Vanguard: First Impressions

Posted by Wolfen in Vanguard

I have finally found my way into the world of Vanguard: Saga of Heroes. My first impression in a nutshell: not as bad as I thought it would be.

My new computer, video card, and power supply all arrived, so I got all of them put together and running smoothly. My computer specifications are: AMD X2 6000+ processor, 3gigs RAM, and Nvidia 8800GT 512mb video card. Screen resolution is 1680×1050. I tested everything to make sure all was working and then I launched myself into Vanguard.

The first few minutes into the game was disconcerting. My frame rate was horrible and it didn’t get better no matter how I changed the game settings. The game then crashed to the desktop and I began to get a bit worried. My concerns didn’t last for long. Once I got back into the game, everything worked just fine. Everything was smooth and looked great. I breathed a sigh of relief and continued on. On a side note, the name Wolfen was already taken, so I had to use Wolfenn.

I created a half-elf druid and started in the Tanvu area. When my character’s eyes opened, I was standing on the beach near the Shang Village. These first two pictures show what was in front and behind me. (Click on the thumbnails for a larger view)

The object in the distance of the first picture is of a man riding a dragon. He is the first person to give me a quest. He told me that the soldiers on the beach were low on morale and needed a cheering up. So, I talked to a few of the soldiers and raised their morale. I wondered why their morale was low.

It turns out that these are troops of a powerful emperor and they were in the middle of attacking the Shang Village. My next quest was to go kill some of the villagers. This made me pause a moment. I know that half elfs are not an evil race, so why was I being told to kill villagers? There was nothing for it but to see it through, so I ran up to the village and killed the required number. Several of the houses were on fire, which was neat to look at. I returned to the dragon-riding commander and got more quests.

One of the village quests did amuse me. Some of the soldiers were not attacking the villagers, so I was tasked with setting them straight. I found one of the “pathetic” soldiers and clicked on him. A status bar appeared on my screen and it said “Laying down the law.” My character was slapping the soldier. When the deed was done, the soldier started attacking a villager – and lost. So here are more soldiers not wanting to do what they were told. Interesting, indeed.

In the end, I was tasked with assaulting a fortress house where a Master Fhungusu lived and kill him. None of the monks surrounding the house attacked me. I entered the house and found the room that Master Fhungusu occupied. As you can see by the screenshot below, something was wrong with this.

What was the problem? I am level 3 and he is level 50. He didn’t attack, however, so I clicked on him, and what he told me cleared up some of the mystery. He said that the emperor is an evil man and that I shouldn’t follow him. I was chided for killing innocent villagers and getting their blood on my weapons. He wants to change my ways for the good. My weapons were taken from me, and I was sent to Dallerjuba Village to begin my reclamation.

More to come in later posts.

–Wolfen