If you learn the timing of attacks (and compensate for lag), you can block nearly everything, especially once you learn your block attacks. As a guardian fighter, I almost never need any potions at all.

People sure like to make things up.

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Originally posted by furbans

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Originally posted by Tsumoro

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Originally posted by shin_chan
Is there really any rules of D&D or name is used only to attract more public?

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There is... and there isn't. To my understanding the rules of the game is based on  the DnD NEXT if that is something you are familuar with...

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Interesting about the D&D Next comment.

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The suggestion that it's based on D&D Next is bafflingly false. Either someone is telling a blatant lie or is making bizarre guesswork. Anyone can sign up for the playtest. See for yourself.

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Originally posted by Lord.Bachus

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Originally posted by shin_chan
Is there really any rules of D&D or name is used only to attract more public?

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Its fully based on 4th edition D&D rules... actually almost 1 on 1, except for the hit rolls.

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One-to-one? You've either never played 4E or never played Neverwinter. The mechanics in Neverwinter are very loosely inspired by 4E.

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Originally posted by gaeanprayer

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Originally posted by Yaevindusk
This part is from my understanding, which I do not claim to be perfect.  But you are not able to buy Zen and then trade for Astral Diamonds or Gold directly from Cryptic (Though they do have set trading currencies; I'm not sure if that's for their own trade or to regulate trade among players).  You will however be able to trade for already existing AD's that players have grinded out.  That being, if you spent a month doing dailies and want something from the cash shop, you could trade your ADs to someone who has Zen, and then buy what you want from the Zen shop.I do not think they simply create ADs (Maybe wrong on this, as I read different things from different testers and haven't touched the Zen store yet) out of nothing and then just trade it for any Zen you buy; it has to exist in the economy and had to be worked for by someone.

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This is indeed incorrect. As of the last beta I played, Astral Diamonds can be converted from purchased ZEN. Further, while it's earned ingame, its done at an incredibly slow rate and one that's based on a lottery system. Some days I earned 3k, other days I earned less than 300. In neither case is it sufficient to 'keep up with the Joneses', as the saying goes.

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Are you sure your zen is being converted to AD and not traded for AD? The guy you're responding to is saying that buying AD with zen doesn't generate new AD. He isn't saying that it's impossible to obtain AD using zen.

I didn't test this myself, but isn't it supposed to be like GW2 where you are essentially buying in-game money from other players? In GW2, gold isn't generated when you buy it with gems. In fact, a large percentage of it is deleted in the transaction.

Guys, do you not see "Dev Journal" right at the top? This article is written by Cryptic. That's... That's the entire point of it. Cryptic has opted to put their information here first. It's a developer blog. Developer blog.

If MMORPG.com let Cryptic upload a new exclusive trailer, would you guys complain about that, too? This is the same thing.

I don't know what's wrong with some of you.

Do you guys not realize that if you pay to shorten the crafting time, you'll be selling the finished good at a loss?

Most people would prefer to wait out the duration, so waiting becomes the standard for pricing. Paying AD doesn't help you "win" if winning is making money.

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Originally posted by Scot
“I expected a more traditional system but instead they have went for a system similar to the duty officer system in STO where you don’t directly do anything other than queue projects up.”

You can’t get more easymode than that.

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You still need the materials. I don't see how adding a time cost and removing the need for a workstation makes crafting any easier.

It's not engaging, sure, but that doesn't mean it's any easier than your average crafting system.

I'm very much a fan of time-based crafting systems such as the ones present in EVE and YPP.

Requiring a cost (such as time) other than the base materials results in the crafted goods being worth more than the sum of their components.

When you buy a crafted item, you're paying someone else to wait out that amount of time for you. If you spend astral diamonds to skip that time, you're going to be crafting at a loss. The patient crafters, however, will more than likely profit.

Trust me, timesinks are very, very good for crafting.

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Originally posted by Yamota
According to Wikipedia:

Massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG) (muh'-mor-puh-guh) is...

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I'm more concerned about that ridiculous pronunciation.

Unless there's an effort cost of some kind, the value of crafted goods will always be less than the sum of their components.

This means that only at the very highest level of crafting (and even then only if it's very difficult or tedious to reach the highest level) can crafting be profitable. It will instead be a huge moneysink for everyone else. You essentially have to pay large amounts of gold to grind your skill level up before you can make any profits. In many games even the top crafted items have very little value, leaving value only to rare recipes. That's not fun at all.

An effort cost can be anything from time (hours or days rather than a second or two) to some sort of skill challenge or puzzle. There has to be something to limit the instantaneous mass production of goods.

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Originally posted by Onomas
p2p is a cash grab? Its stated up front, 15/month for 24/7 entertainment and no restrictions for 30 days....... how is that a cash grab? Old games charged 2$/hour now you get the same entertainment for an entire 30 days for 50 cents per day. Find me cheaper entertainment. MMORPG subscription prices are about the only thing in our economy that hasnt risen 300% since a decade ago.

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You're really going to ask someone to find you entertainment cheaper than a subscription service in a discussion about pay-to-play versus free-to-play?

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Originally posted by Onomas
Simple fact, the newer game suck, copy wow way too much, offer no long term playability, remove features, force you down a set path, remove your choice and freedom, and people are sick of that. If the game sucks to begin with and no one wants to pay, turning it f2p wont make the game any better.

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Flawlessly executed strawman.

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If someone goes out and creates ‘The Herk’, it's not very exciting to me. I don't know who that is or how he fits into the story – it diminishes the world in my opinion.

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No, it wouldn't be very exciting to you, but it would be pretty exciting to the player who created 'The Herk'. The Marvel universe is absolutely drenched in superheroes. Creating your own character is significantly more immersive than allowing an entire team of the same character.

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Would you please explain the soft locking system in detail? For example, how does it interact with dodge? Does it apply to melee attacks, or just ranged? During missile travel time, is it possible for another target to intervene between you and your existing soft lock target to take the attack? – By Matt Feisthammel

You must be facing your target to hit it. However, soft locking allows you to pick a target out of a crowd to hit. It is possible that your target could be behind another target. You would hit the target you had soft-locked, provided you were aiming at them. Another target could not step in the way of the soft-locked target to prevent you from hitting your soft-locked target. As for dodging? The target can execute a roll dodge or evasion move to avoid attack.

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This is probably the worst thing of all of them. This means that in any "serious" fight, you will need to soft-lock your targets. The whole bit about "facing your target" sounds like you only need to be looking in their general direction. This doesn't sound at all like action combat. You have to face your target in WoW, too. I'm not crazy about the GW2-style dodging, either. It means that most damage will be completely unavoidable.

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I have a question about your targeting system for combat, from what I've heard there will be a soft targeting system. My question is: How does this system work in raids/large PvP groups for healers? Will healers have a hard time finding players, and keeping track of their group’s health? – By Jacob Avila

Soft-lock targeting doesn’t really affect healing because you don’t have to find your target to heal them. You don’t target allies. Most of our heals are area-of-effects (AoEs) or cone effects. To be effective, you might want to stay in the middle of your allies for AoEs or face them for cone effects. Healers will need to be aware of their environment of course, and pay attention to the battle.

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I'm not sure why they shy away from targeted heals. They could have made healing so much more interesting if you actually had to aim your heals. A skilled healer could have been noted in his/her ability to land heals on specific players in the heat of large battles, even with everyone moving around. I can't help but feel like they're trying to take a cue from GW2 where one is completely unneeded. GW2's lack of targeted heals made sense because they were actually trying to prevent healer from being a viable role.

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You've stated that any class can use any weapon, but will different weapons have different abilities? For example, I plan to be a healing Templar character; will I have the same healing abilities with a greatsword than with a staff? – By Zalkar/Braeden Weibel

Yes, each weapon has a unique set of abilities that can be unlocked as your skill increases. For example, if you become an expert with Restoration Staff, you can use the ability “Grand Healing.” If you equip your greatsword, you would not be able to use that ability. Your Templar healing spell, however, can be used regardless of what type of weapon you have equipped. Finally, you can equip a back-up weapon and swap between the two in combat. So you can have one loadout with a restoration staff and healing abilities, and then swap mid-combat to a greatsword with damage abilities.

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At this point it seems like they're copying GW2 for the sake of copying GW2, but the wording makes it sound like the skills on a "Restoration Staff" will be the same regardless of your class. It's hard to say if that's better or worse at this point.

The best argument in favor of autofollow is so you can go to the bathroom while another player continues to run you to your destination? That's it?

If that's the best you can come up with, then my vote is a resounding "NO".

You don't need something to automate any aspect of the game, and that includes traveling. What do you do when there are enemies around? What if you're in a dungeon? You wait. There's no reason you need some special command for walking around while AFK.

This isn't even about botting. It's about laziness. You don't need macros, and you don't need autofollow, especially not for combat purposes as the OP asks.

These so-called "D&D purists" should probably think for a moment what D&D is actually about.

You think it's about the "complexity"? The classes? The alignments? Turn-based combat? The specific list of skills each class gets? Ability scores? Feats? What?

If you take any one of these mechanics and replace it, you won't have changed the core of the game at all. We can change the setting of a 3.5 campaign from Forgotten Realms to Star Wars, and you know what? Even without the same classes, skills, feats, and other mechanics, it still feels an awful lot like D&D. We could play AD&D, and... yeah, it still feels like D&D.

We can completely change the rules of combat (change the way dice are rolled, replace the dice with some other mechanism, play a physical game instead), and still retain that D&D feel. Is the transition to realtime really a factor? Surely a game can feel like D&D without turn-based combat.

The core of tabletop is in two things: dungeon-crawling and storytelling. By level 10, Neverwinter has more dungeon-crawling than any other MMO I can think of, and with fairly well-written quests, scripted instances, and, most importantly, the Foundry (which, using dialogue options and trigger items, will allow an incredible amount of complexity), I think the storytelling will be quite strong.

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Originally posted by Xepo
I haven't even played the beta and based on what I have watched and read it is starting to look like this will not be my D&D game fix. The more I have read about this game makes me say even louder this game does not deserve the D&D title. Most of the core D&D elements are not in this game. Where is the alignment choices? Where is the dual classing option? Even watching the game play is a little sad because the classes do not play like a D&D character.

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Someone's not familiar with 4E...

Classes, combat systems, and even alignments aren't truly the core of D&D. There are two things that (to me) make D&D what it is, and those things are storytelling and dungeon-crawling. Neverwinter has those in abundance.

I think the Foundry is the thing that will make this feel more like a D&D game than any other MMO. I've already seen people recreating campaigns they used in P&P.

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Originally posted by Catbert
Yeah I got the code and it redeemed a pony or somthing haha im guessing I just get items when its fully released as it wont let me log into the game still after redeeming the code...

Thanks,

Rob.

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Oh. That's weird. It worked for me... :[

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Originally posted by Dogblaster

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Of course it's easy. You expect epic challenges from level 1? We haven't seen much of anything beyond level 15, so it's still too early to make the claim that it's too easy.

I don't understand why this complaint comes up so much. "Man. These tutorial mobs are dying in two to three hits! This game is for casuals!"

One way or another Neverwinter is about the dungeon crawl. It really wouldn't live up to its title if it was any other way.

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Why you only reply to one of mine concerns? I know why, you agree with the first one :)

And BTW.. when I see super easy start at lvl 1-5-15 I am sure there wont be super hard lategame and I doubt there will be any epic challange at all, maybe couple of wipes on hardest bosses, easy. Almost everything will be easy so everyone can handle it.

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I addressed your other 'concern'. I don't consider it a negative. Neverwinter is D&D, and D&D is about the dungeon crawl. I'm actually impressed how much the game feels like the Neverwinter Nights games in spite of the fact that combat is so different. The reason is the focus on instances and mini-dungeons.

I can't think of too many games, especially MMOs, that aren't super easy from 1 to 15. Can you?

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Originally posted by Catbert
Thanks man but this does not get me into the beta unfortunetly :(

Rob.

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Are they out of keys or do you not know the answer? They email you a code you redeem on the official site for beta access.

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Originally posted by Dogblaster
It is only me, or zones in Neverwinter are so small and too restricted ? I cant force myself playing at all because all you do is follow quest track, jump from small instance to another and thats all ... And also, why is the game so easy ? :) You just rush 1-20 mobs, kill em, move ... faceroll all around

For me .. MMORPG needs to have open world feeling but in Neverwinter i dont see/feel it at all. For me the whole world just feels like one straightforward rout of instances, you cant go left or right, just forward. No thank you.

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Of course it's easy. You expect epic challenges from level 1? We haven't seen much of anything beyond level 15, so it's still too early to make the claim that it's too easy.

I don't understand why this complaint comes up so much. "Man. These tutorial mobs are dying in two to three hits! This game is for casuals!"

One way or another Neverwinter is about the dungeon crawl. It really wouldn't live up to its title if it was any other way.

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Originally posted by jazz.be
Two simple questions

Does the game have any open world type of zones? Or should I mostly expect dungeons.  Don't bring my attention to the name of the game, I can see that, I just need to know for sure. :-)

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Yes to both questions, actually.

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Originally posted by jazz.be
At what level do you start doing things in group?

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As early as you want but I think the first group-oriented dungeon is at 15.