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Thanks to the fine folks at ArenaNet, I had a chance to ask Linsey Murdock and Isaiah “Izzy” Cartwright some questions on the Guild Wars series.  Linsey is the current lead designer for the Guild Wars 1 Live Team, and Izzy is hard at work on Guild Wars 2.  The interview gives some good insight for what both may have in store for the future.

In many past Guild Wars interviews, ArenaNet developers have said that the skill system incorporates a few ideas from collectible card games, such as Magic, which has a strong niche protection they lovingly call the color wheel.  How is the Guild Wars balancing approach for professions similar to the Magic color wheel?

Linsey: It’s a fair comparison.  One of the big similarities is that in Magic they take all the key mechanics of the game and divvy them out to different colors.  We do basically the same thing, dividing our game mechanics among the various classes.

Izzy: Yeah, players outfit themselves from a large collection of skills.  That kind of play feels very similar to Magic.  We have builds, they have decks.  And like in Magic, some mechanics are stronger than others.  It takes some player skill to create effective builds, just as it takes player skill to play the game well.    But while the mechanics are similar, Guild Wars is a different beast than Magic.  Both Magic and Guild Wars have strong metagame shifts, but we deal with that issue in different ways.  Magic adds new sets every 6 months or so, while we do updates every few months; we’re pretty similar in that regard.   I think the big difference is we added new professions into Guild Wars, which would be like if Magic added entirely new colors; I don’t know, like mauve or beige or something.  (laughs) It just makes balancing a lot harder.

Could you briefly describe what you would consider to be each profession’s niche?

Izzy: Warriors are front line damage dealers with variable utility.  They’re the most durable profession and are the best at dishing out Deep Wound and Knockdown.  Rangers have definitely changed a lot since they were introduced.  They’re our primary condition-spreading class.  Rangers are a little more solo-oriented, jack-of-all-trades kind of characters.  Ranged attacks, DPS, interrupts, conditions… a little bit of everything.

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