So basically, you'll be doing everything you already do in other MMORPGs aside from raiding only somehow players will magically be more social and will magically want to progress through the game more slowly because they WANT to see ALL the content?
Um, no.
Name the other MMORPGs where your character scales to the level of the content, so at max level you can be challenged by ALL CONTENT IN THE WHOLE WORLD. Oh yeah, there aren't any.
Players will be more social because the mechanics provide for and encourage more social play. The game is designed around creating positive interactions (i'm excited to see other players show up because the game gets more interesting, fun, and even challenging when we play together) and making social play an additive rather than subtractive experience. It's not magic, it's called smart game design (it might seem like magic considering the way things have been going in the genre lately).
Progress more slowly? More slowly than what? Is there some universal standard break-neck pace at which all MMORPGs must be consumed? A game being about the journey has nothing to do with the pace of the content...the journey can be fast and exciting...the point is just that you're playing the way you want to play regardless of your level, rather than playing one game 1-max and a totally different game after.
So basically, you'll be doing everything you already do in other MMORPGs aside from raiding only somehow players will magically be more social and will magically want to progress through the game more slowly because they WANT to see ALL the content?
Um, no.
Name the other MMORPGs where your character scales to the level of the content, so at max level you can be challenged by ALL CONTENT IN THE WHOLE WORLD. Oh yeah, there aren't any.
Have you ever played Everquest II? You can visit NPCs to manually level yourself down to match the level of the mobs. Vanguard: Saga of Heroes and other games have similar features. The only difference is that it's totally optional in those games. A lot of people, myself included, don't understand this fascination with repeating low level content. It's hard to escape the feeling that level scaling is just a way to artificial elongate content.
If I want to go back to a low level area to steamroll through some content for an item or whatever, I should have that right. I've put in the time and effort to have a max level character, and I should be rewarded for it if I chose to do so; however, I should still have the option of scaling my level to match the content appropriately. Neither style should be forced upon me.
Bethesda's Oblivion (not an MMORPG) had a gameworld that leveled with your character rather than your character scaling down to the content. Most people hated it (there are mods to completely take that away) because aside from flashy armor and a larger variety of skills and abilities, players didn't feel their character's growth in power was visible enough to be discernable.
Players will be more social because the mechanics provide for and encourage more social play. The game is designed around creating positive interactions (i'm excited to see other players show up because the game gets more interesting, fun, and even challenging when we play together) and making social play an additive rather than subtractive experience. It's not magic, it's called smart game design (it might seem like magic considering the way things have been going in the genre lately).
Interactions such as what exactly? Please inform me of how Guild Wars 2's game design facilitates players being more social towards each other. If you're referring to dynamic events, how do they encourage teamwork any more than a Rift raid or a PQ in WAR? How does group interaction in dungeons differ that greatly from a heroic in WoW? In your original post, you say that players will want to "hang out" with one another, which would imply a clear difference from the usual "group with this random guy only because you need to kill x more of y."
Progress more slowly? More slowly than what? Is there some universal standard break-neck pace at which all MMORPGs must be consumed? A game being about the journey has nothing to do with the pace of the content...the journey can be fast and exciting...the point is just that you're playing the way you want to play regardless of your level, rather than playing one game 1-max and a totally different game after.
In Rift, players were hitting max level in a month and complaining about a serious lack of content at endgame. WAR, Aion, AoC and others share the same issue. At least those games have some form of raiding. The problem with Guild Wars 2 is that the developers have already said there won't be a gear grind or a leveling grind. There's no raiding, but I haven't seen anything that sounds like it's going to retain players nearly as effectively. Pretty much, as I mentioned in my previous post, there isn't much of anything you listed that I can't already do in some other game. Just what is Guild Wars 2 going to do in order to retain the same amount of players as the upcoming AAA P2P releases?
Likewise, the journey is every bit about the pace of the content because the pace of the content is the length of the journey. The phrase "it's about the journey" was invented as a reference to older MMORPGs where endgame wasn't the focus, so you've got that part right. Where you're mistaken is that in older MMORPGs, you weren't focused on the endgame because it took months/years to get there. You'd drive yourself insane if all you were concerned with upon logging in and out every day was reaching the max level as fast as possible. Players didn't run out of content because it took them so long to get through the content. Modern MMORPGs (GW2 included) start players about 2 feet from the finish line, so among other reasons, of course all they care about is racing to the endgame. Once you've seen it all, you've seen it all. How many times can you run the same content over and over before you're sick of it. Even if you're seeing different dynamic events in the same zones, you're going to get sick of those zones and hunger for new content. You're going to have all the gear you need, but you'll have nothing to do with it other than PvP, dungeon grind, and do mini games.
It's so clear to me that this is an MMORPG that has no intentions of having any longevity. Anet makes money off of huge box sales. Players get bored with the content, and then they all go play SW:TOR or TSW. Anet comes out with a content update. Anet makes money off of players buying the content update from the in-game store. Players take a couple weeks off from SW:TOR or TSW. Players complete the new content. Players go back to SW:TOR or TSW. Anet announces GW3 and content development for GW2 pretty much ends. 4 years after GW3 is announced, the game is released and the cycle repeats. If you try to play this like a sub-based MMORPG, I just don't see how you're not going to run out of content unless you're very casual or, as in the case of GW1 players, you don't mind such little new content.
So the ways in which you progress a character after you reach maximum combat level include: story progression, item appearances, and crafting. Am I missing something? If so, please point it out.
I need to back up a second here and not just talk about endgame, I need to talk about philosophy.
ArenaNet is not just trying to create a great MMO, they're trying to change the way we play MMOs.
Think about how you play a game like WoW. You probably enjoy leveling the first time well enough, but it's largely a solo experience. There's a linear progression of quests. To group with someone, you have to be on the same stage. The second time you level a toon, it's probably just as fun because there's probably a 2nd leveling path for that faction. After that though, it just gets tired. You've already seen the content. All your friends are max level so you want to get to max level so you can do things with them again. If you get into raiding, that's a 12-16 hour a week job beating your head against the one raid you're on. If you do quests, they're the same dailies because you've done the regular quests. You might do a daily dungeon to get a token, but it's unchallenging content you just want to blast through and not even bother speaking to anyone. There's also PVP but that's the same maps with the same strategies against the same opponents with no purpose beyond your individual collection of gear.
Not to say that it wasn't fun, or that there aren't moments of accomplishment, but on some level people raid because it's all about the gear and it's either that or hardcore PVP in order to get it.
It's true that GW2 won't have raiding, but that's because the game really isn't about gear. Gear will be obtainable through a variety of different means, and they'll be different vanity skins from optional grinds. So without gear pushing people towards max level, I think it will just be a whole different philosophy. Instead of playing for the carrot, play for fun and do whatever it is that you find fun.
With no endgame for people to be sitting at, the focus is free to shift to replayability. The mechanics of dynamic events are too complicated to get into for this post, but instead of being isolating, everybody in the area can do them together with no hassle. You can play an alt or even take your regular toon into a lower level area and see people to group with. Because there isn't a linear path and DEs don't always run, you might see different events if you're in a zone, or see them in a different stage (because they were won/lost last time). They're even going to continuously add events to the world to make it even fresher. With automentoring, you're not stuck with the same dailies, but the entire world is open to you to go anywhere. There's even hidden events to reward explorers and GW1 easter eggs to find. There's elite events and very difficult 5 man dungeons for people who want a real challenge. Dungeons even have events that don't always run so they're not always the same thing each time.
In addition, there's 30+ minigames in the cities. There's PVP against different servers instead of the same people There's structured PVP where you can make custom games. There's tasks out in the world to build up NPC goodwill like feeding cows at farms. There's collecting skills and traits out in the world. There's achievements, titles and vanity skins to work towards.
There's also the personal story which probably has enough branches so that each race can do it 3x and get a very different experience each time.
And finally, you know, it sounds crazy but with raiding like I said, that's a 12-16 hour a week job, plus preparation time. Maybe it doesn't have to be like that. GW2 is B2P. Play it 10 hours a week, play it 20, play it however much you find fun without having to worry about being on someone else's schedule. Raid in your P2P game if you want. They can peacefully coexist.
"Gamers will no longer buy the argument that every MMO requires a subscription fee to offset server and bandwidth costs. It's not true you know it, and they know it."-Jeff Strain, co-founder of ArenaNet, 2007
So GW2 Endgame is ¨play the the low level content again¨ or make an alt?, thats revolutionary. The disappointment about this game will be epic, well if you love gw you probably gonna love gw2, but thats all.
1. Bethesda's Oblivion (not an MMORPG) had a gameworld that leveled with your character rather than your character scaling down to the content. Most people hated it (there are mods to completely take that away) because aside from flashy armor and a larger variety of skills and abilities, players didn't feel their character's growth in power was visible enough to be discernable.
2. Interactions such as what exactly? Please inform me of how Guild Wars 2's game design facilitates players being more social towards each other. If you're referring to dynamic events, how do they encourage teamwork any more than a Rift raid or a PQ in WAR? How does group interaction in dungeons differ that greatly from a heroic in WoW? In your original post, you say that players will want to "hang out" with one another, which would imply a clear difference from the usual "group with this random guy only because you need to kill x more of y."
3. It's so clear to me that this is an MMORPG that has no intentions of having any longevity. Anet makes money off of huge box sales. Players get bored with the content, and then they all go play SW:TOR or TSW. Anet comes out with a content update. Anet makes money off of players buying the content update from the in-game store. Players take a couple weeks off from SW:TOR or TSW. Players complete the new content. Players go back to SW:TOR or TSW. Anet announces GW3 and content development for GW2 pretty much ends. 4 years after GW3 is announced, the game is released and the cycle repeats. If you try to play this like a sub-based MMORPG, I just don't see how you're not going to run out of content unless you're very casual or, as in the case of GW1 players, you don't mind such little new content.
How the hell is Oblivion’s system even close to what GW2 is doing? In Oblivion you had all the spawns change so where once wolves spawned now you have bandits in glass armor. Yeah that is totally realistic after all don’t you see all of those bandits running around outside in tanks! In GW2 you scale so the game always maintains a challenge level, which some people you know might actually like. After all I do not know about you but I suddenly have not become a god and can kill everyone with a finger, so why should my character? Besides the fact that I am delusional and have flights of fancy about how epic cool I could be if I only had that one item.
Also Great job at speaking for all gamers and saying why they did not like Oblivions system and modded it, and completely leaving off the reason of how the spawns change and how people did not like it. I know that is reason why I got the mod and so did many of my friends, not because we did not become a god like character so it made us cry. Next time speak for yourself and leave the rest of us gamers out of your argument you are not god and you do not speak for us all.
Yeah because GW2 DEs are exactly like PQs and rifts so we know exactly how GW2 is going to be. How about you do some research and learn the difference between the systems before you make arguments about someone else’s opinion. Or is that too much to ask that you educate yourself before you make comments on a subject? I do not intend to be a prick here but I am so sick of people bring crap up about a game when they do not even take the time to learn about it before speaking.
You make it sound like a bad thing that people might play multiple games at the same time. Oh god I play single player games and took breaks from pay to play MMOs that is a sin. Oh yeah that is right we all have to be no live MMO players that just do nothing but play MMOs or we are not worth thinking about. I also love how you feel like you can speak for all gamers here again and how only people that do not appreciate a true MMO could stand to play GW1 for extended period of times (casuals). Because we all know 3 stand alone games and an expansion in just over 2 years is so little content that no one with half a brain could like it.
This thread just needs to be locked It was started as something for people to post things they like about a game, and instead it turned into a venue for people to post crap about how their opinion on the game is right and everyone else’s is wrong. This PVP sucks because it is not designed the way I like it, no it is great because it is what I want. This game sucks because it does not have raiding and what I look for in a MMO, no this game is great because it offers horizontal progression and not vertical progression. Where have I heard this before oh yeah from a bunch of 3 year olds arguing about my dad could beat up your dad. /days like to today make me happy to be a gamer!
So GW2 Endgame is ¨play the the low level content again¨ or make an alt?, thats revolutionary. The disappointment about this game will be epic, well if you love gw you probably gonna love gw2, but thats all.
So what you're saying is that you haven't done any research at all? That's kinda cool... I guess.
endgame endgame endgame. God I'm sick of this shlt. Let's discuss end game once we reach it. Most of us already know how Areana Net always loves to go back and redo things soo. I don't know if this "End game is gonna be like this" argument is valid at this point.
Guys I suggest not arguing with anyone since it seems fanboys from gw2 go talk smack on TOR and TOR fanboys come talk smack here, anytime you see a troll do not feed it, just ignore his/her post and I asure you it will lower down.
The truth may be puzzling. It may take some work to grapple with. It may be counterintuitive. It may contradict deeply held prejudices. It may not be consonant with what we desperately want to be true. But our preferences do not determine what's true.
So GW2 Endgame is ¨play the the low level content again¨ or make an alt?, thats revolutionary. The disappointment about this game will be epic, well if you love gw you probably gonna love gw2, but thats all.
So what you're saying is that you haven't done any research at all? That's kinda cool... I guess.
Yes i did it. there is nothing about gw2 endgame, well is all about dynamics events i guess, like rift, but probably it will be just waiting in a queue for ¨arena¨ pvp.
Dodging looks more interesting when you're able to make judicious use of it simply as a means of avoiding a few key attacks. Stuff like this however shows the darker side of active dodging. It just looks grindy and uninteresting.
As for situational attacks (fire arrows etc) it sounds at best gimmicky and at worst dangerous for flavor of the month potential. They might have what, a dozen, maybe two dozen combinations you can pull off? I'm skeptical of that in the same way I was skeptical about the vaunted variety of the Rift soul system, and the exact same thing happened to them. Less than two weeks after launch and there were plenty of cap-level players who had well and thouroughly figured out the game's systems, it's limits, breaking points, and created optimal PvP and PvE specs. I'll give it maybe a month after GW2 launches until you have competent, coordinated guilds executing the best situational attacks as part of their well-oiled routine rather than as a special spur-of-the-moment decision.
It's funny how some people is hyping this game so much and desperately hoping will change the whole genre and their lives.
I really hope they wont get disappointed when the game finnaly comes out. I am buying GW2 for sure but I am not expecting it will change " the way we play games". I am not convinced that so many new ideas will magically work as intended. Nevertheless I wish Anet the best.
Have you ever played Everquest II? You can visit NPCs to manually level yourself down to match the level of the mobs. Vanguard: Saga of Heroes and other games have similar features. The only difference is that it's totally optional in those games. A lot of people, myself included, don't understand this fascination with repeating low level content. It's hard to escape the feeling that level scaling is just a way to artificial elongate content.
If I want to go back to a low level area to steamroll through some content for an item or whatever, I should have that right. I've put in the time and effort to have a max level character, and I should be rewarded for it if I chose to do so; however, I should still have the option of scaling my level to match the content appropriately. Neither style should be forced upon me.
Bethesda's Oblivion (not an MMORPG) had a gameworld that leveled with your character rather than your character scaling down to the content. Most people hated it (there are mods to completely take that away) because aside from flashy armor and a larger variety of skills and abilities, players didn't feel their character's growth in power was visible enough to be discernable.
The scale most commonly referred to is that of the amount of enemies and the overall health and damage attributes. None of that is sophisticated enough to compensate for the larger array of skills, traits, and tactics you'll have developed at higher levels, so even if your damage and health is scaled back when you visit a lower-level area, you're still going to be heads above what you were when you first got there. We also don't yet know how much those values scale, and we won't until we actually get to play the game. My guess is it will be like CoH and Rift events, where the enemy's attributes depend on who is attacking it at the time.
Most of what you say here and in the rest of your post pays no heed to the design philosophy of GW1 which GW2 is based around, that the level cap is higher and the world is open doesn't detract from that. You hit level cap in hours in GW1, and because it was so low, 90% of the content stayed challenging no matter how much you repeated it. Plenty of people enjoyed it that way, not everyone wants to "steam roll" through content on a power trip. Many in fact, are tired of everything being so easy.
As for Oblivion, we're not talking about single-player games. I hated that in Oblivion as well, but that's a single-player game. I want to eventually "beat it." I want it to end. I don't want that from an MMO. Completely different subjects, there.
Interactions such as what exactly? Please inform me of how Guild Wars 2's game design facilitates players being more social towards each other. If you're referring to dynamic events, how do they encourage teamwork any more than a Rift raid or a PQ in WAR? How does group interaction in dungeons differ that greatly from a heroic in WoW? In your original post, you say that players will want to "hang out" with one another, which would imply a clear difference from the usual "group with this random guy only because you need to kill x more of y."
My guess is he was preferring to the actual gameplay mechanics that enforce team play. Without the trinity, people of any profession can get together and play and thus they will, because the rewards, unlike the enemies, do not scale. There's no reason whatsoever, competition or otherwise, why you wouldn't play with others, except that you don't have to, which is the point. You have that option.
Game-play wise, the lack of targeted spells (very few are) are meant to encourage that same team-play mentality. Rather than simply aim an AoE, people will be setting them up to go off in strategic areas that work off continued effects of already-cast spells for plenty of unique skills combinations that benefit everyone around them. It's a completely differently style of gameplay than raiding, although there are raids, too.
Further, while yes, dynamic events scale so that they can be completed by few people if that's all that are participating, they don't all have the same outcome. That centaur example that's frequently cited for example, just because you can kill them by yourself doesn't mean you can stop them from destroying that town in time, and so even if you win you may still not get that NPC you need. That actually has the potential to backfire though, so I haven't decided how much I like that feature yet. We'll see.
As for players "hanging out" I can't speak to that. I've heard nothing about anything in GW2, at launch, that encourages people just chillin'. *shrug*
In Rift, players were hitting max level in a month and complaining about a serious lack of content at endgame. WAR, Aion, AoC and others share the same issue. At least those games have some form of raiding. The problem with Guild Wars 2 is that the developers have already said there won't be a gear grind or a leveling grind. There's no raiding, but I haven't seen anything that sounds like it's going to retain players nearly as effectively. Pretty much, as I mentioned in my previous post, there isn't much of anything you listed that I can't already do in some other game. Just what is Guild Wars 2 going to do in order to retain the same amount of players as the upcoming AAA P2P releases?
Once again, completely different games. Rift is built around the WoW mentality, and so it suffers from the same pitfalls; you hit level cap, you run out of things to do. GW2 is built about GW mentality, where leveling up is practically irrelevant. It didn't determine much in GW1, it really doesn't determine much in GW2. While there are more levels yes, you plateau 25 or so levels before you even hit cap. Even then, most of what benefits you through leveling is higher HP. Most of your actual character progression will come from skills, unlocking traits, and creating a combination of gear that works for your playstyle.
There is raiding, so I don't know where you got your information. The dungeons are "raids" from the second time onward. The first time they are story-oriented, everytime after is an "exploration" mode where you reach the end and are rewarded with a token that can be traded in for 1 piece of gear of your choice. That's for people who actually like raiding. There are other ways to get gear, though they won't look the same seeing as each dungeon will have its own distinct style of equipment.
As for level grind, there was a low level cap in GW1 and once again, it was perfectly fine. Regardless of what people say about how much of an MMO GW1 was or wasn't, there was never a time I couldn't log in, teleport to Lion's Arch/Kamadan and end up sorting through at least 3 instances of the town filled with people. That number has tripled since GW2's announcement. It's actually kind of a pain in the ass, because the price of things refuses to return to acceptable levels. But that's a different discussion.
Likewise, the journey is every bit about the pace of the content because the pace of the content is the length of the journey. The phrase "it's about the journey" was invented as a reference to older MMORPGs where endgame wasn't the focus, so you've got that part right. Where you're mistaken is that in older MMORPGs, you weren't focused on the endgame because it took months/years to get there. You'd drive yourself insane if all you were concerned with upon logging in and out every day was reaching the max level as fast as possible. Players didn't run out of content because it took them so long to get through the content. Modern MMORPGs (GW2 included) start players about 2 feet from the finish line, so among other reasons, of course all they care about is racing to the endgame. Once you've seen it all, you've seen it all. How many times can you run the same content over and over before you're sick of it. Even if you're seeing different dynamic events in the same zones, you're going to get sick of those zones and hunger for new content. You're going to have all the gear you need, but you'll have nothing to do with it other than PvP, dungeon grind, and do mini games.
I quickly find the problem with your arguments is you are looking at it from the same perspective you are complaining about. You keep talking about what modern MMOs do, nevermind that GW2 has gone out of its way to do the exact opposite. You keep saying "run out of content" referring to the leveling curve, then in the same breath complain that the leveling curve is so low. Why is it so difficult to comprehend that it is NOT about the number of levels you can "up?"
How is it that it doesn't occur to you that you can hit level cap long before you've actually completed all the content? Happens pretty often in gaming, it's not a new thing. Happened in nearly every DnD game I played, digital or otherwise. Happened in Fallout/Oblivion. I know I kept playing the rest of the Zelda games even though I'd gotten all the gear and hearts long before the end of the game. This isn't a new concept. Stop being hard-headed.
Ignore the level cap. Level 80 means nothing. It's there for people who bitched that level 20 was too low. Your progression in terms of numbers is in addition to that. Your progression in terms of gear will not be dominated by that. Your progression in terms of story and gameplay is beyond that. Your progression in PvP couldn't care less what level you are. Levels mean nothing. Moving on.
It's so clear to me that this is an MMORPG that has no intentions of having any longevity. Anet makes money off of huge box sales. Players get bored with the content, and then they all go play SW:TOR or TSW. Anet comes out with a content update. Anet makes money off of players buying the content update from the in-game store. Players take a couple weeks off from SW:TOR or TSW. Players complete the new content. Players go back to SW:TOR or TSW. Anet announces GW3 and content development for GW2 pretty much ends. 4 years after GW3 is announced, the game is released and the cycle repeats. If you try to play this like a sub-based MMORPG, I just don't see how you're not going to run out of content unless you're very casual or, as in the case of GW1 players, you don't mind such little new content.
It's so clear to me you haven't bothered getting informed about the game. I wouldn't care if you did, and just didn't like it. It's impossible to think any one game could please every single person. It's another thing to bash a game based purely on false pretenses.
You are right though, about a few things. Anet makes money off of box sales. They don't pay people off of just box sales though, paying employees to develop new content is an on-going affair and so they will need to regularly offer new content in order to stay in business. And you are right that players will get bored with content, but that will happen with any game, be it GW2, TSW, SWTOR, or any other game under the sun. Very few people stick with any one thing for a lifetime.
The problem is you mention box sales as if that's going to determine what game people go back to, as if TSW/SWTOR having a sub fee means people will have a reason to go back to it. There's nothing saying the content in GW2 will not rival the content of those games, especially over time, so the only different is that you're paying consistantly for one, or just once for the other.
Hmm...I'm going to eventually get bored with GW2...and TSW...and SWTOR...but SWTOR is dull as hell (I've actually played it, I get to say that) and TSW will come with a monthly fee. GW2...well hell, I bought it, I can play it whenever I want for free now!
Very few decisions come so easily.
"Forums aren't for intelligent discussion; they're for blow-hards with unwavering opinions."
Dodging looks more interesting when you're able to make judicious use of it simply as a means of avoiding a few key attacks. Stuff like this however shows the darker side of active dodging. It just looks grindy and uninteresting.
As for situational attacks (fire arrows etc) it sounds at best gimmicky and at worst dangerous for flavor of the month potential. They might have what, a dozen, maybe two dozen combinations you can pull off? I'm skeptical of that in the same way I was skeptical about the vaunted variety of the Rift soul system, and the exact same thing happened to them. Less than two weeks after launch and there were plenty of cap-level players who had well and thouroughly figured out the game's systems, it's limits, breaking points, and created optimal PvP and PvE specs. I'll give it maybe a month after GW2 launches until you have competent, coordinated guilds executing the best situational attacks as part of their well-oiled routine rather than as a special spur-of-the-moment decision.
That video you linked was old because they've redone the energy system. Right now skills don't use energy and are only limited by cooldown (or in the thief's case, initiative). You can only dodge twice before your bar needs to refill at least somewhat. Though there are other skills that provide a similar effect, such as a heal that makes you jump backwards, or a bow shot which teleports you to the destination. A thief might be a bad example because they're the most mobile class. This is what happens to thieves who don't dodge.
According to this page, the number of cross profession combos is "literally hundreds." As far as FOTM builds, they're designing and testing the game so that any 5 players can do a dungeon (the hardest content). They've run them with 5 elementalists or 5 thieves or whatever. While I'm sure there are people who will insist on trying to get what they think is the optimal team, all professions have the tools to work together and succeed, they just need to be able to come up with the right tactics for the situation with the skills they have available.
Keep in mind that they've made cross profession combos so that only one initiator and one finisher combine for an effect, it's not open ended. I'm sure there will be guilds who are very much taking advantage of them, but it will really only matter in PVP (PVE is fully cooperative). Even in PVP, with the way winning servers are matched up against winning servers, those people will be playing against other highly coordinated guilds, while the rest of us mere mortals can enjoy our casual combinations.
ArenaNet also takes balancing very seriously. GW1 with its dual classing and thousands of skills was a balancing nightmare, but they did weaker PVP versions of skills as necessary for balance purposes. If something gets out of hand, I'm sure they'll quickly take action.
"Gamers will no longer buy the argument that every MMO requires a subscription fee to offset server and bandwidth costs. It's not true you know it, and they know it."-Jeff Strain, co-founder of ArenaNet, 2007
So GW2 Endgame is ¨play the the low level content again¨ or make an alt?, thats revolutionary. The disappointment about this game will be epic, well if you love gw you probably gonna love gw2, but thats all.
So what you're saying is that you haven't done any research at all? That's kinda cool... I guess.
Yes i did it. there is nothing about gw2 endgame, well is all about dynamics events i guess, like rift, but probably it will be just waiting in a queue for ¨arena¨ pvp.
just saying , there is no queue for pvp,
we have a browser system (similar to fps game) , U see a server (exemple: Proplaying no noob) 8/10 u jump in or 14/20 for 10 vs 10, u click u join,
It's funny how some people is hyping this game so much and desperately hoping will change the whole genre and their lives.
I really hope they wont get disappointed when the game finnaly comes out. I am buying GW2 for sure but I am not expecting it will change " the way we play games". I am not convinced that so many new ideas will magically work as intended. Nevertheless I wish Anet the best.
I'm guessing this is directed at me.
I actually think I have very reasonable expectations for GW2. The polls on this site for the Most Anticipated MMO of the last 5+ years have been very depressing, actually. I'm not seeing any red flags for GW2, but until we have it in our hands we won't know for sure. I feel I've just done a lot of research about the game.
I really do believe that not only is GW2 examining everything about the genre, they've also got a vision for the game and goals they want to achieve. One of their goals is to put the MMO back in MMORPG and get people playing together. So many things about the game outside the Personal Story (which is putting the RPG back in MMORPG) are designed to support that goal.
It starts with Dynamic Events, but it goes beyond that. DEs are an amazing concept. They let people play together naturally without grouping. They chain together so that people don't just scatter afterwards. They aren't like quests where you have to be on the same stage to be able to play with someone.
The game is designed to be as griefless as possible. They want you to want to see other players. Other players can never hurt you. Everybody gets full xp and loot for helping kill a mob. DEs scale up with more players, so not only is it always a challenge, it becomes more chaotic and fun. The game automentors you down when you do a DE and that was originally designed to prevent griefing, but it has the social bonus of letting you play with your friends anywhere, even if you've outleveled them.
Players each get a whack at gather nodes so as to prevent griefing, but it goes further than that. Each player has every gathering profession, so that you're never waiting for anybody or feel like you're holding someone up.
There's hundreds of cross profession combos to get players working together. There's the downed state so anybody can rez anybody else. Maybe these start a conversation, even if it's just a thank you at first.
Any 5 players can do a dungeon so you can play with your friends without having to turn someone away because you need a specific class.
Even World PVP indirectly benefits socialization. Because it's Server Vs Server, it doesn't divide up PVE into factions, giving you more people to play with. Developers don't need to add content for each side, giving players more events to see.
Right after the tutorial, you can teleport to another capital city, letting you play with your friends right from the start. Even later on there's teleportation to let you meet up with people quickly.
There's 30+ unique minigames in the cities. That's one of the things that originally impressed me. Instead of just putting in the expected things like AH, bank, etc, ArenaNet was trying to make them more social places to hang out.
You can even see where your friends are in game from an iPad and send them messsages.
This game isn't all about forcing socialization or forcing grouping. It's about removing all barriers to socializing. It's about getting people working together and events chaining so they stay together and hopefully start talking. They say they've seen it even in testing sessions, where people who only intended to solo were drawn into socializing because there's just absolutely no reason not to.
I think if any game has the potential to change how we play MMOs and make them more social, it's this one. And it won't be magic. It'll be because ArenaNet made it a priority and tried to design the game as best as possible to achieve it. I'm optimistic that they'll be able to pull it off.
"Gamers will no longer buy the argument that every MMO requires a subscription fee to offset server and bandwidth costs. It's not true you know it, and they know it."-Jeff Strain, co-founder of ArenaNet, 2007
Keep in mind that they've made cross profession combos so that only one initiator and one finisher combine for an effect, it's not open ended. I'm sure there will be guilds who are very much taking advantage of them, but it will really only matter in PVP (PVE is fully cooperative). Even in PVP, with the way winning servers are matched up against winning servers, those people will be playing against other highly coordinated guilds, while the rest of us mere mortals can enjoy our casual combinations.
The point isn't so much that guilds will exploit powerful combinations to win, it's that of these hundreds of combinations, a select few will easily be found as optimal and create a "right" and "wrong" way to play, which I'm sure is exactly the opposite of what they were aiming for.
Part of good design is understanding how good ideas can go horribly wrong when people are involved, and then planning accordingly. That, to me, is the difference between a run-of-the-mill game and one that is truly exceptional.
Keep in mind that they've made cross profession combos so that only one initiator and one finisher combine for an effect, it's not open ended. I'm sure there will be guilds who are very much taking advantage of them, but it will really only matter in PVP (PVE is fully cooperative). Even in PVP, with the way winning servers are matched up against winning servers, those people will be playing against other highly coordinated guilds, while the rest of us mere mortals can enjoy our casual combinations.
The point isn't so much that guilds will exploit powerful combinations to win, it's that of these hundreds of combinations, a select few will easily be found as optimal and create a "right" and "wrong" way to play, which I'm sure is exactly the opposite of what they were aiming for.
Part of good design is understanding how good ideas can go horribly wrong when people are involved, and then planning accordingly. That, to me, is the difference between a run-of-the-mill game and one that is truly exceptional.
An interesting point.
One thing I was going to mention earlier about the combat in GW2 before that post got cut short is that weapons work differently in GW2 than they do in other games. In GW2, your weapon determines 5 of your 10+ available skills (though in most cases you can swap weapons to access another 5). What makes GW2's weapons interesting is that they do different things. For example, a bow for a warrior is an AOE weapon, whereas a rifle is single target.
This adds a lot of complexity to the PVP situation, because even if some combos are optimal, it doesn't seem like they could be optimal for all situations due to the wide variety of things your opponents could be doing back to you. For example, one such combo from the manifesto trailer is an air elementalist creating an electical field and a warrior with a rifle shooting someone, electrically stunning them. If this is the FOTM combo of choice, perhaps thieves could dodge the bullets and come in to do serious damage on a warrior ill-prepared to defend themselves against melee with a rifle. Or guardians could put up shields to make the bullet bounce back.
Going back to what you said earlier about Rift, I think if your goal is solely to maximize DPS, then there's always going to be a best build (especially with Rift which I think really lacked synergy between a lot of the tree combinations). But if you need to build in enough control and support abilities to keep you alive, and try to damage when you get a chance, it seems reasonable that the optimal cross profession combo is going to depend on the situation.
"Gamers will no longer buy the argument that every MMO requires a subscription fee to offset server and bandwidth costs. It's not true you know it, and they know it."-Jeff Strain, co-founder of ArenaNet, 2007
Have you ever played Everquest II? You can visit NPCs to manually level yourself down to match the level of the mobs. Vanguard: Saga of Heroes and other games have similar features. The only difference is that it's totally optional in those games. A lot of people, myself included, don't understand this fascination with repeating low level content. It's hard to escape the feeling that level scaling is just a way to artificial elongate content.
As opposed to artificially elongating content by creating a linear gear progression that you have to grind through to unlock the next layer, or artificially elongating content by creating "hard modes" for all your dungeons, or creating two factions to artificially double your content?
Level scaling doesn't artificially elongate content...it OPENS the breadth of content to the max level player. We're not talking about repeating the same linear low level content, we're talking about having the ability to do content you missed...content that would become trivial in most other MMORPGs and be locked off from play unless you create an alt.
That's great that some previous games tacked on a system to de-level you...but the issue with making it optional is griefing. Players who want to go back and one-shot all the content in low level areas ruin those areas for level-appropriate players. Having level scaling happen automatically removes the griefing while still allowing players to utilize ALL content at max level with at least some level of challenge. It's one of the many ways the game facilitates social play...high level players can actually group up with lower level players to do their content in an organic way that doesn't completely trivialize the game play.
Also, having to visit an NPC and manually level yourself down every time you want to visit a lower-level zone seems pretty annoying and immersion breaking. In GW2, you can just head out and explore...and whatever new content you find, wherever you go, will be at least a reasonable challenge for you regardless of your level, and you'll be able to play cooperatively with the players there regardless of their level.
Interactions such as what exactly? Please inform me of how Guild Wars 2's game design facilitates players being more social towards each other. If you're referring to dynamic events, how do they encourage teamwork any more than a Rift raid or a PQ in WAR? How does group interaction in dungeons differ that greatly from a heroic in WoW? In your original post, you say that players will want to "hang out" with one another, which would imply a clear difference from the usual "group with this random guy only because you need to kill x more of y."
Clearly you're uninformed about the game. If you legitimately want answers to your questions, you should avail yourself of the readily available MASSIVE quantity of infomration that's on the web and easily accessible with a simple search.
Everything about GW2 is designed from the ground up to facilitate social play...it isn't just a couple systems that push players into proximity with each other tacked onto a solo game like what you see in Rift. Just as a start, read up on the way loot works, the way gathering resources works, the way combat works (cross profession combos, healing, rezzing, etc), the way scaling works for events and for players, the more open guild system, the minigames in cities, and the info we have on WvWvW PvP. Hopefully then you'll start to grasp the way social play is built in from the ground up.
In Rift, players were hitting max level in a month and complaining about a serious lack of content at endgame. WAR, Aion, AoC and others share the same issue.
Those are all badly designed games that use some version of the exact same formula and mechanics. They all suffer the same problems because they are all very similar in design. The fact that you run out of content quickly and have nothing to do at max level other than raid is a product of their game design... GW2 is designed differently, so won't suffer from the same problems.
Just as one quick example... Rift has only two linear quest progression paths (one for each faction), which totally fill in every zone. Once you've played the path for one faction, you've literally played all the content other than dungeons and raids. It's this linear progression system, and the fact that you can only get challenge and progression from a very limited range of content (due to content being fixed in level) that causes players to run out of things to do so quickly. The assumption by the developers is that content throughout the leveling curve doesn't matter, because everyone will be max level super quick and so the focus is on creating time sinks in endgame to keep everyone paying a subscription until expansion time.
GW2 is designed in a completely different way. Because of the automatic scaling of players to the content, there is no content that becomes trivial, so the developers can spend their time creating a very wide breadth of content in each level range...none of it goes to waste because it can be utilized by players regardless of their level. There really are no restrictions on where they place content, since their DE system frees them up from having to place everything in a linear path for the player (no need to line everything up according to level). I could go on...
Likewise, the journey is every bit about the pace of the content because the pace of the content is the length of the journey.
Wrong. The journey is GW2 isn't fixed to the leveling process. You will be able to continue doing all the content regardless of your level...so the journey will be much less linear in terms of open world content. It's also much deeper and can last much longer, because again, all content can be utilized by all players, instead of a game design where the leveling progression content is wasted once players outlevel it.
The phrase "it's about the journey" was invented as a reference to older MMORPGs where endgame wasn't the focus, so you've got that part right. Where you're mistaken is that in older MMORPGs, you weren't focused on the endgame because it took months/years to get there. You'd drive yourself insane if all you were concerned with upon logging in and out every day was reaching the max level as fast as possible. Players didn't run out of content because it took them so long to get through the content. Modern MMORPGs (GW2 included) start players about 2 feet from the finish line, so among other reasons, of course all they care about is racing to the endgame.
You're mistaken impression again comes from trying to view GW2 through the goggles of prior MMORPG design. GW2 is "about the journey" just as much as those older MMORPGs, but it just gets there by a completely different route. The level cap isn't the "finish line" in GW2... if you level to max and stop playing, that will be your choice, but you'll be missing out on a tremendous amount of content (again, because this game is not going to be layed out in a linear path). You won't come anywhere close to seeing and doing everything just by leveling up...and unlike previous MMORPGs, that's okay, because nothing becomes trivial or gets left behind.
This game is about journey because the journey isn't attached to the leveling process... the journey is simply playing the game the way you enjoy, and it takes place from level 1 until you run out of fun stuff to do (long after hitting level cap). Levels will come easily, but they matter much less than in traditional MMORPGs. So...the focus is taken off of leveling in a totally different way, but the result is the same.
Will there be players who try to play GW2 like WoW, sit at level cap and ignore all the breadth of content and complain that there are no 24-man instances? Sure. But that's no a problem with the game design...it's a problem with the ingrained mentality of those players. Hopefully GW2 will provide enough little nudges to help those players change their thinking and realize what they are missing.
It's so clear to me that this is an MMORPG that has no intentions of having any longevity. Anet makes money off of huge box sales. Players get bored with the content, and then they all go play SW:TOR or TSW. Anet comes out with a content update. Anet makes money off of players buying the content update from the in-game store. Players take a couple weeks off from SW:TOR or TSW. Players complete the new content. Players go back to SW:TOR or TSW. Anet announces GW3 and content development for GW2 pretty much ends. 4 years after GW3 is announced, the game is released and the cycle repeats. If you try to play this like a sub-based MMORPG, I just don't see how you're not going to run out of content unless you're very casual or, as in the case of GW1 players, you don't mind such little new content.
I think you're totally wrong. I think they are approaching longevity in a completely different way than the WoW-formula dictates (hence the problems a lot of people are having with wrapping their heads around it). GW2 will approach longevity in terms of building a server-wide community and facilitating players meeting people and making new friends. It will facilitate longevity through addicting and varying fundamental game play, and through a changing world that stays fresh much longer and shows persistent consequences of player actions. They will keep players around by getting them truly invested in their own story, and the story of the world.
They'll be encouraging players to stay by enticing them with fun and community and a myriad of choices of how to play, rather than by placing an endless line of little pointless carrots in front of the player to keep them paying. Will some players take time off once they've completed everything they enjoy in the game? Certainly. But show me the MMORPG where that isn't the case. The choice to return to GW2 is a much easier one, as well...since it doesn't require starting up a subscription again.
It's funny how some people is hyping this game so much and desperately hoping will change the whole genre and their lives.
I really hope they wont get disappointed when the game finnaly comes out. I am buying GW2 for sure but I am not expecting it will change " the way we play games". I am not convinced that so many new ideas will magically work as intended. Nevertheless I wish Anet the best.
I'm guessing this is directed at me.
I actually think I have very reasonable expectations for GW2. The polls on this site for the Most Anticipated MMO of the last 5+ years have been very depressing, actually. I'm not seeing any red flags for GW2, but until we have it in our hands we won't know for sure. I feel I've just done a lot of research about the game.
I really do believe that not only is GW2 examining everything about the genre, they've also got a vision for the game and goals they want to achieve. One of their goals is to put the MMO back in MMORPG and get people playing together. So many things about the game outside the Personal Story (which is putting the RPG back in MMORPG) are designed to support that goal.
It starts with Dynamic Events, but it goes beyond that. DEs are an amazing concept. They let people play together naturally without grouping. They chain together so that people don't just scatter afterwards. They aren't like quests where you have to be on the same stage to be able to play with someone.
The game is designed to be as griefless as possible. They want you to want to see other players. Other players can never hurt you. Everybody gets full xp and loot for helping kill a mob. DEs scale up with more players, so not only is it always a challenge, it becomes more chaotic and fun. The game automentors you down when you do a DE and that was originally designed to prevent griefing, but it has the social bonus of letting you play with your friends anywhere, even if you've outleveled them.
Players each get a whack at gather nodes so as to prevent griefing, but it goes further than that. Each player has every gathering profession, so that you're never waiting for anybody or feel like you're holding someone up.
There's hundreds of cross profession combos to get players working together. There's the downed state so anybody can rez anybody else. Maybe these start a conversation, even if it's just a thank you at first.
Any 5 players can do a dungeon so you can play with your friends without having to turn someone away because you need a specific class.
Even World PVP indirectly benefits socialization. Because it's Server Vs Server, it doesn't divide up PVE into factions, giving you more people to play with. Developers don't need to add content for each side, giving players more events to see.
Right after the tutorial, you can teleport to another capital city, letting you play with your friends right from the start. Even later on there's teleportation to let you meet up with people quickly.
There's 30+ unique minigames in the cities. That's one of the things that originally impressed me. Instead of just putting in the expected things like AH, bank, etc, ArenaNet was trying to make them more social places to hang out.
You can even see where your friends are in game from an iPad and send them messsages.
This game isn't all about forcing socialization or forcing grouping. It's about removing all barriers to socializing. It's about getting people working together and events chaining so they stay together and hopefully start talking. They say they've seen it even in testing sessions, where people who only intended to solo were drawn into socializing because there's just absolutely no reason not to.
I think if any game has the potential to change how we play MMOs and make them more social, it's this one. And it won't be magic. It'll be because ArenaNet made it a priority and tried to design the game as best as possible to achieve it. I'm optimistic that they'll be able to pull it off.
Fantastic post Cali. Really great description regarding how the game's design removes the barriers to social interaction and thus promote its growth organically.
As to the people worried about end game and nothing to do: Fozzik answered it best: you can do the content you never got to see, you can run dungeons, elite DEs, make alts for different storylines/gameplay and PvP. If you are bored of all that, since you ARE NOT PAYING A MONTHLY SUB you can happily put the game down and rest assured your characters will be there for when new content comes out.
It's funny how some people is hyping this game so much and desperately hoping will change the whole genre and their lives.
I really hope they wont get disappointed when the game finnaly comes out. I am buying GW2 for sure but I am not expecting it will change " the way we play games". I am not convinced that so many new ideas will magically work as intended. Nevertheless I wish Anet the best.
Some scepticism is just healthy.
I am not convinced either that all of the new things will work as intended and some of them are probably being revamped one way or another rather soon after release.
But we need that experimentation, the MMO genre have been stale as an old loaf of bread for a rather long while now. 10 years ago there were still plenty of games around that tried to invent it's own way of doing things but lately almost everyone have settled on exactly the same mechanics but just a different skin and all different games today are even old like Eve or really low budget.
I don't think GW2 in itself will change the entire genre, but I think it is starting something that will be revolutionary in the long run. Hopefully will others continue to evolve the good ideas instead of just copy and paste. And a new game that actually successfully does something new sets a great example for the entire genre.
The genre really needs Guildwars 2 and World of darkness online, we need someone to prove for the publishing houses that you actually can make more money trying something new and bold then just making more of what we already have.
Yeah, I am an optimistic old MMO vet that misses the diversity the genre used to have. It wasn't that long ago that you could choose between games like EQ, AC, UO, Lineage and several others depending on your taste. I miss that.
Am I going to buy it? Yes. But honestly, it's hard to get excited about games these days because so many games have let us down. I hope when I play it, my opinion changes but I'm more at a wait and see kind of thing.
The thing I am worried about is...and no offense.... it's the community.
I get somewhat tired of the elitist "WoW Sucks" and GW2 is a WoW Killer sort of attutude. I mean, that's not unique to Guild Wars 2 but can't we just enjoy a game and not constantly compare it to another game or belittle that other game to make ourselves feel good? Kind of a rabbit trail. So, yes, I'm excited for the game. I definitely look forward to it. Just tired of the negativity when it comes to dissing on other games.
Ability and trait acquisition, guild advancement, collections, achievements and feats. Also, you can progress your character's reputation among your community, and progress your server's win/loss record and gain buffs / benefits for your server in WvWvW PvP.
In all fairness, vertical progression is much less significant in GW2's endgame...instead it's about the journey and horizontal progression/depth...enjoying the game play rather than getting lead around by the nose to the next little carrot. You'll be playing because you WANT to get X or see Y or hang out with some new players you met while getting your arse handed to you in a starter zone... the options available to each player only expand as they gain levels, rather than content becoming trivial and options shrinking steadily until there's only one (like the typical raid-focused bait-and-switch endgame).
Hmm, that's a bit preoccupying. When playing RPG's, I like the sensation of becoming more powerful, I like obtaining fabled items, and I like leveling and seeing my character grow in significant ways. Some of my greatest gaming moments consists of times when I loot a powerful weapon or when I craft a pristine set of armor for a customer. Sure, there will probably be rare weapons in Guild Wars 2, but their stats won't really matter, and that just feels artificial to me. It does remove part of the grind in the sense that you don't need the weapon for a statistical advantage, but I frankly don't mind working to get items that change my character beyond merely aesthetically since I feel that hard work is necessary to grasp that sense of accomplishment.
Level scaling also isn't really my thing. It just makes leveling seem rather insignificant (something I did not like when playing Guild Wars 1). I like it when after each level, you attain something useful, your character grows in ways that really matter. Also, even though level scaling allows anyone to do any content they want, what purpose would there be to running all this content? Why would a higher level player want to run a lower level quest? Just for the hell of it? For achievements? For weapon skins? These are methods of progression that feel too artificial, too insignificant, too superficial.
Some of my favorite moments in D&D, for instance, come from these things that Guild Wars 2 is basically doing away with. Achieving a level and picking my class, picking my feats, raising my skills, increasing my attributes, choosing my spells, raising my stats. All of these make leveling feel significant, make leveling feel important, they make leveling feel like an actual accomplishment. Likewise, going to the farthest depths of a dungeon, killing a strong monster, and taking from him his most valuable and powerful treasures make me feel like the expedition had meaning.
Also, in terms of immersion and overall believability, sword X should be different from sword Y (apart from looks). If one sword is made by a legendary blacksmith with a harder, more durable, and lighter metal, and the other is just your average and crude guard weapon, they need to behave differently for the sake of meaning and plausability.
Ability and trait acquisition, guild advancement, collections, achievements and feats. Also, you can progress your character's reputation among your community, and progress your server's win/loss record and gain buffs / benefits for your server in WvWvW PvP.
In all fairness, vertical progression is much less significant in GW2's endgame...instead it's about the journey and horizontal progression/depth...enjoying the game play rather than getting lead around by the nose to the next little carrot. You'll be playing because you WANT to get X or see Y or hang out with some new players you met while getting your arse handed to you in a starter zone... the options available to each player only expand as they gain levels, rather than content becoming trivial and options shrinking steadily until there's only one (like the typical raid-focused bait-and-switch endgame).
Hmm, that's a bit preoccupying. When playing RPG's, I like the sensation of becoming more powerful, I like obtaining fabled items, and I like leveling and seeing my character grow in significant ways. Some of my greatest gaming moments consists of times when I loot a powerful weapon or when I craft a pristine set of armor for a customer. Sure, there will probably be rare weapons in Guild Wars 2, but their stats won't really matter, and that just feels artificial to me. It does remove part of the grind in the sense that you don't need the weapon for a statistical advantage, but I frankly don't mind working to get items that change my character beyond merely aesthetically since I feel that hard work is necessary to grasp that sense of accomplishment.
Level scaling also isn't really my thing. It just makes leveling seem rather insignificant (something I did not like when playing Guild Wars 1). I like it when after each level, you attain something useful, your character grows in ways that really matter. Also, even though level scaling allows anyone to do any content they want, what purpose would there be to running all this content? Why would a higher level player want to run a lower level quest? Just for the hell of it? For achievements? For weapon skins? These are methods of progression that feel too artificial, too insignificant, too superficial.
Some of my favorite moments in D&D, for instance, come from these things that Guild Wars 2 is basically doing away with. Achieving a level and picking my class, picking my feats, raising my skills, increasing my attributes, choosing my spells, raising my stats. All of these make leveling feel significant, make leveling feel important, they make leveling feel like an actual accomplishment. Likewise, going to the farthest depths of a dungeon, killing a strong monster, and taking from him his most valuable and powerful treasures make me feel like the expedition had meaning.
Also, in terms of immersion and overall believability, sword X should be different from sword Y (apart from looks). If one sword is made by a legendary blacksmith with a harder, more durable, and lighter metal, and the other is just your average and crude guard weapon, they need to behave differently for the sake of meaning and plausability.
Well if it makes you feel better, weapons aren't JUST skins. They do have stats and in vidoes, Total Biscuit's for example, you can see that there are different weapon grades as well. The thing with the skins is that if you really liked the way a weapon you had looked, then you can re skin your new weapon to look the same as the old one while keeping its stats.
I agree with you about character growth. I want to see and feel my character get stronger. When Anet announced the stat system going down to four stats my initial reaction was concern of the system being too simple. Then I thought about other games like say WoW for example with their hit and expertice and crit etc..... and I remembered how much they really didn't matter. You had a minimal limit to get to and the rest were put into the only stats that actually made your character viable. After my initial shock, I have come to not only accept their stat and leveling system, but like the idea.
Either way, it sounded like your biggest problem was that the gear/weapons were all the same and only had different skins when that just isn't the case.
Am I going to buy it? Yes. But honestly, it's hard to get excited about games these days because so many games have let us down. I hope when I play it, my opinion changes but I'm more at a wait and see kind of thing.
The thing I am worried about is...and no offense.... it's the community.
I get somewhat tired of the elitist "WoW Sucks" and GW2 is a WoW Killer sort of attutude. I mean, that's not unique to Guild Wars 2 but can't we just enjoy a game and not constantly compare it to another game or belittle that other game to make ourselves feel good? Kind of a rabbit trail. So, yes, I'm excited for the game. I definitely look forward to it. Just tired of the negativity when it comes to dissing on other games.
This is a WoW killer statement has been coming with every game, unfortunately there isnt an age restriction to these forums so your going to have to put up with the nonesense that comes out of peoples mouths unless you quit the interweb of course, Then of course you get the rl nonesense coming out of peoples mouths in 3D. The same nonesense is coming from the Star wars corner.
Comments
Um, no.
Name the other MMORPGs where your character scales to the level of the content, so at max level you can be challenged by ALL CONTENT IN THE WHOLE WORLD. Oh yeah, there aren't any.
Players will be more social because the mechanics provide for and encourage more social play. The game is designed around creating positive interactions (i'm excited to see other players show up because the game gets more interesting, fun, and even challenging when we play together) and making social play an additive rather than subtractive experience. It's not magic, it's called smart game design (it might seem like magic considering the way things have been going in the genre lately).
Progress more slowly? More slowly than what? Is there some universal standard break-neck pace at which all MMORPGs must be consumed? A game being about the journey has nothing to do with the pace of the content...the journey can be fast and exciting...the point is just that you're playing the way you want to play regardless of your level, rather than playing one game 1-max and a totally different game after.
I need to back up a second here and not just talk about endgame, I need to talk about philosophy.
ArenaNet is not just trying to create a great MMO, they're trying to change the way we play MMOs.
Think about how you play a game like WoW. You probably enjoy leveling the first time well enough, but it's largely a solo experience. There's a linear progression of quests. To group with someone, you have to be on the same stage. The second time you level a toon, it's probably just as fun because there's probably a 2nd leveling path for that faction. After that though, it just gets tired. You've already seen the content. All your friends are max level so you want to get to max level so you can do things with them again. If you get into raiding, that's a 12-16 hour a week job beating your head against the one raid you're on. If you do quests, they're the same dailies because you've done the regular quests. You might do a daily dungeon to get a token, but it's unchallenging content you just want to blast through and not even bother speaking to anyone. There's also PVP but that's the same maps with the same strategies against the same opponents with no purpose beyond your individual collection of gear.
Not to say that it wasn't fun, or that there aren't moments of accomplishment, but on some level people raid because it's all about the gear and it's either that or hardcore PVP in order to get it.
It's true that GW2 won't have raiding, but that's because the game really isn't about gear. Gear will be obtainable through a variety of different means, and they'll be different vanity skins from optional grinds. So without gear pushing people towards max level, I think it will just be a whole different philosophy. Instead of playing for the carrot, play for fun and do whatever it is that you find fun.
With no endgame for people to be sitting at, the focus is free to shift to replayability. The mechanics of dynamic events are too complicated to get into for this post, but instead of being isolating, everybody in the area can do them together with no hassle. You can play an alt or even take your regular toon into a lower level area and see people to group with. Because there isn't a linear path and DEs don't always run, you might see different events if you're in a zone, or see them in a different stage (because they were won/lost last time). They're even going to continuously add events to the world to make it even fresher. With automentoring, you're not stuck with the same dailies, but the entire world is open to you to go anywhere. There's even hidden events to reward explorers and GW1 easter eggs to find. There's elite events and very difficult 5 man dungeons for people who want a real challenge. Dungeons even have events that don't always run so they're not always the same thing each time.
In addition, there's 30+ minigames in the cities. There's PVP against different servers instead of the same people There's structured PVP where you can make custom games. There's tasks out in the world to build up NPC goodwill like feeding cows at farms. There's collecting skills and traits out in the world. There's achievements, titles and vanity skins to work towards.
There's also the personal story which probably has enough branches so that each race can do it 3x and get a very different experience each time.
And finally, you know, it sounds crazy but with raiding like I said, that's a 12-16 hour a week job, plus preparation time. Maybe it doesn't have to be like that. GW2 is B2P. Play it 10 hours a week, play it 20, play it however much you find fun without having to worry about being on someone else's schedule. Raid in your P2P game if you want. They can peacefully coexist.
"Gamers will no longer buy the argument that every MMO requires a subscription fee to offset server and bandwidth costs. It's not true you know it, and they know it." -Jeff Strain, co-founder of ArenaNet, 2007
So GW2 Endgame is ¨play the the low level content again¨ or make an alt?, thats revolutionary. The disappointment about this game will be epic, well if you love gw you probably gonna love gw2, but thats all.
How the hell is Oblivion’s system even close to what GW2 is doing? In Oblivion you had all the spawns change so where once wolves spawned now you have bandits in glass armor. Yeah that is totally realistic after all don’t you see all of those bandits running around outside in tanks! In GW2 you scale so the game always maintains a challenge level, which some people you know might actually like. After all I do not know about you but I suddenly have not become a god and can kill everyone with a finger, so why should my character? Besides the fact that I am delusional and have flights of fancy about how epic cool I could be if I only had that one item.
Also Great job at speaking for all gamers and saying why they did not like Oblivions system and modded it, and completely leaving off the reason of how the spawns change and how people did not like it. I know that is reason why I got the mod and so did many of my friends, not because we did not become a god like character so it made us cry. Next time speak for yourself and leave the rest of us gamers out of your argument you are not god and you do not speak for us all.
Yeah because GW2 DEs are exactly like PQs and rifts so we know exactly how GW2 is going to be. How about you do some research and learn the difference between the systems before you make arguments about someone else’s opinion. Or is that too much to ask that you educate yourself before you make comments on a subject? I do not intend to be a prick here but I am so sick of people bring crap up about a game when they do not even take the time to learn about it before speaking.
You make it sound like a bad thing that people might play multiple games at the same time. Oh god I play single player games and took breaks from pay to play MMOs that is a sin. Oh yeah that is right we all have to be no live MMO players that just do nothing but play MMOs or we are not worth thinking about. I also love how you feel like you can speak for all gamers here again and how only people that do not appreciate a true MMO could stand to play GW1 for extended period of times (casuals). Because we all know 3 stand alone games and an expansion in just over 2 years is so little content that no one with half a brain could like it.
This thread just needs to be locked It was started as something for people to post things they like about a game, and instead it turned into a venue for people to post crap about how their opinion on the game is right and everyone else’s is wrong. This PVP sucks because it is not designed the way I like it, no it is great because it is what I want. This game sucks because it does not have raiding and what I look for in a MMO, no this game is great because it offers horizontal progression and not vertical progression. Where have I heard this before oh yeah from a bunch of 3 year olds arguing about my dad could beat up your dad. /days like to today make me happy to be a gamer!
So what you're saying is that you haven't done any research at all? That's kinda cool... I guess.
Better than raid grinding. People are so used to the skinners box it seems.
Anyway, other games have had horizontal progression and people still play them. Not everything has to be about numbers and mind numbing repetition.
endgame endgame endgame. God I'm sick of this shlt. Let's discuss end game once we reach it. Most of us already know how Areana Net always loves to go back and redo things soo. I don't know if this "End game is gonna be like this" argument is valid at this point.
Guys I suggest not arguing with anyone since it seems fanboys from gw2 go talk smack on TOR and TOR fanboys come talk smack here, anytime you see a troll do not feed it, just ignore his/her post and I asure you it will lower down.
The truth may be puzzling. It may take some work to grapple with. It may be counterintuitive. It may contradict deeply held prejudices. It may not be consonant with what we desperately want to be true. But our preferences do not determine what's true.
Carl Sagan-
Yes i did it. there is nothing about gw2 endgame, well is all about dynamics events i guess, like rift, but probably it will be just waiting in a queue for ¨arena¨ pvp.
Dodging looks more interesting when you're able to make judicious use of it simply as a means of avoiding a few key attacks. Stuff like this however shows the darker side of active dodging. It just looks grindy and uninteresting.
As for situational attacks (fire arrows etc) it sounds at best gimmicky and at worst dangerous for flavor of the month potential. They might have what, a dozen, maybe two dozen combinations you can pull off? I'm skeptical of that in the same way I was skeptical about the vaunted variety of the Rift soul system, and the exact same thing happened to them. Less than two weeks after launch and there were plenty of cap-level players who had well and thouroughly figured out the game's systems, it's limits, breaking points, and created optimal PvP and PvE specs. I'll give it maybe a month after GW2 launches until you have competent, coordinated guilds executing the best situational attacks as part of their well-oiled routine rather than as a special spur-of-the-moment decision.
It's funny how some people is hyping this game so much and desperately hoping will change the whole genre and their lives.
I really hope they wont get disappointed when the game finnaly comes out. I am buying GW2 for sure but I am not expecting it will change " the way we play games". I am not convinced that so many new ideas will magically work as intended. Nevertheless I wish Anet the best.
"Forums aren't for intelligent discussion; they're for blow-hards with unwavering opinions."
That video you linked was old because they've redone the energy system. Right now skills don't use energy and are only limited by cooldown (or in the thief's case, initiative). You can only dodge twice before your bar needs to refill at least somewhat. Though there are other skills that provide a similar effect, such as a heal that makes you jump backwards, or a bow shot which teleports you to the destination. A thief might be a bad example because they're the most mobile class. This is what happens to thieves who don't dodge.
According to this page, the number of cross profession combos is "literally hundreds." As far as FOTM builds, they're designing and testing the game so that any 5 players can do a dungeon (the hardest content). They've run them with 5 elementalists or 5 thieves or whatever. While I'm sure there are people who will insist on trying to get what they think is the optimal team, all professions have the tools to work together and succeed, they just need to be able to come up with the right tactics for the situation with the skills they have available.
Keep in mind that they've made cross profession combos so that only one initiator and one finisher combine for an effect, it's not open ended. I'm sure there will be guilds who are very much taking advantage of them, but it will really only matter in PVP (PVE is fully cooperative). Even in PVP, with the way winning servers are matched up against winning servers, those people will be playing against other highly coordinated guilds, while the rest of us mere mortals can enjoy our casual combinations.
ArenaNet also takes balancing very seriously. GW1 with its dual classing and thousands of skills was a balancing nightmare, but they did weaker PVP versions of skills as necessary for balance purposes. If something gets out of hand, I'm sure they'll quickly take action.
"Gamers will no longer buy the argument that every MMO requires a subscription fee to offset server and bandwidth costs. It's not true you know it, and they know it." -Jeff Strain, co-founder of ArenaNet, 2007
just saying , there is no queue for pvp,
we have a browser system (similar to fps game) , U see a server (exemple: Proplaying no noob) 8/10 u jump in or 14/20 for 10 vs 10, u click u join,
for wvwvw there is no limit u jump in and u play
for endgame
http://www.tentonhammer.com/gw2/features/interviews/endgame-philosophy
~The only opinion that matters is your own.Everything else is just advice,~
I'm guessing this is directed at me.
I actually think I have very reasonable expectations for GW2. The polls on this site for the Most Anticipated MMO of the last 5+ years have been very depressing, actually. I'm not seeing any red flags for GW2, but until we have it in our hands we won't know for sure. I feel I've just done a lot of research about the game.
I really do believe that not only is GW2 examining everything about the genre, they've also got a vision for the game and goals they want to achieve. One of their goals is to put the MMO back in MMORPG and get people playing together. So many things about the game outside the Personal Story (which is putting the RPG back in MMORPG) are designed to support that goal.
It starts with Dynamic Events, but it goes beyond that. DEs are an amazing concept. They let people play together naturally without grouping. They chain together so that people don't just scatter afterwards. They aren't like quests where you have to be on the same stage to be able to play with someone.
The game is designed to be as griefless as possible. They want you to want to see other players. Other players can never hurt you. Everybody gets full xp and loot for helping kill a mob. DEs scale up with more players, so not only is it always a challenge, it becomes more chaotic and fun. The game automentors you down when you do a DE and that was originally designed to prevent griefing, but it has the social bonus of letting you play with your friends anywhere, even if you've outleveled them.
Players each get a whack at gather nodes so as to prevent griefing, but it goes further than that. Each player has every gathering profession, so that you're never waiting for anybody or feel like you're holding someone up.
There's hundreds of cross profession combos to get players working together. There's the downed state so anybody can rez anybody else. Maybe these start a conversation, even if it's just a thank you at first.
Any 5 players can do a dungeon so you can play with your friends without having to turn someone away because you need a specific class.
Even World PVP indirectly benefits socialization. Because it's Server Vs Server, it doesn't divide up PVE into factions, giving you more people to play with. Developers don't need to add content for each side, giving players more events to see.
Right after the tutorial, you can teleport to another capital city, letting you play with your friends right from the start. Even later on there's teleportation to let you meet up with people quickly.
There's 30+ unique minigames in the cities. That's one of the things that originally impressed me. Instead of just putting in the expected things like AH, bank, etc, ArenaNet was trying to make them more social places to hang out.
You can even see where your friends are in game from an iPad and send them messsages.
This game isn't all about forcing socialization or forcing grouping. It's about removing all barriers to socializing. It's about getting people working together and events chaining so they stay together and hopefully start talking. They say they've seen it even in testing sessions, where people who only intended to solo were drawn into socializing because there's just absolutely no reason not to.
I think if any game has the potential to change how we play MMOs and make them more social, it's this one. And it won't be magic. It'll be because ArenaNet made it a priority and tried to design the game as best as possible to achieve it. I'm optimistic that they'll be able to pull it off.
"Gamers will no longer buy the argument that every MMO requires a subscription fee to offset server and bandwidth costs. It's not true you know it, and they know it." -Jeff Strain, co-founder of ArenaNet, 2007
The point isn't so much that guilds will exploit powerful combinations to win, it's that of these hundreds of combinations, a select few will easily be found as optimal and create a "right" and "wrong" way to play, which I'm sure is exactly the opposite of what they were aiming for.
Part of good design is understanding how good ideas can go horribly wrong when people are involved, and then planning accordingly. That, to me, is the difference between a run-of-the-mill game and one that is truly exceptional.
An interesting point.
One thing I was going to mention earlier about the combat in GW2 before that post got cut short is that weapons work differently in GW2 than they do in other games. In GW2, your weapon determines 5 of your 10+ available skills (though in most cases you can swap weapons to access another 5). What makes GW2's weapons interesting is that they do different things. For example, a bow for a warrior is an AOE weapon, whereas a rifle is single target.
This adds a lot of complexity to the PVP situation, because even if some combos are optimal, it doesn't seem like they could be optimal for all situations due to the wide variety of things your opponents could be doing back to you. For example, one such combo from the manifesto trailer is an air elementalist creating an electical field and a warrior with a rifle shooting someone, electrically stunning them. If this is the FOTM combo of choice, perhaps thieves could dodge the bullets and come in to do serious damage on a warrior ill-prepared to defend themselves against melee with a rifle. Or guardians could put up shields to make the bullet bounce back.
Going back to what you said earlier about Rift, I think if your goal is solely to maximize DPS, then there's always going to be a best build (especially with Rift which I think really lacked synergy between a lot of the tree combinations). But if you need to build in enough control and support abilities to keep you alive, and try to damage when you get a chance, it seems reasonable that the optimal cross profession combo is going to depend on the situation.
"Gamers will no longer buy the argument that every MMO requires a subscription fee to offset server and bandwidth costs. It's not true you know it, and they know it." -Jeff Strain, co-founder of ArenaNet, 2007
As opposed to artificially elongating content by creating a linear gear progression that you have to grind through to unlock the next layer, or artificially elongating content by creating "hard modes" for all your dungeons, or creating two factions to artificially double your content?
Level scaling doesn't artificially elongate content...it OPENS the breadth of content to the max level player. We're not talking about repeating the same linear low level content, we're talking about having the ability to do content you missed...content that would become trivial in most other MMORPGs and be locked off from play unless you create an alt.
That's great that some previous games tacked on a system to de-level you...but the issue with making it optional is griefing. Players who want to go back and one-shot all the content in low level areas ruin those areas for level-appropriate players. Having level scaling happen automatically removes the griefing while still allowing players to utilize ALL content at max level with at least some level of challenge. It's one of the many ways the game facilitates social play...high level players can actually group up with lower level players to do their content in an organic way that doesn't completely trivialize the game play.
Also, having to visit an NPC and manually level yourself down every time you want to visit a lower-level zone seems pretty annoying and immersion breaking. In GW2, you can just head out and explore...and whatever new content you find, wherever you go, will be at least a reasonable challenge for you regardless of your level, and you'll be able to play cooperatively with the players there regardless of their level.
Clearly you're uninformed about the game. If you legitimately want answers to your questions, you should avail yourself of the readily available MASSIVE quantity of infomration that's on the web and easily accessible with a simple search.
Everything about GW2 is designed from the ground up to facilitate social play...it isn't just a couple systems that push players into proximity with each other tacked onto a solo game like what you see in Rift. Just as a start, read up on the way loot works, the way gathering resources works, the way combat works (cross profession combos, healing, rezzing, etc), the way scaling works for events and for players, the more open guild system, the minigames in cities, and the info we have on WvWvW PvP. Hopefully then you'll start to grasp the way social play is built in from the ground up.
Those are all badly designed games that use some version of the exact same formula and mechanics. They all suffer the same problems because they are all very similar in design. The fact that you run out of content quickly and have nothing to do at max level other than raid is a product of their game design... GW2 is designed differently, so won't suffer from the same problems.
Just as one quick example... Rift has only two linear quest progression paths (one for each faction), which totally fill in every zone. Once you've played the path for one faction, you've literally played all the content other than dungeons and raids. It's this linear progression system, and the fact that you can only get challenge and progression from a very limited range of content (due to content being fixed in level) that causes players to run out of things to do so quickly. The assumption by the developers is that content throughout the leveling curve doesn't matter, because everyone will be max level super quick and so the focus is on creating time sinks in endgame to keep everyone paying a subscription until expansion time.
GW2 is designed in a completely different way. Because of the automatic scaling of players to the content, there is no content that becomes trivial, so the developers can spend their time creating a very wide breadth of content in each level range...none of it goes to waste because it can be utilized by players regardless of their level. There really are no restrictions on where they place content, since their DE system frees them up from having to place everything in a linear path for the player (no need to line everything up according to level). I could go on...
Wrong. The journey is GW2 isn't fixed to the leveling process. You will be able to continue doing all the content regardless of your level...so the journey will be much less linear in terms of open world content. It's also much deeper and can last much longer, because again, all content can be utilized by all players, instead of a game design where the leveling progression content is wasted once players outlevel it.You're mistaken impression again comes from trying to view GW2 through the goggles of prior MMORPG design. GW2 is "about the journey" just as much as those older MMORPGs, but it just gets there by a completely different route. The level cap isn't the "finish line" in GW2... if you level to max and stop playing, that will be your choice, but you'll be missing out on a tremendous amount of content (again, because this game is not going to be layed out in a linear path). You won't come anywhere close to seeing and doing everything just by leveling up...and unlike previous MMORPGs, that's okay, because nothing becomes trivial or gets left behind.
This game is about journey because the journey isn't attached to the leveling process... the journey is simply playing the game the way you enjoy, and it takes place from level 1 until you run out of fun stuff to do (long after hitting level cap). Levels will come easily, but they matter much less than in traditional MMORPGs. So...the focus is taken off of leveling in a totally different way, but the result is the same.
Will there be players who try to play GW2 like WoW, sit at level cap and ignore all the breadth of content and complain that there are no 24-man instances? Sure. But that's no a problem with the game design...it's a problem with the ingrained mentality of those players. Hopefully GW2 will provide enough little nudges to help those players change their thinking and realize what they are missing.
I think you're totally wrong. I think they are approaching longevity in a completely different way than the WoW-formula dictates (hence the problems a lot of people are having with wrapping their heads around it). GW2 will approach longevity in terms of building a server-wide community and facilitating players meeting people and making new friends. It will facilitate longevity through addicting and varying fundamental game play, and through a changing world that stays fresh much longer and shows persistent consequences of player actions. They will keep players around by getting them truly invested in their own story, and the story of the world.
They'll be encouraging players to stay by enticing them with fun and community and a myriad of choices of how to play, rather than by placing an endless line of little pointless carrots in front of the player to keep them paying. Will some players take time off once they've completed everything they enjoy in the game? Certainly. But show me the MMORPG where that isn't the case. The choice to return to GW2 is a much easier one, as well...since it doesn't require starting up a subscription again.
Fantastic post Cali. Really great description regarding how the game's design removes the barriers to social interaction and thus promote its growth organically.
As to the people worried about end game and nothing to do: Fozzik answered it best: you can do the content you never got to see, you can run dungeons, elite DEs, make alts for different storylines/gameplay and PvP. If you are bored of all that, since you ARE NOT PAYING A MONTHLY SUB you can happily put the game down and rest assured your characters will be there for when new content comes out.
Some scepticism is just healthy.
I am not convinced either that all of the new things will work as intended and some of them are probably being revamped one way or another rather soon after release.
But we need that experimentation, the MMO genre have been stale as an old loaf of bread for a rather long while now. 10 years ago there were still plenty of games around that tried to invent it's own way of doing things but lately almost everyone have settled on exactly the same mechanics but just a different skin and all different games today are even old like Eve or really low budget.
I don't think GW2 in itself will change the entire genre, but I think it is starting something that will be revolutionary in the long run. Hopefully will others continue to evolve the good ideas instead of just copy and paste. And a new game that actually successfully does something new sets a great example for the entire genre.
The genre really needs Guildwars 2 and World of darkness online, we need someone to prove for the publishing houses that you actually can make more money trying something new and bold then just making more of what we already have.
Yeah, I am an optimistic old MMO vet that misses the diversity the genre used to have. It wasn't that long ago that you could choose between games like EQ, AC, UO, Lineage and several others depending on your taste. I miss that.
I'm not hyped about the game.
Am I going to buy it? Yes. But honestly, it's hard to get excited about games these days because so many games have let us down. I hope when I play it, my opinion changes but I'm more at a wait and see kind of thing.
The thing I am worried about is...and no offense.... it's the community.
I get somewhat tired of the elitist "WoW Sucks" and GW2 is a WoW Killer sort of attutude. I mean, that's not unique to Guild Wars 2 but can't we just enjoy a game and not constantly compare it to another game or belittle that other game to make ourselves feel good? Kind of a rabbit trail. So, yes, I'm excited for the game. I definitely look forward to it. Just tired of the negativity when it comes to dissing on other games.
Hmm, that's a bit preoccupying. When playing RPG's, I like the sensation of becoming more powerful, I like obtaining fabled items, and I like leveling and seeing my character grow in significant ways. Some of my greatest gaming moments consists of times when I loot a powerful weapon or when I craft a pristine set of armor for a customer. Sure, there will probably be rare weapons in Guild Wars 2, but their stats won't really matter, and that just feels artificial to me. It does remove part of the grind in the sense that you don't need the weapon for a statistical advantage, but I frankly don't mind working to get items that change my character beyond merely aesthetically since I feel that hard work is necessary to grasp that sense of accomplishment.
Level scaling also isn't really my thing. It just makes leveling seem rather insignificant (something I did not like when playing Guild Wars 1). I like it when after each level, you attain something useful, your character grows in ways that really matter. Also, even though level scaling allows anyone to do any content they want, what purpose would there be to running all this content? Why would a higher level player want to run a lower level quest? Just for the hell of it? For achievements? For weapon skins? These are methods of progression that feel too artificial, too insignificant, too superficial.
Some of my favorite moments in D&D, for instance, come from these things that Guild Wars 2 is basically doing away with. Achieving a level and picking my class, picking my feats, raising my skills, increasing my attributes, choosing my spells, raising my stats. All of these make leveling feel significant, make leveling feel important, they make leveling feel like an actual accomplishment. Likewise, going to the farthest depths of a dungeon, killing a strong monster, and taking from him his most valuable and powerful treasures make me feel like the expedition had meaning.
Also, in terms of immersion and overall believability, sword X should be different from sword Y (apart from looks). If one sword is made by a legendary blacksmith with a harder, more durable, and lighter metal, and the other is just your average and crude guard weapon, they need to behave differently for the sake of meaning and plausability.
Well if it makes you feel better, weapons aren't JUST skins. They do have stats and in vidoes, Total Biscuit's for example, you can see that there are different weapon grades as well. The thing with the skins is that if you really liked the way a weapon you had looked, then you can re skin your new weapon to look the same as the old one while keeping its stats.
http://dawn-guild.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=99:gw2-weapons&catid=45:gw2&Itemid=100
I agree with you about character growth. I want to see and feel my character get stronger. When Anet announced the stat system going down to four stats my initial reaction was concern of the system being too simple. Then I thought about other games like say WoW for example with their hit and expertice and crit etc..... and I remembered how much they really didn't matter. You had a minimal limit to get to and the rest were put into the only stats that actually made your character viable. After my initial shock, I have come to not only accept their stat and leveling system, but like the idea.
Either way, it sounded like your biggest problem was that the gear/weapons were all the same and only had different skins when that just isn't the case.
RIP Jimmy "The Rev" Sullivan and Paul Gray.
This is a WoW killer statement has been coming with every game, unfortunately there isnt an age restriction to these forums so your going to have to put up with the nonesense that comes out of peoples mouths unless you quit the interweb of course, Then of course you get the rl nonesense coming out of peoples mouths in 3D. The same nonesense is coming from the Star wars corner.