Forum

[Jasperak]

Originally Posted by WizarDru

Amusingly enough, almost all of the people I know who play Guild Wars are married couples. But you're right, GW is NOT what DDO should have been. I liked the cut of DDO's jib, but it's implementation just didn't work for us. I know several of my players who tried it and thought it was 'ok', but it just wasn't quite right. I thought, in many ways, that Neverwinter Nights was a much better implementation of what DDO should have been. If DDO and NWN could have had a baby, that's what I would have liked DDO to be.

As it was, several of my players tried it for a free trial and felt they'd seen as much as they were likely to and never went back. Which is a pity...but then, we have a weekly game, so the online game couldn't really compete with that.

DDO's implementation is the exact reason why I think GW evokes more D&D-like feelings. For me D&D is a more tactical and resource management game than shooter. Who the hell ever kept track of combats rounds with an egg timer?!?

While GW and most of the other games I mentioned are real-time, twitch reflexes do not play an as important part. Those games generally reduce combat to a choose your target and action and the computer will handle all the dice rolling. Now you must decide with what ability you wish to use in real time, but you character's chance to hit does not depend on how fast you can press keys or click the mouse. It is a fundamental difference that allows me to concentrate a little more on the tactical aspects of the game.

D&D in its later incarnations also concerns itself more with builds. Games like GW remind me of a cross between Sorcerers and Wizards. Any given class combo in GW will allow you to use well over a hundred abilities. That's your spellbook. But before every quest you get to choose what eight abilities you want to be able to use at-will. That's your spontaneous casting. DDO is primarily concerned with your builds but they can be nerfed with any given update or Mod. Thats almost like taking 75% or my Magic the Gathering cards and making some change to them that ultimately changes the capabilities of my deck. DDO is very much about the current build of the day because two months later a feat and enhancement combo could be nerfed to oblivion.

Regardless of if they are D&D games or not, others seem to have a closer kinship with D&D. NWN is by far the best experience in real-time D&D gaming, although SSG's gold box games (Pool of Radiance, Curse of the Azure Bonds, etc...) and games like the Wizardry series, The Bard's Tale series, or the early Might and Magic series nail turn-based as I have played it for the past 20+ years. Turbine could have used the above as inspiration for DDO or they could have used Baldur's Gate, Icewind Dale, or Champions of Norrath. They chose SOCOM and Unreal Tournament. WTF?!?

In hindsight I guess I could have said any of the above games are what DDO should have been, but I have been enamored with GW. It has the character-build sub-game that a gear monkey like me enjoys, it has the exploration for unlocking abilities sub-game that ensures the completionist that I am will play the game to its fullest, and a campaign that actually interests me. If DDO was not going to be faithful to D&D in its game play, if it was going to introduce new sub-systems into the mix (enhancements I'm looking at you) then GW did the same thing but in a far more rewarding manner.