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Asheron's Call


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Are there, perhaps, any Asheron's Call veterans around this forum? I use to play the MMO back in 2000 and 2001. In short, I loved the game, and I doubt there exists a game which I have enjoyed as much to this day.

 

Asheron's Call (AC) was very unique. Every detail of the game seamlessly conformed to an utmost alluring and extraordinary fantasy theme, unlike any other. It didn't follow the depreciated "elves, trolls, dwarves, and dragons" cliche, but rather had it's own particular form of fantasy. AC had "Gromnies," the mysterious "Virindi," the simple-minded "Drudges," "Golems," the ever feared "Shadows," "Banderlings," "Sclavus," "Monougas," "Mattekars," the brutish, humanoid "Lugians," "Phyntos Wasps," and vast, countless other forms of inhabitants. All of these creatures resided in an enormous and seamless, 575 square mile large game-world known as "Dereth," a landmass extremely varied and mysterious. One could spend real-world days simply journeying afoot across its vast expanse of grasslands, forests, mires, deserts, beaches, rolling hills, mountaineous ridges, and snowy peaks (not to mention its seemingly unlimited magnitude of dungeons, catacombs, and caves), venturing about and perhaps stumbling upon unexplored areas. Each of the game's widespread locales had a particular atmosphere and dwelling of inhabitants. A newly arrived adventurer would find comfort in the relatively unscathed eastern territories of "Middle Osteth," harboring numerous consoling and populated towns of the likes of "Eastham" and "Cragstone," and with a wide variety of critters that gradually, but moderately grew more and more vicous the farther one distanced themselves from a trail. But those daring and battle-hardened could venture into the unexplored and feared "Direlands" in the distant west, where in the most ferocious and erratic creatures lingered and the refuge of fortress or commune did not exist for a hundred miles or more. Map

 

A player had the choice of selecting one of three races, all of which were part of a congomerate "Isparian" race (essentially a human): The "Aluvians" (Caucasian), the "Gharu'ndim" (Negro), and the "Sho" (Asian), each of which had different inherent advantages, but which were generally insignificant in difference. In stark contrast to the "cookie-cutter" MMO's of today (IE: World of Warcraft), in Asheron's Call each and every player was unique. The facial customizations alone were so extensive one could go several years into the game without ever finding two players with the same set of characteristics (and there were different facial sets for each race), and this is not taking into consideration the varieties of skin tone, and hair color and style. Though, most importantly, not only were players defined unique in their appearance, but most especially in their player-defined attributes. The skill system is still probably the most extensive and well-designed out of all MMO's to date *1*, and there were so many forms of armor, weapons, gems, jewerly, clothing-attire, special-loot items, and other articles (5 years later, in this day and time, the item-set selection has likely doubled) that I do not believe I had ever come across a set of players who looked even remotely alike, or even two items that were exactly alike for that matter. Items were randomly generated in their appearance, worth, weight, color, special-affects, and usage-requirements upon defeating an adversary *2*. Overall, though, what I enjoyed most about this game was its challenge, longevity, and vastness, and this is the same area in which the game met its downfall.

 

Early on in Asheron's Call (back when I played), it obliged at least two years or so to reach the maximum level--level 126. This estimation is solely for those who played in a mode of consistent hunting ("powerlevelers"), ignoring the many other features of the game, such as trading, questing, alchemy, spell research *3*, fishing, exploration, cooking, and "lore-research" *4*. In addition to these, one might also spend their pastime aside from hunting straightforwardly socializing with the wonderful community Asheron's Call had. AC's design encouraged socializing and cooperation between players of all levels, through certain personal benefits one could capitalize on. Aside from the obvious advantage of traveling in numbers, players who formed fellowships would be granted experience rewards. Likewise, the game touted a novel allegiance system, where in players could form patron/vassal relationships: Lower level players could swear allegiance to a higher level patron, in which they would thereafter become their vassal. The patron would be responsible for providing the vassal with items, knowledge, and personal assistance (all the while competing with the offers of other patrons), whereas they would personally receive a percentage of experience gained by the vassal in return.

 

On the same token, Asheron's Call was just as suited to solo play as it was to cooperative. I know for a fact, as I personally enjoyed individualistic play in substitute to aggregate during my years. One was highly capable of perservering on their own means, not depending on the services of others. This was relatively more challenging, but, as a result, much more gratifying in the end--once accomplishing something. Though, this is not to say I never involved myself with others in AC. It's not often that you find an MMO in which a good portion of players have a friendly and non-rival decency about them, and a quality beyond a tiresome droning towards acheiving the highest level or finding the most popular, highest-experience hunting spots. For mellow players such as these (a good handlful of them were roleplayers), it would have probably taken much longer than two years to reach a high level like 126, but I do not believe such a feat was much of their concern. And, even so, the level cap did not have much significance *5*.

 

This longetivity is one of the primary reasons I enjoyed Asheron's Call; the game seemed to never end. AC didn't necessitate a minuscule duration of two weeks to a month in order to "complete" the game, as is with many newer MMOs. And it was not as if level progression was a slow and tedious task without recompense. Had this been the case, there would have not been a point in dedicating so much time to the game in the first place. Rather, Asheron's Call was more of an adventure filled with much variety *6*, mystification *7*, and peculiarly random events *8*. And with the monthly content updates and live events the game received, in addition to the huge content base established at the release of the game, it would have been quite a feat (in other words, if you "have a life" outside of the game, outright impossible) to experience every bit of content the game offered to its players.

 

 

But, alas, nothing this good could last for even a few years. The developers of Asheron's Call, insistent on ever improving their game, took to the likes of an aweful development scheme, in which they turned to their players for development/modification concepts. One might think this is a reasonable idea, but--as it turns out--players do not really know what they want. I can specifically remember the day when "Pyreals," Asheron's Call's form of ingame currency, became burdenless (Yes, characters were affected by the weight of items, depending on the level of their strength attribute). At first, this was a change that I didn't think much of. It was welcoming in that my character's movement was much faster, but, at the same time, it was surprisingly disapointing not having to worry about storing or carrying pyreals and my other various items strategically. I was oblivious to the motives of such a decision, and I didn't bother questioning them at the time as I had figured they were insignificant.

 

Little did I know that this was the beginning of a whole slew of gameplay-altering changes that would ruin Asheron's Call. The next thing I knew, portals leading to virtually everywhere in the game were emerging all about the world of Dereth. Players had complained of needing to travel on foot to various locations in the game, and the developers--ignorant to the consequences--acted accordingly. Had they simply pondered the fact that eliminating any bit of necessary on-foot travel would render all of the inbetween land masses useless and entirely desolate, and dismiss all prospects of the once natural adventure that occurred in between such areas, I doubt they would have considered such decisions. I can recall traveling in fellowships across the huge Dereth landmass, depending on one another for "survival." It was quite an experience to say the least. But now all it took was one step into a swirling-portal and I was immediately at my intended destination. It was simply a shortcut to the prize; there was now no journey involved, and the "journey" or challenge--to many people's ignorance--is what makes a game fun.

 

It was only a matter of time before other decisions and modifications of the same blazons arised. Players decided the extremely unique and intriguing spell research system*3* was only a nuisance, resolving that all spells should simply be bought at an NPC in the form of scrolls available in all towns. Persistent spell durations, previously lasting between five and eight minutes, uniformily began lasting twenty to even thirty minutes. The usage of ingame plugins were condoned, and as such "buff bots," non-player assisted "bots"--controlled by cleverly designed macros--offered all characters augmentations unintended for their rank, allowing them to hunt in areas not nearly intended for their level (this resulted in overly fast-paced character progression and unchallenging experience acquisition. Buff Bots are now treated as an ingrained "part of the game," and all new players are sadly encouraged to use them). "Double-Experience" weekends were introduced at whim if there was any sort of downtime (as the players could use this as an excuse). Drop rates of once rare items now surfaced on every other corpse. Many other miscellaneous and once challenging features of the game followed suit, and would either removed or castrated like the others.

 

It was about this time that I left the game. As a result of all these nonsensical changes, the game had become rather boring and monotonous. There is no entertainment in obtaining a reward if there is no effort involved to obtain it. Three years after, I returned for a day or two to see what had become of the game, and it was even worse than before. Instead of the steady, yet enthralling leveling pace of two years to reach the highest level, give or take a few months, one could reach level 126 in a mere month or two--less if you were experienced in AC. As a result, 80% of the game's unique and classic content--of which had been designed for the previous gradual progression--could now be rushed through quite instantly. Much of the "hunting" areas, dungeons, quests, exploration, and great experiences once occurring in this content might as well have been removed. Pyreals, formerly having substantial value, were now a common place in that they dropped excessively on all creatures, and in that loot sold from creatures was amended with extravagant payback (whereas the price of items sold hardly changed). It was as if the developers really believed there was some merit behind the thoughtless rants of complainers, as though there was some public good beyond their obviously selfish intents to simply augment their alter egos.

 

And from all of this, probably the worst of all changes transpired within the community: the Unattended Combat Macro (UCM). Expectedly, Asheron's Call--a once intriguing, immensily fun, and challenging game--had become boring. As a result, players decided that if the game was not fun, then why play it at all? In fact, why not simply run a program that would play the game for me, allowing me to continually advance 24 hours a day, without any effort? So, nowadays (as I hear anyways), 50% of the active population on each server is not actually "active," but more or less just some script repeating itself in a far off dungeon. Knowing what the game had once been, and what its further potential could have been, it is really sad to hear the cries of new players consistently complaining on the Asheron's Call forums about never once seeing another player in all their time in the game. It is estimated that there is about 150-250 players active, half of which are bots, on each of the 7 AC servers at high times. I can personally recall when the active server population rarely dipped below 1,800 on every server. 'Tis a sad story.

 

 

 

*1*(In the year and a half that I played, there were more than 30 skills to choose from, including but definitely not limited to such things as "War Magic," "Missile Defense," "Life Magic," "Cooking," "Dagger," "Staff," "Archery," "Alchemy," "Arcane Lore," "Jump," "Deception," "Mana Conversion," "Unarmed Combat," "Sword," "Run," and on and on. The player had the option of training or--in a further advancement to training--"specializing" in any of these skills, depending on how they utilized their "skill-credits," and, afterwards, spending experience on whatever they preferred accordingly. In addition, the player was given "attributes," a base form of stats (in a different category than the skills system) which encompassed such things as "Strength," "Endurance," "Focus," "Coordination," "Health," "Quickness," and so on. All of these decisions based around XP and skill credit allocation affected how your character would turn out--not just in the beginning of the game, but all throughout. Your decisions affected, for example, further experience costs, special-items requirements, and such. There wasn't simply a "Sorcerer" class where every other "Sorcerer" was virtually the same character as your "Sorcerer," give or take a few minor differences. You were completely unique.)

 

*2*(In addition, and most interestingly, recently I heard the developers introduced a "Rares" system, in which each player has the capacity to receive a randomly dropped "rare" loot item belonging to one of seven or so tiers of rares. The higher end tiers of rares, albiet quite hard to attain, are completely unique in the game, meaning they have entirely custom-designed models and special abilities, solely attainable by one player.)

 

*3*(Initially, the role of a mage was quite novel in Asheron's Call. There were seven tiers of spells attainable in the game, and additional levels would render themselves usable as you progressed in a specific profession. From what I can recall, of these seven levels, for each of the magical professions of "Life Magic," "Creature Enchantment," "War Magic," and "Item Enchantment," there existed a vast collection of spells. Most were uniform across each of the seven levels in their type and affect, simply growing stronger and lasting for longer durations at higher levels (For instance, there was a "Flamebolt IV," "Flamebolt V," "Flame Arc IV," Flame Streak IV," "Frost Bolt VI," etc"). But there were so many variations and types--probably amounting to several hundred, and each had a tactical use. Far from generic or boring on there own, these spells were supplemented by special sets of entirely unique forms of spells, each of which had individualistic affects and animations.

For every spell in the game, there existed "spell components" which would need to be combined in order to cast and learn a spell, and this is where "Spell Research" came into play. The spell components that founded these spells took the form of "Scarabs," "Herbs," "Powdered Gems," "Alchemical Substances," "Talismans," and "Tapers," each of which was compromized of a group of several dozen variations. Some types were extremely rare and valuable--naturally needed for higher-end, powerful spells, others were simply commonplace, and many were somewhere inbetween. Following a formal pattern of combination, the player would need to test combinations of components in order to contrive spells. The combinations for each of these spells were unique for every player, so one could not simply divulge their entire spellbook to their fellow. In addition, spells could also be learned by spell scrolls found in loot, though higher end ones were naturally rare.

 

*4*(The game had its own arrangement of extremly extensive lore and story, in which players could attain texts and valuable information in the form of books, scripts, tomes, or straightforward NPC-communication, revealing the hidden facts about Dereth and its history/mysteries. Such findings might disclose secret quests, the whereabouts of a scroll for some unique and powerful spell, the appropriate combinations of extraordinary or seemingly useless loot in order to form some peculiar item, the secretive dwellings of a certain horribly powerful and legendary monster, or perhaps the lore divulged would simply be another piece of Dereth's expansive puzzle of history.)

 

*5*(The level cap did not have much significance anyways, beyond the fact that one couldn't attain additional skill credits used in training new skills; you could still increase your skills and attributes with experience gained afterwards.)

 

*6*(For instance, there were hundreds of different grounds of exploration and hunting. So many that even with the 120,000 large player-base in the game's peak, many far-off areas--aside from the popular and ever-changing hunting locales--were often almost or altogether abandoned, which would evoke a sort of mystical feeling of adventure--not knowing what might be around the next bend of a cavern wall or what treasure may have existed in a chest at the depths of some dungeon.)

 

*7*(Often throughout Asheron's Call's history, developers of the game would hint at the fact that they would secretly implement much content kept disclosed from the regularly released patch's feature list. And indeed they did, as such peculiarities would emerge regularly. According to developer chats, even to this day--in addition to normaly adding such curiousities--some content back from the early 2000's has yet to be discovered.)

 

*8*(I can recall such spontaneous events as monsters, having defeated several players, leveling far past their base level, becoming quite powerful of foes, or random raids of 30 or so of a certain creature on some town, for example.)

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*Wins award for longest post evar*

 

I didn't read all of that, and I@m sure no one esle will, but I did play Everquest back in those days (99, 2000) and it's also a game I miss, (I know it's stlil going, but after a million patches and expansions it's nothing like what it was back then)even though it had a lof of flaws, it's was raw and dirty and did not hold your hand. It forced you to team together with strangers and make the best of it.

Civillisation will not attain perfection until the last stone, from the last church, falls on the last priest.

- Emil Zola

 

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JESUS MOTHERFUCK LOL!!!....... Just copied pasted into MS Word....2,985 words :blink: ....longer then the essay I had to hand in last Friday for uni lol!!!!

 

I read some of it until I saw the scroll bar...lol

 

I played everquest a while back to, haven't played it for a looong time now.

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Shit! I admit I'd didn't fully read either, I was scanning for the part where you say,

 

"Well they're offering free play to all now, the way Anarchy Online does."

 

But I didn't find it. :-\

 

Anyway, I used to play EQ around the time of the Luclin expansion, for about a year, and I so badly miss my bard... I could never go back though. During that recent 21 free days, I logged on twice, tried to remember the UI, realized how outdated my setup/knowledge/equipment is, and never logged on again.

 

Still though... there was nothing like being a tiny, frail wood elf bard, with nothing but lambent and a set of combine instruments, CHARM KITING A SWARM OF GIANTS TO THE GROUND. >:) That feeling of satisfaction is tangible, I swear. I also fondly remember and miss being in a pickup group, in any random location, and playing the role of the bard - healing, mezzing, charming, even swapping instruments out for weapons on each turn - it's a frenzy of button pushing which leaves you happily brain fried. It was so satisfying to frequently hear team chatter like,

 

"damn how many songs you play bard?"

 

"WTF doc left, who is healing me?"

 

"wheeeee! endless mana!"

 

"dam ur fast"

 

"great work ench, saved the day!"

"we don't have enchanter, LOL"

"oh haha I though the mobs were mezzed, they werent attacking. /BUG ROFL"

"no, that was our bard"

 

:wub:

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Haha, didn't realize that was so long lol. I just started rambling and I couldn't get myself to stop. I assume I had so much to say because I played Asheron's Call as if it were a "second life," and, indeed, it felt like one :blush:. Actually, what I provided was a rather brief summary of the game; there is so much more I would have liked to say about the game's features, atmosphere, and my personal experiences, but it's a matter of trying to effectively put it into words.

 

EDIT: By the way, I just want to know: How many of you had even heard of Asheron's Call (NOT Asheron's Call 2) before I posted this? I'm just curious.

 

I don't believe Turbine or Microsoft advertised the game even once. All the players it gained were solely accumulated by word of mouth, yet it spread like wild fire between the groups of gamers that knew about it. And part of its relatively low peak subscription-base came as a result of it only being offered through Microsoft's "Zone" games service, which was quite confusing to utilize as a new player. Had it been advertised, I can bet the 120,000 large playerbase would have at least doubled.

 

Asheron's Call 2 was a horrible sequel that died within a meager few years of its release; Asheron's Call 1 has long out lived it. I will save you mental pain by not expounding upon it; it relinquished everything that was good about its predecessor, and destroyed any hope of further the Asheron's Call games.

Edited by woah
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Shit! I admit I'd didn't fully read either, I was scanning for the part where you say,

 

"Well they're offering free play to all now, the way Anarchy Online does."

 

But I didn't find it. :-\

 

Anyway, I used to play EQ around the time of the Luclin expansion, for about a year, and I so badly miss my bard... I could never go back though. During that recent 21 free days, I logged on twice, tried to remember the UI, realized how outdated my setup/knowledge/equipment is, and never logged on again.

 

Still though... there was nothing like being a tiny, frail wood elf bard, with nothing but lambent and a set of combine instruments, CHARM KITING A SWARM OF GIANTS TO THE GROUND. >:) That feeling of satisfaction is tangible, I swear. I also fondly remember and miss being in a pickup group, in any random location, and playing the role of the bard - healing, mezzing, charming, even swapping instruments out for weapons on each turn - it's a frenzy of button pushing which leaves you happily brain fried. It was so satisfying to frequently hear team chatter like,

 

"damn how many songs you play bard?"

 

"WTF doc left, who is healing me?"

 

"wheeeee! endless mana!"

 

"dam ur fast"

 

"great work ench, saved the day!"

"we don't have enchanter, LOL"

"oh haha I though the mobs were mezzed, they werent attacking. /BUG ROFL"

"no, that was our bard"

 

:wub:

 

Heh, I was an half elf bard as well, (Maestro Furioso) the armour looked so much better on half elves before the new Luclin graphics than on humans. Got to level 55 (I think) mid 50's anyway. I just got bored one day and deleted him. I could twist 4 songs at the same time even on a 56k wiht the lag. Very useful one you got the third DoT song, you could twist those three and selo's for very quick and endless kills. Was pretty dangerous though at high level, becasue if you lag or miss your timmg you end up losing speed and have 2 or 3 level 50 mobs beating the crap out of you. I never ever died once while DoT-kiting though, the only time I used to die was when I grouped in dungeons. I think bard was the best soling class regardless of what necros and mages thought. The big plus was that you had no down time at all, so could kill endlessly, and of course nulke them you could group with almost anyone as well.

I tried playing severla other classes, but Inever got past the teen levels with anything but the bard.

I remeber whne the Luclin expansion came out Iwent up

Civillisation will not attain perfection until the last stone, from the last church, falls on the last priest.

- Emil Zola

 

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That's a great post Woah, and my beliefs about how MUDs should be designed are similar. Fortunately, that doesn't happen to all MMORPGs, but sadly it happens to many. Have you considered playing free text-based MUDs? Some are quite good. Although I haven't played it in years, The Two Towers cares a lot about balance and quality control, though admittedly they unfortunately don't limit how fast players can walk.

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Just download Zork and find out.

 

It's simple really, you just type junk like "look at rug" or "go south" or "climb the rope" or whatever. You gather clues, and explore the world solving puzzles and gathering treasure.

 

It's like a book because you let your imagination flow to envision the places you are exploring.

 

Oh, and you draw a map, and rework the map once you realize you had it a bit messed up, then rework it again till it's perfect!

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Well, MUDs are different from IF like Zork, of course, because they are multi-user, and have top-down ascii graphics. (I love IF, too, but just to distinguish the two).

 

The text-based MUDs I know (from 10 years ago) are more like ultima 1 if you remember it. It's all ascii art, the dungeon walls are like "I" and and the PC ("*") and monsters ("M") and other users and items, etc.

 

You use the keyboard to move around, and there are special keys to do special commands, like rest, cast a spell, attack monster, get item, etc. And since there are other people in the dugeon at the same time, you can also talk to them, and interact in other ways, trading, buying and selling items.

 

And as you advance through levels, there's more you can do ... so in a lot of them you see some level 90 wizards just zipping through the whole MUD looking for hapless newbies to harass. But all in all, they are fun to run through for a quick jaunt ... sort of like WoW unplugged.

Edited by demagogue

What do you see when you turn out the light? I can't tell you but I know that it's mine.

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I was there in December 1999. It was my x-mas present and mom paid a hefty 50$ for it. I was running it on a pentium 1 233mhz with a graphic blaster riva tnt card 16 mb.

 

It was my first MMO and it holds a very special place in my heart. Nothing will take away the feeling of portaling into shoushi outpost on Thistledown server. Then going to the first newbie dungeon with a group of allies. Being level 10 was a God back then.

 

Portaling to the dires was things of lore and legends. Things of myth uncatchable by my newbie eyes. One of the hardest lessons I ever learned was don't listen to what people always tell you.

 

I had made a life/war specced mage. Then my friend told me to reroll and not spec since he knew the game more. What ended up happening?

 

Specialize was the way to go. If I had gone my own way I would of been on the top. So I learned my lesson. Everyone started respecializing and owning up. I had to reroll and got fed up and left after it was on a decline

 

I did spend about 2 months and friends helped me to get a very powerful armor piece.(Greater shadow celdon) I was one of the few on the server to ever get it. It took me soooooooo loooooong but little by little I got it

 

I was there for the shadow invasions of February 2001.

 

Asheron's Call left it's mark in MMO history. It stands to this day. http://www.turbinegames.com

 

Meridian 59, Ultima Online, Everquest, Asheron's Call, then DAOC. Those are the top 4 that made MMO history. WoW broke all those of course but those set the path for WoW.

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Awesome, nice to hear from someone who actually played the game--let alone has heard of it. :)

 

I remember attempting to collect shards and get "GSA" (Greater Shadow Armor). But I quit before I could complete my set. I never let anyone help me collect them; I always liked the challenge of doing it all on my own. My friend always told me about another set of shadow armor which was extremely rare; I'm guessing that was what GSC was.

 

Shoushi is where I originated too--specifically on an outpost about a half of a mile from the town, and then moved on to Eastham. After probably about a month of hunting on the Eastham beach and the adjacent fields and forests, taking down such feats as Azure Gromnies, Drudge Prowlers and Drudge Slinkers, Red Phyntos Wasps, and many different blazons of Shreths, I somehow found my way back to Shoushi, and--in the midst of one of my random explorations in that area--found what would become a memorable area. I ventured up a long incline and onto a mountainous ridge. It was here that I found a player, Troll the Destroyer, who would later become my patron after weeks of hunting in this locale with one another. Various forms of Zeffirs, Rats, Wisps, White mattekars, stone throwing Lugians (of which could consume about half of your health with one hit of a rock), and other such creatures were the primary game in this area.

 

Everything else afterwards is just a haze, but I can recall some memorable areas as the "Lugian Citadel," a dungeon infested with hundreds of Lugians, of many different forms, and the hunting the ferocious and rare "Dread Mattekars," (of which--if you were lucky--had about a 98/100 chance of dropping a mattekar hide that could be formed into a wieldable "Mattekar Claw." Unfortunately, I think I only came across about 20 of these dread mattekars in game, but that made the excitement of finding one and actually being able to take it down tremendous) on the snowy mountains behind the Citadel's entrance. Afterwards, I remember just spending months of play wandering about in the deserts, establishing temporary hunting grounds in such areas as "Zaikhal" (sp?), "Tufa," and "Yaraq," exploring some skeleton infested catacombs and such. When I was a high enough level, I moved on to "Fort Tethana," a stronghold far out in the Direlands, which happened to be where I spent most of my ingame time, and which is where I would depart. I always wanted to attempt to venture out to Teth on foot alone (without the usage of portals), but--even at level 50--it was so dangerous in the direlands I had trouble taking one creature at a time. Unfortunately, the developers ruined the game for me before I could accomplish this, or experience any of the thousands of other areas in Dereth.

 

But I'm rambling again.

Edited by woah
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Hehe yea I loved how you could hide in buildings and take shelter. Easthamb each was the shit for newbies. It was like a beach party where you leveled up. Ccheck this out it's Darktide history the only pvp server by oneof the players who was there since the start.

 

http://www.schattenkind.com/main.htm

 

Also has a page about shadow warriors vs bhael'zharon when he invaded.

 

http://www.schattenkind.com/main.htm

 

That guy was all class. They moved on to World of Warcraft eventually. However Asheron's Call did what no other MMO did at the time. You could go anywhere and doa nything without loading.(Except when you portaled) It was just jaw dropping that you could keep running for miles on end.

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All modern MMO's are like that.

Shit.

I probably would have given Asheron's call a go, Idid know about it, but Everquest was the only MMO I saw in the shop at the time.

Civillisation will not attain perfection until the last stone, from the last church, falls on the last priest.

- Emil Zola

 

character models site

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What is it that the eight million or so people that play World of Warcraft see in the game? Obviously most of the players are not from old MMO descent; somehow they attracted a new crowd of gamers. The game has many aspects of instant gratification, and perhaps this is why I see so many Counter-Strike gamers involved.

 

My fear is that developers may attempt to model future MMO's on World of Warcraft

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WoW is like the best MMO out since ever for a reason. it's easy for anyone ages 5+ to get into. It has great personality with the npc's. The quests are funny and not difficult. You can solo from 1-60. The leveling is the fastest in any MMO. It encourages usage of alts because if you log out in an inn you get rest xp.(Which when you kill a mob you get xp and a half so you level even fast if you're rested)

 

Think of it this way. WoW is based off of everything before it. So they copied a lot of UI and the best game elements of the games that came before it. The UI is similar to Lineage 2. The mobs aren't exploitable like in other games. The engine is coded very well to prevent cheating. They crack down hard on cheaters too.

 

The quests are solable and fast, sometimes you need a group but the game lets you know when you do. Mounts are acceseble and look and feel great.

 

It's just a great game. No other MMO has received the awards WoW has received. Blizz is #1. http://www.mmogchart.com

 

However once you get into the 60 everything changes. It turns into a raid game where you must team with players to acquire better gear. Basically you're just fighting together npcs and story content from here on out. Not everyone likes that but a lot of people do. With the expansion they'll add a level 70 player cap, pvp outside of the world, flying mounts in Outland, and much more.

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Yeah, Blizzard's handling of Diablo II has convinced me to avoid any subscription-based MMORPGs that they make.

 

The original Diablo was great... Magic items were fairly rare. Rings and amulets were even rarer. Every time you heard the chime of a ring falling, it felt like christmas day. It was feasible to gather all dropped magic items and sell them. Exploring the caverns alone felt like you against the world, but when you could face them with your friends at your side it was great fun. And yet since people could choose to PK whenever they wanted, it had an interesting sort of tension: When playing with strangers you had to carefully watch your comrades... you were never sure if they were watching your back or just waiting for the right moment to put a knife in it. That was scary and fascinating in a way I've never seen another game be. The original Diablo had a wonderful aptmosphere and gameplay. Tis a shame that it was client-side, so cheating was rampant.

 

Diablo II on the other hand... although it was technologically more advanced and had nicer quests and a wider variety of items, it was missing something. Magical items no longer felt valuable: they dropped so often that they were junk. Even rare and some unique items were usually treated as junk. Whenever more players came into the game, the monsters had drastically higher health, and yet the amount of dropped loot felt the same. This made it actually easier and more worthwhile to play alone rather than with friends, which is very unfortunate. Also, its overworld maps just sort of felt more empty and computer generated than the original Diablo dungeons, though they were in many ways nicer looking. And as usual, gold was worthless. Also, they made it impossible to PK... You could only change your friend/enemy status to other players while in town, which flashed a big red alert on their screens and prevented you from using their portals. I've never PKed anybody in Diablo or Diablo II (except in fun free-for-alls), but I felt that never worrying about other players potentially PKing me made the game far more boring.

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