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10 Reasons to be excited for Upcoming Action RPG Survival Sandbox: Rend
SerMedieval
Member UncommonPosts: 99
Rend:
1. It's a Three-Faction War Survival Sandbox:
The content and utter destruction of Rend takes place across 3 different unique factions (20v20v20):- The sly and cunning faction - Conclave (Purple)
- The proud and brutal faction - Order (Orange)
- The mystical and intelligent faction - Revenant (Green)
In addition to several life roles such as harvesting/gathering, crafting, and more!
Every faction will be vying for power in this non-stop Action Sandbox, and by fighting for your allied faction and completely wiping your enemies off of the map, you gain meta-progression points that can be used towards rewards like convenience items, cosmetics, and even (planned feature) talent-tree expansions for your faction.
2. Pre-Alpha/Early Access Planned for the Spring
With spring being just around the corner it's quite the pleasant surprise that this Sandbox is already scheduled for a quick delivery! Especially due to the game being announced only a few days ago.Rend shares a lot of similarities with games like Crowfall and Camelot Unchained even though it is not an MMO, like those it has a sort of Realm vs Realm vs Realm, but in the form of 20-man Faction v Faction v Faction. If this game delivers, it may very well be the first of these games to bring the concept of war in a Sandbox to life! Be sure to sign up for pre-alpha on their website to try your hand at finding out!
https://www.frostkeep.com/
3. Weekly Base vulnerability to spark PVP & PVE Engagements (The Reckoning)
While
you're busy fighting an all-out war in Rend there is definitely one
thing to keep in mind AND be excited about. And that is - The Reckoning.The Reckoning is a weekly event where the shields on your base (fully constructed by the player) come down and scores upon scores of monsters swarm in to try and destroy it. If you manage to beat these creatures back from whence they came your shields will remain down for another couple of hours and be vulnerable to the other factions.
Some servers may even have more frequent Reckonings to increase the intensity of your experience.
There will also be a countdown to when this event begins which shows even before you connect to a server (and a planned in-game timer). Make sure you plan your defenses accordingly to properly defend against The Horde!
4. Talent & Skill System
During
your adventures in Rend you will find that you are able to specialize
into 4 different classes (Assassin, Mystic, Soldier, Survivalist) and
that each of these classes will have specific talent-trees unique to
your character which offer full customization based on how you want to
play.On top of that, you can also customize your experience further via the Skill System - where you can specialize into activities like: harvesting, crafting, weaponry, hunting, magic, armor, exploring unforgiving areas of the game and more.
Which will make players feel like they have more freedom in terms of gameplay and create a unique experience for every single person in a faction. Because with only 20 people in your Faction, every single one of you will matter!
5. Developed by Ex-Blizzard Devs!
On top of being an awesome-looking Sandbox and having a great concept, this game is being developed currently by probably some of the best minds in the industry! With experience in design related to (some notoriously famous) games like World of Warcraft, Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare, Wildstar, Wasteland 2, League of Legends and even Overwatch!Overall, I believe this game is in great hands! Be sure to check out the team's part of their website to learn about their stories and experiences with the games listed above! It's awesome (Gotta love DA: Origins, and Jedi Outcast
)https://www.frostkeep.com/the-team/
Post edited by SerMedieval on
Comments
6. Access to Artifact Weapons/Equipment/Mounts
Not only will those who contribute to the success of their faction's victory be rewarded, but those with a lust for power will also have an untold treasure to find... In the frozen Eternal Wastes you will be able to explore and unlock powerful Artifacts that immensely increase your power. From weapons like a hammer that can call down the power of Lightning from the skies above (Thor Powers Initiate) to Boots that let you run incredibly fast (Sonic Status).But make sure to bring a winter coat before making the long journey to the Wastes, in addition to limited visibility due to a raging blizzard you will also need the means to keep warm, or risk freezing to death
And keep in mind that we only have access to one Artifact per server!
7. Buy once and play forever!
One of the best things to know about this game is that you only need to purchase it once! No micro-transactions or subscription, just war-war-and more war! A price point hasn't been decided yet for Rend but we will probably be getting one in the upcoming weeks, be sure to stay tuned for that!
8. Faction-Driven-Economy
In a game where your faction is your family, everyone will need to work together if you intend to succeed. Every single person will be important, whether they are a lumberjack, miner, crafter, or even a hunter. Everyone matters, and the economy will be entirely based around your faction. Make sure to communicate amongst yourselves if you need something only another can provide.And don't forget to defend your gatherers! The bases may be protected temporarily, but the need to expand outwards for what you need is ALWAYS a gurantee in Sandboxes
A happy harvester makes for a happy faction!
9. Server Resets:
Your experiences with Rend will always be kept fresh due to these. No experience will ever be the same and you will never be built up to the point where there's nothing left to do (which can happen a lot in other sandboxes). Instead you will always be fighting, always be building to something greater, and you and your faction will still be rewarded for your hard work via Meta-Progression.
If you aren't always able to log on and play the game, there will be systems in place to assist with this. And to keep you up-to-date on when "The Reckoning" will commence.
Not to mention the way you play completely depends on your preference, if you wish to log in one day and gather materials to aid in your factions fight, you are free to do so! Or even play with some friends and hunt down players of the enemy faction/collect Spirit Points (Stored in your Faction's Home Base) to further progress towards victory!
10. Action Combat!
This game is being developed in the Unreal Engine (Version 4.14) and features a form of full-fledged (no tab-targetting) action combat! Which you absolutely cannot go wrong with. From what we've seen so far it looks very fluid and entertaining.
I am so pumped to be apart of this experience. Let's hope for the best regarding optimization and server stability. Don't forget to support this game via the official Discord (Also has the Dev team) and newly formed reddit:
https://discord.gg/6yFbufH
https://www.reddit.com/r/rendsurvival/
There's still so much to learn about Rend and we've only scratched the surface of the game! This game has a lot of potential to be the Sandbox masterpiece a lot of us have been waiting for. Filled with limitless possibilities for our experience.
I hope you enjoyed this post and hopefully it has answered some questions you may have or peaked your interest for learning more about it.
Take care!
Which is even better!!!
Anything that is PvP first is an automatic NO from me.
Watching this one.
"My Fantasy is having two men at once...
One Cooking and One Cleaning!"
---------------------------
"A good man can make you feel sexy,
strong and able to take on the whole world...
oh sorry...that's wine...wine does that..."
Aloha Mr Hand !
I'll keep an eye on it, but survival games...least innovative genre to date.
~~ postlarval ~~
Which is also why I've turned to Sandboxes!
Its got to be big, its got to be challenging and it has to be fun.
I don't really care what genre you want to call it.
Most survival games I've seen are pretty much an RPG without quests.
"Be water my friend" - Bruce Lee
I only take caution when it comes to the MMO tag. Wouldn't want to be the one to mislead anyone.
This game will feature 60 player servers during EA as far as we know, not sure if it'll be expanded on afterwards. But it would be awesome if both the player count and map size were increased at some point (not sure what exactly the map size is at the moment).
Mainly because we're not forced to talk to each other and it's usually not the first instinct. But if you take a Moba or any PVP-based MMO with a global chat or any sort of option to chat, it's just as bad if not worse.
But if they make a form of communication between factions that's a different story, because it'd be no better than the other options.
The truth is, when you're dealing with PVP of any kind you'll see the worst of human nature. It's inevitable. So I definitely agree there.
And I absolutely respect your opinion about the rest. Everyone's got their different likes/dislikes.
*Added the 20v20v20 part to the front to clarify. That's a huge piece of information.
*Also just realized I had it in there already under #2 but I'll add bold text to it when I come home from work tonight.
There are just so many potential bad outcomes, I'm having a tough time envisioning how it could possibly work. There are too many ideas in conflict with one another.
---------------------------------
Questions:
First of all, I'm not sure I understand what they are going for with the "weekly-Reckoning" and "frequent server resets". Does this mean servers won't reset for weeks at a time, I assume?
If you need replacements, what are the odds that people will want to join in on a half-finished server(particularly on the losing sides)? I'd certainly prefer a fresh start if I were beginning.
Can you have excess players? You will have people who don't get to play for half of the cycle on their chosen server because of the limits.
If you have to move to a different server every time you log in because of the server always being full with low population caps, then what's the point of having the base-building and progression systems at all? You will likely never get to see it through and enjoy it.
---------------------------------
Sure, the Reckoning thing offers support for a comeback, but I have my doubts about how well-received that will be. It would be incredibly lame for the powerful team if it completely turns the table and causes them to get wrecked. And, for the losers, how many would want to wait around for this when they could just go to a fresh server? This sounds like a real fine line to walk. Nobody wants to have an unfair game mechanic cause them to get wiped out.
It all sounds a bit muddled to me. They are building semi-long games built on MMO persistency mechanics, but have a smaller player-count than many FPS games.
The scope sounds alot like Planetside but without the incentives and rewards, not to mention permanence and populations, to me.
From my perspective, they either need to find a way to increase the population quite a bit, ditch the total reset idea entirely to emphasize the MMO mechanics and home servers, or they need to have incredibly short cycles so people are willing to stick it out until the end... which would sort of nullify the entire MMO-like half of the game.
I feel that private servers with set communities would be the only way to get anything out of these systems.
It just sounds to me like they just smashed together a bunch of ideas without any clear vision of how they would fit together.
But the games not over until all the opposing factions or everybody goes down, which means games could go on for months, like they did say. Planetside does sound pretty similar though...
It seems to be somewhere between games like DayZ and Rust - there seems to be some sort of persistence (bases) and progression and these seem to be tied to a server / map / game, but they'll be wiping experience regularly?
Also, where is my base? Is it just mine and I build it in a standalone instance, or is it part of the 60 player map?
How are the map limits handled? If I joined a map yesterday, did some fighting and progressing, does that keep me tied to that map until the reset? Can new people join my map? What happens when all 20 from my side decide to switch to a different map because they're getting stomped? Can newbies replace them, or is that it, faction destroyed?
Rend looks to me like one of those designs that look good on paper, but fail spectacularly once implemented.
Reminds me a bit of the vastly overestimated design of ESO's Cyrodill campaigns at launch, which were quickly reduced in length and the amount on offer.
Most players want to be on the winning side, and will just switch campaigns until they are. Lock them in place and they'll simply abandon the game...
In terms of map limits I'd say think about Battlefield 1 or a more recent release of a game similar with an entirely different theme - Blackwake. Where you could just join at will and either have to wait till a game ends or (more likely in Rend's case) wait until someone leaves if you want to join a specific faction.
And you wont be tied to the server but your progression will be saved to said server, I don't think they'd make it to where you have to progress on a certain server till it's over (because what if you connect to the wrong one by mistake).
And yep new people can join at will, I'd imagine once all 20 leave unless a new 20 pop in, that faction is basically screwed. Picture a campaign in Elder Scrolls Online.
Got new people coming in and out of there all the time, factions have peak times and downtime's and it effects the campaign immensely. Same deal here, except a ton more serious considering a faction could get wiped out during downtime.
It probably wont be THAT easy to take out a faction though. We've only scratched the surface of the game after all. Also if you would like, the dev team is very very active on discord and can answer any questions you may have a lot better than I can. They also follow the subreddit if you wanted to ask questions there. Here's the links.
https://www.reddit.com/r/rendsurvival/
https://discord.gg/6yFbufH
P.S: An increase in server cap is definitely a possibility. From what's been said in the Discord, 20v20v20 seems like it's just a good cap for testing purposes. Don't quote me on that though, it wasn't said directly by the developers yet.
Nothing as demorilizing as knowing that your glory is fleeting and waining. Why put the effort in when it will be reset and removed anyway.? What is the carrot on the stick...
They will have to give some phat nostalgia lewts to build that fatigue away.
This have been a good conversation
What's the real reason we play those games over and over, a Moba for example. In HOTS your progression in any game you play never sticks, or in League. You just get better at it, and you can unlock cosmetic rewards for your characters as a result. But what else does it give you besides a number, besides (just like this game) a form of meta-progression via Rank if you play ranked games, or differences in matchmaking based upon your level.
And if you take a shooter like Battlefield 1, or even Blackwake is a good example. Our progression is never the same in those games, all we unlock are new weapons and utilities and (especially in Blackwake's case) just cosmetics for our characters. Yet people still play games like this and enjoy them very much.
It's the same with this game. It's not meant to be a full fledged MMORPG or Single-player RPG where everything you do is saved forever. But they have already said we will get cosmetics, convenience items, and possibly in the future talent-tree expansions for our factions which we can purchase via meta-progression points.
Which doesn't sound very different from how Mobas work, in my opinion. And in a game like Rust even, that would reset servers every 30 days in some cases you wouldn't get anything afterwards. Anything at all.
Haven't played the versions of these next 2 games but I wouldn't be surprised if Ark: Survival of the Fittest or H1Z1: King of the Kill ran with a similar setup.
*Overall: It's the experience, enjoying the experience is what you get out of it. And the cosmetics/convenience items/talent tree expansions and whatever else they decide to add in that we can purchase with the meta-progression points we earn every game.
This game is just another themepark with a few differences. Just because someone worked at Blizzard does not mean they are gifted in game design. I would hold off on any praise until they actually put out something playable.
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
Such an elusive term, so many make the mistake of trying to define it with set of features it does, or does not have.
Not quite that easy.
"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
"Theme park is like well a theme park. Theres a nice path around the world which brings you to different attractions at each stop. IE: start at forest world (level 1 to 10) then mountain world (level 11-20) then Ice world (21-30) etc. Its used to describe linear MMO experiences. Sandbox is just like a sandbox."
I can't really argue the class point too much because I at the moment can't think of any sandboxes with defined classes already in place. Ones that I'm used to like Mortal or Albion Online or even Darkfall/Wurm don't have them. But I'm also not sure about it not being a sandbox just because it has classes.
This sounds about right. There have been so many definitions of what a sandbox or MMO is popping up over the past few years I have no idea what the 2017 version is at the moment. But this sounds about as linear as Planetside 2 or Crowfall.
So, Survival game with MMO and Sandbox elements? Sounds dead on correct actually. Theme park? I... don't think so.
*And while I was typing this post I realized that Kyleran gave an example of a game that does have classes and is still considered a Sandbox - Star Wars Galaxies.
- Thanks Kyle!