Spoiling Games

[old.Anxiety]

Warmest hello's Boardgoers!

I've been playing MMORPG's for about 2.5 years now and i consider myself unable to go back to AI one-player games or whatever you wanna call them.

The crux of my post concerns the wealth of online material that becomes available for online games regarding training methods, ways to get the best character for PvP or where all the "uber" items are located, spoiler sites if you like. I appreciate that it's down to the individual whether they choose to view this information or not but by exposing yourself to all that a game has to offer in as quick a time as possible you're actually using up your enjoyment credit allotment prematurely. You're actually taking the longevity of the game away from yourself. This has particularly come to my attention with DAoC as i don't feel the character development system is the most flexible that i've seen.

Take the Shadowblade class for example (the only one i've played to high level), if you decided you wanted to create a Shadowblade that was to rule the roost from Yggdra all the way to Snowdonia it would be a simple case of going to daoc.warcry.com, following a link in the forums and they would tell you how to do this. Admittedly it is the general consensus that there are 3 main templates, so the only major player decision is which type of SB he/she would like and then it's a simple case of doing the xp spots in order and following the training instructions listed...where's the choice leading to an individual character in that? Not wishing to tar everyone with the same brush but it's just a general vibe i'm getting that players would prefer to have a website create their character for them.

I guess essentially i'm a disappointed roleplayer as opposed to an "owner" but i just thought i'd share my thoughts...

What do you think?

P.S I'm an advocate of world wide game releases in unison, so the American's don't get to complete the games first and then tell us europeans how to do it. Thus denying us the chance to figure it our for ourselves.

 

[old.Sami]

So what?

Build your char the way you think is the most "fun" or way you wanna do it. I play a hib bard, specced VERY diffrently than most of the others (read heal). Ppl keep telling me that bards are no healers (which is true), they should concentrate on songs and mezzing (which is also tru). So what? I wanna do it this way, I've put a lot of time and effort into balancing my skills and finally, at lvl50, my bard will have 2 skill points leftover.

Never seen no-one complaining about the suicide-groupheals.. saving evry1 elses ass, getting myself killed. Wonder if its the fact that they've never seen any other bard casting a groupheal...

 

[old.Hendrick]

Roleplaying does not come with numbers or stats, but with the way your character interacts with others. I see no trouble in making the most out of my character stat-wise, and then still give him that personal touch by roleplaying certain characteristics.

 

[old.dittytwo]

Thoses website
I read them all when starting my Minstrel (there are a lot of them)
I then went and put my stats into different ones than what they said and now I have a Minstrel that can kick ass in Melee too as well as cast stun mezz shouts etc

I choose to do it that way as I know that the times I play are different all over the place (ie different times week in week out)
so I have to do a lot of soloing, so really it suited me down to the ground.....

 

[old.Spug]

Well, those sites are there, I'll admit I've viewed them occasionally...

I've used them to get lists of spells that normally i wouldn't have access to, but this has helped me in knowing what to have on my quick bar, and explaining the difference between a Mez, and a Stun.

My Shadowblade is specced a little strangely, but he tends to fluctuate depending on how I feel when i train. Its a little easier with my healer, as she's only 3 lines to choose between

but I agree... a lot of the "go here, kill this" sites remove the enjoyment...

 

[matax]

I read the websites, worked out the sort of character I wanted to play and then decided myself where to put the skill points. For a sword/shield Hero thats not too difficult, for my ranger I've decided to put some points into Dual Wield even though most people say it's a waste of time - because I like it (and of course it looks cooler ).

When you consider you spend days of RL time getting your character to a good level, you want to make sure you are heading in the direction you want otherwise that is also spoiling your gaming experience - I gimped a couple of new characters by skilling in the wrong things before level 5 and had to restart - I wouldn't want to have to restart my level 24 hero.

Basically it's down to the individual. Ignore the websites completely, read them and take the info you want, but make up your own mind, or read them and follow them exactly to the letter. Everybody has their preference - the key thing as with most games is enjoy it in the way you want to

Personally the ones with things such as quest spoilers I tend to avoid, or skim read. Useful to know that the quest exists, but I'd rather work out the steps to completing it myself.

 

[galdora]

Fully agree markm, well said.

I cruise warcry for lists of quests and their starting points. I don't want to miss any and do not want to check in with every NPC in my realm everytime I lvl to see if there are any new quests.

I mybe uke: but I love running around looking for the quest mobs to kill.

Then, I love exploring new places. That's why I've started an alt in a different realm. I still love my main and main realm, but like to explore some new places. Can't wait for DF and expansion (not meant to start a "it'll be 2000 years before we see those" thread ok?).

I also checkout some sample templates for each of my chars. Don't want to gimp them from the start.

 

[old.Zepra]

Originally posted by dittytwo
...and now I have a Minstrel that can kick ass in Melee...

:O
Minstrel can't, and propably never will, kickass in meele :/
At lower levels it's easier though I guess, at 40+ most will propably start to feel minstrel gimp meele for real.

 

[cleeve]

hey all

Have you ever played D&D Anxiety? Or any paper based rpg for that matter? I don't know a single person who doesnt thoroughly research their 'character' before deciding what class they want to play. This would mean checking what spells you get - what level you get them at. What skills you get - when you get those skills - what your stats do and the effect of your stats on the various skills that you have. etc etc

Originally I was going to play Midgard and take a troll - but my m8 was already playing in Hibernia so I looked at the classes available to Hibernia and settled on druids, Then I checked the boards for advice on druids and playing a druid. Finally I checked the template and character info building sites so I could plan my way though the levels.

If I hadnt my character would now be binned. I didnt know which spells did what and what spending points in certain areas would do for my character. So no I dont think that theres anything wrong with character generation sites.

Spoiler sites - Can't see anything wrong with them. I enjoy doing quests but I don't know which quests are where and I dont fancy walking the breadth of Hibernia right clicking every single blooming NPC to find out thank you very much. I use spoiler sites to find out where I can get nice armour drops and nice weapon drops. This way I improve my character and know how to hunt more efficiently.

I am for freedom of choice on this. Some people will read them and think - I wish I hadnt, some will read them and think - this is invaluable. Me - I tend to read what I want and ignore the spoilers as best I can...

Global releasing - I WOULD love global releasing - but I doubt that we'll ever see it. Its a shame cos I hate waiting for games to be released


Cheers

Revor

 

[Ardwan]

I looked at the character builder on daoc catacombs to just see what spells and abilities each class has, so that I know what other realms can do, and know what my realm can do, I haven;t really looked at any templates, as I make my character us as I go along, putting points into whichever skill look lonely

 

[old.dittytwo]

Originally posted by Zepra

:O
Minstrel can't, and propably never will, kickass in meele :/
At lower levels it's easier though I guess, at 40+ most will propably start to feel minstrel gimp meele for real.

well probably but by the time that i get to such a high level due to not being able to play and what have you that Mythic will have released a patch that will allow us to re set all the states and reapplie the base states

we are talking years down the line here

 

[old.tRoG]

i tend to loo at the spoiler sites to find out where to get the new quests, but only look at the actual spoilers if a quest is REALLY annoying me and i just wanna get it finished

like that mucking through the ick one (a lvl 8 quest i think)... my thane had it till he was lvl 27 and i was bothered to check warcry

that stupid spider ick...

 

[old.Anxiety]

Have you ever played D&D Anxiety? Or any paper based rpg for that matter?

I've first played the paper and dice games when I was 7 years old I think (and that's a good few years now). We moved around a lot when I was younger so I was always finding new roleplaying groups to join through school etc. Many systems were owned by friends and a few owned by myself (literal use of the word owned). I think the most fun was usually had whilst playing a completely new system that I didn't have a clue about, because i could think of a character in my head, the kind I wanted to play and then the GM/DM could advice me on the race/class. This usually led to some highly amusing encounters, because what my character was capable of in my own head was somewhat different to what it was actually capable of on paper, it had that element of mystery,bravery and damn right stupidity.

I found that the games that everyone knew or had a copy of became kind of slowed due to the fact that folk knew the rules inside out and would start arguing with the GM about the result of a particular encounter, or they would keep hinting at the GM to drop magic sword "X" into the quest because the had seen it in the magic items section of the rulebook and thought there Swordsman might like it.

The aspect of gimping has been mentioned a few times in your replies and I certainly appreciate this, maybe it's the fundamental flaw with level based systems. I'm a big fan of action based training (didn't want to bring up UO, but it had good game mechanics), the idea that your character became better at a skill by practising it more and it was also impossible to gimp your character, also if you got bored with your skillset you could go for something different just by practising those actions.

On the subject of Roleplaying in DAoC, I tried in the face of overwhelming opposition. Roleplaying is somewhat dependant on having others to roleplay with and these are few and far between in DAoC. When my character was young I met a hunter who described himself as a roleplayer through and through. In the hunting group we subsequently put together he spent the majority of his time quizzing the other hunter about " How much he put in spear", or "when was he gonna start training stealth" and why did he only have 95 skill in bow when the other hunter had 98.

I'm still enjoying DAoC because visually it's fantastic and the realm set-up offers good diversity for player characters and the lands in which they live (tried some keep defence the other day, which was wonderful). I don't think it'll be an all time great due to the level based system. The enjoyment in killing for xp has limited long term appeal.

 

[SFXman]

Yeh... it is your own choice. I myself prefer to make good characters using information given by others but this doesn't affect the longevity of my gaming, just because playing with other is the main point.

 

[Ardwan]

aye, I think that it would be much better if you got better at whatever you used most...does anyone know what the new mmorpgs(swg, morrowind etc) are gonna be point based, or the UO kind of lvling??

 

[old.Anxiety]

I've heard talk that Starwars Galaxies is going to be action based progression and i've heard simliar things about World of Warcraft, althought that is still in the early stages.

 

[Ardwan]

Originally posted by Anxiety
I've heard talk that Starwars Galaxies is going to be action based progression and i've heard simliar things about World of Warcraft, althought that is still in the early stages.

Cool, A good thing I heard about morrowind was the character creation part, rather than having a selection screen like DAoC, it just starts with you getting off a boat, and being asked questions by like custom officers(for lack of a better term )
So you character depends on how you answer the questions, it reminds me of Ultima Ascension, and is kinda cool to start like that

 

[old.stroke]

I like the "rolling" off a character in a rpg. It gives me a hint about what kind of guy this is. I agree that it's a bit boring to have set skills like here, but then again this is not an RPG, it's XP hunt.
My only good RP experiences from online gaming comes from the Barbary MUSH, a Call Of Cthulhu MUSH that was run in San Francisco. The 9 hour time difference made it difficult to keep up with, but it was excellent. Mostly storytelling with a Game Master handling all NPC's. Since you /emoted everything you did, and the GM handled dice (if needed at all) everything went very smoothly.
A game like Daoc is just too simple and blocky to allow the realism a text based MUSH can.. That's my 2 c.