Avoid the Slippery Slope

[Thicklesip]

Hrm. To revisit difficulty versus challenge, I've been thinking about the crystals system. I think it's a semi-challenging system: there's complexities, but nothing horribly illogical, and once you know the rules it's very straight-forward. There's an element of challenge in picking out the best crystals for your needs at the moment, and you can swap them around all you want-- so new situations can always present chances for tweaking. Actually getting your crystals falls under difficulty, since there's no way to out-"skill" the RNG. Regardless, I feel that the crystal system is pretty good: it works better the more experienced and knowledgeable you are.

The problem, and where I think the trouble lies for newbies, is that there is no fast and easy way to explain the rules. You can summarize it ok in a paragraph, but to explain it in enough detail to avoid confusing newbies or making them shriek in outrage 15 minutes later when they discover something you skipped/glossed over/didn't mention all the minutiae of... you have to Wall O' Text them. And I like how complex the system is, I really do, but every single newbie either has to laboriously trial-and-error their way through it (and there will be lots of trials and error) or else ask to simply be told how it works-- and get thunked over the head with Frith-Rae's Big Book.

Which, I think, would be ok, but this is a single relatively minor system/mechanic. You don't get Wall O' Texted about crystals and have no more questions for the day. You still need to learn about techniques, about how gear works, about how the sweet baby Drulkar fighting things works-- hint: first 20 hours of combat are probably going to be confused flailing-- how the heck you level your crafts, why you'd bother, and hey, what are these training point things, and speaking of how much do I like any of these statstics I'm increasing, and could someone please explain how defenses work because I tried to read the sticky about it but one level 100 dragon later I still have no idea beyond "stack wards and resists at the same time, surely at least one of them will apply."

And arguably, I know what I'm doing. I don't pretend I'm an expert and given how this game is paced I don't EXPECT to be an expert. It's ok if I'm still learning new things a year from now. But a lot of games these days try to put the challenge into going from playing at 90% to playing at 100%-- not learning the first 90% in the first place, the way this game does. Asking new players who weren't raised in EverCrack-style MMOs (motto: "Stockholm Syndrome is what we aim for!") to spend so long just trying to learn what they're doing at all seems like a losing proposition to me.

That, and I'm starting to wonder if having to babysit people for a week lest they get frustrated by apparently doing everything wrong isn't leading to a horrible cycle of dependency. If you get through the first 14-day trial of the game by having to have your hand held the entire way-- because everything is new, and confusing, and comparatively punishing of your ignorance, and there's all these helpful oldies who are willing to carefully guide you-- it doesn't make a newbie feel like a contributing member, or someone who can stand on their own. I remember coming back to the game about a year back, and despite having a pretty solid grasp of how everything worked (at least for a fresh character) I spent my first 7-8 months very, very distressed by how powerless I felt, especially in the face of all the towering ancients of the server. People were willing to help me at pretty much every turn, and I sincerely appreciated it, but I was so frustrated by how many things I even wanted to ask for help for in the first place. And it wasn't just that I needed help for everything fancier than the latest series of adventure grind quests, it was that there was nothing I could do to repay them. Coin's basically worthless, although with the loot revamp I have my fingers crossed that no longer will hatchlings try to offer me their paltry life's savings (which amount to the coin I make for sneezing near a pawnbroker) in exchange for some trivial amount of work on my part that revolutionizes the game for them. Construction work is something the oldest oldies will happily accept-- if they don't need it, I bet they have friends who do-- but if you're in a position to offer construction materials, you're probably not living in desperate powerlessness. Tech comps? Like coin, if a lowbie has it, an oldie probably has a hundred times as much rotting in storage.

I think the tipping point where I finally felt like a contributing member of the community instead of another hatchling-shaped parasite was when I finished buying the tech comps I wanted for my "final" adventuring scales. They included a number of harder-to-get materials that I really didn't want to go try to get-- so I asked around and poked the people I knew and found comp hunters who had it or could get it and would be happy to relieve me of some of my excess coin for the privilege. The bill wasn't huge, but it was substantial enough that it didn't feel like a token pat on the head. It was the first time I felt like I could actually repay someone for what they done, instead of having to nebulously promise "when I'm bigger, someday" or that I'd pay it forward. Finally, I wasn't scurrying among the ankles of giants, I was walking among them! Granted, not exactly at the same level-- the rampaging uberpeds and twenty-lair ancients are still way more awesome at this game than I am by most conventional measures. But it was liberating to deal with them roughly as equals, as opposed to begging for handouts.

And this is all coming from a player who is irrationally independent, in long-term love with the game, and sufficiently terrified of being a pimple of the community's butt to at least give try to stand on my own, even when I think that I'll mess up, or fall short of doing it perfectly, or blah blah blah. What about all the new players who show up completely unprepared for this much challenge, or are naturally clingy? What if they don't come here in love enough with the game to stick with it, despite the learning curve and the small size and all the little bugs?


Ok, ok, in case you can't bear to read all of that (I don't blame you!):

• I think the initial learning curve might be a bit steep, although I certainly like how deep the game is over all.
• I wonder if making the oldies act as such superheroes for fresh players might be undermining their willingness to later stand on their own two feet.

...I think I'm done for now (for all our sakes).

[Veruliyam]

I read it all! I read it all!!

*thud* Zzz...

~ Aucapoma

[Dragonboy]

Trophies do not fall out of the sky and once their value drops in half they are not that great. If someone wants to burn them all day long to get ratings like that then I say go right ahead.

Because I was bored with doing real adventuring with my alt I gathered trophies. 50 trophies per quest that the NPC offered and it brought me straight to the next list of quests... Not gathering 2000 trophies of 1 mob, just 50 trophies for 10 quests per mob at full experience.

Even story-wise it makes sense that a Biped who IS Gifted has the time on their hands to progress their abilities to near God-Hood and that this is the real EDGE they have up on the WA.

By using Trophies? Why do you think that the Dragon Techniques were probably added.

You have just one Adv Class which if you go Melee has some powerful One Hit Kill (though they hit multiple times with one use) moves, plenty of HP, Plenty of Defense, and full Armor Usage. They also come with great AoE skills and Spells and even very fine and usable healing abilities and spells. So they have a nice mix of everything you need to be successful with just one class.

Yeah yeah we are a nice hybrid with lots of HP, lots of “natural” armor but we only have 1 scale slot open when we start the game. Dragons cannot use a full set of scales till lvl 90… So no… not full Armor Usage. The only Healing Ability that dragons get very early is Refreshing Breeze, which indeed is probably the best ability in the whole game, but it does not stack with Quickening breeze, Rejuvinating Breeze and Breeze, Primal Instant Heal is a quest only ability unlike the Cleric version which is granted nearly the moment you enter the school. Primal Health is a addition of later years thank the gods of Istaria, before that dragon heals were too few.

On the crafting front they are INSANELY easy by comparison doing everything it would have taken a Ped many many classes to do in just TWO.

Crafting is as freaking dull as any biped craft school. Lairshaping is more like a bipeds Tinkering School, complex and loads of resource variations. Bipeds collect a gazillion bars and make sheets out of them for their plots… BORING!!!

[LOVWYRM]

I read it all Thickle.
Very well spoken! As usual.
Makes me think .
But what else to do- if pampering is not the silver bullet/not appreciated?

[Frith-Rae]

Well if that isn't enough I wonder what is... Tier 1 and 2 have plenty of quests, the CD website gives plenty of information needed to learn the game in case newbies ignored the tutorial in the beginning. There is only so much the elders can do apart from dropping all we wish to do and create alts to hold the newbies by hand and do quests with them day in day out.

I quoted this, and wanted to add that I know Thickle was talking about this as well -

To me its not enough to say "go to a website." A game's survivability or a new players abiliyt to comprehend the game should NOT be "happy" that it relies on older players explaining things, or basically requires you to go to a third party website to understand what you need to do.

I mean heck even understanding BACKPACK and DISK options requires a flowchart! LOL

Yes, these are good resources. But to me, making the game "newbie friendly" (not easier..) should mean such knowledge should be find-a-ble somewhere on newbie island, or at a trainer, or library, or something. Several games now-a-days have "lore books" and such, ways that you can put in game the at least basic information about options and what's availabile. Even if the more "in depth" information is on a 3rd party system or reliant on friendly elder players.

In short - we (or the devs) should NOT be "content" that "well this takes care of it and that's good enough". This is I would venture to say exatly why people don't realize the complexity and variety of the game - and why pepole quit early on in frustration. If I've had to spend every night in game as a newb having various systems explained to me, I'm going to logout frustrated and overwhelmed.

People do like to figure things out on their own, move at their own pace - and believe it or not there's ahuge chunk of players out there who do not WANT ot have to rely on a website to tell them where/what/how of a game. They consider that as "dumbing down" as you guys consider quest-icons on a map.

But that doesnt' mean the information can be easily accessible in game, and even fit with "lore" or the "Feel" of the game itself.

(plus not everyone can run in windowedmode and alt tab out to read things on a website..)

I think its great that the game is so complex you need the "Big Book" to even remember half of it.

I think it sucks that there's a population that thinks this is "sufficient" to keep the game afloat for years to come - we need to not be satisfied with what is in place, and push for this information to be readily available without alt-tab and without encyclopedia-player being online.

I mean when I started it was a slow trickle of information, half the complexity in the game now wasn't even around - (you didn't have 35 different backpacks and disks to choose from for example, and things were easily findable on the connie or from guilds which were all busy and active) - but now, 7 years later, so much is built upon so much else.

Seriously its mindboggling!

[Dragonboy]

I agree that things have changed through these years from which my main character has been present on for nearly 6.5 years.
In the old days when I first started playing with Rvlion on the EU – Wind server the old tutorial on spirits Island was bad beyond say in comparison to what new players have to deal with, While I appearently was smart and manage to figure out that my abilities were supposed to be placed on a hotkey within approximately 1 hour. The fact that some do not take the time to actually finish or read anything in the tutorial says more about the player then the game itself.

Original source: http://www.cad-comic.com/cad/20070205

While in general things in this game have only become better through the years I must also admit that the tutorials I went through while playing LoTRO, CoV were better in explaining to me the general gameplay. Nonetheless the tutorial is sufficient enough to teach players that want to play this game all the necessary skills…
I went through Skalkaar on 5 occasions, 1 time on Blight, 1 time on Order and 3 times on Chaos. Also I went through the Biped Spirits Island 3 or 4 times as well, the whole adventure quests in the biped schools are in general the same, but it does force you to use special abilities and as such search for there location.

[AmonGwareth]

While in general things in this game have only become better through the years I must also admit that the tutorials I went through while playing LoTRO, CoV were better in explaining to me the general gameplay. Nonetheless the tutorial is sufficient enough to teach players that want to play this game all the necessary skills…
I went through Skalkaar on 5 occasions, 1 time on Blight, 1 time on Order and 3 times on Chaos. Also I went through the Biped Spirits Island 3 or 4 times as well, the whole adventure quests in the biped schools are in general the same, but it does force you to use special abilities and as such search for there location.

The tutorial tells you where those abilities are, opens the window for you, and even tells you how to move it to the hotkey bar so that you can use it.

[Thicklesip]

I definitely feel that a lot of people harbor an unnecessary hatred of reading the provided instructions, whether it's for the basics of using your new appliance or how to manage the simplest things in a new game. When the tutorial covered it and it's something that's not even too confusing (the concept of "drag an ability from your ability repository to your bar of quick-access keys" is not exactly new or unusual at this point) my opinion tends to rest firmly on "RTFM and leave me alone."

The problem is when it's something too complicated or in-depth for the tutorial to cover, that is best explained in a paragraph or two or three. A few mechanics like that would be ok, especially if they were paced so you reached them gradually, but when there's a bunch of complex things to explain towards the start while you're ALSO still near the Reading Of The Manual phase... this game is social and the players are nice, so asking them for at least a place to look up the information is reasonable. Only you have to keep asking (or keep going to the wiki or whatever) and a newbie's confidence is likely to erode.

I really wish I could think of an obvious solution. Adding or beefing up non-tutorial in-game information vendors (do those book pavilions I've seen on Skalkaar and New Trismus really work? Hmm) and/or pointers towards said informants might do something. Dunno. Must think about it.

[Shinkuu]

I read it all. I fully agree with the issue of feeling worthless. Many ask me "Why don't you have guildies or others do this or make that for you?" all the time... That is the very reason WHY. Because I do not want to feel like a leech. I cannot repay them in any real way. I have NOTHING they could possibly want because they are at the end of the game and do not want anything anymore.

So instead of dealing with being a parasite I changed my tact. Instead I leeched KNOWLEDGE off of others as much as possible but tried to DO everything for myself. (with the help of my mate of course) I have been successful and being able to do it all with my tiny 2 person team does make me feel a lot better. It is also neat when I can do things that older players cannot.

Just today I made Niveus a teched Withered State II. He could not make it for himself even with his uber Dragon Alts because they did not have the spell and techs for it. Zarla having outfitted Shinkuu DID have these and she was able to do it no problem. I did not need any repayment and Niv's player has helped me out before many a time but it was fun being able to ACTUALLY do something for her that she honestly needed done.

So once you get past the enormous hurdle of the beginning of the game things can get much better but it is quite an initial hurdle. It takes forever to learn what quests you can do, where you can get them, and what they give you... That part is a little rough.

Also, I had much less issues with this MMO compared to probably 80% of players because I had played MANY MMORPG's before Istaria. I was already well trained and it was just a matter of finding out what was DIFFERENT about Istaria. A Brand New Player to MMO's would REALLY struggle to survive in Istaria in my opinion. It would seem like an insurmountable cliff side that required them to scale it in order to even function.

[Dhalin]

I read it all. I fully agree with the issue of feeling worthless. Many ask me "Why don't you have guildies or others do this or make that for you?" all the time... That is the very reason WHY. Because I do not want to feel like a leech. I cannot repay them in any real way. I have NOTHING they could possibly want because they are at the end of the game and do not want anything anymore.

This right here is what gets me.

Now, God knows that I am very grateful towards the people who have helped me on Order, but they also know that I don't like having to rely upon the charity of others.

One thing I really wish they'd change in this game, is make things a little more accessible oneself, instead of needing charity donations from everyone else. Given that there's very little-to-no market in-game, money doesn't mean much of anything and it never will. The low-level players continue to have not enough of it to buy their forms/techs, while the endgame players have more than they know what to do with.

Those who got their forms/techs with tokens and such, who are at endgame now, already have most (if not all) of their forms/techs, the new "money sink" doesn't apply to them. However, newbies are now faced with mountains of coinage needed (seriously, 40s+ for some T3 formulas!?). The junk drops might help that a little, but meh. I seriously doubt it is going to make 40s+ farmable in a reasonable amount of time.

Since everything takes so dang long, everyone wants to find optimal ways of doing it -- I understand completely. But unfortunately for us, said "optimal" ways involve Techs. Even with the recent revamps to loot tables, some techs I'm hearing are far too difficult to obtain, due to intentionally rare drops. They think it is OK to have to kill 20, 30, 50 mobs to gain a couple comps. What they Don't realize, is nobody likes doing that, especially not when they are mid-level and trying to get to where the action is, at the "endgame", where they can help similar-level players with stuff, instead of being a leech full-time.

If you don't use techs, things take a ridiculous amount of time to complete, whether it is the slow slow kills as a biped without tech'd gear, or trying to gain craft levelups (it can take up to half an hour to get 10% of a level.. yay for spending 5 hours to gain one level!) in certain crafts. I'm not talking about construction here, either.

I just....

Sometimes I think that the playable dragon is the -only- reason I even have two subs to this game, and with RL problems coming up, I may find myself re-evaluating such, especially with other games out there that are not as grindy, and/or do a better job of masking the grind behind variable tasks that go beyond sitting back half-asleep while watching my character's digging animation while occasionally navigating them to the next node. Or sitting down in the same spot to kill mob after mob after mob after mob of the same type. Whether it is 50 golems, or 50 ruxus or 50 beetles, it doesn't matter, the mob just looks a little different.

[LOVWYRM]

I really love your input here, folks
some even made me lol- thy for that comic, Rv

Amon, the tutorials are very good! I see no reason to change them atm.
I assume the probs start, when the new players leave the starter islands.

Having read all you wrote: How about Istarian Universities (one for each tier?) where new (returning players) can learn from numerous npc- teachers what there is important to know to proceede.
The incredible knowledge that Chasing put together for us, could be the content of teaching.

Or let taverns be universities too: While you wait for your dps to fade- do something useful and learn about Istaria (beside others- why you gained so much dp)

[AmonGwareth]

I would like to point out that there is a very wide and vast difference between teaching a player to play the game and teaching a player to min-max the game. You don't need to know the optimal backpack to have at level X unless you are trying to min-max. You just need to know that you CAN upgrade your backpack. The best way to do that imho is through quests.

However, upgrading the backpack or cargo disk and that sort of thing is honestly secondary to learning the basics of the game. As many have said the game is already overloading players with information. Most games do, actually, but its a matter of easing players into it slowly.

The real trick with Istaria is that a) players can join a trade school right at the start and b) players can join any adventuring school they wish right at the start. These two things alone make the game FAR more complicated to learn than something more simple such as WoW or EQ2 where you choose your class during character creation and aren't introduced to a trade-skill until you are out of the first few levels.

We do appreciate your feedback on all of this, but the key point is that when developing tutorials and early game experience you can't think about it as someone who already knows everything... "well, they'll need to know X or Y if they want to succeed". You have to think about it as "what would i need to know to simply play and have fun as quickly as possible". Introducing them to more complex stuff, such as techniques, such as vaults and backpacks and cargo disks, or ability mastering, is guaranteed to overwhelm players.

Currently the progression goes kind of like this..

• Spirit Isle/Skalkaar - Introduction to movement, communication, inventory and equipment, abilities, quests, basic combat, gaining levels, basic trade skills (tools, gathering, formulas, making something).
• New Trismus - More quests, more types of trade-skills, vaults, consigner and pawnbrokers, more advanced levels, new types of monsters.
• Lesser Aradoth - More quests, more trade-skills, construction, plots, trophies and town marshals, death.
• Dalimond Peninsula - Cargo Disks, more quests, prestige schools.

So, thats kind of the progression at the moment. I may have left out a few things. But, as you can see we've tried to spread things out a bit so that players have time to learn the basics without getting too bombarded (though it can and does happen).

By the way, not sure if you have been on Blight and noticed, but we introduced a new option on the Star Menu, Tutorials. We've got a page that lets you go back to some tutorials again. And we'll have the Information Center tutorials there as well (though we're still working on the General Information one).

[Diput]

I would like to point out that there is a very wide and vast difference between teaching a player to play the game and teaching a player to min-max the game. You don't need to know the optimal backpack to have at level X unless you are trying to min-max. You just need to know that you CAN upgrade your backpack. The best way to do that imho is through quests.

Thank you Amon! I was just about to post the same thing but you have done it much more eloquently. This is the biggest problem that I see with the responses to questions from new players - Too Much Information. A new player doesn't need to know all about every formula, tech, spell, skill, backpack, disc, etc. Just point them to the consigner with a hint to check regularly for new stuff they might be able to use. Leave some room for discovery.

[Dragonboy]

some even made me lol- thy for that comic, Rv

Your welcome…
In a way I found it appropriate to this thread and the reaction I wanted to place about a certain category of players...

One thing I really wish they'd change in this game, is make things a little more accessible oneself, instead of needing charity donations from everyone else. Given that there's very little-to-no market in-game, money doesn't mean much of anything and it never will. The low-level players continue to have not enough of it to buy their forms/techs, while the endgame players have more than they know what to do with.

Those who got their forms/techs with tokens and such, who are at endgame now, already have most (if not all) of their forms/techs, the new "money sink" doesn't apply to them. However, newbies are now faced with mountains of coinage needed (seriously, 40s+ for some T3 formulas!?). The junk drops might help that a little, but meh. I seriously doubt it is going to make 40s+ farmable in a reasonable amount of time.

I can truly see this being a large problem for the new players. Myself and many elders did hundreds of crafting quests for beginner and journeyman loretokens just to buy all the forms that we needed. A huge grind, but worth it for the form collectors among us.

[Sigi]

T3 is not really newby stuff. The T1 and T2 revamp includes lots of quests which give good money.

[Dhalin]

T3 is not really newby stuff. The T1 and T2 revamp includes lots of quests which give good money.

Well, hopefully the trend continues (with the T3 revamp), as my own T3 biped receives (or received) regular money dumps from my T5 dragon, and blows through them at alarming paces, even when I'm trying to conserve.

These T3 quests better give good money, or there'll be lots and lots of farming needed to get money..

[AmonGwareth]

Well, hopefully the trend continues (with the T3 revamp), as my own T3 biped receives (or received) regular money dumps from my T5 dragon, and blows through them at alarming paces, even when I'm trying to conserve.

These T3 quests better give good money, or there'll be lots and lots of farming needed to get money..

Not sure if you did the Tier2 quests, but you could easily get a couple hundred silver from the quest rewards alone (The later quests give upwards of 20 silver each). Not counting the junk loot and other loot from killing baddies as part of the quests.

[Dhalin]

Not sure if you did the Tier2 quests, but you could easily get a couple hundred silver from the quest rewards alone (The later quests give upwards of 20 silver each). Not counting the junk loot and other loot from killing baddies as part of the quests.

Admittedly, it has been awhile since I've gone through the T2 areas and quests, however...

I started my biped out with about 110s.

She got down to about 20 left, then I did a full load of craftables on my dragon, and traded her another 150s.

Took her down to about 50s again, buying only the forms I needed to PL my crafts (was waiting until she can get the expert forms and skip as many jman as possible).

Last I remember, I gave her some more money so that she's about 150s again.

Anyways, in trying to PL just a few crafts and trying to skip as many jman forms as possible, I easily blew 200-300s.

I'd hate to actually be trying to buy lots of forms in doing a non-PL path through crafting, but like I said I will admit that it has been awhile, and the fact I PL'd a few of her crafts to 100 wouldn't make quite an accurate assessment of a biped's leveling experience, I guess.

It just felt like a Lot of money to be blowing in those forms, though this was pre-loot revamp. Not sure how things look afterwards, as I said. Mayhaps if I ever get to that stage again with another character, I'll write up another review/opinion/etc.

[Shinkuu]

Admittedly, it has been awhile since I've gone through the T2 areas and quests, however...

I started my biped out with about 110s.

She got down to about 20 left, then I did a full load of craftables on my dragon, and traded her another 150s.

Took her down to about 50s again, buying only the forms I needed to PL my crafts (was waiting until she can get the expert forms and skip as many jman as possible).

Last I remember, I gave her some more money so that she's about 150s again.

Anyways, in trying to PL just a few crafts and trying to skip as many jman forms as possible, I easily blew 200-300s.

I'd hate to actually be trying to buy lots of forms in doing a non-PL path through crafting, but like I said I will admit that it has been awhile, and the fact I PL'd a few of her crafts to 100 wouldn't make quite an accurate assessment of a biped's leveling experience, I guess.

It just felt like a Lot of money to be blowing in those forms, though this was pre-loot revamp. Not sure how things look afterwards, as I said. Mayhaps if I ever get to that stage again with another character, I'll write up another review/opinion/etc.

I usually was out of Silver all the time trying to keep up with crafts. I cannot really PL any crafts because I have no school at Expert or near it for anyone. So I just go up as I go and try to buy what forms I need for each level which is fairly cash devastating.

However, IF you are an adventurer and can kill monsters at around your level en mass then you can rack up quite a chunk of change since the revamp thanks to the Junk Loot from what I have seen. Each big hunt I do brings in around 20+ Silver with a little luck which is vastly more than I used to get.

Doing the Adv quests on the other hand assumes A) You can find them, B) You can DO them which is quite a trick in many cases because even with a two person team many of them are too hard until you out level them by a whole tier, C) You already have all the gear you need as an adventurer to complete them which may be what you are trying to get cash to buy the forms to make in the FIRST place.

So yeah... Quests due to the lack of hardly any Ped Crafting quests is not so great for a Crafter to pay their way with. However, the new Junk loot can work if they are even DECENT at ALL as a Adv of any sort.

[Shinkuu]

T3 is not really newby stuff. The T1 and T2 revamp includes lots of quests which give good money.

Honestly... I consider everything below T5 to be newbie stuff. I consider it thus because that is the way it is viewed. All the made players are working on T6 things and treat anything T4 or lower as if it is extremely old news and very amateur. It is pretty much the same thing you got at T1 & T2 just with higher level baddies.


Dhalin tries to point out some of the grind factor but I think I would want to speak up a bit on that matter.

Yes... Killing the same monsters over and over is a painful grind for Adventurers. However, I still must admit that it is not so horrible. At times you fight interesting mixes of Named and Non-Named which can be a fun challenge.

Recently my Sslik Ampera and its mate Ssurge were out at the Ice Fortress killing Ogres and Pygmies and we got flattened by Ugrot. So we trophied up a few levels and went back with a more cohesive strategy and pwned him several times. That was FUN. We also mixed it up with a number of them while "invading" their fortress and all in all had a good time thrashing their Semi-Intelligent behinds. Eventually we ran into a named Pygmy there that killed me but Ssurge got him and we came back. We ran into him again this time with friends on his side and decided it was too late to put up with him but we will be back.

The point here is mostly that there is a nice bit of quests to break up the grind and a little bit of making up your own quests if you look around at various monsters. As an Adventurer you are in the thick of the gaming experience as you work yourself up. You are also rewarded on a nice even progression of once every 2 levels. Though, getting Coordinated Bolts/Strikes often feels like a major let-down as they are not that useful nor powerful and in the case of Strikes share too many cool downs.

Where Adventurer starts to fall on its face is when you are working up multiple classes. This is MANDATORY for most Bipeds because most Prestige classes do not provide enough base skills (especially Armor Use) to be played at length without another class to fill in the gap. You start being unable to equip proper armor for your level or use proper spells for your level and quickly get your rear handed to you by every monster in sight. (Honestly... Is there a REASON Armor Use is not just 10 for everyone?) So when you go back and try to level up all over again you hit an annoying snag. Now your quests are done and over with, you get piddly exp for the monster kills thanks to your rating, the only way to get levels is to grind trophies. If you have already exhausted the 10 turn ins then you are in for some looooong grinding on the same monsters over and over and over and over with little reward... THAT takes it in the tail.

Just as a side rant... the Complete lack of ability to control monster Aggro is very irritating... It makes Warriors and other heavy Melee classes pretty useless. Why play a Tank character when you are not allowed to get in the way of the enemy and protect the thin skinned folks? Having a % chance that maaaaybe you will block an incoming attack towards them or maaaaybe you will pull Aggro off them (and Distract there is pretty sick on its HUGE cool down for being only "Likely" to grab Aggro) is not enough. Out damaging Mages is next to impossible and out Aggroing Healers is likewise nearly impossible. So your healers or damage dealers die which makes it A) Pointless to be a Tankish Class and B) Worthless to team up with anyone. I mean you are already taking a hit to your EXP for teaming up to begin with. (And no, you do not kill things fast enough to make up for it)


The real pain though comes in Crafting. For Dragons crafting is somewhat grindy. They have to dig and dig to get a single level. However, Dragons have little to complain about here because with that single level they get a slew of benefits. It is annoying and grindy but at least every level brings you closer to perfection.

It is the Bipeds who get shafted hard here. It partially boils down to the whole "One School at a Time" rule... When a Dragon Smelts something they get EXP for Mining, Gathering, Scalecrafting, and Spell Making. Essentially every craft they do outside of Lair Shaping instantly gets exp and level progression. If a Biped Smelts something they get EXP for ONE SCHOOL ONLY and that is only if the school they happen to be at the moment is the right one. If you were a Gatherer at the time then you get NOTHING. Sorry buddy, tough luck on that one. If you want to change what class you are you need to hunt down the appropriate craft trainer and talk to them which is not feasible during heavy craft grinding if you want to try to get exp in several schools like say Miner and THEN Smith.

To make that equation worse is how in Biped Crafting you need to be so many different Crafting Schools in order to achieve much. Being just one is useless. You have to GRIND GRIND GRIND up one or both of the Material Acquisition Schools and then you NEED a Tool Making School and if you want this done some time during the next month you will very much NEED Tinkerer (so you may as well be one for the tools as well)... To be a good Tinkerer though you will NEED Gatherer AND Miner up high so either way you are stuck with around FOUR classes that must be GROUND up INDIVIDUALLY in order to be worthwhile... That may get you the ability to make Weapons, OR Armor, OR Potions, OR Spells but if you want to fully outfit yourself like the Dragons can then forget it. You will have to have all the crafting classes outside of the Building ones... Absolutely INSANE when coupled with the ONE SCHOOL AT A TIME rule.

Building any Plot is the same affair. You may as well forget about it. Dragons get more room to build lairs and do it all with one School. If you want to do that as a Ped be prepared to spent a fortune on forms and have FIVE very hard to level schools to get up.

This part confuses me a lot because one of the money makers for Istaria is the lure of owning your own plot and working it. It is a lovely feature but when doing that is basically a lesson is masochism I can imagine that any Ped would give up on it pretty early on. I have been thinking about giving up my plot and forcing Zarla to start Lair Shaping for this reason. At least that way she can get all the work done herself some time in the near future instead of me breaking my back trying to Grind up 3 schools (Shadina takes 3 as well obviously sharing a school between us) just to make a new Silo and that is not counting the other non-building classes I need to grind to make it happen...



There is also a side note on ALL of this which is this:

Dragons = Easy Mode. Say what you will but it is blatantly the case. Flight and One School does it All makes them very easy to level and deal with. Every NEW player really should play a Dragon or be given a good indicator of the fact that Dragons are good Tutorial character to run with. They will learn the game a bit as a Dragon and not be so overwhelmed or feel quite so worthless.

Bipeds = HARD Mode. A new player should probably avoid playing a Ped. You will need to spend UNGODLY cash buying the forms and techs you need for all your many many many crafting classes as a starting Biped and likely find that Adventuring is too complicated to handle from the get-go. After you LEARN how the game is played and are confident in that THEN you can perhaps roll a Biped and give it a shot but until you understand the game mechanics a Biped can be very overwhelming as you cannot make what you need to be worthwhile in a timely fashion and you have to use even better strategy and get a good feel for how to mix schools and why than with a Dragon for Adventuring.