Guild Wars Guru

ArenaNet's Design Director looks at past and future of Guild Wars

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I
Inde
Site Contributor
• #1
Over at massively.com, lots of interesting stuff from James Phinney:

Quote:
What do you think is the most significant change or series of changes to come to Guild Wars since launch?

There are almost too many big changes to list. I think we've been trying to improve every aspect of the game over time. Here are my top 5:

Titles – As I mentioned before, this was actually something of a mixed-bag for us originally – especially with many titles initially requiring ridiculous grind for a while – but overall they've been a huge addition to the game. We're happy for players to enjoy the game in whatever way suits them, whether that means playing through a campaign once and calling it quits, jumping straight into PvP, or trying to experience every last element the game had to offer. Titles have been a way to recognize players for the things they've done in the game and they've been a big plus in that regard.

PvP-Only Characters – The philosophy of letting players do what they want was really put to the test in the early days of Guild Wars (especially when you had to earn "Refund Points" in order to change your attributes), when getting a new character ready for PvP, meant a frantic race from level 1 to 20, with a lot of work to learn the exact skills you'd need along the way.

Heroes – The ability to customize NPCs and issue commands in game has had a huge impact on Guild Wars. Much of it has been positive, even necessary, but it's also posed a real challenge for us. Social experiences are a huge part of what make online games worthwhile, and now that people aren't "forced" to play with other humans, they don't always choose to do so. We continue to work on things like cross-profession balance to make sure that when you do want to group with other players, there'll be a spot for your character.

Hard Mode – One of the interesting parts of having a game that rewarded player skill was the difficulty of balancing things for players with very diverse play-styles and skill levels. Hard Mode allowed us to once again give players more control over what kind of experience they were interested in and to provide more depth for veterans of the game.

Better Voice Acting – This is the only non-feature on my list, but it's meant a lot to everyone working here. Minister Cho's Estate. Nuff said.
http://www.massively.com/2010/04/26/...-of-guild-war/
Ariovist Lynxkind
Ariovist Lynxkind
Lion's Arch Merchant
• #2
Quote:
Looking back at the game now with several years of experience behind you, what is one thing that you would change?

Just one, huh? I'd make sure we had a fully-staffed live team from the start. We've gotten better about it over the years, but in the beginning, we couldn't respond to player needs as quickly as we should have because we were always scrambling to get the next campaign ready. This would need to include either public test servers or something like the Test Krewe we have today.
Interesting....
slowerpoke
slowerpoke
Desert Nomad
• #3
Titles are grind.

Playing the game in a natural enjoyable way will not max anything.

And you can bet in this achievement obsessed gaming world, gw2 will have them from the start.
Terrible Surgeon
Terrible Surgeon
Krytan Explorer
• #4
I'd like to hear the guy talk about the biggest mistakes they have made and explain what they should have done differently. This is kind of like patting himself on the back. I have not read the rest of this article but I will to see if this question was posed.
S
SlipknotOFA
Frost Gate Guardian
• #5
Quote:
Originally Posted by slowerpoke View Post
Titles are grind.

Playing the game in a natural enjoyable way will not max anything.

And you can bet in this achievement obsessed gaming world, gw2 will have them from the start.
No one is forcing you to do them. Achievments you make go to gw2 so im not suprised they are from the start. They already nerfed them once which is a shame :S


One of the things I hope they change is the way the skills are so they dont have to nerf them over and over again I know they said they were going to but they have to be careful now that its actually going to be a mmorpg like KSing and stuff like that and the way the aoe's are.
Ariovist Lynxkind
Ariovist Lynxkind
Lion's Arch Merchant
• #6
Quote:
Originally Posted by Terrible Surgeon View Post
I'd like to hear the guy talk about the biggest mistakes they have made and explain what they should have done differently. This is kind of like patting himself on the back. I have not read the rest of this article but I will to see if this question was posed.
He himself actually said that it was a softball interview. Kinda surprised the interviewer didn't ask harder questions after that comment
Pugs Not Drugs
Pugs Not Drugs
Krytan Explorer
• #7
Yeah but the grind guild wars implemented has a minimal affect on the game, except the reputation titles, which i strongly oppose.
Skyy High
Skyy High
Furnace Stoker
• #8
Quote:
Originally Posted by slowerpoke View Post
Titles are grind.

Playing the game in a natural enjoyable way will not max anything.
Beating all the missions and vanquishing all areas isn't natural? Exploring all the areas isn't natural - note that many people had already done this before they added the titles.

Titles aren't inherently grindy. Some of them are, some of them aren't. If, on release, there are titles in GW2 and the community immediately goes ZOMGWTFGRINDFESTFAIL, I will laugh. I won't be surprised, but I'll still laugh.
S
SlipknotOFA
Frost Gate Guardian
• #9
Quote:
Originally Posted by Pugs Not Drugs View Post
Yeah but the grind guild wars implemented has a minimal affect on the game, except the reputation titles, which i strongly oppose.
Well I heard in the new guildwars there is alot of grinding for the people who like it and there is a certian lvl where you dont have to grind anymore but once you get to that lvl where you choose I bet what you are working on next is those titles lol.
Khorrax
Khorrax
Krytan Explorer
• #10
Quote:
Originally Posted by slowerpoke View Post

And you can bet in this achievement obsessed gaming world, gw2 will have them from the start.
Sad, but so true.
October Jade
October Jade
Wilds Pathfinder
• #11
It is beneficial to distinguish between the different types of titles. There are two main kinds, as I see it, and one is much more favorable than the other. Checklist titles, in which players must complete tasks A, B, and C (e.g. Skill Hunter, Guardian), are a hell of a lot more interesting than "complete task A, then do it again seven hundred times."

Maybe it's just me, but the checklist titles provide a deeper sense of involvement in the game.
Shayne Hawke
Shayne Hawke
Departed from Tyria
• #13
Quote:
Originally Posted by October Jade View Post
It is beneficial to distinguish between the different types of titles. There are two main kinds, as I see it, and one is much more favorable than the other. Checklist titles, in which players must complete tasks A, B, and C (e.g. Skill Hunter, Guardian), are a hell of a lot more interesting than "complete task A, then do it again seven hundred times."

Maybe it's just me, but the checklist titles provide a deeper sense of involvement in the game.
This. Nothing wrong with stuff like Guardian and Skill Hunter. But, nobody is going to open ten thousand chests or drink ten thousand minutes' worth of alcohol in a normal course of play.
snikerz
snikerz
Krytan Explorer
• #14
Quote:
Better Voice Acting – This is the only non-feature on my list, but it's meant a lot to everyone working here. Minister Cho's Estate. Nuff said.
Elder Rhea is probably the worst voice acting, come to think of it, Factions in general was pretty bad in that category, rule of thumb, dont let game coders do the voice acting.
Bryant Again
Bryant Again
Hall Hero
• #15
Quote:
Originally Posted by October Jade View Post
It is beneficial to distinguish between the different types of titles. There are two main kinds, as I see it, and one is much more favorable than the other. Checklist titles, in which players must complete tasks A, B, and C (e.g. Skill Hunter, Guardian), are a hell of a lot more interesting than "complete task A, then do it again seven hundred times."

Maybe it's just me, but the checklist titles provide a deeper sense of involvement in the game.
Agreed. Many of the "checklist" ones are what I'd consider to be a "good" title. Titles that simply require a lot of time and/or money are cheap annoying cop-outs, something that shouldn't be applicable for the KoaBD title track.
B
Bob Slydell
Forge Runner
• #16
Quote:
Originally Posted by slowerpoke View Post
Titles are grind.

Playing the game in a natural enjoyable way will not max anything.

And you can bet in this achievement obsessed gaming world, gw2 will have them from the start.
Maybe for you it won't max anything. But believe it or not, people actually have gotten MORE out of this game NOT even touching those silly ass titles then any of you title grinders ever will.

Title grinders = Tunnel vision.
Normal Players = Open minded.

And don't dare say I'm close minded for saying normal players are open minded, because it makes no sense. I'm not opening my mind to respect people who grind virtual numbers in a database that could very likely be prone to data loss at any time.

'Hey.. maybe it's just me, maybe I like to not waste my life grinding. I can guarantee you, whatever you get in GW2 for your titles, will not be worth a damn thing. It will not be game changing for you, it will not give you godmode powers over non GW1 veterans, and there will be SO MANY people using whatever the hell the reward is, it'll become OVERCOMMON and worn out so bad it'll make all of your eyes bleed. Just watch.
T
The Drunkard
Wilds Pathfinder
• #17
Quote:
Heroes – The ability to customize NPCs and issue commands in game has had a huge impact on Guild Wars. Much of it has been positive, even necessary, but it's also posed a real challenge for us. Social experiences are a huge part of what make online games worthwhile,
Since when has adding heroes been a good thing? They have been removed from pvp for completly overshadowing humans with certain aspects of the game. They also led to the collapse of any recgonizable population within districts, since people don't need other people nowadays when heroes can do everything for them. I had no problems when henchmen were added, because they still made the group functional if you were missing profs. on a team, but their terrible ai and skillbar punished you for not having a full team of humans. Heroes watered the concept of group work down.

Quote:
and now that people aren't "forced" to play with other humans, they don't always choose to do so. We continue to work on things like cross-profession balance to make sure that when you do want to group with other players, there'll be a spot for your character.
Here's a hint as to solve your dilema, NEVER IMPLEMENT CONS OR PVE SKILLS IN THE GAME. If you want to push groups to be human, make the ally helpers weak, dumb, and unreliable, don't try to give humans wtfpwn skills because they WILL exploit them.

Quote:
It was more than that, though. Business model also matters because it affects how you design the game. There was never any pressure on us to make the game grindy or to follow any other cookie-cutter MMO conventions that we didn't enjoy ourselves. We were really just trying to make something that people would enjoy playing and would want to tell their friends about.
Because Eotn wasn't based on grinding at all...considering that, you know, the only things to do in that expansion was grind for armor and weaps.

Quote:
People need a challenge and a sense of progress. We've always tried to provide both without forcing people into repetitious, grindy behavior. Especially when we released, this philosophy stood in stark contrast to the prevailing gameplay of time. A lot of character progression was through open-ended collection mechanics rather than a linear progression or even a tree. Of course, we had challenges of our own after we added titles to the game. These were difficult for us to balance at first, and even though they were entirely optional, many initially brought a feeling of grindiness to the game. We've done a lot of work to address this over the years and restore the proper balance between content and reward to the game.
Then let me ask you this, how many people on the dev team have maxed wisdom or treasure hunter? I've been playing casually for 4 years, and spent a lot of time doing the sanctum chest run before it was nerfed and I'm currently at 5k. Half of the Pve titles implemented atm are nothing but time and gold sinks, it's a braindead challenge to get them that takes hundreds and hundreds of hours to do.

Quote:
Just one, huh? I'd make sure we had a fully-staffed live team from the start. We've gotten better about it over the years, but in the beginning, we couldn't respond to player needs as quickly as we should have because we were always scrambling to get the next campaign ready. This would need to include either public test servers or something like the Test Krewe we have today.
Please keep the test krewe for GW 2. You should always value the opinion of people that actually play the game over "skill balancers". The updates I've seen from the test krewe show that game mechanics are being closley watched, compared to the NF skill updates (Avatar of melandru, Searing flames, etc.)

my2cents
Chasing Squirrels
Chasing Squirrels
Krytan Explorer
• #18
Quote:
Originally Posted by Skyy High View Post
Beating all the missions and vanquishing all areas isn't natural? Exploring all the areas isn't natural - note that many people had already done this before they added the titles.

Titles aren't inherently grindy. Some of them are, some of them aren't. If, on release, there are titles in GW2 and the community immediately goes ZOMGWTFGRINDFESTFAIL, I will laugh. I won't be surprised, but I'll still laugh.
I wouldnt have a problem with it if all titles were account wide i mean seriously who enjoys doing the same rep grind for eotn to top pve skills?
jazilla
jazilla
Desert Nomad
• #19
It is my opinion that the titles in EOTN and the number of titles in that expansion were solely to help sell units. And you know what? It worked. Same goes for the PvE only skills and the con sets. You can't get in an SC anymore without them. Those things are in there simply to make the players purchase the expansion so that they have to buy it to be competitive in PvE. I am surprised that the skills that were introduced in EOTN weren't kept meta in PvP to a larger extent as well. It would have made the PvP crowd also purchase at least the skill pack for it if not the game. When are we gonna start getting NEW info on GW2? I am sick of these interviews that are old information, or nothing at all.
G
Ghost Dog
Krytan Explorer
• #20
AHHH Master Togo!