Guild Wars is everything DDO should have been

[Jasperak]

I don't normally start threads but I just had to make a comment about my CRPG thoughts. I enjoyed Diablo and Diablo 2 and had a blast when a friend of mine in another state played Titan Quest with me. I had a good time with Morrowind although I have not tried Oblivion. Neverwinter Nights was the bomb and I have NWN2 on the shelf awaiting its turn on my computer. I have beaten Pool of Radiance and Curse of the Azure Bonds (Gold Box) and Eye of the Beholder 1 and 2, although 3 was garbage and not worth my time.

More than two years ago I joined the Dungeons & Dragons Online Beta and preordered the game. I played for one month plus the beta stage. IMHO it was a FPS in Eberron and had nothing to do with the strategy and tactics that I grew up with in PnP and some of the CRPGs I listed above. The class abilities and "enhancements" were either changed or completely overhauled throughout different stages of the game necessitating rebuilding characters. Success in the game depended more on twitch reflexes than brain power, and to top it off if you didn't have a group, good luck succeeding in a good portion of the missions at your level. I did go back at least once during a welcome back weekend. Except for the marketplace tent being gone, not much changed.

While shopping for Christmas at my local Target I saw Guild Wars Platinum Edition for ~$10. I thought oh what the hell, maybe THIS PvP might be fun. Well I have been playing for the past week or so and my Warrior/Necromancer is just about to make 11th-level. I have my own guild, although I have not grouped a single time (I wanted a cape!) I have yet to join in PvP.

This game is everything I wished DDO was. It has an interesting campaign and I am not forced to group with anyone unlike DDO which has no story and forces you to group. Like a regular D&D campaign GW sets the rules and starts the story in motion and doesn't let up unless you want to take a break by taking side missions. DDO has no overriding campaign arc that I can see and has changed their rules so much I shudder to think what my 4th-level Cleric is going to look like since I have not played him since 2006.

DDO is the very antithesis of what D&D has always been to me. It is a twitch shooter with about a half-dozen viable builds for the end game raids (If what I have followed on the DDO forums is true.) It has a poorly constructed campaign that is covered by Monte Haulism that I have not seen since the days my friends and I played D&D at lunch in middle-school. It has no point. GW more closely resembles any D&D campaign I have been in more than DDO has.

Maybe GW will suck once I have been at 20th-level for a while, but it wouldn't change the fact that DDO sucked from the start and only seemed to get worse with its three-day raid timers and its end-game Monte Haul item searching.

If anyone reading this loves DDO, great, different strokes for different folks and all of that stuff. But for me, a great story and the ability to have friends join in is what I game for. Regardless of rule systems.

/rant

I feel better now.

 

[Thanee]

Guild Wars is definitely a good game. Have fun!

Does the platinum thingie have the expansions? The one with the better heroes is quite nice.

Bye
Thanee

 

[Jasperak]

Guild Wars Platinum has Prophecies and the expansion Eye of the North. It does NOT have Nightfall or Factions. No Paragons or Dervishes for me

 

[Vocenoctum]

I bought Nightfall just for the Heroes, henchman just weren't cutting it.

Never did finish Nightfall though, and GWEN just didn't do it for me.

 

[Jasperak]

Yeah henchmen suck.

Does Gwen ever grow up?

 

[Merkuri]

This looks interesting. I noticed that it said there's no monthly fee. Do they make all of their money from people buying the boxed games, or are there other charges they hit you with somewhere?

 

[Thanee]

No charges. I think you can buy stuff in their store, but that's definitely not necessary.

Bye
Thanee

 

[Merkuri]

That's cool. I found another MMORPG a while ago (called Mabinogi, I think) that didn't charge a monthly fee and didn't even charge you to download the game, but just about anything else you could do in it that was fun required money. It was fun at first, then I got frustrated with it.

I'm trying to save money right now so I can't really afford to spend too much on computer games, and a monthly fee for one is right out, but I liked WoW when I played (dropped it mostly because I didn't feel like the fee was worth it - felt like I couldn't play anything but WoW since I was paying for it by the month), so I'm eager to find another MMORPG that's as entertaining as WoW without the fee.

Do you know if it's possible to buy a used copy of the game? Like, does the game come with a one-time-use-only code to activate your campaign, or whatever they call it?

 

[Evilhalfling]

GW is my favorate online game.

I suppose just having GW:EN allows you to pick up heroes - (customizable henchman) As soon as you can get to the Eye, grab a couple of heroes and then go back to prophcies. As the title acronym hints, gwen plays a major role in it.

Their money comes from frequently releasing a new expansions. Although this has slowed GW2 will be the next release. If you don't like grouping with others the game can be played solo, even if it is deserted. Some missions basically require multiple players, although I have a friend that can hench them all.

PvP is designed assuming you are 20th level. Unless you find a newbie arena,
or use a PvP only character your going to get killed.

The first game actually has the slowest character advancement, so I haven't played it as much.

 

[Vocenoctum]

Yeah henchmen suck.

Does Gwen ever grow up?

She's in Eye of the North, which was one of the cool parts.

Overall, the story to GW:EN was nice enough, but I just got tired of the swarms of stuff that became so much more common it it. Prophecies has some tough areas, but it seems like the later campaigns built on those tough areas.

(Like I said, I never did get back to Nightfall, but I hear the "nested monsters" where you kill 1 and two spawn and such are a lot more common there.)

I actually rarely grouped in my GW stuff. Most of my online bud's either didn't like it or just never played it vs WoW which most play.