Guild Wars: Factions

ArenaNet co-founder Jeff Strain talks us through the next chapter in NCsoft's Guild Wars saga

"When we announced Guild Wars back in early 2003," explains ArenaNet co-founder Jeff Strain, "we made a promise to gamers that we were going to change the online RPG industry." It's a lofty claim, but the original Guild Wars' million-strong following clearly demonstrates that ArenaNet's dedication to content-driven, subscription fee-free MMORPGing has reaped rewards for the developer and publisher NCsoft.

Now, ArenaNet is putting the finishing touches to Guild Wars: Factions - a stand-alone title designed to expand the original game's universe, without punishing players who choose not to upgrade. "We are big proponents of player choice-no subscription fees, which force you to pay every month whether you have actually played the game that month or not, and no forced purchases", says Strain on ArenaNet's unique approach in the world of MMORPGs. "We believe that it is our job to make cool games that you want to buy. If we succeed, everyone is happy. But if you decide to pass on a new campaign, we are certainly not going to setup a business model that forces you to make a purchase that you don't want to make!"

Clearly though, the team at ArenaNet is determined not to disappoint existing Guild Wars players when Factions hits shelves later this year. We recently had the chance to quiz Strain about the developer's philosophy on online gaming and, of course, what fans can look forward to with Factions imminent arrival.

How important is Factions to Guild Wars, and how do you expect it to improve the Guild Wars experience?

Jeff Strain: We think Factions is a pivotal campaign for Guild Wars. When we announced Guild Wars back in early 2003, we made a promise to gamers that we were going to change the online RPG industry by offering a global online game that did not require subscription fees of any kind, but that was supported with new content in excess of what was delivered by traditional MMOs. In other words, you get more (much more) for your money. With the release of Factions this spring, and additional campaigns that will follow roughly twice a year, we will be fulfilling that promise.

We are also excited about the Factions campaign because it gives us a chance to improve on the Prophecies campaign (the original Guild Wars release) in all areas. It will certainly have improved graphics and music, but perhaps more importantly, the game will offer entirely new play mechanics. One of our core philosophies is that each new Guild Wars campaign should not simply offer "more of the same," but should instead offer completely new ways to play the game. We want Guild Wars to evolve and stay fresh over time, and the combination of our on-demand streaming technology and regular releases of new campaigns allows us to do that.

The alliance and factions features in Factions add new real-time, global territory conquest mechanics to the game, which we believe will bring the PvP and role-playing communities together in new ways. There are also many new types of role-playing and PvP areas in the game, including Faction Battles, in which allied guilds battle against the opposing faction to conquer new territory; Alliance Missions, in which players co-operate to take ownership of public towns for their alliance; and Elite Missions that provide the ultimate co-operative challenge.

Is there a storyline for Factions? If so, what is it, what are players caught up in and what are they aiming to achieve?

Jeff Strain: The Factions campaign takes place on the continent of Cantha, to the south of Tyria, which was the setting for the Prophecies campaign. Two hundred years ago, the Emperor of Cantha was slain by his closest bodyguard - a man by the name of Shiro Tagachi. When this bodyguard was finally brought to justice (read: killed), his death wail was so powerful and full of hatred that it petrified the forest and turned the sea to jade, forever changing the landscape of Cantha and its neighboring nations. In the current day, Shiro's spirit has returned to Cantha to cause havoc, and it is up to the players to stop him. There are three nations on the continent of Cantha:

• Canthans: Players were introduced to the Canthans in the first release. The Xunlai Agents (account storage NPCs) are from this nation. They are generally wealthy merchants and traders. As a group, Canthans are very cosmopolitan and worldly. Their country is lead by an emperor, who inherited the title from his father.
  
  
• Kurzicks: Highly religious and made up of talented crafters and artisans, this culture resides in a petrified forest (the result of Shiro's death wail 200 years ago). Their buildings are highly ornate and masterfully crafted out of the gigantic fossilized trees. In general, these people respect artisans, titles of nobility, and the established order of things.
  
  
• Luxons: Once a seafaring nation, this nation has had to adapt since the sea has been turned to jade (the result of Shiro's death wail 200 years ago). They travel across the petrified water using huge magical walking machines. Because of this transition, they have become a mostly nomadic culture, using easily portable materials to make shelter able to be picked up and moved at a moment's notice. As a group, this culture respects strength above all else.

The Luxons and Kurzicks have a tremendous hatred for one another. The reasons for this stem mostly from a dispute over resources. Each side currently controls lands and resources that the other would like to get a hold of, and as a consequence, they are at a constant state of war. Players will be able to ally with either one of these nations, thus creating a system in which guild wins advance the cause of one side or the other, changing the political face of the world.

We understand Factions is a standalone product. Why did you choose to go down this route rather than release an expansion that requires the original Guild Wars to play? What benefits does it bring?

Jeff Strain: That is correct - Guild Wars Factions is a standalone product, and does not require Guild Wars to play. We chose to go this route for several reasons. First, we are big proponents of player choice - no subscription fees, which force you to pay every month whether you have actually played the game that month or not, and no forced purchases. We believe that it is our job to make cool games that you want to buy. If we succeed, everyone is happy. But if you decide to pass on a new campaign, we are certainly not going to set up a business model that forces you to make a purchase that you don't want to make!

Factions, like all future campaigns, and like the original Prophecies campaign, is optional. We do our best to add compelling new gameplay features and content, and while we may think you are insane if you opt not to purchase it this time around, it is ultimately your choice. We'll do our best to catch you next time.

We also want to make sure that anyone can jump in and start playing Guild Wars at any time, even three years from now when there are numerous campaigns available. You should not have to go out and purchase two or more products to try it out, nor should you have to buy something that is three years old. And you certainly should not have to feel that you are "late to the party" and that it is not possible to catch-up. Each new campaign is a full game, not only in the scope of the content, but also in that it contains unique professions, quests, tutorials, and starter skills to bring you into the game and teach you how to play.

Every new campaign also has a large amount of content for fully leveled-up (or "Ascended") characters, so your existing characters can freely travel between all the campaigns you have purchased and play through the new content.

We've read that owners of both Guild Wars and Factions will be able to 'transfer' stuff between the games. What exactly can you transfer and how does transferring work, and also does this mean that characters of players who only own Factions will start off boosted, if you see what we mean?

Jeff Strain: In the original Prophecies campaign, new characters leveled-up to level 20, at which point they reached Ascension. This event occurs a bit beyond half way through the campaign, so roughly half of the quests and missions were designed for fully-Ascended characters. New Guild Wars campaigns, including Factions, will also provide content for leveling-up new characters to Ascension, but this content will comprise about 20 percent of the game. This means that your existing Guild Wars characters can travel freely to each new campaign and participate in the new story and quests.

If you purchase only Factions, you will be able to create new characters from any of the six core professions or one of the two new Factions professions, and then play through the Factions story until your character reaches Ascension. You can then continue on through the Factions story, or if you purchase the original Prophecies campaign, you can take your Factions character through the post-Ascension content in that campaign.

What's the key content that's being added to the game - and what does the 'Factions' in the title actually refer to?

Jeff Strain: The key new content in Guild Wars Factions is the territory conquest mechanics introduced by the alliance and factions features.

Guilds can join together to form guild alliances. Allied guilds share alliance chat and can visit each other's guild halls. Alliances can also gain control of cities and towns in Cantha by participating in Alliance Missions, which gives them the ability to trigger events and gain access to exclusive areas.

By aligning with one of two warring factions, alliances can gain and hold territory by participating in Faction Battles. The outcome of these battles influences the progress of the war between the two factions. Current battle lines and control of cities and towns is visible on the world map. In addition, there are several new game types:

• Challenge Missions: Co-operative missions with specific scoring objectives, such as holding out against progressive waves of enemies. We will track and display personal bests and high scores and display them in-game.
  
  
• Elite Missions: The most powerful alliances will have access to new areas that are designed to be the ultimate co-operative challenge.
  
  
• Alliance Missions: Multiple teams compete to control resource points and achieve strategic victory. Victors earn faction points for their alliance that will determine control of towns and outposts.
  
  
• Faction Battles: Large-scale, strategic PvP battles that allow factions to conquer new territory.

In the announcement for Factions, it states that it'll feature expanded options for both co-op and PvP play and enhanced features for guilds. Can you elaborate on these new elements?

Jeff Strain: One of our primary goals with Factions was to build stronger ties between the PvP and role-playing communities. Guild Wars offers a fantastic mission-based role-playing experience, and the design of our skill and character progression systems has resulted in a game that is very attractive to top PvP guilds, but we wanted to develop new mechanics that encouraged these two communities to interact. Specifically, we wanted to add value to guild membership for players who primarily play cooperative missions rather than PvP.

In Factions, allied guilds can take ownership of towns within the territory that their faction controls. Within these towns are portals to high-level co-operative missions (with a correspondingly high-level of loot!), called Elite Missions, that are accessible only by members of the guild alliance that controls that town. Larger towns have better Elite Missions, and ownership of these larger towns is given to alliances with higher faction ratings. An alliance gains faction through both PvP Faction Battles and co-operative Alliance Missions and Challenge Missions, so the most successful guilds will have a diverse membership of hardcore PvP players, role-players, and players who enjoy both.

It's mentioned that Factions is introducing a new PvP continent called Battle Isles. What can we expect from Battle Isles, and what other areas are you adding to the original set-up?

Jeff Strain: The new Battle Isles area was introduced during the Factions Global Free-for-All PvP Weekend in January. Since we want all players to have access to the core PvP areas regardless of which campaigns they own, we needed to move the Battle Isles to a separate continent. We also introduced some major new features to the PvP experience, including a full tutorial mode and the ability to sharpen your PvP skills by fighting against AI-controlled henchmen in the arena of your choice. This has been a very popular feature! We also added the ability for you to choose the type of build you are training against based on popular builds from the current tournament season. Finally, the automated tournament, team arenas, and random arenas each received new maps.

Post game release, and based on player feedback, what are the most important issues you've addressed in Guild Wars - if any - and are you using Factions to make any significant alterations to the core game?

Jeff Strain: The huge number of players around the world generate (as you would guess) a tremendous volume of feedback, and we go to extreme lengths to ensure that all of our developers stay on top of the community response to gameplay issues, balance opinions, feature requests, and expectations for the future of Guild Wars. One of the more important issues that we addressed very shortly after release was the disparity between the rate at which role-players and PvP players were able to unlock new skills in their account. We substantially overhauled the faction system to correct this, and we will continue to ensure that the game is balanced for both types of play.

We also continue to run an external alpha test of around 1,000 players who give us constant feedback throughout the development process. The addition of AI-controlled henchman is a great example of a feature that was added to the game based on player feedback. Leveraging our streaming technology, we are able to publish several game updates per month, so we are constantly incorporating player feedback on user interface, skill balance, battleground awareness, and so on.

What benefits do you think the lack of monthly subscription requirement has brought to Guild Wars and do you foresee other companies following this model for MMORPGs?

Jeff Strain: We think the benefit of ditching the monthly subscription fee is more than a million happy gamers! Our belief before release was that a top-tier online RPG that did not require a subscription would be more appealing both to hardcore as well as casual players, and based on the success of the game around the world, we certainly continue to believe that. We also like the fact that you don't have to feel "guilty" about playing (or not playing) the game. I know that I have many "classic" games on my shelf that I love to take down on a rainy day. If you are paying a subscription, you feel like you have to justify the cost every month. Games are for fun - they shouldn't be part of the budget!

I definitely think other companies will be following this model. I believe Sony made some recent announcements about this. If you are an online game publisher and have been remotely paying attention to the sales charts during the past year, it is clear that Guild Wars has defined a new category of gaming, and it's going to be much harder to justify a monthly fee in the future. We don't care to justify it at all!

Guild Wars strays significantly away from the traditional MMORPG template. During the design of the game, what did you think were the weakest areas of the MMORPG that needed addressing?

Jeff Strain: I have always loved the idea of MMOs, and yet I have never really enjoyed playing them. I grew up with the classic RPGs-the SSI gold box series, Bard's Tale, the Ultimas, and Might and Magic - and while those games certainly can't match the scope and community of modern online RPGs, they did excel at making you feel like you were the hero.

The traditional MMO persistent world is a static entity - it is very difficult to allow players to change the world, because the next group of heroes to come along needs to be able to kill the same boss, find the same treasure, or open the same door. The instancing model in Guild Wars allows us to bring more of the offline RPG quest and story experience into an online RPG, while still providing a large online community and the ability to play with your friends from around the world.

There are numerous aspects of Guild Wars that make it a unique game, including the balanced PvP, lack of a subscription fee, campaign-based content model, streaming technology, and fast-action combat, but it is this ability to create a world and story that draws you in and makes you feel like an intimate and pivotal element of your surroundings that truly makes the game unique, and Factions will take full advantage of this ability.

CVG Staff