Guild Wars

[Raiders Army]

Has anyone gotten this game yet? I haven't seen the reviews, but the "reader" reviews at Gamespot are pretty encouraging. For those who don't know about it, it's a PC MMORPG set ala Everquest, WOW, etc. There is also no subscription fee. If anyone has any thoughts on it, please post em!

[condors]

guy i work with beta tested it, he is not a mmo player at all, he said its the next great game(his last great game was rome total war)

[Bonegavel]

When I first heard about this I was jazzed. I made lame attempts to be involved in their free beta dealies and never got to play the game.

The concept is great and I will definitely pick up a copy especially since there isn't a monthly fee.

It is going to have to be extra great thanks to my addiction to CoH (which is my benchmark for MMOs).

[Raiders Army]

Bumping above HA's thread.

[Raiders Army]

From Warcry's unofficial FAQ:

After reading through many many interviews I’ve come up with a few points from many different sources. Below are questions raised from here at Warcry, as well as from HomeLAN, GameSpot, IGN, The Guild Hall, RGPVault, GameHelper, Game Banshee and The WarGamer.

What is some background information about ArenaNet?

Over three years ago a few members of Blizzard Entertainment broke away from the company to form their own group, ArenaNet. Their first game; Guild Wars has been developed in a shroud of secrecy. Guild Wars was finally revealed the first details to the public a few years ago and is still currently being worked on for its final release. The founders of Guild Wars, Patrick Wyatt, Mike O'Brien and Jeff Strain will be having Guild Wars published by NCSoft.

The FAQ on GuildWars.com has listed Guild Wars as a MMOG instead of a MMORPG. Can you give us a bit more insight on this?

According to the ArenaNet Team, they think of Guild Wars as more of a CORPG, or competitive online role-playing game. They don't want people using the term MMORPG because it makes people think of games such as EverQuest, Guild Wars isn't about spending hours and hours leveling your character, its not about spawn camping, or hours of running across a vast world to get to where you need to go. A new unique style of game play will provide all the good parts of an MMORPG without the tedious hours spend leveling or running to where you need to go to only to find the place camped by a group or more of people.

Can you give me a more in depth explanation on how the leveling system will work in Guild Wars?

As you compete in quests or slay monsters you gain in experience and acquire gold, as in other games. The experience points and the gold can then be used to obtain skills. The difference between Guild Wars and other games is that the skills you obtain are not variations on a few basic abilities, and do not grow more and more powerful as your levels rise. Instead at higher levels you will find more unique skills to choose from. This means that as a lower level character you wont be weaker, you will just have less skills to use. It will take good strategy and skillful playing to defeat a higher level character. Guild Wars also supports dual professions, and there will be a maximum to higher levels which is 50, but that may change during further development. Maximum character level will be able to be achieved faster in Guild Wars than in most other RPG's

The title "Guild Wars" implies PvP or player versus player, How will this aspect work, and will players have the option if they want to participate in it or not?

You will always have the choice to participate in PvP, and will never find yourself being random player killed. Guild Wars is a mission based game, and the choice is yours whether you would prefer to enter into cooperative or competitive missions. You will never find yourself attacked by surprise by another player, which will eliminate much grief. After you've learned the game and have built up a character through questing you may choose to participate in battlegrounds, where teams of players engage each other in combat, and then beyond in casual team warfare. The unpleasant character costs associated with death in other games, such as experience loss, item decay or loss are not a factor in Guild Wars.

Will there be any sort of PvP practice between just you and guildmates?

Yes, you will have something where you and your guildmates can test out your new skills before a big battle.

What will the items be like such as armor for example?

Items really won't unbalance the PvP aspect of the game; they will have abilities like 'more damage to undead' or something like that. The monsters in the missions really don't care how powerful you are, they are just there to try and stop you. In Guild Wars as things get more powerful, they become more specialized." Such as armor that helps you with protecting against fire damage, but is less resistant against cold.

Are we going to see a wide variety of strategic missions, like in E3, mission three had a catapult, and you would use it too win the match, will we see some more missions like this game?

Yes, you will see lots of maps you would have to thoroughly think out in order to win

Will there be a lot of focus on Guild Hall customization?

People should enjoy having a guild hall, so yes, there will be, and you will be able to upgrade and buy different decorations for it. You will also be able to buy archers, fighters, and casters to defend your guild.

Will you be able to join a guild with each character?

Yes, however, there is always the danger of spying, but you will be able to see every character of a person's when they are on your list, so they won't be able to sneak too easily.

What about guild tabards and color customization?

The players won’t be able to upload any designs because of the lack of security in that. You will get to design your own logo from a tool that will be provided in game. You will have your own banner.

Will all guilds get a guildhall?

Yes, but they will be customized with money so not all guild halls will look the same

Will there be guild ranks?

There will be a set number of ranks, but you will be able to name them. There will also be several permission levels.

Will there be a ladder system?

Yes there will, it has not been decided yet on how it will be shown to the public but there will be some sort of statistical system. You will be able to become the "best in the world" and that competition is something that the developers want, and think is an important part of the game

How will tournaments work?

You will have to go through all the missions before you are able to participate in the tournaments, however we will have PvP arenas along the way so you will always be able to get your fill of PvP. Once you have gone through all the missions you will be able to reach ascension around level 15-25. The benefits of ascension will be more skills, skill points and equipment. There will however be multiple ways to acquire ascension.

What will the single player campaigns be like? Can a player be associated with a guild but not need to involve themselves with the guild they are in?

A great deal of effort is being put into the single player quests for several reasons, in Guild Wars you will be able to play the game when you choose, where you choose, and with whom you choose. There will be a significant number of quests that are built specifically for the single player experience. Guilds will form for both social and competitive reasons, but as in the real world if you belong to an organization you will be expected to participate in it. If you prefer to play solo you aren't required to join a guild to play with your friends, you will be able to play with your friends and form ad-hoc teams, even challenge other teams in competitive quests.

What is the primary design goal with Guild Wars?

The primary goal is to create an online RPG that supports truly meaningful competitive gameplay. Guild Wars is a game that offers a full range of gaming choices: competitive play in one-on-one duels, team play and in massive group battles; cooperative play, and single player gaming. This will all be offered on a global network that will allow true world championships, all provided without a monthly fee.

According to the Guild Wars website there will be no monthly charge to North American players, how do you plan on updating the game with new content without having a steady stream of income?

Guild Wars is designed around a network of technology that is very efficient in terms of bandwidth and hardcore utilization. In addition to lower operating cost, The ArenaNet team believes that they can sell a lot more copies of Guild Wars by not charging a monthly fee. Not charging this fee allows larger communities of gamers to enjoy the online role playing game experience. The money earned from game sales will be turned right back to support the game and to develop the expansions which will be called chapters. The ArenaNet team is highly motivated to keep their customers happy and keep them coming back for more, if they've liked what they have experienced they will want to buy an expansion pack when it comes along. It was once believed that you could not offer a gaming network for free and remain financially successful, which Battle.net has proved wrong. A goal of ArenaNet is to prove that you can offer an excellent online game with full support without a monthly fee.

Can you explain what sort of "Death Penalty" system will be found in Guild Wars? What is the philosophy behind this choice?

The philosophy behind the death penalty system is “don’t punish people for having fun.” Losing items permanently is not fun. Losing two hours of accumulated experience is not fun. Searching for hours out in the wilderness trying to find your corpse is not fun. The goal with any death penalty system is for the player to believe that death matters, and to break into a sweat when doom is imminent. However, that goal needs to be carefully balanced against the possibility of player frustration when “reaching” into new areas and risking frequent deaths. Our solution is to impose a death penalty that lasts only for the duration of your current mission. This death penalty reduces your health and energy, but disappears when you leave the mission. We have had this system in place for quite a while, and it has proven to be a good balance between these two goals.

One of the potential advantages of the streaming technology that has been mentioned involves cheat/hack/exploit prevention. Could you explain how the streaming technology will help in this regard? How do you intend to handle cheaters?

Streaming technology is just one tool Guild Wars uses to combat cheaters, albeit an important one. There is no magic bullet to guarantee that a game is cheat-proof. However, in the team at ArenaNet's experience, creating and running large-scale global game networks we have identified a few technologies that are essential to reaching that goal. One is a pure client-server infrastructure, in which only the server holds the authoritative game state and clients simply react to server commands. Another is putting the client on a strict “need to know” basis for all information about the game world. For example, your client knows nothing about monsters that you will encounter or items that may be spawned in a mission until it actually happens. However, even with these structural safeguards in-place, there is always the possibility that someone will find an exploit, and when that happens, we have to act fast, and that’s where the streaming technology comes in. Because we are able to patch individual assets, rather than viewing your entire installation as being at a specific version, and also because we are able to build new versions of the game and very quickly distribute them to our data centers around the world, we are able to address cheats or exploits within minutes. Since the process is built-in and completely automated for the player, we avoid “patch paralysis,” in which necessary updates to the game are delayed for months while the developer frets about breaking something. Our alpha testers often joke about the fact that a problem is fixed before they can finish typing in the bug report and this ability to respond rapidly will one of our most effective tools to ensure a balanced game with a fair playing field.

What kinds of gamers do you see as your core target market, and what will make Guild Wars stand out in their eyes relative to other fantasy RPGs of the same generation?

We've always tried to develop our games to be approachable to the largest audience of gamers we can. Initially, the game should be easy to play and help players learn what they need to know to overcome later challenges, while providing a depth of play that will keep them coming back for the long term, which we call "emergent complexity."

In order to attract this broad audience, we made the game easy to learn by building an intuitive interface for Guild Wars. We made it mission-based so people can have fun and achieve a sense of accomplishment even if they don't have three to five hours to play in one sitting. We designed the character system so that the outcome of combat is determined by which player is the most skilled, not by which player spent the most hours building up his character.

We also designed Guild Wars from the ground up to be a competitive game so that players of different experience levels can compete against each other, and as a side bonus of that system, enabled friends to continue to play together even when they have characters with different experience levels. Finally, we created new server technology so that Guild Wars will not have a monthly subscription fee. We believe that all these aspects of Guild Wars will make it stand out, and give players a game that they'll want to play for a long time.

What kind of personal Storage will Guild Wars offer?

You will have a shared storage that any of your characters will be able to access, which makes it easy to share items that you think your other characters will need. Now we are still tossing around the ideas of Guild storage, and we think it would be hard to do guild money banks.

[Danny]

The one thing that does sound great is the streaming technology.

[HomerJSimpson]

That sounds like something I would be interested in.

[Greyroofoo]

The BWE would've been great for me if my internet didn't diconnect every 15 mins

[Ragone]

I'd be interested in this as a part time thing if fofc got a guild together

[QuikSand]

Maximum character level will be able to be achieved faster in Guild Wars than in most other RPG's

I'm mixed on this... while I never even got a single character to maximum level on any of the many NWN servers I played, I also realize that if leveling is quick and easy, I never find myself valuing the process. I don't want to run around in the woods for 400 hours to build a powerful character (do you hear me Avlis?) but I also don't want to feel like I'm gaining something for nothing.


Their comments on "death penalty" are assuring to me, though -- their balance sounds okay to me, in general, and their thinking sounds right on.

[Dutch]

Yeah, I remember my lone experience in "Avlis". Yeah, I got skills with the bo-staff, but against three or four brown bears? No contest.

[Raiders Army]

I'm going to pick it up this weekend (since I'm not getting a Master Replicas Lightsaber FX). I'd be interested in joining/forming a FOFC guild as well.

[NickSaban]

I was in the beta for this. It's an awesome game, and it got better the more development they put into it.

[Raiders Army]

Originally Posted by NickSaban

I was in the beta for this. It's an awesome game, and it got better the more development they put into it.

Hopefully you'll put more time in it and the 'Fins will get another high draft pick next year.

[NickSaban]

Originally Posted by Raiders Army

Hopefully you'll put more time in it and the 'Fins will get another high draft pick next year.

Definitely. We have to angle to get Leinart, after all..

[Thomkal]

Guild Wars has some interesting and/or puzzling design decisions. Here's a few I've encountered so far. I may be "misinformed" about some of these, so please correct me if I've got something wrong.

1) You get to choose from two of the six classes, starting the game with one, and having the option to pick a second very early in the game. The primary class gives you a unique ability, you don't get the secondary class's unique power. You can pick and choose from the available skills from both classes, but you may only have a total of eight powers available to use at any one time. And you can not change any of the eight until you enter a town or outpost. So you can't change this mid-mission, or in the countryside. I like the strategic choices this provides, but its also very limiting, and having to go back to a town and outpost to change them is not a very good idea.

2) You start out only being able to team up with one other player and gradually (not sure how gradually) expanding to 4, 6, and 8. Seems a very puzzling design decision here, especially when you consider that there's no competition for prime "camping" spots because once you leave a town or outpost you enter a totally individual zone or instance-that's right you (and your team) get their own individual version of the zone you enter to explore. I have two friends in the game, and right now can't team up with both.

3) You go through the first few levels only to find out that once you have a second class and probably are up to sixth level or so, you should go through the Academy, the start of Guild Wars individualized missions that deal with the world's history and current events. You team up to go in the Academy I believe (haven't done that yet) and you end up apparantly in a different time frame from when you started the game, the "Searing". I believe you lose all your current quests when you do this, so make sure you go through them before you enter the Academy. I'm probably a bit off in my facts here since I haven't gone through the Academy yet, but again seems a bit of a odd design decision in my mind. Many people say the game doesn't really start until you go through the Academy.

4. Crafting. You can't do any crafting yourself, but you can "break down" items you find with a salvage kit to individual components, then bring them to an NPC crafter in towns (along with some gold) to get crafted items. You can also "customize" your existing items at another NPC (haven't tried that yet)

5. Henchman-Don't want to group with someone but need help with a mission or quest? Hire a henchman, a NPC to work with you. Haven't found a henchman to hire yet, so not sure how good or bad they are at their job of helping you.

The game just hasn't really "grabbed" me yet. Everything just seems "ok" to me so far, not spectacular or interesting. Maybe when I go through the Academy I'll be more into it.

[Ragone]

So its just one server right? i got the game.. but got some wow raiding to do.. we gonna have a fofc guild? :P

[Thomkal]

One US server, and there's an international server I believe. When you enter a city or outpost there are several different "instances" of the same city to prevent overcrowding. They are called districts, and its easy to move from one district to another to find your friends. Once you've been to an outpost or town you can instantly travel there with a click on a map, which is a nice touch.

[Bonegavel]

Picked it up last night. Just trying to get a feel for it now, but so far so good. I can see this sharing time with City of Heroes.

Combat is old school click on beast and your character does his thing. But, no monthly fee will keep me playing this. I could never justify a monthly fee for a Fantasy based online game since I am heavily steeped in sit-down-with-your-friends-with-pencil-paper-and-dice role playing games. These games have EONS to go before they can compete with good old DnD like RPGs.

But, CoH has shown me that a lot of what makes it fun is the people you choose to play with and I think this forum is a good source for that.

How do we get together in game?

[Thomkal]

you post your name here and then hit the letter n in game to call up the friends menu, then put people names in the box there. Double click on their name if they are online to send a tell to that person. I have a solo character Kallor Silverbranch you can add for now until I make a new char for an FOFC group. He's a 6th level Ranger/Elementalist about ready to enter the Academy.

[Thomkal]

Just bumping to see who else has the game now and what their character names are.

[Bonegavel]

Ranger / Kal Kazzar

[Raiders Army]

Dammit. I gotta wait till we go out for dinner to get it. I'll have it tonight and I'll be on.

[HomerJSimpson]

Gareth Conquer, Warrior

[Thomkal]

I have just created a necromancer, Devin Blackpool to adventure with my FOFC brethren. So add me to your friends list and send me a tell. Just let me know you are from FOFC. If you are looking for a class to play and it appeals to you, Monk would be a good choice for a primary class as its the healer class. But play what appeals to you. I'll be taking monk as a secondary class.

[Raiders Army]

Alastor Slayton, Ranger.

[Raiders Army]

Made another. Jarel Grimking, Necromancer.

[Thomkal]

Copycat

[Raiders Army]

Doh! I'll take Ranger as my secondary. Necro is cool looking though.

[Bonegavel]

What level are you at now RA? 30th?

[Bonegavel]

Well, after spending a bit more time with the game it does seem to be more of a single player game with coop thrown in.

Can't share mission/quest info. In City of Heroes, you can view all other missions of teammates (at least those in same zone).

Finding others isn't too bad. You have to be in an outpost or city and in the same District number.

There is a lot of mystery about game play and that isn't intended, I believe. Just a byproduct of being this sort of game. The book with the game talks about seeing trainers for skills and I don't believe that is the case. You have to visit people and do quests/missions to get skills.

I'm really hoping that with their "streaming" technology that means they will constantly be adding new stuff to the game (new NPCs, new missions, new spawns, etc).

Final verdict is still out on this one, but having a decent time with it thus far.

[gi]

I have limited game playing time, as my lack of time in CoH shows, but if this is a game where everyone is at, I'm in.

[Bonegavel]

Originally Posted by gi

I have limited game playing time, as my lack of time in CoH shows, but if this is a game where everyone is at, I'm in.

Hard to say at this point.

This really seems like Neverwinter Nights only the servers are run by the devs rather than just fans. I'm all for that.

They just need to make the teaming thing a bit better and I'd be real happy.

[Raiders Army]

I would also vote for more varied costumes. Again, CoH spoiled me, but we all look alike. Made it to level 5, and I think I'm going to enter the academy. I think that the trainers for skills are after the academy (not pre-sear).

This is a pretty good guide for newbies. I've found it helpful.

[Raiders Army]

You can also name your pet by pressing enter, and typing /namepet *name*

Or you can use /petname *name*

[Thomkal]

There are Skill trainers in post-Ascalon City (post-Searing) but they appear to only give you skills that you might have missed in pre-Searing. At least from what I read and what happened when I sent my first character through the Academy. I was only given one skill to add.

The Academy is an intense little bit of action against another team. When you enter it you get random people and henchman added (you keep your current team) and then get sent off to face another team. Pretty chaotic especially if you haven't gone through it yet, and your damn computer continues to lag in every single MMORPG and nothing seems to help with it. But I digress.

If you are on the losing team you get a new quest which I won't spoil, but you get some added help to make sure you get through it. Make sure you watch the cut scene whenever you win so you get an idea of what happened to the pre-Searing world.

Post Searing Ascalon City is pretty overwhelming at first. Most of the familiar landmarks and geography is changed or simply gone. A lot of people running around, and not too sure what you should be doing or where you should be going. A helpful tip is turn off the trade and emote chat, at least for now, and to use the ALT key so you can see where all the NPC's are in the city.

Grouping could be much better handled as mentioned with the ability to share missions so people in your group know what the heck to do and look for.

I still need to level my Necro up a bit before entering the Academy, but he's not too far off.

[wade moore]

Strongly considering this game, but probably won't be able to get it for a bit...

[Raiders Army]

Originally Posted by Thomkal

The Academy is an intense little bit of action against another team. When you enter it you get random people and henchman added (you keep your current team) and then get sent off to face another team.

Wish I had known that. I quit after we got our asses kicked.

[Peregrine]

I think I'm going to wait on this game, I'm hearing very mixed feedback overall, and am not sure how much depth there is to it. But I watched a friend play it a bit, the graphics seem okay. I wish everyone wasn't the same race though.

[Yellow5]

Playing and loving it. Ranger named Johnny Chilled and a E/Mo named Myra Maines.

[Bonegavel]

Didn't go on last night, but I'm a bit aprehensive about hitting the academy. RA, going to be on tonight?

[Raiders Army]

Originally Posted by Bonegavel

Didn't go on last night, but I'm a bit aprehensive about hitting the academy. RA, going to be on tonight?

I'll probably be on tonight between 6-9 P.M. EST. That was very weird not knowing what was going on when I went to the Academy. Also, for some reason I can't get my quest to show on my failure mission.

[Thomkal]

Devin Blackpool is now 6th level and ready to go through the Academy. I'm also holding on to some potentially helpful magic items for you guys. That is if you don't go and sell them without ID'ing them like a certain someone did. Not sure if I will be on or not tonight, so you'll have to wait for your goodies if you go through tonight.

[Peregrine]

Well, I broke down and bought the game, it's been pretty fun so far. I have a Monk/Mesmer at level 5 and just started a new Elementalist as well.

[jbmagic]

Originally Posted by Peregrine

Well, I broke down and bought the game, it's been pretty fun so far. I have a Monk/Mesmer at level 5 and just started a new Elementalist as well.

i saw it at the store today. its looks pretty good. i might get it when it goes on sale.


is this game similar to NeverwinterNights. you make a character and fight monsters?

is there solo play on there too?

thanks

[Raiders Army]

Well, I've decided that level 5 is too low to go to the Academy. I'm getting my ass kicked in Ascalon (post-sear). I can't travel too far without getting killed. It's like I'm a blaster in CoH or something...

IMHO, you could play this solo easily. The hiring henchmen option is pretty cool.

[Schmidty]

I broke down and bought this.

My only character (so far) is Cameron Icecrusher (dumb, I know). he's a warrior who I plan on making into a Warrior / Elementalist. seems like a pretty cool game so far. Look me up if you are so inclined.

[Blackadar]

Ok, what's the final verdict? I heard a lot of negative stuff before the release, but now I'm hearing a ton of positive stuff.

And provide details. We want details!

[Raiders Army]

Originally Posted by Blackadar

Ok, what's the final verdict? I heard a lot of negative stuff before the release, but now I'm hearing a ton of positive stuff.

And provide details. We want details!

What details do you want?

To me, the graphics are good, not exceptional, for a MMOG. The gameplay is interesting and simple to pick up. The music/sounds leave a lot to be desired. I can see how you could play this game solo or grouped, although grouped is much more fun.

To focus on the gameplay for a bit, I would say that it is interesting that you can play two different classes (a combination of being a Warrior, Elementalist, Mesmer, Monk, Ranger, or Necromancer). So there is a bit a strategy to that. Another plus is the ability to respec your character immediately; in other words, you just leveled up, and you spent your attribute points in Air Magic. You later find out that you wanted to spend them in Healing Prayers, so you can move them around at will, although there is a limit to how much you can move your points around per level. So, if you make a mistake when you level up, you can correct it without going through hoops.

Travel is nice as well, since once you've been to certain waypoints, you can bring up the map and "teleport" there immediately. The problem with this is that you have to leave your party in order to do so. I don't know why they made that a requirement.

On the downside, everyone looks alike (at least in the early game). Also, from what I understand, the U.S. has a server and Europeans have a different server. When you sign up, you are assigned to the geographical server at your location...so if MIJB got this game, I wouldn't be able to play with him. There is a workaround to this; just register in the country that your friends are playing in.

Overall, it was worth $50. Hell, I spent $70 filling up our two cars with gas last weekend. It has some problems, but from my perspective (still a n00b), it's not a bad game...not a bad game at all.

[Blackadar]

I'm hearing it's *very* geared towards PvP. Is this true? Are all the higher levels centered around PvP? Can you avoid it?