ALSO this is bothering me: "Also, I totally agree with your disappointment on some of the WoW cookie-cutter stuff. In particular, I was very disappointed with the combat. It's straight EQ, WoW, pretty-much-every-other fantasy MMORPG click-and-wait styled combat. " please tell me about this "innovative" combat system you imagine? i dont get you people. your complaining about the combat and all, but dont mention what they could have done to make the combat better? please tell us about this revolutionary combat system?
Mount and Blade?
Mount and Blade is incredible yes, however its combat isn't really revolutionary at all except for the mount combat. Lol. However that doesn't go to say it implements the mount combat VERY well, especially for a husband and wife team.
-------------------- You led a great life. Rest in Peace. Laura "Taera" Genender 2008
Tested it now and I can say the following about it,
WAR is reasonably polished, not as polished as WoW was on release but not far from it. However it's drastically smaller in size in terms of content. That's not to say that the game won't keep you busy for quite some time ahead. The game is fairly stable and even handles tabbing quite well, although not during loading screens. But yes, you will encounter a few strange bugs, glitches and get momentarily stuck in terrain objects at times.
The classes don't have alot of depth but they're still rather well designed, although much character balancing needs to be done. I didn't find the Warrior Priests to be that bad, however the Burning Wizards pretty much burns the whole place to a crisp if allowed a moment of peace.
The PvP was fun for me, although much more slow paced than WoW. People generally don't die as quick and healing will spoil anyones day. You need to focus your damage on a single player in order to be effective, either that or be a Bright Wizard. I can see the stacking, combination and synergy of certain abilities to become very powerful and I expect to see much of these to be used in higher tier PvP, once guilds and groups start to be more serious about RvR (which is just another lame word for normal PvP, there's really nothing more RvR about WAR than WoW). The open areas seemed pretty dead with few people in them, often being scarcely populated by mobs or none at all. The dwarven starting grounds were mostly just raided by the far more popular orcs 'n goblins, which made much of the place inaccessible to the dwarf players.
- The fact that it takes longer to die is an advantage in large scale PvP, but hurt the small scale PvP engagements. WAR's system wouldn't work in WoW's arena very well, but proves to be alot more entertaining in the battlegrounds.
The public quests are like AoC's special attack system, overhyped and not that effective. Sure, the public quests are entertaining to do at least once because they're fairly cinematic. It's like Assassin's creed, cool once but then it kinda gets old. It also completely fails to create any sense of companionship and co-up, people just do the stuff or happened to stumble upon the quest and then hope that they get lucky with the roll for the rewards.. most often winning nothing and having to do it all over again or grow fed up with it and go somewhere different.
The graphics are adequate, despite not having access to high quality textures (probably due to bandwith limitations). The characters look fairly good, especially the Orcs, goblins and dwarfs and they're all a step up from the graphics of WoW. However the world in WAR can look rather sloppily put together at times and I'd say that WoW makes a better job there instead. It also seems to run quite fine on an above average system and I believe that it will run on low quality settings even on poor machines.
As for the PvE it was rather mweh, didn't come across a single instance but I hear that some are s'posed to be in the game. Mobs are fairly stupid, have slow reaction times and the aggro range is so short that it makes the mobs seem really retarded.
The community on the test servers was fairly dead, very quiet. Too quiet in fact, people only talked when adressed and not even that at times. However, it was damn nice to see people use more roleplay names again instead of the usual "SHaodwdeath" "DEadlyassasin" yatta yatta that you see in other games. Hopefully though the game will become more cheerful on launch.
As a conclusion, WAR can be a fun game and for anyone who likes PvP, is tired of WoW but who wants another fantasy MMO. My only real gripe with the game is how they screwed the warhammer lore and feel of the Orc 'n Goblins by teaming them up with Chaos and the Dark Elves. I'd also liked to have see three factions in this game instead of just two, in order to make it stand out and be a real option to WoW.
Ah well, I think that most people who try it, will enjoy it. This isn't the pile of shit that AoC was, rest assured.
Originally posted by augustgrace our complaining that nobody knows what to do in a game that many of them just started playing yesterday? Okay...
I've already addressed this earlier in the thread, but I'll address it again. My issue is not with people who don't know what they're doing on the first day, you're absolutely right about that being understandable. My issue is that in a game so focused on RvR, Mythic didn't even take the time to put in tooltips or instructions or little popup help menus explaining what's going on in the scenarios or RvR areas. I played through and past the area for level 8-10 and I still couldn't tell you what its purpose was. Kill or be killed, that was all that mattered, and stand near the flag to cap it, which I worked out based on intuition and past experience with other games. There was no direction, zero, NONE. In a game like EVE, where PvP is a way of life, you PvP because you have to, to defend your base/resources/territory. In a game like WAR, that's far more "theme park"-ish, why are we fighting? At least WoW had quests and descriptions to ease you into the Battlegrounds, and explain their purpose within the lore of the game (sort of). WAR's quests consisted of "kill 5 people" and "collect miscellaneous trade goods hidden within the city".
Maybe you can expect people to "figure it out on their own" but I have no such hopes. If they make it to the first RvR area and aren't being taught the basics, they will zerg eternally until someone tells them otherwise. That's what people do.
NO YOU CAN'T HAVE MY ACCOUNT. I only got in for the Preview Weekend, which ends tomorrow. Target is selling the pre-order box for $1. Go buy one and you can play on the 7th.
------------------------------------------------------------------------ Maybe my expectations were too high. I don't know. All I can say is that WAR was too much like WoW, and with all the bugs and crashing and stupid quirky things that just weren't right, I'd rather be playing WoW (which is to say not at all). To give a little background, I played a Chosen and made it to Rank 10, Renown 7 within a few hours. My issues are not with the Chosen class, I liked it very much, but with the game as a whole. RvR and PvP
RvR is a bit of a mess. Nobody has a clue what they are supposed to be doing. Good luck finding people to group with, everyone (including people who rolled healers) just run into the fray head first and start spraying spells. On the realm I played on, Destruction won every time hands down, but it was still like walking into a meat grinder. The Order players would all bunch up at a bottleneck and toast anyone who came too close. Not that this is a bad thing, but it's far flung from the dynamic, PvE/PvP mixed battlefields I was expecting. I also felt the RvR areas were a bit small, but that's probably because they were in the early game and the zones were focused more on PvE questing. I'm sure they get bigger towards the upper tiers. I agree with the point about people not using their brains when in RvR. I also take into account the fact that its a new game so most of us are trying to figure things out. That said, this aspect of the game is fairly decent, its fun and you enjoy it in small portions at a time. The point about it being a one sided war is just not true. I played 3 servers and they all had the same dynamic shift in territorial control. At times we're winning, at some we are losing. Community
The community is not bad so far, but it's very very quiet. I've seen the usual "it's still in beta so your opinion doesn't matter" trolls, people who steal kills, people who get upset because they can't solo PQs or whatever. I've also had random strangers save my life, random strangers answer cryptic questions with detailed answers, random strangers offer to give away loot that's not for their class. Overall I'd say it's pretty balanced, and a little better than you'd expect from any MMO. Nothing to say about the community. I mostly went on my own exploring and testing, checking to see if I was going to become a paying customer. PvE and Questing
The PvE element is, to be totally honest, a complete joke IMO. I would frequently have to turn off my auras (Chosen are like reverse Paladins) to avoid aggroing every mob in the area, including non-hostile mobs and even level 1 critters. Even if I did aggro them all, I had no problems soloing 5-6 mobs at a time, as long as they weren't Champions (WAR equivalent of 'Elite'). NPC damage is a joke. This I find silly at most, ignorant at best, then again it is your opinion. I like the fact that I have NO downtime while fighting mobs and questing. On the Chosen Aura point you made I have nothing to say because it was annoying for me too. Although it makes some sense, its still annoying. Point is it makes sense, even if it is stupid. I would often have mobs run away for no reason, even before I had done any damage. At first I thought maybe this was part of the AI, but as I played on it became obvious that even mobs who shouldn't run away (such as Champion mobs) were still tucking tail and running. I can only assume it's a bug. Yeah, bug. Nothing left to say. I think people are expecting to be able to level from RvR alone, and I can tell you now that doing so would be painful. It would take easily 3-4 times as long to do it that way. The quests give HUGE amounts of experience, and you simply can't compete with that in RvR. Also, the gear that you can buy once you've reached a certain Renown Rank also requires a PvE Rank, usually higher than the Renown Rank. This means you'll have to do a lot of PvE questing/grinding to get where you need to be. Leveling from RvR IS a viable option and NOT painful. I leveled my marauder from 7 to 12 on the first tier open world RvR. There are quests that give good experience below level 10 for killing 5 enemy PLAYERS in the RvR zone. Not to mention RR9, which I got in just a few hours, ALL TODAY. On this point you are MISTAKEN. Had to put it on caps because its a big, BIG mistake on your part. What I do have to add is, it is a lot easier if you mix it in with quests and PQ's its just less tedious than all out RvR grindage. Money
That brings us to the money issue. Even playing as far as I did, saving every bit of money I could, gathering skills and all included, not to mention all the extra grinding I did just to farm money, I was still able to buy only 4 of the 12 pieces of the Dominion set. There were times where I struggled to be able to afford even my basic class spells. Needless to say, prices on gear and spells are too high, or money drops are too low. Again, mistaken, I played for 7 hours today and I made 6 gold in quests, drops and RvR. You just didn't micromanage well enough or kept all the loot instead of selling it. I don't know what to say on this point. I made a lot of money, especially with the RvR kill player quest that gives 6 silver at completion. Crashes
As was mentioned several times before, I believe, crashing is a serious issue right now with the game. My own client crashed roughly every 30 mins, and it seemed to get much much worse when I tried to do RvR. Often after a crash I would lose levels or quest credit, and I'd have to do it again. I thought maybe it was my system causing it to crash, but after doing a little research I found hundreds of posts and dozens of comments in game from all kinds of people who were having the same issue. It seems to be totally random, and a problem with the client rather than with our systems. I had some random crashes, nothing too bad. Is it annoying? Should it happen?.... no. Can I live with it?... I've played a LOT worse. It is also still in testing. Close to release? Maybe so. BUT STILL IN TESTING. Hopefully it gets fixed before then, if not THEN you earned the right to complain. Collision Detection
In my experience, the collision detection didn't work properly either. Sometimes I would get hung up on small objects (like a brick in the road) and other times my character would teleport on top of objects that he clearly couldn't climb (like trees or lamp posts). Player collision was sketchy at best, and worked roughly half the time. It was also frustrating being a tank and getting blocked in by my own team mates. I think collision detection would have worked better if it didn't apply to people of your own faction. COMPLETELY AGREE. I hate the collision bugs or otherwise "features". Too many problems with it on my side as well. I can handle it though I found a few workarounds like surveying the area, staying away from BIG groups ( not groups in general, just the really big groups ). Conclusion
I won't tell you not to play this game, because I do have a sincere respect for what they were trying to do. I think, though, that they shaved it a little too close to the WoW cookie-cutter and focused a little too much on the aesthetic decoration. Maybe the game will be better closer to release, but I doubt it. With about 3 weeks to go, "it's only beta" doesn't really hold water anymore. All we can do is wait and see. It's only a beta. You know why it holds water? because IT'S STILL A BETA. When it gets released and these issues still come up ( which probabilities lie on that they will arise ) then you can complain. Not flaming or showing aggression of any sort, just stating out the facts. EDIT: I tried to break it up a bit so it's not such a wall-o'-text. I hope it helped. EDIT 2: Added a few points that I forgot, and a notice at the top. Please stop sending me PMs to beg for my account!
I've never posted before and I usually only read. I just had to correct some of the points the OP made that were bugging me a little while I read ( bugged me enough to write this reply ).
I'm not a fan or a blinded customer. I'm just a player who played the game and found it enjoyable in small portions. Truth be told, I would play this for around 4 months, not even a year. GREAT GAME, just not one that would hold an individual's attention for more than that.
GUYS AN MMO PLAYS LIKE THE OTHER MMOS OF THE GENRE.
I feel the same way, i'm bored of FPS, i want a different system besides point and click with weapons. We should make an FPS and call it an MMO and have it play like an RPG right?
If that's the case, why make more than one game at all? Why not just have one MMO and make all the other MMOs shut down, since they will always be exactly the same game?
What a silly, pointless post.
It was an epiphany for me, personally... I've already set to work on the world's first ever MMORPG-FPS-RTS-Flight Sim-PvP-Badminton game...
It's gonna be AMAZING!!!
So... Who wants in for beta?
"If you just step away for a sec you will clearly see all the pot holes in the road, and the cash shop selling asphalt..." - Mimzel on F2P/Cash Shops
NO YOU CAN'T HAVE MY ACCOUNT. I only got in for the Preview Weekend, which ends tomorrow. Target is selling the pre-order box for $1. Go buy one and you can play on the 7th.
------------------------------------------------------------------------ Maybe my expectations were too high. I don't know. All I can say is that WAR was too much like WoW, and with all the bugs and crashing and stupid quirky things that just weren't right, I'd rather be playing WoW (which is to say not at all). To give a little background, I played a Chosen and made it to Rank 10, Renown 7 within a few hours. My issues are not with the Chosen class, I liked it very much, but with the game as a whole. RvR and PvP
RvR is a bit of a mess. Nobody has a clue what they are supposed to be doing. Good luck finding people to group with, everyone (including people who rolled healers) just run into the fray head first and start spraying spells. On the realm I played on, Destruction won every time hands down, but it was still like walking into a meat grinder. The Order players would all bunch up at a bottleneck and toast anyone who came too close. Not that this is a bad thing, but it's far flung from the dynamic, PvE/PvP mixed battlefields I was expecting. I also felt the RvR areas were a bit small, but that's probably because they were in the early game and the zones were focused more on PvE questing. I'm sure they get bigger towards the upper tiers. Community
The community is not bad so far, but it's very very quiet. I've seen the usual "it's still in beta so your opinion doesn't matter" trolls, people who steal kills, people who get upset because they can't solo PQs or whatever. I've also had random strangers save my life, random strangers answer cryptic questions with detailed answers, random strangers offer to give away loot that's not for their class. Overall I'd say it's pretty balanced, and a little better than you'd expect from any MMO. PvE and Questing
The PvE element is, to be totally honest, a complete joke IMO. I would frequently have to turn off my auras (Chosen are like reverse Paladins) to avoid aggroing every mob in the area, including non-hostile mobs and even level 1 critters. Even if I did aggro them all, I had no problems soloing 5-6 mobs at a time, as long as they weren't Champions (WAR equivalent of 'Elite'). NPC damage is a joke. I would often have mobs run away for no reason, even before I had done any damage. At first I thought maybe this was part of the AI, but as I played on it became obvious that even mobs who shouldn't run away (such as Champion mobs) were still tucking tail and running. I can only assume it's a bug. I think people are expecting to be able to level from RvR alone, and I can tell you now that doing so would be painful. It would take easily 3-4 times as long to do it that way. The quests give HUGE amounts of experience, and you simply can't compete with that in RvR. Also, the gear that you can buy once you've reached a certain Renown Rank also requires a PvE Rank, usually higher than the Renown Rank. This means you'll have to do a lot of PvE questing/grinding to get where you need to be. Money
That brings us to the money issue. Even playing as far as I did, saving every bit of money I could, gathering skills and all included, not to mention all the extra grinding I did just to farm money, I was still able to buy only 4 of the 12 pieces of the Dominion set. There were times where I struggled to be able to afford even my basic class spells. Needless to say, prices on gear and spells are too high, or money drops are too low. Crashes
As was mentioned several times before, I believe, crashing is a serious issue right now with the game. My own client crashed roughly every 30 mins, and it seemed to get much much worse when I tried to do RvR. Often after a crash I would lose levels or quest credit, and I'd have to do it again. I thought maybe it was my system causing it to crash, but after doing a little research I found hundreds of posts and dozens of comments in game from all kinds of people who were having the same issue. It seems to be totally random, and a problem with the client rather than with our systems. Collision Detection
In my experience, the collision detection didn't work properly either. Sometimes I would get hung up on small objects (like a brick in the road) and other times my character would teleport on top of objects that he clearly couldn't climb (like trees or lamp posts). Player collision was sketchy at best, and worked roughly half the time. It was also frustrating being a tank and getting blocked in by my own team mates. I think collision detection would have worked better if it didn't apply to people of your own faction. Conclusion
I won't tell you not to play this game, because I do have a sincere respect for what they were trying to do. I think, though, that they shaved it a little too close to the WoW cookie-cutter and focused a little too much on the aesthetic decoration. Maybe the game will be better closer to release, but I doubt it. With about 3 weeks to go, "it's only beta" doesn't really hold water anymore. All we can do is wait and see. EDIT: I tried to break it up a bit so it's not such a wall-o'-text. I hope it helped. EDIT 2: Added a few points that I forgot, and a notice at the top. Please stop sending me PMs to beg for my account!
Odd, I have experienced only one crash to desktop, and had more than enough cash to buy my full PVP set and weapon and all skills. Its only about a gold, which I got from selling all the stuff I looted. On each charater. Of which I made about 6. And without farming for money.
And on the realm I am on, people have been working together on both the PQ's and the RvR, standing back, letting the tanks block and taunt, letting the DPS fire from behind, and with healers keeping me up and going. All without any plans or talking. They just seemed to .. "get it" I guess.
I found a few bugs, but compared to some released games, this was almost nothing. Compared to most beta releases, it was stunning how polished and stable it was.
The game is just.. fun. I guess. But, it of course depends on your rig, your realm, who was in the area, levels, which area you were in.. But, its not going to be for everyone. At all.
"When people don't know much about something, they tend to fill in the blanks the way they want them to be filled in. They are almost always disappointed." - Will Wright
If some people are saying it gets even better later levels, then Im sold. I believe no other game has been as fun in the early levels as War. People are judging the game as if the first 10 levels are the entire thing, but this is just the beginning and you're instantly thrown into the fray. In what fantasy game did you ever rescue people from burning buildings in your home town, have to recruit loyal farm folk and have them possibly try to kill you and get uppity, find suspicious barrels floating in the river and find out its like Bilbo sneaking up the river with dwarves in the Hobbit, have to disturb the graves of the dead to release a maelstrom of souls to summon a demon, watched a giant come breaking trees to kill you all, slain a dragon, shot down harpies with a bolt gun, fired huge cannons onto a battle field and flew through the air to leap upon a battlement all before level 10!
I was worried that later content would lose replay value as the fun lower level stuff might if done too often, but stories of how five held an entire siege castle by blocking the main gates and defending makes me optimistic, not to mention all the incredibly badass gear I saw the 30th players wearing in videos. Sign me up, Im going to War.
Yes but, you have to remember that especially the casual players that will flock to this game are completely delusional and turn an incident that involved them zerging the shit out of another group 10v5 somehow turns into them fucking alamoing their way through a 3v30. People make up shit all the time to seem like their life is epic, in and out of game. It's like that "2v6 PvP video" that some one released earlier. It was, in (virtual) reality, a 3v4 with a 2v1 to start.
Especially on this board, you have to remember that people make up shit to make themselves feel better and to increase their epeen status all the time.
I disagree with a fair amount of your post but you do have some points, Collision detection has been very hit and miss with me so far, and on the money problem it's really not to bad they lowered the cost of skills by quite a bit and increased the money drop from rvr it seems.
Also a tip for anyone come open beta and release you are able to get the kill 5 players from each pairing and finish them in the empire/chaos area for 19s silver total(all repeatable). It takes a bit of extra time but I found it to be worth it. This should put you well on your way to affording all you need. Also from my experience leveling in Scenarios has been faster then questing and PQs, and open world rvr because of the kill quest seems to be the best money.
I'd say this is a pretty fair assessment, but it seems like you maybe missed a few things. Sorry if this has been addressed, but I skipped multiple pages. It's late, I'm at work and posting during downtimes :P
RvR and PvP: Many aren't going to know what to do during the first few hours of play. However, during my experiences, most folks have gotten the gist and have applied some tactics in the Scenarios. On my realm there was about a 50/50 win/loss rate in the scenarios, but the RvR areas on the map it was basically a Destruction zerg camped outside our Warcamp. However, it got better when I visited the Troll Lands.
Community: 100% agreed with what you said. I've actually run into a lot more helpful people than whiners. I've only been on the Order side, Empire specifically.
PvE: As a Witch Hunter I've not run into the odd aggro issues as you, since I don't have the Aura system, obviously. Normal mobs I agree are easy, but to me that seems intended. The challenges seem to come from the PQs where Champion mobs hit me like a truck, even if they are a couple of levels below me. I'd say PvE challenge rating in the lower area is right about where it should be. Yes there are pathing issues, which can be annoying, but not game breaking to me.
Also, I have leveled from 8 to 11 strictly from RvR. At the main warcamp of the area there are a number of repeatable quests that have RvR objectives. For Empire there was one to just complete a scenario battle, kill 5 enemy pcs in the world RvR area in the zone and also cap or defend a world RvR objective, to name a few examples. Each completion awarded me with money and xps. I would say I was averaging a level per hour doing it that way, once I knew what I was doing.
Money: I had the same issue as you with not being able to afford Skills at level up and whatnot, but to be honest as soon as I found the repeatable RvR quests, the money was rolling in. I went from about 10 silver to 2 gold very rapidly that way.
I personally have enjoyed myself during the preview so far. Very few crashes for me. The only times I've crashed have been in extremely populated RvR areas with a ton of spell effects going off. I simply left that area and went somewhere else, problem solved.
Just as a side note: I do not get a WoW feeling at all while playing this game. It honestly feels a lot like LotRO in terms of graphics and DAoC in terms of general gameplay. There are a few WoW similarities, but I've played WoW for four years now and I am really not getting a WoW vibe from WAR.
As always, take all of this with a grain of salt. I'm not trying to make up anyone's mind for them, just sharing my experiences.
All I'm going to hop in here and say, agreeing with the OP on is they need to do something about the chosen aura's pissing off non agro mobs. Thats the one truly anoying things I found with the class. Other than that is was pretty fun. That and they are definitly weak early on RvR. I know my job is to protect others but you dont even start seeing decent enough skills till 10ish to do that while other classes get what they need to do well. I also wish there was a catagory in scenarios and an renown mechanic added in for soaking up damage. I'm sure as hell not killing anyone (again I noticed this to get alittle better after lvl 10).
interesting. I have faith that Mythic will iron out the bugs pretty quick. Mythic is not Funcom and Mark Jacobs has always been a stand up guy. Funny thing though is this thread almost makes me want to stop by Best Buy today and pick up a preorder box just so I can see the game for myself . ..eh ... Still I think I will hold to my original plan and pick it up and play for real next spring. I got enough games to keep me busy for awhile.
How in the hell do you not have enough money for skills? Did you level completely off of exploration?
Kill every mob you run across and sell everything they drop you personally can't use. Do every quest . Level 10 with a little more than a gold saved up and all my skills plus the best armor/ weapons I could get. Don't waste money on crap you don't really need to play. Doing that you will always have plenty of money and you don't even have to try and make money. Do that and try and make money too, well the sky is the limit.
Did the OP even read my counter point? Any comments on it?
Pyro, this has happened to me many times on many different forums. If you make a clear, logical argument then it will be ignored by everyone. People like to respond to controversy and poorly written posts because its easy. Sadly I failed this time around because he did respond to mine.
However I think, just like your whole "review", you don't understand. You keep complaining because a game that isn't out yet has bugs, you can't make money, and people don't know what they are doing. Those are your three real main points that you say over and over more or less. Which all are addressed easily: its a beta, you CAN make money easily, and of course people aren't talking much and don't know what they are doing. In fact, you can't even review the "community" yet. Only a small collection of more hardcore fans got into the preview weekend, not the overall community.
I said it before and I'll say it again, I just cannot believe how many people think this original post is a fair review. It's not even a review, just compiled complaints that add up to the OP hyped this game up way too much in his head. If it helps you decide what you already decided, that you don't like the game, well then you already decided that and you can move on.
NO YOU CAN'T HAVE MY ACCOUNT. I only got in for the Preview Weekend, which ends tomorrow. Target is selling the pre-order box for $1. Go buy one and you can play on the 7th.
------------------------------------------------------------------------ Maybe my expectations were too high. I don't know. All I can say is that WAR was too much like WoW, and with all the bugs and crashing and stupid quirky things that just weren't right, I'd rather be playing WoW (which is to say not at all). To give a little background, I played a Chosen and made it to Rank 10, Renown 7 within a few hours. My issues are not with the Chosen class, I liked it very much, but with the game as a whole. RvR and PvP
RvR is a bit of a mess. Nobody has a clue what they are supposed to be doing. Good luck finding people to group with, everyone (including people who rolled healers) just run into the fray head first and start spraying spells. On the realm I played on, Destruction won every time hands down, but it was still like walking into a meat grinder. The Order players would all bunch up at a bottleneck and toast anyone who came too close. Not that this is a bad thing, but it's far flung from the dynamic, PvE/PvP mixed battlefields I was expecting. I also felt the RvR areas were a bit small, but that's probably because they were in the early game and the zones were focused more on PvE questing. I'm sure they get bigger towards the upper tiers. Keep in mind ...its beta nobody has cleu becouse a lot of people are testing and trying things out , besides you start at level 31 so dont exspect fully planned pvp in a beta game, in all mmo's betas are always a lot of mess and mostly arent anything close to the real thing. Community
The community is not bad so far, but it's very very quiet. I've seen the usual "it's still in beta so your opinion doesn't matter" trolls, people who steal kills, people who get upset because they can't solo PQs or whatever. I've also had random strangers save my life, random strangers answer cryptic questions with detailed answers, random strangers offer to give away loot that's not for their class. Overall I'd say it's pretty balanced, and a little better than you'd expect from any MMO. What to say about communtiy well , this is beta so there hardly is any community out there mate. PvE and Questing
The PvE element is, to be totally honest, a complete joke IMO. I would frequently have to turn off my auras (Chosen are like reverse Paladins) to avoid aggroing every mob in the area, including non-hostile mobs and even level 1 critters. Even if I did aggro them all, I had no problems soloing 5-6 mobs at a time, as long as they weren't Champions (WAR equivalent of 'Elite'). NPC damage is a joke. Its a joke in your eyes becouse your making judgements , based on a beta game wich is always a wrong thing to do. I would often have mobs run away for no reason, even before I had done any damage. At first I thought maybe this was part of the AI, but as I played on it became obvious that even mobs who shouldn't run away (such as Champion mobs) were still tucking tail and running. I can only assume it's a bug. I realy stoped reading here...
Playing:World of Warcraft. Played:Lord of the Rings Online, Starwars Galaxies. Tried:Starwars the Old Republic, Everquest 2, Guild Wars, Vanguard, Age of Conan, Aion.
Ive been playing closed beta for a bit, and this weekend was able to join up with a good RL mate who still played DAOC.
I like the game so far, took me a while to get a handle on the graphics, initially i felt they were WOWish. Since then i have to say they arent, much better than WOW.
When we started this weekend i rolled a healer and he rolled a Engineer. First day he liked it. Got to level 6 say after a few hours of just goofing around.
Today, hes pretty much reserved its a crap game full stop and thats it. I asked him why and he says it lacks depth... He had made it to level 10 hah.
Ahh well some people like it some dont. I think ive played many more online games and can appreciate them more. Im also not so tied to one game. He still is pretty locked into DAOC and cant be helped. I think it is every gamemakers dream to have people so locked into a game where nothing else is better.
Btw i love DAOC and am thinking of opening the account again just for fun.... that was when i realise i have to have a second account just for my buff bots
Guess my point here is anyone calling a game crap before a good few levels or at least give the 30 free days a run, really shouldnt post any opinion about any game.
If you do its biassed... eg i dont like wow because it looks cartoony. Or i dont like DAOC because it looks too Dark (hah).
Hell i gave AOC 2 months before i left. Game has alot of potential but fails end game with bad vibes on how the devs handle the patch process. I even played Lineage for 2 weeks solid got to twenty and then just so sick of the automated players called ykjjherk running around that i left.
I guess another thing is that some people dont want to relearn a new game, if it feels different and not what they are used to they will call it crap also i guess in some cases.
So when trying a new game, take your time. Take a few deep breaths and try to take in what is before you. Do your best to put other games out of your mind and play what is in front of you.
Above all try and enjoy your new experience no matter how long you stick with it or what.
If you don't like and know you won't like it with no reservation, then it's best take yourself out of the running.
For me, I find it rather amazing primarily because I never used to PvP and now I just can't get enough. Once I got my first character to 5 or 6 and jumped into my first Scenario (admittedly, I was lost when I did. I just started killing red guys figuring that was safe) I just could not get enough! Unless I have some quests that I have decided to cap first, I queue up ASAP and jump right in (I don't leave groups if I'm in a PQ, of course). I love it!
I kinda disagree, you can learn alot about a game in a few hours, i think you kinda now if the game is for you or not....its like meeting someone for the first time, you kinda now there personality and what kind of an individual they are...kinda like a game, you sense if the game has personalitiy or not...everyone is different and have different opinion..
Originally posted by krackajap Am I the only one that finds it funny that he complains about the RvR and that no one knows what they're doing when everyone been playing for a day? What exactly to you expect from a bunch of people who started playing the game yesterday?
There is an element of truth to your comment, however there seems to be a crutch effect when it comes to the ideology that unless you've played X amount of time you can't appreciate the game. I've had my first experience with the game this weekend, however this isn't my first experience with MMO Beta's or with MMO's in general.
For most MMO players that have been around for a while I wouldn't expect that it requires weeks or months of play to get an impression of the game and how it fits their play style. It does take time to experience the fullness of the content, but it doesn't take long to get the general feel and impression.
The Old Timers Guild Laid back, not so serious, no drama. All about the fun!
www.oldtimersguild.com An opinion should be the result of thought, not a substitute for it. - Jef Mallett
Originally posted by LordBANG you are able to get the kill 5 players from each pairing and finish them in the empire/chaos area for 19s silver total(all repeatable). It takes a bit of extra time but I found it to be worth it. This should put you well on your way to affording all you need.
Yeah, of course it would be, if the game actually counted your kills. The problem now is their "kill 5 people" system works like WoW's kill credit, where you only "get the kill" if you dealt the killing blow. For some classes, this might not be a problem, but for others... heh, good luck.
At any rate, the point I was trying to make earlier is how dumb it was for them to make gear a reward that needs to be bought. If they want players to PAY for it, they should put in some kind of system like the Influence used in PQs, but for PvP only.
Am I the only one that finds it funny that he complains about the RvR and that no one knows what they're doing when everyone been playing for a day? What exactly to you expect from a bunch of people who started playing the game yesterday?
There is an element of truth to your comment, however there seems to be a crutch effect when it comes to the ideology that unless you've played X amount of time you can't appreciate the game. I've had my first experience with the game this weekend, however this isn't my first experience with MMO Beta's or with MMO's in general.
For most MMO players that have been around for a while I wouldn't expect that it require weeks or months of play to get an impression of the game and how it fits their play style. It does take time to experience the fullness of the content, but it doesn't take long to get the general feel and impression.
very true. Just speaking for myself by the time I play at least 2 classes 3 hours each I am pretty sure whether the game is for me or not. AoC was the exception, I loved lvl 1 - 20 then it fell flat. I have pretty much decided now I will get a pre order box today just to try the open beta. But to be honest after reading a lot of forum posts on various forums I am not expecting much.
Originally posted by daeandor I think the OP made some decent posts. I too agree that the "it's beta" excuse is weak due to the proximity of release. We saw the same argument last year with Tabula Rasa and even Vanguard before that, and some might argue AoC too. Look at TR and VG, it took them both nearly a year to get to a point that was approximately what people expected upon release.
My overall opinion: Games are releasing far too soon in the development cycle for today's fickle mmorpg players. Yes there are other issues with the new games like the "been there, done that" syndrome, but really I think the biggest complaint I have is the unfinished releases.
In fairness to the game developers, what would constitute a 'finished' game? LoTR was the smoothest launch I've ever experienced in an MMO, but it still had its issues. When you consider the sophistication and complexity involved in making most any software product its unrealistic to think it can deliver on being trouble free upon release.
Like most projects there's a projected time of completion and there isn't a lot of wiggle room to retool, retweak and re-crucnch code. There is a lot of pressure from the bean counters to get the product to market so they can make a profit off their investment.
The Old Timers Guild Laid back, not so serious, no drama. All about the fun!
www.oldtimersguild.com An opinion should be the result of thought, not a substitute for it. - Jef Mallett
I said it when AoC was in beta and approaching a fixed release date and I'll say it again... WAR will need a good 6 months after release to iron out the bugs, imbalances. I'm still having fun in elder beta and plan to join several weeks after release but anyone expecting WoW/LotRO/EQ2 stability and polish is going to be disappointed.
As for when a product is finished... I think MMOs should be held to the same level as single player games. I wouldn't accept this level of 'done' in Diablo III or Fallout 3 so why do publishers think its ok in the MMO market?
I said it when AoC was in beta and approaching a fixed release date and I'll say it again... WAR will need a good 6 months after release to iron out the bugs, imbalances. I'm still having fun in elder beta and plan to join several weeks after release but anyone expecting WoW/LotRO/EQ2 stability and polish is going to be disappointed.
And so they should be, these games have been live for quite sometime.
What we have here though is a content ready game with a few minor bugs to be ironed out. Not game breaking features like conan.
Comments
Mount and Blade?
Mount and Blade is incredible yes, however its combat isn't really revolutionary at all except for the mount combat. Lol. However that doesn't go to say it implements the mount combat VERY well, especially for a husband and wife team.
--------------------
You led a great life.
Rest in Peace.
Laura "Taera" Genender 2008
Mount and Blade. Great Game
http://www.gamespot.com/pc/rpg/mountandblade/index.html?tag=result;title;0
Tested it now and I can say the following about it,
WAR is reasonably polished, not as polished as WoW was on release but not far from it. However it's drastically smaller in size in terms of content. That's not to say that the game won't keep you busy for quite some time ahead. The game is fairly stable and even handles tabbing quite well, although not during loading screens. But yes, you will encounter a few strange bugs, glitches and get momentarily stuck in terrain objects at times.
The classes don't have alot of depth but they're still rather well designed, although much character balancing needs to be done. I didn't find the Warrior Priests to be that bad, however the Burning Wizards pretty much burns the whole place to a crisp if allowed a moment of peace.
The PvP was fun for me, although much more slow paced than WoW. People generally don't die as quick and healing will spoil anyones day. You need to focus your damage on a single player in order to be effective, either that or be a Bright Wizard. I can see the stacking, combination and synergy of certain abilities to become very powerful and I expect to see much of these to be used in higher tier PvP, once guilds and groups start to be more serious about RvR (which is just another lame word for normal PvP, there's really nothing more RvR about WAR than WoW). The open areas seemed pretty dead with few people in them, often being scarcely populated by mobs or none at all. The dwarven starting grounds were mostly just raided by the far more popular orcs 'n goblins, which made much of the place inaccessible to the dwarf players.
- The fact that it takes longer to die is an advantage in large scale PvP, but hurt the small scale PvP engagements. WAR's system wouldn't work in WoW's arena very well, but proves to be alot more entertaining in the battlegrounds.
The public quests are like AoC's special attack system, overhyped and not that effective. Sure, the public quests are entertaining to do at least once because they're fairly cinematic. It's like Assassin's creed, cool once but then it kinda gets old. It also completely fails to create any sense of companionship and co-up, people just do the stuff or happened to stumble upon the quest and then hope that they get lucky with the roll for the rewards.. most often winning nothing and having to do it all over again or grow fed up with it and go somewhere different.
The graphics are adequate, despite not having access to high quality textures (probably due to bandwith limitations). The characters look fairly good, especially the Orcs, goblins and dwarfs and they're all a step up from the graphics of WoW. However the world in WAR can look rather sloppily put together at times and I'd say that WoW makes a better job there instead. It also seems to run quite fine on an above average system and I believe that it will run on low quality settings even on poor machines.
As for the PvE it was rather mweh, didn't come across a single instance but I hear that some are s'posed to be in the game. Mobs are fairly stupid, have slow reaction times and the aggro range is so short that it makes the mobs seem really retarded.
The community on the test servers was fairly dead, very quiet. Too quiet in fact, people only talked when adressed and not even that at times. However, it was damn nice to see people use more roleplay names again instead of the usual "SHaodwdeath" "DEadlyassasin" yatta yatta that you see in other games. Hopefully though the game will become more cheerful on launch.
As a conclusion, WAR can be a fun game and for anyone who likes PvP, is tired of WoW but who wants another fantasy MMO. My only real gripe with the game is how they screwed the warhammer lore and feel of the Orc 'n Goblins by teaming them up with Chaos and the Dark Elves. I'd also liked to have see three factions in this game instead of just two, in order to make it stand out and be a real option to WoW.
Ah well, I think that most people who try it, will enjoy it. This isn't the pile of shit that AoC was, rest assured.
- Sajt
I've already addressed this earlier in the thread, but I'll address it again. My issue is not with people who don't know what they're doing on the first day, you're absolutely right about that being understandable. My issue is that in a game so focused on RvR, Mythic didn't even take the time to put in tooltips or instructions or little popup help menus explaining what's going on in the scenarios or RvR areas. I played through and past the area for level 8-10 and I still couldn't tell you what its purpose was. Kill or be killed, that was all that mattered, and stand near the flag to cap it, which I worked out based on intuition and past experience with other games. There was no direction, zero, NONE. In a game like EVE, where PvP is a way of life, you PvP because you have to, to defend your base/resources/territory. In a game like WAR, that's far more "theme park"-ish, why are we fighting? At least WoW had quests and descriptions to ease you into the Battlegrounds, and explain their purpose within the lore of the game (sort of). WAR's quests consisted of "kill 5 people" and "collect miscellaneous trade goods hidden within the city".
Maybe you can expect people to "figure it out on their own" but I have no such hopes. If they make it to the first RvR area and aren't being taught the basics, they will zerg eternally until someone tells them otherwise. That's what people do.
I've never posted before and I usually only read. I just had to correct some of the points the OP made that were bugging me a little while I read ( bugged me enough to write this reply ).
I'm not a fan or a blinded customer. I'm just a player who played the game and found it enjoyable in small portions. Truth be told, I would play this for around 4 months, not even a year. GREAT GAME, just not one that would hold an individual's attention for more than that.
my 2 cents, enjoy.
If that's the case, why make more than one game at all? Why not just have one MMO and make all the other MMOs shut down, since they will always be exactly the same game?
What a silly, pointless post.
It was an epiphany for me, personally... I've already set to work on the world's first ever MMORPG-FPS-RTS-Flight Sim-PvP-Badminton game...
It's gonna be AMAZING!!!
So... Who wants in for beta?
and the cash shop selling asphalt..." - Mimzel on F2P/Cash Shops
So you have to BUY skills?
wow good review!
Odd, I have experienced only one crash to desktop, and had more than enough cash to buy my full PVP set and weapon and all skills. Its only about a gold, which I got from selling all the stuff I looted. On each charater. Of which I made about 6. And without farming for money.
And on the realm I am on, people have been working together on both the PQ's and the RvR, standing back, letting the tanks block and taunt, letting the DPS fire from behind, and with healers keeping me up and going. All without any plans or talking. They just seemed to .. "get it" I guess.
I found a few bugs, but compared to some released games, this was almost nothing. Compared to most beta releases, it was stunning how polished and stable it was.
The game is just.. fun. I guess. But, it of course depends on your rig, your realm, who was in the area, levels, which area you were in.. But, its not going to be for everyone. At all.
"When people don't know much about something, they tend to fill in the blanks the way they want them to be filled in. They are almost always disappointed." - Will Wright
Yes but, you have to remember that especially the casual players that will flock to this game are completely delusional and turn an incident that involved them zerging the shit out of another group 10v5 somehow turns into them fucking alamoing their way through a 3v30. People make up shit all the time to seem like their life is epic, in and out of game. It's like that "2v6 PvP video" that some one released earlier. It was, in (virtual) reality, a 3v4 with a 2v1 to start.
Especially on this board, you have to remember that people make up shit to make themselves feel better and to increase their epeen status all the time.
I disagree with a fair amount of your post but you do have some points, Collision detection has been very hit and miss with me so far, and on the money problem it's really not to bad they lowered the cost of skills by quite a bit and increased the money drop from rvr it seems.
Also a tip for anyone come open beta and release you are able to get the kill 5 players from each pairing and finish them in the empire/chaos area for 19s silver total(all repeatable). It takes a bit of extra time but I found it to be worth it. This should put you well on your way to affording all you need. Also from my experience leveling in Scenarios has been faster then questing and PQs, and open world rvr because of the kill quest seems to be the best money.
I'd say this is a pretty fair assessment, but it seems like you maybe missed a few things. Sorry if this has been addressed, but I skipped multiple pages. It's late, I'm at work and posting during downtimes :P
RvR and PvP: Many aren't going to know what to do during the first few hours of play. However, during my experiences, most folks have gotten the gist and have applied some tactics in the Scenarios. On my realm there was about a 50/50 win/loss rate in the scenarios, but the RvR areas on the map it was basically a Destruction zerg camped outside our Warcamp. However, it got better when I visited the Troll Lands.
Community: 100% agreed with what you said. I've actually run into a lot more helpful people than whiners. I've only been on the Order side, Empire specifically.
PvE: As a Witch Hunter I've not run into the odd aggro issues as you, since I don't have the Aura system, obviously. Normal mobs I agree are easy, but to me that seems intended. The challenges seem to come from the PQs where Champion mobs hit me like a truck, even if they are a couple of levels below me. I'd say PvE challenge rating in the lower area is right about where it should be. Yes there are pathing issues, which can be annoying, but not game breaking to me.
Also, I have leveled from 8 to 11 strictly from RvR. At the main warcamp of the area there are a number of repeatable quests that have RvR objectives. For Empire there was one to just complete a scenario battle, kill 5 enemy pcs in the world RvR area in the zone and also cap or defend a world RvR objective, to name a few examples. Each completion awarded me with money and xps. I would say I was averaging a level per hour doing it that way, once I knew what I was doing.
Money: I had the same issue as you with not being able to afford Skills at level up and whatnot, but to be honest as soon as I found the repeatable RvR quests, the money was rolling in. I went from about 10 silver to 2 gold very rapidly that way.
I personally have enjoyed myself during the preview so far. Very few crashes for me. The only times I've crashed have been in extremely populated RvR areas with a ton of spell effects going off. I simply left that area and went somewhere else, problem solved.
Just as a side note: I do not get a WoW feeling at all while playing this game. It honestly feels a lot like LotRO in terms of graphics and DAoC in terms of general gameplay. There are a few WoW similarities, but I've played WoW for four years now and I am really not getting a WoW vibe from WAR.
As always, take all of this with a grain of salt. I'm not trying to make up anyone's mind for them, just sharing my experiences.
All I'm going to hop in here and say, agreeing with the OP on is they need to do something about the chosen aura's pissing off non agro mobs. Thats the one truly anoying things I found with the class. Other than that is was pretty fun. That and they are definitly weak early on RvR. I know my job is to protect others but you dont even start seeing decent enough skills till 10ish to do that while other classes get what they need to do well. I also wish there was a catagory in scenarios and an renown mechanic added in for soaking up damage. I'm sure as hell not killing anyone (again I noticed this to get alittle better after lvl 10).
interesting. I have faith that Mythic will iron out the bugs pretty quick. Mythic is not Funcom and Mark Jacobs has always been a stand up guy. Funny thing though is this thread almost makes me want to stop by Best Buy today and pick up a preorder box just so I can see the game for myself . ..eh ... Still I think I will hold to my original plan and pick it up and play for real next spring. I got enough games to keep me busy for awhile.
I miss DAoC
Kill every mob you run across and sell everything they drop you personally can't use. Do every quest . Level 10 with a little more than a gold saved up and all my skills plus the best armor/ weapons I could get. Don't waste money on crap you don't really need to play. Doing that you will always have plenty of money and you don't even have to try and make money. Do that and try and make money too, well the sky is the limit.
Pyro, this has happened to me many times on many different forums. If you make a clear, logical argument then it will be ignored by everyone. People like to respond to controversy and poorly written posts because its easy. Sadly I failed this time around because he did respond to mine.
However I think, just like your whole "review", you don't understand. You keep complaining because a game that isn't out yet has bugs, you can't make money, and people don't know what they are doing. Those are your three real main points that you say over and over more or less. Which all are addressed easily: its a beta, you CAN make money easily, and of course people aren't talking much and don't know what they are doing. In fact, you can't even review the "community" yet. Only a small collection of more hardcore fans got into the preview weekend, not the overall community.
I said it before and I'll say it again, I just cannot believe how many people think this original post is a fair review. It's not even a review, just compiled complaints that add up to the OP hyped this game up way too much in his head. If it helps you decide what you already decided, that you don't like the game, well then you already decided that and you can move on.
Playing: World of Warcraft.
Played: Lord of the Rings Online, Starwars Galaxies.
Tried: Starwars the Old Republic, Everquest 2, Guild Wars, Vanguard, Age of Conan, Aion.
Ive been playing closed beta for a bit, and this weekend was able to join up with a good RL mate who still played DAOC.
I like the game so far, took me a while to get a handle on the graphics, initially i felt they were WOWish. Since then i have to say they arent, much better than WOW.
When we started this weekend i rolled a healer and he rolled a Engineer. First day he liked it. Got to level 6 say after a few hours of just goofing around.
Today, hes pretty much reserved its a crap game full stop and thats it. I asked him why and he says it lacks depth... He had made it to level 10 hah.
Ahh well some people like it some dont. I think ive played many more online games and can appreciate them more. Im also not so tied to one game. He still is pretty locked into DAOC and cant be helped. I think it is every gamemakers dream to have people so locked into a game where nothing else is better.
Btw i love DAOC and am thinking of opening the account again just for fun.... that was when i realise i have to have a second account just for my buff bots
Guess my point here is anyone calling a game crap before a good few levels or at least give the 30 free days a run, really shouldnt post any opinion about any game.
If you do its biassed... eg i dont like wow because it looks cartoony. Or i dont like DAOC because it looks too Dark (hah).
Hell i gave AOC 2 months before i left. Game has alot of potential but fails end game with bad vibes on how the devs handle the patch process. I even played Lineage for 2 weeks solid got to twenty and then just so sick of the automated players called ykjjherk running around that i left.
I guess another thing is that some people dont want to relearn a new game, if it feels different and not what they are used to they will call it crap also i guess in some cases.
So when trying a new game, take your time. Take a few deep breaths and try to take in what is before you. Do your best to put other games out of your mind and play what is in front of you.
Above all try and enjoy your new experience no matter how long you stick with it or what.
If you don't like and know you won't like it with no reservation, then it's best take yourself out of the running.
For me, I find it rather amazing primarily because I never used to PvP and now I just can't get enough. Once I got my first character to 5 or 6 and jumped into my first Scenario (admittedly, I was lost when I did. I just started killing red guys figuring that was safe) I just could not get enough! Unless I have some quests that I have decided to cap first, I queue up ASAP and jump right in (I don't leave groups if I'm in a PQ, of course). I love it!
I kinda disagree, you can learn alot about a game in a few hours, i think you kinda now if the game is for you or not....its like meeting someone for the first time, you kinda now there personality and what kind of an individual they are...kinda like a game, you sense if the game has personalitiy or not...everyone is different and have different opinion..
There is an element of truth to your comment, however there seems to be a crutch effect when it comes to the ideology that unless you've played X amount of time you can't appreciate the game. I've had my first experience with the game this weekend, however this isn't my first experience with MMO Beta's or with MMO's in general.
For most MMO players that have been around for a while I wouldn't expect that it requires weeks or months of play to get an impression of the game and how it fits their play style. It does take time to experience the fullness of the content, but it doesn't take long to get the general feel and impression.
The Old Timers Guild
Laid back, not so serious, no drama.
All about the fun!
www.oldtimersguild.com
An opinion should be the result of thought, not a substitute for it. - Jef Mallett
Yeah, of course it would be, if the game actually counted your kills. The problem now is their "kill 5 people" system works like WoW's kill credit, where you only "get the kill" if you dealt the killing blow. For some classes, this might not be a problem, but for others... heh, good luck.
At any rate, the point I was trying to make earlier is how dumb it was for them to make gear a reward that needs to be bought. If they want players to PAY for it, they should put in some kind of system like the Influence used in PQs, but for PvP only.
There is an element of truth to your comment, however there seems to be a crutch effect when it comes to the ideology that unless you've played X amount of time you can't appreciate the game. I've had my first experience with the game this weekend, however this isn't my first experience with MMO Beta's or with MMO's in general.
For most MMO players that have been around for a while I wouldn't expect that it require weeks or months of play to get an impression of the game and how it fits their play style. It does take time to experience the fullness of the content, but it doesn't take long to get the general feel and impression.
very true. Just speaking for myself by the time I play at least 2 classes 3 hours each I am pretty sure whether the game is for me or not. AoC was the exception, I loved lvl 1 - 20 then it fell flat. I have pretty much decided now I will get a pre order box today just to try the open beta. But to be honest after reading a lot of forum posts on various forums I am not expecting much.
I miss DAoC
In fairness to the game developers, what would constitute a 'finished' game? LoTR was the smoothest launch I've ever experienced in an MMO, but it still had its issues. When you consider the sophistication and complexity involved in making most any software product its unrealistic to think it can deliver on being trouble free upon release.
Like most projects there's a projected time of completion and there isn't a lot of wiggle room to retool, retweak and re-crucnch code. There is a lot of pressure from the bean counters to get the product to market so they can make a profit off their investment.
The Old Timers Guild
Laid back, not so serious, no drama.
All about the fun!
www.oldtimersguild.com
An opinion should be the result of thought, not a substitute for it. - Jef Mallett
I said it when AoC was in beta and approaching a fixed release date and I'll say it again... WAR will need a good 6 months after release to iron out the bugs, imbalances. I'm still having fun in elder beta and plan to join several weeks after release but anyone expecting WoW/LotRO/EQ2 stability and polish is going to be disappointed.
As for when a product is finished... I think MMOs should be held to the same level as single player games. I wouldn't accept this level of 'done' in Diablo III or Fallout 3 so why do publishers think its ok in the MMO market?
And so they should be, these games have been live for quite sometime.
What we have here though is a content ready game with a few minor bugs to be ironed out. Not game breaking features like conan.