Sawed Off

So I managed to get access to the beta event for Rift, which is were I was all weekend. The game is interesting, however I only got to level 13 so I can't go into much depth. The graphics are good, between WoW and EQ2 I would say (WoW graphics I love, EQ2 graphics suck), the game play was smooth and you were directed to quest turn in spots, objective locations and new hubs very nicely. I played a cleric, which seemed like a cross between a D&D cleric and WoW shadow priest, and enjoyed it. I'm thinking I will get this when it goes live and play it as a change of pace from WoW when I need a break.

Are the rifts more compelling than just being wandering monsters? I have a friend who's a dev, but he's so secretive about it, I really have no idea.

I will admit the rifts I was a part of were all pretty much the same, but there were several different stages of each one, and you are able to join public groups. During the rift there are several objectives you meet as the event progresses. They were fun, but hopefully there will be a bit more to them eventually.

I was also in the most recent Beta for Rift.

I enjoyed the Rifts but my favorite part was the class system. Basically there are 4 callings. Each calling has 10 sub-class choices and you pick 3. I was a cleric and I picked shaman/druid/justicar. I ended up being able to heal decently, wear a mace/shield and have a pet. I kinda felt like a EQ Beastlord.

I have preordered the game and will be playing it for a bit. I canceled my WoW sub (but that is good until april anyways) and will come back to WoW after a couple content patches.

If anyone is going to go over to Rift, let me know so we can get on the same server. Maybe make a Walkers/Sawed-Off over there.

Just to re-iterate, I will still be playing WoW, just not much.

I'm giving this a shot. I'm defiant Aliarle on Belmont if anyone else is about.

Thinking bout getting Rift. Anyone playing? And how is it?

Got Rift for my birthday last week. Enjoying it so far. Seems to be enough quests to get you thru the levels easily without having to grind out xp, but like Clouseau I've only gotten up to level 15ish. The rift events have been pretty fun, and right now there are lots of world events going on. Just took out a big world event raid boss earlier today. Rift events, world events, warfront events, etc are easy to group up on, just run into the area of the event and you get button to join public groups. The game forms up the raids automatically if enough public groups form up in the area. I've just about finished gathering up all the mage souls for my defiant mage, except the pvp soul.

The different souls are actually pretty neat. You can have up to 4 different "specs" of soul combinations per toon, each with a combination of 3 souls. Wanna play a rogue class? They have a bard soul, assassin type souls, ranger and marksmen types, and blade class rogues. They even have a rogue soul that is made for tanking, and it's pretty good at it from what I hear. You like playing mage class, but sometimes wanna be a healer? They have a mage soul that can heal! I think it said there are 1300 different combinations you can create on the classes, of course some of them would not make a lot of sense, but you can try anything

I mentioned you can have 4 different specs, but even with just 1 spec you can switch your mind around. The class trainers will "reset" your soul points for you for a small fee, essentially zeroing out any points spent in the 3 souls you have selected for your current build. And any soul that has zero points in it can be swapped out for any other soul that you have "learned" as long as you're not in combat. For example, my current build includes an elementalist (pet class), pyromancer (fire nuker), dominator soul. I keep points in both elementalist and pyro, but no points in dominator. I still get the mez type ability of the dominator, but any time I want I can swap out dominator with chloromancer for heal ability, and don't have to visit trainer to do it. Of course, the souls get much more powerful as you invest points into them, which is why they also give you the 4 specs you can switch between.

All in all, I'm enjoying it, but would like to do some stuff with friends in there. Only so much fun going solo. I got Peek and Nix hooked up with the free weekend Allies event this weekend, so hopefully they'll have a lot of fun with it also. I don't think I'm ready to leave WoW over this, but if my budget allows I wouldn't mind going back and forth between WoW and Rift for a while.

- Maige

I think I might grab it tonight. It's on sale at steam today for 9.99 and 14.99 for the digital collector edition, kind of hard to pass up not to just try it out for a month. You guys still playing? What servers if so?

Seems kind of like a cheap WoW immitation. I should have known from the same guys that made Two Worlds, a cheap Oblivion immitation. Granted I haven't gotten any significant level yet to check out the end game. The way the game plays though, besides the Rifts, I feel like I'm playing Warcraft.