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how is the map???
maddogmikie
Member Posts: 349
is the map wide open or is it zone to zone loading??
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BOYCOTTING EA / ORIGIN going forward.
Is the google Earth like map in now? Ive been away for a couple of weeks.
If so, then the answer is yes and no. Most areas are linked so that you don't have a loading screen (ie. you just run continuously) but there are one or two with loading screens. It seems to me that the loading screen zone changes aren't finished yet because the scenery changes abruptly (Ered Luin to the Shire for example) - I suspect that these zone boundaries will be having new areas placed in between in patches, and eventually the whole world will be continuous.
so you're saying that the map is like WoW or DAoC and etc...
what I meant by zone to zone loading was like the game CoH or FFXI.
I personally dont like the loading maps... I like it wide open where I can run around freely~~~
You have absolutely no clue what you are talking about.
Troll away on some other forum please.
To the OP.
No the gameworld is almost one huge zone where you can run from 1 end to the other almost without zoning.
Here is a somewhat accurate map on the gameworld as it is now.
Some zones are a bit off but you can run through almost them all without ever having to zone.
img300.imageshack.us/img300/6263/worldmapos4.jpg
Most of the times when you zone is when you are going into a shop and into a personal instance.
The zoning times are extremely short however.
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With that note, there are "zone" loads, mainly when going into the instance quests or personal spaces or shops, but they are very short (about the same amount of time as Vanguards "chunking"- if you were unfortunate enough to have played Vanguard).
You still have time to try the game free in beta. It is worth trying it to see if the zoning is to much for you.
Update: I had a character saved near the gate between Erud Luin and The Shire, so I just checked it out. It does skip you over a decent sized area of what appears to be hills on the map, so it's possible it's just an area not in game yet.
Want to know more about GW2 and why there is so much buzz? Start here: Guild Wars 2 Mass Info for the Uninitiated
You obviously have not played the game at all, otherwise you would not have made the above comment. The load times from going into and out of buildings are incredibly short, and there is no load time at all when you go from one zone to another when doing quests (w/ rare exceptions so far). Load times for instances are shorter than load times for WoW instances.
Why do you insist on making comments that reveal your ignorance or irrational hatred of a game to everyone? All it does is completely discredit your opinion on this and other topics.
Anheuser
The game world is 19,000 Square miles.
I like pie !
The transition between the zones is seemless.
Also, the game map is not tiny. I have to believe that anyone who would say such a thing either confused the level 1-6 starting zones for full zones, misunderstood the debate about how much the scale of the original maps from the books has been reduced for practical gaming reasons, or is just making things up.
Having made the Night Elf run from Menethil Harbor to Ironforge in WoW many times, before all the cities got Auction Houses, I can safely say that the journey from Archet in The Bree-lands to the border of The Shire takes at least as long and that's a journey through a single zone, where the trip I mention in WoW covers three zones.
I wish I had thought to time some runs in WoW before my account lapsed, so I could quantify things more accurately, but I would say that each of the 9 major zones currently in LotRO is the equivilent of two to three WoW zones in size. With another major zone being added in May and more to come through out the year, I would make an educated guess that if the LotRO world isn't already bigger than the pre-TBC WoW lands, it soon will be.
Want to know more about GW2 and why there is so much buzz? Start here: Guild Wars 2 Mass Info for the Uninitiated
The transition between the zones is seemless.
Also, the game map is not tiny. I have to believe that anyone who would say such a thing either confused the level 1-6 starting zones for full zones, misunderstood the debate about how much the scale of the original maps from the books has been reduced for practical gaming reasons, or is just making things up.
Having made the Night Elf run from Menethil Harbor to Ironforge in WoW many times, before all the cities got Auction Houses, I can safely say that the journey from Archet in The Bree-lands to the border of The Shire takes at least as long and that's a journey through a single zone, where the trip I mention in WoW covers three zones.
I wish I had thought to time some runs in WoW before my account lapsed, so I could quantify things more accurately, but I would say that each of the 9 major zones currently in LotRO is the equivilent of two to three WoW zones in size. With another major zone being added in May and more to come through out the year, I would make an educated guess that if the LotRO world isn't already bigger than the pre-TBC WoW lands, it soon will be. Ok, here we go, every building which can be entered is an instance. This is true for every dungeon and scene. And for the noobies, the whole scene is an instance with even more instances added into it. Instance forever!! yay...
The transition between the zones is seemless.
Also, the game map is not tiny. I have to believe that anyone who would say such a thing either confused the level 1-6 starting zones for full zones, misunderstood the debate about how much the scale of the original maps from the books has been reduced for practical gaming reasons, or is just making things up.
Having made the Night Elf run from Menethil Harbor to Ironforge in WoW many times, before all the cities got Auction Houses, I can safely say that the journey from Archet in The Bree-lands to the border of The Shire takes at least as long and that's a journey through a single zone, where the trip I mention in WoW covers three zones.
I wish I had thought to time some runs in WoW before my account lapsed, so I could quantify things more accurately, but I would say that each of the 9 major zones currently in LotRO is the equivilent of two to three WoW zones in size. With another major zone being added in May and more to come through out the year, I would make an educated guess that if the LotRO world isn't already bigger than the pre-TBC WoW lands, it soon will be. Ok, here we go, every building which can be entered is an instance. This is true for every dungeon and scene. And for the noobies, the whole scene is an instance with even more instances added into it. Instance forever!! yay...
Yes, building interiors are shared instances. Less than a second transition time. Shared in that if you enter the building and someone else enters the same building, you will both see each other inside the same building.
Yes, some storyline quests are instanced. Fast transition. Less than 5% of all the quests in the game. Many of these take place in sections of the world map, rather than interiors. Instancing allows for modifications to that world space with out effecting players outside the instance and allow the player or group to experience that content with out interuption by another group.
Your game, Vanguard, has load times with chunks, a world that looks seemless, but that's really just an illusion. You can spend hours running around a place like the Shire in LotRO, doing quests or hunting and if you never enter a building, there will be zero load times. Take your hunting to the next zone over, same deal, no chunks to load, no zoning. (Yes, Vanguard is a lot bigger, but that's a lot of open space to try to fill with content and the dwindling player base).
As to size, it takes 12 minutes and 15 seconds to run from one side of the Bree-lands to the other in a straight line. This is one of the 9 major world zones in the game at this point. For people who have played WoW, I found a blog that timed the run from the east end of Thousand Needles to the West coast of Ferelas, in close to a straight line. That trip was timed at 18 minutes 35 seconds. The Bree-lands in LotRO is 2/3 as wide as the continent of Kalimdor in WoW. Once again, Bree-lands is just one of nine zones currently in LotRO. It is far from tiny by area and I can tell you it feels even bigger because of the realistic terrain.
If I had to guess, I would say LotRO will be at least twice as big a year from now.
(BTW, I really wish Vanguard had had an extra year of development before launching. I think it could possibly be a killer game a year from now, but most MMOs don't get a second chance).
Want to know more about GW2 and why there is so much buzz? Start here: Guild Wars 2 Mass Info for the Uninitiated
I have to say that of all things you could accuse LOTRO of being.... "full of laoding screens" is not one of them. Moving between zones and in and out of buildings is basically instantaneous..... many times you wont even know you have entered a new zone if it wasnt for the message telling you what part of the map your in.
Im actually surprised at how much Im enjoying this game and how obvious it is that they took the DDO team off to a building many miles from the LOTRO team so there would be no "contamination". You could almost go as far as to say that every mistake Turbine made with DDO (and there are a bunch) has been thoughtfully and elegantly fixed in LOTRO. It really does seem like they have taken every decent idea ever seen an MMO's and sweetly slotted them into this game.
Im just going to assume the "loading screens" comment is satire.
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"Far away across the field, the tolling of the iron bell, calls the faithful to their knees. To hear the softly spoken magic spell" Pink Floyd-Dark Side of the Moon
I was not a fan of instancing before LOTR, but the way they've has done it is excellent. I thought I'd hate it, but I like it. You do not feel like you instance forever at all, far from it. You know where you are going to transition, and it's quick and smooth. It doesn't bother me anymore than having to stop to open a door in rl to go outside or come back in. I honestly don't even notice it.
As a contrast, in Vanguard, it was supposed to be seemless with no instancing. I thought that would be perfect. Turned out chunking is far more unimersive (at least to me) than instancing. I hate hitting that invisible chunk. In some cases, you could be killed by a mob while you chunk. You could turn around while you chunk and end up rechunking again and again. Also when you hit those 4 corner chunks, it's a chunk fest. If you're in a party, your direction arrow goes out of whack when you chunk. As you're trying to catch up to someone they may show 200 feet ahead, then 1k behind you, then 600 ahead, etc before it finally settles down. That is incredibly annoying and mood breaking especially if you're trying to catch up to them to help them before they die. It's gotten better, but they are still very disruptive, unappealing. If they can't fix it to be really seemless, I'd much rather have it predictable and trouble free instead of just suddenly you hit a black hole.
I suspect for any game, the execution of a strategy is more important than whether the strategy sounds good or not. I love how they've handled it in LOTR.