« Capped — Now What? | Home | I’m Kindled »
Age of Conan Kind of Rocks
By Cameron Sorden | May 5, 2008
Thanks to the generous Mr. Zenke, I’ve been exploring the AoC closed beta all weekend. My impressions are up at Massively as of this morning, but suffice it to say that I’m pretty impressed by what I saw. Maybe it’s just that I happened to have the right graphics card or maybe it’s the closed beta client, but I haven’t had any major issues with the game that made playing it problematic.
My favorite things about it: The story, setting, environments, and dialogue trees. My least favorite thing about it: having to reach over to the 4-0 keys all the time for combat abilities, or else having to learn a new control scheme. I suspect that will get better with time and practice. The game is a blast to play, though. I’m gonna be rolling a Dark Templar on release. I dig the whole tank/soloing/life-drain aspects of the class. I just wish I could be a Stygian, since I think the class fits them best and I think they look really cool. Sadly, I’ll probably just go with Cimmerian.
I also have a question for you hardcore PvP buffs who read my blog: I’m trying to decide whether I want to play on a PvP or a PvE server. In games where there’s open PvP, open communication between players, and no factions (which is what AoC seems to be), what usually happens with the PvP? Is there more or less of the random ganking like you see in WoW? I would expect less, since the players you’re ganking can actually communicate with you and it’s less encouraged to slaughter all your foes. Anyone wanna give me a little history lesson or some insight here? What happens with open PvP and open communication? Fun or not? Syncaine? Keen? Heartless? Anyone?
I’d really like to get on the same server as a lot of other bloggers, too — I think it’d be fun. Lets try to coordinate this as soon as we have a definitive server list for anyone who’s interested.
Topics: Age of Conan, community |
May 5th, 2008 at 12:05 pm
Well, I’m not a PvP expert, but I think we TTH folks will be playing together so you can always ask us which server we wind up.
I don’t think we’d mind having you along with us, Cam.
May 5th, 2008 at 12:09 pm
Are you guys rolling PvP or PvE?
May 5th, 2008 at 1:16 pm
You know… I hadn’t even thought to find out. Will get back to you. We’re just getting set up really since we don’t know server names or anything yet.
May 5th, 2008 at 3:18 pm
in Lineage 2, certain clans started to dominate the best leveling areas, however that game hoes close to 0 instances, so you might see something a bit different here.
But I’m quite sure that some sort of food chain will form here too.
May 5th, 2008 at 4:05 pm
I’m still torn on the decision to play or not. The game being designed for such high end systems is a real turn off for me. Additionally I have my doubts about the combat system and the seemingly WoWesque mundane questing. And lastly the fact that the NDA is still up 12 days from release… what are they hiding? Questions that need answers. Big time.
As for the PvE vs PvP servers the only difference is that PvP servers are FFA pvp everywhere. PvE servers restrict the pvp to mini-games and border kingdoms. So ask yourself whether or not you mind fighting against players as well as the game to level As Zaphid pointed out it’s a very popular practice to camp popular leveling spots and gank people. Is that something you want to put up with or even participat in yourself? Player and guild politics could also play a stronger role in the ffa servers. It’s just a lot more “unknown” variables if you play on a PvP server in AoC. Personally I’m leaning toward PvE, if I decide to get the game.
May 6th, 2008 at 11:14 am
I too have decided I will go ahead and pull the trigger on AOC. I only have access to the level 13 capped client, but I like the combat and the look of the game and everything else you mentioned so I am gonna play it when it comes out.
I don’t believe I would ever play on an open PVP server. Being able to communicate with opponents just means you’ll get to read official-wow-forum style dialogue before and after you gank or get ganked by somebody.
The standard PvE server with PvP zones and arenas will be fine for me, especially being a guardian. I always play a tank and they rarely have a great time going up against opponents with actual DPS…
Let us (me) know what server you end up on, because aside from myself and wifey I don’t know anybody else thats going to dive into AoC.
May 6th, 2008 at 11:58 am
I’ve been playing and keeping tabs on the game for over a year and a half now. One thing I will tell you is that I plan to roll on a PvP server. I usually play MMORPGs either solo or with a small group of RL friends, opting to stay away from large guilds altogether. However, based on the nature of Age of Conan, I actually decided to join up with a guild last November, before I had even stepped foot into a server.
I know that the guild I’m in is already setting up plans on zone and resource control. Basically, we plan to dominate certain areas that are strategic to building guild cities and battlekeeps, in an attempt to slow down our enemy guilds from accomplishing their goals.
In the end, if you want to survive and really get into the PvP part of AoC, you’ll want to roll on a PvP server. Otherwise, you’re basically paying full price for half the vision. Oh, and you’ll want to be grouped for longer journeys to avoid having to hide from large groups hunting for other players.
May 6th, 2008 at 12:05 pm
Ah. I will definitely be rolling on PvE then. I want a casual game where I don’t have to get super-involved in the community if I don’t want to — I have WoW for guilds and raiding.
May 6th, 2008 at 1:15 pm
Hey Alex, congratulations on scaring all of us carebears away from the PvP servers.
May 6th, 2008 at 1:24 pm
Hey Cam,
I believe we’re planning on PvE as we don’t want to be forced to roam protected all the time… you and I both know that we can’t always team up. Once I know more I’ll let you know. You’ve got my e-mail.
Cody and all those guys will be in-game. It should be a good amount of fun.
May 7th, 2008 at 12:28 pm
Meh, not sure what you found in the game. Personally, the controls are not something I would ever get used to. Button-smashing clickfests, which all AoC combat is currently, just are not something that can be adjusted to.
I just don’t see the draw of the game, especially concerning that the end-game stuff hasn’t even been put into the game yet and Funcom seems to be determined to throw up as many possible roadblocks to keep players away from it.
Launch will be a technical disaster for AoC. You are the first person that I’ve talked to that hasn’t had issues with the game. Even on my top end rig the choked out repeatedly.
I know I’m jaded, but no game has succeeded after launching amid cries from beta testers that the game is not at all ready to launch.
May 7th, 2008 at 12:48 pm
To be fair Heartless, a great deal of beta testers (myself included) are perfectly happy with the game.
And the combat is far from a button-mashing clickfest affair. From someone who plays as many FPS games as you do, I thought for sure you could handle it.
Not meant as a snark either, I’m just consistently surprised you found it not worth your time.
But then again, different strokes for different folks.
May 8th, 2008 at 3:36 am
I’ll be playing, but that has probably more to do with WoW burnout than with me really being all that excited with AoC. The most brilliant feature of AoC for me is the timing of its release, right after people got bored with the last WoW content patch, and way before WAR or WotLK come out. I don’t think AoC will survive the release of WAR and WotLK very well, but for now its a good alternative.
Definitely playing PvE, for the reasons that both the carebears and the PvP hardcore mentioned in these comments: hardcore PvP guilds will be able to dominate areas, and as a casual player I’d be run over if I tried to play on a PvP server. I find random ganking on WoW PvP servers bad enough, so players ganking others for the advantage of their guild will be unplayable for anyone outside a strong guild structure.
May 8th, 2008 at 7:31 am
PvP serves will probably suck in AoC. Random gank servers, as I like to call them, just don’t work any longer. Mostly because the “sheep” are given a choice to play on PvE servers and soon the “wolves” find out that its no fun without the sheep. That guild that “dominates an area” will soon find out it gets quite boring with no one else playing.
In WoW it was a bit different, as players went PvP under the impression that PvP servers were the only servers that would have PvP activities. Blizzard squashed that with BGs, arenas, PvP flags, etc. all being available to every server.
Bildo I am not sure how you are comparing the AoC combat to an FPS. The FPS games that I play are smooth, well-oiled machines. AoC is clunky, buggy, and absolutely painful to my wrists. In an FPS I am clicking a few times to get a kill here and there. In AoC I am clicking for twenty minutes straight to fight through some weakly scripted NPC encounters. And PvP… ROFL… spam faster noob. Then you flip over to a spell caster and back to normal
May 8th, 2008 at 7:45 am
LOL.
Well, that might just be our playstyles then. I don’t click the skills, I hit the hotkeys. To me it feels no different than managing my rogue or hunter in WoW. Lots of button pressing, but that’s what I like. It’s engaging.
It’s not really clunky (though I admit it’s buggy), I find it infinitely smoother than some other MMOGs out there (LotRO, TR, EQ2) which gave me trouble with the response time of skills.
Different tastes, Heartless… that’s what it comes down to.
May 9th, 2008 at 6:40 pm
My god.. I agree with Heartless on something. Afk while I go lay down.