Wow did hot really change
Lake Doric is an excellent map for sure (sirens i think is an abominable map, but i wont bore you with my long list of reasons). The great thing about all 6 maps is despite any flaws, there is so much variety across them all, they cater for many tastes.
I love HoT maps. They are fantastic to play in, so i love draconis mons and bloodstone fen. But, bitterfrost and lake doric ground things for others to enjoy.
Map design and variety alongside map storytelling (as opposed to the a tually instanced stories) has been a real strength of the design teams.
Map design and variety alongside map storytelling (as opposed to the actually instanced stories) has been a real strength of the design teams.
I second this statement, the bold part in particular.
The problem with PoF, from what people got to explore during the recent demo weekend, is the lack of waypoints — there are too few, and that will cause a variety of problems, regardless of the speedy mounts.
Lake Doric is one of the most boring map designs ever, but I guess some people who are directionally challenged like their flat planes.
I actually like all the verticality in HoT maps, not sure if that point of view is still considered in the minority. It made the maps feel bigger, with more things to explore, gliding from way on top, going to the other end of the map in one glide was satisfying.
The PoF maps are okay I suppose, they had too much flak for creating vertical maps, so they’ve toned it since for the LWS3 maps. But I’m hoping they have at least one map similar to HoT, along with the challenging content to do in it. I guess we’ll find out, but I’m hoping the difficulty steadily increases from the first zone all the way to the last. They don’t need a full on meta event for each map, but I’m hoping they atleast have something in the open world which requires a lot of players/coordination. The best part of HoT was during the first few weeks when everyone had been trying and failing to get the HoT meta events to succeed.
Not sure if stuff in the Oasis was disabled, but there didn’t feel like much to do in it during the beta. The only difficult/fun things I recall was the bounty missions which I had a blast doing. I also don’t recall.. was there any sort of currency in the Oasis that I’m not remembering right now? Something to keep players going to the map for grinding/farming I mean.
Lake Doric is one of the most boring map designs ever, but I guess some people who are directionally challenged like their flat planes.
Lake Doric’s layout is about as flat and boring as it gets, but I like the feel of the events going on in the map and the way it ties into the story.
Actually though there are a lot of little hidden nooks and crannies in Lake Doric that I found reminscant of more intersting maps. Still it’s my least favorite map of the Living Story.
I found Lake Doric to be the most sustainable map. The events are easily accessible, they have variety, and there is the leather farm.
Bitterfrost is the map I struggle most with. The NE corner is pointless to visit. There is too much junk that cannot be sold to a NPC. The cave is not worth the effort. The last POI required 35 BLC Keyes. The only parts of Bitterfrost that have repeatable value are the frozen chests, berries, and underwater unbound magic and that is just boring.
I was actually the biggest fan of Bloodstone Fen, but that might just be due to its uniqueness. I think that, historically, there’s been an inadequate amount of variety in map design, which is starting to change very much for the better now. This is one of the main reasons I’m looking forward to PoF.
I found Lake Doric to be the most sustainable map. The events are easily accessible, they have variety, and there is the leather farm.
Bitterfrost is the map I struggle most with. The NE corner is pointless to visit. There is too much junk that cannot be sold to a NPC. The cave is not worth the effort. The last POI required 35 BLC Keyes. The only parts of Bitterfrost that have repeatable value are the frozen chests, berries, and underwater unbound magic and that is just boring.
Off topic, the way to get to the ice cave is to use one of the lava tubes, which shoot you right up to it. You can avoid all combat by doing that in the Bitter Frost. You can get the POI you need there, unbound magic, a couple of chests and complete that part of the story with zero fighting.
Map design and variety alongside map storytelling (as opposed to the actually instanced stories) has been a real strength of the design teams.
I second this statement, the bold part in particular.
The problem with PoF, from what people got to explore during the recent demo weekend, is the lack of waypoints — there are too few, and that will cause a variety of problems, regardless of the speedy mounts.
The only “problem” having few waypoints will cause is for people who don’t like it to complain on the forums.