If EVE was a level based game wormholes are the highest teir of PVE content there is atm - and your expecting CCP to just allow them to be easily farmable by just allowing anyone to safely hop in and out of them all the time?

Risk vs Reward my friend, and you just got bitchslaped by it, they are unstable for a reason, 0.0 is harsh for a reason, you want to milk the wormholes for everything they've got? Don't expect anyone to be playing nice.

Originally posted by Neanderthal

Originally posted by RealmLords

DDO's click to swing with non-sticky auto-targeting is definitely the best of any I've played.

 

 

Sometimes I wonder if I missed something when I tried DDO because I thought the combat in that game was probably the worst combat I'd ever seen. 

For me it was: Hold the button down and watch as my guy rapidly swings his ax in high speed mowing down anything near him...and that was it.  Just hold the button down.  I didn't even have to pick targets.  Just hold the button down and if I'm in the general vicinity of a mob I'll hit it. 

I'll allow for the possibility that I was missing something but if I was it doesn't really matter because what I was doing worked.  So if there was something more to it, some deeper complexity that I didn't notice, it apparantely wasn't necesary to make use of it. 

I became disgusted with the game very quickly so I didn't play it very long.

It's really dependent on what options you have on with what class, with my Wizard if i'm in a relaxed mode I turn to 'MMORPG mode' with just autotarget and number keys but if i really want fun turn all that off pop up the crosshire and it's a Third Person Spellcaster (or even first person) - yes it's hard to not miss first time out but really go in a mess with the options DDO can be a totally different beast.

Oh and to answer the OP question: DDO and see above :)

Originally posted by sadeyx

What you have to remember, and whats been cleverly avoided in this and other such articles about DDO is that the European version is still NOT FREE.

Therefore the 'success' they are having is most probably attributed to EU players leaving Codemasters EU version to play the American F2P version.

Not only that, players of DDO in EU will see a lot more in the way of dev feedback and community intereraction on their official forums.

Yes well TBH with the name change, many thought that would be the 'loop hole' for Turbine to get out of the deal with Codemasters to host it in the EU, as CM aren't exactally good at running these own MMOs as it is (RFO and Archlord case and point) compeared they were basically just happy not doing anything and just basically 'customer support', to the point it felt even GoA at least tried to match their US counterparts better.

Thankfully Turbine havn't IP locked the game - so we saw that 'success' comming a mile off

Originally posted by EricDanie

Originally posted by Kremlik

Rob: couldn't agree more - irrony really as they do have the only other 'good' f2p western deved title out there atm.

Bottom line is DDO IS cashshops done right for the western market, then again it is the only real 90% pve one out there so players don't have that 'BUT I'M GIMPED IN PVP IF I DON'T SPEND' feeling, now if Turbine had a chat with CCP... *drool*

Why chat with CCP? CCP has implemented one of the best, if not the best, forms of being able to turn the game F2P without screwing up the even playing field that much. It allows those who want to spend more to spend, those who want to spend nothing, to do so, while losing zero cents in the process, actually making more as there will always be unused PLEXes around, but in no way monetizing over virtual items or exclusive features and actually monetizing on supporting the trade of a service license (the monthly fee) in-game.

Ironically the best F2P method in my opinion is within a subscription game. Just shows how things got inflated enough to create a whole "genre" around lower budget or older games to make them competitive (these games would stand little to no chance in the P2P market, while surviving solely on making the people who can spend crave for shiny stuff or advantages.

I ment it the OTHER way around BECAUSE of the PLEX system  (and ecomery)

Both CCP and Turbine in my head are the two better devs to be looking at for a desent MMO - most devs would have thrown in the towel wiith DDO instead of doing what Turbine did, same with CCP and EVE, both devs don't see a 'failed product' that just can be left to rot milking off the last of the profit only to rinse and repeat, they see a problem and find solutions - It's just a shame CERTAIN MMOs can't be bought and resarected by either dev group.

Rob: couldn't agree more - irrony really as they do have the only other 'good' f2p western deved title out there atm.

Bottom line is DDO IS cashshops done right for the western market, then again it is the only real 90% pve one out there so players don't have that 'BUT I'M GIMPED IN PVP IF I DON'T SPEND' feeling, now if Turbine had a chat with CCP... *drool*

Originally posted by altairzq

Originally posted by Kremlik

Originally posted by altairzq

Originally posted by girlgeek

Originally posted by uquipu

 Ginaz in the post above hit the nail on the head.

When Vanguard was released, the huge world was one of their selling points.  The first time you traveled through an area, it was exploration.  The next time you traveled through that area, it was a commute.  I would take over an hour sometimes to gather up a group.  I began to resent the company, feeling that I was ripped off.

In WoW at least, it didn't hurt the community much if at all.  People still gather in Stormwind, Orgrimmar and now Dalaran. 

 

Yeah, I don't understand the complaints about Dalaran. When I was actively playing WoW (which wasn't all that long ago...a few months, and had BEEN playing for about 5 years) there were ALWAYS lots of people also in the main cities, NOT just Dalaran.

I think Blizzard has TRIED to spread it out by making the main cities the place where the auction houses and class trainers are, for one. You DO always go back to those areas. The only people that "always hang out in Dalaran" are lvl 80s that never buy or sell on the AH, and are not crafters. That's really....about it.

 

You guys don't get it. Dalaran has become a hub where you teleport to dungeons. Yes I know there is still the need of two people to summon parties but that means you are travelling only 1/3 of the time and lazy people are never travelling.

 

Ok I'll throw my 2 copper in..

For starters you've got your wires crossed Dalaran isn't the reason for the 'travel time' loss with dungeons, the new LFG system is, although I agree it's the same reason, with the LFG system in place now WoW became less of a MMORPG to just a dungeon cralwer, it's basically Diablo 2.5 you don't 'need' the world anymore to do anything bar achevement running and crafting, heck I've done a fresh reroll and have barely left the capitals to level, thats the source of the 'world killing', it's a fine line between helping the players that don't have the time to travel and just basically distilling the game down to the core reasons - heck blizzard could remove the whole world and just turn it into a host server instance based game it still wouldn't change the core reasons for playing it.

IMO all dalaran has ever done is kill the Mage portal market.

 

If what you said was true, then people would be spread all over the territory. No, Dalaran is the main hub with teleports to everywhere, pretty much as PoK. It's absurd to discuss it.

Ok to further debunk the 'main hub' theroy on Dalaran - it's only really the 'main hub' of WotLK not the whole game, so techically speaking the orginal cities are still present in all forms of content, and yes players ARE still sprend across the game, the pvp realms still have active gankers and levelers respectivly evn on pve relms there are still players leveling, the only real soild reasoning behind your 'daralan is the main hub' aurgument is that it's close to the end of that expantion and a marjority of players have 'done' said content the only real thing left to do is ICC so many are sitting waiting to do that on a weekly basis atm, in turn it doesn't help that blizzard funneled the players thru both content expansions not really spreading out the content across the rest of the game just the areas each expantion related to.

Bottom line is Dalaran is still not the 'main hub' of the game itself only it's current cap leveled content, the capital cities are still strong hubs for all the content involed, still Dalaran is just a waystation to get back and two between the main chunks of the game for end level players, to be classed really as a 'main hub' it needed to be accessable by anyone not just WotLK users, when Cata happens Dalran will be empty and the new 'hub' will take it's place for the cap level content yet still the cities will still remain, those two factors nullify your claims.

Originally posted by altairzq

Originally posted by girlgeek

Originally posted by uquipu

 Ginaz in the post above hit the nail on the head.

When Vanguard was released, the huge world was one of their selling points.  The first time you traveled through an area, it was exploration.  The next time you traveled through that area, it was a commute.  I would take over an hour sometimes to gather up a group.  I began to resent the company, feeling that I was ripped off.

In WoW at least, it didn't hurt the community much if at all.  People still gather in Stormwind, Orgrimmar and now Dalaran. 

 

Yeah, I don't understand the complaints about Dalaran. When I was actively playing WoW (which wasn't all that long ago...a few months, and had BEEN playing for about 5 years) there were ALWAYS lots of people also in the main cities, NOT just Dalaran.

I think Blizzard has TRIED to spread it out by making the main cities the place where the auction houses and class trainers are, for one. You DO always go back to those areas. The only people that "always hang out in Dalaran" are lvl 80s that never buy or sell on the AH, and are not crafters. That's really....about it.

 

You guys don't get it. Dalaran has become a hub where you teleport to dungeons. Yes I know there is still the need of two people to summon parties but that means you are travelling only 1/3 of the time and lazy people are never travelling.

Ok I'll throw my 2 copper in..

For starters you've got your wires crossed Dalaran isn't the reason for the 'travel time' loss with dungeons, the new LFG system is, although I agree it's the same reason, with the LFG system in place now WoW became less of a MMORPG to just a dungeon cralwer, it's basically Diablo 2.5 you don't 'need' the world anymore to do anything bar achevement running and crafting, heck I've done a fresh reroll and have barely left the capitals to level, thats the source of the 'world killing', it's a fine line between helping the players that don't have the time to travel and just basically distilling the game down to the core reasons - heck blizzard could remove the whole world and just turn it into a host server instance based game it still wouldn't change the core reasons for playing it.

IMO all dalaran has ever done is kill the Mage portal market.

Welcome to World of Diablocraft - the game is now more towards a dungeon crawler now and it damn well works, besides the raids which you still have to deal with your own server only, the rest of the game doesn't require you to stand about bored screaming in channels to find a group - it's just wait 5 mins tops and your away, added bonus if it's a good pug then you can rattle thru everything 5 man and enjoy.

Like I said shame it's only for normal groups

The ONLY soild way 40K will work is that if it's a sandbox MMO. Mythic was doing the right think to start with basing WAR off the WHFB RPG series but then flipped to the 'me too!' cloning of every fantasy title out there WAR only had the 'idea' of Warhammer and sadly as much as I hate to say this the moment Vergil say either 'leveling system', 'faction warfair' or 'Horus Hericy', it's going to be on my avoid list.

Level and Faction PVP MMOs have been done to death, I hope Vergil are smart enough to look at WAR and reliease it SO doesn't fit the IP, if Relic have any input in this title theres hope to follow the 'true' essence of the 40k IP and just make it every man for themselfs

FINALLY! It's getting to the point it can bounce back, it's not going to be a big game by any means but it's seeming that the game could be taken off life support at last and not be in fear of closing, the J&J seem to have relised and brought in the things that really needed the game to be less painful and more fun to play....

PS. GRRRR!!!! I own dragon age in the EU - yet again I lose out on a Skaven Cloak!.. DAMN YOU GOA I'LL GET MY CHOPPA!

Originally posted by PratzStrike

If you're going to start, I'd start now. Every moment you wait is one more moment that the people who've been playing since launch are skilling up ahead of you.

Which is why I can't bring myself to play. I will never catch up to the people who started before me.

Lets debunk this now:

YES - older players do have acess to most of the tech of the game and basically drip of ISK (the ingame cash).

HOWEVER NEW PLAYERS CAN USE THAT TO THEIR ADVANTAGE

1) Big ship VS small ship - aye the big guys have the capital ships but EVE is designed in such a way those are NOT the be all and end all of a situation - It's all about how you use that to your advanage. Big ships can tank a lot of damage, but shoot slow and heavy, smaller ships if hit blow up easy and can advoid being targeted a lot easier. 1v1 big > small but 1 big vs 20 small, big loses

2a)Lie cheat and steal - yup, playing the bad guy does pay off with money, can flipping, ransoming, or even blagiing your way into a corp then running off with their assest is ALL PART OF EVE, and 100% legal to do.

OR

2b) Gametime cards are your friend - CCP have made goldselling kinda legit in EVE, all you need to do is buy a GTC from CCP from the EVE site (or one of their auth sellers) and using the systems in EVE SELL the GTC for ISK in game. NOTE: this doesn't mean the isk/gold farmers that advistise are legit, ONLY buying GTCs and selling them on ingame is the way to go

3)THIS ONE IS IMPORTANT - Plan ahead, before you start thinking deep in EVE, work out what your goal is in the game, do you want to be a miner, thief, recon, stout etc etc... Then ask around and look up what you need to get skill wise to build the ship you need, with the new speed skillgain for new players, you could with proper planning you can be in a desent ship pulling in good money within the first few months.

----

All this 'fall behind' and 'catchup' stuff is total BS, all thats holding ppl back is knowlege, knowing those basic three facts about EVE nothing stops a newer player being just as good as a ventaren

Yea it's done to a few reasons like ppl have said

Timing - there was nothing like WoW on the market at release - the only real 'big' names at the time were EQ and DAoC ( others were still smaller names) - these days the market is flooded with IPs- therefore it's harder to break into the market

Related Fanbases - WoW's fanbase was basically All of Blizzard's stuff, EQ/DAoC castoffs AND the Warhammer few mainly because Warcraft was the closest thing to Warhammer in gaming at the time. Theres no other bigger fanbase out there at the time - unless you count the Starwars/LOTR fanbases - but again Blizzard did break into the 'geeky' market by bringing over the 'gamer' to MMOs

'WoW is the best' - This factors in a LOT: ppl say 'it's polished' but anyone whos been with the game at major release times knows it's just as buggy with new content as anything else, Blizzard can just hide it better.

For example WAR has 'laggy PVP' but you enter Wintergrasp and it's just as bad, to the fact Blizzard limited the numbers to tone it down, yet ppl don't really focus on that as the other BGs run fine and they're smaller numbers and being a pve based game ppl focus on the instances over open world - the reverse of other games, it's way easier to hide things like system/client/server lag behind instances.

Factor that in theres a lot more latecommers to WoW that swear by 'it's polished' as they missed the first months/year whereas these days ppl jump on every title on release and see what it's REALLY like and flock back to WoW under that false beleave that WoW has always been 'polished'.

Marketing/Content releases - This is where Blizzard catipalises on the situation they see whats comming and plan their 'new content' on the back of a title released so by time you 'give up' on a new game Blizzard have already dropped in said content ready to tempt you back in.

On top of that they look at the other titles and basically cherry pick the best ideas and meld them into their game in a few months after you come back - So why would you play X MMO if WoW has everything you need? It's very cleaver, cheap and nasty but effective.

-----------

So why didn't WAR work?

Easy WAR uses the 'idea' of DAoC and Warhammer Fantasy but it actally neither - On the Lore front it's screaming an epic bloody war between 'good and evil' yet the game is nethier warlike and bloody. It looks and feels like Warhammer alright but it plays nothing like it - For one it rewards players for NOT fighting the other faction - To a Warhammer player ( and kinda DAoC players) thats like not bothering to play at all.

A lot of the classes don't even play like the achtypes their ment to be (something that LOTRO got right) for example the Runepriest my 2nd personal favourate choice on the TT who is basically a battlemage in combat - WAR he's a healer archtype, very weak on the magics and VERY squishy.. Thats not a Runepriest!

Bottom line with WAR it was just bad choice after bad choice Mythic just took two GOOD IPs that go perfectly together and just totally ignored everything about them, WAR has to be rebuilt from the ground up - I'm hoping they do that - but thats if EA doesn't shut the game down first.

To make matters worse there was already a better title out there to WAR - that was DAoC.

Riker HAS been Captain on the ship before the last ep. Around Wolf-359 when Picard was Lacutus Riker was given a feild commission of Captain of the Enterpise but then handed the title  back to Picard once back abord the ship

Originally posted by shadow417

I like the game to, i hate one thing, there is a Vip/Premium access wich is $14,99 a month wich does not give you much, Limited character creation you can go lvl up without some stone wich is annoying to find or buy from the store.

But the game it self is fun, i aggree.

The Sub/VIP option DOES give you a lot TBH - near enough everything in the F2P mode with come as 'standard' in a MMO either requires you to jump thru hoops to get or will have a small charge to, plus then you add the fact the VIP has access to all classes and areas from the start - it's not as 'worthless' as some may think..

As it stands Turbine have hit a good balance between Sub and F2P, subs feel like they get somthing more and the f2p prices dont seem that bad or too much to feel like your being ripped off.. A slight offtopic on this but it's good enough to feel like games like CO who have the same features condsider opening the door to 'limited F2P' if their current system doesn't take off in the long term..

Like Ryzom it seems like DDO has revived itself well with the f2p options - As I've always said cashshops and f2p work well IF managed and handled correctly

Originally posted by popinjay

A decades old popular European based IP (Warhammer) that has six struggling servers left in Europe.

 

Not good.

 

I'd imagine its like if people just lost interest in Mario Games in Japan, or the people in the U.S. had no more interest in Mickey Mouse.

The 40K IP seems to be working better as a gaming franchise (probly because Relic KNOW what the IP is) - Mark J ran WAR into the ground by supporting the 'avoid pvp' crowd too much The Tomb kings area proved that he wanted a pve game - Warhammer and things not fighting in a bloodly war equals dead idea from the start - Sad to say WAR makes Mark of Chaos look good (considering that was marketed as a 'true version of the TT' and ended up nothing like it).

Kinda wish Gamesworkshop was more hands on with their exturnal projects, instead of just 'yea looks good', all WAR is is IP exposure

Love the topic title as i 100% disagree with you - it's not dummbing down at all it's putting it back to were the stats should be in the first place - BASELINE

As said in the press bit - Theres too many added bonus stats theres days, basically it was done so we had to find yet MORE gear to farm, I'm a vanilla players and i hated having to lug about 2/3 sets just so i could tank and dps on my warrior - all the added stats just made it worse then base stats like Spirit weren't touched at all.

Dumb? hardly - making the game and item stats make more sence more like..

As for the people who claim how 'great' vanilla was - did you every run a raid? Why do you think most of us quit with Naxx? It was too damn stressful organising 30 people to lazy to sort themselfs out and have 10 others spoonfeed them

Yes 100% - MOST of these changes are CORE GAMEPLAY changes - WoW will never be vanilla again

IT'S THE END OF THE WORLD (of Warcraft) AS WE KNOW IT :)

Originally posted by delvenar

Maybe i'll go drop 5 bucks on Aion when i preorder my CO and give it a try in beta (unless i can get in without) and see which one i like better myself. Biggest problem i have in mmos lately is finding a guild. I've never done well with random pug type guilds, and i end up getting behind on stuff because i solo too long while trying to meet people and find a decent bunch i get along with, and as of right now, none of my RL friends or friends from wow (most of which are RL also) are planning to play either Aion or CO.

For community reasons CO seems the stronger of the two as dispite it being sharded into channels it is still one sever, if you have seen EVE dispite it having smaller numbers then most server based MMOs it still feels very large and active, finidng a guild in CO wont be a problem and even if the game does drop in numbers server mergers and empitness wont be an issue - also iirc players can scale down (or up i forget) to match their friends so you can still play no matter where you are.

Both are looking strong titles (which is very promising for the industry) but for ease of community I beleave CO would be the better option

Originally posted by madeux

The fact that they have cryptic bucks that can be used in multiple games opens up an amazing possilbity that friends and I have talked about for a long time... one subscription for multiple games.  Wouldn't it be great to pay 15 buck a month, and then play either Champions Online or Star Trek Online, assuming you've purchased both games?

This is what people forget or don't even realise Cryptic Points (ala the MT system) isn't just for CO but for STO and possibly a third rumoured game, so like someone stated before it could extend into a Station Pass type thing...

I think the main problem is misinformation people are comaring Cryptic's system to the F2P market too much, where those games need your money to actally continue, where as if you look at SOE's system it's not that bad, Station Players, the Items fr real cash system in EQ/EQ2 and the Station Pass have still been profitable for them (it must have been because it's been going on for so long) even though many players flame SOE a lot..

With DLC/MTs being to practally every game these days, it was only a matter of time for a dev to again gamble with this type of system, it's paid off once with SOE, perhaps it will for Cryptic - again it's all down to how it's handled.

I can see wheres he's comming from the Architech system has left a VERY bad taste in players mouths and TBH the power colour thing isn't that big of a feature and truefully Going Rogue is basically a glorifed hype of the variable "isevil=0/1", heck EQ2 had this in for years now..

It's exactally how Aion's got it's players from AoC and WAR - people did not get what they wanted from one game so the alturnitive has turned up that may get it right..

CoX has been dragging it's heels for a while now as it's been the only one of it's type - Cryptic know ths too well as we all know why and are capitalising on it and with Architech backfiring that badly the timing couldn't be perfect, if they deliver on a just a tiny bit that was wrong with CoX and keep with the updates on a regular basis CoX will be in trouble.

Even if the cracks start to show with CO by time that happens DCUO will be opening it's doors, players wont go back to CoX, they'll head stright to DCUO, hopng that will be the one they want, like I said it's the same pattern with Aion..

I agree the diehards wont leave CoX but unless it pulls somthing big out of the hat quickly that doesn't seem like it's just a quick fix with a slight mod AND keep up with content, it's only going to have those diehards left... Not saying it'll happen soon but it'll have the leaky balloon effect if they don't keep it interesting and not have players sitting on their hands waiting for these 'big changes'

As people say about WoW - only Blizzard can kill it, well Cryptic created CoX and they know exactally what they should do with CO with regrads to hitting CoX at it's weakest points, all I'll end with is that CoX is now playing catchup for all the time they sat around milking the fact they were unique