EPT![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/E2jiK.png)
I had the pleasure of joining our community counterpart in Guild Wars 2 during this past beta weekend. You can find information about Team Legacy in this thread and on their website.
INTRO
I've always liked the concept of an MMO - the idea that a large group of people from different backgrounds defies geographical boundaries and unites to defeat a common enemy.
I've also always preferred that enemy to be human.
+ Show Spoiler +
It was very hard for me to fall in love with WoW the way so many other MMO players did. The slaying of dragons always seemed to amount to performing a set pattern of moves and keep an eye out for whoever deviated from said pattern and scold them for it. Once you discovered the pattern, that was that. When the boss lay dead, the challenge was gone.
I sought a more adaptable foe. In my teens i co-led a clan in RuneScape that would engage in 100+ vs. 100+ fights on a weekly basis. Wars were fought with over 500 people on the same screen. In Tribal Wars we controlled an entire map. If free online games can do it, why not AAA titles?
So i tried Age of Conan which promised "epic siege battles". Yeah. No comment.
So i tried Warhammer: Online, heir to DAoC and this time i really tried. I played extremely hardcore shunning sleep to reach the levels required to participate in siege warfare. Under the legendary guildmaster and video maker Fura we were the only sponsored WAR guild and represented the Millenium organization that today hosts the foreign hope
Stephano. We rushed to endgame content and were all really excited. Only to find that fortress sieges, the core element of WAR, were completely unplayable. Millenium.WAR disbanded only weeks later and no epic videos were ever submitted to warhammermovies.com.
So i abandoned hope of a massive PvP game. Instead i helped lead the TL.EU WoW guild as Cataclysm was released. Those were good times but alas, just more of the same and after the initial batch of content was cleared, our motivation to continue was snuffed out.
Then rumors started growing, whispers that a new challenger would emerge. That the successor to Guild Wars would this time stay true to its name and put clan warfare at the center of attention. I refused to listen to such rumors. I'd been disappointed too many times.
But as i learned that GW2 wouldn't carry a monthly fee, the monetary risk of buying the game became small enough to warrant the potential disappointment of yet another failed attempt at creating online warfare on a massive scale. Even if the chance that they succeeded was less than 1%, it would still be worth trying it out.
I sought a more adaptable foe. In my teens i co-led a clan in RuneScape that would engage in 100+ vs. 100+ fights on a weekly basis. Wars were fought with over 500 people on the same screen. In Tribal Wars we controlled an entire map. If free online games can do it, why not AAA titles?
So i tried Age of Conan which promised "epic siege battles". Yeah. No comment.
So i tried Warhammer: Online, heir to DAoC and this time i really tried. I played extremely hardcore shunning sleep to reach the levels required to participate in siege warfare. Under the legendary guildmaster and video maker Fura we were the only sponsored WAR guild and represented the Millenium organization that today hosts the foreign hope
Stephano. We rushed to endgame content and were all really excited. Only to find that fortress sieges, the core element of WAR, were completely unplayable. Millenium.WAR disbanded only weeks later and no epic videos were ever submitted to warhammermovies.com. So i abandoned hope of a massive PvP game. Instead i helped lead the TL.EU WoW guild as Cataclysm was released. Those were good times but alas, just more of the same and after the initial batch of content was cleared, our motivation to continue was snuffed out.
Then rumors started growing, whispers that a new challenger would emerge. That the successor to Guild Wars would this time stay true to its name and put clan warfare at the center of attention. I refused to listen to such rumors. I'd been disappointed too many times.
But as i learned that GW2 wouldn't carry a monthly fee, the monetary risk of buying the game became small enough to warrant the potential disappointment of yet another failed attempt at creating online warfare on a massive scale. Even if the chance that they succeeded was less than 1%, it would still be worth trying it out.
A LEAP OF FAITH
I loved the idea of a beta weekend. It was no secret that a substantial quantity of pre-purchases had been made and that the event itself would ride on a tidal wave of hype. This made me figure the weekend was a perfect way to see for myself if Arenanet had managed to pull it off - that illusive dream of online battles. I was looking for a concentrated version of the experience as a whole.
Most importantly i knew right from the start that i would have to play with the right group of people in order to give the game a 'proper chance'. I always had TL in the back of my head and relief washed over me as i saw that their beta experience (and teamspeak channel) would be open to curious members of the public.
A BEAUTIFUL GAME
I won't lie - in its current state GW2 is an unoptimized mess. My CPU (QX9650) ran the game with three cores at 20-30% utilization and one core at 60-70% utilization. My GPU (GTX580) usage never went above 20% and i even had to force it not to downclock due to lack of challenge. In spite of these unnaturally untaxing numbers, the game was plagued by framerate issues. It's been this way with every MMO beta though and i'm not too worried.
So i won't judge GW2 visuals from a technical standpoint but rather an artistic one.
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/biohE.jpg)
Age of guildwars?
The visual style of GW2 is very appealing. You've all seen the watercolor style they use for cinematics and i have little to add other than to say it's beautiful. The general look of the game i would describe as being somewhat close to Age of Conan with a colorful high-fantasy KMMO touch. It works. Sometimes the result is nothing short of stunning.
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/t6zQX.jpg)
How beautiful destruction is.
Sadly the character creation options are your standard MMO bread and butter. Customization options found in games like Saints Row 3 are nowhere to be seen - what's on offer are generic barbie dolls and fantasy beings. It's not quite the high heels and revealing armors of Tera but certainly doesn't push the boundaries in any way.
THE CHAOS OF WAR
So onwards to what really matters. The game could be horribly ugly and point & click only for all i care, as long as it provides a stage for battles to be fought on and an active playerbase of sympathetic individuals. Did i find what i was looking for?
The beta had a hectic start. Basically it went online about an hour earlier than announced which meant not everyone was ready for it. We were. Make no mistake about it - GW2 after a server reset is pure blitzkrieg. A race straight through the mists into the battlegrounds. Defender's advantage is huge so the initial race to secure unclaimed keeps and towers very much sets the board for future combat.
So when you do encounter an enemy?
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/03XsH.jpg)
The calm before the storm.
Zergfest. Player vs. Doors. AoE stalemate. Buzzwords that have been thrown around to describe the events that characterize GW2 WvW. To an extent - sure, they're all true. But mainly if you aren't playing it 'right'. Organization is everything and i would like to give a huge shoutout to Freelancer for his composed leadership throughout the weekend. If executed correctly, tactics will counter zergs. AoE can be bypassed and gates go down fast to proper besieging.
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/aNELI.jpg)
The chaotic beauty of online warfare.
The tactical elements of the game and the fun in executing them is one thing, but the true depth is found in the strategic planning of assaults. Through capturing supply depots you gain access to a self-replenishing resource that is required for literally everything in WvW - offensive and defensive measures. These depots then spawn caravans that transport supplies to nearby controlled towers and keeps adding to their respective cache. By controlling supply you control WvW. I was impressed by how it felt most events that took place in WvW zones mattered, simply intercepting a caravan or making sure it reached its destination could completely turn the tides of war.
So. On to the One question: great in theory, but does it work?
To an extent. Currently there's a pretty restrictive cap on the number of character models that will be simultaneously displayed on screen. But the people were there. At the same time, at the same location and it all worked for them individually. Even if you only see 50 people, there might be more there. Their models aren't rendered but they're there, not in another instance, not on a mirrored server. If Arenanet can somehow fix the clipping issue by perhaps implementing heavier scaling on player textures, it actually does work, massive PvP is functioning.
Which takes us to what went down this weekend. I think i can safely say for all of us involved in WvW that we had a blast. Living in Europe the time zone difference was brutal, but it was all worth it. When people were commenting that the sun was coming up, it was already midday for me. So how come i chose to destroy my sleeping pattern? Because you do it together, or not at all. WvW without teamspeak using the current chat system is a desolate and uninspiring experience. A scramble to bunch people together, herding cats if you will.
In a guild, WvW is an amazing experience. Once you're engaged in a full scale fight, you must utilize positioning, surgical strikes and of course speshul tektics, but you also need a supply chain to reinforce you, scouts that keep track of enemy movements and a general idea of what's going on in the rest of the map. Provided you have all, dictating the tempo of battle becomes everything. Not getting bogged down, knowing when to stand and fight and not breaking, gamble on seemingly foolish counterattacks.
Once you have a couple of trebuchets down and you and the enemy start flinging stones (and cows!) at each other, you know you're having a good time.
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/gUOf5.jpg)
A not-so-friendly exchange.
Every night at 00:00, WvW would reset and your world was pitted against two new ones based on how you'd done relative to the others. Having demolished our initial pairing and decisively defeated our second thanks to quick paced raids and long nights we knew things wouldn't be quite so easy on the third reset. We were paired up against the Reddit homeworld and faced a seemingly endless tide of Redditors looking to -1 us. Our blitzkrieg proved stronger and we managed to secure Stonemist Castle before they were able to fully mobilize and then went on to ravage the rest of the world, stripping it of supply in a locust-like fashion.
As most of us went to bed however, i don't think it would be an unfair statement to say that Reddit had a stronger representation in certain timezones. We woke up to find a world that was almost entirely taken. As i touch on this subject i would just like to mention that i give full credit to Reddit and their efforts in this war. They beat us fair, square and convincingly. Not only that but they realized to a greater extent than we did, the importance of fully locking down what you had acquired. We came back to find a world that was not only taken, but as we set out to take it back, we were met with high walls and reinforced gates behind which were harbored an impressive arsenal of the oh so important arrow carts.
We were shut out. Our efforts to retake keeps were thwarted for hours and as we restructured to a mode of all out offense, we lost as much as we gained but truly did leave our mark by doing so. Local chat in WvW displayed the chat of everyone talking in /s, including that of opposing worlds. As we moved across the map with a considerable force we saw the impact we had on the defenders. At one point we moved past the keep of Dreaming Bay to hit a supply camp and someone posted something along the lines of "Help! Massive zerg incoming at Dreaming Bay" and it was decided we should have some fun with it. Disinformation is an important weapon of war and so it was that every time we hit something on the map, we'd also call for help at Dreaming Bay (you couldn't see which world a player talking in /s belonged to). Eventually the defenders must have grown tired of those who would "cry wolf" and stopped coming Dreaming Bay's defenses. We tried to capitalize on this by finally striking it for real and nearly succeeded. As we were halfway through the second gate they mounted a massive counterattack and drew us off.
We admitted defeat and went on a prolonged break and engaged in various guild activities unrelated to WvW. As the night neared its end though, we were determined to return to the battleground and make our final stand. After a few drilling exercises for newcomers (the way i understood TL's only scheduled raid was on sunday night though most of the guild had been playing pretty much non-stop anyways) the time came to decide on a target. A couple of ideas were tossed around but the decision was obvious - we had to return to Dreaming Bay.
THE BATTLE FOR DREAMING BAY
We quickly broke through the outer wall gates and proceeded to sweep their walls off of siege equipment. The way the keep is structured, it incorporates cliffs as a natural part of the wall which normally would serve to keep invaders out but now became our entrenched position. As we mounted four trebuchets on the cliffside and started shelling the inner keep, they quickly assembled a vast defense force, aided in their efforts by an Arenanet developer. They rebuilt the outer gate, effectively locking us in as they advanced on us. Arrow carts were set up en masse to hold them back and raiding teams scurried in and out, carrying valuable supply and getting teleported back up the cliff by Mesmer portals. Our trebuchets kept pounding on their inner walls, they built trebuchets to break our position. The air was filled with projectiles as neither side seemed to make much progress. Eventually though, we persevered. Their supplies were depleted and they could no longer repair the walls nor field enough siege equipment to drive us back. As the walls fell we swam across the canal and rushed through the gaping hole. We divided our forces so that some of us would clear the newly claimed walls and others would remain below to hold our new position. The wall clearing team managed to destroy the remaining siege equipment but at a terrible price - we were all slain by the remaining defenders who proceeded to advance down unto our last few. A mad dash was made for the Keep Lord who fell quickly and then a last stand was scrambled in the Lord's chamber. If we survived this final onslaught the keep would be ours. They charged in and fell to our spells and blades, our sweat and blood. It was done. The keep was claimed. Dreaming Bay was ours! Our colors proudly hanging from the walls.
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/gyRjW.jpg)
TL in front of Dreaming bay, image courtesy of our appropriately (un)dressed leader, Freelancer. Me on the far right (Thrillseeker).
All in all, i'd just like to say thank you to everyone who was part of making this beta weekend such a success. To Arenanet for rekindling my hope in a massive PvP game. While there were many things i hated in the beta - no shift binds, forced camera snapback, clipping issues, poor optimization, boring gameplay with certain classes/weapons etc - all that is fixable. WAR was pretty polished in the late stages of beta but none of that mattered as the main feature of the game was broken to an unfixable point. To TL for taking myself and everyone else who wanted in under their wings. I hope to see much more of you in the future.
I played ~35 hours over the course of the weekend 95% of which was spent in WvW.
There's a series of novels called The Sky Crawlers that was turned into an animé movie. An extract from the synopsis of the movie reads as follows:
On an alternate future Earth, there is no longer any war between nations. Peace reigns over the entire planet. However, it's been found that people need the tension and excitement of war -- even experienced vicariously -- to truly feel alive. To fill this need, staged "wars" between various corporations provide the excitement and nervous tension that actual wars had provided.
Perhaps Hiroshi Mori's vision of an alternate universe wasn't so different from our actual future. While i might not be quite so optimistic, wargames most certainly fill a larger function than simply being distractions.
Today i can safely say that Guild Wars 2 is a step in the right direction and i do so with a smile on my face.
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/ykrCG.jpg)
