f13.net

Not that anyone should care, but I have had enough of the WAR experience.  I really, REALLY wanted to like this game, but it fails in several respects.  For me, the most significant ones are:

1.  The grind.  Just stupid in an RvR or PvP environment.  Discourages alts and switches between sides.  The PvE is just too weak.

2.  Population imbalances.  These affect gameplay in many different ways.  My experience was far too much "there are no open groups in your area" and dead ( I mean totally and completely dead) T1 and T2 RvR.

3.  Itemization.  I might be wrong here as I never got high enough to see what the end game gear would be like, but throughout the levels it was pretty much totally unexciting.  Why not offer more items that can be used by multiple classes, and offer differing stats on different items?  Even if not maximally effective for that class, some players like messing about with different equipment builds.  This just smacks of laziness in game build.  On a related note . . .

4.  Seeds.  Seriously, WTF is with all the damn seed drops, from level one on.  This is like a joke that got put in during alpha and they forgot to take it out.  A blood and guts, RvR kill-other-player game and the most frequent drop are seeds?  Christ, this makes the old "piece of bone" or "worn out shoe" look good in comparison.

I find it intersting that in cancelling, there was no space for "Tell us in 50 words of less why you are quitting" in the cancellation process.  I think every other MMOG I have quit in the last three years has had such a feedback option.  I guess Mythic must be of the opinion that it is not the game that failed, but me.

I am of the opinion that the population issues in their various forms, across sides, tiers and servers, will be the death knell of this game.  Which is too bad, since there is evidently a great mass of people looking for an alternative to WoW.  Of course, YMMV.

Too dramatic. I suspect the game will survive. Even without you. ;)

Kindly permit me to expand.

I know players will stick around almost any game that keeps its servers up.  I have ex- guildmates that still play EQ, not just to check in from time to time, but to raid the latest iteration of bosses, and crow their victories on the guild home page.  To each his own.

What I meant is that I believe that Mythic could fix many of the things that ail WAR without massive changes to the game.  But the population problems, specifically Dest. v Order imbalance, and the lack of population at lower Tiers, will result in WAR being more niche than it should have been.

Drama would have been "OMG, I quit and you all should too, to help validate my opinion of the game !!!"

Can I have your... er...

I think you make some valid points and hope that you're open-minded enough to reevaluate the game in a few months. 

1) Expecting good pve from mythic is silly.

2) Population imbalances can be good and bad.  I personally enjoy being the underdog... my scenarios pop MUCH faster.

3) Itemization is terrible.  I agree.  Needs attention soon.

4) Crafting is also terrible.  It's Mythic. 

I do like and appreciate your comments on feedback as well.  Perhaps that will get added as soon as they start seeing people leave after the first 30 days.  I'd almost bet on it appearing.

I'm definitely hanging for month two or three, I think Mythic is one of the few companies that deserves it.  If I do end up leaving, I have a feeling this will be one of the few games that I'll keep my eye on for a long time. 

The fact is, no matter how much work this game needs, what else is there to play?  Just about nothing else, really. 

That reasoning is just not good enough for me anymore. Only took me 10 years. :)

That's a shitty argument.

I don't care if it's Mythic or Blizzard or Bioware, I expect quality PvE, crafting and PvP in a MMORPG game. Otherwise, what the hell am i paying them money every month for?

Accepting their faults on the basis of "oh it's mythic, they can't do better" provides them with no incentive to actually try to do better. You're delusional if you think that their PvP is so fucking awesome that it makes playing the game completely worthwhile on its own. Hell, there are massive issues with PvP as well, including scenario grind, lack of people and shitty itemization rewards.  I'm doing my best to give the game a shot, but WotLK does look mighty appealing.

Not to mention "Crafting sucks, it's Mythic" should have gone away when Mahrin left the company.

Yes, Mahrin, I still hold a grudge about the crappy DAOC crafting.

I never once complained about crafting in PS. :)

Then again, I was maxed out from the day I logged in (kinda). And everything is free. And there is no economy.


Bummer PS had its issues, there were some nice things about it :)

All I'm saying is that when you walk into a McDonalds, it's silly to expect to get gourmet food.  We have a past to draw from and our consumer decisions are made based on that past.

If you expected good pve and crafting from Mythic, you didn't do your homework.  Caveat emptor.

WAR is all about accessible PvP.  If you want more than that, play WoW. 

I think what we're saying is that the PvP is hardly accessible and that if Mythic wants to keep making money hats in the post WOW world, they better get their act together.

Either that or umm... wowfanboi4lyfe.

Using your analogy though it's like walking into a restaurant called "Mcdonalds Extreme" and when you go in it's the same burgers and fries. Sure it's tasty and convenient. It's fast, cheap and enjoyable but it's the same food, they just changed the packaging and you were just, expecting more.

Pfft. I'd say that the PvP is a good deal more accessible than WoW arenas and most of their battlegrounds. And since you can go from 1-40 entirely through PvP, I don't think that somebody would be delusional if they played the game solely on the strengths of the PvP even if they considered the PvE and crafting to be worthless. That said, I wouldn't agree with them, since I consider the PvE combat to be acceptable if flawed (poorer than WoW's and I don't consider their PvE great either). The crafting is utter crap and they should just remove it and have vendors selling potions and talismans as a money sink. I don't really need crafting, player housing or city building in every MMOG. The collecting aspect of Tome unlocks is brilliant however, and I think that qualifies as PvE.

I'm still having fun, and while I will probably buy WotLK and install it, right now the idea of going back to WoW is less than appealing.

I'm fine with the crafting.  But ye gods the bag space required!  They need to condense it down a bit lot.

I actually hit the cancel button, but this thread interested me enough to spend a few more days giving it a try at least until my sub runs out. The PVP really is fantastic, particularly compared to WoW's dead in 10 seconds to a circle hopping ultratwink in all purple stuff.

I really like the PvP.  Sjofn is right about there being something to Mythic's way of doing it.  It could be the not dying in 10 seconds to bunny hoppers thing.

You can't have accessible PvP if your PvP isn't accessible. So I agree first off that this is the killer. If you're on a server where the PvP is available generally when you want it, the game has a chance. If you're on a server where you have to sit around cleaning your fingernails waiting for it, the game is pointless, because every other subsystem that might keep you busy and modestly entertained in the meantime frankly blows. The game's fate depends on the proportion of the latter to the former, and from what I can see right now, the second kind of server is in the lead as they come up on the mammoth obstacle that is Lich King.

I don't see the appeal of WOTLK.  There isn't anything different that's attracting me.

This will most likely be my last mmo so I'm willing to cut it more slack. and as it stands the fun is outweighing the annoying.

I have to agree with you.  I've been hoping the next best thing would come along and just suffer differing degrees of disappointment.  Besides, I'm starting to wonder why I spend so much time in a virtual world when I should be spending more time out in the real world. 

Time to dust the canoe off!

This is why I'm waiting to join WAR. If the only thing to do is wait for a PvP fight to happen, I can't imagine spending money for that. I can wait for things on my own time.

In the Age of the Internet, the only real way to be a geek is to do outdoorsy shit.

Heed my words. When the robots attack, you may be able to run 3 miles at full sprint, but will you know how to fight them?

Its not. There are some extreme views here, and some people are to much of a MMO nerd to enjoy the fun (including me, and my nitpicking of this and that, but i'm having a blast), even if its right before them. (Not directed any any one person)

Throw plates at their heads and slice off their antennas.

Hah, same.  Only way WoW gets me back is if my RL friends beg me. After then, what the hell else am I going to play? Bioware's RPG? When the hell would that realistically come out?

This game has fucking heaps of issues, but I can still have fun at the tiers I'm playing at.

If I feel the need for endless grinding I can always attempt to max level characters in Persona 3 FES or any Disgaea title I own.

Its probably going to take me a million years to hit cap in this one, but I will do it. The PVP is keen. The PVE is... at least better than DAOC's.  :awesome_for_real:

But I have WoW for PVE.

I have been very underwhelmed with the RVR. I was expecting a lot of exciting RVR, but as my friend likes to call it, its mostly "WoWHammer BGs". This isnt the players fault ether. People will gravitate to where the best returns are, and right now they are in the Scenarios. I honestly feel they need to increased EXP and Renown earned in RVR by a factor of 4 or 5. As I think this would keep people "In the world" and not instanced in a scenario, which is making the world feel really empty.

THIS! I'm sick of scenarios, but open field RvR is fun.

Drink up all their booze and wait for them to rust.

I think my friend is set on coming back to WoW due to the lack of 'smooth mechanics', most of the combat mechanics in game felt unfinished and very,very clumsy. It could've been better. If they can't fix it, then too bad; some people are more tolerant than the rest. But I refuse to be caged by this retarded lag and swordmaster nonsensical balance mechanics, I tried other classes and found some of their mastery trees made no sense at all. It's like they failed to even consider how the game plays out. Itemization is very, very, dull. I even hopped on a destro alt to do mostly PVE with a friend to see how it is, it's as good as WoW on launch 2 years ago, but times change.

 PQ Scripted events are not bad, but they need to build around 6 players max to complete it, not fucking 10 or even 15. On peak hour, PQ is a load of fun with a decent warband; otherwise grinding with a trio is quite pointless, we'd rather queue for scenario. So my point, lower the PVE requirement; let people experience it. It's a waste making people skip over it.

In most every RPG type game where i am given a choice, i most always choose a caster.  I have been enjoying my swordmaster though i thought the balance mechanic was kinda cool.  Is it fun early on then you run into a giant wall of suck?  Or is swordmaster just not your thing?

Then why is it so grindy?

Seriously, I have a sub and a level 8 Runepriest. I just could not be fucked leveling him. They killed the game for me with this grind. I've played, and many of us have played, MMOs for many years now, and I'll no longer accept long-ass grinds. It also does not make sense for a game to ask me to bend over backwards and fuck myself to access their endgame when I could just log onto WoW and play my endgame characters there instead.

I would say it is a personal taste.  I really like my Swordmaster at 20.  It is a solid tank, and I can switch between defense, tank killer, or utility and dps on the fly.

Getting PlanB to change my hotbar depending on stance did help with clutter.  Their lack of mechanics in the UI does fail pretty hard.

DAoC crafting was Mahrin's fault? I hate him and all he stands for now.

This makes me almost tempted to play the game. Pity about the rest.

I believe they don't intend to tinker with class balance for a while and in general I approve of that.  However last night I encountered the Magus ability Chaotic Rift (http://www.wardb.com/spell.aspx?id=8499)


That's some crazy shit, I'm not sure if it's working as intended.  Let me try to describe what happened to our couple of Order groups when this ability was used. All our guys suddenly flew towards the middle of the enemy group, landed together and shortly thereafter, died.  This happened several times in a row, I actually thought it was some sort of exploit.  :awesome_for_real:

How on earth did you find the game to be grindy at level 8? If you do the first dozen or so quests, the first public quest, pop down to the warcamp and do the scouting missions in the RvR area and the first scenario that you're offered, you're most of the way there.

HAHAHAHAHAHHAH wtf . grind at 8. holy fuck. Go back to Guild Wars seriously. I' don't even think I had a problem hitting lvl 5-10 in a good day. The grind only starts past 20. Even my friend who couldn't stand asian grind managed to scenario queue his way to 11 and he said he had a blast before the warpers ruined it for him.

Swordmasters ? Why are they so fucked up?
I stopped at 38. I can't stand it in RvR. Mythic don't really know what to do with this guy, you're stuck in a 1-2 step moves that had to be done before you could even use the crucial knockbacks and damage debuffs. The mastery tree balance is fucked. The tanking skills are too selfish compared to the rest of the tanks in game. Chosen had team aura. Black Orcs can buff his mates, Ironbreakers has shouts. Wtf can a Swordmaster do? Guard. Hold the Line. Standard tank toolkit. There had to be something messed up along the way when they patched the Empire Knight out of the game, because Swordmaster ended up like a half dps class wearing heavy armour but none of the dps numbers or tanking utilities to fit any role, don't even get me started on the dps mastery not giving the best dps among other trees. Most of their tactics points towards melee dps, but Mythic still slapped tank label on it, and gave it gimped dps gear and raped the lore with shield tree just to give order two tanks. One awesome and the other broken.

I see where he's coming from, to be honest. If anytime along the way think "Nah, that sounds boring, I'd rather do something else", you're fucked. The content that gives you decent XP is spread so thin that you need to do every single quest in one pairing to actually get somewhere, especially as most quests are arranged as longer chains, so if you skip one, you're potentially missing out on another 2 or 3. This comes into effect really early actually, especially if you're levelling in the dwarf zones. Maybe not as early as 8, but it's noticeable far earlier than 20.

This may be the case also in older MMOs, but recent years have spoiled us with having a plethora of quests and achievements to complete for decent XP. Mostly you have more quests than you can carry. Also, "cross-levelling" by going to same-levelled zones of other pairings is really unsatisfying to me. It just enhances the sense of grind.

I never made it past level 8 in the beta.  Once I realized how awfu and unfun leveling was at 8 I could just imagine how bad it could be at 30.

This game really is for the PvP-fanatics.   I really do not mind the leveling curve at all, but since I level entirely by scenario/open-world pvp, I may have a bit of a different take on it.  Then again, I'm the kind of guy who doesn't mind running a map a zillion times, as long as I get to play against different opponents, so I can understand folks frustrations. 

*Crosses fingers and hopes the guild is still around in a month when he and sianne get back from their honeymoon*.

I have to say though, leveling healers/tanks via PvE is total ass. I'm glad I have a T4 viable healer now, because the thought of not being able to level one via PvP chills my bones.  I started a withchunter alt to fulfill my solo PvE needs (which I am actually having quite a fun time with).   

I've been slow to level (level 9 or 10 right now with Astrydd the Shadow Warrior) but I'm having a damn good time with it. Actually killed another player out in the Bone Wastes (I think that's the name - south of the High Elf war camp). Lil' Sorceress thought she could take me.  :awesome_for_real: And the mix of PvE, PQ, Scenario, etc. keeps it fresh. Heck, I even had one really cool bug hit me when I signed up for Khaines Embrace and got dropped into a level 20ish scenario. I was doing some good damage too thanks to the scale up. Kinda funny being Rank 2 with a bunch of high Rank 20+ people. Don't remember the scenario name but it was all snowy. There are some definite downsides to WAR right now, but it's been the first PvP game since UT 99 I've ever enjoyed and felt that I could participate in.

I think the scenarios would be a pretty interesting part of the game if they were being used as intended, as sort of a casual thing to do a couple times a night if you were short on time.  But everyone's going there because it's the place to grind for xp/reknown, you can find balanced fights, and you can find fights period.  So everyone just goes there and grinds.  So much of a PvP game depends on the playerbase not being lame.  But I don't blame the players for being lame, I blame Mythic in not recognizing that the players would be lame without mechanisms and rewards against it.

I think so too, the rewards from Mourkain is just too good to be skipped. The amount of renown and exp rewarded from kill 25 & participation is quite sizable (around 3000 EXP). That plus 5000-10000, depending on how good your scenario went within 15 minutes is enough to blow any PVE / PQ quest reward out of the water.

Have you played WoW? It is considered one of the least 'grindy' MMORPGs around, and you just described it. I think that any time you set out in a game to be the maximum level before you will have your fun, you're setting yourself up for a bad time. Either you enjoy the game getting there or you don't. And if you don't, why bother?

Tempting though the 'prize' of 'endgame' may be in an MMORPG, you're supposed to stop and look at the scenery on the way there. I'm prepared to stop, play another character and group with other people on their new characters along the way because I'm playing the game for fun, and I get the fun at any level. I suspect that at some point, I'll have one or more level 40, renown 80 characters, but its not a hard objective so long as I'm having fun.

If you find it to be a grind at level 8, its definitely not your game, and its even probable that MMORPGs are not your game. Run away.

Fake edit: As for XP rates, 'skirmish' or 'open field' RvR is seriously lacking for a game that needs to have players constantly participating in it. Quests, not so much. I can make twice the XP in the same period (5-10 minutes) as I could running a winning scenario. You have to kill mobs at least 2 levels higher than you, so this may be a limiting factor for some classes, but its cake for tanks. Its just not as fun, because in a scenario you're playing with somebody else. Buddying up for questing though and you can still rip through XP (likely not quite as efficiently as a tank with 2h weapon solo) and do some fun stuff along the way such as killing named champions for creature tactic unlocks.

I'd much rather play Phoenix gate and the lack of participation due to this is what kills me.  PG is so much more open and allows for a wider variety of gameplay.  Mourkain is just an in-your-face-zergfest not to mention a LoS mess for anyone that depends on it.  I won't even get into the lag issues. 

I realy enjoy PG, but its about half the xp and renown at the moment for twice as long a match because it almost always goes to timer.

Righ, head over to Open RvR server and see what happens when 1 tier above can go down to lower tier to RvR. I had some instance of defending a T1 objective with a healer and fellow tank. We both guarded each other and skirmished with them while the T1 NPC Objective guards provide us cover.
I mean, yeah it's probably more exciting and shit, but to the outnumbered side they'll just stick to warcamp and scenario grind to avoid being zerged while going out there. But I think people want to Open RvR more but just not seeing enough reward for it. In Core servers, you're basicaly looking for a fight in the lakes. Flagging outside RvR zones is not very likely to get you a fight. I think the major conflict points in Core servers are usually Stone Troll Crossing where destro who wants to PVP had to cross over thru RVR just to get to their chapter 8-9 towns. And try taking a keep with 10 defender inside, i'm very sure you need more than 3x the numbers to take the keep. It's just too much of a hassle for 1200 RP and chance at chest loot.

Why? I'm not sure where that's relevant to what I posted. I don't want to go to an Open RvR server. The rules are stupid.

Ah, is it because I said 'open field' RvR? That's another term Mythic use, like 'skirmish' or 'RvR lake'. Simply put, fighting other players outside a scenario.

Such as? I'd mostly be interested in pursuing trade skills or exploring, but if we can at least grind money or faction and have it mean something, it would be enough to keep me occupied.

If only they would stop designing games that way.  I think Blizzard got the message though.  You can level so freeking fast in WOW now....


When the scenery sucks, it's not worth looking at.

I'm probably not the best person to recommend crafting - I think its crap. However, I also thought that crafting in SW:G was crap, and people tell me it was the best thing ever. I prefer the generic 'collect from node spawn, process raw material, save stacks of stuff that minimally impacts on bank space, make item' form of crafting - something to do medium term as a secondary mini-game. WAR's crafting is more time-consuming, plagued by item level requirements that impact the outcome in unexplained ways and doing it will consume all your bank space, and force you to participate the the slow-ass mail server mini-game as you hand off stuff that's currently too high level to mule characters for storage.

The exploring is fun. I'm very much an explorer - the whole thing is underpinned by the brilliant Tome of Knowledge which makes every discovery, kill and reward into an item in a collection and which builds up a story that's fairly good reading.

Grinding 'faction' in WAR is actually called 'influence' and its grouped by chapter. At 25%, 50% and 100% of the chapter's influence there are level appropriate item rewards. They are some of the best leveling equipment in the game, which is in some ways a shame, because the renown rewards actually should have at least parity through the levels (renown gear is good in tier 1 then worthless before the endgame, at which point some looks good and some is rotten). Getting influence is generally a good thing as you level then, but its not required since the green drops that show up on the auction house at little cost are generally good enough, especially for classes that are less gear-centric.

Whether the game is for you is hard to say - its definitely got its attractions and it has its flaws. Its not 'WoW with better PvP' that some evangelised it as, and which too many people were banking on. However, its a fun game for me and a subset of other MMO players.

They have had four years to add content.

QFT. Fuck's sake, Mourkain Temple is such LCD, meth head twitch fuck assy mcasstastic gameplay compared to either Phoenix Gate or Stone Troll Crossing. And people just keep doing it over and over because the rewards are so much quicker. They need to up open RVR, keep battles and the other scenarios xp rewards or seriosly diminsh Mourkain's rewards. It's just too crazy good.

The problem with the other scenarios that require more thought / strategy [such as phoenix gate, khaine's embrace, half of tier3 and tier4] is that you usually end up royally screwed if you get in a bad pug and you find maybe 1-2 people other than you doing anything to achieve the objectives. In the end, it's safer to go for the meatgrinder scenarios, at least you know what you'll be getting.

It's the same thing in WOW. WSG has a lot more room for finesse than AV, but if you get in a bad group, you're going to be looking at a 50+ min turtle match in which both sides completely fail at getting anything accomplished. WAR has time limits to help this, but it doesn't solve the "I want to stab these people in the face with a rusty spork" problem.


-- Z.

Still enjoying the game here with a lvl 21 Squig Herder main and half-a-dozen alts lvls 5 through 14.

I think you have to enjoy scenario play in order to really like the game (at the levels I've played).  I definitely do; especially with a group of friends.

The last bit is where the game shines.  Sadly, I prefer world pvp... I think incentivizing world pvp would go a long way toward improving this game as would limiting the dilution of the playerbase through the many varied scenarios.  As someone cited earlier (or in another thread) having players vote on a scenario and then having one pop for all players in that tier based on votes would help as well. 

If the game released with a server without Scenarios I would of joined it.

Am I the only person that really enjoys Mourkain?  I would be psyched if WoW had something similar (WSG without flags  :grin: ) except that it'd still be WoW pvp.

It's fast paced, full of action and it's never overly long.  Then again, I've always been more of a death match person.  Capture the flag or capture and hold really can be fine, but I like the flagfests.

I really enjoyed Mourkain Temple, Tor Anroc on the other hand I despise already and it's mostly due to the size.  The action can be pretty fast like Mourkain but depending on where the fighting is if you die twice you could miss half the scenario.  That to me is really frustrating.

I enjoy it, but it gets repetitive when its the only one that pops up all night.

Mourkain favors dps classes.  There's no place to kite and lots of LoS for us healer types.  I don't enjoy the scenario because it offers no rewards for thinking outside the box.  It's just straight in-your-face, button-mashing action for 15 minutes.

I think thats why its popular.  :why_so_serious:

Not sure on your server but on Ulthuan (sp?) if I click join all since they added that then just leave Mourkaine queue either PG or STC pops pretty fast with PG the much more common. Before they added the join all button it was a lot harder to get into anything else. Also in T1 it's been nice since it's not all Nordenwatch now if you do the same thing.

And hence why I called it the meth head's LCD scenario. It's fine the first 10 times you do it. But it really is very much a repetitive scenario. Either tanks and melee dps form a chokepoint killing zone in the middle of the temple, or one side manages to pull the ball back towards their spawn zone and pick off those opponents foolhardy enough to walk into the death zone. Once one side reaches 100, it's generally not going to swing back the other way.

You're just jealous of my ginormous DPS. #1 on the charts since level 14  :drill:

No, you would HAVE or WOULD'VE. ARGH.  :mob:

Can you imagine the xp grind without scenarios?  Would get ugly in off peak hours. 

Still, I'd love a server that weighted rvr more heavily... but I like the option of the faster pace in a scenario.  It's a nice palate cleanser.

I was in beta so I knew what to expect later on. I got to level 8 just on "yay release" steam and just couldn't be fucked getting higher because I didn't want to get to the grind.

What? It's already ugly in off-peak hours.

The statement was geared toward a potential server with no scenarios as an option. 

why don't we just roll on open rvr server then? head over to their PQ and farm their exp. I ran past one dude. gibbed him n got around 1.4 k exp while running to my PVE quest zones earlier.

A bit long, I'm sorry if it's incoherent, I just came home after nearly 12 hours of work-work.

-

You're pushing my point to extreme generalization, I'm not saying it's bad because it's "kinda like this", I'm saying it feels tedious because it's done precisely the way it is done. WAR is so formulaic that you're basically rehashing the same two or three levels (the length of a chapter) 15 times, until you've hit 40. Enter chapter, pick up 10 quests, grind PQs for twice the time it took to do the chapter-related quests, get rewards, proceed to next chapter, repeat. And repeat. Every MMO is repetetive, but WAR gives it some fresh air and seemingly quite deliberately. Every item you get is [Old item] +10%. Every PQ is [Old PQ] +10%. Mastery points in general mean [Some Old Skills] +5%.

That's PvE and it's not WAR's long suit, I'm aware of that, but it's still part of the grand design. It's (atleast) a third of the game that's horribly linear. In terms of content creation, it was probably closer to 50% or maybe more.

RvR lakes are fun, until you realize you're really doing it in vain, because there's nothing about it even resembling closure. Threewave CTF without a capture limit set. Yes, melting faces is fun, for a little while, but since it's largely about zerging or being zerged, it ends being fun fairly fast. But D/G is H/D is E/C RvR lake. Pairing doesn't matter, it's just the same objectives copied and pasted all over. Thank God they removed two of the endgame pairings, I don't know how it would have been supposed to work otherwise.

Which leaves scenarios, which seem to be where people are having some kind of consistent fun, including me. Not really because it's scenarios and shoebox levels being awesome, but because it's the only way I'm getting rewards and some sort of closure and actually differing layouts. So I "grind" those, instead. Three venues, ten levels. And if I actually like one or multiple of them and want to keep doing (grinding!) them, I will still be forced out. Hold it there mate, you've had too much STC already, ten laps around PG before I'm letting you back in. You back? Well, I changed my mind and gave your spot to the tall guy with the crazy-ass beard.

Put shortly: It's like a bad three-hour movie that with a decent editor could have been just one and a half hour of awesomeness. Less everything, please.

I'm not really pushing your point - you STILL haven't said anything that can't reasonably describe just about every quest, levels and gear related game out there. You're saying WAR's PVE is excessively formulaic, and yet its the same damned formula that WoW, LotRO or EQ2 uses. I think the only reason that people are taking umbrage with it in WAR is that they see it as an obstacle to overcome to get to the PVP fun - they would prefer a Planetside or at the most extreme, a Guild Wars game attached to their PVP, not a quest and incremental reward RPG. In the other MMOs people are okay with even worse repetition simply because that's all the game offers. You play LotRO don't you - are you seriously saying that the questing in LotRO is less repetitive than in WAR?

I still play LOTRO as a fun PvE game to do with friends and I think that it can be argued that LOTROs PvE is pretty good.  All the stories have "flavor" related to the books and they did a great job keeping that all in character and the instances are amazing visually and story-wise.   Also the combo system is quite fun.  WAR doesn't have anything like that.  Having said that, I LOVE WAR pvp, but I am aware they need to fix a few things...

It is grindy as shit though in some parts (deeds I am looking at you - kill 500 f$$%ing slugs to get 1 level of Determinaiton, Ughhh).

Funny you should say that, after the RvR combat, I would say that the implementation of the Warhammer lore and the associated Tome is the best part of WAR. LotRO's Fellowship Combo system is fairly unique and one of its better ideas, but it doesn't mean that the quests aren't very similar, and that the items aren't incremental improvements. Sadly, those really are generic concepts in all modern MMORPGs. I still contend that WAR's PVE isn't atypical. Its just that nobody wants to do it when there are more attractive things they could be doing.

Lets face it, the whole idea of leveling up a character in an MMOG is a bad one - in every single game it is in. Its not the pen and paper world where there's a games master with every group that ensures that the characters are of appropriate level to play together. Its not a solo video game RPG where you advance through a story setting. Where WAR is potentially worse than WoW, LotRO or even EQ II is not the quality or repetitiveness of the PVE experience, its in the delineation between players of different levels into locked tiers. In a shared game, I should be able to play with everybody from day one until the day the server closes or I decide to leave, regardless of how often I play compared to other people. Certainly there is scope for character development, specialization and improvement as well as reward for quality and quantity of play, but it should not prevent meaningful game play between a veteran and a beginner. To do so is BAD GAME DESIGN, and the fact that every single MMOG copies the bad design is a damning indictment of the so-called deisgners.

Amen!

But its a design that makes money, because its what the players want. The need to catch up to your friends is most likely a huge retention point.

But i agree with you for the most part. Ah, planetside.

It's not what the players want, it's the only friggin' option available.  Players want to be able to play with their friends.  Thus the popularity of mentoring systems.

On retention, it might work for a little bit or if the friends actually manage to catch up.  When they realize it isn't happening, it becomes a huge barrier and one major reason people quit.  I've done it over and over.

WAR kind of gets it right but not really.  I'm at least able to play with my friends some of the time when we're in the same Tier.  That means I'll last a month or two more than had it not been the case.

what if you don't know anyone?  The mechanics need to be there to encourage grouping. 

Can anyone point to an MMO that really does that well? 

WAR sounds to be close with PQs but you all have highlighted they are not successful because the population is so spread out level wise. 

Yes, I am, same goes for most MMORPGs with a strong PvE component. No, it's not about generic traits of the genre such as "gear", "levels" or "hotbars" - by large I like dikus. If it were, I'd could say Vanguard is as fine a game as WoW, which I assume we both think it's not (to whichever's favour)? So you're generalizing when you're saying WAR's PvE is as good or fun or non-repetitive as any other diku's PvE, because I don't think all dikus have equal PvE. Fun is about execution, not the genre of the gameplay.

In fact, repetition is never an issue in a game as long as the repetition is well-disguised, varied enough and that it sometimes gives you a break. It's kinda imperative to the game not to derail and become a complete sandbox - there are restrictions on what's logical to add. Every game will repeat if you're looking at it with a large enough scope - it's just that WAR repeats without mercy every other level or so. Let me be frank here, WAR's PvE is damn uninspired. For the most part they haven't even -tried- to break out of the monotony. Quests don't even really give you any gear that's worth getting.

And yes, I play LotRO and I will say that LotRO has probably one of the finest crafted quest progressions in the genre. It's the only diku I got multiple capped characters in. If you're saying that quality's implication on fun does not apply because they're sharing the same tenets of design, I don't know what to say. Quake to Half-life?

That said, I would love to get some truly new gameplay, but until someone comes up with something enticing I will keep separating bad, monotone PvE from good (better), involving PvE.

I think WAR's primary issue with PQs is that there are too many - 9 per faction and chapter. There's no way for people in all 9 places to communicate that they're interested in doing the same thing. But content dilution is an issue the PvE got in general. It's Autobahn despite most people are riding bikes.

Actually I'd call it a difference of opinion, not a generalization. I find the overall PvE content of WAR to be acceptable, better (and less repetitive) than LotRO, much better than Vanguard or DDO, much much less repetitive than CoH/CoV and marginally worse in both execution and repetition than either EQ II or WoW. That's why I think that much of the hyperbole about WAR's PVE stems from a desire to be doing something else, not the systems themselves. If you hate it, that's fair enough though.

There is a monotony to the WAR pve linked to the fact that there are no real idylls or areas outside of the war.  Every zone another battlefront and invading forces.  Only the capitol cities offer anything separate to a degree.  It starts of really good, being thrown in the thick of it all, but there really needed to be places away from the war that had their own domestic non destruction/order concerns that gave more contrast.

Also the fact that every second quest takes you to a mostly empty pq further promotes the monotony feeling as well as reminding you of what you could be doing if there where more people around.

But ... but ... war is everywhere! EVERYWHERE!

It's more like 'Where is everyone?' on my server.

I think the concerns of the RvRists is that war is somewhere, but they just can't find it regularly.

(http://www.penny-arcade.com/images/2008/20080220.jpg)

Even if it wasn't empty, it'd still be the same PQ you did last chapter, and the chapter before that. :oh_i_see:

The problems with WAR PvE are:

a) Every fight is completely the same. There are no real wrinkles or complications to mobs, no need to think out any fight. Even a champion fight, if you're in one you can win, is just a matter of time. This is *most* but not all routine PvE in other games, including WoW. At least in some environments in WoW, I need to think out my pathway. Or I need to pick mobs carefully, or use an appropriate pull. I may need to consider target order. Clothies will go down quickly, but I want to get on any mob that can heal quickly, and use an interrupt if I have one. Etc. In WAR, every single PvE fight is the same and virtually every single fight takes the same amount of time.

b) The visual environments actually get less interesting as the game goes on, not more so. Avelorn is a totally generic "elf-land", Talabecaland dull as dirt, Greenskin Tier 3 is "Barrens With Mountains". The mobs are also visually monotonous, and sometimes stupidly so. By Tier 3, I'm supposed to be pretty capable in terms of the surrounding mythos, but there are peasants with no armor on who take as much time to kill as supposedly highly skilled enemies and who do as much damage to me. The PvE has no narrative coherence in that sense, including in the PQs. Think of the first Chaos PQ you see, the one where the giant comes out in Stage 3. It has a snappiness to it as an experience, and the giant is an enjoyable visual reward at the end. Try to think of a Tier 3 PQ that feels anything like that. There aren't any. So there is nothing visual and nothing narrative to make you go 'that's cool' once you're past Chapter Four or so.

c) There aren't really any variant quest types or unusual twists in PvE beyond the difference between PQs and not-PQs. No bombing runs, no scripted bits, etc., nothing to relieve the "kill X shit" and "get X drops" monotony.

d) The itemization sucks in multiple ways, and this means you don't have that vague sense in the back of your head that maybe this fight some really cool or valuable thing will drop. The greens in a given Tier and level range are all identical in their stat bonuses (unless they are one of the genuine variants that has wackily stupid stats on it). Plus crafting is so utterly shit that you also don't have any real gathering "hook" to PvE, where you're trying to accumulate something for crafting. Plus the economy doesn't matter at all anyway, so there's never really any wealth-accumulating implications to PvE.

e)  The time-to-kill for many mobs, especially if you're a tank, is just fucking mind-numbing. I'd estimate it is three to four times time-to-kill on even con mobs that WoW offers, even for a protection-spec warrior. As a tank, I virtually never have any sense that I'm going to die even in a crowd of even con mobs, so it's just "set my timer, yawn, and read a book while I click on the button". PLUS the repop time on PvE mobs is exceptionally rapid, so this adds extra tedium when I'm trying to kill a particular mob or make my way through a spawn to get to a target. PLUS you dismount very easily AND most "shortcuts" are blocked by nuisance mob spawns, forcing me often to have to clear through a spawn in order to get anywhere far away from a quest hub. (Like those champion wyvern things in Talabecland, or those spawns of lions.)

f) Many many quest sequences consist of a back-and-forth between a hub and the same location multiple times. This is hateful in any game, but especially so given the particular montony of WAR's PvE.

g) The Chosen auras aggro mobs at ridiculous distances and they aggro all mobs, including orange ones. Meaning as a Chosen I sometimes get dismounted by level 2 rats and suchlike.

h) Mob following distances are goddamn insane, especially champs and heroes. Again, not threatening, but annoying as all fuck to be followed halfway across the zone by three mobs whacking on you periodically, in part because that keeps you from mounting and it sometimes keeps you from dealing with the quest you've travelled to do until you get rid of following mobs that you had no interest in fighting.

i) In the only major instance I've been in, Gunbad, the clumping of mobs really works against conventional grouping strategies common in PvE MMOGs. This would be ok if some alternative tactics were rewarding and it took a while to think them out. But instead from what I can see the model is "zergfest with appropriate level players and you get loot pinata; zergfest with under optimal level or without some healers and you die". At first I thought it was us, but I've been in two parts now with a careful, skilled group and it still turns into pure chaos zergathon for the most part.


Seriously, it's the little things that make PvE in this game about eighty times more annoying than any comparable product. In CoH/CoV, I can avoid most fights with travel powers, I can call my contacts to turn in quests and get new ones, the mobs have more visual variety and a variety of tactics, etc. In LoTRO, the environments and narrative are more interesting and varied even without their connection to the books, many zones give you a way to maneuver through them to get to desired targets, and you can usually load up on quests and complete a bunch right in one area rather than doing a lot of back-and-forth. Etc.

There is no way to fix any of this: WAR just has bad PvE. End of story. Anybody who preferentially does WAR PvE or who finds it ok, kind of fun, is someone with depraved tastes.

I have to agree with pretty much every point. Plus so many of the mechanics are shitty. Makes me genuinely sad.

yeah my friend brought up a good point, he was darn happy with his chosen. 'wow such cool armour let's head out to chapter 9!'

we got there n he got raped by 3 lvl 20 peasants (he was 18).

'wtf? how can these peasants beat the shit out of me?'

They are peasants hardened by a lifetime of constant WAR! obviously

It's well-known that peasants in Talabecland have callouses all over the body from their sweaty exertions, harder than forged steel. That's why Destruction is out to kill hundreds of them, so they can harvest peasant hides for armor-making.

PVE is just beyond suck for a Zealot, takes me a good 30+ seconds (I know this because it's always 2 DoTs) to take down an even con.  That's not including pulling or locating the mob.  I've started avoiding trash mobs just because the encounters are so boring, but that's making my progression even slower.  Maybe you could give trash half the HP and double their damage?  That might throw other shit out of whack though.  Hope something can be done in any case.

How to minimize the suck of WAR PvE:

Relatively easy fixes (I think), and worth doing right now because no matter what you do, PvE will have to be there when RvR is just not happening.

1) Make RvR even more rewarding so that there is almost no need to do PvE, so that RvR is overwhelmingly incentivized. (Ok, not really a direct fix to PvE, but the goal is to get PvE there just for times when no one's on or you're feeling kind of antisocial.)
2) Thin out or outright eliminate trash spawns. Especially thin out or even eliminate spawns whose obvious design intention is to impede easy movement between quest hubs and quest destinations. I could come up with a list without much effort. There is no reason for such mobs except to slow down questing XP gain by forcing players to take very roundabout routes or to clear trash before getting to quest areas.
3) Cut kill X and drop X target rates for quest completion by 20% or even 33%. (Boosting XP gain rates doesn't quite achieve the same goal: you want to eliminate the experience of tedium during the completion of the quest.)
4) Make it more difficult for mobs to dismount players.
5) Cut the respawn rate on mobs except in PQ areas, where a high respawn rate is appropriate.

This would at least cut out the annoying level of intermediary tedium that is very obviously about trying to slow down the pace of levelling.

----------

Longer term fixes, some of which should be relatively low priority compared to getting RvR in a better state.

1) Go back and look at the Tier 1 PQs and use them as a structural model for redoing the Tier 2, 3 and 4 PQs. E.g., make them faster, give them more narrative "pop" and try to make Stage III a visual and gameplay surprise in some fashion, whether it's a boss with an interesting script, some kind of fun event, what have you.
2) Completely overhaul itemization so that there are more varieties of items and that some of them are anomalously good or useful. Improve the PQ loot especially.
3) Improve crafting and tie it into drops from PvE more extensively.
4) Improve mob AI while developing a much more varied range of mobs. Make some mobs disproportionately dangerous to some classes, etc.--rock paper scissors design for mobs and their AI. Make it so I have to think just ever so small an amount while I'm doing PvE, so that I have to have situational awareness.
5) Change the mob spawn density and clumping in Gunbad and any similar instances. Change the pacing of fights in instances so that there are more definite pauses in between major battles rather than just a constant zergfest. Add visual effects to make it much clearer who mobs are attacking: I've found it very hard to tell who a ranged mob is attacking unless I'm on vent with people because many of them don't visually signal very well what they're doing.
6) Make the design of mobs more narratively immersive. I shouldn't be having to fight uber-peasants in Tier 3: peasants should only dangerous to me in very large swarms at that point. Reinforce your setting and mythology with visual design.
7) Introduce at least two or three other common quest templates.

My main was an Archmage, the more I level the slower I kill mobs, the more I level the number of mobs I need to kill increases exponentially.

I need to interact with items in quests, and the mobs repop faster than I can kill them. I aggro into champion mobs behind trees, around the corner and die because the mobs behind me has respawned. I try to find quest objectives and I can't do it because mobs are spawning in my face constantly.

In pvp the melees get stronger and stronger - most of them get healing debuffs, movement debuffs, and the higher I level the easier I melt to melees. I get the sense that class balance is delicate and fluid in a PVP game, a process that require constant balancing - and it's very disheartening to see practically nothing come in the way of class/mirror balancing so far. As mentioned, leveling in warhammer is tedious, boring, painful - rerolling a different class is not quite an option in this game as it is. Oh, and every time you outlevel one tier, it's pain time - if you go scenarios you get melted by everyone because you just signed on to be the lowest in the food chain; or you try to level up 3-4 levels through pve alone and go through no less amounts of pain, frustration and tedium.

On the flip side, Wow's patch 3 is up. Lots of new talents allowing healer's hybrids to spec and do very respectable dps - you know, when you can actually kill stuff if you spec for it. Healing/spell damage is folded up into a single stat, gear used to dps can now be used to heal too and vice versa. It's a welcome change coming from Warhammer where you need to find the stats you want in the faction/class you are where often it does not exist/only appear in loot rolls for PQs that are completed once in a blue moon. Warhammer's itemization is disgraceful, in other words.

I'm out and back to Wow, it is not a very difficult decision to make.

This is more than 50 words.

having to tank a lot in RvR is a frustrating experience, so i distracted 3 BWs by going in first with my shield up. They unload everything on me and naturally i died in 10 secs. And the witch elf in solo mode stealthed in during the 10 sec and took 2 of them out before dying to the 3rd. I gained 0 RP out of that. Final game score was around 30k XP and 4K RP for him while i'm staring at the bottom with 10k and 800 RP

I know how you feel.  I'm one of the two people who guard the flag in Phoenix Gate.  If I'm lucky, they'll do a small push so I get some action.  Usually it's one person who sneaks by and I have to hunt down, or a full rush which steamrolls me in five seconds since I'm the only one they have to target.  The other fourteen minutes I'm twiddling my thumbs.

As far as I can see, I'm the greatest tactical player on most of the Tier 2 maps on the Order side.

On Phoenix Gate, I scout to see which side the enemy is going to come from.

On Morkain Temple, I sometimes go around the temple the other side to catch the Destro team from behind (which is usually where the artifact is).

In both cases my ShaWar is going to get steamrolled real quickly on being discovered, but goddammit, is it really that hard to think about what the map objective is to try to help your team?

Going around the temple is clearly an exploit. You are supposed to zerg it out in front :why_so_serious:
I usually try with a 'let's go round the back' or 'let's try to do this or that' after a respawn and see if anybody picks up on it. If they do great, if they don't I go zerg with the rest of the rabble. It's not much fun being the only one trying to do something sensible in a scenario.

Buddy I carried the damn flag in T4 twice, capped it two of three tries. And I still get rock bottom RP and EXP. Win or lose. So there's very little reward for doing the objective itself.

 It seems they want my chosen to stand in front and spam damage + kills. Maybe I should reroll healer/dps since my buddy same level as me was getting 20k EXP and 3k RP cause he was hitting 150k heals regularly.

If the people who always zerg head on at least focused on the guy that is A COLUMN OF LIGHT instead of whoever the fuck is closest to them it wouldn't be so bad, but they don't.  It's so frustrating when I'm the only guy who goes to attack the single enemy player that matters.

I agree. I should have added to my post "And by doing this, I'm not doing DPS which in turn drops my scenario score. So I should just stand back and fire into the crowd, regardless of what is actually going on."

Yes. Flanks do not exist. Rear attacks are for homos.
 :awesome_for_real:

I saw this a lot in Mourkain Temple. Everyone would just funnel through the meat grinder corridor in front of the temple. Maybe 1-3 people at most during the scenario would try to flank around instead of going through the obvious channel.

I was a constant flanker in Phoenix Temple and often either a) got the flag or b) stopped the enemy flag carrier because of it. So why don't many people do it? Because it's not rewarding in concrete terms. You're often too far away from kills to get XP or RP, if you do get the flag, you had better hope you don't need support because most of the time it's not forthcoming, if you run into an organized group on the other side, you're going to get killed a lot while everyone else on your team grinds unhappily away in the crush of the middle.

Same for defending the flag, which I also do quite often.

You have to just care more about winning the scenario for the sake of winning than you do XP or RP. Which is annoying, but I'm not sure what the alternative is. If you got big rewards for being the flag-carrier, then every idiot in the world would be grabbing at the thing even if it was an inevitably doomed attempt or if it was a glass cannon trying to do it.

Kill the Dude.  With the Thing. (http://www.gamespy.com/pc/warhammer-online/913667p1.html)  It's applicable to other scenarios.

That one was great.

hell, that applies to several games, great find.

The more I think about this, the more important I think it is as a MMOG design problem. Persistent-world MMOGs incentivize individuals accumulating power and wealth for themselves. Guilds use social tools to push back on that, and some accumulation in many games require working through the social tools that guilds provide. But wanting to *win* a game in terms of the objectives defined by the rules is more like a religious commitment: you believe in doing that or you don't. I'm not sure there is a way to incentivize winning that doesn't just boil down into rewarding individuals for individual behavior, which usually means that it will have perverse consequences when it comes to winning the game as a whole.

As a proud level 21 engineer I frequently get yelled at for defending our flag in Phoenix Gate. And then yelled at for not being able to hold off a whole group of destruction on my own. I think it might perhaps help if the rules for a scenario were put up in very big letters, using simple words, right at the beginning. Might help if there were achievement unlocks for winning scenarios. Maybe they already exist, but not noticed one!

I play on Makaisson, a European server, and all is not well. Now I'm realm rank 20, there's very little reward for me in doing tier 2 scenarios, so I have moved up to the next league. There's some open world RvR, though it is mostly a case of following eachother about resetting objectives as we go, with little PvP engagement. I cannot find anyone who has ever been in a tier 3 scenario. We have whole warbands signing up for them, and still nothing happens. Admittedly we're a low population server, but I know for a fact that both sides have more than enough people for a scenario. Something is not working right. Maybe it's a GOA European server thing. It might also help if the ridiculous limitation that you have to be in a tier 3 area to join a tier 3 scenario queue was lifted. If I'm doing something elsewhere, I don't want to have to be paying 25 silver just to fly to the Badlands to sign up.

Even in tier 2, there is no RvR outside of primetime. I suspect, like many MMOs over the years, Mythic have underestimated the number of players they need on a server for it to function right.

I just want to fight :(

My willpower is starting to wane.  They did some wonderful things and hopefully this game has legs and puts up a good fight with WoW, but ugh.  Doing scenario after scenario in hostile pugs and never meeting anyone even remotely friendly is just starting to wear me down.  If ORvR were more appealing it'd have a bit more permanency and downtime that might make things a little easier on that front, so I'll stick it out for now in case things improve.  I really think FPS gameplay modes should've never seen the light of day in an rpg.

On the plus side I still have no interest in WoTLK.

That totally depends on your server as well.  I've got a friend that plays on a completely dead server, and yeah, he says not much open RvR goes on.  I mainly play on Sylvania (US) and there is a ton of ORvR going on, even in off-peak hours.  Just this last saturday there was a 50 v 50 keep siege/defense going on in Avelorn that lasted something like 5 hours.  Unfortunately, I get zero FPS when I get near keeps :(  But still, on the more populated servers, ORvR is  more common.  I would like even more though ;p

I've completely given up on scenario PUGS.  Tooling around is a guild group is pretty awesome though, people actually play their class rather than trying to DPS their way to whatever XP and renown they can scrounge up while you inevitably lose.  The recent healing renown nerf and subsequent realisation that rewards are DPS/kill based really encouraged shitty PUG behavior.  Well that and people just plain sucking.

Get a guild and run scenarios with them until Mythic beef up RVR.  Hopefully shouldn't be long given what I've read in that SOTG thread.

Your HE swordmaster has a pretty mouth...

The internet has disappointed me, I can't find a picture of an ork with a banjo  :sad:

(http://www.leisuregames.com/acatalog/NAOR.jpg)

You're welcome.

Oh god, you rule, I don't know how I missed this post, I'm stealing that  :awesome_for_real: