I haven’t played much in the past week. First I was out of town for six days. I was feeling a bit under the weather when I got back home. A couple of days later feeling not so hot blossomed into full blown sick/flu/whattheheckever.
When I popped into Runes of Magic for a few minutes I felt disoriented. There are so many side activities to participate in that it takes time to decide what you feeling like doing when you’re gone for a while. I knew I didn’t have enough energy to stay longer than a half hour so I settled for turning in a few quests before taking another nap.
Rested XP plus the bonuses received from my house furniture, I achieved 1.5 levels on my Priest by turning in a half dozen quests. I enjoy riding around ROM seeing the sights. I’m now stationed in the third player community, the Distillery in Aslan Valley. At levels 25/23, I’m at the half way point in leveling. I have a ton of quests to turn in for the Warrior half of my character, which should bring her to level 25. When I reach 25/25 I’ll be able to purchase my next set of Elite skills:
Priest/Warrior
Chain of Fighting Spirit
Fires off 2 hits for 90% main hand damage - upgradeable
Warrior/Priest
Magic Barrier Protection
Magic barrier lowers damage received by 1% - upgradeable
It’s funny to think that I’m half way finished with leveling in a game that hasn’t even released yet. I am by no means half way through overall progression. With crafting, raiding, PVP and character customizations, there will be loads of things to do to level 50 and beyond.
The influences of Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings are all over fantasy MMOs. I wonder what he’d think about it. With most games leaning so heavily on the high fantasy elements he created, it’s no wonder some players are getting burned out on fantasy. That’s not the case for me. I still enjoy seeing different visualizations of the high fantasy theme and never tire of rolling hills, glens, barrows and shire-like communities. My only complaint is that we’re back to fighting animals again. I don’t know what this game has against combating humanoid creatures.
I think JRR would not be too happy with RoMs use of the Ents; the quests to kill Ents for various reasons just pile up...
Barkbark is slightly more of a gentle spirit though.
My priest/rogue is at 27/27 now, but I have not picked up the level 25 elites yet, since I do not have any of the crystals for it. Not sure when I get opportunity to head to the Abbey and they are too expensive on auction house. Not sure why they picked crystals for the skills here when they are back to the regular resources at level 30 I think.
At for humanoids, least you have the goblins to fight also, not just animals and plants&trees. But it is certainly a lot of fighting against Mother Nature, in a way...
Posted by: Sente | March 02, 2009 at 04:54 PM
@Sente - Yes, the killing of the Ents ranks up there with Nessingway sending players on that animial slaughtering spree in WOW.
Sure we have the goblins but I really do wish there was more fighting of humanoids for two reasons. First is that it tends to take out of fighting in wilderness areas. I find it more compelling to fight in and around communities. It lends a level of urgency for me. Secondly, even though they are giving mobs class abilities, which is a bit hack (bug that is a Knight), I enter combat expecting to win against animals and beasts of labor.
I get that it's easier to drop mobs in wilderness and send us off for the killing and collecting. I'm just disappointed that more games don't take the time to keep the combat in the context of the society. With creative asset re-use it can't be that hard. Wizard101 does a good job at this even when I can see the re-use, it's still preferred.
Posted by: Saylah | March 02, 2009 at 05:40 PM
Sente, how does the Priest/Rogue play? I'm going to try out ROM (finally! I don't know why I keep getting distracted from it) and looking through the classes. I'll try them all out later myself but just wanted to have someone else's opinion on it as well. I was actually thinking that the P/R combination is something I'd really like -- that or Priest/Mage, or Priest/Knight.
Posted by: Mallika | March 02, 2009 at 05:46 PM
@Sente - Oh fudge, I hadn't checked the comps for the 25/25 elites. I wouldn't need the one for the Warrior and the Priest is a bit lack luster for something that will cost me mana to cast. If it's too expensive in mats, I'll just wait and see.
Posted by: Saylah | March 02, 2009 at 06:12 PM
@Mallika - I think the priest/rogue combo is fairly neat, although I have not really explored other options that much.
Fights are mainly single target, there are not really any AoE capabilities. It is mainly the R/P combo that benefits from the combination rather than P/R, although the latter gets a nice DoT that does not consume mana, but rogue energy (a la WoW).
Still, both combinations do ok. Rogue should have his dodge buffs (elite skill + regular) etc for survival. Poison buffs also helps with the damage output.
Rogue buffs are shorter in time, so it is not that useful to kick off the primary buffs and then switch to priest primary. Priest has longer running buffs, so can be more useful to run those before switching to rogue primary.
The weapons and armor for the two classes are different, so you would need to swap these when switching primary.
The classes uses different power pools (rogue energy, priest mana), so does not interfere with each others consumption for the skills.
Posted by: Sente | March 03, 2009 at 12:23 AM
I don't know about always expecting to win in fights against animals. In reality they're typically far stronger and deadlier than we are. ;)
But I do prefer fighting humanoids, CoH was great for that. We've probably just been brainwashed over time into thinking our natural superiority over other species, that we only really feel something over fighting another humanoid. Perhaps we need a caveman MMO without all the fancy magic and technology to really be scared of fighting the beasties, heh.
Posted by: Nef | March 03, 2009 at 09:25 AM
@Nef - I would agree with that if I wasn't walking around in armor, can heal and cast magic. ;-)
You're dead on that if I had nothing at my disposal other than my bare hands and a club, there would be more of an adrenaline rush in animal combat. As it is now, not so much. Unless the mob is an elite of very high level, I can't get worked up over fighting a bear.
Remember fighting the Syndicate around Alterac Mountains and Defias stealthing around Darkshore? Those are the sorts of encounters I find challenging and fun.
Posted by: Saylah | March 03, 2009 at 09:53 AM
I agree on the humanoid fighting. One thing WAR did well was make it feel like war. Boars aren't often involved in plotting take-overs of human population centers. They just go where the food is.
A knight in heavy armor with sword and shield in an epic battle with ... a wild pig. Sheesh.
Posted by: Khan | March 03, 2009 at 12:00 PM
@Khan - You got that right. I posted about it but too lazy to find the link now, how WAR PVE won my heart because of keeping the combat relevant to the context of the story. You started fighting other humans - the opposite faction which was SO cool.
There's a level of excitement and urgency that can't be matched by me stalking Flamingos. I don't care how much health they have! When I burned out in WAR T4, I went to an alt. T1 to T2 was just as much fun the second time around. WOW zones like that were still fun the 6th time around.
Posted by: Saylah | March 03, 2009 at 12:18 PM