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Why do you support Neverwinter?
lucidproph3cy
Member, Neverwinter Beta Users Posts: 0 Arc User
Let me start of by saying these are reasons why i don't support the game any longer. People may not share the same opinion that i do and that is fine i just want to find out why people support the game. I been playing this game for about a year now. I was an avid player multiple hours everyday and now i only play maybe one in every three days. I was an avid community contributor and have posted builds in the past. I have seen it develop into something completely different than what i expected which lead me to believe i should no longer support development through zen purchasing. Here are the main reasons why i stopped purchasing zen.
Class Balance (PVP)
The community has been crying for class balance for over a year now and we are no where near as close to actual class balance from when this game was first released. Actually class balance was the closest then except for tenebrous which was an enchantment not even a certain class. This was prior to the installment of the artifacts which i believe started the game down imbalance issues. Prior to these players had to make sacrifices. Max gears score was around 13k with the refinement system that was in place due to higher enchants beings ludicrously expensive. Regen was capped around 1.5k due to rings and gear. Healing depression wasn't needed because regen and health couldn't reach such high levels as today. This was prior to giving the GWF the IV path which ultimately destroyed the GF purpose in PVP. TR's were known for their burst damage as intended and perma had no damage output which was a large dps sacrifice to get the recovery needed, GWF destroyer could do some damage but was squishy, as sentinel was unkillable but definitely manageable with a CW or shocking from a TR also they hit with wet noodles at this time. Or you could just cc a gwf straight to death which would never give them a chance. GFs extremely strong in pvp with prone chaining and decent damage and DCs could heal as intended. CWs has cc for days especially using the oppressor line but also lacked the damage that they can achieve today. Technically all classes did less damage due to the lower gear score.
When the dev's gave the IV path to the gwf this was a mistake the community raged against. Everyone stated this was going to kill the GF and it has. GF's are no longer needed for any content because the gwf can do everything better. This also lead to the prone, prone, crush your face tactic that they excel at. Previously gwfs didn't have that much cc nor did they need it but giving it to them made a beast. By killing a class to make one better was not the right choice the dev should have gave the gwf a new paragon that was their own and not interchange the two paragons between these two classes. The gfs got gimped and the gwfs got all the power thus making the GF a sub-optimal class.
Artifacts allowed players to have their cake and eat it to which lead to the corresponding nerfs of healing depression and ultimately tenacity to allow players to live longer. Players could now stack everything and no longer had to sacrifice damage for tanking. When tenacity was added this has had problems for cc based characters such as the cw being a stronger nerf to them than prone class skills. Healing depression wouldn't have even been needed without the implementation of artifacts. Also a lot of class balance issues are due to bugs which i will address separately.
PVP Matchmaking Broken/ Boring
Lets move on to the ELO and penalty system. I have played a couple pvp match and left with no penalty people constantly disconnect from pvp to avoid a penalty. So the penalty is not working as intended people either avoid it or don't even get one so what the point in it. It doesn't ultimately fix the problem of why people leave but make people sit in campfire mode. ELO has been horrible i have been in just as many one sided match or even more that my elo is somewhat high than before. There is definitely a trade between wait times for a match and how good the match is. Should i wait 30 minutes to get a really close game that i play for 45 minutes to lose and get zero glory for the whole match. There should be no difference in glory if you win or loose but maybe something additional if you win like a pvp token. No one wants to play and wait that long to be rewarded with nothing.
Vice versa would you wait 5 minutes get a one sided match but ultimately farm more glory along the way. This pvp system need a huge amount of attention because if we got perfect matches they would take an extremely long time to finish, and thus the ELO would be working perfectly but people wouldn't want to spend that amount of time in one match. OR a broken system as it is now with fast match making. I would say 20 min matches would be optimum for a time constraint with a good elo. Also allowing more than 2 of each class in a pvp is definitely broken. Only allow 2 gwfs on a team or 2 hr's this would prevent from troll groups going into pvp and creating rage on the forums. Last but not least we only have 1 pvp type and only 2 maps which has slowly sucked the life out of everyone that pvps because it is the same boring scenery. I can barely pvp anymore because i am tired of seeing the same things over a year time period.
The worst part is these implementations were suppose to make my pvping experience better but only has hindered it.
I attribute most of the pvp imbalance/broken due to these issues
Main points:
gwf got IV path
artifacts implementation
tenacity/ healing depression
lack of type/maps of pvp
lack of reward for time
Bugs
Nerfs
Now let's move on to the next huge problem that this game suffers from
Bugs
Yeah there is an infestation of termites. Every time that exterminator developer comes alone and fixes one another critter pops up. Or when they add in a new chemical/ spray or new spray gun to make things better something that was working right is now broken or the spray gun breaks. This has lead to many issues in pvp and pve. PVP certain classes are broken or skills are broken and are then fixed and then are overpowered somehow. Example: deep gash was not working at all got fixed and was op broken. Castle never has never been bug free everytime one is fixed something else is found. I could give countless examples of dungeon bugs and glitches that have changed but i will only mention my favorite. Oh Draco's breath how did you come out the tail end of you with no warning and insta kill me when i had you at 2% life left. Any added paragon is riddled with broken skills or feats. However this is by far not the worst part. It is the turn around time to fix these issues. I understand it may be complicated and it takes some time. But allowing broken skills to go unfix until the next patch when you have already found the solution and put it on the preview server which always occurs is not acceptable. The new bugs such as the roar or HR careful aim will undoubtedly go till the next module. Deep gash did as well as many other bugs or broken skills. I have no doubt that they will fix them but the turn around time is snail paced. Also i fell that when it is fixed something else will just be broken. I have played long enough to come to this conclusion.
Now there are other reasons i came to my conclusion of stop purchasing zen. I feel these other reasons pale in comparison to the ones listed above. I would like to thank people that do purchase zen still and have hopes that the game will be something that i just can not see at this time. I definitely enjoy my time playing the game but i came to the conclusion this game will never be bug free or have proper class balance with the route that was taken. I would definitely love to play the old pvp with pve gear and no artifacts or coins or gimmicks. Oh do i miss the good old days.
So let me hear why you support the game? Why you stopped supporting the game?
I do have a feeling a lot of people have gone my route due to no zen on the market but again just my opinion there.
Class Balance (PVP)
The community has been crying for class balance for over a year now and we are no where near as close to actual class balance from when this game was first released. Actually class balance was the closest then except for tenebrous which was an enchantment not even a certain class. This was prior to the installment of the artifacts which i believe started the game down imbalance issues. Prior to these players had to make sacrifices. Max gears score was around 13k with the refinement system that was in place due to higher enchants beings ludicrously expensive. Regen was capped around 1.5k due to rings and gear. Healing depression wasn't needed because regen and health couldn't reach such high levels as today. This was prior to giving the GWF the IV path which ultimately destroyed the GF purpose in PVP. TR's were known for their burst damage as intended and perma had no damage output which was a large dps sacrifice to get the recovery needed, GWF destroyer could do some damage but was squishy, as sentinel was unkillable but definitely manageable with a CW or shocking from a TR also they hit with wet noodles at this time. Or you could just cc a gwf straight to death which would never give them a chance. GFs extremely strong in pvp with prone chaining and decent damage and DCs could heal as intended. CWs has cc for days especially using the oppressor line but also lacked the damage that they can achieve today. Technically all classes did less damage due to the lower gear score.
When the dev's gave the IV path to the gwf this was a mistake the community raged against. Everyone stated this was going to kill the GF and it has. GF's are no longer needed for any content because the gwf can do everything better. This also lead to the prone, prone, crush your face tactic that they excel at. Previously gwfs didn't have that much cc nor did they need it but giving it to them made a beast. By killing a class to make one better was not the right choice the dev should have gave the gwf a new paragon that was their own and not interchange the two paragons between these two classes. The gfs got gimped and the gwfs got all the power thus making the GF a sub-optimal class.
Artifacts allowed players to have their cake and eat it to which lead to the corresponding nerfs of healing depression and ultimately tenacity to allow players to live longer. Players could now stack everything and no longer had to sacrifice damage for tanking. When tenacity was added this has had problems for cc based characters such as the cw being a stronger nerf to them than prone class skills. Healing depression wouldn't have even been needed without the implementation of artifacts. Also a lot of class balance issues are due to bugs which i will address separately.
PVP Matchmaking Broken/ Boring
Lets move on to the ELO and penalty system. I have played a couple pvp match and left with no penalty people constantly disconnect from pvp to avoid a penalty. So the penalty is not working as intended people either avoid it or don't even get one so what the point in it. It doesn't ultimately fix the problem of why people leave but make people sit in campfire mode. ELO has been horrible i have been in just as many one sided match or even more that my elo is somewhat high than before. There is definitely a trade between wait times for a match and how good the match is. Should i wait 30 minutes to get a really close game that i play for 45 minutes to lose and get zero glory for the whole match. There should be no difference in glory if you win or loose but maybe something additional if you win like a pvp token. No one wants to play and wait that long to be rewarded with nothing.
Vice versa would you wait 5 minutes get a one sided match but ultimately farm more glory along the way. This pvp system need a huge amount of attention because if we got perfect matches they would take an extremely long time to finish, and thus the ELO would be working perfectly but people wouldn't want to spend that amount of time in one match. OR a broken system as it is now with fast match making. I would say 20 min matches would be optimum for a time constraint with a good elo. Also allowing more than 2 of each class in a pvp is definitely broken. Only allow 2 gwfs on a team or 2 hr's this would prevent from troll groups going into pvp and creating rage on the forums. Last but not least we only have 1 pvp type and only 2 maps which has slowly sucked the life out of everyone that pvps because it is the same boring scenery. I can barely pvp anymore because i am tired of seeing the same things over a year time period.
The worst part is these implementations were suppose to make my pvping experience better but only has hindered it.
I attribute most of the pvp imbalance/broken due to these issues
Main points:
gwf got IV path
artifacts implementation
tenacity/ healing depression
lack of type/maps of pvp
lack of reward for time
Bugs
Nerfs
Now let's move on to the next huge problem that this game suffers from
Bugs
Yeah there is an infestation of termites. Every time that exterminator developer comes alone and fixes one another critter pops up. Or when they add in a new chemical/ spray or new spray gun to make things better something that was working right is now broken or the spray gun breaks. This has lead to many issues in pvp and pve. PVP certain classes are broken or skills are broken and are then fixed and then are overpowered somehow. Example: deep gash was not working at all got fixed and was op broken. Castle never has never been bug free everytime one is fixed something else is found. I could give countless examples of dungeon bugs and glitches that have changed but i will only mention my favorite. Oh Draco's breath how did you come out the tail end of you with no warning and insta kill me when i had you at 2% life left. Any added paragon is riddled with broken skills or feats. However this is by far not the worst part. It is the turn around time to fix these issues. I understand it may be complicated and it takes some time. But allowing broken skills to go unfix until the next patch when you have already found the solution and put it on the preview server which always occurs is not acceptable. The new bugs such as the roar or HR careful aim will undoubtedly go till the next module. Deep gash did as well as many other bugs or broken skills. I have no doubt that they will fix them but the turn around time is snail paced. Also i fell that when it is fixed something else will just be broken. I have played long enough to come to this conclusion.
Now there are other reasons i came to my conclusion of stop purchasing zen. I feel these other reasons pale in comparison to the ones listed above. I would like to thank people that do purchase zen still and have hopes that the game will be something that i just can not see at this time. I definitely enjoy my time playing the game but i came to the conclusion this game will never be bug free or have proper class balance with the route that was taken. I would definitely love to play the old pvp with pve gear and no artifacts or coins or gimmicks. Oh do i miss the good old days.
So let me hear why you support the game? Why you stopped supporting the game?
I do have a feeling a lot of people have gone my route due to no zen on the market but again just my opinion there.
Post edited by lucidproph3cy on
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Comments
I don't support Neverwinter specifically, per se. I do Support Cryptic Studios (and I suppose Perfect World by extension, but for me it's about Cryptic Studios.)
Why: because I've been playing Cryptic Studios stuff for almost five years. I've also played Ubi, EA, Access and many of the others. When they were nickel-and-diming me to death and brutally punishing me, a paying customer, for playing their games with the ridiculous DRM and really flippant attitude toward their game-buyers Cryptic Studios was different.
They aren't perfect by a long shot. But I've always had the impression they actually try. And their free-to-play system has zero gated access to any part of their games: you can go from zero-to-sixty without ever spending one red penny.
This is why I support Cryptic Studios, and by extension: Neverwinter.
As for the bugs, play-balancing, economic policies, both in-game and without (Zen market) - I know they're trying. Sure, unpopular by the squeakiest wheels, but still...
If it were so damned easy then everyone would be doing it, and doing it so perfectly. Even YOU, OP. But I don't see your solution outlines, all I see is hyperbole and wishful thinking. If you have a so-called solution then show us - describe in detail just how it will work and how it affects other areas of the game and most importantly: how players will react, especially exploiters (economic and otherwise).
NOTE: Though this comment is loosely directed at the OP it's intended for all readers and commentators. Go ahead, let the flaming on this comment begin. I'm not here to try to change anyone's mind about anything. I'm only here to say: stop looking a gift-horse in the mouth, you might not like what you see.
TL;DR: Because I'm selfish: I support Cryptic Studios and Neverwinter so the company remains profitable and continues to give me FREE STUFF. Any monetary support is also selfish: I am GETTING STUFF. If it all keeps the game going then we all win. Bugs, unbalancing, warts and all.
Also it gets frequent updates, which is great in my book.
Roar was always broken, it's just that most GWFs didn't use it because the cooldown was prohibitive.
What bug for careful attack are you referring to. The one where a dot enchant may make it proc one extra time for 500 extra damage, which is working as intended according to the tooltip- when anyone damages the target?
Anyway, I support the game because I think it's the best f2p MMO around and really enjoy the combat system and class interactions in PVP.
I support the game because of the great gameplay, and dislike it because of Bind on Pickup <font color="orange">HAMSTER</font> almost everywhere, like what da <font color="orange">HAMSTER</font>?
Yeah that bind on pick up nonsense is super annoying. I wish you could sell mounts and other things for at least half the price you paid for so you can put that towards new things when they release, wishful thinking. :rolleyes:
A lot more than that when it comes dissatisfaction, but I play anyways. A F2P MMO afterall, sure won't be paying to play something like ESO when people are already filing their complaints. Or WoW, who dumped their original hardcore fanbase in the trash for casuals and cash.
Roar.
Dev #1: The players are saying CN is busted.
BigWig: I want this new module out by such in such time.
Dev #1: What about fixing what we have first?
BigWig: I -want- this new module out first then you can fix such in such.
Granted there might be other factors, but when you work for a large company, the developers are one of the lowest on the totempole.
Unfortunately, grinding for gear and boons I can't do anything about it, especially now that you need to have specific gear just to play a particular skirmish.
Some bugs, which have been reported since Open Beta, are still not fixed.
The devs rather seem to focus on new content, than fixing the content that is already there. New content might attract new players, but when older players see that well known bugs in existing content are still not fixed therefore, this won't help the community grow at all. Since even the maybe newly aquired players will sooner or later see the flaws in the existing content. So that's a marketing / priority fail in my book.
And now the thing with Coal wards? Basically saying: "You are a new player and want Weapon / Armor / higher normal Enchantments? Well, sorry, that's only for the paying customers or those playing this game for some time to grind enough AD." And I think this will only get worse.
I bought ZEN now and again (mostly for respecs), but these named issues just continue and continue and get worse with every expansion / greater "fix" (Tenacity introduction).
All in all: I still play this game (for now...), because I really like the combat system and other games didn't appeal to me as much. But I'm going to seriously consider supporting this company finacially again.
Oh, and to the OP: I agree with everything you said.
In all honesty, all we have here is a title with nice art direction and a great IP behind it, plagued by clueless development and lack of Quality Assurance.
To make this constructive:
What should be done to make things right?
Hire consultants from the player base.
Sucks to say it, but Player Councils/Consultant Boards can easily end up causing more harm than good.
Also, due to recent decisions made by the 'suits' and beancounters in the Monetization department, I have decided to take my wallet somewhere else for the foreseeable future. Because causing numbers to plummet (and not just a spike, but a constant development over a longer time), while threatening the game and the developers, will also threaten a beancounter's existance in the long term.
CRAZY MIKE - 14.6k PvE CW
Backbone - 16.7k PvP HR
[SIGPIC]http://i59.tinypic.com/s3hts7.png[/SIGPIC]
The other side of the coin however, is the games are often buggy and mismanaged. And in some cases, like CO, all but neglected to death. But for the most part im content with what they deliver. They will never make a deep open sandbox world, but they do just fine with light shallow theme parks. And for now that all I need. I dont need a 5 star dinner when chicken nuggets will do...And Cryptic makes good nuggets.
The combat system feels more "realistic" than in other MMos and they send out regular updates with new content (two big thumbs up for me).
Regarding balance: honestly I don´t care so much. I play a PvE optimized HR and can run any single dungeon in the game with my guildies. The Pathfinder has been a huge improvement in PvE.
I play PvP without any tenacity and PUG only and still am able to stay around page 120 in the leaderboard which is fine for me, considering that focused PvPers using tenacity sets and having invested more time/money in their PCs (I have rank 7 enhancements and often see PvPers with rank 9 or 10) deserve to beat me at equal skill level. By the way once you hit page 100 you start to meet pre-mades made by PvP Guilds that are not only well-geared but also organized much better than the average PUG.
Do I suffer the GWF prone, prone, welcome-to-the-afterlife routine? I do (especially as my ping is not very good and makes dodging quite difficult), but I guess this will be fixed. Do I believe that PvP in Neverwinter is beyond any redemption? Definitely not.
What I like is that I see Cryptic making changes. They still make mistakes, but they keep constantly working on the game and tweaking it with the intent of making it better. Until a few weeks ago I was playing a purely ranged HR, never hitting the Tab key. Then they nerfed Split Shot (with a general outcry) and bumped some other powers. This brought me to change my behaviour and use a different subset of powers, mixing melee and ranged and I found out that I am more efficient than before, generate less aggro making the life of my buddies easier and have overall more fun.
And on top of all this it´s D&D....
Born of Black Wind: SW Level 80
I wish they'd stop "balancing" PvP and just separate PvE and PvP altogether as they keep catering to the PvP crowd which usually affects (and not in a good way) PvE
Anyway I have spent $ on the game since beta and I'm sure I will continue to do so until it becomes "not fun" or something better comes along.
I do like how you can be casual jump on for a few minutes and quickly run Dread / Shar or play for hours and do a couple DD's etc.... the gateway as well is something I spend a lot of time one - all great stuff!
I dont think this game was really made for Long Term PLayers, More so for SHort term Burst's of money coming in,, etc... I dont wanna sound personal, but its 100% true.
50%+ of the original End game players have already quit a long time ago.
I refuse to spend and money on this game, THis game is F2P because it needs to be. Believe me working for Nvidia for 3 years, You cant charge people for this......lol.
Im just glad its F2P and the combat system is nice, that's about it.
Not to mention the Mod 3 System's update which Made the LAD in mod 3 UNbearable, THey changed something with their rendering system where EVERYONE is easily having 10-20% increased FPS lag, My my brother 6 core system cant handle Kessels reateat? kidding me? lol
Anyway just my 2 cents
Also what is the solution?? It's tough to say. I verbalized my disagreement with a lot of things cryptic created. I didn't think the gwf should get the IV paragon and so they should make a gwf and GF paragons that are unique to each and remove the IV from the gwf. I verbalized my disgust with what would happen with artifacts being allowed in pvp and how its going to create a gap between players, and in all honesty i would love to see them remove the gear score associated with it and leave the abilities. This would reduce gear inflation drastically. The implementation of all these buffs have contributed to it as well so i understand tenacity reduction in damage. I would suggest remove the cc duration decrease and implement you can only be cc'd once every four seconds this would stop the prone, prone prone and allow the cw to excel once again at slowing targets, snap freezing targets, or even repelling. Healing depression may have to stay or you could just reduce the clerics ability to self heal by 50% and still allow 100% heal on everyone else.
This is a few suggestions i have to fix some of the problems. Bugs are bugs and should be fixed period no suggestion needed. It was disheartening to see that coal wards are now strictly behind a pay wall which i don't fully agree with. Honestly if they reduced the price on everything to a reasonable points more people would enjoy the game and the gap between hardcore and casual would shift. As it is now its practically unreasonable to assume a new player can get rank 10's, artifacts, and perfect enchants without dropping thousands and dollars which no one will do. You spend 50 bucks get 5500 zen and that amounts to what 2.75 mil AD that is not even a perfect enchant on its own which is inflated due to the exchange. So you either drop a ton of money or play a ton and if you not either you really have small chances of actually being completely "end game." I would love to see these high tier item much more accessible to the general population of neverwinter and see the only difference between characters would be boon progression. Example have coal wards around 100k and greater mark of potency around 50k may do the trick.
Again these are just some ideas i have. They may not be the best but i believe it is a start in the right direction. I hope people keep posting why and why not they support the game i do believe its a great topic and can get attention that it needs.
Time will tell.
People like to feel like they get something for their money. Last time I purchased zen was for the stone of radiance. A stone companion on all my characters is good value however it's green so it's gimped but still not a bad value for my money. Prior to that I probably bought zen back in September. I agree a micro transaction system would be better. I would actually buy more mounts if they were say 10-15 dollars instead of 25-30 dollars I haven't bought a mount. Only mount I bought was the guardian of neverwinter which seemed like good value. I surely would not pay 10$ for a coal wards at which I have to buy 15 to make a perfect thus totaling at 150$ for 1 perfect enchant. The worst part is you need one for your armor too. I would say level a perfect enchant at 15$ and rank 10 enchants at 5-10 dollars and let the money fly. People would start buying things because they "feel" like they are getting their money worth and trust me they would spend 100 bucks not even thinking about it. People notice larger spending increases rather than small overtime. The worst thing is force people to spend money which can do the exact opposite and have people leave. Should adopt a way to allow people to spend money because they enjoy the game because you will keep doing it if this is your reasoning as stated in many of the positive post here.
Heck if things were cheaper I would buy much more cosmetic stuff than force myself to farm it or not buy it. However if we made everything easier to get the content should definitely become more difficult. Maybe intruce a difficulty slider and making the difficulty higher increases drop rates.
My thing is, if a game doesn't support the ability for a new player to be competitive while remaining free for that player, it shouldn't be supported.
I don't support the game anymore because I don't believe it's possible for a new player to become competitive without spending real world cash.
Ebony (Whisperknife)