The developer chat has come to an end and we would like to extend a huge thanks to Jon Peters, Eric Flannum, and Isaiah Cartwright from ArenaNet for taking time out of their day to answer the community’s questions! A big thanks to everyone who submitted a question as well. You can find a transcript of the chat here.
We found out some very interesting information during the chat, some of the highlights being:
Guild Wars 2 will have a combat log
New for the Guild Wars franchise and something that was speculated about rather heatedly here on the Guru forums this past week!
[noxicon] Will GW2 feature a combat log, or any method of reviewing combat events after the fact?
[IsaiahCartwright] Yes there will be a combat log, we fell people should be informed about how skills work so they can understand how combat works, this allows people to better understand the game and make better decisions about how to play the game. It’s not practical to play the combat log up nor do we expect players to play with it up but we do believe in giving players as much info as people and let them use it as they like.
Info on underwater combat
Slippery when wet! Underwater combat seems to getting a modified combat system.
[Ravious] How does underwater combat work, especially in regards to wards and other ground targeting skills?
[JonPeters] There is no ground targeting in underwater combat because we can’t guarantee that there is any ground around to target. Once we reveal more about underwater combat this will make more sense. We understand that underwater combat is very different in nature so we aren’t just going to translate our ground combat into 3D space.
Balancing the guardian and other professions
ArenaNet assures us that group and solo balance is a high priority and that each profession will be able to hold their own.
[Archaes8] Now that we’ve seen the Guardian, we know it’s good in groups, but how effective is it in solo combat? Can this class be as much of a heavy hitter as the warrior?
[JonPeters] We balance every every profession so that they are effective solo and in groups. The Guardian Virtues are built specifically to be held when soloing or used when in a group. There are also many NPC, and pets that can benefit from activating your virtues as well as other players that you aren’t grouped with but are playing a dynamic event with. The guardian like every other profession also has many different utility skills that can allow him to make a variety of builds. A guardian could equip 3 summoned weapons, or 3 shouts.
All in all I would say the chat was a success, even with the technical difficulties there at the beginning. Hopefully we’ll be able to hold another IRC event for the Guild Wars 2 community and get to answer the other 50 billion questions that didn’t get answered!
