Novus War Journal Ver. 2.0

Hours before Episode 2

2007-08-28T10:49:00.000+08:00

If all goes well today, RFO-Ph will be on Episode 2, Giga 1.

This is RFO-Ph's much-awaited patch, simply because it introduces a lot of dynamics into the game, more than perhaps the other patches, and because one of the most vocal groups in the community - the Armored Riders - are hoping Ep2 is the start of the turnaround of their fortunes. Although Ryu and I believe otherwise (or that the actions of Saga, et.al., were responsible for the present woes of the ARs), many of the Riders hope that Ep2 will allow them to once again enjoy their class.

But then, Ep2 is also RF's most controversial patch, simply because the minute Ep2 goes online, we're now Free to Play (F2P).

Since the end of Open Beta (OB), RF players have considered themselves as a sort of elite in the Philippine MMORPG industry. This is because RF is supposed to be a "premium" game. Where a 100 PhP of load nets you a week's play in LUG flagship Ragnarok Online (and, AFAIK, so goes for Pay-to-Play (P2P) games), RF only nets you five (5) days. This game was considered expensive for the local MMORPG Community, and thus RF players were confident in the thinking that there was only a certain type of player in the game.

F2Ps here in the Philippines have a really bad reputation. I guess there is no better way to illustrate it than the term RF's (soon-to-be) veterans use for the expected large mass of players suddenly going into our little private preserve: squatters.

If there are any non-Pinoys reading this, the term "squatter" is a very derogatory term pertaining to one of the lowest levels of the socioeconomic spectrum. "Slums" does not even capture the essence of the perception the general public of the Philippines have over one who is "squatter." Generally, you are not only dirt-poor (with all its derogatory connotations), but you are also devoid of ethics, morals and even the most basic sense of urbanidad.

The situation in RF as LUG released the news of the game going F2P was akin to members of an exclusive golf club suddenly being told the facility was being opened to the public. You cannot imagine the stuff flying around the RF Boards during this time. It only petered out when people stood up, equally outraged at the elitist way several players viewed the coming P2P.

Originally, I thought F2P was bad; every Philippine online gamer worth his salt knows the kind of crap that can be found in most F2P MMORPGs here. And those of us who are "laking LUG"- the ones who played RO, got bored, then played ROSE - shudder at the memory of how a good game like ROSE Online tanked badly when IT went F2P.

But then... RF is that one game online gamers seem to talk about but never play because of its price tag. Many RF players have experienced having onlookers say how nice the graphics are, and their eyes gleam when RF players discuss the latest PvP. There are gamers who want to play RF but can't because of the price tag. It's like WoW: who doesn't want to go to Azeroth?

Also, there's a lot of new stuff coming in. Ryu practically drools at the potions we can purchase via the Item Mall. It's going to cost real money, but... what the hell, right? Like we're not using money now? At least, this time, there's... "immediate feedback" to the PhP we're plunking into this game.

The MAU gets tougher. Accretian specialists get deadlier with the new grenades. CP feed is a thing of the past, since you can't lose more than a certain amount of your CP in a single day. Chip Wars are expected to be longer because of a lot of new features connected to that most central of RF activities. Mining will be harder, but in my opinion the realism in this new "bleed to mine" feature will be worth it. As one Vanguard said, "mas hardcore na siya." Leon's Weapons - the so-called Relics - new BDs, and the friggin' monsters now have spells.

I remember when the news of Ep2 coming had just arrived. I was at LUG to fix a problem with my account when I ran into GM Garamond. Boss Gara knows me from the Experimental RP Scenarios over at Altrax, and because I'm an active "Boarder." The first thing Teh G said to me was, "your class is going to rule in Ep2!" That's because Elemental defences are much reduced come Ep2. And I am, after all, an Archmage. With GM spells.

But best of all... the Anima are now Level-capped.

There is justice, after all ^_^

I probably won't be able to login until later tonight. Hopefully, Ep2 will be up then. And we'll finally know if the long wait has been worth it.

Asa sa Isis

2007-08-03T02:56:00.000+08:00

Ok, let me level-off here: I have Corite friends. Elendia is a very, very good friend of mine, and Melai (the other half of Inokeichi) is also a friend, so is Sylph, Synbios and CrystalViolet. And let's not forget Mamu, of course. I deeply respect former C-Nex Board Archon GoddessRylai. Kaira is one of the people truly special to me IRL.

But even given that, I really, REALLY, would have to say that of all the Races of RF, it is truly the Corites who, because of the goddamned Anima, require so little skill to engage their enemies in combat.

I mean, look at it: every engagement between equitable power levels of the Bellato and Accretia is no sure encounter. There is much weaving, thrusting and falling-back in the formations, and when an engagement happens you come to appreciate the sheer skill of the pilots as they let their abilities fly in their favorite combinations.

But after GU4... Guh.

I remember that time I turned level 40. This was at the tailend of Gu4, before the staff nerf, before the Anima boosting. LadyYvonne of Unforgiven was a constant thorn on my side, particularly, since that player almost always encounters me when "she" (she nga ba talaga?) raids. By the time I was 40, the Corite was probably in the mid-40s range.

To top it all, LadyYvonne was a Summoner.

So there I was, a new Archmage on solo patrol at Anacaade, ECO's favorite stomping grounds. Suddenly, I felt lag in an otherwise smooth gameplay. Any veteran of the Second Novus War knows what that means, so I pan my camera.

Sure enough, there was LadyYvonne, gleefully running up to me with her pet Isis in tow.

By this time, an encounter with what we in ECO call a "smart Corite" - a Cora who debuffs first rather than rely on the sheer hitting power of a Summon-Force combo - reminded me that I should not be a munchkin, even though that was partly the underlying philosophy of my class.

So, in what is probably my first recorded Lockdown, I showered LadyYvonne with debuffs while ocassionally showering her pet Isis with AoEs.

Sure enough, the Isis fell (this was pre-GU5, remember?), so Yvonne did the next best thing: she brought out her Hecate. Three or so AoEs later, the Hecate was down. Since I was beginning to make her pots spill, Yvonne then brought out her badly wounded Isis again, and two AoEs later it was down again. Hecate up, Hecate down. Isis up, Isis down.

Eventually, the fanatic probably realized I couldn't kill her yet she couldn't kill me. I was putting her in Lockdown, so regardless of her equipment she couldn't bring the Corite advantage in Force to play (and since the Anima were coming out almost-dead, I realized Yvonne was a cross-classer!). Additionally, her Summons just kept dying. She waved at me and I thought that was it.

I forgot there was a reason why the Unforgiven are in ECO's Kill-on-Sight (KOS) list: When I turned my back, thinking the duel done with her wave, I was suddenly showered with debuffs and the Anima. Dead archmage.

Still, pre-GU5 and after becoming an Archie, I rarely feared the Cora. I could do battle with a Summoner one-on-one, or rather one-vs-two, since a fight with a Summoner is never a fair fight with that LightForsaken anima always in tow.

I don't fear them now - sus, far from it! - but it really is just uber irritating the way they seem to flaunt the bloody things.

Our - meaning ECO's - thinking when we heard the ups to the Anima was that in a sense it was necessary. Before all this, every CW seemed to be a battle only between the mechanical might and numbers of the Accretians against the combined-arms philosophy and tactics of the smaller but feisty Federal Army of the Bellato. Most of the wins of the Holy Army during this their "dark age" were kill-steal wins, or when the Accretians decided we Bellato were getting too cocky and would contract with the Corites for a combined assault on BCC. The boost the Anima received not only revived a community even we thought was on the verge of collapse but allowed the Cora to become a force to reckon with. Contrary to the "imba"-sayers, we in ECO maintained that, "a way can be found to counter the new power of the Anima."

I won't dwell on the various "Elan-linked" accusations against the Cora here. What I want to simply point out is that CCR should really look into the design of the goddamned Racial speciality of the Cora. Because there is something wrong with the whole thing, when you get to think about it.

Consider the BMAU. Supposedly, it is the point of the Bellato spear, our most powerful weapon. But formidable as the BMAU is, its repair costs are prohibitive, and after the stupidity of our own Armored Riders turned their armor into tissue paper, a BMAU could be destroyed in SECONDS when a Force user - which is about, oh, 70-90% of the Holy Army? - starts cutting lose. Of all the ARs, only ECO Guildmaster Ryunaito and an elite few don't back down from a Corite Mystic, or a deployed Launcher. And even Ryu calculates first if he has enough money to cover repair costs before he dives.

And what about the Accretian specialty, the Launcher, and its critical component, the Siege Kit? The SK has a life: despite the vaunted superiority of Accretian technology, their SKs can only last for 1000 firings. After that, they go back and buy the damned thing from the NPC. No, their Scientists can't craft SKs. They can't even craft Launcher ammunition. There is also no better target than an SK-deployed Accretian, especially when you're an Archmage.

Like what I, xml and others in the Mystic Haven teach budding Federal Archmages, when an Accretian deploys his SK, DO NOT RUN. Debuff the bastard. Hit him with Defensive Cancellation, Suppress, Slow, Sloth, and Vulnerability for good measure. If you want, Blind the twit. Chug an Advanced Adrenalin Potion, sit back, and let your AoEs fly. How many tin cans have I... educated that it's really not in their best interests to deploy their SKs vs. Archmages?

But a Summoner?

God knows I've tried. I tell my guildmates that I've gone toe-to-toe with several and have come to the conclusion that, lag aside, I could account myself quite well versus one unless it's carrying a gold-wheeled Isis. My pots just can't keep up with that evil creature's damage. I do the old-fashioned Ctrl-lock both, debuff the Summoner and AoE the Summon till the latter dies, then give the Summoner a piece of your mind, in the form of a gigantic meteor if possible.

I find that I have developed an aversion to battling a Corite head-on unless I'm with my guildmates. Axelle and I once decimated a four-man Corite highbie party. There was that celebrated wipeout of Weng's first team and her 20k contribution point loss when the lowbie we were PL-ing got the last hit ("mga kuya, tama po ba to? Bigla po tumaas ng 10k cp ko...").

It's... There's something wrong somewhere. I once said that alone, I could battle either. Heck, I'm more scared of the Isis or the Hecate than I am of the Summoner! Seriously! As an Archmage, I think I know the power of the spells of RF - we Bellato and Cora get our spells from the same grimoire, after all - so I'm fairly confident about what I can and can't take. At level 42, with a hodgepodge of level 40 - 41 Force armors, I managed to withstand the attentions of the legendary Redhound, enough for the cowards over at Bellato Wharf to realize lowbie-little-me wasn't dead after 10 seconds and get the courage to gangbang Reddie.

One Summoner managed to kill a 4-man ECO party, simply because his Isis was level 50. I had the bastard on Lockdown; he was nothing but a bloody Refresh bot. But even as HnD was hitting his Isis, the Isis was hitting ME, and my potions couldn't keep up. When the sole Mystic of the party - me - died, it was a matter of time before the Corite got out of his Refresh bot-ship and pounded the rest of the team.

Weng brings a big party with her now when she raids, and its a frightening sight, because a normal 5-man party becomes a 10-being (5 corites, plus 5 anima) group when its the Corites we're talking about here. It takes a while, a lot of courage, and a lot of lost CP before Weng taps Weng23 for the warp back to their settlements.

I once ranted to Ryu that the problem was threefold: the Isis - let's not even go to the Hecate - deal impressive, neutral-Force damage, has a lot of HP (also a part of the upgrade of GU4 and 5) and loses nothing when it dies. Even worse, the bloody things cause major lag; enough of them, plus the BMAUs of the ARs courageous enough to respond, will make your screen crawl. Which is not a good thing when facing Summoners.

Sana man lang, di ba, that there was a cost somewhere to the Cora's racial specialty. The Corites crow in the Boards that its hard to level an Animus. The retort other Races give to that will only spawn a flame war so we don't usually say it. But you can see it in the large number of banned people on the Stockade, and where they committed the infraction. All those gold Isis, in so short a time... There was even this exasperated comment by one Bellato that it was an impossible situation when the Summoner was a lowbie but it was carrying a high-level Animus, since the Anima are not level-restricted, unlike BMAU parts and Launchers. Sure, Episode Two will correct that, but in my opinion the damage has been done.

Is this a rant? Maybe. We in ECO pride ourselves in ranting little, especially in public. Its said that when a particular ECO member rants about his specialty, its a serious matter.

Maybe I am ranting. Overpowering due to level, equipment and racial ability is, in my view, a feature of WoW, not RF. There are trade-offs to the Racial specialties of the Bellato and the Accretia. We possess formidable weapons in the BMAUs and the Launchers. But these cost something to deploy, whether in the dalant-heavy repairs and paper thin armor of the MAU, or the immobility and cost of the Launcher-SK combo.

What does it cost the Corites to deploy an Animus?

If any Corites manage to read this, then prove the title wrong; I will duel with you, but leave the Anima out of this. Let's fight as Force specialists. If the Cora are not dependent on the power of the Isis, then fight me without calling on DECEM's "angels" for fire support. I don't care for the disparity of our equipment: I will fight even a level 47 Corite Summoner who is equipped with an SI Hora Staff just to see if, truly, they depend on the Anima for their strength.

Otherwise, everytime an Isis and its pet Corite - oh, its the other way around? I'm so sorry, I thought the Isis was the master since it does most of the work, anyway - take me down, it won't impress me, since two-versus-one, especially when you have no known defense against the one other than killing it, has never been fair, nor truly indicative of power and skill.

"You want to go back to Novus?"

2007-07-23T01:56:00.000+08:00

Haha. This should be one of RF's legendary lines. Now that I think about it, I have seen this line before.

I think it was at that last scene in Bismarck's epic, Peregrine's Rock, the one where Admiral Virae and Ensign - I'm sorry, Lieutenant - Jobarth were talking. The once-stammering ensign, now a Hero of the Federation, told the Admiral that he was requesting a re-posting at Novus. "You want to go back to Novus?", the Admiral asked, since, as a Hero, Jobarth could have his pick of assignments. As to his reason, I suggest you just read the epic by clicking at the linkie above, hehe.

The question is relevant to me in the sense that, given everything that's happened to me in RF - both as a player and as a person - I found myself asking it quite a lot at the early part of the year, especially as the kuya introduced me already to World of Warcraft. And there's the work. OMFG, the work.

Why stay? Why go back? All those bugs! All those buggers! All those munchkins and neanderthals! And let's not get to the delay for Episode 2!

Because... and maybe this is just me, mind you, but...

It's the PK...

Ok. Call me psycho. Call me a friggin' bloodthirsty excuse for a gamer. But, dammit, this is a MMORPG that actually encourages PK. It wants you to go out and kill people. Its main everyday event - the Chip Wars - are nothing but an excuse for its gamers to do massive PK!

Like I said during my interview at the New Worlds Alliance thing, you don't play RF so you can traipse around and enjoy the scenery; go to Flyff if you want that! Nonononono: you go into Novus because you want to KEEEEELLL.

Hah.

Actually, its much more complicated than that. I mean, my server in WoW is Bleeding Hollow, a PK server. I've killed players there. I've gone out of my way to hunt players there (especially after a Horde player messed my PL by killing me. Ah ganun ha? If only those Horde I killed after could understand me, I'd tell them, "sorry dude, but blame your friend. He killed me."). I've engaged in multi-player battles there.

But... there's something missing.

How does one explain it? How do you tell a non-RF player the thrill of CWs? Of the... excitement you feel while waiting for a massive Event to start? How do you illustrate to them the blood pounding in your ears as you duel with players from another Race, the sheer... pleasure in seeing them, especially if they're more powerful than you, kiss the ground (or lie down in a very uncompromising position, in the case of the Cora)?

Our targeting system sucks; unlike in WoW, you have to drag your cursor over to the target and click them. Which is, in my opinion, one of the things that make Summoners imbalanced (or "imba", in RF slang), because the targeting "square" of a Summoner's Anima is so big you click it rather than the Corite. When key to defeating a Summoner is Locking Down the Summoner and slowly killing the Summon.

Play here in the Philippines is truly unequitable. So many of the top players and guilds have pilots to keep training their avatars 24/7, and some engage in PhP, or real-money trading (RMT). They hog the Pitbosses, which are the source of some of the best equipment in the game. Heck, our top guild in Bellato Nexus owns both of the massive mining units that are the only source of +4 Ores. Most of the time, I and my guildmates have to battle uber-equipped, uber-leveled enemies.

But I still go back. I still play. Heck, I'm stuck at level 45 because (a) its so boring to grind, really, and (b) its really so much more fun to PK in RF than anything.

Do I go about killing lowbies? Hell, no! I prefer battling people close to my level or above. I love a challenge, you see. I only massacre lowbies after some munchkin disses me.

I mentioned in the first post one encounter I had in Ether. It was some time since I last played, and I needed to go up the bloody ice-and-blood-covered island in the sky to replenish my potions. And because you don't go up and down immediately (at 214k per ticket? No way!), one has to "farm" - meaning, kill monsters, get their item drops, and sell them once enough have been "farmed" - to make the trip worth it.

I decided not to go through one area in order to avoid all the bloody PKers; I wasn't in the mood to kill people at the time. So I went left, to go through the "BRS" route. Lo and behold, some stupid Accretian was trying to PK another Bellato. And he's higher ranked than me, too!

As one of the oldest players in Bellato Nexus, and because of my guild, I have to engage him. And as a testament to my being rusty, it took me a good amount of time to react to the tin can. Yet, perhaps lady luck was smiling at me that evening. Or maybe that Accretian was a new player and didn't know several things about the game. Because he did the worst thing any tin can can do against an Archmage: go Siege Mode.

One Vulnerability, three GM-level AoE spells, and one Force Impact later, the Accretian was face down on Ether snow.

Heh, even I was surprised at the damage. The tin can's HP bar went less than 1/2 when my GM-class Meteor Swarm connected...

The other instance that for me defines RF as a PK game was just last Saturday morning. It was already three and I wanted to sleep. But there was a report of a massive raid, led by one of the Corite legends, Asheron. Wanting a challenge, I and my guildmates moved to intercept the raiders.

Little did we know, he was carrying two full parties of level 50s.

And the lag, to top it all, was horrible.

Ok. That was no contest. Level 50 Corites. Plus lag. Really bad combo. No one, least of all Asheron, was to blame for my two deaths. Perhaps if my guild was at full strength, we could have done something, but even our commander, Ryunaito, conceded that we just lacked the power to match Asheron's team.

So I logged off at 3:30 a.m.

An hour later, I was logging in.

I couldn't get the bastard off my mind. So what if he was level 50? I've faced the legendary Redhound and he, one the best mystics of the Holy Alliance of Cora, ended up dead. And I was level 42 at the time. His SI Hora Staff, his GM spells, his very Corite-ness and level, didn't help him as I Locked-Down his avatar. A few minutes later, all the highbies cowering at Bellato Wharf realized I was still alive and Reddie was trying to run away. Three BMAUs gave him a beat down he won't forget.

So I logged in. Chances are, Asheron wouldn't be around anymore. But I wanted to clean the stench of Anima blasts and Zealot spittle from my Bellato uniform with Corite blood.

Minutes later, I was jogging off to the Corite settlements to PK. Three of them managed to intercept me early on and killed me. Took them all of five minutes, too. I came back, and killed their leader just outside the settlement.

I remember being killed THREE TIMES by this lousy braggart in WoW. Somehow, that Blood Elf hunter, who was one level below me, could do stuff like flit around the field. I couldn't tag her, and traps being laid so quickly by her kept my pet - I was also using my Hunter, Raiya, here - from tagging her while hers kept hounding me. She could see me too, even as I used the Night Elf ability to hide.

I never hunted that player down. Neither did I hunt Horde players after. There's something with WoW PK that isn't... satisfying. Like I told Mai - the veteran Accretian player Morrigan - in WoW, level discrepancies are too much that you can't hope to stand up, one on one, against someone 3-5 levels higher than you.

In RF, even a lowbie could kill a highbie if the highbie wasn't taking care.

Do I want to go back to Novus? Sir, yes sir! I have a long list of people to frag, now that we're all stuck at below 50. God help them when I start hunting them down for real, wehehe...

New Beginnings: Novus War Journal Ver. 2.0

2007-07-17T15:19:00.000+08:00

And there are times I REALLY hate my memory-loss problems. And the new setup by Google.

Since I'm having problems accessing my original Novus War Journal, I decided that, instead of going through the motions of resolving it, I'll just make a new one.

And here it is.

Frankly, this is going to take some work. For one, Blogger has changed a LOT from when I started dabbling seriously in blogging. In another area of concern, I don't play RF as much these days due to... various reasons.

But, well... the thing is I STILL play RF. Rianos is level 45, decently equipped, and just killed a higher-ranked Accretian over at Ether two weeks ago. Solo. That guy must be a new player and doesn't know me. Haha. Imagine deploying your Siege Kit on an ARCHMAGE. And THIS Archmage.

Anyway, story for another post.

So... forgive the bleakness of the blog for now. I'm at the office so I can't tweak it as much as I want to, but I'll do what I can when I get back to the house PC.