August 12, 2009
Sorcerer vs. Spiritmaster, which caster DPS should I be?
Alright, well, its time we had the logical follow up to Middea’s well written article on the healing classes. Although I was tempted to play a healer from my past experience in WoW, I decided that I wanted a bit of a change and to continue with my more recent DPS role. With that said, I’m going to initially try a mage out.
The logical question now is, sorcerer or spiritmaster? Which do I choose?
So far, I’ve played a sorcerer in the North American Aion betas and I’ve really enjoyed the class. Even with its wide range of crowd control abilities for slowing and rooting mobs, as well as hard hitting spells to destroy them before they reach you, I’ve still managed to get myself killed far too many times. Having extremely low health isn’t really a good thing for someone who plays as recklessly as I do at times. Despite this, I like the class design and play style.
From what I’ve read, the low HP of mages in Aion also makes them fairly weak and easy targets in PvP. I can’t really backup this statement yet since the only PvP I experienced in the beta was a couple of Elyos who were just outside one of the Asmodian towns ganking us while we were questing. At the time, I didn’t stand a chance and I wasn’t interested in focusing on the PvP elements of the game, so after a few quick attempts at getting revenge I decided to run and hide.
As far as which class to choose at level 10, I’ve currently decided to remain as a sorcerer.
Spiritmasters have their summoned elemental spirits for support. Having the pet out at all times is essentially a must if you want to kill mobs efficiently, and managing the pet’s attacks is also important for increasing your damage done. One potential drawback of the spirits is that they do not fly with you, they remain on the ground (with the exception of the Energy of Fire summons). I’m sure highly effective players will have their spirit on the ground hitting specific targets and manage their pet well while they are in the air focusing on either the same target or potentially others. I know for a fact that this is more than I can personally handle, especially in a fast-paced PvP environment. However, if you like to have a pet and managing it’s attacks, then this may be the class for you.
The other noteworthy aspects of the spiritmaster class are its ability to remove buffs, the debuffs it has and the dots and direct damage spells available. With a potential to reduce the strength, combat speed, lower resistances and decrease the flight time of targets, a spiritmaster will be very important to have around for group PvP as well as in a PvE environment. Although they do have many of the early spells that sorcerers do for damage, most of your time as a spiritmaster will most likely be spent applying debuffs, removing buffs and placing dots on targets while focusing on your pet instead of using damaging spells with a longer cast time.
The sorcerer, on the other hand, is pretty much the opposite end of the caster DPS spectrum. Without a pet, a sorcerer’s focus is on casting their damaging spells. These range from dots to direct damage nukes and AoE spells, and also vary from frost to fire. Basically, the focus here is to do as much damage as possible with the spells available to you. If you like casting and doing high amounts of damage, the sorcerer is probably a better choice for you. However, you will have to keep track of the cooldowns on your spells in order to optimize your casting rotation while playing keep away with the enemy. Slowing and rooting effects are available to both of the mage classes and are important to each.
A spiritmaster is very much a utility class, however, they do have an important role to play. If you like having a pet and multitasking watching buffs and debuffs while doing a little damage, then this is the class for you. If you prefer to focus more on damage, high single target DPS and the ability to AoE mobs, then you should consider a sorcerer instead.
August 7, 2009
Cleric vs. Chanter, Which Should I Be?
Coming from WoW as a priest, I’m finding the easiest way to compare a cleric and a chanter in play styles is to compare them to discipline and holy priests prior to the conversion of +healing and +spell damage to +spell power. This does not mean that you should expect to play either in Aion, I mean, could you imagine someone seriously trying to melee as a discipline priest? Eeps!
A Discipline Priest can heal effectively by preventing a ton of damage done to them and group members. They maintain the ability to level solo with next to no downtime or long waits to kill mobs due to built in mana conservation talents. In the same way, a Chanter has mantras that prevent damage that needs to be healed.
A Chanter’s strength is that they are a strong hybrid — they can heal, dps, and buff. As a Chanter you will be in melee range smacking the mobs, keeping up your mantras, and single target healing as needed. The Chanters main options for healing are a strong hot (that overwrites a Cleric’s hots) and a single target cast heal. A Chanter also buffs the groups stats which in turn increases the groups dps and defenses. Mostly in a group setting the Chanter will be contributing to the group dps, and occasionally throwing out a heal or two.
A Holy Priest is not as strong solo because their shields aren’t buffed and does not hit back. The Cleric has nice survivability when solo’ing but still requires a break between mobs while a Chanter can go from mob to mob.
Both the holy priest and Cleric’s strength is in their versatility in heals. Clerics have single-target heals, group heals, instant heals, battle resurrections, a self resurrection, and hots. As a Cleric your first and main priority will be to heal. While in a group, expect to be standing still and healing constantly, your dps isn’t significant enough to waste your MP on, though throwing in a stun or root might still be something to watch for.
In instances and PVP both appear that they will hold their own. Keep in mind when picking how you play; do you solo a lot, pvp, instance, farm, etc. If you prefer standing in the back and having a wide array of choices to heal with-including AoE heals, go Cleric. If you prefer to be in the middle of the action, with mantras and other such preventative measures to require less reactionary heals, go Chanter.
Pick which one fits YOUR play style best. Both will be used in all aspects of the game as they each offer something different. Your effectiveness and enjoyment are tied to how much you enjoy playing your class, so keep that in mind when choosing!
Personally, I’m a healbot and I love a variety of choices to heal with. I’m going Cleric. Rawr!
Are you rolling a priest? If so, Chanter or Cleric? Why?
If you’re torn between Rangers and Sorcerers, check out Weekly Ranger’s article here.
August 4, 2009
Power Shards?
What?
A common question from people playing in the closed beta for the first time this weekend was “What are power shards?” The tooltip on them is not very helpful in answering the question.
The very first power shard one stumbles on is the:
Minor Power Shard
Available for Level 1 or higher
A monster’s soul was sealed within this stone. Using this stone increases the weapon damage by 10 points.
The highest level one increases weapon damage by 35 points.
How?
However, when you right click the shards, it only places them into the smaller box next to your weapon and does not activate them.
In order to activate the power shards you need to press the “B” key (by default). Each individual hit with that weapon will do additional damage based on the type of power shard being used. Each hit also will consume a shard, so they get used up quickly.
Why?
While the damage increase is not anything to write home about, it is an increase in damage. They drop from mobs often enough that using them situationally might be in your best interest.
Who?
Anyone who melees should be sure to have them equipped for those “oh shit” moments. If you are a dual wielder, you can place shards in each weapon. If you wield a 2 hander, you cannot use shards in both slots to double buff your weapon. Power shards only work for melee attacks, including shield attacks.
Where?
You can buy power shards from General Goods vendors in stacks of 50 or you can loot them off of mobs.
When?
Being able to activate and deactivate the power shards by pressing “B” you can choose when you want to use them. You can therefore choose to only activate them in life and death situations or use them all the time. You can hoard them to save for pvp battles or what ever you choose.
Did this help you any? Still unsure of something regarding Power Shards?
July 24, 2009
Aion Impressions
This past beta weekend has let us take a glimpse at the gameplay in this upcoming MMO up to level 25, finally giving us a bit of a taste for the PvP elements of the game as well.
With the fourth closed beta event behind us, we now have two more to look forward to; the July 31st weekend will be opening up levels 26 to 30, and a yet to be determined focus for the final closed beta on August 14th. For those of us who have been eagerly following any and every detail we can on this game, those weekends have been marked off on our calendars for some time now and we can’t wait to get what little game time we can in before the September 22 North American release date.
Let’s quickly run over the basics for this game. Aion is a massively multiplayer online roleplaying game (MMORPG) with two playable factions, the Asmodians and the Elyos. Within these two factions, there are four main playable classes: warriors, scouts, mages and priests. Each main class will choose between two subclasses when they specialize at level 10, making the true class list consist of: templars, gladiators, assassins, rangers, sorcerers, spiritmasters, clerics and chanters. There is currently a lot of information on the factions and the lore behind them, as well as the classes and their abilities elsewhere if you are interested in the finer details.
So what is it that sets this game apart from the rest? Well, my initial thoughts upon seeing it were that I couldn’t believe just how good the game actually looks. The graphics in Aion are stunning to say the least; the characters look incredible, the level of detail on gear is second to none and the environments are absolutely amazing. I haven’t seen any other MMO to this day that looks even remotely close to as good as this one. You will have to see it to truly understand and once you do it will leave you feeling slightly let down when you return to other games you may be currently playing.
The level of detail available on the character customization is also nearly mind boggling. You can start with the preset base features and pick and choose different combinations to form the character you will be playing. If you’re like me and somewhat lazy, you may be tempted to stop there; I urge you not to though and to take some time to play around with the finer details. It’s quite unbelievable how much you can change and to what degree you can really create your own character that will be unique in the Aion world.
Besides the stunning graphics and customization, what really got me about Aion as a whole was simply how fun it was to level. For the first time ever I actually found myself enjoying the questing process. Not only do the campaign quests do a great job advancing the story along, but even doing the optional side quests does not seem like a chore. I can’t recall a single quest that I really did not like during my time in the beta so far, which says a lot considering my normal feelings about questing in MMOs.
To put this into perspective, I leveled my druid in World of Warcraft from about 35 to 60 by instancing over and over again just to avoid questing. When the first expansion came out, I chose to do the same to get the druid from level 60 to 70. I would have paid any amount of in game currency in order to avoid doing a quest. I found them monotonous, boring, dull and generally an annoyance. I was all about playing for the end game content and considered the process of getting there a job I didn’t like to do. None of these statements apply to the quests so far in Aion. I’m eagerly awaiting getting back in game to level some more and figure out what quests await us.
With visual queues on the map to help you find the item or person you are looking for, an easy to use map overlay, and many other sweet, simple interface refinements, Aion makes the entire process of questing simple and painless. There is also a channel system that provides you with instances of the world server; if one quest or mob is being farmed you can simply hop channels to find an emptier instance of the area to play in. Basically, you’ll never really get stuck or bored for too long at all.
A few other quick things that I liked about Aion were:
- The flight system: Not only do the wings on the characters look incredibly cool, but the timed flight adds an element to PvP that will be interesting to see in action. Being able to cast in the air is amazingly fun even this early in the game.
- A varied PvPvE experience: Most of us cannot wait to check out PvP once we see more of the game and get a chance to get to the Abyss. So far, I’ve only encountered some random Elyos (we chose to be Asmodians) while questing who were out to have some fun killing us.
- Private stores: They add an interesting and unique twist on how you sell items. I think it’s interesting from an in game economy perspective and also quite fun.
From my short time playing Aion, I really do think this is one game you should take a look at if you haven’t already. It’s everything that other games haven’t been lately: stunning, exciting, different, but most of all it’s incredibly fun.
Quirky Quiescence 