View Full Version : What is/was Neocron?
Whenever anyone talks about what Neocron used to be, there's always the danger of glossing over the bad things and only remembering good things, of being overly nostalgic. I'll try to keep that in perspective for this post.
In beta and early US/UK retail, one of Neocron's selling points was freedom. This was best shown in solo vs group playing. You could viably do either. A single player could farm rares or hunt most mobs without problem by themselves. If their friends are around, they can just as easily make a team. People with varied preferences for social interaction were all happy with Neocron. The loner can do most things on his own, but he's still part of the game world. He'll still need tradeskillers, or he might need combat help sometimes. That kind of play was very popular early on. At the same time those that love social interaction form teams and have fun in groups. I recall many people giving Neocron tons of praise just because you could do solo gameplay if you wanted. Comparisons to Everquest were made all the time, people hated having to wait around an hour for a team so that they could go do what they wanted too. Sure that gameplay works for some, but not everyone. There were many other ways that Neocron gave you freedom to do what you wanted. Tradeskills did not impair your combat abilities so horribly, it was possible to have fun on your character doing both. Character setup and weapon stats did not matter as much as they do now. You did not absolutely need to have a rare to fight, a good tpc or other normal weapon would do just fine. Monks had much less to worry about when they lost spells, because they only required a couple slots.
Since then, it was decided that Neocron is supposed to be just like the other mmorpg's. We lost much of the solo play that made this game so much fun and unique. I believe the history of the Monk class shows this perfectly. Monks were all hybrids originaly, you had two main stats (apu, ppu), and you had a third (epu), which you realy had to drop a lot of points in to use some high end ppu spells. The setup wasn't ideal and had a lot of problems, but it gave monks freedom. You could be a ppu inclined hybrid or apu inclined hybrid, or any combination therein. You could drop some in epu and become the equivalant of a ppu back then. Being a hybrid is so wonderful, you have the choice to play solo, in a team as extra firepower, or in a team as extra defense. You can adjust to a given situation, you have no reason to ever sit in the city waiting for people to show up so you can go level.
Then PPU's were born and shortly after, APU's. I was one of the first ppu's on pluto, along with some other famous old timers. It wasn't that bad back then, because we were honestly the joke of the monk community. The only people playing pure monks were those that really liked the support role, and prolly had a lil masochistic streak too ; ) Somewhere along the way though, things reversed. Pure monks were fixed, strengthened, and then turned overpowered. The game was soon dominated by a few super ppu's, who basicly made the big clans on the server. At the same time hybrids were diminished, with patch after patch determined to nerf them, and eventualy wiped out entirely. Those that chose to remain monks now went over to pure and had fun being overpowered. Today Monks are a support class, you chose to have offense or defense, not both. The few hybrids around are hybrid only because they refuse to be forced to only have an offense or defense. Because they're fighting the system, hybrids are pretty pathetic. Everything is stacked against you ever being good as a hybrid.
In short the Monks have gone from solo/team to just team. With Monks leading the way, the whole game has changed drasticly. As a die hard ppu, I endorsed most of the changes. That was the gameplay that I enjoyed the most.. but it's gone way too far. I've given up being a ppu and have gone back to my roots as a Hybrid. Personaly I'm having a blast, it's so much more fun... As long as I accept that I'm pathetic and can't really pvp. Why can't Monks have an offense and defense and not be overpowered? Why can every other class do alright with an offense and defense, but not us. On a larger scale, why does Neocron have to force us to team? Why can't we do things on our own, why was this decided as the path kk took?
Neocron was complete character freedom - It's now complete character specialization.
Sure you can make pvp vaible hybrid with ds core and exp 3 its possible to have bless buff and holy halos to attack witch is more then enough becouse with blessed shelter good setup hybrid olmost unkilleble. I do agree tho that hybrids now r pretty useless unless u have ds i dont i played hybrid for few moths (106/64) and just lomed back to apu becouse hybrids now r solo class only there is no good you can do in op fights due to low dmg output and team lvling is imposible due to high cr.
Cruzbroker
14-04-04, 20:52
Sucks, doesn't it eh?
Mighty Max
14-04-04, 20:53
Neocron was complete character freedom - It's now complete character specialization.
I disagree, the PvP part of Neocron is about that. But that is the players fault imo.
I still have my wild & funny skilled chars, and tbh that are the chars i have the most fun with.
man carinth you always do those long posts, read a bit, ill read the rest later.
but to what i think your talking about, neocron was freedom early retail, the specialisation wasnt there, you could have a tank with libby who was viable that kind of thing.
now were are basically told what our class can and cannot do,
tank = HC or MC
PE = Pistol or Rifle that kind of thing
if i want a fucking droning PE i should be able to(not saying i want to though :p )
and if i want a viable hybrid im bloody well gonna have one(though we will soon see about that)
^^ Amen Ezza.
I disagree, the PvP part of Neocron is about that. But that is the players fault imo.
I still have my wild & funny skilled chars, and tbh that are the chars i have the most fun with.You have to be almost completely specialized to be good at PvP, that is a development issue, not a player issue.
I had fun as a rifle tank - its a pity that I can't play one effectively anymore.
With BDOY the hot topic, I was trying to think what exactly they are going to advertise. How are they going to draw in new crowds to play BDOY. Neocron is most definitly not the same game we payed for back in 2002. If the advertising represents the new Neocron then it really won't be aimed at many of us. We're not the market KK is targeting with Neocron. So where does that leave us? Most of us are die hard fans or we would have quit already, but is that enough to warrant staying and playing a game not intended for us?
Just some food for thought : )
You have to specialise to the point of absurdity to be any good at PvP, which really sucks :(
What can kill a pure PPU? Nothing but a pure APU. If you're tank you'd better make sure you have a completely PvP based setup or you're next to useless. As PE you can be crazy overpowered if you go pure pvp, use drugs and spec the executioner. No one wants a cster spy with less than 200 cst, or a resser spy who might break rares, so you have to go pure either, which means no fun weapons to break up the tedium; I wonder why tradeskillers are so damn hard to find these days?
I started playing towards the end of the more open class system, and with rose tinted hindsight I'd say it was a lot more fun back then. Now if I want to make a char I decide which one skill I want and go for it. HC PE is fine, but you need to go PURE hc to use the rhino, no middle ground. How many Tanks do you see gunning combat hovertecs? Fook all, cos they need to gimp their PvP setup to do it.
End of grumble :)
Heavyporker
14-04-04, 21:39
1 - I've been pure apu essentially ever since I started, and even now, I can still solo hunt just perfectly fine, thank you.
2 - you CAN make a more than viable droner with a PE. Hell, a PE can go H-C perfectly well. Same for a Gentank droner, rifler, pistoler.
3 - how many of us go and make a combat+tradeskill char? I'd say a damn lot, and we do just fine, thank you very much.
4- Don't ppus still have an excellent option in going pistol/rifle as an offense for when they want to do a little hunting or heaven forbid, pvp?
5 - agree that hybrids still have too much stacked against them - it's a necessity that psi combat 1 has to be self-castable, that PSI combat ranks are brought back to normal for hybrids (no point in insanely high CRs now that they've been effectively balanced), and that the really high apu/ppu reqs for psi modules have to be trimmed down a LITTLE so that its somewhat realistic for a PE to try and reach some of the TL 40-50 spells and for the hybrid to straddle both branches at the mid-point level without REQUIRING a MC5 chip to be capable of using both branches at the mid-point.
I know someone playing a very successful pistol/melee tank. He even wears NCPD armour to conceal his true class. According to his speccing, he'll be able to use a lib and a PoB at the end of it!
I've seen it in use, it is very, very cool.
You can still be outrageous!
Steve
I know someone playing a very successful pistol/melee tank. He even wears NCPD armour to conceal his true class. According to his speccing, he'll be able to use a lib and a PoB at the end of it!
I've seen it in use, it is very, very cool.
You can still be outrageous!
Steve
The fact that setups like that are considered 'outrageous' shows the problem in my opinion.
:(
Lol, so I had a bad choice of words. The problem with beta was that ANY setup was successful, and balance issues were rife. (though I loved playing a gruesomely underpowered psi in late beta). Nowadays you just have to think outside the box, the two key faults in this game equation are the specificity of rares (class and stat-wise) and their current importance in a PvP setup.
With a more varied selection of weapons/items, and less of a reliance on rare items, instead just rare finds (perhaps), we would see ourselves leaning toward a more experimental gaming experience.
Steve
A tank can get over 80 or more? in MC just picking the right imps.. and its not like do or death option because you can really do it if you want!!
With a more varied selection of weapons/items, and less of a reliance on rare items, instead just rare finds (perhaps), we would see ourselves leaning toward a more experimental gaming experience.
Steve
True. I think that coupled with all the newbies coming in might make for more entertaining combos. *shrug*
Heavyporker
14-04-04, 22:09
well, hopefully the TL changes will alleivate the Rares or Nothing problem in pvp...
Though I have to say - hand grenades and the non-rare flamers are just jokes.... just jokes. Remove H-C reqs on the grenades, and make the flamers do limited-AoE in their aiming so that wherever you point it at, if someone's in the flame path, they're gonna get hit, even if only for a bit.
I don't really care about exceptions to the norm : ) If I wanted too I could find you a pistol spy who owns cs tanks in duels. I could find you ppu's pk'rs who've killed far to many people considering their "lack of offense." I've also seen a few decent hybrid setups, so what? That doesn't change the fact that you must perfectly setup your char to do well in pvp. If you're a ppu with a tradeskill and you think you're doin fine in pvp, then you have no idea what you're capable of. A real ppu would wipe the floor with ya. I've done so on both sides, as a ppu with a tradeskill and as a pure combat ppu.
I want specialisation toned down a bit, at the moment its just stupid.
Heavyporker
14-04-04, 23:16
amen to that!
I mean.. wtf... atm you need like 170 in a subskill to cap a TL 105 item/weapon...
If that was toned down to 160, that's like 50 skillpoints that could be applied to another skill... HUGE.
Hybrids were overpowerd back in our day, but in the current day they are underpowerd and unfeasable.
Yes a nerf was needed to level the PVP playing field. But who among us can say that they like the current 1:1 PPU sitchewation?
Post was dead on car, 5 stars.
Hm... G.0.D, isn't it that MJS said KK never wanted Hybrids to be viable?
The statement may just as well be BS... *shrug*
Back when hybrids were uber and people like you Carinth were fighting to seperate hybrids into pures. Those of us that didn't want that solution, told you and your kind a million time you wouldn't want what you were asking for. Well you fought on anyway and now you have it. Time to lie in the bed you made. Even if it is a steaming pile of crap. Specialization has absolutely ruined this game..
Spartan, there is such a thing as going too far.
It might be that now they have to lie in the bed they made, but they can also REMAKE it.
Hm... G.0.D, isn't it that MJS said KK never wanted Hybrids to be viable?
The statement may just as well be BS... *shrug*
nope they stated that they didnt want hybrids using the best of both worlds, which was holy lightning and holy para, which they could before MC5s. then they changed it so they couldnt, then brought out MC5s which ment they could again :lol: then they changed it some more after the hybrids became over powered then they nerfed hybrids into oblivion.
they may of stated that hybrids should be doable, but its seems what they say and do are 2 diffrent things.
Carinth, you make it sound like KK dont care about us die hard vets in your post, hmm i hope your wrong with that :(
Shadow Dancer
14-04-04, 23:57
Back when hybrids were uber and people like you Carinth were fighting to seperate hybrids into pures. Those of us that didn't want that solution, told you and your kind a million time you wouldn't want what you were asking for. Well you fought on anyway and now you have it. Time to lie in the bed you made. Even if it is a steaming pile of crap. Specialization has absolutely ruined this game..
eh?
I don't remember carinth asking for hybrids to be separated into pures. I remember him asking for pures to be viable as well.
There's a difference.
lol there was so much shit flying around about the hybrids back then i cant even remember who was saying what
Back when hybrids were uber and people like you Carinth were fighting to seperate hybrids into pures. Those of us that didn't want that solution, told you and your kind a million time you wouldn't want what you were asking for. Well you fought on anyway and now you have it. Time to lie in the bed you made. Even if it is a steaming pile of crap. Specialization has absolutely ruined this game..
You couldn't be more wrong, Spartan : ) I was happy with there only being a few ppu's around, I just wanted our numerous problems to be fixed. For a time I was a hybrid myself, one of the nasty 50/50 holy para/holy lightning hybrids. I was well aware of how overpowered I was, but compared to what some hybrids were capable of, I felt like a noob. I fought against those hybrids along with everyone else, but always went for a more moderate nerf. I didn't want all hybrids ruined, we needed to be balanced, not hammered.
I agree specialization has really sucked the fun out of Neocron, it's not the only problem, but definitly one of the big ones. I wish we could get some idea of what they have planned for us in BDOY.
Specialisation sucks dead monkey scroat.
Carinth is 100% right.
KK don't care because this way we all need more accounts.
Personally I prefer the current Neocron, the one where, when you go to an op fight you have just about equal chances of seeing Monks, Spies, PEs or Tanks, the one where when you go to an op fight, not every single character bar maybe one or two is a hybrid monk (the other two being tanks).
I do agree a bit on perhaps toning down the amount to cap things like weapons lore slightly (as in by 10 level points or so) to make trade skilling easier, but overall the current Neocron is far better than the monk-o-cron of a year or so ago.
Ultimately, as with any computer game, we're playing the game that the developers wanted to create, not the one we want to create. There are always going to be things about it that people don't like. If you don't want to play this game, then leave. No one's forcing you to pay & play.
Athon Solo
Vampire222
15-04-04, 10:21
i played nc for like 3 or 4 years now, im still enjoying it, only problem i see with the game is the lack of something to do, low server population, its still viable to be a loner, i think they should revert op genreps to the old situation, if they want to improve the situation for unclanned people
This makes me recall Dr. Phil and other hybrids pre-hybrid nerf running around
plaza1 with negative soullight just to show how overpowered they were, it
made people want to nerf the class to pieces of oblivion. He acheived this
from a bug in shelter+deflector usage.
Although when hybrids were overpowered, it was mainly due to minor things
like shelter bugs that Dr. Phil and others exploited and one important thing
that contributed to 90% of the nerf threads included the word Parashock.
How many threads did we see about nerfing hybrids, first post was usually by
a tank saying:
"I hate hybrids, they have best offense and defense. I get parashocked and
can't escape then get killed in 5 seconds by super duper fast Holy Lightning.. " etc.
My point of this post is that most of the problems that contributed to the
nerfing and re-nerfing of the hybrid monk of the past is now fixed or close to
being fixed. Hybrids could be balanced with the current mechanics, but as
long as parashock and HL/FA is used by one person, that being is still going to
be considered godly unless the stats suck from PPU +- APU rule.
Just my thougts.
5 star thread @ Carinth
Parad0x -FBI
Original monk
15-04-04, 12:05
hehe, what was neocron ?
ya cant even imagine :) (ffcourse ya can but ... it aint the same nomore sniffllez)
and about hybrids: hehe :) yeah, hybrids, them nice memory's :)
Just reduce the amount of skill required to cap by 10%, freeing up loads of points for minor skills which people currently have to gimp for like vehicles. leave the minimum skills unchanged and all of a sudden all sorts of new setups are viable without altering the ballance massivly.
Can anyone think of any horrble overpowered setups that would arrise if you did this? (the apu/ppu stuff might require tweaking)
I have been playing almost only hybrids since the beginning, and I am agreeing with most of Carinth's first post.
It is fun to play hybrids, far more than playing a pure breed : you have to move, manage your power pool, carefully choose your armour and quickbelt, time your attacks, plan your play, and, finally, you can do it all alone if you want to. However, hybrids aren't loners. They cannot afford to do so : they need high quality modules, so social interactions are a big part of the play.
Now that the game revolves so much around teaming, teaming an hybrid may be a problem. Teamed hybrids are fun. Hybrids teamed with pure breeds suck unless they concentrate on one role by using the right implants setup. And even then, their capabilities are inferior to what their combat rank may lead to believe.
I really liked the APU/PPU/EPU division, and, in my opinion, the current situation is worst. It is worst because MST is of absolutely no use at all, not even as a skill points hog : APU and PPU requirements were recently upped, and MST, which was introduced to promote APU/PPU differentiation, was left unchanged.
I would really like to see only support and healing modules under PPU, and leave para under APU and soul clusters, rez, PSI shield and even anti-buffs under EPU.
I would really like to see some TL revision, to allow for someone wishing to specialize to be able to get modules sooner, even at low level (-> lower PSI requirement, up the APU/PPU/EPU requirement).
What could be great would be for some modules to be under two or three skills. One could imagine, for example, anti-buffs requiring both APU and EPU.
And, a *few* rares for each combo.
Just wishing aloud I guess.
Anyway, on a somewhat lighter note, I must say that levelling a new character has become easier, money wise, even without selling gatling pistols ;)
Levelling an APU/PPU duo is quite fun too, more than it used to be.
Neocron was complete character freedom - It's now complete character specialization.
tbh that sums it up. everything is becoming pure pvp based. which would be ok if the game engine could actually handle fps style pvp shennanigans. but it cant.
Heavyporker
15-04-04, 16:15
wow, what a crap statement icarium.
man, it gives me such a warm feeling that someone here knows what the fuck he's talking about. Oh, wait, no.
wow, what a crap statement icarium.
man, it gives me such a warm feeling that someone here knows what the fuck he's talking about. Oh, wait, no.
and i thank you for expanding on your argument in such a mature a and responsible way like a decent human being
no....
wait....
what precisely are you saying? neocron has a good fps engine? if so you are kidding yourself m8, in either event i wont be answering you because you are evidently socially retarded.
why does Neocron have to force us to team?
why does Neocron have to force us to team?
why does Neocron have to force us to team?
why does Neocron have to force us to team?
why does Neocron have to force us to team?
why does Neocron have to force us to team?
It was funner before patch 160, you could do alot of things, and not be gimped. They should lower specialization down. Also there were people playing in beta and early retail, nevermind the synchs and lag, it was still alot of fun.
Solo players should be able to do most things reasonably without problems, and with a team 10x as better. Right now, teamwork is so vital you cant do anything. Give back the players their solo ability and their limited freedom back.
Also back then, Monks were pretty rare, making them a "mystical" group that stuck together, which was fine, unlike now, where everywhere you go youre sure youll see a monk, which is why there should be a restriction of monks, either restrict the monks to the Crahn faction or have a procentage of a faction be allowed to take in monks, or both, no restriction of monks in the crahn faction, but say 10% of an allied faction can support a monk population, 5% neutral and 1% enemy.
Of course this is just shit talk, MMORPGS SUCKS. OH WOW I GOTTA LEVEL TO AND HIT MOBS TO GAIN EXPERIENCE??? OH GEE I AM TRULEY ROLEPLAYING NOW!!!! I GOT 50 IN IMPLANT SKILL, WHICH MEANS IM A TRUE STREET DOC!!!!! OH LOOK AT ME IM SO WEAK EVEN A ROACH CAN HURT ME!!!!
i played nc for like 3 or 4 years now, im still enjoying it, only problem i see with the game is the lack of something to do, low server population, its still viable to be a loner, i think they should revert op genreps to the old situation, if they want to improve the situation for unclanned people
4 years O_o
hmm I came in feb 2003 and the game was out hmm 2002 sep? ok ½ year beta..
thats march 2002 to 2004 april :rolleyes: maan I really feel sorry for you if you played for 4 years because then you are really lost....
½ year beta..
More like 3 years.
I was in for ~6 months and had followed the game for about a year before that.
@Athon - "Uber Hybrids" were a product of specialisation. They came about after EPU turned into MST and PSI got heavily overhauled.
Duder almost tricked me into goin on a rant about monks, but I'm not gonna derail my own thread : ) In short, don't blaim Monks so much. Before us Tanks were the dominate unfair majority. I remember seeing a sea of grey PA at most op wars. It's true that things were better for the other classes when Tanks dominated, as opposed to now, but shouldn't we strive for a more ideal arrangement? Honestly Monks have had such a devestating effect on the game, because KK decided it wanted to use us to enforce teamplay. Monks are exactly how KK wants the game to be, with players totaly dependant on each other to do anything. I love teamwork as much as anyone, more so then most as my ppu inclinations show, but enough is enough. Specialization has dragged down even the last remaining element of Neocron that was fun.. Combat.
Monks are the main problem right now, but only because of KK's decision to force specialization/teamwork. It shoudl be entirely possible for monks to be balanced and just as viable as the other classes. Don't get carried away with anti monk propaganda ; )
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