Feedback talk:Regina Buenaobra/Archive Game Related Topics/Oct 2009

Archives by Topic
Random Chatter Wiki Topics Game Related Topics Community & Website Product Information Misplaced Topics, Etc.

Build Contest results

What exactly happened to this part of the contest rules: "Originality: Entries must be the submission of the contestant and cannot be taken from any other source."?? Is copying from PvXwiki now not equal to "taken from any other source."??? --The preceding unsigned comment was added by 129.13.102.141 (talk).

I wouldn't have recommended copying from PvX, mainly because it seems that the Live Team wanted to stay away from incredibly overpowered AI builds, and because they're not always ideal for henchmen (whom you can't micro). Karate Jesus 14:42, 2 October 2009 (UTC)

HELP! Regina I won the GvG Bsurge bar under the name "A Papaya In There" although the email that is used for my account is now changed, HOW can people at anet reach me ? PLEASE HELP! I sent a ticket to both anet support and ncsoft support. Anything else I can do ? Vincent E V A N 01:09, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

IP: This contest isn't exactly like submitting a piece of art. Every single person has access to the same building blocks, so it stands to chance that multiple people will have independently thought of and submitted the same or similar sets of skills. Each winner has to sign a release form. By signing and returning the Declaration of Eligibility and Liability Release form to us, those winners are declaring on a legal document that they thought of those builds themselves. --Regina Buenaobra 01:22, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

I've already spoken to Vincent privately. :-) --Regina Buenaobra 01:22, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

Rololoololawyers --ilr 01:25, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

I can't believe that any build that can be found on PvX was even allowed in the first place. They should have been immediately disqualified as violating RULE #1 from the very beginning. -- Wyn talk 01:28, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

IMO, it wouldn't make much sense if builds from PvX wiki were forbidden. Ignoring the logistic nightmare that would be (Arena Net would have to check if each of the 30.000 entries had been posted on PvX before being submited for the contest), the goal of the contest was to create useful henchmen that would be viable in PvP. With Guild Wars being as old as it is, it's within reason to assume that most (if not all) of the best builds have already been found and displayed by the community; not accepting builds similar or equal to the ones available on the fansites would leave us with henchmen using mostly bad builds, making the entire goal behind the contest to be pointless.

It would be more or less the same as Arena Net refusing to accept, on the Feedback space, any suggestion similar to the ones which used to be within the mainspace, and thus refused to implement a trade house on GW2 because it had been suggested in the mainspace months ago. Erasculio 01:36, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

In that case, Erasculio, Rule #1 should never have existed to begin with. -- Wyn talk 01:42, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

It wouldn't make much sense to use PvX as a standard for disqualifying builds, but in ANet's own words, they said gimmicks will most likely not be picked and that submissions should be original. They flat-out lied. There's nothing original about any of the winning bars, and most of them (particularly the midline bars) are still gimmicks. It's nice that they're trying to keep henchmen useful, but they're ignoring the part where they're supposed to be removing game-breaking mechanics from PvP. All that's aside from ignoring their own contest rules and in essence shitting on their playerbase with the results.

EC - basically, I agree with Wyn. Either they were going for original bars or they were not. Since they said they were going for original bars as a criteria for selection, I would have figured that was the truth. If they wanted meta bars, they should have said so and not pretended that they were screening them out. -Auron 01:46, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

Actually, as Regina mentioned, originality wasn't a criteria for defining which builds would be chosen; they were aiming at things that work. The Originality rule asked people to not violate any patent or etc in their builds, and I guess that's something people followed.

I agree with Auron, in that it would have been better to make non gimmick bars and remove gimmicks from PvP, so henchmen with balanced builds would be useful; but given how Arena Net is not going to remove gimmicks from PvP any time soon, giving the henchmen the best builds currently available (aka, gimmicks) is only what would be expected in order to avoid having the henchmen to be useless. Erasculio 01:54, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

People do not seem to understand that the language in contest rules is legal language, there to protect Anet. "Originality" mean that the submitter claims they came up with the bar on thier own. Which in all cases will be possible, if not probable. In either case, Anet is protected, and anyone who would be minded to sue them, unlikely as that is, would have to show that the submiter didn't (pretty impossible without an admition from the submitter) and that they copied it from one specific source (same).

Seem to me like people have invented a meaning they would like to be true, generally centred around their prefered gameplay, and then got upset when their fantasies failed to come true. Backsword 02:50, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

People do not like being lied to. Martin said they would not be picking gimmicks. Every single winning bar was a gimmick or meta build. Originality aside, ANet took a huge dump on the entire fanbase with just that. Then add on the fact that they said "original builds" and all that won were PvX builds, and people who just got dumped on feel even worse. It's good that ANet has all that legal mumbo jumbo to protect themselves - fuck how they treat their fanbase or how their ambiguous posts are interpreted, that definitely doesn't matter. -Auron 04:27, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

"the goal of the contest was to create useful henchmen that would be viable in PvP" LOLOLOL because dual falling(h/h does not use falling spider/falling lotus strike) and prage hench is REALLY useful.. other than that, they just created henchmen versions of currently abused heroes? yes! they just gave rewards to random ppl? yes! they just completely lied, wasted developer and my time (bothering with this shit at all)? BIG FUCKING YES.. why do we even need hench to pvp? if you even bother doing gvg/ha then you shouldn't be filling your party with AI AT ALL...... its called pvp you know.. (neither should you in pve but who cares anymore) you guys should write a book: how to fuck the perfect game up to become THE BIGGEST SHIT EVER CREATED.. gogo it would sell nice - Wuhy 06:48, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

I was gonna ask a question to Regina here, and initially this backlash made me fear doing so, but I will go ahead; I am the creator of the henchman bar "Khai Kemnebi" for HA. When I made the bar, I started with the goal to create something that would be good on the AI at the time, but not overpowered, nor exploit the reaction times of the AI too badly. I knew that this was popular in the HA meta and I wanted to emulate having a powerful snare, so I chose Crippling Anthem. Res sig because you need res sig, GftE as standard e-management, same thing with Aggressive Anthem.

I didn't trust the AI to upkeep Aggressive Anthem with only GftE, so I put Anthem of Flame up (although I'm surprised I didn't choose Anthem of Weariness). I chose Brace Yourself because I thought it was a powerful support skill from the Command line; I almost chose either Never Give Up or Never Surrender as a support skill. I wanted the paragon to have spike support potential, so I thought I needed a Deep Wound source, so I put up Vicious Attack. That left one skill slot, which I wanted to be Wild Throw, Disrupting Throw, or Harrier's Toss. Again, I did not want to abuse AI interrupts, so I went with Harrier's Toss over Wild Throw.

To say that I was not inspired by knowledge of the meta would be entirely false; my knowledge of meta builds allowed me to construct something that I thought would be balanced on an AI skillbar. I put a lot of thought and effort into coming up with something that was balanced between being too weak and too strong, something that the AI would use and not abuse. I will tell you this; I did NOT go and simply copy a build off of PvX and just submit that to Dizhou, and yet, here is a similar build. This is because you do not make a build for originality, you make it because it works well. You all know this. Over half of the bar is on just about every PvP paragon bar in existence. I submit to you that Res Sig, Aggressive Anthem, Vicious Attack, GftE, Anthem of Flame/Weariness are needed for most PvP paragons to work well (at least on an AI). That leaves 3 skill slots with the question being what to fill them with. There are not many choices.

To digress, I sent you a message on Guild Wars Guru, Regina. Aevar talk contribs 07:30, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

(Sort of referring to Auron) I agree. People are feeling "lied" to, but the literal wording about gimmick builds is that they were "not very likely" to be chosen, but still could be chosen, and I guess we just all misjudged the statement. Many of us thought the carefully-worded rules were hinting at "don't copy from PvX", which led the majority to not submit those builds for a chance to win, making PvXwiki builds "unique". Many of the PvX builds have "optional" or "adjustable" skill slots, so it is probable that the statistics of filling in those open slots with random skills further led to those "unique" builds that won. I know a few of us view "unique" as utilizing skills that are normally not used and using them in a way where somebody goes "huh... ive never seen that... that actually might work...", innovating a new perspective of these underused skills in these pvp formats. The point is... our perception of "unique/original" was something that hasn't been done in meta/gimmick/pvxwiki while the stated contest-perception of "unique" was something that was submitted by less than 5 or so people.

Though, ArenaNet is in a tough situation since either way, they are making somebody mad, either the participants and/or the winners. Either way, they kinda lose... disappoint the community or disappoint the 40 winners, while ruining whatever integrity of the contest is left. With the recent FAQ postings, it seems they are standing by their decisions and showing proof of their decision without directly addressing the pvx wiki issue, but you cannot blame them since its one of the safest option (right next to adding 40 additional winners). Yes, the winners might not file their documents correctly or in time, disqualifying their win to a runner up; however, people who did copy PvX already lack enough ethics to further lie on the document stating their builds are legit. Many winners have already felt attacked and have spoken up saying they made an original build that just "happened" to be a PvX GREAT GVG/HA build, but there is no way to prove or disprove that. The safest way to end this is probably for all of us to accept that the contest was a contest, we lost, they won, and we made our statement of disapproval clear and hold whatever opinions we have. I think we all can agree that it has been a GREAT mess, but at least both the community and ArenaNet have learned from the experience, am I right?

On a risky attempt to bring some positivity to the situation, at least the contest did have a strong impact on the community and hopefully helped the overall mentality of unique deck building, such as Aevar's story. Though the uproar of disappointment is unfortunate, it is actually great to see people very passionate about originality in the game with general rejection of meta/gimmick techniques. I know many of us found this as an opportunity to break away from the narrow view of "normal/common/popular/meta" skills and try to make the most of "unique/original/unused" skills. It's awesome to hear people analyze different options and ways to make unused skills viable for versatile usage. I think a few of us also realized that are some amazing combos out there that aren't popular due to the fact that they require a bit more effort and skill to make them work correctly. Meta/gimmick builds are popular because they are effective and straightforward to play, but we can't forget that the skill of the player makes builds work, and that difficult builds may require more effort, but that doesn't make them less effective. It would be great to see some of these contest participants actually try to adjust their henchmen submissions to make them effective human-builds, and we can start seeing a bit more originality in these PVP format. (Yes, it's very ambitious, but hey, it's possible!) --Rex 09:03, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

@anet: Your builds always make me wonder if you're joking. If not, do you even play this game? - Zesbeer 07:08, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

Regina, please read Auron's post here, and have the Live Team read it as well. It sums up the thoughts of many who have posted in that thread, and countless others who have not. 99% of people in that thread are clearly not happy with how this turned out. 86.134.198.138 10:06, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

you know it would not be the first time they disqualified someone from a contest if they disqualified all the people who submitted these bars. and i think that is what should happen and that you guys should wait and do the contest again with the test krew in place so they can test the bars and tell you if the bars are fake but instead your handing out the prizes already regardless of the fact that people balitly lied and copy and pasted from pvx wiki. lastly this quote seems appropriate.

"Ok, let me clarify a couple of things here: 1. We will manually pick the winning skill bars. 2.We do want robust, general purpose builds, not some niche meta builds or builds that will not be immediately made obsolete by meta shifts. 3.Common gimmick builds are not very likely to be picked The point of this contest is not to find a 1:1 replacement for Heroes, but to offer henchmen with useful skillbars (read: useful but not making use of the AI advantages that certain Hero builds had) for players, who want to compete but are not able to field 8 human players. They are not meant to replace human players." -Martin Kerstein.

seems very fitting that right there you say what you want but you go and choose bars that are exactly not what you wanted.- Zesbeer 10:46, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

That would be a massive waste of time. Even if the Test Krewe checked to see if all builds chosen had not been posted on PvX, GWO and GWG, the remaining builds would not have been posted because they are not used by anyone, and they are not used by anyone because they suck. It's more important to have henchmen that can actually be used by a PvP team than to have warrior henchmen spamming Lightning Javelin. Arena Net had to take popular builds because the popular builds are the good builds, as people gravitate to things that work. They should have chosen less builds, as like Auron said they have taken bars that players and heroes can use well but henchmen won't know how to use, but the complain about originality is pointless. Erasculio 11:45, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

the thing that i am complaining about is that they are still using what is broken about heroes. ie interrupts preproting ect. they say one thing and they are doing another. and wasting everyone time in the meantime. also they said right there that they didn't want meta builds, ie the exact thing that you are saying its ok for them to have used. they are going against there own rules. also the bars they did pick i mean if anyone has played the game in the last few months would know that thous bars are or were part of the meta hence my earlier posting "Your builds always make me wonder if you're joking. If not, do you even play this game?" - Zesbeer 11:54, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

Actually...

• "not some niche meta builds": there are no (ok, few) niche meta builds. There are plenty of builds that are work, and thus have been chosen and are popular and thus are part of the meta.
• "Common gimmick builds are not very likely to be picked": no EoE bomb. That's a "common gimmick". Builds with utility plus offense plus defense that rely on a party of players of other professions to work (which isn't the case with all builds, but with most) aren't gimmicks. They are, again, the builds that work.
• "useful but not making use of the AI advantages that certain Hero builds had": no Discord build, although they shouldn't have chosen the mesmer build that is basically a bar full of interrupts.

Do you want to try something fun? Tell us of a skill bar you would have liked Arena Net to choose. I would then show you either a bar that's available somewhere (be it PvX wiki or any other fansite), or a bar that sucks. Erasculio 12:04, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

@Erasculio:

I doubt you'll find that elsewhere, because it's designed for a very specific team setup (my personal take on HA dervsmite). Is it the PvX dervsmite bar? Not even close, down to the choice of secondary. Is it useful in a fitting team setup? Exceptionally. Would it be useful other places? It's no shockaxe (original shockaxe!), but it's certainly a straightforward, effective melee bar.

Though, of course, henchmen make poor frontline, so they'd obviously not be a replacement for a human player - is this not the intent? is for Raine, etc. 13:08, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

5 out of 8 skills from the (meta) Wounding Strike Dervish build, which has two open skill slots anyway. Erasculio 13:37, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

Oh, okay. I thought when you said "a bar that's available someplace", you meant, "a bar that's available someplace", not "a bar that's sixty-odd percent available someplace." is for Raine, etc. 14:15, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

When people ask above for "something that hasn't been done in meta/gimmick/pvxwiki", are they asking for "something that hasn't been done in meta/gimmick/pvxwiki" or for "something like what's been done in meta/gimmick/pxwiki"? Erasculio 14:22, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

That would be a good argument if so many of the bars weren't EXACT PvX duplicates.

That being said, the operative difference is that bars submitted that are similar to meta/gimmick/PvX (and by "PvX", I mean "meta/gimmick") bars are not necessarily the ones in which the issue lies, but rather in the ones that are broken when used with AI; that they're meta is irrelevant to the central issue.

I mean, if someone found a new, original way to create something lolbroken with AI, I'm sure people would also have a problem with it. is for Raine, etc. 14:35, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

See, that I agree with. IMO Auron is right by pointing how Arena Net should have avoided bars with AI issues (the Syn Spellstrike bar is horrible). What I don't agree is that the claim about bars having to be original should have meant they had to follow the "unique snowflake" route of having useless skill combinations, as opposed to having stuff that works and therefore is used often. Erasculio 14:47, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

When you're talking about the AI in this game... "Unique Snowflake" can often be a lot more effective than the builds that Human Players usually run. Take Zealot_Sheoli for instance who is several times more devastating to your entire Party than a split group of Dervish Henchmen running the proposed PvP builds, AND much much much harder to kill in Hard mode when other Margo Zealots accompany "it" and not just b/c of it's Armor and rate of casting; but also b/c of its skill Synergy. Meanwhile most other Hardmode Bosses and even some "Boss Like Foes" are not NEARLY as effective despite having even greater base-stats. The simple fact of the matter here is that the AI can TURN a "bad" build with only 5 skills into Pure Awesome but they have to be skills that were already at maximum effectiveness for AI use at the time they were made. --ilr 22:37, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

Orison of Healing, Signet of Lost Souls and Healer's Boon were on a necromancer healer bar I submitted (yea, stone me for doing that <_<). They could've taken all other away and it would be better than the submitted bar using Infuse Health because of the AI. Fully agreeing with ilr. Ɲoɕʈɋɽɕɧ 02:06, 4 October 2009 (UTC)

LOL! Zealot Sheoli has an incredibly bad build that would be useless in PvP, especially when compared with any of the builds submited, most of which have one of the most overpowered skill in the game. That's exactly the kind of ill-informed and clueless comment that is fueling most of the talk about how the "unique snowflake" builds would work, when they would actually be even worse than the (bad) builds which have won. This discussion is already filled with enough people to stand those who are sore because their Paragons spamming Blood Ritual haven't won the contest. Erasculio 13:44, 4 October 2009 (UTC)

(Reset indent) ...And you seem to be under the assumption that the only acceptable AI build is one that plays better than ...well... Me (for starters) and anyone else here. ProTip: That's not how you get new players into PvP. It's bad enough that Pro teams raep them every which way already... standardizing Henchmen in a way that also makes them superior to an average player (or even a newby with potential) is the most direct way to ensure suffocating dominance by smurfs, shitters, and AI-minmaxers in the lower rungs...leading to epic Team/Raeg Quitting. Go back and re-read the reasoning that people wanted Heroes OUT of PvP for good. Iow: If you think the builds should be anything BUT Mediocre at best, then you're the one who's ill-informed and clueless here. --ilr 23:48, 4 October 2009 (UTC)

I would suggest trying to learn what the entire contest has been about (you know, replacing the current mediocre henchmen for something less bad) before blabbing more about a(nother) subject you have no clue about. What is your next suggestion going to be, nerf skilled players so "pro teams" don't "raep" new players anymore? Erasculio 23:55, 4 October 2009 (UTC)

Why the hell would I recommend that? They're the only thing that's *supposed* to keep the Smurfs and shitter Scrubs out of the top ranks... well them and balance changes by the Devs that were supposed to keep gimmicks from taking over PvP entirely but I guess that ship has already sailed. Meanwhile you could stand to be a lot less insulting here, and try discussing AI builds without launching into NPA's everytime you disagree with someone else's understanding of the AI. OR at the very least present real cases for this "Expertise" you claim to have on the issue which so far you haven't done despite repeated requests. And When I gave you my example, you immediately turned it into a cross-posting NPA instead of providing a better example. If you're just here to kill this discussion with Noise and Insults, then by all means keep it up and you will be properly recognized for it. But if you're actually serious about improving the situation then a change in tactics is necessary and I expect you to follow through on that. --ilr 23:05, 5 October 2009 (UTC)

The Henchmen Contest

Was a failure, your own site links to PvXwiki as being a "fansite" and yet you allow builds from that site to be winners of your ill conceived contest, who's rules clearly state that the builds must be "original and not from any other source". The builds are crap, the winners are plagiarists, and even if you have them sign "Disclaimers" that they originally thought of the builds, it will still be a joke. I know for a fact that those bars existed long before your contest, and that the "creators" who won the contest only knew about them because everyone uses them. You're lawyering out of this in a most foul way, "You can't prove that they weren't the original creators". What a fucking joke, Good game Arenanet. I hope your the next company to fail due to the recession. --Shadowsin 20:05, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

P.S. Only a fool would believe the bull shit you are spewing Reggie. --Shadowsin 20:07, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

Shadowsin, there's no such thing as a unique build that works. QQ-- 75.121.137.122 20:41, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

gtfo ip. - Wuhy 22:00, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

The ip is right. There are many things worth complaining about regarding the contest, but requiring the builds to be "unique snowflakes" would be requiring the builds to suck. Everything that works is popular because it works; original builds would give us completely useless henchmen, worse even than the builds which have won. Erasculio 22:09, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

I am now tired of this topic, so I propose an alternative: Remove the PvX - then people cannot say in the future for any more bar contests (if there will be more) that they were taken from the PvX. And heck, while at it, remove the old wikia (personal distaste for it, only worthwhile for old/removed content, imo - it's absolutely terrible with the lore info on there, laughable at some things even...). /endhalfsarcasm -- Konig/talk 22:13, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

Over my dead body. Vili 点 22:14, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

^ agrees with Vili. How about Arenanet just clean it's act up instead. ~~000.00.00.00~~ 22:44, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

if U look ...U will find 95% of all builds made over time on pvx.wikia.com.. to make a build on the last 5% is the same as two VS drops in one run... ce★devilman

Ofcourse there is no such thing as a unique build that works, because builds are only unique untill they get onto observer mode, they then get taken by other people and abused, to which, the build isn't unique anymore. This whole contest should have been about taking what's good in the game at the moment, and making a good hero "version" of the build, this version would be inferior to a human running it (in most cases) but allow you to take 1 less person to PvP. Unfortunatly all of the winning entries are essentially Player bases builds that only players would be able to run correctly, there are a couple of builds that go a bit hero friendly (some of the Necro bars, and the Migraine one) but tbh that's the kinda stuff we take on hero's anyway... Frosty 22:26, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

I'm in a hurry so I haven't been able to read all the above posts, but on topic: Lets not forget how, even if some of the builds are good and you'd want to take one along, we need to consider the issue of OP builds used (ie, the LC and Soulbind in HA, the mes with 4 rupts). And unique builds not working? I submitted some very unique builds that worked well (non OP) after much testing. Underated 00:47, 4 October 2009 (UTC)

To the IP, duh? That's why the contest was fail to begin with. But to choose builds that were designed by players for players was even more blatantly retarded. AI cannot play a vast majority of those bars as they were meant to be played.--Shadowsin 01:46, 4 October 2009 (UTC)

Underated, the Warrior/Elementalists who spam Flare are rather sure that their build works very well, too. Feel free to show us your unique builds so the community can point how either they are not unique, or how they don't work. Erasculio 13:46, 4 October 2009 (UTC)

Are you retarded or just illiterate? I never said there was any uniqueness left in the game, just that well over half the builds were blatantly yanked from the meta/PvX wiki, which was also against contest rules(Which makes the contest fail from the start). The winners of the contest were not only yanked straight off pvx wiki but there was no consideration that they were made for players, not for AI. If you can tell me with all honesty that a hero has ever been able to use frenzy well, or that you bring infuse on your monk heroes in PvE and they actually use them as they are intended to be used, then you win. Since I know that heroes ,let alone henchman, can't possibly use over half of those builds as they were intended to be used because I don't suck at the game I would know you were lying. So, Yes there could have been at least a little creativity when designing an axe warrior bar, or a healing monk, like replacing skills that the AI would obviously use the wrong way and cost teams the game. So please, go crawl back into your arenanet ass kissing hole. If you were one of the "winners" lolurbad.--128.211.248.26 15:09, 4 October 2009 (UTC)

I didn't know Underated, who was who I was addressing in my last comment, also made contributions from an IP address. But go on, little IP, answer the challenge I presented above: post the builds you think Arena net should have accepted. Then we can laugh at you while showing exactly why your builds are completely clueless or how they are copies from PvX wiki and other fansites. Erasculio 15:21, 4 October 2009 (UTC)

Eras, NPA vios against you does not validate responding in the same vein. Backsword 15:25, 4 October 2009 (UTC)

(Reset indent) Okay I decided to check for myself the validity of the PvX copy claims, thus decided to check the HvH winning builds against prior existing PvX builds. I followed a rule that if I couldnt find the build on PvX in 3 searches or less then I trusted it wasn't there. This is what I found:

The following Winning builds are identical, or near identical*, to pre-existing PvX builds. (all of which are located under the cateogory of Great or Good HvH builds on PvX wiki)
(*Near identical in this sense is at least 6 matching skills and the exact same utility within a group)

Tiny Tina - Shock Axe

Iarwain De Llanowar - Hundred Blades Warrior

Adepte De La Guerre - Devastating Warrior

Haldibarn Earendul - Incendiary Ranger

Unfaithful Servant - Bunny Thumper

Syn Spellstrike - Migraine Mesmer

Leet Noobified - Boon Monk

The Necromaxime - Lingering Curse

Eric The Devistator - Bind Necro

Our Guild Is Leet - Unsteady Ele

Bacchikoi Bacchikoi - MoI Ele

Der Held - SH Ele

Rolol Lololol - Mind Blast Ele

Pnoy Pride - Coward Pressure

Hi Captain Obvious - OoS Utility

Le Boucher Alsacien - Wounding Dervish

Khai Kemnebi - Crippling Para

Noodle Legs - Cruel Para

Therefore out of all of the winning HvH builds only 2 of the builds I could not find on PvX wiki. However out of these 2 remaining builds, 1 of them did bear an uncanny resemblance to a pre-existing PvX build. As shown here:

Healing Blocks - HA Monk (but with only 5 identical skills I decided to leave it off the main list, even though the differences in the 3 other skills do not change the utility of the build itself)

Thus Meaning that out of all of the winners, Uto Pro was the only winner I could not find a duplicate, or near duplicate, PvX build for.

Really I think this needs addressed. -- Salome 15:15, 4 October 2009 (UTC)

All the 3 derv builds share half their bars (Mystic Sweep, Heart of Fury, Signet of Mystic Speed, rez sig)... And Attacker's Insight, Wounding Strike and Faithful Intervention appears twice. This is Build Wars™, not "people steal builds from pvx". --Cursed Angel 15:33, 4 October 2009 (UTC)

I don't see why you spamed a copy of that list here. Could at least have attributed it to the original poster, as gfdl requires. Backsword 15:25, 4 October 2009 (UTC)

??? What are you on about Backsword? -- Salome 15:28, 4 October 2009 (UTC)

I would like to point out that your "reward" is so special, people can't wait to sell it. -- Wyn talk 15:29, 4 October 2009 (UTC)

Holy hell. Damn, this thing is so messed up! ~~000.00.00.00~~ 00:44, 5 October 2009 (UTC)

The real reward is naming a henchman "Rolol Lololol". --Cursed Angel 15:38, 4 October 2009 (UTC)

The GFDL requires that you attribute stuff you copy to the original poster(s). Backsword 15:40, 4 October 2009 (UTC)

No don't get me wrong, it's not the PvX'yness of it all that is so bloody worrying. That i don't care about. What I do care about is that this competition highlights just how few builds are actually valid in the current meta and how badly balanced as a whole the game has become to reduce such a large pool of skills to only a handful of valid builds. VERY worrying IMO. Also backsword, once again man I'm really not following you. I know what the GFDL states just not sure what you mean at the mo. Is this list else where on the wiki? If so, my apologies, I just spent the last hour looking through PvX manually to compare the winning builds against it. (the irony of this is not lost on me) -- Salome 15:42, 4 October 2009 (UTC)

Could've copied Shard's list (or linked) and saved an hour. :) --Cursed Angel 15:46, 4 October 2009 (UTC)

Bugger thats an hour of my life I won't get back. sigh. :( (hmmm... their is a certain irony to my prior post now) -- Salome 15:48, 4 October 2009 (UTC)

Of course you didn't make that list yourself. You copied one of the existing ones. Every normal conspiracy theorist understands that. (yes, the irony is the point.) Backsword 15:50, 4 October 2009 (UTC)

I get that backsword, however the problem being that comparing 20 skill bars with existing bars in PvX is a very A leads to B type of affair, thus duplication of work is inevitable. However with a pool of over 1200 usable skills, you would hope that the same does not run true. Thus once again showing the brokeny-ness of skill balance at the mo. -- Salome 15:55, 4 October 2009 (UTC)

No it was definitely the judging that was broken here since they convinced themselves somehow that they'd have time to fix the A.I. on every skill on these bars. ...even for skills that require a "combo" which they have NO pre-existing algorithms for so just stringing a few quick script functions together wont cut it. ...While actually pulling it off could easily take 100's of hours they never needed to be wasting in the first place (or at the very least: better spent on fixing PvE Mobs and Quarry NPCs in heavily Farmed areas instead). --ilr 20:49, 4 October 2009 (UTC)

I have a question related to the FAQ update and the initial topic: You know, statistically for so many builds to be very similar on PvX wiki and out of 30,000 submissions, it was hard for me to believe that twenty-three of them are only submitted by 1 person since the chances for another person to be unethical enough to copy paste a GREAT wiki build from PvX is high. Yes, there could be a reasoning to why they were 1/30000 when (1) many misunderstood PvX wiki to be a disqualifying offense and (2) a lot of the PvX wiki builds have optional/adjustable slots, but then I noticed that pretty much all of them are "reshuffles" of the PvX builds.

So my question is: When searching for "uniquely submitted builds", with "unique" being defined as "submitted by the least amount of players", was the order of the bar part of the "unique" search? Did you simply look for the same Template Code? Or did the search in the database include rearranged versions of the same skill set? (Because if you switch the same skills in a template code, it technically make a "unique" code in the literal sense) --Rex 15:56, 4 October 2009 (UTC)

One problem is that there are too many different points of view here. We have...

• Players who wished Arena Net removed all AI from PvP. Those players would be very happy if the henchmen had horrible builds, because then no one would use them and PvP would be mostly free of AIs.
• Players who want the henchmen to be a last option if you can't find anyone else, but still want them to be weak so they won't be stuck fighting people with henchmen more often than not.
• Players who don't really care if the henchmen have good bars, given how the AI will already limit them, but who don't want the henchmen to have broken bars that would make them better than human players (see the interrupt bot build).
• Players who want the henchmen to be viable as generic builds without any broken skill or overpowered gimmick, and at the same time are against henchmen having skills they are not going to use well (Frenzy, etc).
• Players who want henchmen to work very well, and are mad at how bad some of the builds are.
• Players who want to use the henchmen to "farm" PvP just like they have been farming with heroes, and thus want henchmen to be as broken and overpowered as possible, being angry at how some of the builds which have won aren't gimmicks or AI exploits.
• Players who have won the contest by submiting meta gimmick builds and thus don't like the current complains.
• Players who are angry because they haven't won the contest and are thus raging about the "originality" thing because their "unique snowflake" W/E with Mind Shock build wasn't chosen.
• Players who like to whine anyway and have found something new to complain about (regardless of how often they are completely clueless about what's a good build and what is a bad build).

Arena Net is not going to manage to make all those groups happy, no matter what they do. Making contests in order to allow the community to have a big impact on the game is clearly not a good idea; it may work for very limited things (Design a Weapon contest), but only that (even the contest about naming bosses had its problems). Erasculio 23:38, 4 October 2009 (UTC)

response:

Guys, the official rules state: "Entries must be the submission of the contestant and cannot be taken from any other source. Your submission must not infringe on any patent, copyright, trademark or other intellectual property right, or any privacy, publicity or publishing rights of any third party, or be libelous, obscene or otherwise contrary to law."

This means that entries should be original to the extent that they do not violate another person's copyright or trademark. The skills used in Guild Wars are owned by ArenaNet, the sponsors of this contest. Using those skills and putting them into particular combinations is not violating a third party's rights. That is what's meant by "originality". --Regina Buenaobra 20:47, 5 October 2009 (UTC)

I'm no good at writing contests rules and descriptions. But i found worse: those who write them when the contest is over. Suddenly i feel good. Yseron - 90.9.120.70 21:27, 5 October 2009 (UTC)

Why even say that, then? How could we possibly have used skills other than what's already in the game? Either this was a MASSIVE communication error, or you guys are trying to cover this up by blaming it on a communication error. It seems pretty obvious that the intent of Martin's statements about the content were that we not copy meta builds or builds from PvX. Claiming otherwise is just foolish. Karate Jesus 20:50, 5 October 2009 (UTC)

That is what's meant by "originality" Seriously?!. --67.159.44.138 20:54, 5 October 2009 (UTC)

Originality when talking about Skill bars now means what you sumbit shouldn't break the law, damn, why didn't we all think of this... Frosty 20:56, 5 October 2009 (UTC)

If we had broken the law and the rules of the contest, could we have won 2 tonics? Seems only right... Karate Jesus 20:59, 5 October 2009 (UTC)

So it means skill bars with Chidori and Kamehameha were automatically disqualified. --67.159.44.138 21:02, 5 October 2009 (UTC)

wow anet your makeing me like you guys less and less.- Zesbeer 21:19, 5 October 2009 (UTC)

reginaAnet, ADMIT YOU FUCKED UP ALREADY! aside from originality, the AI cannot use the bars properly stop ignoring us and creating excuses..... - Wuhy 21:39, 5 October 2009 (UTC)

"So ALL it means is skill bars with Chidori and Kamehameha were automatically disqualified." I'm fucking rololo lolol'ing so hard rite nao... nice try Regina but you're not getting out of this one that easily... --ilr 23:12, 5 October 2009 (UTC)

@ regina, "Entries must be the submission of the contestant and cannot be taken from any other source." you seem to have forgotten that part of what you quoted.- Zesbeer 22:00, 5 October 2009 (UTC)

So I'm guessing by that defination, Regina, you didn't want to see things along the lines of the 'sex' builds, or builds that were using skills to name Television shows, or movies. Zesbeer has a point that you should address though. It's not the 'copyright' people are questioning, it the fact that if you go on PvX you click two or three times and you can find these builds, and the PvX builds pre-date the competition. It's hard to claim originality for a submission when it was 'submitted' elsewhere. ~~000.00.00.00~~ 22:33, 5 October 2009 (UTC)

Yea well i mean it says cant be taken from any other sorce well they were taken from pvx wiki, and last i checked thats another sorce.- Zesbeer 23:18, 5 October 2009 (UTC)

Apparently the phrase "any other source" meant from any source outside Guild Wars. Obviously, that's why the IPs Chidori and Kamehameha builds were disqualified and why my WoW druid build was thrown out. I was pretty upset about that one, tbh. Karate Jesus 23:21, 5 October 2009 (UTC)

But this would have been so awesome to see in game >:| ~~000.00.00.00~~ 00:00, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

Oh man, using this as a way to avert blame is just pretty sad. It works, but still not very professional. Also Regina, you seem to be ignoring the many other legitimate reasons why people are upset. Truly ignorance at its finest. 209.89.252.164 00:35, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

well you know what they say they say; "ignorance is bliss..."- Zesbeer 00:58, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

Used on PVX wiki see means I guess instead of Guildwars?84.80.151.136 05:38, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

Arch enemy wouldn't agree with you :o and neither would I when it comes to your own game :/.Then again that is why robots always take over the world in movies :3 Lilondra *poke* 06:02, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

On topic : Regina,Linsey,Rest of Anet the whole point is that people are dissapointed in you (the ones that still believed in you that is but well for some reason I was one of them).We don't want to hear some legal mumbo jumbo we want to hear something like 'we realise the problem and intend to fix it" or just a sorry or anything would proly make most people feel better Lilondra *poke* 06:09, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

(Reset indent) I believe Regina won't be answering on this topic anymore cause it's tagged as answered. - Reanimated X 06:40, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

Avoiding the issue is equal to answering the topic, amirite? Karate Jesus 15:13, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

I'd like to make a brief futile attempt to divert some of your unholy wrath by pointing out that the contest is over, nothing is going to change, and it's not Regina's fault. The results disappointed me too, but not to the point of attacking people's integrity. elix Omni 16:40, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

Is it LIVE yet? Is it even being tested yet? ...then No, it's not "over" until they stop listening entirely at which point PvP will be "over" with too and I'll be celebrating it's stupid inevitable demise. ...but perhaps I've already said too much >.> --ilr 07:17, 7 October 2009 (UTC)

Again....I hate to bring this up, but...

Um, how's the XTH going? >.< I know you guys hate that question, but it's been....well, a while and we still haven't heard anything. Will we get some idea before or after the "PvP love/removing content" update? Or will we need to wait later? I'm hoping you can respond to this since we're trying to be more open about stuff now, but if you can't....I guess just ignore it... Karate Jesus 19:23, 28 September 2009 (UTC)

It's coming with the big "pvp-love" update bro. But I hope it gets removed :3 - Wuhy 20:08, 28 September 2009 (UTC)

Really? I have not heard that. Where did you get that info? Karate Jesus 20:11, 28 September 2009 (UTC)

Linsey's journal seems to say this. They have been making that update for more than 5 months and god knows how longer it will take(I don't think too much time, tho. It defo comes before halloween).. I'd be surprised if they didn't include this in it. - Wuhy 20:34, 28 September 2009 (UTC)

So....you're just assuming that they will? You're making assumptions based on....Anet's record? No thanks. I'd rather hear back from someone who actually knows what they're talking about. Karate Jesus 20:48, 28 September 2009 (UTC)

And you're expecting any better despite this question being deferred the last 3 times? --ilr 21:04, 28 September 2009 (UTC)

KJ: yup, it's pretty clear that it will be included in the update. or removed. - Wuhy 21:11, 28 September 2009 (UTC)

@irl, good point. They (see? I'm using a plural pronoun so I'm not laying blame on any one person -.-) probably wont tell us anything until the day of. Karate Jesus 22:05, 28 September 2009 (UTC)

(Reset indent) Btw, Regina, I'm still waiting for new news on this. It'd be nice to actually hear back short of the 1 year anniversary of the XTH being removed :/ Karate Jesus 21:38, 5 October 2009 (UTC)

Unfortunately, I don't have new status information about this. I discussed this with the Live Team producer yesterday, and he told me he would speak to a few people about it and give me more info after he's able to discuss with them. --Regina Buenaobra 22:21, 7 October 2009 (UTC)

The Live team has a "Producer"? XD ...*pictures Nathan Lane in an Anime shirt drinking bawls* --ilr 20:44, 8 October 2009 (UTC)

Does this mean...?

Does this conclude Arenanet's stance on hexway? Because the two necro bars containing to of the most problematic hexway hex-STACKING skills (soulbind and LC) stacked with others. Seeing as it sounded like Arenanet didn't want the hench bars to be thrown out by an update to the meta or a skill update, then it seems like Hexway might not see a nerf? Hexstacking in pvp is often seen as degenerative (unskillful) play and while hexway is popular, is often concidered over powered. While its great that the henchman were given bars that the community would actually want to use, the other end of the issue is that, being PvP, people will have to face these henchman. Which may be an issue.

On the other hand, I'm excited for the AI update. Hopefully it'll branch into PvE (pve heroes that can use dagger chains? :O) I'm looking forward to see whether the hench will be able to use grasping earth effectively, or cancel frenzy. Underated 02:45, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

Maybe I missed it, but where did Joe ever say he willingly signed onto totally reworking all the AI scripts for this many skills?? I mean It apparently takes them 2 months just to make Ion Cannon cause scatter properly... --ilr 04:16, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

it means that they don't give a crap. - Wuhy 07:46, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

On GWO/Guru (I forgot where I read it) I believe Regina said they'd be upgrading some AI to make these builds feasable for henchman to use. Whether Joe is willing, is an interesting notion. Underated 15:12, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

Great, but there still aren't enough event handlers to make the use of those skills fluidly. Nearly all of them will just be mostly Random and the few triggers that aren't overpowered (balanced != complete bullshit 1/8 second AI Interrupts) could be exploited by Gimmick teams in other ways... IoW: this is most definitely a case where "the bare minimum" to make them functional will not be enough so unless 'Bob' over there got his Algorithm programming degree from Princeton or MIT and plans on pitching in too, the entire effort will be all for naught --ilr 19:43, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

Yes ilr, I agree. When I said "I'm excited" I had a bit of underlying sarcasm in the content. I'm a bit skeptic that after having the game out for years that all the sudden they'll be able to create godly AI that will work in GW1. Underated 00:45, 4 October 2009 (UTC)

Let's put it this way: henchmen will never be as skilled as real people. Joe will adjust their AI to fit the needs of the builds, as appropriate, but those henchmen will not play as intelligently as real people. --Regina Buenaobra 22:24, 7 October 2009 (UTC)

Actually, henchmen can be MORE skilled than real people using specific skills and builds. And Martin seemed to have that in mind about the contest (or at least that's what the majority of us thought); however, apparently some people thought player builds would be a better idea. Karate Jesus 22:29, 7 October 2009 (UTC)

im confus

Admitting your failures is a great first step in gaining(/regaining) trust. Even if you are understaffed and content is just too much to handle, saying "I'm sorry, we screwed up, we'll try not to make that mistake again" will win you a lot of support, even from many of the naysayers.

But you've never done it. Why is that? Are you afraid that people will leave if you admit you're human? Is it company policy to pretend you never make mistakes, and instead write walls of text about legal mumbo jumbo that has nothing to do with anything in order to avoid admitting you screwed something up?

I don't get it. But since you're the community rep, maybe you can explain it to me. It seems like such a logical option, I simply can't comprehend why you've never done it, and instead have gone to great lengths to avoid a simple apology where one is due. I read through and participated in the 29-page Guru thread where you made more than a handful of posts; yet none of them was an apology to the community. You talked about guidelines and the legal definition of "originality," but you ignored the part where ANet screwed up and pretended like nothing happened.

Why?

P.S. this is not a discussion about the contest results or game balance or any of that, so please keep third party posts on topic. -Auron 16:19, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

This has always bothered me as well. I would actually really appreciate an apology from the CR team when terrible, ridiculous shit happens....or even when stuff is delayed. Just making excuses for the overall company and specifically the Live Team really bugs me. I'm pretty sure Gaile used to apologize and, to be perfectly honest, I really respected her candor and it made me feel like she was on the community's side (something...that I feel we've lost). Karate Jesus 16:22, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

I already posted the exact same (albeit without the wall of awesomeness) thing earlier.I'm sry auron but I doubt you'll get response Lilondra *poke* 16:35, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

maybe we should ask someone else - Wuhy 19:10, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

It's Regina's job to speak to the community, and this is a question about her actions not anyone else's. The question should stay here (although, I highly doubt it will be answered). Karate Jesus 19:13, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

I mean we could bitch about her performance on Mike's page - Wuhy 20:04, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

"We"? If I was Mike, I'd ignore pretty much anything that wasn't both at a fever pitch and coming from the entire wiki population all at once. ...which it's not yet. Mike's not dumb, he's stayed near the top in this biz a decade now and knows that even the guys who totally fuck up (LoL, Roper) or let the redshirts crash the ship (LoL, Sony) still get to stay in charge of important shit just from investor name-recognition alone. As long as the "Regina's an Ice Queen!" shouters aren't organized, he's got nothing to worry about b/c it doesn't actually hurt sales of GW2 until they get organized. --ilr 20:24, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

From the way I see it Arenanet don't see that they made a mistake, so there will be no apologies, on pretty much anything. They have their own definition of what the rules were, what the wording meant, the community obviously had different. Personally, I think they dropped the ball, again, but clearly they don't. And why go to Regina? Yes, she's CR, but when has she ever done the right thing? She's more into patting herself on the back. ~~000.00.00.00~~ 20:27, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

^I don't think they are THAT stupid, imho they are just making excuses because they don't want to admit they fucked up. - Wuhy 20:57, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

Auron: Thank you for commenting. We've both tried to address yours and others' concerns about the rules by clarifying the legal text to hopefully make the Live Team's decisions understandable. Martin and I have discussed the community reaction with Linsey many times over the past couple of weeks, to get her take on the situation, and to hear any input she had about how to publicly address the issues that people had a problem with. At the end of the day, Linsey's decisions about the winning entries will stand. I'm sorry that the legal text was confusing to some players, but it is standard legal language for contest rules, and it's difficult to have much flexibility in phrasing, especially when you consider that these rules have to apply to multiple countries and continents. However, for future contests, we will work with our lawyer to try and strike a balance between having all the required legal text in place and being as clear as possible to people who aren't fluent in legal jargon. I'm sorry that a few people didn't agree with the explanations I and Martin provided on behalf of the Live Team, but I know you understand that the community will not always agree on the decisions made by the designers. --Regina Buenaobra 00:33, 13 October 2009 (UTC)

Karate Jesus: I believe you may have a case of selective memory. I have apologized on behalf of the company and Live Team many times over when there were mistakes made, for example: every single month that Xunlai Tournament House had technical issues and people received the incorrect number of reward points (which, as you may recall, was frequent), when skill builds that were given a release date were delayed, when network issues (which are often not due to any problems with ArenaNet's or NCsoft's network infrastructure) occur and players have trouble connecting, when there were issues with redeeming the free storage panes, when there were issues with NCsoft's web store after the April content build was released, when there was confusing messaging on the in-game login screen, etc. When members of the various different Guild Wars communities are upset, I communicate this to the appropriate folks and yes, I advocate for players' interests, but you should keep in mind that what the players want isn't necessarily good for the game nor in agreement with what the developers want. --Regina Buenaobra 00:33, 13 October 2009 (UTC)

Apologies mean little if it is perceived that they aren't genuine but only offered out of courtesy or etiquette. You can apologise all you want but if the general community concensus (and in the end, it ought to be the community's/customer's opinion which matters) is that their concerns were not handled well, then of course you're going to get an unhappy, unsatisfied, cynical lynch mob at your door. As it's been stated, the vast majority of people do give a rat's ass about legal mumbo jumbo - especially if it's used to justify decisions that the majority of users perceive to be (fundamentally, in a more simple sense, even if your legalities justify it) unfair, unjust and breaking the rules that you explicitly set, or if their concerns are not adequately answered and simply brushed aside. In fact, using the law in this way makes it even worse (violating the spirit of laws). Even if the issue isn't ArenaNet's fault - eg. network issues, the fact of the matter is there are (most likely a lot) of users who were experiencing these issues and an official effort made to resolve them rather than an attitude of 'it's not our fault, fix it yourself' would go a long way to make people happy. Of course, you're never going to satisfy everyone but if the community perceives (not YOU perceive) that their concerns are also shared by the company, that they are really being addressed to a satisfactory standard and efforts really are being made for them, then there wouldn't be as much anger and disatisfaction with the way things are run. Jennalee 05:55, 13 October 2009 (UTC)

000.00.00.00: If you think I am "into patting myself on the back", you really don't know me. Your impression of what is important to me personally, or discussing whether I personally do the right thing---(When you should know by now I (or anyone in this position) as a Community Manager rarely, if ever, say anything in public that hasn't been discussed, double-checked, or debated internally with multiple people. This isn't some rogue operation where Regina says anything she wants independently of ArenaNet.)---is wildly off-topic. I would appreciate it if people could please stick to discussion topics. Cheers. --Regina Buenaobra 00:33, 13 October 2009 (UTC)

"This isn't some rogue operation where Regina says anything she wants independently of ArenaNet" <-- what are you even talking about there? I have, and will, always go from the stand-point that everything you say has been checked, and doubled checked, that's why when things, like with what Wyn has down below about GW2 suggestions happens, we know that you've checked and double-checked what you said, and hopefully your response to her question before saying it. ~~000.00.00.00~~ 07:18, 13 October 2009 (UTC)

Regina that may be true but most people didn't even care about the XTH afaik.I could be wrong but it still wasn't as important as this.Because XTH is a small defect this is actually F'en up in the eyes of the community.For the last time very few care about the legal mumbo jumbo.This isn't about legal !!! at all.Even if it were illegal you would have to be a complete douche to actually sue for it and I'm pretty sure everyone besides that guy would agree with me.Everything we said was from a moral standpoint.We asked you if you could explain and by that many people meant " apologise" (damn you spelling).You can derail it all you want and say its legal all you want.But you will satisfy nobody this way.Lilondra *poke* 04:50, 13 October 2009 (UTC)

regina, how many times do we have to tell you that we don't care about legal bullshit? Martin said you(anet) don't want gimmick crap and logic says that you don't want to give AI bars they cannot use just to make the AI for those skills better effectively 1. randomizing the entire fucking contest 2. WASTING TIME. You(anet) failed both of these things, congratulations. EDIT: 3. you won't be able to program it any decent. - Wuhy 20:47, 13 October 2009 (UTC)

this iz lulzy... "Thank you for commenting."-- get ready for spin-mode "make the Live Team's decisions understandable" -- ya'll got some learning disabilities! "I'm sorry that the legal text was confusing to some players" -- And this is just how dumb we think you are "but it is standard legal language for contest rules" -- I'm gonna totally ignore the fact that Y Misrepresentation(X) is Y and blame the Rolol loLawyers instead "I'm sorry that a few people didn't agree with the explanations I and Martin provided on behalf of the Live Team" -- suck on it ... PS: Karate Jesus: I believe you may have a case of selective memory. // Discussing whether I personally do the right thing --- is wildly off-topic.
You guys are pathetic, and by that I don't mean the CR here or Anet... I'm talking about all you PvP'ers and anyone else who don't like being lied to. You're just gonna piss and moan again like usual and A> Forget about it later on or B> Give up and move onto the NEXT studio that will just do the same exact thing... which personally suits me just fine b/c I can't wait for Organized PvP to die completely (more resources in the future for World PvP and PvE!). And why do ya do it?? B/c it's just plain easier than organizing or doing something more productive that raises your collective bargaining power from a negative integer to something they can't ignore everytime. ...but noooo, ya'll still stuck on this carousel for the Nth time again... --ilr 23:04, 13 October 2009 (UTC)

What? Were any of the questions actually answered? Man, maybe she's better at CR than I thought. At least she's able to confuse and distract us from what the primary issues are/were (which, I guess, is the mark of any good CR :/) Karate Jesus 15:16, 14 October 2009 (UTC)

Preparing for Halloween... When?

I like the Halloween festivities, so I want to have as much free time on my hands while the event is live. Can you give me an estimate of when the Halloween event will begin and end so that I can plan accordingly? 66.219.148.4 23:20, 14 October 2009 (UTC)

6:00 p.m. PT Friday through whenever they feel like shutting it down Sunday or Monday, I'd imagine. I'm fairly certain that's how almost all events happen, no? ··· Danny Pew Pew 23:22, 14 October 2009 (UTC)

There have been occasions where these events have begun on Thursday. I think I recall a Wintersday even beginning on a Wednesday, but I could be wrong. The ending time may even extend through Monday, or Tuesday. Since this weekend will have AB, I don't suppose it will begin for another week, but I would still like a confirmed time range. 66.219.148.4 23:56, 14 October 2009 (UTC)

My guess is that drops will start Thursday, Oct. 22nd, and run through Tuesday Nov. 2nd, with the finale event being Sunday Oct 31st. Of course, that's just a guess. -- Wyn talk 01:28, 15 October 2009 (UTC)

My bad. I don't usually play during the holidays, so my event experience is mostly limited to the Dragon Festival. ··· Danny Pew Pew 19:39, 15 October 2009 (UTC)

Wyn's guess is a pretty good one (though October 31 is a Saturday). We'll be putting up the event page next week with all the details. --Regina Buenaobra 19:45, 16 October 2009 (UTC)

Woops... I misread my calendar :P -- Wyn talk 00:08, 17 October 2009 (UTC)

Skill icons

hai Regina. I've asked... six different people about this now, but the responses have mainly been "Ask somebody else," "no idea," "huh?", and "<no reply.>" I copy/pasted this from Matthew's talk page:

I work with the game's icons for a variety of purposes, from improving them with texmod (example, explanation) to... well, that's about it, actually. Anyway, if you didn't know, a few months/years/whatever ago, ANet released "skill card packs" (here) consisting of gloriously high-resolution skill icons... with a positively atrocious JPEG compression. Ordinarily, I could live with that as I have "legitimately acquired" a tool to remove JPEG artifacts in photoshop (also acquired through entirely legitimate business practices), but that skill pack is actually missing a lot of icons: all icons available only in PvE as well as any no longer actually in the game, to be specific. I've been talking to some of the artists, but they've completely ignored my plea.

Could you ask somebody with access to the icons to release them sometime? :o Preferably in the .png compression format. If you don't want to use too much server resources, you could upload them to mediafire/rapidshare/etc. or just use a torrent file, so that after I finished it'd be my bandwidth and not yours. I've also been working on using them to improve the wiki's icons, which currently look miserable because A) they're JPEGs and B) whoever made the in-game versions used a terrible resampling method and then oversharpened them. —Jette 08:22, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

Considering that Guild Wars came out when dial-up was still relatively standard, I wouldn't be surprised if the icons were mangled in favor of smaller files sizes. ··· Danny Pew Pew 19:46, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

Client/Server. is for Raine, etc. 19:51, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

They were mangled because whoever optimized them for game use (the artists make the images, then people at ANet make them work in-game) either A) did it really fast or B) didn't know what they were doing. —Jette 20:30, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

That happens when you don't check the advanced options and slide reduce the compression that is usually set as "awful" by default. MithTalk 00:13, 7 October 2009 (UTC)

.dds textures are really stupid. Their supposedly "lossless" compression method actually isn't, but most people don't notice the artifacts because the image format is so uncommon. The only benefit in using it is that it's the native format used by graphics cards. In any event, this was definitely just oversharpening and bad resampling. The release of the high-res images in .jpg format was undoubtedly intentional, since they get the best compression ratio, but of course that means that the image quality was terrible. They could have released them as jpeg2000, which gets an even better compression ratio and can still be (mostly) corrected by a different algorithm; or could have merely made the sheets smaller rather than posting a huge 3D model and some artwork nine times on each page which would have more than saved the space necessary to use .png compression, but apparently using 20-year-old lossy compression combined with a poor design scheme seemed a better idea at the time. —Jette 11:22, 7 October 2009 (UTC)

Jette: Unfortunately, there isn't an easy or simple solution to this question. Many, many different artists worked on the skill icons, and the icons won't necessarily be in a uniform state/format (I don't know what state/format they're in). A lot of the artists who worked on those skill icons may no longer be at the company. We're talking about hundreds of different icons, and with the artists (the ones who are still here who actually worked on them) being pressed for time on other projects, it would be a burden on them to make a request to open up hundreds of files and save them in the requested format. There is no single person at the company who works only on skill icons, so this request, while it seems simple on the outside, is actually not that easy to fulfill. I've asked about it, and I think you'll just have to be patient with this one. I'm sorry that I don't have a better answer for you. --Regina Buenaobra 23:40, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

So

In short the community claims :

• The bars are not original at all

=> From a legal standpoint they are but from a moral standpoint they aren't.

• The bars either exploit the omniscience or can't be played correctly by hero's.
• People are dissapointed because they thought that meta builds shouldn't be submitted.
• People are frustrated because of the resources spent on getting this done while it will change little.Some expected alot to happen but in reality it won't change a bit.
• To finish off even if you say people misinterpreted (I proly didn't spell that right) the rules it doesn't matter.Since most peeps still were under the impression that you'd do it that way so basicly it doesn't really matter.

Just saying it all without the rage Lilondra *poke* 16:35, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

Lil....I think they're done responding to this. It was a mess. They know it, we know it. We're upset...and I'm sure they're upset. In my opinion, it's time to let them move on. They have a rather LARGE shit-list of stuff they need to get done, none of which we've heard about in a while, so let's try to get them to focus on that rather than the terrible excuse for a failure that was the Henchmen contest. Karate Jesus 16:43, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

added one thing. also, you spelled misinterpreted right :3 - Wuhy 17:24, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

one thing i have to add is the blatant copy and paste of pvx wiki builds that won.- Zesbeer 20:45, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

What exactly do they have to be upset about?? That they're understaffed due to their own lack of foresight all this year? ...seems to me like a quandary that would solve itself... IoW: 1> Slow down -- 2> Embrace "transparency" and Put the details out first -- 3> Sit back a few and actually listen to the feedback from other gamers. 9 times out of 10 they'll see ways to save time or veto unnecessary work. Or at the very least will be sympathetic when a catch22 is apparent. THIS situation however is definitely NOT in that second category... --ilr 21:28, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

Sorry, Lil. I'll just shorten it to this, Thank you Regina for proving that you know nothing about Guild Wars to the community. Cheers! Psychiatric Consultant 19:32, 7 October 2009 (UTC)

Besides the fact that this is regina's page can you leave the answers to regina ? I don't believe in it myself but atleast give them a chance to prove themselves (well another one) Lilondra *poke* 19:05, 7 October 2009 (UTC)

Ascalon

I've been wondering about this but it's something that's been conspicuously absent from every GW2 interview thus far, so I thought I'd ask about it. Feel free to move this if there's somebody else who would be more appropriate to answer, as I wasn't sure where to put this but as you're the community manager, I thought you might know. It's something that as yet none of you have mentioned when talking about GW2 at all and, as I said, is a question that has been repeatedly been left out of interviews. Anyway, here it is. Will the reclamation of Ascalon be addressed at some point in GW2? Not looking for spoilers here, no need to get into the how or the when or any kind of details. Just a yes/no is enough. At least so that we know it hasn't been forgotten about. It's a gaping story thread that's been hanging open ever since the Searing in the original GW and which has yet to be resolved. I know that there are some among both the humans and the Charr that are working toward a truce, which is fine, but that's not necessarily the same thing as humanity getting Ascalon back. Thanks for your help! --Nathe 16:07, 9 October 2009 (UTC)

Don't know what Regina will be able to say about this, probably not much. But my guess is that, since The Movement of the World specifically talks about the rightful king of Ascalon returning to Ascalon City with either Adelbern's or Prince Rurik's sword, then I think it's a safe bet that this will be a pretty major part of the story in GW2. They also talk about how in the GW2 there is the main storyline (the fight against the dragons) and then each race has their own story as well, so I would bet big that the Human story is about finding one of the swords and bringing it back to Ascalon City. But that's all conjecture, so any word from Regina on this would certainly be welcome ;-) (Satanael | talk) 18:57, 9 October 2009 (UTC)

I understand what you're saying and I agree that that's likely to be a significant part of the human story in GW2, but simply bringing the sword back to Ascalon City isn't the same as reclaiming Ascalon itself and driving out the Charr. That's what I'm asking about. --Nathe 19:34, 9 October 2009 (UTC)

The one true king of Ascalon returning with the sword would almost have to be a part of some sort of reclamation. I mean, how would he just show up deep in charr territory say "I am the true king of Ascalon!", and then not go to war with the charr? On the other hand, Rin is now the charr capitol, and they've said that the races are not going to go to war with each other in this initial thing, so I don't think there will be a full reclamation. Furthermore, they've said that the charr were driven south by a dragon, but that only Zhaitan will be the main focus of this campaign. So it could be that they will save the reclamation of Ascalon for a later expansion, one in which the humans help the charr go kill that dragon and take their homeland back in return for letting the humans take back most or all of Ascalon? (Satanael | talk) 16:15, 14 October 2009 (UTC)

I can see that, yeah. I'm just hoping for some official comment on the whole thing, is all, since they've said absolutely nothing thus far about it. And none of the interviewers have asked about it, either. Nathe 16:50, 14 October 2009 (UTC)

Yeah, you're right, I mean, thinking about it is fun, but getting an official word would be awesome. (Satanael | talk) 16:52, 14 October 2009 (UTC)

As would be the battle to retake Rin and bring down the Iron Citadel. That would be just all kinds of epic. ^_^ A thought just occurred to me, separate from that. Perhaps the true king/queen of Ascalon and Adelbern's lost descendant might in fact be our character, if we play as a human. That would certainly give us clout enough to close the human/Charr conflict and forge alliances with the other races against the dragons. More so than just some random adventurer doing a few quests would have. Again, though, it's just a thought. --Nathe 19:37, 14 October 2009 (UTC)

That would be cool, but I doubt they would do it that way. I mean, after all, if are characters become the king/queen of an entire kingdom, even a lost one, we would have all kinds of responsibilities that wouldn't let us go galavanting about on other continents fighting dragons, undead kings and evil xenophobic emperors. (Satanael | talk) 19:47, 14 October 2009 (UTC)

Well... I really can't go into much detail on that, unfortunately. What I can say is that there may be some information included in the Guild Wars novels, which will cover the 250 years between GW1 and GW2. --Regina Buenaobra 23:23, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

That only details the fall, though, since the books take place before GW2. Not the reclamation, which is what I was asking about. As I said, a simple yes/no on whether it will even be addressed in GW2 was all I was looking for. Because the continual avoidance of that topic by both the devs and the interviewers is somewhat odd, to say the least. --Nathe 12:52, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

RR Day, Halloween, Wintersday, and code 15s/13s/200s/etc.

Hey Regina, I have a question. Recently I noticed that every RR day inevitably leads to code 13s, code 15s, etc. And eventually makes the game unplayable. And that's only with 60 districts. So my question is this: Will the servers be able to handle the much larger number of districts that will be common during the Halloween and Wintersday events? I remember last year during the Halloween finale there were over 100 districts in LA and Kama. If the servers can't handle 60 districts, how are they going to be able to handle over 100? Karate Jesus 18:30, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

pretty sure this hasn't been a problem during any prior holidays. You also have to consider what people are doing in those districts. During holidays, the vast majority of players are just epic idling in Nine Rings or whatever. Vili 点 20:12, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

Well, I guess I'm more worried about the Costume Brawl. I think the dynamic is the same as the PvP modes of click to enter, wait, then join team, etc. And we've had TONS of server problems today (although, according to Regina on Guru it's a latency problem between Germany and the US and has nothing to do with Anet -.-) Karate Jesus 20:14, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

i am sure they bring on extra servers to handle the extra traffic during thous times.- Zesbeer 20:46, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

Extra servers? I thought all the servers they had were in Austin, Texas. If they had extra servers why wouldn't they be used all the time so the fiasco that was PvP today wouldn't happen? Karate Jesus 00:59, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

Because that would mean they would actually be able to fix mAT and that would make them look bad.Now tbh I'm hoping they just get the extra servers and I'm actually expecting it.Not doing it would be a really bad idea.Lilondra 05:54, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

Gotta love loading into Halls and having 0 other teams on the map. is for Raine, etc. 17:16, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

Or AB or GvG or playing against 2 guys in JQ/FA. Sunday was a PvP nightmare. Seriously, though, how are the servers going to handle the holidays? And at this point....I think the whole "it's a latency issue between Germany and the US" wont cut it. This happens every RR day and it's not just some coincidence because of latency issues. Karate Jesus 17:20, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

By now you should be used to anet always using some flawed excuse be it legal mumbo jumbo or latency issues Lilondra 17:29, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

I am, but that doesn't mean that I want more excuses come Halloween. I actually like the Halloween of GW and I really don't want it screwed up and then excused away....as everything else has been done lately. Karate Jesus 17:39, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

I was actually playing quite a bit yesterday and the entire time I got one whole Error 15. I think ANet might not be fucking with us on this one. ··· Danny Pew Pew 20:37, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

Well, I got at least a dozen and people in my ally were constantly bitching about it (as well as people in outposts and forums). It was pretty bad and widespread. Karate Jesus 20:40, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

Get better internet connections. My 20 Mb/s connection didn't cough up a single 200 all day. ;o ··· Danny Pew Pew 20:43, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

I have 20 Mb/s too. :/ I even live in Texas where the servers are (I think). So it should stand to reason that I would have the least "latency" problems. Karate Jesus 20:49, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

I spoke with the network team, and they reported that the connectivity issues on Sunday were related to network traffic between the servers in Europe and the US, and not related to the servers. They've been monitoring it, and have been re-routing traffic between the peering companies we use, as needed. I'm sorry that folks were having issues connecting over the weekend. During special events, due to the increased amount of network traffic and people connecting, players may experience a few issues, and the network team does what they can to try and compensate. --Regina Buenaobra 22:57, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

Team Arena/Hero Battles Closure

Can you tell us whether or not SD will be added to the game when HB/TA are removed? It would be nice to know. And will there be an in-game announcement concerning this? I think it would be appropriate considering how many players aren't aware. Karate Jesus 21:38, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

Agreed with KJ, some form of non-website-based announcement that HB/TA are being removed is absolutely essential. I also wonder what will happen to the players who were in the outposts for TA and HB when they're removed from the game- I trust the Live team has already considered this, though. elix Omni 21:46, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

^ I'm assuming that that's part of the "waiting on QA" thing. ··· Danny Pew Pew 21:52, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

(Edit conflict) They probably get kicked over to GToB or something. --RIDDLE 21:54, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

Or their own guild halls, yeah. But it would be funnier if they were sucked into the dark voids of space. elix Omni 21:57, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

(Edit conflict) "waiting on QA" is bullshit when it's 4 days away. Also the lack of info about SD is upsetting. I'm guessing we'll need to wait until after Halloween for that. Boy, wont Guild Wars players take that well. 2 PvP formats removed and nothing added. Ugh...there's going to be soooo much whining. And Felix...that would be hilarious! Karate Jesus 21:57, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

I'm sure the empty TA outpost will see quite a riot. ··· Danny Pew Pew 21:59, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

Who said the whining will come from TA/HB players? Just saying....it'll happen. Karate Jesus 22:02, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

There are gripes with any modification in anything, because there is always someone who disagrees. Trolls will be trolls. ··· Danny Pew Pew 22:04, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

k now let's all shut up so Regina can read this section and respond without wading through billious curds of prattle. elix Omni 22:07, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

seconded at what Kj said. that was my exact question.- Zesbeer 12:29, 20 October 2009 (UTC)

Having the brand new arena compete with Costume Brawl wouldn't be the best of starts for it... 24.197.253.243 13:12, 20 October 2009 (UTC)

Actually, better in-game communication would be appreciated all around. It seems now that support plans on banning for RR day. At least some of the players who participated in RR day were PvE players and had no idea it was match manipulation (cause and point: My whole alliance). Now they're all scared to death they're going to be banned for participating in it the last three weeks. If there had been some in-game communication saying that RR day was against the rules, all of this could have been avoided. Karate Jesus 21:15, 20 October 2009 (UTC)

Also, I just saw the log-in announcement and noticed you're not announcing this. God, the communication lately.... Karate Jesus 21:24, 20 October 2009 (UTC)

If HB is being removed on Thursday, will there even BE another RR day? I don't see why it is so necessary to do a special announcement that says.. hey... all you who have been cheating are going to be punished. They should know that by cheating, they can be banned. The fact that so many don't consider it cheating says more about the state of the playerbase than any lack of communication by Anet. -- Wyn talk 21:48, 20 October 2009 (UTC)

This section is concerning HB/TA removal, not RR day. I was using RR day as an example. I was hoping Anet would announce that TA/HB would be removed, because I've noticed that a lot of people don't know. Obviously I don't expect them to announce it now. That would just be asinine. Karate Jesus 21:51, 20 October 2009 (UTC)

"The fact that so many don't consider it cheating says more about the state of the playerbase than any lack of communication by Anet." <--- that kind of thing is a Yes and a No. There's a lot of misinformation within the community, or just a lack of knowledge. Most people aren't even fully aware of the agreement they accepted when first starting on Guild Wars, had they, they might have seen that the RR-Day was match manipulation without waiting a couple of days of this for Gaile to say it was, which was obvious from the get-go but never-the-less.

Arenanet has, and always has had, far more power at keeping people informed than what they are using. Although they have their official website, although there are places like the wikis and forums, Arenanet doesn't use even some of the more basic functions to their fullest, like the log-in screen when keeping the players informed. This RR-Day non-sense is a matter that highlights this. Should Arenanet had informed the players, on a more global sense not a more limited sense, a lot of this could have been avoided. As is true with many situations; had Arenanet used the login status window for more than just password, plishing or "Don't buy gold" messages a lot of the current level of tension could have been avoided. As with what Karate Jesus mentions many people are unaware, even after all this time, that TA/HB are to be removed and replaced with Sealed Deck. This is a clear indiciation that the methods used to keep the player-base informed are less than nominal considering what it possible in such respects. Yet, this is something that has been true for some time now.

A current trend is to move more and more away from common sense, Arenanet is now extending on to Twitter and other social networks, which are not actually helping anything, actually the same can be true with Twitter and Facebook as with the TA/HB situation, or just with what Arenanet is doing, it appears a lot of the player base has no clue about any of it. This also leads to more confusion and can we take it all seriously: just look at the Feedback Portal sitaution here and Regina saying on Twitter that there was no legal place to take Guild Wars 2 suggestions. Communication is key, but Arenanet has, and still is, missing the lock.

Long-winded typing is long-winded. Arenanet has the potential of centralising information, releasing it directly into the players lap, either via the login screen or introducing a possible popup window once the Account has been logged in, something to make it insanely obvious that Arenanet actually wants to keep it's players in the loop. Such things are not unreasonable, can be clicked away this is true, but it's in-game, not on a website or unofficial websites where messages can be questioned for their seriousness.

More concise communication is something I wanted to see more of, especially with it being within their power: login screen use or more direct in-game methods of keeping the players informed, but Arenanet seems to think moving more and more away from common sense, more into the realms of Twitter and the likes, seeing these as a more worth-while investment of time. Which is sad. That's my opinion. ~~000.00.00.00~~ 22:42, 20 October 2009 (UTC)

Wow, nice post 000. Hey, do me a favor and add your ideas to the talk page on my feedback page on better communication Feedback:User/Karate Jesus/Better In-Game Communication. I want to add that to my suggestion (hopefully, they actually read them). Karate Jesus 22:51, 20 October 2009 (UTC)

Thanks. I will do that shortly. ~~000.00.00.00~~ 00:55, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

At the same time, the fact that Guild Wars is an online game means that anyone who actually wants to know more about the game has the means to do so, be it by looking at the official website, or by looking at the official wiki (which is linked from within the game itself). Lack of willingness to see the information by players isn't the same as lack of communication from Arena Net. The removal of HB is the perfect example of this - most people are not going to have their gameplay changed thanks to the removal of HB, given how that's exactly the reason why HB is being removed; therefore, it doesn't make any sense to give so much coverage about this piece of news, especially considering how it would be poor marketing to advertise removal of game content. It's much wiser to use the log in screen for announcements such as the Halloween event and similar things that Arena Net has already been doing for a long time. Erasculio 01:05, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

Guys. You're spewing more text than a diarrheic typewriter. Is patience really so hard? elix Omni 01:16, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

I agree fully with KJ here. The fact that you have the means to consult wiki and official website doesn't mean you have to; you could even not now that they exist. You purchased Guild Wars, not GWW or GW.com, so everything should be announced on the game client. It's like if you follow a TV show, and after a while the producers start an ARG (Alternate Reality Game), and you HAVE to follow it through websites and RL to understand/follow the story of the show. It just makes no sense. -- Large 14:12, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

Actually, that's a great analogy for this. It simply doesn't make sense that this information isn't available in-game. However, I really don't think we're going to see an answer to this guys. They're obviously not announcing the removal of TA/HB this week (which means unless you happen to read the Wiki or the forums, you wont know :/) and the rest of this is a suggestion...which would be a feedback thing...for which I've already created a page. Karate Jesus 14:45, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

The TV show is, indeed, a good analogy. You don't have to look at the GW website or at the GWW in order to understand the story of Guild Wars; however, if you want to see news about the future of the game, you better look at one of those sites, just as TV shows often present teasers and news about their future in magazines and websites. Erasculio 17:48, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

Or, you know, at the end of every episode :/ Karate Jesus 17:50, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

So you heard about the cast changes for the Simpsons at the end of one of their episodes? Erasculio 17:56, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

I haven't watched the Simpsons since I was 15 :D. And cross promotions is just a thing for TV shows to get more money from online advertisers. You know that as well as I do. And now I think we're off topic. Karate Jesus 17:59, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

Even if you had watched, you wouldn't have heard about the actors being changed because that was not mentioned in any episode. Likewise, all TV shows have news that are not announced in the 15 seconds long "in the next episode..." epilogue (which would be equivalent, in Guild Wars, to Ogden's Benediction). Books do not end letting people know the date the sequel will be released, or who will write it, or the details about its story. All kinds of media have news made available somewhere else; Guild Wars only follows that pattern, as it should. If you disagree, feel free to demand Arena Net to list the entire content of the game updates on the log-in screen, for all the good that would (not) do. Erasculio 18:20, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

Times and technologies change, thus methods must adapt. It has now become extremely possible to alert players to important changes in-game, via login screens (which most MMOs/Online games use more than Arenanet does), in-game windows or NPCs. The old ways of 'having to go elsewhere for the news' are old-hat. There is absolutely no good reason to not setting up in-game based communication of what is going on in relation to the game: imagine getting a 'There's a new Arenanet Noticeboard Update avaliable for viewing.' once every so often in the same means as a 'There's a new update avaliable' (though I admit I'm not sure if a reboot would be required, such as with an update). Though it may be technically challenging, at first, to set things up, one must balance what it could achieve; the possible benefits and downsides. It is undeniable that it's in-game where all the players can be reached, and that external methods of communitating changes and stances directly relating to Arenanet and Guild Wars are not being viewed (via the official website, official wiki or forums). Extending more and more away from your player-base is an extremely negative thing. Use the best medium you have right now; the game itself. ~~000.00.00.00~~ 19:03, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

^ Tbh, if GW should be compared to any other type of media, other MMO/Online games should probably be the first ones. And most of the ones I know well commonly use the log-in screen to announce practically everything. Hell, I even played WoW on a private server for a bit and even there they had tons of information on the log-in screen. We're not asking for much here, but seriously not informing the players about TA/HB removal using an in-game format was a mistake. Karate Jesus 19:06, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

Probably not smart to advertise removal of content in the game's login screen, specially when they know how small is the amount of people who enjoy/care about the formats being removed. They'll probably try to overshadow this announcement by announcing Sealed Deck at the same time.--Sensei 19:15, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

(EC) There is an absolutely good reason to not set up an in-game communication for what's going on in relation to the game: that's a waste of resources that Arena Net could be implementing somewhere else. All Guild Wars players have internet access, therefore all of them are capable of looking at one of the current sources of information, including the places that are linked from within the game (in other words, this site).

As far as changes to the game go, if there's one that it makes sense to not let players know about, it's the decision to remove TA and HB. First because only a very small number of players is going to feel any change at all (given how both game modes are going to be removed exactly because so few people care), and second because removing content from the game, while necessary once in a while, is not the most popular course of action ever. Erasculio 19:19, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

'Hey, guys, after much consideration we're removing two formats of game play due to low player-interest, but don't dispair, from the ashes of the old comes the new: Sealed Deck, an exciting new format for PvP'" Arenanet has released information that 'removed' content is going to be reworked for the new, pity is how even though they've release this information elsewhere that a lot of people are still unaware that 'something old' is going, but in it's place 'something new' is coming. It's a pity that though they've released elsewhere that skill updates are now bi-monthly instead of month that a lot of people are still unaware. It's a pity that though they have announced it elsewhere people are unaware of Arenanet's Twitter/Facebook pages and their new 'information release' approach.

No, it's not the most popular course of action to remove something, but in a situation such as what's actually happening it's a reworking of old content into something new. ~~000.00.00.00~~ 19:24, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

They are removing something now with the promise of adding something else later. If you really think adding Sealed Deck is enough to completely prevent whining over the removal of HB and TA, I have a couple of epic long rants posted on this wiki to show you.

It is a pity that players could choose to see information about Guild Wars and yet chose to not do so. It is their problem, though, not Arena Net's; all they can do is make that information available, as they are already doing. Erasculio 19:34, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

"If you really think adding Sealed Deck is enough to completely prevent whining over the removal of HB and TA, I have a couple of epic long rants posted on this wiki to show you." WTF are you on about? Dude!

For your second comment: It's an ineffective approach releasing information knowing all too well that the approach isn't the most effective means of information release in the first place. Having information within the medium people are using is far more productive than external means, even if it's releasesd on the official website or the like, or the newsletter (to which I am which I hardly see popping into my inbox which is a shame). You have to cater to the fact, such as with say the Auction Houses people have set up, that most people don't want to have to leave the game to do/get game-related stuff, such as with getting information, I'd hazard a guess that more people would be informed, or be interested of getting informed, if they had an in-game means of doing so. Times are changing, developers need to adapt. ~~000.00.00.00~~ 19:44, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

In other words, you cannot reply to the fact that it doesn't matter what Arena Net may add, the fact that they will remove content from the game would still cause complains, and therefore it only makes sense that such news isn't being shouted at the top of Arena Net's lungs.

See, it doesn't really matter if players who today don't want to know more about Guild Wars (and thus don't access the website or the wiki) would have easier access to more information, given how they already don't want to know more. Your assumption that Arena Net should take resources away from actually improving the game in order to let players who don't really care know more about the game is as fundamentally wrong as your opinion that Arena Net would have to adapt to your specific opinion. Erasculio 20:00, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

There will always be whining about something, Eras, this can not be avoided; whether it's valid or invalid complaints people will always do this. As for reallociating resources even if it means having it there for people who 'don't care' (which is a sweeping generalisation), I know of a developer that has spent the time to do things similiar to how I would advise, Eve Onlines In-game browser as example. I have to say I wasn't interested with it in the begin, didn't really 'care' for it, until I was actually told how useful it could be, then started using it and then it become an incredibly powerful tool. What you may think is fundamentally wrong doesn't mean it will always be as such, Eras, you also have to consider that if something becomes avaliable to a person they will access it's viability to them, and, as with what Regina says all to often, "things change" and views change. I would encourage you to stop thinking on a one-dimensional level, situation change, so to do people. ~~000.00.00.00~~ 20:55, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

GG Era... this is why we can't have nice things. --ilr 21:05, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

Sealed Deck will be added when TA and HB are removed (barring any unforeseen circumstances...). Speaking to Linsey and Joe this morning, there isn't anything they can think of at the moment that would prevent Sealed from going live this week (but you never know). Lots of details to come with the actual update, though. :-) --Regina Buenaobra 22:33, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

Some people (I've thought about it also) are concerned that halloween is going to overshadow some of the new updates (it'd be cool to have everyone get into sealed deck, but everyone will likely be off doing halloween things. Myself, I know I will be playing costume brawl.), and personally, I was wondering why you would release them both at once? Underated 21:02, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

You see, walls of text like this is why you don't always get a response from ANet :S ---Chaos- (talk) -- 00:09, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

GW2 PvE

I'm concerned by ^that since yes, you said you want to avoid grind(and that is great) but we still haven't heard anything about things like buff consumables, potions, pve skills, grindable professions(like crafting/tailoring) and shit like that... I saw many retards on gw2guru supporting this kind of utter crap but I hope Anet still has enough sensibility to avoid this. (Yes, you did it in eotn but you[anet] said you learned from your mistakes). This may seem to some clueless ppl that they add content to the game and are awesome, but look at the direction gw1 pve took after this, its so terrible that there are no words for it. Anet already stated they are adding crafting and I can just hope you guys can pull it off the right way and the pve does not get ruined by this. God mode and imbalance is not fun in the long run, if you want pve to be any decent with replayable high-end content, then this is mandatory. - Wuhy 16:27, 13 October 2009 (UTC)

Moved it to my talk please add the moved to tag I don't know how to do it. Lilondra *poke* 17:36, 15 October 2009 (UTC)

← moved to User talk:Lilondra#Moved From Regina's Page

None of the things you yaddayadda about are inherently bad. Only the way you implement them is bad. It's like titles. Achievement titles like protector, skill hunter, cartographer or vanquisher are good, they are based on doing something one. Each point different, and you earn the title making different things. Titles like the allegiance titles, survivor or treasure hunter are not so good. They are based on doing something that can be done anywhere, and so many people just look for the fastest place and do it again and again. Similar things happens with anything. For example, potions are nice if they are just a bonus to recover in a pinch, but they have some kind of cooldown, or limitation on how many you can carry or any other downside so they don't become "the way" to recover and people go around with an inventory filled with them like in the first Diablo. And crafting tailoring is not bad if you go with 'recipes' that are relatively easy to master, and you master each one, and the hardet part is getting the recipes and materials, not spending hours getting materials making the same item again and again. And fishing is not bad if getting each different fish or getting abig fish is more important than fishing again and again to fill a 'fishing' exp bar. I mean 'doing different things' should be more important that 'repeating things'. This can be applied even to farming. There are ways to avoid people looking for the 'optimal place to farm' and do it again and again, like, for example making less monsters appear for you in one place the more you kill, until they move way or become almost extinct for some time. MithTalk 17:46, 15 October 2009 (UTC)

Setting the maxing of titles aside, most of the "repetitive" titles offer a few ways to do them. EotN titles - you can vanquish different areas, do books. Luxon/Kurzick? Again, vanquishing, AB, FA, JQ... It's just that people always flock to the fastest one and grind that :/ No amount of balancing the different ways will suffice, since there will always be the one easiest/fastest way that people will flock to. — Poki#3 (talk) 17:59, 15 October 2009 (UTC)

Yup, that is the problem with those. Books help with that a bit, but people still go for 'runs' they make again and again to max the titles as soon as possible. MithTalk 00:11, 16 October 2009 (UTC)

Right now we're not talking about game mechanics for GW2, but your concerns and hopes for those features are noted. --Regina Buenaobra 01:00, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

There should be a title for complaining about grind, like Legendary Grind Hater. There would be several maxed titles from just the people that comment on this page. :P I'm not saying I like the grind, but one thing that I've always said is, most GW grind is not grind that you absolutely have to do. It's a choice. Sure there is a little grind you have to do, but not so much that you wouldn't get if you just played the game normally. I'm not saying I want GW grind in GW2, but if there is, I won't go complaining about it. I will decide whether to do it or not. --24.92.116.83 21:25, 30 October 2009 (UTC)

Hero Battles

--- Sealed already released. --Regina Buenaobra 01:02, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

Until sealed deck is implemented, here is a suggestion. Require 4 wins in HB minimum and only get 3000 faction for the HB zaishen combat quest.— The preceding unsigned comment was added by 173.61.28.182 (talk) at 17:38, 18 October 2009 (UTC).

That would slow it down but it wouldn't stop it.-- anguard 17:39, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

Let resigning make you dishonored. Like AB. Fix't? BlazeRick 17:57, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

Nope. Most people leave rather than resign. Please don't suggest fixes for something that you don't understand. Karate Jesus 18:18, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

For your info Karate Jesus you still get dishonorable for leaving a pvp match so it would get rid of red resign.--Soul of misery 20:42, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

Just wait till they are able to fix SD.Lilondra 18:20, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

For something I don;t understand? I was merely suggesting to put the dishonoring system that RA and AB has in HB. Liek. What giefs? Leaving marks you too, dog. BlazeRick 18:38, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

dont mind karate jesus, everyone pretty much has the same opinion about him. --adrin 18:41, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

Same goes for you adrin :/ Karate Jesus 18:49, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

Another "nou" battle.. - Reanimated X 18:55, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

Teach me how to do this Gild Wors. BlazeRick 18:56, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

It is meant to fix the economy and make it 4x slower which will make it not very profitable. — The preceding unsigned comment was added by 173.61.28.182 (talk) at 19:28, 18 October 2009 (UTC).

It costs nothing. If you spend nothing and get something, it's profitable. elix Omni 19:31, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

/care i mean for reals this is probably the last time you will be able to play hb rr i am more then certain we wont see another rr before they remove it.- Zesbeer 20:48, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

look at dat i was right.- Zesbeer 01:10, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

If you want to be awesome

Make a guild with ArenaNet Inc.[anet] name, make everyone at anet join and do daily gvgs. <3 - Wuhy 21:19, 27 October 2009 (UTC)

lol Anet staff playing GvGs lol. Karate Jesus 21:21, 27 October 2009 (UTC)

TF2 staff play test everyday, and their game doesn't have balance issues like this one. 218.214.126.215 00:40, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

Point made, sir....point made. Karate Jesus 00:45, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

Lol @ anet like doing that last time I checked the only gameplay they got was RA and we all know thats a good arena to derive balance issues from.Then again you can derive how F'ed up the powercreep is and they didn't so meh Lilondra 06:55, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

They can't. Jette took the icon already. MithTalk 23:59, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

I'll pass the suggestion along, thanks. :-) --Regina Buenaobra 00:57, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

Perhaps I should reiterate my point

In a previous question, we were told that the lag on RR day caused by "latency issues" or simply the fact that the game servers can no longer handle that many districts, would not be a problem come Halloween. Here's the problem - it is. People (from the U.S., Germany, and England as far as I know) have been having CONSTANT lag issues now that the districts are filling up.
So, I'd like to repeat my question from the archived section. Will the servers be able to hold up during the Halloween event? I'm starting to have serious doubts and I'm pretty sure having widespread lag-outs during the Halloween finale would be a big problem for you guys. Karate Jesus 21:41, 27 October 2009 (UTC)

Yep, in England here and getting some pretty bad constant lag, rarely see a green ping now, and it does seem to be associated with sever population, its better at times when there's less people online. Tidas 22:27, 27 October 2009 (UTC)

New Zealand, constant lag, makes doing the quests and farming harder, I know quite a few Australians are having troubles too. What's causing it I don't know but I doubt it'll be stable through the finale, I can't even stand in LA or Kamadan without primarily red lighting the whole time. Note: this wasn't the case before the festival started. ~~000.00.00.00~~ 22:33, 27 October 2009 (UTC)

Its always been the same for the past few years, with alot of people in a town and also using all their festive items and having minipets out its going to cause some issues, i bet if you went to the lowest district where there is barely anyone in there you will notice less lag issues, ive tried and tested this theory with several friends from all over and its exactly as i said, less people, less lag.Simzy 22:38, 27 October 2009 (UTC)

That's nice and all, but this is going to be a serious issue during the finale if something isn't done. There is rarely a district with "less people" during the finales and mass lag-outs would be bad. Karate Jesus 22:41, 27 October 2009 (UTC)

Maybe the servers just need a defrag, i know of a good program that can do it quicker then most defrag programs, but yeah mass lag-out would be bad indeed.Simzy 22:44, 27 October 2009 (UTC)

Yes, the problem is clearly being caused by the servers' hard drives. elix Omni 22:47, 27 October 2009 (UTC)

^ I'm sure it's just a "latency issue" ;/ Karate Jesus 22:48, 27 October 2009 (UTC)

Wasn't their answer last time "the internet is too big?" It hasn't gotten smaller guys, so don't expect this to be fixed soon. -Auron 23:55, 27 October 2009 (UTC)

It was something about a connection issue between somewhere and something. The whole "internet is too big" thing was the answer to another question. However, I wouldn't doubt it'll be used here. Oh, well. Might as well play another game that isn't lagging (even though they have more people and similar events). Karate Jesus 23:59, 27 October 2009 (UTC)

Funny enough story, more people aren't lagging than are.. -FireFox 00:07, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

And your proof is? Wait, let me guess, your friends? Karate Jesus 00:18, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

I'm concerned as to what will happen when everyone afk's on halloween and they all err 7 out so they dont get the hat(s) --adrin 00:46, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

Which is exactly what I'm talking about. That would cause some pretty extreme backlash. Currently LA, Kama, UW, ToA, and some other outposts are seeing some lag problems (just in general. I'm not making a statement for the majority of the player base). This IS an issue. Whether it gets admitted or not, I don't care. I just want something to be done. Karate Jesus 00:52, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

(Reset indent) I've been at about 78 ping since the event started, tbh. The only time I went over 200 was when I was syncing with Frosty in euro districts. Also, would this be an appropriate time to remind everyone that the internet is not a big truck? ··· Danny Pew Pew 17:46, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

That's b/c you're just another yapper who stands around and reads discussion more than you actually play the game. Last night I was running Abb'sMouth mission with a full group & we started getting those 30-second Death Latencies. One guy Actually got disconnected by it. Then once we completed the mission, the server thought we still had 8 players and it wouldn't let us add any replacement heroes to our Party. So there your PROOF that this is indeed ANET SERVER LAG causing VOODOO BUGS and NOT JUST SOMETHING THEY CAN BLAME ON ISPs. It was easy enough to fix that bug though... we just zoned to Int'l District and that re-synched everything --ilr 22:23, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

I'm not sure what to say. I have a top of the range computer with a 20meg fibre-optic cable line and I have had occasional pings over halloween of about 3000, this seems to happen in spurts. Normally it runs at about 80-ish but then for no reason it will just have a lag spike. This happens with NONE of my other games, however I know that proves nothing, but just thought i would put forward my own experience. -- Salome 22:31, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

Guys, please, Arenanet has the most stable servers in the world. All these issues expressed, and all before and all in the future, are, as always, out of Arenanet's control and everyone elses fault. If only the rest of the world caught up with the awesomeness of Arenanet all would be awesome too. hehehehehehe. ~~000.00.00.00~~ 22:44, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

Actually, I've been cb'ing. Next time you want to hit edit, make sure you squeeze out every last bit of autism. ··· Danny Pew Pew 23:16, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

Karate Jesus: If you re-read my response, you'll note that I did not say that lag "would not be a problem come Halloween" (your words). You will note that I said, "the network team does what they can to try and compensate" whenever there are network issues, and this statement still holds. If there are network issues, the network ops team will do what it can to mitigate issues players experience. In terms of server lag, when a lot of players visit the servers during high traffic periods, like festivals, people might experience some issues, often depending on what region of the world they're connecting from. Sometimes network latency, again depending on what region of the world a player is connecting from, might affect a player's experience of server lag. Again, this is something our tech team tries to mitigate as best they can. I've let the server team know about your concerns, and they will keep an eye on things on the server side. Today they have reported no issues. The network team is also aware of these concerns and they will keep an eye on things as well. --Regina Buenaobra 00:53, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

No issues? Really? Shocking -.- Guess I'll just play other games that don't have lag issues until Halloween is over :/ Karate Jesus 14:06, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

KJ, did you ever stop to consider that it might be your side thats having the problem? You could check with your ISP to see if they are having issues, if not then its your connection in your home that might be causing it, routers can cause some issues even with the ports forwarded, i know a guy in Canada who was having issues because of his router so he changed the firmware and now its fine, another suggestion is set your network card to 100/mbps half duplex mode, thats helped me alot in the past, 1 final suggestion is that you could try to netstat one of the server ip's that appear ingame when you move your mouse of the ping icon and that should help you get a clue as to where your connection might be suffering the most.Simzy 14:19, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

Nice try, but I always check my end first. Called my ISP, they said I'm good. Ran a diagnostic test, said I'm good. I use PingPlotter, so I checked it, and it said my end was good (still does actually). I have a fast connection, no problems on other games (which would imply that it's not an issue with my end), and know enough about this stuff to know that it's not my fault...otherwise I wouldn't have posted. And trust me, I'm not blaming the servers (although I am suspicious). It's probably a issue along the connection route that I have no way of correcting; however, Anet usually can do something by having their guys do what Regina has already said they're doing. My connection has been better today, but my alliance and a lot of friends are struggling. Karate Jesus 15:02, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

I like how it tells you to check your connection if you run two Guild Wars at once and one of them disconnects. King Neoterikos 22:10, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

I'm still not convinced that anything's seriously wrong with ArenaNet's servers. I've yet to experience a ping over 200, except when I decide to zone into AD1 Kamadan - but that's to be expected. ··· Danny Pew Pew 22:46, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

Maybe ArenaNet likes you so much that they secretly laid a fiber optic cable directly from their servers to your home. elix Omni 22:47, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

Codex Arena is Awesome!

I must say I love the new format. It really forces the players to think to make up original bars that may not be a part of the current meta.

Some players have presented issues *6 fire skills but no fire attunement*, *Air attunement but only invoke and gale*, *lack of healing prayers*

I see this as being common with a randomized system. I also see it as perfectly acceptable. If a player can't work with the 20 skills he/she has been given, he/she needs to either change their secondary, change their primary, or try again the next day as the skills will constantly change.

In response to the above issues, I would like to ask you this, Regina. * I would ask Linsey, but she locked her page because it was overflowing :D

What system did the Live Team use to determine the random choice of the 20 skills? Are there any mechanics in place to prevent same or similar skills to be chosen on consecutive days? And are the skills divided into tiers as a form of usefulness as they have been in Sealed-Deck sanctioned tournaments at past PAX events?

Thank you for your consideration, again, love the new format :) --Malchior Devenholm 03:36, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

I'm a bit worried, it's almost too random with too many Elites to pick from but not enough support powers. Some primaries apparently just get locked out of attacks entirely (like Paragons were today) while other classes can just look through the long(ish) list of Elites, load up PvX, and then Broadcast their that exact build (or whatever is improvised for it) by it's known Meta nickname. I fail to see how that reinforces "honorable" play. --ilr 05:23, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

I don't like very much the fact of people making teams to enter. I though it would be a bit more like the costume brawling, just with a more skills, but still letting anyone in. If you have to form a team, those that PUG may find themselves with a 'trend of the day', in which only the 4 professions with the best 4 elites are used. If parties was formed randomly, then success won't depend just on how good are the players on finding that 'build of the day' - usually in pages like PvXWiki - leaving the other 6 professions and players that favor them out. Instead of that, random formation will allow anyone to join, and the Honor system will keep them inside even if it's not the 'build of the day' party. And then it would depend just on the skill of each player separately, not on the knowledge of the party leader or the pages he checks. At least I hope the system checks which skills are most used each day, and prevents them from appearing again for a while. Something like a 'weight' system. The more a skill is picked in the Codex, the 'heavier' it gets, and the harder it is for it to appear again. And the heaviest skills are completely left out of the daily list. MithTalk 11:35, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

kind of agreed with mith but i also feel that the arena is really defense based and thus making matches last for ever. every time i have played we need two healers to get anywhere because of the lack of good healing skills. i also think it would be awesome to have a random codex were you cant make a team you just have a bar and hit enter like you said but i also like the team aspect of it because not all the time do i have a full party of 6-8 to play gvg or ha and ab is super stale right now. so i would be in favor of either more skills per day and have it change every other day or buff the skills just for the codex. lastly i would love a weighting system to bring the most popular skills out of the loop for a bit or just make them a rarer drop- Zesbeer 11:46, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

We already have Random Arena if you want to pair up with bad people running mediocre bars. Putting out more skills and changing it less often would cause stale metas to sit around for even longer. Also, the point is that the skills are random - weighting out popular (read: useful) skills is just stupid, mostly because it encourages bad gimmicks. ··· Danny Pew Pew 18:35, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

I just want to say that I love how it was coded so that PvE characters could equip and use the codex skills even if they didn't have them bought. Only having to slightly alter PvE equipment is a small trade-off for looking pretty. Mr J 11:56, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

"It really forces the players to think to make up original bars that may not be a part of the current meta."

I just want to point out that after ~2 hours, everyone was running prage sword, glimmer, Weapon of Remedy, and an ele or second frontline. That's a meta if I've ever seen one. is for Raine, etc. 17:53, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

Unfortunately, lazy people will always exist. Bad players will always exist. People will always need an easy route, another person to do the thinking for them, so of course, people will eventually copy paste builds. That can't be prevented.--*Yasmin Parvaneh* 18:19, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

We ran prage axe at that time, then we ran stunning strike(adrin), poison arrow/barbed something(underwood), glimmer/return(pug monk) and weapon of fury(pospospos). Pika Fan 18:21, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

We were running D, Me, E, Mo and wiping that PRage build constantly, for 50 consec, tbh. There are always going to be good combinations and bad combinations from Sealed Deck - you can't expect people to not figure out what works. ··· Danny Pew Pew 18:32, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

In any case, that "Popularity Flagging" weight system pointed out above should really be put into play in the random skill generation code to keep the meta-whoring suppressed. ...IoW: Anyone who can organize stuff neatly and legibly, plz go post your own variants of that suggestion to the Feedback Space. --ilr 21:02, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

Why would you want to suppress meta skills? So bad skills without any utility begin to see play? Removing some of the randomness from SD removes some of the quality of it as well. ··· Danny Pew Pew 21:25, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

OMG Ur Bad at logic...Easily re-organizing around OP Metas is the Antithesis of retaining Randomness. --ilr 21:30, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

You're obviously considering "randomness" to mean "force people to use skills that they wouldn't normally use, not because other skills are necessarily overpowered, but because the skills they're not using are ridiculously situational or just plain bad." ··· Danny Pew Pew 21:44, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

Yes actually... that would be the Definition of "Random". --ilr 21:48, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

^ exactly ilr.- Zesbeer 21:59, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

No, actually. That is NOT the definition of random. Even by your own link "proceeding, made, or occurring without definite aim, reason, or pattern". What random means is, once again by your link, "characterizing a process of selection in which each item of a set has an equal probability of being chosen.". If you take skills out of the possibilities, then you are reducing the randomness of the system. Mr J 22:11, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

But if everyone always chooses the most popular skills everytime they come up, then how does that make it an Equal Probability of every skill being chosen?? --ilr 23:46, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

Hey, at least you have 2 hours of "degenerate meta" free play time. After that, be ready to deal with cookie cutter builds/shitter gimmicks. Gogo new format that's not degenerative. Karate Jesus 23:48, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

That's why I mentioned the weight system. At the end, the more likely to appear would be the crappy skills no one wants, and instead everyone using the Machine Gun and the BFG9000, we'll get into an arena in which everyone has to use the Fist weapon and the Pistol. MithTalk 12:31, 24 October 2009 (UTC)

Ilr, that is the most brain-piercing thing I have ever read and is wrong on SO many levels. Firstly, it's the pool of skills which should be random, not the skills players choose to use. Patient Spirit will show up just as often (given enough time) as Supportive Spirit and thus it is random. Mr J 13:39, 24 October 2009 (UTC)

Okay now I KNOW you're just trolling. Good one, ya totally got me ...which doesn't happen often --ilr 20:28, 24 October 2009 (UTC)

No, you really are wrong. Mr J 20:44, 24 October 2009 (UTC)

moo. I believe you two are discussing random at two different stages. the way Dr J. is describing it is how Regina said Robert said it is implemented: GW randomly selects 20 nonelite, 5 elite skills from the entire pool of skills from each profession every day, and makes them available for players to pick and choose from (non-randomly). I believe ilr is wanting GW to randomly assign your bar when you click 'enter', which would (mostly) turn Codex into rock-paper-scissors (without a careful implementation, i.e. ensuring you don't get four resses and one attack skill), and isn't even in the spirit of Sealed Deck (which I think I can safely assume you'd never done before Codex, otherwise you wouldn't be complaining). In short, you're complaining because people are being rational decision makers, and will always choose skill combinations which maximize their chances of success; i.e., meta is always meta. There's nothing you can do about it. — derp de derp derp a tum tee tiddly tum ta tum Maf 23:06, 24 October 2009 (UTC)

No that's not at all what I said so next time just speak for yourself, thx. ...And yes, there was plenty to be done about it since SD wouldn't have been recommended in HB/TA's place if it was as exploitable as this format is. --ilr 13:32, 25 October 2009 (UTC)

@Malchior Devenholm: I asked Robert about it this afternoon, and he told me that the skill selection for each day is random. Whether skills have been in Sealed Deck tournaments at PAX don't affect whether they will appear in the skills for the day. --Regina Buenaobra 02:02, 24 October 2009 (UTC)

Thank you Regina. Is the Live Team pleased with the format and how the players are reacting to it? Will we hopefully see this transform into an AT done in the traditional 4v4 sealed deck format at the PAX events?--Malchior Devenholm 04:45, 24 October 2009 (UTC)

Couldnt charm animal also res pets since you dont get every day a res skill with it. Death Sligher 15:02, 24 October 2009 (UTC)

Are they happy with the players' reaction to it? Hmm....considering there have been at least 4 threads on Guru talking about hating it, several pages here talking about people hating it, other threads and pages here and in other places questioning its fundamentals, only three districts last night during a common peak time (lol), etc. I'd say they're probably not happy with its reception. It's not a bad format, but definitely not what I think players were expecting (a PvP game type that PvE'ers and PvP'ers could enjoy).

Good thing guilds aren't making cookie cutter builds and grinding it for title points alrea- .....oh wait.... Karate Jesus 13:48, 25 October 2009 (UTC)

Bwaaaaaaaaaah! BlazeRick 13:52, 25 October 2009 (UTC)

Intelligent comment based on solid reasoning and comprehension. -.- Karate Jesus 13:57, 25 October 2009 (UTC)

The real solution was balancing the game they took the shortcut or atleast what seemed to be a shortcut ? Lilondra 14:21, 25 October 2009 (UTC)

I'd have to say I do like the new format, although I think it may have been a bit of a mistake to release the day before Costume Brawl opened. I think the lack of players in Codex Arena right now is largely due to people doing Costume Brawl.--142.68.87.49 17:45, 25 October 2009 (UTC)

Forgot to sign in--Orry 17:46, 25 October 2009 (UTC)

They had to get rid of HB immediately. Not sure why that ditched Team Arena, though. Same exploit?-- anguard 18:06, 25 October 2009 (UTC)

It's not particularly helpful to measure reception by comparing the number of complaint threads to support threads: anyone in customer service can tell you that complaints always outnumber compliments by anywhere from 5:1 to 20:1 (depending on various factors). Also: we don't know whether ANet intended the new format to cater to new PvPers, veteran PvPers, or some combination.

Comparing the number of districts spawned should be a good proxy for popularity. Early in the introduction to the Zaishen challenges (before we knew the schedule), PvE mission outposts generally saw 3–6 districts on the day of a new quest. If we take into account that the availability of PvPer compared to PvEers, then seeing 3 Codex districts spawn during peak hours suggests a reasonable amount of enthusiasm.   — Tennessee Ernie Ford (TEF) 18:29, 25 October 2009 (UTC)

I definitely agree with your quantity based on the realistic proportion the PvP community makes up, but on Day1 it had 9 full districts, Day2 a steep drop to 6... and I don't need to log in right now to know it's under 4... Such dramatic decline means it's not bringing any PvE'ers or new PvP'ers into that community.
Which means that the Live team just wasted THE LAST 7 MONTHS OF WORK FOR NO REASON. And you can't just say "Oh they were SF n00b PvE'ers who weren't gonna PvP anyway, fuck 'em!". You just can't say that because we've seen first hand already what happens when a new venue is executed CORRECTLY and continuously succeeds in getting people out of degenerate routines. --ilr 21:04, 25 October 2009 (UTC)

I think it's part of GW2 "beta". Like the many other things added before. Stable, Daily Quests, Dungeons, GvG Tiebreakers, Books for rep with factions, etc. BlazeRick 22:07, 25 October 2009 (UTC)

I know for myself, and after discussing with allies/friends, that I/we tried Codex, saw the mechanics of the title, the mechanics of the format and how the player-base is interacting within it and won't be doing it again. It's "just become another PvP zone" from our prespective; it's quickly become a 'copy and pasta' environment, negativity, title requirements and the likes, which is why most of us stopped most kinds of PvP (and high-end PvE for that matter). Good effort though, I know there are others who find it's the greatest thing since sliced bread ^_^ ~~000.00.00.00~~ 22:26, 25 October 2009 (UTC)

The quantity thing makes this pretty obvious that it's not been well received. It's not surprising that the CB and ToT farming stole away from the Codex, but if it had been that good, people would still play it over the other stuff. RA, commonly, now has more districts than the Codex. If that doesn't say something about the Codex's reception, from both the PvP AND PvE communities, then I don't know what will. Karate Jesus 01:18, 26 October 2009 (UTC)

RA always had more districts than TA and HB as well - at least Codex has a varying population of players. ··· Danny Pew Pew 18:44, 26 October 2009 (UTC)

I wish they would make codex an 8v8 guild affair. 4v4 arenas that allow players to decide the full party configuration have never been popular. Anet needs to work their new features around things that work, such as RA, CMs, AB, CB, GvG and to an extent HA. ~Pika 152.226.7.202 01:52, 26 October 2009 (UTC)

Lazy Pika no sign in? And you're right, 4v4 with the ability to pre-config a team has always been unpopular, mainly because it is inherently degenerative. 6v6 or 8v8 would have been smarter (I would have liked to see 6v6) or it should have had more of a random aspect to it. Meh. Oh well, we all know Anet isn't into admitting fault, so get used to it. Karate Jesus 02:30, 26 October 2009 (UTC)

lol6v6 PvP. Forgot about the 6v6 HA fiasco? Pika Fan 06:37, 26 October 2009 (UTC)

Thereason they chose 4 peeps is because its easier to set up but like I thought we immediatly get to see how CA is broken :) GOGOGO USE THAT HONORABLE EDA BU...owait Lilondra 06:48, 26 October 2009 (UTC)

I haven't forgotten about the 6v6 HA shitfest, but I'm suggesting that if the format had been different AND the teams had been bigger (maybe even 5 like CB) then it could have been less of a degenerative, cookie-cutter, title whorefest. Karate Jesus 16:08, 26 October 2009 (UTC)

GW has been a titlefest for a few years now. A new format isn;t going to change that. If you can't do with guildies what others can do, then just don't. Feels like reading "BWAH I can;t HA cus I has no Bambi". BlazeRick 16:26, 26 October 2009 (UTC)

I'd argue that it's closer to people complaining about not being able to get champ titles, but the GvG ladder is a joke now so meh. ··· Danny Pew Pew 18:44, 26 October 2009 (UTC)

i think its the lack of skills if they add 2x the amount of skills and had it change every other day i think it would be better. also pvp skills in that areana are fail, along with skills that require spirits or minions and having none is quite fail imho.- Zesbeer 23:08, 26 October 2009 (UTC)

The problem is that in a normal arena you have all the resources you need.Basicly you can take any direction.Be it hexway,gimmickway,othergimmickway,otherothergimmickway,anothergimmickway or relativly balanced.So every team has condition removal,DW,hex removal,... almost every team has knockdown,enchant removal,... . Basicly these are things you *need* to have a decent game going.I don't mind taking lacerating chop but if you have no dismember there is no point.I think that by design assassins and dervs are more likely to be chosen because of the lack of DW warriors often have.So if a "honorable" arena instantly points towards gimmicks thats a really bad start.You need to give every profession X amount of codex skills they get w/e happens and X amount of skills that they can't have.Now many will contest the second but think about it some skills are just to much of terrible terribleness to ever be used,EVER (I'm referring to skills like mending).Lilondra 06:57, 27 October 2009 (UTC)

Either that, or run Codex the way we all thought it would run. An entire team given a deck of skills from which 4 bars must be made. But that would slow down match frequency. I just hope the sanctioned system is used if we happen to get Codex ATs. That will require alot more skill to make bars on a random set of ALL SKILLS than 20 in one profession. And there will be no build of the day, as each team gets a different randomization in the deck.--Malchior Devenholm 13:54, 27 October 2009 (UTC)

I'm pretty sure that would be harder to code and I'm also sure peeps would just rezone till they get a suiting deck.I'm also sure that if they weren't able torezone they would simply get outbuilt by other peeps because they got EDA and you got no viable condition removal Lilondra 07:01, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

Small Thanks

I am sure many not on the Live Team contributed to the awesomeness of the new Halloween content, but I particularly wanted to thank the skill icon artist. I really like the skill icons for the new skills. I know putting "action" into such a small space can be hard, but whoever designed the new ones did a great job. Please pass it along. :) --Ravious 15:58, 27 October 2009 (UTC)

Firstly, I'm pretty sure those are old stock icons. I could be wrong, mind you, but I know for a fact that there are a lot of icons that have just never gotten used (though, to be fair, a good chunk of that number are just different color schemes). Secondly, if there is is a message to pass along, could you do me a big favor and ask if they can put them somewhere? >_> It'd help me out a lot, I'm beautifying the wiki skill icons, and lossy compression is baed for you, liek socialism. –Jette 16:55, 27 October 2009 (UTC)

Socialism lulz. Hf with losing an arm and a leg or, spending either of them to preserve one. BlazeRick 18:08, 27 October 2009 (UTC)

I wonder what margin one can have to adapt, if he restrict himself to one extreme or the other. Yseron - 90.48.131.185 18:26, 27 October 2009 (UTC)

That was either a terrible logicfail or you're quoting someone who didn't fully think that one out. ··· Danny Pew Pew 20:33, 27 October 2009 (UTC)

Can you remind me which country rushed into an economic crisis because of abusive money speculations ? Yseron - 90.28.82.214 19:43, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

Yeah, Jette, I especially like the Agent of the Mad King icon (which I seriously doubt was an old stock icon. I wouldn't mind a high quality version of it. Be a fun forum avatar. --Ravious 18:15, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

Actually, you might be surprised. A lot of Halloween icons existed before this. Also, I dunno what socialism really is, but I hear it's pretty bad. Almost as bad as AIDS. –Jette 19:29, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

Well, people yell out lolsocialismbaed because they can't get it through their thick heads that (partially(!)) government regulated/owned health care really is for the best. And it saves money on the long run, too. Change! But yeah, who cares. Silly topic. BlazeRick 22:13, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

Bahltek

any possibility that we could learn more about him? ~ Dregoloth 20:23, 30 October 2009 (UTC)dregoloth