NCsoft has announced several changes to Lineage II with the upcoming Gracia update, which include the introduction of the Vitality System, and efforts to reduce 'the grind' and entry barriers to new players by allowing players to level faster.

One of our greatest assets is our fantastic group of players, who are a very dedicated, hardcore bunch that spend a lot of time and effort building up their characters and battling each other in big player vs. player (PvP) fights like castle sieges. However, the process of building and leveling characters can be a very long and frankly tedious process in Lineage II, which may serve as a barrier for letting a much larger group of potential customers to fully enjoy our game. While in the past the developers in Korea have continually built the game with this hardcore mentality firmly set, with the release of Gracia, they’ve completely changed the rules and made Lineage II even better and a lot more fun.

The big change is that leveling a Lineage II character is now extremely easier—and we say “extremely” in a fairly conservative manner. A normal new character that goes through the beginning quests can gain a few levels in just a few minutes, and players should find leveling now quite easily, all the way up to level 60 and beyond. Players that could spend several months of hardcore grinding to get up to a competitively high level will now be able to accomplish the same feat perhaps a month, if not less. They’ll also be able to get to their occupation changes a lot faster, so developing a selection of specialized characters is a much more realistic option. Building characters is now a lot fun and easy to do, rather than a long-term activity many players would rather do without. This drastic change in leveling is due to several factors.

Get all the details here.

Take a look at the Gracia Part 1 preview site here.