Age of Conan Poll... staying... going... trying... what !?!

[kllrwlf]

Ok... there's a lot of hype with AoC out now... so I'm just wondering where you guys are at with AoC.

[MrLonghair]

Where's the "Got turned off by the WE HAVE NIPPLES AND BLOOD AND GORE and traditional FunCom mishaps" button?

Alternative post

"I'd like to try it with a trial code but until then I'm gunning for Warhammer Online"

It's real cheap, I should pick it up rather than reactivate my WoW accounts because I have too much time on my hands..

[The_Whack]

Ive read too many posts about how the game is heavily Instanced, sort of like Guild Wars.... just not my thing, I'll wait for the trial to come out and see then.

[Kopitar]

Installing it at the moment, taking forever just to install, then it will likely take a long long time to patch....

[Xaedra]

You need to put up there a "I don't plan to buy it" option. :)

[Allokra]

Not sure yet - I bought it and it replaced WOW for sure...it is just a question of whether or not it will get replaced by WAR (likely) or whatever else comes out (Darkfall)...

I have been looking at the necromancer class...imagine 4 boxing with 4 Necromancers...they get up to 11 life draining/group healing pets per necro...44 pets and 4 necros....That would be a nice little army lol (plus being able to hide etc.)

[kllrwlf]

Damn it... I knew I forgot something!

Changed the poll... if you want to change your vote... go fer it!

(sorry about that) :wacko:

[Xaedra]

Voted :)

I've been in WoW since release... I'm loyal. I'm not going anywhere. While I may stop multi-boxing at some point (we're trying to start a family, and kids are expensive), I'll always have at least 1 account open with WoW. Unless of course, they release a KOTOR MMO that doesn't suck it up like SWG is now thanks to SOE.

[kllrwlf]

Unless of course, they release a KOTOR MMO that doesn't suck it up like SWG is now thanks to SOE.

Oooh... that would be nice. KOTOR was just awesome to play. It's amazing how the choices that I felt were right made me so pale and dead-looking. 8o

[shiVen]

Game is a lot of fun and and worth trying out.

Do the trial version though if you really dont think you will like it.

[Tizer]

I plan to try it but i highly doubt i'll be able to quad box in it without a /follow built into the game. Besides, sometimes its just nicer to play a single character so i think i'll try AoC while my shaman accounts are "on pause" see what i think, and if i like it, swap, if i dont, i'll reactivate wow and carry on. I might even play both once S4 hits anyway.

[geoffdavison]

game is fun... easy to get into and out of in regards to time.. i was on limited time last night.. jumped on played for 30 minutes finished up some quests.. and bam.. off to hang with the wife before aggro built up :D

[glo]

The final phase of the beta was extremely buggy and from what I hear quite a few of those bugs made it into the release version.

It's not going to be fun to box in my opinion and it has a "skill" based combo system that is easily made into a single button press with a programmable keyboard. As far as boxing goes it would take my upgrading all but 2 of my machines to even try it out, if you are one of the type that plays 4-5 copies of wow on one machine you can forget about it, not going to happen.

This is going to be a hard sell for most new customers, I for one couldn't see offering a trial to a friend or co-worker unless I knew 100% they would be into the gore and graphic content. I just don't see this going over with anyone except immature boys who are eventually going to get back to the excitement of occasionally hearing a girls voice on vent ;)

[Kel]

My boyfriend is buying a copy so I'll be trying it out on his version.

If it's good then I may purchase a copy of my own, but it would need to be really good for me to stop playing WoW because of it (good enough to get most of my guild over there).

I'm somewhat put off by the seemingly sexist nature of the game (though the info I get is mainly from male players who may have scewed priorities), but I'm hoping that the game play doesn't just revolve around tits and wenches.

[PyrostasisTDK]

the game doesnt revolve around tits and wenches.

Its the lore... Conans times were rather shitty for women. There were slaves, murders, thieves, etc. You dont walk into town and see 500 naked women riding poles, you do see women scantily clad... and looking better than in most mmo's, but its not a porno by any means, and the game is quite fun.

[Kedash00]

I got it and have been hardcoring it, it's a beautiful game and the blood and such is cool and it does have some nipples in it...
The game is very heavily instanced, like if you travel anywhere outside the main cities (like org, UC) you go into a instance...
The one bad thing is i'm a necro and any melee class it seems can pummel me and i get ganked every 10 minutes and it pisses me off to no end! but besides the ganking it's really fun, alot more in depth than wow in some ways, leveling is no where near as easy and i dunno about end game yet.

Player cities are just starting to be built barely, and siege battles haven't happened yet, the crafting is hard as hell but you can pick up everything but you just have to walk around and find stuff, they dont show up on your map or anything like in wow. The story is really really good, you get your own personal questline that you go offline to play so you dont have to worry about getting ganked, that part was nice.

Anyways i'll keep you guys posted, it's still a little buggy but not very bad at all, i haven't personally had any problems but people in my guild have said they have crashed.

As far as hardware wise, you will need at least a dual core processor 2.0 or above, 8800 or up video card, and 2 gigs of ram to play it smoothly.

[elo]

Yeah, I cancelled my 5 WoW accounts and am currently having more fun single boxing in AoC than I had in 4 months of 5-boxing WoW. I will say though, the game is not finished, not even from an MMO perspective. I've hit several bugged quests/bosses, I can't believe that the loot tables are complete as is, and the quests have trickled away on me here in the late 30's. I think they basically needed a cash influx to keep going. If they finish the game out the way they started I think it will be stellar.

'Loyal to WoW'... that's just hysterical that anyone is 'loyal' to a game.

Anyhow, is it a WoW killer or all that buzz? WhoTF cares? Why does any game have to be 'killed' in the name of any other? For me AoC is fun, exciting, and new. When it stops entertaining me I'll go look for something else, maybe that will be WoW again, maybe another MMO.

BTW - I'm on Stormrage as Elothyn playing a Tempest of Set. Come gank me some time! BTW - ToS is possibly THE coolest healing class of all time! Considerable AoE damage + HoTs = the sh*t! I'm so loving the gameplay!

[Vyndree]

Suvega picked up two copies on Friday, and we spent the weekend leveling his assassin and my bear shaman.

These are my initial thoughts...

The Good
- The game does hybrid classes justice (i.e. heals+dps) -- the bear shaman class is one of the most enjoyable hybrids I've played. I really enjoy hybrid classes but hate having only one "workable" role in the endgame. Bear shamans are forced to melee in order to effectively heal, which I think is a great class mechanic.
- Quests are interesting -- while there are some collection quests they pretty much drop for everyone in the party. The quest icons on the maps is also a great touch.
- Combat system is somewhat difficult to pick up, but I like it that way. Too many games are "too easy" -- I love the combo system. However, I have to admit that not allowing you to 'queue up' your next swing properly and being quite finicky about the timing of your combo swings can be annoying - particularly in PvP
- Gathering professions can be learned by all - 1 crafting profession per character. This ensures an adequate supply of mats -- or just go collect them yourself.

The Bad
- UI definitely needs work. Sucks majorly, non-intuitive. I couldn't even FIND my spells until I was level 15 -- all I could see were my combos and I spent much time wiping due to not having many heals.
- Many quests/zones are bugged. Suvega has fallen through the world on more than 1 occasion. Several quests are unable to complete because of bugs. Suvega's character has bugged out and not been able to attack things for some time.
- Trade/auctionhouse is disabled due to bugs.
- Grouping UI sucks, as does the broken /follow and other various tidbits like "summon to instance" being bugged. You can't see what instance you're in. Party healthbars are teeny tiny in the corner of your screen. Party minimap dots are gray colored and hard to identify.
- Resources: the forums are either queued FOREVER or just bugged. They won't let me in. The few wiki's and non-official forums I found have little to no information. With the number of bugs, it would be nice to know of a "known issues" list so you can avoid the buggy areas. Skills (feats) and ability tooltips are vague, so it's hard to make correct decisions on what you should be using. The /petition report feature has a queue that spans for miles and is very hard to figure out how to use.
- Speaking of resources... The [OOC] chat is filled with what's worse than 14 year old barrens chatters -- they are now 18 year old foul mouthed college fratboys who relish in the fact that they can get away with telling you to suck their **** when you're asking for help. When they're not swearing, they're bragging about their graphics cards and having heated WoW vs AoC discussions.
- The level 35-40 zones are nonexistant. We talked to a couple level 80's and were told just to grind it out. We looked up a progression map online and found NO zones tailored for 35-40. While levels 1-35 are FULL of quests and quests and quests, you are literally dumped in the middle of nowhere with nothing to do at level 35.



As for "tits and wenches" -- there are boobs. And lots of them. IMO, the feel I get from the shirtless boob appearances is that it was thrown in as a "added bonus" to the horny male gamer crowd, and as an afterthought they tried to make sure that it was ALMOST tastefully done to appease the significant others and/or female gamers. I get a laugh out of it at the very least -- one of my quests for my female character was to sleep with a drunk (wasn't shown -- just a fade to black) and the dialogue between them afterwards was humorous. The character models can be tweaked to have a bigger/smaller bust size but even at the smallest size your character will end up looking like breast implant barbie.

Your character loses nothing nor gains anything stat-wise from being female -- for the lore, male NPCs will flirt with females (sometimes female NPCs too) and female NPCs will flirt with males. There's some random flashing of breasts in some quests, but in places where it would logically be due to lore (i.e. naked girls flee'ing from a harem, etc). You'll wonder why some of the NPCs don't topple over due to the weight of the two ginormous basketballs adhered to their chest, but if you have a sense of humor you'll realize the only reason why they're put there is to reel in the lonely male gamer crowd -- as a girl, get a good laugh at how obvious it is and, if it works, how pathetic the poor lonely male gamers are. I'm not poking fun at any of the guys here -- as long as you didn't buy the game specifically for digi-boobs. ;)



All in all, my impression is that is a VERY buggy game with big issues and could've used a much longer "polishing" phase. As a software tester myself, I'm abhorred at the vast number of in-game issues. If these issues were resolved or are resolved in a timely manner, then my opinion will improve. As of now, it's a intriguing combat system thrown into a rushed-to-production game that hasn't been tested properly. I may or may not stick with it (along with WoW) depending on how well they execute their fixes.

I realize WoW wasn't perfect at first release either, but it's the AMOUNT of bugs in the FIRST NEWBIE ZONE ALONE that astonished me, and the bugs haven't tapered off since leaving that zone either. There's literally bugs EVERYWHERE.


Suvega and I are on Tyranny server -- named Suvega and Vyndree respectively.

[Lyonheart]

I am playing on the Zug server. I play a few hours a week with some friends. The game looks GREAT if your pc can handle it. It is buggy and that a shame! But it just might be a great game as it works out the bugs and adds more to the game. I'm not leaving WoW. I am more excited about WotLK tha any new MMO or expansion ever. I like the additions they are doing to PvP/Mounts. And the fact that every raid zone will have a 10 man option is good. I'm hoping at least a few of those will have some boos encounters that are MB friendly. But thats another topic. AoC=7 out of 10 for me.

[bodefeld]

I've started playing AoC the day it was released in europe. My experience is somewhat different from Vyndree's. My guardian is now level 34 and so far I have not encountered any serious bugs. It was a pleasant gameplay altogether. True, the interface and GUI need improvement, but today's patch has already made it better. Surely, once interface addons are out, customization will be possible too. I never got stuck, the game never crashed, and out of the 50ish quests I did so far only one did not work (due to a non-existant questmob).

As for the game mechanics, AoC is different. When I bring to my mind that I have been conditioned to WoW over a period of almost 3 years, it becomes understandable that the first 10 levels or so demand an unusual amount of thinking. Besides my guardian (the def tank in a way), I have played together with a mitrapriest and from what he told me, he does not have to melee to play. No combos for essential healing etc. either. It should be mentioned that no class is restricted to healing or dealing or tanking alone, really. I.e. the priest needs to deal damage in order to heal better. And they deal quite well. Healing appears to be non-targeted, sort of like a cone of cold or area of effect type of spell. At least from what I have learned so far. I have played solo most of the time and most of that was in defstance and using a tactical buff called "enduring defense maneuver". It is still quick and a lot of fun.

With today's patch I noticed a couple of little buttons that appear when in a group. One of those reads "follow" and one reads "assist" when mouse-hovering over them. I will look into that in a while. I have no information whether macros are or will be possible.

I'm excited and optimistic about how the game will develop.

Regards,
George

[Vyndree]

My guardian is now level 34 and so far I have not encountered any serious bugs.

Try the Pyramid quests and let me know how it goes and if they fixed that over the patch. I was only able to do the one to free some girl's sister and find a guy's brother (or at least parts of him). The main quest (I believe it is part of your Destiny questline) was unable to complete the "Enter the Pyramid" objective. Also, do not kill the minibosses before you reach the statue on the 3rd floor -- killing the minibosses beforehand (you can literally just walk through the doors -- there is no collision) will cause you to have to leave the instance and reset because the last boss's door won't open either and if you just walk throught he wall and kill him he will get stuck in a death that lasts 9-10 death animations/sounds and no lewts. Humorous, though.

Do not try to climb things in the Sanctum of Burning Souls -- the wall behind the climbing area has no collision and this is where Suvega fell through the world multiple times.

Those are the majority of show-stopping bugs I've found around your level. The rest are all cosmetic -- disappearing hair, getting stuck on invisible walls, staring at a questgiver's crotch when he's talking to you, quest NPCs sliding across the floor without animation, glitchy graphic colors intermittently... they don't actually prevent you from being able to complete objectives.

I found this map to be helpful:
http://img242.imageshack.us/img242/790/hyboriawestpx8.jpg
Let me know if you find any good questing areas for 35-40. ;)

[kllrwlf]

Holy-mother-of-cluster-F*cks!

My thoughts exactly Batman!

[bodefeld]

I does have an ingame map which is actually quite good. For example, there is an X on the map if you have a quest to do there, and merchants, travel hubs, and such are also indicated by symbols. However, each zone is instanced. That means you talk to an NPC to take you to another zone (waggoner, ferryman, etc.), involving a loading screen like in WoW instances. (WoW instances are called "dungeons" in AoC)
The map above is quite helpful. It shows how the zones and dungeons are connected and can be reached travel-wise.

[Ellay]

Anyone tried the caster type classes? I would assume these would be the easiest for multiboxing at least to start out with :)

[Kopitar]

2 Tempest of Set - 1 stackable hot, plus 2 other HoT's and some nice aoe Lightning spells and stuff goes down quickly...only 16 at the moment but they are a lot better than my two necor's

[Allokra]

- Resources: the forums are either queued FOREVER or just bugged. They won't let me in.





You mean that you can't log into the official forums? Not sure if that is the problem but at first I couldn't log into the forum either until I realized that you don't log in with your account information. I had to go to My Account and make a separate usename and PW for the forums.

[Nisch]

I absolutely love it. I am not a WoW fanboi, as I played it for about a year and it just didn't keep my interest, but I did move from DAOC over to AoC and I think it's a great game. Yes there are some bugs, like the Pyramid quests as stated before, but overall I really like it. I have a Dark Templar up to 41 so far and have been trying some alts out. The game encourages quests rather than grinding which is nice.

The wife and I are playing it until all hours of the night, and despite the rocky launch, it's a great game in both of our opinions.

[Marathon]

I bought the game today because I figure I will at least give it a try. I have not installed it and probably will not for a couple of weeks or untill one day when i get really bored. I am hoping that in the next few weeks or even month that they will work out most of the bugs and it will be a decent game to play.

[Mosg2]

@Ellay on the caster issue

I've played 5 toons to ~25 or so now and I'm pretty sure that Tempest of Set is going to be the best multi-box class in the game. The other casters are all fairly squishy with no heals... but ToS get three heals--Two are PBAE group only HoT's with 1.3 second and 0.3 second cast times respectively, and one is a 60 second cooldown 1.5 second cast heal that restores approximately 75-100% of your AND all nearby party member's HP's. Their base DD spell will also damage anyone near the target for full damage and they have the best PBAE spells in the game. They wear mid-grade armor (equivalent to Mail in WoW) and can use shields.

In my estimation, ToS would be a power-house multiboxed. As it stands now, one of them can solo AE a group of 4-8 mobs that are up to 6 levels above the PC without losing almost any mana or HP. There are actually *multiple* different specs and ways to accomplish this--One of the best is actually based around you casting an insta cast heal that will also AE anything next to you--And you get the mana back. I refer you to the youtube link at the bottom of my post for specifics (Settar, the guy in the video, also has a ton of other ToS videos detailing how to AE). Let us not forget that in AoC, you get virtually the same xp per kill in a full group as you do solo... And you get bonus xp the more even or higher level mobs you kill in a row. Some of Settar's videos show him getting 8-10 mob chain kills... Those kills towards the end are rewarding almost double xp.

If I had a multi-computer setup I would be multiboxing this in a heartbeat. /follow works in a group and with the autotarget feature turned on and/or just using PBAE you never need to assist. I think that the biggest hurdle to this is going to be the sheer level of hardware you need to run this game. If that can be overcame... Man I can't imagine the QQ at a 6 ToS PBAE group running around raping. Bwuahahha!

http://youtube.com/watch?v=TVKqX-BRml0

[Vyndree]

- Resources: the forums are either queued FOREVER or just bugged. They won't let me in.





You mean that you can't log into the official forums? Not sure if that is the problem but at first I couldn't log into the forum either until I realized that you don't log in with your account information. I had to go to My Account and make a separate usename and PW for the forums.

No, I meant that I followed the instructions on the website and logged into account admin, created a forum username/pass, attempted to log in a half hour later (as specified)... then 2 hours later.... then 24 hours later... then 3-4 days later... Nothing.

Also, while a few of the issues I've mentioned were fixed in the recent patch (i.e. SOME trader/auctionhouse works, the gray dot party icons are now blue people-looking icons), they've added a bunch of new ones -- the Cotton resources are completely bugged and you can't gather any cotton, for example. It does show that they are listening to feedback, particularly about the party icons, but I am losing alot of confidence in their testing strategy. Hotfixes still require testing.

Software testers are the gatekeepers -- their job is not necessarily to FIND bugs (though that is an inevitable end result), but to ensure that the product is of adequate quality for the customer. They are the gatekeepers, they hold all the keys -- if they say a product isn't good enough for the customer, then it is not good enough. Test measures quality -- so either their testers aren't doing their jobs or they are being ignored.

[elo]

I hit 38 last night and it's still hella fun but yeah, far from finished. My take is that they spent 4 years developing, ran low on cash, and were also trying to hit the market at the right time (before WotLK and Warhammer). So, a buggy release gives them the cashflow to finish it out as well as get it into people's hands before the competition. Was it the 'right' thing to do? All engineer's worth a sh*t will say no, most business people would say yes. It is a gamble though, can they fix enough stuff fast enough now to prevent a significant number of people from getting fed up and /quit.

When I cancelled my WoW accounts I did so with the full intention of renewing once WotLK came out, but after playing this I'm really not so sure. Just the thought of the rep grind, instance grind, raid grind, PvP grind, etc... really not interested anymore. Does that mean I'll be playing AoC for years? Iono, the end game will tell, as well as how quickly and effectively they finish out what we've already got. If the end game raids are anything like WoW's, then I'm done, done, DONE. If they take as long as Blizz does to introduce new (non raid) content after 80% of the server is max level, then I'm done. If all this means that I just have to swap MMO's every year (because that's pretty much the only genre I enjoy playing regularly) then that's what I'll do.

Anyway, sorry to get off on a tangent there.

[kllrwlf]

I also used to be a lead software tester for PC games in the mid 90s.

We would test the games, give the engineers a 100+ pages report with all of our findings. They would fix 60% and give us the next version to test. Meanwhile, someone in marketing goes around screaming, "This needs to ship NEXT WEEK !!!". Someone upstairs yells downstairs to get it done. Next week, it ships... with a boat-full of bugs. Then a patch is released a couple of weeks later. Then another patch... and maybe another one.

Memories...

[MrLonghair]

Still looks a bit better off than Anarchy Online did at the start.

http://kotaku.com/5012048/conan-gm-to-goons-you-pvp-nice-now-

Maybe not. They follow the rules of the pvp server and get GMs bending over to complainers, so watch out, those who plan to *box AoC.

[Nisch]

WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII T



/follow works now?

You mean I have 5 computers here collecting dust for no reason?

[Kopitar]

WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII T



/follow works now?

You mean I have 5 computers here collecting dust for no reason?

Yeah it works, but it breaks so often it is starting to drive me towards *gasp* playing only 1 character....I can deal with deaths/new instance breaking follow, but it's breaking with the character just running behind you, continually jumping is a way around it but on a pvp server i'd rather not stick out any more than i have to at lower levels.

/Yeah It works
//But it breaks a lot

[kllrwlf]

I think updates like these will help AoC convert more people over. :thumbsup:
I haven't bought it yet... but with news like this, I'm getting pushed over the fence very soon.

http://community.ageofconan.com/wsp/conan/frontend.cgi?func=publish.show&template=content&func_id=2510&table=CONTENT


The following information from Game Director Gaute Godager is about the plans for the near future.

Fellow Hyborians!

As you may have noticed we have had frequent patches the last two weeks. We hope this will soon start to quiet down, but as long as there are major issues – and there have been – we will dedicate the Conan team to fixing them and giving you these fixes as soon as possible! We have a plan on how to move this game forward because as you know, what you have today is but the platform – the dawn of this world. I hope you enjoy the game as is, but I can ensure you, this is but the beginning!

Our focus from now on can be summarized by these points:

1. We will add content, specifically in mid-late thirties and mid-late fifties and make the leveling speed smoother in those areas, reducing the need to grind.
2. We will have an overhaul of the PvP system – adding consequence and a host of small things.
3. We are fixing bugs you reported through all channels we can get information from.
4. We will add a new large outdoor region in the 55-60 range this summer!
5. This is only a small taster! More information about the exciting summer and fall Roadmap will come the end of the next week!
6. We are staffing up Customer Service, Quality Assurance and Community departments!

[Eteocles]

If you do play...don't roll a Dark Templar. They fuckin suck. Their skills may even be broken(getting +1hp per hit from Leech Life when you're getting hit by 4 mobs for 30-50+ each every second doesn't quite work too well) and they're too dependant on combos for pvp with how much everyone moves...I rerolled a Herald of Xotli and it's fuckin awesome, I'm mowing things down left and right and even have a self-transformation spell that looks like friggin cthulu lol

[elo]

That's freaking awesome Killr, thx for the post!

Someone earlier mentioned this heavily instanced bit and I thought I'd elaborate.

Yes, everything is instanced, there is no global zone where you'll find everyone all at once. My first reaction to this was 'wretched' and 'horrible'. After a couple hours of play though I love it. The thing is almost all instances, save for your personal destiny quests, are multiplayer instanced. So what this effectively does is reduce the number of people down to a manageable level.

Does the world feel lonely? Never. At least on Stormrage there always seems to be just the right number of people around. Also keep in mind that if you've got a batch of mobs to kill it's common practice in FFA PvP to kill whoever's in the way of you killing your mobs. So, if there were no instances you'd easily have 20-30 people in an all out war over who gets to kill the actual mobs. With the instancing it's down to 6-8 and if you're getting too much grief you can just switch instances and find more favorable terms. If there was only one instance and a level 80 (I'm 43) decided it was theirs.... well you'd have to wait for buddies and start an inter-guild conflict in order to complete a friggin quest.

Lastly OOC, guild chat, and /tell's cross all instances so it never stands in the way of hanging with the people you want to. You can switch instances on the fly and join up with your buddies in a heartbeat, although it took a little time for some people to figure out how to do that.

Some people though still insist that they will except nothing other than lag-forge and are truly convinced that a 200 person free-for-all fight is fun... well, keep looking and good luck with that.

[Nisch]

If you do play...don't roll a Dark Templar. They fuckin suck. Their skills may even be broken(getting +1hp per hit from Leech Life when you're getting hit by 4 mobs for 30-50+ each every second doesn't quite work too well) and they're too dependant on combos for pvp with how much everyone moves...I rerolled a Herald of Xotli and it's fuckin awesome, I'm mowing things down left and right and even have a self-transformation spell that looks like friggin cthulu lol DT's start off rough, but come into their own from 30-40.

[Nisch]

That's freaking awesome Killr, thx for the post!

Someone earlier mentioned this heavily instanced bit and I thought I'd elaborate.

Yes, everything is instanced, there is no global zone where you'll find everyone all at once. My first reaction to this was 'wretched' and 'horrible'. After a couple hours of play though I love it. The thing is almost all instances, save for your personal destiny quests, are multiplayer instanced. So what this effectively does is reduce the number of people down to a manageable level.

Does the world feel lonely? Never. At least on Stormrage there always seems to be just the right number of people around. Also keep in mind that if you've got a batch of mobs to kill it's common practice in FFA PvP to kill whoever's in the way of you killing your mobs. So, if there were no instances you'd easily have 20-30 people in an all out war over who gets to kill the actual mobs. With the instancing it's down to 6-8 and if you're getting too much grief you can just switch instances and find more favorable terms. If there was only one instance and a level 80 (I'm 43) decided it was theirs.... well you'd have to wait for buddies and start an inter-guild conflict in order to complete a friggin quest.

Lastly OOC, guild chat, and /tell's cross all instances so it never stands in the way of hanging with the people you want to. You can switch instances on the fly and join up with your buddies in a heartbeat, although it took a little time for some people to figure out how to do that.

Some people though still insist that they will except nothing other than lag-forge and are truly convinced that a 200 person free-for-all fight is fun... well, keep looking and good luck with that.they changed the instance situation. You can no longer change instances on the fly. You have to go to a rez pad and then you can change instances. If you die, you have to wait a while and go to another rez spot in order to change instances. It's kind of stupid now, but doable.

[kllrwlf]

I was seriously looking into the Dark Templars... hmmm...

Now, when you guys say that everything is instances... do you mean like the way City of Heroes is?

[Kopitar]

You would not be able to move if the game where not instanced as there is collision detection in the game

\(Seen a bunch of idiots attempt to block entrances with their mounts, many noobs just stood there trying to jump through and could not)

[Nisch]

You would not be able to move if the game where not instanced as there is collision detection in the game

\(Seen a bunch of idiots attempt to block entrances with their mounts, many noobs just stood there trying to jump through and could not)

Yeah, it's funny how they don't realize they just need to hide and they can walk right through them.

Other than the instance switching issue now, I don't see it as a bad thing at all.

[Goodguy]

I want some screenies from this game, gife ! :)

[daddyd302]

From what I've been reading about it, it's like a beefed up GW.

[Nisch]

I want some screenies from this game, gife ! :)I just got my 3rd 22" setup and running 5040 x 1050. I'll try to get some screenshots tonight.

[L33tBoxer]

I'll be hittin AoC at least until WAR comes out. RvR is more my style than AoC PvP. FFA PvP just doesn't make sense in an MMO.. no it doesn't emulate real life more.. it doesn't even emulate the fun you can have in a FPS honestly.

But anyway my bets are with FC at the moment and I'm thinking they'll take an ok slice of WoW's market if they get some bugs worked out. And it's nice to finally get an MMO that comes complete with nipples.

[Darthane]

Been playing a bit, got some info here for those hungry for it....


Lafe's Leveling Guide/Zone List

Here is a list of zones in Age of Conan, the zones recommended level range and the zone path to get to each of the zones.

If you were looking for a general 'where do I go at Level X', this is it.

If you were looking for a guide on Powerleveling/Fast XP etc this is it here - "Kill Stuff, Fast, and lots of it".

Enjoy!

* - 'Normal' Dungeon
** - 'Group' Dungeon
*** - 'Raid' Dungeon

Pre L20

Tortage L1-20

White Sands Isle* L1-20

Underhalls* L1-20

Acharonian Ruins* L1-20

Hubs

Old Tarantia
Conarch Village
Khemi

L20+

Wild Lands of Zelata L20-38
(From Old Tarantia -> Wild Lands of Zelata)

Khopshef Province L20-36
(From Old Tarantia -> Khemi -> Khopshef Province)

The Maze* L25+
(From Old Tarantia -> Wild Lands of Zelata -> The Maze)

Border Ranges* L29+
(From Old Tarantia -> Wild Lands of Zelata -> Border Ranges)

Conall's Valley L20-32
(From Old Tarantia -> Conarch Village -> Conall's Valley)

Spider Caves* L25+
(From Old Tarantia -> Conarch Village -> Conall's Valley -> Spider Caves)

L30+

Overflow Tunnels (Tarantia Sewers)* L30+
(From Old Tarantia -> Tarantia Sewers)

Blessed Cave* L30+
(From Old Tarantia -> Khemi -> Khopshef Province -> Blessed Cave)

Black Castle* L30-38
(From Old Tarantia -> Khemi -> Khopshef Province -> Black Castle)

Sanctum of Burning Souls** L35-42
(From Old Tarantia -> Wild Lands of Zelata -> Sanctum of Burning Souls)

L40+

Sewer Catacombs L40-66
(From Old Tarantia -> Tarantia Noble District -> Sewer Catacombs)
This includes Cistern, The Main System, etc.

Armsman Tavern / Arena L40+
(From Old Tarantia -> Tarantia Noble District -> Armsman Tavern / Arena)

Field of the Dead L40-50
(From Old Tarantia -> Conarch Village -> Conall's Valley -> Field of the Dead)

Frost Swamp** L40+
(From Old Tarantia -> Conarch Village -> Conall's Valley -> Field of the Dead -> Lacheish Plains -> Frost Swamp)
***Quest in Brannoc Village***

Imirian Ravine** L40+
(From Old Tarantia -> Wild Lands of Zelata -> Poitain -> Imirian Ravine)
***Quest in Caenna Village***

Oasis of Zaara** L40+
(From Old Tarantia -> Khemi -> Khopshef Province -> Purple Lotus Swamps -> Zaara Oasis)
***Quest in Nasten Village***

Tarantia Noble District L40+
(From Old Tarantia -> Tarantia Noble District)


L50+

Eiglophian Mountains L50-60
(From Old Tarantia -> Conarch Village -> Conall's Valley -> Eiglophian Mountains)
(From Old Tarantia -> Conarch Village -> Conall's Valley -> Field of the Dead -> Lacheish Plains -> Eiglophian Mountains)

Ice Cave L50-52
(From Old Tarantia -> Conarch Village -> Conall's Valley -> Eiglophian Mountains -> Ice Cave)

Cannibal Caves* L55+
(From Old Tarantia -> Conarch Village -> Conall's Valley -> Eiglophian Mountains -> Cannibal Caves)


L60+

Atzel's Approach L60-75
(From Old Tarantia -> Conarch Village -> Conall's Valley -> Field of the Dead -> Atzel's Approach)

Thunder River/Os Harku L60-70
(From Old Tarantia -> Thunder River/Os Harku)

Acheronian Cave* L60+
(From Old Tarantia -> Thunder River/Os Harku -> Acheronian Cave)

L70+

Kheshatta L70-80
(From Old Tarantia -> Khopshef Province -> Kheshatta)

Ice Ruins** L70+
(From Old Tarantia -> Conarch Village -> Conall's Valley -> Field of the Dead -> Atzel's Approach -> Ice Ruins)

Scorpion Cave** L70+
(From Old Tarantia -> Khopshef Province -> Kheshatta -> Scorpion Cave)

Atzel's Fortress** L75+
(From Old Tarantia -> Conarch Village -> Conall's Valley -> Field of the Dead -> Atzel's Approach -> Atzel's Fortress)

Thoth Amon's Stronghold** L75+
(From Old Tarantia -> Khopshef Province -> Kheshatta -> Thoth Amon's Stronghold)

Caravan Raider's Hideout** L75+
(From Old Tarantia -> Khopshef Province -> Kheshatta -> Caravan Raider's Hideout)

Onyx Chanmbers** L76+
(From Old Tarantia -> Khopshef Province -> Kheshatta -> Onyx Chanmbers)

Chief Kykikkis Crypt** L75?-80
(From Old Tarantia -> Conarch Village -> Conall's Valley -> Field of the Dead -> Chief Kykikkis Crypt)

Chief Toirdealsbachs Tomb** L75?-80
(From Old Tarantia -> Conarch Village -> Conall's Valley -> Field of the Dead -> Chief Toirdealsbachs Tomb)

L80 (non-raid)

Onyx Chanmbers** L80
(From Old Tarantia -> Khopshef Province -> Kheshatta -> Onyx Chanmbers -> Soul Chambers)

Yakhmar's Cave** L80
(From Old Tarantia -> Conarch Village -> Conall's Valley -> Eiglophian Mountains -> Yakhmar's Cave)


L80 (RAID)

Black Ring Citadel*** L80
(From Old Tarantia -> Khopshef Province -> Kheshatta -> Black Ring Citadel)

Vistix's Lair*** L80
(From Old Tarantia -> Conarch Village -> Conall's Valley -> Field of the Dead -> Atzel's Approach -> Vistix's Lair)

Resource and Building

Note: These 3 zones will spawn mobs which will immediatly attack you. These mobs will be of a level close to your own.

Lacheish Plains L20+
(From Old Tarantia -> Conarch Village -> Conall's Valley -> Field of the Dead -> Lacheish Plains)

Poitain L20+
(From Old Tarantia -> Wild Lands of Zelata -> Poitain)

Purple Lotus Swamps L20+
(From Old Tarantia -> Khemi -> Khopshef Province -> Purple Lotus Swamps)

http://forums-us.ageofconan.com/showthread.php?t=43076


And about /follow...


The follow command works, but I doubt that it's working as intended.

To get the follow command to work, do the following:

1. Ensure that you are in the same instance as the person you wish to follow

If you are not in the same instance as the person whom you'd like to follow, you need to go to that instance, DISBAND your GROUP, then REGROUP. If you go to an instance and you're already grouped, /follow will NOT work. It's imperative that you regroup in order to make it work

2. If you cross zones (read: if you see a loading screen), you will need to disband your group and regroup before you can follow.

3. Follow does not have a successful message; you just start following.

4. If you die, you will most likely need to regroup, and repeat step 1.

5. If all of your party members die, you won't have to regroup in order to follow.

Misc:

You may need to click on the person that you want to follow and then type /follow.

/follow <person name> doesn't always work.

Now the real stuff, you can't run 2 clients on one pc well, they corrupt each other graphics a bit, and the 2 seperate installs required overlap each others settings in the registry, so multi boxing is about the only hope.



Tschoo, 58 ToS, Gwahlur

ps, just one thing, the connects between some of the zones listed are wrong and have changed since beta (when this was drawn up)

[Occam's Razor]

Unless of course, they release a KOTOR MMO that doesn't suck it up like SWG is now thanks to SOE.I'd LOVE to see a Jade Empire MMO 8o

[glo]

If anyone wants to try it out without purchasing the game there is no official trial version but you can download and play it for a couple days by signing up as "pay by cash".

https://register.ageofconan.com/signup/ctrl/register/conan

[kllrwlf]

If anyone wants to try it out without purchasing the game there is no official trial version but you can download and play it for a couple days by signing up as "pay by cash".

https://register.ageofconan.com/signup/ctrl/register/conan

Anyone try this? 15 gig download...

[merujo]

i bought AoC, got it in its EU release, leveled until 30 and... i couldnt continue or else my brain would fry. I know its getting fixed, things are going to be better, etc, but overall, it's wasnt doable to continue, because each night i would have an headache due to so many bugs around.
it was like they gave all the beta to ppl that never played a mmo, and the past 5 years were spent on graphics. i continue to say to my friends, they should had copied more from wow, not only the talent names.

[Nisch]

i bought AoC, got it in its EU release, leveled until 30 and... i couldnt continue or else my brain would fry. I know its getting fixed, things are going to be better, etc, but overall, it's wasnt doable to continue, because each night i would have an headache due to so many bugs around.
it was like they gave all the beta to ppl that never played a mmo, and the past 5 years were spent on graphics. i continue to say to my friends, they should had copied more from wow, not only the talent names.

No.....they shouldn't copy anything from WoW. Not everyone likes WoW.

I think the game's great. WoW was a piece of crap IMO. I'm glad they didn't copy WoW.

[kllrwlf]

If/when I stop playing WoW and want to play another MMO, it'll be for a game that's not like WoW... otherwise, I would just play WoW.

[JD50]

I just cancelled my account. It was a fun game, but I just can't get used to playing in a non seamless world. It just kills it for me that I can't look at the map and walk from zone to zone and just go exploring.

[merujo]

im not saying to copy wow, like, feel like it, or gameplay, or wtv.
all im saying is that, if this was their (funcom) idea of a blast game, they should had look'd into other mmo's, and if wow is a piece of crap, i wont classify many others mmo's out there.
aoc was a 5y development game, that many ppl are leaving already because...graphics aint everything. i played the game for several hours, and somethings are just impossible to come out on retail like that.
Yes, it has potential. No, i wont pay to beta test a game.

[Nisch]

MMO releases always had problems.

I remember how crazy it was trying to login to WoW when it was released.

People that leave already expect too much, in my opinion. A few buggy quests, graphics glitches, item problems, etc. are not enough to scare me away from the game that has great graphics...content is great. You have a story to follow, the active combat system, etc. There are many good points of this game and I personally plan to stick it out.

[elo]

LoL Mr. 'I Won't Play to Beta Test a Game'! What a big man! Tell em like it is!

or... w/e

There is no perfect software starting with your operating system ( 'I won't pay Bill Gates to beta test his software' - rofl).

If you're so high and mighty above it all why are you playing PC games at all? The issues go with the territory. Oh wait, they're trickling into consoles too because they're really just mini computers.

[Vyndree]

LoL Mr. 'I Won't Play to Beta Test a Game'! What a big man! Tell em like it is!

or... w/e

There is no perfect software starting with your operating system ( 'I won't pay Bill Gates to beta test his software' - rofl).

If you're so high and mighty above it all why are you playing PC games at all? The issues go with the territory. Oh wait, they're trickling into consoles too because they're really just mini computers.

There is no need to get huffy over someone else's opinion. Honestly, if anyone doesn't like the quality of a product -- ANY product, including Windows -- they should put their money where their mouth is. Which is exactly what some people are doing.

The fact that the "issues go witht he territory" is the consumer talking -- at what level of quality can people push out a product such that the consumers will buy it -- and continue to buy it. For some people the bar is different, and that's your right as a consumer. Some people value potential over intial content, and some are the other way around. Some would consider a game with perfect flawless graphics and combat system of beta-quality if the questing, trading, or crafting system is flawed. That's their opinion and they have a right to it. Clearly funcom considers it release quality, and since it's their product they can release it in whatever state they feel is acceptable. The consumers who don't find it acceptable can choose not to play. That's all that's happening.

Nobody here is trying to be the "high and mighty" person here, but the thread is asking for opinions and so people are giving them -- and peoples opinions are bound to differ. I didn't find anything wrong with merujo's post or his "tone". Let's play nice people -- the thread is about your opinion of the game, and people shouldn't be afraid to give their honest opinion.

Suvega honestly enjoys playing AoC so much that he only hops on WoW to raid. I, on the other hand, quickly got bored and while I loved the combat system and the way they made their healer hybrids -- I couldn't stand being blocked from the destiny quest storyline or having to tiptoe around the "if you respec you lose all gathering professions" sort of bugs. Two different people, two different opinions -- we can still play nice and live in the same house. So let's not start throwing insults at each other over an OPINION on a game.

[elo]

Yeah, sorry. I've just been reading the AoC forums too much and there's a LOT of attitude on there right now. I never really got into the WoW forums for the same reason. I just get huffy because there's been nothing that's remotely interested me in the MMO space since WoW came out and now that there is a game I'm enjoying there's all these people trying to tear it down. Sure, as long as FC is making money they'll keep at it regardless of forum trolls, it's just frustrating.

And my point on Windows wasn't really that it's a piece of junk (I've been quite happy with Windows since Win2k), was just drawing the analogy as far as companies delivering a 'finished' product. [edit] Oh, and Linux has much greater issues. It's just all in what you want to do and personal preference.

[Kopitar]

Compared to Vanguard, the release of AoC is almost perfect...

[Vyndree]

Yeah, sorry. I've just been reading the AoC forums too much and there's a LOT of attitude on there right now. I never really got into the WoW forums for the same reason. I just get huffy because there's been nothing that's remotely interested me in the MMO space since WoW came out and now that there is a game I'm enjoying there's all these people trying to tear it down. Sure, as long as FC is making money they'll keep at it regardless of forum trolls, it's just frustrating.

Believe me, I understand getting frustrated from all the garbage on the official forums for various games. ;)

As is such with the opinions of people, they are always unique. I just want to make sure the thread stays civil so that everyone can manage to share their opinions without stepping on too many peoples' toes. As always, people are more likely to complain -- so you'll tend to hear that the loudest. The people who are happily playing the game (hint hint, nudge nudge, Suvega) are probably too busy playing the game that they have no spare time to post about it on a forum. ;)


And my point on Windows wasn't really that it's a piece of junk (I've been quite happy with Windows since Win2k), was just drawing the analogy as far as companies delivering a 'finished' product. [edit] Oh, and Linux has much greater issues. It's just all in what you want to do and personal preference.

I wasn't taking offense... I may work for MS, but I don't work on Windows. ;) I was just drawing the same analogy... In essence, Windows has to meet a certain quality bar in order to get the number of sales it's looking for -- if consumers are unhappy with a product they will say so with their dollars. An unhappy customer will leave. Different types of software have different requirements for stability, security, and content -- but in the end it's the consumer they're trying to please. :) So as long as they're pleasing the number of consumers needed to get the profit they want, they'll continue making and supporting products.

[Mosg2]

I've been able to setup two AoC instances running on the same computer with HKN and maintain ~50fps without getting any errors or graphical tearing. Yeah, having to reform to follow sucks, but... The healer classes are all hybrids so you just cast your two HoT's and go to town. I love it.

[merujo]

LoL Mr. 'I Won't Play to Beta Test a Game'! What a big man! Tell em like it is!


Elo, im sorry if u got me wrong. It's not, i wont play, but i wont pay to beta test a game.
Nah, im not here to bash the game or whatever, since it was a "give ur opinion" thread, i just gave my 2cents.
I trully believe u enjoy the game, i also enjoyed it a bit, and like i said, it has potential, lots of it. To show u how i was waiting for it, i was the first to get a copy in my town :P and it was a CE :) Perhaps the hype was too much around the game, but im not the one to blame, thing is, it didnt came out perfect, like i was expecting, but truth is i didnt expected so many flaws at the beggining (lvl20 onwards)
I even pulled my hair like a mad man when i couldnt reach a npc or basic bugs :D but nah, i decided to give up, after reporting bugs and try to do some petitions, because unlike some wow haters, i didnt played 30 minutes in northshire abbey, i played a lot of hours, and the release factor isnt enough to cover all the mess. 3 friends continued and gave up at 50+ because, basicaly, theres no more quests ? they returned to wow.

thank god not all ppl like wow! thank god ppl differ in opinions! thank god u like the game!
but im not really gonna continue playing it, because i just... dont have that geek look when i load AoC :)

Elo, hope u dont get me wrong again, and sorry for my sucky english, portugeezers are the suck :P

[Ðeceased]

I've been able to setup two AoC instances running on the same computer with HKN and maintain ~50fps without getting any errors or graphical tearing. Yeah, having to reform to follow sucks, but... The healer classes are all hybrids so you just cast your two HoT's and go to town. I love it.

hehe I was thinking about this :P I've been looking at some vids of say "Tempest of Set" and solo they already seem quite OP.. multiboxing multiple ones..
The WoW equivalent would be like having a 5 Paladins with the AoE damage of Hellfire that acctually heals you and other allies around you and regens mana..

I could see myself getting tiered of the game pretty quick if I Mboxed those :S

all i can say is the combat system looks like it could be interesting. Melee doesn't appeal to me that much but I do like the directional spells including healing. and the amount of AoE :)

Quick question.. how long was Alpha and Beta testing? or is it still in Beta? Because that is one thing that astounds me.. the sheer quantity of issues atm :S

[Nisch]

Yeah I plan on 6 ToS soon.......

[elo]

Yeah no worries Merujo, like I said just the forum trolls got me goin'

Ya know, yeah there's a LOT on the forums about all the issues, but I've made it to 47 and have experienced very few. I think I've fallen through the world twice and both were related to climbing. One instance i found has a bugged boss which is unfinishable, another has one that didn't fight back until last tuesday (but that was a fun bug!). There was one where you had to get 4 pieces of something (body parts FTW) and we had to reset for each piece, but it was quick and you got XP so meh. Yeah a couple of my feats (talents) don't work as advertised but I'm SO used to that.

Actually a lot of the things that I thought were bugs were just me not understanding. Like there was this one NPC showing up on map I couldn't get to and I was just absolutely convinced it was bugged, even dropped the quest. Later figured out it's a 'hidden' route to get to her.

Ah, I did recently discover the infinite trap bug, now THAT one is annoying.

Honestly the most frustrating part of me is getting ganked while playing my level 20, then logging on with my 47 and not being able to find the bastard that did it (multiple instances, etc.) but when looking at it objectively it's probably a good thing to help cut down on PvP anger.

[geoffdavison]

Like there was this one NPC showing up on map I couldn't get to and I was just absolutely convinced it was bugged, even dropped the quest. Later figured out it's a 'hidden' route to get to her.

God that was annoying... i was lucky to figure it out.. :-D

[merujo]

I think the worst of AoC when i played was the constant split of players on the same party, to other instances, and, the fact that u can only see them on the minimap on a very short range. Those can be fixed easily i think, but i got so annoyed man...i just gave up. Also the gathering professions and..meh...i dunno, it really didnt grabed much of my attention, only the graphics were outstanding. I think that in some months it will be better overall, but i'll stick to wow for now.

[Tdog]

I very rarely use most software or hardware upon initial release of it to the public. Because of this I have avoided man "buggy" headaches :) I just let most everyone else try it till I hear that it has calmed down and things are under control. Still not sure if I'm even going to buy AoC, Thus far the only game that's really caught my eye over WoW is Warhammer.

[Sabes]

Meh just hit 80. Going to re-roll cause nothing else is really going on for me. Friends have at least another month till cap. Sticking around till I at least get this city built. Not rerolling on this RP-PvP server though, boring to level might as well of been on a pve server :sleeping: there just was no pvp or at least not enough for me(as well as rp). Hitting up Tyranny or maybe Bane the culture pvp server. Hell anything thats just PvP actually

[Flight]

Played AoC a lot since release until a week ago. If you want to play solo and casual you wil (just about) get your moneys worth out of buying it.

They obviously based their whole launch strategy around making the game up to level 40 as smooth as possible. I enjoyed it a lot up until this level, rarely encountering any bugs. The experience from level 40 up is different and gradually gets worse. There is only one zone for each level range form then on. The end game is horribly broken.

Funcom have moved the majority of their devs onto the three other games they are developing, so the weekly patches are the worst ever for breaking more things than they fix.

The crafting system is ridiculously overpowered, making purple items redundant for everyone except tanks.

Class balance is non-existant. One of the healers (Tempest of Set) can do more damage and offer more party utility than the Mage class (Demonologist) as well as heal, rez and self rez.

[Wilbur]

If anyone wants to try it out without purchasing the game there is no official trial version but you can download and play it for a couple days by signing up as "pay by cash".

https://register.ageofconan.com/signup/ctrl/register/conan

Or in my case, a month.

[Bradster]

I tried this out, took 2 classes to the 20’s, on FFA PVP.

Here’s what I think.

Short Version: It’s ok.

Longer Version:
The combat system, although a completely different direction than any other game deserves kudos, but at least I myself struggled with it. Perhaps I’m just getting old. To run after something to try to use these abilities at the same time, I’m sure people do well at it, I don’t XD. I normally did pretty well if we stood still and fought but with WASD movement engraved in to my skull I just can’t adapt .

Balance between classes are, well. There working on it. Last time I played caster were raping and pillaging the villages.
The classes I wanted to play (Tanks) pretty underpowered. Tank does so little dps, that someone could pop a heal over time pot with a small tick that would out damage the tanks dps lol. Already takes a day in a half for him to kill someone, so they just run.
Speaking of which, in this game although better than any SOE again with people getting away scout free without care or worry on a PVP server, at least some classes have enough burst to actually have someone die in PVP in this game.

Sound and Graphics are pretty decent. I just say the amount of blood and gore in this game is pleasing! You haven’t really owned someone until you slice then up and chop off their head and watch blood squirt out of their neck.

The greifing here was pretty bad. There’s spawn points. Example, I was doing a quest on my Barb, a necro jumps me while I was fighting a mob. I managed to kill the necro but died to the mob 15 seconds later. We both went to the same spawn point, he had time to regen, I didn’t. So for the next 30mins any time I spawned he;d 2 shot me and scream “owned AGAIN bitch” over and over. I had to go afk and come back to continue. That’s just a simple example. My friend had a much worse experience then I did lol.
I must say the Island when you first start out 1-20 was really cool. In fact if the rest of the game was like it, I think I’d still be playing it. Once my friend and I left the island it went downhill real fast and became boring.

I spent a great deal of time chasing after people I jumped. I hate people that run on PVP servers. I hate even more game mechanics that allow people to escape more often than not, which this game does allow. It is however still possible to burst DPS someone down before they get away.

The other thing I didn’t care for is the FFA PVP, sounds fun on paper, seeing how I love PVP and all. But I realized there is a limit and that crossed it. It sucks leveling solo and everyone is red to you. One min you’ll be working on a quest next to each other, they see you have a bad pull and take advantage of it and such. Can take hours to kill a few mobs for a quest do to the amount of PVP. Get’s old after while, least it did for me.

I felt Faction PVP servers, like the ONE they have would be perfect. However they separate it in to 3 groups of people. My friend wanted to be this class, and I wanted to be that class. Already we would have had to be different races. Only a few classes are available per race so, it’s really confusing in PVP how exactly you attack other people while grouped with the same faction.

From 1 to 10 here’s what I rate.
Graphics: 7
Sound/Music: 8
PVE Style Game play: 6
PVP style of play: 3
Class balances: 2
Quest/Lore: 9

Don't see how anyone could box this game with all the combos and such you have to use. I'm sure there will be a few out there that could pull it off. I can't.

[Simulacra]

I remember the first time I played an mmorpg, it was wow. My friends had been hammering me to play for ages and I finally went out and bought it, this would be around January 05? not sure. I created my account, created a human warrior on Tichondrius and watched the opening animation and I was thinking "is this the game ive been waiting for since I played zork back in 82?" and then there I am standing in northshire and it hits me like a sledgehammer as I look around, yes. I move forward and it's fluid, looking around is so damn fluid, the graphics are great and the control so intuitive and I'm just dumbstruck as I come to terms with the fact that this is an immersive world where there are potentially thousands of other people wandering around and the shear cohesiveness of the world and my interaction with it amazes me.

I bought AoC and it just wasn't there for me, that xfactor was missing. The difference I think is that AoC is obviously a computer game and it just feels two dimensional, it's a bit clunky. wow on the other hand is like a window onto another reality and the seamlessness of my interaction with it just isn't there with aoc. Yes I am addicted and passionate about wow lol. A week after installing it I deleted every other game and haven't played anything else since because really: what is the point?

Where aoc falls down is in part due to the graphics, they've tried to do the photorealism thing and it doesn't work imo. Wow on the other hand shelved that idea and went down the toonistic path which works very well. It's about imagination, if you create a world where the framework is toonish and just use subtle pointers to support the myth (realistic water ripples, swaying grass etc) your imagination fills in the blanks. WIth a photorealistic approach there's little room for your imagination to take control and so the sense of immersiveness is lost, plus with a photrealistic approach is has to be absolutely perfect and indistinguishable from reality so that your imagination doesn't get in the way. Unrealistic photorealism jars my senses and constantly reminds me that this isn't real.

The aoc characters move in an unrealistic way which detracts from the immersiveness, I'm not saying that toons in wow move realisticly it's just that the movement is fairly organic and is another subtle pointer supporting the imagination and enabling you to suspend disbelief.

Just my opinion.

[Kopitar]

I tried this out, took 2 classes to the 20’s, on FFA PVP.

Here’s what I think.

Short Version: It’s ok.

Longer Version:
The combat system, although a completely different direction than any other game deserves kudos, but at least I myself struggled with it. Perhaps I’m just getting old. To run after something to try to use these abilities at the same time, I’m sure people do well at it, I don’t XD. I normally did pretty well if we stood still and fought but with WASD movement engraved in to my skull I just can’t adapt .

Balance between classes are, well. There working on it. Last time I played caster were raping and pillaging the villages.
The classes I wanted to play (Tanks) pretty underpowered. Tank does so little dps, that someone could pop a heal over time pot with a small tick that would out damage the tanks dps lol. Already takes a day in a half for him to kill someone, so they just run.
Speaking of which, in this game although better than any SOE again with people getting away scout free without care or worry on a PVP server, at least some classes have enough burst to actually have someone die in PVP in this game.

Sound and Graphics are pretty decent. I just say the amount of blood and gore in this game is pleasing! You haven’t really owned someone until you slice then up and chop off their head and watch blood squirt out of their neck.

The greifing here was pretty bad. There’s spawn points. Example, I was doing a quest on my Barb, a necro jumps me while I was fighting a mob. I managed to kill the necro but died to the mob 15 seconds later. We both went to the same spawn point, he had time to regen, I didn’t. So for the next 30mins any time I spawned he;d 2 shot me and scream “owned AGAIN bitch” over and over. I had to go afk and come back to continue. That’s just a simple example. My friend had a much worse experience then I did lol.
I must say the Island when you first start out 1-20 was really cool. In fact if the rest of the game was like it, I think I’d still be playing it. Once my friend and I left the island it went downhill real fast and became boring.

I spent a great deal of time chasing after people I jumped. I hate people that run on PVP servers. I hate even more game mechanics that allow people to escape more often than not, which this game does allow. It is however still possible to burst DPS someone down before they get away.

The other thing I didn’t care for is the FFA PVP, sounds fun on paper, seeing how I love PVP and all. But I realized there is a limit and that crossed it. It sucks leveling solo and everyone is red to you. One min you’ll be working on a quest next to each other, they see you have a bad pull and take advantage of it and such. Can take hours to kill a few mobs for a quest do to the amount of PVP. Get’s old after while, least it did for me.

I felt Faction PVP servers, like the ONE they have would be perfect. However they separate it in to 3 groups of people. My friend wanted to be this class, and I wanted to be that class. Already we would have had to be different races. Only a few classes are available per race so, it’s really confusing in PVP how exactly you attack other people while grouped with the same faction.

From 1 to 10 here’s what I rate.
Graphics: 7
Sound/Music: 8
PVE Style Game play: 6
PVP style of play: 3
Class balances: 2
Quest/Lore: 9

Don't see how anyone could box this game with all the combos and such you have to use. I'm sure there will be a few out there that could pull it off. I can't.

I've been multi-boxing it since release, i'm not a fast leveler , last patch really fixed a lot of issues with /follow, no need to re-form group now upon death/zoning. If you want to multi-box i'd suggest running some type of caster combo, currently my PoM and ToS combo works quite well, run in grab 4-5 mobs, Cleanse of Fire/Storm Crown, then repulse/storm field, , Lance of Mitra/HoT , then cast repulsion on the PoM for Heal/PBAO dmg and most of the times everything is dead and i am at full health/mana on both characters. Just make sure to bunch up the mobs a bit, working great so far.