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Great base game for casual, and ends there. Recon Senses giving literal wall hacks to players, and Defib ruining the ranked meta makes for a massively unbalanced game for other classes. I tried to give them patience, but the latest balance patch shows their intentions. I do not recommend if you take the game in a serious stance,

I shared the same post on the forums here: https://forums.newworld.com/t/the-mismanagement-of-new-world-by-ags-is-almost-like-a-cruel-joke/580989

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I've been a gamer for over 20+ years spamming MMOs (honestly, not a hardcore MMO player, but I've spent stupid amounts of time in RS and Ragnarok Online), competitive FPS, and more.

Before anyone says "X Y Z was more poorly managed!!111" - this is simply me speaking from my own experience.

New World as a foundation of a game is actually really good. The first 40 levels of this game got me hooked *completely* and is honestly the reason I still play the game because it seems they have the right idea. I also love the ambiance + sound design of the game. The *idea* of PVP combat that takes skill and mastery is also something I love in this MMO, unlike the point and click adventures of RS/RO which was more about equipment and spamming potions.

But my god, watching such a good game with such an interesting foundation go downhill this fast is honestly sad.

**PVP**

- Wars and Outpost Rush right now is unplayable. Not just on a meta perspective (GA/WH spam which quite literally all of Reddit and this forum predicted during the PTR - AGS ignored every single piece of feedback), but on lag. Any time there is more than 10 people together on the screen, it becomes a slide show.

- The meta is GA/WH. Enough said. There is no current better meta. I don't need to repeat what has been repeated ad nauseum across this forum and other social media outlets.

- Weapons that previously countered GA/WH such as the Bow and Ice Gauntlet got nerfed, much reducing their effectiveness. IG nerfs made sense, but the Bow? Really?

- The majority of perks that improved skill effectiveness don't work. Empowering Fireball on the Fire Staff is one.

- While the changes to faction missions are a step to the right direction, it has actually made raising influence in a territory much harder. There are now six missions that are random. Previously, factions/companies could band together people to "zerg" these missions and quickly raise influence. Now, this is impossible to do because of the randomness and the conditions of having to kill enemies that may or may not exist. Maybe this is an intentional design decision to give defense an advantage that is already greater than before (wars are won 80% of the time for defense according to devs). Now, attacking is even more futile.


**General**

- The hidden patch notes is a major break of trust with developers that already have negative trust with the community.

- An already poor PvE experience made worse by major nerfs to end game content.

- The # of exploits that's gone by is something that genuinely blows my mind. I have *never* played a single MMO/game that had this many game breaking issues within the first two months of launch. Never.

- The non-stop apologies. I'm sick of hearing "we apologize". So many of us are sick of hearing it. When is the next apology is all I am thinking..

- The studio claims they listen to feedback but zero. Zero feedback from PTR was acknowledged or listened to. Community managers (I don't fully blame CMs because they don't have much say in the actual game development) claim they listen, but your actions say you are completely lying to us.

- The game is absolutely still in beta. Maybe calling it a beta is even a bit too generous. Even in alpha, the number of issues is still too much.

- End game is really a cruel joke. The even sadder thing is that devs to extend the length of the *lack* of content with end game is to make things harder. Really?

- PvE is really really one-dimensional. Monsters all operate the same way. Even bosses have incredibly uninspiring moves and is pretty much about having a tank get aggro, and DPS kill it. This is the same for *everything*.

**The Good**

- Part of my disappointment about this game is because it can be so good. While the studio lies to us repeatedly, the communication and depth of patch notes have been improving. You guys don't listen, but you do talk to us.

- The base of the game is so good. It's just incredibly incomplete. First 40 levels are incredible, the end-game is awful.

- The sound design, item design, crafting, foods, illustrations, world design, etc, are beautiful. I walked in Lazarus last week for the first time (yeah, I don't do PvE a lot) and said out loud "wow".

- While many towns are copy and paste, the unique towns such as Ebonscale are breathtaking. Even Great Cleave is beautiful with its new snow storm. It's almost as if an intern designed Windswards/Brightwood, and then a seasoned designer worked on Ebonscale. The contrast is huge.

- Combat *can* be amazing. Duels where I fight excellent Rapier/Bow users, or Musket/Spear users, are exhilarating. Except outside of duels, this is never the actual situation as everyone knows the meta is what I mentioned above. It takes little to no skill to actually use.

I want to *love* this game because I think it has such great potential and the first 40 levels reminded me of playing a 21st century Runescape.

But my god the mismanagement of this game is actually mindblowing to me. It blows my mind how *poorly* this game is being executed upon. It's almost as if there is intentional sabotage. There is no way a triple AAA studio can run a game this poorly and anger its community this much out of ignorance right?

Please. Slow down and think hard. Stop trying to fight fires every single week. AGS management - please, slow down. Sit down and think where you want this game to actually be.

Your mismanagement of this game is quite literally killing New World. This game can be so good but right now, you are running it to the ground.