[Megathread] Wildstar - Now F2P

[Edge-]

The reason why talent trees were removed was not because people got upset when they picked the wrong talents (when's the last time you saw someone get upset over their own talent choices?), it's because the fact that there were bad choices and good choices means that there's a correct choice. Basically what I said. There's a thousand word GC post about it.

Indeed he did, and it's a bunch of spin. There are always "right" builds in anything. Hell, with the current WoW talents there are cookie cutter builds for roles, so the change to the extremely limited talent tree is pointless.

WoW doesn't do everything right, and GC isn't some infallible developer.

There are "correct" choices, and there are other "correct" choices. Check out Rifts talent trees if you want to see one of the best talent systems around. I personally hate what WoW has done (and what Blizz did to D3) because it removed so much choice from the player and made what few decisions you did make rather pointless.

[Razael]

Indeed he did, and it's a bunch of spin. There are always "right" builds in anything. Hell, with the current WoW talents there are cookie cutter builds for roles, so the change to the extremely limited talent tree is pointless.

WoW doesn't do everything right, and GC isn't some infallible developer.

There are "correct" choices, and there are other "correct" choices. Check out Rifts talent trees if you want to see one of the best talent systems around. I personally hate what WoW has done (and what Blizz did to D3) because it removed so much choice from the player and made what few decisions you did make rather pointless.

I actually enjoy talent trees. I like the feeling of investing points in stuff like that. Dunno why, its just appealing.

[Kelimbror]

(and what Blizz did to D3)

Which is why TL2 will always be superb in comparison. That is a game that does talent trees to almost perfection. I would welcome a similar system in Wildstar. Especially given that you will have to further customize your character with active abilities like TSW. Seriously this game seems to be made from every good feature of each MMO that has launched in the last decade and then improved on each one of the successes.

It's getting scary how much this game seems like it was made for me. All of those "Combine your best MMO feature" threads really just equal Wildstar.

[Edge-]

I actually enjoy talent trees. I like the feeling of investing points in stuff like that. Dunno why, its just appealing.

It's a visual representation of progression, just as getting cooler looking armor is. You can see your talent tree growing in size and know that that directly correlates to an increase in the power of your character.

[SirRobin]

WHAT?

I "suspect" that Carbine is going to add a social media element to the game that goes further than we've seen before.

[Kelimbror]

I "suspect" that Carbine is going to add a social media element to the game that goes further than we've seen before.

Yeah something about this rings bigger than simply being able to connect to chat functions via smart phones like wow/rift.

[paralleluniverse]

Indeed he did, and it's a bunch of spin. There are always "right" builds in anything. Hell, with the current WoW talents there are cookie cutter builds for roles, so the change to the extremely limited talent tree is pointless.

WoW doesn't do everything right, and GC isn't some infallible developer.

There are "correct" choices, and there are other "correct" choices. Check out Rifts talent trees if you want to see one of the best talent systems around. I personally hate what WoW has done (and what Blizz did to D3) because it removed so much choice from the player and made what few decisions you did make rather pointless.

I've just had a look at the Rift talent trees. They look exactly the same as WoW talent trees, just with free spells. And as such they have all the same problems as the WoW talent trees.

Correct choices aren't much of a problem now, at least not to the same extent they used to be. Not even Simcraft advises on talent specs anymore. The same cannot be said for the old talent system or Rift.

But guess what? I don't see talent trees in Wildstar. Maybe I missed it somewhere.

[RoninaThorstone]

I've just had a look at the Rift talent trees. They look exactly the same as WoW talent trees, just with free spells. And as such they have all the same problems as the WoW talent trees.

/facepalm

If you looked at the rift talent trees and didn't understand how they are different from WoWs then you have to go back and look again.

[Thallos]

Indeed he did, and it's a bunch of spin. There are always "right" builds in anything. Hell, with the current WoW talents there are cookie cutter builds for roles, so the change to the extremely limited talent tree is pointless.

WoW doesn't do everything right, and GC isn't some infallible developer.

There are "correct" choices, and there are other "correct" choices. Check out Rifts talent trees if you want to see one of the best talent systems around. I personally hate what WoW has done (and what Blizz did to D3) because it removed so much choice from the player and made what few decisions you did make rather pointless.

While I agree that there's still some cookie cutter "choices" in the new talent system, it's not really that way with every class on every tier. Some tiers really just come down to preference and while there may be a better option for some, the difference is sometimes so small that you're better off just picking the one that suits your play style best.

One could look at it as cutting our options down, but since there weren't really many "options" (assuming you wanted to be good anyhow), they simply just gave players all those tools simply for choosing a spec instead of making people put points into something they were going to pick anyway. Granted the new system isn't perfect, but it's definitely better than the old system that swtor adopted (way to think outside of the box BW).

[Thephayul]

/facepalm

If you looked at the rift talent trees and didn't understand how they are different from WoWs then you have to go back and look again.

What made the rift trees so wonderful was the absolute freedom of them, pick any 3 souls ad have a field day allocating points.

[RoninaThorstone]

What made the rift trees so wonderful was the absolute freedom of them, pick any 3 souls ad have a field day allocating points.

I know. He doesn't seem to.

Did you mean to quote me?

[Thephayul]

nope, my bad sorry

[Zeek Daniels]

It's a visual representation of progression, just as getting cooler looking armor is. You can see your talent tree growing in size and know that that directly correlates to an increase in the power of your character.

Its an illusion, dont fall for it.

I like dumbed down trees it gives more options for max level play. Except in D3 but thats because high end gear makes some choices a no brainer but you dont have that in WoW. I was a ele shammy from the end of BC through 4.3, My build rarely ever changed from a PvE perspective. There was not much choice. The only choice was like extra shock range or 40% dmg reduc when your stunned. And then in cata it was like root targets with earthbind or lower shock cd. It was really stupid and there was no choice. With the new WoW talents you can make cases for 2 out of the 3 in each tier. Some are good for this and others good for that. If i was still raiding i know i would be changing a talent or two each raid night depending on bosses and raid needs.

A game like GW2 has a ton of different ways to build your character for PvE. And i think it works in that game because the ceiling for success in dungeons is soooo low that any build works. That obviously wouldnt work in earlier versions of WoW raiding because the ceiling for success is really high so only the best builds will succeed most the time. I assume Rift is the same way but i stopped at 50 and never did any raiding when it first came out.

[Kelimbror]

I assume Rift is the same way but i stopped at 50 and never did any raiding when it first came out.

No, there are several viable builds for end game raiding for each class and for solo play it is literally anything goes, which is amazing.

[paralleluniverse]

2) Each raid is designed for 1 raid size; you won't be running the same content with two different-sized raid groups. That is, a 40-man raid is a totally different map/content/zone than a 20-man raid.

Source: http://wildstar-central.com/index.ph...72/#post-20007

Wow, this is worse than I thought.

20 man and 40 man raids are different. So why on earth would anyone make a 20 man raiding guild? How many guilds in WoW classic, which lasted 3 years, enjoyed running ZG and AQ20, while needlessly being blocked out of MC, BWL, AQ40 and Naxx?

This model of raiding, where 20 man guilds are prevented from doing most of the raiding content, simply because of their size doesn't work. It's a needless restriction? There's no point to it. What is lost from moving to WoW's current model where every raid has a 10 and 25 mode, so both 10 and 25 man raiding guilds can thrive?

Not only does this model make 20 man guilds worthless, it also hurts 40 man guilds. It makes it harder to keep a stable roster, when half the raid is either excluded from 20 man content, or creates a A team, B team split.

With an almost trivial amount of work, they could have doubled the raid content and opened it to a much wider audience without needing to make it easier. Just like what WoW did. But for no discernible reason, they've chosen not to, and made 20 man raiding guilds second class citizens.

There's a quote for this situation:
“Those who fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it.”
-Winston Churchill.

[Dagzter]

Wow, this is worse than I thought.

20 man and 40 man raids are different. So why on earth would anyone make a 20 man raiding guild? How many guilds in WoW classic, which lasted 3 years, enjoyed running ZG and AQ20, while needlessly being blocked out of MC, BWL, AQ40 and Naxx?

I'm not sure, do YOU have those statistics to hand? I can only speak from person experience, and I appreciate anecdotal evidence is worth little value, but on my server during vanilla there was no such thing as a '20 man' guild. The raiding guilds were ALL based around the 40-man model, but also did 20-man content. Now, I'm certainly NOT saying this is ideal, and one can easily see how it could be a logistical nightmare, but the raiding guilds did 'adapt' to the situation...

Your point about whether or not this is a sensible model to pursue is a valid one, but I'm not sure we know enough to credit or discredit it either way.

Something that hadn't occured to me, but a friend suggested: what if the 40-man content is more like the WoW approach to world bosses (Vanilla dragons etc), where 'pugging' players was more feasible, and the 20-man model was what the raiders structured themselves around? Not sure how I feel about that, if I'm honest, but if content was tuned correctly, you would possibly have your guilds fightining it out for 20-man honours, but having to often work together for 40-man PvE - thus promoting server interaction and communities etc.

The bottom line is we will need to wait and see, but I'm happy to give Carbine the benefit of the doubt for now as I've been very impressed with the way they have conducted themselves so far in WS's development (how they have promoted themselves, keep the community informed etc.)

You're right: history is pedagogy, but there are often many different lessons to be learned, and some perhaps you and I haven't quite perceived or appreciated yet. Possibly Carbine may be more on the ball than we are at the moment

[Bokoshoko]

Wow, this is worse than I thought.

20 man and 40 man raids are different. So why on earth would anyone make a 20 man raiding guild? How many guilds in WoW classic, which lasted 3 years, enjoyed running ZG and AQ20, while needlessly being blocked out of MC, BWL, AQ40 and Naxx?

This model of raiding, where 20 man guilds are prevented from doing most of the raiding content, simply because of their size doesn't work. It's a needless restriction? There's no point to it. What is lost from moving to WoW's current model where every raid has a 10 and 25 mode, so both 10 and 25 man raiding guilds can thrive?

I'm not sure why you are constantly using WoW as your baseline reference. Are you suggesting it's best in class and serves as a gold standard against which all other MMOs can be judged? Your comment

What is lost from moving to WoW's current model where every raid has a 10 and 25 mode, so both 10 and 25 man raiding guilds can thrive?

Are you sure 25 man raiding is thriving?

You're making a sweeping assumption that in some way 20 man raids will be second class, why is that? Since Carbine do seem to be trying to be everything to everyone is it not possible they may have turned your assumption on it's head and decided 20 man is "hardcore" and 40 man is for LFR type kicks?

As it currently stands it seems too early to pass judgement and I'm not sure of the validity of constantly referencing WoW as the gold standard.

[ShimmerSwirl]

With an almost trivial amount of work, they could have doubled the raid content and opened it to a much wider audience without needing to make it easier. Just like what WoW did. But for no discernible reason, they've chosen not to, and made 20 man raiding guilds second class citizens.

-Winston Churchill.

There's your discernable reason right there. WoW raiding has sucked since they went multi-mode with everything. Carbine is bringing back epic raiding, not 'grind-fest run every raid in 3 modes until your eyes bleed' accessible raiding.

[RoninaThorstone]

Wow, this is worse than I thought.

20 man and 40 man raids are different. So why on earth would anyone make a 20 man raiding guild? How many guilds in WoW classic, which lasted 3 years, enjoyed running ZG and AQ20, while needlessly being blocked out of MC, BWL, AQ40 and Naxx?

After enough nerfs MC was puggable, the rest... not so much.

I mean, hell, 1% of the WoWs population actually did naxx40.

[paralleluniverse]

There's your discernable reason right there. WoW raiding has sucked since they went multi-mode with everything. Carbine is bringing back epic raiding, not 'grind-fest run every raid in 3 modes until your eyes bleed' accessible raiding.

Strawman argument. The argument is not about the difficulty of the raid. It's the concept of having 10 and 25 versions of every raid. That does not require that the raid be made easier, both 10 and 25 versions are about equal in difficulty. For example, Lei Shen was killed on 10 man first, but Ra-den was killed on 25 man first. Nor does it mean that the raid content is easier. For example, it took about 5 weeks for world first clear of ToT, which is quite long. If you ask these raiders, they'll tell you that WoW raiding is as hard as ever.

People need to differentiate between raising the skill floor and lowering the skill cap. WoW has done the former, it has NOT done the latter.

But this isn't about skill or no skill, this is about a flawed raiding model, which will make 20 man raiding guilds pointless. We know that this is a flawed model, because we've tried it.

Sometimes, WoW players ask for talent trees back, they ask for world PvP back, they ask for hard and sprawling dungeons back, on rare occasions they even ask for 40 mans back. But they never ask for going back to separate 10 and 25 man raids. Because they all know that the game is better now that every raid has a 10 and 25 man version.