WoW player here.
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Originally Posted by
Armameteus
Anyway, my largest gripe is that they are money vampires. First off, you have to buy the game. Okay, last I checked, that's at least 20-something dollars, maybe more. Next, if you want the full game experience, you have to get the expansions... all three of them. So... say about 30$ a piece for the old ones, again, last I checked. Obviously at least 60$ for the new one coming out.
You haven't checked right, or recently. The original game is $19.99. The Burning Crusade's price was dropped to $19.99 I believe. That already is cheaper than most non-MMORPG games out there, $10 cheaper. Okay, there's Wrath. I bet it will be dropped in price once Cataclysm is released. Still isn't that bad.
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Then there's the monthly subscriptions. I don't know how much that is, but the fact that you can't even play the game you just bought without also paying a sub seems sort of... hm, what's the word...? Oh, right extortionate.
They give you discounts for 6-month subs. It is actually cheaper than Istaria's paid subscription if you buy the 6-month sub.
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Then there's the world system. Granted, Istaria has that, but only three-fold, and each that cadre to a different style of player, from role-players, to beta-testers, to the common gamer; those being the Order, Blight, and Chaos shards respectively.
WoW on the other hand is a game which has little in terms of "dedicated" worlds and more along the lines of simple mass quantity to be able to accommodate for their huge player base.
I don't see the problem here. WoW has five different server types:
Public Test Realm (Istaria's Blight server)
PvE (Istaria's Chaos)
PvP (The opposing side can attack you at any time if you're in enemy or contested territory)
RP (Istaria's Order)
RP-PvP (Same as PvP, only also RP)
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Problem is, in creating a character, they in turn become locked to the world in which they were created. So, if my friend happens to be on another world and I want to play with him/her with one of my characters that's on a different world, 1) I'll have to ask Blizzard to transfer it over, 2) pay them a gross (and by "gross", I mean "disgusting") sum of money to do so, and 3) wait for who-knows-how-long for them to do it. Days, weeks, months? Who knows. They seem to tend to do things at a pace that suits them, rather than the player. I guess I can't really blame them though, if they're busy. They've got a lot of players to deal with. But that's not the point. The first two are the big problems.
Or, 4). Reroll a character on their server. It really isn't hard to do; they realize that people like to experiment and try different things. You're encouraged to roll alternate characters in WoW partly for that reason. You're allowed a Max of 50 characters per account, 10 per server. That's plenty. And the price to move a character isn't THAT bad, and as others said, it is pretty quick. I was able to move mine within 3 hours of my application.
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Next, we have the players themselves. And, my god, if you haven't been on a WoW server, you haven't seen nasty. The people in this game can be freaking vicious--no, rabid--NO, psychotic. Yeah, that. Absolutely, crack-pot, bat-crap insane. Hostility? Through the roof. l33t-freaks? Like you wouldn't believe. Murderers? ...In some cases. Did you know? People are sometimes outright murdered in real life by players who are so disturbingly into that game, they think that anyone who crosses them over it needs to die. For real. I mean... how screwed up do you have to be to do something like that? It may be uncommon, but I'm certainly not going to chance coming across one of those nut jobs if it means I'll get MURDERED, thanks.
I've been playing since Early-to-Mid Vanilla. I've never been stalked IRL. I don't really get how someone is going to know where you live through a game (unless you TELL someone, which is exceedingly stupid), even if they did care THAT much.
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Aside from that, there are so few generally nice players in there, it's like trying to find a needle... in a pile of needles... inside a warehouse filled with numerous piles of needles. As one particular Istarian said here on the forums somewhere, asking for help/making a comment/trying to be nice, etc in that kind of game is just like asking to be derided, branded a "noob", generally despised by the 'vets', have your name smeared into gruok dung for eternity... I can go on. It's just sad how little there is in terms of community in that game. Everyone hates everyone else, unless your one of the haters, in which case, you're looked at as "cool" because you frequently degrade other newbies. To hate is to be loved by those that hate. *sigh* Sad.
I've never been called a noob or anything of the sort when asking for help in WoW. It happens, but that's what the ignore funciton is. For every 1 idiot that calls you a noob, there's 5 more ready to answer your questions. Also, there are HUGE wikibases on WoWhead/Wowpedia/Allakhazam that cover 99.9999% of anything you need to know about WoW. Istaria's wiki is... well.
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Next is more a personal gripe of mine, but I may as well inform those that haven't played the game before. It's two-fold: the leveling system and the abilities/trades system.
First off, levels. Every expansion sees another ten added to the level cap, which would make this newest one I think 90? Hm... not really sure about that. Haven't been bothered to keep track. Regardless, the game play is essentially this: if you haven't maxed out your level yet, you're still a noob and you can't actually do very much in the game at all because you're too weak/inexperienced. Monsters still kill you, quests remain incomplete and items are too high on the tier system to be used/equipped. Until you've hit the maximum, you're not 'really' playing the game because you're so limited as to what you can do.
Newest one only adds 85, due to the massive revamping of the old world. WoW makes it EASY for you to catch up to the older players, because when a new expansion is released, the veterans' elite dungeon gear is eventually replaced by the same quested greens you will eventually get. And no monster will kill you -- you can start WoW right now at level 1 and level clear up to 80 with no problems at all! You aren't going to be thrown into Northrend at Level 1. No, you start where all Level 1s have started since the dawn of WoW. In fact, WoW is something of a unique MMORPG in this; no other MMORPG I know of frequently gives "catch-up" sessions where the new can catch up to the vets in terms of PvE and PvP both.
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On top of that, the game play is very much group-oriented. Kind of ironic, considering how generally evil some of those players can be, having to team up with so many at one time. Anyway, much of what you can do is very limited to massive group efforts. Even when you're maxed out, you'll likely be finding it impossible to complete even one-tenth of the overall game play (trades not included; more on that later) without grouping up with a bunch of other people in the faint hope that you'll be able to successfully defeat that one particular boss or finish that certain quest, etc.
Other than a few optional group quests in the world, the only thing you need groups for are Dungeons and Raids. You're not forced to do them.
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Forced group game play is a massive no-no in my books. It should be totally optional and you should be able to solo 100% of the game without any help what-so-ever if you desire. It may be hard work-yes, but it should still be open to those that are willing to go through that. And, in a horrid community like WoW's, I would definitely be willing.
Why make WoW an MMORPG at all if EVERYTHING is solo-able? That doesn't make a lick of sense. I mean, take the Lich King for example. Why should someone be able to SOLO such a huge, evil MONSTER of a person who has killed millions of people? Raid Bosses are _epic_ battles between insanely powerful monsters and groups of brave heroes. I mean, in Istaria, do you complain that you can't solo Fafnir, or Sharoth, or what-not?
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Finally, in terms of the level system, there's the fact that leveling is truly a joke. You hit that maximum so fast, with so little effort that (coupled with the above grievances), it may as well not even be a part of the game at all. "You've hit maximum? Whoop-dee-freakin-doo." is about all you get from the 'vets' because, well, it's just too easy. They practically hand them to you on a silver platter. There's so little work involved, you feel as though you've accomplished nothing. That's why games like Istaria are all but dead nowadays; players are so used to "modern" gaming that dumbs everything down, gives the players essentially zero challenge starting out and makes them go through no effort to gain levels/skills/equips, etc, that games that actually make you feel like you've achieved something when you gain that level, learn that skill or find that equip (Ie, make you work for it) are shunned and despised.
Yeah, like doing the same thing over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over again is fun or challenging.
Leveling in Istaria is just like leveling in WoW, only in Istaria you don't have quests or anything to break up the Tedium of killing the same few golems/treants/whatever thousands of times until you move onto slightly stronger golem/treant/whatever. The only difference is, you have to kill a fewer number of them. Once you kill it 3-5 times, you've proven that you can kill the stupid thing. Time to move onto something new. No, Istaria makes you kill it 50+ more times, because the first 5 times you killed it wasn't redundant enough.
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Personally, I like that feeling of self-satisfaction when I've finally gotten what I was hoping to achieve. If it's wrong to enjoy that sensation of finally seeing your hard effort rewarded after you've shed blood, sweat and tears for it, then sue me. I can't stand games that give you everything. It defeats the purpose of even having systems like those in place.
When I finally gain a level in Istaria, my very first thought is "man, its about freaking TIME." or "Thank God I don't have to do That again." Seriously, Istaria isn't "hard" to level in, the only challenge is trying to figure out how to do it as quickly as possible. Anybody can beat on golems all day long and gain levels. That's child's play.
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And now, for the trade system. Every expansion, they add a bucket-load of new trades to learn, but only enough skill points per level to learn a tiny fraction of what can be learned in those new trades, not to mention all the other ones that preceded them. There are so many things to learn and yet you'll never be able to learn them all with one character. Never. You know why? Because obviously your player has a limited memory bank in that brain of theirs and can only learn so much before their brain seizes up and can't learn any more. Not unlike real life. Wait, no, that's no like real life at all. In fact, it's the opposite... hmm...
They limit how many things any one character can learn, so that you don't get a "Do It All Yourself" Syndrome. Unlike Istaria, WoW has a thriving economy. Why? Because you don't have everyone being able to make everything themselves. Yes, my Blacksmithing can make me money? Why? Because there's somebody out there needing a weapon or armor, who is willing to pay me to make it for them because they don't have Blacksmithing. They might have, say, Jewelcrafting. Hey look, I need a gem cut. I can't do Jewelcrafting because I have Mining and Blacksmithing. I hand them a gem, they cut it for me, I tip em, and they hand me the cut gem in return. It is called TRADING. You can't have that when everyone knows how to do everything!
That, and in WoW, each craft has its own unique benefits to the characters. Miners get extra Stamina (which grants extra health), Herbalists can get access to a mild Heal-over-Time spell, Skinners have a higher critical hit chance, Blacksmiths can socket their bracers and gloves, Leatherworkers, Scribes, and Tailors get extra item enchants that nobody else has access to. If any one character could have access to all of these simultaneously, it'd be too overpowered.
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I don't mind having to make choices toward your character's development that affect game play--it can be fun even, if done correctly--but essentially preventing your character from learning any more than one one-hundredth of all the available trades is so... restricting. What? Do they fear that their players won't be responsible enough to handle such power as to know everything there is to know? To be able to do everything there is to do, trade-wise? Oh, look; more forced game play elements, this time in the form of "forced multiple characters". Yep, the only way you'll ever be able to experience 100% of the game is by making truckloads of new characters that you can grind up to make into specialized tradesman. Never will you be able to make that one "über-character" that can do everything.
I LIKE having multiple characters, thankyouverymuch.
In Istaria, everything takes so dang long to do, it discourages multiple characters, especially bipeds. I like my Saris, but sometimes I wonder... "what would it be like to have a Sslik? I wonder what it is like playing a Dryad?" I'm not going to go find out, because it'd take me 3,000 years to actually get them leveled to where they are useful.
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Why is it so wrong to want to become "godly"?
Weren't you just griping about how leveling in WoW is "Too easy"? If your character is too godly, then everything is too easy. To make things challenging for the "Godly" bipeds in Istaria, the devs had to resort to having mobs being stupidly cheap (one-hit kills, perma-stuns, ridiculous numbers of mobs swarming you, etc) just to keep some challenge there. WoW went another route -- they limited characters' power, so that insta-kills, perma-stuns, etc weren't necessary to maintain a challenge level.
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I mean, it's not unfair if everyone can eventually do it. It just takes time. I used to frequently play a game with a leveling/skill system that was only restricted by the maximum. Essentially, with enough hard work and effort, you could ascend into the realm of godliness that was the true epitome of the "über". You knew everything. You did everything. You could fight any fight, kill any monster, craft any tool and explore any area of the game you desired. The world truly was at your fingertips.
What good is becoming a god in a game, when there's nothing left to challenge you? That's the day you quit.