Benji
Joined: 01 May 2005
Posts: 395
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 Posted: Fri Feb 24, 2006 11:14 am Post subject: |
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just stupid. I understand what he's saying and I 'somewhat' agree with it.
I think it's dumb that some shitty hunter who doesn't have a fucking clue can beat me just by having some gay bow that can nearly 1 shot me. And I think it's dumb that they dictate what kind of player you should be by giving so much of a advantage to 20-40 man grouping.
But this dudes biggest arguement is conflicted with the core of MMORPG's.
'previous accomplishments WILL give you an advantage' you do not enter a fight on the same playing field as someone else. Usually there will be a gear/level/rank advantage. The important part about this is that those levels/ranks/gear are from accomplishments that came before the fight.
With that said, WoW has completely rewritten the rules by allowing players to enter instances to gain levels/gear without any conflict. That's what's frustrating. I felt like in DAoC Andred when I saw a 50, I knew a few things. I knew that he had to be a decent player because, first off leveling wasn't a timesink, leveling meant you had the ability/network(guild) to survive being ganked and rolled while pulling mobs, and you had the ability to survive XP loss and the major gold sink <50 PvP was. And that was satisfying. Knowing that I was fighting someone at level 45 who had been able to come out the otherside of that crucible meant that I felt like he should have an advantage and he was being awarded for doing well before he even came across me.
But what do I see when I'm fighting a level 60 in WoW? Someone who has played the time sink, and who has done care-free, risk maybe a 50 silver repair cost, instance til their eyes bled.
And nothing about that is satisfying. The rank system did alleviate that for a short time. Being a dominant PvPer meant you would get the best items and it was based on player ability/network. But sure enough, BG's and MC hit like a truck. Now getting rank meant sitting in BG's long enough to get bonus honor and the gear you get from it doesn't hold a candle to MC gear for most classes.
Time commitments and addiction have completely taken over the MMORPG market. Dungeon crawling and grouping should be a core aspect of MMO gaming. It's fun to get a group of friends together and try to get some experiance/equipment and it should be crucial for character development. But what WoW has given up with it's dynamic instance system is the importance of competition and player interaction.
DAoC had this down to perfection.
On the Realm servers you COULD NOT enter the 'MC' equivalent instance unless your faction controlled the majority of keeps/castles. What did that mean? It meant that there was depth to PvP, there was depth to character development and there was depth to dungeon crawling.
On the PvP servers the dungeons were OPEN, completely open meaning if there was competition for spawns (and there always was) you could take them by force. I remember when we went with Karas Hur to Darkness Falls we'd have someone like my animist or a hunter dedicated to watching for ganks and pulling out stealthers before they could get to healers and our casters. Or just being able to shout GAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAANK before it was too late and a AOE mez was on tha party, everyone could drop the mobs heal up and be ready to hold on to the grinding spot with force. And what did that mean? It meant that every piece of lewt and every coin earned meant something.
And so that's the major problem I have with this guys article. Should someone have 1000 more health and able to 1 shot you just because he's a level 60 chun-li? Yes. Because before that he was a level 59 chun li and before that he was a level 58 chun li and before that.... The important aspect is that he did everything right to get there and he deserves to have an advantage. It adds to a game. Having someone who's just a powerhouse Highwarlod or R10L0 means that he adds something very dynamic to the battlefield. Someone everyone can follow and you can be very satisfied with taking down for the XXXXX times he ganked you while you were doing XXXXX.
My room mate just started playing WoW about a month ago. He had played DoTA prior to that and he's complained numerous times how stupid is that he couldn't land a hit on a level 60 or how a level 60 could see him from clear across the map while he was in stealth. It's a novel concept and not totally something that makes sense to people. MMORPG's are on their primal level focused soley on community and character history. You and your character are at exactly where you are development wise because of the last 10 things you did, and before that the last 10 things you did etc etc etc. And in a lot of ways that has way more lasting appeal and something you would be playing enough to make the monthly fee worthwhile.
WoW and Guildwars have robbed the community of that. The last 10 things you would have done were to grind for lewt in a conflict free environment. So how is it fair that a level 60 chun-li got to level 60 by putting in the time or whoring themselves to get the right build to get invited to these trash instances? It isn't. And I hope this is a lesson in MMORPG's history not a trend. Solidly built games center character development and community on conflict, politics and wars. I firmly believe the players have all the abilities to entertain themselves and get into a game even before they log on. The goal of a MMO should be to provide an environment that allows that to happen in an interesting and dynamic way. And WoW has done one thing exceptionnaly well. They made an amazingly fun game. They combat is outstanding, PvP is so much fun.
But unfortunetely it's no more lasting then a game of counterstrike or dota. Because I know that when I perform an amazing play, Stealth in see 3 people protecting the flagcarried in WSG, kill the priest before they see what's going on, mind control the warrior and force him to fight and kill the other warrior, turn the flag in for the winning capture... All that happens is that another BG will be going up shortly.
And often I won't care enough to enter the next friendly game of friendly capture the flag and I'll log out. But I can think of something much better, a WoW server were winning more WSG's meant that all instances closed for the opossing faction or that the guild that had the most wins for their clan members would have access to control over towns and zones.
Those simple changes would totally alter the game experiance. EVERY player would dedicate a part of themselves to PvP. No player would ever enter an encounter without their mind control helm and a full supply of potions and every player would study how to better their game and strategies to make sure they were on top. Team work and guild networks would have layers upon layers of depth.
And ofcourse the response would be that games like WoW only had PvP as an afterthought and what I am talking about is a game that would be centered around PvP. I would disagree. Player interaction is the only reason I play MMORPG's. And I know even if people aren't to avid about PvP that fighting Ragnaros 10000 fucking times isn't enough to keep them playing. And if it is I have a game with no monthly fee they can play. http://www.progressquest.com/ Point of the matter, nothing boils blood and nothing keeps you logging on more then the struggle that is player combat. And certainly that's not the only way to bring player interaction to the level that an MMORPG should have... There's been many different mostly non-mainstream type mmorpgs that focus on governmental type playing and pure politics with little to no combat whatsoever.
But they all share a principal that grinding for better items and playing on addiction wears thin very quickly. And despite how popular WoW is, I really believe most people who play it are either dissastisfied or think that it could of been 1000x times better. Blizzard had a name in gaming that even if they released a game that came on a floppy disk would have still gotten amazing press and sales. There was limitless potential and I think Blizzard took a step back in something that could of been an amazing leap forward.
When I played UO, I rarely PvPed. I was very interested in crafting and my tamer. But I never left felluca. It didn't make sense to me. I was very young but I just perfered to be ganked and to be chased down by reds when I was mining then... well... not being ganked. Because it added something to the game that no code or collection of pixels could have. There were people I hated, there were people anti-pks who I could depend on, there was ways I could defend myself. More then anything I was part of a system that was greater then myself. The community. If I stayed in trammel, I knew I could mine a lot better or go dungeon crawling with my wyrms without the risk of a bard provoking them to attack eachother and then looting everything I had looted. But why? Just so I could go dungeon crawling more? Why would I want to do that? I would never feel like I won anything or that my being there even mattered more then my 15$ a month to osi. And so I stayed in fel and I got pissed when I lost. But I never bitched to osi and demanded a PvP free server. I was that more fond of everything I had done and become more dedicated to logging on and participating in the community. every tiny accomplishment meant a thousand times more to me then anything that could ever happen in WoW because I knew I had earned it through hardship.
I think it's different to understand the difference between the people who are teh l337 pk reds and the people who really understand how important and complicated having that apart of the game really is. Thing like the bounty system (if it wasn't so easily exploiatable) in UO are what make games worth playing. Knowing that I just put in 1k to help the guy who had just stolen my vanq viking sword to be hunted down and molested every where he went was enough to be able to justify my losses and not just uninstall.
I realize that most of this post has little to do with the article itself, but the article got me thinking about what an MMO is or atleast can be. And they aren't for everyone but there is lasting and emotion available in MMO's that no single player gaming experiance could ever come close to. |
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