Game Model Too Much like WoW

rsomazzi · July 2013

So I've learned rather late that NW is the same model as previous MMOs, but there are some things inherent to NW that outright <font color="orange">HAMSTER</font> me off. For example:

1. Crafting, i.e. Platesmithing. I've recently learned levelling this to max serves merely to acquire shirt and pants. Really? Is this what I've spent money to acquire Zen to achieve? End game plate is not acquired through crafting but Dungeons instead? Please explain what worth there is in the slow grind to level Platesmithing WHILE spending real cash ?

2. Dungeon grinding to get gear, only for a shot at getting more gear to run the next tier dungeon. Rinse, repeat, until you get the top stuff. Is this correct? I hope I am not. This has been done before, for far too long, and I am looking for something at least evolutionary if not revolutionary. Copies of other games, no thanks.

3. How many ******* currencies does this game have? AD, Zen, Gold, Silver, Copper, Seals... HOLY ****! No one back at the studio ever said, "What a second! This is crazy?!" Ever?

4. PvP - Classic Stun fest. Chain CC. Again, this has been done for far too long. Copied/Ripped Off... a "feature" best left behind, but not in NW.

Sorry to rant. Wait a second, no I am not sorry. lol.

hackbeard · July 2013

I feel like a lot of fantasy MMOs follow the same recipe, but that's not necessarily a bad thing. You could say that most RTSes are the same, most shooters are basically the same, etc. They are all inspired by those that came before them, and the models that work best are the most often mimicked.

There are definite similarities between NW and WoW, but I think one big difference that stands out and is impossible to ignore is that the combat in NW is superior. In WoW, so often I felt like I was at the mercy of two calculators doing battle while I just hit number keys repeatedly. NW's combat requires a bit more finesse, and I think it's a ton more fun in the sense that I feel like I am actually kicking *** rather than letting the game decide for me. NW wins in this aspect.

ambisinisterr · July 2013

rsomazzi wrote: »

Snip

You might want to read the developer blogs. One of the ones discussing Module 1 actually discusses the faults with the crafting.

What we are beginning to see and will see in the future is, at the very least, items being able to get upgraded by using crafting features. Currently there's a way to make "reinforced" gauntlets for every class but we'll see more of that soon enough and that is just one way the craft will be made more viable.

As for the gear drops, well...that's not WoW. That's...well...that's part of the RPG setting. It existed long before wow and it will exist long after wow. If you have any suggestions to improve the system by all means post them but there's really no evolution to that concept.

adinosii · July 2013

1) Why would you want to spend cash while leveling crafts? Sure, you can level the professions faster, but you don't *have* to spend $$$ to do it. But yeah, making the highest level shirts/pants is really all that is profitable. Leadership is very useful, though, and Alchemy is not all bad.

2) Pretty much yes. I had hoped the foundry stuff would set this game apart, by providing an endless stream of new content, but unfortunately there are two big flaws (scaling and reward/work ratio) that made them almost pointless.

3) Don't forget the trade bars, the GG coins and the bones - ok, that was just during the invasion event.

4) No comment - I just stay away from PvP myself.

.

rsomazzi · July 2013

I would agree with this. The fact my GF could block when I chose to changes the routine dynamic of fighting. I like this. It's why I continued playing, now level 53.

The problem is sustainability. What is there for me to continue, down the road, playing? Although PvP is ok now, all we have is a queue, and one of 2 maps, both just shoeboxes with spires to stand next to. There has to be more to this, I hope.

The crafting is still my biggest complaint. I don't see how I can continue when the grind and cost so disgustingly outweighs the rewards.

flyingfinn · July 2013

1. Take Leadership, make some ADs and stuff. And maybe Alchemy to level 7 when you can make Dye Packs...
Don't spend Zen/Real Money to level them. Ever....
3. It's free to play. So you don't have to worry about Zen...Or Seals...

dsolz · July 2013

Yes crafting sucks. Just shirts and pants. Make sure u don't get too much AD from it as well because of it is too profitable it will be nerf like the leadership quest then got nerf to 100 AD. But wait didn't what you did served PWE purposes already? U spend real money!!!

Yes again you need to grind dungeon for gears... Isn't all mmo the same? If you don't want to grind ... Spend money ... PWE will be happy

For currency, there is only one that matters cold hard cash.

ambisinisterr · July 2013

rsomazzi wrote: »

The crafting is still my biggest complaint. I don't see how I can continue when the grind and cost so disgustingly outweighs the rewards.

Gather supplies yourself. Craft junk. Sell for gold or keep for later use.

Without a doubt you level far faster than your professions do and they've heard this complaint loud and clear. Look at how much Alchemy is spread out.
But there's zero cost in professions if you simply do it without being silly and pressing the "Finish Now" button or buy materials on the AH.

kiralyn · July 2013

rsomazzi wrote: »

1. Crafting, i.e. Platesmithing. I've recently learned levelling this to max serves merely to acquire shirt and pants. Really? Is this what I've spent money to acquire Zen to achieve? End game plate is not acquired through crafting but Dungeons instead? Please explain what worth there is in the slow grind to level Platesmithing WHILE spending real cash ?

Why would you spend $ on crafting, without having done some checking into what it was like/about?

2. Dungeon grinding to get gear, only for a shot at getting more gear to run the next tier dungeon. Rinse, repeat, until you get the top stuff. Is this correct? I hope I am not. This has been done before, for far too long, and I am looking for something at least evolutionary if not revolutionary. Copies of other games, no thanks.

Don't blame this one on WoW - they copied it from virtually every MMO that came before them. It's what many people seem to expect (along with "large groups") of MMO "end game".

imsmithy · July 2013

1) You can see what locked levels will allow you to do from level 1 on wards by checking the box to make them visible , and I don't think you NEED to spend real money to level up crafting , unless you want to do it faster.

2)This is how it always has been and in all likelyhood will always continue to be , do one dungeon to get gear to allow you to move up to the next level of difficulty , I agree that it would be nice to see it done a different way but I have no ideas , do you?

3)Totally agree , so many different types .....

4)Tried lvl 60 pvp once , was totally slapped about by cash shoppers so no longer bother xD , lower level pvp used to be a bit more fun but now the same cash shoppers are gearing up their twinks and destroying everything that moves so not so much fun now , only pvp I touch now is Gaunt simply because I have no choice plus because its a zergfest its possible to actually assist killing or even kill outright the super geared peoples which can be quite amusing since some of them take great offence at being killed by somebody they deem unworthy and they then spend the rest of the event trying to chase you about , almost like virtual kiss catch xD

cesmode8 · July 2013

Gw2 does more revolutionary(or rather I should say...thinks out of the box a bit more) than most MMOs.

I wouldnt consider gold silver and copper seperate currencies. It is one...gold.

And if you think this game has many currencies, look at GW2. Its drowning in its currencies: Gold, Karma, Relics, pristine relics, globs of ecto, merits, commendations, laurels, a seperate dungeon token for every dungeon, soon achievement points, gems.

iceybluekitsune · July 2013

ambisinisterr wrote: »

Gather supplies yourself. Craft junk. Sell for gold or keep for later use.

Without a doubt you level far faster than your professions do and they've heard this complaint loud and clear. Look at how much Alchemy is spread out.
But there's zero cost in professions if you simply do it without being silly and pressing the "Finish Now" button or buy materials on the AH.

problem is gathering the materials is now limited since shortly before the invasion event. sure you can get them from profession packs or doing repetitive "gather" tasks every 10 minutes but thats not any fun. same with just buying stuff from the auction house, theres no real feeling of "i did this work to make this item that can help me in some fashion" buying all the materials rather than gathering them yourself

antovaras · July 2013

1. Crafting. Not spent a penny on crafting outside what I've earned via crafting. Currently sitting, for my main, on Tailoring Lvl 17, Leadership: Lvl 15 and the rest rank 4. So far, my crafting is easily self sustaining... It's not, after all, a race.

2. Welcome to DUNGEONS and dragons

3. Gold , Silver and Copper is just the one currency and Zen is technically not an in game currency.

4. PvP: Should have read Cryptic's track record with PvP... bad doesn't describe it...

sellestine · July 2013

OMG u cry about everything.

1. U spend "real cash" in a game u dont like the fault is on u so stop crying.

2. U are wright. U sould get top items just cos u loged in. Once.

3. How many currencies are there in your ''Real Cash" ?

4. L2P and do the chain cc first ffs. There are taktics in every aspect of every game. Learn them of keap crying.

bioshrike · July 2013

1. Most of the crafting professions are kinda worthless. You are dead-on that the only things really worth making are shirts and pants, since they almost never drop from enemies, (the only ones I've seen are blue shirts from certain dungeon delve chests).

2. To be perfectly honest, at level 60, there really isn't much worth getting other than rare/epic gear. You need some sort of "carrot on a stick" to entice players to keep playing.

3. There are a lot of currencies, but I've found that this is a strategy many F2P MMOs utilize. It tends to muddle the player's actions, but it also serves to separate the rewards for specific activities a bit more. At least said currencies don't take up inventory space, and if you step back a bit, it's not too hard to understand them:

Gold = basic stuff
ADs = better stuff, and is the closest to a universal currency the game has, (as it can by items directly, be exchanged via the Ah for items from other players, or can be exchanged for Zen to buy stuff from the in game store).
Seals = level/dungeon tiered reward tokens - only good for exchanging items from very specific vendors, and has a limited selection of items.
Glory = similar to the seals above, but granted for participating in PvP.
Tarmalune Trade Bars = "Runner up prizes" for opening lockboxes - basically just a gimme so they can say that the lockboxes aren't a total gamble.

4. It's very difficult, IMO, to handle crowd control properly in PvP. If it doesn't work well enough, then it becomes pointless and people cease to use it. If it's too powerful, people perma-hold their opponents and PvP becomes heavily one-sided. I think we are in the latter case currently. I'm not really sure how to fix it totally, and pretty much just avoid PvP entirely.

ceryndrion · July 2013

Great quote from Mark Kern, lead designer of Firefall, and former developer for Blizzard.

Mark Kern wrote:

Sometimes I look at WoW and think “what have we done?” I think I know. I think we killed a genre.

The rest of the article is here..

Article on MMOSite

I have to say, I agree with a lot of the points he makes..

diogene0 · July 2013

Crafting is useless? Good! Crafting makes games a korean grind. Collect easter eggs/skill node for hours like an idiot, and you can't even make a bot for it even if it's not fun, sluggish, boring. Actually, what bugs me is that we can't even loot epic pants with a gem slot in pve.

More crafting is also more pay to win, there's no way to level up and have a good sucess rate to craft what you want without using the cash shop or the auction house (so buying stuff from buying customers is pay to win anyway, since someone paid for your item).

Crafting means the best items are from the cash shop in a way. Which is pretty ridiculous and not the kind of game i enjoy.

hackbeard · July 2013

imsmithy wrote: »

1) You can see what locked levels will allow you to do from level 1 on wards by checking the box to make them visible , and I don't think you NEED to spend real money to level up crafting , unless you want to do it faster.

Very true. Uncheck the "hide higher levels" bit in the professions window and see what the top tasks will give you before deciding if you want to proceed. For my own game, I use Leadership and nothing else. I find the other professions to be almost worthless. Leadership at least gives XP and AD.

willsommers · July 2013

How many ******* currencies does this game have?

There's really only two that matter gold and AD. To a lesser degree maybe drake seal and GG seals.

The last game I stopped playing had 10x the currencies of Neverwinter and many of them were behind serious time gates which was even more annoying. Not time gate for mere bonus items like with celestial coins, imagine if T2 or T2.5 items were only attainable after invoking for 30, 60 days or more.....

As far as crafting it's a delicate balance for MMOs. Make crafting too strong and people will complain about grind, costly, pay to win (in free 2 play MMOs) and just ***** in general. Make the best items only drops and people will complain that crafting is worthless and an unnecessary part of the game. I do not envy trying to keep that balance.

Game Model Too Much like WoW

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