MMOs – Page 21 – Windy Weather

Tera – 20 > 60 Dungeons Only

Can you level a character from 20 > 65 using dungeons only? And is that better or easier than using Story quests?

Since a recent update, story quests were given much more XP, and zone quests XP rewards were dramatically reduced. As of that update, it was easily possible to level a character from 1 > 65 using only Story quests. I’ve done that many times with all except Sorcerer and Archer.

More recently I found that it is easier to level any class from 60 > 65 using almost only dungeons. In this pattern, the story quest chain is stopped after doing the quests in Highwatch.

I just completed leveling a Mystic character from 22 to 60 using only dungeons. Starting with Bastion of Lok at level 20, and completing in the Ebon Tower reaching level 60 after two runs. You can find a list of all the dungeons here.

There are a few Caveats with this method of leveling.

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Tera – Ninja and Other Changes

The Ninja class has finally arrived as of the May 17, 2016 Patch. Another race / gender locked class and the second one for the Elin lovers out there. And the forth in a series of Over Powered classes.

In spite of the cloth armor she wears, she’s a bad-ass DPS dealer. Mostly this is because, like the brawler, once she gets started, it’s easy to keep the target[s] from getting a spell in edgewise or any other wise. Like the Brawler before her, many Ninja spells elevate and silence the target[s] doing very effective crowd control on all but the bosses.

After being away for almost two months, I came back to Tera about a week after Ninja was released, and things calmed down a little, to she how she plays and to see how other things level, so I have almost finished leveling a Zerker as well as finishing the Ninja and a Brawler who was at about 40 to 65. Here are my thoughts on the current state of Tera.

Update at bottom: How to level 60 – 65.

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Unavailable Items?

World of Warcraft is notorious for this. Making items “no longer available” in the game.

Why should an item become “no longer available”?

The item must be kept in the client forever. Yes FOREVER, since some players will have the items and they must be displayed or otherwise operate correctly when they are used.

If an item is truly “removed” from the game, it must be replaced by something of equal value and there must be an overwhelming reason to remove it. I’m having a very hard time thinking of a reason that would call for an item to be permanently removed from the game.

Removing an item is not the same as changing it. If a weapon or armor piece or set is too powerful, or too weak, then one can easily change the stats on it to make it more in line with the play styles of the game. This is done all the time.

Here are some of the Excuses that game designers have used to remove items from the game, and the reasons that none of them hold up.

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Flying Mounts – Why Dumb Them Down?

In January 2007, Blizzard released World of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade. This expansion included flying mounts in Outland. You had to reach level 60 to purchase flight training and a mount. You could only fly in Outland, the new continent. In the Cataclysm expansion flight was possible in all areas, except the starting areas.

Now, after all this time, other MMOs are adding flying. Guild Wars 2, in Heart of Thorns, has added flight, well Gliding actually, where you can glide in the whole world, but only for a limited distance.

In a few days on May 17, 2016, Tera is adding flying mounts. Again these mounts have limited range. Why are these games dumbing down flight?

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My, Don’t These Trees Look Similar?

Trees Below Dalaran in Wrath of the Lich King

On 13 November, 2008, Blizzard released Wow Wrath of the Lich King including Northrend and the city of Dalaran. Below Dalaran there are two trees.

On 25 January 25, 2011, Tera was released in South Korea. On the Island of Dawn, the starting area for all characters is this tree at Tower Base.

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Tera – Layoffs and Rewards

Two things have happened in the last few days over at Enmasse, publisher of Tera in North America.

Enmasse just laid off a bunch of developers.

And they just started a new Rewards Program to encourage more participation among their player base.

First lets look at that Layoff Announcement. They say they have laid off Developers.

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GW2 – Heart of Thorns – Go with Friends

GW2_2016_03_28_09_16_39_914 — Guilded Hollows Guild Hall

I’ve recently been playing the Heart of Thorns expansion for Guild Wars 2. I resisted it for a while. $50 seems like a lot to pay based on all the money I’ve already spent to buy and upgrade the original game. I think that Arena Net could have given the expansion away and made it up in in-game purchases that folks would purchase, or at least have priced it at $29, which would have been a no-brainer purchase price.

But regardless of that, I now have the expansion and I’ve played it enough to recommend it, with a provisio. Don’t try to Solo the new content. It apparently is designed for groups only. And not even one friend is enough. Join a Guild. It is best to run with a half dozen to a dozen folks to get the full experience and avoid the heart break of being left alone in the jungle. The Maguuma Jungle is a very nasty place with groups of powerful Veteran bosses just around every corner.

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ASTA – Nothing to See Here

ASTA from Webzen is in Open Beta, and honestly, there is nothing to see here.

While it’s written by a Korean developer Polygon, it is nowhere near the quality in any dimension as Tera from Blue Hole.

ASTA is / will be free to play. But so is Tera. I would not even spend the time to download the 10GB of game to try it. Let me count some of the reasons.

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Echo of Soul – Give It a Pass

Recently released in NA by Aeria Games, Echo of Soul is a surprisingly backward MMO. While the graphics are pretty good, it has features that one would have expected five years ago. Maybe there are some reasons for this as we will look at below.

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Blade and Soul -Complicated Martial Arts MMO

BnS_2016_02_25_09_08_23_284 — Blade and Soul

Blade and Soul has just opened it’s doors in North America from NCSoft. It’s a martial arts MMO in the style of Jade Dynasty of a few years ago.

This is not a full review. Those are available elsewhere, I’m sure. But these are some first impressions comparing this game with others that I play and like.

The first impression is pretty good. The game is Free to Play and the graphics look very good. So those looking for Martial Arts with modern graphics, then you may want to try this one. Jade Dynasty is looking quite dated by now, but this game looks much better.

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