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Hence the official forums being down. =P
But yep. Rejoice everyone! That being said, here's my impressions from being in all of Beta 4:
THE GOODS
Diplomacy has a lot of potential. A lot. I think it can become very engaging and the Dark Elf Diplomacy quest is very fun... but... they need to add a Diplo trainer to Leth Nurae STAT.
Havn't started diplomacy yet even tho it's one of the things I'v been looking forward to. Theres JUST so much to do.
Beautiful Environments: Leth Nurae is amazing. So is the entire High Elf area. The Dark Elf area is bleak and rough and perfect for the Dark Elves. I love Hathor Zhi. There are a lot of interesting characters.
I have to agree. And the aquaduct/water slide ther in LN is a blast.
Quests from 1-10. Good. Leveling almost seems a bit to quick but once you hit 10 or 11 you slam into a brick wall basically. Can you solo past that? Sure, but it takes a little while longer. Expect to grind grind grind.
Quest are fairly easy to find from level 10 to 15. And its about 10 solo that they slow down and about 15 grouped. But thats ok. Lets you figure out your class and how they game works.
Decent dungeons. Granted I've only done Aeokar Zhi & Vault of Heroes, but I found both dungeons to be pretty swank personally. I can't wait to see what the future has in store.
Epic / Legendary crits. O.M.G. epic crits rock, but Legendary Crits? Jesus, lets just say they ARE really Legendary. Nothing like casting some lowbie spell and them BAM like 650 dmg. You sit there at the screen going, WTF was that?
Its cool. Just think of them as lucky shots everyonce in a while.
Dual-Wielding Casters is pretty swank (by this I mean having a main-hand item, and then an off-hand item like a wand). Unique approach, though it begs the question to Arcane Casters having itemization to fill their 'ranged' slot with. I'm assuming stuff like bows and ranged weapons will have stats of some sort on them; so I guess it seems like a minor balancing issue to me.
THE BADS
Diplomacy. Yes, I know a lot of folks don't want to hear this, but as engaging and fun as I think Diplomacy is (generally all the good points listed out in my good section), the system has been overly simplified it seems. I can name 5 cards that I carried with me all the time that basically made winning any diplomatic situation a cakewalk, and really? It shouldn't be that way. I was hoping for a system that had a range of difficulty and in some cases it does; but for the most part when I can win every parley with the same five cards, something needs to be changed. THis is not to say that they have some plans for it in an upcoming patch or whatever, and I hope they do. =) Overall Diplomacy is fun, but this is the part that draws heavily from it.
Area imbalances. THis is very noticable. The gear and drops I could basically guarantee myself by grinding in a certan spot in the High Elf area hands down kicked the crap out of drops that were in Hathor Zhi area.
True but This is being worked on all the time so will probbaly get twinked a bit.
Grouped with a Necromancer in the dungeon near Hathor Zhi, Aeoker Zhi. Group wiped twice because the "fear button icon looks like the pet taunt icon". I can't be 100% sure on this but it seems to me that this could be a future issue later on down the road with Necromancers and grouping. Granted the guy coulda been a bad Necromancer; but it still would seem a source of confusion somewhere down the line.
Ha! Try Chrysol Mines. The elevator is buggy, the pits (you have to jump into them) can kill you and drop your corpse underworld. Running into some items while in a building or underground can cause a collision error that teleports you to the top of what ever your in. These are minot points tho. The game is a blast.
THE WHAT THE..? (Not Good, Not Bad, Just In Between Somewheres)
Bards. I'm sure a lot of you have heard the rumors that Bards are disgusting, and this is pretty much the case right now. Bards destroy things solo and in groups. I'm sure they'll be knocked around with the nerf bat at some point and can probably use it, but in some way it makes me a happy camper, haha.
More so in groups and between 10 and 25 ish it slows down solo.
Sorcerers. I apologize to people who want to make Sorcerer's and I think it's a solid class foundation, but I really dislike how minimal their group utility is. It'd be okay if their Damage was insane, but it's really not that well balanced. Necromancers and Druids provide more group utility, and Psionics? That class was BUILT for groups with their CC abilities. As someone who loves casting classes, the Sorcerer made me a sad panda. I liked their self buffs, but I also disliked the fact that by level 10 they still have only one castable spell, all of their other damage spells are instant-cast. And speaking of the castable spell, I hate the fact that the Rank 1 spell costs 38 Energy and the Rank II upgrade you get at Level 6 costs 39 Energy. What? Makes no sense to me. Overall I did have fun on the Sorcerer but there are some slight issues I'd like to see corrected.
Hit Points. HP scales a lot faster than Energy does, and for you caster classes, this is your biggest downfall. A Sorcerer unbuffed at Level 10 has 537 Health; 350 Energy. You're thinking, that's not too bad, right? 98 Health, 198 Energy. Those are the HP/Energy numbers at Level 1. Not much change in Energy yet a huge change in Health. Yes, the Health is necessary, but I just would like to see Energy gained naturally without having to get a bunch of +Energy/+Wisdom gear to boost up the pool to useable levels for us caster types.
Other notes:
People are hating on Sorc's hardcore early on. You have a lot of instants and people have been using them to tag mobs that Melee has to run up to to tag. Been a huge issue in several starting areas.
From every high level I've spoken to caster DPS is almost forsaken in groups. People would rather take an extra Bard or Ranger than drag along a Sorcerer (since Sorc's have little group buff viability).
Bard songs are SICK. When you can make songs that last forever that add a crap ton of dps, oh my god. The speed boost song Bards get basically make them save the 12s50c it costs to get a mount. Trust me @ Level 10 my speed boost song has +33% to run speed whereas the basic mount gives +30% (though this can be boosted by spending more coin on horseshoes and stuff). Still... saving the money is very helpful.
Bahhh Stop hating on the bards. I still baought a horse just to have saddle bags. And bard speed song isn't faster than any other class with movment speed buffs. Tho with a drum your 33% should be more like +50%. 12 silver isnt that hard to come by at level 10 either. not when most quests around level 10 give 80 cp to 1 silver.
My ranged weapon dmg is crazy as a Bard. I fear what kind of dps Rangers can do with those things.
This is not a bad thing. Bards Can't bow kite with these. even running backwards while killing you still can't get more that 3-4 shots in.
Dual-Wielding shortswords or daggers = incredible DPS as a Bard. That's about all I can say there.
At early levels yes but later on it slows down. With the advent of the Item expertise you can no longer twink your toons out so if you have level apropriate gear you are doning less damage than most the other light classes.
Concluding, I like the game a lot. Sigil's done a good job and they'll get my money!
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Not tearing your post apart just adding my opinions.
Chunking:
Moving between chunks is still causing some crashes. and it's not totally instant. some foks have a 30 sec wait. some only 1 second. Bard songs drop crossing each chunk.
Market Merchant.
To sell your gear you place it with a merchant who does take a cut weather you sell it or not. The limited time it was up it seemed to work for me. Could use a bit of rework on the searching for window but not to shabby for a first attempt.
Crafting
Has gone thru so many reveamps that I'm not even gonna comment on it till I get into the newest rendition.
Harvesting
Is cool. Something to do while soloing or in a group. As a group everyone can "attack" one node. giving larger quantaties and better chances at rares.
Boats/Ships
Theres still an issue with breathing while on a boat or ship. Occasionally the game thinks your underwater and will show your breath meter. Jumping usually clears it. But if your not paying attention you can die.
The Mail Box
For a price you can send gear to people. Kinda nice. You can send it to your alts or even to yourself. Watch out for sending stuff from one continent to another as it doubles the price. And yes you can send just text AS well.
The Dot system.
Clicking on a mob can show you its level but this represents nothing. The dot system will show you what your chances are. 1 and 2 dot same level mob is soloable. Level 3 is sometimes soloable but dificult. 4 and 5 dot same level mob is group while 6 is a raid mob. Theres a nice little target icon that can show you all this info rather easily so I really have no complaints about this.
All in all this game is fun.
Rao