Wildstar Launch Thread - Server: Stormtalon | Faction: Dominion

Pyros

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The thing is, if you're gonna focus on endgame, if you're gonna focus on hardcore gamers. Why the fuck would you make a slow boring uninspired leveling process that doesn't challenge anyone? It's just so fucking stupid to go with this. They shouldn't have bothered wasting so much time on the leveling experience. Remove one planet, remove half the quests, boost xp rewards for both mobs and quests(but especially for mobs), make the tutorial 1-2minutes, if you even make a tutorial(just have tutorial tips popping up during normal questing and don't fucking start with clicking quests, start with combat quests), have your classes shape up quicker(locking the LIMITED action bar until level 20, like really, what the fuck is the purpose of this shit, it's only 8 fucking slots anyway, do people really need to play 10hours to get used to having 7 abilities before a 8th is revealed as a massive shock and infinite possibilities unveil?).

None of that shit makes sense, it's not just the tutorial, it's the entire leveling experience. At least they removed having to buy skills in town, but like, who the fuck came up with this idea and how did it even make it past the drawing board for example? The whole thing is the same shit, it's absolutely fucking dumb design. If they had spent the time they spent making the quests and one of the bigger zone to make one or two more dungeons, the leveling experience would be a fuckton better, because dungeons are actually fun to play, questing isn't.
 

Miele

Lord Nagafen Raider
916
48
The thing is, if you're gonna focus on endgame, if you're gonna focus on hardcore gamers. Why the fuck would you make a slow boring uninspired leveling process that doesn't challenge anyone? It's just so fucking stupid to go with this. They shouldn't have bothered wasting so much time on the leveling experience. Remove one planet, remove half the quests, boost xp rewards for both mobs and quests(but especially for mobs), make the tutorial 1-2minutes, if you even make a tutorial(just have tutorial tips popping up during normal questing and don't fucking start with clicking quests, start with combat quests), have your classes shape up quicker(locking the LIMITED action bar until level 20, like really, what the fuck is the purpose of this shit, it's only 8 fucking slots anyway, do people really need to play 10hours to get used to having 7 abilities before a 8th is revealed as a massive shock and infinite possibilities unveil?).

None of that shit makes sense, it's not just the tutorial, it's the entire leveling experience. At least they removed having to buy skills in town, but like, who the fuck came up with this idea and how did it even make it past the drawing board for example? The whole thing is the same shit, it's absolutely fucking dumb design. If they had spent the time they spent making the quests and one of the bigger zone to make one or two more dungeons, the leveling experience would be a fuckton better, because dungeons are actually fun to play, questing isn't.
If you don't like it, you don't like it, but you are not the representation of all gamers around the world, nor is this forum. There is still a fuckton of people playing GW2, despite what people here think, same for SWtoR.
Wildstar is a theme park with quests and a boring 15 minutes tutorial that will be skippable. I got it. Who the fuck cares?
I like questing, I tend to do the levelling-questing game multiple times per title. I have 8 level 80s in GW2, 11 level 90s in WoW and I'm 100% sure I'll have 6 level 50s in Wildstar (well, maybe 5, warrior is dull).
Wildstar is a decent title and *for me* right now is leaps and bounds more fun than any other MMO, which is good enough to preorder and play the fuck out of it.
I don't think the first half hour I'll spend to get out of the first 3 levels will kill the game for me.
I love these boards, but goddammit, sometimes it seems a truckload of sand landed in the collective vagina.
 

Pyros

<Silver Donator>
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I'm not sure what GW2 or SWTOR have to do with my post, and I had about 15 wow capped characters at various cap periods(had some when it was 60, some when it was 70 and I didn't play after that), 5capped GW2 characters. It doesn't make Wildstar leveling any better. It has fucking awful leveling, it's slow and it's boring, there's very few quests that are actually interesting, they don't even bother pretending there's a story for most of them and removed all the quest text. It's just extremely tedious.

They themselves said the game was meant for a more hardcore gamer demographic, that they wanted hard content, that endgame is their focus, I'm not projecting my wishes or anything. Yet the leveling experience is basically the entire opposite of this, it's casual as all fuck, it's extremely bland and it delays access to endgame by a very long time for no specific reason other than giving casual players something they can play for longer, so they pay for a sub. Which to be honest, housing was probably good enough to do anyway, their housing is insane.

As I said in a previous post, I didn't care about the tutorial, it's short as fuck anyway so whatever. It is a terrible tutorial, but it's not a big deal. The problem is the entire leveling experience, besides the space missions and the adventures/dungeons is absolute shit. It's just filler quests, a lot of it. It's not even the fact it's a themepark that bothers me, it's the fact it's a shitty themepark. A lot of the planets aren't particularily interesting, most of the quests have no backstory and no reason they just happen and almost everything about the entire thing is completely forgetable and unchallenging.

I think that the leveling experience is shit as a whole. It's both a subjective and objective statement, as I feel a lot of stuff is objectively stupid in the way they designed it and for the stuff that kinda makes sense(making it last longer so casuals don't "finish" the game in a month, making it easy enough so casual don't quit in droves before they pay their first month etc) I subjectively don't like it. It doesn't mean I won't play the game even if the idea of having to level a character is as appealing as playing dota with 4russians for 300games in a row, and it doesn't mean no one else will like it. I'm not deying your right to like a game by saying it has shit leveling.
 

Raes

Vyemm Raider
3,264
2,718
If you don't like it, you don't like it, but you are not the representation of all gamers around the world, nor is this forum. There is still a fuckton of people playing GW2, despite what people here think, same for SWtoR.
Wildstar is a theme park with quests and a boring 15 minutes tutorial that will be skippable. I got it. Who the fuck cares?
I like questing, I tend to do the levelling-questing game multiple times per title. I have 8 level 80s in GW2, 11 level 90s in WoW and I'm 100% sure I'll have 6 level 50s in Wildstar (well, maybe 5, warrior is dull).
Wildstar is a decent title and *for me* right now is leaps and bounds more fun than any other MMO, which is good enough to preorder and play the fuck out of it.
I don't think the first half hour I'll spend to get out of the first 3 levels will kill the game for me.
I love these boards, but goddammit, sometimes it seems a truckload of sand landed in the collective vagina.
He pointed out several other things he didn't like, besides the tutorial. Acting like he's ranting and raving about one small detail is specious.
He, and this forum, may not be representative of all gamers, but we are representative of the demographic the devs have claimed to be aiming for. And let me just add a "No shit, Sherlock!" Who the fuck here doesn't know that? It's hilarious how many times it gets repeated though.



I love these boards, but goddammit, sometimes it seems a truckload of sand landed in the collective vagina.
I feel exactly the same way when I see someone whine about someone else's negative opinion that they don't agree with. Everyone here has a right to state their opinion, positive or negative. Otherwise, this forum might as well not exist.
 

TheYanger

Bronze Knight of the Realm
264
30
The levelling experience is FINE. If it were just the tutorial it'd be one thing, but people are bitching that the game is care bear level 5 shit the entire way when it CLEARLY fucking is not. The very first dungeon is harder than most content in wow is at max level these days. Questing isn't OMG YOU CANT BEAT IT hard but it's certainly engaging and you have to pay attention. No, it's not that way at level 10, but it's bullshit to claim that the game is snooze inducing for 50 levels and THEN you do hard things. You can start doing hard shit at level 6 if you like PVP and level 20 if you don't, and even the shittiest quest mobs are engaging even if you're not going to wipe constantly while doing it as a reasonably good player.

FYI, 90% of EQ1 players (people on this board) suck fat dicks at anything that isn't braindead too, so I'm shocked to hear how much some of you guys want that shit.
 

Raes

Vyemm Raider
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Interesting word choice. The word "fine" when used as an adjective has several definitions. Could you possibly clarify which one you are referencing? Is it okay/average/satisfactory or excellent/superb? I'm genuinely curious.
 

Voldeth

Trakanon Raider
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He, and this forum, may not be representative of all gamers, but we are representative of the demographic the devs have claimed to be aiming for. And let me just add a "No shit, Sherlock!" Who the fuck here doesn't know that? It's hilarious how many times it gets repeated though.
I'm not so sure about that anymore. There has been a silly amount of complaining about the tutorial on these forums and very little talk in regards to the actual game. Wildstar seems aimed at a younger demographic and I don't mean that as an insult towards the game. Similarly there's nothing wrong with the fact that this boards demographic has gotten older and a very low percentage of people here actively play MMOs in a hardcore capacity. With that being said, how do you think complaining about EQ's offline tutorial would have gone over back in the noows days?
 

Raes

Vyemm Raider
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Wow, I had forgotten about that, been a long time since March '99. I honestly can't remember if it was optional or not. Was it? (Edit: Looked it up, was actually a seperate exe, so completely optional.)


Edit: Also, it's not about what audience we think they are aiming at, it's what the devs have clearly stated. Here's a random quote I googled in 2 seconds.


Says Gaffney: "We don't walk a tightrope: we're very willing to throw ourselves right off it. It's the hardcore that matters in the long haul. If you don't appeal to the hardcore, you've got no one to get up to the high level. It's not us, you know? We're hardcore gamers. First and foremost it's to appeal to those complex gamers, those players that want the depth, and if we can make it so we're not scaring off players that are new to it, rock on. That's cool by us.
 

Pyros

<Silver Donator>
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The levelling experience is FINE. If it were just the tutorial it'd be one thing, but people are bitching that the game is care bear level 5 shit the entire way when it CLEARLY fucking is not. The very first dungeon is harder than most content in wow is at max level these days. Questing isn't OMG YOU CANT BEAT IT hard but it's certainly engaging and you have to pay attention. No, it's not that way at level 10, but it's bullshit to claim that the game is snooze inducing for 50 levels and THEN you do hard things. You can start doing hard shit at level 6 if you like PVP and level 20 if you don't, and even the shittiest quest mobs are engaging even if you're not going to wipe constantly while doing it as a reasonably good player.

FYI, 90% of EQ1 players (people on this board) suck fat dicks at anything that isn't braindead too, so I'm shocked to hear how much some of you guys want that shit.
I mentionned the dungeons being good and how they should have removed one zone from the leveling(like the snow one for example), and then used that time and ressources into making one more dungeon at least, while speeding up the leveling. The dungeons are fine. The endgame is fine(I assume, looks fine at least, even if ugh 40man but whatever). The leveling is horrible. Yes you have to pay some attention, but not much and it depends heavily on your class and spec. Most telegraphs are still not actually a big deal even if you don't avoid them as long as you start the fight at full health(so eating sandwiches between every fight if you're terrible). A few are, which creates weird situations where in one area you can aoe 6-8mobs at once and in another you have to pull mobs 1 by 1 because they have instant cast stuns followed by strong telegraphs, which makes you very dead if there's 2 mobs at the same time. Slotting a decent amount of CC to interupt the telegraphs will make leveling easy and efficient though.

My problem is how it's designed. The easier boring content is the best way to level. Pretty much the only way to level, PvP can be done but is slow as shit past level 15-20, and well it's PvP, it's its own thing. Want to dungeon to cap? Well fuck you, xp in dungeons is trash, go back to questing. Now maybe that changed in a patch since I haven't kept track of shit, but it was really bad xp doing dungeons runs a couple months ago and didn't hear anyone talk about dungeon leveling. Yet it's group based and challenging, it's basically the point of the game and what they're aiming for. So why is it shit to level doing this, and better to level doing herpderp follow the arrow click the things kill 20mobs. And you have to do a lot of it. And you better not group for it(did they fix that? I saw they're adding elite mobs or whatever so I guess they didn't).

As for the comment about EQ1 players, well that's too bad for them. Having not played EQ1 past lvl 11 myself, I couldn't care less. I never said this should be like EQ1, shit I said leveling should be FASTER. You know like the opposite of EQ1. Guess that remark wasn't meant for me though.
 

BubbySoup

Golden Knight of the Realm
125
45
Wow, I had forgotten about that, been a long time since March '99. I honestly can't remember if it was optional or not. Was it?
It was very optional, in so much as it wasn't even in the game. If memory serves, you had to run a separate executable to get into the tutorial. I think it was the tutorial executable people used to use to walk around empty zones from EQ - they worked out a way of loading up zone data into it, although only certain zones were accessible as the starting co-ordinates where the tutorial dropped you were not always inside a zone map.
 

Raes

Vyemm Raider
3,264
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It was very optional, in so much as it wasn't even in the game. If memory serves, you had to run a separate executable to get into the tutorial. I think it was the tutorial executable people used to use to walk around empty zones from EQ - they worked out a way of loading up zone data into it, although only certain zones were accessible as the starting co-ordinates where the tutorial dropped you were not always inside a zone map.
Yup. Googled it when the board went down for maintenance. It was so optional, I think I didn't even know it existed till I happened across it one day when the servers were down.
 

DMK_sl

shitlord
1,600
0
I don't really understand the logic "but the other parts of the game are great so who cares about this"

Do developers these days get one free shitty design pass for every one thing they do well or something?
 

Arcaus_sl

shitlord
1,290
3
I don't really understand the logic "but the other parts of the game are great so who cares about this"

Do developers these days get one free shitty design pass for every one thing they do well or something?
I've never played a game where there wasn't one thing that was bland, uninspired or just plain bad. I could understand your statement if there were people arguing that the tutorial is good. No one is saying that. Every game has shit parts to it. For this game, it happens to be the tutorial.
 

Caliane

Avatar of War Slayer
14,687
10,265
It was very optional, in so much as it wasn't even in the game. If memory serves, you had to run a separate executable to get into the tutorial. I think it was the tutorial executable people used to use to walk around empty zones from EQ - they worked out a way of loading up zone data into it, although only certain zones were accessible as the starting co-ordinates where the tutorial dropped you were not always inside a zone map.
Actually, lets add DDO to great tutorials.

Now, it did only have one tutorial, and you had to run it..
but it installed the rest of the game while you played the tutorial.
 

Draegan_sl

2 Minutes Hate
10,034
3
I think the bitching is justified. It's not that the tutorial and other hangups are so terrible that they can't be dealt with. It's that their existence is indicative of the developer being out of touch with what you're looking for in a game. If they made those decisions on the simple things, what other more important game systems have they fucked up?
The thing is, if you're gonna focus on endgame, if you're gonna focus on hardcore gamers. Why the fuck would you make a slow boring uninspired leveling process that doesn't challenge anyone? It's just so fucking stupid to go with this. They shouldn't have bothered wasting so much time on the leveling experience. Remove one planet, remove half the quests, boost xp rewards for both mobs and quests(but especially for mobs), make the tutorial 1-2minutes, if you even make a tutorial(just have tutorial tips popping up during normal questing and don't fucking start with clicking quests, start with combat quests), have your classes shape up quicker(locking the LIMITED action bar until level 20, like really, what the fuck is the purpose of this shit, it's only 8 fucking slots anyway, do people really need to play 10hours to get used to having 7 abilities before a 8th is revealed as a massive shock and infinite possibilities unveil?).

None of that shit makes sense, it's not just the tutorial, it's the entire leveling experience. At least they removed having to buy skills in town, but like, who the fuck came up with this idea and how did it even make it past the drawing board for example? The whole thing is the same shit, it's absolutely fucking dumb design. If they had spent the time they spent making the quests and one of the bigger zone to make one or two more dungeons, the leveling experience would be a fuckton better, because dungeons are actually fun to play, questing isn't.

Dingidng
 

Vandyn

Blackwing Lair Raider
3,656
1,382
I haven't keeping up with what dev said what but there is nothing hardcore or niche about this game from what little I've played it. They may be wanting to target endgame with hardcore players but they (as a company) also like money and the best way to get money is to try to appeal to the WoW casual crowd. I think their tutorial even fails in this regard because I didn't feel I got some in depth understanding of how the skill system works or any of the other parts of the game. I don't really get how devs develop this type of games anymore. There is this thinking that all they got to do is develop a generic quest level treadmill and throw in some lore and people will flock to their game. Every themepark MMO seems to do that these days and they all wind up the same, bland and generic. Nobody has the time or patience anymore to trudge through a boring leveling experience just to experience 'the good stuff'. Most of the time the good stuff isn't that good anyway.
 

Xaxius

Lord Nagafen Raider
531
147
I haven't keeping up with what dev said what but there is nothing hardcore or niche about this game from what little I've played it.
I don't think niche is their target audience, it's definitely a mainstream release. However, I would agree that there really isn't anything "hardcore" in the first 20 levels for people who frequent this forum, but that's relative. If you look at it objectively, it is a more difficult leveling and dungeon experience for your typical casual player. If you also compare to a recent MMO release, say TESO, it's no question that Wildstar is more challenging.