MMO Boredom

[ocato]

I quit World of Warcraft about three weeks after the expansion, or so. Maybe less. Since then I've dabbled in Dungeons and Dragons Online, and I played the pre-release beta of Lord of the Rings Online. Neither really stuck with me. Sometimes I convince myself I really want to play DDO again, but I play for a day or two and get bored and go 'there goes 15 bucks'. It's hard to play MMOs by yourself and enjoy them (especially DDO) but its not easy meeting nice people on them either. Other than work, I don't have a lot going on, and I'm looking for a new MMO to pick up to occupy myself with from time to time. Not hard core 'I live in Blackwing Lair' style play, but something that I can enjoy by myself or with others. So tell me, what're some good MMOs? The ability to play Bards is a plus (What can I say?).

[dyslexicfaser]

If I'm right in assuming you're looking for a fantasy MMO, WoW and LotR seem to be the top contenders right now. EQ is dated and DaoC is ... well, you can try it, but I didn't care for it myself.

Best suggestion I got is the new Warhammer MMO - I haven't been following it myself, but a couple friends swear by it.

[Call_me_Fate]

I still ahve the WoW account, but really I don't play much. Once I hit 70 I never had the chance to do much. My guild does all sorts of raids and fun stuff, but at bad times for me, so I get left behind. I sometimes log in to go solo some place that used ot be hard, but not often.

[NEO|Phyte]

Thus far, there is only one MMO that I know for a fact I would pay for, and thats EVE Online (http://www.eve-online.com/).

I'm still deciding on Wurm Online (http://www.wurmonline.com/).

[Timarvay]

Guildwars is a one time fee, and it is rather people focused, you may want to look into that.

If you want to look at something different, take a look at puzzle pirates. Its focused on puzzles! The graphics aren't the best, but the people tend to be friendly, and its generally better than a mindless grind game.

[Vaniel]

Get your hands on free MMOs. I'm sure they exist :P

[Ranis]

I played WoW and Guild Wars.

I now play City of Heroes.

I will never go back.

City of Heroes is AMAZING. The character creation is unprecedented, the story is far superior to any other MMO that I know of, and it's extremely visually satisfying. I made a thread about CoH a few weeks ago, do a search function for City of Heroes and you should find it if you'd like more info.

[ocato]

Yeah, I'm sort of looking for fantasy, though I will not shun any suggestions otherwise. Pretty much I don't get to play D&D anymore outside of pbp games and I'm looking to fill my nerd quota for the week.

[Sereneprophet]

Well LOTRO, while not being perfect, and shares some similarities to WoW via some gameplay aspects and GUI, is a very vibrant world as you might expect, and has some fun new stuff likes deed's, traits, etc.

There is a bard class, the Minstrel, which is a healing/buff class, though you can do some decent melee damage if you dont feel like grouping all the time. Most of the "spells" are songs of sorts, ballads, anthems, etc.

And, for the burgeoning musician there is an in game music system, where 1-8 correspond to a specific musical note, and control and shift bring it flat and sharp. I believe its C Minor or Major, or something like that, but they are adding more in the June update. I personally am enjoying the game. Feels much more epic, not to over the top like WoW, and the quests for me seem at least partially interesting, like it would be something you would do.

Example, Helping a Hobbit pick the last of her Pipeweed, or going to a bandit camp to convince a son to come home. Some are obviously a little on the boring side, but theres just so many quests and stuff, I dunno, I love it.

It will take a more powerful computer to play it than WoW did, because WoW on max and WoW on low were not a big jump of quality, but not so on LOTRO. Obviously take a look at the RECOMMENDED requirements, as those will get you the best functioning.

Good luck choosing.

[Daze]

Conan: Hyporbean Adventures looks pretty awesome... not due out til later in the year though. I like some of the game decisions it looks like their making.

EVE kicks butt.. though its a very different style of play, fun once you get some time in there under your belt. (literally)

Other than that, pretty thin I'd say.. but I hear good things about City of heroes/villains, havent played it though.

[Midnight Son]

I play DDO and still enjoy it. you're right, however, that it is much more enjoyable with friends. None of my friends here play MMOs, though, so I just have to find a group to play with in game. I think that will be an issue for you with pretty much any game you play. They are always much more enjoyable with friends. Of course, if any of my friends did play, I might freak them out, considering that I use a voice changer for my female characters.

[ocato]

I broke down and renewed my DDO account, I'm on Thelanis and going to give it a try. I had fun tonight except the horrible mashing of my halfling bones by a trapped chest. Twice.

... it had a +1 to charisma gem in it, you'd have done the same.

[Midnight Son]

I broke down and renewed my DDO account, I'm on Thelanis and going to give it a try. I had fun tonight except the horrible mashing of my halfling bones by a trapped chest. Twice.

... it had a +1 to charisma gem in it, you'd have done the same.Awww. I'm on Ghallanda. Too bad. What we should do is get all the GitP players to get on one server and form a guild.

[Lolth]

We're not an MMO per se, but if you want to play D&D online, with DMs and other players in real-time, please feel free to check out our chat (URL in my .sig). Free to play, of course.

[The Evil Thing]

To my shame, I've been neglecting EVE Online in favour of actually finishing my schoolwork (wait, shouldn't that be the other way round?).

You can always play a Bard in EVE. You just have to be a little... creative.

[Tengu]

Try Guild Wars maybe. This game has a lot of endgame content, is free to play (you still need to buy it of course), and from what I know it caters to casual players too. It's very pvp-centric though.

Don't try EVE. This game is worthwhile only if you are a fanatic of it and spend 12+ hours per day playing it, and the griefer/scammer ratio is very high.

Personally, according to the description of your issue, I think that you are just bored with MMORPGs as a genre.

[Setra]

Well if you don't want to buy anything..

Rappelz is an interesting game, fun to play. I suppose.

Guild Wars is great if you don't like grinding, the options for Henchmen (And Heroes in Nightfall) means it's quite possible to solo the game, if you want, however groups are also quite often done.

Of course the PVP is probably the best part of it.

[Rincewind]

I quit World of Warcraft about three weeks after the expansion, or so. Maybe less. Since then I've dabbled in Dungeons and Dragons Online, and I played the pre-release beta of Lord of the Rings Online. Neither really stuck with me. Sometimes I convince myself I really want to play DDO again, but I play for a day or two and get bored and go 'there goes 15 bucks'. It's hard to play MMOs by yourself and enjoy them (especially DDO) but its not easy meeting nice people on them either. Other than work, I don't have a lot going on, and I'm looking for a new MMO to pick up to occupy myself with from time to time. Not hard core 'I live in Blackwing Lair' style play, but something that I can enjoy by myself or with others. So tell me, what're some good MMOs? The ability to play Bards is a plus (What can I say?).

www.popomundo.com :smallbiggrin:

[Shikton]

www.popomundo.com :smallbiggrin:

Popomundo... lol, played that for a few months, but it got kiiiind of repetitive :P

I'd second holding out for Age of Conan. Looks like it'll be a pretty good game with a different twist to a lot of things. Could end up pretty PVP-focused though.

[ocato]

It isn't that I don't want to pay, I just don't want to shell out 50 bucks and play a game for 3 days and go 'bleh'. Free trials are pleasant and wise.

I think I might just be bored of MMOs since World of Warcraft set the bar high in some places and instilled a deeply rooted fear/cynicism of humans in other places.

I'd love to play D&D online, but the trouble is getting a certain time a week that I am off of work every week. My schedule is somewhat obnoxiously uncertain.

Well, I heard that Thelanis is the big unofficial RP server. So I'm giving it a try. Despite the bone crushing.

I have a slight aversion to PVP. I'm not so much a carebear as a compassionate and kind human being. In that I make characters to enjoy them, so sometimes they are better at helping other people be good. So when the level batman supertwink rips my arms off and punches me with them, then goes onto the forums and goes 'dude, ocato is t3h sux', I get miffed.

[Exachix]

www.anarchyonline.com (By Funcom... the same people making Age of Conan)

Ok... so it's spacey.
The base game (and Notum Wars in fact I think) are free. You don't have to pay for them...
and you get the option of more than 10 'classes'... all up too level 200.
There are alot of aspects too it... not only do you have plain old shooting, but there's armour creation and weapon creation too... plus a whole load of other things.

It may not be for everyone though =).

[Earendill]

I'd advocate Guild Wars inside a friendly guild (I can recomend a great one if you're interested). However in order to be able to make a good suggestion, I need your answer on at least 3 questions.

1. Role Playing. If it's very important I suggest to try NWN (not NWN2) on specific RP oriented Persistent Worlds - its not really an MMO but it can be gratifying...and you can play a bard too :)

2. Grind and items. If you hate it then GW is the best choice.

3. PvP - If you want Fantasy based team PvP then GW is a great choice again - it would require a friendly guild to introduce you though. GW is quite satisfactory even without the PvP aspect.

GW might look cheap (no monthly fee) yet it has 3 chapters (independent yet you know you want all of them :) - try finding a guest password for Nightfall (3rd chapter) - allows 15 hours of free play I think, then try and you can decide.

It could also be that you are really bored with MMOs and want to try something else...

[Erloas]

Sometimes it just good to stop playing MMOs for a while and rediscover the games you didn't play while you were playing MMOs. For me that was a lot, and there were a number of good games I didn't play that are all cheap now.
Then when you do find the next MMO for you it will be more refreshing and easier to enjoy then if you are jumping between other MMOs.

If you want to play an MMO, I suggest picking one thats pretty close to what you want and go out of your way to find a guild. Most decent sized guilds will have people on most of the time, and so long as they aren't a hardcore raid oriented guild then it shouldn't make much of a difference when you can and can't play.

As for which game... WoW was great for me for a little while, but it was probably only a couple months before I was completely done with the game. Not that I had a bunch of characters to max level or anything, but that no aspect of the game made me want to keep playing. The fact that except for a few instances and cap level content it was almost always better to solo then group really hurt the community and took away one of the main aspects I play MMOs for.

EVE was a great game, just not for everyone, or even most people. It is a very boring and grinding game if you don't find a good PvP corp to join. Pretty much all non-PvP in EVE is a grind, some of it is pretty good for a while, such as the missions, but just playing the game to make money in the game wasn't enough for me. Though that is for some people. I really love the theory of the game and I really wanted to like the game, but a few design choices here and there meant I just couldn't enjoy the game. The high cost death penalty being the biggest, since it actively discourages people from PvP, and encourages very one sided PvP was just poor design (as far as I'm concerned) in a game that is PvP oriented. Why make a system that discourages people from taking part in the main point of the game?

DDO I thought was a decent game, not great but ok. The community was a nice step up from WoW. The lack of open world content was annoying, not being able to do anything at all except visiting specific instances to do missions just wasn't for me. The grouping was pretty good because of it though. I also didn't like using the integrated voice chat which most people seemed to insist on using. The combat system I didn't really care for, being so much based on the PnP game. It didn't allow for a lot of the things that make combat more interesting such as reactionary skills and really a large choice of skill options at all, at least for the barbarian class I had, casters and utility classes may have been different. I only played for the trial period so I can't say how it turns out long term.

I've heard EQ2 got a lot better after some of the major patches. I haven't tried it at all though so not much to say about it. I think they have trial accounts so it might at least be worth downloading and trying for a week.

I just started playing LotRO over the weekend. I'm using the trial right now. The game is pretty good. It has a lot in common with WoW. Many things almost seem like a direct cut and paste between the two games. Its not entirely a bad thing though since WoW had some good points to it. But if you are coming from WoW it will either be very familiar to you and great, or it may be more of the same that you are trying to leave. Early on there isn't a lot of grouping, though it seems to be picking up a fair amount pretty quickly. All the classes seem interesting and all can solo and group without changing them. (where as WoW some of the spec lines where solo lines where as others were group lines so you had to respec for solo vs grouping)
The combat is pretty good so far. I like the fact that there seem to be a lot more reactionary skills involved with melee characters. The queuing/delayed/cooldown system on the skills is a little annoying for me, but I'm very much used to the system used in DAOC where none of that applied. There is a slight delay from the use of the skill and it actually being used, so when you try to use a reactionary/time critical skill it might take a while because others are active but not gone off yet, delaying the time critical skill past its time critical point. Of course that will probably go away with more familiarization with the system. I haven't tried the Monster Play yet, but it seems like it could be interesting. I haven't yet decided if I'm going to start a subscription after the trial or not, it mostly comes down to if they expect me to pay the $40 for the game before starting the subscription or not.

But if non of the games out right now are what you are really looking for then just don't play an MMO for a while. Wait for a game you actually want to play. There are plenty of other game types to play until the next MMO for you is out. For me that MMO is WAR, so I've got another 6-8 months to waste before then.

[draca]

I got bored with WOW too, and the expansion could only sucker me into continuing my subscription for a couple of months.

Have you ever tried EverQuest or Vanguard?

I played EQ for a while and quit, frustrated with not being able to solo, and with some of the old graphics. Coming back this year, they have visibly improved almost all of the things I hadn't liked, and kept all the stuff I did love.

Vanguard I find to be an excellent game for only having short times to play. I craft, I play the diplomacy game, and I do the little soloable quests.

[sateryn]

EQ is dated ...
thing is, EQ is dated in the same way starcraft is dated, and way starcraft 2 might even be 'dated' to a certain extent: instead of mindlessly concentrating the bulk of their development efforts on 'ooo pretty' graphics that kill low-mid range computers, EQ is built around in game mechanics, content, and lore.

now granted EQ is *not* exactly what you'd call a casual friendly MMO like WoW... it is, in fact, rather difficult to get the hang of, and rather unforgiving in its gameplay, but that's why i like it. it's the only MMO on the market right now i've played that's hard.
however, EQ has something which no other MMO has, nor will any other MMO ever have for as long as EQ is live: a freaking ginormous amount of content and options.

EQ also has bards - and they are a powerful and diverse class that is really quite unique within the MMO market, there's really no comparison (in any other game) to the way bards work in EQ.

granted i'm biased - i'm going on 8 years of hardcore EQ playing. it's absolutely worth it, if you're willing and able to invest some time into it (like any good hobby - it takes a certain level of commitment)

[sateryn]

I played EQ for a while and quit, frustrated with not being able to solo, and with some of the old graphics. Coming back this year, they have visibly improved almost all of the things I hadn't liked, and kept all the stuff I did love.
what class were you playing?
several classes in EQ can solo very, VERY easily through all levels of the game, and others just can't.

[Jerthanis]

I hear good things about customization of bardic music powers in Vanguard, but I don't really play that game, so I don't know for sure. Earendill made a suggestion that I'm going to support. If what you're looking for is a replacement for a former D&D style of gameplay with heavy RP and so on, there are RP heavy persistent worlds which you can visit in Neverwinter Nights where there are some really fantastic deep roleplay experiences available. The gameplay will definitely leave something to be desired, as no one who ever made a PW ever had even the slightest grasp of mathematical probability, or balancing threats, but the roleplay and community there will be the closest you'll find to replacing a missing tabletop game.

[Earendill]

..... as no one who ever made a PW ever had even the slightest grasp of mathematical probability, or balancing threats.....

That's a bit harsh. I know several build teams for NWN PWs and they really do understand the balance implications. It is however very difficult to create an encounter that is challenging for a lvl 20 min/maxed 18/1/1 Cleric/Monk/Rogue Svirfneblin and not murder for a lvl 20 RPed Half Orc Bard :) That's where the smaller player base and DM interventions come handy, in correcting obviously imbalanced stuff.

[ocato]

Wow, the Vanguard site has 0 information on the game that I can find. What are they hiding?

[Daze]

Wow, the Vanguard site has 0 information on the game that I can find. What are they hiding?

Tons of glitches and bugs. Most people have said that they shoulda beta-d that game a lot longer than they did.

Also, it's a group heavy game, so if you're a solo-er... tough luck. Plus, no instances, so theres a lot of camping (like EQ).

I like the idea of builidng your own houses and ships, but I've yet to hear how its been implemented in Vanguard. They say that your house can be destroyed by other players, can you imagine that frustration? Spending months on grinding, partying, building.. only to have some leet speak freakazoid ruin it cause he's bored...

anyways, good concept.. but poor implementation. as usual...

[sateryn]

Also, it's a group heavy game, so if you're a solo-er... tough luck. Plus, no instances, so theres a lot of camping (like EQ).
actually, EQ is almost completely instanced now... which is kind of a pain in the ass, to be honest. there's very little viable non-instanced group content any longer in EQ.

[Daze]

actually, EQ is almost completely instanced now... which is kind of a pain in the ass, to be honest. there's very little viable non-instanced group content any longer in EQ.

huh, I didn't know that. Guess they finally wised up. I mean, camping is not all that terrible in theory, but waiting hours for "your turn" in line is extremely frustrating.

I do know vanguard has no instances though, least according to the last review I read.

[Quincunx]

Vanguard is attracting the people who liked 'classic' EQ: the grinds are there, the camps, the steep learning curve. EQ itself is going to be a pain to enter now because the lower-level player base is even more pinched than the general population and because its supplementary websites have been losing contributors and interest. How well can a newbie learn when the helping hands in game cannot remember what it's like to be newbie well enough to advise? How well can a newbie learn when the best newbie guides are four years old, at best? EQ gameplay has been improved since competitor MMOs arrived, but at the cost of the players' support.

Particularly to Ocato, the EQ bard is unique in its gameplay, and there's a feature which allows you to not have to mash a button every three seconds and therefore have time to type/talk.* However, the bard's fighting styles frequently involve target switching and running across the landscape; that cuts into typing time since keyboard steering and typing are mutually exclusive activities. You can be the sort of bard who only stands by the group, sings buffing songs, and chats/roleplays while the melodies cycle, but that makes you a bit of a dumb bard; you will need to spend some time on your own, racing hither and yon with a pack of angry mobs on your heels, to learn the tricks of your class.


*
/melody x,y,z
where x, y, z are the numbers of spell slots (you can have only eight songs 'memorized' and ready to use at a time). This command will use a new song as soon as the first one is finished 'casting' (three seconds) and loop until you "miss a note" and fail your casting; a cast song generally gives its effect for eighteen seconds. While there's no limit to the length of the /melody command, only four** songs can be simultaneously sustained with a low latency or three songs with a high latency.

**Four songs of 18-second duration. Yeahyeahyeah, there are a few odd songs which last longer, but those come much later.

[Setra]

I've been playing the City of Heroes trial I got from Guild Wars Factions.

I must admit I like it quite a bit, however it could just be the newness of it. That's why I love trials, in the end it only takes me a week or two to get bored of a game, if it takes longer than it's probably pretty good.

Alas, it's down for maintenance.