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MELTDOWN
07-30-2004, 12:11 PM
I happen to be a MMORPG Entrepreneur at the moment. I recently quit playing FFXI(because of many reasons). I have been a long time Blizzard fan. I've played (Religiously), Warcraft, Starcraft, Warcraft 3 and I heard awhile ago that Blizzard had WoW coming out. Recently I've been checking in on the progress, screenshots, movies and forums such as these for gameplay screenshots. It's really becoming quite the game.
But, I'm worried. I played FFXI for about 10months before I tired of its repeticious gameplay(fighting the same monsters over and over and over...and over again), hard to find parties(and if your familiar with FFXI you cannot solo for XP at all at high lvls), slow paced and worst of all lack of fun within the other gameplayers(always dicks because all they want is money and experience).
I've noticed that WoW seems to have the same setup as FFXI, paladin tanks, mage heals, mage cast spells, warrior swings sword ect ect. It's the same thing, it looks, to turn out like FFXI. Boring, monotomous and un-eventful. So I'm asking anyone who views this post that has played the beta or can give me the least bit of hope for WoW, is it fun and will it last?
Can I solo-level at higher levels? Is it difficult to find a party at just about any level? Does the game *require* that you play constantly in order to have the proper items to level fast and effectivly? Is the world of warcraft so plain that once you've seen one backdrop you've seen them all? Is it strategic or do you just click attack and sit back and watch your character swing(maybe get up for a drink while a mage heals you)?
If you don't understand what I'm getting at say so, I'll clarify later.

Thanks for your time.
Sincerely,
MELTDOWN

King Burgundy
07-30-2004, 05:42 PM
Well, let me preface this by saying that you never can tell. Its hard to say with any kind of certainty how long you'll be playing a game. I would have never guess I would have played EQ for more than 3 years, for example. Nor would I have guessed that I would quit DAoC after only 2 months as I was still having a blast at month 1. *shrug* At this point, I would say that I could play this game for a really long time, but...you know how that goes.

Can I solo-level at higher levels? Is it difficult to find a party at just about any level? Does the game *require* that you play constantly in order to have the proper items to level fast and effectivly? Is the world of warcraft so plain that once you've seen one backdrop you've seen them all? Is it strategic or do you just click attack and sit back and watch your character swing(maybe get up for a drink while a mage heals you)?


Thus far, I have solo'd 80% of my time in WoW, and am level 40 now. So the answer is yes, it seems that you can solo at any level. You won't always be able to do SPECIFIC quests, such as elite quests solo, at least until way after the appropriate level, but you will always have something to do.

It *is* difficult for me to find a party in WoW at times...but mind you, we are on an underpopulated beta server, and I play at really really odd times, way outside of prime time, and I'm playing what is the least populated side at the moment, Horde. So take that with a grain of salt. It may be easy as pie for people to form groups under other conditions.

No, you don't have to play constantly, but it depends on your goals. WoW is much more casual friendly then any other mmog I've ever played, but mmog's still revolve around time investment... So if you are only happy if you have THE coolest gear, etc, then you need to devote lots of time, not necessarily all in large chunks though. Sorry for the vague answer on this one, but without knowing what you want exactly, it would be hard to say.

The world is not in any way shape or form, plain. I never tire of the scenery personally, even in the areas that I spent way too much time in, like the Barrens.

Strategic? Depends on class, and how you want to play I guess. I personally find the warrior to be really deep and strategic and bar none the most indepth I've ever encountered in one of these games. However not everyone agrees with me, even on this board, based on past posts. Druid seemed to be lacking a bit in the strategy department, but maybe after their next round of changes to them things will improve there. I can't really comment on other classes yet.

***

Final Caveat... So far the beta has only implemented content to level 50, we are still missing pvp battlegrounds, end game raid content, the last 10 levels, becoming a hero, etc. So its really too early to give a full picture of how things will be, this is only how things are now.

MELTDOWN
08-04-2004, 01:53 AM
That is a great reply and I truly appreciate the time you took to put that together.
What completely killed me with FFXI is the way it was impossible to solo level at high levels. I'm so glad that 80% the time you can solo. The way FFXI worked is at like level 50 you need 10,000 xp points to gain a level (mind you 75 is the maximum) only way to solo in FFXI is kill easy for anything greater than that will kill you, no matter what race/equipment you own. Easy give you 33xp per kill and would take nearly 4 minutes per kill. Do the math, thats nuts.
I know my original post was a lil vague as to what kind of questions I was asking but the bottom line is as long as the game is fun, I'm happy. FFXI lost that fun around level ~20 because after that you just kill the same **** with a different name above its head.
And from this reply and many others on numerious boards I've checked out it seems that Blizzard is at it again.
Thanks for the information King Burgundy, I'm definitely going to try this game when it comes out.

PS Burgundy is a great drink. ;) Choi.