.: rift

Showing posts with label rift. Show all posts

Friday

Black Garden Domination

I finally received my final overall achievement in Black Garden which is Black Garden Domination. I am now 170/170. Most of the achievements were pretty easy to finish, but I couldn't figure out the power up one. I thought maybe you received a power up when holding the fang, but after killing players it didn't give me my final power up achievement.

I decided to roam a little in the Black Garden, and I finally found where these hidden power ups are. They are so out of the way they are pretty pointless to even use. They are basically all the way east or west on your Black Garden map. If you feel like you are running off to hide to go afk you are heading in the right direction. I am not sure why they put them so far away from where the action is. By the time you run back to where everybody is fighting you only have about 20 seconds left of the one minute timed buff which gives you a 100% spell power, or melee power boost.

Here is a summary of all the achievements for Black Garden to earn the title Black Garden Domination

Power from the Pain
Strike them Down
Left holding the Fang
Star Offense
Star Quarterback
The best Defense is the best Offense
Carrier Down
Carrying Corruption
Smash and Grab
Win a victory in Black Garden

Monday

My First Warfront Premade Tonight

Sounds like fun huh? Premades are always fun because you rarely lose, and usually destroy pugs. Today I thought I would see if anyone would bite on making a premade? It didn't take long to have a full group, and off into the queue we went.

The queue hated our group. The average queue time solo was almost instant, but we were forced to wait over 10 minutes each time. How hard is it to let a full group in?

Anyways we all decided that the plan was to camp out at Codex. Everyone seemed to understand the concept of winning in there. I thought to myself that this was going to be alot of fun.

The Warfront starts, and we all rush Codex. We easily take it, and I am one happy camper. I thought okay we will just camp out up here, and protect the flag. What was I thinking? The next thing you know my whole premade is off doing their own thing.

I knew the premade was fail when at the end the healer was bragging about his healing, the dps was bragging about best damage on the scoreboard, and so on. I thought I would give it one more chance. Once again we enter a Warfront, but this time none of my premade even made it to Codex. I just ended up putting up the white flag, and did my own thing, and left the premade after that Codex.

The next Codex I join solo, and we destroy the Guardians. We held all 4 flags, and I finally finished my win 5 codex quest. It was the best way to end my night with a great victory like that.

Playing A Ranger In Warfronts In Rift Is Fun

I still love my Ranger in Rift. It can be frustrating to lose Warfront after Warfront, but when I look back at each one I actually enjoy myself. I kill so many players it just makes it fun. I just see triple digit numbers flying everywhere on my screen. Who can complain about that?

I love everything about my Ranger build in Rift. Here is a build calculator showing my current build at level 22, but it isn't 100% accurate. It will at least give you the general idea of how OP a Ranger can be. Of course I have a hard time in one versus one fights especially if they come in melee range. I just suck at that part of my character. I just say watch out though if you let me fire away in the distance at a crowd of red players. I am a killing machine.

Currently some of my favorite spells are trick shot, concussive blast, rain of arrows, double shot, virulent poison, and a few more. I just love playing my Ranger in Rift.

Tuesday

How To Win Black Garden Every Time in Rift

Black Garden is the first Warfront you encounter in Rift. It is one of the easiest to win, but it seems no one seems to know the secret to winning every time. Would you like to know the secret of winning every time you join a Black Garden warfront in Rift?

After I tell you how simple it is you will be amazed on how easy it really is to win the Black Garden warfront. The main objective is to hold the fang. Yes it looks like a fang, or a big tooth. It initially spawns right in the middle of the warfront. It can't be missed.

Of course you want to run in, and grab it. Once you have the fang the biggest secret is you want to hold it as near to the middle as possible. You want the rest of your faction zerging around you so that they can easily pick it up once you drop it.

As long as everyone is healing you, or ready to click to pick up the fang once you drop it you simply can't lose. By holding the fang near the middle you gain nearly six points a second. The farther away the less points you get.

Rift makes it real easy to know who has the fang. The healthbar shows up on the right of your UI right below the blue and red scoreboard that shows each factions current points. The person also has a glowing around them that shoots up into the sky. You can't miss who has the fang.

If your team doesn't have the fang than everyone needs to be clicking on that name, and taking that person down. You need others doing AOE around the fang so you can pick it up, and run back to the middle.

Can you believe it is really this easy to win Black Garden every time in Rift, but players decide to do their own thing instead? I know I find myself frustrated so many times in Black Garden because players run around like chickens with their heads cut off.

Friday

I Love The Ashstone Server In Rift

Do I really need to say anything else? This was the best thing I could have ever done by leaving Briarcliff, and rerolling to Ashstone. I love it.

Is it because I am Defiant again? I am not sure, but my Black Garden record completely changed. I think out of fifty warfronts today I went about 47-3. I swear every player knew exactly what to do in the Warfronts. How can one faction be that much smarter than another?

Does it prove that one faction attracts the twelve year olds? I don't know for sure, but I didn't have to beat my head on my keyboard all day, and actually enjoyed myself. I seem to see a pattern of terribad players on Guardian.

My Rift Queue Queue In My Pillow

My pillow currently is full of tears from my queue queue from Rift. I know I should tough it out, but other factors have also weighed in on my decision. I will no longer be playing Guardian on Briarcliff with my old Warhammer Online buddies. I have switched back to Defiant on Ashstone with no one I know.

I know originally this was my plan to roll solo. I had this crazy idea to join my old Warhammer buddies, and it just wasn't the same. I felt like an outsider, and most didn't even remember me. I have to say that part hurt the most. I guess that is what happens when I didn't follow them to World of Warcraft. I also felt like I was playing solo anyways. They were leveling up together, and doing Warfronts while I was lagging behind having to pug it.

I am not going to sugarcoat it. It was the worst twelve hours of Rift. I feel so much better on Defiant. The comfort of knowing everything from quests, to locations, to npc's makes a huge difference. Although I am questing alone I don't feel the pressure of fitting back in with my old guild buddies. I am not sure I would have either. I felt like I was also lied too. Most of the guild is staying in Warcraft, and only about fifteen made the jump to Rift. I just don't see them staying anyways, and I may as well not get hurt later.

I also feel a huge stress release from the stupid queue situation on Briarcliff. It was controlling my decisions on playing. It was to the point I wanted to take some breaks, eat, shower, or whatever, but with a six hour queue looming over my head I just kept playing. It is just plain stupid to change your life for a queue. This morning I woke up at 3am just to get in the queue so I could play this morning when I actually felt like getting up. Both times I ended up being disconnected, and seeing even longer queues. It was time to move on.

I hope to see some of you in Black Garden later today. If you see my Ranger/Marksman/Assassin her name is Plixy, and please refrain from killing me. I am still trying to recover from yesterday, and I really don't need to queue queue in my pillow over Rift tonight.

Kudos To Rift

My hat goes off to Rift. I think it was one of the smoothest launches I have seen. Of course queues are impossible to prevent when everyone, and his mother are trying to play at the same time. If players stopped worrying about saving their name on every server there probably wouldn't even be queues.

I played for about twelve hours yesterday, and I ran into no glaring problems. My biggest problem was trying to find Sanctum since I played Defiant the whole beta. After playing both now I have to say the Guardian side flows much better than Defiant.

My biggest Kudos to Rift is I did not see one gold or powerlevel spam the whole day. I repeat. I did not see one gold or powerlevel spam the whole day. I know in the last several launches the first week was usually ruined with all the spam scrolling non stop, and out of control.

After such a long beta I am surprised that no one still knows how to Black Garden. The Warfront did cause me to want to pull my hair out. How hard is it to stay in the middle to hold the fang? I would think six points a second is better than one or two if you go try to run off, or hide behind the tree. How hard is it to see right under the score the name, and healthbar of the person carrying the fang?

I guess players never learn. I still see them trying to kill a tank with five healers running around in our back lines while the fang guy stands in the middle twiddling his thumbs. I played about fifty Black Gardens yesterday, and my win-loss record was shameful. I think my record is probably about 3-47. I still haven't won five to get my weapon reward.

My next Kudo goes to Rift for handling the populations very well. Every once in a while I would see a new announcement of servers being launched. It makes me a little nervous because Warhammer Online initially did it, and a week later they had 63 servers with a hundred people on each.

Anyways I think Rift is doing a great job, and I look forward to playing another twelve hours today.

Thursday

Twitter While Playing Rift

Now you can tweet while playing Rift. It is a cool new feature they added this beta. You can now tweet pics of your achievement, screenshots, or if you just want to tweet something. Once you have it enabled you can easily tweet in game by simply using /tweet in the chat box.

Hit ESC to bring up the Options Menu

In the Options menu click on Settings

Next Click on Interface and than Twitter at the bottom

It will than ask for your Twitter login, and password to authenticate. I highly suggest changing the suffix from #rift to maybe something like #riftingame to keep all the spam directly out of the main #Rift Twitter channel. If you have any further questions on it please let me know.

Wednesday

Where Did My Motivation To Play Rift Go?

I don't understand why I have lost all interest in playing Rift. Is it just because of all the betas that mean nothing? Is it that my time to play will be alot less than I wanted? Is it the excitement of a new MMORPG, but once it is here its not as exciting?

I will be playing Rift, but I am starting to doubt for how long. I have to admit these last few months of playing nothing has been a great eye opener. I don't miss Cataclysm, or Warhammer Online. I have no itch to play any games.

Lately I have enjoyed catching up on alot of movies, and tv shows. It has been nice just sitting back, and enjoying real life.

Monday

Finding The Perfect Guild In Rift

Rift is getting closer, and closer to launch. It is now my daily task to filter through all the guild recruitment spam on the official forums to find my perfect Rift guild. It is not as easy as someone might think to find my perfect Rift guild. I don't necessarily think I am picky, or hardcore but I am tired of being in dead end guilds.

My biggest debate is rolling Defiant or Guardian. I played both in the betas so far. I have mixed feelings on both. I think Guardian players are more organized, and will be the underdogs. Defiant will have players everywhere, and probably have the zerg mentality. If I roll Guardian I will probably never have problems with queues for Warfronts, logins, and so on. The defiant side may have more players queued up, but will have to wait for Guardian to queue up to get Warfront matches.

Currently leaning towards Defiant even with all the cons.

My next issue is choosing a pvp server, or a pve server. I am a pvper. It is what I live, and breathe in every MMORPG I play. The problem is I am no longer a great pvper. I am not sure if getting older has caused it, or players are just better these days. Do I risk leveling a character on a pvp server, and end up hating it and rerolling pve. Will PvE servers be so focused on PvE that no one will ever want to do organized PvP in Warfronts? I think PvP servers are always fun, and adds to the game, but it does sometimes get frustrating if you are on the losing side of things.

Currently leaning towards PvP since it is in my blood.

My next issue is joining a casual or hardcore guild. It is a tough decision because the definition hardcore is way overused. I can show you ten coworkers who say they are hardcore players. I think maybe one fits my definition of hardcore. On the other hand casual makes it too easy for players to not care. I have found myself very frustrated in most casual guilds because everyone thinks that five hours a week is just fine. It just doesn't work. You can't make friends, you can't bond, you can't do anything together because no one is ever on at the same time. Hardcore also has issues. I have no problem dedicated 20-30 hours a week to gaming, but I am not a pro. I may need guidance on picking specs, finding the right gear, learning dungeons, and etc. I just don't want someone breathing down my throat because I missed some cleanse, or missed a spell rotation.

Currently leaning towards Hardcore, but not to the point of being arrogant aholes.

My next thing is I am looking for a guild that uses Ventrilo exclusively. I don't want to hear my mic is broken, my computer is in my bedroom, my speakers are not hooked up, I don't have sound. These excuses drive me nuts. I refuse to belong to a guild that doesn't have at least a 25-50 man ventrilo. It is just stupid trying to do anything in the game pve, or pvp oriented using guild chat, and I just won't do it. Don't tell me you have vent, and than no one uses it. Also don't say you use vent, and than only the guild leader, and officers are allowed to talk while everyone else is muted.

Currently will only join a mandatory Ventrilo guild.

The guild must have very active guild leader, and officers. I want to see them on every day, or pretty close to it. I don't mean a five minute venture either. You better have the balls to actually lead by example. I want a guild that has rules about inactivity. I am not talking about the last login. I am talking about booting players who don't contribute to the guild every week by leveling up, crafting up, gaining pvp ranks, and etc. I am sick of guild leaders that use the 30 days since last login rule. I can login every day for 30 seconds, but what good is that doing the guild?

I want a guild that /gkicks inactive, uncontributing players.

The guild must always be growing, and have a huge active roster. With my many experiences in guilds I have preferred guilds that are basically almost Zergs they are so big. As long as the officers, and guild leader do their jobs a big guild offers many more fun opportunities for every player in the guild. It keeps the guild closer knit because you can always find guild only groups for anything you want to do in game.

The guild must have 100+ active/contributing members

This basically summarizes most of the main issues of finding the perfect guild in Rift for me. Is there a guild like this out there? Should I try to just create my own guild by applying the above principles?

Sunday

Why Is Rift Gold Spammer Free?

I am surprised that no one else has noticed. After playing Rift several different betas I haven't seen one gold, or powerlevel spam. Is it because it is still in beta? Did Rift finally find a way to keep gold spammers, and powerlevelers out of the game? Has anyone else noticed? What do you think the reason is?

I have played in plenty of betas, and open betas that are filled with gold, and powerlevel spam. Are they just waiting for launch, and blowing up the chat channels on day one? Do they not want to give Rift a chance to fix it prior to launch?

I just find it hard to believe with so many Rift VIP beta keys floating around that the game wasn't infested with them. I really hope Rift actually has the spammers under control because it does ruin your initial gaming experience when chat is virtually useless.

Do you think that Rift servers will be infested with gold spammers on the first day of launch?

Tuesday

Go Go Power Rangers

Thank goodness for Rift Beta #5. I decided I wanted to try out the Ranger today, and play a little less squishy class than Mage. I am in love with the Ranger already. This is why I love Rift so much. You have so much versatility, and every soul seems fun to play.

I am not sure how long this honeymoon will last with my Ranger today. At least with my Necro/Lock/Dom I can heal myself, and I don't see any spells like that as a Ranger. The good thing is with the Ranger I will be able to take more damage, and it seems like deal more damage so I won't have to worry about heals.

I have to say I enjoy having a spell called Headshot. The combo points seem to build faster with the Ranger so I am able to kill mobs one after another pretty quick since Quickshot can be insta spammed to build combo points before doing Headshot.

Friday

25 Rift VIP Beta Key Give Away

I have twenty five Rift VIP Beta Keys to give away. The Rift beta key below will work for 25 times. The first 25 players to follow the directions below will be in the remaining Rift betas.

ZQ6Q-PJJX-XYPY-LCJQ-2FHH
To Apply the VIP Code:

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.

Saturday

Rift Soul Planner

A few days ago I posted about my Rift OP Soul Combo of the Month for a Mage. A commenter by the name of Deerhunter716 provided a great link to a Rift Soul Planner. It is a very well done planner, and I wanted to share it with everyone.

It is now alot easier to play with different souls, and see which one best suits your play style. It even allows for you to post links to your builds. I would love to see everyone link their best soul builds in the comment section below.

What soul build do you plan on using once the game launches?

Sunday

Rift Mage OP Soul Combo Of The Month

I have played around with many different soul combinations now in Rift beta. I think I can say I have found the most overpowered soul combo so far. What spec is it? It is actually a pretty similar spec I was previously running, but I am now putting more points into my second soul than my first one.

Originally I was running with Warlock, Necromancer, and Dominator. It was a pretty good soul combination. I could dot, life leech, fear, and turn players into squirrels. It seemed like the perfect soul combo that would let me dps till my fingers bleed, and keep me alive with self heals from all the dps/heal spells.

I soon realized that 5-10 health ticks a sec don't keep you alive in pvp. I think they may need to boost it up a little to make it a little more viable. I also found myself with an empty mana bar which is an automatic death sentence in the Warfronts.

I decided to reset my soul points, and put most of my points into Necromancer instead of Warlock. What a huge difference. I lost fear, and wither which was a 70% snare, but gaining Soul Purge is like handing me an Iwin button.

I now just dot players up, and build up my charge. I than unleash Soul Purge on them which is a channeled spell that uses my charge buildup. I do over 400 damage with this spell, and the best part is it heals my skelly pet, and myself for over 600. It makes you almost unkillable.

Also what makes the necromancer soul so OP is the new stronger skelly pet along with a spell called Exhume which basically lets you instacast your pet. On my Warlock every time my pet died I had to spend 8 seconds summoning it again. I felt like I spent more time summoning my pet than I did fighting.

Most solo fights are now easily won, and picking off targets in the Warfronts have never been easier. I can now get a good ratio of kills, killing blows, damage, and so on. If you love playing a dps caster I highly suggest this combo, or another one I am now seeing which is Necromancer, Warlock, and Chloromancer.

Friday

Rift Will Steal 99% Of Warhammer Online Players

You heard it here first. After playing Warhammer Online, and now playing Rift beta I see almost every player coming to Rift. Rift definitely caters to the Warhammer Online crowd more than it does the World of Warcraft crowd.

Prediction: Warhammer Online closes by the end of 2011 if not sooner.

Thursday

I Will Be Playing Rift Warfronts All Weekend

Once again I will be beta testing Rift this weekend. It will be my first taste of PvP in the game. I am really excited to see how it all works. Rift Warfronts from the outside looking in looks like a Battleground, or Scenario from World of Warcraft, or Warhammer Online.

I am really looking forward to teaming up with Oak, Zezzle, and Hedgewick in the Warfronts. I hope we make tons of Guardians cry themselves to sleep this weekend when we destroy them in pvp. I think our group setup will be pretty deadly to anyone who tries to fight us.

I will be getting plenty of sleep tonight to ensure some long gaming sessions this weekend. I really want to see the PvP since 99% of my MMO gaming consists of playing PvP. In prior Rift betas I have checked out some of the PvP gear, and it is simply amazing. How does it compare to PvE gear? No idea since we have no level 50 PvE gear to compare the PvP gear too.

Will I be giving up World of Warcraft to play Rift? Yes without a doubt. I have a hard time playing multiple games, and I like to devote all my time into the game I love the most. Of course I will still play WoW until the Rift launch, but it will definitely be unsubbed as the release date of Rift inches closer.

Friday

Rift Was A Blast Yesterday

Each day I play Rift I fall more in love with the game. It is that girl you always dreamed would make the perfect wife. I can't believe how much fun I had in Rift yesterday. Is it the game, or is it that I am playing with Oak, Zezzle, and Hedge while all of us hanging out in vent?

I have to say playing Rift with friends makes the game even better. We all created new characters again on Defiant. We flew through the quests like they were nothing. We all enjoyed listening to Oak complain that his tank felt like a clothie. I guess the first few levels of tanking are rough.

Hedge was pretty funny too. He decided to roll a Cleric since Zezzle and I rolled ranged DPS. I had to laugh when on vent he was like what level do I even get a heal spell? Once again it takes a few levels, and healer archetypes don't get a heal at level one.

Being the noob that I am I pulled the biggest noob move of everyone. At around level 12 I asked in vent I thought with my other characters I got talents a lot earlier. I soon realized I had 12 unspent points, and unlocked a plethora of other spells I could have been using. I guess that is what I get for not clicking on the big question marks that would of told me about my talent points right away.

I decided to ditch the Pyromancer and Stormcaller Hybrid. After thinking for about fifteen minutes I rolled a Warlock, Necromancer, and Dominator. All I can say is unstoppable. You take life leech, the dots from Necro, and the crowd control from Dominator of turning things into squirrels and you are a killing machine. Last night before logging I got fear, and a few more spells. I don't know how I am going to die.

Last night there was a server wide Invasion, Rift, or whatever you want to call it. It was fun going from one rift to another, and to another, until the grand finale. We all ended up getting an Orb of Heroism, and basically called it a night.

We hung out in the city Meridian for a little bit, and checked things out. I saw the gear for PvP, and I can guarantee you that I will be running warfronts non stop once I hit 50 when the game goes live.

Wednesday

Rift Caters To My Play Style

Rift at PAX

Rift is even better than I remembered in PAX. It is just a fun game to play. The choices offered for souls makes everyone a little different. Basically you can build a character to your own play style by mixing, and matching different ascended classes. Do you like certain aspects of a Warlock, and other aspects of a fire Mage? Rift lets you combine them, and have the perfect class to play.

It reminds me a lot of clothes. If you had a pair of jeans you could only wear with one outfit it would suck. What if that same pair of jeans you could match up, and wear with four other shirts? Who wouldn't want to do that?

Right now I initially picked Pyromancer. I love to blow stuff up as a dps caster. I start off basically with three basic fire spells. I seem to be killing mobs pretty quickly with very little downtime so far.

I picked up my second soul, and I decided to go with Stormcaller. I like the idea of the Crowd Control effects along with more dps. The thought of electrocuting, and being able to stun sounds like a great tool to have once I start pvping.

Lately it seems that most MMORPG's offer glass cannon classes, but after doing so much damage they get nerfed to nothing on top of having no crowd control. Now I feel like I will be in control of my destiny with my character. I can add souls that will make my character everything I ever dreamed of. Rift is going to be so much fun.

Rift is going to definitely be worth buying, and playing. Of course you never know how it will turn out once at max level, but the game seems worth reaching that goal. Rift is a must buy in my book.

Sunday

My Top Five Games From PAX

Rift Planes of Telara

I spent this last Friday at PAX. I have to say it was better than even I imagined. It was just great to see, and play games. It truly makes a difference on your decision making. I found some games I never even knew about, but are now on my list of games to buy.

The top of my list goes to Guild Wars 2. The game is just fun to play. The graphics are amazing. It is the first MMO that really makes you feel like you are making a difference. I couldn't find any flaws with game, or find a reason to not like the game. I think this game will definitely make a huge impact in the mmorpg genre. If I somehow get selected for this beta I will play it till my fingers blister up, pop, and blister on top of the old blister.

The next game on my list is Rift Planes of Telara. I spent three different sessions playing this game. Each time I fell in love with the game more, and more. Of course it is hard to judge a game in such a small little bit of time, but for me games are mostly a love at first sight. I either like a game, or don't in the first few minutes of playing. Fortunately I snagged a few beta keys, and will be downloading the beta, and having a contest to give away the others.

The third game on my list is Tera. It is another mmorpg with amazing graphics. They will have world pvp servers, battlegrounds, and arena fighting. It sounds like my type of pvp game. I signed up for the beta, and talked quite a while with the dev. I enjoyed this booth the most because it wasn't like a swarm of bees hovering around, and I could ask lots of questions. The dev said I was the only one the whole day that actually asked detailed questions about the game. This MMO shouldn't be overlooked. I think it is going to be a good one.

My fourth game on my list is Assassin's Creed Brotherhood. I have never played a game like this, and I didn't actually play it at PAX because I didn't want to look like a noob playing it. I was mesmerized by other players playing it though. I just love the killing part in that game. It is so gruesome, and brutal. The graphics seem so realistic.

My fifth game on my list is not SWTOR, but instead Star Wars Force Unleashed II. The game should seemed full of action, and killing. Playing it was just so exciting, and fun. I guess sometimes a game like this is a great game to play when you need a break from the grind of an mmorpg.

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