AoC versus WoW

[lozo]

Is AOC any Good?
I play WoW mostly and I’m liking MMO’s a lot since I started playing. I’ve been hearing a lot about AoC lately. Some ppl say they like it and some ppl don’t. Is it any good? Can anyone list some good and bad points to help me decide?

[Darting Flea]

AoC is a work in progress. It has some good fun stuff but its going to be awhile before the end game gets implemented fully, classes get balanced, bugs get hunted down and so on.

That being said AoC is pretty good. Better than WoW? Probably not yet, but it could be.

Good:
- Its Purty
- Combat has some good bits too it, it is fun.
- Class concepts are solid and most are good tweaks on the standard MMO norms
- It will have city building
- Low level content is good

Bad:
- Released too early. So it has bugs and balance issues.
- Its demanding on your computer system.
- Its not true to the conan setting but it does capture the mood.

[Zombie Shakespeare]

AoC is just in pretty bad shape right now. Massive class rebalancing is going on, many classes still have broken abilities and feats, and you can easily perceive nasty design problems across the board.

On top of all this, the main reason for me picking up the game (and a main feature championed by the developers), player cities and siege PvP, isn't even working. Not even close to it.

Right now, you may be able to salvage a decent PvE experience from the game, but you're liable to hate yourself for buying it if you want to do PvP.

[AdrianChapman]

I gave AoC a month to impress me and it really really did.
Combat was fun and engaging. Quests were a good time, both instanced and in the field... Don't even get me started on how great the music was. All was going well with my soloing and duoing (it's how I roll) until a big stealth patch came in and took all my fun away.

Now I know you are supposed to be playing these types of games (mmos) with groups. But I usually like to just duo with one of my irl pals. All was going well in that regard till the aforementioned patch made it nearly impossible to solo or duo elite type mobs.

That threw my style of gameplay out the window. Since I'm mostly antisocial by nature while gaming online.... that was pretty much a deal breaker.

Beyond my own little problem with it... It had wow beat nine ways to sunday, glitches aside. If you like bloody, action based combat and a flavorful world made for the over eighteen crowd... You could have a good time with it.

-AC

[Azulthar]

For me, AoC is more of an RPG and WoW is more of a game. :p

WoW does the whole kill, collect, achieve thing way better than AoC. If you like thinking about your character's gear, what items and stats would give you just that extra bit of DPS and never running out of 'upgrades' to get, go with WoW.

If you prefer to immerse yourself in the world and enjoy the fight more than the reward, go with AoC. It focusses a bit more on the other, non-achievement-driven aspects of the MMORPG genre.

Both activities can be done in both games of course, but the focus is different.


Or, put differently:

Does the idea of building a city together with your guild sound interesting (AoC), or would you prefer more variety in the dungeons you can raid (WoW)?