So I finally broke down and bought Guild Wars and the expansion Factions on Thursday and have been having a grand old time… that it until I left the newbie area. I really enjoyed the PvE that the game offered and expected that the trend would continue once I left the starting area but boy was I wrong.
I think the main problem I am seeing is the mobs warping all over the place which sometimes leads to my death. Also the fact that I guess the henchmen are fearing the mobs or something because sometimes they just go running off in all directions and I have to try to follow them which is a problem because they warp back and I dont and yadda yadda yadda.
I guess it could be the servers are getting seriously hounded with the Nightfall preview weekend but I dont have any idea if thats how it is all the time or not. So is the PvE always like this or is it a recent thing? The warping mobs and stuff really sucks.
One last thing are the Warriors in the game supposed to be tanks or something because I find its kinda hard to tank mobs when you dont really have a way to taunt the mobs off the weaker casters. I dunno I might be doing something wrong because I am only level 9.
Oh yeah and the lagg isn’t on my side. Honestly the way the lag is reminds me of AO when it launched. Everything was great in the newbie yard but once you left holy shit watch out. If this game had a subscription fee I highly doubt I would pay it after the first month because it bothers me so much.
The short of it is Lagg sux!
EDIT:
Oh yeah and thats not to say I dont like the game because I really really do. I have put about 15+ hours in to it so far and I really dig the graphic style it has going for it. I do like the combat ( when its working ) and I am doing the missions and actually reading some of the text (unlike WoW ). The cut scenes rule too ( I did always like that from FFXI ) and I am glad they finally made the mouths move in nightfall.
The lag was fairly nasty at times this weekend because of the preview weekend (likely). It’s definitely the exception.
Warriors are supposed to be tanks, and yet how can one tank without a taunt? Well, you can body block and physically stop people from reaching the casters, but really, the best way for Warriors to “tank” is by being a big-ass threat. IIRC, Warriors have the highest sustained DPS. If ignored, they can be straight up nasty. Degen, interrupts, MOTHERFUCKING KNOCKDOWN… they can make a spellcaster’s life pretty messy if left unchecked. I usually play a monk in PvP, and I always end up with two warriors riding my ass. Interrupting me, crippling me, knocking me down, you name it. What happens is that eventually the group has to turn their attention to the Warriors.
That’s in PvP. In PvE, just make sure the warriors go in first. And let them engage for a few seconds. Then it’s usually fine, or at least relatively managable.
And for gods sake if teamed with warriors DO NOT use powers like Firestorm.
Speaking as a long time warrior player in just about every game ever there is nothing worse than a spellcaster deciding to cast a spell that causes your targets to suddenly run the feck away.
This applies to powers with Knockback in certain other MMOs. Energy Blasters in City of heroes I’m looking at you.
Speaking as a long time warrior player in just about every game ever there is nothing worse than a spellcaster deciding to cast a spell that causes your targets to suddenly run the feck away.
God is that the spell that does it? Is there a way to make your henchmen not use it? Seriously its retarded.
Don’t take the NPC Mage if you’re a warrior. Fireball and Meteor Storm are far better choices when working with warriors for EL and the NPC uses Firestorm.
This weekend was pretty rough in the Lag department for everybody. Everybody had to download the content so it was really dragging down the performance. No, the game usually is better than that and you’ll find it more fun if you partner up with some real people when you play. Got Guild? Looking for one? www.ioncross.com [ion]
I’m waiting for the official “Nightfall Preview Review” thread. I spent less than 23 hours on a character and took it to level 19.5 with onle the Heroes & NPCs.
Firestorm and any other spell that does damage over time in an area. The baddy AI will always run away from such effects the moment they start. This is why I like Air Elementalists for teaming cos they do massive spike damage and also have lots of spells to knock people down.
I haven’t really played around with this yet but I’m guessing with Nightfall’s new command system, you will be able to order henchies to stay back by setting a flag. Could be a great way to manage aggro.
Also it gets easier to manage henchmen as you progress and get more types of them. The protection and healer henchmen do a great job (for AI) to keep the the party alive.
Personally, I have rarely experienced warping/lag in GW. Even this weekend I didn’t feel any lag but it could be certain areas were more crowded than others. Oh yeah, I played really late at night so that could be it too.
They’d do that job better if the monster AI wasn’t told to always attack monks first.
Seriously the number of times I run into a big mob only to discover they all peg it towards the NPC monk; who isn’t in aggro range or even cast a spell yet, and beat the crap out of them is stupid.
I think that is the last of my pet peeves with Guild Wars though.
Oh except for the 54hp monk and monks that insist on only taking smiting powers, running off from the group and then leaving the mission the moment they die.
They go after the party member with the least amount of armor usually from what I experienced. I went out with a group from my Guild and playing as the Monk I am CONVINCED that they knew that the Ranger next to me had crappy armor. I was using my Monk to block the NPCs that were more interested in beating the hell out of him than the Monk that was in front of him.
I don’t know how much of that carries over to the NPC monsters but it sure seems like they always find the weakest person in a group.
I think so, that’s been my experience as well. I mostly play elementalist and they always pick on me but if I put up spells like Armor of Earth, I am targeted much less. Proximity is probably also a factor. DPS? I’m not sure. In other games DPS/anti-DPS(i.e. heals) is almost always the most important aggro inducer but doesn’t seem to be in GW.
EY! Smiting monks are AWESOME. Esspecially in Alliance Battles. Zealots Fire + Bal’s Aura plus the standard Monk Spammables and you can be very effective. Super effective even. I can understand the frustration though. But man, for taking down a minion masters army, there’s no one better to do it.
Actually the monsters go after whoever they think they can take out the fastest first and then large threats second. Since we had to balance the skills in the game for PvP we wanted a monster AI system that simulated human targetting more accurately. It uses a fairly complex combination of factors to determine who it can kill the quickest but some of the things it takes into account are target’s current health, armor level, speed, and distance to target. As a monk what this usually means is that creatures will often come after you, a very simple way for a warrior to “taunt” a monster is to bring a crippling attack and have them use it on the monster while the monk runs away. Similarly speed buffs are a very good way to make monsters lose interest in lower armor level targets. Assassin can be a very good secondary for soft target classes because you can bring along dash which is a 50% run buff and doesn’t need to be attribed. Hope that helps.
