RIFT 2.5 on PTS!

[Padwarle]

Hey all, there was an update today for the PTS, that patched 2.5 into the game!
(I'll leave the pictures on stuff to Slipmat.)

But I recommend you come check it out and provide feedback.

[Puremallace]

The water zone by Ember Isle is alright. Needs more quest. Not hard to navigate, but you have to remember I have 2+ years of doing air combat in Aion, so water content is not that different then flying.

It does favor ranged classes, so Warrior better learn how to play their Paragon with Grasp the Horizon or go Tempest to make life easier. I do like the idea of bringing people back to Ember Isle. The place is loaded with adds that you can swim over, but not that bad.

Also I could not locate a porticulum outside of the one that gets you there. All mobs there are non elite lvl 60 with 82k HP with one or two story elites mixed in there.

Interesting references to Agrarians race and Shi Ming warriors. Maybe a way of introducing a new playable race in 3.0

[Khelendros]

The water zone by Ember Isle is alright. Needs more quest. Not hard to navigate, but you have to remember I have 2+ years of doing air combat in Aion, so water content is not that different then flying.

It does favor ranged classes, so Warrior better learn how to play their Paragon with Grasp the Horizon or go Tempest to make life easier. I do like the idea of bringing people back to Ember Isle. The place is loaded with adds that you can swim over, but not that bad.

Also I could not locate a porticulum outside of the one that gets you there. All mobs there are non elite lvl 60 with 82k HP with one or two story elites mixed in there.

Interesting references to Agrarians race and Shi Ming warriors. Maybe a way of introducing a new playable race in 3.0

They patched a lot more in than just EI. Almost all of 2.5 is in except Return to Deepstrike Mines (which is not a rehash, its got all new bosses etc).

They are however rehashing 3 old chronicles and 1 old raid. Simply scaling them up to max level. These are called "Intrepid's". There is also a zone event in the underwater zone as well as rifts. Haven't seen the Zone Event so I can't comment on that.

There are also "rare carnages" in the new underwater zone. I guess they work like normal carnages but reward rare currency? Not sure. Haven't found any of the rare mobs they are tied to yet.

There is also 1 brand new chronicle that is set in Planebreaker Bastion called Planebreaker Bastion The Aftermatch. It appears to take place after the Abominus and Inyrtaka are destroyed.

[Slipmat]

there was an update today for the PTS, that patched 2.5 into the game!
(I'll leave the pictures on stuff to Slipmat.)

Slacker !, it's not that hard to press 'Prt Scr'

It seems Update 2.5 will be called 'Song of Dreams'



A lot of 2.5 will be focused off Ember Isle in the new underwater zone, which offers a very good story quest chain, lots of voice acting, you even get a mermaid serenading you with a few songs



Depending on the feedback from players, Rift 3.0 the Plane of Water Expansion will be tuned accordingly on if people liked underwater combat, too much, too little? There will be a testing session today/tonight on the PTS so try and jump on, experience it and leave feedback

Ember Isle Underwater Playtest, 10/29 3pm PST

We'd like to invite you guys to join us for a playtest of the new Ember Isle content coming in patch 2.5.

Time: 10/29 3pm PST

Keeper Ivan in Tempest Bay (next to the porticulum) will start you on your journey to the west coast of Ember Isle.
Try out the underwater story quests, daily quests, carnage quests, and rifts.
At some point during the test we'll launch an underwater zone event.


The next expansion will have a number of underwater content areas, so one goal of this new Ember Isle content is to identify and address issues that will make swimming more enjoyable.

Feel free to post feedback or bug reports. Thanks!

Source: http://forums.riftgame.com/general-d...9-3pm-pst.html

As Khelendros mentioned, there's a lot more added to this PTS update than Ember Isle, there's four new Chronicles added, albeit three of them are level 60 versions of old favorites, Plane Breaker is brand new though and is awesome, and yes I went 61 Chloro for this guy



First and Second bosses in PBB, didn't go too far in, too much to explore elsewhere





There's also a return to another old favorite Dungeon, Deep Strike Mines, which was voted on by the players when the Devs held a poll to see what old Dungeons people wanted to revisit and DSM came tops, followed by Ap so who knows...

It's not just an upgrade mobs to level 60, the achievement shows five all new bosses



There's also new Planar Attunement trees added, as well as T3 of the PvP tree:







There's also a lot more goodies thrown in, an epic Achievement which will have you chasing shadow mobs in the various Experts and Chronicles, daily quest limit raised to 40 quests for patrons, lots to look forward to

[Calliso]

Sounds pretty cool! Though I admit I am rather disappointed by the fact that most of the new chronicles are not actually new just scaled up versions of old ones. I mean we were supposed to get a brand new Hammerknell chronicle originally back in 2.4 right? But that got delayed and looks like we still are not getting it. Planebreak Bastion chronicle does look neat though and look forward to doing the new storyline.

[gonterf]

I'm very interested in the names chosen for those PA trees - is there any connection to the lore other than that they seem to be combination-planes?

[Slipmat]

Some fun 'fluff' getting added, new raid marks



From top to bottom:

Crown -- Heart -- Radioactive -- Sad -- Lucky

[Lathais]

Some fun 'fluff' getting added, new raid marks



From top to bottom:

Crown -- Heart -- Radioactive -- Sad -- Lucky

How are the Tank 2, 3 and 4 done. Is it just the same icon again or is there a number on it or is it slightly different?

[Razael]

What are Chronicles? i see them talked about much. Are they solo dungeons? Solo progression? Or sort of like scenarios in WoW with 3 players?

[Lathais]

What are Chronicles? i see them talked about much. Are they solo dungeons? Solo progression? Or sort of like scenarios in WoW with 3 players?

Basically solo dungeons, yes. Some are designed for 2 people but can also be done solo. Similar to WoW Scenarios, but chronicles came first so it would be more accurate to say WoW Scenarios are like Rift's Chronicles.

[Pachycrocuta]

I wonder if there is rage about the new floating target icons being made when they could be using that massive dev time waste on making another raid.

I like the inclusion of those, as I prefer the images over the numbers for use as target markers.

[Razael]

Basically solo dungeons, yes. Some are designed for 2 people but can also be done solo. Similar to WoW Scenarios, but chronicles came first so it would be more accurate to say WoW Scenarios are like Rift's Chronicles.

Sorry meant no offense , im new to Rift, so WoW (which i haven't played in over a year) was the closest thing i could think off to compare.

[Lathais]

Sorry meant no offense , im new to Rift, so WoW (which i haven't played in over a year) was the closest thing i could think off to compare.

No offense was taken. I apologize if I made it seem like some was.

[Primalthirst]

Sorry meant no offense , im new to Rift, so WoW (which i haven't played in over a year) was the closest thing i could think off to compare.

No offense was taken. I apologize if I made it seem like some was.

You two are being far too polite, you need to remember this is the internet!

[Fencers]

Seems like some nice additions. I like the expanded attunements.

[Deleted]

Nice with extra planar attunement. However, will we get reset of our points? Like if there is new pvp addition, I would like to swap the points from my pve ones into that.

[Deleted]

the only thing im interested in reading is optimisation, nothing else, the content is hindered outright from this, anything else is just nonsense at this stage, they really should make a whole patch note dedicated to this

[Lathais]

the only thing im interested in reading is optimisation, nothing else, the content is hindered outright from this, anything else is just nonsense at this stage, they really should make a whole patch note dedicated to this

I agree with this. I also think they need to re-open another US Server to alleviate the server lag. It was pretty bad last night. Just chat was taking 3-5 seconds to go through. Horrible ability lag in Experts. Was just bad. They chose a really bad time to merge. Why would you merge at the same time as the Steam Re-Launch knowing you are are going to get a surge of players? Daglar even admitted on the forums they knew they were going to get a surge. It was quite a bit more than they expected but they still expected it, during the same exact patch as merging servers. wtf? It feels like someone at Trion went, "Well, we know we already have issues with some systems lagging for no reason, especially in highly populated areas. Let's cram more people on each server and get more people to play at the the same time. That will fix all the lag by getting lots of players to quit and giving the new players from steam a bad impression of the game."

[Razael]

I'm on a full server , Zaviel in EU, and despite reading alot of people complain about it in the 1-29 chat , i personally havent lagged at all, other than the usual slowdown when too many people are together, like in cities, rifts etc., but i suspect thats more on the games engine than lag itself. Hope they sort it out soon, server mergers along with Steam opening was bad timing.

[Puremallace]

hmmmmmmmmz November 6th possibly??

http://forums.riftgame.com/general-d...ember-6-a.html