Sandbox Interactive recently released one of the biggest updates ever for its sandbox MMORPG Albion Online. The Beyond the Veil update introduced a brand new type of content called the Mists, a new city Brecilien, multiple new types of armor, a new enchantment level, and a rework to the Roads of Avalon in addition to tons of other minor tweaks. This new content was highly anticipated by both old and new players alike, but did it live up to the hype?
New Gear and Tiers
One of the fears many players had about the Beyond the Veil update was that the newest gear enhancement level would cause gear prices to crash. Previously, there were 8 tiers of gear and 3 enhancement levels. A piece of tier 7 enhancement 1 (7.1) gear was equivalent to tier 8. With a fourth enhancement level, a tier 4 enhancement 4 (4.4) can now also be the equivalent of tier 8.
Theoretically, an abundance of enhancement 4 material could cause prices to shift to the tier below them because raw tier 5 materials are cheaper than tier 6 and so on. However, the materials required to produce an enhancement level 4 (.4) piece of gear are time-locked and displayed on the mini-map meaning that typically only guilds and not individual players are going to be harvesting them most of the time. This has made .4 materials so expensive that there’s simply no reason to buy them and other equivalent tiers are still significantly cheaper.
The only time this matters is for 8.4 gear, essentially tier 12, which is now the most powerful in the game. The thing is that this gear is so expensive that only the top players and guilds are actually able to purchase it and risk it in battle. Therefore, it’s having a minimal impact on content most of the playerbase is active in.
The other gear change is the addition of a new gear set for light, medium, and heavy armor, which includes a brand new helm, chest piece, and boots. The Feyscale (cloth) focuses on casting, Mistwalker (leather) has some unique mobility, and Duskweaver (plate) emphasizes crowd controlling enemies.
Each of these items brings something completely unique to the game, but the artifacts required to make them are only found on extremely rare bosses in the new Mists content. This has made even the cheapest versions quite expensive and most of the items have not found their way into the meta builds yet. My personal favorite item so far is the Feyscale Robe because its Wild Magic skill 3 different abilities that you can choose from: Ring of Fire, Storm Shield, and Frozen Fragments. The armor is both flexible and offers some of the highest damage base stats in the game.
The City and the Mists
The Mists is by far the most exciting part of the Beyond the Veil update. All around Albion, wisps will randomly appear on the map that allow players to teleport to the mists either alone or in groups of 2. Each area in the Mists is completely separate from any other area and you cannot party with other players (except in the Greater Mists where you can have a party of 2). In lethal Mists all players are automatically flagged for PvP and hostile towards each other. This creatures a sort of instanced Black Zone with a reduced level of risk because there won’t be any roaming guilds or large groups.
There are both lethal and non-lethal versions of the Mists and there are multiple objectives spread throughout each map. These will usually include a few monster camps that grant bonus Fame and Might, wisps that can be rescued, Arcane Spiderling, treasure chests, and resource nodes. Additionally, the Griffin, Veilweaver, or Fey Dragon have a rare chance to spawn and drop the artifacts needed to craft the new gear sets.
As players kill monsters and complete objectives they’ll gain reputation with the wisp faction. Once a player obtains 50,000 reputation they’ll have access to the new city Brecilien, which can be entered from portals in the Mists or Roads of Avalon. Brecilien is similar to any of the other major cities except you can only enter or leave from the Roads or Mists, which makes transporting gear or resources from there relatively risky. Additionally, players can build a second island in Brecilien, which can be a huge benefit to anyone who doesn’t use alt characters to farm multiple islands.
Finally, the Roads of Avalon received a few significant quality of life updates similar to ones the rest of the game has received over the last few years. The main focus was to provide more group content and better rewards. Now mobs will spawn and upgrade into stronger versions that provide more Fame and better loot and open-world treasure chests will spawn randomly. Additionally, Hideouts in the Roads can be declared as Headquarters, which provides more opportunities for guilds to live full-time in the Roads.
Thoughts and Moving Forward
In their current state, I find the Mists both engaging and rewarding but there are a numbers of flaws holding them back. Lethal Mists can be incredibly exciting with the possibility of being attacked at any time but not having to worry about getting ganked 10vs1.
However, the system is not necessarily working as intended and players are still whispering each other to group up and pick off single players. It can be extremely frustrating to start a fair fight and then have 2 or 3 other players jump on you just like in any open-world part of the game. Thankfully, there are changes on the test server that should reduce this, such as hiding players’ names and removing the ability to whisper while in the Mists.
Other issues within the Mists are that the most lucrative objectives appear on the mini-map no matter where a player is located. So once an Arcane Spiderling or treasure chest pops up, usually every active player will immediately rush there. This usually leads to everyone posturing around it, one brave soul completing the objective, and then everyone else killing him and then each other.
While this makes for interesting PvP content, it’s not very rewarding and only the last player standing actually makes any silver. This has also lead to an abundance of rats, or players who build their character to steal loot and run away. Another change on the test server is also attempting to deal with this issue by heavily reducing the range that Arcane Spiderlings appear on the mini-map. Additionally, they’re also planning to remove player death icons from the mini-map to reduce the likelihood of players who recently won PvP fights from getting instantly swarmed.
Despite my frustrations with the Mists so far, there are still safer ways to enjoy the content and get rewarded. At the moment, the Mists offer one of the most efficient ways to farm Might in the game. Previously, Might was typically obtained by completing content in the Roads or Black Zone or through lethal PvP activities like Hellgates. Might is important because for guild achievements, but it can also be lucrative by completing the weekly chest and season achievements that grant powerful battle mounts.
As a solo player, farming might was relatively painful and it took a significant amount of time to complete the weekly Might chest and season achievement track. However, completing objectives in the Mists can grant a significant amount of Might. Even the smaller objectives like killing enemy encampments can earn between 300-1000 Might while helping wisps or killing spiderlings can earn thousands.
While the Albion Online Beyond the Veil update definitely has its flaws, it’s a step in the right direction. Improving old content while adding new game modes is important to keeping the game fresh and the players active. New armor and enhancement levels will give veterans new items to grind for and hopefully shake up current equipment builds. The Mists has already made me more excited to login and I can’t wait to see what SBI has in store for Albion Online next.
