gentle cargo
So lemme set the stage a little bit, i have technically played MMOs before, but that was a WHILE ago, the last proper MMO i ever really touched was Path of Exile 5 years ago and i never really got very far in it at all, so for all intents and purposes, i'm basically a clueless noob looking for a first shot at the genre all over again.
Recently i've been watching some WoW hardcore content and that along with Path of Exile 2 being a thing made me tempted to go try this genre again.
Since from my understanding this genre seems to have a lot broader of a scope than i first thought: here's some points that i'm looking for:
-Free to play would be preferable, although i can go for subscription or outright buying the game if the cost isn't unhinged high, would also be nice if it wasn't too pay to win so i don't fall into a trap of unreasonable spending habits...
-Combat is an interesting case, the 2 RPGs i played for any semblance of time (Path of Exile and Metin2) had combat that basically was just "click on enemy, autoattack and spam the number keys for your spells, kill enemy". Not gonna lie, bored me pretty quick, BUT it could also have been my dumbass just brute forcing things without giving it proper thought , so while more "involved" combat could be interesting, it's not necessarily a 100% requirement. After all League of Legends has similar combat and that didn't put me to sleep, so who knows.
-Would be nice if you could play alone without trouble, since i tend to be sort of a loner in games that don't have a small community i can crash land in, and i somehow don't foresee MMO guilds to be the most welcoming to complete newbies not looking to sweat their balls off (my deepest apologies if this is a very wrong impression i have there).
-I really like spending time coming up with builds in games that have character customisation and things like that, my closest example to the MMORPG genre being Elden Ring and Dark Souls 3, so games that offer a lot of cool build opportunites would give me some neat occupation when grinding a character gets boring.
-Speaking of grinding, i know it comes with the territory, but like, i already have a full-time job, and i would rather not have whatever MMO i dive into become a second one (looking at you GTA Online....).
-Having PVP would be nice, but i'm probably not gonna go ham on it for the sake of my peripherals staying alive and not giving myself a stroke from sheer salt, so PVP-focused MMOs aren't necessarily what i'm going for.
Hopefully this helps and i can find something nice with y'all's help, i don't really care about playing a modern or old game, as long as game can keep my interest, it's whatever.
rich jasper