Rifters I Seek Your Aid

[Northy]

Hey guys, so I just recently (as in the last 24 hours) decided to consider giving Rift a shot. With the new expansion arriving (and the abysmal state of Elemental Shamans in PvP) this might be the time to do so. Beforehand I want to know the facts, as the little I received on their official page doesn't do much for me.

1.) Is there a ranged high-damage dot class without a pet? I love the idea of WoW's affliction lock but hate their damage and pet management.

2.) I LOVE PvP with a passion. My favorite thing in WoW is arena, followed closely by small (10v10 , 15v15) scale bgs. Are there arenas in Rift? I'm sure there's bgs, but are there smaller scale bgs?

3.) Based on what I hear about the soul system, what is going to stop people from play the fotm spec if they can be any soul they want. Or am I completely gettin this wrong?

Thanks in advance from a noob.

[philefluxx]

Hey guys, so I just recently (as in the last 24 hours) decided to consider giving Rift a shot. With the new expansion arriving (and the abysmal state of Elemental Shamans in PvP) this might be the time to do so. Beforehand I want to know the facts, as the little I received on their official page doesn't do much for me.

1.) Is there a ranged high-damage dot class without a pet? I love the idea of WoW's affliction lock but hate their damage and pet management.

2.) I LOVE PvP with a passion. My favorite thing in WoW is arena, followed closely by small (10v10 , 15v15) scale bgs. Are there arenas in Rift? I'm sure there's bgs, but are there smaller scale bgs?

3.) Based on what I hear about the soul system, what is going to stop people from play the fotm spec if they can be any soul they want. Or am I completely gettin this wrong?

Thanks in advance from a noob.

1 - Yes, the mage archetype has soul combinations to achieve this. In fact a couple archetypes do if i remember correctly

2 - No, Rift's focus is and most likely will always be PvE. There are BG's and world PvP, but its not the focus so I would not expect Arenas or any type of E-Sport. To be frank, with the soul system it would be impossible to completely balance and the next thing you know every archetype and class become the same like that one other game.

3 -There are 4 archetypes and within those are the souls. Yes people do flip flop to FoTM but remember that PvP is not the focus here so who cares?

[Antipathy]

1. yes, each class has the option to play with or without a pet, so you can mix and match between 9 callings for each of the 4.
2. No Arenas. the BG's are available in 2 options, 15/20/25 man and 200 v 200 v 200 (three faction)
3. Please refer to number answer number one. you can literally make your very own spec and as long as you don't make outlandish talent choices, then you're more than good to go and have fun. wanna be a tank/range dps/healer hybrid? go for it.

[drtrann]

1. cabalist (cleric) sounds kinda similar to this
2. feel free for someone to call me out, but i dont believe there are arena's
3. nothing. if you pvp or pve competitively, you need to play the FOTM (if your lucky there are 2 options)

[Kaelynath]

The 200 vs 200 vs 200 is just absolutely insane. Never had so much fun PvPing until I did that.

[Acquiesce of Telara]

1. Cleric for DoTs spec without pet.
2. No Arenas. Arguable PvP quality in Rift. Real PvP fanatics don't rely on Rift for their jollies.
3. Nothing stops players from playing FotM specs. Happens everywhere. You have 9 souls at your disposal, you pick 3 (and ignore up to 2 of the 3)to build a spec. You can have up to 6 specs. If Trion finds a particular spec is behaving way outside their expectations, they'll nerf it or buff it in the hopes of balance. Otherwise, the ridiculous number of combinations is factored into things.

On specs: Each soul is almost literally a tree: most of the points you invest go to +modifiers in damage, speed, etc. Spells and skills associated with a particular tree are earned in the Root of the tree. The more points you invest in that particular tree, the more spells become available to you.

Here's a link to a random spec. You can see how things work

[DeltrusDisc]

I find Pyromancer 41 with some points in lock and archon gives a fair bit of dots to keep up.

I quite liked the spec, but RIP, harBANGER TIME!!!

[Fencers]

1.) Is there a ranged high-damage dot class without a pet? I love the idea of WoW's affliction lock but hate their damage and pet management.

As a Cleric Inquisitor + Cabalist + anything have quite a number of DOT abilties to maintain, no pet and also have that Warlock thing where their DOTs provide some healing to them. They even have access to Warlock-ish channeled abilities that drain health and mana. I don't know what they are called in WoW but I remember they were like swrilking laser looking things... soul drain?

I think the Cleric archetype with Cabalist and Inquisitor fits the bill.

2.) I LOVE PvP with a passion. My favorite thing in WoW is arena, followed closely by small (10v10 , 15v15) scale bgs. Are there arenas in Rift? I'm sure there's bgs, but are there smaller scale bgs?

No arenas in Rift. There is 3 faction PVP in a huge map and small scale BGs from 10 v 10 to 20 v 20.

The game is mostly PVE focused. With PVP sorta being a side thing at this point.

3.) Based on what I hear about the soul system, what is going to stop people from play the fotm spec if they can be any soul they want. Or am I completely gettin this wrong?

Nothing to stop them.

The way the class system works in Rift is modular. You have 4 templates; Warrior, Rogue, Mage and Cleric. Each have 8 unique classes which can be combined by any 3. So a Cleric archetype, for example, is free to combine any 3 of their 8 souls-- same as a Warrior or Rogue or Mage.

Respecs in Rift are trivial in cost. Killing like 4 mobs cover the cost of a respec in Rift. The fee is flat. Also the game emphasizes different experimentation with combination classes as you please.

Further unlike World of Warcraft where one is limited to 2 specs on hand, for example, Holy and alternate Shadow spec as a Priest. In Rift one may have up to 6 specs on hand to swap between.

So a Rift cleric may have on hand and in the same gear-

Spec #1- AOE healer
Spec #2- Melee DPS w/o a Pet
Spec #3- Hybrid healing w/ tank absorb shields & damage
Spec #4- Single target healer with some ranged or melee DPS
Spec $5- Burst ranged DPS
Spec # 6- Melee DPS w/ a pet

Breaking that down even further all the instances and raids in Rift are discrete zones. So there are 10 man specs, 20 man specs, 5man specs, 5 man master mode specs and solo dungeon specs aplenty to play with. They are all their own zone not the same raid in 20 or 10 man version, but 2 totally separate zones in different parts of the world with different bosses, etc.

The only thing one would need a second gear set for is tanking. But Rift allows alternate gearing so that potential tank players can easily meet the minimum thresholds without specifically having to farm for tank gear. This works in reverse too, tanks who DPS on the side can easily pick up DPS gear with alternate gearing.

So playing a FOTM spec is no sweat off anyone's back. Not only does the meta in Rift change constantly due to the extremely fast updates, but the wealth of options available to any archetype exceeds what is found in many other MMOs.

Because you are never just 1 or 2 things in Rift. You can play all roles & styles for the most part.

[slime]

1) i pass here because im only a lvl 50 rogue
2) There are no arenas - even though pve is rift's main focus - pvp can be fun. I too would like to see arenas implemented in the future - how hard can it be?
3) souls. You've touched on Rift's best quality (it really has so many it's hard to pick sometimes). Yes and no. There will be flavor of the month specs i guess, but what I have picked up in my short Rift playing career is, you are expected to know all of your specs as different fights call for different specs. I can't tell you how many times I had to go Marks spec for the interrupts and purges - even though pre 1.11 ranger was top dps spec. I was asked to go tank spec because 1 boss fight in particular needs a gimmick tank to do something upstairs in the boss room. oh and bard - yea youll be asked to go bard too. I can't say fotm doesn't exist in Rift - but I can say they hide it well by distributing utility to all of the specs. hope that helps ~