Avoid it's about Lineage 2

[Arthur_Parker]

Creating this to reply to Alluvian about Lineage 2, didn't want to drag the other thread any further off topic.

I can't imagine even the PVP in L2 being any good.  Even after the class change all you have is like 5 skills (only 3 active if I recall), 2 of those shared with every other of initial class (Knight for instance got two warrior skills and a heal thing if I recall, the evil knight got the same two warrior skills and a lifetap, the warrior got three passive weapon skills...)

Target and auto attack is just as boring vs a human as vs a mob really.  You are still not matching your skill vs theirs.  You are first off matching your character vs theirs, and if the characters are identical (like oh so many are) you are more matching your connection with theirs.  In fps connection speed makes a difference as well, but a skilled player can compensate for that, and a poor player on a great connection will still be poor.  In L2 there is just no interactivity in combat.  I don't see suddenly adding PVE at X level will make it any better.  Unless you enjoy picking on noobs and azzraping them.

I don't know as yet, items will play a large part, hence my creating a dwarf to start with.  To answer the azzrape comment, not my choice of playstyle.

A Human Fighter gets a class change at level 20 to Knight, Warrior or Rogue.  At level 40 those 3 classes get a further class change choice of two further classes.  Heard rumours that another class change at 60 is planned, given that A grade equipment exists it looks like a further 2 class changes will be implemented.  You still get to use the skills you picked up on your earlier classes.  Going to paste the skills available to a Human Fighter if he goes through 1st class change to Knight and 2nd class change to Dark Avenger (Level: 40 - 59).

Number after the skill shows how many times you can increase it at various levels.


Fighter Skills
Luck 1
Armor Mastery 1-5
Relax 1
Weapon Mastery 1-3
Mortal Blow 1-9
Power Shot 1-9
Power Strike 1-9

These Skills In addition for Knight
Expertise Grade D
Heavy Armor Mastery 1-15
Magic Resistance 1-14
Shield Mastery 1-2
Sword Blunt Mastery 1-8
Drain Health 1-13
Majesty 1
Shield Stun 1-15
Ultimate Defense 1
Aggression 1-12
Deflect Arrow 1-2
Divine Heal 1-9
Focus Mind 1

These Skills in addition for Dark Avenger
Expertise Grade C
Heavy Armor Mastery 16-36
Magic Resistance 15-35
Shield Mastery 3-4
Sword Blunt Mastery 9-29
Aggression 13-33
Drain Health 14-37
Hate Aura 1-21
Life Scavenge 1-7
Majesty 2-3
Reflect Damage 1-3
Shield Stun 16-36
Summon Black Panther 1-3
Focus Mind 2-4
Hamstring 1
Iron Will 1-2
Corpse Plague 1
Horror 1
Ultimate Defense 2

[Venkman]

But it's still one person tossing an Excel spreadsheet at another. Most MMOG PvP is like this, yes, but others cover that by making it faster or the by-the-minute choices wider. I haven't seen L2 provide either.

[daveNYC]

How'd L2's opening day go?  Any billing/login server issues?

[schild]

How'd L2's opening day go?  Any billing/login server issues, cuz we didn't have any in City of Heroes.

Fixed.

[kaid]

And of those skills listed only a tiny handful are active skills. Most skills in lineage 2 are passive. Alluvians coments still run true up to level 20 you have at most 3 active skills. As a dwarf to level 20 you have 0 active skills to assist you in wacking foozles.

I think you get one or two more active skills at the next bump up.

To give you something to compare in the newbie tutorial in COH you will have as many active powers and probably more power diversity than you do at level 20 in lineage 2 and very close to the same as you do at level 40 in l2.

Kaid

[daveNYC]

How'd L2's opening day go?  Any billing/login server issues, cuz we didn't have any in City of Heroes.

Fixed.

You took the "In your face!" right out of my mouth.

Although I did get booted from the mapserver after making my second character last night. ...grumble

[Arthur_Parker]

How'd L2's opening day go?  Any billing/login server issues, cuz we didn't have any in City of Heroes.

Fixed.

Heh, it went same as yours, I was in both beta's so both games used the same ncsoft account server, when I activated L2, I had the option to activate COH.

Very smooth release of both games, did they wipe open beta characters in COH?

[Arthur_Parker]

And of those skills listed only a tiny handful are active skills. Most skills in lineage 2 are passive. Alluvians coments still run true up to level 20 you have at most 3 active skills. As a dwarf to level 20 you have 0 active skills to assist you in wacking foozles.

I think you get one or two more active skills at the next bump up.

To give you something to compare in the newbie tutorial in COH you will have as many active powers and probably more power diversity than you do at level 20 in lineage 2 and very close to the same as you do at level 40 in l2.

Kaid

Aye all true, just wanted to get the skill list out as it does improve somewhat at very high levels.

[Venkman]

They wiped the beta account characters last Thursday (4/22), but gave those beta testers the chance to log back in three days ahead of the Launch. On Sunday 4/25, beta testers could roll new characters in their Catass2Justice program. While I didn't get in until that night, word was that there was some warping for the first two hours, but nothing like the wholesale crashing of most other early MMOGs. And then Wednesday pretty much went off without a hitch.

I did predict this'd be a launch to finally dethrone DAoC as "the best launch of an MMOG". So far I think I was right :) But then, if Lineage 2 also launched as well, it's possible that NC Soft just does good launches (since Lineage 1 when it went live also went well... for the 10 people that played it).

[schild]

Very smooth release of both games, did they wipe open beta characters in COH?

See, now you're just being a wiseass. And to that I say, Have fun killing monster_1-500 until you hit level 40 or whatever rediculous level you need for raiding. Right now I can take a group of 8 and go at 40 monsters - this is a week after release.

On top of that, I can see where you're going - you're trying to compare Lineage 2 to City of Heroes. If you remove time, Lineage 2 is to City of Heroes like Pong is to Soul Caliber II.

[Alluvian]

Could you relist the skills and only list the active combat ones for one weapon choice?  Like rest does not count, sword mastery doest not count.  Listing power shots for multiple weapons does not really count (although I guess you could switch from sword to dagger for it's power shot since you have absolutely nothing else to do in combat).

And items don't really add to combat diversity in my opinion unless they actively have some sort of really interactive proc.  Just having +20% more damage does not make combat more fun.


I just don't understand how you can find any of that PVE combat any FUN.  And if so, you are just doing WORK to get to the fun stuff.  Work and game are antonyms.  They just don't go together.

[Sky]

Combat diversity is great.

A stat-based system for pvp segmented by levels you must treadmill, not so great.

Imo it's like sending the squire out to joust for you instead of getting your old knight ass in the saddle. You can be the best squire in the world and that other knight is going to disembowel you without breaking a sweat.

I will never understand level-based pvp.

[Venkman]

See, now you're just being a wiseass. And to that I say, Have fun killing monster_1-500 until you hit level 40 or whatever rediculous level you need for raiding. Right now I can take a group of 8 and go at 40 monsters - this is a week after release

Shit, I got caught as a straight man there. Didn't get the sub-text.

Arthur, the big huge difference is that L2 has no business having levels 1-18. It's there as an abject time sink, religiously avoided until someone affects a macroable method. It's like NC Soft forgot everything after EQ Ruins of Kunark. Very little in the way of interesting combat, from both a what-to-fight and a what-to-use angle. They'd have lost players if they wiped out the weeks it took them to get there.

The only thing that L2 and CoH have in common is their publisher. Oh, and I guess that players play only one character. In fact, I see my hate of L2 a strength for NC Soft. Instead of releasing a bunch of blah clones, they have a product line I can admire for success even if I hate the title(s) that got them there. It's why I think they're a company to watch.

But L2 has got a very specific playability to it. People will play it for a long time because they have no choice, or because they're part of that unique mentality that likes DAoC without the content and Shadowbane without the fun. In my opinion, of course :)

[schild]

But L2 has got a very specific playability to it. Koreans will play it for a long time because they have no choice.

<3

[Arthur_Parker]

Very smooth release of both games, did they wipe open beta characters in COH?

See, now you're just being a wiseass. And to that I say, Have fun killing monster_1-500 until you hit level 40 or whatever rediculous level you need for raiding. Right now I can take a group of 8 and go at 40 monsters - this is a week after release.

On top of that, I can see where you're going - you're trying to compare Lineage 2 to City of Heroes. If you remove time, Lineage 2 is to City of Heroes like Pong is to Soul Caliber II.

Er, I asked cos I honestly didn't know the answer, I did wonder if COH launch was so smooth cos as with L2 you didn't have lots of New characters being created and therefore the game world was more balanced.  If they hadn't wiped COH then it would look like an overall policy by NCSoft that other companies would have to consider.

As the answer was they did wipe, then it's not really going to have much impact.

Hey get this Schild my L2 character is a items getter Dwarf, that means I'm going to have to roll up a pvp character too, possibly also Dwarf item maker to make full use of the first so I think your "monster_1-500 until you hit level 40" comment is wildly undervalued.

[schild]

Dwarf Item Maker and Dwarf Item Getter sound like SUCH FUN CLASSES. Does the game manual have any scratch and sniff catass? Or maybe a little tiny treadmill replica to put on your desk?

[cevik]

Does the game manual have any scratch and sniff catass? Or maybe a little tiny treadmill replica to put on your desk?

[Mr_PeaCH]

Hey AP,

Will you be keeping us appraised of the goings on in Lineage 2 for the forseable future?  I'm not trying to be a smartass here (unlike in the 4/30 mmo update thread where I was trying) but as I spent the better part of April in the OB and then, at the last minute, decided I would resist the siren call of open PvP, I'm actually sincerely interested in the shape that Lin2 takes over the first few weeks and months.

My main reason for not sticking it out is actually the zero confidence I have in NCsoft and whoever taking care of the adena-botting and associated duping rumors which promise to ruin the game's economy before it's even begun.  People had reported that clans made up entirely of Chinese 'bots' were positioning themselves to be the true powers on the American servers and would simply sell (for RL$) the guilds which paid them the right to 'own' the castles in the game... meaning if you paid them (and only if you paid them) would they not crush your attempt to claim any castle on your own.  That and I felt they were a bit underhanded in withholding the Chronicle I until June when everyone was assuming that it would come with the box sales Apr 28.

So take that for what it's worth... I'd like to hear about things there from time to time.  And I'm sure others will look forward to it if only to laugh about Lin2 woes compared to teh CoH love.

[Arthur_Parker]

It's Dwarf Artisan and Dwarf Scavenger, I just made those names up as few know anything about the game.

Time permitting and still being able to post, yup, I'll update you on my slow progress.

Finance moving in this weekend, selling her house, then selling mine and buying a big one.  MArried start of next year and then trying for kids, so all that's going to affect my catass gameplay to some extent.

Was looking for a game that appealed long term on a casual basis, I don't think lineage 2 will be able to maintain the current grind level, I reckon they will have to lower it somewhat as even for what it offers end game it's a bit intense.

I would relist the skills Alluvian but details of what exactly they do is hard to come by as it's all translated, fair to say divide the active skills by 3 unless you switch weapons.

Darniaq, I would agree 1-18 are pointless, still I didn't design it I'm just giving it a go.

[Mr_PeaCH]

Finance moving in this weekend, selling her house, then selling mine and buying a big one.  MArried start of next year and then trying for kids, so all that's going to affect my catass gameplay to some extent.

Sounds like you married for money?  har!  Seriously though, all the best with that.  And with any luck you won't get the kids too quickly which means you'll have more time for practising.

Cheers

[schild]

AP. You're playing the fanboi. You've played Lineage 2 enough to know it sucks - but you just want to be contrary. The problem here is you assume all of us are CoH fanbois - when the reality is I'm sure (at least in my case) - CoH, like every other MMO is on thin ice. When the first publish comes out we'll see if that ice cracks or not. If not, good for them - if so, at least the game is fun out of the box. Lineage 2 was elf boobies and shitty gameplay out of the box.

It's one thing to defend a game, but it's another thing to defend a shitty game and not have any good defense.

[Venkman]

But L2 has got a very specific playability to it. Koreans will play it for a long time because they have no choice.

<3

Thank you for treading where I was reticent to go :)

And AP, I hear ya on the RL stuff. I long ago had to relegate my catassery to slighter manageable chunks. I want long-term repeat play, which in MMOGs means short and long-term goals, but not when parts of those required more than 1 or 2 hours of straight play.

The fact that I can sometimes play 5 hours straight doesn't mean I'm signing up for a Raid two months in advance on an Event Calendar site. I don't want to be bothered that much by it. I accept chunks of game content is forever closed to me, so it's just a matter of gauging if the parts I can access are fun enough to keep me.

L2 couldn't. I'm really not being snide when I say it forgot all advances in MMOG playability since EQ Kunark. It's as if the game were designed entirely in a bubble by a developer that quit SOE in 2000, and joined a monastary right away.

Or, by someone who was only looking to improve L1 graphically. Features are different, but the system bears so much resemblance, their target audience not being me is really not a surprise. I hated L1 in almost exactly the same amount of time played.

What CoH got right is that it's fun right out of the box. Work2Fun is so out-of-date that it's laughable any game still requires it.

[Arthur_Parker]

Schild, depends really what your defination of fanboi is, I see it as someone who refuses to acknowledge "their" game has faults and always has a good reason why things were designed just so.

If I knew L2 sucked I wouldn't play it, I just don't know if it does yet.  I'm looking for a game I can play as long as I played UO and AC for, L2 has the potential to hold my interest, enjoying it so far but then I'm not expecting a lot from the low end game.

It's a hell of a lot easier than getting started on Darktide in AC1, I know that for a fact.

Really got to get some work done now.

[Alluvian]

Levels 1-5 have NOTHING.

Then at level 6 you get:

Fighter Skills
Luck 1
Armor Mastery 1-5
Relax 1
Weapon Mastery 1-3
Mortal Blow 1-9
Power Shot 1-9
Power Strike 1-9

Of these, only the last three are actual skills.  They are all just a normal attack that does more damage and are on timers.  You can only use one of them unless you switch weapons (no real reason not to, you have nothing else to do).  Relax is just a minor variant on sit where you gain more health at the cost of endurance or whatever they call it.

Then at level TWENTY you get a split, but again they are almost all passive, and VERY few differences between knight and rogue for instance.  Following is my recollection and some guesses on the powers.

All passive:
Expertise Grade D
Heavy Armor Mastery 1-15
Magic Resistance 1-14
Shield Mastery 1-2
Sword Blunt Mastery 1-8
Ultimate Defense 1

Active:
Drain Health 1-13
Shield Stun 1-15

Unknown
Majesty 1
Aggression 1-12
Divine Heal 1-9
Focus Mind 1
Deflect Arrow 1-2

I think all but the heal in the unknown are actually passive as well, but I am not sure.  Focus mind I believe is the opposite of relax.

And that is expected to last you all the way to 40.  They are arbitrary numbers, but these levels are NOT FAST.  The game was dreadfully painful to play.  I think I drudged on to 12, thinking for sure 10, or 11, or 12 would give me SOME skills.  But nope.  I had all my skills capped by then as well, so there was NO advancement at all for me until 20.  And the game I was 'playing' was anything but fun.

The listing I saw of night was much smaller actually.  Either it was very incomplete or they have added more. I suspect the former.  But this was the official lineage site and it listed something like 3 powers for knight, rogue, and warrior, two of which were the same.  Glad there are more than those three, but unless all those unknowns are dynamic active ways to change the outcome of battle I can't see post 20 combat being any fun either.  VS mob or VS human.

[Arthur_Parker]

Heh, checkout the Dwarf skills for a real laugh:P  I'm 35% of a level from 20 with class change quest done and I don't even know when I will get the chance to play again.  I haven't even used a combat skill apart from spoil and sweep in 4 weeks of playing.

[Alluvian]

Heh, checkout the Dwarf skills for a real laugh:P  I'm 35% of a level from 20 with class change quest done and I don't even know when I will get the chance to play again.  I haven't even used a combat skill apart from spoil and sweep in 4 weeks of playing.

And a few posts up you said "I am having fun playing".

See, this is why we think you are an escaped mental patient.  Do you get it now?
[joke]
When you look at your back in the mirror, can you read what the patch says?
[/joke]

(tags are for you entirely missing the intent of my azzrape comment and pissing off cevik in the other thread)

[kaid]

Given the setup of skills for dwavers and the utter pain of actually crafting anything with one I can only imagine they were designed to be guild bots. I can see no other reason for the punishing tedious trudge to 20 and their utter vulnerablity to pvp attack throughout their careers.


Kaid

[Arthur_Parker]

Heh, checkout the Dwarf skills for a real laugh:P  I'm 35% of a level from 20 with class change quest done and I don't even know when I will get the chance to play again.  I haven't even used a combat skill apart from spoil and sweep in 4 weeks of playing.

And a few posts up you said "I am having fun playing".

See, this is why we think you are an escaped mental patient.  Do you get it now?
[joke]
When you look at your back in the mirror, can you read what the patch says?
[/joke]

(tags are for you entirely missing the intent of my azzrape comment and pissing off cevik in the other thread)

I don't see how the 2 statements are incompatible, the second statement should read as expressing a wish to complete the last part of level 19 and finally have access to the unholy goodness of level 20.

As for the azrape comment, I didn't missunderstand it, I reacted to it and used it as a point of reference when it suited me to do so.  If you make fun of something it's easier to dismiss it, that's why that comment comes up so often when pvp is mentioned.

As for Cevik, he got to call me a fucking moron, he probably feels better for it.

[cevik]

As for the azrape comment, I didn't missunderstand it, I reacted to it and used it as a point of reference when it suited me to do so.  If you make fun of something it's easier to dismiss it, that's why that comment comes up so often when pvp is mentioned.

You did however, misunderstand who used it, because it suited you to use it against someone who didn't post it or even agree with it.

[Alluvian]

And I don't disagree with the line of logic Cevik used to arrive at that point.

You really think just pressing autoattack and then staring at the screen for 19 whole levels was anything approaching fun?  That is where I found the statements incompatible.  It would mean that you thing a pre level 20 dwarf is actually fun to play in L2.

[Arthur_Parker]

Well it's not just auto attack, using a short spear at the moment so have an area effect ability that can affect up to 3 mobs at once.  Using soulshots which double your damage with the chance for a critical at 4x.

Healing potions are handy, different types of mob drop certain rare items that have a certain market value so there's that to look out for.  Also sweep gives access to extra drops.   It's of some interest to build up a lump of cash and try buying weapons for cheap and selling high, made a bit that way.  I like how tight the money is, it's very very difficult to get enough money to outfit your character.

Skill level 50-99.9 in UO was not fun either but I made GM Miner, Smith, thief, Mace, Sword etc etc on different characters.

I just like a challenge I think.

[Alluvian]

But it's not a challenge.  It is just time consuming.  You are gaurunteed success if you put in the time.

[Arthur_Parker]

You did however, misunderstand who used it, because it suited you to use it against someone who didn't post it or even agree with it.

Sorry but I didn't misunderstand who said it, I reacted to it, you just happened to be the person my reaction was currently aimed at, I made sure the correct author was quoted directly above the quote.

[Alluvian]

But you did take it entirely out of the context I used it in and attacked someone else using it as ammunition that the forum was somehow calling pvp players assrapers. Which was not at ALL what I was saying.

[Arthur_Parker]

But it's not a challenge.  It is just time consuming.  You are gaurunteed success if you put in the time.

Agreed, but not in the end game when characters are at the low cap.  The boredom is a challenge though.