Tabula Rosa

I was very keen, based on all the hype, videos and promises. However, since the NDA was lifted and the beta testers could post what they thought I am very sceptical.

More and more info is coming out about the severe shortcomings of TR, I will list them:

1. The game is basically a shooter trying to be a MMORG, or a MMORG trying to be a shooter. You move your gun cursor to somewhere close to a bad guy and it sticks to it, you push buttons and shoot and it dies. Good , bad? Up to you.

2. After about 3 hours of doing this over and over and over the game loses its shine, there is little about it that keeps most people playing MMORGS that they pay over R100 a month for. Crafting means little, everyone looks the same, with the same gear. Quests are go kill x and bring x things back.

3. There is no Auction House. Might change on release

4. There is no in game mail. Might change on release

5. There are very few channels to communicate in

6. You cannot move your UI around

7. You can solo the entire game, all the levels and 90% of the instances. Now some might think this is great, but for those who have played MMORGS for a while, it is not. Groups and teams make a game, you dont pay a monthly fee to play a single player game.

8. There are no "needed" classses, some might again think this is great but I know it isnt.

Good Points that sound good but arent it seems:

1. Cloning, you can clone your character at set levels, 5, 10, 15 etc and rename it. This means you now have an "alt" that you can start playing at that level and make different skill choices for. Sounds good, but from what I have read, not so good as now you play through the same stuff again just with different guns etc.

2. Instanced world. You cant have more than 300 people in the world instance, so a zone called The plains of X will fill up and then you will go to The plains of X (b) if you zone into it. It allows for dynamic action (such as in Guild Wars) but ultimately seems artificial, the world doesnt seem to be very "real".

FINAL Decision:

I am going to hold off buying this until there have been a few content patches and the game is filled up with more things to do. I dont want to pay R120 or so a month and be bored after the first month. Either the game will fold and go the way of Auto Assault or it will move on and become a great game but only later in its life (like City of Heroes/Villains did).

Sadly I cannot play Age of Conan as I only have an ISDN line so I am still looking for something new to play.

I am currently playing Lord of the Rings Online and loving it, not sure how long it will last though.
 
Also Love LOTRO...probably one of the best storylines in a MMORPG...however I have gone back to Guildwars...it remains in a SA sense the cheapest MMORPG
 
I played GW for about 2 months, bought all the expansions, had a few characters but despite the really amazing SA community got really really tired of the immaturity level in the game. You can only handle so much, wrong skilzz noob, PLZ change setup, etc etc

LOTRO is my new love, good community, great people, good combat, relatively quick leveling and for a family man the no need to raid aspect is great.

You can raid and there are plenty of it happening, there is jut no real NEED for it like there is in WoW.

I see myself playing LOTRO for about another 2-3 months, possibly to the next year. Definately give Tabula Rasa a go in the new year, give it time to get on track and see if it lives on.
 
LOTRO for me too for now, definitely has the most mature audience out there, due to most people being into the lore. I'll check out TR out and see what's happening but I think the next MMO that will interest me will be Age of Conan.
 
Boerewors
did you miss the words BETA along the line ?

btw its called Tabula Rasa and not Tabula Rosa ;)

played the beta myself now - thought it was fun apart form the usual dnd/wow/magic clones coming out
there is hower few bugs in the code, got stuck and couldn't unholster my guns...

...but one can except some degree of bugs if an application is still in beta status, even looking at the version number they are not at 1.000.00.0 yet still under v1
 
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did you miss the words BETA along the line ?

btw its called Tabula Rasa and not Tabula Rosa

played the beta myself now - thought it was fun apart form the usual dnd/wow/magic clones coming out
there is hower few bugs in the code, got stuck and couldn't unholster my guns...

...but one can except some degree of bugs if an application is still in beta status, even looking at the version number they are not at 1.000.00.0 yet still under v1
Click to expand...

No, I didnt miss the word Beta ;-) and I am not the OP, so not my spelling mistake ;-)

However, I did also did not miss the literally hundreds of comments about the repetative nature of combat, the lack of depth in that combat. Fair enough, continuous monster drops via drop ship, dynamic battlefield etc sounds nice, but the many many testers mostly say that it wears thin after about 2 hours or so.


Also the class differentiation is meager to say the least, from the reports. Being a CoX player myself for over a year, I can appreciate the difference from a fantasy clone, however: from what I read, there is only one way to kill mobs in TR and thats with guns, guns and more guns in the exact same way.

CoX at least had a million different ways of dispatching mobs, punches, guns, grenades, bombs, traps, powers, Psi powers, gadgets, etc etc etc.

From what I read in TR there is only.. well guns and no different ways to use these guns. This means, yes you can clone your soldier and become a specialist and then... use another gun to shoot the bad guy.

As I am saying, until they add depth such as CoX has for gameplay and character differentiation, I will give it a miss. Maybe in about 3 months time it will be varied and full of depth due to content patches, or it will be dead, as fewer and fewer people renew a subscription after the first free month runs out.
 
atleast its not as bad as neocron... what a waste of download - well my opinion anyways

*goes looking @ CoX*

...even the great WoW has its repetitiveness - go get x amount of X and so on.
 
Some recent news on the TR front:

Stratics

General British here to introduce a new weekly feature to our website, Feedback Friday. Every Friday a member of our staff will be responding to your issues, questions, and feedback or giving information on things the dev team is working on. You can use this link to add Tabula Rasa community news to your RSS reader and have the Friday Feedback sent straight to you along with all the other Tabula Rasa community news.

For this week, I want to talk about in-game economy and how it relates to our upcoming Operation 0: Fair Trade where we add a new feature, Military Surplus, to the game. Military Surplus outposts will allow players to buy and sell items in a fully-browsable store. We are working on getting them in-game as soon as we can with the idea that we will upgrade the Surplus stores later to support auctioning as well as consignment based buying and selling.

As mentioned by Starr earlier this week, we recently made changes to our crafting system to be more robust and more meaningful in the game, as well as making dropped loot more useful. Starting with the last patch you can disassemble items to separate their buffs from the item and use that buff on another item. For example, you get a weapon dropped from an enemy that has +1 to Body. You can take that weapon to the crafting station and disassemble it to get the Body buff off the weapon and then use a modification recipe to attach that buff to, say, a pair of boots. In the last patch you could only upgrade existing buffs, where in the next patch you can add new buffs. The grade of item determines how many different buffs you can add. This is a fun mechanic, however, there are literally thousands of recipes, items, buffs and component parts used in crafting. Getting exactly what you need to craft what you want can take some time fighting in the field. This is where Military Surplus really rounds out the in-game economy.

With Military Surplus, you simply go to the market and purchase the items you need to make that uber weapon you have always wanted. We really feel like our crafting system starts to shine once players can easily buy and sell items and supplies which is why we are working hard to get the Military Surplus outposts in the game as quickly as possible.
Click to expand...


and

Time for another quick, or not so quick update. Right now, the team is working hard getting the game ready for the next patch. I think balance has greatly improved, and a lot of the features that have been implemented are excellent additions to the game. You will see those on Tuesday and we look forward to hearing your feedback.

As we move closer to launch, some may think that now would be a good time to finally relax after months of crunch, but that’s not what making am MMO is about. So the question “what’s in store for the upper level player?” has come up, and I thought I would share a sneak peek of some of our plans. Some of these will come sooner rather than later and as with any development, nothing is set in stone and our plans could and will invariably change. Still, here are just a few of the features we are working on:

* Personal Armor Units (PAU’s): When players get to level 40, they won’t just get a pony! Promotion to Level 40 comes with the option to train for certification in the PAU. Each PAU will have bonuses such as movement, more firepower, and different abilities per type. Each type is unique to the military career the player has selected. When visualizing the PAU, visualize the AFS Mech, although each will be very different… and may not necessarily be a mech.

Sneak peek: PAU for the Grenadier: Grendel – The surprisingly nimble Grendel, has two machine gun turrets on each arm, providing a cone of doom a short distance in front of the Grendel. More impressive is the Hornet’s Nest capability of the Grendel, which when unleashed uses the remaining power of the user to determine the number of rockets unleashed on the opposing forces but does massive damage to surrounding units.

* Command Opportunity: When you climb the ranks to level 50, you need someone to order around. Command Opportunity is the privilege the AFS commander has to control their own subordinate squad of NPCs. Teach them, outfit them, and give them commands on the battlefield. The more successful you are with your squad, the bigger and better your squad will become, granting you Command Points.
* Flashpoints: The Neph generals aren’t happy with the setbacks in their bid to rid the universe of Eloh manipulation, therefore they have begun attacks on various worlds. Each Flashpoint will require multiple squads to solve. Certain objectives will need to be done simultaneously to fight back the Bane and each objective will require a dedicated squad that is at their best. Conquer flashpoints with squads formed of all players, or have a few players that have NPC squads at their command.
* Clan Warfare: Clans will gain their own abilities for their members over time, meaning the leader will be able to select a passive buff that all members of the clan will have. This buff will grow in strength the larger the clan. Clans who go to war can wager these buffs and loot in clan wars. Eventually, clans will be able to lay claim to Control Points fighting off rival clans, and earning bonuses while they control them. There will even be AFS sanctioned Rivalry Zones where players have strategic objectives to fight over such as Capture the Flag, and Hold the Location.
Click to expand...
 
Sorry about the misspell..was reading about the Tabula Rosa..somehow it was stuck in my mind..

please enlighten the noob...what is CoX?
 
Been Sidetracked by Dungeon runners.

Opinion about EXTEEL ?
 
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