Daniel Dociu Featured in Communication Arts Congratulations to our Art Director, Daniel, for his recent feature in Communication Arts' 2008 July Illustration Annual 49. Read more about this prestigious competition here, and pick up July's issue here. Xunlai and Zaishen Rewards Updated
It's reward time again! After today's live update, anyone and everyone who made predictions for June in the Xunlai Tournament House can speak to a Xunlai Agent to claim Tournament Reward Points. Additionally, the Zaishen Chest has a fresh new tonic for July. To see just what flavor it is, check the Rewards Calendar.

Just a reminder that our Guild Wars Guru GvG Challenge 2008 sponsored by Electronics Extreme is being held this Saturday, July 12th. If you have not signed up your teams  yet you can do so on our Registration Page also open to all the community is our Predictions Contest for your chance to win some great prizes.

You will be able to listen live to the tournament hosted by Online Gaming Radio with Rusty and Joe Hostile starting at 1:00 PM EDT/10AM PDT/6PM GMT. Tune in using: http://live.onlinegamingradio.com/ogr.m3u

Don't forget to also stop by the IRC Channel for real time discussion for the tournament.

Server: irc.gamesurge.net
Channel: #gwp

We have made some changes to the Guild Wars Guru forums for everyone.

• We have combined Guild Discussion, and Community Contests into a new forum called Community News, Contests and Events. Hopefully this will bring more exposure to your upcoming events by combining these together.
• We have added a much requested Alliance Recruitment forum for everyone. Post here if you are an Alliance looking for guilds or a guild looking for an Alliance.
• We have merged our PvE Skill Discussion in with The Campfire as well as the PvP Build Directory has been merged with Gladiators Arena. These forums did not have much traffic and our focus was on concentrating the discussion.
• Our Explorer League forums have been renamed from Canthan to Factions and so forth.
• We have cleaned up the stickies in a lot of forums, please look for those.
• Our Technicians Forum has new sub-forums for Hardware, Software and Computer Buying & Building to aid you. In addition we have a new Usergroup called "Technicians" who are there to answer your questions about these issues.
• We are also looking for new moderators. If you are interested please send a PM to either Inde or Lasareth:
• Game Bugs
• Farming
• Auctions

Guild Wars Community News:

• As announced last week, Guild Wars Guru, in conjunction with OnlineGamingRadio.com, is hosting the GvG Challenge 2008 on July 12. Participants, even players who make accurate predictions, can win over $10,000 in prizes! For details and rules, visit the official tournament page.
   
• Starting in July, the KISS alliance and Prepare to Burn are hosting the Guild Wars Olympics, where players can win prizes for competing in a variety of in-game events. For more information go to their event wiki page.
   
• Blade Radio is hosting a Fissure of Woe event on June 27, where one player will win a full set of Fissure of Woe armor materials. Tune in and win!

Guild Wars News:

Guild Wars 2 Questions? We've Got Answers!

So what are we doing with Guild Wars 2, anyway? Check the FAQ to find out!  To stay up-to-date with the latest information about Guild Wars 2 and the beta test, be sure to sign up for the Guild Wars newsletter.

June Tournament Reminders

Don't forget! The finale of the June Automated Tournament is this weekend, so place those last minute Xunlai Tournament House votes. Also, the deadline for claiming your May Xunlai prizes is this weekend. To get your rewards, speak with your neighborhood Xunlai Agent.

Guild Wars News:

The Dragon Festival Approaches
Join us at the Shing Jea Monastery this Fourth of July weekend to celebrate the annual Dragon Festival! The celebration includes the Shing Jea Boardwalk, Dragon Arena, Rollerbeetle Racing, and reenactments of past events. Festivities start at Noon Pacific (-7 GMT) on Thursday, July 3 and continue until 11:59 PM Pacific on Sunday, July 6. Read all the details and see a schedule of events here.

Dev Update: Hall of Monuments Changes
In the latest Developer Update, the design team reveals exciting news about the Hall of Monuments. Head over to the official wiki for the full story.

The Guild Wars Guru GvG Challenge 2008 is using ANet's mAT system, which requires all players to be members of the guild, and 6 of them have to have been in at least 2 weeks. What that means is you need to be in the guild continuously from early this Saturday morning, 28 June, until July 12th. If you switch guilds say after the mAT this Saturday, you cannot count towards the 6 needing over 14 days.

So bottom line, by this Friday night you should be in the guild you plan to do the Guru Challenge in.

Guild Wars Guru Hosts New GvG Tournament - GuildWarsGuru.com, in connection with OnlineGamingRadio.com, has announced the GvG Challenge 2008. The tournament is sponsored by Electronics Extreme and offers more than $10,000 in prizes such as laptops and portable DVD players. It even has a contest just for making accurate predictions! Registration is open to everyone and goes until Friday, July 11, 2008 at 8:59 AM Pacific (-7 GMT). The tournament itself takes place on July 12. Visit the official tournament page for a full list of prizes and contest rules.

News from eu.guildwars.com:

Beware of Fake E-mails

We have recently noticed a number of fake e-mails being circulated telling players they are eligible to participate in the Guild Wars 2 Closed Beta.
Please be aware that these mails are phishing attempts to get your account information, and players should not reply to them.

ArenaNet or NCsoft employees will never ask for your password.

News from GuildWars.com:

Sweepstakes Winners Announced
We're pleased to announce the results of the Guild Wars 3rd Anniversary Sweepstakes! To see who won prizes, visit the sweepstakes page. Congratulations to these lucky winners!

 

Community News RSS Feed Available
If you're interested in community events, we now offer Community News in its own RSS feed. To get updates from this feed, add it to your RSS reader.

Registration is now open!

Please head to our Guild Wars Guru GvG Challenge 2008 Registration Page to sign your team up today. Please also look through the full Rules & Regulations and our FAQ page for full event and contest details.

Our Predictions Contest will open on June 16th, 2008 and will be located on our Teams page.

UPDATE: The Gateway notebooks are not available. Our sponsor misjudged their inventory. I have good news though! They are being replaced with better computers.

Instead of:

Gateway Notebooks MX8738 / Intel Dual Core Mobile T2080 / 17 inch widescreen WXGA TFT 1440x900 Display / DVD±RW drive / 1GB DDR2 RAM / 160GB Hard Drive / 802.11g Wireless / Windows Vista Home Premium

We now have:

Compaq Presario C769US Laptops / 1.73GHz Intel Pentium Dual Core T2370 Processor / 15.4" Widescreen WXGA 1280x800 Display / 2GB DDR2 RAM / 250GB Hard Drive / DVD±RW drive / 802.11g Wireless / Camera / Windows Vista Home Premium

Better processor, more RAM, bigger hard drive, extra goodies like camera and LightScribe tech, better resale value. They have been confirmed and shipped so we shouldn't have any further changes. The Splash page for our Guild Wars Guru GvG Challenge 2008 has also been updated.  Thank you!

Guild Wars Guru, in connection with OnlineGamingRadio.com, is proud to announce the Guild Wars Guru 2008 GvG Challenge, sponsored by Electronics Extreme and scheduled for Saturday, July 12th, 2008. This PvP tournament is open to everyone in the community, and will have five different divisions with total prizes of nearly $12,000, as well as special Guild Wars in-game awards courtesy of ArenaNet. In conjunction with this tournament, additional prizes will also be awarded in an open predictions contest, where players have a chance of winning great prizes by accurately predicting the winners of the various GvG divisions beforehand.

Each division of the GvG Challenge has its own prizes: Premier Division winners each receive Gateway Notebooks MX8737 (retail value $999.99); Gold division winners each receive Axion AXN-6070 Slim Portable DVD Players (retail value $149.95); Silver Division winners each receive Samsung Yepp YP-T10JAG 4GB Digital Multimedia Devices (retail value $129.95); Bronze Division winners each receive 600-denier polycanvas duffels (retail value $24.95); and Casual Division winners each receive Team Love custom guild T-shirts (retail value $19.95).

Want in on the action but don't want to PvP? We are also holding a related contest with additional prizes of a Gateway Notebook, Axion Portable DVD Player and Samsung Yepp MP3 player for predicting the top winners in the GvG Challenge.

In all we are giving away nearly $12,000 in prizes! As the date gets closer we will be releasing more details so watch for those upcoming announcements. 

Guild Wars News:

New Zaishen Rewards Announced

With the conclusion of April's tournament, we're now moving over to our brand new in-game reward system. To learn more about what's in store, check out our new Zaishen Rewards page. You can also view our newly updated automated tournament rules here.

 

State of the Game: Meet Dark Alley

Meet Dark Alley [dR], the most recent champions of both the April tournament and the Rawr Cup. Formed primarily from former members of guilds such as Idiot Savants [iQ] and Team Quitter [QQ], Dark Alley sits down with us to share their stories. Read what they have to say here.

 

Guild Wars Gear Sale

The celebration of the Guild Wars third anniversary continues! There's a bunch of merch on sale at the Guild Wars Gear Store and the PlayNC Merchandise Store. Also check out our brand new "Alchemy" t-shirt, which was designed to commemorate our third year. Visit our merchandise page to see a list of everything available in each of the stores.

 

Guild Wars News:

Guild Wars Anniversary Sweepstakes

The third anniversary of Guild Wars is here! To thank all of you for another awesome year, we're holding a sweepstakes. You have a chance to win fantastic prizes, including an Alienware laptop. Read all about it here.

 

April PvP Predictors

For April, we bring you the predictions and analysis of Jakal Storm, a regular monthly contributor. Check here to see how Jakal thinks the tournament will play out, and why.

 

Celebrate Three Years of Guild Wars

You're invited to the party as we celebrate the Guild Wars Third Anniversary! The festivities include a brand new reward after finishing the Hell's Precipice mission in the original campaign, boardwalk games at the Shing Jea Monastery, and starting April 28, third birthday presents for characters created on this date. Join us for the celebration, starting April 24!

RTSFirebat is back with the latest guide!  You can check this out in our Riverside Inn and find out all about: Guild Wars Guru Complete Guide to Guild Wars 3rd Birthday Event!. This guide covers Collectibles, Mini-pets, event times, mini games and more! Head over and find out all the latest for the 3rd Guild Wars Birthday event starting today.

And we are always looking for your help to give you the most complete and up-to-date information possible. So drop by the thread and send any new screenshots you have, information we are missing, locations, tips and other contributions to RTSFirebat.

GLOBAL COMMUNITY HOSTED EVENT FOR ALL GUILD WARS PLAYERS: CINCO de MAYO 2008!

Spring: ''the year breathes anew with life, festivals and rejoicing of warm days and starry nights. So too comes the annual recognition of the most celebrated holiday in the Southern Hemisphere of the Americas; Cinco de Mayo – the officially recognized date of Mexican independence from French taxation of property in Mexico. Today Cinco de Mayo is date which is celebrated throughout the Americas with the abundance of poured spirits including beer, ale and most notably Tequila.''

It is appropriate then that the holiday be adopted and celebrated in the Guild Wars community. The Guilds of [LaZy] Nation are proud to adopt the holiday and host the first Guild Wars global event to celebrate Cinco de Mayo for all those who hail from the lands of Tyria, Cantha and Elona. The pyramid ruins and land of the Asurans most closely match the mystic theme emboldened in historic civilizations from the Southern Americas; including the Aztecs, Incas and Mayans whose empires once bridged across the lands today known as Mexico.

Where: [Rata Sum] (International Districts)
When: Saturday, May 3rd, 2008
Time: The event starts at 4PM EST (8PM/20:00 GMT) and will end two hours later

Find out more in the event thread located in our Guild Announcements and Events forum here: CINCO de MAYO 2008! Global Community Event hosted by [LaZy]

The Ascalon Royal Family Masquerade Ball is a long forgotten formal event, engraved into history years before the searing. The Ascalon Royal Family led by King Adelbern was once a prosperous kingdom, and the ball was the yearly celebration to celebrate the wealthy and beauty that was Ascalon. But alas, The Searing as it has come to be known shattered the hearts of men in the kingdom of Ascalon. The ball for the past 4 years has been forgotten. Deux Du Machina, in his travels, stumbled upon an old text depicting a dance festival of epic proportions in the kingdom of Ascalon of old. Intrigued, he did further research. After painstaking tasks, Deux begged the wealthiest of the lords of Ascalon and surrounding kingdom of Kryta to donate what they saw fit to bring back this beautiful festival. The time of the Ascalon Royal Family Masquerade Ball has returned, and the hearts of men shall once again be warm and lively! Let the festivities commence!

The Ascalon Royal Family Masquerade Ball is on for 2008!  This event has been highly successful in the past but needs your help. They need donations and staff to help out. Head over to the thread in our Announcements and Events forum here: The OFFICAL THREAD:Ascalon Royal Family Masquerade Ball 08 Returns!

We would like to direct your attention to our Community Contest forums and a new contest by Rahja the Thief was has done community events in the past such as the Ascalon Royal Family Masquerade Ball.  In this contest you will be creating a custom skill for any character class!  The contest will run until Friday, April 25th 3PM (EST). Full details of the contest with the prize can be seen in the forum thread here: A Little Contest with a Big Prize.

We've now installed gwBBCode on GuildWarsGuru.com for you to post your builds and skills discussion. We have the tutorial posted in our Campfire if you need to see how to use this in our forums.

A big thanks to Liu Pi and the members that code this great feature for all the Guild Wars fansites out there. Don't forget to support them and visit their site GWShack.us and forums, or download it for yourself and your own guild and website.

News from GuildWars.com:

Guild Wars and Sarah Brightman

As some of our eagle-eyed players have noticed, Symphony, the latest album from world-renowned vocalist Sarah Brightman features art from Guild Wars. Several months ago Ms. Brightman approached ArenaNet Art Director Daniel Dociu, feeling that his art style was a great match for this album. The album and website include concept art from Guild Wars, as well as original art created specifically for Symphony. For more information, visit the official Sarah Brightman website.

Everyone can extend a big welcome to the new Guild Wars Community Manager, Regina Buenaobra, who starts today. Head over to our Riverside Inn to welcome her and read more: New Guild Wars Community Manager.

Guild Wars News:

Farewell Party Starts

Join us this weekend for an exciting farewell party for our community relations manager, Gaile Gray. This extravaganza will extend from Noon Pacific (-7 GMT) today until Noon Pacific on Monday, April 7, so mark your calendars and party hearty! Find all the details of this one-time event here.

 

April Xunlai Tournament Predictions

It's that time again! The Xunlai Tournament House is accepting predictions for the April tournaments. If you'd like a chance to get your predictions featured in this month's PvP Predictors article, be sure to send us your winning picks. Get all of the details here.

 

March Automated Tournament News

Rebel Rising [rawr] wins the GvG tournament! Rebel Rising is a familiar guild to see in competitive play and has won several gold capes. In Hero Battles, Pls Patch Crossing defeated Cs Element to take first place. Congratulations to all our winners. The final match reports are now available, as are the complete tournament standings, the updated tournament rules, and the ever-popular skill usage charts. Enjoy!

 

Andrew's New Role

Andrew Patrick has decided he will be moving on from community to QA. Read all about his decision and wish him well on his new role at ArenaNet.

Midline PvP Guide Concludes

Mark Yu of Delta Formation [DF] returns for the third installment of his series covering the midline in GvG. In this article, he covers the synergy between Rangers and Mesmers. Find it here.

 

You'll want to head over to our Riverside Inn thread by NoXiFy to check out the latest Design-A-Weapon winner additions that were added to Guild Wars in today's, April 3rd update. NEW Weapons, second batch. We'll keep updating the first post as more weapons are found. Good luck!