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Post by Sollo on Aug 24, 2007 9:56:00 GMT -5
I didn't take the day off so I haven't had much time to play and won't until tomorrow. Does it meet expectations?
I was on this morning only long enough to get to the first outpost and noticed these things?
1. I spent a lot of time downloading patches. 2. The monster AI is improved and more realistic. 3. I spent so much time running that I barely had time to admire the scenery.
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Post by Aeron Serabien on Aug 24, 2007 11:26:34 GMT -5
We had some crazy storms here last night and our cable went out. So we spent our night shopvac-ing water in our basement. Fun! So, if the cable's back up and running and we're not getting any more water tonight, Night and I will jump on after we've put the basement back together. If we don't make it, I'll count on this thread to give me the skinny.
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Post by Fate on Aug 24, 2007 12:25:59 GMT -5
Hey I got on this morning and started the first quest. After 20 minutes of loading files and only being 25% complete I locked the computer and went to work. So if I'm still logged on and I don't answer you if you ask me something you wil know why.
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Post by Sollo on Aug 24, 2007 15:11:54 GMT -5
I'm surprised that Anet didn't stream in some of these patches for GW:EN over time. With everyone hitting the patching servers in mass, it takes forever just to get in.
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notrub
In Ascalon
[BGN]
Posts: 86
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Post by notrub on Aug 24, 2007 18:23:19 GMT -5
Welp, I spent 16 hours and finnished the Norm quest line and got the tapestry for the Hall of Monuments. Up to that point I like the changes they made to the game very much. The NPC's talk to you. The graphics upgrades made it obvious I need a new graphics card. The things I didn't like is: 1) It was suppose to be for level 20 characters. But a lot of the content was like being on a starter area. Especially the drops. 2) The Hall of Monuments turned out to be a BIG disappointment. No heroes unless they have upgraded armor. And, No PvE titles only PvP. Which made me feel kind of stupid putting all the time to get 13??? 3) The missions you don't really know your in until they are over. You get them just like any other quest. And, I still don't haqve a clue if there is more than one level. Or, they are just finnish or not finnished. The way you find out they are missions is when you go to the HoM and they can be readded to your quest log. Quests can not. 4) The downloads are a bear (no pun entended). And you have them every time you go someplace new. Anyway, the bottom line for me is they made PvE were you have to put in a lot of time and effort to have anything to show show for it, and then ANET showed me it wasn't worth it. So I am think I about just skipping GW:EN and wait on GW2 and hope for something better??? To say I am highly disappointed in this HoM thingy is an understatement.....
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Post by Indagatrix on Aug 24, 2007 18:41:41 GMT -5
I thought the little critter that kept calling me a boobie or booblah or whatever sounded a little like Brain -- from Pinky and the Brain...
That's all the impression I got this morning will drinking coffee...oh and the blonde almost nekkid chick I think is taller than me in real life -- and that's freaking tall!
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Post by Quintare on Aug 25, 2007 1:39:22 GMT -5
I think the hall of monuments is going to get a major revamp sometime soon. I hear a lot of dissappointment with it. I never held up really high hopes on the thing in the first place cuz it's not the kind of thing that really interests me in the first place.
I'd feel like an idiot telling everyone "OooOOoo, so you wanna come see my hall of monuments," so they can ooh and ahh and tell me how leet I am? Whatever.
But, we'll see. Aangy is mad cuz now all her mini pets are customized to one character, and she wasn't expecting that, but I dunno what she thought would happen. Maybe they'll make the place recognize your achievements account-wide instead, that would solve a lot of problems, I think.
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Post by Indagatrix on Aug 25, 2007 11:06:55 GMT -5
Aangy is mad cuz now all her mini pets are customized to one character, and she wasn't expecting that, but I dunno what she thought would happen. Maybe they'll make the place recognize your achievements account-wide instead, that would solve a lot of problems, I think. Agreed -- I won't use it if my critters can only be per one character -- my girls like to share their things.
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Post by Xaja on Aug 25, 2007 20:00:07 GMT -5
I was a bit annoyed at the fact that they just reskinned a lot of foes, but I didn't have too many qualms about it other than that, although I'll admit it didn't quite have the feel that the rest of the games had for some reason.
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Post by angelspassion on Aug 26, 2007 7:57:40 GMT -5
Crazy storms should be in-game, not in your basement. Hope things are much better, now. After 5-6 hours or so, I like it. But since I'm kinda new I'm easily impressed. And because I live in a desert, I'm really enjoying running around the snow and ice (because in real life, I'm afraid of snow and ice.....and bears). Saw a couple of skills that I would like to get, one for my bow-Ranger and one for my Beastmistress, so they hopefully hit a little harder. Hey, BGN #1 vote-getter, and the competition is lagging. What happened there?
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notrub
In Ascalon
[BGN]
Posts: 86
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Post by notrub on Aug 26, 2007 16:04:12 GMT -5
Well a day later and a new perspective. As usual the best part of GW:EN was today running with guildies and alliance mates. What a difference exploring with real people is over heroes and henchies. Even when we fail it is fun. And that is what this is all really about, just having fun........ Oh btw, Rangers FTW!!!! And, in answer to your question. All the ones that gave us real competition got booted for one reason or another, last month and the month before?
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Post by Sollo on Aug 27, 2007 7:50:46 GMT -5
I already posted my first impressions, so let me post a final impression. Also, I should point out that I was irritable all weekend due to my ISP dropping connection for 30 seconds at a time, half dozen times an hour all weekend long.
1. I've never been much of a fan of winter wonderlands. Snow depresses me so the game is already starting out with a handicap. However, I believe the charr lands are green so...
2. GW:EN seems to have gone down the same path that Nightfall did in which the path to the ending is not clear. I'm not sure, but I believe there are three different paths you can take? And I get the impression that you can do them all at once when the game is released. I don't like when they do that because it makes it harder to keep track of what is going on at any given point.
3. The hero's that join seem to be more like stalkers in that you turn around and suddenly there they are! Previously you had to work to get a Hero to join your party and it was clear when you succeeded. I think it was late Saturday before I even noticed that there were 4 hero's in my list that I hadn't been aware of.
4. This may just be a glitch, but it seems that some quests did not go away when I finished them. When the explanation points came back I thought there was something else I needed to do and was unsure if I should spend the time trying to find out. If they are repeatable quests it would be nice of they were labeled as such like they did in the past.
5. Anet seems to be abandoning the Agro circle rule. Several critters seemed to alter course and come straight to my party from the far edge of the Radar screen. They introduced this in Nightfall with "Spotters" but in NF they were able to make it work. Now it seems like everything is a spotter. Why don't they just go the next step and remove the agro circle entirely?
6. I seem to have been trained for hand to hand combat, and even got brass nuckles. Yet the only time I seem to be able to use the skills is to repeat the quest that gave me the skills to begin with. Maybe they are going somewhere with it but right now it appears that they wasted my time.
7. They introduced some new skills that don't seem to be class specific. It's an interesting idea that could be useful. Will have to see how they flesh that out.
8. I like the improved graphics of the critters. They really seem to come alive at times.
9. Like others, I'm not really impressed by the hall of monuments. This could be because I couldn't make any of it work. I have several tappestry pieces but could only unlock one of the shrines and that's it. Couldn't actually do anything with the unlocked shrine either. Disappointing.
10. I like that I'm getting more options for Hero's now. I can toss together a larger range of possibilities than I was able to before. For instance, one quest (forgot the name) required me to defend the Eye against an invading army. Between hero's and henchmen I was able to assemble a party with 3 healers, 3 fire elementalists, and 2 tanks and slaughter the invading army.
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Post by Quintare on Aug 27, 2007 10:55:46 GMT -5
Yay for 10 more heros. Boo for 10 more sets of gear to purchase or farm. Hall of Monuments is in need of a remodel, I expect it will happen sooner rather than later, just remains to be seen how drastic it is. I noticed when Vekk joined the group, however Ogden joined at the same time and somehow I missed that... I agree that more warmup to that bit of plot would have been nice. Personally I like the idea that I can choose my own path through the game, I would have been much happier to start off by slaughtering Char. I think the new Char may actually supplant my long-cherished love for slaying the White Mantle. It's interesting to me how sophisticated ANet is getting in blending missions in with primary quests and secondary quests to weave a more seamless storyline, but that's probably the game design enthusiast in me talking, because in practice it's a bit confusing. Especially considering it's a new and unheralded approach. Not that we should be surprised really, every release has seen modifications to the way the story is presented, marked and rewarded. Aggro circles I'm not so sure about. It seemed to me that they were being particularly diabolical in the paths and spacing of their patrols. I saw numerous instances in the explorable zones in which there it was very difficult to pick out one group of monsters and kill them before another group marched into your combat range. And then more stacked up behind them... it was pretty much a massacre more often than not. End analysis for me, having been very busy all weekend with work and finals and hence trying to play when I really should have been eating/sleeping/cleaning house/playing with kids is that there are a lot of things to do, and they aren't all quests. Which is nice I really like that. I know ANet strives to avoid the drudgery of the typical 'fed-ex' quest, however they replace that with the drudgery of endless background quests. Background quests are nice mind you and they add a richness of detail to the chapter, but they wear out their welcome eventually also. Oblivion has had the best mix of that so far that I've seen, but their world was totally open in a way you can't really do in a multi-player setting. I didn't really do any of the dungeons or discover any of the traps they talked about. I got my pvp titles displayed in the Hall (that is to say I hung a blank tapestry ), I got statues of all but 3 of my (prior) heros, and I followed the primary Norn line out to the end (I think). Next week I'll probably be invading the Char homelands and I hope it has as many diversions to play as the Far Shiverpeaks.
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Post by Aeron Serabien on Aug 27, 2007 11:09:33 GMT -5
We only got to play for about an hour last night. So far it doesn't seem that much different from anything else. The shiverpeaks are lovely and I like the cragginess of the mountains. I DID love this moment when Night and I were hanging around clearing an area and avoiding going through the portal to the next one when suddenly like 30 charr come out of nowhere to storm the area. I'm all... "OH CRAP." He's like, "whatever lets take them. They're only level 8." Sadly, there were some 20s hidden in there who ganked us, but Margrid and Vekk stayed alive and saved the day. I like "OH CRAP" moments. Fun stuff!
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Post by Sollo on Aug 27, 2007 12:10:27 GMT -5
That happens more often than not. I've started bringing along a couple of Fire elementalist out of habbit now. Doesn't take long to clear those mobs when a couple of fire ele's are dropping meteor showers and fire storms on their heads.
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Post by Fate on Aug 27, 2007 12:21:10 GMT -5
All and all I had fun. Got to run with guildies. do some quests, got some new drops (one that removes all death penalty from the group and gives everyone a 10% morale boost. Not sure exactly where I got it), met a 9 ft tall blonde female warrior, got to sing the Pinky and the Brain theme song to my guildies over and over (this did involve a litle adult beverage), got run over by a giant snowball, got to hit some dwarfs with some brass knuckels........ Hall of monuments was a waste of time for me. I miss the missions. The primary quests that seemed to replace those did not seem to have the finality of a mission where if you screw up and all die then you have to start over. Not to mention no bonus or masters parts of it. Wonder where hard/normal mode went? It seems that this was really in hard mode. The critters agro's easier and they did not stay focused on one target for long and ran really quick from AOE things. But that is how ANET likes to do it. Make it real hard and then nerf it later. All in all I would give it an 8 (if not just for the 9 foot blonde woman). Solo, I had to replace my router. The wireless has been buggy for a while but even the wired connections seemed to start having some weird disconnects lately.
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Post by Asya on Aug 27, 2007 16:36:49 GMT -5
Completed everything the preview had to offer except for one difficult quest (centuri hordes) and completing the Norn fighting tournament.
Preview Hits * See new heroes * Introduction to the dungeon system * View the Hall of Monuments * Getting a nice drop at the end of each dungeon run from a giant chest * PvE only skills * Dwarf boxing * Norn Fighting Tournament * New pets including eagle and polar bear * Dynamic music
Preview Misses * Too short primary quest. Could be done in less than 8 hours. * Extensive rehash of existing modes/skins. The expansion relies too heavily on existing ArenaNet assets. Examples: Djinn, polar bears, avalanches, and map tiles. * Out of place monsters. Dredges from the Faction’s forest are in the dungeons. This gives the appearance of a slapped together level editing. * Quests without a locator arrow. Running around with no idea where to go. Not fun. Examples include Krak’s Cavalry and Anything You Can Do. I don’t like Jack-in-the-Boss monsters that are not on radar either. * Dude! Where’s my mission! Breaking from the mission metaphore and all task becoming a quest, gives GWEN a chaotic characteristic which this player does not like. * Repeatable quests with no idea if they are repeats. Hey, this seems familiar. Why not call them groundhog day quests. * Hall of Monuments. What a total failure. Customized pets. PvP rewards? * Crazy Korean like chests that fall from the sky at the end of dungeons. This breaks the RPG aspect. It should be like chests in DoA where they open upon completion. * All the chests use lockpicks. ANY chest that requires a lockpick should ALWAYS spit out a gold — NOT GRAPES! Spend 1,500 gold for a lockpick that breaks when you use it, and produces a 54g item. gg anet. * Dungeons need adjacent outposts to facilitate party play. Anet is doing a wonderful job of turning a good co-operative RPG into an online single player game with built in instant messaging. * Any type of PvE balance is gone. With the new skills and consumables it becomes a I win/You loose button. * No sense of failure. Guess it is to boost self estime that even if the entire party is at -60DP the quest can still be accomplished. I even started one quest by intentionally getting to -60 DP just to see if it could be done. Yep. * Ungodly long downloads. 20+ minutes. What happened to streaming updates at the login screen? * Chirping NPCs get annoying.
Summary Personally, I found the event failed to showcase GWEN. The Nightfall team should have worked on it. GWEN appears to have been infected by the NCSoft Dungeon Runner team.
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Post by Sollo on Aug 27, 2007 22:06:49 GMT -5
Hey, BGN #1 vote-getter, and the competition is lagging. What happened there? And, in answer to your question. All the ones that gave us real competition got booted for one reason or another, last month and the month before? Inda's assassination squad hard at work knocking off the other guilds!
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Post by Eldarion on Aug 28, 2007 15:15:26 GMT -5
From what I've read the Nightfall team *did* do EotN. The Factions team is working on GW2.
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Post by TheUncleanOne on Aug 28, 2007 22:05:57 GMT -5
Well, I think, one of the various online articles said both teams transition to GW2 after GW:ENs release... (with a few people left over for maintaining GW1).
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Post by Eldarion on Aug 31, 2007 23:26:00 GMT -5
So far, I'm finding GW:EN to be very depressing. It epitomizes everything I dislike about GW -- the overlong dungeon crawls, the grinding for special points. It's just Sorrow's Furnace all over again, with a deceptively bright coat of paint to hide the flaws.
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