Earlier today I got a couple of comments from MMO Tomb regarding GW2, apparently from the perspective of someone who has not been following this game especially closely (at least that was my impression; my apologies if I have got it wrong). I was at work and not in a position to really closely address any of the concerns raised, but I promised to do so once I got home, since I relish the opportunity to present information to curious bystanders, so here I am and here it is, much too long to be lodged in the comments.
MMO Tomb says:
I have nothing against Guild Wars 2. But I’ve been following games and MMORPGs in particular for a long, long, long time. I believe I developed a skill that I can forsee things about games regarding if I (me, myself) will like it or not.
I didn’t follow GW2 but I just read about it in blogs and forums and how people praise it. But I have some concerns.
Fair enough! I only just recently have come to recognize the details that tell me whether or not I will like an MMO, so good on you for figuring it out yourself. Saves a lot of money that way.
Are there Roles for Players? Do the classes have specific jobs to do? or are they all the same? (Jack of all trades or just DPS with healing). If there are no “roles” then I know I will not like it and I’d bet that a lot of people who likes the idea will be disappointed. I’ve seen it done before, only very few dedicated fans will accept the “everyone can do everything” type of class system.
I’ll put it this way: there are “roles” for PLAYERS, but not CLASSES. ArenaNet has broken the traditional “trinity” of DPS/tanking/healing into damage/healing/support:
ArenaNet Blog: A New Way of Looking at Healing and Death
There will be specific ways in which a player can fulfill any of those roles at any given time given proper planning. For example, an Elementalist’s water spells can provide healing support, but so do an Engineer’s med kit elixirs, or a Guardian’s symbols can provide allies with extra damage prevention.
Your observation that there will be those who are attached to having a particular class fill a particular role is valid, but there is a whole other segment of the gaming audience (I disagree that it’s only a “few dedicated fans”) who will be pleased to be rid of the traditional class setup (yours truly included). There are plenty of gamers who don’t like to be forced to LFHealer/Tank/CC etc. before they can go about the business of running a dungeon, while this system still allows players to excel at any one of those roles within any class they desire.
Is there really no restrictive game play?
What do you mean by “restrictive game play?” If you are referring to an extremely sandbox-type world in which you can craft, wear, wield, interact with, and kill anything and anyone, then no, Guild Wars 2 does not fit that particular bill. However, there are fewer restrictions than in other themepark-style MMOs.
For example, players scale up or down in level based on the area in which they are adventuring: a level 80 player returning to a level 10 zone will be scaled down to the approximate power level of, say, level 12, to enable them to experience a reasonable challenge in the area while preventing them from trivializing content by one-shotting everything for miles around. Similarly, players will scale up when adventuring in a higher-level area; they may be under-equipped to deal with the monsters therein, but with skill they may be able to avoid being instantly killed simply because they are outleveled.
Player sidekicking is also available to allow friends of different levels to adventure together.
If that’s true, then GREAT I will encourage people to play GW2. But I am skeptical. Dynamic Events is another bullshit thrown at me and I know better not to even think it will be something to look forward to just like Rift’s “Rifts”. I don’t care for Public Quests, Dynamic Events or anything scripted/systematic/game-made. I believe if you want dynamic events, don’t do dynamic events. Just make the tools and let players be the drivers behind the “events”. So, I think Dynamic Events are going to get old and repeatetive too fast just like Battle Grounds or Public Quests.
Is it going to be Quest Driven? (a.k.a yellow exclamation marks?) is it going to be Quests on Rails? or am I going to be free to do what I want from the beginning? If it’s going to set me Free.. then I will buy it, play it, and enjoy it even the “Dynamic Events” won’t turn me off because I’m waiting for a game where hand holding is limited.
First, let me direct you to ArenaNet’s post about Dynamic Events, which provide examples that answer most of the above questions:
So, to answer your second set of questions first, there are no quests in Guild Wars 2, and no yellow (or green, as in GW1) exclamation points. Yes, you will be “free” in the sense that you can pick a direction and wander, and merely interact with whatever is going on in the area at the time. Finally, you won’t have to talk to someone first before you put that fire out or kill those centaurs in order to get credit for it.
That said, all of the dynamic events are indeed scripted, with various branching outcomes based on several different win/lose scenarios, and, as I said in my previous post, they do not “reset/despawn”. There is a finite amount of content, but given that you will have to “win” some events (along multiple chains of events) in order to see others, and “lose” (again, along multiple chains of events) to see others still, and that some events are triggered by day/night cycles, weather, or even by player activities themselves, it may not be as simple to exhaust all of the possibilities as you might think. Of course, what ultimately happens when we are in-game remains to be officially seen.
Is the itemization the same as WoW? Easy to obtain? Artificially designed and perfectly balanced that it becomes too predticable and boring?
ArenaNet Blog: A Rewarding Experience (Loot)
As to the first question, no, itemization is not the same as WoW. Items will be able to be obtained by cashing in karma rewards (gained by participating in Dynamic Events) or with cash, or item drops from Dynamic Event bosses or via tokens obtained from dungeons. It is not the intent in GW2 to make people grind a dungeon dozens of times for the chance to obtain a particular item; as in Guild Wars 1, drops appear uniquely for each player, so there is no rolling on items.
As to your third question, I haven’t played WoW, so I don’t know how your words apply. I can say that there is a power plateau that is expected to be reached with Guild Wars 2 loot, such that you are not eternally increasing your armor or weapons by +1; ultimately GW2 is a game of skill and not the numbers you’re wearing. At the far end of the scale, prestige will be represented by unique looks of armor specific to difficult dungeons, rather than the bonuses they provide over all other sets.
But perhaps you can clarify.
Is there an Auction House? Or is there going to be more player-to-player trade interaction? Is the economy as shallow as WoW’s economy? (monsters poop coin everytime?) as in if you want to collect money you kill thousands of snakes which pull gold/coin from thin air? (which leads to inflation).
There is going to be a global Marketplace, not, for example, player shops such as those found in Aion or FFXI/FFXIV. As the game isn’t live yet, I’m not certain what the main method of making money will be, although you do receive gold rewards for participating in Dynamic Events and completing Personal Story items. There is also crafting in the game, which I assume will be a way to profit via selling crafting components as well as the finished results.
I don’t recall mobs dropping money so far in demo videos, though my memory could be faulty and those things could be subject to change at any time.
Is the combat twitchy? Am I going to play the “Action bar game” or is it more tactical which require more team work? because I’m sick of playing the Action Bar, I’d rather play Tetris.
Guild Wars 2 is a bit of a hybrid between the standard action bar and twitchy FPSes.
ArenaNet blog: Combat
There is indeed a skill bar, but no auto-attack, and players have the ability to actively dodge or block attacks. The results of evasion are not based on RNG, but actual player placement. Combat relies on tactical awareness and placement, and it is possible to combine the abilities of different classes, such as (this is the most common example) an Elementalist casting a fire wall, and a Ranger shooting arrows through it, igniting the arrows and thus causing fire damage to the foe on the other side. Projectiles can be physically blocked by terrain. There is no ability to target allies in Guild Wars 2, which means that anyone who wishes to support a teammate who is taking damage must be aware of their positions at all times, whether providing a healing rain on a specific ground target, or physically deflecting attacks with spells/blocks, or placing themselves between the ally and foe.
Am I going to be able to solo all the way?
Is there enough Group Content which start at early level?
Yes, and yes, although perhaps not in the way you’re familiar with in other MMOs. Guild Wars 2 does not require grouping except for dungeons, the first of which becomes available at level 30 (keep in mind that the leveling curve of GW2 is flatter than traditional MMOs), and then again every 10 levels thereafter. However, GW2 takes the Open/Public Group concept farther by granting credit to all players participating in a particular dynamic event, and by scaling events so that most events can be played either solo (if there are no players around) or grouped (if several players are around), as well as “playing alone together”. At higher levels, dynamic events can lead to open raid-like encounters that require dozens of players with varying coordinated objectives (see this demo video of a level 45 dynamic event that has been toned down in difficulty for demo purposes).
All these are questions that I ask myself everytime a new publisher announce an MMORPG. I am always disappointed that it ends up the SAME CORE GAME. Nothing changes. Same experience, same crap. Just one random new “feature” (dynamic events, yay!) but the rest of the game is nothing but…. same ol’ crap.
Allow me to be perfectly frank here: it is not my intent to convince you that you’ll like Guild Wars 2. I will go so far as to say that GW2 is changing more things than simply how quests are delivered; if you read the blog posts I linked throughout my response you’ll see that ArenaNet has challenged a lot of conventional MMO wisdom and examined it to see what works and what can be thrown out.
I see that you are looking forward to CCP’s World of Darkness, which (although we know little to nothing about it thus far) will likely be as different from fantasy combat-based MMOs as EVE is to Star Trek Online, so it may be that you crave something COMPLETELY different. Guild Wars 2 is more like half of the elements familiar to traditional MMOs, and half of the elements evaluated, ripped out, and rebuilt anew from scratch to fulfill a different purpose.
Hope this helps, and don’t be afraid to follow up in the comments.
People who look for games to disappoint them will be disappointed by the games they find. It’s that simple. I may be excited for guild wars 2 but I also keep my expectations thoroughly in check. Guild Wars 2 is a video game, everything in perspective.
So when I see this guys questions/observations… it seems like he’s looking for his opinions to trump the quality of the game regardless. People can be so determined to prove their “instincts” are right, when really its just their preconceived notions.
I mean just look at some of the things he says.
He doesn’t like public quests/rifts. Are you kidding? Why do you play online if you don’t want to interact? Why do you complain you don’t want to play the same core game but crap on innovation?
Players want to be stuck in the same roles? My experience couldn’t be further from this in every MMO i’ve played.
Balanced itemization and classes is a bad thing?
Need I say more?
Well, if you look at it from the perspective of someone who’s a fan of CCP, I think it makes more sense. Is any other game out there like EVE? Darkfall, to an extent, and it differs in many ways from what GW2 has to offer as well.
If one is looking for that kind of experience, they won’t find it in GW2, simply put. Eh, at any rate, the comment made me brush up on my wiki-fu!
*bows reverentially*
Your Fu is strong!
For those of us who are gobbling up every morsel of information on GW2 as soon as it becomes available it can be a little frustrating to deal with the type of questions that MMO Tomb had.
However, I thought you responded with exemplary patience, and more importantly, with excellent, accurate information that was extremely well supported with the appropriate links for further information if he wanted to take some initiative and do a little reading for the answers he’s looking for.
Most impressive.
This blog entry will now be the link I provide to those asking me similar questions, and I thank-you for that… tremendous time saver.
You are also correct that someone coming from an EVE / Darkfall experience and looking for a new or upgraded version of that type of game will be sorely disappointed with GW2, and that’s ok… GW2 is not intended to be that type of game. However, I do think that players of those games who are open to something a little different could ultimately find the innovations of GW2 to be a very rewarding experience… only time will tell I suppose.
Thank you for the kind words, ArcherAvatar! 😀
Hunter, if you enjoy scripted events then good for you. You should be happy, there are plenty of MMORPGs that will make you happy for a long, long… long time.
I, in the other hand, have tried both worlds. I don’t live in the WoW box. I’ve been playing games for a long time and Role Playing games in particular from Paper ‘n’ Pencil to Single Player RPGs from MUDS to 3D MMORPGs. I have to tell you that the worst Role Playing experience I’ve ever had was when WoW beame successful.
Developers relied on Scripted Events and pre-defined linear content. To me they are both the same (artificial game experience). They are both “gamish”. Any scripted event (Public Quest/Rifts) is just a sad way to say “here we have content” It’s not content. It’s just a script where you go play them to collect “coins” which you can then use to “buy” phat l00t! Another mindless loot grind.
What kind of game is this? I don’t want to play the “Whoever collect the te most blue stars wins the prize”. How many times have we seen this? WoW PvP system, Age of Conan PvP system, Aion PvP system and now Rift’s Rifting system? Really? grind a scripted event for zillions of times just to cash the chits for “purple” items? *sigh*
Players want to be stuck in the same roles? My experience couldn’t be further from this in every MMO i’ve played.
Again, you are living in your own box. I never said I want the same roles (a.k.a stupid Trinity). Read my above reply. I dislike Trinity because it is a mutation made by WoW. Class roles were trivialized to the Trinity.. Tank, Healer and DPS. That is ridiculous. Just as ridiculous as having no roles at all. But let’s see how GW 2 is going to do this.
In the end. MMORPG is a collection of features. A few bad choices will not kill the game but too many bad choices will kill the game. If a game has great features but just had few features that I don’t like then I am willing to ignore the downfalls and will enjoy the game. As simple as that.
However, we have the rights to express our opinions regarding what we think is good or bad. That’s why I’m here, that’s why this blog is here. Just because you don’t understand how I think about a specific game design point of view doesn’t make it a bad game design point of view. It is simply a “different” approach to how MMORPGs should be made. Nothing wrong or right about it. It’s just what we want to see in a game.
But then again maybe we both want to play two different genres and there’s absolutely nothing wrong with that. To each his own.
I am really flattered Randomessa for dedicating a post to answer the comment I posted earlier. I consider this a kind gesture from your part I admire and appreciate your efforts with your blog and I enjoy reading your post and this time it’s dedicated to answer my questions which is something I rarely find in any forum/blog on the net. Two thumbs up!
As for GW 2 there are things I like and dislike about the “vision” of the game. Which is something that is true for every mmorpg I am going to play. Clearly there’s no way an MMORPG will be catering to everything I like. But at least GW 2 development team are trying to change the “mold” of MMORPGs.
I actually hate the term “Trinity” because it trivialized class roles to Tank, Healer and DPS. Very shallow and boring. Roles should be expanded upon, say, what was in EverQuest. Not downgrade it like in World of Warcraft (Trinity). Why things always get les complex and more steamlined/simplified? Why cant we expand upon what worked before? For me, grouping/teaming with other people in a massively online game it’s all about interacting. Having roles makes team work more entertaining, to me at least. That’s the core of D&D is the fact that every class bring to the table what they are extremely good at to support the group and whatever the classes weakness is it’s going to be covered up by the group’s team work.
In the article you linked it’s explained that every class in GW 2 is self relient. That’s a vision/design point of view which really doesn’t give you a solid understanding of how this is going to be balanced/implemented. I just hope it doesn’t end up like Champions Online or Dark Fall. In Champions Online grouping lacked tactics, fun and coordination since you don’t need the other player to do anything specific. Everyone just pew pew pew the enemy trying not to get hit and hoping the enemy eats their friends instead. You just feel like playing a mindless shoot ’em up.
I like how every class has a different kind of “support” roles so we’ll see how this is going to play. A lot of new ideas were great on paper, but not so great in game. I’m not holding my breath but looking forward to see it in action.
“What do you mean by “restrictive game play?” If you are referring to an extremely sandbox-type world in which you can craft, wear, wield, interact with, and kill anything and anyone, then no, Guild Wars 2 does not fit that particular bill. However, there are fewer restrictions than in other themepark-style MMOs.”
I dislike both extremes. Sandbox or Theme park. But I was really burned out from the latter that if I see another “Quest Driven” game I’m going to shoot someone!
I believe a mixture of both worlds is what leads to a successful game. Too much sandbox will result in an empty and boring world. Too much theme park you end up with restrictive game play and the inability to retain subscribers.
I don’t think GW 2 is even close to being labeled sandbox it is clearly close to the “Theme park” genre and there’s nothing wrong with that. But even then we hope to escape the Quest Grind (Quests on Rails).
So, to answer your second set of questions first, there are no quests in Guild Wars 2, and no yellow (or green, as in GW1) exclamation points. Yes, you will be “free” in the sense that you can pick a direction and wander, and merely interact with whatever is going on in the area at the time. Finally, you won’t have to talk to someone first before you put that fire out or kill those centaurs in order to get credit for it.
I find this too good to be true. This is exactly what Brad claimed before Sigil launched Vanguard but everything changed in the last month. They added quests, they added auction houses and copied WoW itemization. Just a few months before launch.
But if ArenaNet manages to release their game the way you describe it (no hand holding, no quests) then… Helleluja! HELLELUJA!
But I will never be excited. I was fooled too many times before observing MMORPG pre-releases. I’ll just see if they’re going to pull it off. Not holding my breath on this one.
“Yes, and yes, although perhaps not in the way you’re familiar with in other MMOs. Guild Wars 2 does not require grouping except for dungeons, the first of which becomes available at level 30”
If reaching maximum level will be most convenient through soloing then I guess that’s a big turn off for me.
I guess I am starting to know more about GW 2. In most cases and appreicate your clarifications. It’s probably not an MMORPG for me. I definitely praise their unorthadox game design mentality and I hope their “No Quest” approach will succeed because a lot of people are complaining about Quest Driven content already. But everything else is not what I’m looking for.
I’ll keep a look at it and I will buy it because I always give games a chance. Sometimes things work differently in practice than in theory. But I wouldn’t count on it this time. It will definitely be a good game for a lot of fans and new faces, there’s no doubt about it.
“I see that you are looking forward to CCP’s World of Darkness, which (although we know little to nothing about it thus far) will likely be as different from fantasy combat-based MMOs as EVE is to Star Trek Online, so it may be that you crave something COMPLETELY different.”
I don’t have a specific favorite theme. I enjoy Fantasy, Sci-Fi, Historic.. almost anything is acceptable as long as the game is done right. I actually don’t consider themes when I look for a game, I am more interested in the “genre”. I do enjoy sandbox games as much as I enjoy theme parks. But I did get sick and tired recently not from Theme Parks but of the shocking resemblance of WoW model.
Actually, my favorite MMORPG is EverQuest (far from sandbox) but definitely not as “Them parkish” as WoW. Since you noticed that I am following WoD by CCP there’s a radio interview which sold the game for me. This is an interview with the lead designer. He clearly said that he doesn’t want to make a Massively Single Player Game he wants to make a Massively Multiplayer Game. Compare this to Bioware’s CEO 2 years ago when he said he wanted to add the “story” element to MMORPGs, bad news for me (no place to explain why..). Also the lead designer (his name escapes me) from CCP said that they want to mix Sandbox Elements with Theme Park elements and Social Elements all combined to create the magic MMORPGs are lacking. This also sold the game for me. I can trust a game designer with such ideas, hence why I believe WoD is going to be closest to what I’m looking for in an MMORPG.
Again I appreciate your kind gesture and patience. In the end we are all here because we like MMORPGs and to have a different variety of them is always a healthy thing. If I can buy you cup of coffee, Randomessa, I would buy you a cup of coffee. Cheers!
Hey MMO Tomb, thanks for coming back and taking a stab at my responses. What can I say, I never have a problem with providing more info to someone I think is asking questions in good faith, and that’s the impression I got from you, even if we end up disagreeing ultimately on a few details of what makes our dream games fun :). I don’t at all think Guild Wars 2 will scratch everyone’s itches equally (it’s pretty much 100% on for me, but that’s just me), and that’s OKAY!
But most importantly, since you’ve already said you’re willing to give GW2 a try, I appreciate your open mind and I hope to see you in-game (even if it’s just the first week or so)!
Well, if you don’t like scripted events, you can ever play sandbox games as Darkfall. It have 100 k players, and for me that say that a sandbox game will be a niche game.
Maybe the problem with Darkfall is that it is a PvP game, and Syncaine is right when he say that we need a PvE sandbox, but I have some doubts. Players can create content, but I fear that will not be high quality content, we will see a lot of mediocre content.
I am waiting for play GW2. I just hope they give a good look at what Trion is doing with RIFT and try make something better. I think the public group system Trion implemented at RIFT can be used at GW2.
I think the future for the MMO, with the thecnological limitations that exist today, is the public quest system. It is the only way to create a dynamic content that can work with the machines and net band we have today. Something more complex, a trully dinamic world with no “scripted” events, will need better and faster computers, because it will need deal with too many objects that change and affect one another at same time.
So, for now, a “trully” dinamic world is not possible, but we can get closer to that with the public quests. And when Arenanet make the public quests chain, they are making a world more dinamic than Trion created. And take note that RIFT is a lot more dinamic than WoW.
By the way, the next logical step maybe be mix sandbox with dinamic quests, for try solve the problem that sandbox have: a mediocre content. I think it is possible to create “crafting” public quests and I hope that Arenanet is trying that when they say that when the players win some public quests they can open options as build a fort or to have a caravan with materails going from the near village to teh fortress being build.
As long as i can explore the game world without getting into to many unbeatable situations i’ll be perfectly happy with gw2, though i’ll never be trully happy till an mmorpg is made where from day one the creators say “no pvp in our game ever!” as pvp seems pointless to me in a game that claims to be about teamwork and adventure(if the tards want pvp they can go play a console fighting game instead since all they really want to do it prove there the bestest at the game even though they have never actually bothered to play it).
Tossing in two cents – and I’m not the most experienced or educated person to talk about this – but from what I’ve read I think it’s important to distinguish Guild Wars 2’s dynamic events (or ArenaNet’s ambitions for them anyway, since the game is of course not out to be played yet) from the rifts of Rift.
GW2 dynamic events are not occasional special events. They’re not supposed to draw people from all over (World vs. World might). They take the place of quests in terms of small adventures on the side, and they just happen – all over the place – all the time. As a player you might pass one part of the event chain (whatever happens to be going on when you encounter it), and you can jump in or pass by as you wish. You will not be in the middle of a quest when you see it; in GW2, you go out to explore, and deal with whatever you find that interests you!
The other thing I will say is, if you like player-driven content (and as a pen-and-paper RPG player, MMOTomb, I’d guess you would!), the game developers can only do so much to provide that. Generally, those organic kinds of things must grow up amongst players themselves. I can’t speak for GW2, which looks like it will have a much broader player base on release, but the original Guild Wars had a lot of strong community groups – which ran events for anyone, not just guild members – which were often supported by ArenaNet when they arranged their own events or campaigns. GW2 is trying to reward player co-operation, so we can hope this sort of stuff does arise to enrich the game.