Elder Scrolls Online vs. Neverwinter vs. Guild Wars 2?

[Toonces]

Hello!

I've been thinking of getting my fantasy MMO on.  I'm a relative n00b at MMOs, though, with a brief foray in Everquest more than a decade ago and about 1 hour of play time in Neverwinter (free on Steam).

I already have Neverwinter, but I'm considering moving to either ESO or GW2.  I've watched some Youtube videos and read the reviews, and I'm still not sure which I would prefer. 

I know a lot of you guys play these games, so can you provide some thoughts and pros/cons of the various options; which you like best and why?

[Yskonyn]

I have played GW2 for about 6 months and while I found it a fun game for a while, ultimately it was a bit of a dissapointment.
The questing is based on the philosophy of the player being encouraged to wander around and explore and find interesting things.
On the world map this boils down to doing one public event after the other with little to no narrative. They are just there, provide a task and give xp and or loot.
For the storybased events you pretty much follow your personal story and participate in the main story, but both of these only have a new Quest after you leveled again for a while; usually a hook every 5 to 10 levels.
I found that balance a bit off and resulting in too much generic public events gameplay to level.
ESO offers a more story based experience.

Character progression is fairly limited when it comes to skill development. You will have All your skills unlocked after a few levels.
The combat system encourages you to swap weapons often depending on the enemies you face because skills are a result of equiped weapon.

I prefer the more traditional character development ESO offers.

PVP is a zerg fest in both games as it is atm with similar gameplay mechanics.

My 2 cents.

[SgtRock]

I've played a lot of Guild Wars 2, it's a fun game with a lot to do. The new mega servers have more players on all maps at all levels.
A lot of players complain about the lack of skills but, it's not until you are level 80 and do dungeons that you learn how to use the different skills & combos, plus you can now reconfigure your characters on the fly, free of charge to try out new play styles. There is no perfect character class/build it's finding the right build to fit your play style.

Guild Wars

Pro's
- A lot too do (Explore maps, Dungeons, PVP, WvW, jumping puzzles, world events, crafting, living story events).
- All new content is free, nothing else to buy, Anet still has no plans for an Expansion pack.
- All items can be purchased with in game currency (change gold to gems).
- Good community, easy to find players to help.
- Over a thousand dynamic game events that spawn on maps.
- Can complete almost all content single player and easy to find pug groups for running dungeons.
- I've leveled 5 characters to level 80 and did each one a different way (Exploring, Crafting, WvW, PVE, Story events & world bosses).

Con's
- Dungeons (once you learn them are the same each time you play them).
- Lack of randomness (dungeons, world bosses) are always the same & do the same thing.
- Crafting top tier items Ascended weapons & armor requires a lot of farming/grind.
- World bosses have become zerg events.
- Need a good PC to play.
- Story there is one but, it doesn't matter.
- Casual play with limited role playing.
- Lot's of Zerg content.

Neverwinter
I got 2 characters to level 20 but, found the game to be too linear, Doing the same content twice the same each time took it's toll on me.

Pro
- User content

Cons
- way too many in game currencies.
- too linear for my tastes.
- always felt locked in a small part of the world.

[Toonces]

This is going to sound like a stupid question, but here goes anyway.

I feel like I've pretty much finished Skyrim, but I want more Elder Scrolls.  Is ESO "Skyrimy" enough that I'm going to feel like I'm getting a good ES fix?  I understand that it's not "multiplayer Skyrim" but...it's hard to articulate but I'm looking for something that is more of ES, but not Oblivion or Morrowind, if that makes sense.

I also like the idea of the stronghold PvP fights in both ESO and GW2.  How are those in each game?

[Yskonyn]

That depends on how you rate the game to be Skyrimmy. ;)
If this means you should be able to take All objects from the gameworld as you see fit and you want to run around going wherever you wish, then no.
Its more on rails due to the fact the game wants you to level on your way to end game.
Another thing is that you will see lots of "mmoslayer", "2l33tforyou" and "Jaime Lannister" characters running around like in All mmo's.

On the other hand if you expect a game with All the MMO quircks, disadvantages and advantages it typically brings, but set in the ESO world where the devs at least tried hard to make the game also appeal to their singleplayer fans you should be safe.

Its really neither as sandboxy as the SP TES games nor as generic as many MMO's. RPG wise.

[Toonces]

I find it surprising that an MMO is on rails.  I would expect an MMO to be even more freeform that a typical ES game.

[Yskonyn]

Well its hard to explain.
I do not mean 'on rails' in the classic sense. But where sandbox mmo's like EVE Online have no guidance or plotline to follow, it is truely freeform.
But themapark MMO's like ESO and GW2 mask the 'on rails' part a bit due to having lots of territory to explore and different kinds of activities to take part in, but in essence if you want to get to end game you will basically have to take the same path through the gameworld as the other players.
Perhaps its made worse due to the higher amount of generic quests in MMO's which are just there to give XP and a little loot.
SP RPG's focus much more on a story and are less generic. Probably also because their world size is usually much smaller. With a narrower focus comes more details.

I don't know, its difficult to explain so I hope I make sense.
But if you're going to approach ESO as a singleplayer gamer you will probably find quite a few glaring omissions in its gameplay compared to Skyrim.
But then again, ESO tries to portray the WHOLE of Tamriel. Something no SP TES game has ever done.

[Toonces]

Thanks- that does make sense.