But arent the weapon skills based off of the first class you select? I think I read that somewhere and maybe even in this thread someone mentioned it.
I for one do not want the same 4 skills for say a mace fresh out of character creation all the way through building my character toward bigger and better things. That is completely boring.
No, the 4 weapons skills are based on your current class and what weapon you're using.
That isnt what I asked.
It doesnt matter. Having the same 4 skills on a weapon type is bad design. Not being able to unlock more skills to switch out the more you use a weapon or by visiting a trainer just isnt going to work long term. And switching out class abilities for the other 4 isnt going to make up for it.
Why should someone with 6 months experience have the same sword skills as someone with 1 months experience? I want more information on such a critical issue with character growth.
I dont care about 4 skills , 8 skills , 12 skill slots or ever how many there will be. I want 100s of skills to chose from including weapon skills so I can have my own build and not just another copy of someone else outside of mixing and matching class abilities.
But arent the weapon skills based off of the first class you select? I think I read that somewhere and maybe even in this thread someone mentioned it.
I for one do not want the same 4 skills for say a mace fresh out of character creation all the way through building my character toward bigger and better things. That is completely boring.
No, the 4 weapons skills are based on your current class and what weapon you're using.
That isnt what I asked.
It doesnt matter. Having the same 4 skills on a weapon type is bad design. Not being able to unlock more skills to switch out the more you use a weapon or by visiting a trainer just isnt going to work long term. And switching out class abilities for the other 4 isnt going to make up for it.
Why should someone with 6 months experience have the same sword skills as someone with 1 months experience? I want more information on such a critical issue with character growth.
I dont care about 4 skills , 8 skills , 12 skill slots or ever how many there will be. I want 100s of skills to chose from including weapon skills so I can have my own build and not just another copy of someone else outside of mixing and matching class abilities.
So far they haven't really release that much information on the weapons or weapon skills.
I guess it's too much work to give us a pool of weapon skill to pick for weapons.. so we are stuck with set skill and no choice but to gather classes untill we find a class we like, with 2 weapons we like, and 4 weapon skills we like.
I guess I should be happy... this system is keeping my hype level way down
I guess it's too much work to give us a pool of weapon skill to pick for weapons.. so we are stuck with set skill and no choice but to gather classes untill we find a class we like, with 2 weapons we like, and 4 weapon skills we like.
I guess I should be happy... this system is keeping my hype level way down
Or wait until the actually reveal the details about the combat and skill model. Oh you think they should give away all the information all at once and leave nothing to keep our interest while they finish the game.
I guess it's too much work to give us a pool of weapon skill to pick for weapons.. so we are stuck with set skill and no choice but to gather classes untill we find a class we like, with 2 weapons we like, and 4 weapon skills we like.
I guess I should be happy... this system is keeping my hype level way down
We still don't have info on how tiers in a class effect weapon skills. We may get to switch the abilities around once we rank up in a class and unlock new weapon skills for our class weapons. So basically a tier 4 warrior may be able to switch out of combat between 4 skills per weapon so that's maybe 8 skills to customize on 2 weapons. Also there may be a hot swap ability between weapons so we might be able to assign skills to hot swappable weapons within combat which would give access to all 8 skills during combat. Maybe more. I would be ok with this system. Especially if there is a more deep crafting customization going on where you can tailor your abilities or weapons and tune them to your specific taste or goals.
Has this been officially confirmed? It seems SOE is promoting "freedom to play your way" yet force you to use specific weapons for skills? I don't mind 8 skills but being forced to use a certain weapon is what broke GW2 for me, that and the lack of trinity and the zerg fest that followed.
Would be nice if there is a way around this. I enjoy playing a necromancer with a staff and don't like the idea of being forced to use a dagger just to get the "best" spells. Anyone else feel this way or is it just me?
I'm with you 150%. It takes all of the individuality out of your character when you all have the exact same type of weapon and use it in the exact same way just because some min/maxer found it works the best. Hell, I'm cool with weapon abilities but not just 5 of them that you HAVE to use, give us a pool of several different abilities for each weapon so even if you both have a dagger you use it in a completely different way.
Has this been officially confirmed? It seems SOE is promoting "freedom to play your way" yet force you to use specific weapons for skills? I don't mind 8 skills but being forced to use a certain weapon is what broke GW2 for me, that and the lack of trinity and the zerg fest that followed.
Would be nice if there is a way around this. I enjoy playing a necromancer with a staff and don't like the idea of being forced to use a dagger just to get the "best" spells. Anyone else feel this way or is it just me?
I'm with you 150%. It takes all of the individuality out of your character when you all have the exact same type of weapon and use it in the exact same way just because some min/maxer found it works the best. Hell, I'm cool with weapon abilities but not just 5 of them that you HAVE to use, give us a pool of several different abilities for each weapon so even if you both have a dagger you use it in a completely different way.
Isn't that kind of what they are saying though?
You run the dancer class of doom, I run the leaping frogman class...we both use a dagger you do a bunch of aoe swishing mamba moves and I bunny hop into one persons face? We both slot rogue skills for movement and utility its just our attack styles are different and we look different and maybe your alternate weapon is a polearm and mine is a pair of swords.
They say the classes are very specific...and lets not forget there are 40 classes...if there were even three times as many weapons in guild wars even with its anemic system it would have a lot more variety.
Has this been officially confirmed? It seems SOE is promoting "freedom to play your way" yet force you to use specific weapons for skills? I don't mind 8 skills but being forced to use a certain weapon is what broke GW2 for me, that and the lack of trinity and the zerg fest that followed.
Would be nice if there is a way around this. I enjoy playing a necromancer with a staff and don't like the idea of being forced to use a dagger just to get the "best" spells. Anyone else feel this way or is it just me?
I'm with you 150%. It takes all of the individuality out of your character when you all have the exact same type of weapon and use it in the exact same way just because some min/maxer found it works the best. Hell, I'm cool with weapon abilities but not just 5 of them that you HAVE to use, give us a pool of several different abilities for each weapon so even if you both have a dagger you use it in a completely different way.
Isn't that kind of what they are saying though?
You run the dancer class of doom, I run the leaping frogman class...we both use a dagger you do a bunch of aoe swishing mamba moves and I bunny hop into one persons face? We both slot rogue skills for movement and utility its just our attack styles are different and we look different and maybe your alternate weapon is a polearm and mine is a pair of swords.
They say the classes are very specific...and lets not forget there are 40 classes...if there were even three times as many weapons in guild wars even with its anemic system it would have a lot more variety.
That is exactly what they are saying,
We haven't gotten a lot of information, but the little we have is being twisted totally out of proportion.
Everyone seems to be making things up, which is ok, if it wasn't about the things we actually DO know.
I think people need to step back from the thought that their class is their character.
The classes seems to be more of a template than anything. The names arent really THAT important, it is what they can do with the weapons they have assigned and what kind of combination of secondary skills they have access too (the TYPES , not the actual skills)
If you want a character that fights with 2 handed swords, you go through the kind of classes that uses 2 handed swords and find the one you like the best.
If you want to cast spells, find the class that have the weapon sets that most resemble what spells you would like to cast. Pretty sure there will be enough of them.
You then put the secondary skills together that fits best with your vision of your character (even if it was name Shadow Knight to start with)
Name it whatever you feel like. Hell you could even start out as a SK, change out the class so you get the weapons you like, put in totally new secondaries and still call it a SK in the end. It will be YOUR version of an SK.
There is a little confusion in another place here too.
We would like to think (some of us, some havent gotten to that point yet) that if you want to fight with a 2 handed sword, then you should be able to just switch classes between fights. Say one class uses 2 handed swords for devestating AOE effects and another uses it in a more Samurai (crit) kinda way.
This should in theory be an option.
However, your character isnt your class. Your gear will have a lot to say in your build too.
Your items will not just give you generic plusses to stats anymore. Instead they will enchance certain skills or make them cheaper (just examples).
This is a huge thing to consider. It means that the people that are scared of everyone just changing classes all the time, can relax a little (i saw no problem with that to begin with, not any different than changing to an alt).
But it also mean that if you change class to a similar class (2 handed to 2 handed) you should probably keep most of your gear in a way that it enhances your secondary skills AND keep your seconday skills the same or close to at least.
Gear will narrow our character down, not 8 hot buttons or limited weapon skills (which is silly considering we can choose from ANY skill combination in the game, with few restrictions)
The answer to that is of course to have different gear sets on you.
But will it be viable? Will we have enough room? Enough time to gather it (yeah right, most of us like to think we have a life, but we still waste it in games hehe).
Will some parts be super rare to collect? Do we need to beat a dragon to get its tooth for that one special piece of our armor? And the orc chief for the other set?
We have no clue, but the gear is what will make the limitations. The rest of the setup is actually pretty open if you sit down and think through the options in a logical way at least.
"I'm with you 150%. It takes all of the individuality out of your character when you all have the exact same type of weapon and use it in the exact same way just because some min/maxer found it works the best. Hell, I'm cool with weapon abilities but not just 5 of them that you HAVE to use, give us a pool of several different abilities for each weapon so even if you both have a dagger you use it in a completely different way"
I feel the exact opposite. How is this taking individuality away? If anything its giving us more. You won't have to be a ShadowKnight that uses a 2h sword or sword and board. You can take another classes weapons and weapon abilities and swap that classes class abilities making your own variation of the shadowknight.
We haven't gotten a lot of information, but the little we have is being twisted totally out of proportion.
Everyone seems to be making things up, which is ok, if it wasn't about the things we actually DO know.
I think people need to step back from the thought that their class is their character.
The classes seems to be more of a template than anything. The names arent really THAT important, it is what they can do with the weapons they have assigned and what kind of combination of secondary skills they have access too (the TYPES , not the actual skills)
If you want a character that fights with 2 handed swords, you go through the kind of classes that uses 2 handed swords and find the one you like the best.
If you want to cast spells, find the class that have the weapon sets that most resemble what spells you would like to cast. Pretty sure there will be enough of them.
You then put the secondary skills together that fits best with your vision of your character (even if it was name Shadow Knight to start with)
Name it whatever you feel like. Hell you could even start out as a SK, change out the class so you get the weapons you like, put in totally new secondaries and still call it a SK in the end. It will be YOUR version of an SK.
There is a little confusion in another place here too.
We would like to think (some of us, some havent gotten to that point yet) that if you want to fight with a 2 handed sword, then you should be able to just switch classes between fights. Say one class uses 2 handed swords for devestating AOE effects and another uses it in a more Samurai (crit) kinda way.
This should in theory be an option.
However, your character isnt your class. Your gear will have a lot to say in your build too.
Your items will not just give you generic plusses to stats anymore. Instead they will enchance certain skills or make them cheaper (just examples).
This is a huge thing to consider. It means that the people that are scared of everyone just changing classes all the time, can relax a little (i saw no problem with that to begin with, not any different than changing to an alt).
But it also mean that if you change class to a similar class (2 handed to 2 handed) you should probably keep most of your gear in a way that it enhances your secondary skills AND keep your seconday skills the same or close to at least.
Gear will narrow our character down, not 8 hot buttons or limited weapon skills (which is silly considering we can choose from ANY skill combination in the game, with few restrictions)
The answer to that is of course to have different gear sets on you.
But will it be viable? Will we have enough room? Enough time to gather it (yeah right, most of us like to think we have a life, but we still waste it in games hehe).
Will some parts be super rare to collect? Do we need to beat a dragon to get its tooth for that one special piece of our armor? And the orc chief for the other set?
We have no clue, but the gear is what will make the limitations. The rest of the setup is actually pretty open if you sit down and think through the options in a logical way at least.
Agreed. It seems some people aren't grasping how much more variety is here than typically exists. There are going to be 80 weapon stances each with 4 abilities all with their own animations. Throw on top of that at least another 160 class abilities (I'm not sure it's been stated that classes will have a max of 4 abilities or not). You're going to end up with ~500 million permutations. The viability of these builds is going to be heavily gear dependent so we'll have to see how gear ends up dropping in this iteration. Additionally, who knows how hard it'll be to get some of these classes. Being in a position to absolutely min/max I feel will be much more difficult in this game just due to there not being set ways to go and get classes/maybe tier up/get appropriate gear. Only time will tell... hopefully they don't screw it up
We haven't gotten a lot of information, but the little we have is being twisted totally out of proportion.
Everyone seems to be making things up, which is ok, if it wasn't about the things we actually DO know.
I think people need to step back from the thought that their class is their character.
The classes seems to be more of a template than anything. The names arent really THAT important, it is what they can do with the weapons they have assigned and what kind of combination of secondary skills they have access too (the TYPES , not the actual skills)
If you want a character that fights with 2 handed swords, you go through the kind of classes that uses 2 handed swords and find the one you like the best.
If you want to cast spells, find the class that have the weapon sets that most resemble what spells you would like to cast. Pretty sure there will be enough of them.
You then put the secondary skills together that fits best with your vision of your character (even if it was name Shadow Knight to start with)
Name it whatever you feel like. Hell you could even start out as a SK, change out the class so you get the weapons you like, put in totally new secondaries and still call it a SK in the end. It will be YOUR version of an SK.
There is a little confusion in another place here too.
We would like to think (some of us, some havent gotten to that point yet) that if you want to fight with a 2 handed sword, then you should be able to just switch classes between fights. Say one class uses 2 handed swords for devestating AOE effects and another uses it in a more Samurai (crit) kinda way.
This should in theory be an option.
However, your character isnt your class. Your gear will have a lot to say in your build too.
Your items will not just give you generic plusses to stats anymore. Instead they will enchance certain skills or make them cheaper (just examples).
This is a huge thing to consider. It means that the people that are scared of everyone just changing classes all the time, can relax a little (i saw no problem with that to begin with, not any different than changing to an alt).
But it also mean that if you change class to a similar class (2 handed to 2 handed) you should probably keep most of your gear in a way that it enhances your secondary skills AND keep your seconday skills the same or close to at least.
Gear will narrow our character down, not 8 hot buttons or limited weapon skills (which is silly considering we can choose from ANY skill combination in the game, with few restrictions)
The answer to that is of course to have different gear sets on you.
But will it be viable? Will we have enough room? Enough time to gather it (yeah right, most of us like to think we have a life, but we still waste it in games hehe).
Will some parts be super rare to collect? Do we need to beat a dragon to get its tooth for that one special piece of our armor? And the orc chief for the other set?
We have no clue, but the gear is what will make the limitations. The rest of the setup is actually pretty open if you sit down and think through the options in a logical way at least.
Agreed. It seems some people aren't grasping how much more variety is here than typically exists. There are going to be 80 weapon stances each with 4 abilities all with their own animations. Throw on top of that at least another 160 class abilities (I'm not sure it's been stated that classes will have a max of 4 abilities or not). You're going to end up with ~500 million permutations. The viability of these builds is going to be heavily gear dependent so we'll have to see how gear ends up dropping in this iteration. Additionally, who knows how hard it'll be to get some of these classes. Being in a position to absolutely min/max I feel will be much more difficult in this game just due to there not being set ways to go and get classes/maybe tier up/get appropriate gear. Only time will tell... hopefully they don't screw it up
For gear, i think we are in for a surprise too.
I have a feeling, that since we can modify our gear as much as we can, that the actual gear drops we will get, will be more "skins" or bases.
On top of that, there will be drops to help in crafting the modifications.
Crafting will play a very large part in EQN (they said)
The more I discuss the things we know (and not the things we do not know) the more things seems to open up.
What a lot saw as too much (multi classing) last week, i know see as being restricted naturaly by how you choose to equip yourself.
You might have 40 classes all opened and maxed out, but I would be surprised if you had gear to equip for them all.
And thats not even thinking about you choosing other secondary skills, then your bags should be a whole dimension in itself.
Lots of good conversation going on here. Figured it would be easier to make an account and respond to everyone than send telegraphs via twitter.
Please don't take anything I saw here as flippant or condescending,etc. This is good conversation and I thank you all for participating.
Let me clear this up for everyone. The current plan is that each class has a pair of weapons that they can use. Each of these weapons gives the class 4 unique abilities themed for the class. These 4 abilities are earned over the progression of the class. So if a class uses 2 swords and a spear then they get 4 abilities for the sword and 4 for the spear. This list does not grow beyond 4.
Why did we choose this design?
As we stated in the class panel our many classes is each very focused. Very very focused on a particular gameplay style. We also want each to be very visually distinct and identifiable. Both of these goals become impossible to reach with too many abilities
As has been pointed out n this thread, in EverQuest Next you are able to become any one of 40 classes at launch. These will feature a wide variety of equipment choices, ability load outs and multi-class options. On top of that you can mix character abilities between classes for even more customization. Trust me there is something for everyone here.
Another thing that I cannot overstate - this is not your typical mmo. Our class and progression model cannot be accurately compared to anything on the market today. We have played the games you have played. We know exactly what you are talking about when you bring up issues. Our hope is that together we can make a game we all want to play.
Please keep up the feedback, you guys/gals rock.
Talisker
My big issues with this whole thing is the inference it has on the rest of the game, and what limitations it places on design going forward.
The assumption I am working from is that you are limiting each character to 8 abilities at any one time because the PS4 has 8 buttons. It is perfectly reasonable to expect you to want to maximize profits from this game, and so taking the PS4's limitations in to account is understandable. What I don't get is, once the decision was made to co-develop for the PS4, why was it decided to limit abilities to 8? The shoulder buttons of a PS controller are designed to be used as adjusters more than they are designed to be used as buttons by themselves, why not treat them as such?
The 8 ability limit seems to be a very core aspect of this game. It is no doubt what influenced you guys to make 40 classes, and to make each ability reflect the ideal of the class. I have no doubts at all that it is too late in development now for you to budge from each class having 4 weapon abilities and 4 character abilities. As such, I expect you will do everything to defend it.
However, I have not heard anyone from SOE say that this system is good from a gameplay or game design perspective (not game feel perspective, not business perspective). Perhaps you have all forgotten that we can get a feel for a fantasy world from a book, a T.V. show or a movie, but game play is something we can only get from a game. As such, even though I know it's the red-headed stepchild of any threefold system of game theory, it is none-the-less the most important aspect of design in a computer game, as it is what separates games from other forms of entertainment (try as you might, you can not deliver a story as well as Peter Jackson or J.J. Abrams can). No one seems to have done any research to put the ideal total number of abilities at 8. In fact, if it weren't for the PS4 controller only having 8 buttons, your conclusion that 8 abilities would be enough and subsequent design around that, after the complaints of other similarly limited MMO's in recent years, would be perplexing.
Personally, I say give us two banks of four character abilities, as well as the 4 weapon abilities. One that is from the class we are currently playing that we can not alter, and one bank that we fill ourselves as per what has been explained so far. This enhances your concept of each class feeling unique, leaves the customization in tact, helps alleviate some of the grief you are getting from the abysmally low ability count, and doesn't add the need to create new abilities for each class with unique animations (which would in turn reduce the number of classes that you can add to the game post launch). It's basically a win/win situation, but the best part is it makes PS4 players aware that shoulder buttons are there as adjusters, rather than ability buttons. This in turn gives you two more banks of four currently empty hotbuttons, which brings me to my other major issue with the 8 ability system.
Assuming the PS4 is the reason you went for 8 abilities, the current design doesn't allow for any hot-barred abilities or items other than the 4 character and 4 weapon abilities. This means no hot-barred potions or poisons, but worse than that, it means no items with activatible/clicky effects. In EQ2, these items were by far the most treasured - I used my Manastone for many years, my Honor of Pantrilla for every top end raid encounter from Tarinax through to Theer when I stopped raiding, and my Trakanon's Gaze was the only item in the game that the raid leaders decided to drop DKP for and assign (which in turn saw all the mages pull aggro when ever we could to 'prove' that we needed it most). Indeed, Manaburn > Trakanon's Gaze > Honor of Pantrilla was a standard part of my DPS rotation for a few years, and without items to replenish power quickly mid combat, Manaburn would have been worthless for many years.
Designing a game from the ground up where items like this are not possible for a reason as abstract as the number of buttons on a console controller, is really quite bad form, as these are the items that people remember.
Lots of good conversation going on here. Figured it would be easier to make an account and respond to everyone than send telegraphs via twitter.
Please don't take anything I saw here as flippant or condescending,etc. This is good conversation and I thank you all for participating.
Let me clear this up for everyone. The current plan is that each class has a pair of weapons that they can use. Each of these weapons gives the class 4 unique abilities themed for the class. These 4 abilities are earned over the progression of the class. So if a class uses 2 swords and a spear then they get 4 abilities for the sword and 4 for the spear. This list does not grow beyond 4.
Why did we choose this design?
As we stated in the class panel our many classes is each very focused. Very very focused on a particular gameplay style. We also want each to be very visually distinct and identifiable. Both of these goals become impossible to reach with too many abilities
As has been pointed out n this thread, in EverQuest Next you are able to become any one of 40 classes at launch. These will feature a wide variety of equipment choices, ability load outs and multi-class options. On top of that you can mix character abilities between classes for even more customization. Trust me there is something for everyone here.
Another thing that I cannot overstate - this is not your typical mmo. Our class and progression model cannot be accurately compared to anything on the market today. We have played the games you have played. We know exactly what you are talking about when you bring up issues. Our hope is that together we can make a game we all want to play.
Please keep up the feedback, you guys/gals rock.
Talisker
My big issues with this whole thing is the inference it has on the rest of the game, and what limitations it places on design going forward.
Assuming the PS4 is the reason you went for 8 abilities, the current design doesn't allow for any hot-barred abilities or items other than the 4 character and 4 weapon abilities. This means no hot-barred potions or poisons, but worse than that, it means no items with activatible/clicky effects.
You can have 12 active abilities at once. That was cleared up last night. 2 weapon sets with 4 skills each and 4 secondary abilities.
They've yet to go into inventory management (40+ classes worth of gear) or any active/clicky stuff. Items will have effects, all passive or some active has yet to be cleared up.
Maybe the 8 buttons are only for active abilities. Maybe we can have an inventory window or bar on the side? I believe this is how EQ did it, been a while.
We haven't seen any of the UI yet. I believe they said it would be customizable like most MMOs these days as well. So you could have 100 potions on a bar, but only 8 active abilities for your class template.
Any future plans to be on PS4 should have little influence on the game. As was shown with FFXIV AAR, you can have a lot of skills available with just a PS controller.
Yes a PS controller has ~8 buttons, but don't forget that EQN will have Jump, Sprint, Dodge, weapon switching, template switching, etc. I highly doubt the ~8 buttons would directly translate to 8 skills. We would need buttons for handling all the rest of the UI and working as "shift" to go from one thing to another.
But arent the weapon skills based off of the first class you select? I think I read that somewhere and maybe even in this thread someone mentioned it.
I for one do not want the same 4 skills for say a mace fresh out of character creation all the way through building my character toward bigger and better things. That is completely boring.
No, the 4 weapons skills are based on your current class and what weapon you're using.
That isnt what I asked.
?How is that not what you asked?
It doesnt matter. Having the same 4 skills on a weapon type is bad design. Not being able to unlock more skills to switch out the more you use a weapon or by visiting a trainer just isnt going to work long term. And switching out class abilities for the other 4 isnt going to make up for it.
Agree.
Why should someone with 6 months experience have the same sword skills as someone with 1 months experience? I want more information on such a critical issue with character growth.
Well, now that we know you don't start with all 4 skills, it may take 6 months to unlock them all.
I dont care about 4 skills , 8 skills , 12 skill slots or ever how many there will be. I want 100s of skills to chose from including weapon skills so I can have my own build and not just another copy of someone else outside of mixing and matching class abilities.
Originally posted by Galadourn well, having skills bound to weapons might seem restrictive at first, but it makes sense if you think it over a bit; a piercing attack would hardly be executable with a great hammer or mace, for example, so it makes sense to have it restricted to certain other weapons (rapier, for example). LIkewise a cleave attack isn't fitting for a 1h weapon. I's less of an issue than it sounds really.
Again no one is asking to have every skill available for every weapon. It isn't hard to give a pool of skills to each weapon that match the flavor and aesthetic of said weapon. Options, even if limited are better then rigid GW2 style skills that never change.
Random Forum Poster: I want an MMO that is different, original and fun.
Me: So you want something like EQN
Them: Nah dude, I want a Holy Trinity, Tab Target combat, Instanced Raiding, and Rigid classes.
Has this been officially confirmed? It seems SOE is promoting "freedom to play your way" yet force you to use specific weapons for skills? I don't mind 8 skills but being forced to use a certain weapon is what broke GW2 for me, that and the lack of trinity and the zerg fest that followed.
Would be nice if there is a way around this. I enjoy playing a necromancer with a staff and don't like the idea of being forced to use a dagger just to get the "best" spells. Anyone else feel this way or is it just me?
I don't understand the concern here. If you use a dagger, the skill is ... dagger fighting. If you use a bow, the skill is ... bow use. That is not abilities based. From how I understood it the weapon defines what in total can be done with it, the class defines what specifically you can do with it. For example if you have fencing as part of your class, you might fence with a sword. But if you are a brute force class and never learned fencing you might only use it to slash and run it through people. Still the sword defines: can't shoot arrows with it.
Played: Pretty much any fantasy MMO, some did not even make it to release ... Favorites: UO, EQ2, Vanguard, Wurm Online, Salem, ESO, Creativerse Playing: ESO, Creativerse, Guild Wars 2 Anticipating: (sigh) ... maybe Ashes of Creation
Has this been officially confirmed? It seems SOE is promoting "freedom to play your way" yet force you to use specific weapons for skills? I don't mind 8 skills but being forced to use a certain weapon is what broke GW2 for me, that and the lack of trinity and the zerg fest that followed.
Would be nice if there is a way around this. I enjoy playing a necromancer with a staff and don't like the idea of being forced to use a dagger just to get the "best" spells. Anyone else feel this way or is it just me?
I don't understand the concern here. If you use a dagger, the skill is ... dagger fighting. If you use a bow, the skill is ... bow use. That is not abilities based. From how I understood it the weapon defines what in total can be done with it, the class defines what specifically you can do with it. For example if you have fencing as part of your class, you might fence with a sword. But if you are a brute force class and never learned fencing you might only use it to slash and run it through people. Still the sword defines: can't shoot arrows with it.
What people are concerned with is that the weapon/class locks you into 4 pre-set weapon abilities, that you never get access to more weapon skills or get to select your weapon skills (for that weapon).
So say, if you intend to play as one of the starting classes and have no interest in playing as one of the classes you unlock while playing, you will only have these 4 weapon skills throughout the ENTIRE game.
This can lead to a sense of no progression in terms of your weapon skills.
What most people are wanting (in this thread) are for the ability to have a wider selection of weapon skills that you obtain within one single class, so you can mix up your weapon skills and have more variety.
So everyone who is say, a warrior, doesn't have the exact same 4 weapon skills as every single warrior in the game.
I think one way they could do this, is to allow people to truly make their own classes. Instead of simply allowing us to mix and match 4 class abilities, why not allow us to mix and match weapon abilities from the classes? (Within the same weapon type of course).
So lets say a warrior uses one handed swords, while a berserker uses them as well. EAch of them has 4 different one-handed sword abilities.
So if you unlock both classes, you can then (while playing as either class) mix and match those weapon abilities how you want (with the more powerful ones obviously costing more to slot in, just like with class abilities).
Has this been officially confirmed? It seems SOE is promoting "freedom to play your way" yet force you to use specific weapons for skills? I don't mind 8 skills but being forced to use a certain weapon is what broke GW2 for me, that and the lack of trinity and the zerg fest that followed.
Would be nice if there is a way around this. I enjoy playing a necromancer with a staff and don't like the idea of being forced to use a dagger just to get the "best" spells. Anyone else feel this way or is it just me?
I don't understand the concern here. If you use a dagger, the skill is ... dagger fighting. If you use a bow, the skill is ... bow use. That is not abilities based. From how I understood it the weapon defines what in total can be done with it, the class defines what specifically you can do with it. For example if you have fencing as part of your class, you might fence with a sword. But if you are a brute force class and never learned fencing you might only use it to slash and run it through people. Still the sword defines: can't shoot arrows with it.
What people are concerned with is that the weapon/class locks you into 4 pre-set weapon abilities, that you never get access to more weapon skills or get to select your weapon skills (for that weapon).
So say, if you intend to play as one of the starting classes and have no interest in playing as one of the classes you unlock while playing, you will only have these 4 weapon skills throughout the ENTIRE game.
This can lead to a sense of no progression in terms of your weapon skills.
What most people are wanting (in this thread) are for the ability to have a wider selection of weapon skills that you obtain within one single class, so you can mix up your weapon skills and have more variety.
So everyone who is say, a warrior, doesn't have the exact same 4 weapon skills as every single warrior in the game.
I think one way they could do this, is to allow people to truly make their own classes. Instead of simply allowing us to mix and match 4 class abilities, why not allow us to mix and match weapon abilities from the classes? (Within the same weapon type of course).
So lets say a warrior uses one handed swords, while a berserker uses them as well. EAch of them has 4 different one-handed sword abilities.
So if you unlock both classes, you can then (while playing as either class) mix and match those weapon abilities how you want (with the more powerful ones obviously costing more to slot in, just like with class abilities).
Their reasoning on this issue is that they want classes to have an aesthetic identity. If you see a player using their weapon in a certain way, you know what base class they are. If you want to use a 2 hander and use SK skills while having different weapon abilities from the SK... There's nothing stopping you from getting another base class that can use a 2 hander and filling in their class skills with the SK's (Assuming the class slots are the same... There may also be more to base classes that they haven't talked about yet).
Edit: To go along with the aesthetics, mixing and matching weapon abilities may not make smooth animation sense at all. Different classes may hold weapons completely differently. For instance, holding a katana with the blade up or the blade down.
There's also no doubt a balance issue that's involved here I'm sure... but we can't really speculate about that until we see what the weapon skill sets are.
There's still a lot we don't know about these systems and it's not all because they haven't figured it out yet. There have been a bunch of tweets lately saying there's a lot they haven't talked about that we'll be hearing about soon. Who knows how gear may affect these skills and such.
Has this been officially confirmed? It seems SOE is promoting "freedom to play your way" yet force you to use specific weapons for skills? I don't mind 8 skills but being forced to use a certain weapon is what broke GW2 for me, that and the lack of trinity and the zerg fest that followed.
Would be nice if there is a way around this. I enjoy playing a necromancer with a staff and don't like the idea of being forced to use a dagger just to get the "best" spells. Anyone else feel this way or is it just me?
I don't understand the concern here. If you use a dagger, the skill is ... dagger fighting. If you use a bow, the skill is ... bow use. That is not abilities based. From how I understood it the weapon defines what in total can be done with it, the class defines what specifically you can do with it. For example if you have fencing as part of your class, you might fence with a sword. But if you are a brute force class and never learned fencing you might only use it to slash and run it through people. Still the sword defines: can't shoot arrows with it.
What people are concerned with is that the weapon/class locks you into 4 pre-set weapon abilities, that you never get access to more weapon skills or get to select your weapon skills (for that weapon).
So say, if you intend to play as one of the starting classes and have no interest in playing as one of the classes you unlock while playing, you will only have these 4 weapon skills throughout the ENTIRE game.
This can lead to a sense of no progression in terms of your weapon skills.
What most people are wanting (in this thread) are for the ability to have a wider selection of weapon skills that you obtain within one single class, so you can mix up your weapon skills and have more variety.
So everyone who is say, a warrior, doesn't have the exact same 4 weapon skills as every single warrior in the game.
I think one way they could do this, is to allow people to truly make their own classes. Instead of simply allowing us to mix and match 4 class abilities, why not allow us to mix and match weapon abilities from the classes? (Within the same weapon type of course).
So lets say a warrior uses one handed swords, while a berserker uses them as well. EAch of them has 4 different one-handed sword abilities.
So if you unlock both classes, you can then (while playing as either class) mix and match those weapon abilities how you want (with the more powerful ones obviously costing more to slot in, just like with class abilities).
Their reasoning on this issue is that they want classes to have an aesthetic identity. If you see a player using their weapon in a certain way, you know what base class they are. If you want to use a 2 hander and use SK skills while having different weapon abilities from the SK... There's nothing stopping you from getting another base class that can use a 2 hander and filling in their class skills with the SK's (Assuming the class slots are the same... There may also be more to base classes that they haven't talked about yet).
There's also no doubt a balance issue that's involved here I'm sure... but we can't really speculate about that until we see what the weapon skill sets are.
There's still a lot we don't know about these systems and it's not all because they haven't figured it out yet. There have been a bunch of tweets lately saying there's a lot they haven't talked about that we'll be hearing about soon. Who knows how gear may affect these skills and such.
That's what I don't get though, why do classes need such an "Aesthetic" identity? Why do we need to know someone's base class is "x" for?
The only reason I can think of is PVP, but really with the ability to mix/match class skills, is it really going to matter if you know someone's base-class?
They could open up the weapon skills like class skills and allow for a LOT more frreedom in terms of people making up their own classes.
They could still keep the aesthetics of the base class people play as (I think many people would LOVE to be able to pick which stance for their weapons they like and overall animations).
That's what I don't get though, why do classes need such an "Aesthetic" identity? Why do we need to know someone's base class is "x" for?
The only reason I can think of is PVP, but really with the ability to mix/match class skills, is it really going to matter if you know someone's base-class?
They could open up the weapon skills like class skills and allow for a LOT more frreedom in terms of people making up their own classes.
They could still keep the aesthetics of the base class people play as (I think many people would LOVE to be able to pick which stance for their weapons they like and overall animations).
This is just a choice they're making I guess. They want said animation to only occur with said skill. Also, I edited my previous post when you were posting this; I think some of it has to do with fluency of animation as different classes will hold the same weapon differently. On top of that, balance becomes exponentially more difficult every time you add another degree of freedom into the class system (It's already going to be nuts with how much freedom they're allowing).
And just to be clear, I'd love to just go nuts mixing weapon skills as well hehe... but I personally see why they're doing it the way they are.
I'm more curious at the moment about what the caster weapon skills will be. AOE heals from a staff? Lightning shooting out of a wand?
That's what I don't get though, why do classes need such an "Aesthetic" identity? Why do we need to know someone's base class is "x" for?
The only reason I can think of is PVP, but really with the ability to mix/match class skills, is it really going to matter if you know someone's base-class?
They could open up the weapon skills like class skills and allow for a LOT more frreedom in terms of people making up their own classes.
They could still keep the aesthetics of the base class people play as (I think many people would LOVE to be able to pick which stance for their weapons they like and overall animations).
This is just a choice they're making I guess. They want said animation to only occur with said skill. Also, I edited my previous post when you were posting this; I think some of it has to do with fluency of animation as different classes will hold the same weapon differently. On top of that, balance becomes exponentially more difficult every time you add another degree of freedom into the class system (It's already going to be nuts with how much freedom they're allowing).
And just to be clear, I'd love to just go nuts mixing weapon skills as well hehe... but I personally see why they're doing it the way they are.
I'm more curious at the moment about what the caster weapon skills will be. AOE heals from a staff? Lightning shooting out of a wand?
Just to add to that this allows you to visually know what's going on while looking at your character fighting - putting unique visual clues into all aspects of the game is an attempt to get people to stop 'playing the UI' instead of the game.
Has this been officially confirmed? It seems SOE is promoting "freedom to play your way" yet force you to use specific weapons for skills? I don't mind 8 skills but being forced to use a certain weapon is what broke GW2 for me, that and the lack of trinity and the zerg fest that followed.
Would be nice if there is a way around this. I enjoy playing a necromancer with a staff and don't like the idea of being forced to use a dagger just to get the "best" spells. Anyone else feel this way or is it just me?
I don't understand the concern here. If you use a dagger, the skill is ... dagger fighting. If you use a bow, the skill is ... bow use. That is not abilities based. From how I understood it the weapon defines what in total can be done with it, the class defines what specifically you can do with it. For example if you have fencing as part of your class, you might fence with a sword. But if you are a brute force class and never learned fencing you might only use it to slash and run it through people. Still the sword defines: can't shoot arrows with it.
What people are concerned with is that the weapon/class locks you into 4 pre-set weapon abilities, that you never get access to more weapon skills or get to select your weapon skills (for that weapon).
So say, if you intend to play as one of the starting classes and have no interest in playing as one of the classes you unlock while playing, you will only have these 4 weapon skills throughout the ENTIRE game.
This can lead to a sense of no progression in terms of your weapon skills.
What most people are wanting (in this thread) are for the ability to have a wider selection of weapon skills that you obtain within one single class, so you can mix up your weapon skills and have more variety.
So everyone who is say, a warrior, doesn't have the exact same 4 weapon skills as every single warrior in the game.
I think one way they could do this, is to allow people to truly make their own classes. Instead of simply allowing us to mix and match 4 class abilities, why not allow us to mix and match weapon abilities from the classes? (Within the same weapon type of course).
So lets say a warrior uses one handed swords, while a berserker uses them as well. EAch of them has 4 different one-handed sword abilities.
So if you unlock both classes, you can then (while playing as either class) mix and match those weapon abilities how you want (with the more powerful ones obviously costing more to slot in, just like with class abilities).
They said specifically that you can mix and match classes to use like an ability pool basically. The weapon you actually pick up then restricts only what you can do with that particular weapon from what I understood. Which again is what I said: you can't shoot with a sword even if you have picked a ranger-paladin mix as class.
Played: Pretty much any fantasy MMO, some did not even make it to release ... Favorites: UO, EQ2, Vanguard, Wurm Online, Salem, ESO, Creativerse Playing: ESO, Creativerse, Guild Wars 2 Anticipating: (sigh) ... maybe Ashes of Creation
Has this been officially confirmed? It seems SOE is promoting "freedom to play your way" yet force you to use specific weapons for skills? I don't mind 8 skills but being forced to use a certain weapon is what broke GW2 for me, that and the lack of trinity and the zerg fest that followed.
Would be nice if there is a way around this. I enjoy playing a necromancer with a staff and don't like the idea of being forced to use a dagger just to get the "best" spells. Anyone else feel this way or is it just me?
I don't understand the concern here. If you use a dagger, the skill is ... dagger fighting. If you use a bow, the skill is ... bow use. That is not abilities based. From how I understood it the weapon defines what in total can be done with it, the class defines what specifically you can do with it. For example if you have fencing as part of your class, you might fence with a sword. But if you are a brute force class and never learned fencing you might only use it to slash and run it through people. Still the sword defines: can't shoot arrows with it.
What people are concerned with is that the weapon/class locks you into 4 pre-set weapon abilities, that you never get access to more weapon skills or get to select your weapon skills (for that weapon).
So say, if you intend to play as one of the starting classes and have no interest in playing as one of the classes you unlock while playing, you will only have these 4 weapon skills throughout the ENTIRE game.
This can lead to a sense of no progression in terms of your weapon skills.
What most people are wanting (in this thread) are for the ability to have a wider selection of weapon skills that you obtain within one single class, so you can mix up your weapon skills and have more variety.
So everyone who is say, a warrior, doesn't have the exact same 4 weapon skills as every single warrior in the game.
I think one way they could do this, is to allow people to truly make their own classes. Instead of simply allowing us to mix and match 4 class abilities, why not allow us to mix and match weapon abilities from the classes? (Within the same weapon type of course).
So lets say a warrior uses one handed swords, while a berserker uses them as well. EAch of them has 4 different one-handed sword abilities.
So if you unlock both classes, you can then (while playing as either class) mix and match those weapon abilities how you want (with the more powerful ones obviously costing more to slot in, just like with class abilities).
They said specifically that you can mix and match classes to use like an ability pool basically. The weapon you actually pick up then restricts only what you can do with that particular weapon from what I understood. Which again is what I said: you can't shoot with a sword even if you have picked a ranger-paladin mix as class.
You can mix and match the class abilities. You can not mix and match the weapon skills associated with the current base class you are playing as.
If you are playing a warrior and using a one handed sword, you have 4 set weapon skills. These skills are tied to you playing as a warrior.
If you have other classes unlocked which also can use a one handed sword, you can not "mix and match" their weapon skills.
In my example I said specifically mixing weapon skills of that same weapon type, I wasn't asking for shooting an arrow with a sword equipped or something absurd, just saying it'd be nice if you have unlocked two classes that have each the same weapon type and weapon skills associated with that weapon, if you could then mix/match those like you are able to with class skills.
Originally posted by Galadourn well, having skills bound to weapons might seem restrictive at first, but it makes sense if you think it over a bit; a piercing attack would hardly be executable with a great hammer or mace, for example, so it makes sense to have it restricted to certain other weapons (rapier, for example). LIkewise a cleave attack isn't fitting for a 1h weapon. I's less of an issue than it sounds really.
Again no one is asking to have every skill available for every weapon. It isn't hard to give a pool of skills to each weapon that match the flavor and aesthetic of said weapon. Options, even if limited are better then rigid GW2 style skills that never change.
Funny enough are there already a game that does that, it is called "Guildwars".
And yes, I do prefer that to the sequels weapon system but I do think that GW2 did what it did for PvP balance issues. It is bloody hard to balance the number of skills GW had.
Now EQN seems to be PvE focused so there I don't see the need to lock specific weapon skills. Then again as I said earlier, we are not sure how things will work yet. If a certain sword have different attacks from another sword you could build your build based on certain weapons and that would work fine.
There are no real reasons in a PvE game for having the same attacks on a flaming sword as on a well crafted non magical one. If SOE took about 15 different attacks and mixed them on different swords it would work fine.
Has this been officially confirmed? It seems SOE is promoting "freedom to play your way" yet force you to use specific weapons for skills? I don't mind 8 skills but being forced to use a certain weapon is what broke GW2 for me, that and the lack of trinity and the zerg fest that followed.
Would be nice if there is a way around this. I enjoy playing a necromancer with a staff and don't like the idea of being forced to use a dagger just to get the "best" spells. Anyone else feel this way or is it just me?
You mind skills tied to weapons and don't like how GW2 was a console-like dumbed down crapfest for soloists but you're ok with 8 skills up at once (which is even fewer than you get in GW2)? 8 skills up at once isn't an MMORPG. 8 skills at once is even beyond the simplistic lameness of consoles.
WoW clones have generally failed (most don't really fail but they fail to live up to expectations or the longevity of earlier MMORPGs) due to trying to be everything to everybody and especially due to too much focus on solo ez-mode and not nearly enough on grouping and challenge.
So along comes GW2, which isn't even really an MMORPG, it's a solo game with social elements. TESO will be the same sewage and it looks like EQN is going the same way along with starting out F2P, which is like admitting your game sucks and is fail right out the door. I guess we can call this POS style the "GW2 Clone" and try not to throw up.
WFT happened to real MMORPGs? There was nothing wrong with the style of the original games that established the genre - the group focus and emphasis on actually doing something (challenge) for your rewards was good. The games has a bit too much brutality in gameplay but that can be smoothed over. There never was a need to shift the genre into solo ez-mode and to dumb it down further and further until MMORPGs aren't even MMORPGs anymore.
You can still have a successful MMORPG without having tons of soloists around because those are the people who bail out first - as soon as the single player campaign mode is done (the solo ez-mode 1-cap leveling). Then they're off to help ruin "the next big thing" How about someone create an MMORPG for people who actually LIKE the genre - people that want challenge, want to group, and want to have a good game worth playing for years on end? Constantly trying to design MMORPGs for people who don't actually like the genre, don't want to level, don't have time to play, don't want to group - seems utterly moronic.
Premium MMORPGs do not feature built-in cheating via cash for gold pay 2 win. PLAY to win or don't play.
Comments
That isnt what I asked.
It doesnt matter. Having the same 4 skills on a weapon type is bad design. Not being able to unlock more skills to switch out the more you use a weapon or by visiting a trainer just isnt going to work long term. And switching out class abilities for the other 4 isnt going to make up for it.
Why should someone with 6 months experience have the same sword skills as someone with 1 months experience? I want more information on such a critical issue with character growth.
I dont care about 4 skills , 8 skills , 12 skill slots or ever how many there will be. I want 100s of skills to chose from including weapon skills so I can have my own build and not just another copy of someone else outside of mixing and matching class abilities.
So far they haven't really release that much information on the weapons or weapon skills.
I guess it's too much work to give us a pool of weapon skill to pick for weapons.. so we are stuck with set skill and no choice but to gather classes untill we find a class we like, with 2 weapons we like, and 4 weapon skills we like.
I guess I should be happy... this system is keeping my hype level way down
Or wait until the actually reveal the details about the combat and skill model. Oh you think they should give away all the information all at once and leave nothing to keep our interest while they finish the game.
We still don't have info on how tiers in a class effect weapon skills. We may get to switch the abilities around once we rank up in a class and unlock new weapon skills for our class weapons. So basically a tier 4 warrior may be able to switch out of combat between 4 skills per weapon so that's maybe 8 skills to customize on 2 weapons. Also there may be a hot swap ability between weapons so we might be able to assign skills to hot swappable weapons within combat which would give access to all 8 skills during combat. Maybe more. I would be ok with this system. Especially if there is a more deep crafting customization going on where you can tailor your abilities or weapons and tune them to your specific taste or goals.
I'm with you 150%. It takes all of the individuality out of your character when you all have the exact same type of weapon and use it in the exact same way just because some min/maxer found it works the best. Hell, I'm cool with weapon abilities but not just 5 of them that you HAVE to use, give us a pool of several different abilities for each weapon so even if you both have a dagger you use it in a completely different way.
Isn't that kind of what they are saying though?
You run the dancer class of doom, I run the leaping frogman class...we both use a dagger you do a bunch of aoe swishing mamba moves and I bunny hop into one persons face? We both slot rogue skills for movement and utility its just our attack styles are different and we look different and maybe your alternate weapon is a polearm and mine is a pair of swords.
They say the classes are very specific...and lets not forget there are 40 classes...if there were even three times as many weapons in guild wars even with its anemic system it would have a lot more variety.
That is exactly what they are saying,
We haven't gotten a lot of information, but the little we have is being twisted totally out of proportion.
Everyone seems to be making things up, which is ok, if it wasn't about the things we actually DO know.
I think people need to step back from the thought that their class is their character.
The classes seems to be more of a template than anything. The names arent really THAT important, it is what they can do with the weapons they have assigned and what kind of combination of secondary skills they have access too (the TYPES , not the actual skills)
If you want a character that fights with 2 handed swords, you go through the kind of classes that uses 2 handed swords and find the one you like the best.
If you want to cast spells, find the class that have the weapon sets that most resemble what spells you would like to cast. Pretty sure there will be enough of them.
You then put the secondary skills together that fits best with your vision of your character (even if it was name Shadow Knight to start with)
Name it whatever you feel like. Hell you could even start out as a SK, change out the class so you get the weapons you like, put in totally new secondaries and still call it a SK in the end. It will be YOUR version of an SK.
There is a little confusion in another place here too.
We would like to think (some of us, some havent gotten to that point yet) that if you want to fight with a 2 handed sword, then you should be able to just switch classes between fights. Say one class uses 2 handed swords for devestating AOE effects and another uses it in a more Samurai (crit) kinda way.
This should in theory be an option.
However, your character isnt your class. Your gear will have a lot to say in your build too.
Your items will not just give you generic plusses to stats anymore. Instead they will enchance certain skills or make them cheaper (just examples).
This is a huge thing to consider. It means that the people that are scared of everyone just changing classes all the time, can relax a little (i saw no problem with that to begin with, not any different than changing to an alt).
But it also mean that if you change class to a similar class (2 handed to 2 handed) you should probably keep most of your gear in a way that it enhances your secondary skills AND keep your seconday skills the same or close to at least.
Gear will narrow our character down, not 8 hot buttons or limited weapon skills (which is silly considering we can choose from ANY skill combination in the game, with few restrictions)
The answer to that is of course to have different gear sets on you.
But will it be viable? Will we have enough room? Enough time to gather it (yeah right, most of us like to think we have a life, but we still waste it in games hehe).
Will some parts be super rare to collect? Do we need to beat a dragon to get its tooth for that one special piece of our armor? And the orc chief for the other set?
We have no clue, but the gear is what will make the limitations. The rest of the setup is actually pretty open if you sit down and think through the options in a logical way at least.
I feel the exact opposite. How is this taking individuality away? If anything its giving us more. You won't have to be a ShadowKnight that uses a 2h sword or sword and board. You can take another classes weapons and weapon abilities and swap that classes class abilities making your own variation of the shadowknight.
Agreed. It seems some people aren't grasping how much more variety is here than typically exists. There are going to be 80 weapon stances each with 4 abilities all with their own animations. Throw on top of that at least another 160 class abilities (I'm not sure it's been stated that classes will have a max of 4 abilities or not). You're going to end up with ~500 million permutations. The viability of these builds is going to be heavily gear dependent so we'll have to see how gear ends up dropping in this iteration. Additionally, who knows how hard it'll be to get some of these classes. Being in a position to absolutely min/max I feel will be much more difficult in this game just due to there not being set ways to go and get classes/maybe tier up/get appropriate gear. Only time will tell... hopefully they don't screw it up
For gear, i think we are in for a surprise too.
I have a feeling, that since we can modify our gear as much as we can, that the actual gear drops we will get, will be more "skins" or bases.
On top of that, there will be drops to help in crafting the modifications.
Crafting will play a very large part in EQN (they said)
The more I discuss the things we know (and not the things we do not know) the more things seems to open up.
What a lot saw as too much (multi classing) last week, i know see as being restricted naturaly by how you choose to equip yourself.
You might have 40 classes all opened and maxed out, but I would be surprised if you had gear to equip for them all.
And thats not even thinking about you choosing other secondary skills, then your bags should be a whole dimension in itself.
My big issues with this whole thing is the inference it has on the rest of the game, and what limitations it places on design going forward.
The assumption I am working from is that you are limiting each character to 8 abilities at any one time because the PS4 has 8 buttons. It is perfectly reasonable to expect you to want to maximize profits from this game, and so taking the PS4's limitations in to account is understandable. What I don't get is, once the decision was made to co-develop for the PS4, why was it decided to limit abilities to 8? The shoulder buttons of a PS controller are designed to be used as adjusters more than they are designed to be used as buttons by themselves, why not treat them as such?
The 8 ability limit seems to be a very core aspect of this game. It is no doubt what influenced you guys to make 40 classes, and to make each ability reflect the ideal of the class. I have no doubts at all that it is too late in development now for you to budge from each class having 4 weapon abilities and 4 character abilities. As such, I expect you will do everything to defend it.
However, I have not heard anyone from SOE say that this system is good from a gameplay or game design perspective (not game feel perspective, not business perspective). Perhaps you have all forgotten that we can get a feel for a fantasy world from a book, a T.V. show or a movie, but game play is something we can only get from a game. As such, even though I know it's the red-headed stepchild of any threefold system of game theory, it is none-the-less the most important aspect of design in a computer game, as it is what separates games from other forms of entertainment (try as you might, you can not deliver a story as well as Peter Jackson or J.J. Abrams can). No one seems to have done any research to put the ideal total number of abilities at 8. In fact, if it weren't for the PS4 controller only having 8 buttons, your conclusion that 8 abilities would be enough and subsequent design around that, after the complaints of other similarly limited MMO's in recent years, would be perplexing.
Personally, I say give us two banks of four character abilities, as well as the 4 weapon abilities. One that is from the class we are currently playing that we can not alter, and one bank that we fill ourselves as per what has been explained so far. This enhances your concept of each class feeling unique, leaves the customization in tact, helps alleviate some of the grief you are getting from the abysmally low ability count, and doesn't add the need to create new abilities for each class with unique animations (which would in turn reduce the number of classes that you can add to the game post launch). It's basically a win/win situation, but the best part is it makes PS4 players aware that shoulder buttons are there as adjusters, rather than ability buttons. This in turn gives you two more banks of four currently empty hotbuttons, which brings me to my other major issue with the 8 ability system.
Assuming the PS4 is the reason you went for 8 abilities, the current design doesn't allow for any hot-barred abilities or items other than the 4 character and 4 weapon abilities. This means no hot-barred potions or poisons, but worse than that, it means no items with activatible/clicky effects. In EQ2, these items were by far the most treasured - I used my Manastone for many years, my Honor of Pantrilla for every top end raid encounter from Tarinax through to Theer when I stopped raiding, and my Trakanon's Gaze was the only item in the game that the raid leaders decided to drop DKP for and assign (which in turn saw all the mages pull aggro when ever we could to 'prove' that we needed it most). Indeed, Manaburn > Trakanon's Gaze > Honor of Pantrilla was a standard part of my DPS rotation for a few years, and without items to replenish power quickly mid combat, Manaburn would have been worthless for many years.
Designing a game from the ground up where items like this are not possible for a reason as abstract as the number of buttons on a console controller, is really quite bad form, as these are the items that people remember.
You can have 12 active abilities at once. That was cleared up last night. 2 weapon sets with 4 skills each and 4 secondary abilities.
They've yet to go into inventory management (40+ classes worth of gear) or any active/clicky stuff. Items will have effects, all passive or some active has yet to be cleared up.
Maybe the 8 buttons are only for active abilities. Maybe we can have an inventory window or bar on the side? I believe this is how EQ did it, been a while.
We haven't seen any of the UI yet. I believe they said it would be customizable like most MMOs these days as well. So you could have 100 potions on a bar, but only 8 active abilities for your class template.
Any future plans to be on PS4 should have little influence on the game. As was shown with FFXIV AAR, you can have a lot of skills available with just a PS controller.
Yes a PS controller has ~8 buttons, but don't forget that EQN will have Jump, Sprint, Dodge, weapon switching, template switching, etc. I highly doubt the ~8 buttons would directly translate to 8 skills. We would need buttons for handling all the rest of the UI and working as "shift" to go from one thing to another.
Again no one is asking to have every skill available for every weapon. It isn't hard to give a pool of skills to each weapon that match the flavor and aesthetic of said weapon. Options, even if limited are better then rigid GW2 style skills that never change.
Random Forum Poster: I want an MMO that is different, original and fun.
Me: So you want something like EQN
Them: Nah dude, I want a Holy Trinity, Tab Target combat, Instanced Raiding, and Rigid classes.
Me: Double Facepalm.
I don't understand the concern here. If you use a dagger, the skill is ... dagger fighting. If you use a bow, the skill is ... bow use. That is not abilities based. From how I understood it the weapon defines what in total can be done with it, the class defines what specifically you can do with it.
For example if you have fencing as part of your class, you might fence with a sword. But if you are a brute force class and never learned fencing you might only use it to slash and run it through people. Still the sword defines: can't shoot arrows with it.
Played: Pretty much any fantasy MMO, some did not even make it to release ...
Favorites: UO, EQ2, Vanguard, Wurm Online, Salem, ESO, Creativerse
Playing: ESO, Creativerse, Guild Wars 2
Anticipating: (sigh) ... maybe Ashes of Creation
What people are concerned with is that the weapon/class locks you into 4 pre-set weapon abilities, that you never get access to more weapon skills or get to select your weapon skills (for that weapon).
So say, if you intend to play as one of the starting classes and have no interest in playing as one of the classes you unlock while playing, you will only have these 4 weapon skills throughout the ENTIRE game.
This can lead to a sense of no progression in terms of your weapon skills.
What most people are wanting (in this thread) are for the ability to have a wider selection of weapon skills that you obtain within one single class, so you can mix up your weapon skills and have more variety.
So everyone who is say, a warrior, doesn't have the exact same 4 weapon skills as every single warrior in the game.
I think one way they could do this, is to allow people to truly make their own classes. Instead of simply allowing us to mix and match 4 class abilities, why not allow us to mix and match weapon abilities from the classes? (Within the same weapon type of course).
So lets say a warrior uses one handed swords, while a berserker uses them as well. EAch of them has 4 different one-handed sword abilities.
So if you unlock both classes, you can then (while playing as either class) mix and match those weapon abilities how you want (with the more powerful ones obviously costing more to slot in, just like with class abilities).
Their reasoning on this issue is that they want classes to have an aesthetic identity. If you see a player using their weapon in a certain way, you know what base class they are. If you want to use a 2 hander and use SK skills while having different weapon abilities from the SK... There's nothing stopping you from getting another base class that can use a 2 hander and filling in their class skills with the SK's (Assuming the class slots are the same... There may also be more to base classes that they haven't talked about yet).
Edit: To go along with the aesthetics, mixing and matching weapon abilities may not make smooth animation sense at all. Different classes may hold weapons completely differently. For instance, holding a katana with the blade up or the blade down.
There's also no doubt a balance issue that's involved here I'm sure... but we can't really speculate about that until we see what the weapon skill sets are.
There's still a lot we don't know about these systems and it's not all because they haven't figured it out yet. There have been a bunch of tweets lately saying there's a lot they haven't talked about that we'll be hearing about soon. Who knows how gear may affect these skills and such.
That's what I don't get though, why do classes need such an "Aesthetic" identity? Why do we need to know someone's base class is "x" for?
The only reason I can think of is PVP, but really with the ability to mix/match class skills, is it really going to matter if you know someone's base-class?
They could open up the weapon skills like class skills and allow for a LOT more frreedom in terms of people making up their own classes.
They could still keep the aesthetics of the base class people play as (I think many people would LOVE to be able to pick which stance for their weapons they like and overall animations).
This is just a choice they're making I guess. They want said animation to only occur with said skill. Also, I edited my previous post when you were posting this; I think some of it has to do with fluency of animation as different classes will hold the same weapon differently. On top of that, balance becomes exponentially more difficult every time you add another degree of freedom into the class system (It's already going to be nuts with how much freedom they're allowing).
And just to be clear, I'd love to just go nuts mixing weapon skills as well hehe... but I personally see why they're doing it the way they are.
I'm more curious at the moment about what the caster weapon skills will be. AOE heals from a staff? Lightning shooting out of a wand?
Just to add to that this allows you to visually know what's going on while looking at your character fighting - putting unique visual clues into all aspects of the game is an attempt to get people to stop 'playing the UI' instead of the game.
They said specifically that you can mix and match classes to use like an ability pool basically. The weapon you actually pick up then restricts only what you can do with that particular weapon from what I understood. Which again is what I said: you can't shoot with a sword even if you have picked a ranger-paladin mix as class.
Played: Pretty much any fantasy MMO, some did not even make it to release ...
Favorites: UO, EQ2, Vanguard, Wurm Online, Salem, ESO, Creativerse
Playing: ESO, Creativerse, Guild Wars 2
Anticipating: (sigh) ... maybe Ashes of Creation
You can mix and match the class abilities. You can not mix and match the weapon skills associated with the current base class you are playing as.
If you are playing a warrior and using a one handed sword, you have 4 set weapon skills. These skills are tied to you playing as a warrior.
If you have other classes unlocked which also can use a one handed sword, you can not "mix and match" their weapon skills.
In my example I said specifically mixing weapon skills of that same weapon type, I wasn't asking for shooting an arrow with a sword equipped or something absurd, just saying it'd be nice if you have unlocked two classes that have each the same weapon type and weapon skills associated with that weapon, if you could then mix/match those like you are able to with class skills.
Funny enough are there already a game that does that, it is called "Guildwars".
And yes, I do prefer that to the sequels weapon system but I do think that GW2 did what it did for PvP balance issues. It is bloody hard to balance the number of skills GW had.
Now EQN seems to be PvE focused so there I don't see the need to lock specific weapon skills. Then again as I said earlier, we are not sure how things will work yet. If a certain sword have different attacks from another sword you could build your build based on certain weapons and that would work fine.
There are no real reasons in a PvE game for having the same attacks on a flaming sword as on a well crafted non magical one. If SOE took about 15 different attacks and mixed them on different swords it would work fine.
You mind skills tied to weapons and don't like how GW2 was a console-like dumbed down crapfest for soloists but you're ok with 8 skills up at once (which is even fewer than you get in GW2)? 8 skills up at once isn't an MMORPG. 8 skills at once is even beyond the simplistic lameness of consoles.
WoW clones have generally failed (most don't really fail but they fail to live up to expectations or the longevity of earlier MMORPGs) due to trying to be everything to everybody and especially due to too much focus on solo ez-mode and not nearly enough on grouping and challenge.
So along comes GW2, which isn't even really an MMORPG, it's a solo game with social elements. TESO will be the same sewage and it looks like EQN is going the same way along with starting out F2P, which is like admitting your game sucks and is fail right out the door. I guess we can call this POS style the "GW2 Clone" and try not to throw up.
WFT happened to real MMORPGs? There was nothing wrong with the style of the original games that established the genre - the group focus and emphasis on actually doing something (challenge) for your rewards was good. The games has a bit too much brutality in gameplay but that can be smoothed over. There never was a need to shift the genre into solo ez-mode and to dumb it down further and further until MMORPGs aren't even MMORPGs anymore.
You can still have a successful MMORPG without having tons of soloists around because those are the people who bail out first - as soon as the single player campaign mode is done (the solo ez-mode 1-cap leveling). Then they're off to help ruin "the next big thing" How about someone create an MMORPG for people who actually LIKE the genre - people that want challenge, want to group, and want to have a good game worth playing for years on end? Constantly trying to design MMORPGs for people who don't actually like the genre, don't want to level, don't have time to play, don't want to group - seems utterly moronic.
Premium MMORPGs do not feature built-in cheating via cash for gold pay 2 win. PLAY to win or don't play.