Nightmnare Tide Digital Edition Information Released

[Slipmat]

Anyone know if you get the instant level 60 if you buy the package now

No the level 60 item (it's a potion your newly created level 1 drinks) will not be available until 3.0 launches, which is October the 8th.

You don't even have to buy the packs as this potion will be tradable to other players, or if you have a generous friend who doesn't need his, gifted to you but....expect them to be selling for a lot of plat/REX on the AH

[Fencers]

I love the instant level potions. Absolutely love it, even more so that they can be traded.

My favorite MMO ever allowed players to "store" excess XP they accumulated at max level in "XP crystals" that could be traded or sold to other players. Which meant you could buy up a few on the AH and level from 1 to max without leaving the starter town. Brilliant.

I am all for and support the elimination of character levels in MMOs as a mechanic. It is despicable time gating design in most MMOs.

Fuck leveling up.

[Edge-]

Fuck leveling up.

But the dings ;_;

[Pachycrocuta]

What exactly is a minion? Admittedly, I haven't been keeping up with Rift news for about a year now. I read the various things you get depending on which you buy in the email I received, and thought the minion thing was just a cosmetic pet like the corgi. Is it something completely different?

[Edge-]

What exactly is a minion? Admittedly, I haven't been keeping up with Rift news for about a year now. I read the various things you get depending on which you buy in the email I received, and thought the minion thing was just a cosmetic pet like the corgi. Is it something completely different?

I'm not 100%, but it's basically like taking the pet system from WoW (collecting various pets) and using them a la STO duty missions (sending them to complete various tasks). That's what I've gathered so far, but I admittedly haven't looked too deeply into it yet.

[Xerra]

Leveling isnt bad, I did it as an necromancer/elementalist my damage wasnt that impressive but Wightmane with her undead knight Morgraine killed many a evils. Though on topic I am disapointed the expansion souls are not in any of the expansion packs.

[Slipmat]

The minion system is still in a rough 'work in progress' state, although the UI Designer in charge, Gingers, said a functional build will be out next week.

From what I understand you'll never actually see your minions or anyone else's out in the wold, you simply select a 'quest', pick your minion and send it off to do the task which can range from taking 1 minute to 5 days.

It also seems to help to pick the right minion for the job, for example, go harvest ore in the Plane of Death, makes sense to send a death themed minion and so on, looks interesting on paper, have to see how it will play out, but here's a look at the first, rough UI of the minion system, bear in mind, still a WIP.

[Pachycrocuta]

Makes me think of the garrison missions you send followers on in the new wow expansion. That's not a jab at Rift or anything. Of course, I think Star Wars had it first? Not sure, never played. Seems interesting. I may pick the game up again, I just don't know how long I would continue on unless the horrendousness of Storm Legion leveling was cut by more than 50%, but that would reduce the money they get from xp potions in the cash shop, which was one reason I stopped. 50-60 is a massive chore. 40-50 is a breeze compared to it.

[Bznga]

I would like a minion that skin mobs after i kill'em.

[Edge-]

Makes me think of the garrison missions you send followers on in the new wow expansion. That's not a jab at Rift or anything. Of course, I think Star Wars had it first?

The earliest version of it I can think of is the STO duty officer system which has been around for a few years now.

It's not the most engaging thing, but it's a nice little side activity you spend a few minutes managing every now and then for some decent bonuses.

I just don't know how long I would continue on unless the horrendousness of Storm Legion leveling was cut by more than 50%, but that would reduce the money they get from xp potions in the cash shop, which was one reason I stopped.

Oddly enough, the amount of experience/time it took to hit 60 was almost unchanged between P2P and F2P. I say almost, because around the time it transitioned, Daglar (lead dev) went in on a weekend and dropped the number of mobs required for all carnage quest by 25% to reduce some of the grind and speed up leveling a bit.

[Kelimbror]

Boost to 60 was the best thing they could possibly have done. I've really wanted to try out another class, but leveling while enjoyable is very tedious. I may buy just for that so I can try a new class in the xpac.

[Pachycrocuta]

Original Rift leveling was a hell of a lot better than Storm Legion leveling. Somehow, I feel Nightmare Tide leveling will be just as horrendous as Storm Legion. I actually like original Rift's leveling, and got 2 classes (mage and warrior) to 50 before Instant Adventures pre 45 came out (took a break from launch until IA 45-50 came out due to money).

Tried leveling my rogue through SL, got to the place with all the undead and bones (forget what zone it is, I think it started with P), and just couldn't stand it anymore. I think my rogue is stuck at 54. I just can't bring myself to level through SL.

[Slipmat]

I feel Nightmare Tide leveling will be just as horrendous as Storm Legion.

Allegedly a few people are Beta testing, i can neither confirm or deny for myself as it's still under NDA but 'apparently' the zones are awesome, the story questlines are awesome, Carnage quests are reduced to mostly kill 4-6 mobs...all this is just 'theory' and 'speculation' of course, hopefully the NDA is lifted next week so enquiring minds can find out

[Lathais]

Original Rift leveling was a hell of a lot better than Storm Legion leveling. Somehow, I feel Nightmare Tide leveling will be just as horrendous as Storm Legion. I actually like original Rift's leveling, and got 2 classes (mage and warrior) to 50 before Instant Adventures pre 45 came out (took a break from launch until IA 45-50 came out due to money).

Tried leveling my rogue through SL, got to the place with all the undead and bones (forget what zone it is, I think it started with P), and just couldn't stand it anymore. I think my rogue is stuck at 54. I just can't bring myself to level through SL.

May not be the case for you, but for some people, I think I know why SL felt so bad. It was an area much larger than Vanilla but only 10 levels as opposed to 50. You do not get that ding as often and at times, it feels like the XP bar is just not moving. You don't see a reward as often so it feels longer. SL leveling takes about the same amount of time as 1-50 leveling, so I don't understand the complaints about length.

[Fencers]

SL leveling takes about the same amount of time as 1-50 leveling, so I don't understand the complaints about length.

Sorta answered your own question here: "You do not get that ding as often and at times, it feels like the XP bar is just not moving."

Personally, I think the questing in SL was really tedious in addition to some of the troublesome things you mentioned such as larger world/less frequent dings and length of time relative to 10 levels.

Questing did not feel fluid in SL; lots of back tracking, kill quests + carnage quests, tons of travel time, large quest hubs and lots of conditional quests. Add that quest design to the aforementioned large/world, high XP reqs for 10 levels and the effect was largely vocalized as tedious.

I do not enjoy or actively play World of Warcraft, but among 2nd era MMOs the quest design and "flow" of leveling is the best I have ever seen in the genre. It's the epitome of fluid, linear and communicative design; from level 1 to max, WoW's questing scheme enforces every goal of the game's design by gameplay. Masterful.

SWTOR does it well too. But mostly in the class story quests. And where the questing experience falters, and many vocalize as poor, is when you are not on the class story quest lines. Where the process becomes as tedious as in Rift; kill 10 of this, use the hyper translocator on a 8 droids, seek the artifact in the forest, etc.

The Secret World and Guild Wars 1 did questing the best in that almost all quests repeatable, deterministic and optional. With a strong main quest line to create linear progression as the player chooses to engage in.

[Kelimbror]

SL leveling takes about the same amount of time as 1-50 leveling, so I don't understand the complaints about length.

Leveling in Rift in general was excruciating. I played that game nonstop for god knows how many weeks/hours to get to cap. It was the first game where hitting level cap actually felt like a monumental accomplishment. What created that experience, especially in SL, was how long it took to kill mobs. For the highest end raiders coming out of vanilla I'm sure it was ok, but for people coming from anything less (and like me from simple quest gear) those mobs were brutal. That combined with how huge the landscape was and how many carnage quests were there really started to take it's toll.

Now I still enjoyed it...how I have no idea b/c I should have hated it...but it was a unique experience. I don't think they should replicate it, but I'm glad I did it.

[Lathais]

I was max level 4 days after SL release(pre-nerfs). If you do not believe me, I will log on tonight and link you my achievement. 4 days is not tedious.

I am not sure how long it took on my mage, but I will check my level 50 and 60 achieves and be able to tell you later. I am sure it was less than a month, while playing her pretty casually as I was still raiding and taking guildies on expert runs with my main.

[Kelimbror]

I was max level 4 days after SL release. If you do not believe me, I will log on tonight and link you my achievement. 4 days is not tedious.

Your experience isn't everyone else's though. I have a wealth of MMO experience and thousands of levels under my belt and it felt tedious. I can't recall how many actual days/hours it took to level in SL. For all I know it was just perception and not actual time spent. Either way it's the same end result. I heard a lot of people making similar complaints. Bard and I were playing around the same time and I remember us talking about what an accomplishment it seemed to make it and start doing max level stuff. It's probably still the only game where it felt like an accomplishment, which is saying good and bad things really. Wildstar felt similarly tedious for me, but not rewarding. So Rift did something right for me at least.

[Lathais]

Your experience isn't everyone else's though. I have a wealth of MMO experience and thousands of levels under my belt and it felt tedious. I can't recall how many actual days/hours it took to level in SL. For all I know it was just perception and not actual time spent. Either way it's the same end result. I heard a lot of people making similar complaints. Bard and I were playing around the same time and I remember us talking about what an accomplishment it seemed to make it and start doing max level stuff. It's probably still the only game where it felt like an accomplishment, which is saying good and bad things really. Wildstar felt similarly tedious for me, but not rewarding. So Rift did something right for me at least.

I too have a wealth of experience, having played just about every single MMO that has come out at some point. Before that I played MUDs as well, some of those had pretty tedious leveling and you didn't even have pretty graphics to look at. i am not arguing that lots of people thought it was tedious though. I understand that. What I do not understand totally is why you feel that way. Most of the people that say SL was slow and tedious and grindy asy they enjoyed the Vanilla leveling experience. They took the same amount of time though, so the complaint does not make sense.

I was able to check my mage by remote, 1 month, pretty casual. Granted that is post nerf, but people are still complaining post nerf. Just don't get it. Torvan/Lycini rep grind I understand, that was brutal. Leveling, not so much.

[Kelimbror]

What I do not understand totally is why you feel that way. Most of the people that say SL was slow and tedious and grindy asy they enjoyed the Vanilla leveling experience. They took the same amount of time though, so the complaint does not make sense.

50 levels vs 10 levels in the same time frame is the exact reason why people don't like it...plus the grindy nature of Carnage quests which were mandatory if you weren't leveling from spamming IAs or Dungeons which suffer similar drawbacks. Believe it or not though, level scaling like that is not normal. There's not a single game I can think of (modern) where leveling operates that way. For me personally I was leveling from 1-60 more or less, which felt like a metric fton of tedium. Like I said though, I thoroughly enjoyed it and felt accomplished afterwards but I can't really even explain why.

I was able to check my mage by remote, 1 month, pretty casual. Granted that is post nerf, but people are still complaining post nerf. Just don't get it. Torvan/Lycini rep grind I understand, that was brutal. Leveling, not so much.

I wouldn't be able to speak to the xp nerfs, because I didn't level another character after them. I do recall that the starter experience was much more enjoyable/smooth and took less time. I think I only played to 30 though, but it was a marked improvement.