How is Guild Wars like M:tG?

Howdy,

I'm discussing GW with a friend--but, as of right now, am unable to draw a clear comparison between GW and M:tG without him referencing something similar to WoW.

Anyone familiar with all three willing to help me out?

What's M:tG?

It's similar in that it's intended to be a system of balanced skills and counterskills. Same as WoW and probably all other MMORPGs.

gw is indeed closer to mtg (magic the gathering ) than to wow...

you have 8 skills you can use, wich form your 'deck'...you have 8 ppl in your party ( higher end areas ) so that means a 64 card deck...

with those 64 "cards", you can make nice and deadly combinations..

And for professions, if we go that way:
mesmer is comparible to blue - interrupts, mana drains, hexes
necro is comparible to black / with a touch of green through minions
elementalist is comparible to red / blue - direct damage. some hexes, some interrupts
monk is comparible to white - healing /protection
ranger is comparible to green - pet, global enchantments, no way to classify bow
warrior - ?

wow balanced skill and counterskills? gg

Warrior = artifacts?

Warriors are clearly red. Brute force to get to their target, with nothing on their mind other than smashing face.

But yeah, GW is very very much like M:tG, specifically in the skill setup. There's hundreds of 'cards' for you to choose from, but you get to make a 'deck' out of only eight--or 64, if you're going by a full eight-man team.

I think the other correlation (besides what kakumei already said) is that you can pretty much pick up M:tG wherever you happen to come into the release ... that is: if you were around since the first version, great, but you're not at a disatvantage if you only happen to start playing at, say, the third version or something like that. One of the reps from ArenaNet mentioned something like this in an interview I watched, bugger if I can remember which one at the moment

Actually the old stuff completely owns the floor, but it's utterly banned in most competition because now Wizards wants you to buy their new, combo-less, overpowered crap...

Unlike WoW, in Guild Wars equipment aren´t everything. Just like in M:tG, the expensive equipment/cards might make your character/deck work a bit better or look nicer, but it´s how you use your skills/card abilites etc. that matters in GW and M:tG.

It´s true that M:tG is closer to WoW than GW in some cases, where the über cards/equipment might make some tactics and combinations more powerful than others, but like in GW there´s always something to counter those tactics, so there´s no unbeatable or unfair build/deck in GW if you are prepared and really know your characters´/decks´ strengths and weaknesses.

That´s all I could think of on short notice, discuss.

This is a post I made in a thread about Mesmers
thought I'd post it here too

Sister Spice
-------------------------------------------------------------------
The blue analogy with MTG is a good one.

I used to play control decks in MTG and was drawn to Mesmer for just that reason when introduced to GW.

In MTG Blue had SOME key powers (countering) but a mono deck was never very effective : crap at dealing damage, crap at getting the win, great at controlling the environment.

In MTG there were 3 (ancestral recall, time walk, and timetwister) that were so broken people had to play them in most decks - the equivalent would be 3 totally overpowered weapons or skills in GW - MTG banned those cards, GW would nerf them

So to be effective blue players in MTG always combined it with other colours (pretty much)
In GW therefore - a mesmer wouldnt be solely a mesmer - they'd need something else for the win - either themselves, or in their other team mates.

Funnily enough when you FIRST started playing magic - you looked at blue and saw the HUGE creatures (10/10 Leviathan) and thought WOW - and didnt notice the countering until you were a bit more experienced.

As you go along in magic you start to see how blue is supposed to be used, and if slow thoughtful (and very annoying) control suits you - you started using it yourself .... that's why it's really tough to play Mesmer in PVE as you simply dont get that opportunity to see how it's played well against you. I daresay it's more possible to see that if you PVP / observe PVP - but it still doesnt help you much for PVE as the environment and foes are so different.

I dumped my mesmer and moved on to creating a monk as I realised that I simply wasn't *getting* Mesmer - I knew it was *like* blue in magic - but my skill level was not up to it.

I think it still isnt .... working through monk, necro and ranger but think it will be a long time before I can be an effective Mesmer.

Sister Spice

PS
I've never played WOW so cant comment on it's similarity to MTG

Attempt =! succeed.

For the MTG = Guildwars analogy to work, you'd have to select which x00 skills you bought, then the game would randomly assign you 8 before a mission/match.

Also, the chance factor would have to be increased heavily. In poker it's said that about 70% of the game is chance, in MTG it must've been over 90%. The chance factor in GW is by contrast very low.

It should also be noted that MTG is actually (loosely) based on how RPG's are set up, not the other way around. For instance in D&D you have to select which few of all your spells you want to memorize before combat, and the "archetypes" aren't exactly new either.

Personally I think the only thing that's more similar between GW and any other MMORPG is that the financial idea behind GW, like MTG, is based on selling upgrades. In other words, in MTG if you wanted to stay competitive you had to keep buying new editions; in GW if you want to stay competitive you'll likely need to buy the new chapters.

You mean all those people who win MTG championships just win primarily by luck? Repeat champions must be really lucky then

Yeah, they are. Just like repeat poker champions have to be lucky.

Yeah the 'poker is 70% luck' comment is clearly made by someone who knows nothing about poker. Texas Hold Em poker is one of the MOST skill related card games around.

Over a period of time everyones luck averages out, the *skillful* players are the ones who successfully make a consistent profit. I've played poker for 15 years, my skill level is still *average* (Im not dedicated enough to get really skillful)- but I've played against people who make a living out of it and it isn't luck that got them to that point.

Of course anyone can have bad draws with magic, but people with high skill consistently win more games *WITH THE SAME DECK* than average or bad players.

In MTG and GW (though not so much poker) playing effectively is one skill, the other important one is creativity; some players have the additional skill of being able to figure out the meta game better or notice new opportunities when they arrive .... before other people do.
I've never been any good at that side of things .... I tweak things that work, but I rarely manage to create something truly original.

In GW's that skill is represented in things like the 55hp monk - whoever CREATED it - not those who play it, that was definitely original and counter intuitive .... In Magic it was the players who found new ways to abuse cards
I don't think there is an equivalent in poker though.

Sister Spice

I thought everything Sister Spice said was quite on point, and I thought I'd emphasize the above line as one of the key separations between GW and WoW when compared to M:tG.

With the same exact character set-up (level, gear, etc.), a skilled and an unskilled player would have completely different results in GW. In a game such as WoW, when all else is equal skill means relatively little. If a skilled and an unskilled player were given the same exact levels, gear, etc. the gap in success between the skilled and the unskilled player would be considerably less than in GW.

And further I think that's why the way skills are available (unlocks only go to PvP not all your PvE characters so go 're-acquire' your cards), the way you have to zone around (change 2ndary to suit), re-populate your bar, change your equipment and attributes every time you want to play a new deck AND can only have 4 slots to toy with, 3 of which you used for unlocks and if you nuke them, lose those for PvE... that's where the design starts breaking down a bit IMO.

It'd be nice to store some regularly used templates, and not have to get a single skill two or three times if you'd like to use it on different characters. Some skills only being available near the end too...

I'm getting close to all unlocks but still don't have room for the 'PvP' deck where I can use them all - the analogy being I'll finally have all the cards but the game won't let me use them together, and never will in PvE. Unless for those with insane hours and patience getting all skills on *one* character. I've put enough time in closing on all skills between 3 characters and might have the 4th do some of the final nabbing once they reach that height.

[Although my first character did a lot of extra nabbing including elites, nowhere near all across 6]

Elites are obviously different - imagine in Magic having a boatload of cards but only being allowed to pick one of the batch. [Or if we're making a 'team' a 'deck' every 7 cards you can toss one, and only one, in.] Unless MtG added that kind of thing, I've been out a *long* time (since Legends really).

I hope at some point they reconsider the PvE dynamic all allow us to use all our tools to try different builds there too and not just PvP but I doubt it.

Yeah, sure.
That's what "70% luck" means. It means that a newbie can win any given hand, but since luck averages out but skill doesn't, over 100 hands the better player wins more often than the newbie, and usually, but not always, comes out on top.
Exactly. That never happen with GW skills because they're not drawn at random from a pool of skills.

lol now wheres my sliver deck when i need it for GW

Then go play Type 1...
It is more apt to compare Guild Wars to the Extended format in Magic than the game as a whole. Extended is roughly the sets from the last five years, so unlike Type 1 (which is almost every set), or Type 2 (which is the last 2 blocks), you dont need to constantly buy the new stuff to stay competitive, or you can buy the newer stuff and have more options.
Also, I like to compare the 55 HP monk to the old Type 1 deck, Long (for anyone who remembers that monster). Both break the game at the most basic levels, both had to be kept in check, and both are the most broken things either game has ever spawned.

Here's where luck comes into GW

Lag, a bad spawn, sodding double clicking glitches (ala holy veil), Error7 messages,

Sister Spice

Yes precisely

I played Magic from the Dark expansion - for a couple of years,
then over the years have casually picked it up and dropped it for a few months

When I first played magic there were all those powerful beta / legends cards
and they were *limited* you could play *only 1*
pretty much like elites.
Also like being a GW player since Beta compared to starting in the last couple of months

Gradually they changed the tournament formats so that in type 2 / type 1.5 you could not play the uber cards at all ...

In GW this is like nerfed items - HOD swords for instance no now longer available but if you have one they can be played with ....
are there any skills that were so powerful they were completely banned?

Sister Spice

Numa Pompilius, i should've been more clear

World of Warcraft is *not* about skills and counterskills..methinks