We finally completed the Guild Dungeon, Marksburg Castle, on our third attempt. Our first attempt was a scouting run when I was in my early 70's. It showed we weren't ready to take on such a challenge so early in our guild's life just yet. We knew it but wanted to see what it would be like. I opted to pass on the opportunity as I didn't think I'd be able to contribute that much at my level.
The second try came last week and though we failed, we came awfully close to completing it. Ultimately our lack of planning and execution led to delays which saw the time run out on us just as we were clearing our way to the last level. I was able to contribute more to the effort this time around as a fresh 90 but it still led to some deaths and running back on my part.
This weekend was our third try and this one proved to be the charm. The combination of familiarity as well as the added levels we all had proved to be the deciding factors. Coming in as a 95 really upped my survivability against the mobs that ranged from levels 91-105. I went through the whole run without a single death although the lower level guildies weren't so fortunate.
The dungeon had a gothic/medieval/alice in wonderland feel as we fought our way against a variety of court jesters, palace guards, knights, wizards, and...grandfather clocks??? We actually had around 30 minutes to spare so the run took about an hour and a half. Not a bad way to spend some quality time with your guildies as well as getting some decent loot. Since this Guild Dungeon features prominently in the Dark Archer recruitment questline, I have a feeling I'll be spending more time in here once I turn 100 and become eligible for the quest.
Showing posts with label endgame. Show all posts
Showing posts with label endgame. Show all posts
Monday, April 6, 2009
Tuesday, March 31, 2009
Nations in Atlantica Online
Having a 50 player cap for guilds can be problematic when it comes to getting the numbers to run endgame content. Except for the most hardcore of guilds, you will usually have a wide range of levels and playing times. Getting enough high-levels together at a certain time for a Guild Dungeon might not happen right away.
This is where Nations and Nation Dungeons come in. Nations are alliances of up to 10 guilds and the Nation Dungeons are endgame challenges which scale in difficulty. If Guild Dungeons can be run with a maximum of 50 players, Nation Dungeons can be run with a theoretical max of 500 players. Access to the B grade mercenaries (currently the highest grade in the game) relies on drops that can sometimes only be found in Nation Dungeons. So if you want a Spartan, Pirate, or Elementalist in your formation, you would be wise to seek out a Nation that has access to and can successfully run Nation Dungeons. Once you join a Nation, you gain access to Nation chat and can share info with Nation members as easily as with guild members.
The leader of a level 30 guild can go to the Caesar NPC in Rome and start his own nation for a fee based on the number of starting guilds. The roster of 10 allowable guilds allows for a wide variety of member guilds and the Nation leader has to seek out like-minded guilds with a decent amount of high-level players in order to grow his Nation. There's a considerable amount of diplomacy involved and the reputations of players and guilds go a long way towards convincing others to join your fledgeling empire.
This is where Nations and Nation Dungeons come in. Nations are alliances of up to 10 guilds and the Nation Dungeons are endgame challenges which scale in difficulty. If Guild Dungeons can be run with a maximum of 50 players, Nation Dungeons can be run with a theoretical max of 500 players. Access to the B grade mercenaries (currently the highest grade in the game) relies on drops that can sometimes only be found in Nation Dungeons. So if you want a Spartan, Pirate, or Elementalist in your formation, you would be wise to seek out a Nation that has access to and can successfully run Nation Dungeons. Once you join a Nation, you gain access to Nation chat and can share info with Nation members as easily as with guild members.
The leader of a level 30 guild can go to the Caesar NPC in Rome and start his own nation for a fee based on the number of starting guilds. The roster of 10 allowable guilds allows for a wide variety of member guilds and the Nation leader has to seek out like-minded guilds with a decent amount of high-level players in order to grow his Nation. There's a considerable amount of diplomacy involved and the reputations of players and guilds go a long way towards convincing others to join your fledgeling empire.
Sunday, March 22, 2009
For Pony!
My guild, Hunters on the Argos server, gifted me with a couple of surprises recently. The first is pictured above. There's several ways to score this particular mount but the most common way is by spending some real cash on the Item Mall for a Mount Box. For around $10, you can buy the box for a chance at a rare mount. The vast majority of the time, however, you will end up getting this pictured mount which comes with no stats and a 10% movement bonus. Like most Item Mall purchases, the mount can then be sold or traded ingame as desired. Currently, this particular mount is going for around 20 million gold on our server.
Now I had enough gold to throw away on this mount and, ordinarily, I would've paid the market price for the convenience as in other games. But Atlantica Online isn't like other games in that it comes with the highly convenient auto-move feature which takes much of the drudgery away of traveling from place to place. Drudgery that mounts with increased movement speeds used to alleviate. Happily, there are other reasons to get mounts in this game aside from aesthetics; most will come with stats that will increase you main character's survivability immensely. So I was saving up my gold for one such mount when my guild leader surprised me by giving me this one bought with our guild funds. Many thanks for the fine gift and now I don't have to look like a complete noob running around everywhere on foot.
The other surprise was their announcement that I had been promoted to guild officer. I was a little surprised in that I had only been playing this game for a few months and still considered myself an AO noob. But I guess my attitude and regular playing schedule impressed the ones who had to make the decision. Either that or there was nobody else that wanted the job. Since I am now on the cusp of level 87 and the AO endgame, I decided to accept to have some influence over upcoming decisions on how to move our guild into the endgame.
Monday, February 2, 2009
Dragonspyre Ratchets up the Difficulty
One of the first things I noticed after I got my first "kill some wandering street mobs" quest in Dragonspyre was the increased HP's of the average mob. In Mooshu, the typical trash mob would have maybe 675 HP. In Dragonspyre, they tend to have around 1200 HP. This would necessitate a change to my typical deck design which had revolved around abusing Immolate for fun and profit.
Immolate is a Fire spell available as a reward after completing Krokotopia so only primary Fire wizards have access to it. For four pips, it deals 600 fire damage to an enemy and deals 250 fire damage to yourself. I had accumulated enough spell power gear that I was able to knock out around 700 HP's in one successful shot even without any charms or traps to augment the Immolate spell. With my Mooshu sword, 4 pips were almost always available during the second turn and sometimes rarely on the first. So unless the mobs were Fire and thus resistant to Immolate damage, I would face them with a 40 card deck that had 6 copies of Immolate increasing the odds that I would always see one on the first or second turn. Add in Fire protection shields that reduced any Immolate damage by 80% and fire resistant gear for even more fun.
The increased toughness of the random Dragonspyre mobs meant a halt to the Immolate festivities. The damage I was doing to myself would mean that I was just doing the surviving mobs a favor in killing myself. So this relegated Immolate to a closing spell to do the final damage to the last mob and increased the importance of my big-hitters, the 5 and 6 pip spells, Stormzilla and Helephant. This also meant an increase in the time needed to kill the pairs of common street mobs you typically come across when soloing. 1200 HPx2 is nothing to sneeze at especially when both mobs are constantly throwing hexes to reduce your spell's power and shields to reduce your damage. Fizzles are absolutely magnified in Dragonspyre as they go from being momentary nuisances to major time sinks.
The increased HP's are not the only feature of the increased difficulty in Dragonspyre. Tower quests are back which have you running through a gauntlet of floors without any health wisps to top you off between fights. Bosses also have some annoying features like one that has two companions wisps that do nothing but cast every protection shield known to man on the boss mob until you manage to kill them. I'm sure the increased difficulty is there to put the brakes on ardent soloers like myself and to increase the importance of grouping up in the endgame. It's all good if it means I have more time to savor the last 5 levels to cap in this game.
Immolate is a Fire spell available as a reward after completing Krokotopia so only primary Fire wizards have access to it. For four pips, it deals 600 fire damage to an enemy and deals 250 fire damage to yourself. I had accumulated enough spell power gear that I was able to knock out around 700 HP's in one successful shot even without any charms or traps to augment the Immolate spell. With my Mooshu sword, 4 pips were almost always available during the second turn and sometimes rarely on the first. So unless the mobs were Fire and thus resistant to Immolate damage, I would face them with a 40 card deck that had 6 copies of Immolate increasing the odds that I would always see one on the first or second turn. Add in Fire protection shields that reduced any Immolate damage by 80% and fire resistant gear for even more fun.
The increased toughness of the random Dragonspyre mobs meant a halt to the Immolate festivities. The damage I was doing to myself would mean that I was just doing the surviving mobs a favor in killing myself. So this relegated Immolate to a closing spell to do the final damage to the last mob and increased the importance of my big-hitters, the 5 and 6 pip spells, Stormzilla and Helephant. This also meant an increase in the time needed to kill the pairs of common street mobs you typically come across when soloing. 1200 HPx2 is nothing to sneeze at especially when both mobs are constantly throwing hexes to reduce your spell's power and shields to reduce your damage. Fizzles are absolutely magnified in Dragonspyre as they go from being momentary nuisances to major time sinks.
The increased HP's are not the only feature of the increased difficulty in Dragonspyre. Tower quests are back which have you running through a gauntlet of floors without any health wisps to top you off between fights. Bosses also have some annoying features like one that has two companions wisps that do nothing but cast every protection shield known to man on the boss mob until you manage to kill them. I'm sure the increased difficulty is there to put the brakes on ardent soloers like myself and to increase the importance of grouping up in the endgame. It's all good if it means I have more time to savor the last 5 levels to cap in this game.
Thursday, January 8, 2009
Clarifying the Grind
It seems I hit a hot topic with my stance towards the gear grind in WAR. I think some points were missed about grinding that were lost in the mad rush towards the torches and pitchforks to vilify the monster called Wards. So I'd like this opportunity to clarify my stance on grinding.
It is my belief that MMO game designers and developers are not the clueless sadists that most people make them out to be on the Internet. I believe they take pride in their work the same as everybody else. It's up to them to design the challenges and rewards that we as players must face in their games. But they can't account for how every single person will react to the content they design. Obviously, there will be those who find the challenges too easy and some too hard. As well, there will be those who think the rewards appropriate and those who think they aren't.
The grind is the feeling individuals get when they feel the reward doesn't quite fit with the effort involved in getting it. Normally, if you felt this way in a non-MMO game, you would just stop playing it altogether and look for some other way to waste your gaming time. But the subscription model of most MMO's means that this option is not taken lightly and is usually reserved as an option of last resort. And so are born the grinds that are undertaken in the name of character progression.
In summary, grinds are here until the day developers can develop mind-reading technology to custom-design every facet of their game to individual tastes. It's up to you to either embrace or reject these grinds. Nobody else can make that decision for you. For me, I enjoy leveling characters to max too much for it ever to be a grind. In much the same way, I just can't see grinding PVE instances over and over with the ultimate payoff being more glorified PVE encounters. That's not what I signed up for in this here RVR game.
Your mileage most definitely may vary.
It is my belief that MMO game designers and developers are not the clueless sadists that most people make them out to be on the Internet. I believe they take pride in their work the same as everybody else. It's up to them to design the challenges and rewards that we as players must face in their games. But they can't account for how every single person will react to the content they design. Obviously, there will be those who find the challenges too easy and some too hard. As well, there will be those who think the rewards appropriate and those who think they aren't.
The grind is the feeling individuals get when they feel the reward doesn't quite fit with the effort involved in getting it. Normally, if you felt this way in a non-MMO game, you would just stop playing it altogether and look for some other way to waste your gaming time. But the subscription model of most MMO's means that this option is not taken lightly and is usually reserved as an option of last resort. And so are born the grinds that are undertaken in the name of character progression.
In summary, grinds are here until the day developers can develop mind-reading technology to custom-design every facet of their game to individual tastes. It's up to you to either embrace or reject these grinds. Nobody else can make that decision for you. For me, I enjoy leveling characters to max too much for it ever to be a grind. In much the same way, I just can't see grinding PVE instances over and over with the ultimate payoff being more glorified PVE encounters. That's not what I signed up for in this here RVR game.
Your mileage most definitely may vary.
Wednesday, January 7, 2009
The Daily Grind
Grinding: Any activity which is not enjoyable but is tolerated because you know that it's good for your character's progression. That's my definition of grinding. Note this means that grinds are highly subjective and what is one person's grind can be another's font of enjoyment. This is why I can level so many characters to max when the thought of this is enough to make most people nauseous. For some strange reason, I love the sound of the ding and look forward to using the new abilities I gain every level. There's just something about completing quests that tickles the achiever in me. When those completed quests turn into the experience bar growing towards the next level, it's a double bonus to me.
On the other hand, I took one look at Mythic's setup for the endgame gear grind and just said pass. Basically, the ward system means you need to grind the lower level wards in order to tackle the next content in line. This ultimately leads you to equipping a set of gear that will enable you to survive the encounter to take down the opposing faction's king. While, in theory, this sounds glorious. The reality is that in order to do this efficiently you need to run around to different zones capping undefended battlefield objectives and keeps and hope you can win some gold bag lotteries. Then you have to hope to win the RNG lottery in the 3-day lockout instance of your choice. No thanks.
I'd rather just RVR for the sake of RVR. I'll check out those end-game instances eventually but I'm in no hurry to do it. If I happen to have a set of gear which will enable me to survive a fortress lord or city PQ or even a Chaos king when it's time to tackle them; great. If not, I can always help out in the defense of said encounters. You don't need wards to do that.
On the other hand, I took one look at Mythic's setup for the endgame gear grind and just said pass. Basically, the ward system means you need to grind the lower level wards in order to tackle the next content in line. This ultimately leads you to equipping a set of gear that will enable you to survive the encounter to take down the opposing faction's king. While, in theory, this sounds glorious. The reality is that in order to do this efficiently you need to run around to different zones capping undefended battlefield objectives and keeps and hope you can win some gold bag lotteries. Then you have to hope to win the RNG lottery in the 3-day lockout instance of your choice. No thanks.
I'd rather just RVR for the sake of RVR. I'll check out those end-game instances eventually but I'm in no hurry to do it. If I happen to have a set of gear which will enable me to survive a fortress lord or city PQ or even a Chaos king when it's time to tackle them; great. If not, I can always help out in the defense of said encounters. You don't need wards to do that.
Friday, October 17, 2008
Life at 40
So yesterday, I was able to log in after work and finally get the 8% I needed to ding 40. I wasn't in much of a rush and actually spent a good hour first wrestling with the mail system and repopulating my auctions. During the course of which I unlocked The Regal title for earning 1000 gold. Sweet.
The nice thing about having a blog is that it records things like actual dates automatically so I don't have to burden myself with trying to remember them. According to this post, it was exactly one month to the day that I started playing my Warrior Priest. One month to level to max isn't too bad and it wasn't like I really rushed either. There were plenty of hours spent just loafing around in Altdorf leveling up my Talisman Making, trying to coax the mail system to deliver my mail, and auctioning all the crap I kept looting off mobs.
Now all that is left is just leveling up my Renown Rank up to 80. The reasons being are the additional renown training and gear available to me. Additional renown training is always nice as the additional stats I can get will come in handy. I'm not quite sold on the renown gear, however. Even the epic and mythic sets don't really excite me. They suffer from too much quantity over quality when it comes to stats. Instead of concentrating on core stats and giving us some meaty values, they insist on giving us a potpourri (Do I really need +bonus to housekeeping?) of every stat under the sun and even some they make up out of the blue and then the values of each stat is anemic because of the fact that we get so many of them.
So I will likely just RvR and scenario for the fun and not for the gear I can get out of it. Which is fine by me but I suspect it won't be for the majority of folks out there. I really hope Mythic takes another look at their endgame renown gear and comes out with some sets I wouldn't be ashamed to be caught dead in.
The nice thing about having a blog is that it records things like actual dates automatically so I don't have to burden myself with trying to remember them. According to this post, it was exactly one month to the day that I started playing my Warrior Priest. One month to level to max isn't too bad and it wasn't like I really rushed either. There were plenty of hours spent just loafing around in Altdorf leveling up my Talisman Making, trying to coax the mail system to deliver my mail, and auctioning all the crap I kept looting off mobs.
Now all that is left is just leveling up my Renown Rank up to 80. The reasons being are the additional renown training and gear available to me. Additional renown training is always nice as the additional stats I can get will come in handy. I'm not quite sold on the renown gear, however. Even the epic and mythic sets don't really excite me. They suffer from too much quantity over quality when it comes to stats. Instead of concentrating on core stats and giving us some meaty values, they insist on giving us a potpourri (Do I really need +bonus to housekeeping?) of every stat under the sun and even some they make up out of the blue and then the values of each stat is anemic because of the fact that we get so many of them.
So I will likely just RvR and scenario for the fun and not for the gear I can get out of it. Which is fine by me but I suspect it won't be for the majority of folks out there. I really hope Mythic takes another look at their endgame renown gear and comes out with some sets I wouldn't be ashamed to be caught dead in.
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