I finally played it during open beta. Combat is good, don't know how some people think it's bad. I guess those people are the kind of nerds that only ever played like 2 MMOs and never played any other types of games? It's super fun to be able to pull 6 mobs and line them up just right so your hatchet slices all of them. And it's really rewarding to strategically use the land/objects around you to fuck with mobs and to win fights you shouldn't be able to. GREAT combat because of that, actually. You can go face to face with a mob 10 levels higher and get wrecked, or you can be strategic and dominate it and not get hit once.
Despite my doubts about longevity, particularly for anyone but diehard pvpers that spend all day pvping, I still can't wait for release and am cracking out to play again. The 28th can't come soon enough. Just wish the world wasn't so small, and there was more content already done. Seriously worried about the lack of pve content, but my god the foundation is addicting as fuck and I haven't cracked out for a game like this in a while.
The amount of people racing is kinda sad. I'm just going to enjoy the weather and go wherever the wind takes me.