Any of you fellas planning to play RIFT at release?

I've spent a few hours with the beta this weekend and I'll throw in my opinions.

Maybe it's because I've just spent the last three months or so playing WoW, but...in so many ways on a very basic level, this feels like WoW. And that's not necessarily a bad thing. From what I've seen: all of the default keybinds are the same, terminology is the same, everything in the UI is in the same place, the quest tracking system is the same, trade windows are the same, rogues even use the exact same combo point system...I could keep going. Now, all of that serves to make it a very comfortable and easy transition from WoW to Rift. I was able to start playing and feel right away like I knew what I was doing. I kind of liked that, but it was also a little unsettling.

The graphics. Other than immediately trying to find out how to turn on AA (I run at 1680x1050 and the jaggies are horrible), I think they look nice. The animations are mostly good, with a few being kind of wonky. I guess I don't find the graphics offensively bad, but I wasn't blown away by anything I've seen yet either.

The class system is really cool. And, for someone like me who doesn't like to place a single point without knowing if it's the 'right' (yeah yeah, I know this is beta) place to put it - stressful. Seriously, all of the class combinations and talent trees are a little overwhelming. And in some ways it seems a little unnecessarily over-the-top. My X/Y/Z mage has a direct damage nuke from each of his three classes, that hits for the same damage, same cast time, and costs the same mana. That being said, I could see myself spending endless time working on different character builds. And, I don't see how it's even remotely possible for them to balance the classes. I expect it will be a flavor-of-the-week/month system that will change based on patches, nerfs, and buffs.

Overall, it does feel much more polished than other betas I've been in that this stage. I haven't run across any bugs yet or anything that felt wrong or broken.

So, those are my initial impressions. I've made a few characters, the highest being level 10. I have yet to do a dungeon or try PvP. I'm hoping to try both of those things tonight or tomorrow. I can't say that it has its hooks in me at this point, but I'm interested and will play a bit more before the end of this beta event. I can't bring myself to have strong feelings about it one way or another and hopefully more time with it will help sway my decision on whether to jump on the release day bandwagon.

So I tried a double experiment just this past couple of hours. I tried the guardian newb zone and I tried a mishmash of new cleric souls.

Surprisingly, most of my concerns regarding the complexity of the soul system are currently alleviated. I started with a purifier and made it comfortably through the first few levels when I picked up cabalist. The cabalist seems really, really cool. I then select justicar, and surprisingly, there will be some compatible cross over skills between the three "random" souls. The purifier has a nice nuke/dot hybrid starter spell in addition to the absorb shield. The cabalist has this sigil mechanic, lots of aoe and is definitely a good rdps soul. The justicar can self heal and does good melee damage.

I think they are really going in the right direction in shaping up this game and they still have a month and a half to go. (well prolly a month since the game needs a few weeks for distribution)

I was playing this morning and one of the devs posted a global server message greeting all the players and telling everyone to take their time. After several jovial taunts from the players there was another server message essentially saying "what? you don't want to start off slow this morning? How's this?" and suddenly multitudes of rifts started opening EVERYWHERE. That pretty much sealed my decision to preorder this game.

I have been playing a lot in the beta so far, and I am really liking it. Casting is seamless and the spell graphics are a lot of fun. I was around for a Rift opening and helped to close it the open quest dynamics are spot on and the looting is great as well. I will more then likely be playing come release day.

I apologize if this has been posted, I had not seen it yet.

A character builder, though with all changes going on in different beta events, it may not stay 100% current. its a good example of what to expect though I think.

Rift Role Builder

I've been tooling around with a riftblade/beast master and wow, do they do a lot of damage. Riftblade was one of the classes I was looking forward to before I got to test RIFT. It was the third character I made once I started testing and I was a bit disappointed with it. It was supposed to be a fighter with some mage abilities and it only had one mage nuke that was on a longish cooldown. I was really disappointed because the description sounded like they could use spears and I found out there were no spears in the game and that the spears that they hurled were nothing more than a magic "bolt".

But yesterday was a different story. I was just chomping through things with my two handed sword or axe, dot and pet and I wasn't exactly lacking for armor either. I'd say that rogues are going to have it tough but the bard is so versatile and 8 points into assassin is going to be really lethal and there are many more options for powerful ranged dps with the rogues.

It is really going to be tough to pick a calling and stick to it with this mmo which I guess is sort of one of the main features. The mages may have it rough when competing with all the rdps rogues, but mages get two pet classes and the chloromancer is very unique and cool. The justicar will be extremely popular overall and not just amongst the clerics.

fangblackbone wrote:

I've been tooling around with a riftblade/beast master and wow, do they do a lot of damage. Riftblade was one of the classes I was looking forward to before I got to test RIFT. It was the third character I made once I started testing and I was a bit disappointed with it. It was supposed to be a fighter with some mage abilities and it only had one mage nuke that was on a longish cooldown. I was really disappointed because the description sounded like they could use spears and I found out there were no spears in the game and that the spears that they hurled were nothing more than a magic "bolt".

But yesterday was a different story. I was just chomping through things with my two handed sword or axe, dot and pet and I wasn't exactly lacking for armor either. I'd say that rogues are going to have it tough but the bard is so versatile and 8 points into assassin is going to be really lethal and there are many more options for powerful ranged dps with the rogues.

It is really going to be tough to pick a calling and stick to it with this mmo which I guess is sort of one of the main features. The mages may have it rough when competing with all the rdps rogues, but mages get two pet classes and the chloromancer is very unique and cool. The justicar will be extremely popular overall and not just amongst the clerics.

Actually, mages are incredibly survivable. I have been incredibly impressed with my Elementalist/Stormcaller/dominator. My other fave is the Ranger/Bard/rift walker. Another wickedly fun combo is the Cabalist/warden/Purifier. The only archetype I didn't take up to 15 was the warrior. Although I tooled around with a Champion/reaver/beast master that was kind of fun. Part of the fun of the game is mixing and matching classes to get that "feel" you always wanted to play. Pick a favorite fantasy character and you can probably build that character. So far I have an Elminster, Drizzt, and a fantasy version of Ravenor. I love the game and late February can't come soon enough.

This sounds intriguing, no Steam pre-order available in Australia though it seems... it probably got pre-emptively banned to save time. Not that it matters, I wasn't going to pre-order it, but the comments in this thread and that very cool class builder have piqued my interest. I'll be keeping an eye on this thread.

Redwing wrote:

This sounds intriguing, no Steam pre-order available in Australia though it seems... it probably got pre-emptively banned to save time. Not that it matters, I wasn't going to pre-order it, but the comments in this thread and that very cool class builder have piqued my interest. I'll be keeping an eye on this thread.

it is certainly derivative of other games, WoW and WAR in particular- but the class system and dynamic world events more than make up for it. I don't think it'll be the WoW-killer everyone seems to be waiting for, but it is still a very good game and I think it has a strong chance of becoming successful in it's own right.

ruhk wrote:
Redwing wrote:

This sounds intriguing, no Steam pre-order available in Australia though it seems... it probably got pre-emptively banned to save time. Not that it matters, I wasn't going to pre-order it, but the comments in this thread and that very cool class builder have piqued my interest. I'll be keeping an eye on this thread.

it is certainly derivative of other games, WoW and WAR in particular- but the class system and dynamic world events more than make up for it. I don't think it'll be the WoW-killer everyone seems to be waiting for, but it is still a very good game and I think it has a strong chance of becoming successful in it's own right.

I think the industry has given up on WoW killer and has instead focused on carving out their own respective playgrounds. Rift takes several successful formulas adds it's own Mythos to the bargain and then flavors it with a unique class system in order to appeal to those mmo fans looking for something new.

Got a beta key if anyone wants to play. It holds 25 uses and I think i have only given away 3 or 4.

Here ya go:

Go to https://account.RIFTgame.com/ to login or create a new account.

Click "Apply Code" on the left-hand navigation bar and enter your VIP key.

You're done! You will automatically be invited into the remaining beta events.

The code is :
LYYC-G7JE-T3J6-9HCK-EJXF

I also discovered I had a 25 slot code this AM if anyone needs an invite.

I jumped into this for a brief time again over the weekend. Nice to see they opened up more soul choices at the beginning.

I have to admit this is a very nice game. Problem is with me having such a background in WoW i was always and still thinking about what it was just --- shy of compared to WoW. Its something hard to explain, but the more i play it the more i want to go back and play WoW. In some ways i'd say thats a great compliment, but i'm sure some would just call me a Blizz fan boi.

I think RIFT touches on some things that you like and are proven to work in WoW. I don't think that makes you a WoW fanboi. In fact I'm sure all of us mmoer's who've been around the block know you are far from a WoW fanboi.

There are just some things that RIFT can't spit shine a month before release like a 2,3,6 years old mmo can. We know there are going to be raids in RIFT but there is no way that there aren't going to be growing pains with them at launch. I have no proof of this but for a launch mmo to have flawless raiding day one would be quite a feat. Not wanting to give RIFT much leaway in this area does not make you a troll.

I will give this a good play through at some point.. In some ways its a prettier more class customizations version of WoW (which ain't a bad thing).. .oh and it has Bards (which is huge in my book)

Though if WoW every just gave up on PVE/PVP balance and introduced real Hero classes for every class then WoW would probably hit 20 million subs.

oh and buff Shamans

Can we just stop saying "boi". We aren't 15 year old girls.

Cobble wrote:

Can we just stop saying "boi". We aren't 15 year old girls.

Ever played Madden with Swampy :)?

I can't comment on much, but I do not see the problems listed in sapman's 7 hr first-glance synopsis as an issue, or as game breaking. I also would prefer distinct inventory areas for currency and quest items, but those concerns have long been routed through appropriate channels for additional review.

if any of the three people left in the world who haven't gotten a rift beta key yet wants one, I have a few left. Help yourself:

Go to https://account.RIFTgame.com/ to login or create a new account.

Click "Apply Code" on the left-hand navigation bar and enter your VIP key: LCRP-PTR7-QFP7-P9LG-CRT6

You're done! You will automatically be invited into the remaining beta events.