More on Guild Wars [Long]
I am having difficulty forgetting about my weekend of playing as I enjoyed it so. I may have to pre-order just to participate in the final two beta weekends.
I apologise for the length but this is a rundown of features that I enjoyed. There are no spoilers for the plot/quests within the game so read freely if online computer games interest you, otherwise I definitely suggest you ignore this entry.
One thing you'll notice about character creation is names. You CANNOT HAVE numbers or non-alphabetical characters of any sort in your name. A-Z and space, that's it. I think this is fantastic. Granted, I believe you can still alter the case of the letters but it stops the really stupid names that just annoy people. On the whole, everyone had names that were either interesting or a bit strange but nothing that made you groan or want to flee to another area immediately.
Creating a character was incredibly simple. You start at level 0 so there's nothing complex at all: At this point, your Name, Primary Profession (Mesmer, Monk, Elementalist, Warrior or Ranger) and Appearance (face, hair, hair colour, skin colour and height) are all you need to think about.
The Primary Profession is your selection at first. You can gain a secondary later on and unlike Dungeons and Dragons there's no splitting levels; multiclassing is ONLY a strength, never a weakness. Despite this, it is not unbalanced and you're not a super-player or anything like that; all it does is open up interesting and different combinations of skills with which to strategise. There are a couple of limitations that makes every combination of professions unique: You can only wear the armour of your primary profession. Each profession has a primary attribute but you may only place points into the primary attribute of your primary profession.
When searching for a secondary profession, the trainers give you a quest and 'lend' two or three skills for that profession to help you complete it (and get a feel for the powers of the profession). After completing that mission, the trainer will offer the profession as a secondary (which is irreversible). Before you accept, I vigourously encourage (unless you're not the explorer/experimenting type) to find other trainers (NPC's give easy directions to them) and try each one (accepting each quest will replace the lent skills from the previous profession's quest) but you'll get them back if you go back and accept the offer to use them as a secondary (and the skills will then be permanently available to you).
It was by doing this that I discovered the Necromancer is not as limited as I thought but that the Mesmer is very, very cool as I had already thought that by looking at skills but the profession is not recommended for beginners due to requiring advanced tactics [according to the character creation screen] and I don't disagree). Come next opportunity I will try my hand at the Ranger and Warrior as well to see what they are like. From watching others in my parties, they have their own good points to try.
Keep in mind, and I found this a magnificent aspect, you can UNDO any ranks you place into any of your attributes with 'refund points' which I found almost inexhaustible. I changed my mind about a few choices I'd made and experimented with the effect a point would have in skills linked to that attribute. It's not limited to the most recent point; you can 'undo' as many ranks as you have refund points (refund points maxing out at 10 but you get more (assuming you aren't at max) per 250 XP and by completing missions, given mission completion gives you 1000 experience and 1 skill point (first time completed). This lets you experiment with different builds and branches of skills without having to start from scratch. Very cool.
As I'm a cautious player, this was great. In Diablo II I was forever saving my Stat points until I knew the direction I wanted to take the character which really sucks out the fun.
Skill points, however, cannot be undone but that's not a real drama. I ended up with more than I knew what to do with. You continue to get one skill point (just not the 5 attribute points) per 'level' after level 20 (the max). There are numerous ways to gain skills. Starting from level 1 I found skill availabilty to be decent but somewhat lacking in those I wanted (but not necessarily those one could make use of). I'm just very picky. You can also 'capture' a skill that a "boss" (magic creature) is using with a signet ring of capture. Targetting creatures shows a health bar and its name at the top of the screen, beneath this appears the skill the target is currently using/casting.
The more skills you have, obviously the more options of combat are open to you. I found that, as promised, Guild Wars eliminates continually tedium and mindless hacking in order to level before your character is anywhere near useful. The second you get your first two skills (by NPC, for free) you are formidable. Not invulnerable, but you can hold your own. I played a caster and traditionally in RPG's, the caster is the weakest and dullest to start with but grows in power as you progress. You still grow in power, but you're poweful enough to go out on your own and not have to run screaming every five seconds. During the 'training' part of the game, your character gets a lot of skills provided by trainers. Perhaps 12 between the two professions you choose.
An interesting and different aspect of the game and completely balanced is that Health and Energy (mana) are the same for every class. Health goes up by a certain amount each level but Energy stays the same. Items obviously add to these such as spell caster armour (which you have from the get-go) adds 10 to energy and also +2 to energy regeneration. Regeneration of health and energy is a big factor, especially for casters. It's a team-oriented game, of course, so having a monk in your party (at least one) is always recommended to help this. (There are no healing or mana potions but when not in combat your health regenerates phenominally like 'resting' between battles.
I felt I should mention the things above because of their unique shaping of the game. Now, to actually playing: The quests were different. It's impossible not to be cliche all of the time but by and by they were original and interesting quests and this is just the training quests, you have others which take you all over the world (in stages, of course as I will mention in a moment) and Co-operative Missions which can be played alone (though there are henchmen) but I don't recommend it. They grow in difficulty but apart from making it easier by having thinking players in your party, it's far more fun as strategy can vary greatly.
My fondest memory and greatest feeling of achievement over the three days was the hardest mission I'd played. It took numerous tries, at least 5, I think (when everyone dies we return to outpost and try again (or change the party)). Eventually quite a few gave up but each time we tried we learned more about our comrades and the way we play. Soon we were brilliant and unstoppable. Some players mentioned the mission was harder than previous BWE's (Beta Weekend Event) but we conquered it anyway, eventually, due in no small part to teamwork. I healed a lot but being Monk secondary I was not as good as a primary would have been (primary attribute of Monk passively makes healing more effective) but we stayed alive and if we didn't, I could resurrect.
On the subject of death, semi-combining with the experimental points of refunding attributes, there is no great penalty for death. No gold or experience loss because that's not fun. Granted, a cost means you can't get away with being totally reckless, but recovering from such costs is tedious, boring and increases frustration if you die a lot. During missions there is a penalty but it's nothing incredibly dire.
There are cooperative missions and there are explorable areas. Explorable Areas can also be played cooperatively, but they're not as hard a missions but still have quests from NPC's they just don't advance the plot or not that I've seen.
There is absolutely no consequence to dying in the training beginning. This section of the game is a semi-safeground where you learn the mechanics but it's not so much a tutorial: There are little blue messages that pop up with tips and directions now and then but I barely noticed them though many were helpful. The NPC's didn't talk about key mapping or options screens. It was all OOC interface stuff which I appreciated.
Once you leave the training area and start missions and such, resurrection after dying comes with a "Death Penalty" whereby, for each death you incur a 15% reduction of your health and energy. The more you die, the more likely you are to die again, I suppose. Don't worry, though, accomplishing goals and just killing the many evil creatures will reduce the penalty one bit at a time (based on XP earned from kills the party makes). There is a 60% cap on the penalty so you won't ever be totally useless, but certainly very fragile at that point.
The second you complete a mission, everyone dies and/or you return to the outpost/city from which the mission/explorable area is launched, Death Penalties, regardless of how high a percentage, vanish. So, while exploring or in missions you should be cautious but there's not horrendous over-all penalty for dying whether through carelessness, lag (not that much was prevalent), bug or mouse malfunction.
The instancing system where leaving a town to an explorable area or a mission creates your very own instance of that part of the world (for just you, or if you're in a party, the group of you) had me a little concerned about lonliness or making things seem a bit strange. While seeing others around is nice, I barely missed not seeing people and it was very nice not having to worry about other people already killing monsters or killing those you target, non-consensual PvP or other annoyances. The system works very well and if you want to interact you can always do that in the towns or have a party before you leave.
Speaking of leaving, Map Travel is by far one of my most-loved features of the game. If you've played the Baldur's Gate series you will recognise this method of travelling: Once you enter a town or reach a mission, a point is placed on your world-map. From then on you can simply click the icon on the map to jump directly to that place instead of having to traverse dangerous areas (or completely cleaned out/empty areas) which eliminates a lot of the annoying running around that wastes time. I've always hated such tedium and when you reach a point and realise you've forgotten something, you don't have to run all the way back again, just a click and you're there.
Some areas don't have the map points, like Green Hills County, but whether that's a bug/glitch or deliberate I'm uncertain. Most do, though, and it's a fantastic thing and without being 'waylaid and having to defend yourself'
Something I found a little irritating is not being able to map-travel while partied. If you try it asks you if you wish to leave the party to do so. Generally, I'd expect most people to disband and reform at the new destination rather than running goodness knows how far.
PvP is not the horrible thing it is in many other online games. I enjoyed it immensely though I still favour PvE (Player vs Environment [monsters]) though highly recommend others give PvP a go, perhaps at level 10 when you're familiar with the majority of your skills and have had a chance to gain more as well as allocate attribute points to your liking. It's when I tried it but mostly because that was when I realised it was there accessible from the city (and is so from level 1). :)
As mentioned in my last entry, I didn't get the opportunity to participate in being in a Guild and the warfare/team playing that extends but hopefully next time (BWE or Full-Release, whichever comes first for me)
That's really just the general stuff and doesn't relay how fun the game really is. Unofficial Guild Wars Site, GWOnline.net is a fantastic and nigh-complete resource for the game if you want more info. Or, if I know the answer, as I said in the first entry after the weekend, I'm happy to talk about anything Guild Wars related.
Are you still alive? :)
I apologise for the length but this is a rundown of features that I enjoyed. There are no spoilers for the plot/quests within the game so read freely if online computer games interest you, otherwise I definitely suggest you ignore this entry.
One thing you'll notice about character creation is names. You CANNOT HAVE numbers or non-alphabetical characters of any sort in your name. A-Z and space, that's it. I think this is fantastic. Granted, I believe you can still alter the case of the letters but it stops the really stupid names that just annoy people. On the whole, everyone had names that were either interesting or a bit strange but nothing that made you groan or want to flee to another area immediately.
Creating a character was incredibly simple. You start at level 0 so there's nothing complex at all: At this point, your Name, Primary Profession (Mesmer, Monk, Elementalist, Warrior or Ranger) and Appearance (face, hair, hair colour, skin colour and height) are all you need to think about.
The Primary Profession is your selection at first. You can gain a secondary later on and unlike Dungeons and Dragons there's no splitting levels; multiclassing is ONLY a strength, never a weakness. Despite this, it is not unbalanced and you're not a super-player or anything like that; all it does is open up interesting and different combinations of skills with which to strategise. There are a couple of limitations that makes every combination of professions unique: You can only wear the armour of your primary profession. Each profession has a primary attribute but you may only place points into the primary attribute of your primary profession.
When searching for a secondary profession, the trainers give you a quest and 'lend' two or three skills for that profession to help you complete it (and get a feel for the powers of the profession). After completing that mission, the trainer will offer the profession as a secondary (which is irreversible). Before you accept, I vigourously encourage (unless you're not the explorer/experimenting type) to find other trainers (NPC's give easy directions to them) and try each one (accepting each quest will replace the lent skills from the previous profession's quest) but you'll get them back if you go back and accept the offer to use them as a secondary (and the skills will then be permanently available to you).
It was by doing this that I discovered the Necromancer is not as limited as I thought but that the Mesmer is very, very cool as I had already thought that by looking at skills but the profession is not recommended for beginners due to requiring advanced tactics [according to the character creation screen] and I don't disagree). Come next opportunity I will try my hand at the Ranger and Warrior as well to see what they are like. From watching others in my parties, they have their own good points to try.
Keep in mind, and I found this a magnificent aspect, you can UNDO any ranks you place into any of your attributes with 'refund points' which I found almost inexhaustible. I changed my mind about a few choices I'd made and experimented with the effect a point would have in skills linked to that attribute. It's not limited to the most recent point; you can 'undo' as many ranks as you have refund points (refund points maxing out at 10 but you get more (assuming you aren't at max) per 250 XP and by completing missions, given mission completion gives you 1000 experience and 1 skill point (first time completed). This lets you experiment with different builds and branches of skills without having to start from scratch. Very cool.
As I'm a cautious player, this was great. In Diablo II I was forever saving my Stat points until I knew the direction I wanted to take the character which really sucks out the fun.
Skill points, however, cannot be undone but that's not a real drama. I ended up with more than I knew what to do with. You continue to get one skill point (just not the 5 attribute points) per 'level' after level 20 (the max). There are numerous ways to gain skills. Starting from level 1 I found skill availabilty to be decent but somewhat lacking in those I wanted (but not necessarily those one could make use of). I'm just very picky. You can also 'capture' a skill that a "boss" (magic creature) is using with a signet ring of capture. Targetting creatures shows a health bar and its name at the top of the screen, beneath this appears the skill the target is currently using/casting.
The more skills you have, obviously the more options of combat are open to you. I found that, as promised, Guild Wars eliminates continually tedium and mindless hacking in order to level before your character is anywhere near useful. The second you get your first two skills (by NPC, for free) you are formidable. Not invulnerable, but you can hold your own. I played a caster and traditionally in RPG's, the caster is the weakest and dullest to start with but grows in power as you progress. You still grow in power, but you're poweful enough to go out on your own and not have to run screaming every five seconds. During the 'training' part of the game, your character gets a lot of skills provided by trainers. Perhaps 12 between the two professions you choose.
An interesting and different aspect of the game and completely balanced is that Health and Energy (mana) are the same for every class. Health goes up by a certain amount each level but Energy stays the same. Items obviously add to these such as spell caster armour (which you have from the get-go) adds 10 to energy and also +2 to energy regeneration. Regeneration of health and energy is a big factor, especially for casters. It's a team-oriented game, of course, so having a monk in your party (at least one) is always recommended to help this. (There are no healing or mana potions but when not in combat your health regenerates phenominally like 'resting' between battles.
I felt I should mention the things above because of their unique shaping of the game. Now, to actually playing: The quests were different. It's impossible not to be cliche all of the time but by and by they were original and interesting quests and this is just the training quests, you have others which take you all over the world (in stages, of course as I will mention in a moment) and Co-operative Missions which can be played alone (though there are henchmen) but I don't recommend it. They grow in difficulty but apart from making it easier by having thinking players in your party, it's far more fun as strategy can vary greatly.
My fondest memory and greatest feeling of achievement over the three days was the hardest mission I'd played. It took numerous tries, at least 5, I think (when everyone dies we return to outpost and try again (or change the party)). Eventually quite a few gave up but each time we tried we learned more about our comrades and the way we play. Soon we were brilliant and unstoppable. Some players mentioned the mission was harder than previous BWE's (Beta Weekend Event) but we conquered it anyway, eventually, due in no small part to teamwork. I healed a lot but being Monk secondary I was not as good as a primary would have been (primary attribute of Monk passively makes healing more effective) but we stayed alive and if we didn't, I could resurrect.
On the subject of death, semi-combining with the experimental points of refunding attributes, there is no great penalty for death. No gold or experience loss because that's not fun. Granted, a cost means you can't get away with being totally reckless, but recovering from such costs is tedious, boring and increases frustration if you die a lot. During missions there is a penalty but it's nothing incredibly dire.
There are cooperative missions and there are explorable areas. Explorable Areas can also be played cooperatively, but they're not as hard a missions but still have quests from NPC's they just don't advance the plot or not that I've seen.
There is absolutely no consequence to dying in the training beginning. This section of the game is a semi-safeground where you learn the mechanics but it's not so much a tutorial: There are little blue messages that pop up with tips and directions now and then but I barely noticed them though many were helpful. The NPC's didn't talk about key mapping or options screens. It was all OOC interface stuff which I appreciated.
Once you leave the training area and start missions and such, resurrection after dying comes with a "Death Penalty" whereby, for each death you incur a 15% reduction of your health and energy. The more you die, the more likely you are to die again, I suppose. Don't worry, though, accomplishing goals and just killing the many evil creatures will reduce the penalty one bit at a time (based on XP earned from kills the party makes). There is a 60% cap on the penalty so you won't ever be totally useless, but certainly very fragile at that point.
The second you complete a mission, everyone dies and/or you return to the outpost/city from which the mission/explorable area is launched, Death Penalties, regardless of how high a percentage, vanish. So, while exploring or in missions you should be cautious but there's not horrendous over-all penalty for dying whether through carelessness, lag (not that much was prevalent), bug or mouse malfunction.
The instancing system where leaving a town to an explorable area or a mission creates your very own instance of that part of the world (for just you, or if you're in a party, the group of you) had me a little concerned about lonliness or making things seem a bit strange. While seeing others around is nice, I barely missed not seeing people and it was very nice not having to worry about other people already killing monsters or killing those you target, non-consensual PvP or other annoyances. The system works very well and if you want to interact you can always do that in the towns or have a party before you leave.
Speaking of leaving, Map Travel is by far one of my most-loved features of the game. If you've played the Baldur's Gate series you will recognise this method of travelling: Once you enter a town or reach a mission, a point is placed on your world-map. From then on you can simply click the icon on the map to jump directly to that place instead of having to traverse dangerous areas (or completely cleaned out/empty areas) which eliminates a lot of the annoying running around that wastes time. I've always hated such tedium and when you reach a point and realise you've forgotten something, you don't have to run all the way back again, just a click and you're there.
Some areas don't have the map points, like Green Hills County, but whether that's a bug/glitch or deliberate I'm uncertain. Most do, though, and it's a fantastic thing and without being 'waylaid and having to defend yourself'
Something I found a little irritating is not being able to map-travel while partied. If you try it asks you if you wish to leave the party to do so. Generally, I'd expect most people to disband and reform at the new destination rather than running goodness knows how far.
PvP is not the horrible thing it is in many other online games. I enjoyed it immensely though I still favour PvE (Player vs Environment [monsters]) though highly recommend others give PvP a go, perhaps at level 10 when you're familiar with the majority of your skills and have had a chance to gain more as well as allocate attribute points to your liking. It's when I tried it but mostly because that was when I realised it was there accessible from the city (and is so from level 1). :)
As mentioned in my last entry, I didn't get the opportunity to participate in being in a Guild and the warfare/team playing that extends but hopefully next time (BWE or Full-Release, whichever comes first for me)
That's really just the general stuff and doesn't relay how fun the game really is. Unofficial Guild Wars Site, GWOnline.net is a fantastic and nigh-complete resource for the game if you want more info. Or, if I know the answer, as I said in the first entry after the weekend, I'm happy to talk about anything Guild Wars related.
Are you still alive? :)