Like the thread title says, I have a few questions I would like to ask before I make my final decision to play this game.  First off, I would like to say that I've played most of the recent F2P and P2P mmo's, and I'm honestly getting sick of it.  So I figure maybe a sandbox will help cure my MMO itch.  First I tried Eve, great game, but kind of boring.  Next to fallen earth, clunky and poor graphics.  So my final stop is Darkfall, and seeing as it does not have a trial yet, this decision will be much harder. So here we go.

1. How is the housing like in darkfall, from what I understand you find or buy a deed, and then you go find one of the set plots (are they all set plots you have to build on?) and then you have it for a set time, and you pay taxes ever 72 hours or something?

2. Is housing useful, I notice in the 2nd free expansion they are adding personal banks, but how are they now?

3. How is exploring, I love exploring.  Finding those little things that only a few people have seen, or stumbling across some awesome landscape.  So is it fun and rewarding?

4. Is the game an open world or is it zoned (Aoc)?

5. How long will it take me to have reasonable assets to counteract loss, and how long will it take me to be able to defend myself from such loss. (I.E. massive gankage)

6. How is crafting, is it simple like WoW, or is it a more complex system like EQ2 or even what MO claims to have? And how important is it?

7.  Can anyone show me some info on the 2nd free expansion, Ive looked and didn't find much except an estimated end of October release date, obviously past.

8. Lastly, what is your personal experience with the fun factor?

Thanks in advance, and its fine if you cant answer all, any answers are greatly appreciated!

EDIT : 9. Graphics, how are they, Ive seen some pretty amazing screen shots of this game, while others look like crap.  I plan to play on max, so comparisons to other games, or screenshots showing max will be helpful.

10. Botting / Hacking, how bad is it, and will it greatly affect my playing?

1. How is the housing like in darkfall, from what I understand you find or buy a deed, and then you go find one of the set plots (are they all set plots you have to build on?) and then you have it for a set time, and you pay taxes ever 72 hours or something?

Housings main function as of now is a way to transport across the map. Once you own the house to can teleport to it at anytime from anywhere. All houses are in villages which are you can capture as a way to raise money for your clan, clans can fight for these and that is what they were intended for but, you can make more money doing other things so they aren't that contested. You can also add house decorations and some useful items but they are very expensive and would take substantial play time to get use out of these.

2. Is housing useful, I notice in the 2nd free expansion they are adding personal banks, but how are they now?

I explained how useful they are in your last question but do not worry, the expansion is also adding player owned vendors at the villages and personal banks which should greatly increase the popularity of using the village system.

3. How is exploring, I love exploring. Finding those little things that only a few people have seen, or stumbling across some awesome landscape. So is it fun and rewarding?

This is one of the most underrated parts of darkfall, the world is gorgeous and there are almost endless places to explore. It is 100% hand crafted and the largest of its type in the MMO world.

4. Is the game an open world or is it zoned (Aoc)?

Completely seemless, love the way its designed, you have no idea when you are crossing into different zones.

5. How long will it take me to have reasonable assets to counteract loss, and how long will it take me to be able to defend myself from such loss. (I.E. massive gankage)

Recent patches have greatly reduced the grind, coming changes in the expansion will make it so you require even less grinding to become competetive. PvP viable gear can be easily farmed and is easy to replace.

6. How is crafting, is it simple like WoW, or is it a more complex system like EQ2 or even what MO claims to have? And how important is it?

Crafting is pretty straight forward but takes a long time to be able to make money doing it. However, crafted counterparts to all the weapons are always superior. Enchanting is fairly complex however.

7. Can anyone show me some info on the 2nd free expansion, Ive looked and didn't find much except an estimated end of October release date, obviously past.

We received word from the devs that the expansion was pushed back to mid november because they wanted to add a few new features they werent planning on. If you go to the forums and check out some of the threads in the community spotlight forum you can find out information on it. If i started explaining it to you now it would not make much sense but you should take my word that every patch so far has improved the game and this is looking to be the biggest and best patch/expansions yet.

8. Lastly, what is your personal experience with the fun factor?

I fucking love this game, it is not for everyone though, it was never meant to be.  If you are looking for player skill intensive pvp and massive clan on clan warfare this is THE game for you

EDIT : 9. Graphics, how are they, Ive seen some pretty amazing screen shots of this game, while others look like crap. I plan to play on max, so comparisons to other games, or screenshots showing max will be helpful.

I dont play this game for the graphics by any means and I always have them set on low to increase my performance as 100 on 100 battles in a seemless world like darkfall can be pretty intensive on my fps but they honestly are not bad for a game thats been in developement since 2001.

10. Botting / Hacking, how bad is it, and will it greatly affect my playing?

There are hackers and its a pain in the ass for some but it has not affected my game play and to my knowledge I have never been killed by a hacker, that I know of, they can be sneaky. If you would have asked the botting question two months ago I would have said you need to macro to compete and some people will tell you that you have to but it just is not the case after a recent patch that increased skill gains. Any issues from this are worth it because there just arent any good MMO's besides this game atm.

nice first post shookums 

Just trying to do my part to bring another darkfaller into the game so I have more people to kill. ;p

I kind of enjoy crafting in darkfall. even tho its really simple and repetitive, which crafting systems aren't? plus crafting is useless in most games where its actually extremely useful in darkfall. this is because of full looting, item decay to destruction and the fact you can craft nearly everything.

dont forget that all crafted items are superior to the mob dropped counterparts

Originally posted by shookums

 

 

 more people to kill. ;p

this is a good reason to get ppl in darkfall

Originally posted by shookums

 

 

Just trying to do my part to bring another darkfaller into the game so I have more people to kill. ;p

This is the reason why there aren't that many characters to kill. ;)

This game is about killing people and there are more than enough people playing for me to have a lot of fun.