I have the power
I have often alluded to the fact that power choice is my favourite game mechanic, stemming from days in Planetside through to City of Villains. Of course a great system isn’t they only component that draws my attention it must be employed in a way that works well with the game mechanics.
Planetside employed the Cert system that allowed you to drop or acquire new abilities at a regular scheduled pace.
Guild Wars made all the powers available but gave the primary one a buff and limited the tray to 8 powers.
City of Heroes pinned you down to 2 selections at the start (excluding epic archetypes) but allowed complete freedom of how you configured the powers for your own use, down to how they were slotted.
The Secret World takes all of the above a mixes into a newer combination.
Unlock any power you want, slot any power you have bought, choose 7 active and 7 passive abilities whenever you are out of combat.
This allows you to pick and choose powers from other Ability sets that enhance your current build, for example, there is a great power in one of the melee classes that increases your Crit Power by 15%, which when I’m being a healer means the amount of healing when I get a Crit is increased.
This level of flexibility is means that as you progress through the game more options and combinations become available, you can pick-up abilities that complement your existing powers, without being block due to not being a tank or having not selected a certain race.
I am currently focused on pistols and blood magic, but I have allocated points into other areas for powers that I use in solo and group builds.
What powers are you using or heading towards?
The world is just illusion
During our recent outing to London I was having a conversation with Mr Van Hemlock about element of games I find interesting. During this conversation it became very apparent that I favour games that offer me the chance to throw a little individuality to my gameplay. Shocking as it may seem I have never really been able to identify the forces that drive me in my gaming choices, especially those that drive my MMO habits.
In the three MMOs that I consider my favourite the ability to choose or customise skills in ways to suit my gameplay or mood is highly flexible and configurable.
- Planetside - The power to pick up and drop skills in any order brings unique benefits to your team play. Specializing in heavy assault or proving much needed support at the correct time.
- City of Heroes/Villains – The power selection may appear limited but you can choice
- Guild Wars – Limited to 8 skills at one time but with a bank of hundreds to choose from. GW certainly makes you question how you approach each challenge the game offers.
On the other hand, although I found it wonderfully detailed and immersive playing Lord of the Rings online, yet the skills offered to my character (providing you have the currency) made them the same as any other player of that class in the game.
Yes there are unique features that set you apart from the crowd, such as weapons, armour and traits, but these always seemed more like small modifiers to the wider picture. I admit that I’ve never made it to level 30 in the game and maybe it all changes in the end game I guess I’ll never know.
I feel rather silly that it’s taking so long to discover this rather simple fact is the one element I appear to yearn in MMOs, but now I can hopefully bring those elements to the forefront of my gaming experiences.
* Image source : http://www.sxc.hu/photo/492545Games and all things past
Well I hope you all had a great weekend and an enjoyable Halloween. Sadly we got no “trick or treaters” so the tub of sweets will likely sit in our kitchen until next year.
Due to my annoyingly awkward bus journey that is required for my trips to and from work my days shrink in hours to a point that full blogging takes a back seat to getting all my living done in the time allotted. I try and post on Twitter at least once a day so you can follow me on there if needed.
So first a quick round up of my activities since my last entry.
In other general “me” news I’ve taken on a interweb piece of work for a friend that I’ll clue you in on in the near future, but It’s quite exciting and different to my other projects.
I was luckly enough to have a wonderful 4 day weekend, yay for booking holidays. My reasons for this were to get some quality Halloween MMO celebrating done and I had another goal that I sadly didn’t manage to achieve in the time which was to read Mr Gaimans’ recently published Graveyard Book.
Thursday : We out in the morning and some lengthy gaming sessions in various titles, in fact i think i swapped about every few hours lol.
Friday Halloween : Rach and I spent some brief periods of the day in GW, entertaining the Mad Thorn King in Kamadam and Lions Arch in exchange for goodie bags and a hat costume piece. I must admit that I really enjoy the that each game has for different events during the year.
Saturday : It was a bright sunny day, but the wind was bitterly cold, a fact that we found out on a trip into Abergavenny. Taking a lot of wilpower I visited and departed from Waterstone with only 2 new graphic novels hehe. A new Game store has opened there, which is highly dangerous.
Sunday : A lazy day to start with as my long weekend was finally winding down. Taking a leaf from Van Hemlocks book, I’ve convinved Dok to re-enter Guild Wars joining myself and Rach on her first run through the Nightfall Campaign. Last night we focused on some of the first missions in Korma. Although this was old ground for Dok, but he was happy to use it as a refresher course before we continue on to the high missions.
In other gamey news:
I was immensely jealous of the folks that attented the EuroGamer Expo and got to try out Jumpgate:Evolution (a nice video over at the LimitedEdition blog and nice write up over at Van Hemlocks blog. This is the only new mmo that I’m even remotely interested in at the present time and i have to admit it look rather wonderful. I’ve So far resisted the urge to purchase Warhammer Online despite the fact that my clanmates from KhaosClan appear to be doing rather nicely and with high attendance each night.
I’ve finally completed Warhammer 40k – Dawn of War:Soul Storm, this weekend. I must admit it was highly enjoyable and there was some pretty tough challenges. I’d recently read a a comment about the graphics in the lastest expansion being very dated and old looking.
Admittedly the GFX are a little dated but in all honestly the game play really does make up for a slightly older graphics engine in the background.
Again and again, it comes down the old fact that I prefer a decent storyline with older graphics over highly detailed graphics with a short game.
