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And overall it doesn't sound good.
Consensus seems to be that the Big Battles is boring and repetitive, the class system revision is nothing short of a disaster, but OTOH, the landscape and quests are really well done.
R.I.P. City of Heroes and my 17 characters there
Comments
Actually it sounds good according to the lotro forums. Most say the Big Battles are fun and challenging not sure where your getting your info. The epic story and landscape have also been said are amazing. Now to the class revision that is a mixed bag but that's something you can expect when you make this major of a change 6 years in. I will hold judgement until I play in a few weeks.
My thoughts on the revamps. The existing 6 yr old consumer base was content with classes more or less as they were. There was no demand from the base for revamps that WB/Turbine was responding too. That leads me to the conclusion that the revamps served one of two purposes. Entice a completely new/different customer base into an almost 7 yr old game(good luck with that) or to lower dev overhead in content design/balance in prep for maintenance mode.
/shrugs, guess we'll see in a few weeks
EDIT:
As far as BBattles that's just skirmish 3.0 from what I can see, some will like some won't.
Well I will throw in my input after having played the beta for a while.
The trait changes will be a love or hate kind of thing, theres alot of skills removed, some that people liked, some they didnt, I personally think they went a bit too far.
In regards to Big Battles, its Skirmishes 2.0 with a few gimmicks, its not something spectacular, and seeing as they want it to be the main endgame of HD, I think people are in for a rude awakening in regards to this, Turbine seems to with every expansion to forget that theres a max level, the journey from 85 to 95 is quality like always, with beautiful landscapes and nice story, however just like with previous expansions theres very little to do once you hit 95, and this time around theres not gonna be an instance cluster coming after launch.
Unfortunately for me, the price tag on this expansion is way too high.
*sigh*I like the slow pace of combat in LOTRO. I like being able to actually think about what skill to use rather than just mashing buttons. I can't see this ending well, at least from my point of view. Why totally change things 6 years in? It's not like they're going to attract a bunch of new players with it, just piss off those of us who like the class we've been playing for years the way it is.
What they really should have fixed were the derp combat animations and character models which mar an otherwise pretty nice looking game.
I agree with you 100% I dont like the class changes and I am tired of the severe tinkeritus the lotro devs have they change things for no reason as far as the big battles go it was just meh for me. I dont think I will be buying this expansion a sad time for me indeed.
How would you react, if they totally changed the class you just loved to play for over six years ?
people dont like big changes.
And if these changes are meant to pull new players to a six year old (but still ver beautifull) game, i do not think changing it to look more a kin to other games like WoW is the right way to go..
Giving players less skills to use in battle, does not make for a better combat system, and in the end having less options dumbs down a game, and this is the opposite direction that people that play these deep and old mmos prefer..
in general, most people that stick with lotro are 30+ and they prefer deep and tactical combat instead of more flashy stuff.
Best MMO experiences : EQ(PvE), DAoC(PvP), WoW(total package) LOTRO (worldfeel) GW2 (Artstyle and animations and worlddesign) SWTOR (Story immersion) TSW (story) ESO (character advancement)
Very, very mixed feelings.
Class revamp: well, lots of skills does not mean lots of fun. Sometimes less is more.
Trees: the problem number one. As from forum, player is penalized for using more than 1 tree (i.e. 1 point for first tree, 2 points fors second/third).
Big Battles: I am afraid, game may go in the same awkward direction like Angmar went: forced fellowships whenever you go. And I do not believe in "players can solo it", haven't seen instance that 1 player could beat solo. Conception about commanding your own little army - it frightens me. Sometimes it is hard to fight solo, and now I should be able to fight and/or to care about each given soldier. We have such pain in "escort lame NPC" missions, when you have to nurse NPC.
However, they are revamping crafting: removing tin, which was a headache. Tin would be purchasable from vendors (think about coal). It allows money sink and may help new players.
Judging from forums, many players are dissatisfied with revamp, especially Ministrels (as far as I understood). I still am not sure what will happen to my poor Champion. Will he become more powerfull, say, AoE machine?
In short: I am a bit afraid of the changes. Skill trees are tricky thing and the only hope is that Turbine found some genius-worth solution...
http://www.mmoblogg.wordpress.com
Having minstrells switch to alts would even mean les healiers available..... After the last great updates, minstrells became finally a class that could solo well, and since then there have been enough healers around... However with the update captains can finally get to the level of true healers..
we just need to wayt 2 months and not review the name on balance issues but on gameplay and fun..
as some say, less skills is not allways less depth, but old timers like me started looking again for games with dozens of skills, realising with games like neverwinter and gw2 that fewer skils not allways means a deeper tactical combat system. And thats why i returned to ganes like lotro (espescially) and eq2 and wow. Its fun to have many choices at your hands andtrying to figure out uses for all the skills you have. Having just 15 skilss on a max level class and a bngle best dps rotation killsmy gameplay..
i prefer switching rolesmid combat thats where lotro allbas shined... If they totally killgdthe switching on the fly, i might beone sad panda.
Best MMO experiences : EQ(PvE), DAoC(PvP), WoW(total package) LOTRO (worldfeel) GW2 (Artstyle and animations and worlddesign) SWTOR (Story immersion) TSW (story) ESO (character advancement)
I've been playing various mmo's having taken a break from Lotro since March last year. When I came back in September, I decided to continue levelling my Minstrel, which had just started Moria when I was last playing the game. The first thing that struck me was the amount of skill bloat compared with most of the other games I'd been playing. The trend over the past few years has definitely been for a much more limited skill set and I prefer it that way.
My Minstrel had a huge number of superfluous skills, filling row upon row of skill bars. My solution was to remove every single icon on my skill bars and to start again from scratch, equipping only the skills I felt were truly useful. That meant dumping most of the skills with very long cool downs for a start and then others that were poor relations of more powerful skills that made them redundant. There are still far more skills on my UI than I'd like but the game is more enjoyable for me.
So, when I heard they were reducing the number of skills in HD, I was expecting a major revamp making the UI more like GW2 etc. However, when I was fortunate to get a beta invite a few weeks ago, I was surprised to find very little difference to the skill set I had selected for myself in the live game. Microsoft had clearly come to similar conclusions to myself as to which were the important skills and which were not but hadn't gone as far as I was hoping to prune them further. The end result though, is that playing an auto levelled lvl 91 Minstrel on Bullroarer isn't much different to the lvl 64 one I'm playing in the live game. I've got no problem adapting to the changes there.
The new trait trees are also a lot more like the ones more recent games have been using for a while. It works perfectly OK for me. You no longer need to visit a bard to make additions when levelling and you can more easily switch trait sets out of combat.
Big Battles are a bit meh. They're really just glorified skirmishes. I was hoping to see large scale battles with dozens of players fighting together such as I've experienced in other games such as GW2 and Defiance but that isn't so. I should have realised the ageing LotRO engine couldn't handle that, so the BIG simply means a big scenario.
Now that the NDA has been lifted, you're bound to come across some very vociferous haters on these forum. They made up a very loud minority on the beta forums, predicting doom and gloom for the game, threatening their whole Kin would be leaving the game if the update went live etc. I believe the majority though will be be more lijke myself, liking some things a lot and others not so much but quietly getting on with exploring the new areas and features.
All in all I give Helms Deep a thumbs up.
Lol, the irony (I mean, you weren't serious, right?)
As I wrote before regarding captains:
"That's the beauty of cappy, you don't need a button to switch, you can (until HD) do anything at the same time without a switch. That is what they will take away. Now you can buff your fellows, jump into the fight, help the tank and pull off the mobs from the idiot overaggroing dps, drop some heals, do some damage, cleanse the fears, rez the afforementioned idiot dps (in most cases a hunter ), drop some heals again and help finishing off the mobs. Without any switch. That's what captains do. That versatility will be reduced into three dumb lines."
Or a much better post from a more experienced cappy: http://lotrocommunity.com/forum/topic/2306-so-helms-deep-nda-has-been-lifted-but/page-2#entry58489 "I'm sorry, it is not going to be a Captain once this fiasco goes live. It will be a completely new class that they will still slap the Captain name on."
One thing to keep in mind when talking about minority / majority in a satisfied market IP like the Tolkien works is that there are not a hole hell of a lot waiting in the wings of the mmo verse, ready to jump in the moment some perceived skill bloat disappears. What is happening is that a portion ( I have no idea how large or small) has decided to leave the game. Before it was the raid community, then it was the pure groupers, now the tactical skill crowd. How many demographics does this game have left compared to what it had 3 yrs ago?
People who decide to leave now are not going to be replaced by a great wave of unknown Tolkien fans that were just waiting around for some reason it's a 7yr old game after all.
EDIT:
SWG tried changing core elements of it's game in an attempt to draw in a mainstream audience. That went well.
If I can ask (since NDA is lifted) - then how does these trees work? Today's mechanic is very simple: you reach level, buy skill, go to bard and here you go.
How will this work in HD (since I played only Istaria which has no skill trees)? Like mounted combat horse's tree - you have to buy skill A and advance it, then buy skill B, advance it...? Or - take any skill, drag to the tree and here you go?
Side notes: lotrocommunity - I do not think they can be credited as reliable source. Their negative attitude towards Turbine and almost all changes as well as their hate towards Sapience are known.
http://www.mmoblogg.wordpress.com
It started from the Codies forum which ceased to exist after the Turbine take-over, so it has many many great and reliable players gathered. negative attitude towards Turbine - I'd rather say objective and stated, not negative.
their hate towards Sapience - well... it's also a bit harsh statement, but somewhat precise indeed
After 6 years of playing the same game maybe it's time for you to move on. just a suggestion.
I just went to the forums and find nothing under the "helm's deep" or general headings.
perhaps you could point us to the disaster thread?
Godfred's Tomb Trailer: https://youtu.be/-nsXGddj_4w
Original Skyrim: https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/109547
Serph toze kindly has started a walk-through. https://youtu.be/UIelCK-lldo
Well, how can anyone NOT hate Turbine after what they did to Middle Earth Online?
Well to be fair, Sapience has been ban heavy since RoR, this isn't new. What is new is the shear amount of threads that disappear now. If you just watch for a week or two you'll notice that the forums pages hardly churn at all anymore. Posts will stay on the 1st page for months. I've seen 10+ yr old games in maintenance mode with more forum churn.
As far as Fed yea that was a bad deal imho he/she was a great community member, I used the hell outta his hytbolt rebuild guide back then. I ddn't always agree with him, and we argued quite a lot but he never made it personal; which is more than I can say for a lot of the pro Turbine posters there. I'ts unfortunate when someone who used to be one of the most reasonable pro LOTRO fans gets banned. So what if he was no longer a banner carrier for Turbine? That's not a banable offence is it? I didn't see the post that got him banned but knowing him I doubt it was over the top.
Thanks.
Makes sense why I couldn't find it it has its own "official thread". I knew the forums seemed too quiet.
Well, this disturbs me a bit:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VKo1Rnd1oRw
As I'm pretty tired of "rarely dying". Actually I think I've only died twice in the latest expansion and ONLY because I thought that a jump from a higher ledge would have been easy but didn't eally the dev's had put cheap kill boxes 6 feet down in water.
However what disturbs me most are the big battles. I wanted to fight in "helm's deep" and I wanted it to be epic. Doesnt' look like it will be but I'll have to take a wait and see approach.
I'll be honest, I hate to diss the people at Turbine but I really wish another studio had this game. Unfortunately "this is it".
Godfred's Tomb Trailer: https://youtu.be/-nsXGddj_4w
Original Skyrim: https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/109547
Serph toze kindly has started a walk-through. https://youtu.be/UIelCK-lldo
Wow, sad to see Fred banned over speaking his mind. I'm enjoying spending time with him in Rift and his quite amazing test/lua/scripting/logic skills. No doubt whatsoever why his LOTRO title is "The Hotshot".
I spent a little time in the HD beta but was overall not impressed except with the environment and flavor, which Turbine manages to truly excel at creating. My main is a mini and I'm not sure I'll ever play her again. /sad
"If I offended you, you needed it" -Corey Taylor
yeah, I suspected that their engine wouldn't be able to handle it. I don't think this has anything to do with it being old, just that it was never meant to run a lot of characters on the screen at once.
I mean, look at what happened in Moria in some of the hub areas.
It's a shame that they didn't look forward in the game's design and realize that there were some pretty large battles in the books.
For me, if it proves to be "lacking", it will be the largest dissapointment in this expansion.
Godfred's Tomb Trailer: https://youtu.be/-nsXGddj_4w
Original Skyrim: https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/109547
Serph toze kindly has started a walk-through. https://youtu.be/UIelCK-lldo
Engines can be improved, espescially over a periode of six years where hardware performanced raised and hardware costs dropped considerely.
newer expansions look for example much better then a lot of the orriginal game.
Best MMO experiences : EQ(PvE), DAoC(PvP), WoW(total package) LOTRO (worldfeel) GW2 (Artstyle and animations and worlddesign) SWTOR (Story immersion) TSW (story) ESO (character advancement)