PerfectWorld and Cryptic are marketing Neverwinter as an "Action MMORPG,"

with a focus on the action part. Combat is the clear focus of the game,

and the combat is dynamic, reactive and fast-paced.

Similar to Guild Wars 2, combat relies less on skill-spamming and more on

active participation. Enemy blows must be actively dodged, blocked or

evaded, and positioning is important. The character needs to be facing his

enemies to land most blows, and will need plenty of room to maneuver to

avoid taking damage.

The small-scale skill bar adds to this effect, as well. During the leveling

process, characters can develop dozens of combat skills, but they only have

immediate access to 7 at any given time - two At-Will skills (tied to the

mouse buttons, the "default" attacks), three Encounter skills (mapped to Q,

E and R - stronger attacks or specialty moves with a short timer) and two

Daily skills (mapped to 1 and 2 - big attacks that cost energy typically

built up by using Encounter and At-Will skills). These skills can be

switched around and swapped out for others of the same type, and the

character must spend skill points to improve the skills he intends to use.

This means any two characters of the same class might play completely

differently, with a different set of slotted skills achieving different

effects. In other words, players can play how they want.

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PvE questing is more traditional - players visit quest hubs, complete

objectives out in the wilderness, and return to the quest-givers to claim

rewards. The story is sort of typical Dungeons & Dragons stuff - a

necromancer named Valindra threatens to overrun the city of Neverwinter

with hordes of undead, yada yada yada. There are some neat cinematics at

the beginning, showing Valindra's transformation into a lich and her

initial assault on the city, but the actual questing and storytelling is

rather tepid. This is an action game, after all, and the focus is on the

fighting rather than on the talking.

This is kind of a shame, though, because all of the main quests are fully

voice-acted. The standard "wall of text" is paired with a NPC reading the

text to you, and the voice-over continues after you accept the quest and

start heading towards your goal. Fans of the R.A. Salvatore stories and

such may wish to pay more attention to the quest dialogue, but I found

myself just clicking through and mostly ignoring the story.

This is only for the main story, though - the stuff designed by the

developers. It's an entirely different matter when you start getting into

the user-generated content made in the Foundry.

Foundry missions can be anything from hardcore roleplaying, dialogue-only

novellas to hack-n-slash dungeon crawls. They are as different from one

another as the players who make them, and if you want something more

story-heavy than what you're getting from the official progression, you

can find it by browsing through the Foundry missions. The Foundry comes

with its own drawbacks - there are no quality control standards or

spell-checkers, and the toolset is somewhat limited in its scope - but the

ability for players to create the kind of adventures they want to play far

outweighs these limitations.

Additionally, some aspects of the game can be accessed "offline" through

the Neverwinter Gateway, giving access to in-game mail, the auction house,

guild management and the Professions window. This website can be accessed

through any web browser, meaning you can manage your characters' finances

and such via your smartphone.