How I hit 50 (And what I've been up to since then!)

The night the 1.3 updated dropped for Rift I managed to ding max level, 50. Interestingly enough I did it while trying out the new open world PvP quests. That night the quests directed everyone to Stillmoor for some random objectives along with a requirement to kill 25 Defiant players. While I recorded much more of this fight, it is available on my Youtube channel, I took this small snippet because I managed to reach max level after about one hour of fighting.






Good times that, the music coming through the background is from my Grooveshark stream, at the time I had no idea Rifts built in video recorder would also include it. Got my first copyright violation from Youtube over it ;)

After I leveled you can see my happy happy joy joy reaction with my guild mates over it. Even though I was not able to get to 50 before 1.3 I am still happy because I got to ding while being one of the first to enjoy the new open world PvP.

Since then I have done A LOT of rifts, Daily Raid Rifts, Daily Expert Rifts, Crafting Rifts and just running around closing Rifts. I know I should be grinding out Teir 2 gear so I can get raid ready but I am just having to much darn fun ^_^

I think once I max my reputation with the last two orders I will buckle down and just concentrate on grinding out some good Tier 2 gear. My guild, Virus is going to want to start raiding soon I can feel it. We've managed to pick up quite a few level 50's the last few days, some of whom are already geared out after running Tier 2 dungeons for awhile.

On the menu for tonight? The Daily Raid Rift is a water one in IPP so I am hoping I can convince my guildmates to take a small break from dungeon grinding and come with me :)

End Game - Where the real playing starts.

What a blur of a couple weeks it has been! I managed to hit 50 of course, though I did it the night 1.3 dropped. Just could not get it done before hand. Speaking of 1.3 the world event has been a blast so far. Lot's of new daily quests to do, at this point Phase 2 is going on and the second set of dailies are in full swing. Judging from the length of time between Phase 1 and Phase 2 the next Phase (3) should be here any day now.

Now, end game... What a complete change in tempo once you hit 50! I went from mindlessly grinding quests alone to constantly bouncing from one group activity to another with my Guild Mates. Between doing the daily Expert Rift or running down defiant with the new PvP dailies it's been none stop group fun. I have even managed to get my gear to a point where I can get into T2 dungeons. I can't tank them yet though, only run DPS as a MM/Ranger or Support as a Bard. But I must say I like how Trion did the dungeons.

Each dungeon is available in "normal" mode while you are leveling up, and each one has a set level range you can play in. Once you hit 50 and can enter Tier 1 or Tier 2 dungeons you are basically repeating the first ones, however they are extended with more boss encounters, in some cases extending the story lines as well.

There are only two things I have not had a chance to do yet, Raid Rifts and Raid Instances. Both require a few more geared out level 50's than my guild can field right now and getting into a PUG for either one can be very hard.

I have a video of me hitting level 50 however I have not had a chance to upload it to Youtube yet, once I do though you can expect to see it here :) Until then enjoy this nice image of Sanctum castle post 1.3

Sanctum Castle after 1.3 changes

Invading the Enemy

It finally happened, I went on a mad killing spree in Stonewood the other night. Many Defiant lost their lives (or at the very least had to respawn). My favored tactic was to come up from behind and send my Wolf at them while I flung arrows from a safe distance. The astute reader would know of course that I was in the low level Defiant zone killing "lowbies" a most dishonorable act.

The PvP die hards know though, you roll on a PvP server and this is what you need to expect. Some wild crazy higher level player just running up and stomping on you from out of nowhere. Well, this weekend, that wild player was me!

The festivities of that night culminated when a massive invasion started in Stonewood. I sat quietly and waited while the Defiant players fought back invasion forces and closed Rifts, then once the boss appeared I decided it was time to reveal myself. Of course being the ONLY Guardian there I focused on attacking the boss instead of trying to get any more kills. I figured even if I was double their level they would dominate me through sheer numbers at that point. I even managed to capture the boss fight ^_^







While I did participate in the fight I was not awarded an achievment for beating him :( Oh well, I still enjoyed myself and managed to get away without getting mobbed by the horde.


Another interesting video I took over the weekend was during an invasion in Moonshade, once the boss spawned everyone raced to him and began taking him down. The best part was a rather large army of Defiant players came as well, you can see everyone kind of popping shots at one another through out the fight. And look for the moment when I realized I could use my AoE skills and damage the Defiant tanks as well. Afterwards of course a rather fun fight broke out between both factions, good times all around I'd say!






End of Weekend Level - 42

Ding! Level 40!

As anticipated I managed to hit level 40 last night! YAY ME! Of course the first point of order was to purchase a new (faster) mount. I opted to purchase one using the Favor I accumulated playing PVP, 13k Favor vs 35 platinum. My choice was limited to one "style" however I cared more about moving faster than I did about looking pretty.  One of the draws to an MMO is earning new gear and I must say I grabbed that carrot pretty hard last night.

After purchasing my new mount I made an expedition trip into lands held pretty tightly by the defiant. While I did gank some poor lower level player (mid 20's) for the most part I just rode by people opting not to fight and just enjoy the thrill of being in enemy lands. I managed to make it just inside of Freemarch before I had my first rude awakening. NPC Guards inside Freemarch auto crit for over 5,000 damage. Up until that point I rode past them without incident, however once inside Freemarch that all changed. The first one I rode by one shot me and that was that.

I am planning another foray into Defiant lands tonight, this time I believe I will record some parts of it. There will also be more blood split of course ^_^  Last night was about how far I could get, tonight will be a full on one man invasion! While part of me feels slightly bad for the lower level's that I will walk on, the other part is giddy with the anticipation of open world PvP at it's purest. I will just have to remind myself that THEY picked a PvP server for a reason. And while I have no doubt that some of them will start to call for reinforcements my tactic's will be from Sun Tzu himself. I will attack without warning and from an unexpected direction. Quickly with drawl and attack another location at random.


Actively invading the Defiant controlled lands will probably set me back a day in my goal to hit 40 before the 1.3 patch lands on the 22nd however I am confident that I will still have plenty of time to make that goal while having a little fun on the side.

To those Defiants who will die tonight, I salute you!

Trip to Meridian Postponed

In my last entry I was thinking about going to the Defiant capitol of Meridian. Mostly for the fun of it of course, not looking to "grief" any low level players. Unfortunately I found out some rather disheartening facts, even though it would be in the Defiant starter zones I would still get flagged for PvP and the NPC guards would automatically attack me. Considering I am only level 32 at the moment I figured I should probably postpone my little trip until I get to a higher level and have a chance at surviving. :)

In the mean time I have been playing a lot more PvP while trying to finish up quests in Silverwood. I know the XP gain in Silverwood is little for me now, most of the mobs are grey to me, but it lets me enter and exit PvP with little chance for zoning back on top of some beasty with my pet dead and me not long behind them. I also believe there is an achievement for finishing all the quests in Silverwood so there is that to look forward to.

As for PvP I have finally decided that Ranger is probably the most fun, and rewarding, soul setup available to Rogues. Others might argue that Assassin's would be, but there is something extremeley satisfiying about KIT'ing a real person, unlike simply sneaking up behind them and bursting them down. Playing as a Ranger also affords me the chance to send my pet after someone while running away ^_^ Nothing worse than having some random razorbeast attacking you from behind is there?

Trion recently added an incentive to use the random dungeon finder, a chest at the end of the dungeon that awards you an item for your class. I must say this has reinvigorated my interest in the instanced dungeons. Even though I normally only do one dungeon a night I find myself looking forward to them more often.

I have taken some more videos of encounters with boss level monsters however I have not had a chance to upload them to Youtube yet. Hopefully my next post will be filled with some great videos of Telara.

End of day level - 32

Dungeons - Weeeeee!

Got into a new dungeon last night, Darkening Deeps. A friend and myself qued up with the looking for dungeon utility, it took a little while of course to actually get into a group, but once there it was a fairly fun time. Unlike my first solo dungeon event that went off without a hitch, no deaths for anyone in the group. This time the group wiped a couple times someone even left towards the end and we had to get another person (a tank) to help us finish the run. Felt kind of sorry for them since they cued for a whole dungeon run and basically showed up for the last boss.

I have also found the usefulness of the auction house ^_^ I have been making a tidy profit selling the lesser essences I find during major raids in Silverwood. Most of them sell for somewhere between 20 and 50 gold. While I have not really found a use for the standard coin in the game I am sure there is something down the line to spend it on, so I have been hoarding as much as I could so far.

Made it to the level 20 mark last night as well, so that meant a brand new PvP arena, and to my delight the first arena is still accessible just with a higher selection of participants. The new arena is a sort of control point game type where each side needs to take control of towers, each tower under your sides control grants your team points and which ever team gets to a set number of points first wins.

As with any PvP area in this game I am woefully inadequate. What I believe my problem is, is macro's. Or the lack of me using them. So while I have some free time in the next few hours I plan on searching high and low on the forums for help in setting up macro's in the game for fighting. (I also might make a switch to using bows instead of melee so I can stay ranged for a while ^_^ )

Harvesting the bacon

I must admit last night was one of the more boring times I have had in Rift, however that is not to say it was the games fault. I finally decided to take a 3rd profession, butcher, and spent the majority of the night in lower level area's getting my skill up.

There were of course some minor rift events and small invasion forces that needed to be repelled. And I ran around doing some of the daily quests. The biggest thing I did was the Realm of The Fae dungeon with a random group of people. It was a really enjoyable experience and the group I had was friendly an helpful for my first time. The only really "meh" part was I sat in Que for around 40 minutes while the game paired me up with 4 others. Truthfully I had forgotten I was waiting by then, when the pop up came it sort of surprised me and I was a little panicked thinking something bad was about to happen ^_^

End of day level ~ 19 & 1/2 (But butchering @ 50 ! )

The First Posting

Welcome to the Rift Diary blog! Here you will find daily stories, images, videos and some other fun things taken from my play time in Trion's new MMO Rift. I hope you enjoy your time here as much I as will enjoy writing for this blog.

I recently began playing Rift a couple days ago at the suggestion of a long time gaming friend. While he has extensive MMO experience, I come from a much more action oriented gaming class, the shooter enthusiast. Quake, Call of Duty, Medal of Honor you name it, if it has bullets or head shots I probably played it. However, I have always had a more adventurous side and love to delve into the occasional RPG. Diablo, Guild Wars, Elder Scrolls are some of my all time favorite Role Playing Games.

At my friends insistence I downloaded the 7 Day free trial for Rift and started up a new character. Sure I was going to be bored inside a few hours like every other MMO I have tried I randomed my character appearence named my self "SlackNoff" and set out.

First impression? WOW graphics are gorgeous! A slight bump with the default keybinding and I was on my way. (Turns out all those years with shooters I need A and D to be strafe not turn or I get motion sick really quick)

My friend, eager to show me the world, rolled a new character on the shard I had selected and off we went. While the game played exactly as I imagined it would there was something pulling me into the world. Nothing in the starting area seemed to really catch my attention though and I figured I would end up playing for 7 days and then just uninstall. I could not have been more wrong.

After rushing me through the starter area my friend said good night and logged off. I took a quick 20 minute or so rest and decided to have another go at the game alone and really get into the nuts and bolts of it. About an hour or so later things suddenly took a turn for the great! There I was completing my third or fourth "Go kill 10 widgy-jiggies" when all of a sudden the music and tempo of the game changed, little did I know at the time I was about to engage in my first Rift event.

The next few hours are a blur of fighting, leveling, learning and dieing. Somewhere along the way I had forgotten that I did not like MMO games and was genuinely having a great time. The next day I bought Rift through Steam and turned my account into a non-trial. Last night I joined my friends shard and started a proper character with one of my default RPG character names.

And so begins the journey of Guardian Qwicked, not just in Telara but here in the blog-o-sphere as well.