User:Eive Windgrace/Spectaculation

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Warning: This page contains opinions and speculation.

This is my general "type stuff down so I don't forget it later" and speculation/ranting page. Feel free to look through it, or press backspace.

Mesmer

Next profession is Mesmer. Hurr durr. Purple color, GDC picture with fan, only other choice is Dervish. I hope it has a sword.

Things we have left to see from Anet

In suspected order

1. Mesmer reveal.
2. WvW details.
3. Playable demo with all professions.
4. Official beta date.
5. Marketplace details.
6. Beta.
7. First chance to play WvW.
8. Official release date.
9. Full skill list. (This probably won't be before release)
10. More to add later. Thanks IcyyyBlue for pointing out a few things.

Things that we may never see

1. Where Jormag actually was. It seems silly to me that they moved him... Even if they wanted to change his size, that would've caused considerably less rage.
2. Tengu article. Although this may not happen since we won't even be able to go to their city in the initial release.
3. Dredge article. (Have we really not had one yet? I thought we did but I can't find it, hence why this is so low on my list)
4. DSD name & info (Or was this retconned?)
5. Ogre article. They're a racial sympathy for charr and have been prevalent in skill videos, along with playing a minor role in EoD. No idea when they'd make an article for them though, so it's staying down here for now.

Ponderings of GW2

Bear with me here, I'm going to start out with the things currently irritating me and then progress into things I like, eventually.

• First off, I'm probably going to turn off the compass within five minutes of starting the game. I don't see much use for it without showing enemy locations, except as a screen-filler.

• Speaking of the UI, I can't say I'm a big fan of it now. Instead of a quest log we get to have the right fourth of our screen taken up by things you'll only occasionally be looking at. I would much rather have a menu that pops up at the press of a button than Kill ten dredge <progress bar> taking up a considerable portion of my already-crowded-enough screen. Also, the Diablo-style giant health circle is a huge eyesore. It looked good in '98, thirteen years later not so much. I feel spite towards whomever changed my health bar. The rest of the UI looks too boxy. Apparently at some point in development it was decided that round edges were no longer in style, and thus the bottom third of the screen was born. The effects monitor and profession-specific abilities look tacky, and don't seem to fit in above the skill bar.

• The personal story. Or rather, the preordained path. I don't see it as "our choices affect the world" but rather "choose either door A, B, or C" on a more massive scale. With the playtime with Destiny's Edge and joining an order then the overarching trip to Orr that we'll eventually take, it feels exactly like GWUno's story progression, with the major conflicts and story points broken up by seemingly mindless missions and quests. Feel free to argue on this one.

• Logan Thackeray. May you die painfully. It would please me. When I'm at your dungeon I'm going to make it my goal to get you killed somehow.

• 3D and multi-monitor displays. I feel like less time should be spent developing and showing off new toys, and more spent on developing the game. This may be because I'm mostly too poor to enjoy any of these features, but it still irks me.

• Karma and the pseudo-personality defining system. Not sure who thought this would be a good idea. Was Peter Molyneux on the development team at some point? Yeah, maybe I'm mad that I can't be evil, but that's besides the point. Whether or not you solve a problem through a specific aspect of your personality shouldn't be a concern. The "how" is irrelevant, the fact that the deed is done is all that should be bothered with.

• Le economy. I'm in favor of any improvement on the original game's economy. So as long as the currency-split and marketplace remain beneficial and not a hindrance, I'll continue thinking of them as positive changes.

• While I may dislike the new look of the skill bar, I do like the change in functionality. Weapon skills seem to be an easily balance-able system, and still allow each thief's skill bar to remain unique from the other thief in the party.

• The map redesign and waypoints seem much better than I initially thought. I still dislike the idea of paying for deaths, but since the fee is so small, I think I'll live.

• Environmental weapons... I'm liking them so far. We haven't gotten much word on them yet, but the idea of being able to logically use items as weapons appeals to me. I was always the type that hated playing games and finding items that I should be able to use as a weapon, but was unable to.

The engineer

Prepare for opinions. A lot of 'em.

• The actually mechanics of the profession seem well balanced and carefully thought out. It really feels like Anet took this profession back to the drawing board over and over to make sure they got it right. I like the idea in general, they took something that is completely out of place and managed to give it a home here. However, it seems that at the previously-mentioned drawing board, they forgot to make the profession look good. Turrets are ugly and don't make sense. I assume you pull them out of hammer space, which will probably look crappy and I can't imagine any animation that can save it. Backpacks seem equally magic. I dislike the idea that the engineer can just pull objects out of thin air. Perhaps they could make it so that engineers have to build the turrets from the ground up. It would certainly look better.

• Overall, the profession idea and mechanics are great (if a bit confusing at first) but the design is horrendous. There's a difference between a steampunk turret, and a tube attached to a boot mounted on a tripod that you pull out of your ass (I apologize but that had to be said) and glue shot looks disgusting and there is a good chance I will log out every time someone shoots it at me.

Dungeons

Thought about this after seeing the most recent discussion on Talk:Dungeon regarding the number of dungeons. If there's 8 total, and 3 are at level 80, then it's safe to assume that the other five are the Destiny's Edge member-related dungeons, progressively placed at levels 30, 40, 50, 60, and 70. Do all dungeons have story modes? If so then once we finish with that crap we'll have to play through three more dungeons to beat the game once we reunite DE. Other people probably already made this connection, but I wanted to get it down here.