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Looking for a new sandbox to play in
Hello everyone! I'm trying to find a good MMO to play.
[Revision 6/24: re-worded most of my post, added section for games that have already been recommended. Yes, I'm still looking.]
Necessities - Game must meet all requirements.
Sandbox. Obviously, from the thread title =p I've played enough themeparks, and they're common enough anyway that I could go out and trip over a few without even looking. I'd like to be able to go where I want and do what I want without having the game trying to beat me back onto one "correct" path. Also no games that are just dungeon running from a central hub. Nothing wrong with them per se, it's just not what I'm looking for.
In terms of mechanics, I'm looking for something other than the standard fare. I find most traditional MMO mechanics like EQ2 or WoW to be boring. Action systems are fine as long as they're not just traditional systems but with manual aim (for reference: that's my opinion on GW2's system). Targeting method alone does not make a system "different". Strategic systems would be interesting to see, but it's gotta be strategic gameplay, not just strategically building your character and then using it in an otherwise bad system. I'm mainly talking about combat systems because they're usually a game's central mechanic but having good mechanics applies to non-combat focused games as well. And lastly, skill > stats. I want to win because I'm better, not because I've grinded past a certain point.
Pricing must be either F2P or the game must have a decent free trial. I'm not willing to spend money on a game before I've even had the chance to see if I like it or not and no amount of words telling me how great a game is will change that.
It should also be playable immediately, not "coming soon" or "in closed testing". Open betas are fine though.
The game shouldn't be primarily PvP focused. PvP and PvE focus should be at least equal, with PvE over PvP all the way up to no PvP at all being acceptable.
Preferred - Everything in here is a good bonus but not strictly needed. I don't expect a game to hit everything on this list, not by a longshot. Even if it misses everything on this list I'll at least check the game out if it hits everything on the necessities.
I tend to prefer fantasy or sci-fi environments, but there's nothing I particularly dislike.
I'm fine with PvP existing and generally enjoy duels or arenas or large faction battles, but don't like it when it's constantly sneaking up on me and sticking a knife in my back. My experience with open PvP is that it tends to be used by griefers almost exclusively and devolves into this, but it's not a deal breaker.
Strong crafting systems are always nice, especially if they have good customization features.
The bigger the world is the better. I like just being able to go out and explore. A treasure hunting addition might be cool to see.
Classless is good.
Challenge is definitely a plus, but don't confuse challenging with punishing. Losing equipment on death is punishing but does not add challenge. I don't mind high penalties for failure, it just really bothers me when the two things get confused. Dark Souls for example isn't hard because you lose your souls on death, it's hard (and fun) because of what makes you die in the first place.
Already Recommended but Rejected
GW2 - Paywall, tried on a friend's account and just didn't find it fun
EVE - Tried it but didn't like it
Wildstar - Paywall
Darkfall - See above
Mortal Online - Looked promising, but sparse on content
ArcheAge - Huge paywall and mechanics looked bad
Haven and Hearth - Not actually rejected, but the sheer amount of wait time on really getting things done relegates it to a side game
Graal - didn't want to run properly on my computer for some reason
So there's what I'm looking for. Any suggestions are much appreciated ^.^
Comments
FFA Nonconsentual Full Loot PvP ...You know you want it!!
a few games on the horizon...
The Repopulation might be out towards the end of the year or the start of next year... that should meet your needs.. It has a mixed combat so you can either do tab target or fps style.. from the few people i know whe are testing it they say that its best to use the fps style combat as you can aim and hit different parts of the body and that gives you an advantage over the tabbed target system. Of course this is a PVP based game but there are safe areas think of the system the eve uses and its very similar.
Other than that there are no sandbox games out there that meet your needs so come back in 6 months to a year and there might be a lot more options.
Darkfall UW. Not sure if it is a sandbox or not. But it is definitely a seamless open world and no linear paths you are required to follow.
There is PvP in the open world so you would be best served joining a clan asap. You can solo PvE without too much hassle most of the time. Emphasis on risk vs reward. Your clan will typically have a holding (city or hamlet) or your allies will have one that you can live out of. There are harvesting and PvE bonuses in certain areas around your holding.
I'm not a huge PvP just to PvP guy and I have really enjoyed the game. The combat is definitely very skill based.
Graal Online is the only zelda-ish online game, play on the zodiac server as it has the strongest rpg feel among the servers.
they have alot of classes, and it's based on skill, experiance and some gear. there are some classes that do not require gear to defeat people they are Gladiator, Warrior, Monk. and Mage.
Warrior - uses the axe weapon, kind of bulky, deals alot of damage with decent stun rate, you have to manage your berserk stacks and use glory for 1700 regeneration 3~4 tics. or pulverize at 20 stacks for most damage and stun rate (it has a cast time but you can move a little during the cast) main combo is to start off by taunt, laceration (bleed), leg trample (stuns target) attack twice whirlwind then throw axe (stuns) attack twice, fall back and glory rinse repeat. pulverize when you have high stacks and also use rush on target to disarm them when they're about to unleash their combo and if not use ironwall if your rush is on cool down or just to soak up damage as it increases your defense by alot. Surtr is the best weapon for warrior as it has 20% explosion rate, this scales off fire aff so draconian is a decent race for it as it also increases defense by 7% and fire weapon damage by 7% draconians also have a buff ignite scales that burns target during the duration the more foolish they are the more ignites they take or say if you're smart enough to know when to use it properly you could burn them very hard i've seen up to 5k burns not sure how much tics though. warriors use Battlemaster's prefix which is like 150k-200k gold a piece 4/4 is 600k-800k surtr is like 3m depends on player but it's worth the money as its a deadly weapon, ring of pyre is a fire accessory for a good damage boost worth 1m or less.
Gladiator's are mobile version of Warriors that uses Swords with decent regeneration (requires victory cry buff to regeneration 400 hp per 3 seconds) they excel on quick brutal stun lock combos and tend to have some decent counter spells like repel magic that repels magic and on second activation throws a small slow shockwave that does the exact damage that the spell would so if a spell usually deals 7k damage and you repeled it and threw the repel magic counter at your target, he would take 7k damage. They also have a melee counter spell called rebuke which is a short duration buff that you use 5 seconds before your enemy attacks you, they will take the damage instead. lastly there is warlords tear which lowers there defense and attack power in a 360 aoe, quite useful.
Combo - Charge near enemy [attack once] shockwave [attack once] whirlwind warcry [attack once] rinse repeat.
they also have repel magic that only works against spells, it shields you (no visual effect) and throws small slow shock wave that deals the same damage as if the magic spell would 6k = 6k OUCH the projectile is pretty slow so it should really be used near the target or after a stun. rebuke is a counter spell that deals damage straight to the target only if its melee, ranged none magic, i think damage was based on your damage or the enemy damage not too sure about this. for gladiators earth weapon is the best however you won't afford that sword so your alternative is a water sword called Hydra's Tail worth 500k or so. for races werewolf is the best for gladiator as it gives sword damage boost and a buff to increase attack speed for like 4-5 seconds for smoother combos unless you're fighting a bursty class that also has alot of crowd control like blind, binds, slows alot of dps.. which would make stygian absolute as it makes you immune to all sources of damage for 4 seconds (some penetrate the buff, not sure which one to be exact) and you can move during the buff. gladiators also use battlemaster's regal set / hallowed set so thats 800k Eyering is worth like 10-12m but grants decent damage boost, 2k health and 3% stun rate this means thats alot of stun locking, you can also choose a fire weapon Dragon's Tongue and just use Ring of Pyre as it's also a cheap option. (red flag badge is the cheapest accessory, so if you want, you can buy this for like 200k, it has 1800 health or so with 6% damage, so it's not that bad, but if you can afford ring of pyre do it since its absolute over rfb in terms of damage output)
Monk - has the most health out of all classes, some sick stun combos that starts with body slam -> earth slam -> s button -> any fist skill preferably cobra fist -> tiger claw (slams stun as default tiger claw stuns only when it's used as a combo finisher) there are many combos for this class like against casters you would need to silence them, you finish the combo with cobra fist in example - s button - dragon fang -cobra fist (SILENCES!!!) like that, and theres another one, s button - cobrafist or any other fist skill - ki wave for a slow, they also have ki blast that you can use for harrassing but they have low mana pool so it shouldn't be wasted too much. dragon fang doesnt have any special effect other than extra damage if used as a combo finisher so it's useless to use it last, so you can just use that is a filler skill to use other combo finishers Chakra heals you for 4k-5k health every minute instantly and it cleanses a debuff! you can automaticly regenerate hp 300 or 400 per 2-3 seconds
lv.54 monk lv.6 priest, Goblin Race is the best set up. for gears they equip Battlemaster's seki 4/4, red flag badge but if you want to be even stronger and have 2-3m to spend, Ring of Anchorite gives the most health and status equippable for monks only!
check out the warrior and gladiator gameplay video here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l3ZCKSQvpZs
I really hope this interests you! ^^
Mage - has various element of spells, i prefer fire for farming as they have a class mastery to burn enemies. takes alot of funding to gear up as a top tier pvp mage but i've seen many people do it without gear. Draconian is a decent race for them, Archmage's Manawoven 4/4 set ring of mizma / ring of pyre (this is better as it has 10 spell power 22 fire affinity which means your fire spells will do more damage its worth 2m) and staff of mizma (500k-1m its a earth/dark/fire staff btw) is what you will use, for the build it's 54 mage 6 priest
for class masteries 3/3 of Crimson Fist- Reduces the cooldown of Explosion by 1/3/5 second(s) and causes targets to ignite. Additionally increases the accuracy of Wildfire and Explosion by 15%.
3/3 Rock Shards- Grants Crush a 0.25/0.5/0.75 second stun. Crush is a channeled spell so hold it for the spell to go further, but you're vulnerable during the channel so becareful. you can cancel the channeling without it going on cool down by moving around.
3/3 of Frozen Heart- Increases the duration of Chill by 1/2/3 second(s) and Ice Coffin by 1/2/3 second(s). 3 seconds of freeze duration is absolute!
combo for mage is Manasurge> Ice Coffin> Merlins Charm > Quake > wild fire > explosion (i think explosion is click to cast so you can do it at the same time as wildfire) then immediately > crush so he can't move for a second out of the explosion.
they also have acid blast to lower defense to increase your damage and chill to slow them, step can be used to avoid combos even when you're stunned.
Manasurge is a buff to instant cast, icecoffin has a long cast time so its prefered to use it with this buff.
Merlin's Charm is a buff to increase damage
you need to gear up a little bit via fishing and mining, you can also sell the drops you get while leveling up to lv.60 and earn almost 1m gold but you need more than that so your friends could gear up for farming (wierd how the game doesnt use "raid" instead use farming, raids in this game are taking forts from a nation, guilds also can capture like three forts)
first you focus on making gold via fishing or mining to do this you must locate the fishing shop or the mining center. for you i'll take you a map screenshot. the one where both red/blue lines start is your "online start location" which you can return to if you're out of combat and stay still for 30 seconds by saying unstick me. red line is where you buy the fishing rod, blue line is where you mine and also buy a pick axe. i prefer fishing as it grants you a bag of spoils that have a chance to give you race essence (stygian, seraph, puppin at the best ones as stygian offers you a 4 second immunity, seraph is popular for paladin, priest, puppin is used for avenger unlock and wind classes because it grants dodge rate, avenger is a mobile bursty pvp class that uses a katana) mining rocks could be more fun at first as fishing tend to escape you at first (maybe its because im playing far from the server, it's located at us and my internet is horrible) http://imgur.com/KNGtUXB
to fish get near the water and find shadows of the fish, equip the rod and spam s button, the spoils also give gold or torn boots (these boots are used for a quest to unlock heavy fishing rod)
the gears in this game have certain prefixes and also suffixes to decide the price. the price for these gears are 200k, defenders could go up to 500k if it is "Hallowed" as they are lv.60 form of heavy armor, archmages are only 200k if it's a manawoven, others are 50k-100k
Battlemaster's gives you 9% damage, good for warrior/brute classes Nightblade's gives you 3% damage 12% critical damage 2% crit rate, yes dextarity classes like thief/scout/ranger/assasin/ninja uses these Archmage's 12 spell power - i think it's obvious that mage/necromancer classes use them xD Defender's - 3% defense -2% damage, the tanks use them preferable tank classes would be Dark Knight, Paladin, Dragoon (these guys are dodge tanks and use Ninja's prefix but you can't dodge spells so yeah)
Tried both Haven and Hearth and Graal.
Haven and Hearth looks interesting, and I can make an exception on the combat requirement since it seems like it's both a secondary thing and doesn't get in the way as opposed to being a central element like in most other games.
Graal for some reason doesn't work on my computer. I tried getting on the Zodiac server and it refused to load the UI, rendering it unplayable. I tried a different server and all the graphics were completely messed up, I couldn't see to do anything at all.
I've heard good things about Darkfall, but I don't see where it has a free trial option.
I've tried EVE before but just couldn't get into it.
give Graal some time to load, as you haven't downloaded the image files yet and maybe your internet is slow.
usually takes like 3-5 seconds when you run it for the first time. or maybe more.
Fixed.
"My Fantasy is having two men at once...
One Cooking and One Cleaning!"
---------------------------
"A good man can make you feel sexy,
strong and able to take on the whole world...
oh sorry...that's wine...wine does that..."
Still taking suggestions, updated op with a bit more info and hopefully more clarity.
Regarding Graal, the problem was that it outright refused to download assets correctly. I've confirmed through checking the console output that there were errors downloading, and these errors repeated themselves across multiple attempts and waiting periods. Even a reinstall didn't help.