Fascinating. It means that both the paranoids and those of us dismissing the paranoids were partially right. It really was random. It apparently really was based heavily on what order you showed up in the zone in; he doesn't quite admit that part, but does admit that the "tie breaker" code that was supposed to kick in on tie scores was "retarded," not a smart design for a tie-breaker, and that would be consistent. On the other hand, they really do have a working contribution system for keep sieges -- it just /wasn't turned on./ (*head desk*)

This goes a long way towards explaining one of the patch notes buried very, very far down in the preliminary patch notes for 1.1, the version that's expected to go live this coming week: "Keep/Fortress Contribution: ... All enemy kills, both Player Character and Non-Player Character, will now contribute towards the Public Quest for taking a Keep/Fortress. Other actions that lead to taking a Keep/Fortress will now result in contribution toward the Public Quest for taking a Keep/Fortress." That had some of us scratching our heads, since we always thought that that was how it was supposed to work in the first place, and not a few of us were pretty sure it *was* working that way the first month or two the game was out.