Talk:Vizunah Square (mission)

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1. 5 May 2006 – 17 November 2008

H/H failure

So I've gone through this mission roughly ten times in as many days, probably more. I hardly ever PUG, but I can frankly say that I am now very appreciative to get some humans in the other party for this mission. Even if they are like level 15 or something... It's not because they will necessarily have better builds than the hench party (though that is usually the case). The main thing that I love is how they don't follow me around and thus abandon Togo/Mhenlo to die.

Normally I'm just fine with H/H parties, no matter what mission it is. But this one in particular, it's more often suicidal than not when I pull a hench party... unless I am taking overwhelmingly strong stuff myself (imbagon, SH nukers, MMs...), there is a very good chance that fights end up into longer-than-necessary stalemates, and then Mhenlo/Togo start getting zapped with Jesus Beam etc. While I have yet to actually fail the mission or miss Master's, I've just had way too many close calls lately. The fact that the hench party won't move apart from mine causes so many problems in this mission, because it is designed to have people defending on two fronts, and only staying in one group during the last parts of fights/the very last fight...

I guess a large part of the problem is that none of the H/H, let alone Mhenlo/Togo, will bother to kite out of RoJ, and so turtling doesn't work that well. From now on I'm not taking overly defensive builds into this mission. :\ I know another part of the problem is that the hench selection is atrocious - they are bound to die a lot almost regardless of what you do, because they are just a weak party. Talon Silverwing's suicidal Healing Signet at 4 tactics gets him killed even while fighting the low-level Afflicted; Panaku is pretty fragile. In this mission, Kai Ying runs ~the same Fire Magic build as Cynn, which only aids in damage, and he's fragile. Lo Sha is suicidal in his usage of interrupts and Hex Eater Signet, often going up to the melee to use it. Su can heal herself with Soul Feast, but if you brought an MM this interferes. Sister Tai and Professor Gai are bad healers because they use highly inefficient skills and lack any real energy management (I don't know if Eve/hench cast Blood Ritual on them; that would make them a bit more effective); there is also a lack of prot monk which is really bad. Zho is the only one who can kinda take care of herself, and she is still bad. :\

Lastly, to add insult to injury, the H/H team often has multiple deaths before I can even reach them at the start of the mission (when playing from Foreign quarter). They will all stand in roughly the same spot, not moving to defend Togo or engaging the enemies before they come to them. This often results in Togo nearly dying, one of the hench running off to fight Afflicted and dying, etc etc. And these are mostly the low-level afflicted too. >.< So before the mission has even started in earnest, they have already used up valuable Resurrection Signets that won't get recharged. Blah.

Unwaking Waters doesn't have this problem at all because it is designed to have both parties bunched up and mostly attacking the same things... even though they often wipe a lot, I've never had to use the resurrection relics there. And once you get to Kuunavang, as long as your party came prepared, you'll be alright. Sigh. </rage> (T/C) 09:32, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

There are some bosses in this mission, so res sig should recharge.... Arnout aka The Emperors Angel 10:55, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Only the party who kills the boss gets the morale boost and the skill recharge. Since that is almost always your party, the hench may as well never have them recharge. (T/C) 10:58, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Didn't know that. Did you like my other answer? Arnout aka The Emperors Angel 12:03, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

In easy mode, I generally had better luck with henchmen from the other side. Henchmen may be mediocre, but that's good enough, and they're reliably mediocre--as opposed to completely awful. They don't go AFK, run the wrong way, wipe before you can get there, etc. If you have only henchmen yourself, then henchmen from the other side may be a little rough, but if you have heroes yourself, getting henchmen from the other side should make the mission pretty easy. Getting a good player from the other side was better than just henchmen, but if I got a player, it probably wasn't a good one.

In hard mode, it's a very different story. The henchmen party from the other side would be a lot stronger, but it's not necessarily good enough. With players, on the other hand, the people who just want you to powerlevel their heroes don't do hard mode. With just henchmen and heroes, hard mode is doable but rough. With players and heroes on both sides, it's not that hard. Quizzical 17:33, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Perhaps it's due to AI tweaks they have made since then, since I can assure you that there's a pretty decent chance at least some of the hench will have died before you even reach them, and some will also die during every major fight, even the first one which is trivial (which you can tell from "death cries"). I can see their health bars somewhat, in the same way you could see any NPC's, and after an Afflicted Soul Explosion they take a massive hit (the melee ones especially, they die a lot).

While the mission is never really "difficult" (exception: Mhenlo/Togo getting left to fend for themselves, because I can't be in two places at once) and I've yet to lose Master's even when I take way longer to kill a wave than I should... it just makes it unnecessarily difficult. The "follow the moving player" AI is exactly as it's supposed to work, and I know they are acting just like they would in any other mission... but just due to the nature of Vizunah Square, that's not the best tactics, since unless you are really lucky and Mhenlo/Togo are standing close enough to each other so as to both be inside Wards etc., "turtling" just doesn't work with two parties in the same place. You have to spread out just a bit, engage mobs on more than one front, not let them gang up on one party too much. At all of the big fights, the arrangement is something like... one spawn point in front and one behind the party, and one more right in the middle of them. The idea is that this middle point can be quickly wiped as it's in the crossfire of both parties, so it is not much trouble. But on those other fronts, you can't just sit near the center and wait for the mobs to come to you. Too many casters stack up, because they won't advance. So when you move your party away from your front to engage them (the hench don't take that initiative at all), that leaves one side dangerously unguarded. The only time this isn't so bad is during the last big fight, because the enemies that spawn "ahead" (direction of the bookstore/shiro'ken) are small spawns throughout. So you usually have time to run back and heal Mhenlo/Togo as necessary. At the other fights, though, the enemies are more evenly distributed so there are constant problems. (T/C) 19:07, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

I think the AI / H/H is definitely fail here. 95% of my failures here are caused by double jesus beam rape on mhenlo or togo, the others are Mhenlo and Togo dying before I had a chance to meet up with them - from both sides. Apparently Mhenlo immediately rushes forward if foreign leaves the mission, causing him to die right away.

I have also noticed something else, which has killed me quite a few times in HM. If I get grouped with a hench party at local, the foreign team sometimes decides to skip the last group of am fah. However, they will immediately run back to them when the cutscene is over - leaving only your party with Mhenlo and Togo against a horde of afflicted, where they usually die by earlier said Jesus beams. Mystzombie 21:52, 4 June 2009 (UTC)

MMs

I'm not certain with Hardmode, but after playing through this mission a bunch of times with and without MMs, I have come to the conclusion that unless you take multiples and just steamroll over everything (36 minions = gg) they don't really help all that much. H/H and Mhenlo will waste healing spells on them (not to mention the whole bug thing with Mhenlo chasing minions to heal them); they often will get hung up on those lone Afflicted which would normally leave you alone anyway (the ones that spawn from Canthan peasants), and I've not had any siginificant improvement in mission completion time. I still finish anywhere from 20-22 minutes, MM or not.

As far as I'm aware, many many people still swear by taking MMs into this mission (I know I used to); I'm curious if maybe I'm just doin it wrong, or it's because of the buff to RoJ, or something else, but I just don't understand how they are so highly rated. (T/C) 10:26, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

As a meatshield for Mhenlo and the other dude. When the afflicted is hurting the minions, they aint hurting partymembers and more importantly, they aint hurting Mhenlo and the other dude. Arnout aka The Emperors Angel 10:51, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

I'm not a noob; I know what MMs do and why they're taken. I'm just saying though, that they are not at all essential to victory here unlike many people seem to think, and there are in fact several detriments to bring them along. (T/C) 12:18, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

I suggest that if the enemy is getting so numerous and close that it can damage the VIPs dangerously, you're failing anyway. It's a bit like Assault on Beknur Harbor really: if they're threatening to overwhelm you, you're doing it wrong. If that's true, you "need" the MMs only if you're doing it wrong. See Rebirth. ;-P Keep in control and all will be peachy. --◄mendel► 12:26, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Assault isn't quite the same deal... there are no mission-critical NPCs to protect, and most of the foes are weak enough that you can sweep the floor with them if you take decent AoE. (My Elonian characters always take Acolyte Sousuke for precisely this reason.) I get what you're saying though. (T/C) 15:35, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Entropy, I wasn't suggesting you are a noob. Most people at vizuna square are not really good at the game (most of them are pretty newb (not noob)), and they dont have access to heroes and high-end builds. If this is the case, a minion master is a very good way of ensuring that the vips remain safe for the largest part. Arnout aka The Emperors Angel 17:33, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Minion masters are by their nature very streaky. If something goes wrong and you lose all of the minions, then you're stuck with a minion master without minions exactly when you really need something powerful. It's also possible that the change to ray of judgement makes a huge difference in the effectiveness of minions here since I've played. Quizzical 17:46, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

If something goes wrong and you lose all of the minions, it can also mean up to around 1000 points of PBAoE to clumped group of enemies (Death Nova), full health bar to everyone in your party (Dwayna's Sorrow), and full energy bar to every necromancer in your party (Soul Reaping). If this was enough to kill two of your opponents, it also means you'll have 4 minions pretty soon again, unless the opponent has a way of disposing of the corpses. IMO minions are not meant to stay, they are meant to die - much of their power is in the way they die, and sometimes also in the way they are created. Kitsunebi 06:13, 25 June 2009 (UTC)

Beknur @ lvl 15 ftw. It is my opinion that people who simply level up to get past difficult spots are playing the game wrong because they're missing on opportunities to learn valuable tactical skills. --◄mendel► 18:51, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

There's number of tactics you can try on this mission in normal mode. Heavy AoE damage is one, overwhelming numbers of minions is one, both can work fine. Yet another is to use the large number of corpses through wells or putrid explosion, or the like. Like mentioned before, you might not have a very versatile skill selection for heroes at this point (assuming you have heroes available at all), so a lot can depend on your own professions (e.g. if you play an elementalist, you might have a solid set of elementalist skills and good understanding on how to use them). In hard mode, on the other hand, I do find that bringing a couple of MM along makes it a whole lot more doable. When playing alone with H/H party, and getting henchies from other side, it's the only composition I've managed to get hard mode masters with. Kitsunebi 05:59, 25 June 2009 (UTC)

In easy mode, if you're bringing heroes to a mission meant to be done without them, then of course a lot of things will work. In hard mode with henchmen/heroes, I tried bringing two minion masters, and found it ineffective. There are too many critical defensive skills that you need to survive and keep the other party alive that you can't bring if you're loading up on minion masters instead. With multiple players and a lot more heroes, you have a lot more flexibility, so bringing multiple minion masters makes more sense. Quizzical 06:55, 25 June 2009 (UTC)

During the zquest days, you can easily get 2 human parties. Mine (local) had one MM, the other (foreign) had two. The local only had one monk, en she didn't even break a sweat. A shit load of minions (30 total), + 16 players, and two stupid NPC's made for one big fragfest. It was epic. Everything went KABOOM. Both parties having a Stay Young! spamming warrior helped a bit as well. Arnout aka The Emperors Angel 11:14, 25 June 2009 (UTC)

Bringing PvE-only cheat codes does tend to make things easier. That's about as useful to note as commenting that consumables make things easier, too. Vizunah Square hard mode is only hard if you're going henchmen/heroes, or matched up with incompetent players on the other side. Quizzical 17:42, 25 June 2009 (UTC)

"Playing on Normal Mode makes this mission much easier" imo ;) --- -- (contribs) (talk) 11:53, 26 June 2009 (UTC)

My guild did this mission in hard mode yesterday. Our strategy was simple: outnumber the Afflicted. Asura summons, Vanguard assassins, and 5 minion masters. We synced the two groups, one with three people and the other with two. Heroes filled in the rest of the slots. It was awesome. There was only one point where >50% of the minions died, and that was against the monk boss. At times, I was able to cast Animate Bone Fiend on recharge, and successfully complete it every time. Togo only got stuck once, at which point, everyone had to run back, dragging Mhenlo with us, until he started moving. Despite that, we still got masters. In fact, I think we were within the time limit for masters in normal mode, let alone hard mode. Of course, this only works if you can sync two groups, and have at least two people in each one, so they can bring heroes instead of henchmen.

My advice: When you outnumber the Afflicted, ur doin it rite.

(btw, none of the minion masters had Blood of the Master, for obvious reasons) --Macros 18:16, 30 July 2009 (UTC)

If you have all players and heroes and no room for henchmen, this mission can be pretty easy by a lot of different tactics. And that's without loading up on PVE-only cheats, even; if you do that, it makes the mission easier yet. Chahbek Village is pretty easy if you bring a minion master, but that doesn't mean that bringing a minion master is terribly important. Quizzical 20:28, 30 July 2009 (UTC)

New Bug with NPC's?

I've done this mission 3 times in the last month & Brother/Togo just stand there doing nothing until "something" triggers their lines. This caused the group to lose the Master's Reward. Can anyone else confirm what I noticed or provide a solution to trigger the NPC lines quicker? ~~GW-Saikano

If you have a minion master, Mhenlo will often stand there healing minions and not move all the way to where he is supposed to go for quite some time, which can slow things down greatly. Quizzical 23:30, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

There's no way to trigger them earlier as far as I know. It indeed happens quite often now (for me anyways) that the dialog after the 2nd big fight won't trigger, or that it pops up 3 minutes later. And if that doesn't happen, Togo gets a pathing bug right before the bridge after that dialog. Mystzombie 10:43, 9 July 2009 (UTC)

I believe to trigger the very first dialogue, ALL party members of BOTH parties must be within approximately aggro bubble range of Mhenlo / Togo. Other than that, just keep moving, especially your MM(s). 17:37, 9 July 2009 (UTC)

From my experience the first dialog triggers when Mhenlo is at a particular distance from Togo, I've had it trigger while i was still standing at the boss' location. Just move the MM's very close to the gate and it works fine. Mystzombie 22:44, 9 July 2009 (UTC)

Oh right, that's it. It's been a while since I did the mission. The reason why you should move all the party members is that NPC allies follow them, so my advice was still accurate :P. 12:30, 12 July 2009 (UTC)

Foreign Hench Bug HM

It is stated somewhere here in this discussion, that the foreign henchies sometimes skip the first group of Am Fah and run back after the cutscene. I can confirm this. Just did the mission, first great battle was flawless, but then we only had mhenlo instead of a whole group of overpowered henchies(HM), causing us to die. Thanks, that was just the 7th time i tried the mission, while I got masters on all others mission at once(except eternal grove and gyala once)212.45.63.98 19:09, October 7, 2009 (UTC)

Capitalization

The relevant policy is GW:ULC. ArenaNet doesn't always capitalize hard mode or normal mode. See, for example, here: or here. They do seem to often capitalize "hard" but not "mode", which is inconsistent and absurd. In case of a discrepancy, I think it's better to go with what makes the article more readable, and that means following normal English grammar rules. In particular, capitalizing lots of common nouns is awkward to read. In particular, this was discussed for the section heading, and every single mission page on GuildWiki uses the title "Hard mode", not "Hard Mode". Quizzical 01:47, October 18, 2009 (UTC)

Doesn't the game always capitalize profession names? (T/C) 01:49, October 18, 2009 (UTC)

It's not my prference, but it seems like Quizzical is correct: we should use Hard mode, which would be consistent with the overall policy.

I happen to prefer to see proper nouns and titles always capitalized (as is common practice in many arenas); I find it more readable (it highlights things I want called to my attention, much as a gossip column emboldens the names that are being dropped). However, the GWiki policy has been in place longer than I've been contributing; I can't offer a compelling reason that it should be changed other than my personal preference.

(In other circumstances, I might argue that Hard Mode is a proper noun referring to the more difficult version of Guild Wars. I would also argue that professions are proper nouns, at least as ANet treats them. However: see above — no compelling reason to even discuss it.)

I am afraid I have tended to overcapitalize and will make an effort going forward to stop that. I will also start reviewing articles as I edit them to reduce capitalization. I appreciate Quizzical's efforts to steer us (or at least me) straight.   — Tennessee Ernie Ford (TEF) 02:49, October 18, 2009 (UTC)

The game also colors a lot of particular text. That's all right for short blurbs, but it tends to make long wiki articles awkward to read. If one refers to the Ritualist class, that could be considered a proper noun, as it names a particular class, and hence could be capitalized. If one says that Quansong Spiritspeak, Ssyn Coiled Grasp, and Flower Spiritgarden are ritualists, the names are capitalized because they are proper nouns. Saying that they are all "ritualists" is using the word as a common noun, kind of like saying that Tom, Dick, and Harry are all engineers.

The game rarely if ever uses class names in this sense, but that doesn't mean that we should use bad grammar and capitalize a word used one way because the game capitalizes it when used a different way. That would be kind of like saying that a particular seemingly random word must always be capitalized on this wiki because the only time it is used in the game, it is the first word in a sentence, and capitalized for that reason. Or perhaps more directly, it would be like saying that "rush" should be capitalized if we talk of someone being in a rush to finish a timed mission for master's reward, because the game capitalizes the skill Rush. Quizzical 04:01, October 18, 2009 (UTC)

Read my post again, please. I'm not advocating a change in policy; in fact, I endorsed GWiki's and promised to follow it better.

I also hope that you can agree that I am entitled to have a personal preference, since grammar (like all parts of language) is not uniform, unchanging, or 100% standardized. If you read style and grammar guides, you'll see that there is broad agreement on some things, rare uniformity, and interesting divergence elsewhere. Capitalization is one of those areas where the proper rules depend on the context. In the context of a game, where there is no particular standard that has existed for dozens of years, the wiki could and should choose one that we see fitting. That has already been done and I repeat that I am not interested in opening up that debate. <sarcasm>If you want to debate whether I prefer my preference for reasons that you do not prefer, Monty Python and I will happily join you on my talk page.</sarcasm>   — Tennessee Ernie Ford (TEF) 08:28, October 18, 2009 (UTC)

+1, Ernie. A F K When Needed 10:58, October 18, 2009 (UTC)

Quizzical, capitalization is not part of grammar, and whether a noun is used as a subject or an object does not determine whether it is common or proper (what gave you that idea in the first place?). The "Rush" skill should be capitalized because ArenaNet puts all skills in title case.

Regarding the topic, GW:ULC states that "If the game capitalizes a word, so does GuildWiki." ArenaNet usually writes "Hard mode", which means the 'H' should be capitalized. They also capitalize all professions, and again, whether a profession is the subject or object in the sentence is completely irrelevant.

Note: I will attempt to move Hard Mode to Hard mode soon if there are no objections. —Shidou 20:17, October 18, 2009 (UTC)

Tennessee, I was replying to Entropy's remark above.

Shidou, can you really not think of any situations in which one might use words like "rush", "escape", "guilt", "shock", or "return" as normal English words, and not references to skills that take their names from those words? If the game doesn't incidentally use the word apart from in reference to the skill, does that mean that we can't use it on the wiki, either? If you want to say, "Get a quest, go kill some mobs, and return to the quest giver to turn it in," now we'd have to capitalize "return" because it incidentally happens to be the name of an assassin skill that is completely irrelevant to the quest? If that was said in the page of a Prophecies quest before the release of Factions, was it proper to leave "return" in lower case until the day Factions was released, at which point the first letter of the word should have been changed to be capitalized? Of course not! That the game happens to capitalize a particular word when used in a different sense is irrelevant.

The link you give for capitalizing professions has all of the professions capitalized in title case--which means that most words are capitalized. It also lists all of the professions on a line without a verb in the sentence fragment. If we're going to blindly mimic their capitalization, should we also mimic their approach of not allowing any verbs in any sentence that contains a list of all of the professions?

I can understand the argument for capitalizing "hard" in hard mode or "normal" in normal mode. ArenaNet botched their capitalization, and it's rather like transcribing typos in the game. That makes sense when transcribing quest text or NPC dialogue verbatim--and adding [sic] to note that there is an error, and we're only reproducing it from the original text. It makes a lot less sense when typing up paragraphs free form to explain how to do things, but there's at least an argument for it. But it makes no sense at all when using the word in a different sense. Does the English language not allow "polish" (as something you might do to shoes) to be in lower case even though "Polish" (relating to Poland) is capitalized as a proper adjective?

The reason there is capitalization in the first place is to make things easier to read. All caps is hard to read. Capitalizing the first letter of every word is hard to read. No caps is hard to read. And capitalizing a bunch of words at random makes it harder to read. Surely making this wiki useful and usable should be more important than mimicking ArenaNet's capitalization errors outside of their context. Quizzical 21:07, October 18, 2009 (UTC)

Could you really not understand why the sentence "Quansong Spiritspeak, Ssyn Coiled Grasp, and Flower Spiritgarden are ritualists" refers to the Ritualist profession and not the plain English word? There are skills whose names contain plain English words, but that doesn't mean that we must capitalize those skills as if they were plain English, because they're not.

The link I provided demonstrates clearly that ArenaNet capitalizes professions. Why are you interpreting it as the bible of sentence structure?

It seems that you're just really confused about how to use the appropriate capitalization in a given context. ArenaNet didn't "botch[...] their capitalization"; they made the first word of "Normal mode" and "Hard mode" proper because those are special terms in GW, but they didn't establish any capitalization rule for other uses of the words "normal" and "hard". Thus, it is correct to say, "Enemies are stronger in Hard mode" or "This quest is hard"; but incorrect to say, "Enemies are stronger in hard mode" or "This quest is Hard".

I think I may have identified where the confusion lies; GW:ULC states that "If the game capitalizes a word, so does GuildWiki" (emphasis added). Terms and words are different (a term contains one or more words), so we should change "word" to "term" in that statement. That way, my four examples adhere to the policy word for word. —Shidou 21:40, October 18, 2009 (UTC)

The example I was going to bring up was the generic use of Popsicle, but apparently that's capitalized even if you're talking about Otter Pops, on the basis that it's a registered trademark. But surely class names are not a trademark.

In the GW:ULC page, the specific example is capitalized because it is a proper noun. You seem to agree that it wasn't meant in the most literal way of capitalizing a word that is incidentally always capitalized because it happens to be the first word in the sentence the only time it is used. I'd likewise doubt that it was meant to say that we have to mimic ArenaNet's capitalization blunders.

A lot of other games don't invariably capitalize class names, either, precisely because it is incorrect to do so. See, for example, World of Warcraft or Vanguard: Saga of Heroes.

ArenaNet itself doesn't invariably capitalize profession names, even.

• Page 42 of the Prophecies manual: "It’s also not uncommon for followers of the Mantle philosophy to be highly trained warriors."
• Page 18 of the Nightfall manual: "The most powerful of these holy warriors transform themselves into living representations of the true gods"
• Page 30 of the Nightfall manual: "The Shattered Dynasty Era was a time when holy warriors roamed the countryside,"
• Page 62 of the Nightfall manual: "Now she is mo zing—a traveling blade, a masterless assassin, selling her services to the highest bidder."

(emphasis mine in all cases)

Even if you want to be pedantic and claim that's only the manual, that last one also appears in the game:

So no, the game doesn't always capitalize profession names. As for hard mode, I'd say that it's self-evident that "Hard mode" is wrong if there isn't some other reason for capitalization such as being at the start of a sentence. "Hard" is surely not a proper adjective. If one argues that "hard mode" is a proper noun, kind of like "United States" or "Great Britain", then they would have to capitalize "mode", too.

So basically, my assertion is that ArenaNet was careless with capitalization. See, for example, how they capitalize some species but not others, with no rhyme or reason as to why this one is capitalized and that one not. As such, it is best to use capitalization correctly, rather than to replicate whatever capitalization ArenaNet used by accident, except when quoting from the game verbatim.

Finally, I'd like to point out the irony of using a page titled "Use lower case" as justification for using far more capitalization than dictated by normal English rules. Quizzical 02:47, October 22, 2009 (UTC)

Alas, the Zenmai example doesn't necessarily support any of our assertions, as arguably, assassin might use its dictionary definition (one who kills peeps for pay) rather than as her GW Profession [sic]. That also applies to manual pages 42, 18, 30, and 62. For example, "the Mantle include highly trained warriors", some of whom are Warriors (e.g. Guards) and others that are Rangers (e.g. Seekers). (Now, if they were described as highly trained elementalists, my argument dies a quick death.) Nevertheless, I have no doubt that ANet is careless about capitalization, as they care little for copy editing generally (just compare brief/long skill descriptions).

In any case, does it really matter? As humans, we can choose to follow our own policy to the letter or to make the occasional exception. So, perhaps we can discuss how we would like to apply capitalization to the particular phrase in question: are enemies stronger in Hard mode or in hard mode? (Or even Hard Mode, in the unlikely event folks prefer it.)

(Reminder: the use of caps isn't consistent across books, textbooks, bibliographies, newspapers, English grammar classes, and government handbooks. Grammar isn't a fixed set of rules; they vary over time and space. While we shouldn't throw out every rule, we can certainly agree to set our own standards for a modest number of them.)   — Tennessee Ernie Ford (TEF) 03:57, October 22, 2009 (UTC)

(outdent) Quizzical, I doubt that the examples you provided refer to professions per se, particularly the "holy warriors" (per Ernie). Even if they actually did refer to the professions, the descriptions of the professions themselves (e.g. [1]) are much more indicative of ArenaNet's preference than a hero description that has nothing to do with the profession.

There is a difference between understanding that a common noun at the beginning of a sentence is always capitalized, and understanding that the only blunder ArenaNet made was not making everything completely consistent. In spite of a few instances of lowercase words that might refer to professions, it's pretty clear from the official site and the rest of the manual that the predominant style is to capitalize professions, as well as the adjective in Normal/Hard mode.

It's incorrect to argue that "Hard mode" is wrong just because one word is capitalized and the other isn't; it's entirely possible to have a proper adjective that modifies a common noun (e.g. "Offline mode"). In this case, "Hard" is a proper adjective and "mode" is a common noun.

I don't know about species, but I'm quite sure that all monster names are in title case. The vast majority of species are capitalized anyway (as far as I know), so that shouldn't be much of a problem. I don't really see the irony in the title of GW:ULC because, in a nutshell, it advises us to follow standard English rules and the only exceptions are ArenaNet's preferences. (It's not like it allows us to write, "A Player can purchase Items from Merchants at Mission Locations.")

I originally thought that you wanted to follow the policy because at the beginning of this section you used it to argue that Hard/Normal mode should not be capitalized, but now it seems that you just want to change it by removing the second point of the summary entirely. Well, if the community is down with that, I'll follow, but as long as the point is up there, professions, skills, and monster names should be in title case. —Shidou 04:14, October 23, 2009 (UTC)

The fundamental question is, if ArenaNet blunders on their capitalization, do we copy their error, or do the capitalization right? I say we do it right, and you seem to disagree. You're trying to be pedantic about the wording of the policy in ways that are unlikely to describe the original intent. I'm pointing out that even by the most literal definition, this wouldn't mean capitalizing all professions.

The point is that the policy really doesn't fit here. The clear intent, as well as the example cited, is that proper nouns are capitalized. The Fissure of Woe is capitalized because it is a proper noun, which is because it names a specific place. Surely it is better to use some common sense and revert to the question of whether to copy capitalization errors than to try to apply an unduly literal reading of a policy in areas where it wasn't meant to apply. Or can you cite discussion with broad agreement that if ArenaNet makes errors in their capitalization, that we ought to do likewise, apart from when copying their text verbatim?

The exceptions, as listed in the article, are item names, skill names, and character names, which are considered proper nouns. Class names and hard mode aren't listed.

Arguing that "hard" is a proper adjective but not part of a proper noun "hard mode" in this context is completely absurd. Even look at the Wikipedia article you cite: "a proper adjective if its meaning is "pertaining to "x", where "X" is some specific person, place, language, or organized group". Surely "hard" does not name any of those.

Your example of Microsoft capitalizing "offline" is title case. The particular feature they cite is called "Work Offline", and is capitalized because that is how it appears in the menu, where most words are capitalized because they are in title case. That's fine for computer program menus that only have a word or two on a single line, but it would be terrible to write entire paragraphs that way. The context here is in the middle of several paragraphs of text, so that title case is not relevant. Quizzical 00:52, October 26, 2009 (UTC)

Um... tl;dr, so maybe I'm totally off the subject here, and maybe this argument has already been made, but Shidou's recent edit was to capitalize "Elementalist", a profession title. I am against that, since we do not capitalize profession titles in real life when we talk about them in general, e.g. "I need to go see the doctor." We only do that if it is used as a personal title, e.g. "I need to go see Doctor Smith." So in this case, "a water elementalist" is referring to the profession in general and shouldn't be capped. [EDIT] In fact, GW:ULC already has a provision for this: see the last section of the policy, the issue of profession names should follow that example. —Dr Ishmael 04:00, October 26, 2009 (UTC)

Quizzical, regarding the fundamental question, I've explained earlier in this discussion that I believe the condition is false. As for the intent of the policy, I'm not trying to be pedantic about it; I just don't see how its original intent excludes professions from the exceptions that should be capitalized. The exceptions section includes "Names that ArenaNet always capitalize"; obviously, "The Frog" is the name of a character, "The Fissure of Woe" is the name of a location, and "Afflicted Elementalist" is the name of a monster—but isn't "Elementalist" the name of a profession?

You missed an important detail in the description of a proper adjective: "In general," which means of course that not every proper adjective must pertain to a person, place, language, or organized group—or noun, for that matter. The Wikipedia article lacks a rigorous definition, so it's completely absurd to say that "Hard" (in the context of Hard mode) isn't a proper adjective just because it does not meet a general definition (especially one that is found on Wikipedia). The article was linked only to give you an idea of what a proper adjective is, but if you're looking for a more rigorous definition, then see this.

Hence the Microsoft example, regardless of the fact that computer menus are usually in title case, illustrates that proper adjectives are used in a manner that is similar to how "Hard mode" is written. How "terrible" it would be to write paragraphs that way is your opinion, but it's a fact that help pages (like the one I linked), instruction manuals, research papers, etc. adopt the convention that if the name of a feature is capitalized by its author, then it stays capitalized. I don't see how an information page that refers to the "Hard mode" feature of Guild Wars should be any different.

Ishmael, there are several things that we capitalize in Guild Wars but not in real life, and professions are one of them. For example, a player would say, "I found Candy Corn in my Trick-or-Treat Bag," but in reality one would say, "I found candy corn in my trick-or-treat bag." The last section of ULC states that "[j]ust because a term is in the game does not mean it should be capitalized." This doesn't apply to professions, because while the professions are terms that appear in the game, they are also capitalized by ArenaNet. —Shidou 17:56, October 30, 2009 (UTC)

Am Fah deaths for A Monstrous Revelation

Is it worth mentioning that Am Fah deaths count for BOTH teams for the purposes of A Monstrous Revelation? In particular the local team get credited with the deaths even though its the foreign team that kills them.Thalestis 00:43, October 23, 2009 (UTC)

Short answer: yes. Long answer: I would expect them to count since this is a Cooperative Mission and there's no reason they shouldn't. Foe deaths count for both teams for reaping souls; this seems roughly the same. I think we should include the note because the circumstances are so rare in which this type of thing matters.   — Tennessee Ernie Ford (TEF) 02:05, October 23, 2009 (UTC)

The difference is that when the foreign team kills the Am Fah in the initial section, before the teams join in the central area, the deaths would not trigger SR for the local team, because they aren't in range. But I agree that the circumstance is unique enough that it should be noted. —Dr Ishmael 04:03, October 26, 2009 (UTC)