[GW1] Hall of Monuments: Bite-size guide & Discussion

[Fencers]

Ah, I see. I can understand that.

Honestly, I'd rather they had sold them separately, especially since the HoM skins are (arguably) better looking than anything Anet's put in the gem store thus far. Not to knock GW1, but I wasn't particularly keen on playing a game just to get things in a game that I'd rather be playing, if that makes any sense. :P

GW1 has surprisingly held up well over the years. Honestly, I was expecting it to graphically look more like Diablo II and with similar gameplay. I seem to remember it came out when I was still playing D2, but all of my friends hated it so I never bothered with it at the time. You know me and anything that requires groups to complete. :P

Can solo the entirety of Guild Wars 1. Even hard modes and elite missions.

GW1 is weird in that, theoretically and in design, it's pretty close to the most ideal MMO ever designed for me. Only The Secret World comes close. GW1 verges on near perfection.

In practice, Arena.net never had the wherewithal to tighten their own games. The flaws of GW1 are almost entirely like... UI, communication, combat feedback, et cetera.

Anet have displayed zero capacity in any of their five games in QA and secondary systems design. Even the "problems" of Guild Wars 2 are like... town clothes suck, UI is poor, feedback of combat information is obtuse, etc.

Firing a rifle, playing a DE, world presentation, etc in GW2? Brilliant. A++.

Changing town clothes or searching the auction house? Oh good lord.

You'll run into odd chunkiness in places like the character screen and hero interface in GW1. You will often be left wondering how Anet managed one of the most complex skill and builds systems in all of gaming but could not figure out how to like have whispers immediate or pets manageable.

It's like the exact opposite of Blizzard. Where Blizz nail all the secondary systems perfectly and their games play with a kind of elegance matched only by Nintendo and Valve. But have about as much complexity as the aforementioned games made for literal children.

[Lane]

Can solo the entirety of Guild Wars 1. Even hard modes and elite missions.

Well, at the time (and even recently) those I asked about GW1, people who I generally share video game interests with, didn't like it. One of the main reasons was having to coordinate efforts with others. I'm not that far into the game yet, but I've already run into a couple of quests that did require the assistance of someone else, if nothing else someone to open that damned gate into Northlands. :P Regardless, that was the single biggest reason I never tried the game when it was new. There were other reasons too, of course. The instanced world, hearing that the missions were nightmarish, the cash shop, etc.

Perhaps I should reserve judgment until I've gotten farther into it, but it looks like a game I might've enjoyed if I'd had people to play it with at the time.

[Fencers]

Oh. Sorry I missed the part where you were talking in the past tense.

Yes, Prophecies was tougher back in the day. It was still possible to solo a LOT of it though. Very little "required grouping".

Now a days, everything can be solo'd. Might be even easier to solo then group with someone with a sub optimal spec or ignorance of the missions. As heroes can do a lot that players do usually.

[Meledelion]

As heroes can do a lot that players do usually.

And they can do it as good or BETTER (minion master nec comes to mind, interupter comes to mind,...)

I'm in the same boat with Fencers though. I have 3 or 4 LDOA toons two of them were done the deathleveling way (this took months btw) and then I came back after a break and heard about the quests and leveled another 1 and the 4th is at like lvl 17.

As time progressed I felt like A-net made the game more and more casual friendly. I actually liked having the option to bring henchmen but ofc they were worse than a team of real players. I also liked how the game just had a real steady flow to it. There aren't many points in the game to get stuck (thunderhead keep is an exception) but the difficulty does rise.

It was very easy for veterans to tell when others joined the game. People who played through Proph back in the day look down upon people who started in factions since it basically was the start of casual and op-fest. You "get" the game a lot better when you start out in proph since some fights rely on using game mechanics while factions (and to some extent nf) are a lot more straight forward.


If I compare GW with GW2 I must say that GW is a far better game design wise. GW2 went too much into the direction of WoW and too little in the direction of GW for my taste.

[Fencers]

And they can do it as good or BETTER (minion master nec comes to mind, interupter comes to mind,...)

Haha. Yea, think I can make a build for Gwen that is more competent at mass Panic and interrupts than many human players. XD

I really feel Heroes and consumables ruined Guild Wars 1. Before that GW1 was actually a skill based game-- WITHOUT being a twitch action based game. Which is no slight feat. It is historically very difficult to design a video game which is entirely skill dependent without debasing gameplay to reactive input solely.

It's one of the reasons why in game culture "skill" is still associated with things such as jumping, aiming, dodging and so forth. Because stuff like Defender, Contra, Ghosts & Goblins, Bayou Billy, et cetera were the only way developers could challenge. Or in the modern era; Dark Souls, Ninja Gaiden, Godhand, Quake. To name a few.

I mean, like Final Fantasy 6? Great game. Not super demanding of the player in skill or thought. Fallout, same. Morrowind, same. Everquest, same. On and on. And those are masterpiece games, mind you. FF6 is without flaw for example. Morrowind might be the only true RPG ever created.

It was pretty rare there were games like Tactics Ogre, Guild Wars 1, XCom Ufo Defense or Metal Fatigue. All of which were fairly challenging, cerebral and thoughtful games that were apart from "low skill"/"high thought" design you saw in Ultima, Zork, etc.

I just feel GW2 is a different type of game than GW1. Not better or worse, per se. Just different in the same way as Panzer General and Starcraft. Sometimes a developer hits on a DD/T (even if sloppily executed in the case of GW1) that is fairly remarkable, by design or accident. That was the case in GW1.

[Valeron]

I understand the feeling about heroes ruining the game. However, the reason I enjoyed them was because I could make builds for them. I was one of the players who loved making all kinds of individual builds and team builds. It was actually my favorite part of the game. I had a chance to try to develop 64 skills working together as a team, it really appealed to me.

[Meledelion]

Funny that every game you listed is in my top 10 of games

Doozer, I too love buildcrafting but I changed to theorycrafting for WoW and GW2 relying more on math and less on what I see/notice.

[Fencers]

Funny that every game you listed is in my top 10 of games

They're great games.

I always feel people mistake "skill" and "challenge". The two are not necessarily related. A game can be a challenge without requiring a lot of personal skill from the player- in thought or action. Just as a game require skill without posing a daunting challenge.

Behold:

[Lane]

Alright, since it seems like most of the HoM stuff can be gotten with gold does anyone have any idea what a respectable GW2->GW1 gold exchange rate would be? I am really not much of a multi-game player to begin with and I'm finding it difficult to section off enough time to play GW1 (without cutting out GW2) to accomplish much of anything.

[Fencers]

Alright, since it seems like most of the HoM stuff can be gotten with gold does anyone have any idea what a respectable GW2->GW1 gold exchange rate would be? I am really not much of a multi-game player to begin with and I'm finding it difficult to section off enough time to play GW1 (without cutting out GW2) to accomplish much of anything.

LOL. Good luck with that!

Money in GW1 was like the exact opposite in GW2. It fell from the flippin' sky in giant sacks with the $ on it enough to make Scrooge McDuck jealous of Tyria's past riches.

This is so much so, that it wasn't/isn't uncommon for people to have multiple GW1 accounts just to hold money due to plat cap. Eventually the only thing of worth was like rare crafting materials and ectos.

Not to mention that you have to find people in GW1 to sell you stuff. Which is becoming less common, more finite and outrageously priced for a non-veteran.

GLHF.

[Razael]

Right managed to find a good Platinum edition plus Factions for uber cheap. Time to get to workkk.

[Deleted]

As GW2 fell far from my expectations I've basically been playing GW1 when I feel the want to game as...well I'm not really much the gamer type anyway. But so far its the only MMO type game that hasn't been a complete grind snorefest for me.

Good luck to anyone starting! it's the best, really. Around this time last year I was getting my HoM and cursing but...still.