Hanging Around

When ArenaNet brought back the Marionette event from Scarlet's War, it came in two flavors: Public and Private. The Private version, which can be triggered by anyone capable of finding a full squad of fifty people willing to do it, is a permanent addition to the game but the Public event was only slotted into the calendar for a single week, something that always seemed strange.

While I was cutting the strings I heard quite a few people express a wish and a hope that the Public version might be allowed to hang around a week or two longer, maybe even be added to the roster of regularly returning events. Some (and I was one of them) even suggested it would make a good addition to the World Boss circuit, making it available several times a day in perpetuity.

When Tuesday rolled around, though, the Marionette was locked up in her private playground as promised. I checked after the update to be sure and not only had the notification of the public version disappeared from the corner of the screen but when the hour rolled around there was only one option at the Scrying Pool: go private or go home.

It was with considerable surprise, then, that I read this news item on MassivelyOP a few minutes ago. The very good news is that there will, after all, be a permanent place in the world for the eighty-player public event. 

There will be some "tweaks", the gist of which seems to be that you'll need a critical mass of players before the event will start. That should prevent situations like the hilarious one I enjoyed a few days ago, when I logged my character back in after having logged her out after the public event the day before, only to find myself the only person in the lane.

Figuring I'd fluked an appearance just as the rest of them had gone inside, I sprinted through the barrier, which happened to be green. I found myself on a platform with... Taimi. 

I'd forgotten that little wrinkle from the original run seven years ago, when the event ran in the genuine, non-instanced version of Lornar's Pass and it was entirely possible to find yourself one of a handful of people who'd turned up. The NPCs, Braham, Rox, Taimi and I foget who else, would try to fill in for the missing players. It was always a token gesture at best.

Taimi, sadly, wasn't much help. She mostly shouted encouragement. She was in Scruffy, her golem, so she could have tanked the boss for me. It was the one that has to be hit from behind so that would have worked out nicely, what with me being pure DPS.

 

Unfortunately, since she didn't, the boss was permanently aggroed on me, making it tough to get behind him. I did manage to stay alive for the full two and a half minutes and I got him to about 75% health, which I count as a moral victory.

Of course, it wouldn't have mattered if I'd been able to one-shot the creature because there were four other platforms with no-one on them at all. I'm still not sure how the barrier turned green in the first place. 

That, I'm guessing, is exactly the sort of thing ANet would rather avoid if at all possible. Their reasons given for bringing the public event back are interesting. Apparently attendance at the event has increased steadily, with more people doing it at the end than when it began. That's a rare thing with special events in GW2. 

Success rates have also been climbing, which doesn't surprise me. For all ANet's laboring the point about this being "a demanding fight" in which "individual players have a huge impact on the outcome of the event" and it requiring "significant coordination and collaboration – much more so than most of the other world events" it honestly is not Asuran Rocket Science. It takes a couple of runs and a quick read through some brief notes to get the hang of it. Compared to Triple Trouble it's a doddle.

If they were concerned the difficulty might put people off, it never made any sense to can the Public event, anyway. It's the Squad version that's genuinely challenging. 

I did the Public version half a dozen times during the week it was here and every time was a success. I did it twice in the squad version and both times it failed. That's not much of a sample, I admit, but plenty of people commented in map chat about how much easier the public version was. It's because you can bring eighty people. Those extra thirty make all the difference.

Whether it will be easy to get eighty people to do it when it's here all the time is another matter. If you can get the fifty to do the squad, though, you really might as well just flag it on LFG and try for the rest. I'm pretty sure you'd get them. Everyone will expect a full map to succeed.

However it works out, I'm happy there'll at least be the possibility of a permanent public Marionette show. The squad version seems too purposeful and serious for what was always a loud, brash, frequently chaotic party.

Now can we look at getting the final fight with Scarlet in her airship over Lion's Arch back, please? That was an instance for a set number of players. It would be perfectly suited for a re-run or, better yet, another permanent slot in the schedule.

How To Do Now: An Overview Of Guild Wars 2's Marionette

She's back! For one week only, Scarlet Briar and her amazing Marionette. Performances every two hours, only at The Eye of The North. Get in line now!

Yes, the promised return of Guild Wars 2's best ever structured event began on Tuesday after the update. The public event runs for just one week, ending when next week's patch lands but there's also a private version that should be available indefinitely.

Here's how it works:

Both versions are accessed via the Scrying Pool in current content hub, Eye of the North. You used to have to own the Path of Fire expansion to go there (or have legacy rights from the pre-launch events a decade ago, I guess) but that requirement has been dropped. Now you just need to be Level 80. If you've never been there before, no worries; there's a one-time portal scroll in the mail that will take you there and open the waypoint for you permanently.

The 50-person private Squad instance is always available. If you want to start one, use the Scrying Pool. More likely, if you want to join one, use the LFG function and search under Tyria - Squads. Right now there are lots of people doing it but as folks get the rewards and the achievements they want it will calm down. Based on other, similar content, though, there will most likely be Commanders and guilds looking to form up fairly regularly, especially at weekends. GW2 is very good at keeping older content in play.

When you've found your squad, join up and follow instructions. Do not zone into the instance via the Scrying Pool yourself. Wait for the pop-up invitation and accept that. Then just listen, pay attention and do what everyone else does is my advice.

If you're there for the Public version, check the Event Timer for the next one, arrive around the top of the hour, go to the Scrying pool, click on the Public button when it appears and zone in. Then you can either run around like a lone wolf and tick everyone off or you can join a lane, follow a tag and behave like a socially responsible person. Your call.

The mechanics are virtually unchanged from seven years ago but if you can remember much of the detail you have a better memory than I do. Of course, that may well be the case. Almost anyone does.

Luckily, there are some excellent guides available. This is the best I've seen. I would strongly advising reading through it before embarassing yourself. I didn't but I think I got away with it. No, I definitely got away with it. I didn't do anything dumb. Still, I would have been a good deal more comfortable if I'd known what I was doing, so the point stands.

I was lucky my first run in that the Commander had a squad message up that detailed the basic mechanics for each boss. Plus I got the easy one first time, even though I was in Lane Two, because the people in Lane One couldn't even manage to kill theirs, even though it was the easiest boss. It passed to us and we killed it for them! Go us!

The next two lanes also killed theirs but after that it was fail time for everyone, and we wiped. Second time around we did even worse and then I had to go to bed. It was a great introduction all the same.

This evening I did the public version which is in some ways easier (you can have more people - the limit is 75 rather than 50, I believe) and in some ways harder (you can't vet who comes and you get quite a few lollygaggers and layabouts). We did brilliantly.

The first four lanes cut the chains. I was in Lane Two and my platform was last to get our kill, mostly because the guy I was with took a while to learn we needed to kite the boss over the mines. He got the hang of it after I yelled at him, though.

Lane five failed, which wasn't a shock because the fifth boss is the hardest. Lane One, on their reprise, took him down. Not a single lane let too many mobs through and we finished with the aethercannon still only 25% charged from that single failure. Even back in the day that would have been counted a very solid run. 

Although the exact details of what to do are quite complex, the basics are simple:

Get organized. If no-one else is stepping up then maybe think about doing it yourself.

Have 10-15 people per lane, depending on whether you have 50 or 75 in total.

When your lane is up, kill all the mobs as fast as possible to get the portal open.

Run in fast. It's really embarassing to get locked outside and watch your team fail because you were late.

Kill the boss on your platform using the correct tactics as outlined in the guide linked above or as explained by your Commander, assuming they know what they're doing.

If the idiot on your platform is doing it wrong do yell at them but also tell them how to do it properly!

All the times it's not your turn, concentrate on holding the line. Use all the available tools (barricades, golems, repair hammers) plus all your snares, roots, stuns, knockbacks and so on to make absolutely certain none of the giant twisted clockworks get to the portal. If even a few make it your lane will fail and the aethercannon will charge up some more. You do not want that gun to fire. It will kill everyone. Literally everyone.

If a lane calls out for help (usually when their turn comes around again after a fail and they realize half of their people already left) do not go charging over to help until you are asked! It's really embarassing when the whole thing fails because everyone in one lane went to help another lane and left one poor guy trying to stop a hundred twisted clockworks on his own.

If you win, jump up and down and cheer like crazy. Or just grab your loot and leave. You do you.

 

I cheered. Then I grabbed my loot. Most of it was the usual nonsense but there's two gold for the first time you do it that day (Maybe. Or maybe it's just the first time ever. Honestly, I didn't check. I'm not doing it for the money.) 

There's a fairly nice set of weapon skins to collect if you're into that sort of thing. Mostly, though, it's about the fun. Marionette is a really well-designed event and I'll tell you why: it's because it keeps everyone engaged from start to finish and makes everyone feel invested in everyone else's success. It's a true mmorpg experience that could not be replicated in a single-player game.

All five lanes have to be held. All five bosses have to die. All five chains have to be severed. Every success is everyone's success. Every failure is everyone's failure. It's a true team effort.

I loved it. I'm just writing this up in the time between the last public run and the next. The private squad version is good but the public one is the real thing. 

I just wish it was staying for longer than a week.

This Is The Summer

Okay, then. Let's take a look at the Great Guild Wars 2 Summer of Fun! ArenaNet aren't calling it that, by the way. I am.

I might not even mean it ironically. I was quite impressed when I skim-read the program on the official web site. I'm curious to find out if it stands up to closer examination. 

One thing I noticed on the first read-through was that whoever put it together had eschewed chronology. Normally what you'd expect in something like this is linear progression through time. That's what a program of events traditionally requires. People don't just want to know what they're getting: they want to know the running order so they know when to line up and when to head for the bar.

If ANet had stuck to a strict timeline, though, they'd have had to open with 

May 11—Skills and Balance Update 

and no-one wants that.

Skills and balance updates somehow manage to be both predictable and controversial. At any given moment there's one bunch of yahoos wailing they need a full rebalance right now while another argues everything's just fine as it is so leave it the hell alone. Inbetween those poles you can find a lobby for every class and even every elite specialization in the game, all making their case for special treatment as all around the various camps trolls and troublemakers prowl, spreading the notion that various classes or abilites are gamebreakingly OP and ought to be nerfed into oblivion.

Whatever ANet says or indeed does about balance they know they can't win. Not hearts, not minds, not even arguments. Like some sisyphean ball of confusion, all they can hope to do is push it a little further up the slope than last time and hope that when it rolls back down it doesn't crush them on the way past.

So, although that little treat is the first course in this summer-long feast, it's been tucked away behind the big reveal. And the big reveal is... there's going to be a big reveal!  

 

July 27—Guild Wars 2: End of Dragons First Look

Believe it or not that genuinely is the most exciting prospect of the whole summer schedule. It fully justifies its place at the head of the program. I can't help feeling there's something just a little sad about it. The thing we're all the most thrilled to see is an announcement that there's going to be an announcement. Not even a date. Just what the new content is.

Don't care. Still excited. I'll be there on July 27 (probably not something any of us should be saying during the end times but you gotta stay positive). The stream's set to include "features, an introduction to the story, a new trailer video", all of which you'd expect, but also "elite specialization beta event information." 

I'm not all that interested in the beta event (or the elite specs) per se but I am interested to hear one's already being planned. Combined with the run of dates for this "Live summer", none of which extends into August, I'd guess we'll get the beta event(s) soon after the livestream, then some kind of anniversary celebration and the expansion will drop either at the end of August or in September.

If not, they're going to have to come up with a Fall Festival of Fun to follow this summer spectacular because we ain't getting another season of the Living Story, we know that much. No, End of Dragons late summer/early autumn. Mark your dance cards.

Of course, when I said the EoD reveal would be the most exciting prospect I was speaking objectively. From a personal point of view, as I made clear yesterday, the true highlight of the summer will be

 

July 13—The Twisted Marionette

I mentioned this to Mrs. Bhagpuss this morning, just after Yaks Bend's expiditionary forces had been unceremoniously dumped back on their own border following a failed assault on Dragonbrand's Air Keep. Her reply was "Oh, I liked the Marionette!", which stands in stark conrast to the kind of reply I usually get to conversational sallies of this kind, namely "What's that? I don't remember it". 

The Marionette fight was unforgettable, which is a lot more than I can say about every Living Story boss fight ever and just about every meta event since Heart of Thorns. Generic events have been the name of the game for so long now it's difficult to remember when ANet knew how to create fights that were actually interesting. Perhaps refurbishing this one will remind them how it's done.

Next comes something from the Quality of Life department. I didn't think ANet had one of those. It's certainly been underemployed these last nine years.

July 13 - The Legendary Armory

This doesn't interest me at all and for a very good reason. I have no legendaries. What's more, not only do I not plan to get any, I specifically plan never to get any. As in I have positive intentions to avoid getting any if at all possible. 

I'm not saying I wouldn't take a legendary if ANet decided to give them away but short of that I would rather not, thanks very much. Never saw the point of them and still don't now.

The thing is this: I really, really hate changing my spec. I like to decide on it once then play it forever. If forced, as has happened a couple of times, I will grudgingly and irritably make the necessary adjustments to fall into line with some new orthodoxy but having done so I will expect to get several more years out of the new set-up before something drives me to change it again. 

That attitude has served me admirably across many mmorpgs and I see absolutely no need to change my behavior. Consequently, the attraction of items that are no more powerful than those I already have but which allow me to change my spec on the fly is utterly lost on me. 

I'm sure the Legendary Armory is going to be a boon for some people. It's nice that they're going to get it. Just don't expect me to care.

And finally, before we get to the list of regular holidays and returning weekend specials, here's the fifth pullout package. It's an odd one:

 

Beginning May 25—Living World: Complete the Cycle

I had to read this several times and I'm still not certain I understand it. Here's what I think is going to happen:

• There will be a series of week-long windows devoted to specific Living Story episodes from Seasons 2 and 3.
• Anyone who doesn't have that particular episode can get it for free during the week it's up.
• The featured episodes will get new achievements.
• If you complete all of the new achievements you get "a voucher for a Guild Wars 2: End of Dragons precursor weapon". This would seem to bootstrap you past the first segment of the interminable crafting process for a single Legendary weapon when EoD drops but that's about all. 
• There's going to be "a new meta-achievement for all three playable Living World seasons and The Icebrood Saga". If you complete that you get a legendary amulet. Whoop-di-doo. 

All of the above (except the getting them for free part) persists indefinitely so you can work on these time-consuming (let's not say time-wasting) tasks at your leisure.

I would literally rather spend my evenings cleaning my oven than ever do any of LS Seasons two or three again and as for achievements I never did most of those in the first place so that won't be happening. Once again, good luck to them as likes it. I'll pass, thanks.

That just leaves us with what you could call the usual suspects, otherwise known as 

 

Ongoing Summer Events

For once, there are a lot of them. They switch on at a slightly better cadence than twice a month for the whole of the designated "summer" season, beginning with the ever-popular World vs. World Weeklong Bonus.

I say "popular" because it generally seems to be but there are plenty of dedicated WvW players who hate these weeks with a passion. They attract hordes of ignorant, unskilled PvE players into the borderlands, afking at the bank, asking inane questions and generally getting in everyone's way. They do have their advocates, though. 

The more positive voices always call for patience, pointing out  the opportunities these events offer for introducing wide-eyed newbies to the joys of WvW. Meanwhile roamers relish the plethora of easy kills and the chance to re-inforce every prejudice and preconception PvE players already have about wicked gankers. I just like the chance to push my rank higher. 

There are a couple of events like that and something similar for the sPvP crowd, who also get tournaments, something that's been denied to WvW for many years. Instead, in WvW we get the marmite "No Downstate" event (June 18), which always kicks up a ruckus on the forums as people take extreme positions, claiming either that they'll never play WvW so long as they actually die when someone kills them or that they wish downstate had never been invented and the event should made permanent. I just find it a fun diversion for a week, which, I think, is all it's meant to be.

 

In PvE there's some kind of "Fractal Rush" in which I don't intend to learn about let alone participate in and then there's Dragon Bash, the festival in Hoelbrak, which I do. I notice there's no mention of the Queen's Jubilee or the Crown Pavilion but on refelction those both take place in August, so outwith the remit. I'm sure they'll be along on schedule to tide us over until the expansion arrives.

In fact, with the anniversary also in August, that does seem to fill the calendar nicely until the beginning of September. It's all falling into place.

Eliot at Massively OP wrote an op-ed piece this week on maintenance mode in mmorpgs. I know this is actually a lull before a major expansion, which is hardly the same thing, but as a program it does feel remarkably similar to what you might think of as active maintenance. I have to say it suits me quite well.

I'd happily sign up for no more Living Story, ever, in exchange for bi-annual expansions with a program like this in the off-seasons. That sounds like a manageable and sustainable business model to me. Especially if the best of the older events, like the Marionette, could be spruced up and re-introduced. I could make a list of those.

Probably lucky I'm not in charge, isn't it?

Marionette Strings Are Dangerous Things

The final episode of the Icebrood Saga just dropped and along with it a whole raft of information about what ArenaNet hope will keep us all busy this summer as we wait for the third expansion, End of Dragons. There's going to be a livestream on July 27 that should (finally) fill in a lot of the missing details about what's actually included in EoD. From the timing, and the mention of an "elite specialization beta event" I would surmise a late summer/early fall launch.

I'll get to all of that (and there's a lot of it) in due course. Not in this post. The reason I wanted to pop something up immediately is this totally unexpected bombshell:

July 13—The Twisted Marionette

Living World Season 1 set Guild Wars 2‘s story in motion, ending with the city of Lion’s Arch in flames and Mordremoth’s awakening. Scarlet Briar left the ruins of her corrupted genius strewn across Tyria, from the broken Tower of Nightmares in Kessex Hills to The Breachmaker’s wreckage in Sanctum Harbor.

Shortly before she launched her war on Lion’s Arch, Scarlet used Lornar’s Pass as a testing ground for her colossal watchwork superweapon, the Twisted Marionette. An army of heroes organized a three-pronged assault strategy, destroying Scarlet’s forces, surviving the Marionette’s attacks, and severing the chains tethering it to The Breachmaker.

Until now, the Marionette has lain scrapped in False River Valley. But on July 13, one of the most memorable battles of Living World Season 1 will return to Guild Wars 2 as a bonus event. We’ve preserved the flow of this highly requested encounter, with some adjustments to bring it up to our current design standards.

In my opinion, the Marionette fight was the single best set-piece event Guild Wars 2 ever had. I did it many times and I'd almost certainly still be doing it occasionally even now, if they'd only left it in the game. 

I really never thought they'd bring it back, not after all this time, but they're going to do it. Better very, very late than never. I will most definitely be there.

I just hope the "adjustments" don't ruin it. If "current design standards" are superior to the ones that operated back when the fight was current content I confess I can't quite see it. Even if they mess it up, though, it'll probably still be better than just about everything they've done since.

That's all I wanted to say. For now.

 

A Vision Sent From The Past

Yesterday's official announcement of the already-leaked Guild Wars 2 update, Visions of the Past: Steel and Fire, threw me for something of a loop. What exactly is it?

I notice there's no specific mention of the Living Story/World or of the Icebrood Saga. This doesn't appear to be the next instalment of... anything. It's more a ragbag collection of odd ends.

If it has any theme or structure it would seem to be about looking backwards while glancing ahead. Part of the update focuses on fleshing out one of the least appealing players in the ongoing storyline, the uncharismatic cypher that is Ryland Steelcatcher. He suffers from being the offspring of two far more interesting characters, Rytlock Brimstone and Crecia Stoneglow and he certainly could do with some help if he's to ever going to stand alone.

Someone at ArenaNet must have faith in him, though, because Ryland is the peg on which they've chosen to hang public awareness and acceptance of the new Visions concept. It's a mechanic that will be all too wearyingly familiar to veteran players of other MMORPGs, where having your character stuffed into a cosplay version of some familiar NPC has long been a fallback position for developers with more interest in promoting their own creations than facilitating ours.

I do sometimes get the impression that a significant proportion of the ever-diminishing subset of GW2 players who still care about the plot don't have much experience of or interest in other MMORPGs. For them, this may come as a welcome new experience.

For the rest of us, I suspect it will just turrn out to be another of the usual "learn five new skills while we set you on fire" keymashing farragos we've suffered through too many times already in Living Story instances, only this time we'll all be dressed as pantomime cats, but hey, who knows, maybe ANet will find some way to make it work.I reserve the right to be grudgingly impressed, should the occasion arise.

The rest of the update looks potentially more enjoyable, although I stress "potentially". Given the game presumably relies almost entirely on cash shop sales to surrvive, let alone prosper, ANet's unwillingness to monetize what would undoubtedly become a major revenue stream in fully customizeable housing remains a source of puzzlement. Instead, they prefer to lurk in the dismal shadow of home makeover shows by offering us upgradeable NPC bases.

This time we get to fit out the Eye Of The North, an instance that originally served as a pre-launch incentive but which now acts as a lair for the friendly (?) dragon, Aurene. I haven't managed to summon up the enthusiasm to click my portal stone and find out just how the new version dovetails with the previous Hall of Monuments. Maybe that will change with the March update. Or more likely it won't if the last upgradeable lair is anything to go by. I haven't visited the Sunspear cave, the name of which I've completely forgotten, since the week it appeared.

Then there's a "Public Mission", which I think is a new sub-category of "things to keep people logging in". The brief description reads "Meet Ryland Steelcatcher’s companions and accompany them on a high-stakes mission to battle the Ancient Forgeman." As yourself, I am guessing, rather than zipped into yet another cat suit or while play-acting as Ryland himself.

Since "your job is to blow stuff to smithereens with a cutting-edge charr tank", however, it's entirely possible you won't need to be bothered with a character model at all, let alone your own class abilities, which will presumably be replaced by a big red button marked "Fire". Well, we can hope.

The only thing that puzzles me about this is what makes it "Public". Will the five charr in Ryland's warband be accompanied by a full armored division as a squad of fifty players, all driving charr tanks, crush all before them in their headlong charge for loot and glory? Or is it some kind of ten-person Strike mission? In which case, what's "public" about that?

Dunno. And, frankly, don't care. As of this writing I have yet to even try a Strike mission. Mrs Bhagpuss gave up on the Icebrood Saga after the Prelude. We both still log in every day but it wouldn't make much difference if nothing new was ever added again because everything we do has been in the game for many, many years.

Some of it since Living Story Season One, in fact, to offer an inelegant segue into the final, most intriguing element of Visions of the Past, the return of "four story missions from the first season of Living World for the first time ever!" This was the part I found both the most welcome and the most confusing.

Although I had some reservations about it at the time, a quick dip into the archives here confirms that mostly I enjoyed the first season as it happened. My affection for it has grown over the years, partly through the inevitable nostalgia of the passing of time but mostly because of how much less I enjoyed each subsequent season, which made the first look better and better all the time.

The thing I mainly liked about Season One, though, was the chaotic surge of the massive-scale open world events. I loved the manic waypointing, the hysteria in General Chat, the rampaging zergs, the wild, howling desperate frenzy of it all. It seemed then and seems now to exemplify the first two letters in the acronym of the genre: Massively Multiple.

I'd almost forgotten there were instances as well - and I don't believe there ever were any "Missions", that being a term added to the game in latter years. Whatever you want to call them, someone's found four to bring back for a very belated encore.

The puff reads "Get to know Rox and Braham, face Scarlet’s toxic forces, and remember how far Canach’s come in his time with you." That rings some bells. I recall the one where we first meet Rox in the North Nolan Nursery and one involving Braham in Cragstead. Both of those have been in the game as visitable maps ever since so I guess now we'll be able to re-run the original conversations and combats as well.

Cannach's Lair has, I think, been inaccessible since Season One. It involved bombs and traps, I remember that much. I even wrote a guide for it, which could come in useful. I wonder if I'll get any fresh hits when the update goes live?

As for "face Scarlet's toxic forces", that could mean anything. We fought them for the best part of two years, on and off. I bet it means The Toxic Tower, though. I was very glad to see the back of that in 2013. I have no wish ever to see it again although curiosity will probably drag me in for one last look.

If Anet are going to carry on down this line, what I'd really like to see brought back are the big ticket events from later in the Scarlet storyline. The three that would definitely get me logging in for nostalgic fun and genuine entertainment would be Battle For Lion's Arch, Marionette and the final showdown with Scarlet herself in her mothership.

The Scarlet finale was instanced to begin with so you'd imagine that wouldn't be hard to revive. Lion's Arch was a full map replacement but I don't see why it couldn't be revisited as a full map instance. Marionette, at the time the best event the game had seen and still among the best even now, took place in the open world but could quite easily be turned into an instance, you'd think, seeing Scarlet staged it in what amounts to an arena-sized enclosed space.

It is, at least, an intriguing development. I look forward to seeing where, if anywhere, it goes from here. It also occurs to me that this could be the closest Anet get to having their share of the increasingly popular, mainstream and profitable Progression and Classic Server pie, currently being gobbled down by the likes of Daybreak, Blizzard, Jagex and Funcom.

It never does to understimate the public's hunger for a juicy slice of their own past.

Come And Have A Go If You Think You're Hard Enough : GW2

Now the lights have gone out at PAX South and the boomsticks have stopped their infernal clacking there's time aplenty to consider the future of Guild Wars 2. Heart of Thorns has no release date. It will, as they say, be ready when it's ready.

We won't have to wait too long to get a first look: there will be a playable demo available for PAX East in early March. There's also going to be a beta phase prior to launch. In the meantime, though, it's a case of reading the runes.

Massively has a disturbing interview with Mike O'Brien and Colin Johanson that sends chills down my spine each time I re-read it. The discomfort I felt listening to O'Brien elucidate his vision of the game at the weekend is only compounded by quotes such as this:

"The way that you earn mastery points is, I think, a very Guild Wars 2 way to earn mastery points: You do really really hard things that you on your account have never done before."

As is all too common when I read or hear the words of the senior developers and designers of an MMO I have to wonder if they play the same game that I do. In the three years I've been playing, going back to the beginning of public beta, I cannot recall ever having felt that doing really hard things was the Guild Wars 2 way. Let alone really really hard things. If anything I would have said the exact opposite.

Any dungeon that ends with my character running around naked is quite difficult enough, thank you.

Yes, it's true that GW2 has, on occasion, contained the odd "really hard thing". Liadri the Concealing Darkness for example, but in general even the supposedly "hard" things, like the Molten Facility or Marionette were only "hard" when measured by the extremely soft yardstick of the rest of the game. The entire ethos of GW2 has always been about inclusiveness not elitism. That's why we can all revive each other when we fall over, why no-one has to compete for resource nodes and why, at least in theory, we are all always happy to see another player.

So, I'm more than a little concerned about this new conceptualization of GW2 as a "really hard" game. Concerned but not surprised. This change of direction has been creeping up on us for quite a while.

Perhaps the first clear indicator that the wind had shifted came with the introduction of the new mechanics for Living Story Season 2. The first season had been open to everyone. By and large the instances and dungeons scaled to level or your character would be bootstrapped up as necessary. Great care was taken to spread open world events across a range of maps so all levels could join in.

Don't pressurize me so. (That's a No Prize if ever I saw one)

Come the second season and everything changed. If you didn't have a max level character you could forget it. The story chapters are hard-coded to require a Level 80. Our guildmate, who only plays on Sunday mornings, not every Sunday and never for more than a couple of hours, has nonetheless been been playing regularly for nearly two years. He has only one character: a Guardian now in the mid-50s. He used to be able to join us for Living Story runs. Not any more. Players with his casual playstyle are no longer welcome.

At the same time the old, easy, inclusive Living World achievement system was ripped out and replaced with something overtly aimed at the elitist's club. Rather than a series of simple, relaxing tasks that would largely fill themselves out as you completed each bi-weekly episode anyone wanting those Achievement Points is now required to replay instanced content in odd, artificial ways in order to hit specified markers of difficulty.

Even before that, though, there were straws in the wind. The changes to the Trait system that came in the first Feature Pack back in Spring 2014, almost universally reviled, contained a plethora of level- or playstyle-inappropriate requirements. To many people playing the game these seemed to have been chosen in order to exclude anyone below a certain level from obtaining them and, while there was some revision under protest, I can attest from my recent leveling run that most still remain.

Devil Machine (and there's another!)

At least with the Trait system you can buy your way out of hours of wasted time or "must be this tall to ride" roadblocks. Ten silver or Blazeridge Steppes map completion? It's your choice. I fear the new Mastery System will come with no such get-out clause.

Many early adopters and believers in GW2's founding design principles, handily precised in the game's official online manual's "Don't Worry" section as "There’s no wrong way to play Guild Wars 2; just explore, have fun, and keep trying out new things!", lost faith long ago. Those of us who arrived with our skepticism fully intact may have been better able to roll with the punches. Still, there is that old one about straws and camels' backs...

Ah well, maybe this is all pre-expansion paranoia.  With so little in the way of firm details its easy to let either your wish-fulfillment fantasies or your tinfoil hat fears run away with you. And there's a part of that quote above that makes me question just what it is they have up their sleeves: "things that you on your account have never done before". 

Tie that in with the assertion that "ArenaNet is being careful to include mastery points all over the current Guild Wars 2 landmass" and you have to wonder. There will be plenty of players for whom there remains pretty much nothing in the existing maps that they haven't already done.

Presuming the intent is not to bar such over-achievers from access to the Mastery system as it may exist outside of Heart of Thorns then O'Brien's claim that ""We're going to keep evolving the world, and we intentionally picked a strategy where it's not leaving behind a wasteland"" becomes pregnant with potential. But then, aren't they all?