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Help me decided between MMO's
Jaded
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
I've played WoW for a long time... I've raided MC, BWL, AQ (20 and 40), done some of Naxx and now seen SSC and TK (4/6 and 3/4 repectively). I've been a whore to blizzard... I've stayed up late when I know I have to work the next day (and drive an hour to get there), I've spent weekends honor farming and I've tanked ever damn heroic instance in the game successfully...
But yonder, from the corner of my eye I see something... It's called Age Of Conan...
I've been good... I've treated Blizzard like my one and only, but AoC keeps lifting it's skirt, letting me see little peeks of it's soft legs, tempting, taunting...
I'm a clicker... which I know makes tanking sound somewhat crappy in WoW, but I've got it down to an art thanks to keybindings and quick hand to eye movements...
I don't mind grinding occasionally... hell... I mastered Architect, Image Designer, Merchant, Dancer, TK and Ranger in Pre-CU SWG...
I implore of your people... please... help me. Tell me which is the more fulfilling game for someone who is a clicker, doesn't mind wasting 8 - 12 hours on a weekend day playing.
My MMO fate... rests in your hands.
But yonder, from the corner of my eye I see something... It's called Age Of Conan...
I've been good... I've treated Blizzard like my one and only, but AoC keeps lifting it's skirt, letting me see little peeks of it's soft legs, tempting, taunting...
I'm a clicker... which I know makes tanking sound somewhat crappy in WoW, but I've got it down to an art thanks to keybindings and quick hand to eye movements...
I don't mind grinding occasionally... hell... I mastered Architect, Image Designer, Merchant, Dancer, TK and Ranger in Pre-CU SWG...
I implore of your people... please... help me. Tell me which is the more fulfilling game for someone who is a clicker, doesn't mind wasting 8 - 12 hours on a weekend day playing.
My MMO fate... rests in your hands.
I can't think of anything clever.
Jaded on
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They really wanted the game to be fun, but it wasn't.
Odd enough I've heard people saying good things about Vanguard lately.
Kyle
Yeah I haven't played AoC but you have to keep in mind the closest thing to exciting endgame in WoW used to be 40-man zerging UBRS and hoping for loot.
I'd say stick with WoW for another few months, then reevaluate. Personally, I quit WoW a while ago and have no plans to go back. At this point, I'm holding out for WAR, which should be released... Novemberish? Something like that. I have a friend in beta, his take on it has been extremely positive thus far, but of course there are no guarantees.
City of Heroes never having any equipment was criminal. With only boring slotted enhancements to buff yourself, the game leaves you without much to focus on aside from the never ending mission grind. It always left something to be desired.
Edit: Honestly most of the big ones have free trials. Just jump in. For EQ2 if you haven't played it before, just make sure you get the third party mapping program.
EQ2 is fairly similar to WoW in many ways as well (although they all are pretty similar) and has decent end game content. You could always give the trial a shot.
Loot whore!
It's a non-linear MMO. You don't gain levels, and you don't have quests, you just do what you want to in a medieval fantasy world. Wanna be a thief? Sneak up to someone and rifle through their backpack till you find something you want. Wanna be a blacksmith? Any piece of solid rock can be mined for ore and gems, there are no "resource nodes" you have to find.
The only problem I have with the game is its age.. I keep waiting for another game to come along and do what they did 10+ years ago, but there still hasn't been one..
naknaknaknaknak
EQ was fun for being one of the first majorly successful games and it was almost a complete chore to play, but one I enjoyed due to the people I knew on it.
EQ2 was made for the hardcore MMORPG player. Solo content has since been added I'm sure and it had nice things for people who liked to grind and click abilities because most classes, you could continually click abilities (or hotkey) through entire fights without much issue. It's biggest issue was the small audience it really appealed to and the lack of substantial amounts of players on their servers meant you either knew people going into the game, or you were almost playing it solo. I haven't played for 2 years or so now so I don't know what's it become recently.
Vanguard was full of great ideas, none of them workable.
Most to all games start out unfinished in some way. EQ, WOW, all of them. The fun games are the ones people play, the leader being WoW without a doubt.
Of the games I have played, I would recommend giving EQ2 a shot to see what you think. If you're a fan of clicking and hotkey stuff, you might enjoy their combat system. Fights are longer than in WoW or many other games, but they kept the fighting enjoyable to me. Maybe I just enjoy punishment, who knows.
Honestly, if I was you and I mostly tanked instances/raids in wow I would re-spec pvp and arena or maybe re-roll a more fun class. There isn't really another mmo with the polish, content, balance and game-play wow can offer. I know, saying wow has balance is asking to be flammed, but most mmo's like age of conan are far far worse balance wise.
Another very valid option I'm considering is just taking a break from MMO's until the WoW expansion comes out. There are other games out there, the orange box is still a great buy.
I might break and continue with WoW or go for WAR or AoC, but right now neither new game is cutting it for me and WoW is getting kinda boring. Why is everyone still farming for loot that won't mean shit in a few months when the expansion comes out? Honestly, the wow 5v5 arena is probably the most fun I have playing that game, everything else is only fun if the people your hanging out with online are fun awesome people to hang out with, the fact that you happen to be in the middle of raiding/playing WoW is kinda beside the point, what your really enjoying is the joking around over vent.
I've also tried CoH, I didn't like in one bit... the "quests" were the same recycled warehouse over and over and over again.
I levelled for awhile in Matrix online, and while I loved it for it's SWG'ish feeling it quickly died.
I've never tried FFXI... I lost all faith in Final Fantasy games after FFX2 (AKA Charlies Angels).
I rolled a hunter recently (since my main was a prot warrior) and levelled to 70 in record time, but now there is nothing to do as server pop on Lethon Horde side is horrible. I also levlled a priest to 62 (you can't bitch about your healers until you've played one) and I've levelled a pally to 54 a rogue to 48 and a shaman to 25... nothing seems to want to take. I don't have the patience to watch things slowly die as a 'lock and I hate the "glass cannon" feel of a mage (partially because I've played a tank I suppose).
The only reason I got it in the first place was because all my friends convinced me to get it, and playing with friends is always fun. Out of the 6 of us, I am now the only one who plays it, and I'm only going to keep on playing it until my subscription runs out.
As for AoC, my roommate was a huge WoW fan a year or two ago, but had quit. He decided to give in and play AoC when it first came out. I also played some of it on his account, just 'cause. The combat is fun, at least early on. There is no denying that the game has fun combat. But I didn't see much else to the game, and the art direction (to me) is a little generic and dry. Plus, there were glitches, though I didn't see the worst. The main annoying thing to me is that mobs pathed onto roads, which I suppose added to the chaotic nature of the game, but overall made traveling a royal pain in the ass. So I traveled by river and would even swim up waterfalls. Yes, swim UP them. And my toon would get stuck in the bottom of a bridge, etc.
I can see it being very attractive in a few months' time. But until then, nothing measures up to the polish of WoW, in my opinion. I'm not even a huge player anymore, maybe 2-5 hours a week. And I've tried EQ2, Vanguard (though back when it sucked), CoH, and countless shitty free ones.
I think your only options are to either keep playing WoW or quit and find something else to do until a really great MMO comes out. It may or may not be WAR, but that'll probably be the next thing worth trying.
You know what you haven't tried? Quitting.
No joke, I took a shadow priest to 68 (I'm gonna finish him out soon enough), but at that point, with 70 looming on the horizon and Heroics still requiring Revered or Exalted or whatever it was, I was spent. I had the choice to do some quests in Blade's Edge I didn't want to do, grind instances I was sick of for rep, repair my abysmally low mining (for that level), or go back to the fucking Barrens with a new character. You think I wanted to go back to early-game Azeroth after leveling a priest? I had stuff in real life going on to, so I deactivated.
Fast forward 4 or 5 months and a couple major patches later, me and a friend are talking..."you know what would be cool? Hooking my PC up to the 50" HDTV and leveling a mage." He's about to hit 70, and I'll wrap up the priest as well. And guess what? Heroics only require Honored now, so I didn't even have to grind that shit after all! However, I'm already starting to hate it again. So I'll get them both to heroic status, and quit again, and pick them both up and start gearing them when I can stand the game again.
Honestly I don't think you're going to find what you're looking for in any MMO. Someone up here trashed UBRS, but honestly was UBRS bad at the time compared to other endgame material in other MMOs, or is UBRS bad NOW given the content in BC raids or the complexities of places like AQ40? Play some non-MMO games, do some stuff in real life, and you'll find yourself ready to relapse in no time.
Edit: I should clarify since the OP asked for other MMOs...the reason I advise quitting is because they are all the same. No, don't tell me about the cool loot system in game A or how game B's pvp is so much worse...no matter which one you get you are going to spend the first half of the game grinding SOMETHING, even if it's disguised by quests, missions (AO), etc.
PSN: TheScrublet
Unless all you care about is eye candy, the game gets stale really fast.
The combat system seems innovative initially, but after time you realize all they've done is removed autoattack and make you do the manual attacking. The combos are still combos or specials if you want to call em that.
Several classes are severely broken in PvP.
I picked up my crafting profession at level 40 with a full quest log (didn't know i was full as it doesn't track how many quest you have anyway) and my trainer technically tought me the profession but I was unable to pick up the quests. Since I was flagged as having the profession when I talked to her again, She wouldn't give me the quests. Petitioning GMs the response every time was "We're aware of the issue, we cannot help you currently, it will hopefully be patched in soon" It was 2 months before I could retrain crafting. Oh btw you cannot unlearn your crafting profession.
The quests started ramping up in difficulty around level 40, to the point that, if you do not have friends or guildees with similar playtimes, you are hosed.
The endgame is either lacking extremely in content, or so bugged that it's not worth it to put your time and resources into participating it.
Overall, rocky launch (like AO), hasn't bounced back yet and still severely lacks content past the first 30 levels.
Every other MMO I'ved played kept m playing longer than AoC did. So I'd honestly suggest any other MMO. Even though Eve has a steep barrier to entry, it was a neat game that was pretty well executed. AO was the best SCI-FI MMO I'ved played (despite the rocky launch).
CoH added a whole lot of loot with the Invention System, which has been around for over a year by now. Its not equipment in the classic sense, but it probably makes more sense in a super hero context than having "Tights of Fire Protection" There's loot, crafting and a market to involve people in, if they chose to participate in them.
But yeah, there's free trials floating around for all the games. Try them all and see how you like them.
www.eve-online.com
14 day free trial. Give it a try, get through the tutorial, do some missions. If you don't like it after the 14 day trial, all you've lost is time.
I was even in a mining guild... so you just mine so you can buy ships and upgrade to mine more...? It was like grinding so you could grind more. Maybe i just didnt get it.
Either way i suggest WaR, it looks promising.
If by "kind of change it up" you mean real time combat instead of turn based, then yeah I guess they did. FFXI combat isn't functionally that much different from WoW (use abilities, spells have cast times, etc), except that skillchains are awesome.
Note I don't play anymore because the grind was *miserable*, but the combat and the classes themselves were awesome.
For those of us potentially curious about the game, why will it not fill any void? An explanation would be greatly appreciated.
Once I move out of the place I am temp. crashing at I will hook my 56" back up and just Mass Effect my brains out... or consider getting a PS3 for Metal Gear...
<drool>
Metal Gear...
It simply has neither the length nor the girth... wait, what are we talking about again?
Honestly, I know a bunch of people who play WoW, tried AoC, but annecdotally, almost none of them actually stuck with AoC.
I'm sure it's a great game, but it might need a little longer to patch in/correct a few issues for the time being.
I must sadly join the anti-AoC chorus. I had enough after a month or so. AoC actually made me start playing WoW again after having quit a couple of months earlier; all of AoC's flaws reminded me of all the great things in WoW that you don't usually notice, beginning right after character creation with how natural WoW's character animations look compared to AoC's strangely wooden and robotic ones. AoC just isn't much of a MMO at this point, and quite a lot needs to happen to change this in my opinion, and this is why my hopes aren't high; in WoW, the promise was there from day one. In AoC, entire key concepts of the game are missing or in need of thorough overhaul. Its only redeeming quality is that the environment looks really pretty in places, but it's telling that my friend and I kept going "man, if WoW looked like this..." only after a week or so of playing.
Then compare that game to what it is today.
Now, step three. Imagine what Age of Conan could become.
See my rant somewhere else re. Destiny Quests, and how every character you make and every other player and every character they make is the "chosen one" and follows the same Destiny Quests, and starts out in the same starting zone, and basically might as well be the same brown item equipped cardboard cutout over and over again...
The combat system is wank.
I'm sorry, it's a great idea in theory but just piss-poorly done. Nothing feels intuitive, or based on quick thinking, context appropriate reactions, thrust, parry, lunge, etc. They said they had games like Soul Calibur in mind when designing the combat system but it's nothing like that...
Playing AoC is like watching a fantastic looking movie with a terrible, terrible script. You enjoy it for what it is but you come out of that cinema thinking, what a waste... If I notice how bad the script is, why didn't the writers, producer, developer, creator, actors, artists, etc. etc.
The only reason I now play CoH to the exclusion of WoW is that I hate soloing. In CoH, anytime, anywhere, I can get a team of people and join them. Because of the mentoring system, two people of any level can play together and both will get something out of it, so I can play with friends very easily even if they want to play their 50's and I have the urge to start a new character.
CoH, like WoW, has its many flaws and pitfalls, which I would be happy to go into if anybody really wanted to hear it... They both do different things really well though, and I suppose it's all what you want out of the game. For me, having people around to play with is more important than setting or repetition. My advice is to try some different things and see what you like best.
I can tell you from experience, though, that WoW is a tough act to follow.
Not perfect, but good. There's lots to do, and a huge world, and the community is way better than in other MMOs. They keep tweaking client stability and fixing bugs ever week or two and it's only getting better with each patch. It looks great, runs well on most systems, and has zero instancing. I mean none. At all. Ever.
There's no PvP to speak of as it was never really designed for that, but it's a great PvE game. We have a PA guild going, and a thread if you don't want to jump in without any direction.
Also you can buy the game for like eight bucks shipped and I think you still get the free month for signing up.
You say this like it's a good thing.
Though I suppose with a small enough userbase and enough to do it wouldn't really matter. That just makes me think of fighting over spawns in EQ though.