NW Beta Thoughts & Discussion

Hey All,
I wanted to throw out some of my thoughts for discussion. I only got to play 1 day of the closed beta - weekend 4 last day. Weekend 3 I had a key but I was at PAX East and NW had a HUGE line as you can imagine . I have never played D&D so my opinions do not reflect nor compare to D&D.

I played the control wizard for the most part and I will start from the beginning.

The tutorial I felt was quick and dirty to get someone into the game quickly. I felt I learned the basics of combat and abilities quickly. Before I knew it, I was slaying skeletons with ease. What I didn't like was that there was no explanation of the foundry which I have since researched.

I LOVE the "z" key that turns on a path to show you where to go for your quest. There was times I had trouble finding where to go but with that feature it helped clear the confusion. I like the fact I don't have a million hotkeys to manage (WoW looking at you) but I felt I had enough abilities to change my build around to what I wanted.

So here I was off to kill things and quest away at level 3 or so? I think is about where I was when I finished the tutorial. When I entered the city...my jaw just dropped at how AMAZING the game looked. I was running on the highest settings(avg. 35fps) and don't exactly have the newest hardware(radeon 6970). The detail and sheer size of the city really blew me away. I think the layout was well done and kept area's organized. I assumed this was the central hub of the game and you could tell by the amount of players it had (reminds of PoK EQ without the lag :cool:). I quickly ran to get my first official quest as I had limited time of 1 day lol. I was excited and curious to see what the game had in store ahead. I believe the first quest was to get some clothes -_- but after that I was off to the hall of justice! When I got there I realized the game was instanced and I wasn't sure how I felt about that.

Anyways, I continued on found I needed various "kits" which I quickly noted. I love to explore and liked clearing every square inch of the place specially since I didn't have to worry about someone running through and killing so & so for the quest...waiting for it to respawn (you get the picture). The combat felt solid and not floatie(?). I couldn't move when casting or whatnot but had this blink(WoW reference) ability to move out of these red spots on the ground which I chalked up as bad. Blinking to avoid attacks and casting away freezing my foes in place, finishing them off with a quick attack...I was falling in love with the game. I was leveling and exploring non stop.

Level 10 - Now I have the ability to do professions. I asked in general chat for some help on finding the trainers and was told to just press the "N" key. Boom I had all my profession abilities right in front of me on a clean UI. Queued up some profession work and off I went onto my next quest. I LOVED this in SWTOR and glad to see it in NW...really makes managing professions easy and less time consuming.

Although I could not do any dungeons I did try a orc assault skirmish which was basically an arena type area with waves of enemies. I queued for a random group and found we did the skirmish with ease.

I also did PVP couple times found it to be ALOT of fun. We had 3 capture points and it was a non stop battle. I did get the most kills on one of my first PVP battles. I couldn't stop playing PVP but at the same time really was enjoying the PVE. It was interesting to see how people used their abilities in PVP.

I ended my day at level 13 ~ 9hrs of play time some of which not knowing what I was doing. Those 9hrs I thoroughly enjoyed and let me say recent MMOs (*cough*defiance*cough*) didn't kept my attention like NW did. I couldn't put the game down and really wish I had more time with it.

Conclusion:
Zen store - I found several pets and companion type items along with adventurer bags. 500 zen = $5. I don't mind micro transactions as long as it does not give anyone a significant advantage over F2P players. I heard of having to spend Zen to get respec tokens (hmm, I think respec should be free). I also heard of mass rez being available in store, hope to see that as maybe a guild perk instead. Zen can be exchange for diamonds and vice versa so technically you don't have to spend a dime to get zen (very nice ).

In game clothing - I found my control wizard clothing (robes mostly) didn't really vary the look. Yes the game has dyes and whatnot but changing out my robes didn't really give me much of a new look. I know I was still early in the game but I played 30mins of a Guardian fighter and felt when I changed the armor it made a noticeable difference.

Instances - Although I am not a fan of instances or phasing, it really seemed to work well here. I liked not having to worry about other players taking my loot or killing a NPC causing me to wait for a respawn. The adventure zones had such a quick respawn timer I could see stuff respawning behind me (hmm might be too quick) but it allowed people to do their quests without having to really wait. All in all it worked out well..instancing/phasing is hit or miss...this was definitely a hit.

Animations - I noticed after I "blinked" my character stayed in this particular stance but I could move him. Not sure if this was a bug or intentional but figured I would mention it. Also noticed when people used mounts it was a little odd looking...not quite sure what it was. Thoughts?

Graphics - Huge Plus The game looks amazing and the FX from my spells or others doing various things really looked awesome.

Combat & Gameplay - I felt my attacks were powerful and I felt I was really helping out when grouped with others. The screenshake to help with this feeling was not overly done and was settle. Although I know some would prefer not to have this so it might be nice to include a option to turn it off. But it might take away from the experience....

Gamepad functionality - I have a gamepad and kind of wish I could try it with the game. I have read it was in the game at one point but has since been removed. Not sure if that was because it was not a feature that was ready or if it was a Dev decision. I can't really comment on whether it works well or not seeing it wasn't in beta weekend 4.

Difficulty - I felt the game was easy starting off but it was progressively getting more challenging which I think if that continues throughout the game will be great. I hope by the end game we are seeing really challenging dungeons and content to keep things interesting. I rather wipe several times trying to get uber loot than do something several times over to get what I want. Difference between keeping it interesting and boring - I think difficulty of the game plays a role in this. I also rather it take time for me to level based on the difficulty of the content then just blasting through the game on easy mode so to speak.

Companions/pets/mounts - Even though I felt you can move throughout the zones without a mount quickly, glad to see them in the game. Companions/pets, I didn't get a chance to use either (lvl 16 I believe?) but hear you can level them and give them various items to look differently.

Final Thoughts - I really enjoyed the game and can't stop watching gameplay videos. I am looking forward to open beta and getting a headstart on launch, as you can see to the left of this post I am a founder and can't believe this is a F2P game. I have already taken time off from work and have a guild ready. I am interested in seeing what is coming in the open beta (over 700mb patch from beta 4). The Devs have done a fantastic job and have a game they could easy get box money from but decided to make a F2P game that will be sure to bring in new and old MMO players for years to come.