Friday, February 20, 2009

Age of Conan - Attaining new heights

It is official. AoC has become the first game with the highest level character of any MMO I have played, exceeding LOTRO (45) WoW (52) and EQ2 (58).

Amatheon, my main, has reached level 60!! (fanfare and a cheer!)



Having finished some quests in the Eiglophian Mountains. He has now entered Ymirs Pass.



Several unique quests here, with of course a finale that is totally freakin cool! (I can't believe I am stooping to teenage talk to implore upon you, my audience, the magnitude of the finale...ah well, to be or not to be eh?)

First up, a strange swamp dweller has been trapped by the humans here. He resides in a cage, and states he is pain. He does not actually seem "evil"...I, of course, offer to help.



In my travels, I happen upon a camp, and tied to a tree, a poor warrior woman is in the last throes of life. I plan to avenge her suffering...



I am unsure of what dangers lie within this construct. But, it sure does make for one kickass screenshot........POSE!



Anyways, upon reaching level 60, I return home to don some new armor that has been waiting for me...snazzy.



_________________________________________

A few quick notes about patch 1.04.

After a few issues needing some quick hotfixes before the weekend, the patch is in full swing.
The global chat has been wild with discussion of the new loot tables. A major boon, this offering has fixed a quibble about tons of junk "white" weapons and armor filling up bags. Now we get cool little stackable baubles.

The next fix is an update to standard equipment. Better stats for example, and some items with new looks for more variety.
Most chests will drop killer green items, and I had more jeweled chests (I had 2 drop last night for example) dropping some awesome blues.
Some of the new changes are being listed on the YG database site, which tracks all items in game.
The Royal Soldier Hauberk is one that has changed for the better. Look below on the page and you will see a tab called "Item History", which shows improved enhancements to stats and armor.

Changes have been done to many aspects of the game. From simple things like timers for food and buffs listed under icons to changes in the visual quality of trees (pine trees for example had more realistic pines).

Class changes have taken place, with the largest change in the one who needed it the most, the Dark Templar. This is probably the most unique class and fun to play, thanks to it's Vampiric like qualities and life and mana taps. As well, they are the perfect off tank (or could have been, and thanks to the patch are now). Oh, and Amatheon is one.
The fact that I was able to take on 2-3 mobs 2-3 levels higher than me sold me on this class big time.

More Voice Overs were added. Not sure how many, as I have only found one so far..

The leveling curve has pretty much been rectified. Some complaints of too much grinding was noted, but now thanks to the new content, 20-80 looks to be working well.
I have two characters who are lower level who I am taking through and they should be able to get a feel for this new questing system.

As more thoughts come up, I will post about them.

As a final note, the client does have the DX10 code in place, and is ready to be turned on once bugs are worked out on Testlive, so progress is going forward.

All I know is I am having a blast with my new playstyle and AoC is proving to be an admirable PvE game.

More screenies are coming soon..

Cheers

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

Congratulations to 60!

Looks like they are doing some good job on improving the game.

Talyn said...

Congrats on the leveling milestone! Well done!

I have to admit, your recent articles on the game have made me wonder if I'd ever be willing to visit Hyborea again; at least on the PC. But this article on the patch makes is very likely that I might take a peek in a month or few!

Gamer Hudson said...

can tank do damage in that game? or is it standard "im a tank and cant solo for crap" type of MMO thing?

Talyn said...

Do you still have to manually switch from melee to ranged? That annoyed the piss out of me in beta and Testlive.

Elementalistly said...

Ok...let me try and get these answered...
@Hudson
The classes make it so that saying you are a tank, DPS, healbot just does not work.
There are times the healer can slam for more damage than a sword based soldier, but thanks to various skills you can make yourself not the target of the mob.
Soldiers can choose to taunt, or instead go for the damage gusto, or even turn into a splash damager...
The classes defy normal MMO conventions, and I think that is what I enjoy.
@Scott
No, you still manually change, and to me that is a more realistic approach.
Luckily, you can have 2 weapon sets, like Guild Wars, and choose between them
On my Ranger, I will set traps, and pin down my opponents, but once they get close, I mapped a set of keys to insta switch my weapons.
Don't forget, I am on a 360 controller also, so I have had a bit of fun doing the combat system thanks to this setup.
I still compare AoC more to GW than a standard MMO, and I think this is why people are not that into the game, as they may not like those mechanics.
The fact I have made it this far and not given up is really a testament.
To Hudson, your need for a truly open world may stop you from ever enjoying the game...but if you can think "Single player game with multiplayer capabilities" and focus real hard, you could pay for just the box and level to max in 30 days...

Cheers guys

Talyn said...

Just a thought I've written before in regards to the "open worlds" issue *glances at Hudson*: even the seamless worlds are segregated, you just avoid the loading screen. But enter a zone and you get switched over to that zone's chat channels and therefore separated from everyone not in that zone. Even when you have a general chat that is global, you're only chatting with those players you're not seeing them because *gasp* they're spread all over the gameworld. Loading screen or not, it's all the same thing. Mind you, I'm a fan of seamless myself which is (one of many reasons) why I liked WoW and now LOTRO over EQ2. I've spent a good chunk of today in GTA4 and couldn't help but be interested in seeing Rockstar's tech put into a huge-ass seamless (massively-?) multiplayer game (RPG or not).

With the 360 controller are you able to scroll the camera or have you chosen a distance that works well and just leave it alone?

Elementalistly said...

Distance is set. I do keep mouse or keyboard handy though in case something comes up though. Seeing it is a MMO with a multitude of commands, I cannot get everything.
I have enabled enough though, that 98% of the time I do not need the keyboard or mouse.
Guild Wars was perfect for the controller due to the amount of skills matching all buttons and DPAD..
I wish they would make that a console game.
AoC is working great thanks to toolbar switching commands and auto targeting when facing...awesome stuff.
Cheers

Unknown said...

wow, quite the achiever arent you... lol...