Now that this beta is over, I went through and look at my high-res screenshots.
DEAR FUCK. This game is fucking beautiful. I mean, I remember it looking this good while I was playing (although it was at 15-20 FPS ), but still... holy shit.
Holy shit.
EDIT: My screenshots look nicer than the press release screenshots they give out and that's crazy.
"While it's a bit late here's a small piece of advice for the next BWE; if you rightclick a "common crafting material" and select "Deposit Collectible" it will automatically be transferred into your bank in a different tab (which you can select on the left side)."
"While it's a bit late here's a small piece of advice for the next BWE; if you rightclick a "common crafting material" and select "Deposit Collectible" it will automatically be transferred into your bank in a different tab (which you can select on the left side)."
Is there any way to craft from bank/collectible tab mats? Running/warping to the bank and back was tedious.
i really hope the next beta has access to the sylvari
my enjoyment of this game would skyrocket if i could make a willowy plant-elf girl with which to subject people to flamethrowering and rocket turreting
No one told me before that the Elementalist is amazing. Dual daggers or staves? You are wrecking house. Also, a runspeed buff with lightning/staff is awesome news.
I'm a bit disappointed that they don't appear to have weapon switching though.
They don't because they have access to so many skills already via their profession mechanic.
But daggers and staves are both awesome. Don't make me choose! ;-)
I couldn't stand daggers when I started with them. They take you too close to the enemy, but once the damage started scaling up it became much more worth it.
Also, anyone notice that they let us go on for several more hours than initially stated?
It was supposed to end at Midnight PDT. That was ... 20 minutes ago.
When I'm looking at my screenshots, I realize that this game appears to have very subtle cell-shading going on in places around the edges of stuff. Juuuuust subtle enough to give it that "painterly" feel.
From the little I played of it, I think Im going to try guardian more next. As much as Im liking the warrior I hated getting rooted in place for a lot of their skills with two handed weapons. Guardians felt like they could move around a lot more.
From the little I played of it, I think Im going to try guardian more next. As much as Im liking the warrior I hated getting rooted in place for a lot of their skills with two handed weapons. Guardians felt like they could move around a lot more.
I don't know about Warrior, but all the Guardian skills outside of the shouts pretty much have cast times. Those that don't, you need to be rooted.
Ultimately, I think the most critical things that ANet need to sort out (for PvE at least anyway) are scaling, combat and client optimization in that order.
Scaling seems totally out of whack in the beta - world events don't seem to scale down in any way, and boss damage grows exponentially fast enough such that one-shots are common.
Combat.. well, they need to relook at melee seriously too. Something is very very wrong when as a guardian, pretty much the epitome of sword and board, I can kill much more safely and often times faster with a sceptre as opposed to a greatsword. Sadly, it took me until level 12 before I realised this, but once you do, playing as a guardian becomes much more enjoyable because you can then do stuff that everyone seems to be good with (e.g. kiting veteran aaxes around as a level 12).
I'm continually amazed at all the people on the Beta forums asking for click-to-move. It's just ... what type of game do you think this is?
The sequel to Guild Wars?
That's nothing like Guild Wars.
For a fan of Guild Wars who hasn't been following gaming news and developments but only hears "GW has a sequel coming out," I can understand the position. After all, non-fans of GW2 have been slamming it on the same grounds of ignorance, accusing it of being fully instanced, no jumping, etc. etc. And I know it's hard for some people to believe, but plenty of folks actually really like the way Guild Wars is set up, including with click-to-move enabled.
I'm starting to get a sinking feeling about combat.
As I leveled my weapons from levels 1-15 I unlocked more and more of my combinations, at level 12 I had almost all of them unlocked. By level 15 I had my rotations down and it was simply a matter of watching my rear when kiting and figuring out on the fly what to do when something bad happened.
....
The top level is level 80.
What's left to make me interested in those 65 other levels of combat and fighting?!
I made a post in the suggestion forum about the difficulty of the Personal Story quests I encountered.
I got a bunch of replies from people who only read the title of the thread and not the actual post itself. Replies like "don't change the difficulty keep it hard if you can't do it you're a babby" etc etc. And I know these people didn't read the post because in my post I said I went in over the recommended level, but got replies such as "it's supposed to be hard go back when you're over the level".
Even my example of the Ballista which hit for more health than I had. No one seemed to read that part either.
This was taken in LA when we did the group meetup. Unfortunately I could only get the people near me in the shot (and a random sylvari NPC) because we were posing for the group picture. I'm the grumpy looking charr.
I'm continually amazed at all the people on the Beta forums asking for click-to-move. It's just ... what type of game do you think this is?
The sequel to Guild Wars?
That's nothing like Guild Wars.
For a fan of Guild Wars who hasn't been following gaming news and developments but only hears "GW has a sequel coming out," I can understand the position. After all, non-fans of GW2 have been slamming it on the same grounds of ignorance, accusing it of being fully instanced, no jumping, etc. etc. And I know it's hard for some people to believe, but plenty of folks actually really like the way Guild Wars is set up, including with click-to-move enabled.
Click-to-move isn't a usual thing for MMOs though in my experience.
I made a post in the suggestion forum about the difficulty of the Personal Story quests I encountered.
I got a bunch of replies from people who only read the title of the thread and not the actual post itself. Replies like "don't change the difficulty keep it hard if you can't do it you're a babby" etc etc. And I know these people didn't read the post because in my post I said I went in over the recommended level, but got replies such as "it's supposed to be hard go back when you're over the level".
Even my example of the Ballista which hit for more health than I had. No one seemed to read that part either.
Fuck.
Yeah, I saw your thread. Also made a reply that I'm sure will fall on deaf ears. Or blind eyes, whatever. Just making my rounds, trying to add my 2 cents to any thread that needs some logic and reason in it.
I made a post in the suggestion forum about the difficulty of the Personal Story quests I encountered.
I got a bunch of replies from people who only read the title of the thread and not the actual post itself. Replies like "don't change the difficulty keep it hard if you can't do it you're a babby" etc etc. And I know these people didn't read the post because in my post I said I went in over the recommended level, but got replies such as "it's supposed to be hard go back when you're over the level".
Even my example of the Ballista which hit for more health than I had. No one seemed to read that part either.
Fuck.
The official forums are what you expect - a cesspool of self-proclaimed wannabe elitists and hardcore fanboys. They seem to dismiss any valid criticism out of hand by attacking the poster instead. Stuff like "learn to dodge", "this is not WOW, adapt or die" nonsense. Sure I could dodge, but hey, I've only got energy for 2 dodges, and that doesn't avoid auto-attack damage in any way. Also, how the hell am I supposed to know to dodge when I can't even see the boss under all that spell effects? And that crap about WOW, if you were a raider in WOW, it would leave you much more prepared than most other MMOs. Things like getting out of the fire, interrupting, positioning, timing of skills would be second nature to you.
I'm starting to get a sinking feeling about combat.
As I leveled my weapons from levels 1-15 I unlocked more and more of my combinations, at level 12 I had almost all of them unlocked. By level 15 I had my rotations down and it was simply a matter of watching my rear when kiting and figuring out on the fly what to do when something bad happened.
....
The top level is level 80.
What's left to make me interested in those 65 other levels of combat and fighting?!
This worries me too because honestly, looking at the skill bar, what you have is like 3 utility skills and 1 elite? And those 3 utility skills typically have a very long cooldown and typically don't gel with each other. So pretty much by 20 (when you get your 3rd slot unlock) you can pretty much choose the 3 skills you want and then never change them ever except for very specific situations. Heck, the only time I changed my stuff around was to get in a run speed skill to move from point to point.
I made a post in the suggestion forum about the difficulty of the Personal Story quests I encountered.
I got a bunch of replies from people who only read the title of the thread and not the actual post itself. Replies like "don't change the difficulty keep it hard if you can't do it you're a babby" etc etc. And I know these people didn't read the post because in my post I said I went in over the recommended level, but got replies such as "it's supposed to be hard go back when you're over the level".
Even my example of the Ballista which hit for more health than I had. No one seemed to read that part either.
Fuck.
Yeah, I saw your thread. Also made a reply that I'm sure will fall on deaf ears. Or blind eyes, whatever. Just making my rounds, trying to add my 2 cents to any thread that needs some logic and reason in it.
Haha well, thanks either way. I suppose my post was too long, but I like to try and be descriptive about these sort of things.
And then of course I find this reply:
I found the personal story epic fun because it was a challenge.
You aren’t a bad player, you just aren’t willing to learn so you are failing.
Just try harder man and learn to dodge, use your skills correctly and don’t stand there and tank hits, button spam.
I'm starting to get a sinking feeling about combat.
As I leveled my weapons from levels 1-15 I unlocked more and more of my combinations, at level 12 I had almost all of them unlocked. By level 15 I had my rotations down and it was simply a matter of watching my rear when kiting and figuring out on the fly what to do when something bad happened.
....
The top level is level 80.
What's left to make me interested in those 65 other levels of combat and fighting?!
there's still a shitload of stuff to unlock!
you don't even have all your skill slots until level 30
there are a ton of skills to purchase with skill points
there are also trait points that actually do a lot more than just give you more numbers
I made a post in the suggestion forum about the difficulty of the Personal Story quests I encountered.
I got a bunch of replies from people who only read the title of the thread and not the actual post itself. Replies like "don't change the difficulty keep it hard if you can't do it you're a babby" etc etc. And I know these people didn't read the post because in my post I said I went in over the recommended level, but got replies such as "it's supposed to be hard go back when you're over the level".
Even my example of the Ballista which hit for more health than I had. No one seemed to read that part either.
Fuck.
Yeah, I saw your thread. Also made a reply that I'm sure will fall on deaf ears. Or blind eyes, whatever. Just making my rounds, trying to add my 2 cents to any thread that needs some logic and reason in it.
Haha well, thanks either way. I suppose my post was too long, but I like to try and be descriptive about these sort of things.
And then of course I find this reply:
I found the personal story epic fun because it was a challenge.
You aren’t a bad player, you just aren’t willing to learn so you are failing.
Just try harder man and learn to dodge, use your skills correctly and don’t stand there and tank hits, button spam.
Good luck.
I don't even.
Seriously these people are fucked in the head. There were several situations while doing the personal story for my Charr Thief where it was a "Whoops the boss got to hit you once, gotta respawn and rush back." Not to mention the fact that the allies with me were made of god damned wet paper. This is not a situation of "lulz noob l2dodge" it's "I know what it was in the last beta, and this shit is ass throttingly harsh."
I'm continually amazed at all the people on the Beta forums asking for click-to-move. It's just ... what type of game do you think this is?
The sequel to Guild Wars?
That's nothing like Guild Wars.
For a fan of Guild Wars who hasn't been following gaming news and developments but only hears "GW has a sequel coming out," I can understand the position. After all, non-fans of GW2 have been slamming it on the same grounds of ignorance, accusing it of being fully instanced, no jumping, etc. etc. And I know it's hard for some people to believe, but plenty of folks actually really like the way Guild Wars is set up, including with click-to-move enabled.
Click-to-move isn't a usual thing for MMOs though in my experience.
It's a pretty usual thing for Guild Warses though
fuck gendered marketing
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UnluckyThat's not meant to happenRegistered Userregular
It's weird to hear an MMO being too hard. Seriously. I think the Guild Wars team was afraid of people saying it wasn't worth the time because it was too easy and a grindfest, so they upped the difficulty to prevent this.
It's weird to hear an MMO being too hard. Seriously. I think the Guild Wars team was afraid of people saying it wasn't worth the time because it was too easy and a grindfest, so they upped the difficulty to prevent this.
And then kinda got this.
honestly, i don't mind it too much. people are more likely to complain about an MMO being too hard than they are to complain about an MMO being too easy, so having the difficulty bar set too high and then lowered as opposed to the other way around means we're more likely to get something that's actually balanced in the end
reVerseAttack and Dethrone GodRegistered Userregular
I love it that GW2 can get hard as balls even when you're just walking about in the world doing your own thing. In WoW it's all like "walk up to mob, hit ability, bam crit dead". That's not very satisfying. I really hope they keep the overworld in GW2 hard, even if it costs them a player or two. There's no other genuinely hard MMO out there right now.
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TannerMS "I'm confidence cause I'm zerg!"Registered Userregular
edited April 2012
I've been really happy with the difficulty so far but I think levels 1-10 could use a bit more hand holding. None of my more casual friends couldn't complete their personal story quests without a lot of advice and ressing (even while overleveled/geared).
It was definitely a weird and satisfying experience to feel challenged while PvEing in an MMO
I love it that GW2 can get hard as balls even when you're just walking about in the world doing your own thing. In WoW it's all like "walk up to mob, hit ability, bam crit dead". That's not very satisfying. I really hope they keep the overworld in GW2 hard, even if it costs them a player or two. There's no other genuinely hard MMO out there right now.
Yeah, completely agree. Don't get me wrong! I love that it's really challenging and forces you to utilize everything your character's got. But as previously said, there's a difference between "challenging" and "soul crushing". When something kills me in one hit, or I have no idea why I died, or whatever, that's not fun. Nor challenging. There's nothing to learn from that, I just get frustrated cause I have no idea how I died.
I think it's just a matter of tuning, probably. I did actually find a thread in the official forums which got an ANet response, regarding one of the quests I mentioned:
Aha, if memory serves… I went through this quest about a week ago and made it a lot easier (I reduced the number of elementals the named Son can summon, replaced some archers with lower level wolves, etc.) Unfortunately, I missed the deadline for this weekend’s Beta so the changes won’t show up until the next BWE. Sorry about that!
I'm really glad I got to try out the thief this weekend (even though the game blue-screened my computer twice). I settled on a pretty standard dual pistol/shortbow setup to keep enemies at range, but now I have a better understanding of the mechanics I think I want a dagger in my off hand. You're just not in stealth much otherwise, so things feel a bit static.
Acrobatics is my favourite trait tree, followed by Trickery.
3DS: 2234-8122-8398 | Battle.net (EU): Ladi#2485
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VivixenneRemember your training, and we'll get through this just fine.Registered Userregular
edited April 2012
guys I just realized
as a Guardian, who does not have nearly as many skills as an Elementalist or Engineer, I could:
- shotgun dudes in the face
- bash dudes in the face
- stab dudes in the face
- immobilize dudes
- knock dudes down or away
- control enemy movement
- be a spinning melee AoE nuke
- have an army of arcane weapons to fight for me
- create bubbles of safety/protection/healing/warding
- light shit on fire
- breathe fire
- and SO MUCH MORE
that is a lot of different things for one dude to do
as a Guardian, who does not have nearly as many skills as an Elementalist or Engineer, I could:
<death by awesome>
Yeah, I'm a bit disappointed in how bland mesmers feel compared to that. Couldn't feel they had anything visually distinctive other than turning illusions into butterflies.
Aha, if memory serves… I went through this quest about a week ago and made it a lot easier (I reduced the number of elementals the named Son can summon, replaced some archers with lower level wolves, etc.) Unfortunately, I missed the deadline for this weekend’s Beta so the changes won’t show up until the next BWE. Sorry about that!
These three words make me way happier than they have any right to.
as a Guardian, who does not have nearly as many skills as an Elementalist or Engineer, I could:
<death by awesome>
Yeah, I'm a bit disappointed in how bland mesmers feel compared to that. Couldn't feel they had anything visually distinctive other than turning illusions into butterflies.
No! For shame! Mesmers are nothing but pure class and panache. It is important to look fabulous.
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reVerseAttack and Dethrone GodRegistered Userregular
I love it that GW2 can get hard as balls even when you're just walking about in the world doing your own thing. In WoW it's all like "walk up to mob, hit ability, bam crit dead". That's not very satisfying. I really hope they keep the overworld in GW2 hard, even if it costs them a player or two. There's no other genuinely hard MMO out there right now.
Yeah, completely agree. Don't get me wrong! I love that it's really challenging and forces you to utilize everything your character's got. But as previously said, there's a difference between "challenging" and "soul crushing". When something kills me in one hit, or I have no idea why I died, or whatever, that's not fun. Nor challenging. There's nothing to learn from that, I just get frustrated cause I have no idea how I died.
I think it's just a matter of tuning, probably. I did actually find a thread in the official forums which got an ANet response, regarding one of the quests I mentioned:
Yes, there is definitely a handful of crap out there that isn't hard, just bullshit. I just hope that while they fix those issues, they don't "fix" the overall hardness of the game.
Posts
DEAR FUCK. This game is fucking beautiful. I mean, I remember it looking this good while I was playing (although it was at 15-20 FPS
Holy shit.
EDIT: My screenshots look nicer than the press release screenshots they give out and that's crazy.
"While it's a bit late here's a small piece of advice for the next BWE; if you rightclick a "common crafting material" and select "Deposit Collectible" it will automatically be transferred into your bank in a different tab (which you can select on the left side)."
Is there any way to craft from bank/collectible tab mats? Running/warping to the bank and back was tedious.
my enjoyment of this game would skyrocket if i could make a willowy plant-elf girl with which to subject people to flamethrowering and rocket turreting
tumblr | instagram | twitter | steam
http://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/comment/22952010#Comment_22952010
Thats the post i wrote, dont know if a mod can retrieve it.
anyway i'll just put the screenshots down cuz its late and I want to go to bed.
I got off the bridge and into the great collapse:
Warrior I played over most of the beta event.
Shot of Wizards tower:
Action shots:
1) follow
2) automatically run up to npcs i click on.
VV I replied to that post, I read the future.
Ah, my bad, had the time zones mixed up
When I'm looking at my screenshots, I realize that this game appears to have very subtle cell-shading going on in places around the edges of stuff. Juuuuust subtle enough to give it that "painterly" feel.
I don't know about Warrior, but all the Guardian skills outside of the shouts pretty much have cast times. Those that don't, you need to be rooted.
Ultimately, I think the most critical things that ANet need to sort out (for PvE at least anyway) are scaling, combat and client optimization in that order.
Scaling seems totally out of whack in the beta - world events don't seem to scale down in any way, and boss damage grows exponentially fast enough such that one-shots are common.
Combat.. well, they need to relook at melee seriously too. Something is very very wrong when as a guardian, pretty much the epitome of sword and board, I can kill much more safely and often times faster with a sceptre as opposed to a greatsword. Sadly, it took me until level 12 before I realised this, but once you do, playing as a guardian becomes much more enjoyable because you can then do stuff that everyone seems to be good with (e.g. kiting veteran aaxes around as a level 12).
Actually ANet has always made a point to emphasize the guardian as a heavily-armored caster, IIRC.
That's nothing like Guild Wars.
I found guardian sturdier then warrior. My warrior felt like he was made of paper most of the time.
I found my Mesmer by far the best at melee. He's evasive enough I never really got hit.
For a fan of Guild Wars who hasn't been following gaming news and developments but only hears "GW has a sequel coming out," I can understand the position. After all, non-fans of GW2 have been slamming it on the same grounds of ignorance, accusing it of being fully instanced, no jumping, etc. etc. And I know it's hard for some people to believe, but plenty of folks actually really like the way Guild Wars is set up, including with click-to-move enabled.
As I leveled my weapons from levels 1-15 I unlocked more and more of my combinations, at level 12 I had almost all of them unlocked. By level 15 I had my rotations down and it was simply a matter of watching my rear when kiting and figuring out on the fly what to do when something bad happened.
....
The top level is level 80.
What's left to make me interested in those 65 other levels of combat and fighting?!
I got a bunch of replies from people who only read the title of the thread and not the actual post itself. Replies like "don't change the difficulty keep it hard if you can't do it you're a babby" etc etc. And I know these people didn't read the post because in my post I said I went in over the recommended level, but got replies such as "it's supposed to be hard go back when you're over the level".
Even my example of the Ballista which hit for more health than I had. No one seemed to read that part either.
Fuck.
Battle.net Tag: Dibby#1582
This was taken in LA when we did the group meetup. Unfortunately I could only get the people near me in the shot (and a random sylvari NPC) because we were posing for the group picture. I'm the grumpy looking charr.
WuvWuv
Charr being charr
If you want to see the rest of my screenshots (well, 20 of the 80 or so I kept) I put them in the MMO Extravaganza screenshot thread here: http://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/comment/22952170#Comment_22952170
Steam (Ansatz) || GW2 officer (Ansatz.6498)
Click-to-move isn't a usual thing for MMOs though in my experience.
Yeah, I saw your thread. Also made a reply that I'm sure will fall on deaf ears. Or blind eyes, whatever. Just making my rounds, trying to add my 2 cents to any thread that needs some logic and reason in it.
The official forums are what you expect - a cesspool of self-proclaimed wannabe elitists and hardcore fanboys. They seem to dismiss any valid criticism out of hand by attacking the poster instead. Stuff like "learn to dodge", "this is not WOW, adapt or die" nonsense. Sure I could dodge, but hey, I've only got energy for 2 dodges, and that doesn't avoid auto-attack damage in any way. Also, how the hell am I supposed to know to dodge when I can't even see the boss under all that spell effects? And that crap about WOW, if you were a raider in WOW, it would leave you much more prepared than most other MMOs. Things like getting out of the fire, interrupting, positioning, timing of skills would be second nature to you.
This worries me too because honestly, looking at the skill bar, what you have is like 3 utility skills and 1 elite? And those 3 utility skills typically have a very long cooldown and typically don't gel with each other. So pretty much by 20 (when you get your 3rd slot unlock) you can pretty much choose the 3 skills you want and then never change them ever except for very specific situations. Heck, the only time I changed my stuff around was to get in a run speed skill to move from point to point.
Haha well, thanks either way. I suppose my post was too long, but I like to try and be descriptive about these sort of things.
And then of course I find this reply: I don't even.
Battle.net Tag: Dibby#1582
there's still a shitload of stuff to unlock!
you don't even have all your skill slots until level 30
there are a ton of skills to purchase with skill points
there are also trait points that actually do a lot more than just give you more numbers
trust me, there will be plenty
tumblr | instagram | twitter | steam
Seriously these people are fucked in the head. There were several situations while doing the personal story for my Charr Thief where it was a "Whoops the boss got to hit you once, gotta respawn and rush back." Not to mention the fact that the allies with me were made of god damned wet paper. This is not a situation of "lulz noob l2dodge" it's "I know what it was in the last beta, and this shit is ass throttingly harsh."
It's a pretty usual thing for Guild Warses though
And then kinda got this.
honestly, i don't mind it too much. people are more likely to complain about an MMO being too hard than they are to complain about an MMO being too easy, so having the difficulty bar set too high and then lowered as opposed to the other way around means we're more likely to get something that's actually balanced in the end
tumblr | instagram | twitter | steam
It was definitely a weird and satisfying experience to feel challenged while PvEing in an MMO
Yeah, completely agree. Don't get me wrong! I love that it's really challenging and forces you to utilize everything your character's got. But as previously said, there's a difference between "challenging" and "soul crushing". When something kills me in one hit, or I have no idea why I died, or whatever, that's not fun. Nor challenging. There's nothing to learn from that, I just get frustrated cause I have no idea how I died.
I think it's just a matter of tuning, probably. I did actually find a thread in the official forums which got an ANet response, regarding one of the quests I mentioned:
So that's cool.
Battle.net Tag: Dibby#1582
Acrobatics is my favourite trait tree, followed by Trickery.
as a Guardian, who does not have nearly as many skills as an Elementalist or Engineer, I could:
- shotgun dudes in the face
- bash dudes in the face
- stab dudes in the face
- immobilize dudes
- knock dudes down or away
- control enemy movement
- be a spinning melee AoE nuke
- have an army of arcane weapons to fight for me
- create bubbles of safety/protection/healing/warding
- light shit on fire
- breathe fire
- and SO MUCH MORE
that is a lot of different things for one dude to do
Yeah, I'm a bit disappointed in how bland mesmers feel compared to that. Couldn't feel they had anything visually distinctive other than turning illusions into butterflies.
These three words make me way happier than they have any right to.
Next weekend is a weekend
Thus, next BWE this weekend
Do not argue with my wishful thinking logic
No! For shame! Mesmers are nothing but pure class and panache. It is important to look fabulous.
Yes, there is definitely a handful of crap out there that isn't hard, just bullshit. I just hope that while they fix those issues, they don't "fix" the overall hardness of the game.