Current Events > Started playing Shadow of Mordor today (spoilers)

(+) Yeah! (+)

Played it for about 10 minutes several years ago and just getting around to trying harder, haha. Just doing a few missions so Ratbag (or whatever) can rise in ranks and be my li'l splinter cell. Hopefully my dude gets better crowd control, because I'm already sick of having every captain fight turn into a 20-on-1 situation, haha.
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Dude you become so op crowds go down fast.

It's a fun game to play if you wanna feel like a badass, but ugh it has some of the worst level design I've ever seen in a modern AAA game. Just an awful, ugly open world.
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Hmm, still having crowd control problems. Guess I better get used to Wraith Flash + that one rune that gives a set chance at instakilling people. Almost managed to do the warchief mission where you lure him out by killing 35 mobs...but I ran out of second wind attempts. =|

As for the open-world stuff, I agree that it's drab...but I didn't expect Mordor of all places to be sunshine and rainbows. It ends up being a hellish wasteland, but after seeing the types of places the orcs made in the movies, I gotta admit, it's quite fitting. All dead, trampled earth and steel structures. I'll give it a pass for being so LOTR-ish.
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I never had a crowd control issue. Once you get good with everything, you want more and more just like with the Arkham games.

It feels amazing stylin out.
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I got the Rank 4 perk that cuts execution time down to a 5-combo, which should be pretty useful. I was a little disappointed that the perk for "quick ground executions" barely did anything, though. But yeah, the combat does feel pretty similar to the Arkham games, right down to the "jump over the palooka and hit him from behind" tactics you had to use. Not a surprise with it being a WB game, I suppose.
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That game was pretty fun. I never came close to finishing the main story but I spent hours running around messing with orcs and whatnot.
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Yeah, now that I'm far enough along that I can micromanage the leadership with my splinter cells, rather than just having another "oh...a random captain/etc." experience, it's pretty enjoyable. Of course, by pushing your units up the ranks, you're basically cheating at everything, which is just a funny way to screw Sauron over.

As for battling, I finally got the perk that lets you do two executions per hit streak, so things have been a bit easier lately. Haven't been using the "20 seconds of free executions" skill (or any of the other similar ones), but I expect they're one of the reasons things can be so easy, huh?
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Yeah haha. Good game haha.
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Is the DLC any good? I have the GOTY edition.
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Fun game, though like you said it's literally just Arkham with a sword. I love the flurry attack followed by the skull explosion though. They removed the second part in Shadow of War which was lame.

That aside, the sequel does everything better and with an even crazier story to boot.
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I'd consider getting the second game based on the strength of this one, yeah.
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Whew, got all the Numen warchiefs branded, and even did the achievement for making a chieftain's 5 bodyguards all defect in battle. It'll be interesting seeing if our old friend Ratbag -- who has mysteriously been absent in the plot -- makes an appearance as a big bad. Bonus points if he's still on Talion's side.

PS: Arrow-proof enemies should be able to be vulnerable to the "pin in place" technique when fleeing. I can't count how many times my athletic tough guy ranger is getting outsprinted by fat, greasy uruks wearing tons of armor. All I wanted...was...*sniff*...to brainwash you permanently and make you betray everyone until your inevitable death as my pawn. =(
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Shotgunnova posted...

Is the DLC any good? I have the GOTY edition.

It's decent. Pretty short, but worth playing considering you have them.
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All the DLC is short? There was one about beasts, another as Celebrimbor, and maybe something else.
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I didn't like it much. It's like if you permanently had 5 stars in GTA. Sometimes I just want to walk from point A to point B and not get sidetracked into a 20 minute fight.
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I kinda felt that way at first, but once you get the double executions and that perk that lets you sprint at lightning speeds when you mantle objects, it's easier to get around. It's definitely amazing how many orcs are just walking around, though. You'd think the freefolk would show up in random events without being enslaved or something.

BONUS:

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Shotgunnova posted...

All the DLC is short? There was one about beasts, another as Celebrimbor, and maybe something else.

Yeah, but like I said, still worth playing. Just wait till after you beat the main game though.

And if you like Shadow of Mordor, definitely check out Shadow of War. Like Smidge said, Shadow of War improves on almost everything. It has more content, it's longer, and it's also much more difficult.

Have you got Shadow Strike yet, by the way? By far my favorite ability in the game.
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I just started shadow of war and am oddly finding it difficult.
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you get an ability towards the end which is awesome and one of my favourites ever
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Shotgunnova posted...

Is the DLC any good? I have the GOTY edition.

Yes, its fantastic and just the right length. Believe its composed of beastmaster where you fight orcs who control giant beasts and then you play as the elf who made the ring. Now the boss fight in that one is outstanding
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Shotgunnova posted...

I'd consider getting the second game based on the strength of this one, yeah.

You can play the demo on steam. Seems a bit different to me, though the fundamentals are the same with a few new additions
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Good game.
The end of the main story was shit, though
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I'll try all the DLC stuff -- currently doing the Beastmaster stuff. Honestly, hunting beasts was never really an enjoyable part of the game, but I have the Shadow Strike upgrades to teleport onto 'em, so that cuts out some of the annoyances.

pres_madagascar posted...

I just started shadow of war and am oddly finding it difficult.

It gets easier when you can do executions faster. The perks that let you stun when jumping over targets, plus the perk that lets your sword glow at a 5-combo instead of an 8-combo, helps immensely. You can use flurry attacks to quickly build up your multipliers, rather than just swinging the sword slow as hell. (I mention this because that's how I was doing it at first, lmao.)

ROBANN_88 posted...

Good game.
The end of the main story was shit, though

Yeah, the final battles were kinda lame. Sauron "coming back" for five seconds, only to lose to an simple QTE, is pretty hilarious, though.
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GeneralKenobi85 posted...

And if you like Shadow of Mordor, definitely check out Shadow of War. Like Smidge said, Shadow of War improves on almost everything. It has more content, it's longer, and it's also much more difficult.

Have you got Shadow Strike yet, by the way? By far my favorite ability in the game.

You're kind of overpowered in Mordor what with the Batman combat and Shadow Strike, but you're practically a god in War. The double jump is one of the best ever, and as if Shadow Strike wasn't OP enough, you can get a reverse Shadow Strike where you can tag any orc that's not arrow proof and teleport them to you.

That's not even getting into the loot and upgrade system where you can do crazy shit like throw exploding axes, or build an armor set that lets you make every 1/5 hits a poison attack that then makes enemies explode poison onto other enemies and so on.
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SmidgeIsntBack posted...

GeneralKenobi85 posted...

And if you like Shadow of Mordor, definitely check out Shadow of War. Like Smidge said, Shadow of War improves on almost everything. It has more content, it's longer, and it's also much more difficult.

Have you got Shadow Strike yet, by the way? By far my favorite ability in the game.

You're kind of overpowered in Mordor what with the Batman combat and Shadow Strike, but you're practically a god in War. The double jump is one of the best ever, and as if Shadow Strike wasn't OP enough, you can get a reverse Shadow Strike where you can tag any orc that's not arrow proof and teleport them to you.

That's not even getting into the loot and upgrade system where you can do crazy shit like throw exploding axes, or build an armor set that lets you make every 1/5 hits a poison attack that then makes enemies explode poison onto other enemies and so on.

You do get OP in both games, but the difference is that War is just much more difficult in general. Shadow of Mordor is a pretty easy game even before you get absurdly powerful.

Shadow Strike Pull is another one of my favorites. In fact one of my biggest pet peeves about War is that you can't have Shadow Strike Pull and Chain active at the same time. I get why it works that way, but all it did was result in me almost never using Chain because Pull is just too good to switch off of. Dominate/Quiver of Souls is in a similar boat, though ultimately not a big deal since arrows are very easy to come by. But in the first one you got used to arrows refilling every time you dominated someone. Took a little bit to adjust to that split. Arrow refills are not at all worth giving up one of your most important abilities.
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GeneralKenobi85 posted...

You do get OP in both games, but the difference is that War is just much more difficult in general

This. I was getting my ass kicked in the demo.
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Shadow Strike can kill ghul matrons instantly...might have to use this more often. Could've probably gotten plenty of fleeing uruks with it, too, haha.
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Welp, beat the Beastmaster campaign. Kinda short, and not terribly enjoyable, but it wasn't too shabby. Got about four achievements killing that last warchief who loved ghuls like they were puppies, haha. All that's left is going through Celebrimbor's stuff, I guess...hopefully it's not another standalone mode where all my hard-earned glyphs and stuff from the campaign are reset to default state.
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Almost done with Celebrimbor's Bright Lord campaign. Some of these new techniques are genius (Wraith Flash auto-branding weakling enemies? Teleporting to archers? YES) but the fact that it's in another drab repeat of the Uruk foothills...this is not that enjoyable. The missions so far have been boring as hell, too. Needing to charge the One Ring To Rule Them All by branding wimpy orcs is pretty crappy, too. Why bother forging an artifact of untold power if you have such a lame drawback, haha.
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Some of these new techniques are genius (Wraith Flash auto-branding weakling enemies? Teleporting to archers? YES)

It was a lot of fun. Don't know why I took so long to complete it.

Why bother forging an artifact of untold power if you have such a lame drawback, haha.

I think it ties into the overall lore by demonstrating that the more minds the ring enslaves, the stronger the ring gets.
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Yeah, but domination power depletes, so it the Ring seems way less OP than you'd expect. The fact that it wasn't granting perma-invisibility kinda speaks to that. Obviously, the game would've been cake if that was the case, so there had to be some nerfing in there, but...yeah, not a huge fan of the Ring's addition.
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Great game, very repetitive, shit final boss.

I finished the main story & Celebrimbor DLC, but couldn't complete the beastmaster one because I was already burned out by then.
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Shotgunnova posted...

Yeah, but domination power depletes, so it the Ring seems way less OP than you'd expect.

I'm kind of curious about that. Like, did the designers intentionally devise it so that it wouldn't be that OP simply for game purposes? Or was there a conscious attention and care to nerf it a bit given that the lore says, since it is Sauron's ring, only he can bring out the greatest power within that ring to dominate all.

In any event, It still allows you to go toe to toe with Sauron, so its strong as it needs to be I'd wager. I loved it. Celebrimbor himself is awesome but would get smoked without it, and this is exactly what happens later on.
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Even hobbits could go invisible, so I dunno what the lore reason for Celebrimbor not doing that inherently is. It almost feels like "the ring chooses its master lolz" logic.

St0rmFury posted...

I finished the main story & Celebrimbor DLC, but couldn't complete the beastmaster one because I was already burned out by then.

I kinda liked the beastmaster stuff a bit more than Celebrimbor's, which is weird, since I thought it'd be the exact opposite. Maybe going through the annoying trials made it feel like more of an accomplishment. That said, riding animals was one of the least enjoyable parts of the game, especially since they seemed weak as hell when they were getting ganked (especially graugs).
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Graugs are much more fun to ride in Shadow of War. Caragors on the other hand got shit on pretty bad. They are absolutely pathetic in most fights. Still useful for getting around, but so are Graugs and the third mount you get access too.
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