Darkfall CounterPostcard: The empty server

Well, well, yesterday's post was a sign of today server's demise. The server has been down for hours and it's not likely to come back online until sometime tomorrow. An MMORPG is a complicated beast with a thousand vital organs and anyone can fail at any given time. Unfortunately, we players only see the 4 red offline simbols that mean we can't play the game. I don't really know what happens but I trust Aventurine is doing their best so this never happens again and to improve server performance (a key component in the player's enjoyment). From this humble blog I'd like to send my best wishes to any technician involved in repairing the server and godspeed for the responsibles fo the next and late expansion. The people might revolt if they're too hungry! ;-D

Darkfall Postcard 8: The Empty Inn

All Agon is waiting for the coming patch to crawl out of their holes and start repopulating the 5 continents once again. Unfortunately, the awaited patch will not implement more NPC so this beautiful Inn will remain empty and lonely for some time. What a pity...

Cap and caps and caps...

In this post from Syncaince blog, I've discovered that Final Fantasy XIV will have an experience cap. This means that players will earn a limited amount of experience per week. I also agree that's a good thing. As said in the Hardcore Casual blog, players can become true robots when there's a potential prize to win. In Darkfall, there's no cap and a player will probably need his whole life to max each and everyone of the skills and stats. So, lots of Darkfall players dedicate a big part of ther gaming time to train some skill or spell or whatever. Sometimes, it's dificult to find players to play with because they are all macroing something or farming X mob because they need Y material to skill up the Z skill.
When I started playing Darkfall I saw it very clear, a soft cap or good skill decay system is what Darkfall needs to reduce the Grind and to let players play for fun instead of playing for the numbers.

The wind barely blows

Well, well, I got a som R40 knives to buy but besides that there's not a lot to do in Agon right now. I'm still thinking on how to do the SGs interviews and today I've seen a thread on Darkfall's Forums that confirms me that my Politics Section in this blog might be very useful if I find the right way to do it. The thread is here (Create a forum for Sg's) and Frank from SUN asks for a subforum where only SG can write and read to reduce the amount, the very big amount of forum trolling. As someone else has said, that forum could be trolled with ease and I think that everyone should be able to read what's post in there but I don't dislike completely his suggestion. Actually, what I want to do in this blog is something similar, I'd like to build an embassy where SGs can truly discuss about politics without the extra hundred troll posts. I'm not gonna open a forum in this blog but I'm gonna try to do something that can work like that. We'll see...
Keep playing!
And convince some friends!!

Toad's Tongue: First Sight

Well, I've decided to start with a small part of my take on Agon's Politics. This first section will be called Toad's Tongue because that's how I feel when I try understand what's happening in the rest of Agon. I could told you a lot of things of Lux Arcana but I got only very few things to say about big wars and conflicts. Nevertheless, I will.
In this, my first Toad's Tongue I'd like to describe the current status of Agon EU1. Right now there's a big war that many people in the forums (The Big Embassy) are calling World War III. I think that the first or second involved the famous Hyperion Alliance but I'm too young to remember those things. Two big alliances are figthing said war: Zagenda and ANG FRISST KINDER (I will use the names in Urme as it's the more reliable source).
In Zagenda, the two most influential clans are zZzZz with Xzyzz zyXz (aka Foggen from The Big Embassy) and SUN with Tsalarian Crystalshard (although I've always considered Frank Sinatra to be its leader); other clans in the alliance are Nadirian Hordes (payed mercenaries I believe), The Fremen Knights and Aesir (who returned back to EU1 after a long absence).
In ANG FRISST KINDER, the two most influential clans are ANG with Razor Ramon (and KRANKONE HSLER as defacto leader) and Devil Preservation Society with King Kokane; other clans in the alliance are The Black Company, Mental Disorder, Le Clan Neanias and French Kiss.
I really don't know why has this World War started but I guess there's no simple reason and probably you'll find every reason needed in TBE. zZzZz, SUN, ANG and DPS, as four of the most influential clans in the server, have always had resentments and conflicts. Some say this WW is due to the low population the server has been suffering during the summer and it might have something to do too.
I'm not completely sure about this but, from what I've been reading in TBE, I think the Zagenda alliance is winning the war partly because of SUN joining the alliance recently. But I really don't care about any of the two sides, the only clan I know, Nadirian Hordes are there as mercenaries and this war is going to help them for sure, so I'm happy for them. I only hope, those apocaliptic voices that say "this war is gonna make people leave the game" are very wrong.
From the little swamp, the Toad says: Enjoy the game!

Friends will be friends

While I think how to start the Politics Section, I want to post a little picture of some clanmates getting ready to roll at clan bank. In this game, more than any other I've played before, you need to have some friends. That's why the majority of people joins a clan as soon as they can. Some very brave players wander the land by themselves but unless you have a good toon and you are a good player you are going to suffer A LOT. For me, that's actually a flaw. For this game to grow bigger it needs to be more solo and casual friendly. Right now, every other player, even a blue one, is seen as the enemy when he should be your ally, at least temporarily. In this game, when two players meet eachother, 99% of the time is to kill eachother, 0.5% to ignore eachother and the 0.5% is to help eachother. Darkfall needs a better alignment system that favors people helping eachother and a better chat system including Chat Bubbles to improve player communication. With those two things, Darkfall would improve quite a lot. Enjoy the game!

One step in politics

Agon EU1 is right now a very interesting place to live in even if it's kinda deserted. There is a World War ongoing and you only need to check Urme's Map to realize it. How did it start? Who are the main players behind it? Who's winning or losing? How big are the armies figthing? I know some of this answers but you need to pay close atention to EU1 Clan Discussion to discover what's really going on and I gotta say, it's not an easy task.
That's why I'd like to create a Politics Section in this, my blog. I'd like it to be an organized and weekly section where you can check the political status of EU1 and the main clans intentions or justifications in a quick look. I've written a post in Darkfall Forums to see what are the opinions of the rest of the players and, hopefully, to receive some good and useful feedback. You can find the thread in here.