Dear Kings and Queens,
Today, we're bringing you two important announcements.
First, after careful analysis and consideration, we decided to shut down the Guild vs. Guild feature. And second, we are happy to introduce its immediate successor — the brand-new Guild Raids!
In this post, we would like to give you a very early teaser of both. Within the next 1-2 months, we aim to bring both the GvG shutdown and the Guild Raids first to our Beta server. For a more detailed timeline on Beta, please visit the Beta forum.
Please mind that both of these events will come to live servers only after the Beta testing phase, which we do not expect to be over earlier than end of this year. Of course, we will keep you posted on the timeline for the live release as it still can change.
Now that we have the timeline out of the way, let us share the reasons that brought us to this decision.
Q: Why are we shutting down the Guild vs. Guild?
A: We recognize that the GvG has become an integral part of the game for some of you, especially those who have been playing Forge for many years. The decision to shut the feature down did not come to us lightly. But here are the main reasons why we decided to make it:
- Participation vs. maintenance. By now, only a very small percentage of our player population actively plays GvG. Being a legacy feature, which makes it slow and bulky, GvG requires considerable effort to maintain. In addition, GvG requires constant updates with every Age increase and, overall, doesn't live up to today's standards in terms of feature design. As a result, often it doesn't perform up to your and our expectations. Overhauling GvG would require many of our resources and would not be feasible and future-proof. Instead, in line with the market and our vision for Forge of Empires, we decided to create a new feature to bring all the different players and Guilds together and make a new long-standing addition to your game experience.
- Inaccessibility. GvG cannot be accessible on mobile without a significant technical overhaul. While it has been the case for a while, we believe it is no longer sustainable for a cross-platform game like Forge. We aim to eliminate this divide and ensure the key features are equally accessible regardless of the platform. The introduction of Guild Battlegrounds in the past had already addressed this, but with Guild Raids, we want to improve even further. Please mind, that during the testing phase, we're likely to release the feature on browser first, with the mobile update coming later.
- Ranking. GvG still holds an important place in the global rankings. With the recent GBG update, we introduced a new ranking focusing on the Guilds' performance in GBG rather than prestige. For us, it was the first step in decreasing the weight of GvG in the competition and making rankings fairer and accessible to as many active Guilds as possible, while including both mobile and browser players. We want to finish what we started and unite all Guilds in a new quest of Guild Raids.
A: We don't have the exact date, but we expect to finish all the necessary preparations during the next 1-2 months. As soon as we know, we will give you another heads-up. By making this announcement early, we wanted to give you time to share your feedback and prepare despite not having the exact date yet.
Q: What will happen to the GvG rankings?
A: They will be frozen in time in their state at the shutdown to commemorate all the impressive achievements by Guilds. Other areas in the game that use prestige and Guild Power will be rebalanced accordingly.
Q: What are the Guild Raids?
A: We designed this feature to bring all Guilds together to compete with each other, while also creating a new way collaborate within the Guilds by bringing your forces together for a common goal. We intend the Guild Raids to be a successor to GvG, but they are not necessarily alike. With Guild Raids, we want to introduce a new concept of a Guild quest in which the participants move together from one point of the quest to another, winning rewards on the way. One might say that Guild Raids are somewhat of a parallel world, with its order, resources, and units.
Q: When are the Guild Raids going to start?
A: We don't want to leave you without the GvG for too long. Upon the GvG shutdown, we want to allow ourselves time to address potential issues and hope to launch Guild Raids soon after. As always, we will keep you posted on the progress.
Stay tuned for the next update about GvG and Guild Raids! In the meantime, feel free to discuss the changes, ask questions, and share your thoughts on what the Guild Raids might look like in this thread.
Sincerely,
Your Forge of Empires Team