Aion After a Week

I actually have a new article going up on the various play styles of each class in Aion over at MMORPG.com in the next couple of weeks. It was already such a long article I couldn't put everything I wanted to into it. One thing that would have been fun is to compare the classes in Aion to other classes from other games, mainly WoW. I feel comfortable doing this since the game of Aion itself is so different from WoW, but many of the class abilities appear similar. I really did not have the room to write a bunch of clarifying information for my article, plus it would add extra length for no reason. So here goes:

Templar -> A Protection Paladin/DK

Gladiator -> Warrior

Chanter -> Bard

Cleric -> Generic Healer

Spiritmaster -> Warlock

Ranger -> Vanilla WoW Hunter minus pet

Assassin -> Rogue/AoC Assassin

Sorcerer -> Mage

If I had put that list in the article, I would have had to explain it all, but since it's here I don't have to worry about it! Those are how I see the various classes. Chanters are a little bit like WoW shamans as well, but not completely. Templars really could be Protection Paladins just lifted and put into Aion, they really only have one DK live ability, but it's a pretty sweet ability. Divine Grip: Grabs a target up to 25 meters away, and all enemy targets within 20 meters of that, and brings all of them straight in front of you. Mass DK death grip.

Aion is still enjoyable, I haven't made it past level 18 though : ( I probably played about 4 hours of WoW this weekend, and way too many hours of Aion, but Friday and Saturday sleep just wasn't happening so I was up and awake forever. I caught up a little yesterday, slept for about 3 hours during the day then I went to bed at 1am and got up at 7:30, so that was some nice extra hours. Still feeling tired. Probably why I'm writing about it instead of Aion.

In Aion you have to complete special quests, I forget what they're called but they're special, they have their own tab in the quest book, in order to level up every 10 levels or so. You work on the quest throughout the 10 levels, but then the storyline all culminates at the end. These end quests, sadly in my opinion, do in fact require a group effort. You will need a healer, so either a chanter or a cleric, and you will need a tank, so either a templar or a gladiator, and you will even need some good DPS. So far I have yet to see a group go through these quests with less than 5 people, and that was rare, almost everyone was going as a group of 6. This is because dying is such a painful experience I believe, that bringing less people just doesn't feel safe. The mobs are elite, so they hit harder, and have a lot more health. They don't hit ridiculously harder though, so it's really all about killing them down.

These quests, so far, are not instanced, though players can still switch game instances if they wish. But this means that the mobs are free for all, and while most of them are just kill so many of this type, there are some boss mobs that can be farmed for gear. I'm hoping that the later stages of Aion has instanced dungeons so players can farm them in peace, but we'll see, I really haven't heard one way or the other, so if anyone knows, feel free to leave a comment about it.

My Templar is level 18 and, while fun, just doesn't hit as hard as I wish it did. My ranger is now level 17, I'm slowly getting her up in the levels, I think it took almost twice as long to level her than it did my Templar. Partly because when I was leveling my Templar I was grouped up with a friend, but also just because even when solo I could level as my Templar with no issues in crowded areas because I could move up to the mob, and not have to worry about other mobs around. As a ranger though... constantly kiting mobs, you have to constantly be aware of your surroundings, and sometimes you really just have no choice but to run away because you are surrounded and there's no way to kite your mob without aggro'ing a bunch of others.

On that note, rangers seem OP to me so far. Animation cancelling will always be powerful, and rangers can definitely pull it off much easier than any other class. I haven't seen any mages manage to pull off animation cancelling yet, but perhaps I just haven't been looking close enough. I know that the mage style of mob killing doesn't require much kiting, and in order to animation cancel on the mage you need to be jump kiting, so we'll see, I'll probably level a Sorcerer later... but I don't want to start any new characters until finally hitting level 20 hopefully sometime this coming weekend.

That's all for now ^^

Aion Day 3

For many it's day 1, but since I pre-ordered I got to mess around starting 2 days ago in the actual game. Is it everything I hoped it would be? More or less. There are a few glaring weaknesses, but honestly, they were already expected. Assassins can't solo for anything in the mid teen levels, not that I'm playing one, but my friend is, and the only people ever "lfg" is Assassins and Clerics. The assassins are supposed to be a force starting at level 25 though, so as long as you have someone to level with you it shouldn't be too bad.

Duo questing was frustrating due to the amount of peo

ple at launch, and may be today, but when it works, aka not too many people doing gathering quests, or kill for item quests, it works really, really well. There is no XP loss for being in a duo group, and I believe no XP loss for being in a party at all, so that's a major plus. It makes leveling faster, and more enjoyable for all. You can gain a semblance of chain pulling when you group up which is impossible for solo players, at these levels anyway.

Eurogamer did a review, and I'm a little surprised they gave the game a 7 instead of an 8. Their score numbers seem to get very arbitrary when it comes to MMO's. From reading the review, it sounded more like the reviewer was trying to play a game that Aion isn't, and then putting this ideal game on a pedestal that Aion was not meant to be compared to. Itis like matching a horror film in a race for an oscar against an action film in the Best Action Film category. Sure, the horror film may have some good action, but that wasn't the complete intent of the director.

Anyway, there's my Templar. She's just a warrior in this picture. I was actually pleasantly surprised to see that not everyone took horns, since only one hair style allows horns and, to me anyway it seems, is one of the best options available. Not that I made all of my characters with horns, but for my first and most carefully crafted one. One word of note in the character creation, the face you choose actually determines just how much the sliders can effect your character. Some of the options just aren't there, like the tilt of the inner eye, you can't change that in any way except by looking at each face and choosing a face with the inner eye tilt you want from the beginning. A little annoying, but I'm guessing it has something to do with making the game run smoother despite all the different possible features.

I'm hoping to get an Aion comic up and going soon, just a small one, not a full blown color one cause I can't draw, but making little circles and lines look semi like characters isn't too hard, especially in the full ink styles of Sinfest or Applegeeks mini's.

Aion

Aion beta is open again! You can level all the way to level 20. Honestly, the sheer amount of possible grinding in this game is making me hesitate from doing just that. Now, there's nothing wrong with a game that takes a little time and is enjoyable on the way up, but as with most MMO's I've encounters, that enjoyment only lasts the first time through.

I want to make an Aion comic, so I'm hoping to test out my black and white 4 panel across simple drawing skills soon. Nothing as awesome as Sinfest, more along the lines of simple like Applegeeks mini comic thing at the bottom.

Crafting in Aion is very grindy. It's not a necessity either, so I'm not sure if I'll put too much time into it once the real game launches. I'm also completely addicted to harvesting. I was addicted to it in Age of Conan, I'm addicted to it in Aion. Whenever I see a resource I have to go get it, even though I know it's going to respawn in less than 5 minutes and I'll be tempted to take it all over again. It's not like anyone else is taking the damn things, but I just feel the need to when I see them. And honestly, I think I'm about doing it on pace to keep the gathering skill up, which is both enjoyable for me, and scary at the same time, because I've been doing a hell of a lot of gathering.

Still haven't seen the end game of Aion, just knowing that leveling more than 1 character is going to be a major pain in the ass. I'm currently looking at a Templar, but I'm growing disappointed with the lag that occasionally plagues the game. I don't know where this lag is coming from, probably Comcast so me, but the rate of it just makes me think it has something to do with Aion as well. When I can get the Templar to weapon swap perfectly and use abilities at the right time without having to press... wait to see if it worked... no it didn't press again... wait another second... that's what this game turns into sometimes and it's Horrible when it does. When the game runs smooth the combat with a Templar is nice, when it runs even the slightest big laggy you're screwed and going to end up healing yourself between every mob.

So I've been thinking about maybe leveling something else, but I'm not sure what yet. The ranger is fun, the kiting takes skill just like hunters used to in WoW, but I don't know if I'm ready to go back to the same play style I used over 3 years ago and had to watch it deteriorate before my eyes over the last 3. Current WoW hunters are a complete joke in comparison. Aion rangers take that same kind of skill, but the weapon manual weapon swapping is again a deterrent to the class in my eyes. This time from ranged weapon to melee weapon you actually have to swap before using. Considering the up to 2 seconds of weapon swap lag depending on what your doing when you hit the button, it's a terribly unresponsive system. I'm also looking at a Summoner just because the pets look f'in awesome, but I'd probably rather have a sorcerer if I leveled a mage. I don't like either the cleric or the chanter really, and I'm not sure which I would take over the other. The chanter looks like more fun, but it also looks more like the other melee classes, so a cleric might be more interesting.

But we'll see. Also, just started watching some show where this girl dies and ends up being a grim reaper... pretty good so far.