I’ve been accumulating news snippets about the as-yet-to-be-formally-scheduled release of Guild Wars 2 for an email newsletter I send out to my friends and acquaintances in the Guild Wars community.

A slow week, compared to the last few weeks.

Part 1: Discussion of previous news

• The first Guild Wars 2 tie-in novel, “Ghosts of Ascalon” by Matt Forbeck and Jeff Grubb has been nominated for a Scribe award.

Part 2: Guild Wars news

• Game update: “Removed all things that can’t be processed with a normal brain:
  – Non-tiger creatures with tiger blood
  – Red Rock Candy from Mars
  – Warlocks”

Part 3: Guild Wars 2 news

• A glowing review of the Thief profession. “Yes, she just dragged him over here like Scorpion. Yes, he just teleported to where he shot his arrow. Yes, her dagger just hit three enemies at once, and YES he just went invis, stole a branch off a treant and then used it to beat down an ogre. Show me another MMO with a class that looks and plays like this, and I’ll give you a cookie. Not some healthy little Snackwells cookie either, one of those big soft mushy ones like you get in a combo meal at Subway. If Guild Wars 2 wasn’t on your MMO radar before (I’m not sure why it wouldn’t be) it had better be now. And for all you WoW Rogues out there who are tired of herp derping around throwing fans of knives, I think you’ve found your true calling.”
• Part 2 of the interview with Daniel Dociu. “It is satisfying to see one of your concept materialize, but it is even more satisfying to see your concept elaborated on and improved upon. And that’s what’s very important to me and something I keep repeating, especially to the young artists who join us. A good modeler is capable of delivering ‘spot on’ and staying very true to a concept — a great modeler, though, is capable of building upon it. Taking a concept as a starting point and bringing their own contribution. Looking at it with a critical eye; dissect it, analyze it, understand it, form an opinion or attitude towards it and then add that layer of your own to the concept. It is extremely satisfying to me when I see a concept of mine brought to a level I wasn’t capable of seeing or anticipating.”
• Part 3 of the Daniel Dociu interview. “Some people may have the artistic inclination and the creativity but lack the drive or ability of hard work and sustained intensity over four years of school. At the end of four years education, there is only a fraction of students who present themselves as a complete package with a convincing body of work (both quality and quantity wise) who would indeed stand a good chance in the very competitive job market. Everyone else may struggle a great deal, and it’s heart breaking for me as a parent to see all these kids misled into believing it’ll be a walk in the park.”
• Horia Dociu talks about putting the Commando April Fool content together. “One day, while working on some of the previous Guild Wars 2 skill videos, I thought about how I’d love to see a SWAT team taking out charr with assault rifles and how much fun it would be to make that video. Then it clicked: April Fools’ Day would be my only opportunity to do that, so I had to make it happen!”
• Video interview with Colin Johanson, part 1. “We caught up with Guild Wars 2 lead content designer Colin Johanson to discuss the upcoming MMORPG. In this the first part of the interview we discuss World of Warcraft, the event system and story.”
• Part 2 of the Colin Johanson interview. “Our interview with Arenanet’s Colin Johanson continues and this time we talk about such diverse matters as the new Silvari race and the keg brawl mini”
• Those sneaky, sneaky Skritt. “Skritt are small, rat-like creatures in Guild Wars 2 who come from deep beneath the surface of Tyria. At first glance, these skittering fur balls may seem barely capable of rational speech, but they wield weapons and wear clothing and armor like more advanced races. Also, as the asura will tell you (or as any careful observer might note), the skritt actually gain intelligence when many of them congregate. Speaking in chirps and squeaks so fast that it sounds like buzzing to human ears, they share information, parse knowledge, and determine actions between themselves. The more skritt there are to do so, the more rational, intelligent, and cunning their activities become. One skritt alone is a simple-minded individual, capable of performing basic tasks and keeping himself alive, but an entire colony of hundreds? Clever enough to challenge even the brainpower of the asura.”

I’ve been accumulating news snippets about the as-yet-to-be-formally-scheduled release of Guild Wars 2 for an email newsletter I send out to my friends and acquaintances in the Guild Wars community.

A mix of real and “real” news this week.

Part 1: Discussion of previous news

• Not technically Guild Wars-related, but the company from which ArenaNet’s founders started off: Blizzard, celebrates their 20th anniversary.
  “You’ll find commercials for console games stuffed into just about every 30-second nook and cranny in primetime TV. After all, the audience is sitting in front of the TV for entertainment, and if you’re a console game developer or publisher, these are your people. So when Blizzard announced that it would air an advertisement for World of Warcraft: Cataclysm during a nationally televised Dallas Cowboys vs. Minnesota Vikings game, it was unprecedented. WoW has become such a staggeringly big and widly accepted entertainment product that broadcasting the opening cinematic for Cataclysm to an audience traditionally more interested in lime-flavored beer and Madden games doesn’t sound crazy. In the PC gaming ecosystem, only Blizzard has the clout to pull that off.”
• Another WoW news item, but one that may impact other MMO games: Canada’s biggest internet service provider, Rogers Communications, has been deliberately throttling the internet connections of WoW players. “Rogers said that it was Blizzard’s use of BitTorrent to deliver updates that triggered the throttling, and said that customers who disabled this setting — as well as any other peer-to-peer applications — would not see a slowdown in speed. “

Part 2: Guild Wars news

• Creating the seven-hero vanquish team. “I run as an SoS ranger. If you’re a rit, even better. Most professions can run a decent SoS easy if you’ve got good energy management: necros, mesmers, eles, and rangers are your best bet. Dervs and Monks can pull it off with some major tweaking. You’ll struggle as a warrior, sin, or paragon, however. If you’re not an SoS, no worries. The team build I use allots for one.”
• Game update including a sneak peak at the new Guild Wars 2 profession — the Commando.
• The commandos are here. “Cpl. Bane will be stationed at Embark Beach until ~noon PDT on Monday. Speak to him before then — the very future depends on it! “

Part 3: Guild Wars 2 news

• Elixabeth at TalkTyria looks at the recently introduced Hylek: “One word has changed. The nature of the hylek really hasn’t changed at all. They are a sentient people with which we as player characters may have peaceable relations or full-on warfare. We see that they still look very much like the frog-men we’ve all come to love stomping on. Their tribal culture seems relatively unaltered. They are still more or less behind on the technology curve, since they have to trade with other sentients for weapons and other goods. The hylek are in most ways indistinguishable from the heket — which leads many people to beg the question “why change the name at all?” What purpose does this serve?”
• Another gameplay example from PAX East, this time in HD. The background crowd noise is a bit irritating, but this is a single player trying out a Guardian, so there’s some good views of individual and group combat, including recovering from the downed state and the use of chained skills.
• ArenaNet announces their convention schedule for the summer, including Comic-Con — July 20-24, 2011, Gamescom — Aug 17-21, 2011, and PAX — Aug 26 -28, 2011.
• Part 1 of an interview with Daniel Dociu, ArenaNet’s Art Director for Guild Wars 2. “The development team has grown a great deal, with the size of the art department having more than doubled. We’re currently in the mid 80s as far as number of artists on the team and that has lead to my role evolving into more of an oversight role. I still insist on art directing in a very hands-on fashion and still spend a fair amount of time getting my hands dirty creating concept art, but I also have to delegate a lot more. The lead artists and all artists in general are encouraged to contribute more of their own vision to the game. Growth is a mixed blessing as it creates a new set of difficulties: more structure is needed; more processes have to be implemented, policed, and massaged to fit our development culture. But it’s also more rewarding. The game we feel is going to be so much better. Bigger, better, and more beautiful.”
• GW2Guru’s exclusive interview with ArenaNet. “How this information has not been leaked yet, I do not know. It’s big, folks. And when I say big, I mean game changing big. Today, ArenaNet has given the go-ahead to release this information, so here goes. Given that the GW2 beta is scheduled for late August 2012, ArenaNet wanted to give everyone a head start on purchasing their iPads. Wait, what did you just say? That’s right, folks. Guild Wars 2 will be releasing exclusively to the iPad!”
• Revealing the seventh profession: the Shadowmancer! “The shadowmancer is a spell casting, scholar profession which is able to effectively prevent damage to itself by becoming invisible and invincible while at the same time dealing out considerable damage.”
• Revealing the eighth profession: the Commando! “A master of the battlefield, this elite soldier is equally at home on the mean streets of Lion’s Arch, in the steamy Maguuma Jungle, or on the Orrian front. The multi-role commando is a combat medic, an infiltrator, and a tank. By land, sea, or air, the commando is a technological force to be reckoned with. Come get some.”
• Interview with Jon Peters about the Commando. “Flamethrower is good in a variety of situations — you can create a basic flamethrower fire attack, but you can also air blast projectiles, create a burning area on the ground, or flame-jump around the map.”
• Another look at the Commando.
  “PC Gamer: The Commando’s motto is “if it bleeds, I can kill it.” If it’s, say, undead, and it doesn’t bleed, then can he still kill it?
  “Jon Peters: The good thing is that everything in the game can be bled, so that lets the Commando pretty much kill everything, but in future we may introduce some none bleeding types to see if that has any balance impact for him.”
• April Fool’s Day video from GuildMag.
• Interview with Eric Flannum on the Commando.

I’ve been accumulating news snippets about the as-yet-to-be-formally-scheduled release of Guild Wars 2 for an email newsletter I send out to my friends and acquaintances in the Guild Wars community.

A very quiet week compared with the last couple of information-dense weeks.

Part 1: Discussion of previous news

• Melmoth registers strong disagreement with the Guild Wars 2 design team philosophy on armour styles.
• Eliot Lefebvre: “Talking about the representation of women in video games is usually an exercise in depression. [. . .] Comparatively speaking, MMOs deserve a medal for being remarkably open to both players and characters of both genders. And yet that’s damning with faint praise in the worst way. MMOs still leave a lot to be desired when it comes to how they handle women, in ways both subtle and searingly obvious. Female characters are generally expected to be in a state of perpetual undress, more often than not without a significant role in the storyline — and precisely because the genre is so far ahead of its contemporaries, complaints are often met with eye-rolling and derision.”

Part 2: Guild Wars news

• The game update announced last week was implemented on Tuesday. I didn’t check to see if there were any changes from the pre-announcement.

• An interview with Adam Trzonkowski, author of the Guild Leader’s Companion.
  “When I started the book, there wasn’t much in print, and I felt like the whole concept was underrepresented. There weren’t a lot of outlets for people seeking advice on the internet, and few people thought to pick up a book on management to help them run their guild. You could find some good blogs, but in general, guild leaders didn’t have a lot of tools. There was also a lot of disinformation and what I call bad role models. People looked at Furor and said, “Now there is a good guild leader,” but was he really? If you modeled yourself after him, you might not necessarily succeed. I just didn’t see the right tools for the job and some of those tools felt pretty demanding. I wanted to include more general ideas and advice — general concepts that anyone can use.”

Part 3: Guild Wars 2 news

• “FUTUREPOLY, a digital arts training studio founded by ArenaNet artist Jason Stokes, is launching an eight-week long online master class on April 2 to help aspiring artists hone their craft with the help of seasoned professional artists.”
• Article about the Hylek. “Prolific and belligerent, hylek are froglike creatures that thrive in all types of water, but prefer to live in swampy areas. No matter where they claim their territory, hylek spawn in alarming quantities. Once reclusive and xenophobic, hylek can now be found farther and farther away from their spawning grounds. From the moment they’re born, hylek find themselves in a fierce competition with their brethren for food and shelter. Those who survive grow more aggressive as their bodies develop the toxins that they use to hunt their prey, protect their villages, and strike down their rivals. They are resourceful survivors, fierce warriors, and masters of poison. They are the hylek.”
• Eurogamer posts an extensive article about the Guild Wars 2 hands-on experience. “‘We don’t intend to be number two this time. We certainly have our sights set on number one.'”
  “Can ArenaNet really deliver a mature MMO from day one, made to a higher standard than the market leader and not missing a single component? It’s hard not to be sceptical, but it’s also hard not to be impressed by the team’s ambition and execution. Guild Wars 2 is already polished, innovative and fun to play.”

I’ve been accumulating news snippets about the as-yet-to-be-formally-scheduled release of Guild Wars 2 for an email newsletter I send out to my friends and acquaintances in the Guild Wars community.

Part 1: Discussion of previous news

• Rubi asks if ArenaNet’s introduction of Mercenary Heroes to Guild Wars is approaching the pay-to-win line.

Part 2: Guild Wars news

• There was a game update on Thursday to fix a bug that ended the “lucky weekend” early. The event will now end on Friday.
• Skill update preview. “In an update next week, we will address some PvP issues that came up as a result of our latest Dervish update. To give our tournament players time to plan ahead, we’re releasing all the skill-related update notes in advance. After the last MAT, we decided to tone down several Dervish skills that proved to be stronger than intended. Additionally, this update will address the power of Blood Magic Necromancers and some other builds that have gotten a little out of line. Finally, we will make a few small buffs to Mesmers and Elementalists.”

Part 3: Guild Wars 2 news

• Here’s a thought for you, especially if you use one of the Guild Wars wikis for more than just looking up stats: if Guild Wars 2 is going to be non-mission/non-quest in the traditional style (that is, pretty much everything in PvE play is driven by dynamic event chains), will you still find the wiki to be as useful?
• Fifteen things we learned from last week’s Guild Wars 2 combat footage: “Last week we posted a massive 10-minute long video of pure, unadulterated carnage in Guild Wars 2. Of course, the GW2 fan communities rabidly analyzed every tiny detail of the video in the hunt for new info, and we were right there in the trenches with them. In particular, we chatted with the the fans over at Guild Wars 2 Guru as they discussed and debated everything they found in our video.”
• I already mailed this one out separately: a series of Twitter updates by the GuildMag folks, and a video of the panel from which they were sending the Tweets – http://quotulatiousness.ca/blog/2011/03/13/twitter-updates-from-a-guild-wars-2-panel-at-pax-east/
• Ravious at Kill Ten Rats tries to consolidate all the information we’ve been given about the Thief class. “The best thieves are going to live on the razor’s edge having a sustained skill barrage with going as close to zero initiative as possible.”
• Randomessa pores over all the videos to discover clues to things that haven’t been directly discussed by ArenaNet. “New dynamic events will be added on the fly after the game’s release, and not publicized, for explorers to discover on their own. I have no intention of wiki-ing these.”
• “Dynamic Events” a Guild Wars 2 comic.
• Hands-on preview of the Guardian class. “The guardian is easily going to be a class that will be for masters of the game. High leveled dungeons and the hardest of missions will put the pressure on this class and make him a needed commodity. I only got a taste of this class and I am already dead set on having him as my primary character when the game arrives.”
• PAX East interview and demo. “I would be a bloody liar if I said that Guild Wars 2 wasn’t one of my major reasons for going to PAX East. I’ve been playing the original Guild Wars since the launch of GW: Factions back on April, 2006. Guild Wars is the game I always fall back on when I’m in-between games, and as a result, I’ve logged over 2,000 hours in the game. It’s safe to say I’m pretty darn excited about the sequel.”
• Martin Kerstein’s wrap-up of PAX East on the official site. “We’ve safely returned from PAX East to ArenaNet World Headquarters here in Seattle, weary but exhilarated after such an incredible show. I wanted to take a moment to share some of the highlights of our PAX East experience with you.”
• Ravious had a fascinating interview with ArenaNet staff at PAX East: “there was one dominant theme in my talks with Peters and Sharp, they are still iterating on nearly every mechanical feature in Guild Wars 2. It is important to keep in mind that even things fans “know” now because of the demo, interviews, or official articles might be obsolete on launch.”
• Top honours for two ArenaNet artists in the Spectrum 18 awards.

No, I’m not there, but the nice folks at GuildMag were sending tweets from the panel:

From a series of Twitter updates by GuildMag:

• Panel is Colin, John, Regina, Randy, Jeff, Tirzah, and Andrew! Playing the manifesto for the newbies.
• Colin introduces GW2. Yes, there is jumping. No, no monthly fee. Arenanet founded to innovate: personal story, dynamic events & combat
• Dynamic events scale with population: more mobs will spawn, or a boss will grow in power & gain new skills with more players
• No kill steals or mob tagging. All participants will gain loot and experience.
• Active combat: line of sight and positioning are important. Mobs can block projectiles or you can face the wrong way and miss
• Question: is there a way for players to know when dynamic events around the world are going on? A: yes. You can also leave before they are finished and still get rewards
• Q: do dynamic events have fast resets? A: we can’t make unlimited one time events. You may run into the same one more than once but they are scripted so the resets are longer.
• Q: how do you plan to keep people playing? A: there are different personal stories, mini games, dungeons, rated PvP for tournaments. WvW
• You can level from 1-80 in world vs world, players drop loot.
• Q: how does the game handle different levels? A: you’ll be sidekicked down in low level content or up to play with high level friends
• Q: life span of norn? A: they live into the triple digits but die from battle. Leader ?? had son at 80. They are young and vital for many years
• Q: how will you know where to go and find events? A: you can talk to scouts, they direct players. But players can just explore and find events on their own
• Q: do you plan on “mini-patching” new dynamic events? A: we have a solid live team, you can expect more content
• Dynamic event scaling AI detects participation: players can’t stand around and do nothing and get credit.
• Q: how do you avoid accidentally logging out and back into enemy territory? A: you can teleport to rally points

I’ve been accumulating news snippets about the as-yet-to-be-formally-scheduled release of Guild Wars 2 for an email newsletter I send out to my friends and acquaintances in the Guild Wars community.

Part 1: Discussion of previous news

• If you feel so inclined, someone is collecting responses to a short survey on Guild Wars as a thesis project.
• There’s still some life in brick-and-mortar games stores, says NCsoft.

Part 2: Guild Wars news

• One of the minor irritations about the big Guild Wars update last week was that all UI customizations got reset (this was probably caused by adding all the extra hero slots on your Inventory). Then, to compound the problem, they had to reset the UI again to fix a problem with the Mercenary Hero secondary profession.

Part 3: Guild Wars 2 news

• PC Gamer has a 10 minute clip of combat in Guild Wars 2.
• Guild Wars 2 “Behind the Scenes” interview with Daniel Dociu, Martin Kerstein, Isaiah Cartwright and Ree Soesbee. (35 minutes)
• INC Gamers picks their favourite clips from the GDC sessions.
• The folks at GuildMag lay out their plans for the PAX East show this weekend.
• Flameseeker Chronicles: Feast or Famine. “Wow! I’ve joked to other Massively staffers that some weeks I really struggle to find content for Flameseeker Chronicles, while other weeks I struggle simply to stay ahead of the information avalanche. That has never held truer than it has this weekend.”
• ArenaNet’s plans for PAX East, including the new bells and whistles for each of the revealed character classes so far.
• Isaiah Cartwright with (almost) everything you want to know about Attributes and Iteration. “We often mention iteration in interviews, at trade shows, and here on the blog. But what does it mean when we talk about the iterative process? I’d like to walk you through some changes we’ve made to the Guild Wars 2 attribute system to give you a better idea of our design philosophy.”
• Crafting in Guild Wars 2, by Andrew McLeod. “Characters can be proficient in up to two crafting disciplines at a time. We feel that this allows players to have a good variety in the items that they can craft, but still maintains player interaction and exchange. It also gives a stronger focus on the specifics of what you can craft- especially with the depth and size of each of our crafting professions.”
• A bit more on the new crafting system from Massively.
• Catch a glimpse of the thief.
• ArenaNet staff provide more details on the Thief. “The interview with Eric Flannum, Jon Peters, and Isaiah Cartwright builds on much of what we already know: dual pistols, stealth skills, stealing, and so on.”
• The updated official Thief page at the Guild Wars 2 website.
• The “ultimate” PAX-East forum thread.
• Livestream of this morning’s session with lots of interesting combat footage, featuring the Thief and the Guardian teaming up for a few dynamic events. Skip ahead about 10 minutes to the start of the actual presentation.
• (So late breaking, it missed the actual email newsletter) Thick as Thieves — a more in-depth look at the Thief class, including this insight (which, based on viewing the videos, I rather agree with) “Despite the intention of making the class as easy-to-understand as possible, the team believes that many first-time Thieves will find themselves dying horribly. Players are used to going toe-to-toe with monsters, and the Thief is built around hopping in-and-out of combat. If you don’t know when to back off, you’re going to die.”

I’ve been accumulating news snippets about the as-yet-to-be-formally-scheduled release of Guild Wars 2 for an email newsletter I send out to my friends and acquaintances in the Guild Wars community.

There’s been so much information this week, thanks to the early leak of information that ArenaNet intended to release next week at PAX East, that I’m dividing the newsletter into sections:

Part 1: Commentary on earlier information

• Economy and Consuming Goods — An interesting discussion thread about the Guild Wars economy (pro and con).
• Flameseeker Chronicles: Norn Week — Rubi Bayer rounds up her impressions of the “Norn Week” revelations.
• GuildMag‘s “Thalador Doomspeaker” talks about the Norn information we got during “Norn Week”.

Part 2: New information on Guild Wars

• The latest issue of GuildMag is now available for download.
• NCSoft is introducing new password security features for your Master Account. Check the page for details.
• Wartower.de video interview with John Stumme on the new (March 3rd) Guild Wars update. Includes information on “the Embark Beach Content Update, featuring the seven hero group, a new mission-hub, enhancements to the user interface, changes to pre-searing Ascalon, Titles and a new hero mechanic.”
• Summary of the GW2 Thief introduction and the March 3rd GW game update.
• Kill Ten Rats looks at the GW March 3rd update: “This update will change the game to such a degree that it might as well be Guild Wars 1.5 now.”
• FAQ on the new Mercenary Hero feature (where you can “hire out” your other characters as heroes — a nice, but potentially expensive, way to fill out your new seven-hero parties).

Part 3: New information on Guild Wars 2

• Localization for Guild Wars — Localizing is a big issue for software, especially one with as rich a selection of user interface options, text prompts, storylines, and all the rest of the things that set Guild Wars apart from other MMORPGs. I work in the software industry, and localization is one of the big ticket items for smaller companies (in this context ArenaNet counts as a small company).
• J. Robert King talks about the process of developing and writing Edge of Destiny, the second Guild Wars 2 tie-in novel.
• The next new GW2 class is officially theThief.
• Walkthrough of a new Norn Guardian’s first quest and dynamic event.
• A Thief packing twin pistols beats up the wildlife in a high-level area.
• A Thief demonstrates interesting attack skills, the downed skill, and being defeated during a high-level dynamic event.
• Massively reviews the new Thief profession.
• Even more on the Thief, including the importance of an attribute called Initiative: “Initiative regenerates at one point a second, which allows you to fight at a fairly consistent pace without letting you spam your strongest skills. There’s a profession ability (not tied to which weapon you’re using) called Roll For Initiative (ha!) that moves the Thief well away from his current position, while giving him an Initiative boost.”

Update: Guild Wars 2 Guru rounds up the links for the new profession.

Wartower.de had the opportunity to talk with John Stumme (Lead Game Designer for the Guild Wars Live-Team) about the Embark Beach Content Update, featuring the seven hero group, a new mission-hub, enhancements to the user interface, changes to pre-searing Ascalon, Titles and a new hero mechanic.

I’ve been accumulating news snippets about the as-yet-to-be-formally-scheduled release of Guild Wars 2 for an email newsletter I send out to my friends and acquaintances in the Guild Wars community.

• Norn Week Begins — The first post to kick off “Norn Week” on the ArenaNet blog.
• Player reactions to the Dervish update in Guild Wars. I’ve certainly noticed a lot more Dervishes around in-game this week, especially in PvP areas.
• Next post on the Norn: Legend and Legacy. The voices of the Norn, with some insight into why they act the way they do. (I find the samples to be a bit too modern, but perhaps that’s just my personal preference.)
• Norn Week post 3: Go Big or Go Home. The sheer scale of the Norn and their works.
• Eurogamer speculates on Mesmers and Assassins in Guild Wars 2. My own take: Mesmers are explicitly mentioned in the 2nd Guild Wars 2 novel, so they’re in. Assassins are not mentioned, but one of the key characters in the novel has a set of skills that seem remarkably similar to GW assassins.
• A player’s response to the GW Dervish updates and how they’ve changed the playing experience.
• Norn Week: Designing and Redesigning Events.
• ArenaNet’s plans for PAX East, including a new demo featuring the Norn starting area.
• Updates and additions to the official web site’s Norn page.
• Views to admire: Relics of Orr posts the list of must-see places in Guild Wars.
• Norn Week: A Spirit of Legend

I’ve been accumulating news snippets about the as-yet-to-be-formally-scheduled release of Guild Wars 2 for an email newsletter I send out to my friends and acquaintances in the Guild Wars community.

• GuildMag has an article on the revelations from the military forces of Kryta post last week.
• Closed Alpha and Beta for 2011: More information/speculation about the recently announced closed alpha and closed beta programs for later this year.
• Rounding up “Humanity Week”: Rubi rounds up last week’s information from ArenaNet on humans.
• An ode to love in Tyria.
• Inside the Quality Assurance group at ArenaNet.
• Rumour of a GW2 team working on “console” development. Expect this to be quashed by ArenaNet soon: UI changes between PC and various consoles alone would make this a very difficult addition to their existing plans. (Later: Regina Buenaobra had apparently already posted this message to dispel these rumours: “I just want to reiterate that the development team is fully focused on making GW2 the best PC MMO ever released. We have a very small team exploring the possibility of console, but there are no definite plans for a console version at this time. The core of Guild Wars 2 development is fully focused on delivering a fantastic PC MMORPG experience.”)
• The promised Guild Wars Dervish update has been released. This is, as promised, a major revision to many Dervish skills. I expect to have to rebuild all my Derv’s builds, eventually. It’ll take a while to absorb the scale of all the changes.
• Developer notes on the Dervish update.
• If you liked “Humanity Week”, you’ll probably be very happy to hear that next week is going to be “Norn Week“

I’ve been accumulating news snippets about the as-yet-to-be-formally-scheduled release of Guild Wars 2 for an email newsletter I send out to my friends and acquaintances in the Guild Wars community. It just occurred to me that some of my blog audience might also be interested:

• Last Saturday, the official Guild Wars 2 Twitter account posted this teaser:
  “Next week, we’re taking a closer look at the human race in #GuildWars2 ! Keep an eye on the blog and GuildWars2.com! Happy weekend everyone!”
• http://bloogum.net/guildwars/ If you like looking at the great scenery in Guild Wars, this site is for you. It’s a huge gallery of screen shots of places in GW . . . over 6000 of them.
• Kill Ten Rats speculates that the new GW2 demo for PAX East may herald a wider (dare we say “open”?) availability.
• http://www.guildmag.com/plotting-more-than-depth Speculation on the upcoming Winds of Change content in Cantha: “if we go back to the same thing too many times, we’re going to end up with Mursaat being the equivalent of Daleks, only without the goofy and endearing qualities.”
• http://www.arena.net/blog/oh-the-humanity-human-week-begins Start of a week of posts on the Arenanet blog about humans in GW2.
• Are long-running events a good thing or a bad thing?
• Against the Wall: Humanity in Guild Wars 2
• Designing Humans The next post in Humanity Week is about the graphics (comparing humans in GW with their descendants in GW2).
• Responses to some of the questions generated by the voices of GW2 clips.
• Canthan New Year – the best bits Looking back on Canthan New Year.
• Updated info on Humans at the GW2 official site. My dogs “sang along” with the music on the Kryta video clip. (HD version of the clip here)
• Details of the GW update for the Dervish. It’s pretty significant: 90% of Dervish skills have been updated or changed.
• The Line of Duty What should be the final “Humanity Week” posting: the Three Military Orders of Kryta.
• I’ve also seen multiple references to a November 2011 release date. No confirmation of that from Arenanet, of course. (Also, the Guild Wars 2 FAQ has been updated with this little snippet: ‘We will be conducting small closed alpha and beta tests in 2011.’ )

I’ve only played Guild Wars, so it was a huge surprise to me to hear that other MMORPGs had a lot of problems with getting players to co-operate. From this article, it’s clear that Guild Wars 2 will have the same useful mechanism to encourage co-operative play:

In Guild Wars 2 we’re fully committed to the concept of rewarding players individually. This is more or less a quick way of saying that we don’t want to design a system where players argue over loot settings, turn to external “out of game” systems to decide who gets what upon downing a boss, or risk spending hours in a dungeon with nothing to show for it due to bad rolls or a ninja looter that hijacked all their treasure.

In the case of distributing general monster loot or opening dungeon end-chests, this principle means that each player gets their own roll, so it’s alright if you are soloing and someone begins fighting alongside you. This won’t cause the loot you would receive to degrade in any way, as long as you actively participate in that combat. Likewise, when you get to the end of that big dungeon with your group, you each get to individually open the chest and receive your own personal reward.

In the case of gathering materials from things like ore nodes, plants, and the like, this means that when you gather from that resource you use it up for yourself, but not for others. In Guild Wars 2 there is no need to race to beat other people to the same resource node. Take your time ripping that bear’s head off, because no one can walk up and steal that copper node in the back of its cave from you. You may be helping others in your world reach that copper safely, but rest assured that you’re not just clearing a path for a node ganker.

I could go on and on with the examples of how we employ this philosophy, but really what I’m getting at is that our overall goal is for players in your world to be seen as a boon to you to help you overcome bigger challenges and larger foes, and therefore earn greater spoils for your time spent in the game. We’d much rather that everyone in the same world felt a common bond in their shared land and saw each other as potential allies. If players find themselves with leftover aggression that they would normally take out on node gankers or ninja looters, we’d recommend they step into World vs. World and kick themselves some otherworldly player butt.

Arenanet had the first live demo of Guild Wars 2 at the Gamescom event in Germany this weekend. Rubi Beyer couldn’t attend, but still feels that she’s getting plenty of information about the upcoming release:

I did not go to Gamescom. I was kind of not anticipating last week at all, because I envisioned it as a week of me looking at all the wonderful things I couldn’t have, much like a starving orphan outside a bakery (or maybe a homeless orphan in some player’s home instance). I figured it would be very un-fun.

In fact, the opposite was true. Sure, I couldn’t play hands-on, but I enjoyed all the Guild Wars 2 news flooding out of Gamescom just the same. I imagine being there would have made it impossible to take in all of these details from every direction — it just would have been too overwhelming.

Don’t get me wrong, it’s not sour grapes. I would have loved to be there! But since I couldn’t, I’m really enjoying my bird’s-eye view, so to speak. Even from this point of view, the amount of new information we have is nearly impossible to keep track of, so for Flameseeker Chronicles this week, I thought I’d take all that we’ve heard this week and try to distill it into a guide on where you can find information.

It’s felt a bit like trying to take an octopus and 15 of his closest friends and convince them all to fit comfortably in one small sandwich baggie, but I’ve done my best. Follow along after the jump to see where you can find the latest and greatest from Guild Wars 2 at Gamescom.