Originally posted by Tarka

Originally posted by AmazingAvery

Are in the works: forums.ageofconan.com/showpost.php

"That system will allow players a purely visual layer of equipment that can be used for display purposes rather than stat bonuses."
 

About time? I think so.

 

Perhaps, but to me there are more glaring issues that need to be dealt with.

Of course. But happy to know there are plans and considerations taking place for it.

Originally posted by Agricola1

In my opinion it would be worth a free trail, but to pay even for one months subscription isn't worth it. I think alot depends on the reasons you left the game in the first place, for myself those issues are still present (broken sieges and instancing with many missing features) but perhaps your issues were fixed?

I don't think AoC needs to be played 24/7 to get enjoyment from it, probably the opposite since after you hit max level it is essentialy game over (another one of my issues). Since siege warfare is an exclusive club that likes to play broken instances and compete in exploiting (another one of my pet peeves since launch) there is little else to do.

Since you say you've already played AoC at launch then you essentially still know what the game is like (although fanbois will deny this), just add a few more bugs and broken features with a liberal dollop of nerfs and you pretty much have it ... oh and don't forget the instancing!

Guessing is your forte!

OP. try the trial, form your own opinion, watch out for people who try to tell you what the game is like without even playing it for over a year. The opposite of what you are asking.

Is you're curiosity about the game worth a second look by doing a FREE trial. Sure at least you will know where you stand after.

Are in the works: forums.ageofconan.com/showpost.php

"That system will allow players a purely visual layer of equipment that can be used for display purposes rather than stat bonuses."
 

About time? I think so.

Always launch the game from Conanpatcher.exe

You also want to go to simpleconfig.exe and tick the verify/repair option and then give the game a go from the conanpatcher.exe

Hope works for you.

Originally posted by heartless

I would love a Dragon Age MMO, I'm completely in love with the game, but I kind of want a Mass Effect MMO first. I think that an ME MMO would be more epic. I mean it's in space and who doesn't want to play as a bad ass krogan?

I am with you on that opinion.

You think the Dragon Age engine could handle and mmo variant?

Originally posted by Rawiz

Originally posted by VultureSkull

Very Slow Mearure of updates is another thing i find baffling, AOC is the most improve MMO, beside Vanguard in my opinion, I challenge you to name another. And you say a very high measure of people leaving the game, in my experience people are now coming back to the game.

 

Okay, so in your opinion adding things that were expected for release means improvement? Well, I suppose I agree there. What about the fact that everytime new things are added, the game seems to generate dozens of new bugs?

On the "coming back" comment, I suppose you have somekind of evidence to back up this observation? Or are you just fanboying blindly?

I share the opinion too that not only has the game had things you might expect at launch put in (in a timely manner) but also nicely improved upon too.

And no it is not everytime a patch is added "dozens of bugs pop up" - I would expect some for sure. Take Ymirs Pass update, hardly and I mean hardly any issues whatsoever put on the forums at the time. I asked here for anyone had seen issues - 1 guy said about the DX update and another had issues with ATI's latest catalyst driver a the time. I am not saying there are issues, just that you check the updates ont he official forums and you will see if some crop up there is always a timely hotfix.

I dunno about masses of people coming back to the game I see a few new faces and read and hear some old people coming back - bit of a mixture. I don't see or can measure a month on month difference over the past 3, just seems the same to me. Thats only from a 3 server experience and not all 26 though :)

Moving forward 2 things to improve are smaller bit size updates (to cut down on those bugs and give a better impression the game is always receiving attention and secondly a dam crafting update..)

Originally posted by SignusM

Originally posted by arenasb

Originally posted by SignusM

, and no actual changing game world. 

 

What mmo has an actual changing game world?

Dark Age of Camelot, Darkfall, Asheron's Call... 

When the things you do in PvP turn out to not even change anything, and everything is wrapped up in a nice tiny little instance.... that does not spell MMO to me.

Well lets see the OP did clearly state:  " but at the same time I don't like FFA PvP, ganking, banding, corpse camping"

Many people at level 80 are awaiting 1.06 with proper guild renown and PvP towers in a meaning ful landscape for this area.

I would say I think lotro is equally as good as supported, on the flip side like the OP I think AoC has had better updates than WAR and VG in a similar timeline on developement.

If you go in to the game not expecting everything and taking it just as another MMO I think it leaves a clear cut decent impression after a short while.

I know when I go play another game, I do NOT have as decent combat experience as I get in AoC. On the flip side I crave for a decent crafting update for Conan. It needs it bad as the current set up (although improved) is not at the level it should be.

Originally posted by SirPaco

how can you not agree?

 

lol seriously, it's not like there is much room for debate.

 

A MMORPG needs to be populated, end of story. Otherwise, it's not a MMORPG.

I think the actual quote was has been floating around a while now. I remember reading it the first time and it was brought up here in 2007. Basically people kinda understood that they were trying to say that a close knit community is what they want to accomplish - I think it is worded wrong but I do "get" what is trying to be put across.

Originally posted by finaticd

Funcom is once again spining the truth but I don't think Funcom knows  what to do next.

 

 have a hard time believing that Funcom knows how bad their game is as they probably never played it but I know for sure Funcom knows how bad the game is doing so they should know better than to spin that stuff.  ALso, Funcom for reasons unknown to mankind, can't  the quality of AoC, but they can fix other stuff like merge servers. If people are on dead servers in a dying game they are likely to quit and since 3 of 4 players stoped playing in the lastfew months and servers were already empty 3 months ago.....can they really aford for anyone to quit?

 

The lack of care is great,,,,after the expansion fails don't bet on server mergers bet on server closures ;p

 

 

 

That made me laugh thanks. Comes across like a 5 yr old telling his teacher the "other kid did this and did this and did that and so I am righ nur nur"

Make believe...

The only parts that makes sense in my eyes, I'll reply to. That is if people are on a dead server then either they will re-roll or quit so either way just like the majority of mmo's out there. 2nd part is - for the last 14 months you have been saying fail and the game is still here.

Originally posted by SaintViktor

I got my copy today and I must say it is pretty epic. Probably the best rpg I ever played since Neverwinter Nights and Baldur's Gate. The comabt is fun and the storytelling is fantastic.

I like the music too and have to agree with what you say so far.

Music is reminding me of a mix between Conan and Guild Wars. Sound track is awesome.

Can wait to wear the Blood Dragon Armor

Yep realtemps is a good program for accuracy over speedfan.

V10 is not it is all it is made out to be. Your not going to have any issues with your PSU either :)

Originally posted by BizkitNL

Originally posted by Dawnsinger

http://daforums.bioware.com/forums/viewtopic.html?topic=699744&forum=135&sp=0

UK Dragon Age buyers appears to be getting shafted in lots and lots of ways:

1. UK Collector's Edition doesn't come with a map or tin case, and it is only sold at Game.
2. UK Digital Deluxe Edition doesn't come with the bonus items that're in all the other region's because they're exclusive to Game.
3. It's a large possibility that the Regular Edition buyers are going to get shafted by not getting Blood Dragon armour / The Stone Prisoner DLC. This would make the Collector's Edition the only one worth buying if the gamer's want to get DLC, too. Every other region gets them free.

If you've preordered it, I'd really advise you to post on there about you being pretty pissed off and maybe cancelling your preorder. This is a disgusting, underhanded business move by EA to fuck over UK gamers.

That is all.

http://www.direct2drive.co.uk/8076/product/Buy-Dragon-Age:-Origins-UK-Download

D2D seems to be selling it, though.

 

Yes they are selling it for the UK, but the UK version doesn't get:

3 exclusive in-game items
Bergen’s Honor: A massive helmet made out of dragonbone (+2 to armor, +25 physical resistance, +6 to attack)
Grimoire of the Frozen Wates: A special book that adds +3 to all attributes when read
Final Reason: A magical staff of immense power (adds to damage, spell power, and fire damage)

Everything else the same. Except the UK people are spending a couple quid extra.

I recommend emigrating from experience Dawnsinger, it does wonders.

Originally posted by GPrestige

First question: Do you work for funcom? If the answer is yes, it'd be awesome.

The reason I ask is because I have another question that you might be able to help me out with. I just resubscribed to the game and am loving it. It has changed drastically since release. However, I cannot understand why funcom refuses to add a new starting zone! This is one of the biggest drawbacks for any player in ANY mmo when they make alts. They have to do the same content over and over. Does funcom not realize that is a massive turnoff?

 

Why not with the Rise of the Godslayer do they add a new beginning area that people can choose from. It would be an absolutely amazing addition and if it is the same quality as tortage, then holy crap will I love to play through something like that again, just with a different story this time.

 

Hi there, first up I do not work for Funcom no, nor mmorpg.com. I volunteer for Funcom as an Advocate, and here too at mmorpg.com as guest writer neither positions are paid or rewarded with things like paid subs. I like to test the game, mingle with the community, garner interests and pass on feedback.

You and me both share the same thoughts on the starter area. The bad news is right now when the expansion comes it looks like people will have to do Tortage and then probably boat their way out of there to Khitai from which the expac will start from level 20 and up with new content from this level.

I really hope that Joel Bylos a nice Austrialian guy who I believe is the product guy for the expansion reads this and revisits the idea with Craig for the inclusion of a new starter area for the expansion.

I remember being at FC HQ in Norway in Jan 2008 meeting the devs (Joel included) but especially remembering talking with the world builders and concept guys. Initially in beta Tortage starter was extremeley narrow. You couldn't go much left or right to begin with and through community feedback leading up to launch they widened it quite a bit from what it was going to be. I watched a guy working on spreading the beach out, positioning trees and adding coves and so on.

Joel is a pretty good lore buff too. He was responsible for a lot of quests, dialogue and camera angles in the cut scenes.

What we need ideally is another starter area for the main game. And a new one for the expansion. I can't think of a bigger turn off than having to do Tortage again (even though looking at maybe 2days of play) just to get to the khitai experience. That will be a bummer when the expansion releases and will just make it a race with new people being caught up in that rush too.

The problem is what level of priority in the grand scheme of things does this weigh in at? There is a production timeline to try and stick to which includes other content inclusions to consider. With not having a starter zone for the expansion focus can be put in other area's. What is setting Funcom back is that they need to give themselves more flexibility to be able to incorporate things like this, instead of sometimes perceived outlook that "we have a starting area already, it is well crafted, work and will suffice". I have seen the change before in having something and improvements made and then releasing it, capability is definately there.

They need to get outside the box a bit and put themselves in the players shoes a little more ( I know they do quite a bit already). The point is Tortage can be as polished all it wants to be, but the result is still the same after 5 goes. It is something you want to move on from asap because the impression is created on the player via the content itself that there are bigger and better things to come. Therefore the player wants those experiences asap. This would be the first stumbling block to an expansion the need to go through one more time, thus giving quite a few people that negative initial experience, and unwittlingly cancelling out good from it.

I am in the crowd that appreciates Tortage for what it is. The experience, the single to multiplayer part, the voice acting it is all excellent but it really does not have much re-play-ability after a few goes.

I guess a good question would be; would you rather have the polish at later levels and more content there, or take the devs from that and create a new starting area. The reality is we should be able to have both, but at the same time there are business constraints and deadlines to consider. Not to mention if you pull others from the live game and updates inbetween to focus on a starting area, how impactful is that going to be? It is quite indepth when you think about and I don't think decisions like this are easy to make.

We don't have all the pieces because we don't do this for a living and are not the people with these metrics at hand.

We are part of an important piece though in letting FC know what we would like to see and have.

I think working more with the community in this area and the steps that FC has taken so far are awesome. I appreciate the suspense of what is to come but at the same time engaging with the players suits all our needs at the end of the day.

You know I have some lore thoughts for a new starting area, maybe we should create a thread with some ideas in for inspiration...

I suspect they may indeed have right now a bunch of new quests for Tortage to do to get you to Khitai on the drawing board.

Originally posted by knightee

Hehe, I just read the posting history of the OP. thanks for the tip :)

 

Incredible how some fear that others will try out this game and find out how good it is.

That's the Brummie spirit :)

Op did you bump into Litigator too? he tried it out again as well forums.ageofconan.com/showthread.php what is it with you guys?

If I was you I would at least wait for the whole of 1.6 to go out.

Originally posted by nihce

Denial Ain't Just a River in Egypt, Mr. Avery - you see, the problem is that it was predicted for 1.06 to hit live in november/early december. Now, we will maybe have 1.06 in late november on test - that means january at best for live

I can not find or remember any wording that will definately say the whole of 1.06 will be released on live in nov/dec. All I know is that there were predictions and in short term goals for this period.

forums-eu.ageofconan.com/showpost.php  July potential split patch up

forums-eu.ageofconan.com/showpost.php - no specific dates (july)

forums-eu.ageofconan.com/showthread.php - "We are working to have it there as soon as possible so we can start testing on the features and content for that cycle, the first focus will most likely be Guild Renown alongside some of the T3 encounters."

So and also in relation to what lord B was saying above; they listened and are looking at simmering down the patch so not all at once if this works better. This way you end up with Tier 3 update, Renown update, Border Kingdom - PvP Tower update, seperately. Making folks happier and giving impression lots is coming in chunks, rather than waiting a few month for one massive one.

The way I see it the servers have been updated 18 times this year so far. We have had 1.4 + 1.5 and looks like some of 1.6 by end of year. So 2.5 times of large patches including many welcomed things like a whole zones and several dungeons and group instances, city life revamps, massive class updated and refinement, and itemization update to name a few. Tons of stuff.

Guys I just want to point out that the expected date for 1.06 to come through was always November. This is something known for months now.

For clarification 1.06 is built up of lots of different things. From the looks of it parts will be broken up and released in installments instead of one huge patch. This will mean that they are still on course to release a portion of 1.06 by end of year to live servers.

FC have been quite clear in this area not promising anything and giving updates.

Things that have changed recently were job cuts at HQ, which didn't impact AoC in a massive way. I would think that the news there would be negligible.

So for those really wondering, nothing as far as 1.06 has changed from expected implementation to test servers for a few months now. Why does this bother ex players? I see no reason why it should as the information is not any different from what was said throughout summer at the conventions.

forums.ageofconan.com/showthread.php and EU forums-eu.ageofconan.com/showthread.php

Silirrion
Game Director
 

Letter from the Game Director - October

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

For this month’s letter I wanted to talk a little about the community, what we are doing to help promote the game and what you can do to help! There have been lots of initiatives that have started over the last few weeks and days so I wanted to take the chance and go through the new programs and what they can offer you!

Recruit a Friend…

With the update today and the launch of the veteran rewards we are also starting a new recruit a friend program. Linked in with the great new value subscription rates you can earn yourself some nice rewards and even free playtime by getting your friends to join you in Hyboria! You can find all the details over on your account page.

Opinions, Information and you…

The more eagle eyed amongst you will also have noticed that we have been doing more player surveys and questionnaires. This is something that we will continue to do on an ongoing basis. As we start to think of what future developments we can plan for your opinion is always important.

Information as to what is in the works and where we are currently at is also an important element of ensuring the community is up to date with the current developments. You will have noticed that the community teams have now started giving regular weekly updates every Friday with an update from the production team as well as any other relevant information.

There is also a lot of information that is mentioned in forum replies and in interviews and other articles but they aren’t always the easiest to find. To this end we are launching a new community driven section of our websites that we are starting testing today. You can find it here and discuss it on the forums here. This portal is designed to put all the latest news and updates, and indeed previous ones, at your fingertips in an easily searchable and categorized way. The community team is actively seeking your feedback on this new addition so make sure you check it out and let us know how you think it can be improved!

As a previous community person myself I see this kind of interaction as vital to the development of the game. We won’t always agree with any given opinion, but finding out what different types of player desire in the game is always worth finding out!

Volunteer Program…

I also wanted to give a mention to the volunteers in the Followers of Asura. Community support and the volunteer systems have always been a key part of our games. Having gotten to work with some of the volunteers down the years, and even meet many of them at annual gatherings and conventions I cannot express enough how much I personally appreciate the fact that these dedicated players give up their own valuable time to help our communities and support them. They really do a wonderful job and add that extra dimension to the online experience when they are able to provide assistance to their fellow players.

The Followers are also recruiting at the moment for new volunteers. If you would like to volunteer a little of your time to help the Age of Conan community you can follow this link, where you can also find a lot more information about the program and volunteering.

What’s coming up…

Of course there is also the game updates to consider! Now that the 1.05 cycle is drawing to a close we shift our attention to the next major update cycle. We are currently hard at work getting the first builds of 1.06 ready for internal testing. Providing all goes well there we hope to deploy the update to the test servers for your feedback and opinions within a few weeks.

We are now focusing on the new Guild Renown feature and the new Tier Three raids encounters. We will be running several initiatives one the test servers during the testing to ensure you get your chance to have your say!

Internally we have a major focus on the expansion content, and the first closed beta testing phases are in progress now. We are currently working through the second and third iterations of the first three playfields and all the content that comes with them. There is a lot involved in the expansion and you’ll start to see more glimpses of it over the course of November, in fact those sneak peeks have already started with the first set of exclusive new screens released to MMORPG.com, keep your eyes out for more in November!

We are also planning on revealing much of the Korean version of Age of Conan in November with our partners at Neowiz culminating in the GStar show in Busan late in the month. I am really looking forward to getting to visit our gracious hosts again and to get to show more of the game to Korean gamers!

The Spooky Season…

Last but by no means least I hope you are all enjoying the new seasonal content. I really like when we get the opportunity to drop some things in there that are just for fun. The new items and rewards for content like this might not have epic stats or be an ultimate status symbol, but they are every bit as appealing, at least to me, so hopefully they will also raise a smile or two as you have some fun with the night of lost souls!

See you in haunted Hyboria this weekend!
__________________
Craig 'Silirrion' Morrison
Game Director

 

Cleffy is right. I actually work for Canada's largest cable company. A lot of the DCT (digital cable terminals) we have are the same as the ones sold in the US.

For your PC to display HD stations from your cable company you will need a tuner. An external one like this or an internal version. Or something like this Hauppauge HD PVR from which you would have to connect your Cable box too. These will get you the premium HD stations and not just OTA ones like ABC CBS PBS and so on which you will find with AVerTV cards getting Clear QAM only.

I would recommend the Hauppauge and read through some on the comments from the link to new egg to get a better idea. Also check out http://www.engadgethd.com/  for some good resources and tips.

PVE: Wicanna / Set

PvP: Tyranny

RP-PvP: Cimmeria

Can't go wrong with those for population. Down to your choice of style of play.  I have characters on all apart from Tyranny and have good experiences. I can only recommend through experience here. Other servers I have friends on whol all enjoy their respect server communities too.

Originally posted by Hamrtime2

As far as patching goes, there are always problems after a big patch. The better companies quickly figure out what those problems are and usually have them fixed within 24 hours.

 

That is what happened today.