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Death in Guild Wars 2 Meant to be an "Experience" not a "Punishment"
Xav de Matos
10
ArenaNet wants gamers to extract more enjoyment out of death in its upcoming MMO sequel, Guild Wars 2. In a lengthy blog post on the game's official site, designer Jon Peters outlined the way Guild Wars 2 will approach player death; revealing a more dramatic execution than competing massively multiplayer online titles.

Rather than force players to wait for revival from allies, hunt their downed corpse or take statistical hits, Guild Wars 2 players will enter a "downed mode" state, similar to near death states in Borderlands. If players manage to defeat the attacking enemy while downed (using four class-based "downed mode" abilities), they will rally to their feet, free to continue adventuring.

"Defeat in Guild Wars 2 is intended to be an experience, not a punishment. Let's face it: dying never feels great, even without a death penalty," Peters wrote. The penalty for constant death is also less severe, Peters says. "Players who have recently been downed several times will take longer to revive each time. If no one revives you, you can spend a small amount of gold to come back at a waypoint. It's as simple as that, and why not?"

Peters also discusses the developers decision to not include a dedicated healing class from the upcoming title, instead giving all classes the ability to heal and revive from level one.

"We keep hearing other MMO developers espousing the "holy trinity" of DPS/heal/tank with such reverence, as if this is the most entertaining combat they have ever played. Frankly, we don't like sitting around spamming "looking for healer" to global chat. That feels an awful lot like preparing to have fun instead of having fun." For more information on the newest additions to Guild Wars 2 make sure to check out the site's official combat blog.

Xav de Matos was previously a games journalist creating content at Shacknews.

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