|
 |
|
 |
 |
|
 |
 |
|
 |
|
|
|
 |
 |
Forum >>
Main >>
General Discussion >>
My thoughts after 3 days
|
|
| User |
Message |
Wyloc
Posts: 2
Joined: 03/07/2008
Credibility: 0 pts
|
I really want to like AoC. It seems to have really good potential, but I am afraid it has fallen flat in my opinion. I really have some problems with the game. It feels rushed. I get the feeling it was released about half way done.
Here is what I find annoying. but, maybe I am just doing it wrong :)
The look. It really reminds me of Neverwinter Nights. It has the feel and look of an RPG from 5 to 10 years ago, but runs really slowly. It is very graphics intensive, due to the textures, but the animations and models seem poor. The game doesnt seem to have any real artistic sense of itself. WoW was cartoonish, but beautifully done in that style. Mass Effect has great animations, and textures. AoC just seems lost in its own design. Gritty, sure. Bloody, you bet. But beautiful and interesting? No.
The Races. They make no difference that I can see. You can only play as a human, but that is part of the Conan Universe, so I can deal with that. But the only difference between the Races is what Class you can be. It is contrived. The difference makes no difference, if you get what I mean. This is even worse than the Races in WoW. In WoW the races didnt make any difference except graphically. in AoC, you dont even got that.
The Classes. The class abilities and designs seem poor at best. I thought it would be awesome to be a sneaky assassin. I was wrong. I thought being a super demonic mage would be cool. It wasnt. The classes all use the same basic abilities, just divided up differently. I have take nearly every class up to at least level 10 to test it out. None of them seem to stand out.
The Demonologist Class. How cool would it be to control demons? You would think it would be amazing... You would be wrong. Your first demon comes along at level 8 or 9, and it looks too powerful, to be honest. It is a super bad, winged, nasty sword wielding, greenish monster. It looks too cool for what it does. What does it do? Not a durn thing. It throws fireballs for no damage. Yay....
The graphics just grate on me. The Necro's spells are just 100% black, no swirling green haze, no underworldly gray, just black black black. The character models look like the ones used in Bethesda's Elder Scrolls Oblivion. They are not as good as they could be. And you only get to choose from a few faces. (Yes, I was spoiled by City of Heroes / Villains) But still....
I want to like AoC. I really do, since I plunked 50$ down on this turd burger. But I just dont. The game is not fun. It has all the boring elements of every other MMO rolled up in an ugly package. (and, yes, I am running the game maxed out on the graphics. It still looks bad)
The combat system is the only part that breaths any life into the game, and even that falls flat. It is nearly impossible to move and attack at the same time, yet it is vital. The combo moves at higher levels are nearly impossible to pull off. Reminds me of the new, and terrible, Mortal Kombat games.
Oh well. There is my rant. Flame away. I just had to get it off my chest. I am very very very dissapointed. And after 3 days, I just cant stand the idea of logging in again.
Had the devs let this one cook for another year, it might have been great. But, in it's current state, I just cant stand it. Fifty bucks, right in the toilet. Thanks Age of Conan. Thanks a bunch.
I guess I am back to waiting for WAR to come out.... Sigh....
|
| 06/22/08 17:51 |
Login to rate this user's post! |
smokebam_07
Posts: 12
Joined: 03/22/2007
Credibility: 0 pts
|
| RE: My thoughts after 3 days |
|
|
|
well thats cool i guess i like AoC because i think its cool but incase you didnt know (you probably did but just to make sure) when you create a char after you hit customize you can go to advanced and customize it more. and there is a move/attack way idk how to do it myself but it looks very easy when you know how its a way to stop archers and mages from hittin you. its where you strafe in a circle around the person and attack while doing so and trust me it works had my archer have to switch from bow to melee because of it.
well gl on the wait sry to hear about the fifty bucs man
|
| 06/22/08 18:32 |
Login to rate this user's post! |
RazoMoto
Posts: 41
Joined: 06/21/2008
Credibility: 10 pts
|
| RE: My thoughts after 3 days |
|
|
|
I'd have that account Kthxbye.
Not every game is made for everyone, otherwise there would be only one Mumupager.
I for one loathe WoW, even though gameplay is good the colors and cartoony style remind me of one huge acid trip.
Being a little out of touch isn't bad, your argument is invalid.
|
| 06/22/08 19:14 |
Login to rate this user's post! |
Phedre_D
GameAmp Staff
Posts: 167
Joined: 05/09/2005
Credibility: 565 pts
|
| RE: My thoughts after 3 days |
|
|
|
Sorry to hear you don't like it, Wyloc. Like RazaMoto said not all games can please everyone. I relly love it. I think it looks great, the attack system is near perfect, the graphics are stunning, and my four alts don't look anything like each other. But I won't try to force to play the game. If you don't like it, you don't like it.
|
| 06/23/08 03:09 |
Login to rate this user's post! |
Evil Geek
Posts: 81
Joined: 10/18/2005
Credibility: 160 pts
|
| RE: My thoughts after 3 days |
|
|
|
I don't think 3 days is enough to see how any MMO and it's classes pan out but if you don't like the game after that time, fair enough :)
| QUOTE | | The graphics just grate on me. The Necro's spells are just 100% black, no swirling green haze, no underworldly gray, just black black black. |
Sure there is lots of swirling black but theres other colours in there too for different spells, then theres that nice bone shield animation and the what looks like a wireframe body merging or falling from yours in other spells, maybe your graphics settings? Necro spells look fine n dandy to me.
I can't say that AoC is the MMO that will keep me happy for any length of time (its very much in development, that could change) but after 3 weeks it's enough to know that spending money on a timecard is worth it for me.
|
| 06/23/08 04:34 |
Login to rate this user's post! |
TheFuriousOne
Posts: 58
Joined: 02/23/2008
Credibility: 230 pts
|
| RE: My thoughts after 3 days |
|
|
|
I love the game as well and am definitely paying for my next month but there are a few things that need to be fixed or modified a little that are starting to make me quite angry.
1. The aggro system is completely fucked... I have had half dead mobs that are locked to someone else run across the map to me and have had mobs that I have run from auto-aggro when I get anywhere within 200 meters of them or if I start running back in there direction before they get to their spawn point.
2. Every god damn mob 70+ has Stunning Punch, 3 second or something ish stun that they use whenever they can, this makes taking on 2 or more mobs almost impossible.
The combat system is very very fun and unique though which I love and if you have a good enough rig to run the game on high setting, or even just with Shader 3.0 it looks amazing, so there are some good and bad points on my part. I say give the game another week or 2 of play time and then decide if it is good or not, but I can't force you to.
Hai, im a noob, me likez teh ezmode.
|
| 06/23/08 05:16 |
Login to rate this user's post! |
mriswith
Posts: 53
Joined: 03/09/2006
Credibility: 50 pts
|
| RE: My thoughts after 3 days |
|
|
|
It is too bad that after 3 days you feel that way. I know from my own try-outs with other MMO's that it has to 'catch' you; if it does not; it won't. Perfect examle for me personally is Reqiuem; first 3 hours were like: wow nice graphics; but after that it became boring and it became apparent that it was a grinding game; and i hate grinding.
But i do read in your lines that your computer isnt entirely up for AoC as well; if characters look the same and animations (in this case) of the necromancer class) looks flat and colorless; then the settings are pretty low. For instance; the necromancer animation of minions is black; true; but in a nice animated sickening, choking cloudway while the ground gets covered with a demonic moss like substance. The ice spells are totallyu the opposite: white blurry hazes with different kind of animations and AoE's
I'm playing it now for 3 days and the only thing i have atm is that it is a shame that it is more of a single player MMO; rather then a teamplay MMO like GW. It is hard to interact with people if there's now reason to team up; unless you get in an area where lots of people have troubles (like the ruďnes)
As for specs; AoC does ask a lot. I think everyone will agree on that. However; new games from the 'vista' age do ask a lot more then games have ever done up to now. Dual/Quad Cores, Heaver GC's faster ethernets is something that was always requiered for gamers. A GC without pixelshader 3.0 support and direct x10 support (however AoC still runs on 9.0c) is 'old'. I have upgraded my comp specially for AoC; and it was worth every penny imho. Simply because you can get the max out of it and see that there is a lot of time spend on the graphics. It might remind, as you said, to games like Neverwinter Nights, but if you like that sort of game; then what's wrong with it? Im still running around Tortage (lol; im taking my time) and it still amazes me how much detail there is and how well laid out the maps are.
But games are a matter of likes and opinions :) If you dont get the 'feeling' after 3 days and feel resiliant to logg back in; then it is a shame that you have bought an expensive game; that is something the developer should really make in my honest opinion: a trial client. You cant expect everyone to pay up €50,- to 'try' it.
But if you cant run AoC on 'medium' settings (if you did; the animations and graphics would have been better) then you will get more such 'disappointments' in the near future. Requiem is a graphic heavy game as well as will new MMO's be. it is after all a known fact that, as being a gamer, you will have to get a new GC every 6 months to keep up with the specs/requierments of new games or at lest to be able to keep running on top perfomance and quality.
It's too bad you don't like it and i hope your next trial will work out better for you :)
|
| 06/23/08 06:46 |
Login to rate this user's post! |
Evil Geek
Posts: 81
Joined: 10/18/2005
Credibility: 160 pts
|
| RE: My thoughts after 3 days |
|
|
|
| QUOTE |
I can't say that AoC is the MMO that will keep me happy for any length of time (its very much in development, that could change) but after 3 weeks it's enough to know that spending money on a timecard is worth it for me. |
After todays patch I totaly regret buying that timecard.
***THIS POST HAS BEEN EDITED***
|
| 06/23/08 11:42 |
Login to rate this user's post! |
RazoMoto
Posts: 41
Joined: 06/21/2008
Credibility: 10 pts
|
| RE: My thoughts after 3 days |
|
|
|
What happened to make you lose faith Geek?
This must be bad.
Being a little out of touch isn't bad, your argument is invalid.
|
| 06/23/08 12:32 |
Login to rate this user's post! |
mriswith
Posts: 53
Joined: 03/09/2006
Credibility: 50 pts
|
| RE: My thoughts after 3 days |
|
|
|
| QUOTE | What happened to make you lose faith Geek?
This must be bad. |
For one: they started balancing while they still need to work out a TON of gamebugs :S
|
| 06/23/08 16:44 |
Login to rate this user's post! |
Wyloc
Posts: 2
Joined: 03/07/2008
Credibility: 0 pts
|
| RE: My thoughts after 3 days |
|
|
|
I actually do have the game on its highest graphics settings. My complaints on the Necro spell was really just based on the low level spells. I stopped playing the necro early on after I realized the pet does no real damage. I was annoyed.
It isnt that the game's graphics are bad, per se. It is more that they feel very uninspired. The game doesnt feel like it has a cohesive artistic plan. It is as if they wanted to make it more realistic, versus WoW's cartoonish look, but didnt have more of a plan than that.
I am a graphic artist by trade, so I tend to dwell on the 'style' more than the 'look'. DAoC, WoW, Mass Effect, Gears of War, System Shock, Deus Ex, WAR, even the old Legend of Zelda, all had a specific style that they stuck to graphically. I dont get that feeling from AoC.
In the end, I am not bashing the game. I guess I just wanted to point out some things that I felt were less than stellar. The things that bugged me right off the bat, and seemed bad / broken / or overlooked.
It seems the game just doesnt deserve the glowing reviews I read everywhere. More and more, you just cant trust online or magazine reviews.
I am glad so many of you love the game. I guess 50$ isnt so much to pay. Sometimes you win, sometimes you loose! :) Ive spent money on much worse games, believe me!
|
| 06/23/08 17:19 |
Login to rate this user's post! |
Evil Geek
Posts: 81
Joined: 10/18/2005
Credibility: 160 pts
|
| RE: My thoughts after 3 days |
|
|
|
| QUOTE | What happened to make you lose faith Geek?
This must be bad. |
As you asked....:P
I like the concept of the Necromancer, that whole raising the dead, sucking blood, performing carnal rituals thing just floats my boat:) Played one in GW then played one in WoW so it was natural to go for one in AoC. Different kettle of fish in AoC than either GW or WoW, thats very cool IMO and the concept is kind of nice but it's implentation has failed, subsequent patching increased our woeful dps in a couple of skills but then last nights patch reduces those skills dmg to less than what they were originally and reduced all our other dps too, sadly FC had spent the last week promising yet more buffs to us Necros but we actually got an across the board reduction in dps. Major nerf which no one was expecting.
Like all classes we have 3 feat trees, the general being the mage class tree and then we have Nightfall (dps/dots) and Reanimation (pets), apparently the devs want to push us into being a pet class so reducing all the dmg in the Nightfall tree is a good way to go to get us there in their thinking. End result my Necro is back to dieing far too often because he can't do enough dmg to take any mobs down fast enough, 2 mobs my level with 8 minions on my side at the same lvl (9 v 2 in my favour) is rarely succesfull without the help of health pots, get 3 mobs on me (minions dont hold aggro the foes always come to the source) and it's sure death, try using fear on them, you lose a minion and you get a 5 second breather to prepare for.......... certain death.
If I hadn't have read the official forums and how we were getting buffed again in the next patch then I may not be quite so dissapointed. Apperently this is all part of some big plan for the Necro and the next patch should 'balance' things out, this expereince doesn't make me feel that optimistic and I wonder why they rolled this out the way they did considering how angry the boards have got over this one.
I could reroll as melee but melee is rarely my style, something I enjoy as an alternative to a main caster character, casters are limited in AoC, I haven't found anything else I want to play :(
There are things about the game disregarding class I'm not enjoying, the instances/solo/group areas seem adhoc in their nature and while most inside areas are nicely done one or two have been more annoying than challenging in their design (Black Castle has to be one of the most terribly designed areas Ive ever come across in a game). On the other hand I was loving doing the villas in Noble District solo last night but tonight they became frustrating rather than fun after my dps reduction.
This is the worst MMO I've played as far as encouraging multiplayer play goes , it too often feels like a solo RPG that enables you to chat with mates, again the instance system doesnt help because there are less random people around.
I think if your not a necro at the moment the good still probably outweighs the bad though.
|
| 06/23/08 18:01 |
Login to rate this user's post! |
RazoMoto
Posts: 41
Joined: 06/21/2008
Credibility: 10 pts
|
| RE: My thoughts after 3 days |
|
|
|
Ah too bad they screwed over your favorite class, infact any class really.
I haven't digged up any info about AoC besides that its a new game, but is the whole team behind it new aswell? Could be their just testing out stuff and then its kinda understandable why the hell things go wrong, it still sucks dont get me wrong, its just an answer to why its such a major screwup.
Im sure you dont stand alone and the majority will say piss off with the patch and the next patch will boost back to please the crowd, if not, they'll notice after a while when the player base is reduced :3
Being a little out of touch isn't bad, your argument is invalid.
|
| 06/23/08 19:20 |
Login to rate this user's post! |
Evil Geek
Posts: 81
Joined: 10/18/2005
Credibility: 160 pts
|
| RE: My thoughts after 3 days |
|
|
|
Hey I paid the money and I'm still gonna try to get my moneys worth :) If anyone asked me I'd recommend them to give AoC a go, it may be a cautious recommendation but I'd still recommend it, it definately has it's moments.
I guess for now if I want to keep playing my Necro then I guess hide and let your minions do the work seems to be the way forward (only way sadly) or spend alot of hard to come by cash respeccing in the hope some weird combination in a weirdly set out feat tree would do the trick to not get slaughtered so easily.
I guess the developers largely come from Anarchy Online from what little I know so some must have experience of this kind of thing.
I have no doubt come the next patch (in theory should be Thursday) that things for the Necro will change, it has to, faced with the amount of grief FC are getting on the official forums they really don't seem to have a choice.
|
| 06/23/08 19:47 |
Login to rate this user's post! |
mriswith
Posts: 53
Joined: 03/09/2006
Credibility: 50 pts
|
| RE: My thoughts after 3 days |
|
|
|
| QUOTE |
I guess for now if I want to keep playing my Necro then I guess hide and let your minions do the work seems to be the way forward (only way sadly) or spend alot of hard to come by cash respeccing in the hope some weird combination in a weirdly set out feat tree would do the trick to not get slaughtered so easily.
|
Dont know what skillbase you are playing; but last night i had 0 troubles to be honest; and that at level 16 :S
I was doing quests in ruins of acharon (killing the bat demon; failed in the end though; so tonight another try) and had absolutely no trouble rounding up 12 level 14 pics and bats and slaying them off. Only trouble began when i got 4 same level warriors; but i didnt use any consumeables and relied on (its true lol) my damage. 80% of the time i survived. PS still does around 120 dmg every 2 secs :/ over a period of 10 secs. More then enough to outheal the Pic 'healers'.
But then again; im still enjoying Tortage ;)
As for a melee class you might to try is Dark templar geek. I'm not that high a level with that alt; but it combines melee with dark magic (aka necromagic... got skills that trigger spells with skulls ;) ) And the fightingsystem is wicked in AoC. its not like GW click and your toon starts hacking and slashing and you only press 1,2,3 (aka sever artery, gash, final thrust); you press a skill and then you get a small HUD saying which direction knob to press to make a combo :) It looks, imho, really awesome.
I have always been more of a caster myself as well (hence my fav chars in GW are necro and ele) but playing this sort of melee is wicked and it keeps the gameplay interactive and fun imho.
|
| 06/24/08 01:57 |
Login to rate this user's post! |
Evil Geek
Posts: 81
Joined: 10/18/2005
Credibility: 160 pts
|
| RE: My thoughts after 3 days |
|
|
|
| QUOTE | I was doing quests in ruins of acharon (killing the bat demon; failed in the end though; so tonight another try) and had absolutely no trouble rounding up 12 level 14 pics and bats and slaying them off. Only trouble began when i got 4 same level warriors; but i didnt use any consumeables and relied on (its true lol) my damage. 80% of the time i survived. PS still does around 120 dmg every 2 secs :/ over a period of 10 secs. More then enough to outheal the Pic 'healers'.
But then again; im still enjoying Tortage ;)
As for a melee class you might to try is Dark templar geek. I'm not that high a level with that alt; but it combines melee with dark magic (aka necromagic... got skills that trigger spells with skulls ;) ) And the fightingsystem is wicked in AoC. its not like GW click and your toon starts hacking and slashing and you only press 1,2,3 (aka sever artery, gash, final thrust); you press a skill and then you get a small HUD saying which direction knob to press to make a combo :) It looks, imho, really awesome. |
Tortage is great and that quest in Acheron is a very nice quest, I thoroughly enjoyed it too. PSS at your lvl doing around 120dmg per tic is great but at lvl 41 and its doing 125 dmg per tic against lvl 40/41 foes it's kind of sad....and your also faced with alot of melee mobs using knockdowns so forget the channeling bit, PSS at higher lvls I'm sad to say is pretty useless for now, I thought last weeks boost was a little OP but this weeks went way too far in the opposite direction.
Curently I am specced with 18 points in the mage tree:
Mage Blood: 5 points
Spiritual Armement : 5 points
Crimson shield: 3 points
Mystical Attunement: 5 points
and 17 points in reanimation:
Decomposition: 5 points
Unholy Power: 5 points
Grim Corrupter: 3 points
Unholy Fortitude: 4 points
Unholy power created an extra 3-5 dmg per hit on Corrupters, with 8 minions thats up to an extra 40dmg in total which doesnt make up for the 60% loss in dmg I see in PSS at my level. The points in Unholy Fortitude seem to be a waste the difference I see in the length and recast time of Frenzy is minimal, again most of the time Frenzy only attracts the attention of the one mob that had focus.
I am going to try different feats tonight to see if I can improve my dmg output. I haven't given up on the necro just yet. From what I've been reading focusing on cold dmg seems to be quite effective.
Yes I tried the DT the other day, only got him to lvl 8 which isn't enough to pass any real judgement but at that point I only had combos and no 'magic' skills, 'slam' seemed ridiculously overpowered though....melee in AoC seems to work extremely well.
|
| 06/24/08 04:43 |
Login to rate this user's post! |
lani
GameAmp Staff
Posts: 327
Joined: 09/08/2005
Credibility: 1388 pts
|
| RE: My thoughts after 3 days |
|
|
|
You know, the more I read about the Necromancer "nerf", the more I get the impression that the class was changed from Nuker & Pet Master rolled into one to just a Pet Master.
Or for comparison:
Old Necro Was GW Full Blood & Full Death Necro, now just Full Death.
Old Necro was CoV Dominator & Mastermind, now just Mastermind.
Looking at it that way, I kinda see where the devs were coming from. The Tempest of Set got a just 'nerf' too. They were outdoing the Demonologist as AoE DPSer which was just [i]wrong[i] (I play both ok, no bias).
It would be nicer though if they'd given the demon itself a bit more role to play. As it is, it's not a pet but a controllable DoT spell with an odd animation. IMO they should convert the AoE spells so you, the player, triggers them but the demon does the actual casting animation. Saves about a second and the poor boy gets a bit more action.
And yes, slams are overpowered. I'm seriously considering switching back to a 2-Hander with my barbarian just for the 2 second relieve you can get from having knocked back the enemy. But I keep hoping for a stun in the dual-wield set :-)
Oh, and Neverwinter Nights DX8 graphics engine comparable to AoC's? Oh how I wish that were true. I'd be happy if it'd look half as good, say comparable to WOW & CoX. I'd still be playing it then.
I guess Wyloc runs NWN on the specially modified Nostalgia™ engine instead of the long-in-the-tooth "square hillocks" Aurora Engine that came with the retail version of NWN all those years ago ;-p
|
| 06/24/08 04:55 |
Login to rate this user's post! |
|
|
|
|
|
 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
