Shamus Young said:
Why the Game's Title Should Have Been Dragon Age: Impositions
We are getting used to the idea of microtransactions, but virtually forcing players to buy health potions for multiplayer with real cash is a bit too much.
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So my brother linked me to this article, asking me if what Shamus was saying is true, as I've been playing quite a bit of Dragon Age Inquisition multiplayer (about equal to the single player campaign) and trying to get him to give it a shot.
Shamus has the underlying mechanics correct, but completely misses the execution of it, showing he has very little to no experience with the multiplayer aspect of this game.
Let me clarify.
Most importantly, the fact that every chest you buy (with gold or real money) contains healing potions, yes, that's right, every chest, you don't have to hold off upgrades, because the upgrades/item chests ALL contain health potions.
You get plenty of gold if you complete the map, and if you're struggling, play on the easiest difficulty and unless everyone is level 1, you'll complete it without needing any potions.
Potions are barely required before the final boss of any map, as you get fully healed between each zone (there are 5 zones per map, each taking 3-5 minutes depending on multiple factors such as how many treasure doors spawn, map layout etc).
I've never once had someone complain that I died and didn't use a potion before doing so (as usually if something kills you, it's because you stood in a fairly obviously bad position, got genuinely unlucky, the Keeper didn't keep barrier up as they were too busy DPS'ing, or Tank did not build Guard and now everyone is dead), and people who use consumables (such as Regen pots on other players, Jar of Bees for bosses) are usually praised as this is not the norm, and is not normally needed unless you are undergeared/underleveled for that difficulty.
Comparing this to Mass Effect 3's multi, which I also loved, the need for consumables is only to help you reach endgame levels early (think Gold/Platinum on ME3 without highly leveled weapons). In fact ME3 was far more consumable centric whilst also being far harder to gather said consumables.
The gripes I have with DA I Multi, are the silly naming for easy/normal/hard (routine/threatening/perilous) and the crafting system in which materials and their effects are not explained at all (You kind of need to know that Iron sucks and what its stats are from single player to be more effective in multiplayer crafting as materials and crafting are not explained at all)
RNG with finding weapons/accessories can also be annoying, you can do a normal mission and get an item level 10 unique (purple/epic) weapon, and have it already be weaker than the item level 15 common you got from easy, feeling completely underwhelmed from your new shiny as it goes straight into the salvage bin to craft some armor.
Lack of content, there are only 3 enemy types and 3 maps, yes randomization happens but most of the random doors are just 30 second distractions to get extra gold and chance at item drops.
I know this is only my first post, and I'm making some likely unpopular calls, but, seeing someone scrutinize a system based on mechanics without understanding or explaining execution, frustrates me.
Edit: Forgot to mention, you can also die 3 times before going down for good and enemies get harder, if this is the case, you're playing above your level and probably shouldn't be tackling whatever you are attempting, the fact it gets harder if someone dies so often, is there to try and stop one person carrying the entire team solo, it is a team game, and coordination and knowledge of role help greatly)