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Neverwinter
Posted: Wed May 01, 2013 2:11 pm
by Prak
http://nw.perfectworld.com/about
Looks like this may be the new DDO, except actually good. The setting has a lot of popularity, I know that, and the graphics look like at least a vague step up from Turbine's DDO.
Anyone going to look into this? It's in open beta.
Posted: Wed May 01, 2013 2:42 pm
by Whatever
I was interested, until I noticed that it's being run by PWE. Let me know if it turns out not to be a pay-to-win grindfest, then I'll check it out.
Posted: Wed May 01, 2013 7:14 pm
by shadzar
i saw it in the D&D RSS feed and was pissed being sent to a non-wizards.com site as they usually do.
i am only morbidly curious what edition it will be using. 4th you be dumb since well 4th just died. i loved how NWN worked, but being 3rd made it just suck
TTRPG which is turn based play cant be used for a real-time MMO or similar-time, so they should jsut write a game engine and ruleset for FANTASY and just fit D&D and NW stuff into it.
i wonder if this kills Bioware and future NWN PC games and D&D games will all "require internet to play", which seems all game makers are going for to prevent the consumer from being able to do anything and have no protection against disreputable companies.
all i could tell the DL queue xrashed a server or two which tells me the game will likely suffer fromt he same ignorance involved in its deployment. people not knowing what will be wanted and make excuses "we werent ready for the overwhelming...." which i always read as "we dont know what we are doing and incapable of making an online game, so figure your gameplay experience will be equally as crappy as your DL or update experince, and when we figure out how bad we suck at it we will just turn our servers off and all your work playing has been wasted time."
Posted: Wed May 01, 2013 7:17 pm
by Nebuchadnezzar
From seeing a few videos people made during closed beta weekends, I've lost interest. It's 4e with inflated numbers, and even in high level dungeons one just spams their at-wills. There seems to be little choice in ability progression, and the microtransaction system attached to equipment is almost assuredly excessive.
Posted: Wed May 01, 2013 8:16 pm
by shadzar
Nebuchadnezzar wrote:the microtransaction system attached to equipment is almost assuredly excessive.
do tell....
Posted: Mon Jun 24, 2013 12:34 pm
by Prak
I've played it a very small amount. My friend who loves MMOs really likes it. I basically spend my day dicking around online and occasionally doing something productive, so my not playing it more is in no way an indictment of the game.
However it does use 4e mechanics.
Posted: Mon Jun 24, 2013 8:46 pm
by DragonChild
This game is awful beyond all compare. Terribly designed dungeons, monotonous quests, pretty much every godfuckingawful "free to play" system imaginable shoved into its wretched frame.
Posted: Mon Jun 24, 2013 10:09 pm
by Lago PARANOIA
Wow, was it really that bad?
You must describe this experience for us, DragonChild.
![awesome :awesome:](./images/smilies/awesome.gif)
Posted: Mon Jun 24, 2013 10:48 pm
by DragonChild
Dungeons are seriously 45 minutes - 1 hour with 3 bosses only, and ridiculous amounts of worthless trash that is no challenge and totally not interesting because it's literally the exact same mobs you've been fighting for six hours outside of the dungeon. Dungeons have most of their reward loaded into the very last boss fight, so if somebody drops midway through and you have to call it, you're fucked. Worse yet, midway through the game the last bosses get MASSIVE difficulty spikes. What caused me to quit the game was a dungeon where I basically slept through all but the last boss it was so easy, and then couldn't get the final boss down below 75%. I felt like I had wasted over an hour of my time.
The game constantly tries to milk you out of money at every single turn. Pay to speed up your professions, which use the same real-time bullshit mechanism Evony does. Pay to get a companion that doesn't become worthless mid-game. Pay to get a mount. Pay to get gear. Pay for some decent inventory space. Pay for this, pay for that. Pay to get keys that open chests full of random, worthless loot, like this is some shitty CCG. Yes, you can theoretically get everything on your own, but that's not going to happen because it takes so much grinding to get this stuff.
If you want a real MMO, play WoW, Rift, or Secret World.
Posted: Tue Jun 25, 2013 5:58 pm
by Ikeren
The people over at the DDO Forums give it a very negative review as well; you blow through the first 1/3rd of the game with ease to get "hooked" then hit a difficulty "wall" which really is supposed to be a paywall. They think that'll get them money, but instead it will get them quitting players.
Posted: Wed Jun 26, 2013 4:34 am
by Whatever
Whatever wrote:I was interested, until I noticed that it's being run by PWE. Let me know if it turns out not to be a pay-to-win grindfest, then I'll check it out.
So, exactly this?
Posted: Wed Jun 26, 2013 1:41 pm
by Fuchs
Leveling is easy, one reaches 60 without trouble without paying money. Money's mostly spent on convenience like more bags.
One interesting aspect is the "Foundry" - the editor allowing players to make their own dungeons/quests. This has a lot of potential.
Posted: Mon Jul 01, 2013 4:18 pm
by Dogbert
I liked NWO, which is to say something given how sick I am of fantasy games. While the chargen engine is a watered down version of the original engine used in Champions, it's still more customization than you'll get on any other fantasy game not named Age of Conan.
Gameplay wise it's pretty much 4E and true to sourceā¦ and indeed, while cookie-cutter characters and uninteresting powers are lame on tabletop, they're totally adequate on a videogame and I dare say 4E has never played better.
The game is pay-to-win, yes, but at least it's not pay to -enjoy- (unlike Champions). Like all F2P games, there are plenty of cash-grabs, but they range from convenience to vanity (and fortunately not half as insulting as say, Scarlet Blade's).
Finally, those creatively inclined will find in The Foundry (Cryptic's mission editor) a godsend. It also means you'll never run out of content as long as you don't mind dumpster-diving for decent missions.
Posted: Mon Jan 13, 2014 4:41 am
by Prak
If anyone wants to add me on Neverwinter (I know Koumei plays, but don't if anyone else is still playing), my account is @koerbl.
I haven't done much with it, but if there are denners on, maybe I'll play more.
edit: fixed my account name. I feel dumb.
Posted: Mon Jan 13, 2014 5:57 am
by Koumei
My goal is to hit level 60 with my main (39 at the moment), the Wood Elf Cleric, and then spend time creating Foundry quests. I have a Drow Rogue and a Moon Elf Wizard too, but they're both below level 10, and playing them will have to wait for a while.
The lockboxes are the most annoying thing: they're effectively $1.25 to open each, and monsters drop them like candy. Or you can grind for astral diamonds (at the rate of maybe 10-11K per day) to convert into Zen. 125 Zen for a key, ~370 diamonds for 1 Zen. That's right, it takes about 5 days for 1 key.
On the other hand, I've found so many Epic magic items (you can easily auction them off for 50-100K astral diamonds), as well as a spare artefact... and piles of trash.
The server really gets loaded down some times and then it's just impossible to play. That's a real pain in the ass. They could do with a separate server. I recommend "One for America" and "One for everyone else in the world" (all seven of us!)
Posted: Tue Jan 14, 2014 6:27 am
by Koumei
Okay, so after the Demon area is... more Undead! In general I don't mind this, as you can get a lot of mileage out of death cults and spooky necromancers and fighting the undead. What I do mind is that "More Undead, now for characters approaching level 40" seriously has fucking zombies and skeletons. And the minions take more battering to put down than before, which is not acceptable.
Also there are spiders (the weird Forgotten Realms ones, and Phase Spiders), and Shadar-Kai. Apparently they enslave ghosts just to be pricks.
The dungeon at the end of it is the most annoying one yet, particularly if you're a Cleric*, and my new course of action will be to cancel any "do a dungeoncrawl" quests. If you do every other quest (especially if you take breaks to do Foundry quests and skirmishes and shit), you're ahead of the curve for the main thing anyway.
After that it looks like it's going to be werewolves. And then sky pirates.
*The Cleric isn't really that good. All their abilities amount to something you'd love someone else to play, or to have as an NPC companion, because they can layer penalties on foes and set up damage-reduction fields and things, but they don't actually get to do much damage or stun-lock. Also they wear crappy armour. So playing a solo Cleric means certain areas are extremely hard, and in a multiplayer thing, you will frequently die in the course of helping everyone else hit harder.
Posted: Tue Jan 14, 2014 9:40 am
by TarkisFlux
Koumei wrote:After that it looks like it's going to be werewolves. And then sky pirates.
40+ levels to get to sky pirates? Meh.
Posted: Tue Jan 14, 2014 10:37 am
by Koumei
Still, I have yet to actually get bored, and that is the moment where I'll stop playing. A nice thing about the standard missions is that yes, you'll get a few stupid "Thin out their numbers - kill 60 zombies and come back" but mostly they're a little more involved, and scatter lore throughout it. Even when a quest is a fancily-dressed "Go to checkpoints A, B, C" thing, the fancy dress makes a difference.
But I would prefer a bit more variety with the enemies, and actually outgrowing the setting. There aren't even flying mounts.
Posted: Wed Jan 15, 2014 11:09 am
by Koumei
So does anyone else have a lot of time on their hands? I will give my login details to anyone who is willing to level my character to 60, following my specifications for what to choose on level up.
In exchange, I will do absolutely nothing except possibly thank you.
Posted: Wed Jan 15, 2014 3:57 pm
by Red_Rob
Why not offer to write feats in return for character levelling? I hear that's what games designers do, right?
Posted: Sat Jan 18, 2014 4:35 am
by Koumei
Level 56, nearly there. I was having problems with individual bosses (who hit really hard, heal, and constantly summon minions). So I went to other areas and levelled a bit, then went back. It's really handy to have a bunch of AoE attacks.
So it's not Sky Pirates: you join the Sky Looters, then fight Lizardmen (yeah, at level 40) and Undead Sky Pirates.
Then it's ICE GOBLINS (Goblins, except blue! And still with the minion/tank/archer/caster set-up), Ice Trolls, massive giants (those are cool, and actually fighting them is fun with the dodging elements of it), and winter wolves. I remind you this is level 45-50. The boss is a Gargantuan Winter Wolf.
After that you get to go beat up Aberrations (including a renamed Intellect Devourer, I assume 4E is to blame for that. Not appearing: any other Aberration that you'd know from any D&D prior to 4th) and Spellplague Undead and Spellplague Survivors who are losing their minds. Yes, there's a bit where you run about murdering people suffering from a plague. GO TEAM HERO! The boss is a sort of Blue Fire Beholder.
Now I'm smacking Drow (and Driders and spiders) about. The giant spiders and Driders are really neat. But not level 50+ challenges in a sensible world. Setting captives free and watching them riot and beat drow up is hilarious.
And the next area is, I kid you not, Mount Hotenow. That e should be a space: Hot now. It's all lava and stuff. Like a true D&D character, lava is quite painful and annoying, but not lethal. There are ASH ZOMBIES and Fire Archons and stuff. This seems almost actually high level.
Yeah, it's annoying to see weak shit as high level challenges. But whatever.
Posted: Sat Jan 18, 2014 7:30 am
by OgreBattle
How about rabbits, rats, and such, are there level 50 rabbits in this game that are a different color than level 1 rabbits?
Posted: Sat Jan 18, 2014 9:43 am
by Koumei
Actually, there are zero such creatures. Even dogs and cats only exist as wandering non-interaction creatures or as Companions.
Posted: Sun Jan 19, 2014 3:07 am
by ckafrica
I've been playing DDO for about 4 years and the thing that has been annoying me this past 1.5 years is their new epic content is nowhere near feeling epic. Seriously at level 28 3.5 There are missions with undead rats as opponents. It pisses me off particularly because a few years ago they actually were going epic in content feel with you running of to other planes and fighting demon lords. There are some cool missions where you walk into an army encampment ring a gong and kill the whole army but we're still talking about orcs, gnolls, and hill giants. Not exactly opponents who's armies should be a concern at this level.
How is Neverwinter's game play and character development? I started on DDO so I like the dynamic play style. I've tried Rift and Age of Conan recently and between little to no choice in character development and the fact you just stand and button bash in sequence made me bored within a few hours.
Posted: Sun Jan 19, 2014 4:23 am
by Prak
Apparently Neverwinter considers "Bastard" a horrible profane word so I'm not allowed to use it in the biography of my tiefling character who is the illegitimate child of a barbarian lord and a marilith...