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My Opinions So Far (not that they matter)
jonsnow13
Member Posts: 67
Guild wars is a game that tries something completely different than the rest, so most the time someone either loves it or it's "not my thing". I give them credit, because their live streaming technology can allow them to fix a patch if it has gone awry in a matter of seconds. However, because the game is basically downloaded on to your computer in very little time at all... it came at what some would argue large expenses.
Since the game is free, these add on to the problems that the problem above created.
What does little money and limited technology create? A game that's trying to do the best with what it can afford and be compatible with. Most the game is downloaded, so the graphics can't be too taxing so that a person spends hours just trying to get into the game. On top of that, most computers have to be able to play it since the game has to appeal to a larger audience, since most the money is going to be made from people purchasing the game and if it doesn't appeal to older computers then it's not going to make much in the skeem of things.
The graphics can't be too taxing *and* the animations can't, either. So, lip synching has to be thrown out. I Know, lip-synching isn't that big of a added download!! Well, for what GW is trying to do I would say it is, anything added even little details can make the expansion take longer then they need to... and since guild wars is trying to release expansions at a whopping six months and has to make sure of it so that it doesn't give the company a bad reputation it has to take out things like jumping, and other aspects that make the game too complicated for publishing. Of course, these are priveledges that most MMORPG's offer, but guild wars isn't a pay to play mmo. Guild wars essentially is inbetween a free mmo and a pay to play. Luckly, the team is so experienced with past games that they were able to make top notch graphics for an engine that isn't that complicated, and fairly decent animations (personally best dance animations).
Now, so far the game seems pretty watered down in terms of what you fight, your party sizes and instanced areas. The instancing and party size might be darn right necessary, if the game wasn't instanced it would take a lot more bandwidth, and the game just wouldn't money wise be possible. Still, I found it depressing that there wasn't any kind of raid content like you would find in any other top of the line MMO. I wanted to go into a group of 20 and pvp... I wanted an epic castle siege or something spectacular that wouldn't take much time.
anyways, to get to the point:
The neutral:
Guild wars has a lot of things restricted and missing mainly because it adds to the development time. So, don't diss on it because we'll be getting expansions fast, which I prefer more in some ways. I hated waiting a year for a content download in other games.
The pros:
The most inovative streaming technology to boot. You see a message pop up at least weekly now, where they have fixes and changes to bugs in record time... for simple things sure, but compair it to Wow and the additions are staggering so far.
Beautiful graphics, the best pvp I've played so far in any game (it takes a lot of playing to actually appreciate it... as in getting to know all the skills, etc.) The instancing is nice, and the game at later levels is a lot of fun.
Guilds is where it's at and if you find a good guild this game is so addictive you will spend about as much time or more you spent playing diablo 2 when you first got it or any of those other classics... If you find a bad guild you will hate this game, especially if they're a lot like my last guild I was in. This makes or breaks an experience.
Everything I said below will probably be fixed in a few months, compaired to years (or if you look at shadowbane, never) because ncsoft is just that good so far at fixing problems and complaints.
Easy to post bug feature, just type /bug then a description of the problem... although limiting in what you can say since it seems it's rather short.
No Monthly FEE 
The cons of guild wars:
Small party sizes for most the game, didn't even bother adding in an easy "Looking for party" search list for finding group members when not with friends and is a pain in the ass... you actually have to spam the chat channel to find a group which seems just taxing on bandwidth which doesn't make sense. For pvp, finding a group for random pvp in tombs is nearly impossible unless you're above rank 3, or of the class monk.
You can't tell if your party members are out of energy, which makes a lot of skills hard to use that give party members regeneration for a limited amount of time.
Henchmen if they die will run off into a mountain or under the ground and then you'll have half the party you did.
Finding stupid and idiotic group members who don't listen and make you lose missions is more common here than any other game. Which brings me to the point that you can easily fail a 30 minute mission and have to redo it. Also, sometimes the npc's that you need to complete a mission will get stuck and you will be unable to complete a mission... or they'll auto attack something and then never lose the aggro for that attack.
Minions in pvp don't lose aggro and will stand in a spot not attacking and be a complete waste of time (which if they were actually attacking, be a huge bonus to your team).
They advertise just being able to instantly join and start pvping but the game does not work that way at all. You have to spend a good 50 hours in the game at least before you will have an equal playing field with everyone else that is any good since runes and skills aren't unlocked until you spend the time trying to get them... same goes for items. 50 hours only unlocks about half of the stuff for two classes, then you have to spend another 100 hours for the next 4 classes and all the skills, etc...
Which brings me to pvp, some skills that are called elites that you get later on in the game are so good that if you don't have an elite, you are at an extreme disadvantage. Spell breaker for instance makes all spells instantly cancel on a target as soon as they're attempted to be casted (doesn't even bother going through the timer of casting) but still uses the mana up... for like 15 seconds. if you don't have that ability, there's nothing else that even compairs to it so you're at a huge disadvantage since majority of classes (even groups) use spells. Lightning elementalists are flavor of the month and will be for a long time.
The story and the voice acting... along with the lack of most animations for cut sceens makes this game a complete bore and an unwelcoming environment for role playing. Diablo 2, a like 6 year old game puts this game to shame in terms of story. Of course, this is just my opinion... others might feel differently. Oh, did I mention the annoying missions? The bonus's aren't really bonus's at all, rather then a *complete waste of time* in most cases. They only offer a whopping 1000 xp, which really doesn't help you at all you'd be better off soloing monsters. If they offered a skill point, then they'd be worth it. Then there's quest's like the infusion runs, where you do the same exact mission five times just to infuse each armor piece so you don't die so quickly... was it really necessary to make us do it five times?
Almost zero solo content, which doesn't make sense since soloing would require the least bandwidth (wouldn't have to send locations of another player to you). Also, finding runes and items that are worth anything is so hard unless you make a build that can solo... and if you don't then you are at an extreme disadvantage once more in pvp... superior vigors are a must!
Monks are the most important class. This makes the game unbalanced, since there is one class that is needed more over the others because their skills are just that good. Sure it's a healer class so it gets some "Ok that's fine" but when half your party nearly has to be a primary monk, it's a big problem. Especially since monks have some of the best elites in the game that practically make a character invulnerable for a set period of time.
No main guild wars forums to post ideas, complaints... etc. Which isn't that bad... since there's really no reason to.
No crafting like other mmo's, but this isn't really why I came here... I came here for pvp. So this is sort of just a complaint because they did offer a system of crafting, although I wouldn't really call it crafting as much as I would call it trading, or buying just with different types of money.
Not much individuality in terms of customization of your looks. I look like a necro, you look like a necro... and necor's seem to all have this collar that looks like I have a big mouth.
A few skills you probably won't ever use, unless you're just wanting to try something different due to their lack of importance or circumstancial requirements.
A lot of the explorable area's are just a complete waste of time especially at early levels where there's no skills to cap. The only reason to "explore" is to just farm creatures and hope they drop items... which can be done just as easily (perhaps more efficiently) in missions, such as one called the gates of kryta where there are a lot of lightning drakes to kill that drop good loot. Most of the time you will find yourself casting mending if you're a monk primary/secondary and run through the levels with a train of mobs chasing you because it annoys you to no end and provides no rewards once so ever to killing through all the creatures.
Which brings me to chests, the loot rewards for chests seems decent in the beginning but at later levels serves no purpose once so ever. I have not found one purple or gold item from a chest since level 12, which was approximately 40 hours of gameplay ago. Anything that is not a rare or unique is completely and utterly useless to me at this point... so there is no reason to stop and check a chest, but I still do hoping that that they changed it while I was gone and I just didn't read it on their updates site :P
For a game called "Guild Wars" There isn't a whole lot to do with a guild... especially in terms of functionality. I haven't yet found a way to add more ranking classes within a guild... such as officer, head officer, etc... not to mention it doesn't even keep score of your guild, but bothers keeping track of a bunch of text information on your wins and losses in guild vs guild. Oh well, I'm sure they're planning a lot for the expansion. They did after all, say it was going to be as big as the original game didn't they?
Comments
Two things, role playing is for nerds. What are you comparing the pvp too. . . . WOW? WOW's pvp is butt.
Having runes and elites do not mean you connot compete in PvP. They can sometimes mean you don't win, but its the fun of PvP that is important. If you want, you can spend time looking for runes and elites. The argument over whether there should be an 'unlock all skills' button like they had in the BWE's has been raging on the GW specific forums for quite a while now. I personally find elites incredibly easy to come by.
The PvE game lasts 90+ hours. That is content. Not some omg-uber-sword-of-doom, 'i win' skill or a house.
Monks are an important class, but fewer players play them than rangers, warriors etc. this is what causes the rarity, very few players are willing to create a monk pvp char, they'd rather moan about it on forums. They are not unbalanced, just useful. If a team went in without any melee classes they'd likely get beaten, it's just that there are always plenty of warriors around.
Spell breaker is not unbalanced, it has a long recharge time and requires a lot of attribute points spent in protection. It can also be interrupted, and normal melee/ranged attacks work fine. Stop using spells and start physically attacking (or attack someone else for a bit). It also means they can't equip other elite spells that worry me far more, like shield of judgement (which is really nice). People tend to see a skill/spell work well against their build and go 'omg, thats unbalanced' until they understand how and why you can counter it. A meteor shower can be the uber-est skill in the game if people don't understand that running out of the AoE radius is a good idea.
You can tell if members are running out of energy, ctrl-clicking your energy bar reveals via the team chat how much energy you have. How far did you actually get in PvE?
As for large party sizes, it is the one thing constrained by the instanced zones but the problems of players dropping out, getting a group together and finding monks would be even worst with a party size of 20. If they ever did develop more efficient technology i'm sure arena.net would love to have larger parties. I always see GW more as a game to pick up and play with a couple of mates (either RL or online), not something you devote your life to.
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PvE in general is pretty lame, if you think long and hard about it. You are spending your time beating a severely gimped AI that would lose to a well trained monkey. Best not to think too long and hard why you are wasting time playing games in general actually...
ok to comment:
who in combat has the time to ctrl+click their mana bar when teamates are dieing and they're a monk? I'd hope they don't for our sake. Also, you wouldn't even be able to see if they were if your team's good and calling targets + doesn't have voice chat... chat gets so flooded.
spell breaker is unbalanced, because it is better than other elites due to it's almost always useful nature, and it's never a bad skill to bring along unless you're fighting a fluke of all warriors, rangers and monks which I haven't seen so far. Lets compair it to blood is power... sure it gives one guy a massive recharge of mana, at the cost of 33% of your max health. It's useful, but not so useful as to make a target invulnerable for (if you have a major/superior divine) 16-18 seconds which is a long time... especially if it's on a relic carrier. The idea is simple, some skills ARE more useful than others, that doesn't mean that those skills aren't useful as well... but spell breaker is almost never a bad skill to bring along as long as you got points into divine (like most skills requires points in the main attribute), while a lot of skills only work in specially tailored groups. This brings the topic to another issue, that guild wars offer a huge selection of abilities and they did a really good job for how many skills they have, and I'm sure that any inbalances they find will be fixed with due time.
I'm not dissing on the game, just making clear the problems I see at this time.
I almost never see more than one/two mesmers, more than one ranger (I rarely see rangers in groups actually) and a ton of warriors, lightning elementalists and minion necro's because people love to play minion necro's regardless of usefullness :P
However, I do see always a monk in every group (yet not to see in any serious group), and I don't always see a ranger in every group, or a warrior, or a mesmer, or a necro. I am yet to hear someone say we need a ranger in our group or we ARE going to lose. I do hear it often with monks. I am yet to see someone leave the group because we don't have a ranger, but have seen with monks. I am yet to see any serious group play without monks.
To comment on the large group thing, I was more considering 20 player groups for pvp. They do it in tomb of the prim... why can't they do it for guild vs guild? They could have various ladders for guild vs guild like 4 on 4, 8 on 8, 12 on 12... etc. Some of the guild maps are really awesome and with a lot of players for consistant battling would easily win my heart over.
Pretty good summary. I don't agree with all of it, but that's ok. Somehow I was one of those people who hopped right into PvP without all the bells and whistles and was able to dominate for a while. Then I settled into Roleplaying and started unlocking stuff and thought "coooool".
It's unique, that's for sure. It's Diablo 2 meets EverQuest and in some ways trumps them both hands-down.
The little things missing, like being able to freely move about the area unrestricted, jumping, giganto-pvp battles, yeah that's kind of annoying at first, but once you sink into the game you don't miss them. Well, I didn't anyway. It develops it's own feel and now I can't go back to those "standard" mmorpg's. Not just because of the monthly fees but because this is more my rhythm. I hated waiting around for things to spawn, hoping I wasn't going to have to fight some killstealer off. GW fixed that and a lot of things.
And it's just nice as hell to look at. I've taken I dunno how many screenshots of this game already.
It quite true that this games has a lot of flaws and the initial post of this thread points them out pretty well. But we all have to remember that this is the beginning and we must give the Devs time to fix things up. We must also not forget that they could of made all the things we complained about right before the release but that would of created to problems...First the game wouldn't have came out on April 28th and second it would have been less content for the next Chapter.
The games has a lot of Pros and Cons but i think overallits a great game that has a lot of potential and promise in its futur.
GW---> (Ranger/Mesmer)Dark Raziel
It takes the same style of graphics that was in fable. It's the graphics engine that is lower powered for people with slower computers but doesn't offer higher power for people with higher end computers, ever see the elementalist spell effects? They're pretty horrid. However, the artists in this game are amazing and so even though the engine is lacking the artists definately make up for it.
every spell has its counter.... beter to say every char has its counter!
PvP is great i like how u have the control of the char (like FPS games) and its really up to u what to do nekst, use combos not necessarly elites. What helps u 10s invurnebility.. just say that u will die in 10 s
Becouse its free of monthly payment can be compared with any of the games (even HL2) and its one of the best game so far.
GW bad things: we all like to compare this game with other MMORPGs (wrong), so trade sistem is not good in GW, no sound when i play instrument (no instrument
), invisible walls, often stuck in the ground, corner, etc. , short and not well organized friend/ignore list, no reward in team arena, mybe some more stuff...
other than that its a great game!
lp