Glorious Alpha Two Testers!
Alpha Two testing is currently taking place five days each week. More information about Phase II and Phase III testing schedule can be found here
If you have Alpha Two, you can download the game launcher here, and we encourage you to join us on our Official Discord Server for the most up to date testing news.
Alpha Two testing is currently taking place five days each week. More information about Phase II and Phase III testing schedule can be found here
If you have Alpha Two, you can download the game launcher here, and we encourage you to join us on our Official Discord Server for the most up to date testing news.
Best Of
Re: Crafting is becoming stupid exhausting
keep in mind, and this is a difficult concept but: the game is in alpha testing and the map is currently approximately a generous 6% of its invisioned size.
Drazard
1
Re: Smite Cleric vs Heal Cleric.
I don't like how one dimensional cleric and few other archetype feel, but this looks like a design intention at this point. Some of this might be balance concerns, but those issues have been addressed through talent trees in other MMOs years ago. I don't think prospective cleric players should be expected to suffer through 25 levels before they open up different cleric based playstyles and gameplay variety.
Anyway, "apparently" all archetypes are still missing a lot of abilities etc, so it is possible we will see some changes here, and we will be able to build more of a support cleric or damage dealing cleric class in the future.
Anyway, "apparently" all archetypes are still missing a lot of abilities etc, so it is possible we will see some changes here, and we will be able to build more of a support cleric or damage dealing cleric class in the future.
Re: is ranger really that bad?
So if a more complicated/convoluted/higher skill ceiling class doesn't sound like your cup of tea...then just run a mage. The mage will solo just fine, and tends to be the preferred DPS class in groups, should you choose to run them.
Ranger has no skill ceiling for the most part. There is only one real build as its useless to spec into multiple hunts, marks, or ammos as they can't be used at the same time as a different one. This leaves us with only half a dozen damage abilities as a dps class which feels horrible and gives no room for different builds. The skill ceiling for this class is extremely low and basically is oriented around creating distance from your enemy with movement ccs and mobility skills. The class isn't complicated. It's far too simple with no unique class mechanic to speak of and no build variety. If you meet another ranger, he's going be running the exact same thing build and use it most likely in the same order. Ranger isn't misunderstood. It simply completely missed the class fantasy and doesn't feel good to play.
Re: Death of the Bard
Yes, most of the bard nerfs feel really unjustifiable. Shock stacks were clearly broken, and everyone knew that since Phase1, but nerfing Chilling Lament or Dark Lullaby doesn't make sense. Dark Lullaby WAS quite fun to use. It required from you set up, and applying negative statuses to the target, before you could do a nice burst of damage, with lets say something like spellbow finisher effects. Now all those interactions are just dead. Measly 15% extra damage from 5 negative statuses? Just remove Dark Lullaby from the game all together at this point. In group farming situations I often take something else instead. Dark L is a joke now.
I also don't understand the direction of some of those changes, which made the class with the highest action per minute requirements even more micro intensive. I'm fine with fleshing out the support aspects of the bard, but there is enough room in that bard's kit to support different playstyles. If anything Intrepid should flesh out other archetype skill trees, so they don't feel so one dimensional in comparison.
I just wish Intrepid stopped breaking those aspects of the bard which worked and made sense for sake of insisting you play only as a support bard.
I also don't understand the direction of some of those changes, which made the class with the highest action per minute requirements even more micro intensive. I'm fine with fleshing out the support aspects of the bard, but there is enough room in that bard's kit to support different playstyles. If anything Intrepid should flesh out other archetype skill trees, so they don't feel so one dimensional in comparison.
That was a necessary change. The thing is that even after Intrepid's insistence to nerf the basic bard damage kit into the ground, I can barely justify to invest points to reach most of the sagas. Not to mention many of them are buggy or don't work. Saga changes would be nice, if talent point investment to reach them wasn't so steep. Both volume I and II of Sagas should be simply free after you reach the level requirements. I see no reason to spend 4 points into sagas for an ability on 1 minute cooldown, which doesn't work, is too weak or/and too situational.The Saga change is nice though. Can get a nice little speed buff gathering without having to recast all the buffs so its up more often.
I just wish Intrepid stopped breaking those aspects of the bard which worked and made sense for sake of insisting you play only as a support bard.
Re: Why The Game Needs Fast Travel
Is it a bummer I cant TP home before I log off at the end of the night? yes
is it a bummer it takes a while to run to a dungeon? yes
Are there more negatives of not having fast travel? yes
Do I want fast travel? NO
All modern MMOs have fast travel and it guts the whole experience of adventuring in a world. We all need to stop asking for instant gratification. Teleport me here so can do a thing so I can quickly get home to do another thing quickly..... Traveling is content and while not always exciting, has the potential to be so fun. Lets try something different. Keep fast travel to an extreme min in Ashes, please.
So im going to put this scenario happens your node and guild are set on the riverlands right but you are on the other half of the map all the way up there in the north of it, suddenly you get a call that your node is getting attacked! When you finally manage to arrive there, war is over and the node its gone lost! « this will 100% happen btw
Yes that can happen and it will happen probably a few times. Your travel should be planned, and a consequence to traveling far is not being around your node to defend it. The point of a system like this is so you CAN NOT be anywhere anytime you want. All pvp games have some form of tactical planning, some have strategic planning, very few have logistical planning. Ashes seems to aim to have some forms of logistical mechanics such as caravans and nodes and the events around them. If fast travel is implement to too high a degree you'll break a lot of what they're trying to make.
what i would like at least, when in the case you being far away from your node and not aware it will get attacked, to implement something like an emergency waypoint ( like existed in gw2). You had to install it (which takes 3 minutes to spawn) and would create a temporarily emergency waypoint at the objective, once activated, it would be an uncontestable waypoint, which lasts for 40 seconds and can be reused indefinitely until it expires with a 20 minute cooldown. Even thought trolls and spies did exist and they did like to abuse and waste the ewp (it could be set to instead anyone can activate to only the person that installed and its guild members can activate it).
Also someone mentioned a situation involving a dungeon, well in throne and liberty there are few waypoints when a dungeon has multiple layers, you cant use them out of it only when inside and you need to interact with a respective one to select which floor you want to get to so then you can get to another (tl dungeons wps).
I think that'd break a lot of stuff. I'd use that way point to get across the map fast to gather and run back. I'd use it to attack a Node with my guild too that's across the map. Fast travel in this fashion would make this game suck. It'd be a never ending stream of massive attack after massive attack from enemies across the map. Distance would no longer be a safety variable. For guilds that want to focus on attacking and never build up Nodes this would be a great boon. I could find myself in a guild that would "abuse" this feature and I'm still against it. Attacking a Node far away should be a challenge more so than one in the same Zone.
It's hard to say what the game needs because so much is missing or a placeholder, and it's a mistake to compare it to other games, or say that Ashes needs something from GW, TL, WoW, or whatever. Because we don't know what it needs yet really. Fast travel has a purpose in some games, but in general it waters down the experience. It'll turn a massive open world game like Ashes into a Lobby/Loading screen game. Some people want that lobby based system to quickly get to the action, and that's a fair point, but others don't want it. And when you have so much of the game's competitive systems based around travel, if you implement fast travel that solves your problem then why even have the travel problem for the player to solve?
The emergency waypoint could only be utilized by citizens/defenders from that node not like anyone out there can utilize it, that do be absurd, far less people who decide attack it. Well i can tell you didnt play gw2 wvw so you not familiar how it worked, very simple the name says it all tho, used when an emergency thats it, definitely couldnt be utilized by who ever was attacking/enemy only by the people of that server in this case citizens/defenders from that node; its pretty much a defensive waypoint that can be submitted when in case there is very few people around to defend the node, needs to be activated and only lasts a short x time (in the case 40 seconds, although for the node concept maybe a minute wouldnt be a bad idea) wvw maps and population were far smaller in comparison with aoc scope) and then also has a long cooldown to reactivate it, can only be activated in the period of when a siege happening or a war over the node. *looks like you got everything backwards of what i said tho*
I didn't play GW or GW2 for long. Felt to arcady for me. People seemed to like them. At the end of the day, there's going to be Fast Travel methods added to the game. And they might be enough to get you back to help defend your Node in time depending on your distance. If not though, then I'm still on the side of no portals, teleports, ect. Outside what they already have planned, even then I think it could be too much. But I am someone who plays Hard Core modes for open world games where fast travel is disabled.
Volgaris
1
Re: Corruption
https://ashesofcreation.wiki/Player_corruption#NPC_guardsNot sure if it's already a mechanic but corrupted players should be stopped by guards in towns and either forced to pay a hefty fee or killed. I think a few outlaw sanctuaries/towns could exist for players with corruption so they can still bank/trade etc. The more people you kill the longer the corruption lasts and this would limit your ability to visit major trading/player hubs etc.
Or player bounties could exist, where corrupt player receive a price on their head and can be hunted and handed in for rewards also.
https://ashesofcreation.wiki/Bounty_hunters
Ludullu
1
