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ArenaNet closes the book on Guild Wars' Winds of Change
If you missed the Winds of Change arc that's bridging the gap between Guild Wars and Guild Wars 2, now's a great time to head to the official ArenaNet blog to catch up. The devs have provided a handy summary post and a bit of an explanation for their narrative goals as both Guild Wars and its highly anticipated sequel move forward. ArenaNet also acknowledges the community feedback regarding the difficulty of the Winds of Change content, and the firm says that initially "the difficulty was getting in the way of people enjoying the story, making it far more of a slog than we'd intended and actively undermining their enjoyment of it." Happily, recent updates have led to "major balance tweaks" and second looks at both normal and hard-mode content, so if you were frustrated before, it's worth your time to give it another go.
Flameseeker Chronicles: Big changes
The last chapter of Guild Wars Beyond's Winds of Change was released just a handful of days ago, bringing nine new quests, fancy weapons, fresh rewards, and a heaping helping of story to the land of Cantha, not to mention a significant update to the way ArenaNet is telling the tale. Miku's Tale in particular boasts a few distinct differences from earlier parts of this storyline -- largely, the consensus seems to be, for the better. There was a fair bit of griping after the first portion of Winds of Change went live and a widespread agreement that something was not quite right about the way the quests at the start of Winds of Change were being handled. ArenaNet responded to this with promises to go back and retune quests, mostly in response to the argument that mobs were too hard. While I certainly understand a fiendish level of mob difficulty acting as an intimidating gateway to players less comfortable with fighting in Guild Wars, I don't think it was really the heart of the problem with the earlier Winds of Change content.
Previously on MV TV: Week of February 6th, 2012
Welcome back to Previously on MV TV, your source for highlights from last week's Twitch.tv streams! If you happen to miss one or want to check out some of our shows for the first time, then this is a great place to start. This week we have some Guild Wars developer fun with Richie and then again with Adventure Mike, a bit of Wurm Online exploration and construction with Jeremy and the creator of the game, the first stages of owning land and building a house in Second Life with yours truly, some MOBA action in Heroes of Newerth with Dylan, and the usual Star Wars: The Old Republic goodness with Larry. So what are you waiting for? Click past the cut to catch up on the streams you might have missed. While you're at it, bookmark our Massively TV guide so you won't miss any more!
Guild Wars: The winds just keep on a-changin'
ArenaNet has just announced that the third installment of Winds of Change, Miku's Tale, will be going live tomorrow! Part of Guild Wars Beyond, an effort to bridge the story between Guild Wars and Guild Wars 2, Winds of Change has been following the shifting states of affairs in Cantha. The rise of the Ministry of Purity, a new governmental organization, has had a central role in the story. First fighting with player characters against the blighted Afflicted then gangs of criminals, the Ministry slowly grew in influence and power. Guild Wars players aided the Ministry of Purity in its fight for justice until a chance encounter at a Ministry rally turned things sour. Since then, players have been rescuing captives, working with the Tengu, and generally making a nuisance of themselves as far as the Ministry is concerned. Now, with things in Cantha at the edge of chaos, we can once again pick up the story -- and dive into the final chapter of Winds of Change. If you'd like to see the new content in action, join us tomorrow, February 9th, at 7 p.m. EST for a special edition livestream. Our own Richie Procopio will be joined by ArenaNet staff as he streams the game live on our Twitch channel!
Flameseeker Chronicles: Round two - Fight!
Winds of Change part two has arrived to Guild Wars, and there was definitely much rejoicing. I've been looking forward to this content for a while now for many different reasons. Many of you probably know I dived in headfirst with a nice-sized audience with a livestream event an hour after the update arrived, and let me tell you: There's nothing like stumbling through unfamiliar high-level content with a few hundred people watching. Including some of the people who created that content. That's right, ArenaNet team members John Stumme, Andrew Patrick, John Foreman, and Joe Kimmes joined the livestream chat room. They watched the livestream, offered tips, talked Winds of Change with the viewers, and answered questions. I want to take a moment to extend my thanks to these guys. They were incredibly gracious and wound up staying in chat for not only the entire livestream event but over an hour afterwards as well. I think everyone attending really appreciated that they took those hours from their busy schedules for this. What about the rest of Winds of Change? Follow along after the jump and let's talk!
New Guild Wars Winds of Change content has arrived
Guild Wars fans, have you finished the first 17 quests in Winds of Change? We hope so, because the next round has arrived! The conflict between the Ministry of Purity and the gangs of Kaineng continues with what is being called Guild Wars' largest content expansion to date! The focus moves from eliminating the Afflicted to watching the Ministry rise in power as its motives become more unclear. Part two of Winds of Change will bring 11 new quests, five new respawn zones, and quite a few extra scenes hidden here and there. Players will also encounter a familiar face -- Miku the Assassin from War in Kryta has returned. We're anxious to check out this new content here at Massively, and we've got a surprise Livestream so we can bring you along for the ride. Head to our Livestream channel at 6:00 p.m. EDT today for a first live look at Winds of Change. Even better, some of the ArenaNet team will be joining us in chat to talk over the new content and answer your questions: Lead Designer John Stumme, Programmer Joe Kimmes, Game Designer Andrew Patrick, and QA master John Foreman. Check out the gallery below for some brand-new screenshots, join us at 6:00 EDT for a livestream of some of the new content, and enjoy Winds of Change!%Gallery-135220%
Flameseeker Chronicles: Who wants to go kill some afflicted?
These winds, they are a changin'. Sorry, sorry. I couldn't resist. Anyway, the first round of Winds of Change content dropped Thursday night, so the Guild Wars community is abuzz with talk of the new content, costumes, and enemies in Cantha. Several members of our guild were sitting around playing the "What do you wanna do? Eh, I dunno, what do you wanna do?" game when Winds of Change arrived, so we were all pretty much free. Six of us bolted for Kaineng Center, partied up, jumped on vent, and took off. We were in for a bit of a surprise. You see, most of us have been playing for a very long time and are pretty comfortable with normal-mode content. We threw in a couple of hero monks, loaded up some standard builds, and off we went. We were treating it like a casual exploration thing, heading out to see what was out there. Whoops. The Live Team has been working overtime, I see. We slunk back to town to lick our wounds and tried again, this time with more (relative) success. So how was it? Follow along after the jump and let's take a look!
The winds, they are a-changin' in Guild Wars
It's time for another major event in Guild Wars, one that's been heavily anticipated by the players -- the next installment in Guild Wars Beyond, centering around the lands of Cantha. There are changes afoot for the land, as evidenced by the title of the new multi-part event, Winds of Change. And if you want to start taking part in the history that will shape Guild Wars 2, now is a fine time to see what those winds are bringing. Players can start their newest adventure by speaking with Initiate Zei Ri at Kaineng Center, setting them down the road following the events of Guild Wars Factions. (Needless to say, you have to have finished Factions to take part in the new missions.) As was the case for the previous installment, the update brings with it new costumes for players to purchase so that the battle for Cantha's future can be done in style. Guild Wars players should get to work seeing all that the update has to offer, because the change starts now... and who knows how much will be different when all is said and done.
Flameseeker Chronicles: Let's review!
The ArenaNet team has been quiet lately in the news department and deservedly so. Between GDC, PAX East, the Guild Wars 2 Thief, and Embark Beach and heroes in Guild Wars 1, I imagine the developers are ready to catch up on frivolous things like eating, sleeping, sitting, and breathing. We've got Winds of Change and Guild Wars' sixth birthday to look forward to, but in the meantime, I want to take the opportunity to play catch-up. When there's a pause in new information, I always enjoy backing up a bit and spending some quality time with newer players. I know that there's been another influx of new players recently, particularly after so many saw GW2 at PAX. Follow along after the jump for a roundup of Guild Wars basic guides as well as an update and information on Massively's official Guild Wars guild.
Flameseeker Chronicles: What have we learned from the War in Kryta?
It was another relatively quiet week in Guild Wars 2 news, but here at Massively we had an exciting interview with some of the ArenaNet team members about aspects of Guild Wars 1. In that interview, John Stumme snuck in some hints of what's to come for Guild Wars: Beyond. We finally got the official name of the Canthan content: Winds of Change. There's much more, too -- Keiran's coming back, there's a wedding on the horizon, and we haven't seen the last of the Lunatic Court. These new details sparked a lot of talk among the fans and got me thinking about player feedback from the War in Kryta. Follow along after the jump as we take a look, and then let me know what you think!
An update on Warhammer's Winds of Change feature testing
With our original story drawing so much heated discussion, we should inform everyone of a few key updates that were announced today. We would also like to emphasize that The Winds of Change feature was being live tested on only one server, Dark Crag. Official forum player feedback can be found here.Update #1 - Mythic has released a server maintenance announcement.Greetings!Today, 4/29/09, all North American and Oceanic servers will be brought offline at 9:00 AM EDT for an update. We anticipate all servers to be back online by 1:00 PM EDT. This update will improve City Instances and server stability; in addition the Winds of Change feature will be removed from Dark Crag during this downtime.Thank you and as always keep an eye on the Herald for the latest news and information during server updates!Update #2 - GOA's Nilax has released this statement on the official European forums."After reviewing the metrics and community feedback Mythic have removed the Winds of Change feature from Dark Crag. As they will continue to look at this or similar options to improve stability I will leave this thread open for now."
Winds of Change to blow through Warhammer
What's the worst case scenario for an MMO pitting hundreds of players against each other in epic large-scale RvR combat? Lag. Crashing. Rollbacks. Unfortunately, many Warhammer Online players have experienced all these issues while participating in open RvR. Mythic has been working on server stability since launch and now plan on taking a more aggressive stance by testing a new mechanic called The Winds of Change (WoC).The WoC will basically teleport certain players to the nearest PvE safe spot (warcamp or chapter hub) when the server determines it is under enough stress to soon buckle. If people do not voluntarily leave once the WoC message is broadcast across the zone, dead players in the effected area will be teleported first, followed by the severely wounded. On the plus side, at least those players who qualify will still have a chance at rolling for rewards.Some players believe the solution is not ideal because it forces people out of RvR, the game's bread and butter, but Mythic says the WoC only be a temporary fix until they can solve their server stability issues once and for all. One has to wonder if that is even possible given the game has been on the market for over 7 months already. Still, we remain cautiously optimistic. A more permanent solution may arrive with The Land of the Dead as we predict many players will flee the original open RvR campaign for RvR in the desert.Update #1 - Mythic has released a server maintenance announcement.Greetings!Today, 4/29/09, all North American and Oceanic servers will be brought offline at 9:00 AM EDT for an update. We anticipate all servers to be back online by 1:00 PM EDT. This update will improve City Instances and server stability; in addition the Winds of Change feature will be removed from Dark Crag during this downtime.Thank you and as always keep an eye on the Herald for the latest news and information during server updates!Update #2 - GOA's Nilax has released this statement on the official European forums."After reviewing the metrics and community feedback Mythic have removed the Winds of Change feature from Dark Crag. As they will continue to look at this or similar options to improve stability I will leave this thread open for now."
