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I have never seen such talk of global cooldown abilities until I started reading about it on the Rift forums. As an EQ2 player I guess I didn't understand what it was.
As with my post on AA systems, Rift follows WoW's lead by implementing a GCD system. I am curious of what you guys think about GCD abilities?
For me EQ2 offers a more intuitive flow to fighting in that each ability is unique in its cast time and cooldown requirements, there is no GCD. Since most people don't come to a new game like Rift from EQ2 (WoW) there has been this obvious sense of surprise like a "what else can you do?" What is even more impressive is that EQ2 manages this independently while doing so for many times more abilities.
As with the AA system, this is yet another way that EQ2 shows itself to be deeper and more complex - and at least in this one place more intuitive as well.
I laughed when researching my Feral Druid in WoW as it was mentioned to be high maintenance in its dps rotation and playstyle relative to other classes. Mastering rotations in EQ2 versus WoW is akin to a Harvard PhD versus a high school diploma. At least Rift looks to be providing a number of abilities somewhere in the middle, far more that WoW but fewer than EQ2.
What frustrates me about EQ2 is that the dev team has failed me recently in gameplay and presentation. The nuts and bolts of the game at its core are superior in so many ways.
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Rank: One of the Main Weird
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Location: UK, Tonbridge
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From a purely technical point of view I think the Global cooldown is a bad thing, with it in WoW my combat looks more like this
Lag | ability | Lag+user response delay | ability | Lag+user response delay etc
With non global cooldown, plus queuing its going to look like this
Lag | ability | ability | ability
(I'm assuming that the abilities are queued at the server side, if not then I guess there is still lag between the client and server.
But from a user point of view going from WoW to EQ2 I did feel initially that EQ2 would be so much better with a GCD and even suggested it, its even harsher in WAR where button mashers get punished with multiple abilities being queued.
Its not a killer to the gameplay, but I the GCD and lack of ability to up the keyboard turn rate mean keybinding for some classes is a must in WoW to minimise the user response lag (I found the protection warrior was so much better keyboard binding the commonly used abilities, a shadow priest could click still though and do pretty well). The keyboard binding works in WoW due to so few abilities that form 90% of a classes effectiveness (I had about 10 for a protection warrior, and about 6 for a shadow priest, the simplest used to be a frost mage with 1 ;) or at least I seriously did see a high DPSing frost mage cast ice bolt for an entire raid).
I'd hate to have to keyboard bind my commonly used 90% of abilities in EQ2 without macros, it'll be interesting to see where the complexity of Rift lies.
Just for the benefits in attracting and retaining WoW players I think the GCD is a smart move by Rift, its a negative although in no way a deal breaker as I see it for WAR/EQ2 players, but this market is pretty small. That's my opinion on it anyway.
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