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f13.net  |  f13.net General Forums  |  The Gaming Graveyard  |  Guild Wars  |  Topic: Nightfall PvE vs Original PvE 0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.
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Author Topic: Nightfall PvE vs Original PvE  (Read 49451 times)
tazelbain
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tazelbain


on: October 31, 2006, 05:49:29 PM

Quote from: Rasix
PVE all of the sudden get "not horrible"? For those of us that don't care much about or didn't enjoy the PVP, there doesn't seem to be much reason to get into Guild Wars... again.

At the core Guild War's PvE hasn't changed.  You take a small team of players/henchmen through a series of quests and missions.  But the things around it has changed.

Original:  Henchmen sucked.  You couldn't play solo past a certain point.
Nightfall:  Henchmen fight well. Heroes are even better. You can play the whole game solo.  I am attempting to prove it now.

Original: Lots of filler quests most weren't rewarding.  Give low xp/money and items you don't want.
Nightfall: Filler quests give more money/xp and Quartermaster items.  Quartmaster items are turned in for utility items that you can actually use.

Original:  Missions give max 2000xp and 2sp
Nightfall: Missions give max 4500xp and 3sp, and bonus' aren't as obtuse, 

Original:  Skills and Elite Skills where a pain to get.  Filling out you're skill set was a lot extra work.
Nightfall:  Skills are much to easier buy because of the above changes and because trainers have offer many more skils to train.  Elites are easier to capture and easier find.  With spoilers they are just like any other quest.  And changing secondaries is much easier.

Original:  The story was a complete mess, uninteresting, and cliched.  Even worse than FF8 and Dungeon Seige.
Nightfall:  The story straight forward, original, mildly interesting. On par with Chrono Cross.

Original:  Loot is boring.
Nightfall:  It's a little less boring with named items and insciptions.

The playerbase still sucks and the world is gamey.  But the bottom-line for me is all the things that dragged down PvE are gone and all the fun core mechanics are still there.

"Me am play gods"
Horik
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Reply #1 on: October 31, 2006, 05:59:20 PM

Dammit now I am going to have to pick it up.
Modern Angel
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Reply #2 on: October 31, 2006, 07:45:02 PM

Pretty much summed it up. I'm enjoying it almost despite myself. The PvE is still a bit bland (but pretty) but it's not a struggle anymore. The heroes aren't just good they're FUN; playing with the different skill sets and watching the AI play a minion master to perfection is a thing of beauty.

Taz, have you tried the hero based pvp at all? I've got just enough people coming back to the guild to set some of that up and am curious as to how it works.
tazelbain
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tazelbain


Reply #3 on: October 31, 2006, 09:04:58 PM

I got throughly trashed the 2 times I tried Hero Battles.  Its going to take some thought.

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schild
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Reply #4 on: October 31, 2006, 09:12:06 PM

Have a copy of the collector's edition sitting in gamestop. Guess I'll pick it up. I wonder if the assassin is fun now.
tazelbain
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tazelbain


Reply #5 on: October 31, 2006, 09:49:12 PM

http://gw.gamewikis.org/wiki/N/Me_SS_Nuker
Maybe you can revive Schild Is Dead with the above build. It sounds like you.

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Llava
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Reply #6 on: October 31, 2006, 09:56:23 PM

Really want to try a Paragon.  Those guys look completely badass.  Being a support type character with henchmen who don't suck sounds much better than the alternative.

I'll pick it up in a while.

That the saints may enjoy their beatitude and the grace of God more abundantly they are permitted to see the punishment of the damned in hell. -Saint Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica
Modern Angel
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Reply #7 on: November 01, 2006, 06:17:19 AM

http://gw.gamewikis.org/wiki/N/Me_SS_Nuker
Maybe you can revive Schild Is Dead with the above build. It sounds like you.


Not far from my build. I run my N/Me SS/AE build through the new chapters first. They're so completely and utterly broken in PvE it's almost like playing with a cheat code.
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Reply #8 on: November 02, 2006, 05:41:49 AM

I don't particularly like playing with broken characters. At the same time, I like playing with super fast characters - which tend to be broken due to DPS in online games. Like right now I'm deciding whether to go the munchkin total ninja badass route with Vaan in FFXII or having a true spellcaster with Ashe. Or go Ninja/Black&Arcane Magic hybrid with Penelo. These are serious decisions I have to make. I did however take off work to finish FFXII by saturday so I can get back to other games I'm loving like Devil Summoner, Scourge, some old PC stuff (kinda learning DotA), and various other games including God Hand.

I'm hoping Nightfall fixes PvE as much as op says. The box is still waiting for me at the store (a lot of boxes are, I'm keeping myself from being distracted - though I did break down and buy Children of Mana and Powerstone Collection this morning).
Modern Angel
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Reply #9 on: November 02, 2006, 05:56:58 AM

I don't particularly like playing with broken characters. At the same time, I like playing with super fast characters - which tend to be broken due to DPS in online games. Like right now I'm deciding whether to go the munchkin total ninja badass route with Vaan in FFXII or having a true spellcaster with Ashe. Or go Ninja/Black&Arcane Magic hybrid with Penelo. These are serious decisions I have to make. I did however take off work to finish FFXII by saturday so I can get back to other games I'm loving like Devil Summoner, Scourge, some old PC stuff (kinda learning DotA), and various other games including God Hand.

I'm hoping Nightfall fixes PvE as much as op says. The box is still waiting for me at the store (a lot of boxes are, I'm keeping myself from being distracted - though I did break down and buy Children of Mana and Powerstone Collection this morning).

Completely broken may be a bit of an overstatement. It's not as though you're invincible or anything. What you do have is an attack that you just tab around putting on everything that the AI is never going to be smart enough to deal with. Quick kills.

The pve's not perfect. There are still bland parts and mechanically there's not a ton of variance. But the missions are all pretty cool; for contrast I went back and got a new set of armor infused and even ten minutes in this old mission was pretty awful by comparison.
tazelbain
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tazelbain


Reply #10 on: November 02, 2006, 07:58:59 AM

Assassins are glass tigers. Assassin chains can be tough. Some people can't adjust.  They have to play like a warrior.

The henchies can take care of themselves now.  That frees up the the assassin player to teleport into the enemy casters, and be reasonably assured the henchies won't die while you are taking of business.

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trias_e
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Reply #11 on: November 02, 2006, 09:03:24 AM

If I don't want to buy Factions, can I still buy this and have an excellent game play experience?  And furthermore, if I somehow get to level 20 and advance to the 'end game', is Factions going to be required for that?

I am very impressed with the description so far.  Non-shitty henchmen is definitely enough to get me to play this game.  The PvE would be 10x better (although still not great, but at least decent) if I wasn't forced to do it with other people.
tazelbain
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tazelbain


Reply #12 on: November 02, 2006, 09:42:47 AM

> If I don't want to buy Factions, can I still buy this and have an excellent game play experience? 
Yes. Nightfall is completely stand-alone.

>And furthermore, if I somehow get to level 20 and advance to the 'end game', is Factions going to be required for that?
You get to 20 early in the story-line.  Development post-20 is lateral.  Having Factions gives you a few more lateral options.

>I am very impressed with the description so far.  Non-shitty henchmen is definitely enough to get me to play this game.  The PvE would be 10x better (although still not great, but at least decent) if I wasn't forced to do it with other people.

I haven't played through Prophecies in a long while, but the Henchmen there should there should use the new AI too.  You could test drive it there before you buy Nightfall.

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Modern Angel
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Reply #13 on: November 02, 2006, 11:44:49 AM

Think I may have found a mission unhenchable. It's that Temple of Whatever mission where you have to take over the different nodes. Damned hard because it's so quick.
tazelbain
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tazelbain


Reply #14 on: November 02, 2006, 12:01:53 PM

lol, going to have to be more specific.  I tried Thunderhead Keep at lunch. Made a tactical mistake.  Didn't have time to re-do it.

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Modern Angel
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Reply #15 on: November 02, 2006, 07:37:02 PM

It's a Nightfall mission... Grand Court of Sebelkeh. Actually ended up with a human group and two heroes. Nailed it pretty well. Prior to that, though, had about eight failures with just AI party members.
hal
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Reply #16 on: November 02, 2006, 07:55:56 PM

OK, well first of all I'm back here. So you really had to group with the unwashed like 1 time. I'm not sure what your telling us.

I started with nothing, and I still have most of it

I'm not a complete idiot... Some parts are still on backorder.
Modern Angel
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Reply #17 on: November 02, 2006, 08:46:22 PM

I'm saying that the new AI is pretty damned good and the new heroes rock faces but there are certain situations where even a bad human is preferable. A mission where you have to split forces is far better in the hands of a human. This mission was one of those cases.
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Reply #18 on: November 02, 2006, 11:11:05 PM

The henchies/heroes can interrupt Orison of Healing and similar fast casting spells. That makes me envious. Friggin LPBs. :P
Of course they don't have any sort of 'priority' on spell interrupting, they'll blow interrupts on fast casting/cheap spells and then watch the enemy cast Meteor Shower unhindered.

They aren't so smart about skill usage overall though, and a lot of builds are wasted on them. A Monk build with Word of Healing f'rex will just spam WoHl over and over and over, even if the target is above 50%; a barrage ranger will just spam barrage (even vs 1 mob) and neglect interrupts (I got around this by manually disabling barrage when I really need her to interrupt stuff), and getting them to use traps properly is a huge pita. They ARE pretty efficient though, overall, even if they seem to have a hardon for spamming elite skills. One of my guildies made a minion master out of the necro hero back on Tyria and he's a one-man wrecking ball. Can probably solo most of the stuff in a mission by his AI lonesome.

Also, have to put their rez or rez signet off autocast as well and use that stuff manually, or they end up wasting it / wasting 10 seconds of trying to rez in combat and letting someone die, then having the person they rezzed die immediately as well.


-- Z.

tazelbain
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tazelbain


Reply #19 on: November 06, 2006, 10:25:00 PM

It's a Nightfall mission... Grand Court of Sebelkeh. Actually ended up with a human group and two heroes. Nailed it pretty well. Prior to that, though, had about eight failures with just AI party members.
It took me 10 trys to finally to beat to it solo.  It was really clawing uphill since the henchies aren't lightbringers and I was forced to use my Monk Hero I hadn't leveled much.  Thunderhead Keep wasn't that hard but it's so long, so many chances to make mistakes.

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Modern Angel
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Reply #20 on: November 07, 2006, 05:56:15 AM

Beat the game last night with an actual (gasp!) group of people who were competent.

The story's not going to set the world on fire but it's all markedly better than the prior two. It also fleshes out the lore in a way that hasn't been there before.

Last boss would be appreciated by Schild (though I doubt he'll get there); it reminded me almost of an old SNES last fight in its execution. Very consoley, though not horribly challenging.

Overall, this was a good buy. Whether I have the easy time negotiating the game with my dervish that I did with my SS necro is up in the air but they've drawn me back into the game. And I still maintain that nobody does environments as well as the GW art team.
Dren
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Reply #21 on: November 13, 2006, 09:41:13 AM

I started up the game this weekend just long enough to download all the new stuff and take on a few fights outside of town.

I didn't play enough to see the new stuff.   Plus, I'm going to buy the expansion later.

I just had to say, I agree that the art in this game is still better than anything I've seen yet.  I just sat and looked around for a long time enjoying it.
eldaec
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Reply #22 on: November 16, 2006, 02:59:54 AM

Is playing pve stil worthwhile/necessary, or can you get everything you need through pvp these days?

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tazelbain
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tazelbain


Reply #23 on: November 16, 2006, 07:52:08 AM

You can lock everything with pvp.

Is there enough people for an F13 guild?

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Dren
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Reply #24 on: November 16, 2006, 08:00:35 AM

After trying this numerous times I'd like to suggest we do it differently if at all.

Have somebody that plays the game quite a bit already find a decent guild for us all to join together.  We can't ever seem to make a go of a guild all by ourselves no matter how many of us there are.
tazelbain
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tazelbain


Reply #25 on: November 16, 2006, 08:14:07 AM

Personally, I think the perfect guild likes to GvG but doesn't care about winning.

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Dren
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Reply #26 on: November 16, 2006, 09:30:50 AM

Personally, I think the perfect guild likes to GvG but doesn't care about winning.

Right, then it isn't so much about how much you play, just that you play.  My perfect night of playing would be to just log on and find people willing to get a fight going.  After each loss we'd talk about how to improve and do it again.  No bitching, no whining, no stomping of feet, no drama...

Um, so have you found that yet?  smiley
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Reply #27 on: November 16, 2006, 09:47:48 AM

You can lock everything with pvp.

Is there enough people for an F13 guild?

There is one. No one else has logged in for 30 days.

tazelbain
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tazelbain


Reply #28 on: November 16, 2006, 09:55:48 AM

Ya, and it was pretty fun back at the beginning.  I think I remember you taunting Koreans in Heros' ascent.
Are you in it? who is the leader?

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Dren
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Reply #29 on: November 16, 2006, 12:12:18 PM

I'm in it, or was.  I'll have to check again, but I think Schild was leader.
Llava
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Reply #30 on: November 16, 2006, 07:51:55 PM

Tried some stuff I hadn't bothered with before.  Alliance Battles, which I assumed meant giant organized fights of guild alliances, are pretty cool.  Just show up, jump into a group of 4 and go.  You're dropped with 2 other 4-man groups against and equal number, fighting for the Luxon or Kurzick side depending on... well, your guild and you.  Since there's automatic rezzing, it allows much looser builds than the random arenas.  Minion masters are fun there.  So is a minion master who brought along Verata's Aura.

That the saints may enjoy their beatitude and the grace of God more abundantly they are permitted to see the punishment of the damned in hell. -Saint Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica
schild
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Reply #31 on: November 27, 2006, 03:56:32 AM

I'm actually picking Nightfall up this week. Probably Wed or Thurs. They were kind enough to hold a collector's edition for me until the winter drought.

Have they put clan stuff in for groups with islands yet? (like us)

Also, how long does it take to 20 a character now? (I ask because I'd like to make a straight Dervish).

Other questions? Sure, why not.

Has the hardware requirements gone up? Factions ran slower than the original one for me. Part of the reason I never got into the assassin. Also, and tell me straight here, does the economy still make no sense whatsoever? Oh, and is there any purpose in the game thus far?

Basically, while picking this up is inevitable, I still have other games to play - including ones I'm paying for (Phantasy Star Universe), but I remember enjoying leveling my necromancer/elementalist in the original game - though 10-20 of us were almost always on.

Anyway, yea, How cool is dervish and is this worth my time?
« Last Edit: November 27, 2006, 04:03:20 AM by schild »
Llava
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Reply #32 on: November 27, 2006, 08:26:17 AM

Dervish is pretty awesome.

No real economy.

Not long to get to 20. Less than a week if you play quickly.

Game runs the same for me as it always has.

If you mean guild halls, you can buy NPCs for it.  And there are, of course, Guild Versus Guild battles.

That the saints may enjoy their beatitude and the grace of God more abundantly they are permitted to see the punishment of the damned in hell. -Saint Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica
tazelbain
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tazelbain


Reply #33 on: November 27, 2006, 08:34:35 AM

You can hire NPCs to provide services for a flat fee.
 
Quote from: GuildWiki
Service     Cost
Xunlai Agent    10 Platinum
Dye Trader    50 Platinum
Crafting Material Trader    100 Platinum
Rare Material Trader    100 Platinum
Rune Trader    25 Platinum
Scroll Trader    50 Platinum
Skill Trainer*    100 Platinum
Priest of Balthazar    10 Platinum
Merchant    25 Platinum
Weaponsmith**    10 Platinum
Total    480 Platinum

Xunlai Agent and Balthazar are the only ones realy needed.

7 hours to 20 if you are going slow?

>Has the hardware requirements gone up?
I upgraded my video card for EQ2, so I don't know, but its only a little bit if they did.

>Also, and tell me straight here, does the economy still make no sense whatsoever?
It not a virtual world, economic simulation is not the goal.

>Oh, and is there any purpose in the game thus far?
The purpose is to play through the story and fight against others online.  Both aspects have been improved. What's purpose of any game?

>but I remember enjoying leveling my necromancer/elementalist in the original game - though 10-20 of us were almost always on.
It was pretty great to able to group with people you like and being chat will playing.

>Anyway, yea, How cool is dervish and is this worth my time?
I have played to 12 with Derv.  The Derv is not nearly as brittle as the the Assassin and I thought it was fun to store up a bunch enchantments and dump them on group baddies.  Many people really like the avatars because they make you a serious badass for 50 seconds.
« Last Edit: November 27, 2006, 08:36:50 AM by tazelbain »

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schild
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Reply #34 on: December 04, 2006, 02:58:22 AM

Picked up Nightfall. Didn't get Much time to play around. PvE SEEMS better. We'll see. Even while skipping the first tutorial, this game holds your hand, a lot. Anyway, we'll see how it goes. Odds are, over the next month or so, I'll at the very least play the storyline.
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