Rift: Sights Along The Way

Posted by Wolfen in Rift

I hit level 49 last night. It has been a fun climb to the top, with only a few “what the heck” moments. I blew through Iron Pine Peaks (more on that later), and spent lots of time in the Droughtlands and Shimmersand desert. The variety of creatures and uniqueness of quests greatly diminishes as you level up. That does not mean that things get boring, but the wow factor is not there as much.

In the Droughtlands, you battle centaurs, scorpions, lizards, ants, and giants. Shimmersand continues with more scorpions, giants, lizards, and cultists. Most quests use the tried and true method of go kill “X” amount something and get a reward at the end. Some quests, however, are fun and interesting. In the Droughtlands, you’ll find an arena where some giants want you to defeat a series of tough encounters in order to gain their respect. Most of these fights require a group, although I was able to defeat the first two fights by myself.

I wasn’t very impressed with Shimmersand until I discovered the city of Fortune’s End. This is a quest hub city that will send you out in all directions. There are three quests here that I consider highlights.

The first sends you go a large prison colony where you find that the inmates have rebelled and you need to find out what they are up to. You are given a disguise that makes you look just like one of the inmates. Once in the prison, as the new guy, you must prove yourself to the gang leaders before they trust you. This requires using a shiv to kill enemies of the gang leader. After running a bunch of quests, you eventually learn what the cultist’s plans are and attempt to stop them.

The second sent me off to find a treasure chest in a nearby cave. The quest is called “I Hope You Like Surprises,” so I was alert to the fact that something would happen. Well, when I tried to loot the chest, I was attacked by a stealthed enemy. I was surprised when I discovered that he had stolen my kidney! I was then on a timer to find certain items that would allow me to get my kidney back. I had to run fast because my health was constantly dropping. I barely got it done in time.

The third sent me to kill the main bad guy in the area. When I arrived at the spot, I saw that this final fight was going to be a rift encounter. I confronted the bad guy and that triggered the first round of the rift. The mobs in each round are level 50. I didn’t think I would be able to win the fight because I was only level 47 at the time. I can kill mobs two levels above me fairly easily, but my attacks miss a great deal with anything higher. Each mob took awhile, but I took my time and got through each stage. I was joined by another player when the final stage started, and I am glad that he did. I would not have been able to do it by myself. Even then it was a very close call.

As for Iron Pine Peaks, I discovered that I had missed a huge amount of quests in that zone. Other quests lead me on to other places, so I didn’t find the other quests until I went back. I didn’t keep count, but it sure seemed like it was another 40 or more quests to be done. So, my advice is to make sure you have turned in all of your Iron Pines quests. The one I didn’t turn in was the one that would have sent me in the right direction.

Read More

Rift: Thoughts on Patch 1.1

Posted by Wolfen in Rift

Patch 1.1 has been live on the Rift servers for awhile now and it brought many changes to the game. I was most concerned with the sweeping changes to the Reaver soul, as I was having a great deal of fun playing it. The patch notes made it seem as though all the fun parts of the Reaver were removed, and to some extent, that is exactly what happened. I am not happy with the changes, but they are not as bad as they could have been.

The biggest change is to the ability called Grisly Works, which is also the ability that made playing a Reaver so much fun. Before the change, if you had three points in the skill, your character would get healed 9% of your maximum health. This made the Reaver an AOE king. In fact, you were wasting your time if you were not AOE’ing as a Reaver. Grisly Works made it damn near impossible to be killed in PVE questing. I would be full health at the end of every fight. That is exactly what Trion wanted to change.

The new description of Grisly Works is this: For 15 seconds after killing an enemy  you have Tagged, healing from Soul Feast is increased by 30/60/90%, depending on how many points you put into it. Soul Feast allows the damage over time spells of Soul Sickness and Creeping Death to heal you for 50% of the damage done. So, no big heals each time you killed an enemy. You do get healed a little while in combat, but you no longer finish fights at full health. It’s back to drinking lots of potions to heal up.

Trion also moved Grisly Works up two tiers on the soul tree. It now requires 25 points in Reaver just to get the ability, plus three more points to get the most out of it. I think the nerf to the ability was enough, and moving it up the tree was unnecessary.

Has the change to Reavers affected how I play the game? Not really. I can still survive an AOE battle with a bunch of mobs around me, I just have to heal up after its done. My survivability has gone down a little bit, and I no longer can run around without a care in the world, but the Reaver is still a viable soul. The changes slowed me down, which is what I believe Trion wanted to happen. The fun factor has definitely been lowered, but I won’t be giving it up.

The Reaver patch notes:

REAVER

* Due to the below changes, characters with soul points spent in Reaver will receive a free soul point respec.
* Soul Sickness, Flesh Rot, Necrotic Wounds, Blood Fever: The damage on additional targets when using Plague Bringer has been lowered. The Threat generation has been increased to keep overall threat gain of the abilities the same.
* Crippling Infestation: Moves down one tier to unlock at 21 points.
* Wasting Away: Moves down one tier to unlock at 16 points.
* Grisly Works: Moves up two tiers, now unlocked at 26 points. Now increases the healing of Soul Feast by 30-90% for 15 seconds after killing a target the Reaver has engaged.
* Soul Devour: Now increases the damage of Soul Feast by 50%, instead of 150%.
* Power from the Masses: Changed to give a stack per nearby party/raid member rather than per nearby enemy.
* Infestation: Cooldown increased to 1 minute, and damage increased based on the new cooldown.

Read More

Rift: The Middle Levels

Posted by Wolfen in Rift

I have been moving through the ol’ PVE grind as I explore the middle levels and inch towards level 50. I have reached level 44 and I am still having fun. I find certain zones better than others, but nothing terribly bad. I moved to Scarlet Gorge after finishing up Gloamwood. From there I went through Scarwood Reach, Moonshade Highlands, and the Doughtlands.

Scarlet Gorge has been the least fun zone for me. I just don’t like the way it is laid out. It is a nice looking zone, but I didn’t like the feel of it. Foul Cascade can be found here, which is the zone’s dungeon instance. It is an interesting 5-man dungeon with some neat boss fights.

Next was Scarwood Reach. It is a large zone with a huge array of quests. I particularly liked the many quest variations to be had. I never felt bored running quests here. There was always something new around the corner.

Once Scarwood Reach is completed, you are left with quests that send you to both Moonshade Highlands and the Doughtlands. Both zones are designed for the same questing levels. I first went to Moonshade, but I soon developed a plan that I think made things easier and faster for me.

I was noticing that each time I came to a new quest hub that I was always two levels below the quests offered there. It was happening without fail. I don’t know if I was just being efficient or if the game was designed that way. Either way, since Moonshade and Doughtlands were of the same level range, I was able to get around that issue. I would run quests in Moonshade until I hit the next quest hub where the quests were higher level than me. I would then move to the Doughtlands where the quests would be the same level as me. I would run those quests until I hit another hub and then move back to Moonshade. Running quests of the same level made getting through them much easier and faster.

Of the two zones, I found the Doughtlands to be more fun. I had already seen many of the creatures that also inhabit Moonshade, whereas most of the creatures in Droughtlands were new to me. You will start in Lantern Hook, which is a city located inside a mountain.

My Paladin/Reaver/Warlord build continues to serve me very well. Alas, it appears as if the party will soon be over. Patch notes on the test server show that the Reaver soul is going to get hit with HUGE nerfs in the near future. There are many nerfs coming, but the one that burns me the most is that they are taking away the 9% heal for each creature killed. That is going to slow me down in a very big way. I’ve had so much fun with my AOE abilities, but it appears that Trion is taking all that fun away and replacing it with pain. It is a damn shame. I will post my experiences with it once it hits the live servers.

I am almost done with the Droughtlands and I have started a few quests in Shimmersand. More details to come.

Scarlet Gorge waterfall	Foul Cascade spider
Moonshade bay	Droughtlands scenery

Read More

Rift: Warrior Experiences

Posted by Wolfen in Rift

I never choose a warrior in the MMO’s that I play. I suppose that comes from my early Everquest days where a warrior did nothing but swing a sword, kick, and taunt. I found that to be rather boring. I usually play a DPS class of one kind or other. Rift, however, changes everything when it comes to how a tank class plays. The soul system allows me to experiment with many different styles of play. Because of this, I decided to play a warrior as my main character.

Just as the byline of this blog suggests, I am a casual player, so I wanted to make sure that I created a character that can solo efficiently. After combing through message boards, looking at other player’s warrior builds, I decided to start the game as a Paladin. My second soul would be Riftblade and my third would be a zero point Beastmaster. My thinking was that the Beastmaster pet would add extra DPS to the tanking soul of the Paladin. Click here to see the build I followed.

This combination served me well for most of my early life in Rift. My pet died more than I liked, but that was usually when I had multiple mobs attacking me. My survivability was very good, due in part because once you spend eight points in the Paladin soul, you get a complete heal that you can cast every 10 minutes. It saved my bacon many times. I would need to switch things around once I hit level 30 because the pet stops growing with me unless enough points are added to the Beastmaster soul.

Life got a bit more difficult as I approached level 30. I was needing to use a drink after many fights because I would get beat down so much. It slowed down my quest grinding. So, I decided to look around for another build that might work better for me. I am so glad that I did.

I switched to equal parts Paladin and Reaver with zero points in Warlord. My entire gaming experience changed with this build. It combines the tanking and direct damage abilities of the Paladin with the damage over time and AOE abilities of the Reaver. My killing ability went through the roof and my downtime was virtually non-existent.  The reason for this is the Reaver ability called Grisly Works. Once you put three points in it, you get healed 9% of your max health each time a mob dies. Add that to the fact that because of the exceptional AOE abilities of the Reaver, I am wasting my time unless I have at least three mobs on me. I kill them all and I am completely healed by the end of the fight. I love it. Click here to see this build.

It is a strange combination, with the Paladin’s life damage and the Reaver’s death damage, but they compliment each other very well. Along with questing, I have also tanked a few instances while using this build with very good results. Playing a tank has never been so much fun.

 

Read More

Rift: Gloamwood Area

Posted by Wolfen in Rift

Gloamwood is a dark, spooky place to visit. It reminds me of the World of Warcraft zone called Duskwood. The setting and ambiance are very similar. Gloamwood is full of ghosts, undead, and evil cultists, which will occupy most of your time.

The visuals in this zone are very nice. I want to compliment Trion on how great the game looks. While they took ideas from WoW, I much prefer the more realistic look of Rift over the cartoonish style of WoW.

The quest hub is the town of Gloaming Pines. It is fairly large, with plenty of buildings, shops, and trainers close to hand. It even has a huge tree that you get to visit via running up a street made of wood and rope. Be warned, however, if you make the journey to the top of the tree, that it is guarded by evil cultists that are higher level than most level appropriate players.

There is a huge number of quests in the Gloamwood area, but there is one in particular that I wish to mention. As you venture along the various quests, you’ll eventually get one that wants you to confront an evil hag that has been causing lots of trouble in the area. I fought my way through all the guards and entered her house. I confronted her and then she started talking some smack and then teleported me out of the house to a spot a good distance away.

I immediately realized that something was wrong. I was no longer human! The old hag had placed a curse on me that had turned me into a werewolf! To add insult to injury, I was now KOS to all NPC’s! I could not go to town, get or finish a quest, or train up my character.

 

As you might imagine, this made things rather difficult. Every now and then I would turn back into a human, but I would always change back into a werewolf. I suspect this transformation correlated with the day/night cycle in the game. I was given a hint that to break the curse I must either kill the hag or find someone in town to cure me. Going to town, however, was a tricky thing since I could change back into a werewolf in an instant.

So, long story somewhat shortened, I continued to run the quests I had and eventually got one that sent me to find and kill the hag (in a different and more difficult location than where I first met her). The curse lifted when she died. It is an interesting quest, but I found it to be annoying rather than fun.

You can also find the Deepstrike Mines instance in this area. A couple points of interest would be a huge werewolf boss fight where you need to keep him out of the moonlight, and a very large and nasty spider encounter.

Other than the werewolf problem, I enjoyed my time in Gloamingwood.

 

Read More