Immersion – Some nice details and features
One of the interesting things I forgot to cover in the previous article is the level of immersion in the game. While this game is basically based on high fantasy, with its ornate cities and over-elaborate impractical armour and weapon designs, it still does attempt to keep the game immersive to a certain extent.
All NPC are placed in associated environment. Warehouse and Trade Brokers are behind desks and counters, surrounded by many crates and boxes. Merchants are in stores with merchandise. All these are nice touches.
All NPC will fight the enemy in the Abyss, even the quest givers. The downside is that they can actually be kited quite far away, although they smash through players quite quickly. You can be quite safe talking to quest givers in the Abyss.
One of the funny things about AION is how, when left to their own devices, they would perform some emotes. If it is raining, the Elyos toons take out a fern leaf to use as an umbrella. They fan the armpits in the desert, and yawn in boredom in the city. Emotes tends to be a little over the top, but it is high fantasy, after all.
Leveling and Classes – Looks like a little grinding in the horizon
Levels 1 to 20 will seem easy mode once you get into the higher levels. It took me one weekend to get from levels 1 to 20, and another extended weekend to get from level 20 to 25. I would imagine that all panned out, this game would take longer to level to max level than Pre-BC World of Warcraft and Age of Conan. I estimate 3 to 4 months of regular play several hours a day. Nowhere near as bad as many Korean MMORPG though.
There were ample quests from level 20-23, but the quests start to dry up before 25. I had to grind mobs for half of my level 23, and three quarters of my level 24. Grinding mobs is about downtime, so pairing up helps speed up the process, especially if one of the pair is a healer. I was playing my Chanter and could solo a level 26 mob at level 24 within 30-40 seconds, have no downtime, and move on to the next. Selecting mobs with lower armour ratings help a lot. Rumour has it that the best leveling duo is a Ranger and a Chanter, only time will tell.
The best PvE soloing classes would be the Spiritmaster and Chanter, from what I can see. The Spiritmaster can tank with their pet, while DoTing up the mobs. The Chanter can Parry and HoT tank normal mobs. What I like about the Chanter is that it is very cheap to maintain. I hardly use potions, unlike all other classes, which need to replenish their HP or MP frequently.
Stigma Stones – A missed opportunity
I read somewhere that the initial Stigma system was not intended to have class restrictions, it led to many OP possibilities which led to it being a dumbed down mechanic and a shadow of a typical Talent/Feat system. At level 25, I have two Stigma Stone slots. Each Stigma Stone gives you a skill, so you can marginally tweak your class by which of the skills you choose, the possibilities would be so much better if you had access to the Stigma Stones of other classes, but alas, they cannot balance it. A missed opportunity to have a headline feature for the game, like Guild Wars’ Primary and Secondary Profession system.
Together with weapon and armour choices, the manastones and Stigma Stones represent small differences between one player and the next of the same class. It can be dramatic if you stack most or all of the manastones of a same type. A Cleric with mostly +HP manastones is a lot harder but loses a lot of damage to one that stacks +Magic Boost.
Rifts – Awesome fun, but where is our cartographer?
One of the most interesting part of getting into the main level 20+ zones, Eltnen(Elyos) and Morheim(Asmodian), is that Rifts will open between the two zones. A hole appears in the sky with a conical beam that points towards the ground. If you go to where the beam is pointing, you will find a portal to travel between the two lands. Each rift is only one way, both entrance and exit rifts open at the same time, but in different places. Each rift has a fixed number of uses, and only allows a limited number of people through before they close. The problem is that it is hard to pinpoint where the beam is pointing towards. After a while, there should be people keeping watch of the various possible points where rifts appear.
Organised groups can send a large hunting party across the Rift into enemy territory to get some great PvP fun. There are also quests that take you individually to the enemy zones, and Infiltration quests asking you to perform tasks in the enemy lands. They are all good fun and lets one faction get a glimpse of the environment on the other side. Having played on the Elyos side all this time, it was refreshing to check out the snow covered and lava spewing zones in Asmodae.
The Rifts show the difference between the organisation and the lack thereof. We suffered several brutal lashings from large Asmodian Legions that worked together and killed people very fast. Mass PvP in this game is all about Assisting your target caller, you can take out players in mere seconds, so a large organised group can roll through a haphazardly put together defence of PuGs like a hot knife through butter. This is one thing that annoyed me about being on the Elyos side. It seems that all the PvP kiddies have gone to Asmodae, and I hope I will not be stuck in Elysea with only crafting and PvE-centric players. The lack of a global chat might actually make being an Asmodian palatable as you can minimise contact with hormonally imbalanced PvP kiddies while benefiting from their fervor.
The Abyss - Not many people made it through
If you think of Elysea and Asmodae as planets, you can think of the Abyss as a asteroid belt that lies between the two planets. It is what it visually looks like. Have jumppacks instead of wings, and you can reskin AION into a sci-fi planet hopping game. You heard it here first.
The Abyss is an all flying zone, with speed boost portals floating around. There are three levels that are accessible with special portals. The Elyos and Asmodians each control one asteroid in the lower layer to start, everywhere else is controlled by the Balaur.
The Balaur are a race of demonic beings that were created to watch over the planet, but turned malevolent. The humans fought the Balaur together, and it was the Cataclysm, a moment in history that tore the human race into the Asmodians and the Elyos, that the Balaur destroyed the physical links between the two halves of the world. They now rule the Abyss between Asmodae and Elysea, while the two human factions blame each other for allowing the Balaur to tear the world apart.
Mobs litter all the asteroids, as are quest givers. Most of the mobs are either made of the stuff of the asteroids, rock monsters, or ghosts of dead Elyos and Asmodians. The rest of the mobs are different minions of varying level controlled by the Balaur. Mobs start at level 27, which means level 25 characters can start playing in the Abyss and level there. The main problem with this particular beta event was that people took so long to get to level 25 that there were not many people in the Abyss, although we did get some PvP done there.
Fortresses and Artifacts – PvPvE
The main point to the Abyss are the several Fortresses and Artifacts that dot the larger asteroids. While the Abyss is all flying, the Fortresses have a force field that kills flyers. This is a mechanic to force the raids onto the ground. The players have to besiege the Fortress and destroy the force fields on foot. Then make their way into the depths of the Fortress to kill the main bosses in there. They would then claim control of the Fortress. I assume the Fortresses would be open to attacks from Balaur and Asmodians from then on.
Each Fortress has a few Artifacts around it. They need to be claimed individually. Each Artifact can be activated to become some sort of weapon of mass destruction. I saw all these in cut scenes. Whether these mechanics are fun or prone to abuse will ultimately make or break this game, since it is the main highlights. If people do not enjoy themselves in the Abyss, there is not much that sets AION apart from other games.
Abyss Points and the Legion – Might be elitist but intriguing
On top of the regular experience points you get from killing monsters, and the regular 1-50 leveling system, there are also Abyss points and Abyss levels. Ordinarily, this would be seen as PvP Exp, but the interesting thing is that you get Abyss Points for killing mobs and doing quests in the Abyss.
They saw it fit to tag the Legion (Guild) progression to the Abyss Points. The Legion needs to earn Abyss Points and pay kinah (in-game currency) in order to add extra member slots, and to rise in ranks. This will lead to an even more extreme elitist behaviour for top guilds, and everyone would be forced to PvP or risk PvP in the Abyss in order to progress. Abyss Points can also be redeemed for gear.
This encourages PvP, but it might just mean lots of non-stop zerg PvP, not quite sure if that is my cup of tea. I prefer something structured that requires a bit of brainwork like Guild Wars Alliance Battles and Heroes’ Ascent. We’ll see how it pans out. Every player has a stake, which may weed out casual players, for good or for ill.
Screenshots
Here I am grinding my way to level 25. I look less noob now.
Here is an example of a mob that you can encounter in the Abyss. Besides Asmodians, the Abyss has mobs as well. From the elite Balaur and their minions, to monsters made from the shards of the Abyss to the ghosts of Asmodians and Elyos.
Here is how you travel from one level of the Abyss to another, through special portals.
The majority of the environment in the Abyss looks like some sort of hell. This is a scene straight out of a Ma Rong Cheng comic book. The armies of the Balaur control most of the Abyss.
More hellish environments and their inhabitants.
Its not all doom and gloom in the Abyss, a few places are quite pictureseque. Here is the Elyos home base with its giant peach tree. What’s up with North East Asians and peach trees?
This is taken from the cut scenes introducing us to the Abyss. Players have to wrestle control of fortresses from the Balaur, and we get siege machines to help us. This is the equivalent of a raid.
And that would be the end boss of the raid. I think its going to be a wipe.
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