New World: Survey & Info

McFly said:

This was the most recent list for the Open Beta. I see that NAEast is the preferred server for FoH. Are you guys planning to avoid streamer specific servers?
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I really dont know what I want my answer to be to that. There are so many pros and cons in going to a server with them, versus not with them. The first instinct is to say "fk that noise" but.. theyre likely going to be servers that have a strong population for months. Shitty queues and strong competition from gathering in the first week or two, though. But always plenty of PVP and groups for dungeons and rifts. Always a full and strong market place with cheaper prices, too. -edit- oh, and the work shops are going to get leveled up way faster on those servers as well. Damn...

If I play this I will have to go US West Laputa. Because la puta.

There's literally no reason to not be on the most populated faction, right? Like if they control the most areas, it's literally just a pure negative to be anything but the most populous faction. I feel like that stuff will be addressed (or you'll have things like GLs for massive guilds swapping their allegiance or some shit) but for the most part, the only reason to be another faction is because you want to make the game harder in many respects.

I'll be pushing on a US west server, bringing at least 10+ people with me. We're not sure yet if we'll be joining another Company or forming our own, as I didn't play alpha I don't know the super sekrit pvp strats. I'm willing to bet on launch almost every server will have at least one company that played alpha which is a huge head start. The reason why i'm going PST time zone is for the time difference and how wars are scheduled - pretty sure wars could only be scheduled between 430-930 PM and if some dink is constantly scheduling shit prior to 630-7, well guess what? you're fucked.

Also heads up, if you wanna be a badass you can make the run to the high level zone which starts with T3 tables, this lets you craft steel tools earlier and even tho it costs you 3-4 hours in time, you'll quickly move past your peers. May or may not be nerfed on launch.

Playing on a streamer server is something to answer though...

Isn’t there a huge cool down on faction swapping?
My group wants to be the least populous so we have more targets to fight. PvP experience is pretty good.

Plus you can’t swap to the biggest faction iirc.

People had characters at 60 within a week roughly, w/o abusing the town board. So it wouldnt be crazy to just have a second character on another faction.

swayze22 said:

not being a bitch and trying to not ruin your server are two good reasons. imagine if everyone just rerolled to the most popular faction every few days

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Point being, outside of strictly pvp based reasons, there's literally negative reasons to be on either "losing" faction. It just makes things more expensive, harder to craft, more resource intensive, etc. Yeah you want to root for your faction, but if it starts imbalanced (like it's going to unless they literally have some mechanic that is going to hard lock the most populous faction until x players sign up for the other ones with the 90/120-whatever day lockout, which they aren't going to do because it's also tied to your guild) it's likely just going to stay imbalanced period. And while it's imbalanced, it's effectively a penalty for everyone who isn't on the overrepresented faction, even if you don't want to PVP at all.

If the mentality is pvpers should join underepresented factions, then hey sounds great go get them. But for literally every other aspect of the game, it's an artificial handicap on game systems.

Eventually you will just end up with the same type of segregation that existed on many WoW servers; one faction is 10x the other population and while it meant your AV queues were great on the weak faction, it meant you had less stuff in the AH, less crafters, less raiding guilds, etc, on the weaker faction.

I think the pvp scaling in closed beta was a good answer to population issues. Now that its changed heavily in favor of higher level and gear, the low population factions are going to have a harder time. Im not sure what camp Im in cause I see the pros and cons to both sides. I want my gear and level to matter, but I also want to be able to defend myself from Johnny McDerpderp that no lifed it to 60 within a few days. If they can find a middle ground on scaling - everyone will be better for it.

I originally voted Syndicate/east, but have since learned there is a group of my old EverQuest guild (Xanit K'Ven from Vallon Zek) playing Covenant on El Dorado (West). Has anyone assumed the mantle of leadership for forum guild yet?

Think the best option here is to actually wait a month for the metagame to establish and for population to smooth out if you get serious about playing it.

Thankfully, I'm not serious about playing it and I think the 2 weeks to a month I will spend playing the game will be on whatever faction feels appealing (aka whichever one has the most congregation of streaming personalities on it) and then go back to FF in preparation for Endwalker.

I'll be doing DPS (or dps-y tank), Marauder (Syndicate if the population disparity continues post-launch) and NA East. Definitely not going to commit until the game is actually fun to play. Can't say I was having an 'amazing' time in beta.

Secrets said:

Think the best option here is to actually wait a month for the metagame to establish and for population to smooth out if you get serious about playing it.

Thankfully, I'm not serious about playing it and I think the 2 weeks to a month I will spend playing the game will be on whatever faction feels appealing (aka whichever one has the most congregation of streaming personalities on it) and then go back to FF in preparation for Endwalker.

I'll be doing DPS (or dps-y tank), Marauder (Syndicate if the population disparity continues post-launch) and NA East. Definitely not going to commit until the game is actually fun to play. Can't say I was having an 'amazing' time in beta.

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I mean you have to join a faction right away anyway. And everyone is going to pile into 1 or 2 because there is no penalty or incentive to spread out. And because they are all piled into those the options for company will be very limited in the one(s) that chose otherwise.

BoozeCube said:

Tempted to try this whats the overall impression so far?

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1-3 months of fun before you run out of things to do and get bored. Maybe more if they turn into miracle content machines, but I wouldn't count on it. Plenty of hours of entertainment for the $40 cost. No sub, no real p2w or p2progress that I saw, basically cosmetics that are purely cosmetic.

BoozeCube said:

Tempted to try this whats the overall impression so far?

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Depends on who you ask of course - but its an "okay" to "good" game for most people. Everyone seems to think it'll last for at least a month before getting bored. 30-40$ price tag just for admission and no sub, which is a pretty good ratio for as many hours thatll come out of it.

Go into it with low expectations and you'll be pleasantly surprised.

Cinge said:

I mean you have to join a faction right away anyway. And everyone is going to pile into 1 or 2 because there is no penalty or incentive to spread out. And because they are all piled into those the options for company will be very limited in the one(s) that chose otherwise.

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Thats a good point. I personally dont think the tax breaks and town freebies is going to cause me to jump ship to the zerg faction of the server. If anything, If I somehow end up in the zerg faction - then Im probably going to move to another faction. If the entire map is a solid color and my guild doesnt own a town, Im going to want to switch so we can at least try to capture one ourselves. Being on the same faction as the zerg just sounds like a recipe to make the game boring as fuck anyways.

It's almost impossible in part to due to population cap to hold entire map for any length of time. If a single company holds four zones and is declared war against multiple territories on the same day, well good fucking luck sirs. You can only fight against 2 wars at max, assuming they all show up and theyre not casuals due to guild member caps at 100 - I also think you can accept people not in your company but then that becomes a PUG shit show, again good luck in that scenario as it'll be hit or miss who you pick up and if they'll excute strats/use comms. So there will be a lot of one sided maps at first but damn the first month is going to be lovely as far as territory drama goes.