Aibreán (April) 2013 Edition


Cead Mile Failte!

Greetings Everyone,

I hope everyone is doing well. We've had some new news hit the press recently and have seen some changes in the future of our family begin to unfold. We've had some relationships made with companies and seen some friends resurface at new companies.

First and foremost I want to send a Huge congratulations to my buddy, closet Gaiscioch, and former RIFT producer Hal Hanlin, for becoming the Lead Producer at Zynga Inc.. This is a huge step for him and I'm very proud of him and think he will do a wonderful job there. Congrats Hal!

Next let's cover some recent events.

PAX East
Gaiscioch Members Get First Look At Elder Scrolls Online

The Gaiscioch family on March 22nd at a completely packed M.J. O'Connar's Irish Pub in Boston, Massachusetts attempted a meet-and-greet. A few members managed to meet but the crowd made it very difficult to connect.

The good news however is that many of our members were invited as VIP's to the ZeniMax Elder Scrolls Online party hosted in a castle! The festivities ranged from tabletop games to free food and drinks and even some sneak peaks at ESO.

We would like to congratulate the ZeniMax Team for sweeping the show with best of show awards for Elder Scrolls Online. We look forward to seeing them again at PAX Prime this August.

PoX has written a very nice recap of the event which can be found at:
http://www.gaiscioch.com/tavern/gaiscioch_discussion/post_56059.html

Saralandrielle also posted a post party recap at:
http://www.gaiscioch.com/tavern/gaiscioch_discussion/post_56263.html

Gaiscioch News

Monthly Meetings:

Gaiscioch 101: The Participation System Livestream

On Saturday, April 6th at 12PM PDT, join Foghladha for a livestream overview of the new Participation system. We will be meeting in RaidCall: 1101 and will be broadcasting to the Gaiscioch Twitch.tv Channel at: http://www.twitch.tv/thegaisciochfamily

This is a great opportunity for new members to get a walkthrough on the cornerstone system that all members will use to advance their Gaiscioch rank. I look forward to sharing the new system with you and will be available for questions and answers after the event.

Gaiscioch Family Summit

Join us on Saturday, April 6th at 5PM PDT on RaidCall 1101 for our monthly Gaiscioch Family Summit, to learn more about our family and stay in touch with current events and updates. We will start by discussing current events, news, and changes to the Gaiscioch family and then open the floor for questions and answers. As always you can listen to the summit after the event by subscribing to our podcast at: http://www.gaiscioch.com/podcast.xml

The Hunt For Chapter 5
Interest Growing For Elder Scrolls Online

When ESO was first announced, I knew that whether we expand there or not, we can expect to see a 30% drop in population. Morrowind was the first to hit us back in our Camelot days, then Oblivion in our Warhammer days, finally Skyrim in our RIFT days. All 3 Elder Scrolls games had the same effect on our community. With each release, we saw a major reduction in activity from our membership. No other game has shown this effect so consistently.

Elder Scrolls Online will without a doubt draw a massive crowd. It's already receiving accolades from fans and the press. But accolades and fan craze aside, just because a game is awesome doesn't mean it's the right game for our family. We run each and every branch of our family through "Foghladha's gauntlet" to figure out the compatibility with our family and the potential growth within the game. The gauntlet contains over 150 line items that the game is scored against. Of the 150, 25 are required to be present for a game to even be considered. Most of these 25 have become painfully apparent in our expansions into RIFT and Guild Wars 2.

Only time will tell if Elder Scrolls has the potential to be a full branch, but at this point it's the only game coming to market in the next 2 years that even meets the minimum requirements. If Elder Scrolls does not meet these requirements, then we may be looking even further down the road for potentials. Regardless, I am actively forming up the Gaiscioch Pioneers (see below) to investigate, evaluate, and contribute to the development of future games.

So far, from the Pre-Beta scoring based on what has been mentioned by the information ZeniMax Online has provided, The Elder Scrolls Online has a rating higher than our highest game, aka Warhammer Online, with an 86% Gaiscioch Branch Compatibility Score (and that is without knowledge of the Guild System). Both RIFT and GW2 scored in the high 60% range. That said this is a very, very early forecast and depending on what makes the "Final Cut" this score will likely change. ATM things are looking very positive. The only "requirement" not currently fulfilled due to lack of knowledge is whether or not the Guild Size will be large enough to sustain our family. The good news is that Custom Chat channels and LUA Based Plugins are already in game so worst case scenario we can resurrect the Tuatha mod of Warhammer Online for use in Elder Scrolls Online to build our own alliance system. But even still, if they pull an Aion on us and only allow a small number of people in each guild it will make it nearly impossible to manage and scrub any chance of us expanding there.

As for Archeage we recently discovered a piece of information which prevents us from officially expanding into Archeage. They have a 200 character limit to guilds within the game. Even if Archeage is the game to end all games, trying to move a 5,000 person family into a game that only allows 200 characters per guild would be insanity and make it impossible to manage.

With that said, until we can find a home for our little traveling circus I suspect we will continue to drift through a few games looking for a place to call home.

To see the list of 25 requirements that every Gaiscioch Branch must have visit:
http://www.gaiscioch.com/tavern/gaiscioch_discussion/post_54798.html

Aethena has put together a wonderful collection of news, articles, and videos of Elder Scrolls Online at: http://www.gaiscioch.com/tavern/eso_discussion/post_55600.html

Just For Fun
Saighdear Games Forecast

April marks the launch of Defiance, Trion and SyFy's experimental MMORPG that, while nowhere close to having the requirements to being a full Gaiscioch branch, has some auxiliary fun value.

At the moment I have plans to set up a casual existing members and friends only Saighdear in the PS3 version of Defiance. This division will be a play as you can division with no requirements or expectations. There will be no ranks or mandatory play times. Just play when you want and have friends to talk to.

We are also looking at launching a similar division in Neverwinter as it nears open beta and launch. For more information, visit the forums or contact Foghladha.

What's New
Gaiscioch.com Gets Some Improvements

Over the past month I got a little time to finally adjust some things on our website. The largest change by far was the launch of the new participation engine or Fellowship System. The new fellowship system works a bit different but should be faster and cleaner. It also removes the chance of getting the Divide by Zero bug in the fellowship engine. Be sure to join us on April 6th @ 12PM PDT for a walkthrough of this new system.

The second change to the site is a wee bit of organization under the leadership system. There were a few things we changed in the objectives tree.

  • WvW Objectives: Changed to Ally Camp, Supply Camp, Tower, and Keep instead of listing each by name.
  • Temples Added: The 5 Temples are now claimable at warlord rank 3 under the "Temple" type.
  • Generic Champion Creature Type Added: For Champion Creatures that DO NOT have events associated with them.
  • Frozen Maw Removed: The Frozen Maw is a champion associated with an event and is not a Epic Creature. Epic Creatures have custom unique name bars at the top center of the screen.
  • Guild Missions Added: We've added guild missions to the list for Elders to claim since only Elders can activate them currently. This may change after we unlock all mission types.

Lastly, I have begun work on a comprehensive Guild Missions Guide that includes Chat Link locations to the nearest waypoints to the target location, as well as maps and general information about the Guild Missions in Guild Wars 2. Venture over to: http://www.gaiscioch.com/guides/guild_missions/.

Building the Future
The Gaiscioch Pioneers

The Gaiscioch Pioneers have been formed to help our family evaluate potential expansions and assist game developers in the development of their titles. These very, very select few have been hand picked based on their backgrounds, availability, discretion, integrity and most importantly their ability to continuously play a game even if they don't enjoy it because they can see the vision the developers have and want to make a difference.

After Guild Wars 2, I realized the type of person I needed for the job at hand. We had a lot of people help for a week then disappear because it wasn't their type of game. This in turn hurt us and the development of the game. The people we are choosing for this have proven their dedication to the team previously and have my seal of approval to speak with developers as a Gaiscioch representative. We really need people who if we said we're testing Justin Bieber Rides A My Little Pony Against Hannah Montana and the Legion of Care Bears Online, they would show up week after week and provide feedback and support, regardless of their dislike for the game.

As we move forward, I may select more to be a part of this, but at this point I'm starting small and controlled. All of the members involved will be taking an oath of silence and will not be able to speak of their involvement. It is my hope that we can build a stronger future and contribute more to the making of awesome games.

Guild Wars 2 News

Guild Wars 2 Update
Events & New Patch Revitalize Guild Wars 2

Over the past month there has been quite a few improvements made to WvW and Guild Wars 2. The removal of server side culling has to be one of the biggest most wanted changes to hit the patcher to date. This allows you to control how many people you see on screen at a time and how detailed the characters you see are. This removes the feeling of getting killed by air and lets you see the foes you're fighting.

They also changed the way that epic creatures distribute loot. Now, when you face off with the Shatterer, Tequatl, Jormag, or one of the other cinematic epic creatures in the game you will get a "daily" style chest on the bottom right which will contain a rare or higher item. This only appears once per day per account. You will still be able to get the chest on each of your characters which has a chance of dropping additional rares but the guaranteed reward only occurs on the first kill of the day on your account. This has almost put a stop to the "Guesting" phenomenon plaguing our server and causing widespread overflows.

Guild Missions
How are we doing? Mission Progress Update

I know this system is one of the most baffling guild quest systems we've seen to date. With 5 guilds pushing forward to unlock all 5 types of missions it just adds a bit more complications. What we know so far is that Guild Bounties reward 2 Commendations and some loot. Guild Treks on the other hand only reward Guild Merits that the guild needs to unlock buffs and the additional mission types.

The problem this ensues is that we have people willing to help with the "bounties" because they "get theirs" yet people don't want to help with the treks because there's no "personal gain". First anyone that is worried about their personal gains should revisit the Gaiscioch Way or even the "Think We, Not Me" etiquette guideline found on the registration page of our site.

By helping with the Guild Treks you can help the family earn 10 Guild Merits per week per guild. Now that Treks unlocked in all 5 rooms next up is Guild Rush which requires 80 Guild Merits to unlock. If each family does a Tier 2 Bounty and Tier 3 Trek each week we can earn 30 Guild Merits per week. After we unlock Guild Rushes we will need 150 Guild Merits to unlock Guild Challenges. After Guild Challenges it will need 250 Guild Merits to unlock guild Puzzles. So between now and then we will need 400 Guild Merits which at 30 per week comes out to 14 weeks before we CAN have Guild Puzzles unlocked. And that's if we can meet all the Influence goals.

So by thinking about personal gain only you delay the family being able to complete the higher end missions which in fact do reward everyone for participation. Without the treks being completed each week we're looking at 20 weeks instead of 14. In addition once we have all of the missions unlocked and can use merits for buying buff banners, 10 Merits allows us to buy 3 Guild Hero's Banners which give all buffs for 30 minutes.

If you're interested in putting personal gain aside for the betterment of the family I will be running a Gaiscioch Treksters event every Monday and Wednesday at 4PM to 5PM. Anyone who is willing to use the tools we have available to us to help hunt down the 20 locations around the entire map of Tyria in less than 20 minutes will be welcome to help. Only the representatives from each guild can activate or even see the active trek locations so we will need people from all guilds present. Monday will be for the main rooms, Wednesday will be for the specialty rooms. We will start with Tier 1's and Tier 2's to get people comfortable with the locations and traveling. I ask that all participants have waypoints available, the website available for reference and be willing to shoulder the expense of waypoint travel. We don't need complainers, we need selfless people willing to help out the family even with no personal reward to themselves. It is only through sacrifice that we as a family can grow stronger.

Family Events in Guild Wars 2

Tuesdays @ 6PM Server:
Great Tyrian Adventure

The Great Tyrian Adventure continues. More than 300 people have participated in this weekly event. More than 50 people have walked away from the event wearing new Guild Wars 2 T-Shirt costume items or sporting 20-Slot bags. The initial rush is over and things have smoothed out quite a bit. If you haven't attended one of these events yet be sure to get involved. You might just win some epic loot or even one of the 2,000 gem cards.

Weekly Guild Mission Events

Prissi and I will be holding events each week to complete the Guild Bounties, Guild Treks, and soon Guild Rushes.

  • Foghladha's Gaiscioch Treksters
    Monday @ 4PM Server - Main Rooms
    Wednesday @ 4PM Server - Specialty Rooms
  • Prissy's Guild Bounty & Rushes
    Monday @ 6PM Server - Main Rooms
    Saturday @ 12PM Server - Specialty Rooms

WvW Heating Up

Each week we have a wide range of family events targeted at WvW. We have both advanced unit training's and casual gamer shenanigans for all to enjoy. In addition, dozens of our members form up daily and take to the fields for some ad lib WvW. Whatever your preference there's plenty to be had.

  • Tuatha ClubNight - 1st & 3rd Thursday @ 6PM Server
  • ClubGaiscioch - Sat & Sun @ 12AM Server
  • Spartans Warriors - Saturday @ 6PM Server
  • Jexia's WvW Homeland Defense - Sunday @ 11AM Server

PvE Event Lineup

If you can't make guild missions, and wvw isn't your forte, there's something for everyone in our calendar of weekly events. We have a full lineup of PvE events as well.

  • Prissy's Retaking of the Temples - Sundays @ 6PM Server
    Join Prissy as we retake the Temples of Orr.
  • Foghladha's Epic Creature Hunt - 2nd & 4th Thursdays of Each Month @ 6PM Server
    Join Foghladha to hunt down the epic creatures around Tyria.
  • Great Tyrian Adventure - Tuesdays @ 6PM Server
    Join the Sanctum of Rall's premier public community event.
  • Quest for Zone Completion with Prissy - Wednesday @ 5PM Server
    A wonderful chance to get waypoints and complete your zone objectives

In Closing

I would like to thank you all for helping make Gaiscioch one of the friendliest communities around. I look forward to the coming months as we are able to share some more insight with you as to where we're going and whats going on. Additionally I want to let those of you who are playing Guild Wars 2 that regardless of what happens with Elder Scrolls Online's evaluation process we will continue to hold a presence in Guild Wars 2 on the Sanctum of Rall until they close our server. Our family has spent too much time, effort and memories on getting the Sanctum of Rall for us to walk away from it. Guild Wars 2 is in a unique position of giving us a low-to-no cost avenue of gameplay. We will continue to support this game as long as we have our server to call home.

I hope all of you can be a part of our future growth and success and look forward to involving more of you in the development of the family. I look forward to seeing you all at this months Gaiscioch Family Summit on April 6th @ 5PM Server.

Slan Go Foill!
(Goodbye For Now)

Benjamin "Foghladha" Foley
Ceannard De Gaiscioch Treubh