f13.net

they give it an 8.1 total review... http://www.mmorpg.com/gamelist.cfm/setview/review/gameID/15/page/1

GFX - 10
Sound - 9
Roleplaying - 8
Value - 8
Fun - 10
Community - 9
Perf / Lag - 7
Customer Service - 4 (ouch)

I liked WoW, but I am burnt out on it atm...

Roleplaying?  How do you rate that?  And why would you give WoW an 8?  Because they have servers with the letters "RP" next to them?

...And why is community at nine?!  Are they rating, like, whether there us an option to have a community (guilds and so forth), or describing the one which is already in place?  'Cause, the one that was there when I was playing... I wouldn't give a nine to.  Is there maybe a second set of official forums that they only let secret special club members on?

Not really sure... maybe the flies buzzing around the female orcs ?

Community is definitely in negative numbers, especially on the forums.  The hunters are planning a 'discussion' and have asked everyone to make a hunter character and join them on Elune (sp?) server tonight.  I'm sure they've broken it.  Mass volume of players is NOT an indication of a good community... just a big one. 

I might be wrong but I think role play is measured by spelling competence. 

And the high ratios of rapping elves.

The MMORPG.com forums are far worse than most gaming communities. Compared to there, roleplaying in WoW is probably an 8 and the community is probably a 9.

?????????

All I hear about is how fucked up all the other servers are. This should be closer to a 4.

This is one of the few areas I would give the nod to EQ / EQ2: community.

In WoW, pick up groups are pretty painful.

Haven't played EQ2 since the beta, so I can't speak to it. However, every other MMOG I have ever played is the pretty much the same as WoW- the majority of the time, I am in the best player in my group by leaps and bounds. It is not like I am King God of MMOGs either (I probably know less than anyone here about WoW, at least among the players); I just have common sense and years of MMOG experience on my side.

It seems to grow with the group size- I have teamed up with 1 other person briefly and had no trouble, but for every extra random person thrown into the mix, it gets worse. I think part of the problem with WoW specifically is that it has so many MMOG n00bs, and that it is so soloable for the most part. These new players never learn the dynamics of playing in a decent group, and are completely clueless as to how to play their class to complement others.

Funny- nearly every time my buddies and I add a couple of folks so we can have a full group for something tough, we get compliments about what a great group we are. It isn't like we are special; we just know how to work together. Apparently that is a dying skill.

The few times I group with pickups, I always get compliments and usually a guild invite. I guess it reflects my real-world philosophy: "It's hard to find good help." I find a situation where that applies at least once a day.

I really try to avoid pickup groups.  The last couple I've been in, the players have just been so bad it's pathetic.   Some of them from other supposedly "top guilds".  The only time I feel like I'm not playing with complete retards is with all guild groups.  It's nice to work with a warrior that with just of the two of you, you can farm guards in Dire Maul. 

Then you end up grouping with some tard that has his BIG FUCKING AXE out the entire time trying to tank shit that's hitting him harder than it would hit me just because he doesn't realize that the extra 2k+ AC from a shield is SOMEWHAT SIGNIFICANT.  Then you've got the rogue that insists on opening with an ambush, ss spamming and then cold blooding an evisc without ever hitting fucking feint.  "OMG I DIED!! U SUX HEALER."  Guess what, fucknut, my heal is 1.5 seconds long.  It takes me at least a second to register that you're being a fucking moron and need help, but by the time the thing lands, you're lucky if the mob hasn't wiped its ass with your carcass.  HIT VANISH, MONKEY BOY.   I love it when tanks, mages, rogues, etc just stand around after a fight with really low hitpoints like I'm made out of fucking mana.  Use some of that runecloth to carve out some bandages instead of vendoring it or getting a whopping 70 silver on the auction house.  I generally don't have a problem with most priests and druids.  Most realize that they're mostly their for healing and tend to play that role with a little more gusto and expertise.  I've yet to come across a crappy priest.  Mages, locks, yes.. I've ran across too many that can't play worth spit.    You'd think in 59 levels they're learn that hitting a mob as hard as they can the second a warrior engages is a dumb thing to do.  I mean, goddamn, the stupid mechanical yeti tanks better than their dress wearing asses.   Sorry for the explosion of hate, but it's a rare occurance that I group with someone outside my guild that isn't a complete waste of my time.  And anytime I try to help them out or suggest that what they're doing is fucking imbecilic (I put it politely, I am a people person at heart  :roll:), they get really indignant and pissy.

I really have to appreciate what a guild does to hammer out the stupid out of a player.  Even the most sophmoric shithead gets his role down after you beat it into his skull.  I know that there's a lot of you that don't need the help and can hold your own, but for every rogue that can go through an entire instance without pulling aggro while delivering supreme DPS, there's some terrible shaman that RUNS around spamming "GET IT OFF ME" 3 times in raid chat. 

And yes, I'll have to agree that grouping with 1 other person to complete a quest is often very painless.  Probably because there's more communication, more specificity of roles and the situation you encounter is likely to have a tad more wiggle room for error.

I think a lot of the problem is that people don't really HAVE to group until the end game and by that point they're so used to soloing everything that they don't know how to playing in a group.

I found the same thing happened in DAoC when they introduced Darkness Falls. We had all these level 50s that had no idea how to play them because they were either powerleveled by a shaman buffbot or zerged the Hell out of DF. True story, I went on a DF raid, hit guard and auto-follow on the group healer, went and had a nap. I woke up just as the raid was ending and won one of the rolls for an axe (if I remember correctly).

It's hard to find a balance, as I love the fact that I can log in, and go do something on my own and actually see some advancement, but I cringe for my future groupmates when I someday do some of the instance runs.

Nice rant.  And I agree with everything you said.  As a rogue, the only way I currently get groups are people who have grouped with me before and know I'm not a fuckwad.  Improved Sap lets me get into any 5 man group I want.  I use distract to it's full potential, letting the group be ready before a patrol comes wandering by.  If it's a raid, I use disenage every so often on bosses to make sure I don't get aggro.  I also keep thistle handy for when shit hits the fan and a mob needs pulling off the healer.

Try and tell this to any other rogue and they'll tell you to fuck off.  Try telling any class how to play and they get all defensive (I do it in tells so I don't disrupt the rest of the group).

I've grouped a grand total of twice now in WoW.  Once to do Ragefire Chasm at 16 and just last night to do Wailing Caverns at 21.

The first group was great.  We had no deaths and consistently handled adds and overpulls with aplomb.  Not that there was a lot of crowd control to do, Ragefire is obviously a starter dungeon, still I was happy with the experience.  Wailing Caverns was worse but still acceptible.  We only had one wipe and even though it was due entirely to player error the rest of the 4 or 5 hours we were in there went pretty well, which means I got lots of phat lewts.  Now the conversations the group was having during this foray, now some of that was unintentional comedy gold.

I imagine as the players get more special use abilities whose proper usage will make or break an encounter I will start to see more variation in player ability affecting the overall experience.

Comparing the first 20 levels as a rogue grouping in WoW to the first 20 levels as an Assassin in EQ2 I certainly feel more useful in WoW.  Sap is a big reason for this.  Several times now I have sapped a boss while we cleared his minions out, amazing what a 30 second mez will do for an encounter (When some dope doesn't charge the boss as soon as you sap it, see wipeout above).  The Assassin class in EQ2 has no such utility, eventually they get a group evac which I am sure is pretty welcome but if you have to use it things are already falling apart.  I would rather be pro-active than re-active.  Grouping in EQ2, at least while I was playing, was MUCH more severe on fuck-ups and even at the early levels and much more required for advancement.