Mmorpgs

[Dis]

I'm still not sure if I'll get WOW.

I don't like the cartoony graphics and the newbie stuff. It looks like it'll be a game for newbies, and not fore people smart enough to play real MMORPG's

[Jon Miller]

AO is a lot more intensive (from what I hvae seen) than EQ2.

Of course, from what I have heard, starwars galaxies is the most intensive of all.

JM

[DinoDoc]

Originally posted by Dissident
I'm still not sure if I'll get WOW.

I don't like the cartoony graphics and the newbie stuff. It looks like it'll be a game for newbies, and not fore people smart enough to play real MMORPG's

Then what's your problem with WoW?

[Qilue]

Originally posted by Dissident
I've never played a MMORPG until last night. So I can't say for sure.

But I bought EQ2 last night.

Pretty cool so far . But as I said, I have nothing to compare it to. We'll see how long I play before I get bored of it. But I don't expect that anytime soon.

Originally posted by Dissident
I'm still not sure if I'll get WOW.

I don't like the cartoony graphics and the newbie stuff. It looks like it'll be a game for newbies, and not fore people smart enough to play real MMORPG's

That was quick, newbie to veteran in a matter of days.

[General Ludd]

My opinion of WoW has sunk after playing it some more. It seems rather shallow once you have played it for a while.

One of the key focuses of WoW was supposed to be PvP, but they've made the majority of their servers (in beta, atleast) non-pvp. Which makes absolutely no sense at all. I really do not understand why they did this - the game mechanics don't even acomodate it. For instance I, as an undead, ran to the dwarven lands (all the way to the newbie zone). All the NPCs would try to kill me on sight, of course, but they are easy enough to get by. So I'm there with all the the dwarves, gnomes, humans and elves - I can't talk to them, they can't talk to me. We can't group. We can't trade. We can't fight (without it being "declared" by one party by either toggling pvp on or killing an npc). So, what the ****'s the point?

And then, even when you do get to fighting - whether it be consensual on a PvE server or on a PvP server, there is still no point. You don't get anythign from it and your opponent losses nothign from it - not even a loss in durability (provided they go back to their corpse).

Supposedly they intend to include some sort of 'honour point' system that will give purpose to PvP and some sort of "battlegrounds" that will make PvP more common in the PvE servers. But if they haven't gotten around to doing this yet and the game's being released in a weak, I'm inclined to believe that they're shifting from what they set out to do and are instead going the path of EverQuest and making yet another pointless level-grind.


All that aside, I don't think there's enough on the character side of thigns to keep the game interesting. Granted, all of the individual classes are vastly different from each other and offer a completely different experience, but that's where the variety ends. The difference between the different races is sparce - the new racial traits have helped in this regard, but for the most part the abilities are not very signifigant. There is also very little customization in how your character developes - limited only to talents which augment the same skills every single person of your class has. I haven't played long enough to say how much of a difference the talents end up having in the late levels, but I don't feel there will ever be much variety between characters outside what class they are.

And in the same note, while the quest system is really nice and makes the game alot more interesting, it really only works for your first character because it's always the same.

[Tassadar500]

What are the racial traits?

[General Ludd]

Dwarf

Stoneform: Activate to gain immunity to poison, disease, and bleed

Gun Specialization: Increase Gun Skill

Frost Resistance: Increase Cold Resistance

Treasure Finding: Activate to see treasure chests on mini map - lasts until canceled - no cooldown



Gnome
Escape Artist: Activate to break out of a Root or Snare effect

Expansive Mind: Increase Intelligence

Arcane Resistance: Increase Arcane Resistance

Engineering Specialist: Increase skill bonus to Engineering



Human
Perception: Activate to increase stealth detection radius

The Human Spirit: Increase Spirit

Diplomacy: Bonus to faction point gain

Sword Specialization: Increase Sword skill



Night Elf
Shadowmeld: Activate while immobile and out of combat to enter stealth mode

Quickness: Dodge chance increased

Wisp Spirit: Become a wisp when dead with movement speed increase

Nature Resistance: Increase Nature Resistance


Orc

Blood Fury: Activate to increase Strength

Hardiness: Increase resistance to stun & knockout effects

Command: Pet melee damage increased

Axe Specialization: Increase to Axe skill


Tauren

War Stomp: Activate to stun opponents

Endurance: Max Health increased

Cultivation: Increase skill bonus to Herbalism

Nature Resistance: Increase Nature Resistance


Troll

Berserking: Activate when "Wounded" to increase melee & spellcasting speed

Regeneration: Increase health regen bonus

Beast Slaying: Increase damage bonus to Beasts

Throwing Weapon Specialization: Increase Throwing Weapon skill.


Undead

Will of the Forsaken: Activate to become immune to fear, sleep, and charm effects

Cannibalize: Increase health regeneration while consuming a corpse

Underwater Breathing: Underwater breath increased

Shadow Resistance: Increase Shadow Resistance



They sound better than they actually are. The "immunities" are skills that you have to manually activate and have a regen time. Really each race only gets one unique skill that's actually meaningful and a few others that are pretty much meaningless. A whole 15 extra points to herbalism? That's beyond useless (especially if you aren't a herbalist). Certain race/class combinations effectively don't even get any traits, because they are no use to them.

[Dis]

Originally posted by Qilue




That was quick, newbie to veteran in a matter of days.

yep

[Dis]

gun? are there guns in this game? then I'll definately buy it

[General Ludd]

Yeah, there are guns. More then there should be, really, because there's so many "dissidents" playing the game.


I might still buy WoW if they make a RP-PvP server that has an enforced naming policy, and/or some other mechanics to encourage roleplay other than stamping RP next to the server name.

[Jon Miller]

There are laser cannons, assault rifles, plasma rifles, and grenade launchers in AO

as well as sword, maces, and big logs

JM

[Qilue]

Originally posted by General Ludd
Yeah, there are guns. More then there should be, really, because there's so many "dissidents" playing the game.


I might still buy WoW if they make a RP-PvP server that has an enforced naming policy, and/or some other mechanics to encourage roleplay other than stamping RP next to the server name.

This might interest you General. Linky

[DrSpike]

Originally posted by Qilue




That was quick, newbie to veteran in a matter of days.

Good catch.

[DrSpike]

Originally posted by General Ludd
My opinion of WoW has sunk after playing it some more. It seems rather shallow once you have played it for a while.

One of the key focuses of WoW was supposed to be PvP, but they've made the majority of their servers (in beta, atleast) non-pvp. Which makes absolutely no sense at all. I really do not understand why they did this - the game mechanics don't even acomodate it. For instance I, as an undead, ran to the dwarven lands (all the way to the newbie zone). All the NPCs would try to kill me on sight, of course, but they are easy enough to get by. So I'm there with all the the dwarves, gnomes, humans and elves - I can't talk to them, they can't talk to me. We can't group. We can't trade. We can't fight (without it being "declared" by one party by either toggling pvp on or killing an npc). So, what the ****'s the point?

And then, even when you do get to fighting - whether it be consensual on a PvE server or on a PvP server, there is still no point. You don't get anythign from it and your opponent losses nothign from it - not even a loss in durability (provided they go back to their corpse).

Supposedly they intend to include some sort of 'honour point' system that will give purpose to PvP and some sort of "battlegrounds" that will make PvP more common in the PvE servers. But if they haven't gotten around to doing this yet and the game's being released in a weak, I'm inclined to believe that they're shifting from what they set out to do and are instead going the path of EverQuest and making yet another pointless level-grind.


All that aside, I don't think there's enough on the character side of thigns to keep the game interesting. Granted, all of the individual classes are vastly different from each other and offer a completely different experience, but that's where the variety ends. The difference between the different races is sparce - the new racial traits have helped in this regard, but for the most part the abilities are not very signifigant. There is also very little customization in how your character developes - limited only to talents which augment the same skills every single person of your class has. I haven't played long enough to say how much of a difference the talents end up having in the late levels, but I don't feel there will ever be much variety between characters outside what class they are.

And in the same note, while the quest system is really nice and makes the game alot more interesting, it really only works for your first character because it's always the same.

Interesting.

I found with CoH the quests (missions) became too samey after a while as well. Having a more quest based system rather than lots of hunting sounds great, but it's not without it's own problems IMO.

I also agree about differentiation within class. Compared to even something like NWN there doesn't seem a lot here. I suppose the classes being distinct and quite quick levelling help with alts though.

As regards PvP I think you need to be a bit more patient. EQ2 doesn't have any PvP at all on release, and CoH is doing it in an expansion. Not many games have good PvP on release. At least there is a base there, and I'm sure they will develop it to add some endgame content.

As regards roleplaying, come on, you always knew it was going to be sparse.

[General Ludd]

Originally posted by DrSpike

As regards PvP I think you need to be a bit more patient. EQ2 doesn't have any PvP at all on release, and CoH is doing it in an expansion. Not many games have good PvP on release. At least there is a base there, and I'm sure they will develop it to add some endgame content.

I don't really know about CoH, but atleast EQ2 has always said that they've had no plans for PvP - which isn't a surprise, since EQ has always been the posterboy of the camp/level/horde playstyle. But World of Warcraft was advertising PvP as key feature, and they've neglected it. I really don't understand why PvP is such a taboo. Look at Dark Age of Camelot, for instance. Every server has meaningful and plentiful PvP and at the same time has safe zones for the cowards people who want something different to camp monsters in all day long. It's not executed the way I would personally want things(I think the PvP servers in WoW would be set up pretty good if PvP had some meaning to it), but it's been a very succesful format and there are few complaints about it from the players one way or the other. Infact, virtually everyone looks forward to being powerful enough to help out their realm in DAoC, and all the high end players end up fighting PvP the majority of their time rather than camping monsters.

I think the problem is that alot of people hear PvP and think there's going to be a some level 60 guy waiting at the spawn to point to kill them as soon as they start their character. It's probably the ****y EQ PvP servers or the UO free-for-all (which I kind of like, actually, although UO didn't execute it as well as it could of) that have made so many people completely afraid of the term.

As regards roleplaying, come on, you always knew it was going to be sparse.

Yeah... but I was optimistic for a while there.


The official word is that they have no plans of making a RP-PvP server but will "continue to monitor the situation"

Yeah, I'll be skipping on this WoW. And EQ2.

I'm still tempted by the Roleplay server on the original EQ - it's ruleset is almsot exactly what I'm looking for... too bad it's stuck onto the worst game mechanics ever.

*sigh* Why do MMORPGs always have to suck so?