Aion is live, at least for preorders. Who is playing, what server? I havent decided where to play yet, but I want to be asmodyian.

I preordered it last night but I might have been too late for the headstart.

Rolled an Elyos on Vaizel. Name is Fatcrab and alt Jam.

Zikel - Elyos Currently 16, thought I would be higher but got sucked into a guild group vs soloing which slowed me down alot more then I expected. No big deal though, just not gonna kill myself tonight. 13 hours of straight grinding is enough for 1 session haha.

Good luck getting an asmo, they are locked out due to overpop on nearly every server already. Oh also for those wondering, Gameguard was indeed removed by NC as promised since they couldn't get it to work the way they and the community demanded it too.

http://www.drow.org/news/

Yeah, unfortunately for me it's a day late and a dollar short. Had they announced the removal of GameGuard in August (or never put it in to begin with) I would've gotten Aion instead of Champions Online, but they didn't so I didn't. I intend to give Champions Online a fair shake for a few months before even considering Aion, assuming CO hasn't satisfied my gaming needs.

Also, in the announcement of its removal I don't like the statement "We will however continue to pursue ways to effectively utilize GameGuard within Aion in the future", as I know now for a fact that GameGuard didn't allow The Claw to work (before it was removed someone who'd bought the game and used The Claw messaged me on another forum asking how to bypass GameGuard).

Actually, I already have an asmo built on Zikel. I just havent been able to log in to play him.

A fair shake in CO was about 10 minutes of play, and another 5 to uninstall. Sorry, jk couldn't resist.

I don't like GG myself, however I won't fault them for attempting to pursue anti cheat. While I think the app is pointless and more problematic then it is worth, I understand why they want it. Hopefully it will remain a non issue since they haven't managed to get it working right in a year anyhow.

Ah then you are good, I didn't know if you had one built or not.

I'm stoked to play it, but I'm stuck in India right now with my macbook until early-mid October. meh.

Hey another MMO that's not WoW!





Wake me when it closes.

My friends and I have rolled up Asmodians on the Yustiel server.

Shouldn't be long. Today WoW just released 3.2.2 to the live servers.

The new Onyxia raid should keep raiders busy for a while, but I'm not sure if it will hold the attention of casuals.

Woo~?

Got my wind pet again, yay. I missed kiting in MMOs.

Wait a second, I pay for a game, and then the producer tells me what kindo of class, race, toon, whatever I can play? Not a game I'm going to be spending my money on. I don't give a crap about over population, balance the others if this one is popular. That's just sounds like poor design.

Asmodians are just on one side of the game, the other being Elyos. You can still play any available class.

As for overpopulation, lolz at everyone trying to cram themselves onto Azphel and Triniel. We originally rolled up on Triniel, then found out it was one of the most crowded servers, so we moved to Yustiel. We have had zero problems with creating characters and playing so far.

If they didn't address it this way, people would be bitching about pop imbalance like they did in WAR. It isn't hard, imo, to just choose a different server.

I guess I just don't give a **** about server population imbalance since if you're talking about PvP war there shouldn't be balance. One side is always going to be outnumbered. If it's a case where one side doesn't have access to content based on that imbalance then mechanics need to be added to the game to allow access to that content.

In other words you just wanted something stupid and meaningless to bitch about. The lockout is only on a few servers and has already started being relaxed. It was only in place to stop too many players from jumping on the same side of the same server. This isn't EQ, having everyone on one side ruins the game.

That said most of the lockouts are gone now as NC has been relaxing the restriction more and more now that players are spreading out. Still having queue one a few of the most populated servers like Zikel. NC already said that after a few days and the initial rush has died down some (See players have spread out a little), the queue will be removed as well. Honestly it is a smart move by them, it is preventing progression areas from being horrendously overcrowded and is making grouping generally very enjoyable. There is almost always the right mix of players at the given level ranges for the majority of players to be able to jump in and actually play, instead of standing around lfg with nothing to kill.

If I buy a game I expect access to all the content. I don't think that's stupid and meaningless.

You have access to all the content. Some content, though, is RVR dependent and, as such, a balanced realm population is important. The mechanic they added to the game to maintain balance was *gasp* population caps on imbalanced servers.

No one is restricted on content, if you want to play asmo or elyos and it is locked out on a server you simply choose another server OR *gasp* wait until the initial flood of players is over and the lockout is removed. You aren't playing the game and haven't even expressed interest in it. So fairly sure your only intention was to bitch and moan about something meaningless.

Unfortunately my guild chose Triniel to play on and I've been in queues for far longer than I've had game time. I guess I get caught up on my reading (like here). Just a random /whine I guess.

Char name is Perle if anyone finds me (good luck because I usually work during the week and only play weekends).

Yea my client crashed a few minutes ago, so I get to sit in the queue a while now. Sucks now the other sorc is going to manage to finally get ahead of me in levels haha.

Locking the content was a poor solution. Eventually things balance out some by people moving around. No matter what they do players will always complain. On my wow server I have 80's on both sides, my ally friends complain the horde cheats in pvp, horde complains because we are outnumbered 2-3 to 1. Not nearly as bad as it used to be before server battlegroups, where there was more nightelfs than the entire horde.

They just pissed a bunch of players off who would have complained anyway.

I'm on Triniel too, Asmo. Level 9 mage named Sacriledge. Are you elyos or asmo?

So after hitting 22 last night I needed a small break from the grind. In Eltnen Fortress the level 20ish hub for Elyos there is a quest that "accidentally" according to the text teleports you to Morheim on the Asmode side. Since i knew they nerfed Abyss points on lower level kills and it wouldn't be too "griefer". I decided to fly down from the ledge it warped me on and start laying waste to the newbies. Apparently a few others got the same idea a few minutes later and did the same thing. To be fair there wasn't a huge level difference, about 6 levels at that point. It was entertaining, we basically killed anyone who fought back, but didn't bother chasing the runners. It took them about 20 minutes of this to organize a couple of guilds to retaliate and kill all of us. I can only image the QQing going on in their general chat haha.

We didn't earn anything, or cost anyone anything more then a 500 yard run from the bind spot. It was just 20 minutes of pking, between fits of laughter. I have to admit, I haven't had that kind of fun in PVP since UO. I was literally laughing so hard I was having a hard time using my chains and not falling out of the sky to my death.

So, yesterday I was relaxing and decided to check out the weekly sales at my local computer store, NCIX. Checking out their 'Surprise Specials' where they have a limited quantity of computer hardware on for (usually) a good price, I stumbled upon the Collector's Edition of Aion selling for $60cdn. I figured I was going to try Aion at some point, and the part that irked me about Aion using Game Guard was that I wasn't going to pre-order without knowing that my Claw would work, and because I wouldn't pre-order I watched as the Collector's Edition went out of stock in the US (and Amazon.ca, but that's the only place I saw it for sale up here).

Well, to make a long story short I've got two months left on Champions Online, an opened Aion Collector's Edition box on my coffee table, and the Aion figurine displayed with some of my other figurines. Now the only question is how long can I wait before installing Aion. I'm thinking of installing it early November then just seeing which I end up 'wanting' more so by the end of the month when Decmber rolls around I'll just make the choice of which monthly fee gets renewed and which doesn't.

Below are a couple pics of the very nice looking figurine, one with a can of Diet Coke to use for scale.

Attached Images

	Aion 001.JPG (478.0 KB, 9 views)
	Aion 002.JPG (463.5 KB, 11 views)

Eff the gladiators, yo! :(

Have Fun Ruccus.

On that note, I was mucking around in the abyss last night for a bit.As some background, the Abyss is pretty much the level 25+ pvp/Raid/leveling area. There are other areas to level outside of that, but the best experience to be had between major campaigns is here. It is effectively split into two sides, across 3 levels. To say it is big, would be an understatement. So one of my quests had me close to the Asmodian area, fortunately i also had a quest to kill asmos for experience (Major points for a quest that says "Go kill players and we give you Fat Exps") So I went ahead and made the plunge into enemy territory. It went well, got killed a little faster then I had hoped, but then I was also solo. I took out half a dozen before I got taken out, not bad given they were all at least my level if not higher. I haven't had a rush like that in years, not many games these days that can instill a true sense of fear as you are trying to move from point to point.

How is this game in regards to putting the fear into you? That was always one of the things I loved so much about EQ.

Every new place that you went had that sense of fear and danger to it. If you died, it was a long corpse run back, so you'd better be careful. Wanna get into some PvP, ok, but don't die. Otherwise you'll be running back and fighting with no gear on. And you'll lose experience. Those were real penalties for dying.

WoW offers no such concerns for death. You died? It's cool, run back to your corpse at twice the speed. Also, nobody can attack you in ghost form, so you don't really have to pay attention. No need to get a res either, keep all your experience.

There are mild experience penalties for dying, but they aren't bad. The biggest penalty is really just losing Divinity Points, which is a resource gained from killing things and then used on various abilities, depending on class.

Imo, the game is best summed up in saying what DAoC was to EQ, Aion is to WoW. It isn't quite as polished, won't have as big a subscriber base and has a slightly different emphasis and style, but it's a viable option. You can shut your brain off and play it. *shrug*

Is Dying, and having an Experience penalty or having to run back to your corpse really something that instills fear? After doing it twice it becomes a nuisance.

I think Aion is a very polished Game, a good competition to WoW.

PvP isnt getting oneshotted like in L2. There are actual useful skills for Healers

But, i think im following a predetermined plot, Playing Aion is like watching a Movie. At leat i havent seen much free room, to explore, outside of the Quests.
I dont like PvP, but if there is an emphasis on it in a Game it should be totally free for the Players for which side they fight. You cant PK Killstealers. I would like a L2 with the skills and mechanics of Aion.

Levels 20-30, you get a little more choice in leveling environment. An area with rifts and an area without them. Not sure how they compare to each other past the early 20's, though. At the start, they're fairly equal in terms of content.

People that think the experience penalty is mild, haven't hit 25+. At that point the experience hit is very noticeable. So yes the game is very much like wow at the start in that it eases you into the game. However as you advance it quickly becomes more like old style Eq where there are very real penalties for screwups. The death penalty does not apply to PVP, other then costing your abyss points. So far that hit isn't terribly severe, that could change. For the most part pvp death is at most going to cost you a bit of a run. If you were the run in enemy territory that run can be quiet long if you choose to go back. There are no corpse runs though, you spawn with your gear. I doubt we will ever see another game ever put corpse runs back. Not entirely certain how I personally feel about that, but for now I accept it for what it is.

Also yes the game is very linear in the early levels. However once you start hitting 20+ it starts opening up quite a bit. While the abyss i mentioned is the best place for experience at 25, it is far from the only place. For example if there starts becoming too much pvp (And there are nights it will), then you just move to another area and level there. There are also tons of instances that start opening up that allow for more controlled grinding sessions without worry of pvp. So while those who like pvp less can't avoid it 100%, they can mitigate their exposure to it quite a bit. However I will say this, Try the pvp. My wife has been die hard anti pvp for years, however even she is really starting to enjoy the pvp. Sure she gets frustrated from time to time when she just wants to kill mobs and gets ganked. However she just moves to another area and problem solved.

I disagree with Snibbs on the polished part though, Aion is far more polished then wow has ever been. Aion fixed ALOT of the really glaring problems that wow has had ongoing for years. Of course it brings its own unique set of issues to the table as well, but that is par for the course. My only real complaint with Aion right now is the community. I expected this however, but it still grates on my nerves. I would prefer to just shut general chat off, because the level of retardation from the wow kiddies is nearly unbearable at times. Unfortunately because I actively participate in pvp, I can't really do that because people call out locations of invading players through general chat. This is a minor complaint really, but that should give you a good indication that the game is pretty good if the best I can muster to complain about is the usual morons that infest nearly all of online gaming now.

For those with concerns about pvp, here are a few things to think about. While all zones except the level 1-10 starter areas are pvp enabled, the amount of pvp you are going to experience usually is based entirely on you. PVP on the whole can be avoided 90% of the time or better. It does still require you to pay attention if you want to avoid it, however there are plenty of areas that either the opposite side has no access too, and or are just too far out of the way for them to bother. I still maintain my stance that while Aion may prove to not be for everyone, everyone should at least play it to see for themselves vs going off word of mouth. I am finding alot of old EQers really enjoying this game. Quite a few of us who were in the "Pinned our hopes on Vanguard to be extremely disappointed" group, have found nearly everything we have sought for years in the game. The game isn't perfect, don't assume I am saying that or expect that. However the dev team is constantly tweaking it and making changes based on community feedback. Not in the "listen to the whiners" respect, but in the taking serious feedback seriously. This is one of the major reasons gameguard was disabled for launch, as well as a slew of other changes made.

Well, it only took me a week to decide to try out Aion (I figured with Champions Online's first update scheduled for October 27th I'd try Aion then go back to CO for the update), and so far I'm really liking the game. The game runs like a dream on my admittedly rather high end rig (overclocked Core 2 Quad and crossfired Radeon HD 4830s), but I'm running with 4xFSAA and everything maxed at 1920x1200 resolution and I'm still seeing triple digit framerates in some places. I might disable crossfire to see what one 4830 would perform like, but I'd imagine simply lowering the FSAA to x2 or off would still allow playable framerates.

So far I've got an Assassin up to level 15 and a Spiritmaster up to level 14 on Fregion (Elyos side). I've been considering rolling up an Asmodian character or two on one or the other servers (possibly a priest type and then maybe a melee class) to see the differences between the two lands but haven't gotten around to it yet.

If anyone wants to team up occasionally, I'll play. My friends all dicked out on the game, so I'm up for Asmo or Elyos heh.

Interesting note about Aion.

While EQ you have EQ players and magelo, that you have to pay for.

http://na.aiononline.com/livestatus/...262&serverID=4

Aion does an armory free for all players. Not 100% sure if wow's armory is free or not. I would tend to assume it is, but i don't know. The armory does stay fairly up to date. Usually is about once per 24 hours that it updates, with ranking updating every monday. I particularly like the 3d preview where you can actually se players physical character. That and being perfectly honest, Aion is fun and sod just flat isn't.

You can also see whether or not you have mail, and what your AH status is (items sold, items yet to be sold, etc.).

WoW's armory is free and updates almost immediately after logging off your character. It also allows you to search for 'upgrades'.

Thanks, I couldn't remember if it was or was not. I figured it was since it was a feature regularly offered on the free servers as well.

Here's a bit of a bump for this thread thanks to a new video just launched on Aion's website.

Here's a link to a 9 minute video showing Aion's upcoming expansion. No ETA as far as I know, but it looks very impressive.

Considering the gameplay was stale and boring (minus the PvP), the expansion would have to completely change the game for me to want to play again.

Considering it's basically WoW with a shiny interface (and the flight mechanic is cool), but it shoves you into PvP... meh. Even if you want to avoid PvP completely, there is no possible way to do so. The quests at some point all funnel you into a specific zone - that zone is PvP enabled, so you get ganked, even if you want to avoid PvP completely.

Why would you be playing Aion if you want to avoid PvP completely? o.O

And, wow, holy crap. As far as expansions for MMOs go, it looks like Aion is trying for the most...expansive? Think I saw the class dynamic changes, possibly new classes, swimming AND full underwater content, addition of mounts and mounted combat, housing and player city creation/sieges, expansion of flight dynamic (i.e. aerial mines), and more engaging boss encounters. Whether or not Aion is for you, that's a seriously ambitious expansion.

Not to mention what looks like a major engine overhaul. Yea it looks like an extremely ambitious expansion. Wondering if they are possibly reaching too far?

Yea, I have the same concern. However, the fact that it's all game footage leads me to believe that a large amount of this coding has already been done. Keep in mind, they were talking about housing and mounts pre-NA release. The underwater stuff seems like something that the NA release highlighted a large demand for. And I'm sure they've been looking at engine upgrades since the game went live in Korea, that's just part of the business.

Don't forget the changing of seasons; that's one that really impressed me. Since EverQuest the thing that's bugged me a bit is that while there are day/night changes there aren't seasonal changes.


I'm currently having a lot of fun playing Aion, though I'm levelling three classes to avoid getting into a rut. I find my Assassin relies on a 'counterattack' combat style where I have to pay attention to what the mob is doing and react with the appropriate skill, my Gladiator relies on weaving his skill attacks with the basic attack to increase damage output, and my Spiritmaster can either kite or help the pet tank. In my mind combat is very different between the classes and not stale, though when you do get to PvP it becomes a lot more hectic (which is a different type of fun for me). I do remember the first time I got ganked though. I was doing a mob killing quest behind Eltnen Fortress when in the middle of attacking a mob I see a Spiritmaster water pet running up to me. I thought "What the...?!" and was quickly killed, to which my response was "Oh we're playing hardball now, are we? Okay." Now whenever I see an Asmodian in Eltnen I attack, and if I see a call for help on the region chat I try to go to their aid. The cost for dying is very low (1 kinah and a trip to your bind point) and the benefits (XP and Abyss points) outweigh that cost, so I treat PvP as an impromptu 'game within a game'.

At level 26 I was part of a group running after a level 41 assassin, and even though I died a few times in the span of less than an hour I had fun. In fact the most memorable part wasn't dying, it was successfully backstabbing, stunning, and throwing another attack on top of that when the assassin thought I was at my weakest. He'd just killed me and I was quickly rezzed, so I sat down to heal. I was still watching the assassin and saw that he saw me sitting, then began to run towards me. I waited until he was close, stood up, hit ambush for over 100 points of damage and a stun (didn't know a level 26 could stun a level 41) then followed it up with a sneak attack for over another 100 points. With the mob of level 20-30 characters approaching he fled without getting one attack in on me. That made me smile.

I've only got 57 kills between my three characters so I'm not exactly a veteran PvPer, but of all the MMOGs I've played I think Aion is one of the best at incorporating PvP into their game. I have however been contributing posts into one of the threads on the Aion forum asking for a PvE server (which I'm in favour of) since alternate ruleset servers are a marker for a successful MMOG and would help to increase player base, and if done correctly could help form a stepping stone to encourage a player to learn the game mechanics in a safe environment then reroll on a normal server for the full Aion experience.

By PvE do you simply mean no combat outside the abyss? Or do you mean no non-consensual PvP combat? If it's the latter, entire regions of the game cease to serve a purpose and, arguably, half the game becomes redundant due to the mirrored content paths of both sides. The former ends up removing all rifting content, which is a sizable amount of content.

Since I believe the alternate ruleset server should be as different as possible from the normal servers, my suggestion for a PvE server is complete PvE where the Balaur would replace the player factions. Balaur would invade through rifts instead of players, and all the [SPY] missions would be removed. If you want PvP (outside duels and the arena) you'd have to reroll on a normal server.

In the view of Aion history, it would be a revised history where the Asmodians and Elyosians became friends during their first meeting in the abyss, and banded together to defeat the Balaur.

Hmm...I guess that could make sense. And fill the forts in the abyss with Balaur NPC's, giving them abyss loots and the like. There would still be the problem of the redundant leveling timeline, as Elyos and Asmos have virtually identical zones in terms of PvE content. But it could work.

Still, though. I'd be afraid of the alt rule sets being to Aion what the Zeks were to EQ. A cesspool of whines and inane complaints about issues that affect an incredibly small minority of players but get inflated to false importance through sheer force of hyperbolic will.

What server are you on, btw? I've taken a minor break since windows7 makes it unplayable with only 2gigs of ram, but should be coming back after Thanksgiving with a glad buddy of mine.

I'm on Fregion, Elyos side. I've decided to stay on one side until I get bored or just don't feel like continuing on, then roll up an Asmodian on another server. I've yet to travel to anywhere on the asmodian side apart from the road that runs by the 20-28 rift entrance so when I eventually roll up and Asmodian things can feel new to me again.

With regards to the PvE server, I envison a PvE server as not only a place for casuals to hang out and talk while playing (without getting ganked), but a way to teach uncertain players (or those who've never PvPed) how to play Aion and show them the lay of the land to allow them to be better players when they rerole on a normal server. It should be kind of an 'easy mode Aion' but not so easy that the player would be overwhelmed when jumping onto a normal server. The PvE server shouldn't affect the normal servers, and in might go so far as to have an XP bump to make levelling easier (maybe 20-25% across the board XP increase) so it's about learning Aion over the span of months with the intention of rerolling on a normal server when the player is ready.

In fact, with the expansion teaser I'm currently mulling over the thought that a PvE server should be 'basic zones only' (the current world as it is). When the expansion is released the normal servers would get everything in the expansion, but the PvE server would only get the game engine enhancements and the new class(es). That would prevent having to rebalance anything as future expansions are released and encourace player to eventually migrate to the normal servers for the 'full game experience'.

I am indifferent on a PVE server myself. I can't really see a reason to not have at least one, though I would argue that players lose a large chunk of the "Experience of aion". I do however realize there are just some people who don't like the fact that they are being pitted against another human. While I don't understand that notion as invariably nearly all games right down to tic tac toe do this, I see no reason to be against it either.

The one thing I would like to see done however is the removal of the cross faction chat barrier. I know elyos get a quest where in the lore alone an elyos married an asmodian and clearly had no issue with language barriers. There are likewise several instances of quests where we speak to an npc of the other race, not to mention the fact that we get a plethora of quests to understand the various npc languages including the Balaur. To me coming from a UO background, being able to talk to your opponent is a major part of pvp and one that I feel is severely lacking. I really fail to see a single justifiable reason that we are barred from it, other then just because wow did it.

That said..for those who want to lean to the non roguely lot..I have the perfect reason to play aion. Check out my hat in the 3d char profile. :D