[AsheMan]

Post your BWE impressions, stories, or thoughts here! I'll start:

I made a Norn Thief to start with. I did the first few story quests, which were decent. He seems pretty squishy and I actually died in quite a few of the story battles. I might be playing him wrong or not making proper use of defensive mechanics. I decided to give him a break and try another class.

Now I'm a Human Mesmer.

[dabble]

Enough of this kerfloundering poppycock. Facts people, facts! Enough of the verbose contrafibluraities.. Hard facts!

[AsheMan]

Any particular aspects to the game that you want hard facts about?

[dabble]

Originally Posted by AsheMan

Any particular aspects to the game that you want hard facts about?

I was just being daft Ash But, I'm a fluff man. Any extracurricular stuff you can shed any light on? Housing, farming, ships, roleplay stuff?

[Fozzik]

Super-quick initial impressions based on an hour of play... not organized or anything...


Wow. It is, without a doubt, the most beautiful MMORPG I've ever set foot in. Hands down. The art style is just incredible...the details are so well done. I've seen a few low-res textures here and there...but most everything just looks like a stunning painting all the time.

Holy crap. We can lay the "too easy" worries to rest right off the bat. I'm a warrior...I did savage leap into the fray for my first renown heart battle... died. Revived, jumped back in... healed... died. Started exploring...went over the hill... LEVEL 8 MOB OMG! Died. It's quite clear from level 2 on...I'm actually going to have to learn how to play. It's a wonderful thing. The couple dynamic events I did complete, there were multiple other players there and it was challenging for all of us. Even without having a clue what I was doing, I was already reviving downed players, blocking attacks and stunning baddies...very exciting. The danger was fairly constant for me as a melee class.

The voice acting is well beyond what even SW:TOR did. There's talking literally everywhere. It really feels alive. I thought it was really neat that I could run up to random NPCs and some of them would just say a line to me...but others I could actually have a text conversation with multiple options.

The little things are really amazing. When you select a profession, it adds sound effects in the background for that profession for the rest of character creation (along with changing the graphical background and colors). You can pick up bottles in the first tavern I visited and throw them. Everything I've picked up so far, whether just on the ground or as part of an event, has been usable in some way. Sure, I need to turn in iron bars to complete the event...but I can also break them over someone's head or throw them if I want to.

I ran into some pretty serious lag where I was clicking things and nothing was happening for 10-15 seconds (interacting with NPCs or fighting). I was also running into graphical lag at certain points, but only when there were dozens of players on screen (the dynamic event areas were all very crowded in my starter area). Also, my tutorial seemed to end very abruptly, with the big death cut scene being talked over by an NPC who was congratulating us before the bad guy even fell down.

Overall, I would say my immediate impression is... awesome. I think the game may very well be as good as I thought it would be. I haven't said that about an MMORPG in 10 years.

I'll be back on really early tomorrow morning. I'm playing a Charr warrior named Fozzik on the Tarnished Coast server.

[AsheMan]

Shootin (Ranger) and Stabbin (Thief) are two of my guys on Tarnished Coast.

[Loampounder]

Originally Posted by Fozzik

. Started exploring...went over the hill... LEVEL 8 MOB OMG! Died. It's quite clear from level 2 on...I'm actually going to have to learn how to play. It's a wonderful thing.

That sounds great (except for you, of course). It would be interesting to hear if the growth of powers over the levels shift this difficulty any or if it stays a challenge.

[mmorpeegee]

I'll read all your posts later, but here's my first impressions. The first 5 hours of the evening were spent refreshing their twitter page as they desperately tried to 'fix' the problem with the server. In my guess they just got hammered with far more players than they budgeted for on that server. By about midnight or so, I found that I could log in and play which is no doubt just due to the fact that half of Europe was in bed by then.

I made an Elementalist, and it's pretty fun. It seems like a game for the ADHD generation, you are constantly running around and constantly shooting spells and constantly under attack and it's been pretty much none stop since the game started, and I expect that it will never really end. Compared to the super sedate pace of EQ, it's a huge change and it's going to take me some getting used to.

If you have played Rift, it will not be all that different in terms of the 'technology' of the game. In Rift you had traditional zones and occasionally a little area would become a rift where a dynamic event happens. With this game, the entire world is basically one giant rift. There are 'events' happening constantly all over the place, anywhere and everywhere. My first impression of them is not very good tbh. They are just so manic and random and completely anti climactic. There is an event what seems like every 2 minutes, and they are just so short and spammy. For example you will be asked to help out on a farm, so you are running around feeding cows and killing worms that pop out the ground or whatever, and then a huge boss worm will pop out the ground. All 20 other players nearby quickly target it and spam it to death, and it dies 3 seconds later. Everyone wants to attack asap so that they get some credit for being involved, but it ends up feeling a bit like kill stealing in EQ, you snooze - you lose. You are just a nobody, in a world full of other nobodies, and everyone is running around spamming everything they got on anything that pops up and then it's off to the next place to repeat the process. You occasionally see a name you recognise from a previous event, but nobody ever stops to talk and there are no groups and people have no individuality or personality. It's just a world full of anonymous players running around in silence spamming their buttons.

It's professionally presented though. After leaving the introduction, you get a cutscene with a big top down map view of the entire region, and it highlights all the areas of interest. You can just go from place to place and get whatever quests they have. The quests aren't like what you usually get though, rather than kill 20 bats, it's just, "Help the farmers" and you have to run around the farmlands doing whatever you can do. And then you'll get one to help defend the town from Centaurs, and you just run around the region shooting centaurs as they randomly spawn all over the place.

I don't like the way it plays or the way it feels to be honest. Rift was far better in that it was a mixture of the old ways of collecting some quests and going to do them, with occasional manic rifts popping up. This game (so far) is just one big rift and it lacks some chill-ness. It doesn't feel anything like a world at all, it feels like a big FPS game server with everyone rushing about to play harder and faster.

The graphics are pretty good, but nothing special as far as I'm concerned. The lack of first person view really bugs me, and being zoomed out in 3rd person most of the time means that all the characters look quite small and you are far away from everything. You need to be zoomed out to get a good view of all the action, but the down side is that it's more like watching an RTS than an RPG. Lots of little 'units' running around which no doubt would look awesome if you had the time to zoom in and take a good look, but there is never any chance (or any reason) to do that. The game world looks pretty good, but it just looks very gamey to me, like a high tech modern WoW, unlike say Age of Conan or Vanguard which looked more like real worlds.

The combat is the most interesting thing so far. I had no idea what to expect so I had to learn everything in the few hours I played. I thought I chose an "Air" mage, but it seems that I am just a Mage and can do whatever I want. You have a hotbar with only about 5 buttons on it, but that is while under Fire mode. The first one is just a little fire spammy nuke, which thankfully automatically spams itself over and over once you select it. The second one is a huge fire comet that falls and does area damage, and lands wherever its targetted when you click, and takes a few seconds to land so it requires some skill and timing to make sure it lands on a bunch of enemies. The third one is a firey phoenix which you can target on the ground and it flies to the location and smacks stuff on the way, then explodes, and then flies back to you.

The second 'mode' is water mode, which turns your 5 hotkeys in to water equivalents of the fire spells. And the third mode is Air/Lightning. At first you only have one spell in each of these modes, and you have to use that spell to unlock the second, and then the third and fourth etc.. So currently I just focused on fire and Lightning. The lightning seems very week so far, but the higher skills offer some utility like blinding the opponent which makes them miss their next attack. What I'm assuming is that a good elementalist will have to quickly switch between all these modes in big fights. If theres a big bunch of enemies they will switch to fire and drop the big comets and phoenix on stuff. If it's one big powerful enemy they will switch to lightning mode for more focused damage and blinding etc. And then I'm sure the other modes will have their uses too.

It makes for very involving and fast paced combat which is something I really love. I'm not sure how many more spells there will be to choose from later in the game, but if there are a lot... then this could be extremely fun for me. There are skill points and some kind of talent tree thingy, but I don't seem to have any of those points yet. I think that might start around level 10. Also you can dodge by the way, by double tapping any direction. It's impressive because the game plays like a really good single player action RPG, only it's online with thousands of other people... So technically very impressive.

All in all, it's sort of what I expected. It's not much of a traditional (EQ-ish) MMORPG experience imo, it's more like a fast paced online action game, which is pretty much what I assumed it would be. I would prefer it to be a bit more slower paced and thoughtful and less of everyone running around like headless chickens, but it just means that the focus is almost entirely on the constant combat, and I really like that.

Also, everything I have experienced so far is in the first several levels, so it may well change a lot as the game progresses. I hope it does, because although the combat seems extremely promising, the framework in which the battles take place is pretty crappy so far. In other words, I can't get too excited about the variety of spells and the tactical decisions to be made, when every fight so far is a bunch of crap that dies in 2 seconds. But assuming the battles become more substantial at higher levels, then it could end up being a game I really get in to.

[AsheMan]

My impressions are similar, but I'm having a decent time playing. I think we can attribute some of the frantic pace in those dynamic events to the fact that the servers are slammed and there are tons of people in those newbie areas.

[AsheMan]

My computer hates the Black Citadel city (Char city). It locked up four times in a row after entering it. I had to force the power off each time. I can play my other characters just fine. Something about that zone.

[Fozzik]

I didn't have any issues in black citadel...definitely something going on with your PC.

They NEED NEED NEED first-person view. I've found myself getting annoyed that it's not there several times. I added my vote to the first-person view thread on the beta forums (everyone else should, too).

I'm finding that I'm quite happy with drop rates. The junk isn't piling up like other recent MMO's, and I'm not outfitted in a full set of magic armor after 2 levels. Slower is better.

As I'm beginning to get the hang of the combat...whoa. It's definitely better than other MMORPGs. You've got to move, and use skills...It's like I thought it would be. You can have entirely different outcomes to a fight (difference between getting killed by two mobs, or killing them without losing any hit points) depending on how you play. Very happy with that. I'm also very much liking the ability to just hit things without worrying so much about targeting. I also like the ability to help others...rez them, etc.

[mmorpeegee]

Yeah the combat is a pretty big deal. The most advanced I've ever seen. I can't wait to see the higher level combat.

Originally Posted by AsheMan

My impressions are similar, but I'm having a decent time playing. I think we can attribute some of the frantic pace in those dynamic events to the fact that the servers are slammed and there are tons of people in those newbie areas.

Yeah I think it would probably be a lot more fun with less people. There was one quest I did to aid some farmers or something, and there was one other guy with me. We didn't say a word to each other, but we followed each other around for about 5 minutes and engaged the same mob at the same time and it was pretty cool. Then an event happened and we went out separate ways.

Then I found a cave and I went inside with a group of other people, and we were fighting together for a while and it was good fun. But then again, half way through the cave everyone just runs off in different directions. I think personally I prefer more structure to this type of stuff so that people play together, if only for 15 minutes. But again this is still the newbie stage so probably later there will be bigger dungeon crawls.

[Fozzik]

You can always invite them to a group if you want more structure.

[Vordox]

The only downside to GW2 I have encountered so far is my playing. I have been killed so many times (which though frustrating I enjoy) and only level 6 WOW! I need to really get my keys mapped better me thinks. I died several times to the Elite Boss Flame shaman in Charr area. I died several times on the second part of the Charr story where the whole camp ganks you :::scratches head:::

PvP I dabbled in it was everything I expected plus more.

I explored alot! The underwater is just marvelously done.

Died in Lions Arch by falling off their little rickety wooden highrise plank like roads to the sky (no railings lol)

Oh another downside I hollered at Fozzik but he never answered lol

Me and my friend didn't get to play together much because we kept getting thrown into overflow servers separately sadly.

I'm about to make me some breakfast and jump back into the game!

[mmorpeegee]

Day2:

Played about another 5 hours today. I am starting to get in to it a bit more now.

I started off with the headless chicken issue again but then realised that it's partly my own fault anyway. I opened the map and looked at the several locations in the region, and I realised that each one has a level suggestion. I was already level 4 and had been randomly running around in a level 5/6 type area, and I had missed a few of the level 3 and 4 areas. It is quite a big open area, so you can't really just run around randomly like I was doing, without coming across inappropriate content. So I back tracked and started ignoring everyone else and just travelling directly to each of these places. I found that I'm the only one there with a few stray players running around, so none of the mobs are being attacked by other people, and it's a lot more fun. It's more traditional feeling now, like WoW, where it says to help the river man or whatever so you run around killing the fish and it took me 20 minutes until I had done enough. Then moved on to the next place, kill the spiders in the orchard, another 20 minutes. Then on to the next place... It's all more ordered and less frantic now that I know what to do and where to go. Going from quest area to quest area seems like the best thing to do.

I still don't like the way the game plays though, at all. In fact I pretty much hate it. To me it looks like an updated WoW and it plays like an updated WoW. Bashing spiders one minute, then run somewhere else to bash worms, etc..etc.. But the combat is really interesting and that's what keeping me playing for now.

Also the combat is even better than I thought. There are 5 fire spells, 5 water, 5 air, 5 earth, so that's 20. But then I found a staff and started using that instead of my dagger, and all of those spells changed! So that's basically like having 40 spells! And then I dinged to level 5 and it gave me some talent points (or whatever they are called), and that gave me an extra slot on the right side of the UI which let me put whatever I wanted in there. It already has a heal in one slot, so in the next slot I put a big nuke that crits every time. So far all the mobs are low level and die after a few seconds if I just spam my best stuff. With tougher mobs I find that I can kill them if I just run in a circle over and over. The character automatically fires magic so all I need to do is run in circles and I can solo pretty much anything.

It's not very interesting, but I think it could end up really very good at higher levels, so that's what's keeping me hooked for now.

[AsheMan]

Originally Posted by Fozzik

I didn't have any issues in black citadel...definitely something going on with your PC.

I think I'm dealing with a bad RAM stick. I swapped them out one at a time and seem to have isolated one. I was able to complete my story quests and wander around the city.

[AsheMan]

Why do almost all MMOs have characters dealing ridiculous amounts of damage? Why does my level 1 ax do 142-163 damage? Why not scale everything down by at least one place value and have the ax to 14-16 damage? When I'm level 80 will my weapon do 2453-2785 damage? It just seems so excessive and unnecessary.

I guess the actual damage done is a lot lower than the number printed on the weapon.

[mmorpeegee]

I'm starting to enjoy it now! The combat just gets better and better, although after talking to some old timers, the Elementalist is the most fun class for PVE, so I'm lucky there..

But now that I am exploring more of the world at my own pace, it's starting to feel more like a real MMO, and it's really enjoyable. I love how you find scouts who reveal new areas to explore and you can just go anywhere and do whatever you want. It really reminds me a LOT of rift... it almost feels like Rift's sequel. It's better though in a lot of ways, the world is much more lively with more characters and more stuff going on.

I also did a bit of PVP and some of my character's main story. Both of which were fun. I think I could end up super hooked to this soon. If there are some good dungeons I can crawl with a group, then I'm going to be in love.

[Fozzik]

Warrior gets much better when you get rid of sword / shield. Longbow is great, hammer is even better. I'm working on axe / sword right now to see how that works.

I think hammer is going to be my favorite. Nothing like smashing it into the ground and creating a shockwave that weakens all enemies in a cone in front of you. nice. Oh, and one that spins 360 and knocks all enemies back.

server just crashed...I was in a cave full of mobs. probably going to log back in dead.

[mmorpeegee]

Yeah mine crashed too. :C

Having a lot of fun now. I was exploring all the different weapon combos and trying to decide which one I will use most of the time. There's a lot of variety.