We got a chance to ask Guild Wars 2 Lead Designer, Eric Flannum, a few questions about the game ranging from World vs World, class balance, PVP vs. PVE progression and more. We’re very excited to share this with, especially on the same day that Arenanet has announced that the game’s launch is August 28, just two months from now!

GW2 Junkies: Guild Wars 2 has some amazing character models, ranging from gigantic norn to tiny asura. With any competitive MMO, players worry about hit boxes and how character models affect gameplay. Since a player can get hit by stray damage, how have you designed the hit boxes for all the varied sizes and shapes that GW2 has to offer—asura are short, norn are tall, charr are wide (and low to the ground when they are running), etc.?

Eric Flannum: Every player character in Guild Wars 2 has the exact same sized collision cylinder. For asura this means that the cylinder is larger than they are and for norn it means that it is smaller. Very early in the process of making the game we knew this was going to be the case, so the min and max sizes of our races are heavily influenced by this.

Eric Flannum, Lead Game Designer, talked to Massively yesterday about the new changes posted in the recent dev blog and here’s what he had to say:

On the newly added Mystic Forge:

Massively: The Mystic Forge that players will now be able to find in Lion’s Arch seems exciting. Will it be random, or will players be able to develop “recipes” of what to toss in in order to receive certain items?

Eric Flannum: The Mystic Forge uses a combination of random and non-random recipes. For example, if I throw four rare swords into the forge, it will return a random sword to me with a chance for that sword to be substantially better. There are also specific items that can be created by throwing four very specific items into the forge with no random involved at all. Players should look for clues hidden around the world and in items for what combinations might work. Another exciting aspect of the Mystic Forge is that it is very easy for us to add recipes, so post-launch, we can continue to add new things for players to discover.

And on the new PVP mini-dungeon:

Massively: How will the new PvE elements feel like they’re intersecting with WvW gameplay, rather than running parallel to it? Will they have any bearing on WvW? Might players find blueprints in treasure chests or anything else to help them feel like they’re contributing to the greater fight?

Eric Flannum: The mini-dungeon we added to the WvW center map was added with PvP specifically in mind. This goes for how the area flows, how traps work, and what reward you get at the end. There are definitely blueprints in the chest as well as other things that WvW players will find valuable.

You can read the rest of the interview over at Massively.

MMO Reviews has an interview up with Eric Flannum, Lead Game Designer, where they discuss a myriad of topics on Guild Wars 2. The interview opens up with these two questions:

What are your plans for the WvW content of the game in the long run?

One of the coolest things that we’ve added to WvW recently is a persistent mini-dungeon that can be accessed through the three keeps in the center map. This area is designed with multiplayer PvP in mind and players can do things like activate the traps in the mini-dungeon to defeat enemy players. Of course, at the end of the area there’s a chest full of rewards.

We also have some exciting plans for WvW post-launch, but of course we don’t want to talk about our post-launch plans until after we ship the game and have had some time to implement things.

Will there be PvP tournaments or some other kind of scheduled competitions?

We fully plan to support tournaments in competitive PvP. We will have a variety of tournament types, from automated tournaments to more competitive scheduled tournaments.

We are still talking about whether or not we want to support any type of WvW tournaments after we launch. If player interest is high, then I think it’s definitely something we’d consider.

Make sure you read the rest of the article over at MMO Reviews.

Source: Exclusive interview with Eric Flannum the Lead Game Designer of Guild wars 2

Hey, everyone, Lead Game Designer Eric Flannum here. As most of you know by now, it’s a very exciting time for all of us here at ArenaNet. We just finished a huge beta event weekend, and we’ve got beta events just around the corner. We have a lot of work to do to get the game ready, but we’re definitely up to the challenge and eager to show off the game to a larger audience. With that in mind, we’ve been adding all sorts of new things to the game, as well as revising and improving on as many aspects of the game as we think need it.

In this blog post, we’ve got Randy Knapp explaining improvements to the compass, Devon Carver discussing some of the additions we’ve made to our open-world content, and Jon Peters talking about changes and additions to our boons and conditions. But first, I’d like to talk about some changes to being downed and defeated.

Eric Flannum, Lead Developer for Guild Wars 2, has posted a new blog post discussing last week’s beta press event. Along with a large slew of updates that have been popping up across the internet, today’s Developer Blog post gives us a ton of insight into what is going on with the game’s development. They discuss Meta Events, Boons and Conditions (buffs and debuffs), and hidden areas. Make sure you read the whole blog post here.