Who is the writing team at ArenaNet right now?

[Erasculio.2914]

The Lore forumers are more likely to know this than the forumers at General Discussion. It feels like a lot of the writers we heard the most about have left ArenaNet - Jeff Grubb, Ree Soesbee, Angel Leigh McCoy, John Ryan, etc. Among those who interacted the most with the community, it appears that Bobby Stein is still around, as well as Peter Fries. I think Mr Stein mentioned he spent most of the HoT development working on the raid storyline... Do we know who is doing what among the ArenaNet writers right now?

[Gorgaan Peaudesang.8324]

Matthew Medina is a Story Design Team Lead for Path of Fire.

[mercury ranique.2170]

https://en-forum.guildwars2.com/discussion/17155/ending-credits-for-pof

They are not making new credits. So many writers we know are from the core game credit list (or cause they made themself known to us by posting here, or appearing on the guildtalk vids). With that source out we have a harder time knowing the devs.

[Michram.6853]

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Matthew_Medina

also Scott McGough is on this team.

[Konig Des Todes.2086]

John Ryan left? Hmm.

Writers I know and their positions:

• Expansion writing team: Matthew Medina (lead), Scot McGough, and Connie Griffiths
• LW writing team: Peter Fries
• Raids writing team: Bobby Stein (lead)

I know there's more per team, and of course many designers do text writing too, but dunno names.

But a (possibly outdated) list of writers with wiki articles (only one I know of without an article is Connie Griffiths): https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Category:Writers

[Kossage.9072]

Based on promotional material, a few of the livestreams as well as comments posted by Mike O'Brien in the Reddit AMA threads for S3 episodes, here's what I've got regarding people who contributed to the stories of Season 3 and Path of Fire in some way. However, with the Living World teams Mo didn't separate the "story group" per se so with some of these names I'm unsure what their contributions ultimately were, but many of them did answer story-related questions in the AMA and/or the livestreams at least so they merit inclusion. Also note that Mo only listed the folks who participated in the AMAs so the S3 lists are incomplete by necessity.

Path of Fire:

Connie Griffith, Connor Fallon, Matthew Medina, Peter Fries, Scott McGough. Bobby Stein also helped with polishing the scripts.

However, the story video for PoF showed more folks, so the team likely had back and forth with the Living World story teams too. We also know that before departing, Jeff Grubb contributed to some of the story ideas such as naming choya (and I believe also chatted about the Balthazar plot stuff if I recall some of the content creator video interviews correctly). Ree Soesbee's contributions are unclear; would be fun to hear from narrative designers what stuff she contributed if any as she was still in the company when PoF began development and only left quite a while after Jeff.

Raids:

Bobby Stein.

Other narrative designers lent a hand at some points too from what I understand, notably Peter Fries. I know from a stream that Angel at least helped with the placement of environmental objects in Forsaken Thicket but it's unclear if she contributed anything to the raid story script per se or not. I imagine there may have been some back and forth too given how tightly knight the story folks at ANet are, though, as per Linsey Murdock's comments.

Living World Season 3:

Team 1 (Episodes 1 and 4):-Episode 1: Andrew Gray, Andrew McLeod, Angel McCoy, Anthony Ordon, Brett Nellermoe, Erik Fagerstrom, Jessica Brasz, Joe Kimmes, Linsey Murdock, Heather Conover, Melina Mitchell, Sara Kanavel, Sonya Ballas.-Episode 4: Andrew Gray, Andy McLeod, Heather Conover, Joe Kimmes, Kirk Williford, Morgan Brown, Matt Pennebaker.

Team 2 (Episodes 2 and 5):-Episode 2: Aaron Roxby, Ben Newell, Joe Kimmes, Josh Foreman, Keaven Freeman, Kirk Williford, Link Hughes, Melina Mitchell, Nellie Hughes, Nicholas Hernandez, Tyler Bearce.-Episode 5: Angel McCoy, Aaron Roxby, Andrew McLeod, Charlie Engelhard, Joe Kimmes, Link Hughes, Linsey Murdock, Melina Mitchell, Tyler Bearce.

Team 3 (Episodes 3 and 6):-Episode 3: Andy McLeod, Anthony Ordon, Joe Kimmes, Keaven Freeman, Kevin Millard, Linsey Murdock, Nick Hernandez, Taylor Southerland. I believe Angel was part of this group too although she did not participate in this episode's AMA...although I could be wrong about her involvement.-Episode 6: Angel McCoy, Andy McLeod, Alina Chadwick, Joe Kimmes, Linsey Murdock, Kevin Millard, Robert Land, Taylor Southerland.

However, this doesn't mean these were the sole contributors to their given content releases as quite a few devs seem to occasionally (or often!) chime in during meetings and folks from other departments may inspire the story teams or even help them out while creating content, thus deserving credit for some of the narrative (whether in instances or open world) too. :)

Also, we've seen some new narrative designers show up since then. From what I recall, Michael Yichao joined ANet narrative design team this summer although we don't know whether he'll work on S4, expansion 3, or some other project in house.

[draxynnic.3719]

@"mercury ranique.2170" said:https://en-forum.guildwars2.com/discussion/17155/ending-credits-for-pof

They are not making new credits. So many writers we know are from the core game credit list (or cause they made themself known to us by posting here, or appearing on the guildtalk vids). With that source out we have a harder time knowing the devs.

Well, the people who have left seem to have been around long enough to contribute to PoF, so they'll be on the credits. It'll be the credits for the next expansion that tell us who was still around now.

[mercury ranique.2170]

@draxynnic.3719 said:

@"mercury ranique.2170" said:

https://en-forum.guildwars2.com/discussion/17155/ending-credits-for-pof

They are not making new credits. So many writers we know are from the core game credit list (or cause they made themself known to us by posting here, or appearing on the guildtalk vids). With that source out we have a harder time knowing the devs.

Well, the people who have left seem to have been around long enough to contribute to PoF, so they'll be on the credits. It'll be the credits for the

next

expansion that tell us who was still around

now.

Did you actually read the linked article? they do not publish credit lists anymore.

[draxynnic.3719]

@mercury ranique.2170 said:

@draxynnic.3719 said:

@mercury ranique.2170 said:

https://en-forum.guildwars2.com/discussion/17155/ending-credits-for-pof

They are not making new credits. So many writers we know are from the core game credit list (or cause they made themself known to us by posting here, or appearing on the guildtalk vids). With that source out we have a harder time knowing the devs.

Well, the people who have left seem to have been around long enough to contribute to PoF, so they'll be on the credits. It'll be the credits for the

next

expansion that tell us who was still around

now.

Did you actually read the linked article? they do not publish credit lists anymore.

Ah. No, I didn't - my apologies. I drew my interpretation from what was in your post at the time.

[Erasculio.2914]

@mercury ranique.2170 said:Did you actually read the linked article? they do not publish credit lists anymore.

Errr... That's not what they said. The only official reply to the link you posted was Gaile offering the credits from 2015. Nowhere there did she say they won't publish game credits anymore.

Asking the wiki liason, he mentioned he will publish the Path of Fire credits when he was time (the 2015 credits are the ones for Heart of Thorns, by the way).

[Bobby Stein.3612]

Here's a partial list of narrative folks who've worked on LWS4 thus far:

Tom Abernathy - Narrative DirectorOversees story development, reviews and revises scripts

Bobby Stein - Associate Narrative DirectorManages team of narrative designers (a.k.a. writers), daily operations, trailers, some script review, etc.

Jessica Price - Story EditorManages the season story, reviews and revises scripts, trailers, etc.

Neil Pollner - Narrative DesignerArmand Constantine - Narrative DesignerPeter Fries - Narrative DesignerSamantha Wallschlaeger - Narrative DesignerTy King - Narrative DesignerAlex Kain - Narrative DesignerMichael Yichao - Narrative DesignerCasey Anderson - Senior Editor (wrote for the raid and fractal in this release)

We have strong partnerships with game designers who are critical to developing and realizing the story, including folks like Linsey Murdock, Andrew Gray, Heather Conover, etc. They help us fuse the story with the gameplay, and are ultimately the people who build the story and open world content that delivers it. (In PoF, folks like Matthew Medina, Connie Griffith, Connor Fallon, etc. were our counterparts on the design team--we focused on story with them, and collaborated daily. They often pitched some story ideas that made it into the final version.)

The relationships with our peers in Design, Art, Audio, etc. go much deeper than this, but I wanted to make sure folks understood that we can't tell a compelling story without members of these adjacent teams. And even though they're technically not on the Narrative Team from an organizational standpoint, they are a big reason why we're able to tell the stories that we do in the game.

In short, we're responsible for the overall story structure and the final dialogue, and they're responsible for presenting it in the game, either through gameplay, art, or other means. They're part of the discussion every step of the way, and help shape the story in very tangible ways.

[Erasculio.2914]

Nice! Thank you very much! That's what I wanted to know. It's great to know who's behind the scenes.

I really miss stuff like this:

And the making off we got with Nigthfall. I realize you guys are too busy right now for this kind of thing, so being able to know who does what is the next best thing.

[Bobby Stein.3612]

I should also mention that the narrative team also includes VO (Eve Eschenbacher, Marissa Sipos) and Editing (David Wilson, Elan Stimmel, and Stacy Kolden).

[Bobby Stein.3612]

Also, Aaron Linde (narrative designer) and Scott McGough (PoF Narrative Lead, now Story Editor) who were both a big help with PoF and other releases.

[mercury ranique.2170]

@Erasculio.2914 said:

@mercury ranique.2170 said:Did you actually read the linked article? they do not publish credit lists anymore.

Errr... That's not what they said. The only official reply to the link you posted was Gaile offering the credits from 2015. Nowhere there did she say they won't publish game credits anymore.

Asking the wiki liason, he mentioned he will publish the Path of Fire credits when he was time (the 2015 credits are the ones for Heart of Thorns, by the way).

Again, please read what I am saying. I also never said they wont publish credits anymore. I said (ast an observation from HoT and PoF) that they stopped publishing credits. I hope they resume it and would encourage them to do so, in order to give credit for who deserves it the most. And in the linked treath, it was established that the HoT didn't had credits and that the list on the wiki was mostly derived from the launch credits, added with people who appeared in video's and stuff like that.

@Bobby Stein.3612 said:Here's a partial list of narrative folks who've worked on LWS4 thus far:

Tom Abernathy - Narrative DirectorOversees story development, reviews and revises scripts

Bobby Stein - Associate Narrative DirectorManages team of narrative designers (a.k.a. writers), daily operations, trailers, some script review, etc.

Jessica Price - Story EditorManages the season story, reviews and revises scripts, trailers, etc.

Neil Pollner - Narrative DesignerArmand Constantine - Narrative DesignerPeter Fries - Narrative DesignerSamantha Wallschlaeger - Narrative DesignerTy King - Narrative DesignerAlex Kain - Narrative DesignerMichael Yichao - Narrative DesignerCasey Anderson - Senior Editor (wrote for the raid and fractal in this release)

We have strong partnerships with game designers who are critical to developing and realizing the story, including folks like Linsey Murdock, Andrew Gray, Heather Conover, etc. They help us fuse the story with the gameplay, and are ultimately the people who build the story and open world content that delivers it. (In PoF, folks like Matthew Medina, Connie Griffith, Connor Fallon, etc. were our counterparts on the design team--we focused on story with them, and collaborated daily. They often pitched some story ideas that made it into the final version.)

The relationships with our peers in Design, Art, Audio, etc. go much deeper than this, but I wanted to make sure folks understood that we can't tell a compelling story without members of these adjacent teams. And even though they're technically not on the Narrative Team from an organizational standpoint, they are a big reason why we're able to tell the stories that we do in the game.

In short, we're responsible for the overall story structure and the final dialogue, and they're responsible for presenting it in the game, either through gameplay, art, or other means. They're part of the discussion every step of the way, and help shape the story in very tangible ways.

Thanks for the list Bobby!

[Erasculio.2914]

@mercury ranique.2170 said:Again, please read what I am saying. I also never said they wont publish credits anymore. I said (ast an observation from HoT and PoF) that they stopped publishing credits. I hope they resume it and would encourage them to do so, in order to give credit for who deserves it the most. And in the linked treath, it was established that the HoT didn't had credits and that the list on the wiki was mostly derived from the launch credits, added with people who appeared in video's and stuff like that.

Yeah, that's where I am saying you are mistaken. The 2015 credits are the Heart of Thorns credit; you can check the wiki contributions of the ArenaNet's liason to see that. He clearly states that the credits they have released are the one for the core release, in 2013, and the one for HoT, in 2015.

[Randulf.7614]

@Bobby Stein.3612 said:Here's a partial list of narrative folks who've worked on LWS4 thus far:

Tom Abernathy - Narrative DirectorOversees story development, reviews and revises scripts

Bobby Stein - Associate Narrative DirectorManages team of narrative designers (a.k.a. writers), daily operations, trailers, some script review, etc.

Jessica Price - Story EditorManages the season story, reviews and revises scripts, trailers, etc.

Neil Pollner - Narrative DesignerArmand Constantine - Narrative DesignerPeter Fries - Narrative DesignerSamantha Wallschlaeger - Narrative DesignerTy King - Narrative DesignerAlex Kain - Narrative DesignerMichael Yichao - Narrative DesignerCasey Anderson - Senior Editor (wrote for the raid and fractal in this release)

We have strong partnerships with game designers who are critical to developing and realizing the story, including folks like Linsey Murdock, Andrew Gray, Heather Conover, etc. They help us fuse the story with the gameplay, and are ultimately the people who build the story and open world content that delivers it. (In PoF, folks like Matthew Medina, Connie Griffith, Connor Fallon, etc. were our counterparts on the design team--we focused on story with them, and collaborated daily. They often pitched some story ideas that made it into the final version.)

The relationships with our peers in Design, Art, Audio, etc. go much deeper than this, but I wanted to make sure folks understood that we can't tell a compelling story without members of these adjacent teams. And even though they're technically not on the Narrative Team from an organizational standpoint, they are a big reason why we're able to tell the stories that we do in the game.

In short, we're responsible for the overall story structure and the final dialogue, and they're responsible for presenting it in the game, either through gameplay, art, or other means. They're part of the discussion every step of the way, and help shape the story in very tangible ways.

Everyone involved did an excellent job on Daybreak. Really set a new bar for yourselves with this one

[Michram.6853]

Jessica Price putted the trailer design on the better level! I already love her, because I had some conversation with her. :) She's cute. :)

[VAHNeunzehnsechundsiebzig.]

@Arden.7480 said:Jessica Price putted the trailer design on the better level! I already love her, because I had some conversation with her. :) She's cute. :)

Cute or not, I loved the recent trailers and the teaser for the latest season was incredible. I loved the recap and the sync with the music SO MUCH.

[Bobby Stein.3612]

@VAHNeunzehnsechundsiebzig.3618 said:

@Arden.7480 said:Jessica Price putted the trailer design on the better level! I already love her, because I had some conversation with her. :) She's cute. :)

Cute or not, I loved the recent trailers and the teaser for the latest season was incredible. I loved the recap and the sync with the music SO MUCH.

We take turns on trailer scripts. Jessica wrote the Ep. 1 teaser. I worked on the recap, but it was mainly driven by the cinematics team since there was no dialogue. I helped with some shot selection but they really took the idea home. One of our internal audio folks did the score from scratch, too. :)

[zealex.9410]

@Bobby Stein.3612 said:

@VAHNeunzehnsechundsiebzig.3618 said:

@Arden.7480 said:Jessica Price putted the trailer design on the better level! I already love her, because I had some conversation with her. :) She's cute. :)

Cute or not, I loved the recent trailers and the teaser for the latest season was incredible. I loved the recap and the sync with the music SO MUCH.

We take turns on trailer scripts. Jessica wrote the Ep. 1 teaser. I worked on the recap, but it was mainly driven by the cinematics team since there was no dialogue. I helped with some shot selection but they really took the idea home. One of our internal audio folks did the score from scratch, too. :)

Didnt make it to the Ama so ill ask here which raid is your favourite?

[Bobby Stein.3612]

@zealex.9410 said:Didnt make it to the Ama so ill ask here which raid is your favourite?

In terms of writing? Bastion. Had a wonderful time collaborating with the team. A lot went into it.

[Michram.6853]

@Bobby Stein.3612 said:

@zealex.9410 said:Didnt make it to the Ama so ill ask here which raid is your favourite?

In terms of writing? Bastion. Had a wonderful time collaborating with the team. A lot went into it.

Bastion of the Penitent was so perfect! And this surprising end was so good! I didn't expect Saul in there at all.

[azureai.9764]

How's Michael Yichao fitting in over there, Bobby? I liked him a lot when he was a writer for Magic: The Gathering.

[Fenom.9457]

@Bobby Stein.3612 said:

@zealex.9410 said:Didnt make it to the Ama so ill ask here which raid is your favourite?

In terms of writing? Bastion. Had a wonderful time collaborating with the team. A lot went into it.

Very interested in where those bosses at the end came from. I can't remember is it was hinted or just my own thoughts, but I got the feeling they're related to Janthir. Hope we get those areas up there some day