Things that WOW didn't invent

[Theroc]

Furthermore, before any other MMO decided to do so - and most still don't do so - Blizzard decided to even out both factions as far as mechanics go. Alliance got shamans, Horde got paladins. There were still a few small mechanic changes, but MOST of the mechanics were equalized. Compare this with the hilariously massive failure of Warhammer Online.

I find this interesting, Cirno. I don't see Warhammer Online as a failure at all, rather, I enjoy it MORE than WoW in many occasions. Also Warhammer Online has 'different classes' for each faction, but most of the abilities mirror one another fairly closely(except for perhaps the Squigherder/Marauder/White Lion/Shadow Warrior rectangle) at least in my experience.

Could you please elaborate on how you feel Warhammer was a 'hiliariously massive failure'? As I truly do not understand your viewpoint at all. Are you saying that allowing both sides to use the exact same classes made it better?

 

[tyrlaan]

I would agree that WoW aren't about instant gratification, but constant gratification. Every time you played, the game feeds you a little bit, your character gets a little better, his gears gets a little better, all contributing to your addiction...

Quoting you because I was about to write exactly this It's what makes WoW such digital crack.

 

[Rechan]

Off topic, I didn't play WH:O but I really liked the idea of the Witch Hunter as a class. I was really hoping that would be the Avenger. Not just the fluff so much as the melee/ranged mix, the holy item usage, etc.

 

[Theroc]

I would agree that WoW aren't about instant gratification, but constant gratification. Every time you played, the game feeds you a little bit, your character gets a little better, his gears gets a little better, all contributing to your addiction...

I would definitely not say every time you played. When I hit max level, I spent a lot of time doing quests to earn gold that is mostly meaningless as far as improvement in end game content is concerned(Epic flying mounts of flight ability don't help you in dungeons/raids), but no one would let me raid because my gear wasn't shiny enough. And since no one would run with me, my gear wouldn't get shiny enough. So I got frustrated and quit for months. >.> And now I can't afford to play again.

I do agree that the game sets players up with loads of carrots to keep them wanting to play, unless the idea of knowing that the things were not placed for them to have fun, but to encourage them to suffer through 'endless' grinding to keep spending money turned them off. Then again, I hate mindlessly killing monsters only to discover half of them do not have heads...

 

[ExploderWizard]

I would agree that WoW aren't about instant gratification, but constant gratification. Every time you played, the game feeds you a little bit, your character gets a little better, his gears gets a little better, all contributing to your addiction...

There was an article somewhere that talked about that...if only I could find it again...

Great point! I do believe this videogame standard has crept into PnP rpg design. Anyone who is familliar with the term "dead level" has seen this influence in rpg games. Making power ups more frequent and making sure each one comes with a shiny new toy has become very popular these days.

 

[ProfessorCirno]

I find this interesting, Cirno. I don't see Warhammer Online as a failure at all, rather, I enjoy it MORE than WoW in many occasions. Also Warhammer Online has 'different classes' for each faction, but most of the abilities mirror one another fairly closely(except for perhaps the Squigherder/Marauder/White Lion/Shadow Warrior rectangle) at least in my experience.

Could you please elaborate on how you feel Warhammer was a 'hiliariously massive failure'? As I truly do not understand your viewpoint at all. Are you saying that allowing both sides to use the exact same classes made it better?

Because, financially, it's crashing and burning hard. It's had how many server merges as of late? And there's word that there's going to be more to come. It has yet to clear any of the financial expectations put up for it, and in fact, simply loses more subscribers and money as time goes on.

As for class mirrors, the issue there is that, while theoretically both factions have similar classes, the unique abilities in the classes can make a world of a difference. Or in other words, lol bright wizards warrior priests.

I'm not saying it's a bad or un-fun game, but it's made some astronomically bad design choices that's lead to it hemorrhaging money.

 

[Theroc]

Because, financially, it's crashing and burning hard. It's had how many server merges as of late? And there's word that there's going to be more to come. It has yet to clear any of the financial expectations put up for it, and in fact, simply loses more subscribers and money as time goes on.

As for class mirrors, the issue there is that, while theoretically both factions have similar classes, the unique abilities in the classes can make a world of a difference. Or in other words, lol bright wizards warrior priests.

I'm not saying it's a bad or un-fun game, but it's made some astronomically bad design choices that's lead to it hemorrhaging money.

And here I thought the problem was it just couldn't pull the users away from World of Warcraft long enough to get behind it. That was my experience anecdotally. Everyone I know that TRIED Warhammer prefers it to WoW(Except that none of their friends will play). In other words, if WH:O did not pull the whole guild along, they ended up failing to keep the players.

Maybe my experience is unique in that aspect, but I actually prefer WH:O's model for class design than WoW.

 

[rjdafoe]

So, I'm noticing that there's an awful lot of threads that complain that something or another is too much like WOW.

The funny thing is that usually they cite mechanics that are actually stolen by WOW from other things, most often from P&P roleplaying games.

So, I'm going to start a big list of things that aren't actually created by wow.

Now I'm not saying whether or not any particular game actually plays like WOW or not. I'm also not saying whether a comparison to WOW is a good thing or not. Finally I'm not saying that you cannot compare a game to WOW.

But it is interesting to see where these features all came from, so add your own!

1. Permanent combat pets as class features. 3eD&D druids and rangers had this and I'm sure it was not the first.

2. Phased monster abilities, or "Sequential boss fights" have been around for a very long time indeed.

3. Perception, aggro radius et al. Again, 3e and possibly even 2e before it had rules for these. In fact I wouldn't be surprised if the wargames that Braunstein evolved from had rules for perception.

4. Aggro - been around in the computer world for ages (most muds have a concrete set of rules for who monsters target in a group), and I'm dead-set sure I've seen an old PnP RPG with it, but I can't for the life of me remember what it was called. And that's just the more specific version, where the target of a monster is predictable and controllable. The concept of "monsters don't like PCs" is pretty much universal.

5. Treasure parcels. Need I say more?

6. Ability cooldowns. I'll start with vancian magic to bust that one, but there's a mass of other examples from computer, board and roleplaying games. Hell, some of them even refer to not firing a gun for a while to give it a chance to cool down!

7. Item sets. It was gauntlets of ogre power, belt of giant strength and the hammer of thunderbolts if I remember correctly...

There is one point that I would like to make.

WoW has done VERY LITTLE in bringing new things to the MMO genre. Virtually all of it was around BEFORE WoW. WoW just happens to do alot of it well, and to bring some of these together into 1 game. (That's not to say it hasn't, or hasn't evolved while doing so)

I played EverQuest (EQ) years before WoW, and almost all of it was there.

Around here, people cite WoW may to much, but it seems that it has become the "Kleenex" (facial tissues) of MMORPGs. (or if you prefer the "Google" of search engines, "Pergo" of laminate flooring etc..)

 

[rjdafoe]

Because, financially, it's crashing and burning hard. It's had how many server merges as of late? And there's word that there's going to be more to come. It has yet to clear any of the financial expectations put up for it, and in fact, simply loses more subscribers and money as time goes on.

As for class mirrors, the issue there is that, while theoretically both factions have similar classes, the unique abilities in the classes can make a world of a difference. Or in other words, lol bright wizards warrior priests.

I'm not saying it's a bad or un-fun game, but it's made some astronomically bad design choices that's lead to it hemorrhaging money.

WARs biggest problem is at it's core, it is a PVP game. There are an awfull lot of people who do not like a PVP game. Jsut look at WoWs server populations.

WoW, is at it's core a PVE game. The PVP aspect is bolted on, and is not as good as the PVE aspect. The reverse is true for WAR.

 

[Jeremy Ackerman-Yost]

There is one point that I would like to make.

WoW has done VERY LITTLE in bringing new things to the MMO genre. Virtually all of it was around BEFORE WoW. WoW just happens to do alot of it well, and to bring some of these together into 1 game.

I played EverQuest (EQ) years before WoW, and almost all of it was there.

But WoW added fun. When MMOs weren't actually fun for more than .001% of the population, they weren't actually a threat.

Around here, people cite WoW may to much, but it seems that it has become the "Kleenex" (facial tissues) of MMORPGs. (or if you prefer the "Google" of search engines, "Pergo" of laminate flooring etc..)

MMOs are actually the red herring, in any case.

4e has more in common with turn based tactics games (Final Fantasy Tactics, Tactics Ogre, etc) than it does with any MMO.

But "4e has a combat engine that is vaguely reminiscent of a bunch of small audience games none of us have played or heard of!" is a terrible rallying cry. It might actually make some of the iconoclasts here go try those games. On the other hand, "4e is just like WoW!" taps into the right sort of media hysteria.