Top 1 gaming blog

How Powergamers Made, and then Broke, the MMOG Genre

Dec 31, 2009 Articles Recommend|333views

Tags: graphics, MMORPGs, world of warcraft

The Heroic Five Man Dungeons Guide

Dec 30, 2009 Articles Recommend, world of warcraft|362views

Fat chance that the Red Proto-Drake will be gone any time soon since it’s only a 280% flight speed mount. Still, anyone after the Red or Blue Dragonhawk mount (when Blizzard gets off their backsides and increases its speed to 310% instead of a measly 280%) from Mountain O’ Mounts should count the Red Proto-Drake among the 100 that they’ll need. Or you can just look a lot cooler riding on a big red proto-drake instead of a puny red or blue bird that looks like it would snap in half if a Tauren sat on it.

The achievements from the heroic five-man dungeons aren’t as difficult as they used to be pre-Ulduar, but a lot of them are still a pain in the backside. They’re all listed here per dungeon, all rated for their difficulty with the appropriate tactics and under the assumption that the groups trying for this are decked out in Naxx 25, Ulduar 10/25, or ToC 10/25 gear.

Utgarde Keep

On The Rocks

Defeat Prince Keleseth on Heroic difficulty without shattering any Frost Tombs.

Don’t use AoE attacks, period. Any tank can take Prince Keleseth without relying on their AoE skills. Frost Tomb is an indiscriminate spell, so the tank, DPS or healer could be a victim. Take multipurpose classes if you’re paranoid.

The Nexus

Split Personality

Defeat Grand Magus Telestra on Heroic difficulty after killing her images within five seconds of each other.

Simply using AoE attacks would do on Telestra’s images, but groups with fewer AoE attacks would do well with controlling the amount of damage done to their targets. 40% for each image would do if there are DoTs on each. Keep an interrupt-capable class on the Frost image to cancel her channeling or else she’ll refuse to die until her Blizzard’s channeling time has finished.

Though she should split twice for the fight, killing her before the second split still grants the achievement.

Chaos Theory

Defeat Anomalus on Heroic difficulty without destroying any Chaotic Rifts.

Clear out all of Anomalus’ rooms before you start this achievement. Your team will need several choke points to AoE the adds that spawn from the Chaotic Rifts without accidentally destroying any Chaotic Rifts. Your healer should be ready to heal everyone because of the massive arcane volleys from the adds until Anomalus stops channeling energy.

You’ll need at least two choke points. The first choke point is the first ramp leading to Anomalus and the second is next to the ramp leading to the bridges that go to the south exit of the room. If these aren’t enough, work your way to the south exit and beyond until Anomalus goes down.

Intense Cold

Defeat Keristrasza on Heroic difficulty without allowing Intense Cold to reach more than two stacks.

Equip your insignias and ready any of your root-removing spells to be safe. Once the fight starts, jump, strafe and squirm your way around the room to keep Intense Cold from stacking on you. If she roots you, use whatever you have handy to free yourself.

Even with the best gear, Keri will hit you with at least one Frost Nova.

Azjol-Nerub

Watch Him Die

Defeat Krik’thir the Gatewatcher on Heroic difficulty while Watcher Gashra, Watcher Narji and Watcher Silthik are still alive.

If your group’s gear is good enough, you can DPS your way through this without caring about the little details.

Groups with lesser gear beware: two of the three Watchers are nasty. One will poison the entire party and the other will disorient the entire party. Both have interruptible casts, but a Shaman is preferred for their Poison Cleansing totem while Insignias can deal with the disorientation.

If you’re taking it slowly, start the fight by killing the Skirmishers. They reset their threat tables frequently and hit hard and then turn your attention to the Webspinners.

And all throughout, keep everyone out of the web wrapping.

Defeat Hadronox on Heroic difficulty before he webs the top doors and prevents more enemies from spawning.

Cheat your way through this with ease. Take any class that can drop their threat table and have them engage the mobs on the web. After they lose their threat table, the mobs will despawn. Everyone should then run down the web to Hadronox’s lair just before the hole in the web. You have 30-45 seconds after Hadronox spawns to kill him. Don’t let the Hadronox’s poison kill anything or he’ll heal.

Gotta Go!

Defeat Anub’arak on Heroic difficulty in 4 minutes or less.

It’s a DPS race. Hit him until he burrows, then kill the mobs until Anub’arak comes back asking for more punishment. The time limit is incredibly generous.

Ahn’kahet: The Old Kingdom

Respect Your Elders

Defeat Elder Nadox on Heroic difficulty without killing any Ahn’kahar Guardians.

Take an off-tank with you and a second healer or have the off-tank survive long enough to nuke the boss.

Clear the area beyond Elder Nadox, particularly the balcony overlooking Prince Taldaram. Once you’re fighting Nadox, take him to that balcony. Your off-tank should stay inside Elder Nadox’s room and pull any Ahn’kahar Guardians before they go through the doorway and give Nadox immunity.

Defeat Prince Taldaram on Heroic difficulty with fewer than five people.

Okay, so bring four people and beat the bloodsucker into the ground. You’ll need to deal 40,000 damage to stop Embrace of the Vampyr before the victim is drained dry.

Volunteer Work

Defeat Jedoga Shadowseeker on Heroic difficulty without killing any Twilight Volunteers.

Jedoga gains a huge damage boost when one of the Twilight Volunteers is sacrificed. Melee DPS can be killed in one hit from a powered-up Cyclone Strike, so anyone in melee except the tank should beat feet until her enrage ends.

Volazj’s Quick Demise

Defeat Herald Volazj on Heroic Difficulty in two minutes or less.

Doing this requires that all of your DPS be competent enough to kill the illusions during Insanity. If each of your DPS can kill their illusions within 20 seconds or less during both phases, you’re golden. Just watch out for the Priest healer and its powerful Greater Heal.

Drak’tharon Keep

Consumption Junction

Defeat Trollgore on Heroic difficulty before Consume reaches ten stacks.

Trollgore casts Consume every 15 seconds. That’s 15 seconds for the tank to position Trollgore in a niche or hallway that gives time for the DPS and healer to run out of Trollgore’s line-of-sight.

Position an off-tank or melee DPS at the top of the stairs to deal with the adds that show up while the rest of the team takes to the fight downstairs.

Tank him in the hallway that you used to enter the room, with the DPS and healer standing behind either column. Every 10 seconds, everyone but the tank should hide before Trollgore casts consume.

Oh Novos!

Defeat Novos the Summoner on Heroic difficulty without allowing any undead minions to reach the floor.

The group only needs to position themselves on the stairs with the healer positioned to heal the off-tank and main tank. The minions themselves deal pitiful damage and don’t swarm that well, so dealing with them until Novos’ shields go down shouldn’t be a problem.

Better Off Dred

Engage King Dred on Heroic difficulty and slay 6 Drakkari Gutrippers or Drakkari Scytheclaws during his defeat.

The raptors needed for this fight are located in King Dred’s pen. Save time by waiting for King Dred to approach the entrance before you pull him, pulling 1 or 2 raptors at the same time.

Kill the raptors and as the fight progresses, pull more raptors to your tank by any means. The Gutrippers can reduce their target’s stamina by 15% only once. Don’t go overboard with pulling the Scytheclaws because each Scytheclaw can put a bleed effect on their target. Couple the bleed damage with Dred’s damage and his bleed damage amplification skills and only a miracle will save your tank.

These raptors do not respawn. If you kill too many, try this achievement again tomorrow.

Violet Hold

Defenseless

Defeat Cyanigosa on Heroic difficulty without using Defense Control Crystals and with Prison Seal Integrity at 100%.

This is no real achievement. Many players don’t notice the pink crystals on the walls around the room and can still keep the entry door at 100% the entire time. Wiping doesn’t affect this achievement either.

Lockdown!

Defeat Xevozz, Lavanthor, Ichoron, Zuramat the Obliterator, Erekem and Moragg on Heroic difficulty.

Run the dungeon a few times and if you’re not so lucky, spend the next week or so trying to unlock that one last boss for this achievement.

Dehydration

Defeat Ichoron on Heroic difficulty without allowing any Ichor Globules to merge.

Don’t expect to do this at the same time as Defenseless.

As you fight Ichoron, her shield loses a stack for every hit she takes. Once those stacks are gone, she explodes into several Ichor Globules that spread around the room and merge in the center.

Around the room are several pink crystals along the walls. Assign someone to click on them whenever Ichoron’s shield reaches 7-10 stacks. The crystals have a charge-up time. By the time the globules are out, the defense crystal should be ready to fire. After it fires, find another crystal for the next split.

A Void Dance

Defeat Zuramat the Obliterator on Heroic difficulty without killing any void sentries.

Focus fire on Zuramat the Obliterator, but have your dispels ready. His Shroud of Darkness reduces healing done to his attackers by 20% for each stack to a maximum of five stacks. With the AoE shadow damage done by the Void Sentries, this can turn very ugly if you spend more than a minute fighting him.

Gundrak

What the Eck?

Defeat Gal’darah on Heroic difficulty while under the effects of Eck Residue.

After killing everything in Gundrak except for Eck the Ferocious and Gal’darah, pay a visit to the giant gorloc. He’s in the tunnel that opens up after defeating Moorabi.

While fighting Eck, stand in front of him when he casts Eck Spit. It stings, but it’s the only way to get Eck Residue. Enjoy your ferocious smell for an hour.

Now make your way to Gal’darah and don’t die until he does. You’ll lose your Eck Residue if you do. Any immunity spells such as Ice Block and Divine Shield, so keep your fingers off your panic buttons.

Less-Rabi

Defeat Moorabi on Heroic difficulty while preventing him from transforming into a mammoth at any point during the encounter.

This achievement is a pain in the arse. The more damage you deal to Moorabi, the faster his transformations are. And if he transforms towards the end of his miserable life, your DoTs might kill him.

There are several party setups that will work. Some of the more popular ones involve at least one shaman with Reverberation who uses Wind Shear whenever it’s available.

His base cast times are 10 seconds while he’s above 50% HP, then 5 seconds below that. The cast speed increases based on how much health he has left. Below 30%, that cast time could be instant.

Depending on your latency, you can either time your interrupts or use one every 2-3 seconds after he reaches 30%.

Share The Love

Defeat Gal’darah on Heroic difficulty and have 5 unique party members get impaled throughout the fight.

While Gal’darah’s a rhino, he’ll impale one party member for a few seconds, dealing bleed damage while parading them around. If you’re lucky, he’ll impale each party member only once. If he feels like making you suffer for this achievement, you’ll get repeated impalements for one party member. If Blizzard feels like making you suffer, your heal will disconnect and you’ll wipe and have to do this all over again.

Ulduar: Halls of Stone

Good Grief

Defeat the Maiden of Grief on Heroic difficulty in one minute or less.

If you’re not in epic gear and don’t know how to DPS as your class, then forget about this achievement.

Your biggest enemy here is the Maiden of Grief’s Shock of Sorrow, a spell with a 4-second cast time that puts a 6-second damage-breakable incapacitation on the entire party. As she is casting Shock of Sorrow, stand in the black circles (Storm of Grief) that she casts earlier. One tick of damage from standing in the Storm is enough to break the incapacitation effect.

Depending on how much damage you can deal per second, the Maiden can cast this spell one to four times. That’s a maximum of 24 seconds wasted if you can’t put her out of her misery quickly enough.

Brann Spankin’ New

Defeat the Tribunal of Ages encounter on Heroic difficulty without allowing Brann Bronzebeard to take any damage.

Take a Death Knight or Paladin for tanking. Use the stairs at the entrance to the Tribunal’s room as a choke point to gather all of the adds before they can reach Brann. Hunters should drop Frost Traps to give the tank time to pick up everything.

Now just avoid the lasers and the giant black ball and you’ll be fine. If you wipe, you can attempt this achievement again.

And no, healing Brann to full health after he’s taken damage will not work.

Abuse the Ooze

Defeat Sjonnir the Ironshaper on Heroic difficulty and kill 5 Iron Sludges during the encounter.

Tank Sjonnir in the corridor you entered from and bring him down to 40-50% of his HP. When he starts casting Lightning Ring, get away from him and focus on the oozelings that start spawning. Leave them alone until they get to the middle of the room and merge into an Iron Sludge. Destroy this Iron Sludge before more spawn or suffer the AoE poison volleys that can rape your party.

Once you’ve destroyed the 5 sludges, Sjonnir can join them.

Ulduar: Halls of Lightning

Lightning Struck

Defeat General Bjarngrim on Heroic difficulty while he has a Temporary Electric Charge.

Before the fight, Bjarngrim moves around the other half of the room, casting Temporary Electric Charge on himself. This powers up any adds that are near him, so clear one of the platforms and the bridges next to it before starting the fight.

Bjarngrim and his adds gain a 30% increase to their damage as long as they have the Temporary Electric Charge. If Whirlwind hurt your DPS classes before, it will downright kill them if they don’t back off quickly enough.

Shatter Resistant

Defeat Volkhan on Heroic difficulty without allowing him to shatter more than four Brittle Golems.

Ignore the golems that spawn through the fight and attack Volkhan if he goes down. The golems only do around 2-3,000 damage per hit. Unless you’re in grays and whites, this shouldn’t be that hard.

Timely Death

Defeat Loken on Heroic difficulty in two minutes or less.

You don’t have to worry about stuns, but Loken’s Lightning Nova may have you running for your life, shaving 5-10 seconds off your attack time.

If you’re tough, your group can stand next to Loken and suck up the damage. Have around 20,000 HP to guarantee your survival and you should be fine.

Caverns of Time: Culling of Stratholme

Zombiefest!

Kill 100 Risen Zombies in one minute.

Take a Paladin tank with you for this one.

Fight through the encounter until Salramm the Fleshcrafter spawns. Take him all the way to the inn in the northeast area and tank him inside. Kill all the zombies that attached themselves to your group and wait for three minutes. Once the zombies outside the inn have respawned, kill Salramm.

Arthas will order you to meet him at the inn, but he’s an incredibly slow runner when he’s not in your visual range, so go make a sandwich.

Kill the third boss and then open the path to the burning alley. Have your Paladin tank return to the first area. Remove any reactive damage effects like Thorns before pulling all of the zombies in the first area. There should be around 70 or so there. Once the zombies have been pulled, run back to the burning alley and wait for the crowd of shamblers to appear on your map. Once the majority of the zombie train is in the burning alley, take them all out with area-of-effect attacks. Any remaining zombies that need to be dispatched can be found in the burning alley.

Remember Rule #1 when pulling zombies: Cardio.

The Culling of Time

Defeat the Infinite Corruptor on Heroic difficulty.

After Mal’ganis turns all of Stratholme into an undead carnival, you have 25 minutes to clear your way through 8 waves of Scourge monsters, 3 bosses and a burning alley laden with more Scourge freaks and zeds. Once you’ve passed the burning alley, take a left at the marketplace to find the Infinite Corruptor erasing one of the Bronze Dragonflight from existence.

The Infinite Corruptor can leave in the middle of the fight, so save yourself at least 3 minutes to kill him.

Depending on how quickly you work, you can allot one or two wipes for this.

Utgarde Pinnacle

The Incredible Hulk

Force Svala Sorrowgrave to kill a Scourge Hulk on Heroic difficulty.

Hulk no smash today.

I haven’t seen Svala trap a Scourge Hulk yet, but this achievement is still possible without it.

Pull a Scourge Hulk at the start of the fight and take it down to 15,000 HP. When Svala casts Ritual of the Sword, free your comrade and then place the Scourge Hulk under the sword. When the sword strikes, it should kill the Hulk. If not, there’s a damage-over-time effect placed on anyone who is caught in the blast made after the sword connects. If the Hulk dies to that, it still counts towards the achievement.

You can help the damage along, but it has to be Svala’s attack that deals the killing blow.

Lodi Dodi We Loves the Skadi

Kill Skadi the Ruthless within 3 minutes of starting the gauntlet event.

Like Hadronox Denied, you can cheat your way through this one. Engage Skadi at the start of the gauntlet, then retreat into Gortok Palehoof’s room. After the mobs in the gauntlet despawn, run to the end before Skadi respawns. Once he has, send someone back to activate the gauntlet.

But this will still not be enough to beat Skadi in 3 minutes, mostly because the Harpooners take so long to spawn. Check My Girl Loves to Skadi All the Time for the rest and get both achievements done in one go.

My Girl Loves to Skadi All the Time

Defeat Skadi the Ruthless after having killed Grauf from 100% to dead in a single pass.

You’ll need six harpoons split among three members of your team to pull this off. After gathering six harpoons, reset the encounter by running back to Gortok Palehoof’s room. Once all the mobs are gone, run to the harpoon guns before Skadi respawns. Once Grauf is within range of the harpoons, let loose and hit him with all the harpoons you have before he passes.

King’s Bane

Defeat King Ymiron on Heroic difficulty without anyone in the party triggering Bane.

Treat the fight as a DPS race. From the start of the fight, you have 20 seconds to damage Ymiron for 20% of his health. Bane is activated 20 seconds after Ymiron is engaged and after he loses 20% of his health. The timer for Bane is reset after he has been damaged by 20%, indicated by the party-wide stun he inflicts while running to the boats.

If your latency can handle it and your DPS can’t, Bane can be dispelled or stolen. But good luck with that. Unless your realm is fresh and without transfers, you’d be hard pressed to find a party with DPS using rusty swords, a tank made out of paper, and a healer who’s always OOM.

The Oculus

Experienced Drake Rider

On three different visits, get credit for defeating Ley-Guardian Eregos while riding an Amber, Emerald, and Ruby Drake on Heroic difficulty.

One: Do not allow your drake to die. If you can accomplish that three times with different drakes on each run, then you’re set.

Make It Count

Defeat Ley-Guardian Eregos within 20 minutes of Drakos the Interrogator’s death.

First off, go to your achievement menu and track this achievement.

This goes up there with Less-rabi in terms of difficulty. You’re not bound by the power of your character’s abilities, but the drakes instead. The good news is that the drakes scale with your equipment, so anyone who’s raided the Argent Coliseum can rejoice. Everything will be peachy as long as you don’t wipe.

After killing Drakos, take your drakes. A common composition of one Ruby, two Emerald, two Amber should work. Every 12 seconds, someone has to cast Stop Time to prevent aggro from the blue drakes surrounding the Oculus.

Fly to the central ring and destroy the constructs.

Once you’ve destroyed the last construct on the ring, mount up and fly through the rings towards one of the platforms with constructs on it. You should only need to kill 2-3 drakes to make a safe landing on the platform.

Tank the construct close to the edge where you landed, then mount up, hit Time Stop, then make your way to the next platform. Fly through the Oculus’ rings to spare yourself the nerd rage from pulling drakes.

With the constructs down, fly through the ring to reach Varos Cloudstrider. Once he dies, that’s the end of the drakes.

Fly up to Mage-Lord Urom and defeat him. Now you have only the whelps to worry about. Fly away from the ring and perch on one of the platforms surrounding the ring at the top.

If you’ve got five or more minutes left, then you should be safe. Fight Eregos, stay away from his large blue arcane balls, top up the drakes and win. If your drake falls, land on the ring and fight Eregos with bullets, arrows, axes, daggers, stones, and insults.

Amber Void

Defeat Ley-Guardian Eregos without anyone in your party using an Amber Drake.

Your damage will be weaksauce without the Ambers and this fight will take an eternity. Keep four Emeralds and a Ruby with you, make good use of Touch of the Nightmare and keep your drain attacks refreshed and maxed out.

Ruby Void

Defeat Ley-Guardian Eregos without anyone in your party using a Ruby Drake.

Ruby Drakes aren’t the only ones with the AoE attack to kill the whelplings, but the only ones that can mitigate damage from Eregos.

Have three Emeralds and two Ambers out if you only want this achievement. Personally, I’d rather go with a completely Amber party.

Emerald Void

Defeat Ley-Guardian Eregos without anyone in your party using an Emerald Drake.

There’s no one to heal you, but as long as your one or two Ruby drakes can handle the damage, the Ambers can cast Stop Time when Eregos enrages and have a spare Stop Time to take care of anything else.

Ruby and Emerald Void

Better to just get Amber Void and then get these two at the same time to be done with it. Order your party’s Stop Time casts. Each has a one minute cooldown and the effects last for ten seconds, so give it at least twelve seconds from the previous cast. You’ll take a little damage, but it’s nothing that can’t be shrugged off. Use the time to kill some of the whelps that show up. Their power is in their numbers and you don’t want to be there when the sky is full of screeching baby dragons.

As for Temporal Rift, it’s only useful if another party member is damaging Eregos during the channeling. You don’t have to order it like Stop Time but someone does need to take shots at Eregos to build up those charges.

Tags: Dungeons, five man, Glory of the Hero, world of warcraft

FFXI Developmental Tour-The November version update

Dec 29, 2009 Articles Recommend, FFXI|390views

There’s a new version update out on the Vana’dielian streets, and that means we’ve journeyed to Jeuno to meet up with our super-seekret contacts at Square-Enix and talk shop on what’s new in Final Fantasy XI.

This latest expansion pack, A Shantotto Ascension, comes bundled with the November version update, as is customary for the past few updates to the title. So, in addition to being able to pay 10 bucks to attempt to foil Professor Shantotto’s aspirations of having her own empire, the game has been updated with a brand new crafting system called synergy, the new ability to add “slots” onto your items and upgrade them with evolith modifications, more job updates, and an improvement to the existing wedding system!

As you can see, it’s a busy time in Vana’diel, and we got to jaunt around the world and find out more. So come along, follow in our adventurous footsteps, and find out what all the fuss is about!
The Legend Torn, Her Empire Born

The tour opened up with a long journey (and by long, I mean a magical teleport that took two whole seconds) to the bustling town of Windurst, where I was introduced to a cutscene featuring the magical experiments of the great Professor Shantotto.

For those of you not in the know, Shantotto is one of the game’s foremost black mages and makes appearances in many of the Windust questlines and even the world event questlines. She’s a curious little woman as she speaks entirely in rhyme, usually showing up as some sort of powerful figure or weasling her way into adventures. In short (but not shorter than her), she’s a little full of herself. Then again, if you could bend space and time, you’d be full of yourself too.

In any case, the opening trailer showcases a rare accident in the Professor’s experiments, creating a large warp rift that pulls her in and triggers a gigantic explosion (shown above.) The Professor disappears from Windurst from some time, only to later reappear with an army of odd, Tarutaru-like solders. However, the Shantotto that reappears is nothing like the old Shantotto — this one is fixated on creating her own empire and conquering all of Vana’diel to showcase her might.

The adventure pack is sure to take twists and turns while it showcases Shantotto’s inner-mind and explores one of Final Fantasy XI’s title characters in the depth she’s deserved for years. While it comes with the update, the Shantotto Ascension adventure pack is an additional 10 dollars to actually unlock the content. Complete all of the quests, and be rewarded with some awesome new leg armor to complete the set you’ve been building with the first two adventure packs.

The Hunt is On

After previewing the expansion pack and the cutscene, off we went to try our hand at the combat portion of the game’s new crafting system — the hunt.

Hunts are very much like the game’s Fields of Valor system, where players accept quests to kill specific notorious monsters throughout the world. Now, these are the same notorious monsters that have been in the game since launch, so expect to see some people camping Leaping Lizzy all over again. These hunts can literally be hunts as you try to track down the game’s tricky rare spawns, plus some brand new ones added just for the system.

Once you successfully take down the monster you’ve been after and return to a Hunt Registry book to confirm your kill, you’ll be rewarded with an evolith unique to the monster and the hunt currency of scylds. Scylds are marks given by hunts once you complete them. While the lower level hunts require no scylds to start, the higher level ones do. So, if you’re looking for those powerful evoliths and difficult hunts, you have go jump through some hoops and do lower level ones first before taking on big game.

Speaking of evoliths… that leads me right into the next segment…

Evoliths, Synergy, and explosions, oh my!

The evoliths rewarded from hunts are the game’s newest form of item augmentation. Similar to the gems of World of Warcraft, gems augment everything from your attacks and defense to how your abilities function. These new crystals are slotted directly into your equipment, allowing you to augment anything to your heart’s desire.

If you want to throw an evolith onto a weapon, you’re going to have to etch a slot into it first, and that requires the crafting portion of the game’s brand new augmentation system — Synergy Furnaces.

Synergy crafting is not your boring sit down, pull out a recipe book and pick something to make type of crafting. This is hands on, wheel spinning, pressure monitoring, furnace thwacking crafting. You’re going to get down and dirty with this new system, and when I say down and dirty I mean “hurling yourself face first into a violent explosion.” Doesn’t that sound wonderful?

Synergy is a complicated system, but it breaks down into the simple act of adding a piece of armor or weapon that you want etched into the furnace and then pressure cooking it with elemental fuel called fewell. If you can raise the right set of elements to the levels the item needs them to be, then the crafting is a success.

As the item is etched, the elements will introduce a few problems — pressure, elemental impurity, and shield degradation. High levels of impurity in the furnace can lead to the furnace exploding in your face, while pressure makes the explosion that much more deadly when it goes off. Should the shield around the furnace hit zero, as denoted by the constantly falling health of the furnace, the elements escape and you’re left with a fizzled recipe.

Luckily, you can get five of your friends to help you keep the process stable. It’s a five person minigame of frantic furnace thwacking (yes, you can really thwack the furnace) as you try to keep everything in check. Sometimes you’ll even need other players, as some recipes need people with high levels of different tradeskills to work on the furnace.

Needless to say, evolith/synergy crafting is rewarding, fun, and complicated. More games should take a cue from FFXI and introduce some wonderful cooperative crafting games such as this one, to make crafting less of a bore. I wish I had more time to describe the other side of the system that is creating brand new items through synergy, but I just don’t have the space.

Here comes the bride!

Finally, after all of this killing and explosions, my character rushed off to a fantastic wedding on the beach, set up by the development team. It was a nice end to a frantic day, although I didn’t exactly look like a well-groomed bride as I stood next to my paladin husband, all dressed in white plate mail as I stood there covered in synergy ash and monster blood.

The game’s long-standing wedding system has been removed from the hands of the GMs and placed into the care of the automated event service, as you can now purchase your wedding through NPCs, buy the appropriate materials with gil, and set up wedding pieces anywhere in Vana’diel with the automated event service. While you lose the touch of a real human “priest” officiating the service, you gain the ability to have the wedding anywhere in the world and not wait for the GMs to have a free date.

As the sun set over the cove and I waved goodbye to my guides, I had to admit, this update was pretty nice. While I was a bit iffy on the wedding changes, the brand new innovative crafting and the playful fun of A Shantotto Ascension more than made up for it, not to mention the job changes and brand new Wings of the Goddess missions that I couldn’t even fit into this article.

If you’re a Final Fantasy XI buff, you already know all about these brand new things added to the game and are probably working to raise your synergy skill levels. But if you’re new to the game, do yourself a favor and pick up the game, it’s four expansions, and all three of the adventure packs for 11 dollars on Steam during the holiday sale. That’s one dollar over the cost of a standard adventure pack, and you get the entire game and 30 days of play. So don’t sit on the fence, pick it up and enjoy the 6 years of content, wonderfully complicated difficulty, and rewarding storylines/cutscenes that the game has to offer. It’s not Warcraft, and it’s better for it.

Tags: FFXI, Final Fantasy XI, Tour

Criticism of Super Street Fighter IV Korean Stage

Dec 28, 2009 Articles Recommend|933views

Not everyone is happy with the way South Korean is depicted in the SSFIV stage. According to South Korean newspaper The Dong-a IIbo, South Korean gamers who have seen Super Street Fighter IV’s South Korea stage feel disappointed and don’t really feel that it looks Korean, but rather, Chinese or a mix-mash of both, making it difficult to discern where the heck the stage is.

It’s not just the outfits that the background characters are wearing, but also the banners which predominately feature Chinese writing — a few banners appear to feature Korean writing. Of course, Chinese writing has traditionally been used in Korea and can be found scrawled on landmark temples and shrines.

Other criticism is that there are few skyscrapers (which dominate today’s South Korean urban sprawl) and the depiction of street vendors is highly outdated.

Stereotypes in Street Fighter?

Hey look, India!

Tags: Criticism, disappointed, Street Fighter

WOW lost vs ATHENE GNOME ARMY!again!!

Dec 27, 2009 Articles Recommend|413views

yep athene as been trying for months to organise world event in the most popular p2p mmo

this week-end on the 27 of december 2009

blizzard lost a lot of luster !again!the fact is the number of player athene bring to each event are too big for blizzard!

athene will go to paris HQ on the 30 to have serious discussion with blizzard about these issue that as been a plague for blizzard since start of bc

blizzard had to boot world raid in new content because the game became unplayable

and athene showed that again in orgrimar this week-end

me, i saw only 2 technology that can save blizzard in these issue

direct x 11

microsoft donnybrook

i might be wrong but i doubt it.

if the monster that is blizzard can only go as high as morpg(not mmorpg as advertise)

not any gaming company can make the massive part happen.(world even ,instead of instanced event .a la guild wars)

right now we got multiplayer online game but we lost the massive part a long time ago

we ll see if athene and blizzard and all technology in the world can bring back the massive part in our favorite

multiplayer online role player game that is world of warcraft

one thing for sure blizzard lost a lot of shine ,and athene showed that world event is more popular then ever

with just the sheer number he bring,hell on a eu server (stormscale)

if he had done that event on us server it would have been even worst since here wow is way bigger then europe

but then athene knew that so he stayed on eu server in the hope that he might have a chance to do a world event

as of yet !lot of try for world event from athene in the last 12 month.and so far as i know .none have  worked if he gave a one week annoucement about the where waht and when.

we ll see if athene and his fan and blizzard can find a solution to the biggest challenge online game faced since its birth ,more then 2 decade ago.

Tags: athene, Blizzard, world of warcraft

HolyBeast Online Big Year

Dec 25, 2009 Articles Recommend|295views

HolyBeast ONLINE Management Team is pleased to announce the start of Big Year, This incredible chance will be go through to January 6th, 2010 (PST).

New Arrivals

1. Lv 30 Rudolf Orb
The mysterious orb which randomly gives you a Little Rudolf, a Rudolf card, or other good items of the sort. You know what is the Little Rudolf? Rudolf is a cute and adorable pet which fights right along your side. You can evolve and fuse the Little Rudolf even further - to Lv 45 Rudolf, Lv 60 Big Rudolf, Lv 75 Holy Rudolf, and Lv 90 Holy Rudolf A – with the Rudolf Card in this Rudolf Orb.

2. Lv 50 Flying Sled Orb
For this Christmas we are pleased to inform you that we are going to offer a brand new Flying Sled, Santa Claus will ride this brilliant sledge and give presents to you. And now you also have chance to get this sledge and fly across the sky.

3. Attractive Costumes
In time for the Big Year End Bargain Sale, We have released four sets of Costume.
Act now and get these gorgeous costumes for 15D!

There will be more updates coming up ahead. We are looking forward to release another great update next week.If you would like to check our site for further information, you can check from: http://hb.getamped.com/home

Tags: HolyBeast ONLINE, Year

Fallen Earth Developer Journal Discussing Town Events

Dec 24, 2009 Articles Recommend|888views

Wandering the desert, looking for something to do? Check out a town event! Town events are another fun way to interact in the Fallen Earth environment. Like a conflict town, a town event offers cool rewards for completing repeatable missions, but most town events have no faction requirement, so anyone can join in as players work together to achieve a goal.

Fallen Earth conflict towns show the violent clash of ideologies in a post-apocalyptic world, whereas a town event often involves rebuilding, fortifying or defending a settlement against an outside attack. Town events provide a different kind of cooperative play. Each has a list of goals players must meet to bring on the event finale. Players might need to gather resources or clear out dangerous areas. Every player’s contribution counts towards the completion of the town event, without regard to clan or faction. The more players cooperate and organize their efforts, the faster the finale comes around.

Individual players, however, are hardly excluded. Anyone can join in and contribute at almost any time, and the repeatable missions that characterize town events always provide XP and rewards. Efficiency matters, though. Most town events are timed, which creates a sense of urgency and allows the event to reset regularly. The finale begins when players complete the goals within the time limit.

The mission log tracks the status of a town event, so players see the results of their actions as they play, but the finale is the real spectacle. If the event required wood for building fortifications, a new tower might appear. There might be a big battle or a boss monster to hunt. The finales vary, but they almost always offer a good, solid fight. Town events also provide some great items if you put in the effort!

So what else do players get for participating in and completing a town event? Aside from experience and the fun of the final fight, players receive tokens that they trade in for gear, often something rare and always something good.

Players can find town events in Boneclaw, Burnside, Clinton FARM, Embry Crossroads, Oilville and St. Sebastian’s.

From a developer’s perspective, creating a town event is a particular challenge. They require a good, clear outline and some technical expertise to set up correctly. The special rewards for a town event take some thought, as the balance is more complex when so many repeatable missions are involved. The story has to make sense too; this can be challenging, as a town event has a very particular structure. Without a good narrative, a town event would be just a grind, but a good story makes it believable.

One of the first town events created for Fallen Earth was in Clinton FARM. Toxic waste poisons the area, and the Blade Dancers aren’t making it any easier for the locals to deal with the problem. Players eliminate Blade Dancers, treat the sick, and research the problem to prepare for the final battle. In contrast, the Embry Crossroads town event runs very differently. The Bankers are running a Monster Hunt. Players collect food and supplies for the monster and clear out the area for the hunt. When all is ready, the monster is released and the hunt begins…

If you get the chance, stop by one of the towns mentioned above and check out the town event. It’s a cool way to interact cooperatively with other players and pick up some neat stuff at the same time!

Tags: developer journal, Fallen Earth, requirement

Dragon’s Call Christmas Event is on the way!

Dec 23, 2009 Articles Recommend|314views

I’m not going to flirt with you about this upcoming Xmas, if you have already joined all those interesting small events in Dragon’s Call official forum. Not to mention how many glorious rewards you will get, the simple joy you can gain from interacting with all DC players will already be attractive.

But all those pre-Xmas events are only the tribute and foreplay. What’s coming up next? Now I will show you the whole plan of our official Christmas Event. Stop drooling, just enter Dragon’s Call now for your sweetest Christmas Day ever!

- Our official Christmas events -

Time estimated: EST 2:00AM , Dec.24, 2009 ~  EST 2:00 AM, Jan.04,2010

Part One -

Mall Promotion Activities

1. Gift Packages will be released for purchase.

5 Cents Special Offer : One Time Limited Purchase, Price: 1 Dragon Gold
VIP membership - 7 days
Lesser Lucky Gem x 3
Exp Blessing - 1 day

Leveling Package (Beginner): One Time Limited Purchase,  Price: 79 Dragon Gold
VIP membership - 7 days
Exp Blessing - 7 days
Gold Blessing - 7 days

Leveling Package (Medium): Unlimited Purchases, Price:139 Dragon Gold
VIP membership - 7 days
Exp Blessing - 7 days
Gold Blessing - 7 days

Leveling Package (Senior): Unlimited Purchases, Price: 259  Dragon Gold
VIP membership - 15 days
Exp Blessing - 15 days
Gold Blessing - 15 days

Leveling Package (Ultimate): Unlimited Purchases, Price:499 Dragon Gold

VIP membership - 30 days
Exp Blessing - 30 days
Gold Blessing - 30 days

2. Recharge to get extra Dragon Stones for free

Players who recharge $10 or more will receive an additional 15% of Dragon Stones! (e.g.: Recharge 10 dollars = 200 Dragon Gold + 30 Dragon Stones)

Part Two -

Online Events:

1. Instance Festival:

During the event time, players will be able to enter the Instance 4 times per day.

2. Santa’s Special Gift:

Additional monster drops of Magic Debris. Different level monsters will have different amounts of debris drops.

Attention: You can not receive Magic Debris using Auto-fighting. Instead, you can get them by either fighting monsters manually or adventuring in the Instance as the Team Leader or Mercenary.

Tags: Christmas, Dragon's Call, Event

Something of Rise of the Godslayer, Age of Conan expansion

Dec 22, 2009 Age of Conan, Articles Recommend|310views

On August 18, 2009, FunCom announced the release of the first expansion for Age of Conan, Rise of the the Godslayer. With FunCom soon to release Age of Conan to servers in Korea, it is very appropriate that the next expansion include elements of the Far East, in the form of Khitai, Robert E. Howard’s vision of Hyboria that later evolved into what we now know as China and Korea. This ancient society lends itself well to the feudal, factioned-based warfare that many players have envisioned in Age of Conan, since before its initial release. Expansive regions, brutal faction-based conflict, and political intrigue draw the players into a world of epic storylines and sexy adventure.

New to Rise of the Godslayer is the feature of interconnected zones. When you look over your shoulder, you can see the playzones you just left and you can look into new zones before you cross their borders. If you see a tower in the mountains on the far side of the playzone, you can cross that zone, climb the mountain, and enter that tower. Each playfield will have a tremendous amount of explorable space to a much greater degree than the original Age of Conan experience.

The Story

Before recorded history, Yag-kosha and other beings of great celestial power arrived on our world. Before the dawn of man, before the apes evolved into our ancestors, these beings strode across our world as conquerors of the great beasts that controlled it. They were feared, and they were respected. They made their home in the dim jungles of the east before the time of the Lemurians and the Lost Kingdom of Mu. The ancient kingdoms of Hyboria rose, fell, and rose again. Atlanteans, Picts, and Acheronians rose to control the west until a great cataclysm destroyed and submerged their civilizations. From the ashes rose the shining kingdoms of the west, such as Aquilonia, Nemedia, Brythunia, Hyperborea, Koth, Ophir, Argos, Corinthia, and the Border Kingdom. Lemuria and Mu rose and fell in the east to be replaced with Khitai, Vendhya, and Hyrkania. Stygia, Shem, Zamora, and Zingara rose to claim the shattered remains of what once was Acheron and its sorcerous and demonic legacy.

Over the eons, the beings of Yag slowly died off, since they were not immortal despite their impossibly long lifespans. So it came to pass that Yag-kosha, also known as Yogah, lived alone in the jungles that became Khitai. His power was respected by an ancient, peaceful, yellow-skinned people whose music could inspire the indigenous grey apes to dance.

After centuries of peaceful co-existence and worship as a benevolent god, Yag-kosha was approached by a seer of ancient Zamora seeking to become a student. Yara sought Yag’s wisdom and power. When Yara learned all he could through civilized means, his lust for power and blind ambition led him to enspell Yag-kosha and drag him far away from his home in Khitai to the decadent land of Zamora.

Yag-kosha was imprisoned, tortured, and forced to perform all manner of perverse and evil acts. For three hundred years, Yag-kosha suffered and lamented under Yara’s control. At that time, a young Cimmerian thief of barely seventeen summers sought to steal a very valuable gem from Yara’s cursed ivory tower. In an act of mercy, young Conan slew the being known as Yag-kosha and unleashed the remaining power of Yag upon the sorcerer Yara. From there young Conan grew into the man who would free Aquilonia from the reign of a sadistic tyrant and become King by his own hand.

No good deed often goes unpunished, as the land of Khitai soon began to wither from within as the protection and blessings of Yag-kosha faded from their realm. Upon hearing of the death of their deity at the hands of the Cimmerian who became king, all blame for their misfortunes fell upon the broad shoulders of an infidel defiler. For twenty-five years, Khitai has been wilting as it slowly dies from the corruption growing within.

Exploration

As you travel across the surface, a majority of the buildings are explorable throughout. Keep your eyes open for caves and other hidden interior spaces; you may run into a group of brigands or uncover a long-lost hidden treasure or weapon. Be prepared to dig on occasion. Some hidden places may even be found underwater. I am having flashbacks here of the crypt that Arnold’s Conan stumbled into where he discovered the ancient Atlantean King and the Sword of the Kings that served him well throughout his lifetime.

FunCom listened to players after the initial release and proactively attempted to remove all sense of linear gameplay from the expansion, consciously attempting to open up the world and allow more exploration. As a result, a player will not see any travel NPCs; there will be no wagons, caravans, boats, or guides to transport a player from one region to another. You will travel across the countrysides by foot or by mount.

This concept of separated regions was necessary in the original release, because each playfield was separated by miles and days of travel according to the maps of the Hyborian world. In Khitai though, everything is as it is represented on the map. Each border is adjacent to the next region’s border. As you cross through playzones, you will experience numerous environmental effects. These effects include smoke on the battlefields, mist and fog, and an encroaching darkness as you approach significantly corrupted areas. Using a technology adapted from Anarchy Online, the dungeons will be interconnected to a degree, allowing you to repeat boss encounters quickly without repeating the preliminary path through the dungeon, once they have been successfully completed by your group. This function can usually repeated in clusters of three or four, and you can move to others very quickly and easily.

The Look

FunCom has long had strong ties to China. In the Collector’s Edition of Age of Conan, we met the other half of the art design team of Age of Conan. We are well-aware of the dedicated staff of the design and development team in Oslo, Norway. Many hours of dedicated labor were also contributed by the talented individuals of the FunCom art team in Beijing, China. Coming full circle, we have drawn the Hyborian world together, and we return home to the talented artists of Beijing.

What’s New

The Empire of Khitai expands upon the Hyborian world as it was laid out by Howard, including five of the largest playfield regions ever made for the game. One playfield is aimed at level 20-40 content, and the other four playfields are aimed at level 80 content. Rise of the Godslayer will not introduce new levels above the level 80 cap, and there will be no new classes. FunCom wanted to give all existing classes more content, as opposed to building the expansion with content aimed at one new class. We start out with the new playable Khitan race that will sail from Tortage to the beginning zone in Khitai. Khitan characters will have a very different destiny quest from what we have seen in the other three playable races of Age of Conan.

New content starts around level 20 and extensive new content has been added all the way to level 80 for current players of all races. The new horizontal alternate advancement system allows even level 80 avatars to learn new spells, feats, combos, new ways to interact with the world, and different special abilities, further defining your unique character. This allows more replayability as players have achievements that take time and effort to bring to fruition. For example, there are two new mounts available as quest content, the Tamarind Tiger and the Nightrunner Wolf.

In other game systems, including the original release of Age of Conan, mounts are simply a speed increase and are just purchased from vendors or acquired as Veteran rewards. Age of Conan designers wanted to make all of their mounts more meaningful, so players would want to collect all of them. The Tamarind Tiger is a stealth mount, allowing you to cross battlefields in stealth mode, and you can use it to sneak around in PvE and PvP playfields. The Tiger is an explosive mount; it has a very quick speed for a very short amount of time. For the Tamarind Tiger, you must find and join the cult that worships the tiger and advance to its highest ranks where you gain the right to learn the ritual to tame a tiger. You must then disarm yourself of weapons and armor, find and defeat a mother tiger with your bare hands, and steal a cub from her den. At that point, you must feed and train your cub to hunt, to stalk, and to kill, preparing it to accept you as its rider and companion; this is no simple effort and it will take you time to complete. These are naturally wild animals, and if you attempt to rush the training, you may lose a hand. You must then make a choice; you can find materials and create a saddle for your new mount, or you can prepare it to fight at your side as a very powerful combat pet. This choice is non-reversible. Consider carefully.

Players will be able to set their new skills into an offline training mode or focus mode, allowing their character to advance in its abilities while they are offline using a form of meditation, further study, or katas. Other new skills include learning martial arts from various masters throughout Khitai. It appears that the new feat points gained for the alternate advancement system will be pooled in such a way so as to allow the player, whether level 20 or level 80, to spend his or her new feat points as they see fit to make the avatar more unique.

As all playable races roam across the eastern frontier, following the Path of the Godslayer, your character will discover a myriad of new mid- and high-level content. The condition of the nearby roads can give you an indication of the level of strife in a region. If a road is in good condition, you travel through a more peaceful area. If the road is damaged, you can expect danger around every corner. Keep an eye open for shrines in your journeys. Khitai is a land of 999 gods. You can pray or meditate at each shrine; the right emote could get your player a temporary blessing. The wrong emote can curse you during your exploration. Travel across the landscape of Khitai is not as simple as it may appear. Natural and unnatural menaces roam the landscape across Khitai, like the barbaric Mountain Men, the swift and deadly Crow People, and the giant Kapa.

Each beast or monster that you encounter has an AI that you must learn the strategy of how to appropriately handle. The Firebirds of Chosain will run from you on most occasions. If you find the bird with its head in the ground, you may be able to draw more to you by attacking it. The Kapa is the turtle-like quadraped that is prominently displayed on one of the promotional photos fighting a full size party for many Rise of the Godslayer articles. The larger the beast, the more likely that it is even more dangerous. Consider a beast’s size before you commit to an engagement with many of the new denizens of Khitai. You have a 25% chance of some beasts, like the Kapa, being in an ambush-state waiting for travelers to come nearby. The Wisp may seem weak at first and will flee your party; once safe, it will summon the souls of the dead that it has killed to defeat your group. Water buffalos are typically benign animals in any Asian setting; attack a Water buffalo calf and a bull or the entire herd may turn on you in its defense. A simple rule to follow would be to never attack a calf. The Crow Men, or Children of Jill, may be a threat in some areas or a Quest NPC in others; they serve as messengers for the Scarlet Circle of sorcerors. Wolves in Khitai are called Nightrunners. If you attack the Alpha Male of the pack, he will howl and his entire pack will come in to defend him. Learning the special abilities of each beast will be an adventure in itself.

Khitai is also a land in civil war, with Hyrkanians encroaching from the west (your first available faction), and other factions vying for control of regions and the country as a whole. The Tamerind Tiger Riders are a faction of Vendyhan Mercenaries drawn into the battles of Chosain Province. The Scarlet Circle are a band of sorcerers working for the emperor of Khitai; they are not very well liked. There are a total of ten open and two hidden or stealth factions to be discovered throughout the expansion. Even the once-idyllic Chosain Province has be ravaged by war, strife, and looting. Will you help the peaceful monks and their healing arts even though they hate Conan for bringing their nation to ruin? Will you assist the rightful heir of Khitai regain his throne, despite the fact that he supports a demonic cult, the Yellow Priests of Yun, that celebrates in the inhuman sacrifice of innocent women and children? There is no clear black and white in Khitai, only a variety of shades of gray. You must make moral choices in who you assist and why. If you change your mind on your path, you must regain honor from the factions that you wronged by slaying the opposing faction’s enemies and performing betrayal quests. Every faction has available faction weapons. Every faction has their own unique faction armor in four tiers. To complete the full set of armor for each faction, you must advance to the highest levels of each faction gaining access to additional pieces as you are promoted from various faction vendors. Likewise, the faction that you become an ally with determines which places that you can visit and what story content will become available to you, and could have serious consequences.

Players seek transport to Khitai from the major cities of Tarantia, Connarch’s Village, and Khemi. All players begin their journey in Khitai on the western side of the Great Wall. This zone of rolling steppes that climb up to the foothills of the Mountains of Night is called the Gateway to Khitai. The Great Wall meanders through the Mountains of Night providing a barrier of protection from the barbarians of the west and a point of reference as you navigate the countryside. You discover that portions of the wall have been breached by the Hyrkanian hordes. After you pass through the Great Wall, you will trek eastward across the far-stretching Northern Grasslands. Places of interest include the Kang Pagoda, the Village of Chow, and the frontier city of Pin Pin. The River of Yellow Curses runs along the northern border of this region.

When you cross the river, you march forward into the black desert of Kara Korum. Kara Korum stretches from the western mountains to the east limits of Khitai on the Eastern Ocean. As you travel across the burning black sands, the unnatural silence carries with it a sense of dread, and unknown beasts of horrible proportions try to press their way to the civilized plains of the south.

In the center of Kara Korum, you will discover an immense crater with gargantuan walls; what will the player find if he or she investigates? An atmosphere of the unworldly surrounds and pervades this landscape and appears to corrupt the desert from here. Along the southern border of this zone, the Northern Marshes of the Grasslands run along the south side of the River of Yellow Curses; monstrous denizens cross the River of Yellow Curses from Kara Korum to threaten and harry travelers. Will you uncover why the village simply known as Ghost Hill was abandoned and a stench of rancid decay is carried on the winds from the forest to its south? Physics may not work as expected in Kara Korum. Rivers flow uphill in some places, gravity misbehaves occasionally, and beasts may fall with meteorites from the sky. Meteorites are also launched from the Black Desert delivering Darkspawn beasts across the landscape of Khitai.

When you pass to the eastern limits of the Northern Grasslands, you can see out into the manicured countrysides of the Chosain Province; be sure to not let your guard down… When you enter Chosain Province, you discover all-out war between the city-states of Gun Xui in the southern lands and Gun Hai in the northern lands. Perched precariously between these cities, Shaulun serves the needs of both military forces, providing mercenary soldiers to the highest bidder.

Shaulun is a staging ground. Training can also be found here in ancient open handed fighting styles. Designers describe this expansive city a “wretched hive of scum and villainy”. Opportunities for quests and betrayals abound here. It is also the former home of the Skulls of Jeng Ho, who now serve the regional warlord in controlling the province. The magnificent Pillars of Heaven are a honeycombed pair of stone monuments connected by bridges towering overhead. A waterfall cascades between them. They sit near by the Palace of the regional Warlord whose faction is in direct conflict with the Tamerind mercenaries. When you climb to the top of the Pillars of Heaven, you can see a spectacular view across the entire province.

The Pillars of Heaven were built by the ancient Lemurians thousands of years ago; they were originally a set of old abandoned temples. When your players seek them out, they are not so abandoned anymore; a bandit chieftain, by the name of Bhangi Khan, controls them with his bandit army. Outside the cities you will encounter active battlefields where warriors of each faction engage each other in open warfare. You can contribute to the siege on the side of your faction at any time you choose. Be prepared for smoke and other battlefield surprises and effects. In addition to fighting soldiers of the opposing faction, you must be on the watch for rag-pickers and looters of the corpses on the battlefield. They are unpredictable and could be a threat to either side. As you approach corrupted areas, stay on the lookout for large Darkspawn mobs. They can be very dangerous and very aggressive, and they will always protect their hidden mission.

The southern border of the Northern Grasslands merges into the thick, seemingly impenetrable jungles of Paikang . Is this jungle the same one from which the Chronicles of Nemedia tell of it as the former home of the Elephant Deity that Conan slew in Zamora in the tale “The Tower of the Elephant”? Rumors abound of a cult, the Children of Yag-kosha, with ambitions to dethrone the King of Aquilonia in revenge for their fallen god. Will you investigate or rely upon agents of the Aquilonian throne to uncover this threat? The jungles break through into Souleater Pass and the mysterious valley of Heaven’s Lake. The coastline of the Eastern Ocean is littered with the skeletons of a hundred ships. Where did they come from and how did they end up here? The Imperial City of Paikang lies to the south of the aptly named Shatterspar Coastline. Travelers tell of how the gleaming purple minarets of Paikang sparkle in the morning sunlight. Paikang is also a city under massive siege, and its leaders call out to the strongest of heroes to resolve her problems. Paikang will also introduce this expansion’s Tier 4 Raid instances for end-game level 80 characters to master. From material released to date, there should be at least eight end-game dungeons for veterans to explore and farm.

Tags: Age of Conan, Rise of the Godslayer

EverQuest II holiday, Frostfell.

Dec 21, 2009 Articles Recommend|232views

‘Tis the season of Frostfell and all over Norrath people are hanging stockings and giving gifts. However, despite the season’s cheer, not everyone is having fun, and heroes are needed to save Frostfell like ‘Ernest saved Christmas’.

Quests Old and New

Like other live events that Sony Online Entertainment puts on, quests from previous years make an appearance in this year’s revelry. This is great for those who are new to the game or took a break. Each year also brings new quests, giving something for veteran players to tackle.

Back in 2005, the original Frostfell quest was ‘The Tale of the Gigglegibber Grump’, a chain of solo-able quests which scale to the player’s level. The quest was dropped the next two years, but made a return in 2008 and again this year. To begin the quest players must talk to the Frostfell elves who have appeared in the cities of Qeynos and Freeport looking for helpful adventurers . Their home, Elfin Wonderland, has been taken over. Lord Bowsprite, their leader, has been kidnapped and the presents stolen. This is the work of Grimagus Gigglegibber (A.K.A. The Grump). Along the way on this mission, you are given a book about how Grimagus became The Grump. Unsurprisingly, this all came about due to other goblins teasing him as a child (sound like a familiar Dr. Seuss story?), so he grew up bitter and decided to ruin Frostfell by stealing all the presents. The end of the quest line sees him realising the error of his ways and making peace with the elves. Aww bless!

Another character taken from a literary source is Mr McScroogle, a miserly, mean-spirited, slave driver of a gnome. Frostfell used to be a time for family and friends, not for profit. McScroogle has other ideas and has a factory churning out flyers and advertisements. In the quest ‘Saving Frostfell’ we are tasked with the destruction of this factory to save the holiday by any means necessary.

Unlike his Dickens counterpart, McScroogle never learns the true meaning of Frostfell. Each year the spirits of past, present and future return to appeal to his conscience and set him on the right path. However, McScroogle is having none of it. This year he asks for a brave hero to take his place. Donning a disguise and entering his home, players will be guided through the life and death of our nasty gnome. Upon receiving the player’s report, McScroogle is unmoved and continues with his exploitative ways, but we do get some festive quest rewards including another book - ‘A Frostfell Carol’.

One of the major areas for Frostfell quests is the ‘Icy Keep’. The tone here is a bit less light-hearted than the other areas. First off, players are asked to plant listening devices to find out what exactly is going on in there. This involves sneaking around the keep wearing a yeti disguise and locating blue sparkly areas on the ground to place the devices. This was a little disappointing as my yeti suit didn’t ‘appear’ I just had an icon in my active spells box to tell me I was disguised (boo!). After being disguised as a gnome earlier, and remembering the fun I had in my giant Murloc suit in World of Warcraft, I was a little let down.

Further quests in the ‘Icy Keep’ line involve slaying a baby dragon in its egg. The dragon escapes, but the quest is finished by handing in pieces of its egg shell as evidence of the monster’s demise. The quest chain continues with the player re-entering Icy Keep to cover up evidence of the lie by slaying any witnesses. It’s pretty dark stuff for a festive event.

Unlike most live event quests, much of the ‘Icy Keep’ is designed for group play. An easier version of the instance was added, but the bosses, particularly the final one, Ice Maiden D’Ina, are very challenging. Fortunately, with the use of chronomagic, players can lower their level so that upon entering the instance mobs will scale down to that level. Then you can return to your original level for a bit of an easier ride. This may be against the spirit of a group quest, but it’s good to have to option to solo difficult content.

2009 Frostfell brings us two new quests: ‘An Exalting Experience’ and ‘The Giftgiver’s Dilemma’. The first sees us once again enter Icy Keep. While the storyline is pretty good, Icy Keep is a small instance and going in again and again is a bit repetitive for those who don’t read quest dialogue.

The other new quest, ‘The Giftgiver’s Dilemma’ is more in keeping with the spirit of the season. One of the Frostfell elves, Gardy Ex-Giftgiver (previously Gardy Giftgiver) has had all his snow globes smashed and now has giving up on giving presents, hence his new surname. The player finds more acts of sabotage as the story unfolds, ending with a confrontation with Santa Glug and his helpers, (goblins) who just want to be a part of the gift giving, but are quite clumsy and accident prone. The quest ends with everyone agreeing to work together and the clockwork toy and warm feeling inside are ample rewards.

Things to Make and Do

Missions aren’t the only thing to occupy you during the holiday season. There is also a vast amount of crafting to be done. There are costumes and stockings, candy cane weapons, paper lanterns, egg nog and pastries - the list of things to make is vast. Ingredients come from harvesting the stacks of wrapped presents all over the Wonderland Village.

If all of this sounds like a bit too much hard work, you can always visit Santa Glug, the well meaning but occasionally misguided goblin. Every day over the whole event, Santa will give you a present for free - Ho ho ho!

On top of all of this there are buckets of snowballs to pick up and hurl at passersby. There is also a fruitcake in the Wonderland Village which you can harvest for the same purpose. Hurl it at an unsuspecting victim and it will appear in their inventory for them to pass on the favour.

Want a tree to decorate your house with? There are quests for that in each of the main cities. I performed the one in Qeynos, all I had to do was decorate parts of the city. Once I’d finished, our old friend McScroogle turned up, infuriated by my efforts to brighten up the place and a fight ensued. Player - 1, McScroogle - 0, and a lovely tree as a reward.

There is also a collection associated with the event. If your stomach can take it, collect the complete set of the frost-bitten toes (eww!) lying about and claim your glacial brazier as a reward, one more item to add a bit of colour to the old homestead.

Frostfell has more than enough to keep players busy for hours and hours. The holiday season in Norrath has come a long way since 2005. The quest lines are substantial and interesting, and the rewards, though mostly cosmetic, are great for those who love decorating their houses.

Merry Questing!

Tags: EverQuest II, Frostfell

Is Better PC Games of 2010?

Dec 20, 2009 Articles Recommend|1,283views

PC gaming - will it finally die in 2010? No. C’mon, stop already with that. Sure, 2009 had its ups and downs, PC gaming is very much alive and maybe looking healthier than ever in 2010.

Blizzard will, we hope, stick to its early 2010 release date for StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty, the first entry in the planned real-time strategy trilogy. And the publisher developer is threatening to release two titles next year, including the third World of Warcraft expansion, Cataclysm.

But 2010 cannot survive on Blizzard alone. Blizzard and Valve? Maybe, but beyond more Left 4 Dead 2 and Team Fortress 2 content, we’re not sure what to expect. Episode III? Let’s not set ourselves up for disappointment.

Thankfully, there are many strong contenders due in the following year, including highly anticipated MMOs like Star Wars: The Old Republic, DC Universe Online, Star Trek Online and APB, to name but a few. So let’s take a look at what’s will be pushing PCs to their limits in 2010, starting right now.

Tags: Blizzard, DC Universe Online, Star Trek Online, Star Wars The Old Republic, world of warcraft

Funcom offers prizes for friends and followers

Dec 20, 2009 Articles Recommend|326views

Tis the season for getting cool things — and for making new friends. Funcom obviously agrees, as they’ve got a contest going where they’ll be giving away some pretty nice prizes for people who become friends, fans, or followers on their various Facebook and Twitter accounts. The idea is pretty simple: for every one of the Funcom accounts you link up with, you’ll be entered in the drawing for prizes. So, with two accounts each for Age of Conan, Anarchy Online The Secret World, as well as for Funcom in general, there are 8 different ways you could land some sweet swag.

Among the prizes for this giveaway are free game time; beta access to Age of Conan’s next expansion, Rise of the Godslayer; a guaranteed spot in hotly anticipated The Secret World beta test; in-game items for Age of Conan and Anarchy Online; and “much, much more” according to their information. With Rhode Island and Florida excluded from the ranks (that pesky “must buy a bond for your prizes” thing we’re sure) most everyone else can enter for a chance to score some sweet Funcom goodies. If you’re looking for where exactly to link up your accounts, they’ve even listed the links on the Age of Conan site, making the clicky-clicky that much easier. Just make sure you’ve joined up before January 4th, 2010 when the contest ends. Good luck!

Tags: Age of Conan, Anarchy Online, Facebook, Funcom, Rise of the Godslayer, The Secret World

Why EVE is not a PvP game.

Dec 17, 2009 Articles Recommend, eve online|427views

One of the most irritating things I come across in gaming is the relative ease in which players accept a game and a few of it’s goals as a rule of the game, or as the definition of a game. In example:

Raiding, by many, is considered to be THE game. Before raiding, you are doing nothing but preparing for raiding.

Role-play is the sole purpose of the game, some think, being that the very act of logging in is an act of role-play.

One of my favorite examples, one that fired off one of those fun Twitter arguments done in 140-word sections, (but great fun because I know so many damn smart people! :)  ) is that “EVE is a PvP game.” Not only is EVE not a PvP game, but PvP can be one of the smallest parts of the game.

First of all, the base of the game is the PvE environment. Picture EVE as a machine, a giant wheel turning with gears and motion. Many seem to think that EVE is somehow a perpetual motion machine, a series of gears and pulleys that create it’s own energy, just to keep running some more. Of course, like a perpetual motion machine, a player-fueled-only game is impossible. EVE players do not provide the energy to drive the machine. Without the environment and interacting with it, the game would grind to a halt within a short amount of time. There must be a stream of NPC missions, loot, and cash flowing into the game or the game would just stop. The PvE provides the energy that the machine needs to turn. The players play within the machine.

If you had (JUST an example, this is just a random number) let’s say 1 trillion ISK, and suddenly asteroids did indeed become limited in number, (they are unlimited right now) and all of the NPC ships stayed dead when killed, (there are endless numbers of NPC’s)  and all the interactions with the PvE environment stopped, the game would die. That 1 trillion would quickly get ferreted away by a few huge corps, and nothing else would happen. The asteroids would be mined until they were all gone, and ISK would disappear. There can be no “player driven economy” with only players participating. Even the small amount that NPC’s put into the economy, with all their missions and buying of goods, equal enough energy to keep the machine going.

Here is a simple question: if you magically took away PvP, or made PvP impossible (like all of space became non-pvp enabled), would EVE stop being able to be played and enjoyed?

The answer would be no. Not only that, but there would be many players (off in their missions, the ones that sit in their stations and rarely leave like my podcasting friend’s do) that would probably never even know. Would it become a different game? Yes. But, instead of pirates you would have NPC ships camping you. Instead of other players attacking you, you could have spawned ships. The game can live (and does in many areas) without any influence from PvP.

Now, if you took away the endless NPC drops and all that the environment gives a player, could the game be played and enjoyed? The fruits of mining, for example, (the very basis for most of the game, the stuff that everything is made of) does not come from players. It comes from the environment and players interacting with it.

The answer would be no. There would be no EVE. The perpetual motion machine would grind to a halt, losing it’s energy to the frictions of PvP and player/player interaction. Without that supply of energy (in whatever amount) from the environment and the interactions with it, there would be nothing.

This is not an attempt to say “haha! Without the game there would be no game!”

This is simply an attempt to say that calling EVE a “PvP game”, indicating that PvP is the sole/majority game-play that players participate in, is not only false but impossible. The bulk of the time in your ship is an interaction with the environment. In fact, take away using “PvE” as the other way to describe EVE besides “PvP.” It would be more accurately described as PIE, or Players Interacting with the Environment. Versus is referring to players locked in combat with NPC’s, which is as small of a part of the game as PvP.

Using “PvP game” to describe any game out right now discounts all the other interactions and activities that have absolutely nothing to do with PvP.

In an example, a blogging friend of mine mis-understood my statement that “the death penalty in Darkfall was meaningless.” He went on to to confess that my statement was true when he considered that “glory”, or the virtual defeat of my enemies (just to be rezzed again to start the cycle over again) was not one of my goals, not important, and not meaningful. (I am not saying it had no meaning for him, though.)

In EVE, PvP is pretty much meaningless. Nothing happens when you die. Can something happen? Yes. But many things can happen in these games, many things that have nothing to do with Player versus Player, that can be meaningful. When I die in EVE, I get paid insurance and lose nothing that I cannot replace. My character isn’t hurt, and I resurrect just to do it again. And, after all, even if I lost all my skill points and were reduced to a penniless pod, ISK is endless. Why? Not thanks to players, but thanks to the environment. I can raise my nation once again, even after being brought to the lowest point. Thanks to that energy coming from the environment.

Now, if I accidentally hit my delete key and destroy a character I have raised for 5 years, I might feel bit of regret at that.

Point is, just because something can happen (like being effected by PvP) does not mean that the game is ruled by that possibility. I would not call EVE an “accidental deletion of your character game” so why should I call it a “PvP game”?

To any of you EVE vets reading this: you, of all people, know that a player can easily avoid PvP in EVE. That’s what makes EVE a successful “hardcore” game with a ton of players and PvP-featuring games like Darkfall or WAR barely live on two or four servers. Giving players that choice (to be a non-pvp’er) is a very smart thing to do. Obviously it worked for EVE. Again, I will bet good money that most players spend most of their time out of PvP.

So why do you refer to it as a “PvP game?”

Not only is it selling EVE short, with all it’s glorious lore and role-play potential, but it sells the player-base short. I would like to think that many players in EVE are pretty smart, creative people. Smart creative people have many goals in a game like EVE, and many of those goals have nothing to do with, or are effected by, or effect, PvP. If  a player wants to follow some made-up set of rules, such as “if you don’t PvP, you’re not playing”, that’s fine. But I choose to take a “sandbox” like EVE and play how I want.

In fact, from now on, I am going to refer to EVE as a “Player Versus Mining” game, being that mining and the act of gathering materials, is more of an integral part of EVE than PvP or PvE. Does PvP effect some areas of the game? Of course. But it is not the all-powerful force in the game by far. The all-powerful force in any game will always stem from the environment and it’s fuel for the (almost) perpetual machine.

Tags: EVE, eve online, PvE, PvP

Club Battle, indiscriminate competition hours of RAN online!

Dec 16, 2009 Articles Recommend|341views

‘Club’ system is to provide better support for the user community which is valued very importantly in RAN online. Single characters can also form a party in a region and play the game together but the system that supports users to be in a certain group and continue the ties between them is called ‘Club’.

The fascinating thing about club is that not only it helps tighten the ties between the users but also it gives players the opportunities to enjoy the various systems which can only be played by being in a club. The Lead Club Battle which was posted last time and today’s topic the Club Battle are such systems.

[Limitless Competition System]
Dynamic massive PK battle is the charm of RAN online Club Battle system. This is a PK (Player Kill, AKA Duel) system which is held between the clubs of rank A or higher so, the scale of the battle is clearly distinguished from PK between the characters and parties.

Also, it is possible to battle against 5 different other clubs at the same time and the battle time can be set from 10mins minimum to 24hours maximum as the participating clubs desire.

[The fellowship felt between the club members]
The Club Battle and dueling between the characters are basically the same system but the difference is that the club battle is progressed under the command of Club Master. As the start of the club battle, it will be announced in the game and all the club members can attack the members of hostile club.

As for the most of other games, PK between characters cannot provide as much excitement as the dueling together in a team. As the teamwork and strategy are very important element when playing team sports, the fact that a player has eliminated his or her opponent is not the point, it is about playing each one’s role perfectly as the team strategy is what gives players more worthwhile sensation. This can never be felt when dueling alone and that is why the Club Battle is really fascinating.

Surprisingly, there is no particular reward for winning the club battle. Only the honor of No.1 club is what the participating clubs and their members are striving for even if there isn’t any reward for winning. This is the heroism and vicarious pleasure felt in the in-game virtual reality and it even gives the motivation for playing RAN online.

The Club Battle, limitless PK system between the clubs!
Through the RAN online club battle, fully enjoy the fellowship with club members and the honor of being the member of No.1 Club!

Tags: Club Battle, PK, Ran Online

LotRO: How to get started with the Skirmish system

Dec 15, 2009 Articles Recommend, Lord of the Rings Online|467views

With Lord of the Ring Online’s Siege of Mirkwood expansion launch came the new Skirmish system. And with it also came a lot of questions. Though Turbine posted a number of Dev Diaries going over the various aspects of the new private instance system and its reward system, the same questions kept popping up in the game. We’ll try to answer as many as we can here.

How do I get started with the Skirmish system? What level do I need to be?

If you are level 30 or above, you will receive mail with an attachment. Putting the attachment in your bags will start a quest that will send you to the nearest Skirmish Camps. The camps are in many places around Middle-earth. A complete list has been compiled on the new Skirmish forums by a generous player. You don’t need to buy the expansion to use the Skirmish system, but your access will be limited until you do.

How do I, uh, Skirmish?

Turbine wants you to run through a few quests that amount to a tutorial before unleashing you into the real deal. When you talk to a Skirmish Captain at a Skirmish Camp, he will first ask you to bring back 10 War Orders found on evil humanoid mobs (orcs, warg riders, etc) in your level range. The drop rate is low at first, but picks up after you get your first. After you get all 10, you need to get 1 Target List from the same kinds of mobs. If you are in your 50s, I recommend running a quick Crafting Instance in Moria.

After you turn in the orders, the Skirmish Captain there will send you into your first Skirmish. Here you will get two new skills: one to summon a Soldier (an NPC that you control in Skirmishes); and one to direct the Soldier on who to attack. The second skill is important because you won’t have any control over how your Soldier reacts in a fight except for this one, and it has a cool down.

After you finish this first Skirmish, you will use the Skirmish Join panel to get into the second Skirmish tutorial. This one has you defending the Prancing Pony from invaders. But before the fun begins, a quest NPC shows you how to transform your Soldier into a specific Role. You are able to buy the Warrior Role, then open up the Soldier’s Trait panel and slot it. This turns your generic companion into the Warrior Role which specializes in melee dps. After protecting the Prancing Pony from waves of bad guys and a few bosses, you are sent back to the Skirmish Captain to turn in your quest and receive another Soldier Role your choice. You will also find you have now earned a pocketful of a new currency called Skirmish Marks.

How do I turn my Soldier into something other than a Warrior?

Find the Skirmish Trainer at any camp and buy the Role you want (healer, ranged dps, tank, etc.) You may also want to purchase some extra abilities (Skills) and passive skills (Training) for them as well as some personal skills for yourself. All of these are purchased with Skirmish Marks. All Roles, skills, etc. have ranks and you can buy higher ranks with your Marks.

How do I slot my new Soldier abilities?

Find the Skirmish Captain at any camp and he will give you the option to slot these new traits for your Soldier. He’s essentially the bard for Soldiers.

Why is there more than one Attribute slot for my Soldier when I can only slot one Role there?

The other slots are for cosmetic upgrades to your soldier. There is a cosmetics vendor in the camp that sells different outfits and hairstyles for your Soldier to separate them from the generic look of everyone else’s Soldier. This costs, of course, Skirmish Marks (and some other specialized marks, see below.) You can change your Soldier’s gender, race, clothing, hair and more this way, but are limited by the number of Attribute slots available.

Ok, I got my new friend traited and I want to do a real Skirmish. Uh, how do I do that?

You can join a Skirmish from anywhere in the game (except in PVmP, instances or in combat.) You don’t have to be in a Skirmish camp. Just open the Skirmish panel (ctrl + j) wherever you are, select the level of monsters, the level of difficulty, the size of the group and one of the Skirmishes listed. A second window will open confirming your choices and from there you can click TRAVEL and you will be zoned into your Skirmish. When you are done with your Skirmish, you will be transported back to where you were when you joined it. There are Skirmishes designed around going on the offensive, defending an area or simply surviving.

How many Soldiers do I get?

One. He is going to start off weak so be sure to spend Skirmish Marks on upgrading his Role, Skill and Training ranks as quick as you can.

Why is there no loot on the corpses?

Turbine wanted the Skirmishes to be fast paced, so only bosses and lieutenants will drop loot.

What are these other Skirmish Marks I’m getting?

These are used to buy special items in the camp. Check all the vendors in any Skirmish camp to see what each one carries and what Marks they want. If you find you don’t have the right Mark, check with the Curiosities vendor in the camp. He offers the ability to exchange specialty Marks (both upgrading and downgrading.) If you are looking for Campaign Marks necessary for many Cosmetic items, they primarily spawn on the optional Encounter bosses that pop up randomly in Skirmishes.

What do I do with these Bounty drops I’m getting in Skirmishes?

This is vendor trash and the descriptive text for the item in-game will soon reflect that.

What if I don’t like my Archer/Protector/Herbalist, etc.?

Buy a new one at the Skirmish Trainer along with some talents and re-trait your Soldier at the Skirmish Captain. The cost is minimal. It may even be worth it to re-trait a few times a night while running different Skirmishes. As a Lore-master, I’ve been running with an Archer in Skirmishes where friendly NPCs will tank for me. But in other Skirmishes where I’m left to do all the tanking, I’ll re-trait my Soldier into a Protector. Try a few different Soldiers and see which one works best for you in each Skirmish.

What are these golden quest rings next to the Skirmish instance list in the Skirmish panel?

Those mean there is a daily quest associated with that Skirmish. Basically, Turbine doesn’t want you to grind the same Skirmish non-stop so they reward you with extra Skirmish Marks and experience the first time you do it that night via the daily quest. Every Skirmish has a daily quest associated with it, so you may want to hit every one before repeating any in a given day for maximum Skirmish Mark farming.

What’s the exclamation mark next to the Skirmish instance list in the Skirmish panel?

It means you haven’t tried that Skirmish yet. Give it a try.

Why do I keep dying in my Skirmish?

First, check your Skirmish settings. Did you accidentally set it to Small Fellowship when you are really soloing it? Also check the level and difficulty settings. After that, think about changing your Soldier to another Role that may work better with your main character. It doesn’t cost much to experiment. If you think you are using the best Soldier Role, consider buying higher ranks of that Role from the Skirmish Trainer along with higher ranks of their Skills and Training.

If you’re still finding it too difficult, you can always lower the level of the Skirmish so you’re a level or two higher than the mobs inside (though you will earn fewer Skirmish Marks).

Why can’t I kill [insert boss] in my Skirmish?

Each end boss has a different mechanic to defeat them. Pay attention to any NPC or boss speech for a clue. Also pay attention to any billboard text that appears and any buff / debuff icons on the boss for clues on strategy.

What are these Lieutenant monsters that are attacking me during skirmishes?

Lieutenants are a special type of sub-bosses that will appear frequently during skirmishes. Which Lieutenant will appear in a certain location (or at a certain time) is randomized. Each named Lieutenant has a unique set of skills or abilities that they will always attempt to use, no matter which skirmish they show up in. By learning what they can do, and what you can do to counter them, fighting them becomes easier over time.

Killing Lieutenants is rewarded with Skirmish Marks, possible loot and incremental Killing Deeds that reward even more Skirmish Marks.

How does the loot on the Skirmish vendors compare to the rest of the game?

The armor and weapons are about equivalent to quest drops for your level more or less. So don’t be expecting too many upgrades if you are raiding or even 6-manning regularly. That being said, there is a lot more than armor and weapons that you can purchase with your Marks:

• Healing, mana and curing potions
• Rare crafting components
• Rare quest drops for class quests (yes, you read that right)
• Legendary weapons
• IXP runes for Legendary weapons
• Scrolls that reset all the Legendary points spent on your Legendary weapon
• Scrolls that upgrade Legacies on your Legendary weapons
• Soldier Attributes to change their gender, race, hair, clothing and more
• Housing items
• New outfits for players

Be sure to check out all the vendors at a Skirmish Camp (any camp, they all carry the same stuff.)

How many people can I Skirmish with?

You can set the Skirmish for solo, small fellowship, large fellowship and 12 man raid versions. Note: some don’t have a solo mode, i.e. Survival - Barrow-downs.

What’s the penalty for dying in a Skirmish?

Thankfully, not Dread, but a temporary debuff that reduces the amount of Skirmish Marks you get for your activities in the Skirmish. If you die, it’s often not the end of the Skirmish. Your Soldier and helpful NPCs will fight on, allowing you to respawn and head back into the fight. However, some Skirmishes, like “Survival - Barrow-downs” ends upon your death as the goal in those particular instances is to stay alive as long as possible. The debuff is removed when you leave the Skirmish or one hour passes, whichever comes first.

What are these “Encounters” that pop up during my Skirmish?

These are extra bosses that have a random chance to spawn during your Skirmish. They will spawn outside of aggro range so you have the option of engaging them or ignoring them. Note that if you do engage them, it does not stop the rest of the Skirmish and the next wave of mobs will be descending on you whether or not you are ready. I recommend fighting them when an incoming wave of mobs DOES NOT have a lieutenant or boss in it. Defeating these optional Encounter bosses results in a deed and is one of the best ways to farm Campaign Marks.

What are these Minor flags that I have looted?

These are temporary, area-based buffs and debuffs. Basically, click on it out of your inventory to either get the buff or debuff the mobs if they are in the circle of affect that appears on the ground. Use these before the end of Skirmish as they will be removed from your inventory when you leave. Good for that extra edge in fighting a boss if you can manuever within the area of effect.

Why won’t the game let me start another Skirmish?

You are limited to starting 5 every hour. Also, if you haven’t purchased the expansion, you are limited even more than that.

Where can I learn more?

Check out the recent Dev Diaries that go into great detail about many aspects of the Skirmish system:

• Part 1: Overview
• Part 2: Story Instances,
  
• Part 3: Randomization and Scaling
  
• Part 4: Skirmish Soldiers
  
• Part 5: Rewards
• Part 6: Accessibility

Also, one of the devs has started a thread on the official forums with helpful hints for navigating the various Skirmish interfaces.

Whew! Did I miss anything? Any burning questions about Skirmishes that I can answer? Let me know in the comments below. A special thanks to the LotRO devs who checked this FAQ for accuracy.

Tags: Lord of the Ring Online, Siege of Mirkwood, Skirmish system