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Looking for an mmo with good pve
I haven't touched an mmorpg after I bought cataclysm (played it for about two weeks), and now I'm considering to give the genre another try. Here are the most important things I'm looking for:
- Good PVE content is a must
- Good crafting system
- Lots of players
- A free trial would be a plus
I don't really mind if the game has poor graphics or if it's old, but I don't want to play a game that is dying either. I've played too many mmo's to name, but I'd prefer a medieval fantasy game that is not wow. Games I'm currently considered are UO and LOTRO.
I used to play Ultima Online on many different free shards years ago, and it's probably my favorite mmo of all time. I like the crafting in UO, the housing system is the best of any mmo I've ever seen, the skill system allows for loads of different builds (including tamer builds which are awesome!) and pve-wise the game allows you to go boss hunting without forcing you to commit hours into it. Having said that, I'm fairly certain the game doesn't have lots of players anymore.
LOTRO on the other hand probably has much more players than UO does nowadays. I hear LOTRO also has a great crafting system as well as pve. I'm just worried that LOTRO has the same type of pve that wow does, which forces you to join large raid groups to take down raid bosses which in turn can take hours at a time, and this just really isn't for me, because I've got enough experience of that from wow to tell that after a couple of days or weeks it just starts feeling like work.
Out of these two alternatives I am definitely leaning towards UO, but the small player base definitely bugs me. That's why I'm hoping to get some more suggestions from you guys.
Comments
Everquest 2 and LotrO are your two best options.
EQ2 has much more to do, but LotrO has its charms. EQ2 housing blows away LotrO and is probably even better than UO. The amount of customizationa nd amount of things you can put in your house is staggering.
EQ2s biggest drawback (IMO) is that there is just too many skills. You will have 5 hotbars at least worth of skills, and you actually use most of them. Some would consider it a plus, but tis just a little excessive.
Population wise, Crushbone and AB can compete with any Lotro server before the Sony hacks, I doubt they will have a big dropoff now but its possible.
PvE content wise EQ2 has an enormous amount of quests and places to go to. Group and raid content as well, but there is way more non raid content overall than you are used to with WoW. Definitely worth checking out, can try EQ2X to make sure you dont hate it but I would recommend going to the regular servers, they have a great community.
if you wouldnt mind it doesnt have a lot of players i would say Vanguard
Thanks for all the suggestions. I've always been under the impression that EQ2 and wow are very similar, and even if that's not the case I'm almost certain that EQ2 pve has a similar focus on raids that wow does, and this really isn't my cup of tea. As for Vanguard, I've heard a lot of good things about the game, but the thing is that if the lack of players wouldn't bother me, I think I would rather play UO. Someone also sent a pm to me and suggested rift, but the problem is that I have a fairly old laptop and I wouldn't feel like playing a game with constant fps problems, not to mention that I can't afford to replace my laptop if it explodes.
The truth is, I'm starting to wonder if there even is an mmorpg out there that would be able to peaque my interest anymore. I've found myself much less interested in gaming lately, and to make it worse all the titles that seem promising to me are still in development and they are months or years away from launch.
youd not be able to play vanguard on a laptop, i dont think, it's engine is pretty intensive.
I can play Vanguard on a laptop just fine. It's a basic Dell Studio XPS...nothing fancy.
OP...try Istaria (formerly Horizons). Small population but the players are very friendly, helpful, and mature.
http://www.istaria.com/
Or just try the Vanguard tutorial. It's free and you can see for yourself if your rig can handle it.
WoW assumes everyopne wants to raid. EQ2 understands that not everyone wants to raid. Yes, to get the absolute best gear you would raid, but unlike WoW gear isnt everything in EQ2. Yes, you could come to a point where you will max out your AAs and get your important master spells and have little progression left, but it would take you quite a long time to get there, plus EQ2 has all the heritage quests and such and again, the housing.
As far as the crafting, a lot of people absolutely love EQ2s crafting. While its certainly better than a game like WoW, it can be quite time consuming.
Possibly the game that fits your criteria most isnt a medieval game. Believe it or not SWG might be worth a try. The best crafting system in any MMO, I dont recall it being very raid centric. And the populaton is supposedly steady. Unlike Vanguard there are enough people playing to have medium/high pop servers
And then there is guild wars. You will never run out of things to do solo PvE, since its all one server its still very populated but you spend quite a bit of time in instanced areas, but a good guild can fix the issue of no correspondence with other players while hunting. Only issue with guild wars is there is no crafting.
All 3 games are worth checking out
I'd give LoTRO a try.
With the worries the OP posted about it, I can say there's no need to worry.
You can solo to the endgame where there are plenty of people looking to do raids and instances. And you don't need to get 24 people together to do one thing.
A lot of the endgame raids and instances require either 3, 6 or 12-man groups. There are a few raids that require 24 people but you'll still be able to raid and group at end-game no problem.
If you want PvE, this game is definately for you, I'd think.
http://ffxi.allakhazam.com/story.html?story=26393, NEW FFXI is really good pve wise.
Thank you for the replies. I might give some of these games a chance. I guess the main reason for my scepticism is that most games that have been mentioned are in one way or another very similar to wow. I realize each of them have their unique qualities but I'm still hoping to find something more different. Remember, graphics aren't all that important to me, a few weeks ago I actually tried to play some muds, and I would probably have kept playing if it wasn't for the fact that even very basic things seemed overly complicated to do.
The population has double since the free 45 days from SOE.
If you have a station accout then you have 45 days free game time on all games.
You are doing yourself an injustice if you don't at least try Vanguard,start with the trail island and download SOE laurcher.
Vanguard is by far the best PVE mmo on the market today.
http://realhistoryww.com/world_history/ancient/Misc/Jesus/Jesus.htm
I haven't played Vanguard in years, but I can vouch for it's greatness. And I thought it was good back when everyone thought it was crappy.
If I were you I'd try LOTRO.
It's F2P now, which is why I left (I know - stupid reason)
It has a fantastic story line and you can reach End game, and still play for years without ever raiding.
They originally built it so that you needed to group ( which was great) now you can play the whole game solo.
There are solo instances (skirmishes) where you can grind your barter items for the good gear, there is an epic story line and enough quests to keep you playing well after you reach level cap.
give it a go.
Wait...what? When it launched almost the entire game was focused on singleplayer. Are you telling me that it's even worse now? God, people actually call this an MMORPG? The only way I can stomach playing it is now that its free I can pretend its like Diablo or something.
Well if you think you could solo the game past lvl 40 at launch, then yes you will be suprised that it is even more solo orientated.
I've met people in game that are at the lvl 65 cap and have never even been in a group, let alone a raid party, any really the only content they have missed is the dungeons.
It's sad really, all this move to soloability to allow for more "casual" play. All it does is foster more of the "me" generation and is turning MMO (Massively Multiplayer Online) into MSO (Massively Singleplayer Online).
Thank you for all the suggestions, I appreciate the help. Having said that, after giving a try (admittedly a very short one) on a few games mentioned here, I've decided to just give up on mmo's for the time being. I think I might instead mod the crap out of baldur's gate and play through the series, or something along these lines. I never have played through BG2 and tob on insane with tactics mod and ascension installed, and this seems like as good a time as any to give it a go.
wizardy 7/8 is better
(imho)
I would agree with you a year ago but now I think that Darkfall has much funner PVE . .. MUCH funner (because of the combat and how the AI feels). Now I put it on my list of 2nd best PVE found in MMORPG games today. I love the fact that all of my gaming sessions are unpredictible. I never know what to expect when I play for several hours . ... even if I had a few plans in mind it may turn out being something else totally epic or something that pissed me off enough to turn it off and take a break . ... lol but the good news is that when you fail at something and lose something, you do not have to try it again to unlock additional content or anything like that. Exploration is funner than Vanguard because you can attempt to fight and even win if you are cunning enough with a new player against any mob in the world.
In Vanguard and most other games the mobs stay still or maybe walk around a little until you get too close to their aggro-range. Darkfall doesnt have aggo range because they mob AI is much better and feels a lot more realistic as aggro is pulled when you are seen, heard, smelt, or even sensed from walking on the ground too hard. I hate those red circles showing you where they are or any kind of fluff such as floating names and things like that . .. since I logged into an imaginary world to use my imagination and not sit back and watch floating damage numbers from my character auto-attack something . ...
eq-cloned combat roles from healer, tank, DPS, CC, etc. are thrown out the window and you are pretty much free to do what you want with the game.
It takes a few months to get started but its worth it. Currently the only MMORPG where I find the PVE fun and exciting where the exploring never ends and there are pretty much no limits.
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