Game Mechanics: Some are better than others?

[Shian]

Last night I tried playing... allods(?) or something like that. It's a FTP WoW clone and I just needing some mindless exploring/quest that I feel WoW is so famous for. "Go bring me 9 eyeballs" and all that...

I went out as a healer and found I couldn't do anything without a group. I found this kinda frustrating, not because of this mechanic but that I was so spoiled by Rift's 'click a button and change your playstyle' mechanic that I found it impossible to go back to boxing myself in to a role. Might be the fever talking though.

[Dhalin]

Last night I tried playing... allods(?) or something like that. It's a FTP WoW clone and I just needing some mindless exploring/quest that I feel WoW is so famous for. "Go bring me 9 eyeballs" and all that...

I went out as a healer and found I couldn't do anything without a group. I found this kinda frustrating, not because of this mechanic but that I was so spoiled by Rift's 'click a button and change your playstyle' mechanic that I found it impossible to go back to boxing myself in to a role. Might be the fever talking though.

Healers in general are usually like that.

If they make them too offensive, then they run the risk of healer characters being too overpowered (being able to heal AND deal damage?).

WoW did it pretty well, IMO: They allow you to change your specs often, but you can only pick two at a time (or respec for a fee that increases each time you do it).

Healer classes have other specs that are not healer (every class in the game has a damage-dealing spec that can be used for solo questing), and so on and so forth.

I don't know about this Allods but if they were trying to really do a WoW-clone, you'd think they would have at least done that part of it right? lol. It is one of the better things about WoW, being able to have a little choice in what your character can do and not be locked into a single style.

I think I've heard of that game once or twice, but never tried it myself.

[Frith-Rae]

Absolutely - some game mechanics are definitely better than others!

[starlight]

I cant speak for WoW because i am not remotely a fan of the WoW game as for a pure healer with no other support classes they are not the offence type
I don't have any info on WoW as i only played it for a very short time on a trial period and never went back. even minor proper multiclassing healer can come a offence type to an extent but nothing like a class designed for combat directly

[Frith-Rae]

I..dont understand whatever it was you just said.

If you said "healer priests cant dps" well..thats what duel-specs are for. One spec for full healy - one spec for dps. Switch at will *shrugs*.

It is an awesome game mechanic in and of itself and Im glad WoW brought it to the table for everyone else to get the idea =D.

[Dhalin]

Back on the subject, in other MMORPGs...

Final Fantasy XI.

White Mages (and to lesser extent, Red Mages) were your healers. Both of them had some decent offensive capability. You'd be thinking "what!? a WHITE mage offense?"

Yup!

With proper gear, that is.

White Mages had access to some gear that no other class had, and they were the one-and-only who had access to a weapon skill called Hexa Strike. Before the huge endgame overhaul, Hexa Strike was -the- most damaging weaponskill in the game, by pure numbers. The only reason White Mages were not putting out larger numbers than warriors, is because warriors had superior damage-dealing gear available to them.

But still, you give a white mage who was maxed on his club skill the right gear (and equipped the Ninja subjob which allowed dual-wielding), they could put out some not-too-shabby damage, but doing this hurt their healing ability quite a bit unless you had a ridiculously hard to obtain weapon that gave you another weaponskill to recover lots of mana.

Red Mages on the other hand, were like Red Mages in any other Final Fantasy -- a jack of all trades. They could throw offensive magic OK-ish, they could melee not too bad, and they could definitely be a healer in a pinch. For awhile, they were better healers than White Mages until they finally fixed that.

And then, you have Dancers which were added to the game some time later. You're thinking "huh? A person who dances"? Yup. A dual-wielding, dagger-stabbing dancer. They healed using TP (the same resource you use for weaponskill) instead of mana, which means they never had to worry about running out of it as long as they continued to melee a mob. Their dances healed their allies, removed their bad status effects and did other things. So they healed while putting out some DPS, and as long as they could hit the mob reliably, they never ran out of healing power. But their dance-heals weren't as strong per use as a White Mage's casted heals and it forced them to be in melee (and in AoE range) the whole time.

Dancer also made a heck of a subjob for any class wishing to solo because TP = Self Healing.

[Shian]

Speaking of game mechanics, I've decided that Bioware as an MMO is a bad idea just based on my playstyle and certain aspects of their mechanics..

Sadly I've gotten too used to boxing myself in to "the game is solely about the romance choice because that's what matters at the end." mentality.

I started this with Neverwinter Nights and the effect bled into every Bioware game I've played because they lend themselves to that. If I replay one of those games it is solely to see the different romance or other choice options.
Yeah, the story's great but for the most part it doesn't change on a subsequent play through. You STLL have to go to the landsmeet no matter your choices. The only thing that's not set in stone with these games are the endless romance options. I say endless because you get a very different game when say, romancing Alistar then killing him off than you do running that all the way to the end. When I started ME2, I was able to research the different romance options and what they get you in the end.

In the case of MEs this is REALLY important because some of the choices I found to be terrible. To the point where I decided that I didn't like ANY of the girls and played as female so I could get Garrus.

SWTOR as a brand new game does not have this option of research yet and has made the game incredibly frustrating. On more than one occasion I've wanted to re-roll my sith warrior as a female so I could romance Quinn. This rolls into my next rant:

Quinn bugs me to no end.
He's a walking Mary Sue. When I picked him up, he stated that he could maintain my ship, navigate, and was an excellent shot with a pistol. After spending, what 10 minutes on my ship he started bragging about being familiar with it. To add to the list, he's a military strategist and.. something else. I forget what he said. He's also a really good healer. He dosen't come off as a braggart, so I'm assuming that yes, he really can do all these things.
How old is he?! Is he like Simon Tam or something where he can just learn way more quickly than anyone else and became a doctor when he was eight? You know, in order to pick up all those other skills... He's stretching the suspension of disbelief for me. That could be part of his charm? I still can't decide whether I love him or hate him. I do like the VO though. I really wish someone would put out a list. There's been a couple of trainers where I do wonder if they are voiced by Marina Sirtis. (She was in ME2, so is she also in SWTOR?)

As a male, I really do question Quinn's mannerisms some times. The way he says, "Didn't lose you." after nearly every fight has an unmistakable ring of affection in his tone of voice. I forget what other piece of battle banter I picked up on, but there was another time where I really did question his affectionate manner. Wish they'd put in the same sex option already so it's not as weird. Someone else told me that Mako does the same thing. I'm finding I've rolled seemingly the completely wrong gender for every class.

I originally rolled a male because the conversations my boyfriend got with Vette were really neat but now I think I also want to see what Quinn's romance options are.

Seeing that I've wanted to romance both of the only two companions I have, I have a feeling I'll want to romance every companion I pick up.... this means how many play throughs? times 8 characters? Just Ugh.

I was able to do SOME research and after learning the next companion I get can be light or dark, I decided I wanted both and yesterday rolled a female sith.

Today while running the lower level missions I decided to just give my shards to one of the other recruits-something I had not done the previous 3 times and as a consequence I had to go all the way back out and loot another set of shards. Later on the kid challenged Vern(?) (whatever the other recruit's name) was and died.
Boyfriend pointed out that by sending the group of young acolytes out when I first met them probably meant that if I had spared them, they might have popped out at this crucial moment making it no longer a "Me vs. Vernin" but "Vernin vs. Me and a ton of my new allies." How cool would THAT be to see?!

Again, there's no magical save point that I can go back and redo. My choice is just to re-roll or live with my choices forever. Not terrible at 1-10 but later on in the game when you're 30-ish? This is not a bad thing in the broader sense mind you, I've never seen an MMO that lets you do otherwise, it's just that I feel Bioware games are set up to run through multiple paths and multiple play throughs to explore these types of options.

There's also been a few times where I didn't hit the escape key fast enough and got stuck with a choice when I was just seeing what my character would say as the choice you make is almost always never the way the character words it.
I know that's your thing Bioware, but I'm not sure if anybody really and truly thinks that this is a great mechanic- in an MMO or otherwise.

Is it March yet? I've got my Bethesda fix, now I need a Bioware one.

[Dhalin]

I don't know much about their Star Wars franchise, but you better bet your booties I'm breathlessly awaiting ME3.

There's one thing that Bioware does awesome, and that's making absolutely Big Dang Heroes.

Square-Enix needs to take a page from Bioware and learn what really makes a good Hero.

I mean, come on... Commander Shepard? Have you seen anyone in a video game that is more badass than this Man/woman, as far as Player-Characters go? I mean there's Thunder God Cid, Fei/Id, etc... but Commander Shepard has to be one of... maybe the coolest Player-Character Hero around.

In a genre where aliens are typically portrayed as being better than humans in some way or another, here's Commander Shepard, showing the universe that nobody screws with the humans and comes out of it alive. Not even some Big Bad race of Doom that's millions of years old. Who was the first to kill a Reaper? Yup, Shepard. Who took down the Collectors despite their ridiculously advanced technology? Yup, Shepard. Oh, He/She had help, of course, but as the beginning of ME2 teaches you, they are nothing without their Commander leading them.

Mass Effect has to be the coolest video game story I've ever had the pleasure of playing through, bar none. Oh, and I liked how ME2 truly allowed you to continue playing the same character you started in ME1. Other games made similar promises, but just didn't deliver on them to the extent ME2 did. Sure, you had to re-level everything from scratch, but you kept the character's looks right down to the haircut if you wished, AND you kept all the character's choices and decisions you made in the first game, AND the game provided IC reasons as to why you need to re-level everything and re-acquire weapons/equipment/money.

Sorry about the Mass Effect tangent there, but... wow. Mass Effect is the one thing that has redeemed Bioware IMO.

[Frith-Rae]

Uhh - you dont get multiple romance options with SW:TOR.

Each class has one, MAYBE two (MAYBE - some just have the one), of the 5 companions you can romance. Thats one/2 PER GENDER.

So no, its not 8 playthroughts - it would be at most 4 (if there were two male options and two female options).

You already have done some research, so torhead (and other sites) tell you which companions you can romance out of each class-5. The rest you CANNOT, no matter how you answer or how you give gifts.

Thats another thing - dont worry so much about wether your companion likes a choice. You can always give a gift and get back the rep level you lost (plus most decisions they "like" ar e+15 or +30 etc, where most decisions you make they do NOT like are -1).

A third thing is - dont worry about the choices you make in questing. It does NOT matter as much as it woudl in a single playe rgame and it does NOT effect your quests that much. Im playing both a LS Sith Warrior and a DS Sith Inquisitor and so far they ar epretty much neck and neck with questing. The choices I have made with their quests have mattered NOT AT ALL in how things have turned out. Wether I picked a LS or DS option, the quests ended almost the same. It didnt bring charactres I left alive back later to help or hurt me - and it didnt effect my later quests (or major story quests) in any big way by murdering someone or not.

It isnt a single player game - its the illusion of "story matters" when really, if you choose to back talk that Quest giver or kiss his *** - the next conversational setnence is EXACTLY the same regardless of what you said.

It doesnt work like their single player games; it isnt that indepth. Unforutnately. It doesnt make that much difference.

Also - regardless of affection levels - all the companions make assinine and reptitive statements. Affection doesnt change that. Dont read too much into it lol.

Oh, and yes males have way more interesting conversation options with their female romance parterns (as well as more random one-night-stands with NPCs they flirt with!) than the female characters. Yes, its sexist - apparently Bioware didnt care. Ive read several forum threads on t his - playign a MALE charater will give you much more "vareity" and intersting flirty conversations than playing a female character.

Stupid sexism!

[Shian]

It isnt a single player game - its the illusion of "story matters" when really, if you choose to back talk that Quest giver or kiss his *** - the next conversational sentence is EXACTLY the same regardless of what you said.

Huh. Okay. That makes sense then. Great! I think.

It doesn't work like their single player games; it isn't that indepth. Unfortunately. It doesn't make that much difference.

Even better! but at one time I thought it did? Rescue a bunch of Rebel soldiers and they come help you later to kill off a sith? Or do you fight the sith regardless of whether or not you have help? If so, that'll make my game SO much easier knowing that it doesn't really make any difference. Think I'll re roll that female and get her to that battle again to see if that's true.

I know that they make assine repetitive statements. I'm reminded of it every time I hop off my speeder to pick up a rock and Quinn is all like, "I have you covered!" XD
Quinn, it's a damned rock, not charging into battle here.
Doesn't make the affectionate way he occasionally talks to my character any less.... wiggy.

Yeah, I just looked at the Jedi options and there's like... nothing. You get a male and a female romance (neither of them are that pretty) and that's it. Compared to the Sith's...4? Two of each gender? Plus the numerous fade to blacks I've found on my sith.
My poor dark Jedi gets the shorter end of the stick than my light side Sith.
This game is so amusing.

[Velea]

I just have to chuckle cause I wouldn't have even thought about "romancing" my Jedi character until I saw this thread. Now that I've seen that it's possible, though, it's making for some really funny roleplaying with RL husband's character and the NPC I'm "romancing".

Sorry for the off-topic post, but I just had to chime in.

[Frith-Rae]

ZOmg i have typed out this novel explaining this stuff twice now and for some reason nboth times it was LOST..I give up.

My points were:

--Nope, that Sith would have fought you anyway. The only decisions that change anything are 1-decisions that your companion likes/dislikes and 2-the specific LS/DS point decisions (which may or may not tweak some of your story options down the road).

The vast majority of quest decisions only result in like 1-2 setence comment differences before returning back to the "rails" of the quest.

--Having 1 or 2 romance options for companionsn is not Faction based at all. Not all Sith have 2 and all Jedi have 1. It is CLASS based; some Sith classes AND Some Jedi classes have 2. Some Sith/Jedi classes have 1. The only real bias is male vs. female characters - far more MALE characters have 2 options (sith or Jedi class) than female characters. Most female characters (regardless of faction or class) only get one option.

I wish all Sith had 2 options. Then all my Sith Female characters (all of what I play) would have more than their one male options. But Noooo!

Male characters (regardless of faction or class) have more overall companion romance options AND more one-night-stands with NPCs options AND more Flirt options. Female charaters have a small fraction of those conversation options.

My level 18 hubbys male bounty hunter has had "flirt" conversation options severla times. My level 18 female Sith Inquisitor has had..one. We are both Sith. :/

Stupid sexism! *spits on it*

If you lookat all the companions there are just more female cmpanions than male ones. Period. Also, all the alien male options are not allowed - whereas thereare several FEMALE ALIEN romance options (Vette, Azshara, etc.). In fact, there are mostly human/cyborg type MALE characters with very few aliens comparedto how many "'sexy alien" female companions in game.

So yea..bias!! Stupid bioware! Grrr! I wanted more than one optin - I wanted CHOICE! But as Iim learning about this game...most of those choices that were hyped are not choices at all (as I expected...).