's there. Weight stuff aside: Greataxes can be more detailed without being unwieldy (Bramble Blade), due to the larger surface :D All for the pretties. --- -- (contribs) (talk) 09:40, May 1, 2010 (UTC)

So any guesses on what the torch and warhorn are for, exactly? I personally doubt that the torch is entirely for fire elementalists, I'd put a guess at it being for the monk. Or it being a universal lighting source that probably gives some navigation related skills. Warhorn, if there is a Paragon, obviously it will use it, if not, I'd guess Warriors get it, maybe one of those medium armor professions --Gimmethegepgun 01:07, May 2, 2010 (UTC)

The torch might be an actual lighting source needed in places like dungeons and caves, with a possible effect of scaring off beast type monsters in a D2-esque "causes monster to flee" fashion, so that they attack, run off, come back and attack some more, etc. This lets you keep your main weapon equipped with it, as opposed to having a torch as one of the "environmental weapons that you can pick up," which will probably replace the whole weapon set while held. The warhorn could also be used as exactly that - make a loud call all across the land for people to hear and come help with a siege or something (also drawing NPC guards from the area?), but this does sound more like a one-use-and-drop thing you'd pick up somewhere, so it could just have more caster-like bonuses than a shield, but not quite a focus yet. RoseOfKali 08:49, May 2, 2010 (UTC)

Dynamic Events Overview

http://www.guildwars2.com/en/the-game/dynamic-events/dynamic-events-overview/

Any thoughts yet? Personally, I really like the way they put it and the examples they give (hehehe, ogres picking daisies) For the rest, it sounds extremely cool. They do like to brag though, don't they? ;-) --El_Nazgir 19:49, May 12, 2010 (UTC)

Firstly, the ogres picking daises is one of the things I hated about EQ2 (where the low end game was basically "get a quest, kill people at this location, level up, gain access to a higher area grind location with different quests, etc), crucially, it's one of the things that have set GW1 away from it's predecessors. Due to the fact that a lot of GW is instanced, the mobs can be more controlled, and you have ballanced group encounters, similar to what a GM will be giving you in a PnP setting, as opposed to what has to be given to you in a non-instanced world - mobs that sit there picking Daises. Some games do this better than others. EQ2 was bad in this respect, EVE is better as the mobs are in instanced missions, or in asteroid belts, but I digress. The Instanced quests seem to be better than what Warhammer online were promoting on their launch (I've never played it, so don't really know to what extent Warhammer online have made this a reality, but they were quoting quests that were much more like this). Not sure how many of such events Anet have programmed, but it seems like they are saying that they've got a lot up (hopefully, otherwise constant repetition will make this just the same, and not something new and innovative, like we hope for). Replayablity +3 if this happens, as new alts hopefully won't have to grind through exactly the same content and zones, just using new spells. .

To sum up, I think Anet are trying to bring what's fun about PnP into MMOs, with PnP, your actions can effect the gameplay a lot more, as you have someone making up the content on the spot, a good GM can change the game dynamically with what the players did in that session. If you can get this into an MMO, by programming more and more dynamic events, you have yourself set up for a really cool system, one that encourages players to explore and find every little secret. You do have the disadvantage of having to code more events than you think are necessary (because we, as players are going to find them all, and get bored). If Anet can code more than necessary, and make it so that, every time we go into a zone, something new can happen - then it will be excellent. RandomTime 22:07, May 12, 2010 (UTC)

You call that a wall of text? Ha! Dynamic events won't work. Quizzical 05:28, May 13, 2010 (UTC)

Interesting, and yes - that does sound potentially true (as I mentioned before, I haven't played WAR). From Anet's article, it seems like they won't include the "traditional" quest system at all, which may well be a mistake. I'm going to be more optimistic and see, hoping that Anet has coded more content than we think, and there will be other things to do in a zone aside from a dynamic quest. RandomTime 05:40, May 13, 2010 (UTC)

In response to Quizzical: In your piece on why the system won't work you mention "draconian" measures that would be required to prevent under-leveled players from under-contributing to a team for zany experience and item rewards. These measures include awarding no experience or items to these under-leveled players, but the awarding of zero experience to under-leveled players in neither draconian, nor is it unprecedented. As any character who has attempted to reach a high level in the Pre-Searing will tell you leveling up is really hard when the monsters are very much lower than you, I see no reason why a similar system could not be put in place to deny experience to persons of a significantly lower level. Besides this minor quibble (and it really is quite minor) your piece raises some interesting points that A-Net will need to deal with if GW2 is to work out as planned. 66.49.142.193 00:36, May 15, 2010 (UTC)

well, quiz said no exp from mobs above you in level. witch is astonishingly restrictive (though i have played mmos with it-_-), in the unlikely event something like that is implemented in gw2 odds on it would be you get less exp the wider the gap between you and your foe. in cabal online you get little no exp from enemies whos names are in grey (lowest level color), and while you get good exp off red named foes (highest level color) if the foe is too high, you gain only a tiny bit of exp from it, so even mooching off the high-levs would be terribly ineffective.and to RT saying they are dropping normal quests, no they are not, they are just adding another kind of quest, and some normal quests will branch into these events, and possibly vice versa.Akbaroth 02:14, May 15, 2010 (UTC)

Actually, they are dropping normal quests. "The dynamic event system in Guild Wars 2 replaces the old concept of the static quest you find in a traditional MMO." —Dr Ishmael 02:37, May 15, 2010 (UTC)

Yes, there are ways around it. But there aren't any ways around the problems that will mean you can just play the game and go wherever and it will work out.

Sure, you could block players from going to areas ten levels above them by saying you can only get experience from mobs within eight levels of you. Then players would just go to areas eight levels above them and you have the same problem. If it's diminishing returns both as mobs get higher level than you and also lower level, then you're not getting full experience and loot like ArenaNet promised, unless you map out your path to always be in the right level area.

You don't think players would find it draconian to say that if you're level 17, you must go to this area, and then the moment you hit level 18, you must leave and go to some other area to get full experience and loot? Want to group with a friend who is a couple of levels above you? Have fun with that, as one of you gets far less experience.

Another approach would be to say that all areas have a particular level, and your level is whatever it is set to for that area. So if you're in Iron Horse Mine, you're automatically level 8, for example. Go to Arid Sea, and you change to level 17. Go back to Iron Horse Mine and you're level 8 again. That would kill off any notion of player progression, which ArenaNet seems to want more of in Guild Wars 2.

You could do something similar with City of Heroes-style sidekicking, where everyone gets loot appropriate to their own level, no matter where they are. If that is done, people will figure out what area levels you the fastest, and some will go to that area and fight there all the way from level 1 (or maybe a little higher if they can't get there at level 1) to the level cap, and level much faster than normal that way. That some games encourage players to purely grind one area for a few levels, then move to the next and repeat is bad enough. To encourage players to grind one area all the way from a new character to the cap would be much, much worse.

This can mostly be avoided by letting players reach the cap of how strong they can possibly be pretty quickly, as Guild Wars (1) does. ArenaNet doesn't sound inclined to go that route. And even if they did, that wouldn't stop players from incessantly farming a particular area. You've seen what people do in this game, even when farming is pointless.

Another way to avoid it is to put diminishing returns on an event, so that each time you do an event, you get less experience and loot for it than before. And if you want to see alternate branches, then you'll have to not merely repeat the earlier parts, but get less experience and loot for them.

So yes, there are ways around the level gap problem. But all of those ways have big drawbacks. And I don't see any way around botters, except perhaps for a harsh death penalty, as they are the right level with the right gear for their area.

In ArenaNet's internal testing, the system will probably work wonderfully, save for some bugs here and there, as all of the people testing it are the right level with suitable gear and trying to do the event properly. In beta testing, it probably still works well for the same reasons. Shortly after release, it still works well, as people are excited to play the game as normal, and haven't figured out the best spots to grind and farm yet. But not long after release, it will all fall apart. Quizzical 02:41, May 15, 2010 (UTC)

How is a bot going to be able to follow these dynamic event chains, anyway? If, based on the outcome of one event, the next event could be in the same place or on the other side of the map, how will the bot know whether to stay put or to move? I'm thinking that bots won't be very effective at all in "farming" these events. Most likely botters will keep doing what they've always done, farm static mobs that always appear in the same place. —Dr Ishmael 02:47, May 15, 2010 (UTC)

it's been stated that each time a-net comes up with something, another event for instance, they "ask each other 'can this be griefed?' if yes then they change the system until the answer becomes no." all of the problems you've listed so far are amazingly common or plainly odvious, i very much doubt they haven't thought of all/ nearly all of them and then found ways around them, so your internal testing argument is likely invalid. i find it very likely that they even keep a few chars on their accounts, specifically designed to be poorly equipped or setup to grief others. as to that being scarcely more than a guess, that goes both ways, how do YOU know that they are with suitable gear? yes they could easily get all the rare stuff likely for testing purposes, but they are trying to look at the game from a normal gamers perspective so likely don't use it for most of the game.

a-net also said they don't want grinding to be a part of gw2, so i doubt it this finding-the-ideal-area-to-grind-in idea would hold much weight, as they probably mean for events and quests to give us the most exp. with regard to finding the ideal area for events to give exp, meaning a low level person hardening up high level events in order to leech rewards, is it so unlikely that their scaling system cannot account for low level people? for example if we're doing an event designed for lvl 30-35 people, and it spawns 2 foes players in that level range, maybe if a lvl 15 pops up and manages to help enough for the game to think that they are contributing, it will only spawn 1 new enemy, or perhaps will only spawn a new foe if 2 low levs show up. i know they said that they would scale by the number of players present, but that doesn't mean it can't take level into account. and no, i'm not saying it will scale completely by total level of the players involved either, odds on a mix thereof, or better yet more complex factors we haven't even worked out.

oh and dr.ish, i read that article, twice (once just after it came out, and again just now), i still got the impression that side quests will still be there. so i think we'll just have to wait for the game to come out.Akbaroth 03:23, May 15, 2010 (UTC)

Some of the problems I'm bringing up are things that actually happened to real, prominent games. Sure, ArenaNet carefully looks at their systems to try to prevent griefing and exploits. Do you really think that Mythic and Cryptic don't do the same thing? And yet their versions of public quests were colossal failures, in spite of being far less ambitious than what ArenaNet is trying to pull off.

If it's so easy to catch imbalances in internal testing, then why is the play balance so bad when games release? It takes a while to see what players actually do, and then you can determine what needs to be nerfed and what needs to be strengthened. And this is something that you can easily get meaningful data on in internal testing, and then mountains of feedback during beta.

Game companies are constantly trying to prevent their game mechanics from being abused, but players are constantly searching for ways to exploit the game mechanics. The game company has to go first, putting the game mechanics in place, and then letting players try to find ways to exploit them. Players only have to find ways to abuse one particular implementation of game mechanics, while the game designers have to try to account for all possible player behavior.

And dynamic events will be much harder yet the game designers. The real test is not whether the game mechanics work well on the first day of beta, when everyone wants to try things out. It's whether they still work well a year after release, so that people who pick up the game then can play through the dynamic events in the intended manner. ArenaNet can get virtually no meaningful feedback on the latter until significantly after release. Quizzical 06:00, May 15, 2010 (UTC)

If these "problems" you mention are existing problems with existing games, do you really think that nobody at ANet knows about them, and they're just blindly going the same route? So far ANet has done quite a bit to avoid mistakes made by other MMO's, and considering their staff, I think they know pretty much everything there is to know about the flaws of existing MMO's, and they're trying to address them. Don't over-analyze something that hasn't even been described in full details yet, you can't possibly know more about it than ANet does right now. RoseOfKali 06:50, May 15, 2010 (UTC)

It's like trying to find a needle in a haystack that probably doesn't contain a needle. Just because you know it isn't over here and isn't over there doesn't mean that it will be in the next other place you look. And there's a huge cost to looking in a particular place, too, as you get basically no feedback until well after release, at which point, you're meddling aggressively with a live game.

Another remark on what Akbaroth said: so ArenaNet said that they're trying to avoid grinding. Don't most game designers say that? Even most designers of really grindy games say that they're trying to avoid grinding. If players of a particular game tell you that the grinding isn't that bad, it's pretty much guaranteed that the game has little else to do but grind.

So yes, ArenaNet did make Guild Wars very light on grinding compared to most of the industry. But they moved away from that with PVE-only skills that take a tremendous amount of grinding to rank up. And especially with GWEN, which is mostly about grinding and farming, with not that much real content. All indications so far have been that they're moving further in that direction with Guild Wars 2; remember the public flirtation with the idea of not having a level cap at all?

Now, I don't think that they're going to make Guild Wars 2 into Runescape or Lineage. It will probably be less grindy than most MMORPGs, for that matter. But for the game to really avoid grinding entirely would be quite an about face from their public comments so far. Even in the current Guild Wars, more than a few players try to power-level, and many will farm for things. Quizzical 16:51, May 15, 2010 (UTC)

Furthermore, is ArenaNet the only company that learns from the mistakes of others? Cryptic completely fixed the biggest reasons why public quests were a failure in Warhammer Online. Indeed, Mythic themselves later fixed one of them. That public quests also failed in Champions Online was for other reasons.

I fully expect that ArenaNet will fix the problems with public quests from both of those games. Dynamic events in Guild Wars 2 will be a disaster for other reasons instead. And unlike Champions Online, where one can easily ignore the public quests to do more traditional quests, that's not going to be an option in Guild Wars 2. Quizzical 17:13, May 15, 2010 (UTC)

Personally, I hope ANet does something like the sidekick/lackey & exemplar/malefactor system that CoH/V had. That would solve most of these level difference issues honestly. Though to go in a substantially higher/lower area, you'd obviously need to do it with someone else, to change the level. But yeah, I would honestly suggest having a lower exp gain for things way too high a level for you, though you can "sidekick" up to a reasonable level and get good exp off them --Gimmethegepgun 08:05, May 16, 2010 (UTC)

The Professions

This section covers the profession introduction articles posted on www.guildwars2.com. Other articles posted there are covered in #The Gameplay above.

Profession 1: Elementalist

http://www.guildwars2.com/en/the-game/professions/elementalist/

Sounds very interesting. I like the idea of Attunements being constant buffs that you can swap on-the-fly. And the revamped Phoenix is quite spiffy. —Dr Ishmael 03:58, April 29, 2010 (UTC)

They should rename it to Boomerang Bird. 05:52, April 29, 2010 (UTC)

The Ele's always been "my" chosen class, back-line nuking > everything IMO. The attunement system seems to make the ele more versatile (but does that mean that we have to trade off 3 of the 10 skills for the attunement spells, not sure. The spells look awesome, and many seem to focus on not only backline nuker, but backline controller (Static feild looked like it kept people in position for a few seconds, allowing the ele to shield themselves from melee inherentl, water trident looked like it had a knockback) This may well be important if GW2 is going to be completely solo-friendly. From what I can gather, then - the new ele is backline nuker/anti fighter much more than the current ele is. RandomTime 06:20, April 29, 2010 (UTC)

Also, is that a female Charr? RandomTime 06:21, April 29, 2010 (UTC)

Indeed it is, my living-up-to-his-name friend! --Gimmethegepgun 06:38, April 29, 2010 (UTC)

Also, yes, Water Trident gets a knockback, it says so in the design manifesto when describing fire wall+water attune+smack them into fire wall --Gimmethegepgun 06:46, April 29, 2010 (UTC)

yes, we've seen screen shots of her before, look at the charr page on the main siteAkbaroth 07:06, April 29, 2010 (UTC)

I'm not particularly happy with the presence of knockback in GW2. You'll notice that in GW1 they were wise enough to never give players a skill or ability to alter an opponent's position. In fact, only very hard and challenging pve areas can forcibly move a player- The Aspect of Scorpions in The Deep, and Mallyx. The fact that they state how important positioning is in the design manifesto and then give players all sorts of options to fuck it up is disappointing. 07:41, April 29, 2010 (UTC)

"Signets provide an ongoing benefit to the Elementalist, but can also be activated for a greater effect." Complete skill function revamp? Also, I'm quite sure you wouldn't need to manually bring the attunements, but it'll probably be a "change attunement" button or something instead of the "switch weapon set" one. Knockback doesn't seem too bad. From the skills article, it seemed like positioning gets a lot more important, so disrupting the enemy positioning could turn into a whole new dimention in the gameplay. Also, first time someone actually DELETED the page while I was typing :S --El_Nazgir 15:03, April 29, 2010 (UTC)

Oops, sorry. ^^; Blame it on RT for not moving it to the right place to begin with. :P

Oh, and I already commented about the attunement-instead-of-weapon-swapping above. If accurate, I like that idea a lot better than having to worry about finding/crafting a perfect weapon set for every different element that you use.

I'd think that knockback would actually be necessary if positioning is going to be that important in combat. The people who rely most on said positioning, probably warriors, will likely have access to "stability" skills that prevent knockback (similar to Balanced Stance/etc.). —Dr Ishmael 15:33, April 29, 2010 (UTC)

Ow dam thats cool :P. It looks so dinamic and reall. They sure want it to look like a RPG. It seems so real. Can't wait to see what they did with the Necromancers :D. Maybe they kill Asura and reanimate them and then kill them again! Hooray! -- † F1© Talk 16:21, April 29, 2010 (UTC)

No F1: You kill Asura, then raise them, and use them to kill others and let others kill the asura again for you. Talk about a laidback profession ^.^ Also, after seeing the water trident movie, I don't think that's knockback. It's just knockdown, but the animation is that they fall backwards. You can see that when they get back up they're still on the same place as where they were before. Too bad :/ --El_Nazgir 16:59, April 29, 2010 (UTC)

Slightly clearer explanation from an interview.

"In Guild Wars 2 an elementalist can attune to one of the four elements. The attunement they are in combines with their choice of weapon to change the first five skills on their bar. For example an elementalist attuned to fire and wielding a staff will have access to five skills including the Fireball skill. An elementalist attuned to fire and wielding a scepter and focus will have access to a completely different set of five skills including Dragon’s Breath. When that elementalist attunes to water he has five new skills."

"Attuning to the different elements will also provide the elementalist with an ongoing passive effect. Fire attunement will damage any foes striking the elementalist. Water will heal nearby allies. Earth will protect the elementalist giving him additional armor. Air attunement will cause bolts of lightning to randomly strike nearby enemies."

--Evenfall 17:42, April 29, 2010 (UTC)

So based on that, are we correct to believe that if you attuned to water, and equipped that same exact staff, you'd get 5 water skills? That is, the staff is not tied to any one attunement? I think that's what the quote there is implying, and I hope that's the case. It's going to suck enough as it is to have to hunt down and carry around a dozen different staves just to get the set of 5 skills you want for one attunement (assuming each staff gives a different set of 5 skills), doing it for four would be obnoxious. 65.207.54.194 17:55, May 6, 2010 (UTC)

Weapon-linked skills will be the same for all weapons of the same type. All water-attuned elementalists wielding any staff will have the same set of staff/attunement-linked skills. All warriors wielding any sword and any shield will have the same set of sword/shield-linked skills. There are not going to be any ultra-rare weapons that grant super-powerful skills or anything like that. —Dr Ishmael 18:12, May 6, 2010 (UTC)

I wouldn't rule out the possibility of some variation between weapons that give some passive effects, though. Maybe put in some extended information boxes, then you can put in what exactly it does for each profession and attunement or whatever others might end up with, but only show the ones relevant to your current profession unless you extend it --Gimmethegepgun 08:09, May 16, 2010 (UTC)

ArenaNet Blog content

This section covers articles posted on the official Arena.net blog.

Nine GW2 Follow Up Questions with Eric Flannum

http://www.arena.net/blog/nine-gw2-follow-up-questions-with-eric-flannum

"The possible number of combinations is in the millions"

He's talking about the number of possible skillbars in Guild Wars 2. For comparison, the number of possible skillbars in Guild Wars, with only eight skills on a bar and assuming no PVE-only skills, is in the quadrillions. Quizzical 22:28, May 5, 2010 (UTC)

Quadrillions? 2 professions with the most skills are N(145)+E(147), for a total of 292 skills, or 222 normal and 70 elites.

222! / [(222-8)!8!] = 222*221*220*219*218*217*216*215/40,320 = 128,795,283,347,445 (8 non-elite)

222! / [(222-7)!7!] = 222*221*220*219*218*217*216/5,040 = 4,792,382,636,184 (7 non-elite) *70 (+ 1 of the 70 elites)

4,792,382,636,184*70 + 128,795,283,347,445 = 464,262,067,880,325

or about half a quadrillion of mostly worthless builds. Then again, it's 2:20am, and I'm probably doing something wrong.

So, if "the possible number of combinations is in the millions," then what's the size of the skill pool? Take into account that they suggest a 15-skill bar, because your second weapon switch adds 5 more. I guess it's too early to do the math accurately, without knowing exactly how the weapon-bound skills work, but what about a crude # of just any 15 skill mix? I'm too sleepy for this... <_< RoseOfKali 23:38, May 5, 2010 (UTC)

There are also 45 ways to pick a combination of professions. Quizzical 00:16, May 6, 2010 (UTC)

i like to look at it, we have 5 skills slots, 'normal' skill slots if you will, considering over 99% of good builds have an elite (and ppl whine if you don't bring one) it's only only 1 of those 5 being restricted, the healing slot. i've played healer monk for about 7 months before trying anything else, and i assure you these arguments about 'if the monk is doing his job you wont need healing/defense' are annoying and false, trust me, unless your monk is VERY overconfident, he/she will thank you for bringing some way of easing their workload.

so of the 5 normal slots, one of them (the elite slot) is barely being restricted, and the healing slot makes sure you have at least something as back-up. let's face it, shit happens, over-aggro, poor planning, or the obvious, the monks poor at his job. so those 5 are barely restricted, IMO.

as to the other 5, they change not just upon switching weapons, but also to use the environment better (environmental weapons). so it's not just 15 skills at all times, it's 5 for sure, and another 10 that can change as much or little as you like to work with your surroundings.

as soon as i read about the new skillbar system i immediately thought, a mix of: that sounds awesome, 5 skills to use with our surroundings!, this ought to help make healers lives easier, and wow... people are going to complain ENDLESSLY about this.Akbaroth 00:32, May 6, 2010 (UTC)

Oh yeah, that, of course, I knew that! >_< So like over 10 quadrillion (straight *45 gives almost 21 quad, but other professions have fewer skills). And I like the new skill bar so far, I just can't wait to get the rest of the professions, ANet is such a torturing monster when it comes to info. x_x RoseOfKali 00:44, May 6, 2010 (UTC)

A count via spreadsheet returns an answer of 7618081977951470. That allows rez signets, uses the cap of at most one elite, and imposes the restriction of at most two professions. It doesn't count a build with only warrior skills separately for a W/N and a W/P profession combination, for example. It does require every skill slot to be filled, however, and exclude all PVE-only skills.

I'd see this as confirmation that the five skills for your weapon aren't "pick five out of 30", but rather "these are your fixed five". If you got to pick five skills out of 25 for your weapon, and the same for your class, that puts you into billions of combinations, just for a single class with a particular weapon. Assuming all one-handed weapons can go in the off-hand as well, there are 66 possible weapon combinations, though some may be impossible to due class restrictions. The "millions" of possible combinations would then point to somewhere in the range of 30-70 skills per class.

On another topic, what I'd worry about is that the game will encourage players to form too large of groups and all run around together, since they all get full loot from anything they kill. Ten people can kill a lot more in a given amount of time than one person solo, and if the ten people each get full loot from everything, that makes soloing not terribly viable.

Maybe the restriction that you have to do significant damage will clamp down on that, but even if so, that could make AoE damage dealers have a tremendous advantage. Follow around some other people, run in and tag everything with an AoE attack, and collect the loot after the others do most of the work.

This could also make relatively unpopular areas basically unusable. What often happens in games is that players figure out that you get 50% more experience and loot in zone A than zone B, so they spend most of their time in zone A. If that leaves farmers competing with each other for spawns, then that dampens the effect somewhat, so maybe the benefit is less than 50%. But if it means that zone A will have ten times as many players running around, so that bigger groups kill three times as fast, then zone A could suddenly get you triple experience and loot as compared to zone B, on top of the natural 50% advantage. This could also lead to a strong time of day dependence.

That's fixable by having copies of zone A than zone B, but only if they're not set on having a fixed number of complete worlds. Right now, if there are 10 times as many players in Cathedral of Flames as in Rhea's Crater, then there will be ten times as many instances of the former as the latter, so it's the same player density per instance. You can do that with open worlds, too; see how Champions Online tends to have far more instances of Millennium City than of Lemuria, for example, in order to keep the player density comparable. Quizzical 01:30, May 6, 2010 (UTC)

Well 7618081977951470 is still millions, even if it's thousands-of-millions-of-millions. :D On more serious note, my greatest worry about GW2 at the moment is that the skill system will be a dumbed-down version of GW1. Perhaps the biggest thing in GW1 for me, that has kept me going for years, is the incredible versatility of skill choises. There's practically limitless number of combinations to experiment on, and discover new ways to utilize. The ability to switch secondary profession adds even more versatility to that, and lets you 'try before buy' to some extent - I played monk a lot, but realized I kept using ranger skills on most of my skillbars, so I ended up making a ranger. Now I do realize it's a balancing nightmare, and fully understand why GW2 is going towards a more static skill system.. but from player-side, it the impression I get feels a bit lukewarm after being spoiled by the current GW system. For similar reason I don't like the idea of being FORCED to dedicate a skill slot for healing skill, or being FORCED to pick an elite for one of the slots. Sure, about 80% of my skillsets would include -some- kind of healing skill, and about 95% or more would include an elite - but what about those that won't? What the GW2 system would appear to do, is to force you into more cookie-cutter builds. 'Ok, we have warrior for tanking, we have mage for damage, we have cleric for healing.. we just need to find a thief for traps, then we're set to go to the dungeon'. Kitsunebi 10:19, May 6, 2010 (UTC)

Do note that GW also has its moments of Trinity-way. Heck, the most recent Elite area builds all featured Shadow Form tanks. Sure, it's not the Whammo tanking, but the point still stands; it's the Tank/DPS/Healbot setup all over again. The hard areas are not going to steer away from that, because it works. Easy and medium range areas never used that setup, however, and I doubt that will happen in GW2. After all, everyone has some form of self-preservation. Another interesting skill to mention for this is Water Attunement. It heals nearby allies continuously, meaning you're less easily pressured to death (degen ftl). Besides, their goal is that it's possible to solo everything. If the Ele can't take a hit, that idea goes down the drain instantaneously. --- -- (contribs) (talk) 11:56, May 6, 2010 (UTC)

"ANet is such a torturing monster when it comes to info." -Kali. See also; Diablo 3. qq. We've seen the Monk, but only know of a tiny amount of skills. We know that the Rune system exists, but have little idea what the runes will do (Energy rune won't simply reduce skill costs I bet). Pretty frustrating as well :P Just felt like venting a little.
There's a metric fuckton of possible combinations. Now, how many are sane and possibly viable? What PvP (Bow-)Ranger does not carry DShot? Who the hell makes a W/Me with 7 Me skills? Let alone having it work a little; half your bar would be energy management, and two damage skills. YES 10 DPS's!
I also wonder if (ex.) different 1h swords will yield different skillbars; A Jitte might give you Riposte v2.0 and Disarm, whereas a Short Sword gets you Sever/Gash. That would be badass, and increases #skillbars/builds. Additionally, there's more weapon types in GW2; 2h swords, daggers, guns... (they've mentioned war + gun fairly often; Hamstorm or truly useful?) --- -- (contribs) (talk) 10:09, May 6, 2010 (UTC)

Well you did say it yourself - What BOW-ranger would? And even so, I'm pretty sure there would be a viable set that didn't include the particular skill, although I don't really do PvP so I can't say a whole lot about it (No, after thinking about that a little, I may have to take that one back - you can assume almost everyone carries rez-signet, and against those it would be invaluable skill). What comes to W/Me, in PvE if your primary profession is warrior, then that's what you are.. but in some particular situation you might need a bucketfull of distance interrupts, and might want to toss in something like mantra of earth.. and in that case, a warrior with 7 mesmer skills might be perfectly viable. It certainly wouldn't be one-size-fits-all build, and most of the time a 'real mesmer' would do the job better.. but the point is that the warrior primary does still have the OPTION to do it. Back in days when there was only prophecies, I played through Hell's Precipice (mission plus bonus) as primary monk, with only 3 henchmen and nothing else in my party - and my skillbar had 5 or 6 ranger skills.. simply because in that situation it worked best for me. Kitsunebi 10:32, May 6, 2010 (UTC)

To go back on something said earlier, I find it great that there is a dedicated healing slot (which probably means that all professions will have more that 2-3 heals *cough*warrior*cough*. It prevents morons (like 50% of the RA population) to solely depend on the monk, who is then, as said before, blamed if they die. I'm not sure how the elite-only slot would work at the beginning of the game. Would you get an elite skill from the beginning (perhaps a racial one), or would you be able to still put normal skills in that one too?

Also, the way they have said it, it makes me feel that it's 3/2 set skills per weapon (depending on offhand/mainhand of course). It doesn't sound like you can actually choose the skills your weapon provides.--El_Nazgir 14:57, May 6, 2010 (UTC)

The early elite slot might be like the Unknown Junundu Ability. Early game should be easy enough to handle without a full skill set. RoseOfKali 16:02, May 6, 2010 (UTC)

I'd favor one slot being reserved for a heal, just for idiot-proofing reasons. This is basically what El Nazgir said, too.

On the other hand, I'd hope that you have the option of having the elite be a healing skill, a non-healing skill, or not having an elite at all. That's how it works right now in Guild Wars (1), and I don't see any reason to change it.

I'd favor some restrictions on builds to block the peculiar gimmick builds, such as 55, 600, perma-shadow form, ursanway, etc. But even Guild Wars right now allows a tremendous diversity of builds without having to take a secondary profession at all. I don't see any reason to believe that Guild Wars 2 will offer meaningfully less than this.

Guild Wars really doesn't do the tank/healer/damage dealer approach. The game doesn't have a concept of tanks analogous to that of many other games, as this game doesn't have an aggro system at all, let alone super duper aggro building taunt skills. It also doesn't have a useful notion of a damage dealer; everyone and his neighbor's dog can deal damage, and if a character can't do anything else, that character is a deadweight. Some players do try to play the tank/healer/damage dealer approach because that's what they're used to from other games, but it's hardly necessary here--and often doesn't even work all that well. Quizzical 17:16, May 6, 2010 (UTC)

Guild Wars doesn't need Trinity; doesn't mean it's not the easiest way to deal with groups. Cryway and HBNuke (and... and...) rely on this concept; One tank balls everything up, nukers come in and wipe the floor. To boot, it's ridiculously fast; faster than most conventional builds. I don't know how this all works after the Shadow Form nerf (because lolGWs), though, just stating examples. --- -- (contribs) (talk) 18:16, May 6, 2010 (UTC)

So basically you mean that overpowered PVE-only skills are overpowered. Quizzical 18:34, May 6, 2010 (UTC)

Right, because Shadow Form and Hundred Blades+Mark of Pain is PvE-only. --- -- (contribs) (talk) 18:50, May 6, 2010 (UTC)

'I'd favor one slot being reserved for a heal, just for idiot-proofing reasons' - this 'idiot-proofing' is exactly the thing I'm worried about. If you build a game that an idiot can play, only idiot is likely to bother. EverQuest 2 had this problem - they simplified things so much the game got boring. A ten years old could play it. 'click there when the green light flashes'. I'm not saying that setting one skillslot aside for forced healing skill is going to ruin the game, but I'm questioning the purpose behind making something like that mandatory, and wether the same policy applies elsewhere. Kitsunebi 04:03, May 7, 2010 (UTC)

"It prevents morons (like 50% of the RA population) to solely depend on the monk"

El_Nazgir, you forgot to mention that generally with the RA population they depend on a Monk, and (knowing this before) go into the Arena only to not have one. A F K When Needed 09:02, May 7, 2010 (UTC)

That's exactly my point.--El_Nazgir 14:14, May 7, 2010 (UTC)

It's a question of whether players should be able to gratuitously sabotage their own character. In a solo game, sure, you can give players enough rope to hang themselves. But in a grouping game, it's not good for players to have undue opportunity to destroy the group. It's important for game mechanics to restrict ninja-looting for the same reasons. Quizzical 16:58, May 7, 2010 (UTC)

Miscellaneous discussion

This section is for GW2-related discussion that is not directly related to any of the officially-posted articles.

Quips

(Starting a subsection since this isn't specific to the elementalist.) Surprised no one's brought this up yet, but those little quips that the characters make in the videos had better be toggle-able. I've played other games with a "feature" like that, and it gets extremely annoying after only a few hours. —Dr Ishmael 17:00, April 29, 2010 (UTC)

OGod, it's NWN all over again RandomTime 17:22, April 29, 2010 (UTC)

Why? I like it. It's the same in Dragon age and I don't mind that. It give me a more realistic feeling. -- † F1© Talk 17:34, April 29, 2010 (UTC)

There are a lot of people saying that (myself included), so if they weren't toggleable already, they'd better make it so. I'll leave it on for like the first day, as some of them sound funny, but then sayoonara. RoseOfKali 17:43, April 29, 2010 (UTC)

So ummm... What the hell are quips?--El_Nazgir 18:03, April 29, 2010 (UTC)

Let me dictionary that for you... —Dr Ishmael 18:39, April 29, 2010 (UTC)

For example: "They're gonna have to glue you back together. IN HELL!" --Gimmethegepgun 19:07, April 29, 2010 (UTC)

This is the first thing I said to my wife after watching the meteor clip... It's fine in Dragon age, for the first little while, but I would imagine that the says would get old very fast (and annoying). Although, perhaps they quips will be replaced, or interchanged, with patches and updates. At least this way we won't have to hear the same things over and over. Venom20 19:27, April 29, 2010 (UTC)

I doubt that's actually part of the game. It's just some action shouting from the voice-actors for promo material if you ask me. --El_Nazgir 19:36, April 29, 2010 (UTC)

I think on the contrary. They're either random per profession, or more likely skill specific, like "And stay down!" after a kill with Meteor Shower. I do think they're in the game. RoseOfKali 20:59, April 29, 2010 (UTC)

Oh for sure. They will happen in the game, and they will be specific to certain spells or actions (aka "BURN!" for fire-attuned ele) but they will happen occasionally and not at the beginning and end of EVERY spell. It'll be a more... tasteful dispersion. They only included them in the little skill demonstrations for cinematic effect. Also, speaking of cinematic effects, notice that the camera pans as you cast. I really hope it actually does that when you cast spells, and it isn't just a trailer-only feature. That adds much-need depth to combat and contributes to the more stylistic quality. ~ Jujipoo[talk] 02:24, April 30, 2010 (UTC)

Compare them to the (non-vocal) combat quotes that heroes/henchies have in GW1 (*I THINK, THERE-FORE I AT-TACK*) Kitsunebi 09:58, May 6, 2010 (UTC)

Food, food, food.. stop... starve...

So we have a lead up at the end of April with a bunch of stuff coming through, one after the other. Interviews, professions, skillbars... Here I was thinking "sweet, I can handle a small piece of info every other day or so". Then nothing for over an entire week. MOAAAAAAR! Was beginning to get excited about the prospect of a late 2010 release... Guess not. 00:59, May 7, 2010 (UTC)

Yeaaaaaah... I was at least expecting another profession every Thursday, but it looks like we're not even gonna get that. So, one profession every other Thursday? That'll stretch it out over 4 stinking months. >.> —Dr Ishmael 01:56, May 7, 2010 (UTC)

Well of course they want to stretch it out. You don't want to reveal all of the important information about the game a year before launch, and then have nothing to talk about until launch. The real question is when to start giving out information. Quizzical 02:29, May 7, 2010 (UTC)

Quizzical you interest me. You think it'll be out in a year? :) A F K When Needed 21:46, May 8, 2010 (UTC)

Moving whilst shooting

Just found this: "independent upper and lower body animation tracks for running n’ gunning" as part of an interview from a couple weeks ago at http://www.mmorpg.com/gamelist.cfm/game/473/feature/4198/Guild-Wars-2-Exclusive-Interview.html. This is one thing that bugged the crap out of me, having to stop to do the most menial of 'spells' or activities with only very rare exceptions. Also, "an arrow shot from a bow doesn’t just go from you to your enemy and disappear; instead it can be reflected, set on fire, bounce between several enemies, or return to you after hitting a target, healing you when it hits" sounds like a bit more detail than I'd read previously. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 121.44.243.220 (contribs) at 11:57, May 9, 2010 (UTC).

Old info is old.

Sounds cool but knowing ArenaNet it's another source of lag waiting to happen.

We'll see. A F K When Needed 17:36, May 9, 2010 (UTC)

Knew it was old (not THAT old) but hadn't seen it anywhere in here or on gw2wiki. Considering it's a pretty drastic change, thought it was worth mentioning. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 121.44.243.220 (contribs) at 22:13, May 9, 2010 (UTC).

Question

Will there still be the Ritualist Class in GW 2? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 68.148.89.114 (contribs) at 03:15, 10 May 2010 (UTC).

We don't know yet. The only 100% confirmed class is elementalist. Warrior is semi-confirmed, since it's been used in a lot of the combat/skill examples so far. Other than that, we simply don't know for sure. —Dr Ishmael 03:06, May 10, 2010 (UTC)

something in a recent interview implied that even though some classes wont make it to gw2, the classes in gw2 will have some similarities to missing ones from gw1. so maybe if necro makes a return, maybe it will have some binding rituals. rits and necroes both get power from grenth, one deals with the bodies of the death, and the other deals with the souls, fits IMO. also, ranger was briefly mentioned in an example, but only once, so i wont put much store by that. necro was also mentioned briefly, but they were talking about an npc, and it's very old info, so, again, i wont put much faith in it.Akbaroth 04:09, May 10, 2010 (UTC)

They won't dare to remove the Necro! Or my ghost will hunt them for life! -- † F1© Talk 11:30, May 10, 2010 (UTC)

I made pretty much the same speculation right here: "Monk and Necromancer are also returning, with Ritualist getting rolled up into both of those". I had written more detail (specifying that N gets the binding rituals), but deleted that bit before posting. —Dr Ishmael 14:06, May 10, 2010 (UTC)

I hope a class similar to Ritualist makes a return, or a Necromancer with binding rituals, or a "Summoner" profession, etc. I like the play style of not directly damaging the foe myself, but providing both offense and defense through the expendable creatures I bring onto the battlefield. Shadowlance 21:02, May 10, 2010 (UTC)

Necromancer is a must, and it's my guess that the necs in this will have more healing and support(The old blood bond went pretty much unnoticed. =C). Though I'm going with(and hoping) that there won't be any one dedicated healer profession, and instead, the survival of the team will rely on everyone's support as a whole. I would love that because then GW2 would be an MMORPG unlike any other, and would likely take some goddamn skill and co-ordination instead of cookie cutters running around. My guess for the scholars: Nec, Ele, and some sort of profession with roughly 50% healing, 50% damage. Kind of like a monk, but less healing. Whatever professions controls the giant crap, duh. Forgot about that.--99.225.28.182 03:22, May 11, 2010 (UTC)

They must have a necro-type character, you can't have a magic RPG without dark magic, and I agree with rolling spirits into it. I also really really hope there won't be anything like the current heal-bot monk concept (required for pretty much any group in this game, save for a couple haxx that emulate the same functionality anyway). RoseOfKali 20:00, May 11, 2010 (UTC)

i certainly don't want this 'heal-bot monk' i don't like the idea of not having any kind of plain healer build. it has been implied that water magic is getting a handful of party and self heals, apart from just the inate healing efect of water attune, so maybe instead of having just one class capable of healing, they will have several, that way you wont have to constantly worry about not having a monk in the party. P.S. i'm not entirely sure i get what you mean by heal-bot monk, you mean just mindless healing build?Akbaroth 16:00, May 12, 2010 (UTC)

A heal-bot is someone whose only job is to make the red bars go up. And as you started to suggest, I hope that every class (or most of them) will have some kind of party support, such as the water attunement. Also, with the required heal/preservation skill in your bar, it won't be essential to have a dedicated "healer" in the group anymore. RoseOfKali 16:21, May 12, 2010 (UTC)

[2] well, that clears the healer argument up, more or less.Akbaroth 07:46, May 14, 2010 (UTC)