People leaving rift has nothing to do with leveling content.
The leveling content in game is fine, its streamlined but highly enjoyable.
The issue is the lack of non-group focused content at max level.
You need to group with people to get anything of value for your character above some faction or crafted stuff at 50.
we all know having to group for 1-2 hours at a time for any type of progress simply isnt casual friendly.
Yet Trion keeps adding in ten & twenty man raids, they add in rank 7&8 pvp gear, pvp rifts, expert & raid rifts all require a decent amount of people...
Thankfully They will be releasing AA, New zones and some solo/duo dungeons because if they keep ignoring these people by just handing them event content they will be left with four servers of a bunch of raiders.
If you can't figure out why Rift saw a sub drop then I do not know what to tell you guys. When every server right now is basically labeled PVE and is high to extremely high pop and the lowest pop servers are PVP that is the first hint.
Trion specifically came out and said the following:
1. PvP was not the main focus
- People said screw that and rushed the game anyways
2. There would be no Arena. I mean come on guys even Blizzard admitted this was a bad idea because you have to balance around it.
- People said screw that and rushed the game anyways
3. RvR was considered WAR or DAoC, but would require a crap ton of time and could not simply be put into a game
- People said screw that and rushed the game anyways
THEN when the above did not happen which should be obvious was not their main focus people called them a bad dev and left. This is most definite WTF moment ever in MMO history. Trion made one single video about a guy ganking some other dude during an invasion and EVERY self labeled mmo pvp'rs rushed the game like it was the second coming of DAoC.
If you can't figure out why Rift saw a sub drop then I do not know what to tell you guys. When every server right now is basically labeled PVE and is high to extremely high pop and the lowest pop servers are PVP that is the first hint.
Trion specifically came out and said the following:
1. PvP was not the main focus
- People said screw that and rushed the game anyways
2. There would be no Arena. I mean come on guys even Blizzard admitted this was a bad idea because you have to balance around it.
- People said screw that and rushed the game anyways
3. RvR was considered WAR or DAoC, but would require a crap ton of time and could not simply be put into a game
- People said screw that and rushed the game anyways
THEN when the above did not happen which should be obvious was not their main focus people called them a bad dev and left. This is most definite WTF moment ever in MMO history. Trion made one single video about a guy ganking some other dude during an invasion and EVERY mmo.
This isnt true at all.
The Pvp servers are freaking packed at least in the NA. its a original big pve shards that are becoming ghost towns. I started in Freeholme NA pvp and you couldnt move with all the lag in cities.
I assumed it would be better in wolfsbane but it was dead then i went to Byrial and it was very similar...
Just look at the lists for prime time the pvp server are much healthier. tis may not be a pvp game but its much more insteresting on a pvp server.
The Pvp servers are freaking packed at least in the NA. its a original big pve shards that are becoming ghost towns. I started in Freeholme NA pvp and you couldnt move with all the lag in cities.
I assumed it would be better in wolfsbane but it was dead then i went to Byrial and it was very similar...
Just look at the lists for prime time the pvp server are much healthier. tis may not be a pvp game but its much more insteresting on a pvp server.
Well I got no idea then. Whenever I look at the shard status list it goes Full/High/Medium/Low. I never see a pve server. I see 7 pvp servers that are low and stay low and might as well be trial shards.
I honestly can not tell anymore I left a pvp server because the qq was just too much. They never did any of the zone events and just afk'd and waited for war fronts after the first month of the game. If ithas gotten better then great, but with no fort objectives or RvR it felt like the pvp population took a MUCH MUCH larger hit then the pve side of it.
A game where leveling is treated as an inconvenience will fail. And thats how Rift treats its leveling. Bare minimum number of zones, bare minimum number of instances, uninspired quests (with mob density that makes many of them not a brutal chore).
Well the problem is I can not justify or rationalize a company spending huge amounts of money on something that is literally 1% of your overall /played time in a MMO.
If you invest a year in a MMO and it took 2 weeks to hit max level why focus on that 2 week instead of the other 46 weeks? Now Trion can do things like try and add alternate starting zones after you pop out of the time machine. It is basically built into the game if you look at it.
The game launched with this:
Standard Difficulty Dungeons Available
- Realm of the Fae (16-17) - Silverwood
- Iron Tomb (18-19) - Freemarch
- Darkening Deeps (22-23) - Gloamwood
- Deepstrike Mines (25-26) - Stonefield
- The Foul Cascade (29-30) - Scarlet Gorge
- King's Breach (34-35) - Scarwood Reach
- Runic Descent (39-40) - Moonshade Highlands
- Fall of Lantern Hook (43-44) - Droughtlands
- Abyssal Precipice (49-50) - Iron Pine
- Charmer's Caldera (49-50) - Shimmersand
Expert Difficulty Dungeons Available
- Realm of the Fae (50+) - Silverwood
- Iron Tomb (50+) - Freemarch
- The Foul Cascade (50+) - Scarlet Gorge
- King's Breach (50+) - Scarwood Reach
- Fall of Lantern Hook (50+) - Droughtlands
- Darkening Deeps (50++) - Gloamwood
- Deepstrike Mines (50++) - Stonefield
- Runic Descent (50++) - Moonshade Highlands
- Abyssal Precipice (50++) - Iron Pine
- Charmer's Caldera (50++) - Shimmersand
If this is considered bare minimum I am not sure what to tell you. They have released a 10man or 20man raid every single month and have announced a Solo/Duo instance system in the pretty near future which the article talks about. A solo/duo instance system is something we begged Blizzard to do for years.
Now I do not know how man flashpoints or raids SWToR plans on launching with, but they said 17 planets which could be huge or small depending on how they do it and it has not launched yet so noone really knows.
Your post did an excellent job highlighting exactly what is wrong with Rift for players like myself, a MMO designed totally towards end game raiding. Great news if you are a raider at heart, terrible news for the majority of the MMO population who don't care to raid, we're looking for alternate content and Rift isn't ever going to be that game.
I'm currently playing EQ2 and will play GW2 and SWTOR because there is or will be content outside of raiding.
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
Your post did an excellent job highlighting exactly what is wrong with Rift for players like myself, a MMO designed totally towards end game raiding. Great news if you are a raider at heart, terrible news for the majority of the MMO population who don't care to raid, we're looking for alternate content and Rift isn't ever going to be that game.
I'm currently playing EQ2 and will play GW2 and SWTOR because there is or will be content outside of raiding.
Who told you SWToR was not going to be the gerbil race exactly? They are releasing with a raid of 16 or something and what exactly do you think you do with that gear you get from the Flashpoints?
SwToR and GW2 hype is so silly. They need to just release those games already, so people can see how they actually play.
Also in GW2 why is it ok for pvp'rs to get mass pvp, but why can't I have mass pve which is basically raiding? Not sure why raiding became a bad term. Just because Blizzard shit all over it for the past 6 years does not mean it can not be done right. It is actually pretty damn fun.
Get off your horses man, the Star Wars mmo isnt anywhere near the most awaited mmo in history, Rift is much closer, but yes Guild Wars 2 might as well be the most awaited mmo in history, dont need any polls to be able to guess that much, no one does.
Rift will do fine in the face of the upcoming behemoths (GW2 and ToR). They have probably recouped their development cost from box sales alone. Ive been playing for close to a couple months and you can appreciate the style of the game. The graphics and sounds are unique, the soul system is a lot of fun to experiment with, the art style is unique as well.
The Rift system is where this game really shines. You can tell that Trion put enough time and detail into the rift engine that they have an astounding amount of freedom creating content via Rifts. It allows them to create new dynamic content and upload it in a patch, fully integrated in the existing world without the need to add new zones. That is a very powerful tool to have at your disposal. Being able to implement new ways to battle bad guys, solve puzzles, having it be a dynamic changing part of the gameworld and being able to develop this content and upload it practically on the fly, Trion has a winning formula and they already have a loyal fanbase big enough to keep them all in the black.
Props to Trion for being the new kid on the block and showing up some of the old dogs that have been slackin.
Get off your horses man, the Star Wars mmo isnt anywhere near the most awaited mmo in history, Rift is much closer, but yes Guild Wars 2 might as well be the most awaited mmo in history, dont need any polls to be able to guess that much, no one does.
Yes, its without question the most awaited MMO release. Rift aint even in the top 10.
SWG
EQ2
WoW
FFXI
VG
AoC
WAR
LOTRO
SWtoR
GW2
are/were *EASILY* more awaited than Rift. By an enormous margin in every single case.
Rift gained steam late because of disappointment with Cata coupled with good word of mouth. Three months before its release it was barely a blip on the radar
Your post did an excellent job highlighting exactly what is wrong with Rift for players like myself, a MMO designed totally towards end game raiding. Great news if you are a raider at heart, terrible news for the majority of the MMO population who don't care to raid, we're looking for alternate content and Rift isn't ever going to be that game.
I'm currently playing EQ2 and will play GW2 and SWTOR because there is or will be content outside of raiding.
Who told you SWToR was not going to be the gerbil race exactly? They are releasing with a raid of 16 or something and what exactly do you think you do with that gear you get from the Flashpoints?
SwToR and GW2 hype is so silly. They need to just release those games already, so people can see how they actually play.
Also in GW2 why is it ok for pvp'rs to get mass pvp, but why can't I have mass pve which is basically raiding? Not sure why raiding became a bad term. Just because Blizzard shit all over it for the past 6 years does not mean it can not be done right. It is actually pretty damn fun.
I dont think you understand the difference between raiding and having single player/small group content. They are not mutually exclusive.
Rift will do fine in the face of the upcoming behemoths (GW2 and ToR). They have probably recouped their development cost from box sales alone. Ive been playing for close to a couple months and you can appreciate the style of the game. The graphics and sounds are unique, the soul system is a lot of fun to experiment with, the art style is unique as well.
The Rift system is where this game really shines. You can tell that Trion put enough time and detail into the rift engine that they have an astounding amount of freedom creating content via Rifts. It allows them to create new dynamic content and upload it in a patch, fully integrated in the existing world without the need to add new zones. That is a very powerful tool to have at your disposal. Being able to implement new ways to battle bad guys, solve puzzles, having it be a dynamic changing part of the gameworld and being able to develop this content and upload it practically on the fly, Trion has a winning formula and they already have a loyal fanbase big enough to keep them all in the black.
Props to Trion for being the new kid on the block and showing up some of the old dogs that have been slackin.
Trion had a good idea with the dynamic events, but dropped the ball. First of all, it's not spontaneous and dynamic if it's constantly happening. Second of all, there really is nothing innovative about the rift system, aside from the server stability. Unfortunately, they pissed away a good idea by making these rift events about as bland as can be. I can count on two hands how many actual different rift events there are. Same events...only the mobs change. Stage one: Kill these mobs that spawn. Stage two: Kill these different mobs that spawn. Stage three: You guessed it, kill these different mobs that spawn. Stage 4 bonus round: Do the same. Stage 5 bonus round: Kill this boss mob with the 50 people you have zerging the rift. Sorry, not very difficult, not very complex, not very innovative. Honestly, these events are nothing more than portable quest chains, with the same "Kill X amount of Y" mobs at each stage that you would normally see in any quest hub, and that we all have grown to hate. It's not innovative because Warhammer did it with the public quests, including separating it into stages. The only difference is Trion has found a way to bring the boredom to you, instead of you actually having to seek it out. And honestly, if Trion truly believes that these "dynamic" rift events are going to be a suitable substitute for increasing actual content, including adding more zones during the levelling process...they will continue to hemmorage subscriptions and lose people after a month or two of playing.
No one bringing up the whole thing of Trion not being able to balance souls for crap. Completely nerfing souls to almost uselessness then buffing souls to broken. Though what got to me the most was taking the only range warrior soul and removing his ability to range without a 6 second cooldown.
At least GW2 gets warriors right, they are the masters of weapons not just melee beat sticks. Warriors should have the ability to attack at range with a bow or a gun but for some reason that's given to rogues in Rift.
Lol, you have no idea what you're talking about. Let me explain what happened so that maybe you'll understand.
First, there isn't "only one" ranged warrior soul. Paragon and Riftblade both have lots of range. Reaver has range, but it's a tank soul.
Second, adding the CD to the ranged attack in question was so that they DIDN'T have to nerf the damage. The problem with the ranged abilities in question is that they did not scale with anything, therefore they were frontloaded with damage and had improper scaling which lead to it being severely OP at lower levels. Adding the 6 second CD only prevented you from spamming it, which is what people were doing. There's enough ranged abilities to have a ranged rotation with no downtime, but you apparently didn't see it or level far enough to notice.
We can talk again in a year or two when TOR and GW2's shiny has worn off and trion is still bringing out epic content and raisisng the bar in both dynamic, raid and customisation content every two weeks.
Noone can compare with that. Trion is owning. I will play rift even as TOR and GW2 try to match trion's effort. THey will be hard pressed.
Rift is growing at such a staggering pace that TOR and GW2 will be hard pressed to match event a 10th of its incredible growth.
We can talk again in a year or two when TOR and GW2's shiny has worn off and trion is still bringing out epic content and raisisng the bar in both dynamic, raid and customisation content every two weeks.
Noone can compare with that. Trion is owning. I will play rift even as TOR and GW2 try to match trion's effort. THey will be hard pressed.
Rift is growing at such a staggering pace that TOR and GW2 will be hard pressed to match event a 10th of its incredible growth.
You think Trion will be able to keep up this development pace?
Sooner or later they will need to cut corners.
When the game first released we had 99 servers now after transfers the game has around 60 non-trial servers.
Thats a big loss... If this keeps up Rift will be like every other game with content updates every 3-6 months...
Not true. Asheron's Call used to do monthly updates and weekly server wide story driven events. The death of the Ancient Olthoi Queen was epic!
You find me another dev that spits out raid content at Trions pace and I will be shocked. They have without a doubt shown Blizzard is flat out ripping off it's customers.
You're moving the goal post.
The assertion you made in your first post was this:
"Trion is still going to do their monthly updates which is still unpresedented. Monthly content updates are just not done by devs at all. "
Monthly content updates. You said nothing about raids.
Someone, accurately, pointed out that in fact, another developer has been doing it, and for many years now.
So you swifly change the topic to "how quickly Trion releases raid content".
The point is, you made an assumption about Trion's track-record being "unprecedented", and asserted that such a thing was "not done by devs at all". That was a very bold statement to make. It was also demonstrably wrong. A perfectly acceptable response would have been "Oh, okay. I wasn't aware of that and just figured Trion was the first to do it".
Ignoring that completely and swiftly changing the topic to a comparison about "Trion's raid content compared to WoW" is a rather obvious dodge.
It does highlight something people do an awful lot of around here.. They make statements based entirely on their own personal experience, without considering that one of the many other MMOs they haven't played or followed might prove their assertion false. This is why I avoid making such generalized, grand-sweeping statements as much as I can, unless I feel pretty certain the facts back it up.
"If you just step away for a sec you will clearly see all the pot holes in the road, and the cash shop selling asphalt..." - Mimzel on F2P/Cash Shops
- Dynamic zone and world events, No other mmo has this. (GW2 is not out yet) In fact is is uber boring running around in a quest zone in any other mmo now, Nothing at all is happening. Except maby for a bit of pvp here and there its dull. You do your boring quests and hand in. Rinse and repeat. In rift the PVE raids you. Every 2 hours or so the entrire map changes and you hav to team up with other ppl to defend positions , take out bosses, destroy stuctures, many other variations .... Its fun and ties in to the story and breaks the manotony of regular grinding. The world event bosses are awesum to take down !! Its like raiding on the world map with hundreds of players. I cannot see that i will go back to any other existing mmo or even SWTOR, because lifeless zones will just be a bore.
- The ascended soul class system is uber. I have for the 100th time made completely different type of char. If you are bored with your char, there is no need to reroll with new class. U just change your souls. You hav 5 specs so no need to destroy the old ones either. And having 9 souls to choose from right from the start, makes wow's class classic types feel like a snooze. You can craft a character with specific things in mind. Example i made a self healing pvp warrior with complimentary abilities that boost each-other across souls, i made a uber tank that can stop a train, i made a high-dps-ing spec that can bring down an uber cleric and on and on. There is just so much that you could never do b4. Playing a game without this will be yawn..... zzzz. Swtor's classes now seem so boring. Hope the big universe makes up for it.
- in only 3 months rift already has 4 raids, 5 warfronts ( counting WF escalation ), many normal and expert instances that are completely different from one-another and a horde of different types of Raid and expert raid rifts that both hard and fun (especially if there is a enemy guild stalking you while trying to do one ). Also new PVP rifts. LOL @ rifts being only different looking. Wanna see you take on an expert raid death rift with your ( i have played to level cap in 2 days ) gear. There are also many raid zone quests and the new pvp-quests and content.
- the world and lore even without the dynamic events is very intersting and alive. There are a multitude of puzzles and hidden treasures all over. There are epic story quests, that absolutly rock. There are baddies that seem and feel realm with sum personality. The dragon lords are uber !! Azeroth is dead compared to this. each zone has a unique feeling and special vibe about it.
You think Trion will be able to keep up this development pace?
Sooner or later they will need to cut corners.
When the game first released we had 99 servers now after transfers the game has around 60 non-trial servers.
Thats a big loss... If this keeps up Rift will be like every other game with content updates every 3-6 months...
Trion even talked about how they were ahead of schedule, and had a lot of the post-release content underway by the time the game went gold. You can tell that's what a lot of it is, by how they've been unable to adapt to what people want, and just keep rolling out the same sort of thing. Most of it was half done already, and I bet that limited their options.
As months go by, they'll talk about moving away from the generic raid game they'd initially thought would be such a hit, but implementing other sorts of content will take a lot more time.
When I want a single-player story, I'll play a single-player game. When I play an MMO, I want a massively multiplayer world.
Not only for originality of soul sistem, incredible detailed and realistic graphics (with no impact on performance, which is per se incredible, war, lotro, ... must play on my computer at half settings to have top perfornance like I have with Rift all maxed out; btw, Rift with half settings is still better looking then majority maxed out :-)), good story quest, rifts itself, .... Rift is first Game (with very big G) after wow. And all this nearly without any bugs since day 1. They have mixed best interfaces out there + added their own. True however I have not yet experienced any end game as I prefer level all possible alts to max.
- The ascended soul class system is uber. I have for the 100th time made completely different type of char. If you are bored with your char, there is no need to reroll with new class. U just change your souls. You hav 5 specs so no need to destroy the old ones either. And having 9 souls to choose from right from the start, makes wow's class classic types feel like a snooze. You can craft a character with specific things in mind. Example i made a self healing pvp warrior with complimentary abilities that boost each-other across souls, i made a uber tank that can stop a train, i made a high-dps-ing spec that can bring down an uber cleric and on and on. There is just so much that you could never do b4. Playing a game without this will be yawn..... zzzz. Swtor's classes now seem so boring. Hope the big universe makes up for it.
Trion delivers.
He, he, ... this is one of the best things in Rift. I'm also constantly tweaking, adjusting, ... to find 3 best working builds and then switch them from time to time. Always a lot of fun.
And still waiting in wow for wardrobe sets. :-) Have made your pefect settings for UI and rest with alt no. 1? In secs you can import all or only few settings into any of existing alts. Etc etc. Game is so full of everything that any time I post something I already forget for many things that looks completely natural to have in Rift while others are unable to program in after long years.
But for sure swotor will have I guess impact in sub numbers (but not only on Rift), for sure will try. If will be good game then I will have now 3 games to switch from time to time (Wow, Rift, Swotor).
About Gw2 ... played gw ... and I'm not even minimally interested in it even if it is for sure possible will try sooner or later.
*shrug* I never get more than lukewarm with Rift. Cookie cutter in every aspect, quests nothing to write home about, standard fare races, zero replayability... It was fun to level to 50 one time. I can appreciate the hard work from Trion, but beyond the namesake Rift events there wasn't anything outstanding. Ok maybe the visuals.
As I said, just nothing that really caught me or persuaded me to stay after having one max level char.
People don't ask questions to get answers - they ask questions to show how smart they are. - Dogbert
- Dynamic zone and world events, No other mmo has this. (GW2 is not out yet) In fact is is uber boring running around in a quest zone in any other mmo now, Nothing at all is happening. Except maby for a bit of pvp here and there its dull. You do your boring quests and hand in. Rinse and repeat. In rift the PVE raids you. Every 2 hours or so the entrire map changes and you hav to team up with other ppl to defend positions , take out bosses, destroy stuctures, many other variations .... Its fun and ties in to the story and breaks the manotony of regular grinding. The world event bosses are awesum to take down !! Its like raiding on the world map with hundreds of players. I cannot see that i will go back to any other existing mmo or even SWTOR, because lifeless zones will just be a bore.
You do realize that the dynamic events are nothing more than portable "Kill X of Y" quests, right? They aren't innovative...Warhammer did this with their public quests. Only difference is that Trion can move those boring public quests, which are really nothing more than a generic quest chain you could pick up on any quest hub, and bring it right to you. So great...now there is no way to escape the mind-numbing boredom. They bring all that right to your doorstep, whether you want it or not. Kudos. Seriously, all of the so-called "dynamic" events are staged, with the same quest objective, only different mobs based on what plane is attacking. And the world events? All the same. Just a different boss at the end.
- The ascended soul class system is uber. I have for the 100th time made completely different type of char. If you are bored with your char, there is no need to reroll with new class. U just change your souls. You hav 5 specs so no need to destroy the old ones either. And having 9 souls to choose from right from the start, makes wow's class classic types feel like a snooze. You can craft a character with specific things in mind. Example i made a self healing pvp warrior with complimentary abilities that boost each-other across souls, i made a uber tank that can stop a train, i made a high-dps-ing spec that can bring down an uber cleric and on and on. There is just so much that you could never do b4. Playing a game without this will be yawn..... zzzz. Swtor's classes now seem so boring. Hope the big universe makes up for it.
The Soul System is unquestionably the strongest aspect of the game, but if you are going to be a hardcore raider or pvper...guess what? You're still stuck with a cookie-cutter spec more or less. Try bringing that hybrid healing/dps cleric you built into a raid and see how long that lasts you before the raid leader tells you to switch up your spec. This feature is best for levelling, as you can switch between builds and keep things interesting. But once you get to serious endgame content, you're back to the proven cookie-cutter specs if you expect to be your best. And as great as their soul system is, and it is a great feature, Trion is using it as a crutch for failing to build any more meaningful content during the levelling process. "Hey guys, we're gonna stick you on a linear path to level 50, giving you ZERO options other than the specific zones we've planned for you. We're going to make it so everyone has to run through the same drab, lifeless, unimaginative zones for every character they have. But the good news is, because of our awesome Soul System, you only have to do it four times! Yay!"
- in only 3 months rift already has 4 raids, 5 warfronts ( counting WF escalation ), many normal and expert instances that are completely different from one-another and a horde of different types of Raid and expert raid rifts that both hard and fun (especially if there is a enemy guild stalking you while trying to do one ). Also new PVP rifts. LOL @ rifts being only different looking. Wanna see you take on an expert raid death rift with your ( i have played to level cap in 2 days ) gear. There are also many raid zone quests and the new pvp-quests and content.
That's great. Trion has added a bunch of new endgame content. But one fact you're missing is that they've cornered themselves into HAVING to add all that content just to keep pace. Sorry, if it's taking the slowest levelling individuals only a month to get to level cap in this game, I think it's a pretty safe bet that there is some serious content lacking on the way to 50, wouldn't you? And if that's the case, maybe Trion should concentrate on fattening up the content BEFORE hitting endgame so they can actually retain their subscribers and give people incentive to continue playing after the first month or two. I've participated in their dungeons and raids, and I can tell you without a doubt they are boring as hell. Unimaginative and not very challenging. The boss mechanics are underwhelming to say the least. And the worst part? The same carrot-on-a-stick grind for tokens that you get from WoW. Same exact garbage, but with far inferior enjoyment because their endgame dungeons/raids are so much duller than WoW.
- the world and lore even without the dynamic events is very intersting and alive. There are a multitude of puzzles and hidden treasures all over. There are epic story quests, that absolutly rock. There are baddies that seem and feel realm with sum personality. The dragon lords are uber !! Azeroth is dead compared to this. each zone has a unique feeling and special vibe about it.
And this is couldn't be further from the truth. Rift's zones are absolutely soulless, uninspired, and boring. The lore is non-existant, and it feels as though Trion hastily through together some of it just to give the drab, boring quests an actual storyline. There isn't anything epic or "alive" about the story. As a player, I just didn't feel invested in the what was happening around me. Rifts spawning? Invasions happening? Who cares? What am I even fighting for? Just to pick up some planarite I guess. I certainly don't care about the little quest hubs enough to save these people, since the only interaction I have with them is "Go Kill X of Y" quests. The world of Telara is boring, drab, and lifeless. Which is one reason they will continue to hemmorage accounts, particularly when SWTOR and GW2 come out. It's bad enough to go through those boring zones once. It's even worse to have to bring every single alt you make back through them to do the same quests, in the same order, in the same zones.
Bottom Line :
Trion delivers.
Bottom line is that Trion is a solid company who does care about it's subscribers. I just think that they made a huge tactical mistake with trying to create a wow clone. You can't out-Blizzard Blizzard, so to speak. They delivered a polished, relatively bug-free game, but forgot to add in the excitement. In essence, they have created an inferior World of Warcraft. Yeah, they threw in a couple of wrinkles that had some promise, but the crux of their game revolves around doing EVERYTHING that Blizzard has done so well the last 5 years. That would have been great a few years ago. However, people are now leaving WoW because they are bored. Creating a clone of WoW isn't exactly the best way to capture the imaginations of those people who left in the first place. Hopefully, Trion keeps plugging along and cranking out content, but they need to start cranking out the RIGHT kind of content, or they will be in big trouble in the next 6-8 months.
A game where leveling is treated as an inconvenience will fail. And thats how Rift treats its leveling. Bare minimum number of zones, bare minimum number of instances, uninspired quests (with mob density that makes many of them not a brutal chore).
Well the problem is I can not justify or rationalize a company spending huge amounts of money on something that is literally 1% of your overall /played time in a MMO.
If you invest a year in a MMO and it took 2 weeks to hit max level why focus on that 2 week instead of the other 46 weeks? Now Trion can do things like try and add alternate starting zones after you pop out of the time machine. It is basically built into the game if you look at it.
The game launched with this:
Standard Difficulty Dungeons Available
- Realm of the Fae (16-17) - Silverwood
- Iron Tomb (18-19) - Freemarch
- Darkening Deeps (22-23) - Gloamwood
- Deepstrike Mines (25-26) - Stonefield
- The Foul Cascade (29-30) - Scarlet Gorge
- King's Breach (34-35) - Scarwood Reach
- Runic Descent (39-40) - Moonshade Highlands
- Fall of Lantern Hook (43-44) - Droughtlands
- Abyssal Precipice (49-50) - Iron Pine
- Charmer's Caldera (49-50) - Shimmersand
Expert Difficulty Dungeons Available
- Realm of the Fae (50+) - Silverwood
- Iron Tomb (50+) - Freemarch
- The Foul Cascade (50+) - Scarlet Gorge
- King's Breach (50+) - Scarwood Reach
- Fall of Lantern Hook (50+) - Droughtlands
- Darkening Deeps (50++) - Gloamwood
- Deepstrike Mines (50++) - Stonefield
- Runic Descent (50++) - Moonshade Highlands
- Abyssal Precipice (50++) - Iron Pine
- Charmer's Caldera (50++) - Shimmersand
If this is considered bare minimum I am not sure what to tell you. They have released a 10man or 20man raid every single month and have announced a Solo/Duo instance system in the pretty near future which the article talks about. A solo/duo instance system is something we begged Blizzard to do for years.
Now I do not know how man flashpoints or raids SWToR plans on launching with, but they said 17 planets which could be huge or small depending on how they do it and it has not launched yet so noone really knows.
rehasing content you already seen while leveling is not more content its just replay of old with a new boss or two and carrot on a stick so you stick around to do them. your list can be halfed.
progression beyond max level and more single player content is a step in the right direction but its not enough to make me re sub. seems like more backtracking to fill in gaps for a minimalist game that shipped with 1 rather small continent and 1 raid zone worth of endgame content, and nothing to do in between but farm farm farm farm farm- resub -farm farm farm farm.
they will likely continue the pace with (omg more content that should have been available at launch) updates until their next money making scam (rts) launches and all but the niche subscribers leave for actual games.
I am playing Rift right now because I was so completely burned out on WoW. While Rift is not very different it is at least a change of setting and new goals to accomplish. I'll admit that Rift is missing something to make it unique and I have posted many times on the forums with different suggestions that I think would go a long way toward making Rift more than a WoW clone with better graphics.
Trion as an MMO developer is second to none right now in my opinion. We have yet to see what Bioware will do and I am a little worried that Rift will become a ghost town when SWToR hits, but one thing I will say is that Trion is freaking incredible. They are pumping out updates and world events and new features at a rate I haven't seen before. They seem to be in permanent high gear and paying pretty close attention to the pulse of the player base.
It is my hope that Trion will get something unique out before SWToR hits that will retain a lot of their players and attract some new ones as well. I personally cannot resist the lure of a Bioware MMO since they are my single favorite developer, but if it sucks or I get sick of it, Rift will remain my backup plan.
Currently playing: Rift Played: SWToR, Aion,EQ, Dark Age of Camelot World of Warcraft, AoC
Comments
People leaving rift has nothing to do with leveling content.
The leveling content in game is fine, its streamlined but highly enjoyable.
The issue is the lack of non-group focused content at max level.
You need to group with people to get anything of value for your character above some faction or crafted stuff at 50.
we all know having to group for 1-2 hours at a time for any type of progress simply isnt casual friendly.
Yet Trion keeps adding in ten & twenty man raids, they add in rank 7&8 pvp gear, pvp rifts, expert & raid rifts all require a decent amount of people...
Thankfully They will be releasing AA, New zones and some solo/duo dungeons because if they keep ignoring these people by just handing them event content they will be left with four servers of a bunch of raiders.
Playing: Nothing
Looking forward to: Nothing
If you can't figure out why Rift saw a sub drop then I do not know what to tell you guys. When every server right now is basically labeled PVE and is high to extremely high pop and the lowest pop servers are PVP that is the first hint.
Trion specifically came out and said the following:
1. PvP was not the main focus
- People said screw that and rushed the game anyways
2. There would be no Arena. I mean come on guys even Blizzard admitted this was a bad idea because you have to balance around it.
- People said screw that and rushed the game anyways
3. RvR was considered WAR or DAoC, but would require a crap ton of time and could not simply be put into a game
- People said screw that and rushed the game anyways
THEN when the above did not happen which should be obvious was not their main focus people called them a bad dev and left. This is most definite WTF moment ever in MMO history. Trion made one single video about a guy ganking some other dude during an invasion and EVERY self labeled mmo pvp'rs rushed the game like it was the second coming of DAoC.
This isnt true at all.
The Pvp servers are freaking packed at least in the NA. its a original big pve shards that are becoming ghost towns. I started in Freeholme NA pvp and you couldnt move with all the lag in cities.
I assumed it would be better in wolfsbane but it was dead then i went to Byrial and it was very similar...
Just look at the lists for prime time the pvp server are much healthier. tis may not be a pvp game but its much more insteresting on a pvp server.
Playing: Nothing
Looking forward to: Nothing
Well I got no idea then. Whenever I look at the shard status list it goes Full/High/Medium/Low. I never see a pve server. I see 7 pvp servers that are low and stay low and might as well be trial shards.
I honestly can not tell anymore I left a pvp server because the qq was just too much. They never did any of the zone events and just afk'd and waited for war fronts after the first month of the game. If ithas gotten better then great, but with no fort objectives or RvR it felt like the pvp population took a MUCH MUCH larger hit then the pve side of it.
Your post did an excellent job highlighting exactly what is wrong with Rift for players like myself, a MMO designed totally towards end game raiding. Great news if you are a raider at heart, terrible news for the majority of the MMO population who don't care to raid, we're looking for alternate content and Rift isn't ever going to be that game.
I'm currently playing EQ2 and will play GW2 and SWTOR because there is or will be content outside of raiding.
"True friends stab you in the front." | Oscar Wilde
"I need to finish" - Christian Wolff: The Accountant
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
Who told you SWToR was not going to be the gerbil race exactly? They are releasing with a raid of 16 or something and what exactly do you think you do with that gear you get from the Flashpoints?
SwToR and GW2 hype is so silly. They need to just release those games already, so people can see how they actually play.
Also in GW2 why is it ok for pvp'rs to get mass pvp, but why can't I have mass pve which is basically raiding? Not sure why raiding became a bad term. Just because Blizzard shit all over it for the past 6 years does not mean it can not be done right. It is actually pretty damn fun.
Get off your horses man, the Star Wars mmo isnt anywhere near the most awaited mmo in history, Rift is much closer, but yes Guild Wars 2 might as well be the most awaited mmo in history, dont need any polls to be able to guess that much, no one does.
Rift will do fine in the face of the upcoming behemoths (GW2 and ToR). They have probably recouped their development cost from box sales alone. Ive been playing for close to a couple months and you can appreciate the style of the game. The graphics and sounds are unique, the soul system is a lot of fun to experiment with, the art style is unique as well.
The Rift system is where this game really shines. You can tell that Trion put enough time and detail into the rift engine that they have an astounding amount of freedom creating content via Rifts. It allows them to create new dynamic content and upload it in a patch, fully integrated in the existing world without the need to add new zones. That is a very powerful tool to have at your disposal. Being able to implement new ways to battle bad guys, solve puzzles, having it be a dynamic changing part of the gameworld and being able to develop this content and upload it practically on the fly, Trion has a winning formula and they already have a loyal fanbase big enough to keep them all in the black.
Props to Trion for being the new kid on the block and showing up some of the old dogs that have been slackin.
Yes, its without question the most awaited MMO release. Rift aint even in the top 10.
SWG
EQ2
WoW
FFXI
VG
AoC
WAR
LOTRO
SWtoR
GW2
are/were *EASILY* more awaited than Rift. By an enormous margin in every single case.
Rift gained steam late because of disappointment with Cata coupled with good word of mouth. Three months before its release it was barely a blip on the radar
I dont think you understand the difference between raiding and having single player/small group content. They are not mutually exclusive.
Trion had a good idea with the dynamic events, but dropped the ball. First of all, it's not spontaneous and dynamic if it's constantly happening. Second of all, there really is nothing innovative about the rift system, aside from the server stability. Unfortunately, they pissed away a good idea by making these rift events about as bland as can be. I can count on two hands how many actual different rift events there are. Same events...only the mobs change. Stage one: Kill these mobs that spawn. Stage two: Kill these different mobs that spawn. Stage three: You guessed it, kill these different mobs that spawn. Stage 4 bonus round: Do the same. Stage 5 bonus round: Kill this boss mob with the 50 people you have zerging the rift. Sorry, not very difficult, not very complex, not very innovative. Honestly, these events are nothing more than portable quest chains, with the same "Kill X amount of Y" mobs at each stage that you would normally see in any quest hub, and that we all have grown to hate. It's not innovative because Warhammer did it with the public quests, including separating it into stages. The only difference is Trion has found a way to bring the boredom to you, instead of you actually having to seek it out. And honestly, if Trion truly believes that these "dynamic" rift events are going to be a suitable substitute for increasing actual content, including adding more zones during the levelling process...they will continue to hemmorage subscriptions and lose people after a month or two of playing.
Lol, you have no idea what you're talking about. Let me explain what happened so that maybe you'll understand.
First, there isn't "only one" ranged warrior soul. Paragon and Riftblade both have lots of range. Reaver has range, but it's a tank soul.
Second, adding the CD to the ranged attack in question was so that they DIDN'T have to nerf the damage. The problem with the ranged abilities in question is that they did not scale with anything, therefore they were frontloaded with damage and had improper scaling which lead to it being severely OP at lower levels. Adding the 6 second CD only prevented you from spamming it, which is what people were doing. There's enough ranged abilities to have a ranged rotation with no downtime, but you apparently didn't see it or level far enough to notice.
We can talk again in a year or two when TOR and GW2's shiny has worn off and trion is still bringing out epic content and raisisng the bar in both dynamic, raid and customisation content every two weeks.
Noone can compare with that. Trion is owning. I will play rift even as TOR and GW2 try to match trion's effort. THey will be hard pressed.
Rift is growing at such a staggering pace that TOR and GW2 will be hard pressed to match event a 10th of its incredible growth.
You think Trion will be able to keep up this development pace?
Sooner or later they will need to cut corners.
When the game first released we had 99 servers now after transfers the game has around 60 non-trial servers.
Thats a big loss... If this keeps up Rift will be like every other game with content updates every 3-6 months...
Playing: Nothing
Looking forward to: Nothing
You're moving the goal post.
The assertion you made in your first post was this:
"Trion is still going to do their monthly updates which is still unpresedented. Monthly content updates are just not done by devs at all. "
Monthly content updates. You said nothing about raids.
Someone, accurately, pointed out that in fact, another developer has been doing it, and for many years now.
So you swifly change the topic to "how quickly Trion releases raid content".
The point is, you made an assumption about Trion's track-record being "unprecedented", and asserted that such a thing was "not done by devs at all". That was a very bold statement to make. It was also demonstrably wrong. A perfectly acceptable response would have been "Oh, okay. I wasn't aware of that and just figured Trion was the first to do it".
Ignoring that completely and swiftly changing the topic to a comparison about "Trion's raid content compared to WoW" is a rather obvious dodge.
It does highlight something people do an awful lot of around here.. They make statements based entirely on their own personal experience, without considering that one of the many other MMOs they haven't played or followed might prove their assertion false. This is why I avoid making such generalized, grand-sweeping statements as much as I can, unless I feel pretty certain the facts back it up.
and the cash shop selling asphalt..." - Mimzel on F2P/Cash Shops
few reasons why RIFT kicks ass.
- Dynamic zone and world events, No other mmo has this. (GW2 is not out yet) In fact is is uber boring running around in a quest zone in any other mmo now, Nothing at all is happening. Except maby for a bit of pvp here and there its dull. You do your boring quests and hand in. Rinse and repeat. In rift the PVE raids you. Every 2 hours or so the entrire map changes and you hav to team up with other ppl to defend positions , take out bosses, destroy stuctures, many other variations .... Its fun and ties in to the story and breaks the manotony of regular grinding. The world event bosses are awesum to take down !! Its like raiding on the world map with hundreds of players. I cannot see that i will go back to any other existing mmo or even SWTOR, because lifeless zones will just be a bore.
- The ascended soul class system is uber. I have for the 100th time made completely different type of char. If you are bored with your char, there is no need to reroll with new class. U just change your souls. You hav 5 specs so no need to destroy the old ones either. And having 9 souls to choose from right from the start, makes wow's class classic types feel like a snooze. You can craft a character with specific things in mind. Example i made a self healing pvp warrior with complimentary abilities that boost each-other across souls, i made a uber tank that can stop a train, i made a high-dps-ing spec that can bring down an uber cleric and on and on. There is just so much that you could never do b4. Playing a game without this will be yawn..... zzzz. Swtor's classes now seem so boring. Hope the big universe makes up for it.
- in only 3 months rift already has 4 raids, 5 warfronts ( counting WF escalation ), many normal and expert instances that are completely different from one-another and a horde of different types of Raid and expert raid rifts that both hard and fun (especially if there is a enemy guild stalking you while trying to do one ). Also new PVP rifts. LOL @ rifts being only different looking. Wanna see you take on an expert raid death rift with your ( i have played to level cap in 2 days ) gear. There are also many raid zone quests and the new pvp-quests and content.
- the world and lore even without the dynamic events is very intersting and alive. There are a multitude of puzzles and hidden treasures all over. There are epic story quests, that absolutly rock. There are baddies that seem and feel realm with sum personality. The dragon lords are uber !! Azeroth is dead compared to this. each zone has a unique feeling and special vibe about it.
Bottom Line :
Trion delivers.
Trion even talked about how they were ahead of schedule, and had a lot of the post-release content underway by the time the game went gold. You can tell that's what a lot of it is, by how they've been unable to adapt to what people want, and just keep rolling out the same sort of thing. Most of it was half done already, and I bet that limited their options.
As months go by, they'll talk about moving away from the generic raid game they'd initially thought would be such a hit, but implementing other sorts of content will take a lot more time.
When I want a single-player story, I'll play a single-player game. When I play an MMO, I want a massively multiplayer world.
Not only for originality of soul sistem, incredible detailed and realistic graphics (with no impact on performance, which is per se incredible, war, lotro, ... must play on my computer at half settings to have top perfornance like I have with Rift all maxed out; btw, Rift with half settings is still better looking then majority maxed out :-)), good story quest, rifts itself, .... Rift is first Game (with very big G) after wow. And all this nearly without any bugs since day 1. They have mixed best interfaces out there + added their own. True however I have not yet experienced any end game as I prefer level all possible alts to max.
He, he, ... this is one of the best things in Rift. I'm also constantly tweaking, adjusting, ... to find 3 best working builds and then switch them from time to time. Always a lot of fun.
And still waiting in wow for wardrobe sets. :-) Have made your pefect settings for UI and rest with alt no. 1? In secs you can import all or only few settings into any of existing alts. Etc etc. Game is so full of everything that any time I post something I already forget for many things that looks completely natural to have in Rift while others are unable to program in after long years.
But for sure swotor will have I guess impact in sub numbers (but not only on Rift), for sure will try. If will be good game then I will have now 3 games to switch from time to time (Wow, Rift, Swotor).
About Gw2 ... played gw ... and I'm not even minimally interested in it even if it is for sure possible will try sooner or later.
*shrug* I never get more than lukewarm with Rift. Cookie cutter in every aspect, quests nothing to write home about, standard fare races, zero replayability... It was fun to level to 50 one time. I can appreciate the hard work from Trion, but beyond the namesake Rift events there wasn't anything outstanding. Ok maybe the visuals.
As I said, just nothing that really caught me or persuaded me to stay after having one max level char.
People don't ask questions to get answers - they ask questions to show how smart they are. - Dogbert
Life is a filler between birth and death... do with it what you wish.
rehasing content you already seen while leveling is not more content its just replay of old with a new boss or two and carrot on a stick so you stick around to do them. your list can be halfed.
progression beyond max level and more single player content is a step in the right direction but its not enough to make me re sub. seems like more backtracking to fill in gaps for a minimalist game that shipped with 1 rather small continent and 1 raid zone worth of endgame content, and nothing to do in between but farm farm farm farm farm- resub -farm farm farm farm.
they will likely continue the pace with (omg more content that should have been available at launch) updates until their next money making scam (rts) launches and all but the niche subscribers leave for actual games.
Sadly Rift has turned out to be just the same old same old. Two months in and I'm tired of it. It's the same crap with a different wrapper.
Swtor is the same but with cinematics!
GW2 is the real competitor here. Not only is it going to be a better game at it's foundation but it's simply awesome looking.
GW2 broke the mold so to speak, Rift reused an old one lieing around.
I am playing Rift right now because I was so completely burned out on WoW. While Rift is not very different it is at least a change of setting and new goals to accomplish. I'll admit that Rift is missing something to make it unique and I have posted many times on the forums with different suggestions that I think would go a long way toward making Rift more than a WoW clone with better graphics.
Trion as an MMO developer is second to none right now in my opinion. We have yet to see what Bioware will do and I am a little worried that Rift will become a ghost town when SWToR hits, but one thing I will say is that Trion is freaking incredible. They are pumping out updates and world events and new features at a rate I haven't seen before. They seem to be in permanent high gear and paying pretty close attention to the pulse of the player base.
It is my hope that Trion will get something unique out before SWToR hits that will retain a lot of their players and attract some new ones as well. I personally cannot resist the lure of a Bioware MMO since they are my single favorite developer, but if it sucks or I get sick of it, Rift will remain my backup plan.
Currently playing:
Rift
Played:
SWToR, Aion,EQ, Dark Age of Camelot
World of Warcraft, AoC