Guild Wars PvP Extreme Weekend

[bapenguin]

This weekend there is a special event in the world of Guild Wars. Arena Net is hosting a PvP Extreme Weekend (http://www.guildwars.com/events/pvpx/default.html) for all players of Guild Wars. What do you get? Earn 5 times the faction awards for wins in high-level arenas and tournament play!

Earn 2.5 times the faction awards for wins in guild-vs-guild play!

This weekend only, gain full faction for guild-vs-guild victories, regardless of the period of time you've been a member of your guild.

Starts Friday at 12:01 and ends Sunday at 11:59.

IGN has an Interview up (http://pc.ign.com/articles/644/644668p1.html) with ArenaNet's Skill Balance Game Designer Isaiah Cartwright about skills and the event.IGNPC: How do you see skills improving in future chapters of Guild wars?

Isaiah Cartwright: I'm glad you asked that. I see the first set of skills as just scratching the surface of what Guild Wars will eventually contain. Down the road when we have a few chapters under our belt, I expect to see thousands of skills in the game. The way I see it, the more skills and combinations we create, the more fun and interesting the Guild Wars skill system becomes.

Thousands...hot damn that's a lot.

[Genital Eclipse]

Time to fire up the old EA guild boys!!!!! Faction city!

[Oblivion]

I am guessing that the skill system will have a CCG-like quality to it: thousands of skills, limitless possibilities.

[Cupelix]

I am guessing that the skill system will have a CCG-like quality to it: thousands of skills, limitless possibilities.
Or, it will turn out like most systems with too many possibilities - there are clear "best" combinations which everyone eventually gets word of, so every player ends up alike anyway.

The GW world seems like that a bit already, considering 95% of the players I see in towns appear to have Warrior or Monk as one of their professions. The Mo/W friend I play with seems so ridiculously overpowered in terms of survivability. My only hope is that things balance out since it's aimed at group PvP and not 1v1 PvP.

[bean19]

Cupelix - Actually, when you get to the higher levels of GvG (I was in a top 10 guild before leaving the game), it is not just about your skill set, but the skill set of your group. You have to arrange your skills so that they are cunning and do not duplicate.

For instance, you can have a Ranger Assault based team that excels at taking out people before they can be effective by concentrating fire from 5 rangers on one target. This team of rangers needs to have powers that deal damage in different ways. . . for instance can cause a health DoT that is up to minus 7 arrows (I think, could be 10 - a long time since I played), so you want to have two rangers who have minus health dots that stack and do this, but no more than that since you are concentrating fire and going over that number won't help. Then you have crowd control, the person in charge of keeping the victim in range and slowing down warriors so that they cannot stay in melee range, and other types of damage dealers.

It also becomes about getting all the weapon enhancements and extra skills from the PvE game. You want a character that deals sick damage, but if you have a super-duper bow that also adds sick damage as a proc, then you have a huge advantage.

That's just one example, but that's how it works in top 10 play. You become a customized team instead of customized builds. In one versus one some of those team builds would get raped by other things, but in team play where you can kill that warrior that is trying to take out your priest in about 5 seconds of combined fire, you win.

However, you have to have a few different tricks up your sleeve. If you know that someone is bringing a ranger team. . . that that is their "thing", then you can have your team all sub-spec monk and use anti-arrow skills.

There are a lot of good strategies and counters in that game. Guild Wars truly rocks. . . I just can't bring myself to play it anymore though. I have no idea why. . . maybe it is the way that player skill can't make up for strategy. Once you've entered the battle, the other team is as skille as yours at that level of play (there isn't any aiming or complex maneuvers to pull off. . . it's all tabbing and pressing buttons like any other MMO), so you pretty much win the battle before you enter the battlefield.

Also, you don't really know who you are going to face in GvG matching, so you can't get to know your opponent and adjust really. . . (I know I made it sound that way). This leads to sticking to the build that has allowed your guild to enjoy the most winning record so far.

[Bushi]

I'm sick of the number of skills you can have, if they are goign to have thousands to pick from they really need to up the number that can be picked.

[Talanvor]

Thousands? Geez, unless they come up with some really creative stuff there's going to be a lot of overlap. But I'm only level 10 right now, meh.

[The Continental]

So are there still a decent amount of GW players on EA? I know a friend of mine got into it heavily when it first came out and it seemed like he was done with the game inside of a month.

[agentgray]

Ah...thousands of skills and only eight slots. I can't wait.

[A-Team]

Penguin forgot to mention that the event begins on Friday, August 26 at 12:01 AM PDT until Sunday, August 28 at 11:59 PM PDT. Just figured I'd re-state the times so that people knew what timezone they were in.

[Hijinx]

I just started up again. I think I'll try and get on this weekend.

[LilBunnyFuFu]

I'm sure one of the expansions will have a quest that expands that slots for skills. I'm hoping that they double it, 8 for primary, 8 for secondary. and for christ sake, higher level cap...

[Kefkataran]

It's cool of the devs to be running events like this to keep interest in the game up. Hope to see more like that in the future.

[Rirath]

I've logged about 80 hours in GW over two chars, and my main wants in the game are more skill slots, and a higher level cap. PvP is fun enough, but honestly I don't care less about this whole "CCG" hype. In a CCG you've got a deck of 60+ cards you're using in a single match, not 8 cards you hand choose. Comparing it to a card game is just some viral term they've come up with, that sadly stuck.

I'd love to just be able to use any skill I want, like WoW. It would even be great if you could simply use two or three times as many skills in PvE alone, but not in duels. I hardly see how anyone would complain. Thousands of skills when I only need and can use a handful just don't do me any good. Surely they realize this.

As for this event... Faction means nothing to me, sadly. I'd rather unlock my items through PvE, than have them handed to me in PvP. One should be able to exchange faction won via PvE chars for PvE runes/items.

[Liquidize105]

I finally killed my account problem and have brought back my beta character.

Time for some playing.

[bean19]

rirath - If they add more skills, they will overpower some builds. Well-built characters use their skills synergetically. . . add more and you'll have cookie-cutter builds.

[Nintendo Revolution]

I <3 Guild Wars.