GW2, part 2
So, official release day, what more is there to add?
I skimmed through an article by someone else of critiques, and generally agree.
They point out the dynamic events really aren't that dynamic for the most part. The biggest improvement is that when they happen, they're open to all comers, and participating brings some measure of reward. Otherwise, they're like most any other triggered quest with the down side of not always being available. I was envisioning a quest wiki that became some interlinked labrynth of events reported by different people, but instead, I've seen the same few come up in one area twice in a single play session (probably not more than an hour apart). It's not a big failing, but it's also far from the revolutionary accomplishment it was hyped to be.
Also, the writer complains about flaky geometry/jump mechanics fouling up some platformy sections. Most of these I've seen are to reach vistas (that grant some points) rather than completing quests, so it's not truly essential anywhere I've seen, but it's a slightly wider issue, too. Another article recently pointed out some nice model-adapting-to-slope graphics for humans, but since that started me paying attention, I couldn't help but notice my charr this morning clipping through hills or stepping on "air." Not sure if that discrepency is race-model or zone-geometry specific yet. That's just more evidence of what seems to be becoming my general summary of the game.
It does some things really well sometimes, but it's just not consistent enough about it.
The original article mentioned, and I'm still seeing, issues with the leveling curve. My human has managed to hit about level 11 before all the available "heart" quests and story quests are starting to be above his level. With my charr, I seem to be hitting that point at about level 5. I guess there's some expectation of more XP from dynamic events or crafting than I'm getting. Or maybe I "should" be shifting between race zones to do lower-level quests there? Whatever the case, it feels clunky and a touch frustrating.
Elementalist is... not shaping up the way I had hoped. Granted, this is just level 5 or thereabouts, and I've only had access to scepter skills. I'd like to get other weapons to try out, because the scepter skills have been disappointing except for perhaps one skill with each of the four elements. Hmm. We'll see there.
I skimmed through an article by someone else of critiques, and generally agree.
They point out the dynamic events really aren't that dynamic for the most part. The biggest improvement is that when they happen, they're open to all comers, and participating brings some measure of reward. Otherwise, they're like most any other triggered quest with the down side of not always being available. I was envisioning a quest wiki that became some interlinked labrynth of events reported by different people, but instead, I've seen the same few come up in one area twice in a single play session (probably not more than an hour apart). It's not a big failing, but it's also far from the revolutionary accomplishment it was hyped to be.
Also, the writer complains about flaky geometry/jump mechanics fouling up some platformy sections. Most of these I've seen are to reach vistas (that grant some points) rather than completing quests, so it's not truly essential anywhere I've seen, but it's a slightly wider issue, too. Another article recently pointed out some nice model-adapting-to-slope graphics for humans, but since that started me paying attention, I couldn't help but notice my charr this morning clipping through hills or stepping on "air." Not sure if that discrepency is race-model or zone-geometry specific yet. That's just more evidence of what seems to be becoming my general summary of the game.
It does some things really well sometimes, but it's just not consistent enough about it.
The original article mentioned, and I'm still seeing, issues with the leveling curve. My human has managed to hit about level 11 before all the available "heart" quests and story quests are starting to be above his level. With my charr, I seem to be hitting that point at about level 5. I guess there's some expectation of more XP from dynamic events or crafting than I'm getting. Or maybe I "should" be shifting between race zones to do lower-level quests there? Whatever the case, it feels clunky and a touch frustrating.
Elementalist is... not shaping up the way I had hoped. Granted, this is just level 5 or thereabouts, and I've only had access to scepter skills. I'd like to get other weapons to try out, because the scepter skills have been disappointing except for perhaps one skill with each of the four elements. Hmm. We'll see there.
Oh god Elementalist skill grinding. MH + OH is 3 skills for that single MH and 2 for that OH per element. Then 2H is five skills for all four elements. I'm actually glad Elementalists don't have more MH due to this way of earning skills :P
ReplyDeleteWell, it's the same as any other class... times four - one for each element. >.> Yeah. Admittedly, they should all be learnable well before level 80, but dang. I haven't done a direct comparison, but they might be the worst. Thief was actually fairly straightforward with something like seven possible weapon combinations, and some skills shared between them (main hand sword skills are the same whether you have a pistol or dagger in the off hand). I believe guardian was worse than that simply because they had access to a lot more weapons than thieves (sword, greatsword, axe, mace, scepter, shield, and focus that I remember just off-hand. Haven't looked closely at the others, but yes, I think the elemental-switching makes elementalists the most weapon-training intensive.
ReplyDeleteThe warrior has a large selection of weapons too. However, once you learn your 5 skills for those (2H or MH+OH) that's it you're done. Elementalist has to do that for all four elements. The amount of skills may be comparable, but the -effort- to learn them all is a pain, especially if you don't outwardly -like- your MH element, but have to use it to learn the OH of that element. (Like if you think the wand MH in Air is crap, but have to cope with it to get to OH Focus for Air). Also the staggered learning of elements means you're stuck with only fire and water out of the gate and have to wait until your class reaches certain levels to even have access to Air and Earth. (At least that's how it was in beta) Lastly is the agony of being unable to have your choice of elements. You have to attune to one and only one at a time (Like Warrior stances in WoW) and are restricted to only those skills. Yes, yes there's the Heal skill and 3 'utility' skills, and the 1 elite available regardless of your attunement, but you still have to get to level plateaus to even have those (You get, like three utilities to choose from at the start and get access to more every few levels, Level 30 unlocks your Elite IIRC) It just.. feels so backwards in design, and you couple that with the dynamic events and Hearts system of "questing" and you find that you lack XP to carry over so have to grind mobs to gain XP, so I guess while grinding mobs you can grind weapon skills and bluargh!
ReplyDeleteMostly agreed. Though I haven't had much trouble with unlocking elements as yet. Admittedly, my elementalist is still pretty low level, but I started with fire, when through water, and got into air already - each without much more time than unlocking the five scepter/focus skills along the way. Honestly, I'm not sure what to think of the whole skill-unlock system. It feels like a throwback to WoW's weapon skills (which were made obsolete with... Cataclysm?) I guess there's some benefit to "easing" players into a skill set, but at the same time you don't even get a full picture of what your weapons skills can even do there until you unlock them (actually... I'm not sure, they might show on the skill window, but I'm pretty sure they don't have tooltips on the action bar until unlocked). In the grand scheme of level 1-80, there's plenty of opportunity to learn them all early on (probably by 15-20 at the most). So I don't really know if the sense of "progression" is worth the hassle. Kind of strange, overall.
ReplyDelete