So I saw this game in a store, thought it looked cool so I went home and read up on it. It seemed like a great buy, and at 40$ it was good for a new game.
My serial number which came with the game didn't work, so while I waited for tech support to help me fix it I played a lot of nightmare tournaments, and went about 50/50.
So once TS gave me a new serial number, I managed to play 2 pantheon games and had a lot of fun. Then came the "You have been disconnected from the NAT Facilitator" annoyance. I read what I could do to fix this, or work around. And right now I have my PC on DMZ in my router, AND I have ports forwarded AND I have Vista's firewall off. What fun it is to risk my computers safety for a game...Anyway, in the past 2 days I have played maybe 6 games, out of probably 50 attempts. P2P may be better for lag, but god almighty does it suck for actually getting to play.
Out of the 6 games I have managed to play, it's been 2-2-2 for fortress, conquest and slaugther...ugh, slaughter. Nothing is more annoying than losing a match because you got stuck with 2 retarded AI and you're playing against 3 Torch Bearers...shatter combo galore.
My concerns are this...
NAT Negotiations - I don't know much about NAT and so I can't propose a fix, but you HAVE to find a better way to match players for games, it's annoying as hell to search for a Pantheon game and after 5 minutes of searching for players and 5 minutes of people connecting to eachother to get "You have been disconnected from the NAT Facilitator"...and now I have to waste more time finding a game. I swear, about 85% of the time I have spent attempting multiplayer games has been wasted on trying to get the started and failing. I know you guys are working on this, and I hope the solution works well, but until then I am going to be pulling my hair out wondering why I shouldn't just go play DoW2 or D2 or hell WoW.
Slaughter for Pantheon games - I'm sure that with 3-4 great players on each team, those games are probably pretty amazingly tense and fun. But for new players and games with AI they tend to be the most dissappointing match to play. Ot's way too easy or you get completely slaughtered without a chance, either way the games last about 10 minutes and compared to conquest which can take 45min to an hour it's a waste of time.
Favor - I had a good 2000 favor saved up from singleplayer games, went into a pantheon game and bought a new weapon for my Rook, went back to single player from NAT frustration and was now -850 favor...and all my items except the one I bought in the pantheon game were reset. UGH, so I ground back out of the hole, bought a few of the good items again, then went and tried Pantheon again, this time I had no items, but 250~ favor and bought what I could. Well, now i'm -250 and can't gain any new favor in Multiplayer and don't want to waste my time on favor that's going to be erased again in singleplayer. I have 1 item, the 10% item discount, huzzah...Just fix this...that's all I can say.
"This player has not yet connected to anyone" - I see these all the time, people connect to them but it doesn't look like they are attempting to connect to other players, tons of "fun" to see 3 players with that below their tag and after a few minutes of waiting giving up to the realization that nothings going on.
This brings up something else, when the game fails to make a game, or match someone into a game whether it be NAT negotiations or failing to connect or whatever, there doesn't seem to be a function to send the player back to the Pantheon or main menu, it just sits there and you feel retarded for either staying there waiting with your thumb up your but or you leave and feel like you left a game that might've gone off.
Ok, so I have a lot to gripe about and rightly so. But since this game is so "remeniscent" of DOTA from WC3 and it so far has been a blast when I actually DO play with and against people, I am not giving up - yet. I am hopeful that you guys will fix all of the issues that are plagueing(yes, a plague, kind of like the 'herps') and I do look forward to new maps, more demigods, more game modes and heck maybe even a few balance changes - unless you're decked how do you get away from the Unclean Beast? he's got increased speed, and slows you when he hits you, it's like a death sentance unless you can warp, teleport, stun or just luck out.
/end rant
/resume Pantheon test of will, aka - matchmaking.
