Glorious Alpha Two Testers!
Alpha Two Phase III testing has begun! During this phase, our realms will be open every day, and we'll only have downtime for updates and maintenance. We'll keep everyone up-to-date about downtimes in Discord.
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 Phase III testing has begun! During this phase, our realms will be open every day, and we'll only have downtime for updates and maintenance. We'll keep everyone up-to-date about downtimes in Discord.
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.
My humble impressions
RealGordo
Member, Alpha One, Alpha Two, Early Alpha Two
I will share my impressions so far, without intending to just make a list of complaints, as I understand that this is an alpha phase, but the current state of the game is evident to everyone.
- The crafting system is the most intricate and, at the same time, unbalanced one I've seen in an MMO, and I've played quite a few. Casual players must carefully choose where to invest their time, because going on adventures and doing quests is absolutely incompatible with dedicating time to crafting, unless you don't have a life outside the game.
Efforts should be made to balance the crafting system with the item drops from mobs and the objects that can be bought from vendors at the nodes. Currently, I believe this balance doesn't exist, nor is it close to being achieved.
To give my own example, I have about 3 to 4 hours a day to play. Since I play with a friend, I mostly discard crafting if I want to do things with him, and if we want to level up, we have to find a group to go to the typical spots like Oakenbane or Steelbloom, competing for pulls with three or four other groups and (with a lot of luck) managing to get some piece of armor.It is worth noting that half of our equipment is the starting one.
- Although class balance has been mostly satisfactory, leveling up is still difficult for players who don't have a fixed group to play with or who simply want to explore the game solo.
Quests are still few, poorly indicated, and offer low rewards.
I’ve always liked MMOs where leveling up feels like a real challenge, not because it’s super hard, but because of the process and effort it takes. But that’s one thing, and it’s a whole different story that Ashes of Creation is pretty clearly stacked against players who, for whatever reason, play solo.
- After today’s patch, it’s clear that there’s no fixed direction to follow regarding certain issues. It’s quite discouraging to see that, after repeated complaints about Firebrand’s poor performance, the “solution” to the problem is to remove it from the game until further notice. Something similar happened with the announcement that node merchants would have basic gear available. It was implemented incorrectly, forced servers to shut down for nearly a whole day, caused a rollback, and ultimately led to the disappearance of the matter without further explanation. In short, when something doesn’t work, it just gets ignored and we simply move on.
- In my particular case, I must mention that European players clearly feel wronged by the server maintenance schedules, which take place during peak hours in our countries. If you want us to help you test your game, you’re certainly not making it very easy for us.
As a final point, I’ve even heard/read rumors that there is a group of clans with a certain amount of power, derived from their financial investment in the game, who influence Steven’s team and steer the course of the game’s development. I like to think it goes no further than a malicious rumor… I like to think so.
- The crafting system is the most intricate and, at the same time, unbalanced one I've seen in an MMO, and I've played quite a few. Casual players must carefully choose where to invest their time, because going on adventures and doing quests is absolutely incompatible with dedicating time to crafting, unless you don't have a life outside the game.
Efforts should be made to balance the crafting system with the item drops from mobs and the objects that can be bought from vendors at the nodes. Currently, I believe this balance doesn't exist, nor is it close to being achieved.
To give my own example, I have about 3 to 4 hours a day to play. Since I play with a friend, I mostly discard crafting if I want to do things with him, and if we want to level up, we have to find a group to go to the typical spots like Oakenbane or Steelbloom, competing for pulls with three or four other groups and (with a lot of luck) managing to get some piece of armor.It is worth noting that half of our equipment is the starting one.
- Although class balance has been mostly satisfactory, leveling up is still difficult for players who don't have a fixed group to play with or who simply want to explore the game solo.
Quests are still few, poorly indicated, and offer low rewards.
I’ve always liked MMOs where leveling up feels like a real challenge, not because it’s super hard, but because of the process and effort it takes. But that’s one thing, and it’s a whole different story that Ashes of Creation is pretty clearly stacked against players who, for whatever reason, play solo.
- After today’s patch, it’s clear that there’s no fixed direction to follow regarding certain issues. It’s quite discouraging to see that, after repeated complaints about Firebrand’s poor performance, the “solution” to the problem is to remove it from the game until further notice. Something similar happened with the announcement that node merchants would have basic gear available. It was implemented incorrectly, forced servers to shut down for nearly a whole day, caused a rollback, and ultimately led to the disappearance of the matter without further explanation. In short, when something doesn’t work, it just gets ignored and we simply move on.
- In my particular case, I must mention that European players clearly feel wronged by the server maintenance schedules, which take place during peak hours in our countries. If you want us to help you test your game, you’re certainly not making it very easy for us.
As a final point, I’ve even heard/read rumors that there is a group of clans with a certain amount of power, derived from their financial investment in the game, who influence Steven’s team and steer the course of the game’s development. I like to think it goes no further than a malicious rumor… I like to think so.
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