Originally posted by Cthulhu23

I like choices.  Period.  So I'm not a big fan of the GW2 system, but I do think the TSW system will be fun because even though I only get one action bar, I can really customize my choices based on a massive number of skills.  GW2's system is far too constraining.  

 

 

id like a mixture of the two.  pick any skills you like (well sort of your active 7 have to belong to your 2 weapeon sets) like TSW, but have 10 abilities like GW2 as i think 7 is a bit too small

i dont think any mmo pvp is a measure off ability in that sense, mini game PVP is less personal skill based than FPS that they try to ape, purely by not having to aim.

no ones going to pay me to play any game im English not Korean

what people forget with rvr games like daoc or gvg games like eve, theres another higher level of strategy and coordination involved, theres a strong element of morale building / maintaining,. with the gvg games theres also a whole layer of politics above that, and with the rvr games (if done right like daoc or planetside) theres a whole othewr layer of server pride and coordinating / cooperating amongst guilds on same side.

Again I disagree in an FPS everyone does the same thing - point and shoot. In RPGs people are limited in what they can do by their class so they must work together in order to win - hence the term meta game.

The player community would agree based on all of the viewership records that LoL has broken with its major tournaments.

To put it into perspective, the NHL hockey team the Florida Panthers can have as few as 5000 people viewing a weekday unimportant game whereas there are often ofver 40k people watching LoL streamers daily and in the hundreds of thousands watching major tournment streams.

FPS games get nowhere near this level of viewership.

My point in all of this is that if you want your game to be successful and capture the attention of the community, you need to make it competitive which means balance and active non-macro gameplay which is better achieved in small skillbar games that offer character or team build customization.

Originally posted by Nihilist

i dont think any mmo pvp is a measure off ability in that sense, mini game PVP is less personal skill based than FPS that they try to ape, purely by not having to aim.

no ones going to pay me to play any game im English not Korean

what people forget with rvr games like daoc or gvg games like eve, theres another higher level of strategy and coordination involved, theres a strong element of morale building / maintaining,. with the gvg games theres also a whole layer of politics above that, and with the rvr games (if done right like daoc or planetside) theres a whole othewr layer of server pride and coordinating / cooperating amongst guilds on same side.

Again I disagree in an FPS everyone does the same thing - point and shoot. In RPGs people are limited in what they can do by their class so they must work together in order to win - hence the term meta game.

The player community would agree based on all of the viewership records that LoL has broken with its major tournaments.

To put it into perspective, the NHL hockey team the Florida Panthers can have as few as 5000 people viewing a weekday unimportant game whereas there are often ofver 40k people watching LoL streamers daily and in the hundreds of thousands watching major tournment streams.

FPS games get nowhere near this level of viewership.

My point in all of this is that if you want your game to be successful and capture the attention of the community, you need to make it competitive which means balance and active non-macro gameplay which is better achieved in small skillbar games that offer character or team build customization.

oh i agree on smaller skillbars and especially no macros

i dont mind people playing mini game pvp, its just bloody annoying that in most games its the ONLY pvp

its also annoying when games like DAOC and EVE get dismissed as "easy biggest zerg wins" as there are whole other layers of other skills involved in those games, a meta game to the pvp if you will

Uh, you have access to MORE than 10 abilities in GW2.   

You have your 5 weapons skills + 1 heal, 3 utility, and 1 Elite.  However, you have a weapon switch with an additional 5 skills which you can access any time (even during combat) by switch your weapon.   So just with the weapon switch you have access to 15 skills during active gameplay.   Then you have class specific skills assigned to the F1 to F4 slot, so any class generally has access to 16-19 skills during active gameplay.

Then you have the elementalist, which has 4 elemental attunements which change the 5 weapon skills, so with 1 set of weapons you have access to 20 skills based on which attunement you use.   Then you have a weapon switch so that's another 20.   Elementalist also have a set of conjure weapon skills that completely change the first 5 skills you have.   If you use 3 different conjures then you have access to another 15 skills.  So in total the Elementalist can have upwards of 57 skills.

TLDR version:   GW2 professions typically have 16-19 skills they can access, Elementalists can have upwards of 57 skills they can access.

Originally posted by Vhaln

Why have any more than one damage ability, right?  Or maybe one DD, one AoE, and a stun.  Maybe because that means you'll be using those same abilities over and over, and being that utilitarian can be boring.  Multiple abilities can add variety, even when they do pretty much the same thing.  Plus it allows for reactionaries, chains, and situational abilities, which can make combat more dynamic.

If combat is little more than toe-to-toe smacking each other back and forth, then, yes, it can get very boring without skills to change it up. However, combat really can be more than just managing a set of cooldown timers. UO, AC and many others have done it successfully. 

WoW seems really cicatrized into the average MMO gamer's mind. :(

Maybe if MMOs started requiring things like aim, had hit detection systems that weren't complete garbage, and a competent level of balance, we wouldn't need 40 different abilities available to make pvp interesting. As it stands there is a lot of standing around and button mashing. 1v1 PvP in MMOs is simply not that fun or interesting compared to other genres due to technical limitations and an inability of MMO devs to move past early 90s RPG mechanics.

I always liked how in EQ you paid more attention to what was going on around you, rather than pressing 1000 buttons in proper sequence while watching cooldowns.

Thought I was the only one.

Originally posted by Yamota

I personally feel the more viable abilities you can have the richer and more tactical (and less twitch type) the combat becomes. People complain that TAB targetting and 1,2,3... button press is boring and repetetive but if you have 20 skills to juggle, for different occasions and in different combinations, it can become more tactical than you think.

So yes, I am dissapointed with only 10 skills and 1 hotbar. For an MMORPG that is kind of lacklustre...

Most DPS players seems to have a singlemacro for those 20 keys that they use over and over...

I don´t mind 20 different skills but then they better be different, most games have several very similar attacks and that is just sad. Pressing 1-2-3 and so on takes no skill whatsoever.

Besides, in GW2 you actualy have 15 skills since you can switch between weapons instantly in combat.

I completely agree with the OP as well.  I never needed more then 10 abilities/spells on keybind in Ultima Online, and EQ1 was a long time ago and I was only 14 or so but I remember only using one hotbar as well.  (Not including long duration buffs)

I don't mind how many 15+ minute buffs there are, those you can pull out of your spellbook or put on a side bar and its fine.  But no game should have more then 10 abilities that you need to press instantaneously on the fly in combat.  SWTOR really bugged me with how many abilities they needed to hotbar, and friggin 4 hotbars could barely fit them all.  Age of Conan was fine, because of how the combo system worked, that felt like about 10 executables.

If I bind a spell/abilities to Q, E, R, T, F, G, Z, X, C, V, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and Shift+(1, 2, 3, 4, 5)  and I still need more keybinds, thats WAY TOO MANY.

My guardian on SWTOR had well beyond that many abilities I needed to hit on the fly, it was unacceptable.  Eden Eternal, a free to play cash shop game had just the right amount of abilities, about 8-10.

Only someone who spent 100+ bucks on a 12 button mouse or someone whos a spell clicker would ever want more then 10 executables.

Simpler (fewer) is better, but those fewer abilities need to offer an emergent depth.

Many League of Legends champions have that, and hopefully GW2 does too.

However it's worth pointing out GW1 had few abilities and despite some of the most dynamic and best-designed abilities in a MMORPG combat system, combat didn't feel all that interesting.  I think it's the fact that even though GW1's abilities were the most dynamic in a MMORPG combat system, they still weren't dynamic enough (as the better LoL champions tend to be.)

It makes a lot of sense. Even 10 is a lot in my opinion if they are all bar worthy!

I like the minimalist approach with the ability to expand your moves based on weapon swapping. Its something I like about gw2. TSW has a good take on this as well.

I definitely prefer Guild Wars 2's "you are what you wield approach" and I've never been fond of large hotbars full of abilities. Just look at a screenshot of my Rift Warrior Tank. See how I macro'd it to hell, just so I could shrink the hotbar to acceptable levels. ^_^

Originally posted by thedarkess

Gw2 doesn't have only 10 skills. It has dozens per class. But you can only have 10 abilities at any given time. Weapon switching provides you with much more abilities than 10 in single combat. Limiting characters to have only 10 abilities allows better balance, introduces BUILDS and most importantly makes people playing the same class unique.

Gw1 has over 1300 skills. Every class have access to them and yet you can have only 8 skills at any given time. Making houdreds of various builds and playstyles is what people loved most about gw.

This.   Depending on where I was going and what I was doing...    I could spend hours researching builds on the Guild Wars Wiki....    Trying them out...   Getting them down...   If they didn't work...  Or didn't suit my style...   Start over again.

I just spent tons of time on that alone.

Originally posted by Vryheid

Maybe if MMOs started requiring things like aim, had hit detection systems that weren't complete garbage, and a competent level of balance, we wouldn't need 40 different abilities available to make pvp interesting. As it stands there is a lot of standing around and button mashing. 1v1 PvP in MMOs is simply not that fun or interesting compared to other genres due to technical limitations and an inability of MMO devs to move past early 90s RPG mechanics.

This.   MMO combat is so 'watching the cooldowns' and stuck in 1990's CRPG roots that it's excruciatingly dull...  

But there is some hope for a good MMO with a good combat system in the mix in the near future.   TERA. I haven't played it yet because it's in beta and I didn't get the invite, uses hit detection.    Rather than send you to their site, I'll link 2010's E3 write up at IGN:   http://pc.ign.com/articles/109/1099505p1.html

Now, I will say there are some other MMOs that are at least partially like Tera, where 'hit detection/area" is important for much of combat...   At least for melee and some magic...    But they otherwise suck and aren't worth playing, despite the good combat systems.

Originally posted by Yamota

I personally feel the more viable abilities you can have the richer and more tactical (and less twitch type) the combat becomes. People complain that TAB targetting and 1,2,3... button press is boring and repetetive but if you have 20 skills to juggle, for different occasions and in different combinations, it can become more tactical than you think.

So yes, I am dissapointed with only 10 skills and 1 hotbar. For an MMORPG that is kind of lacklustre...

You do in theory have more than "one skill bar and 10 skills" as the skill change with weapon swapping

for instance, if you change from 2h sword to 1h sword and pistol you have another set of skill at your disposal, not available on the 2h sword.

Originally posted by Fusion

Originally posted by Yamota

I personally feel the more viable abilities you can have the richer and more tactical (and less twitch type) the combat becomes. People complain that TAB targetting and 1,2,3... button press is boring and repetetive but if you have 20 skills to juggle, for different occasions and in different combinations, it can become more tactical than you think.

So yes, I am dissapointed with only 10 skills and 1 hotbar. For an MMORPG that is kind of lacklustre...

 

You do in theory have more than "one skill bar and 10 skills" as the skill change with weapon swapping

for instance, if you change from 2h sword to 1h sword and pistol you have another set of skill at your disposal, not available on the 2h sword.

Not really just "in theory".  The game is designed with weapon swapping in mind.  They don't expect you to just use one weapon during a fight, although you can do that if you so choose.  I suspect the people who excel in dungeons and PvP content will be those that learn to maximize their character's potential, which includes swapping weapons regularly.

I'm comfortable using up to 24 keybinds, that's what I've gotten used to over the years. Beyond that, I have to start using the F keys and I don't like that at all.

I too think that MMOs with more than 2 full hotbars worth of skills is complete overkill - specially in games like SWTOR where half your skills do the exact same thing (direct damage) just with varying CDs. At least that's how it was on my sentinel.

6 skills like DCUO is too little imo (doesn't mean it can't be fun though).

Too many skills is starting the ruin the fun in MMOs. When you gotta spend all your time staring at your hotbar waiting for cool downs...ya its like playing whack a mole.

Some how devs got the idea that more abilites=more fun/deeper gameplay though. Theres a reason most people try to figure out macros to make 5 abilities into one button.

Totally agree in SWTOR i had an Assassin and i spent more times bufing me up than fighting, pvp was a real pain to control.