Saeviomagy
Adventurer
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...
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...
