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A Word About The Meta Game and Limited Respec.

clockwerkninjaclockwerkninja Member, Neverwinter Beta Users, Neverwinter Guardian Users Posts: 0 Arc User
edited May 2013 in PvE Discussion
A ton of players are angry about the fact the respec's are so limited in this game. At the same time others are happy about it. Let's not let that come between us where we could be having conversations that improve other people views of our opinions.

I would like to talk about the META GAME. That big looming "zeitgeist" that is making everyone angry over respecs. It is my opinion that the meta game for Neverwinter includes the fact that respecs are limited and players may want to function in more than one capacity.

Sure, this leaves open the possible players who has a pvp only character or pve only toon excelling over a dual set up.
That is fine tho. in my opinion it is more than fine,it is perfect.

Choices that have to be made, and lived with are what DnD games thrive on.Even a mmo version should include this aspect. It is not something to be angry about,or cry fowl that players are being deprived of something that is a gaming "standard".

It is not the standard, it is a relatively new crutch that many long time gamers do not like.

You do not have to fear limited respec's because it is what the meta game will be built on. I am sure most players fear some rich *** hole with to much money will be able to respec all day every day. I will also find that annoying,and would be in favor of simple limiting it with a time limit and quest line or something..

The important point is that it is limited, and if you want to play Neverwinter you will need to include that in your meta game thinking rather than revolt against it. That is if you want to succeed.
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
Quote Originally Posted by roents
It's an "open beta" that can't be wiped even in the midst of multiple economy destroying exploits. FUN
Post edited by clockwerkninja on

Comments

  • proposalproposal Member Posts: 5 Arc User
    edited May 2013
    other than the story and locations,this game really has nothing to do with D&D,and feels nothing like D&D at all. The respec shenanigans is obviously a cash grab,like bag space. nothing else to it.
  • clockwerkninjaclockwerkninja Member, Neverwinter Beta Users, Neverwinter Guardian Users Posts: 0 Arc User
    edited May 2013
    proposal wrote: »
    other than the story and locations,this game really has nothing to do with D&D,and feels nothing like D&D at all. The respec shenanigans is obviously a cash grab,like bag space. nothing else to it.

    Ok, but without making money from things that players will want to buy how would you fund the game? I think what is given for free in this game is plenty to play with. Extra bag space, extra respec, extra character,extra extra extra..Seems legit to me honestly..

    My wife is functioning fine with no cash shop items, and I have all but insisted on buying her some stuff...She simply does not feel like she needs it.

    I honestly did not want to debate the merit of the respec situation tho, we have threads for that going...I wanted to talk about what the meta game will be like when forced to live with choices made.

    Edit to add: Other than story and locations ,nothing to do with DnD? Well that's perfect because other than story and locations DnD has nothing to do with DnD either..
    [SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
    Quote Originally Posted by roents
    It's an "open beta" that can't be wiped even in the midst of multiple economy destroying exploits. FUN
  • ambisinisterrambisinisterr Member, Neverwinter Moderator Posts: 10,462 Community Moderator
    edited May 2013
    Well said clockworkninja.

    I adore having to make choices and living with them. That's something I don't bend on in D&D.
    And it's something I feel should be very important in Neverwinter's Gameplay.
  • aedndorfaedndorf Member, Neverwinter Beta Users, Neverwinter Guardian Users Posts: 18 Arc User
    edited May 2013
    I honestly did not want to debate the merit of the respec situation tho, we have threads for that going...I wanted to talk about what the meta game will be like when forced to live with choices made.

    Not be contrary, but trying to quantify a meta game in Neverwinter is rather pointless, as its so shallow and non existent in terms of potential.

    PVE meta is equal to rolling your face across the keyboard, 99.9% of all fights are easy enough to win with minimal though. The hardest areas of the game, The Foundry, because player created content has the potential to be challenging. i have died a grand total of 3 times in 46 levels, once due to Mad dragon pickup group, with 3 level 30s, and 2 level 32s, and the only reason we lost was because people could not grasp the two simple concepts of staying away from the red spots on the ground, and kill adds first. One time was at the Dragon skirmish at 39-40, and was a cheese death because the dragon can blow you over terrain off the cliff at a 90 degree angle to the ground. Third was me being bored and pulling something like 35 mobs to see if i could kill them all.

    While i enjoy the game, trying to attribute some kind of Meta game or grand strategy to a simplistic theme park D&D RPG game seems a bit of an overestimation of its potential.
  • pantamimepantamime Member Posts: 0 Arc User
    edited May 2013
    I would actually like to see them put a once per week limit on buying Respec tokens. For one it would help balance it out a bit for f2p users who can't afford to respec all the time. While on the other hand it will make all the people calling a gaming company "Money Hungry" shut their faces for a moment.

    It's a free to play game yes, but with out the ability to make money it will be "Hey remember that game that was awesome but shut down"

    Putting a time limit on it would help show that they aren't all about the money. I used to play another game with a cash shop that put a limit on respecs as well and the player base actually appreciated that fact. (Save a few who wanted to respec all the time)

    So I think to save face with a lot of the player base having a Time Limit on something like a respec would be great. Also , why not include some sort of epic quest line involving multiple dungeons or something that ends with the reward of a respec token.

    This would help make respecs accessible to people that don't have the extra cash to drop on it. It would also, in turn, help generate more respec sales imo.

    Let people get a free one to try something out, they will further understand their class/the game and will inevitably want to tweak their character a bit more.
    [SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
    PVPer rocking it Solo queue style since the dawn of Neverwinter
  • fieryinvectivefieryinvective Member Posts: 15 Arc User
    edited May 2013
    The mechanics in this game have nothing to do with the rules of D&D, aside from being named similarly. What is this creepy obsession with 'WELL IN MY D&D GAME I NEVER ALLOW RESPECS AND NEVERWINTER HAS A D&D LICENSE, THEREFORE THEY SHOULD BE THE SAME'? Go power trip over your own campaign, dudes.
  • redeclipzeredeclipze Member, Neverwinter Beta Users, Neverwinter Hero Users, Neverwinter Guardian Users Posts: 0 Arc User
    edited May 2013
    Respecs being cash grabs doesn't really make sense because you can farm AD for Zen...
    BiS DC Seyfried - PvP / CN farm (Dragon Server) 1st Degree Burns

    twitch.tv/redeclipze
  • spacebux66spacebux66 Member, Neverwinter Beta Users, Neverwinter Guardian Users Posts: 107 Bounty Hunter
    edited May 2013
    redeclipze wrote: »
    Respecs being cash grabs doesn't really make sense because you can farm AD for Zen...

    Someone has to pay real money for that ZEN. Even if you farm AD and sell it to another player for ZEN, someone paid RL money for that ZEN already. So yes, respecs are a revenue stream for Cryptic/PWE.

    But that isn't what this thread is about. This thread is about how it will affect the metagame.

    I think that because experimentation has a real money price tag attached to it, people will be less scientific in researching which abilities do and don't trigger procs, establishing concrete statistical proc rates, performing side-by-side DPS/HPS comparisons which isolate variables like crit vs. recovery, and the many sorts of research you see in mmo games where respecs aren't monetized.

    Sure, there will be some of this sort of methodical min-maxing and experimentation, but not as much as I'm used to seeing in other mmos.

    Instead, I expect to see more arguments based on speculation, side-by-side comparisons with too many variables to be valid, and conventional wisdom that often will be grounded in false assumptions which go unchallenged for long periods of time. I also foresee more metagame disputes between players with conflicting hypotheses which are never resolved to my satisfaction and the benefit of the community.

    I also think there will be more cookie-cutter building and less outside-the-box thinking. But that's as much a product of the limited skillsets as the costs of respecialization.
  • northreyarnorthreyar Member Posts: 3 Arc User
    edited May 2013
    I agree with most of the content of the Main Post of this thread, but someone made a reply that caught my atention and i personally thought that it was acurate. The thing is, sadly, very sadly this game's gamplay, rules and depth is not even close to D&D. I say this based on little things and big things that i noticed while playing this game. First of all, this game has so much potential to be a game that stands aside from this trend of easy, lazy, instant max lvl and epic gear, pvp focused games made for casual gamers that have been coming out in the recent years, being its pinnacle of mediocrity: Guild Wars 2. But thats not the point that im trying to make and i wont ***** about other games in this forum because its not apropiate or even related to this thread or my main point at all. One of the Little (Big) things that i have noticed, its that so far the game its just too easy in pve, it requires nothing than button mashing to win any fight (Specially if you're a control wiz),im roling (or at least trying to role) a Guardian fighter going for a PvE spec (this separated specs shouldnt exist though pve and pvp should not be separated in two ways of playing the game, they should be part of a whole experience and thus, not needing to make 2 chars with different proposes in the game or having to respec all day long like in WoW to be able to be proficient in both aspects of the game) and the only actual strategy that i had to come up with is to kill rangers first and then just position myself in front of everyone so i can block the atacks. in dungeons and skirmishes the same issue comes up. the bosses have a lot of hit points but thats pretty much their dificulty. especially on mage bosses the only thing required is to move away from the red areas and their potential dmg is reduced to nothing. On PvP, the scene its a bit unbalanced right now, because the amount of crowd control that 2 wiz on the same team can offer its just almost impossible to deal with, making my character's (not toon, CHARACTER) contribution to his team in terms of CC nearly powerless, might as well not be there. how is a GF soposed to land a stun if them Wizards just TP away and then Slow/stun/root/supress you while the rest of the wiz team shreds you to pieces? and other thing, not having a TR on the team its a lost battle, since they are the most dmg dealing class specially at early lvls(this op rouges dominate almost till lvl 30 or more). These 2 things combined(pve issues and pvp unbalance) make no room for possible metaplay, and limit the games potential, because if a Pve game has easy Pve then whats the point?and this issue cripples the game even more because if pve has low population they Devs will focus more content for PVP, and transforming this game into a MOBA. My advice, Make Dungeons, Skirmishes and specially leveling areas more dificult, maybe not in terms of monster dmg but in amount of hp, that should be enough to encourage some kind of grouping outside of skirmish and dungeon qeues. (wich is really pointless to do at the moment because the monsters are very easy and everything outside of Dungeons and skirmishes its soloable and does not encourage you for social interaction and grouping, wich is the point of the MMORPG genre to even exist) I hope that the instanced based leveling areas go away, because having a max of 20 players per instance and all of them doing different stuff and being of very different lvls limits all of the multiplayer potential of the game, right now the grouping option outside of dun. and skm. might as well not exist, because even if some people do it, most people wont, because there's no need for it, i dont think that the highest lvl players of the beta have died more than 10 times in the proccess of becoming max lvl(60 atm). Going deeper into this last comment, because its another of the things that caught my attention, its that the game's multiplayer aspect its not exploited. so far the only meaningful and useful interactions that i had with other players is when i qeue for dng or skm or pvp arena or when i buy something from the auction house(and i still dont talk to any of them). and i hardly even talk to them, many of them wont even say Hi. having a guild may improve some of this, but not entirely! the leveling areas dont encourage you to any kind of interaction because any class can solo any mob, and many quests take you to instanced areas that are for player and party (if there is one) Only. My recomendation on this, i've already stated it. Make leveling zones more difficult and uninstance them, or increase the ammount of players per instance if that sistem cant be taken out. make(or force) us players interact and actually talk to each other and ask for help, guidance, advice. this basic interaction will surely lead to a friend list request, or even a guild join or create. Friendships will be formed, and grouping becomes part of the experience. in an MMO game we players should experience the games content as a whole, not individually. Another point that i would like to be considered is that the game is too flexible in terms of choises and actions. if Devs ever read this (wich i highly doubt but at least i hope to influence some of you players). If devs and players want to have a game that its not just D&D themed, but D&D based, player choises and interactions should have more impact on how the game is played, and how the character feels when playing it. when i first found out that this game was being developed and going into closed beta, I prayed so the Devs would make an actual Roleplaying game, because it was soposed to be D&D BASED where player interactions and choises should have an impact on what happens, people now are just too lazy to even bother of giving an apropiate or serious name to their Character(or Toon as some people call it wich really pisses me off), if they dont even take the time for that, then i wont bother to try to role on chat(that was my first thought when i first got to protectors enclave and saw someone called like ''Spongebob'' or ''captain fiizypants'' or the likes of that). Game should offer less flexibility to decisions made, if we made a trait spec that we would like to change in the future, then we should learn to live with it, and if it really needs changing, then there should be like a quest, or something dificult to get or do, to give you the possibility to respec. They could even create more content out of it. '' If you wish to unlearn all of your battle earned talents, then you need to see Balmund a wizard that has mastered the ways of memory magic and can help you unlearn your talents and giving you the possibility of learning new ones (or something cheesy like that, but it doesnt matter in the end because youre making content that will contribute to the game's longevity) The thing that i most want out of this game, its an experience, a multiplayer game experience that persist over time, that takes time and work to archieve things, and that it wont bore me after 3 months, and has me coming back to it in a daily basis at least for a while. A game that potentially has me hooked playing it for years
  • nemesis788450nemesis788450 Member, Neverwinter Beta Users, Neverwinter Guardian Users Posts: 0 Arc User
    edited May 2013
    what PISSES ME OFF extremely is not even the fact that you have to buy for a respec - i dont like it but i accept it. What i cant accept is the fact that the dman respec token doesnt even allow you to respec your entire character - NO SIR - only goes for powers. For feats of course you have to pay separatly ad - and a lot at that. I think thats just no ok - thats for me just a stepp over the nickel and dime line...

    besies, the notion that oh you can farm ad and eventually get there - thats just nonsense, dont even imagine that nonsense - youll need SOOOO LOOOONG to get that ad by ingame content its not even funny - on lvl 30 feats respec costs 50'000 AD - and thats just the feats...you can get maybe -if you do quests, crafting, praying - 10'000 AD a day - and than youre mostly doing the ad farming - at least on my level - that means you need at least a week just farming for that respec...if you add the the respec token that you have to buy for the powers youll easily play several weeks for that respec DAILY.
  • ambisinisterrambisinisterr Member, Neverwinter Moderator Posts: 10,462 Community Moderator
    edited May 2013
    what PISSES ME OFF extremely is not even the fact that you have to buy for a respec - i dont like it but i accept it. What i cant accept is the fact that the dman respec token doesnt even allow you to respec your entire character - NO SIR - only goes for powers. For feats of course you have to pay separatly ad - and a lot at that. I think thats just no ok - thats for me just a stepp over the nickel and dime line...

    Respec Tokens basically take your character and reset every option you applied after level 1.
    Feats are reset with a respec token as well.
  • sent8sent8 Member, Neverwinter Beta Users, Neverwinter Hero Users, Neverwinter Guardian Users Posts: 70
    edited May 2013
    There are a few things about limited respecs in Neverwinter that bother me. The first thing is purely an unpolished feat system. As of right now I believe the feat systems needs work, especially when you look at the state of the end-game content. Atm there is only one form of PvP, while there is much more PvE content. A full set of PvP gear is 5 pieces, which means to get higher level equipment for your other 5 pieces you have to do PvE content. So if I went to fully gear my character I will need to do PvE content. The feats do not support this, my CW build atm is mainly for PvP/Leveling and would not allow me to excel in my roll in PvE conent. I might be able to scratch by but in any difficult instance with a capable team I would stand out like a sore thumb. That means if I want to be a capable member of a 5 man PvE team, I would need to respec. Because the majority of feat trees center around specific power I would more than likely have to get a full respec if I did not put points in these powers.

    Sure potentially there will be plenty of PvP content where someone could focus on only PvP and not worry about needing to do PvE to fully gear their character but as of right now there isn't.
    21.jpg
  • clockwerkninjaclockwerkninja Member, Neverwinter Beta Users, Neverwinter Guardian Users Posts: 0 Arc User
    edited May 2013
    sent8 wrote: »
    There are a few things about limited respecs in Neverwinter that bother me. The first thing is purely an unpolished feat system. As of right now I believe the feat systems needs work, especially when you look at the state of the end-game content. Atm there is only one form of PvP, while there is much more PvE content. A full set of PvP gear is 5 pieces, which means to get higher level equipment for your other 5 pieces you have to do PvE content. So if I went to fully gear my character I will need to do PvE content. The feats do not support this, my CW build atm is mainly for PvP/Leveling and would not allow me to excel in my roll in PvE conent. I might be able to scratch by but in any difficult instance with a capable team I would stand out like a sore thumb. That means if I want to be a capable member of a 5 man PvE team, I would need to respec. Because the majority of feat trees center around specific power I would more than likely have to get a full respec if I did not put points in these powers.

    Sure potentially there will be plenty of PvP content where someone could focus on only PvP and not worry about needing to do PvE to fully gear their character but as of right now there isn't.

    If you look close, you will see that their are no factions or world pvp in this game. Pvp here is just a mini game, not to be taken seriously.
    [SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
    Quote Originally Posted by roents
    It's an "open beta" that can't be wiped even in the midst of multiple economy destroying exploits. FUN
  • spacebux66spacebux66 Member, Neverwinter Beta Users, Neverwinter Guardian Users Posts: 107 Bounty Hunter
    edited May 2013
    If you look close, you will see that their are no factions or world pvp in this game. Pvp here is just a mini game, not to be taken seriously.

    If you look even closer, you will see that there are factions and faction-based (though not open-world) pvp in the game.
  • t3hmerct3hmerc Member Posts: 5 Arc User
    edited May 2013
    If you look close, you will see that their are no factions or world pvp in this game. Pvp here is just a mini game, not to be taken seriously.

    The idea that this game needs to follow certain ideologies from D&D while having no relation to it beyond a storyline shouldn't be taken seriously either.

    I doubt they'll change respecs costing zen since that's a great way to make money but this argument that it needs to follow something in line with D&D after having played it is just hilarious. And I'm sure people that enjoy pvp agree with you, not that I even want to try it because surprise, another mmo with a stealth class.
  • adwenoadweno Member Posts: 9 Arc User
    edited May 2013
    Why are you all crying? Just read descriptions of feats and add to ones you like... It's really easy choice. Not talking about powers because we have a lot of points here and most of the skills will be maxed anyway. If you need respec that hard, collect this diamonds and do it, but please think and calculate before you spend your points.
    24qpo1z.jpg
  • n3pheran3phera Member Posts: 32
    edited May 2013
    adweno wrote: »
    Why are you all crying? Just read descriptions of feats and add to ones you like... It's really easy choice. Not talking about powers because we have a lot of points here and most of the skills will be maxed anyway. If you need respec that hard, collect this diamonds and do it, but please think and calculate before you spend your points.

    You're disregarding typos in the descriptions, skills that aren't as good as they seem on paper, vague descriptions, things that are nerfed to a point where they're no longer desirable to have in your build, things that are changed to a point where they're no longer desirable to have in your build, abilities that are changed into different categories of abilities and everything else that would cause someone to want to respec that is not entirely their fault.
  • knoteskadknoteskad Member Posts: 0 Arc User
    edited May 2013
    This would be a lot better if we could just go to a test room to play around with feats and see what they actually do, with hard data.
  • realpureshadowrealpureshadow Member Posts: 90
    edited May 2013
    You cant really compare d&d board games respec to mmo respec. The reason being is that they are balanced for books that last for a few years. MMO's have updates ever 2weeks to a month.

    I think if they do major changes to a class they should at least give it a respec. I've played games like city of heroes where respecs are a hard mission, buy a recipe from the game $ store or people sell it at ingame auction.
  • adwenoadweno Member Posts: 9 Arc User
    edited May 2013
    n3phera wrote: »
    You're disregarding typos in the descriptions, skills that aren't as good as they seem on paper, vague descriptions, things that are nerfed to a point where they're no longer desirable to have in your build, things that are changed to a point where they're no longer desirable to have in your build, abilities that are changed into different categories of abilities and everything else that would cause someone to want to respec that is not entirely their fault.

    Then i have no idea why i never had to respec and i still have everything what i wanted to and it works how it should.
    24qpo1z.jpg
  • eros1986eros1986 Member Posts: 0 Arc User
    edited May 2013
    Choice have to be made, but hey if you made the wrong one you can pay 5 euro..

    Good logic bro'
  • adwenoadweno Member Posts: 9 Arc User
    edited May 2013
    You don't have to pay. You can also exchange AD to ZEN. So you can respec for free too. But that's a bit of work.
    24qpo1z.jpg
  • n3pheran3phera Member Posts: 32
    edited May 2013
    You could have gotten lucky, not noticed changes made, not cared about changes made etc and/or they may just not have addressed your class for balance changes yet.

    It's an MMO, they can and they will make changes to something you use eventually, and you may not like having whatever it is they changed on your character anymore.

    Heck, in CO they've been regularly reworking powersets and forcing anyone who has one of the afflicted sets to respec. (Usually this works out fine for everyone)
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