ArenaNet has quite a bit in store for Guild Wars 2 fans in 2013. The team has already began discussing their plans for updates we’ll be seeing early on in the year, including custom arenas, leaderboards, and 1 team vs. 1 team PvP matches for tournaments. On the PvE front, we also received an update from Colin Johanson who talked about the January and February game updates as well as some future plans to make fighting mobs out in the world a little more interesting. Here’s the first bit of news:

Originally posted by ColinJohanson (Source)

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There will be a blog post in around week or so that summarizes the high level plan for the first 6 months of 2013 for Gw2.

Then each of the individual releases for January, February, etc. will have their own release pages on our website, as well as blog posts describing specific important new features where appropriate.

More info coming in about a week once it’s all edited and localized!

Keep reading to see the other dev tracker announcements.

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On the official forums, players started a thread offering ArenaNet general feedback regarding what improvements they feel need to be made to Guild Wars 2′s PvP gameplay. PvP is an important part of the game, and has seen some recent updates, but are those updates enough? What should the team focus on next? Players expressed their feedback regarding these questions, and Jonathan Sharp, Game Designer, took the time to address some of the points being made:

Originally posted by JonathanSharp (Source)

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Great thread guys. Some positive posts in here. It’s always great to see you guys passionately voicing how the game needs to improve.

I think that dueling is a great feature, but I don’t think it’s as important (right now) as ratings or a leaderboard is. With custom arenas, people will be able to duel all day long (1v1, or 2v2, or 3v3), so it seems to me that we need to focus more on rankings and leaderboards.

To that same end, I think that other game modes are something we’ll look at down the road, but for now, I think other features are just more important (like rankings, custom arenas where people can practice in private, leaderboards, spectator mode).

He also posted later in the thread with the following statement regarding dueling in GW2: “Dueling is not currently in development. Some of the other things mentioned, however, are.”

It seems dueling is off the table for now, which was also hinted at previously. Custom arenas, leaderboards, and spectator mode may be heading our way in the near future, however. What do you think Guild Wars 2 needs to liven up its PvP gameplay?

Jonathan Sharp, Content Designer at ArenaNet, shared some interesting PvP news in a developer blog published yesterday. Guild Wars 2 is going to have a much larger structured PvP scene, and in the near future players will not only be able to take part in normal (free) PvP tournaments as they can now, but also more competitive, paid tournaments that will offer a different set of rewards:

As the name implies, paid automated tournaments have an entry fee. You’ll need tickets to enter a paid tournament, which you can purchase in the gem store, find in reward chests from free tournaments, and receive when you rank up!

These tournaments reward ALL teams that play in them, and offer better rewards on average than free tournaments. Successful teams can earn excellent rewards from paid tournaments, but you’ve got to be good to finish in the top prize slots. We expect that more experienced PvP players will start to migrate to paid tournaments because the risk/reward is much higher than in the free automated tournaments.

There is also no matchmaking in the paid tournaments. You have to come in with a premade team, which means the teams will ALL be organized teams – you won’t have premade groups fighting pick-up groups as you would in free paid tournaments.

Players will most likely need Tournament Tickets to take part in these tournaments, which are already available in the Black Lion Trading Company for gems.

ArenaNet is also working on a custom arena system, where players can set up a private, password-protected area for friends and guildmates, and use it to arrange custom challenges. The team also has additional PvP features in store for Guild Wars 2 players, but some of those plans are tight under wraps for the moment. Read the full developer blog for all the details.