What went wrong?

[Mrbloodworth]

What the hell is that nerd doing in the outdoors?

He heard there was porn in the woods

Midget clown S&M porn no less.

Did you say Midgets ?!!1!?

[Tarami]

*shrug* Combat in LOTRO has always been just as fast as in Wow to me. But way more fun IMO.

Hey. I hate WoW, but come on.
Actions are delayed. You press a button... and some time after that something happens. How fast is that?

P.S: I hit 50 very fast in Lotro.

You need a faster weapon. You have two swing timers in LotRO, one for auto-attack and one for abilities. Some abilities are instant and disregard the swing timers altogether. I got three of those on my Guardian, for example, and they can all three execute within two seconds. A faster weapon will let you activate stuff faster but deal less extra damage, while a slower weapons get more bonus damage but can execute abilities less often. A faster weapon consumes more Power, of course, for the same reasons.

[Falconeer]

Tarami,

As I said I played lots of Lotro, so I know perfectly how it works. It doesn't matter the weapon, combat still plays "slow" and underwatery to me. The weapon speed thing is true, but doesn't really change the substance: a combat where slower, heavier weapons give crappy unsatisfying feedback is just full of fail.

I loved Lotro for a couple of months, I really wanted to see the world and complete all the quests and I did it. But combat was definitely underwhelming. I think it pales in comparison with WoW's.

[Mrbloodworth]

Tarami,

As I said I played lots of Lotro, so I know perfectly how it works. It doesn't matter the weapon, combat still plays "slow" and underwatery to me. The weapon speed thing is true, but doesn't really change the substance: a combat where slower, heavier weapons give crappy unsatisfying feedback is just full of fail.

I loved Lotro for a couple of months, I really wanted to see the world and complete all the quests and I did it. But combat was definitely underwhelming. I think it pales in comparison with WoW's.

I think its exactly the same. I don't see a difference, never have when people say that. *shrug*

[Tarami]

That's fine Falconeer and I'm not arguing how you feel about the combat. However I'm sort of on the same page as MrBloodworth here, I can't say I felt too much of a difference between them. Maybe a little, but personally I think it makes more than up for it by being leaps more interesting than the ability cycling I used to do in WoW.

[Mrbloodworth]

yeah, Utility.

[Morfiend]

Tarami,

As I said I played lots of Lotro, so I know perfectly how it works. It doesn't matter the weapon, combat still plays "slow" and underwatery to me. The weapon speed thing is true, but doesn't really change the substance: a combat where slower, heavier weapons give crappy unsatisfying feedback is just full of fail.

I loved Lotro for a couple of months, I really wanted to see the world and complete all the quests and I did it. But combat was definitely underwhelming. I think it pales in comparison with WoW's.

I agree completely.

I couldn't stand more than a few days in LotRO because of the slow combat.

[Count Nerfedalot]

AoC is getting the audience it deserves.

Jesus man, did Gaute piss in your wheaties or something? Did Funcom gangbang your mom?

I stopped playing but FFS man, get a grip over your obsession. The comments you make aren't witty, it's mainly angst-filled bullshit and has been for months. It's not healthy.

Dude, chill.  After the dozens of posts in this and other threads that detail the many ways that Funcom failed to deliver, for someone to claim that everyone who left AoC just wasn't hardcore enough was insulting and absurd.  It sounded like something straight out of the fanboi hymnal, and Lakov's snarky response was downright funny, in a gallows humor sort of way.  You go apeshit every time anyone says anything bad about AoC.  You really need to relax, before you pop a blood vessel or something.

You fuckin chill, DUDE. If I wanna tell Lakov to piss off with his usual comments, he doesn't need you to defend him. His comments about AoC are as tiresome as mine were defending it. His comment was shit, almost as shit as yours. If I recall correctly, I can't remember of a game you actually have liked. All I hear out of you is ...everything sucks. You fit in great around here.

The funny part is, you are pretty much right. MMOs suck. Well, Diku sucks anyway.

Hey, don't get me wrong, I wasn't defending Lakov, just chiding you for making things so personal. 

But are you sure you're responding to the right Count?  I actually like WoW a lot, just not the end game. So eventually I quit when I got tired of alts.  But I drifted away satisfied, rather than angry or annoyed or feeling betrayed or cheated.  I also like EQ2 and frequently recommend it to anyone tired of WoW and looking for something else.  And I really did kinda like LoTRO.  My only attacks on it have been about the delayed reaction combat and general lack of somethingorother.  Other games which I've trashed for their stupid shit I've also cheered for their brilliance.

And thanks, I do feel comfortable here.  Even though I trend more towards over-analyzed critiques, I enjoy Lakov's and others comments that point out the lack of clothes on the emperor of a game that wasn't everything it's most dedicated supporters gushed it would be.  And your inevitable apopleptic frothing hissy-fits in response generate plenty of amusement as well.  Although I must confess I find his snarky comments more inherently funny while your personal attacks on anyone who criticizes the current target of your fanboi loyalties are only really humorous when juxtaposed with the knowledge that they actually emit from a presumably rational adult.  But hey, it all mixes together for plenty of entertainment so it's all good.

All that said, it is ironic we do almost agree.  MMO's (mostly) suck!   

[Slayerik]

I musta missed those threads, I just post the general impressions I have of people...maybe I should have took some time to research your last posts and shite, but that's a little overboard. I still recall you slamming most any game coming down the pipe, but maybe I have mistaken you for someone else. In Lakov's case, it has been tiresome for quite some time...just as you probably felt some of my defense of it was.

I find myself doing the same thing you do, taking jabs at the guys I disagree with. You just try to do it with fancy prose and witty retorts. Why the fuck not? I like sticking to the basics, though. It saves me time from having to bust out the thesaurus.

And by the way....I juxtaposed my balls on your chin. 



Seriously, anyone that uses juxtapose in a sentence deserves that :)

[Aez]

Stock is crashing...
Not sure if the site has any credibility but Funcom sure hasn't any left.
http://wowriot.gameriot.com/blogs/Epidemic-Obesity/Funcom-Investors-Jump-Ship-as-Age-of-Conan-Founders/

[Sir T]

Stock is crashing...
Not sure if the site has any credibility but Funcom sure hasn't any left.
http://wowriot.gameriot.com/blogs/Epidemic-Obesity/Funcom-Investors-Jump-Ship-as-Age-of-Conan-Founders/

Sifting through the comments I think these 2 are the most relevent to that

papadoc299

AoC is a turd, sadly. The rich world of Hyboria converted to online garbage. Still, if you are to blog about a share, do show the full story. Apart from the fact that stock markets have plummeted overall in the Nordic region, FC has simply fallen back to levels pre-launch. Had you cared to show a graph displaying 2-3 months more that would have been obvious. FC bashing is fun, but you can give an accurate picture and still prove what silly asses they've been in this case.

That said, right now the question is what subscriber base AoC will have ahead.
Quite a large chunk of subs is needed for NOK50 and above for the
stock, at NOK20 the profits can be limited and still leave it decent
valuation ratios. There are a lot of profitable MMO's out there. AoC have a good chance of being one of them. But showing a decent earnings level is quite a different story from fantastic margins, continued sub growth and skyrocketing PEs...

briyan

The share price did indeed get inflated due to hype and expectations for the AoC launch, but I think it's telling enough to see the fall.  We should see things stabilize as low or lower than before the AoC launch hype, and no change (other than the loss of customer goodwill) is a bad thing, given the scale of the development efforts on this title.

When it comes to subscriptions, I have a hard time seeing how they can do anything but drop a good deal further.  WoW opened the eyes of millions to the MMO genre, and the marketing buzz around Age of Conan was pretty big. Many bought in, most were dramatically disappointed... the word of mouth referrals should be tiny as a result.  Hard to make truly educated guesses about the cost of running the game vs. subscription income -- I don't imagine those items are broken out individual on financial reports =)

[Miasma]

That guy is obviously a lunatic with an axe to grind.  That said I'm sure the investors will be unhappy with the retention rate.

[Slayerik]

Isn't that the same site that had the slam piece, then fluff piece in response to its own slam piece? 

But ya, what Miasma said.

[Mrbloodworth]

Stock is crashing...
Not sure if the site has any credibility but Funcom sure hasn't any left.
http://wowriot.gameriot.com/blogs/Epidemic-Obesity/Funcom-Investors-Jump-Ship-as-Age-of-Conan-Founders/

[cevik]

Isn't that the same site that had the slam piece, then fluff piece in response to its own slam piece? 

But ya, what Miasma said.

Not only is it the same site, it's the same poster.  Come on, lets stop linking to this guy, he's trolling you for ad revenue.

P.S.:  Go look at what's happened to the entire stock market since AoC launched.  ZOMG!1!  FUNCOM WRECKED THE WHOEL STACK MAREKT!!!1!

[Trigona]

IMO, the lack of a decent death penalty is a deal breaker for a PvP game.  Depending on respawn sites you could end up killing the same person until your fingers bleed.  Games like Eve have got the death penalty worked out to a t  ...  it's a hassle but not bad enough to have you quit the game.

AoC should reassess this aspect of the game

[schild]

Comparing Eve to AoC is doing it wrong. More than that, anyone complaining about lack of death penalty being a deal breaker is basically too hardcore for words. That's a poopsocking dayjob type thing to say, and frankly, results in bad game design. Eve is a unique beast and recreating it's absolute luck that arose out of player politics will be practically impossible unless That Particular Playerbase picks up camp and moves entirely to another game.

[Sir T]

EVE's Death panalty is utter lunacy. Only compleate idiots would have gone anywhere near it. "hassle but wont make you quit the game" My ass. I literally spent weeks replacing ships, and I literally had no job and no life at the time. Now that I have a Job there is no way I would have stood that crap. I'd have stuck to T1 Frigs or quit

If AOC had an eve like death penalty the suscrber numbers would have crashed to 1 person inside a week.

[Falconeer]

EVE's Death panalty is utter lunacy. Only compleate idiots would have gone anywhere near it.

[Slayerik]

If you can't handle the death penalty in Eve, don't play it. It's not lunacy if you think it actually makes sense in a PVP game. Also, if you are defending your home you can quickly be back up and ready...it all depends on circumstances.

Item loot on death is lunacy too. Somehow both these work, so more power to Eve...the sandbox powerhouse. More sandbox, less Diku shit please.

[Miasma]

Yahtzee made a review.  Not as good as his others but still entertaining.

[Slayerik]

Damn you, beat me to it :)

[AcidCat]

Ultimately AoC was just a nice break from WoW for me. I was a bit worried the melee combat would spoil me from autoattacking, but I'm back playing WoW and having fun, and AoC is pretty much forgotten as a half remembered dream at this point.

[Threash]

I dont know why this needed a seven page thread, what went wrong is that there was absolutely nothing to do at 80 and apparently for some people there wasnt enough stuff to do on the way there.  When city building/raiding/crafting/pvp/loot are all broken and/or simply dont exist you are going to have severe retention problems, its really as simple as that: nothing fucking worked.

[Tarami]

Yahtzee made a review.  Not as good as his others but still entertaining.

Oh, the irony of having a huge Conan advertising campaign in the background...

[slog]

Comparing Eve to AoC is doing it wrong. More than that, anyone complaining about lack of death penalty being a deal breaker is basically too hardcore for words. That's a poopsocking dayjob type thing to say, and frankly, results in bad game design. Eve is a unique beast and recreating it's absolute luck that arose out of player politics will be practically impossible unless That Particular Playerbase picks up camp and moves entirely to another game.

It's not about being hardcore, It's about "hey I just killed this guy 8 times and he comes right back in 8 seconds" 

[Sir T]

EVE's Death panalty is utter lunacy. Only compleate idiots would have gone anywhere near it.

I demand genuine rolling eyes in that pic. :)

If you can't handle the death penalty in Eve, don't play it. It's not lunacy if you think it actually makes sense in a PVP game. Also, if you are defending your home you can quickly be back up and ready...it all depends on circumstances.

Item loot on death is lunacy too. Somehow both these work, so more power to Eve...the sandbox powerhouse. More sandbox, less Diku shit please.

Oh I could handle the death penalty. it was all the "dying with no chance to win and the death penalty being crucifying to most people and a mild inconviniance for the rich with 3 accounts or happening to have a 10/10 complex" Bullshit that annoyed me

I don't mind dying. I just want a general fairness to everyone, not to be paying entertainment for those higher on the pyramid scheme and not having to work for weeks to recover whereas the other guy would not even blink should he somehow lose.

(and I killed like 6 billion isk and lost 2 or something, so drop the carebear crap)

But it doesn't matter. The point is that if AOC had something as harsh as that people would have left in droves.

It's not about being hardcore, It's about "hey I just killed this guy 8 times and he comes right back in 8 seconds" 

So? theres other ways to handle that other than "hey you just lost all your loot and 2 levels" Teleporting to your home city would fix that, or bouncing him to another instance. And if your sick of killing him you can just wander off. Whats he going to do, kill you?

[Soln]

I got a question: how hard is AoC on the PC? 

I know one of the reasons my wife and I grew tired of LotRO was the constant fiddling and dumbing down of the video to get it to work.

I thought after EQ2 people we're going to give up on photo-realisms. 

[Tarami]

I'm runing LotRO at Ultra High, I ran Conan at something like Low. A machine that's struggling with the former will be slaughtered by the latter.

[Sir T]

Agreed. I have to set it at brown-with-brown-and-brown-with a hint of brown shiteovision and it still chugs a lot for me.

[Morfiend]

I got a question: how hard is AoC on the PC? 

I know one of the reasons my wife and I grew tired of LotRO was the constant fiddling and dumbing down of the video to get it to work.

I thought after EQ2 people we're going to give up on photo-realisms. 

Its probably the hardest game on a system I have ever seen, and I played through the whole of Crysis. This game is a BEAST on your system. Also its a 25gb install. If you need to fiddle with your setting for LotRO, AoC will cripple you.

[Miasma]

Yeah if AoC was an FPS all the graphic card sites would use it as a benchmark along side 3DMark.

[waylander]

My server, Deathwhisper, has seen massive attrition of all existing guilds as well as the departure of quite a lot of established guilds. I am not going to guess how play players they are retaining, but I know the PVP servers (which they said were the most popular) are bleeding massive amounts of people with each stupid patch.

What's driving the people off the PVP servers is:

1. Arenas that don't matter
2. Sieges that don't work, or teleport whole raid teams out of the zone constantly
3. No PVP system
4. No way for smaller guilds to get involved in end game pvp (i.e. no towers to fight over)
5. Constant class nerfing that is sudden, extreme, and wastes lots of character investment time

There will be a big sucking sound in AOC when Warhammer is released.

[Evildrider]

There will be a big sucking sound in AOC when Warhammer is released.

I dunno, I'm not having much faith in Warhammer either, and i was really hoping that it would be good.

[Sir T]

There will be a big sucking sound in AOC when Warhammer is released.

I heard that phrase about Conan.

The Next Big Thing will never casue the flight of the Isrealites, kids...