My frustrating & fun Level 1-15 newbie experience [Free Weekend]

Master10K

Just been playing Rift during Phase 2 of the World Event free weekend and since it won't let me go beyond level 15 I'll just give my thoughts on the game. Oh and go on, I'm not an MMO player. So far the only MMO I've played, besides Rift is LOTRO and only for 2 months. So this will be from a newbie perspective.



After downloading the client (took 6 hours), I rolled a Rogue Guardian on the Heatherfield PvP-EU server. Unfortunately my PC currently isn't good enough for gaming:

 Athlon II X4 2.63Ghz | 4Gb RAM | Radeon HD 4350 512Mb (gonna get a 5570 in a couple months).

So I was forced to turn down the graphics to Medium-Low settings but it still looked alright.

I've heard a lot of people complain that the levelling experience is just a boring linear grind to max level, like most other MMOs and it definitely is. Every quest I did was dull & solo-able but at least grouping was made easy, with the public group feature. The Rift actually did help break up the monotony of the grind, but people weren't lying when they said they happened too often. Also after sealing a Rift everyone just goes back to doing their own thing, which is something I hope Guild Wars 2 will fix with its dynamic event chains.



-Frustrations-

When I got into the game I had an idea of what kind of class I wanted to make. I wanted a ranged DPS that's highly mobile and quite survivable so I went with Marksmen(DPS)/Saboteur(DPS)/Riftstalker(Tank). Yeah, noob mistake. My class ended up having some really good DPS, but my useless Riftstalker tree didn't help me survive at all and I was forced to learn that the hard way. I probably died around 50 times during level 1-13 and the one thing that really pissed me off was the way everything aggros. Especially those f**kin' boglings at around level 12. Had to get my soul mended so many times thanks to them.



-Fun-

I was jumping for joy when I finally made it to the Sanctum, thus allowing myself to get new souls and respec. So I made one for Soloing and another for PvP. Was able to have a bit of fun after that. Queuing for warfronts as a Guardian was fairly quick (5mins average), but that's because Guardians suck. Still had a lot of fun PvPing with my PvP spec. Shame I never got a chance to do a dungeon/instance, since even with Rift's soul tree system, it is still bloody hard to find a healer.



So that was my 2 day experience with Rift. Did I have fun? Yes, but only after changed my noob spec. Did this free trial make me want to buy Rift? No, because I doubt I'd pay a sub for any MMO (besides World of Darkness). However I may consider buying a 30 day time-card, if I'm bored during the Summer, cause waiting for Guild Wars 2 is painful.



Anyone else care to share their initial experience with Rift?

 

Ikeda

Thank you for posting your opinions.  This is basically what I experienced through Beta, early launch, and the first 30-day window.  It's also why I'm not re-upping.