So I get that this is a heated discussion, and I couldn't read all 15 pages (sorry!), but I have a question for the more technically minded. Sorry if this has been addressed or if this is a stupid question!

Guild Wars 2 had a system where you'd be able to play the game while they were performing maintenance, only bringing the servers down for ~5-15 minutes. The way this was explained to me is that they would work on the updates and maintenance on a different server, and then apply the update to the game in that 5-15 minute period. This was just wonderful, it obviously cut down on the times the game was inaccessible to the players. Is there some reason that Square can't do the same thing that ArenaNet does (or did, haven't played it in a while)? I'm not saying it's necessary for the game to be successful, but it sure would cause less downtime and irritate less people. That's usually a good thing.