f13.net

Here (http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/patchnotes/patch-8-17-04.shtml)

Major changes. Hunter class added.

Mage class loses invisibility. That sound you hear, is 30% of the WoW population crying (Mages) and the other 70% breathing a sigh of relief or pointing and laughing.

This has been a big topic of mages saying its fine, and every one who doesnt play a mage saying its overpowered.

Funny thread here (http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.aspx?fn=wow-pvp&t=12252&p=1#post12252)

Highlight



Fun stuff. As a Warrior, I cant help but gloat a bit, because I cant count the times an invisible mage has nuked me for like 80% of my health.

What about rogues? I gather that they're keeping their invisibility... does their opening attack just not do as much damage?

Unlike a mage I'd imagine they'd be REALLY close to the guy they just tried to gank.

I don't see anything interesting in the patch. I just hope for silent fixing. Like skills working properly (for example backstabbing working from behind, and not from the front), Line of Sight bugs, netcode etc... They starteted the balance tweaks but nothing about the missing parts of the game.

Here's my collection of (announced) missing systems:

- Better water implementation
- Weather system (rain, snow, mist..)
[X - Done] Zeppelins and boats
- Flight/levitation
- Instanced Battlegrounds for PvP
- Frontier zones (?)
- PvP rewards (treadmill)
- PvP purposes (goals)
[X - Done] Reputation system
- Updated netcode (smoothing movement updates)
- Decent "Line of Sight" for spells
- Update to the ranged combat (I think announced for this patch)
- Hero classes (in doubt)
- Better maps with custom bookmarks
- Better LFG system
- Movable windows in the UI (not my suggestion but rumored by a dev)
- Racial abilities

This patch adds just the zeppelins and the faction system (that is horrible designed, also).

I was really expecting a lot more to this patch than just Add hunter. Nerf Mage, nerf warrior.

I mean its been over two months since then. I thought we would get the PVP rewards. Horde quest lovin', and talantes for more than 2 classes.

I think I will have to replan my theory on them releasing in november.

Players had a chance to spot stealthed Rogues. Also they move at 60% speed while stealthed, and have to be in melee range. Mages didnt have any of these drawbacks with invis.

Basically before the patch, there was no real reasion to choose a rogue in a group over a mage.

Mage do better than rogue:

CC
Damage
Range
Stealth (scout)
Open locks
Withstand damage

Can also:
Make food and water.
Teleport self.
Teleport party to town
Dimension door.
Root

Rogues can do better than mage:
...


Now rogues got talants, and are the only class who can stealth and open locks. We will see how they do now.

I had this reaction with the patch before the last one, in June. It was MORE than two months of waiting for a patch that didn't add nothing and basically broke everything. From the animations, the graphic, quests, balance etc...

I still think that the game in April was way better than how it is now and I even made a post to demonstrate the decrease in quality of the graphic:
http://www.cesspit.net/drupal/node/view/209
Screenshot here: http://www.cesspit.net/misc/worse.jpg

When I joinied in March I *really* expected the game to be released in June. And complete. Then I started to notice the extremely slow development at Blizzard. Now it's a miracle if they are able to push the game out in December by cutting half the features I posted above.

Another month and half and it's October. They need to patch major systems like battlegrounds, level 55-60+ all the other talents and various missing systems. All in one patch.

Some good stuff in that patch. Druids got some serious buffage (relative to where they were before). Poor Warlocks, though, are going to have suffer for a few more months (given Blizzard's current patch rate), apparently, before they get comparable treatment.

Edit: Deleted Taunt question, I see now they changed the Talent for this to compensate.

I must admit the percieved Warrior nerf confuses the hell out of me. I just don't see warriors as overpowered. I also don't like that essentially a warrior HAS to take the taunt talents to be effective in their role at all.

Whoops, sorry I deleted my question while you were posting. They changed the taunt talent to increase taunt effectiveness rather than decrease rage which is presumably why they nerfed the base skill.



That's one of the problems with not having many classes. Ignoring the gimped bear form (which got an AC boost this patch so it might be better) there are only 2 tank classes one of which isn't available to the Horde (no Pallys) so Warriors are pretty much stuck with that job. It also looks like there are fewer methods for managing aggro compared to something like EQ which makes Warrior taunting even more important in WoW.

Edit: Fixed quoting

From the Blizz thread:



Way to beta!

Any news on what exactly the Hero Classes are going to be? I'll probably play WoW eventually, but the classes available look about as dumbed down and generic as it gets.

No official word yet but hints and rumors would suggest that they will be based on both your class and your race and will be patterned after the Heroes and other elite units in WC3. So you would have things like:

Dwarven Warrior -> Mountain King
Night Elf Druid -> Keeper of the Grove
Human Mage -> Archmage

and so on.

Related note. Finally someone has hacked the Blizzard bittorrent to extract a .torrent to use your own bittorrent client. Since Blizzard's sucks.

Mirrored here: EDITED BY ADMIN - DON'T BE A DOUCHE

As a warrior, I am a bit leery of even more taunting.  However, I think that the move was primarily intended to nerf AE groups, which needed nerfing.  Everyone needing to mind their aggro now should make the game less easy, which is a good thing (TM).

After reading his posts, when he learns how to spell "knew" and "known" he can come back and talk about how bad Blizzard is. Otherwise, he needs a big warm cup of STFU.

This is Blizzard; delays are their middle name. November may be way too optimistic.

I know what they did. But it follows up with my quote below:



Actually a Paladin can't tank. They can take hits but they can't hold aggro. A druid can hold aggro and I have done temple runs many times with a druid in bear form and he has done very well in tanking. He'll be even better now.

And really, notice what I said. Warriors now are almost required to take the taunt talents to be good at their jobs.

Something about the whole tauren hunters using guns brings the following to mind.

http://www.albinoblacksheep.com/flash/cowswithguns.php

Just waiting to see Cow Se Tung.

Kaid

The fact that Blizzard had a class that could stealth, move at speed, and lay down high ranged damage has me worried.  That's the sort of skill combination that should never be in a game.

In their defense, it IS still beta.  I can forgive teh stupid when its erased before release.  People on the Bliz boards need to remember that Blizzard is still testing the game.  In fact, if I was Bliz, I would implement the following beta cleanup policy:

1.  Make a giant purple ball that bounces all over the game world, perma-killing every character in line of sight.  

2.  Post a note on wow.net to the effect of:  "hahahaha."

3.  Delete the beta account of every forum warrior that so much as peeps in complaint.

4.  Second post on wow.net:  STFU fuckers....b-e-t-a!

5. Replace lost beta accounts.

6.  Repeat 1 - 5 immediately, then later as desired.

Yeah, but it's a kind of obvious stupid, I was hoping that they would be working on cleaning out the more subtle stupid by this point.

If Blizzard was attempting to remove the stupid from their beta, they'd have to start with the goddamned forums and move on from there.

:D

You found a kindred spirit I see.  When is the wedding?

Actually, I'm finding the signal to noise ratio on the beta forums to be quite high. The battle.net forum though, ugh.

This happened 6 months ago. The pony express must be slow in Italy. That and I removed your link from your post - DON'T DO THAT SHIT, CUMJOB.

I don't mind people talking about warez, but posting links to warezed copies of a beta - especially when people are actively trying to make freeshards for the game (and the fact we may have to cover WoW here) - is a strict no-no.

Also: I realize that may have been helpful to some other people (in the beta) here, but many - MANY of us are not in the beta.

It wasn't Warez Schild. It was simply a way to download a patch. That's all. He didn't link to the beta client, he mimiced what was done on the Blizzard forums.

People who have a pirated version of the game can download that patch and update theirs. Basically - it was a reverse engineered torrent. In no sense of the words was it not warez. Hrose knows the rule. And I'll admit, that probably entered a gray area. However, he knows that people who aren't in the beta do NOT have the WoW bt client - any type of access to it falls into the category of illicit if you aren't given it by Blizzard themselves.

I know I'm not alone when I get the impression that this is your uncle's Blizzard.  I'm thinking that they are getting lots more pressure from the money men to start cutting and shipping.

Edit: On a sidenote, they should have blocked off the beta forums so we can't read what the beta testers say on there.  Let the beta testers figure out how to make a website to advertise their superb beta testing skills.

Why? I love that fact that WoW doesn't have an NDA and the beta forums are open to all to read. I wish more MMORPGs in development would do that.

Some may find this pretty corny, but combined with the hunter ability to capture and level his pet, I think this is pretty cool:

"Hunters are closely related to their pets and must remember to always keep their pet's happiness in mind. When using a pet, Hunters will notice an icon in the top left corner of their screen that depicts their pet's happiness. The more Hunters use their pets, the lower their pet's level of happiness will become. Hunters should always remember to feed their pets to raise their pet's level of happiness or worry about their pet abandoning them or even attacking the Hunter! Hunters are also the only class able to name their pets."

EDIT:  from Mr. Hat's posted link below:
"Happiness determines damage output, so the less happy your pet is, the weaker it gets. "

Tomagochi!!!

I think it's a good idea, if you read the Hunter Sneak Peak Page (http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/info/classes/hunter.shtml), you can see how much it has benefited from special attention.  Kind of unfair to the other classes all the cool stuff Hunters get.[/url]

Check the quote below by an apparently young beta tester.  I found it illuminating (but not articulate lol).  Over time WoW is converging with some conventions of EQ, and perhaps straying from the pace of combat many of us enjoy in CoH:


"efficient solo play now consists of bottom feeding off the smallest mobs in the area that you can squeeze exp out of. anything else on par with our level just runs up downtime and/or forces you to stop to eat every other fight, if not after every fight. i think it is pretty unanimous amongst all players and classes abound that we are generally getting our butts kicked out there now.

one of my favorite things to do in wow, the quests, are now in part no longer doable alone. group play is most definitely encouraged with this patch, and not in just the elite missions [where those rightfully should be group missions]... that's exactly why i left eq."

Isn't this exactly what several of us predicted would happen as they brought in more and more 'leet' EQ players?

  To those of you in the beta, how's it going trying to fight "even-con" mobs? I know Hrose has become disillusioned, but is it starting to feel 'Eq-like' to the rest of you?  Not just in terms of level grind, but character power as well.



As well they should.  They're not an independent company and Vivendi's looking to offload the division.  It makes sense to me that they'd want to push out the game so that prospective buyers knew they'd have a revenue stream instead of just a sinkhole for development dollars.

Im only level 11 Orc Shaman, but I dont find things my level particularly challenging. i solo mobs from 10-15 without a problem. So far I find the game fun, but I can see that missions are becoming a real choir without having at least one additional guy to help.

The whole discussion is about the content. What makes EQ (or DAoC) and WoW different is the quest system. In other games you grind, in WoW you follow a story.

The point is that quests are becoming hard to solo. Or not enough to just support the solo play.

There's obviously much more but the point is that with each mobs "power up" the content of the game goes more and more unbalanced.

And yes, it was more fun to play a few months ago without rest system, with a lot more exp coming from quests, with the animations in synch during combat and the possibility to fight easily more than one monster.

I also agree, with each patch the game seems to lose a bit of that "fun" that was so great.

As to making monsters to hard to solo, here is a quote form one of the devs.


From a thread entitled "Blizzard dont make WoW like EQ".

I've no issue with this so long as grouping is noticably advantagous enough to go through the trouble of doing it, and the gameplay remains challenging in a group.

I'm tired of MMORPGs which support soloing on the grounds that often this is not the case.   CoH is a good example, where most players would rather solo since grouping is a poorly rewarded PITA, and in a big group of players half the players barely even get a chance to interact with the mobs before the mobs are blown to bits.

Beyond trivially easy.  With a lot of classes, you would really have to go out of your way (as in, go out on your porch for an hour or two with your character logged in) to die to most even cons.  That was yesterday, of course.  I was not online for the few hours the server was up today, and it has been down to fix patch bugs for a long time now.  Apparantly, during that few hour window armor was maybe not working and there were other bugs that made things much harder than expected.  

I have no doubt (and very much hope) that the difficulty level was jacked up somewhat, but I suspect that much of the current shitstorm (beyond the typical "the sky is falling" reaction to every change) is due to these bugs, amplified by the fact that everyone is cranky because Blizzard's new Bit Torrent client is an utterly worthless piece of shit and the download took forever,

When people get used to winning every solo fight by hitting random keys, and obliterating everything in groups with nobody ever worrying about aggro, and every mage spamming their max damage AE as soon as it refreshed with no consequences to obliterate instances in no time flat, they get cranky when that all gets taken away.

Yeah. And here my reply:

Eno, come on...

In every game out there levelling is possible. The problem is "pacing". Till now WoW was a fun game because the pace was fast and balanced with quests/content. It's from a few patches that you are starting to disrupt this balance and add broken systems that are preventing the content to flow naturally.

This started back when you introduced the rest system.

Right now the progression through the game feels way less fun, both because you are making errors from the initial good purpose and because the lack of syncronization of animations is making the combat way more messy and chaotic than it is already.

My dream currently is for them to make a single player mmo like game, new content every month or so, no need to balance grouping versus soloing because there is no grouping. I wouldn't include npc henchmen because that'd just mess everything up again. Now if they did that and the game was actually good, I'd be in for a subscription for a good long while. Though adding a chat client or intregrated instant messager software to talk to other people that are playing would be a good move if you could turn it off.

Still have all the aspects of normal MMOs, crafting, fighting, questing, all that just make it all centered on one person playing in the entire world and everyone else being npcs.

Wouldn't this just be something like Morrowind?

Add a meta-layer, and you have the .Hack games for PS2. You play a player of a character in a MMORPG, and the plot is to discover the nefarious purposes of the people behind the in-game game.

No Morrowind was an horrible attempt something almost like that and I didn't like .Hack at all, was nothing like what I wanted.

And I'll be quiet to keep from derailing the thread.

And it will continue to degrade as more and more is added/cut/adjusted to the game. It is an unfortunate by-product of the "never-finished game" paradigm. Once again I'll state that just because it's polished does not make it a good game. You can polish a turd all day and it'll still be shit. ;)

I like the option to solo.

Most groups I'm in scale up their chosen mobs to match their abilities.  If a group blows away a mob before half the group can interact, they're probably getting crappy XP anyway and need to move on.

My problem with CoH is that at the higher levels mobs have more members and BAF much more easily.  This essentially rules out soloing.

Oh, man. Don't get geldon going on group vs solo again :P

/agree

Oppression! Geldon, stop censoring me! ;-)

Soloing is wrong and bad and stuff.

Actually, I've no issues with soloing so long as it doesn't negatively impact the group game.   When a MMORPG is balanced to support soloers, it is often done so to an extent that it damages the game experience for groups.    This makes going through the trouble of assembling a group more trouble than it's worth.    Grouping is a lead form of socialization in MMORPGs, and once you've thrown that out the window you greatly damage the MM portion of a MMORPG.

Really, if I wanted to solo all day, I could do so in Morrowind.

Have no fear, Blizzard has the EQ grouping formula down pat:

http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.aspx?FN=wow-general&T=237676&P=1

Last patch it was perfict. There was areas where soloing was better, and other areas where groups where better. Like grouping, go to the grouping area (instanced dungeons).

Now from what I hear, mobs are very overpowered compaired to the PC, making solo almost impossible.

Oh for fuck's sake. Hurray, mandatory grouping to go into dungeons. Didn't the industry figure out with the batch of games currently in development that only total fags who want to force people to be their "friends" want forced grouping? If they stick with this it moves the game back into the "Don't even bother" category.

Heh, this is just _another_ reason I'm not going to bother beyond an open beta if there is one.

It's like they want me to buy EQII...  like one of the mongoloids in that linked bnet forum post said, "WoW is becoming more like EQ than EQII is".  

I really dislike that I probably won't get to beta either of these(WoW or EQII) before they shove them out the door.  Both games have my interest but both worry me in that I feel both might miss my requirements by the narrowest of margins by falling to far into the "GROUP OR DEATH" paradigm.

Lol *rereads the post and laughs again* What game have you been playing?

Yummy... that's one fucked up class slotting template they've got going.

Druids able to tank and heal? I hear they can't do either right now with any decency. This one *might* be able to work as long as they keep druids from being able to cast in animal forms. The current lack of downtime in WoW means a tank that can naturally heal itself will only wind up saving cash vs time, which *would* have been balanced by the druid's need to buy mana potions if they'd stuck with the "no mana regen in animal form" thing.  Currently I think they'll just make more bank over the char's lifetime.

Shaman - only role is as "Secondary Healer"  WTF? "Ok so I get to heal, but not the tank.. just you other guys in case the tank sucks and can't hold aggro. Great."  Can they at least debuff, CC or deal damage to some extent? The other "secondary healer" class can at least tank.  To be delegated strictly to that role just speaks of a life of suckdom.

Warlock = crowd control?  That one will spark some outcry along the lines of,  "We don't want to be enchanters, we want to be like EQ Necros!",  I'm sure.  I don't think I really disagree with this slotting, since it's better than being a fucking mana battery.  Maybe add-in some buffs/ debuffs for grouping though.

They've got Hunter down in 'damage classes'. They're a ranged class with a pet for tanking/distraction and run buffs.  YOu can make spiders pets and train them in webs for 'rooting' abilities, I hear.  Hello COH blasters. Expect mucho bitching from the rogues when they figgure this one out.
(from what I'm hearing about hunters, I fully expect the big nerf bat to hit sometime soon as outcry swerves from the currently exploiting rogues to the absurdly overpowered hunters.)

Hunters are actually gimped right now so they'll need to be buffed first before they get nerfed back down. The only pet ability they can learn is "Growl" (taunt). Hunters also can't use their missile weapons at melee range unlike every other missile weapon using class in the game and they apparently suck with melee weapons.

WoW.  Seriously, (prior to this last patch) killing the vast majority of level 1 mobs when I was level 1, level 10 mobs when I was level 10, level 20 mobs when I was level 20 etc etc up to killing level 44 mobs when I was level 44 (where I was when the patch came) was trivial.  I can't imagine anyone thinking they were hard if they were even sort of paying attention while they played.  

It is harder right now, but they have said that was unintentional (almost everyone has junk for equipment right now because of the massive changes to the loot system) and that if further changes need to be made to keep it so that a retarded monkey on crack could blow through every level solo again they will make those changes.

As for the balanced groups in instanced dungeons (that are intended to be hard, though they were mostly pretty easy before), duh.  It's a class based game.  90% of the content is outside of instanced dungeons (this includes outdoor areas and "micro dungeons", some of which are of decent size) and, as I said, you could solo from 1-60 with trivial effort prior to the last patch, and they have reiterated that every class being able to solo 1-60 is their goal.  I prefer the instances, but that is mostly because I prefer group tactics.  But I soloed a lot, because most weeknights I don't have time.

Schild, passing on WoW because the hard parts require balanced groups while patiently waiting for EQ2 sounds like a solid plan.

EDIT: This thread is why NDA's are a good idea.

EDIT 2: shamans do nice damage, have some quality enhancement skills and also tank quite well.  That list is very oversimplified.

This is a good thing. And yes, they need an NDA. This thread reminds me of the days of playing EQ. Nothing like looking at pages upon pages of balance "discussion" that would never make any difference on the game anyhow. ;)

Let's put it this way. I like Blizzard. I like the games they have created. I have been able to avoid the people who play their games up til now - because I fucking loathe them.

I do not like what SOE has done in the past. Fine. Did anyone see what happened in Planetside over the weekend? That 'bending' shit? Anyway, they have created an amazing in game event. This was not the same team that made EQ or SWG.

Basically

EQ != SWG != EQ2 != Planetside.

SOE just owns these properties - all the teams are different, particularly with Brad McQuaid gone. As far as I'm concerned Vanguard is EQ2 (the real successor to EQ2). I have no reason to believe EQ2 will be anything like EQ other than the world it's set in - which was never my gripe with Everquest.

Anyway - I have reason not to like WoW, the lack of an NDA exposed me to all those reasons. EQ2 has shown me nothing that actually gets my goat. Yet.

Edit: In fact - wtf does brand loyalty have to do with any of this? Must I remind you that waterthread became f13 and most of the people went to Corp because I R TEH DEVIL!!!111!!. I haven't run anything into the ground. What makes you think the EQ2 live team will (NOT SOE, EQ2 Live).

Enlighten us, whatever it was, it sounds like it might have been interesting.

I don't know, I'm currently having some good chuckles with current Alliance rez situation which has Paladins running away like chickens so that they can come back to rez the party (Paladins but not Priests have invincibility spells in WoW unlike EQ where both classes have them). Giving Druids rez would sort of ruin the humor.

I sort of understand this reason but disagree with it. You're gonna get douche bags in all MMOs. It's the pool griefers are pulled from. I also think alot of the truly annoying b.net kids won't be in the game because their mommies won't pay for it.



I don't play Planetside. Bending sounds interesting if you're implying some sort of sci-fi ish time/space thing or something.



True enough to an extent though I had thought alot of the EQ2 devs were also EQ devs. I may be wrong. Sadly, the part of EQ2 I like the most is that the devs have said it has little in common with EQ other than setting. I preordered it just in case. What the hell.



On the other hand isn't Raph Koster in charge of games now or something? Creative Director or some crap like that. HAM may yet sneak into EQ2.



Exactly. We know jack about EQ2 except some videos, and some dev claims. That's it. That's what I find so amusing. You're practically creaming yourself over a game from a company with a pretty spotty track record. And honestly, when I watch those videos I have mixed reactions. Like the characters swinging swords 5 feet from the monsters they are fighting.



Actually I don't know the history of the "great split".

I don't necessarily think the EQ2 live team will make a stinking pile of waste. If I did I wouldn't have preordered. BUT, you can be damn sure I'm feeling wary, and more than a bit stupid for preordering another game from SOE. I'm just wondering why you're not. You guys are supposed to be the jaded ones. Yet, so far, I seem to be one of the few that is feeling a bit cautious about EQ2.

http://planetside.station.sony.com/news_story.jsp?story=63216

Enjoy

We're supposed to be the jaded ones? Yea, we're jaded with what we've played. Why am I not allowed to get excited about new games? I'm confused, is the hate still 'in?' Man, I fell off the wagon.

To be fair to SOE, a lot of 'teh hate' for their games comes from EQ. Specifically from the McQuaid days of EQ.  While I still loathe the cockblocks that wound up in the game, it's proven to be a different game these days from back in the day.

Yeah, there's still core issues and 'flaws' that some folks won't like, but you can't lay those at SOE's feet.  They've made a reasonable effort to put some fun into the game vs the "OMG 1337 2000 hour eye-stabbing pain campfest" that was McQuaid's vision.  Fuck going to Vanguard if you ever hated old school EQ.

  Luclin was the last expansion under McQuaid and it's still the biggest pain in the ass to get to the endgame content.  PoP I've known casual players to get into the elementals through pickup raids.  Yeah, they're not going to get into Time until a few more expansions when they’ve got more levels, but it's better than the shit that was Vex Thal/ Ssra Emp camps.

I've enjoyed EQ since I went back after LDoN and not had to spend 6 hours a night online doing so.  I also managed to hit 65 in less time than it originally took me to get to 30, because there's plenty of good XP spots.  I only ground 2 levels when I went from 52-65, since I managed to earn most of it just dicking around with friends or doing LDoNs. Shit, if i blame SOE for anything in regards to EQ it's that they managed to make me have fun in a forced-grouping game.

Crappy CS, jerking folks around with shitty marketing schemes, lame assed 'time to slay the dragon' commercials. Sure, those are SOE's flaws and I'll agree all day how fucking asinine they can be with them. Releasing buggy 1/2-completed expansions and games knowing the masses will eat that shit up and pay for it.  I'll hate 'em for that, too.  

However, after playing EQ, Planetside and SWG, I know the teams SOE has are capable of developing vastly different game play experiences.  It's all about who the designer is and what the game's goals are.   Perhaps they can pull of their goals in EQ2. They'd be stupid to try and mimic EQ1, though, since nobody I talk to has designs on abandoning their chars and effort in that game for the same one with a prettier wrapper.

So really, I guess what I'm trying to say is. If you want to hate, then at least hate smart. Hate McQuaid for the game flaws, and SOE for their ridiculous business methods.

My view on the matter, in case anyone cares:

EQ2 by any other name would have me at hello.

FUck, that PS event would have been SOOOO damn cool to be playing when it happened.  Wonder how many people freaked when the "bending" occured (assuming it actually DID occur like the video indicates, and they didnt just take the servers down and reboot them with different land layouts)

The ingame Planetside event was a bit less impressive than the video, but pretty cool anyway. Over last weekend eartquakes and meteor showers started to appear. They increased gradually in frequency until monday night. Then the servers were taken down, a patch applied and when the servers came up that video played at login and the world had changed.

It may be that the new EQ-expansions are more casual-friendly, but they got increasingly bland. The unique feelings of the different places in the old expansions seem to be missing. Might be nostalgia, though.

"the hate" is out, "fear" is in.

I have these horrible nightmares where I'm playing WoW, doing quests and having fun all over the world; then things suddenly slow down more and more until I've been stuck in Duskwood for a whole month. Then, I realize I'm not in Duskwood at all, I'm back in Toxxulia Forest again. Then I wake up in a cold sweat.

hehe some zones are like that.  I always got lost in Tox, and Dark Astoria in CoH with its impossibly high buildings and impenetrable fog constantly arrests my movement rate.

The zones of WoW really seem to stand out though - brilliant colors - and an "alive" landscape (from the screenshots and HRose descriptions).  In EQ I often felt like I was in a virtual golf course - where it seemed every tree and rock was "placed" there.  

Anyone know the patch status for adding more weather effects in WoW zones?

The reason I was pissy yesterday is that people are screaming about the world coming to an end because "OH NOES THEY RELEASED A BUGGY PATCH IN THE BETA TEST!!111!!!"  People need to settle the hell down.

I will stick to my guns on the "game was too easy" issue (play a warrior as my main btw, and no I was not talking about just 1-on-1 though if you pay any attention you rarely get more than 2 on you except for a few spots and that is still easy to handle).  Soloing needed to be a little harder (not more tedius, just harder so you have to think a bit at least once in a while).  AE tactics made groups too easy (and flummoxed class balance).  There is a LOT of fine tuning and bug squashing that needs to be done, but I think the last patch was progress.

In the interest of full disclosure, I must note that I am also looking forward to checking out EQ2 and (asbestos on) Vanguard.  Say what you want about McQuiad, he made a game with character.  EQ through Velious had more character and feel than any other game I have ever seen.  WoW is the first one I have played that feels even close.  I think that in the next year we will finally see an "EQ done right" style game that is actually better than EQ.

Okay, that explains a lot. Now that I know to completely ignore anything you have to say about games, let me say that adding a completely pointless timesink and exponentially increasing difficulty that grinds away at your ability to live a life or function as a person is absolutely not "character". It was and still remains a tool to stretch out subscription lengths, and thankfully it's not something people are willing to deal with anymore except for a few abherant retards who rationalize being failures as humans to accomplishing something and being "elite" in a videogame that no one will give a shit or remember 10 years after it launches.

Hopefully, the desires of the entirely reasonable "crybabies" wanting fun over some shitfest grinds will win out and you and your type will be ignored.

I meant character as in the character/atmosphere/design of the zones.  Compare the guks or sebilis or even ever/permafrost to the bland, soulless and frequently modular areas in most other games (and EQ after McQuaid left).  I wasn't talking about the timesinks (which got worse as McQuaid got less involved with EQ anyway, since he was only partially involved with the Luclin shitfest and had nothing to do with the PoP flagging backflagging and reflagging nightmare).  

Like I said, I wasn't calling people crybabies in WoW because they don't want timesinks, I don't want them either.  The problem is that they want a game where it is literally impossible to ever lose no matter how shitty you play, which I don't want.  Godmode isn't fun.

I agree with Tebonias and ElGallo about the 'blandness' of EQ in recent days.  The level of craft isn't there in the newer zones and it leads to a much more 'blah' game world.  So long as you long for that aspect of EQ out of MMOs I'm with you all the way.

After that point, I'm all about angry.bob's arguement.  It's a game, it shouldn't be a second fucking job much less a primary one.  That bullshit is what I've seen McQuaid arguing for, though, and not the immersive gameworld of the original EQ. Thus, my hate.
 


That's from Vanguard Saga's FAQ.[/quote] It says to me the same nonsense Brad & Co. were saying when they ran EQ.  "But guys, you're not supposed to be playing that way.. play it like THIS and it'll be fun." without actually addressing anything.  That kind of stubborn-headed nonsense makes things fun only for those who think exactly like the designers.

 (http://www.vanguardsoh.com/faq.php?eid=16&faqid=16&ptext=Dealing+with+issues+%26+problems+plaguing+earlier+MMOG%27s)

Many times I recall whining from the old EQ live team about how you were supposed to crawl through a dungeon, not just camp the named areas.  So their solution appears to be 'just move the named around and force crawling'.  It'll still be more efficient to sit in one of the 'safe spots' and pull until the named pops.  Unless they actually do implement the fabled 'anti-camping code.'


EQ at the time of Kunark was NOT a fun game.  It's what they're aiming for, though.

And the biggest bugger of them all you find under "General MMO Philosophy."




Time = Rewards.

No thanks, I'll pass.

I don't know, it sounds like that could be the design philosophy for WoW or CoH.  You seem to be reading into everything and coming up with the most negative interpretation of every word possible.  Maybe he deserves that from EQ1, but I don't think it is a fair reading of the text.

The first quote is "we hate camping and boring treadmills and want more fun dungeon crawls and will design a game to make that a reality."  Now, you can doubt that he can pull that off.  Maybe they can't.  Maybe the "advanced encounter system" won't work.  We won't know until the beta at the earliest.  But it doesn't sound at all like "we are going to clone Sebilis and then bitch at the players because they camp instead of crawl" which is how you take those comments.

Second quote is the same deal.  I will be skeptical about the "advanced encounter system" until I see it in action, especially because it lack details.  But I won't just make up things like "obviously that just means they want to clone sebilis but have the mushroom king spawn at different spots."  Maybe that's what it means, maybe it isn't.  The point is that we don't know.

The third quote is something we all like to bitch about, advancement where time spent is a component, but you aren't going to avoid it.  If you don't want time = rewards, you won't like Vanguard, you won't like WoW, you won't like CoH, and you won't like Diablo.  Time = rewards in all those games.  The only remotely frightening thing in this quote is the "hours and hours" remark, which comes across as a bit of a hyberbole to me, especially since he says that there will be solo routes always available to the top levels.  Anyway, if you kill a trivially easy mob in some easy outdoor zone that takes no thought or effort, you should not get as much of a reward as you do for cooperating with other skilled players crawling through to the bottom of a challenging dungeon for a couple hours where each person's skills are tested to the extreme.  That doesn't sound so bad to me.  I just want something fun to do when I log in.  If I can log in for a quickie during a weeknight and do some worthwhile soloing and log in for a few hours on a Sunday afternoon and do a worthwhile dungeon crawl, I'll be happy.  If I can't, I'll quit.

Anyway, Vanguard may well suck ass.  I just said I was looking forward to checking it out.

Ditto. I have gone on record many, many times about how much I liked the original EQ 'dungeons' (Unrest technically isn't a dungeon, but pretty cool nonetheless), and that I feel they've set a bar no mmog (that I've played or heard about) meets or exceeds, even subsequent EQ expansions.

And once I got tired of hanging out in the atmospheric gameworld, it was all over for EQ, as the core mechanics are pretty crappy.

Final straw in EQ, dying to green and blues that conned indiff, putting my 54th level necro a sliver from /regressing/ to level 53. It was taking me about a month to recover from /each death/ at that point (I wasn't in a big guild or a powergamer). So I logged off in the Magi Room of Guk, and there he sits to this day.

My time is valuable to me. I'd rather play something that doesn't eradicate the small gains I do make in the time I spend playing, it doesn't make the game more fun or the rewards more worthwhile for me, it just tells me it's a game I won't be playing.

In that 40-minute video on kikizo with the Big Blue Box devs, one dev states a nice piece about how he despises punitive games that punish players for screwing up. I find it refreshing to hear from a developer, I don't play games to get punished, there's plenty enough of that in the real world. Games should be fun, alpha and omega.

Depends on how far you take this.  Godmode sucks and is incredibly boring because you can't lose.  If you never punish a player for screwing up they can never lose.  That game will suck balls IMO.

If punishment is equated to lack of progress than I could see it, but only if the challenges are actually difficult.

It reminds me of why I hated dungeon siege.  The game played itself if you went through any effort to setup even a mediocre AI for your characters.  Clicking in the next room was sufficient to defeat that room.

Well, even assuming that, there's a difference between being punished by reloading a save game and losing 5 minutes of gameplay and a mmog costing you hours, days, or more, which compounds upon each successive 'mistake'.

You can have challenges without punishing people for not besting those challenges. A losing scenario that's rewarding in a different way, for instance, or at least fun. Everything should be fun, even losing or dying.

I never said anything about godmode :)

Bottom line is the same management that approves shipping crappy, unfinished, poorly thought out, least amount possibly spent on expansions out the door in EQ is going to be in charge for EQ2. As long as they get their bonuses every quarter they couldn't give a shit about the quality of the work, so personally I hope EQ2 crashes and burns.

BRING BACK THE VISION!

(http://www.cenara.com/users/ce00367/images/antiEQ.gif)

So you are still fooling with the "difficulty" in a MMOG? Really? You even believe your own words?

I'll avoid to link my long essays and I'll just say that difficulty in a MMOG doesn't exist, because these games are designed with the "risk vs reward" model. When WoW was "easy" you simply fought higher levels mobs, ofter aggroing more than one and still winning. Now that the game is harder (I don't know since I didn't have the time to test) nothing will change from the difficulty point of view. You'll simply have to aim at lower level mobs, one at time. I die in WoW 20 times more than I do in DAoC. Where's the god mode? If I easily win it's simply time to move on a harder target.

This is all about the grind. After you killed a mob once all the gameplay goes to hell, even in a game like WoW where you have many, many tools if you compare it to a similar game like DAoC.

So stop talking about the difficulty in a MMOG, because it really cannot exist without stirctly instanced content for a fixed number of players.

Hrose, how would you suggest Blizz handles player advancement in a game which is likely to become 1+ million people strong, without using a tried-and-true method of monster-slaying/questing xp gains while at the same time making it accessible to their fanbase and appealing to the uninitiated?

Not gonna happen.

Bruce

Bear in mind, bruce, that I am making a loose guess on total subscriber count during WoW's peak popularity.  Stranger things have happened than the smash-success of a potentially super game being placed by a world-reknowned developer into a rough market.

What in the world makes you think everyone who bought a Warcraft title is going to be willing to subscribe to a World of Warcraft MMOG?

As I just said in an interview for EGB, I think WoW can get 100,000 - 200,000 subscribers within the first 6 months no problem.  But I would be reluctant to predict anything beyond that.  And 1 million?  That would be more than EverQuest, Dark Age of Camelot, and Star Wars: Galaxies combined.

Not gonna happen.

Bruce

What about the korean market?  I realize if any market is suffering from a glut of MMO's it is Korea, but that country damn near lives for Blizzard games.  Please understand, I'm being entirely sincere in my inquiry, since I know for a fact you'd have more hard data on MMO statistics than I would care to research.  Just curious...

Quote saved. We'll see in about a year. My prediction is 400k in the first six months.

I think WoW will do incredibly well. Not because it will bring anything new to the table, or because it will actually be good. But rather, because it is a Blizzard game. Blizzard games have millions upon millions of players worldwide. They release one game at a time with a fairly reasonable amount of time in between each one (especially since Blizzard North dissolved).

WoW will bring a lot of players to the MMORPG world that aren't already completely jaded by online gaming. It will be the new Everquest. Everquest brought us all to the world of MMORPGs (well, you know what I'm saying, of course there were MU*s, but anyway...).

Do I think that WoW will be "The Game of Choice" (tm) for the current MMOG vets - No, not at all. But it will be the Game of Choice for the new generation of MMOG players.

I think all the vets will be playing Guild Wars, EQ2, and Tabula Rasa becasue they know better than to trust a team known for streamlining rather than innovation. Though, everything that is old to us will be 'New' to the Kekelaaaaaaa~ generation of MMOG gamers. I'm going to hopefully be fooling around with WoW this week, but I've been catching up on what they're doing and to all the people who are planning to preorder it, all I can say is: Enjoy babysitting n00blers, n00blers.

If EQ2, Guild Wars, Tabula Rasa, and a few other games weren't on the horizon - I'd say double or triple that number. 400k sounds about right though given the number of Blizzard fans who will probably sign up. I know 5 of my friends who have never played an MMORPG before are salivating at the mere mention of the game. Needless to say, I don't talk to them much at the moment. It's Pavlov's MMOG.

Edit: And no reason to save the quote - neither you nor he are the once and future Master of MMOG subscription numbers.

Ahh, my mistake.  I did not realize that they were targeting simultaneous release in Korea.  However, the Korean MMOG-style is very different from NA-style.  History has shown that it is hard to produce a game that appeals well to both audiences... L2 and FF XI may be the best examples of crossover.

I wouldn't want to gamble on any predictions on how the game will be received in Korea.  400K certainly isn't impossible.  But 1 million?  Nope, it's not in the cards.

Bruce

I mostly agree that these games are about RvR rather than skill.  However, there is a skill involved in these games, and that skill is the ability to cooperate effectively, and includes logistics, cohesion, and discipline.  There should be a big difference between an extremely coordinated group of people and 5 random b.net retards mashing keys or 5 people who placed their cats on their keybords while they went to the can.

As was said for TSO and SWG.

Neither of which have even remotely near the same level of gameplaying fanbois as WoW. Blizzard has an installed base of customers who are BRAND loyal. In addition the number of people that are loyal to them outnumbers probably any other company on the market. They will eat up almost any shit Blizzard feeds them.

As for SWG, it did bring a lot of people to MMORPGs, it's why you didn't see any other MMOG drop in membership numbers near at the amount that SWG gained them. As for TSO, I know a lot of girls who played it and just found it to be an awful waste of time.

While I agree that WoW will bring some new people to the mmog genre, I just don't see it sustaining them.  Let's face it, the Diablo Monty Haul-esque nature most of these people are expecting will soon be replaced by the lack of immediate gratification that all mmog treadmills bring.  The short attention span folks will buy this title at release and quickly move back to their PS2 or Xbox lives.

I think WoW will have some solid numbers at release and perhaps grow a bit for the first 3-6 months... after that it will likely level off or decline slightly.  I'm guessing this one at the 250 - 300k subscriber mark with an outside shot at 400k.  Why?  I don't see WoW bringing anything to the table that we haven't already seen.

Improvements yes but on the side of innovation you might consider one thing:  its graphics strategy.

WoW graphics are heavy on style, masking their simplicity and low poylgon count.  That we can agree on, but consider the implications:

1.  Effort on patches can be concerned not with graphic upgrades, but improvements in game play (new quests, class adjustments, guild tools).
2.  A wider market segment of those that can meet the systems specs
3.  Resistant to becoming "dated".  WoW graphics merit is based on style (is Bugs Bunny outdated cartoon due to lack of resolution? - maybe with Pixar - but how long did that take?).
4.  Reduced lag for pvp battles and raid encounters.

EQ2 is the opposite of course - their idea of a graphics strategy - is to have graphics so demanding that systems today cannot run them with all options on.  The longevity of EQ2 graphics is tied to the same old technology cycle we are all familiar with - sooner or later technology improves these graphics will look tired.

WoW may have sidestepped the whole issue.  Not everyone will like the graphics , but for the market they attract, the future of upgrade path of this MMORPG can be focused on things other than graphics.

Think about it - 5 years from now - is the cartoon nature of the WoW graphic system going to look "dated"?
My 2 cents :)

I'm not sure a graphics strategy as a pivotal factor really applies anymore.  The leap in graphics technology would practically demand virtual reality, when compared for example the leap of UO 1997 to EQ2.  EQ2 could replace textures for many years to come and still be an attractive competitive product.

While Blizzard technically now has have more free time for gameplay balancing it's not clear from the other competitors this is something to expect.  Nor is it clear from their own track record.  Adjusting an ongoing game is more a political/marketing challenge than an engineering one.  It probably makes more business sense to make a new product and reuse the branding.  Much as is already being done these days.

1- Accessibility
2- Fun
3- Stability

If you look at the slideshow presentation of Lum about the mass market you'll see that accessibility is *everything*. And I agree. If CoH was able to get 190k I'm sure WoW will be able to triplicate that number. And without involving the Korean market.

There isn't a single game out there that even comes near to the accessibility of WoW.

Actually, it was UO for me.

And those monty-haulesque games they love so much were free to play online ad nauseum. As I found when trying to recruit members of my bf1942 clan to go play Planetside, the transition from free to monthly fee can be a nigh insurmountable problem.

Quoting Haemish:


In my opinion there's no match between EQ2 or WoW.

1. Accessibility will bring users if and only if it's coupled to appeal.  I have tried/played just about every mmog released since UO and I have almost no desire to play WoW.  I'm willing to bet that there are others that feel this way. When I stated that it didn't bring anything new to the table, I meant in terms of gameplay elements.  Been there, done that... I see no reason to endure the Blizzard fan base while attempting to play another game carved from the typical mmog mold.  CoH had a mission/task/quest driven system and it still felt like the usual whack_a_mole treadmill.  I lasted a month in CoH and I consider it to be the finest mmog combat system out there.

Second topic: If I can't afford to upgrade my computer, can I afford a monthly sub fee? I'm not sure what Blizzard plans on their subscription fee, but I'm certain that it will be a barrier for many (as Sky pointed out).  

2. Fun - Subjective.  No point in arguing this one.

3. Stability.  Unproven.  They have the tools in place that demonstrate stability, but we'll have to wait until release to see how they do.  I'll admit that they'll likely have a flawless release, but until we see it, it's all conjecture.

One of WoWs biggest advantages is that EQ is finally on it's long awaited death spiral, with WoW being best situated to take advantage.  I have never seen any other MMOG garner the attention that WoW is getting on the various EQ boards.  Not even close.

You're absolutely right. I guess I'll be seeing you in EQ2.

We'll see. I'm ready to bet that I'll see you in WoW :)
And with you, everyone else now snobbing the game.

I may have to admit that you're right, until then I'll just be bitter.  

At this point, I find myself playing games to spend time with friends that I know/have met.  It seems to me that with the sheer lack of anything interesting to play that mmog's have been relegated to an "IRC with pictures" status for me.  If I do end up in WoW, I'm sure it will be to join some gaming friends.  

Given a choice though...

I hate SOE, Fuck SOE. I hate EQ. EQ Sucks. Fuck EQ.... Ohhhhh EQ2 Shinnneeeeyyyyy....

As a quick aside, since I wasn't able to address this earlier.  You're right, I'm taking it all in a very negative light.  I remember well the days of Aradune and Abashi. That was before SOE owned them. I see no reason to blame that bullshit on SOE, and every reason to blame it on VI, who is now Sigil games.


Now on to the current topic.



Among the hardcore gamers, you're absolutly correct.  The less hardcore I know aren't interested in WOW, but are attracted to EQ2 because it's a familiar gaming world.  Go figgure.

  Right now which will 'be the biggest' is all speculation. Bliz has a huge fanbase, yes, but how many will pay a monthly fee? This one will be the biggest sticking factor. Plenty of 'pre-reviews' out there on Amazon EBgames, etc saying "OMG there's a fee? Bliz u suck" or the like. Fewer than the glowing reviews, yes, but you can't take a good polling from it.

 
  However, if you're going to 'factor in' the Korean market, then you're missing one important discussion point.  The games we all thought had decent leveling curves made THEIR eyes bleed because they were pussy-level easy.  WOW doesn't have "hardcore" mode. Hell it doesn't even have the basics for Hero-level content yet.  Bliz states they'll put that in 'after release' which means 2+ months out. Your Korean market left after they maxed out before the first month, folks.

I won't be surprised if WOW *does* wind up being bigger than EQ2.  I don't expect it to be larger than EQ was at it's peak, though. While the genre may be expanding, I don't believe it's growing as fast as some predict.  Plenty of folks still maintaining two accounts for different games out there, hardcore and casual alike.  CoH and EQ being the dual subscription I'm seeing the most of.

So basically your thought is that graphics alone will make the difference, and you appeal to Haemish's authority that EQ2's artists are too incompetent to make that leap.

Perhaps.

If you can find a single place where I said any of those - I'd be impressed. More than that, do I need a syringe the size of my pinkie to get it into your head that EQ2 has nothing to do with EQ except for the setting?

It's like comparing Empire Strikes Back with the fucking Star Wars Christmas special.

EQ2 is more closely related to EQOA than it is EQlive. That's a good thing, too.

Which game will garner more fans or last longer or whatthehellever isn't something you're going to be able to make a call on at this time. When it comes down to it, the only way to really know is play the thing and make your own decisions.

I'm not a Warcraft fan. I couldn't care less about the Warcraft universe and have no background knowledge of it at all. I don't have confidence in Blizzard's ability to balance their way out of a wet paper sack or even correct basic technical problems in gameplay (that's D2 playing experience talking). However, I do have friends that are gung-ho on WoW. So...I'll probably be giving it a look. Whether I stay or not, I have no clue. But I will look.

Same with EQ2. I'll be giving it a look as well if/when it ships. Although I can't stand the thought of EQlive anymore, I did like EQOA quite a bit (community notwithstanding) and I'm willing to give EQ2 a chance on that basis. Again, I don't know how long I'll stay, but I will give it a chance.

I myself wouldn't be so trusting in that assessment, since the leveling curve in D2 is next-to-nothing and the Koreans still invade the US servers en masse since apparently their own realm servers are taxed heavily(or God knows why they really seem to prefer the US realms).  They had been doing that from almost Day One up until last november when I stopped playing D2, and for all I know they are still a significant contribution to the realm population.  I would suspect that if anything was going to prevent the korean players from being a significant part of the worldwide subscribership, it would be that Korea itself is home to a fucking boatload of MMOs.  Understand, though, that I consider even that to be a big "If".

EDIT:  I had some decent fun with my time in EQ:OA.  Mind you, it was a rather barren world having been beta, but the only significant complaint I had about the game was one that is easily remedied with a keyboard.  IF, I say IF, EQ2 plays similarly to that, then I may just have to give it a try.

Yeah, but I've been told they play Hardcore mode or are PKz with looting, which is why I'm not sure you can count on them as WoW audience.  No hardocore and no looting.

Well, there's one thing going for it.

You are too easy on SoE.  SoE is responsible for Planes of Power, Gates of Discord, Lost Dungeons, and Star Wars Galaxies.  3/4 of those were laughably unprofessional, completely unfinished shitfests that any decent company should have been humiliated to put their name on.  The other one (LDoN) was workmanlike in its execution, but also the most bland and unimaginative expansion ever.

I have more faith in the ability of the people who made EQ-Velious to make a good game without the downtime than I do in the guys who made SWG and Luclin+ to make a game that doesn't reek of failure from every pore.   But I could see both of them crashing and burning too :)

I agree with SirBruce.

You can fucking quote me on this one. WoW will start out (first 2-3 months) with no more than 200k subscriptions.

EQ2 will start out with between 50k-100k subscriptions.

Both of their sub numbers will remain constant, depending on how long it takes for the hardcore to realize that they need a second account to handle the really hardcore shit solo/duo, or that they need a buffbot/rezbot account for the guild.

My numbers are culled COMPLETELY from my anus. My anus never lies. He tells me funny stories about Swedish cheerleaders. He is All-Seeing.

Vanguard can, is and will be the spiritual successor to all the things that made EQ the most hated popular game on the planet. It will also garner somewhere between 50k-100k subs.

All of these numbers will vary based on stability, because CoH and DAoC showed us stability can trump lack of content any day.

Gotcha!

HaemishM should start his own chart.  Then I could demand links to his anus.

Bruce

Point Bruce.

If I give you links to my anus, will you promise to enter it, shrivel up and fucking die like a good little hamster fucker?

No?

Too bad.

Would you two just fuck and get it over with?

(http://www.grannygear.com/Assets/Images/Races/Moab/2003/The_Lemmiwinks_Experience.jpg)

Lemmiwinks!!!

I already did months ago on my old website :)



Not for WoW.

So what's with the bitching on the beta boards? Are there seriously that many sandy pussies, or are those, as I suspect, the Bliz fanbois who are being shouted down by the EQ vets.

  Every argument I've seen since the most recent patch seems to be one of "OMG this game is so hard" "STFU it's still less downtime/easier than EQ" "Easier than EQ" isn't really a metric I'm looking for in a game.
 
The Devs were oddly quiet about it, saying only things like. "We didn't nerf anything." Until a thread I saw at lunch today where Enyo indicated that things were fine on the internal server.  Seems you should be checking the LIVE server first, folks.  Classic EQ Alchemy/ Oak Bark Tannin mistake here.

   Your players aren't usually just makeing shit up when they're saying "this specific thing is broken", folks.  Generalities and large scale whines you can ignore. Large numbers of people saying things like, "My spirit went up but I'm regening LESS mana than before." or "My AC was 400, and now it's 1500 and I'm taking more damage." or "I'm not seeing any damage mitigation between 400 and 450 AC" usually indicate a problem.

I wonder if the recent bitching has hurt WOW's chances of getting people to buy it at release more than helped it.  It's seeing patches go down like this I wonder if an 'no NDA' beta is a good thing.  At least behind the veil of the NDA you can guess the Devs are being proactive and responding intelligently and quickly.   The WoW dev responses I've seen seem snipish and are something, at times, I'd expect from one of us rather than a guy expecting you to pay his mortgage.

My predictions:

WoW will sell 500k+, probably close to a million, boxed copies in the first few months. When W3 had over a million PRE-ORDERS, you know you have brand loyalty.

It will peak at around 350-400k subscribers (PAYING) in about 3-4 months.

It goes downhill from there to maintain a steady ~200k about a year after release. Why do I say this?

Because Blizzard's strategy of delaying, delaying, delaying until it's good WON'T WORK with patching an MMO.  If there's one thing that has been demonstrated, it's that MMO players are bored easily - but gluttons for punishment. When Blizzard can't spit out content fast enough, people will start leaving for games with t3h n3w sh1ny.

Or you could send  Herbie (http://www.gameinformer.com/NR/exeres/FEECD8AC-CA51-4BA2-921D-B2F22B5437BE.htm).

-Tige

Wow..

Walking into the end of this thread is like the second coming of confessions of a teenage drama queen.

Repeat after me.

W3 was an RTS, with FREE online play, that requires little to no real commitment on the part of the player, since they can always play single-player and never touch the filth that is B.net.

WoW is an online game, requiring a monthly fee, in a genre that is much less open to new players. It requires an investment in time very unlike a single-player game, as well as being a multiplayer (possibly) group-focused game, in which you cannot avoid the stuttering shitmittens that are Blizzard fanbois.

One of these things is not like the other. You are making the same mistake most of us did when SWG was released, thinking that licensed brand loyalty will overcome these very serious obstacles.

This is why I believe WoW will be successful. Because even if it still has those problems you pointed like the monthly fee, it still does a wonderful work to fix the issues inside the gameplay, like a perfect newbie experience and accessibility.

This is why my prevision is about 400k in six months. It won't broke the mmorpg standard, but it will max it out.

Remember that CoH reached 190k and WoW has all its qualities and a lot, a lot more.

Sweet monkeh, WoW has superheroes? Fuck, sign me up. The only thing they have in common with CoH, according to people in beta, is the goddamn instancing and combat system.

Goddamn, am I glad you don't work in marketing anywhere.

I'm getting dangerously close to getting stabby with fanbois. Hrose, you've been around a long time. Stop believing that any game will save the world.

WoW won't save the world, it will simply be successful. I'm the first to criticize it strongly when we consider the "quality".

Why I cannot have an opinion? I'm just saying that WoW does a lot of good things. These things are about *crucial* problems. If you take a look at the presentation of Lum about MMOGs and the mass market you'll see that WoW goes straight to the point. That's all. WoW solves many accessibility problems both because of the tech and the design. This will make it extremely successful where "extremely successful" stands for "maxing out the success possible in this genre at this point". And I consider it equal to 400k in six months.

What we have to see is how WoW will react *after* the first year. Because I'm a lot more worried about the ability of Blizzard to support and expend the game world.

I must have missed something, was there more to CoH than instancing and a combat system?

On a side note, I like to follow up dev posts on various games forums, and w/ WoW I'm very reassured that it will be bug free and newbie friendly.  What scares me is that whenever Tigole posts, it smells of EQ.

I'd be worried after the first day myself. They have shown in D2 just how well they support and expend their game worlds.

Yeah, CoH had super-heroes, which is a whole other fanbase than RTS, Fantasy and Blizzard fans. The dearth of super-heroes games means any computer gamer who is also a large comic fan will be at least mildly interested.

RTS fans won't care about an RPG set in that world, especially not one that requires a subscription fee. Blizzard fans are also used to not paying for something. Diablo is not what I'd consider an RPG, and it really isn't an MMOG-like game. If it smells like EQ, many computer gamers WILL NOT TOUCH IT. These are people who have no interest in MMOG's whatsoever, because even if WoW does all the MMOG-type things well, IT'S STILL AN MMOG.

MMORPG's are a niche of a niche. 200k will be a wildly successful game. There are no more blockbuster MMOG's in the works.

You mean 180K?

Bruce

Sweet merciful crap, is that really necessary?

I just want to make sure I didn't miss an announcement. :)

Bruce