Age of Conan: you may enjoy it, but approach with caution.

[Winklewil]

I was going to vent my frustrations on the official forums, but ... meh. I'll just be flamed into oblivion there; I'll take this opportunity to deliver some caveats to everyone thinking about buying the game here. Don't let me actively dissuade you from it: the good stuff is worth the $50 and a free month, at the very least. I just want to warn people against getting their hopes too high, as I did.

Here are a few brief bulletpoints outlining my impressions with this title, after having played for a while. In no particular order:


1) In spite of the truly massive army of fanboys that populate the official forums that continually insist that all naysayers "go back to WoW n00b" ... Age of Conan is actually much, much, MUCH easier than World of Warcraft. The flow of experience is like trying to take a drink of water from a fire hydrant ... you'll drown, it comes so fast. Every quest item/mob/location is clearly indicated with markers on maps (that you never have to buy or plot out in any way), down to spawn locations of generic mobs.

Any character can easily solo three ordinary mobs of an equal level at the same time ... utterly naked, except for weapons. Gear stats do almost nothing, at this point ... yet another broken feature. You can easily make it to level 80 in six weeks of casual solo play in this game, never wearing anything that you didn't easily earn as a normal drop or a quest reward.



2) The economy is practically non-existent. There's no reason to ever buy a piece of equipment from another player -- gear means nothing, so eager was the development team to differentiate themselves from past MMOs, in which gear is almost everything. There's no reason to buy tradeskill items, because of the very same issue above, and also the fact that tradeskills are so broken at the moment that your game will literally CRASH if you try to equip/make certain things.

Money is meaningless, aside from individual-character interaction with NPCs for things like mounts and increased inventory space.



3) Half the player base pays no attention to their chat screen, because everyone is running around playing a single-player game. You don't NEED anyone else, EVER. There's only one public chat channel (OOC), and Funcom seems to go out of its way to actively discourage players from grouping. The experience penalty for partnering is unlike anything I've ever encountered, and quests are made ten times more cumbersome (rather than much easier, as with more established titles) if you dare bring along two or three others. After well over thirty levels of play, I've only had a single group, which lasted about three minutes. I've only ever personally WITNESSED two other groups actually occuring.

Every other exposure I've had to other players has been a simple, fleeting glimpse of them as they go about their solo tasks, and I do the same. We chat occassionally in the OOC channel, but almost NEVER actually opt to cooperate with each other.



4) The atmosphere and artwork of this game are so artfully done, and the lore is so magnificent, that you don't really notice these things at first. Fatalities rock, the horizon and zone design is gorgeous, characters LOOK cool, and mobs look scary. A demonic insect from AoC makes a crawler from FFXI look like the "Baby Sun" from Teletubbies. The delivery of the "environmental" aspects of the game is almost perfect. I mean, the pros are so good that I personally really, REALLY want it to succeed. Once the novelty of the game's aesthetic beauty wears off, however, its flaws start to wear on you.




As things stand now, the game feels to be in about a mid-beta stage. Once again, the fanboy army will insist that "all" MMO releases were like this (especially WoW OMGWTFBBQ), but having personally played two MMO's from lauch myself ... this is actually second to only Vanguard in terms of lack of polish.

Once they make killing an individual mob feel like more of an accomplishment than a fly colliding with a windshield on the highway ... or, at the very least, make the "epic" versions of each instance actually have some sort of significant DIFFERENCE in reward from the normal version ... that alone will go a long way towards fleshing the game out.


At any rate, 1-30 is very much a blast. The content is almost all there; there are quests a-plenty, and the zones feel "almost done." Just bear in mind, due to huge flaws in grouping dynamics, it's a "solo" blast, and after 30 ... the fact that the game is unfinished becomes readily apparent by the fact that there's suddenly almost nothing there anymore.

I hope they fix the game within a couple of months, to give it a fighting chance. I just re-iterate that because of the things that are done RIGHT with this game ... Age of Conan has the possibility of truly being GREAT.

Long stretches of silence from the development team, however, aren't making things encouraging. I pray for this title. T_T

 

[Anaeran]

I was going to vent my frustrations on the official forums, but ... meh. I'll just be flamed into oblivion there; I'll take this opportunity to deliver some caveats to everyone thinking about buying the game here. Don't let me actively dissuade you from it: the good stuff is worth the $50 and a free month, at the very least. I just want to warn people against getting their hopes too high, as I did.

Here are a few brief bulletpoints outlining my impressions with this title, after having played for a while. In no particular order:


1) In spite of the truly massive army of fanboys that populate the official forums that continually insist that all naysayers "go back to WoW n00b" ... Age of Conan is actually much, much, MUCH easier than World of Warcraft. The flow of experience is like trying to take a drink of water from a fire hydrant ... you'll drown, it comes so fast. Every quest item/mob/location is clearly indicated with markers on maps (that you never have to buy or plot out in any way), down to spawn locations of generic mobs.

Any character can easily solo three ordinary mobs of an equal level at the same time ... utterly naked, except for weapons. Gear stats do almost nothing, at this point ... yet another broken feature. You can easily make it to level 80 in six weeks of casual solo play in this game, never wearing anything that you didn't easily earn as a normal drop or a quest reward.



2) The economy is practically non-existent. There's no reason to ever buy a piece of equipment from another player -- gear means nothing, so eager were the development team to differentiate themselves from past MMOs, in which gear is almost everything. There's no reason to buy tradeskill items, because of the very same issue above, and also the fact that tradeskills are so broken at the moment that your game will literally CRASH if you try to equip/make certain things.

Money is meaningless, aside from individual-character interaction with NPCs for things like mounts and increased inventory space.



3) Half the player base pays no attention to their chat screen, because everyone is running around playing a single-player game. You don't NEED anyone else, EVER. There's only one public chat channel (OOC), and Funcom seems to go out of its way to actively discourage players from grouping. The experience penalty for partnering is unlike anything I've ever encountered, and quests are made ten times more cumbersome (rather than much easier, as with more established titles) if you dare bring along two or three others. After well over thirty levels of play, I've only had a single group, which lasted about three minutes. I've only ever personally WITNESSED two other groups actually occuring.

Every other exposure I've had to other players has been a simple, fleeting glimpse of them as they go about their solo tasks, and I do the same. We chat occassionally in the OOC channel, but almost NEVER actually opt to cooperate with each other.



4) The atmosphere and artwork of this game are so artfully done, and the lore is so magnificent, that you don't really notice these things at first. I mean, the pros are so good that I personally really, REALLY want it to succeed. Once the novelty of the game's aesthetic beauty wears off, however, its flaws start to wear on you.




As things stand now, the game feels to be in about a mid-beta stage. Once again, the fanboy army will insist that "all" MMO releases were like this (especially WoW OMGWTFBBQ), but having personally played two MMO's from lauch myself ... this is actually second to only Vanguard in terms of lack of polish.

Once they make killing an individual mob feel like more of an accomplishment than a fly colliding with a windshield on the highway ... or, at the very least, make the "epic" versions of each instance actually have some sort of significant DIFFERENCE in reward from the normal version ... that alone will go a long way towards fleshing the game out.


At any rate, 1-30 is very much a blast. The content is almost all there; there are quests a-plenty, and the zones feel "almost done." Just bear in mind, due to huge flaws in grouping dynamics, it's a "solo" blast, and after 30 ... the fact that the game is unfinished becomes readily apparent by the fact that there's suddenly almost nothing there anymore.

I hope they fix the game within a couple of months, to give it a fighting chance. I just re-iterate that because of the things that are done RIGHT with this game ... Age of Conan has the possibility of truly being GREAT.

Long stretches of silence from the development team, however, aren't making things encouraging. I pray for this title. T_T

What level are you?

How long has the game been out?

Do you play with a guild?

I'm just curious. Conan has it's issues for sure, but some of the stuff you point to in your post is just plain unfair/inaccurate at this point. I'm willing to bet that you are not 80, do not play with a guild that is relatively active and generally don't really know what you're talking about.

There are people forming pickup groups all the time. There is tons of group content both PvP and PvE. It sounds to me like you choose to be antisocial-- which of course is your choice. Hell I get tells all the time from random people asking me to group or join my group. It's kind of annoying.

Epic instances yield both better loot and better experience while imposing a greater challenge on your team...I don't really get where you're coming from. It honestly sounds like you've barely played the game.

Criticize the boring harvesting system. Talk about how mindless crafting is. We could even get technical and discuss bugged mobs, line of sight issues, and broken encounters such as Tordealbach at the end of her tomb... but I would hardly say the game needs your prayers. For 3 weeks after release this is the best MMO launch I have ever seen. The game is in great shape for so early in it's life and I expect, with Funcom's seeming interest in what the players have to say about their game (yes they are listening), it will only improve with time.

I'm not a Conan fanboy either. I have no problems criticizing the game for the obvious flaws that it does have atm. I just think your review is inaccurate and unfair and could mislead people who are looking at this game.

 

[Anaeran]

I'd throw poor itemization into the mix too somewhere. Some of the loot is just plain retarded.

 

[Winklewil]

What level are you?

35 ... long enough to see the reality of the problems I listed above.

How long has the game been out?

May 20th to the public, with some getting access earlier on.

Do you play with a guild?

No. I never start an MMO with a guild, until I can make sure that I'd actually be an asset to it, rather than a fleeting fly-by-the-night player.

I'm just curious. Conan has it's issues for sure, but some of the stuff you point to in your post is just plain unfair/inaccurate at this point.

I'll grant that you yourself may still be in the "in-love" phase with the game (it's different for different people), and these things may be more difficult for you to see ... but to outright suggest that they don't exist? Go to the official forums, and even with the rapid locking/flaming down of threads, you'll be unable to swing a dead cat around without hitting a post addressing these very issues, TO THE LETTER. I made none of this up. They are all well-known issues, albeit in my own words, and have been discussed at length by countless others. I pulled none of this from my ass; I assure you of that.

I'm willing to bet that you are not 80, do not play with a guild that is relatively active and generally don't really know what you're talking about.

No, I'm not 80. No, I don't NEED to be in order to give out the information I just did. I didn't have to be 75 in FFXI to discover what the philosophy of the game was about, nor 60 in WoW, nor 65 in EQ. Endgame and initial character development are two different things. The very, VERY common opinion at the moment is that AoC endgame is almost entire non-existent at this point, save for a few zergfest raid-type encounters. I only discussed initial character development in my review, and I can assure everyone of its validity and accuracy.

I don't need a guild, nor maximum level, to tell people that levelling comes cheaply, and more rapidly than WoW. I don't need a guild, nor maximum level, to tell people that few players really take advantage of player-to-player economy. I don't need a guild, nor maximum level, to explain how most class-types could play their characters NAKED, save weapons and shields, for all the difference it would make.

There are people forming pickup groups all the time.

All the time? Absolutely not, at least not in the level ranges I've experienced. It may indeed change as your character goes along, but as I understand things right now, that's because of the lack of quest content at higher levels ... when things "work as intended," a group just isn't really required. A group might form over a tightly contested spawn, or a particularly hard boss-type mob. It'll disband the moment the task at hand is completed. You need a solid group of friends to get regular parties. For every ten groups that might form in FFXI or EQ, you may get a half-one in AoC. The focus on solo-play is spectacular. This isn't necessarily a criticism ... just an observation regarding some of the choices the development staff has made.

Epic instances yield both better loot and better experience while imposing a greater challenge on your team...I don't really get where you're coming from. It honestly sounds like you've barely played the game.

Epic instances will yield a fight that takes four to five times as long per mob (though not really "harder"0, but about twice the experience, and VERY little difference in loot drops. Believe me, I've experimented at length with epic instancing. As things stand now ... instead of 1 "ratty tunic of worthlessness," you may get 3. You may have something like a 5% increased chance to get a green or blue item on a boss, but that's all I've been able to discern.

This is not something I made up; again, it's a well-documented issue, to the point of actually being one of the few problems officially addressed by Funcom.


Anaeran, I don't really want to pick a fight with you. From what I can see of your vehement defense of Vanguard, right up to the bitter end, I know you get passionate about MMOs you ejoy. That's fine; if you want to hold out hope, so be it. I do too.

I can recognize realistic, practical flaws where I see them, however. If anyone doubts my word, I suggest you visit the general discussion page of the official forums:

http://forums.ageofconan.com/forumdisplay.php?f=8

And just peruse the first 25 or so threads available. I'd be willing to bet that no less than ten of them will be talking about one of my four issues I listed above.


Just because you want the game to work, it doesn't mean you have to turn a blind eye towards these things. I'm with you. I want this game to be fixed. I just don't believe stringing people along, pretending these problems aren't there, is the way to go about it.

Anyway, I bear no ill will towards you. I'm not going to start a big, multi-post argument over it. To anyone thinking about giving it a try: buy the box yourself (which I actually did recommend), and make your own judgement. More likely than not, I think I'll see more of you agreeing with me than disagreeing.

 

[Anaeran]

I'm not turning a blind eye to anything, just pointing out that your primary reasons for why someone shouldn't buy the game aren't aligned with the real reasons why someone shouldn't buy the game-- if they are looking at serious issues.

How about stats not working properly? That's a glaring issue. There are a number of bugged encounters, you're right about all that, as I said above. The economy is a tough one to concede considering the early stages, but for the most part you're right, the exchange isn't all that helpful.

But not able to find a group? Guy I've been logged in for not even 15 minutes and I'm sitting here watching groups form up in OOC. That's just ooc. It isn't hard to find interaction for just about anything in this game. Now most pug groups absolutely suck and can't do much to help you, but that isn't the game's fault.

The loot in the instances I have run has been drastically different in epic instances from the regular counterparts. You can't sit back and tell me you collect blues regularly in normal instances.

35 is not long enough to comment on 30+ content lol. You are judging 50 levels on what you experienced in 5 of them?

I'm just saying, the reasons you're giving- while some are somewhat accurate- many are not. I'd hate to see people not buy the game because they believe one thing, when the opposite may be true.

Note- I'm not trying to fight or argue here- I just don't feel as though your post reflects the true nature of the game thus far. /shrug

 

[Anaeran]

Btw- My vehement defense of Vanguard stemmed only from the fact that I was in direct contact with the developers of Vanguard and had a clearer picture of what they wanted to do with the game than most. My guild, Blades of Wrath, was essentially an extension of the development team for a number of months, so we had insight that most did not.

The problem was, management never allowed that vision to come to fruition and everything I said would be good about the game never came to be. This is essentially why Blades threw in the towel and picked up Conan. Real sad really.

Vanguard was hyped as the next "EQ" and I felt like it needed to be a success no matter what. I still think about what Vanguard might have been had the dev team had freer reigns to do what needed to be done to make the vision come true.

 

[bjbreeze1]

I would just like to comment on the group thing.

On the server I play there's not that many group forming in general chat, and the lfg/lfm function is kind hard to use. (still havent figure out how to read ppl's lfg/lfm comment, so you know someone is looking but dont know what for...)

So what usually happens is you simply form group near where you do the quest. Just ask ppl around the quest area and usually people are willing to group. I've had abt 10 or so long time group so far and a bunchshort ones. ( short ones is usually team up to kill some mob so nobody needs to wait for respawn).

And yes there are quests that definitely need groups to compelet if you want to do them at the approiate level. Most solo quest are easy as joke, but most group quests / instance quest are kind impossible to solo (as a conqueror anyway).

Jus hit 51 conqueror and been doing gathering/crafting 2nd tier quests.
Gathering material is boring for sure, but it's expected.
I can see crafing working out well, the idea is craft armor = customizable armor, but right now crafted stuff crash ur game so yeah.....it's not working out well for ppl.

 

[Chasym]

i dunno about all this, i put alot of time in the game and im 30 now, i play with a fun guild and am having none of these issues...

 

[Anaeran]

Oh another big gripe I have with conan is the NPC loading distance. Even on max distance, NPCs disappear if they exceed like 20 meters. This makes pulling/navigating highly populated areas incredibly annoying.

This def needs a fix.

 

[Kurgon]

Yeah I finally got into the game. I have a level 20 Necro, and 30 Tempest. I've had mobs "pop" in where they shouldn't be, my health/stamina/magic simply stop regenerating, several server disconnects, and several times it freezes my system and CPU usage goes to 0%, etc.

I was slightly surprised how well the game runs on my system:
High settings, no AA, 1920x1200 resolution, Cities: ~30fps, Outside: ~60fps, Caves: ~110fps
AMD 4800+
2GB Ram
8800GT

All in all, the game is good and/or fun. I don't see myself getting hooked for the long term. The best thing about the game so far is the tutorial. It is a nice touch how different classes experience different parts of the same story.

In my limited experience, there aren't many "traditional" groups in the game. In my experiences people seem to only group up when there is a lot of competition for a quest mob or because they couldn't complete the quest without gaining a couple levels. Granted levels 1-20 are pretty much all focused to the soloist. Levels 20-30 I can only think of one quest the I received that was listed as a group quest and I duo'd it while the quest still showed as red to me.

I've never bought anything from a vendor or from the broker. I've never sold anything except to the vendor. The game itemization is kind of weird. I can have a level 5 item and a level 25 item and I still find myself debating if the level 25 item is an actual upgrade. A 20 level gap should be fairly substantial except for the most rarest of items. As long as you don't run out of quests the exp is fast. My buddy was trying the game out yesterday and at one point he had gained two levels without ever noticing.

The harvesting seems kind of blah. I have yet to experience crafting.

I started a Dark Templar and the first decapitation was pretty sweet. My favorite was when I grabbed the limp dead body of my foe and proceeded to bash my weapon into his skull another 4 times just to make sure the job was done. While there have been times I would have liked a basic auto attack, I have to say I like the attack system. It does keep you a little more connected to what is going on.

Wish list:

I wish there was a spot that showed unspent feat points.
I wish there was more of a focus on traditional exp grouping over quest groups, but that is unfair because I don't think it is going to be that kind of game.
For my tastes I'd like a slower progression and greater scaling of items.

Summary: I probably will still be playing FFXI. I will play out my free month before I make any real decision and should have at least one class to 50+ by then.

Question: What is the difference between Heroic Defense and Regular Defense? I've read the instruction manual and it doesn't say.

 

[Legomyeggo]

I heard the combat system relies on combos. Mortal Kombat MMO.

Confirm/Deny

 

[Kurgon]

Some classes use combos and some don't. Fatalities are in the game but they are rare.

 

[Anglis]

Not having meaningful gear wiill hurt the games longetivity. I dont care what anybody on the AOC forums say "But this game is made for skillful players, we dont need gear!", the point of an MMO is progression and once you hit the cap, gear is progression.

Players love the fact to try and be the best, and only some people have access to gear. Once you take that out, everyone is the same. I repeat, they'll have to fix the stat adjustments big time. Thats the life of any MMO, you have to have GEAR im sorry.

Also, combos are stupid and in pvp, they are easily interrupted. I man they hardly land because the player just has to MOVE lmao.

This game is pure alpha stage. Groups should give bonus exp to encourage grouping.

 

[Anaeran]

Supposedly heroic defense is supposed to add a bonus vs either bosses or elite mobs, I forget which. It's irrelevent though because stats aren't functioning properly at this point.

They need to make fixing stats and making gear worthwhile a priority- which I do believe it is right now. We will see.

 

[Anglis]

Nobody would raid, nobody would do quests once they cap out. People could fight naked and win. It would be pointless.

 

[bjbreeze1]

Armor do makes a difference. When ppl say they can fight naked and win it's probably because they are playing a mage class that wears the lightest armor.

At similar level fighting same mob, you can easily tell the difference in dmg taken between a tank and a melee dd/healer/mage. So the defensive stats on equipment is definitely working.

I think the main problem people are having right now is they really cant tell which gear is better. For example: is a weapon with higher dmg better or the one with lower dmg but gives +10 str? The game gives very poor in-game explanation, sorta like ffxi. It just takes time for people to figure out what everything does. There is a parser already out which should help quite a bit.

 

[Zethren]

There are many bugs and some issues with the game, but I enjoy it very much. You cannot solo everything. There are a few quests that you need a group to do, even around your level and less. Try killing Yimirs solo, you can't.
Economy isn't that great right now, I'm sure it will develop in time.

For me AOC deals with a lot of the bull shit that we've put up with ffxi over the years. I can't exp more cuz I haven't spend 30days farming 2m for this item or what have you and i'll be gimp if I don't have it. You quest and you exp and you get great gears from doing that.
I don't know what you consider casual. But I don't think is is possible to hit 80 in the time frame you said for the casual player. maybe if you play 8+hrs a day. You can hit 75 in the same amount or even less in ffxi with a good static.

There are many other points, but I really don't feel like spending anymore time trying to convince anyone If you don't like it w/e go back to ffxi or whatever game you played before.

edit: I will make this point, the reason you think its so fast to level is because you are used to lfp for so long in ffxi and in conan you can just solo the exp up.

 

[Zethren]

I heard the combat system relies on combos. Mortal Kombat MMO.

Confirm/Deny

hellz yea.
The fighting system is a blast

--> ^ --> ---> = Fatal CRUSH

|

 

[Kurgon]

Actually I've played EQ, EQ2, Lineage II, Vanguard, D&D, WoW, LoTRO, and many others. I am not bashing the game but leveling is fast due to lack of downtime (lfp, grinding money, grinding equipment, etc), quest exp, map leads you to every location, just generally less exp needed (ratio not simple numbers), etc. Saying the leveling is fast isn't directly bashing the game. Not every game is made to satisfy everyone. Some people love the grind, aka me, some hate it, and some come to hate it. Some love to level, doing nothing but running back and forth doing quests. Some like to just run through a dungeon to explore not just to mark things off a list. Some like a game where the group battle mechanics make it golden. Some get off on raiding the same mobs over and over.

I haven't given up on the game yet. I am not calling it bad. Ultimately it may prove to not be for me and that is ok. Who knows, maybe this new guild of mine will show me the things I've been "missing" and that combined with a couple updates may make me enamored with it.

I guess my biggest issue is that generally in MMO's, endgame isn't really built for me so I like the trip to endgame to be a little prolonged.

 

[Elemmire]

curious.. are you into PVP at all? Cause from the sounds of it, this game is awesome for PVP. Building guild forts and cities... defending them from others or going out and attacking other guilds' stuff... it sounds so awesome that when I have more money I'm gonna give it a try :3