Holyssa Posted July 8, 2008 Share Posted July 8, 2008 (edited) Heyo folks. With WotLK coming up, it's tough to find something outside of the usual WoW grinds to occupy oneself. So Holy thought she'd try out Funcom's MMO entry, Age of Conan. And no - Holy ain't quitting WoW. It is my life & hobby. If anything, I tinker with AoC for maybe an hour or so when the chance arises & that's it. The following is a little summary of what this nerdy pally went through in it's first few weeks while exploring this new, bloodthirsty boob-enriched world...just so you don't have to "Getting the Ball Rollin" The starting zone isn't all that bad - it's very solo-friendly, and the quests are as basic as they get, with a few exceptions (like killing 30 damned NPCs in a public dungeon). Tortage was designed well, familiarizing yourself with the game's basics, while still providing a few laughs via general idiocy through chat channels. I personally picked the Wiccania server, since the only RP servers available were RP-PvP only. Screw that ######. And just my luck: Wiccania just happens to be the game's "unofficial" RP server. Why? Dunno. But the people were very nice, and much like WoW - you can find it if you look in the right places. Once you hit L20 and do your "destiny" quest (which rewards you with some kickass blues), you're tossed into the 100% multiplayer portion of the game, beginning with your race's capitol (Khemi, Old Tarrantia, or Cimmeria). There's a crapton of easy lowbie quests to get one started, but my God, this game needs more dungeons. The lowest one is around L35-ish (Sanctum of Burning Souls), and is on-par with Deadmines if you were to compare it to WoW standards. I went in at L37, and loot was very generous to all who went in (I myself walked out with 4 upgrades and a plethora of quests). Group quests outside the dungeons were no joke. Whereas a decently geared player could solo elites in WoW with little trouble, elites WILL wreck you in seconds regardless of class & spec makeup. A L35 mob (who is grey to my L63 character) can still dish out enough damage to make you hesitantly look for potions in order to survive. Perhaps this was done to prevent instance farming, since some items will last you a very long time. Levelling isn't all that bad, despite the cap being at 80. Mobs and quests will FEED you XP, but money is very scarce until you see your first BoE blues. I didn't get my mount until L55, after finally saving the exact 3g needed for the animal & training (FYI - 3g is equal to 300g in WoW numbers). Questing has begun to suck during endgame, with a good portion of grinding done via dailies & wanted poster stuff, but is slowly picking up as I crawl past the mid 60s. "You're Doing it Wrong!" Classes are something I'm still not totally familiar with, but they are amusing to compare and play with. My first was the Priest of Mitra, since I was tired of rolling a plate-wearing badass like I first did in WoW many moons ago. And besides, everyone loves a smart healer - how could things go wrong? Mother of Christ on a pogo stick. Never have I seen such an imba class, even for a clothie. It can AoE like a mage (with knockbacks!), stack HoTs like a resto druid on some kind of gizmo-crack, has plenty of defenses via shields & light armor (leather?), and packs as much punch as an endgame WoW rogue, even when I was in common white gear. The class has only gotten one nerf, but I can see why people QQ like madmen. I think I'm in love. I'm able to easily juggle 8 mobs at once and not break a sweat, but it eats up mana like popcorn...kinda like a *gasp* Paladin in cloth. Healing isn't too hard, but no more insta-heal spamming like most games: you have a HoT (big), a HoT with a nice mana-regen proc, and a huge heal with a 1 minute cooldown that also roasts nearby foes via holy damage. Keeping people alive could easily be done in one's sleep, since heals can stack almost endlessly. "WTB Raid (can)" Bugs. This game has em in spades, sadly. All new titles have them, it cannot be helped. But how bad is it? Look at Funcom's forums, and there's so many tears flowing, you'll probably drown. People still claim the game is a "beta out of the box", but it has it's moments. I was able to solo a 6-man boss due to a faithful glitch which placed me in perma-combat, but had the mob staring off into space...got an amazing bunch of blues for my troubles. And some pulls of 4 to 6 mobs come one-by-one even if you run right at them Leeroy-style. You figure barbarians & bandits would be a bit more...well, territorial. I even managed to bug out a mighty Tier 1 raid boss named Yakhmar with some quick hill climbing, but I did not have what it took to solo the mighty worm due to me being a lowly L54 at the time (raid bosses are L100 FYI...the skull next to it's name doesn't fark around). Got him to about 98% after what...half an hour? Screw this. (click his name for a pretty, yet scary look at this Onyxia wannabe). *gets eaten* ..I'll be back! *shakes fist* The environment itself can play some nasty tricks too. People magically fall through floors & bridges (hello waterfall, meet my face), mobs have insane-fast repop rates (one dungeon had them on a 2 minute timer), and some stats are totally broken (WTF mana regen). Mobs will also sometimes refuse to reset, chasing you all the way across a zone until guards steamroll them into oblivion. And if you're clever enough, you can wallclimb to practically any outdoor goal you want, bypassing hours of mindless clearing & grinding to get that extra mob. Seriously, don't companies test this stuff? "What has been seen cannot be UNSEEN!" Visuals...hot damn. This game is gorgeous, even with my measly 3 gigs of ram and on the default/semi crappy settings. I had to lower particle effects by a bit, as zerging mobs in groups began to drag my machine down a bit in terms of framerate, and the client is plagued by the occasional crash/memory leak. It doesn't lag as bad as one thinks, but the better your rig, the more enjoyable things become. Even water looks amazing, but once you dive down, it looks like thick Kool-Aid for some reason. MY EYES!! The sound & music is very relaxing, but some songs grow annoying very fast, like the dramatic music that plays when you even so much as sneeze at a named/boss mob. Voice acting is very well done, but it only shows up for specific lore characters. Fatalities are awesome. While the Priest fatality is kinda boring looking (it's a beam of light that looks like alien invaders took a mobs soul), some are really nice, like when a tank impales someone on their sword, and kicks the body to the floor. They even provide some amazing buffs. Boobs. Yes, it has them in spades. Even a Jewelcrafting lady in one town stands topless as you try so hard to look at the starting quest she gives you, as opposed to her own...treasures. WTS shirt. Over time though, you grow used to seeing them. And no mailbox dancers here, since all the item swapping/buying is done via tradepost NPCs. "It Could be Worse" Overall, AoC isn't bad, but Funcom has to get it's crap together. It's not a bad escape from WoW if you want a new game to play on the side, but I'd still save your money for Warhammer. This game is still taking baby steps as far as I'm concerned, and Funcom still has a lot of work to do before it can do any real ankle-biting on it's own as a viable WoW competitor. When I have the time, I'll post some screenies to share. I'm trying to take just enough to make a "day in the life of..." kind of reply. EDIT: here's a link to AoC's forums for those who want to know just how strong the current of tears is: http://forums.ageofconan.com/index.php. Watch what you click though...while there isn't anything nasty like keyloggers, lots of links are NOT work safe (*COUGH*tits*COUGH*). Edited July 9, 2008 by Holyssa Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Perthes Posted July 8, 2008 Share Posted July 8, 2008 If I didnt know that this was AoC.. id say it was Anarcy Online all over again... and from what I just read.. it sounds like a AO clone for sure but without the Assault Weapons or Laser Swords FC had much of the same problems as AO had in the start as AoC seems to be having.. You would think that they had learned from their former MMO.. But from what Ive seen and read it does look amazing. But then again looks can be deceiving.. I hope that yes FC gets their crap together and dont ruin the world of Conan. Personally i dont wanna touch another FC game... So im gonna keep to WoW and work on my new Fury Warrior(54) and Shadow Priest(11) where its fun hehe. Thank you Holyssa for your long and interesting post about AoC Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Martok Posted July 8, 2008 Share Posted July 8, 2008 Great review Holy. I was wondering how the game was to play, and did not want to bother trying it out in all honesty. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nawt Posted July 9, 2008 Share Posted July 9, 2008 Awsome post there HolyOne! I too was curious and rather tempted to check it out. Being that I am a sole Linux user now, I just didn't want the hassle of trying to force it to play nice with penguins. Especially for the 50 bucks it retails for? However, if you do come across any trial keys/share a friend pass and no one else wants it, I'd love to check it out. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Martok Posted July 9, 2008 Share Posted July 9, 2008 Being that I am a sole Linux user now Wow. You must hate yourself. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Holyssa Posted July 9, 2008 Author Share Posted July 9, 2008 If I didnt know that this was AoC.. id say it was Anarcy Online all over again... and from what I just read.. it sounds like a AO clone for sure but without the Assault Weapons or Laser Swords FC had much of the same problems as AO had in the start as AoC seems to be having.. You would think that they had learned from their former MMO.. But from what Ive seen and read it does look amazing. But then again looks can be deceiving.. I hope that yes FC gets their crap together and dont ruin the world of Conan. Personally i dont wanna touch another FC game... So im gonna keep to WoW and work on my new Fury Warrior(54) and Shadow Priest(11) where its fun hehe. Thank you Holyssa for your long and interesting post about AoC Give Funcom a few months, and Tier 3 raiding itemization will be full of lightsabers & flaming shoulderpads just like WoW has. Most endgame gear looks like togas, Roman infantry armor, or ninja costumes, but then again PvE progression is wonky where I am (only two total raid boss kills, both done via heavy exploiting because of massive add-spawning bug errors, and impatient basement monkeys who simply MUST get server firsts -_- ). Have a look at this page I found from an endgame AoC guild called Dread, which has Tier 1 raid stats (note: loot spoilers! Don't click if you want to be surprised): http://www.dread-guild.com/viewtopic.php?f=17&t=618 Friggin' PRIEST cloth has +melee damage on it. Many pieces have silly stats like +run speed (which is marginally noticeable), knockback resistance, and +attack rating for melee as well. It's kinda like when Blizzard used to add +spirit in bulk to pre-BC mage gear, but still...*sigh* Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Holyssa Posted July 29, 2008 Author Share Posted July 29, 2008 Sorry this took so long, but with Funcom's neverending nerfbat swinging (rofl, dishonerable kill system), I finally had the time to hit the Uninstall button and kill this poorly disguised shagfest. But as promised, I took some photos before dragging the game out back & whacking it. Enjoy!! Even with a crappy video card, Hyboria doesn't look TOO bad. Here's Old Tarantia with the default settings: http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v185/maj..._picture004.jpg Quite possibly the greatest quest item known to man. http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v185/maj..._picture000.jpg Here's what Guild Recruitment posts usually look like: it's a mini hotlink that opens in a new window. http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v185/maj..._picture005.jpg Robynn was probably the brightest person in the chat channel at the time... http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v185/maj..._picture006.jpg After a good hour of battling snakes, half-naked thieves, warlocks, and giant komodo dragons, I save...a dog? http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v185/maj..._picture001.jpg Tradeposts are all-in-one banks, mailboxes & Auction Houses. Oh, the spam flows like water too. http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v185/maj..._picture007.jpg I wonder if he sells Feral Druids... http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v185/maj..._picture010.jpg Wanna travel? Walk, sail, or ride. No exotic birds or portals here. Notice there's two ways to say "no" to the rather nice ferryman http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v185/maj..._picture011.jpg This doesn't look very protective. She's actually wearing pre-raid blues. http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v185/maj..._picture012.jpg I'd Sap that. http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v185/maj..._picture008.jpg My priest experiences a feeling of deja vu... http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v185/maj..._picture013.jpg "Kalgan, please don't nerf me next pa--wait a minute..." http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v185/maj..._picture014.jpg You think WoW has crappy servers? Check THESE numbers out! http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v185/maj..._picture015.jpg Holyssa can SO take him on. http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v185/maj..._picture016.jpg A closeup of the King. Obviously he's got epix. http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v185/maj..._picture017.jpg It took 2 minutes to grab this f**king plant because the collision box is so small. http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v185/maj..._picture018.jpg This robe is amazingly made, but it's not for my class. "Tier-0" gear like this scales with level, so if you want an upgraded version, you gotta go back & farm it again. http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v185/maj..._picture019.jpg Resource zones - take Un'goro, jam-pack it with nodes, and watch CGFs drool in unison. http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v185/maj..._picture020.jpg This funny little stone is a placeholder for a guild city. Farm a fortune, build it, and QQ as people steamroll it in seconds. http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v185/maj..._picture022.jpg "Do you feel a draft out here?" http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v185/maj..._picture023.jpg The Oasis is one of 3 instances that scale with level. Even the critters (see below) can pose a problem! http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v185/maj..._picture024.jpg This guy is one of many solo-able 6-man bosses due to pathing glitches. Took me 10 minutes to defeat him with just my crossbow alone. http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v185/maj..._picture025.jpg Next stop: Azeroth! I think... http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v185/maj..._picture027.jpg Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
itcrystal Posted December 1, 2009 Share Posted December 1, 2009 Find a good place to buy aoc gold, aoc powerleveling, aoc cdk. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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