Over the past week or so, I've finally gotten back into a bit of an Eldevin groove(in between job hunting, and other things), and I've gotten around to exploring much of the new 40-45 content zones. I thought I'd offer some feedback based on my experiences.
General Impressions
HCS has put in a lot of work into this content update, and it shows! I had tons of stuff to do on my way from 40 to 45, and there were some really lengthy questlines to complete.
That said, if there's any issue with the new content, I'd say that you guys probably tried too hard to pack the new zones full of content! A fair amount of the new content feels very crowded, almost claustrophobic with just how many collection quests and monsters at every turn there are. Getting this much content in into your zones is a good thing, but give the players some room to breathe and explore, too!
As far as mechanics are concerned, it was a little disheartening to see all my hard-earned stats not scale very well with leveling, even to go far as to lose(slightly, but noticeably) DPS, haste, and dodge as I leveled. I understand that this is designed to balance things out for new equipment and the level 50 update, but it was still a psychological blow, even if I agree with the effects in terms of overall balance.
Zone difficulty was just right in most cases, albeit somewhat tedious(I like tedious, but not everybody does). There are a couple of notable exceptions, which I'll get into when I go over things zone by zone. A big problem with a few of the zones is that they're simply too crowded/frustrating to ever want to return to after completing the quests there. Since you guys put in so much work into this content, I want a reason to re-visit these areas now that I'm finished questing!
I still haven't tried the new dungeons, or the boosted-up ASV or world bosses yet. I'm sure I'll get to those eventually.
Overall, I really enjoyed the new stuff, with some caveats. I look forward to upcoming updates when they happen, but in the meantime, there's a lot to do!
P.S. The 'Ken' quest was brilliant.
Zone-by-zone:
Western Nasaroth(41)
First up is West Nasaroth. I'd already seen what this zone had to offer since it was completely available prior to the patch, without quests, of course.
This zone was a nice intro to the content for the most part, albeit a little generic. Also, this was the first of several zones in the new patch that had the player collect many, many items from monsters that were spread few and far between...in the middle of several other kinds of monsters, all of which were aggressive and would basically give you a really bad time. Having to claw my way through bears, wolves, and boars, just to get to the one deer in the corner who may or may not have one of the fifteen deer quest items I need, was easily the most frustrating thing about the zone(and other zones in this patch). Western Nasaroth wasn't quite as bad for this as some zones coming up, though. It also had (just) enough breathing space in between packs of monsters to make the zone enjoyable, and not a chore to get through.
Not much else to say about the place, other than it's an AOE class paradise but not so fun on the single-target classes. Enjoyed it though! Now, about that broken flight path...
Azraq Desert(42)
Okay, this was among my favorites for the new zones. There were a lot of quirky and fun quests, even though the four temples quest line was somewhat repetitive. There was also a solid mix of silly, easy, and challengingly difficult quests: for example, I was thinking I'd make short work of Sire Calgorn. Boy, was I wrong! He gave me a good ass-kicking. I had to come back at 44 to take him on solo, and after a couple attempts, finally managed to down him after a nail-biting fight. Definitely a highlight of the new content.
The other good thing about the zone is that it has a solid balance going. I still think it could use a little more breathing room, as getting ambushed by wolves every ten steps got a bit tiring for the first half of the zone. Still, I think that, map space notwithstanding, this zone you guys got really right for the most part.
Taranuka(43)
On the subject of breathing room? This zone has very little, and it detracts greatly from an otherwise very immersive zone, full of quests and stories: learning about the Agama and their ancestors was awesome, and there were more than a couple hilarious quests in Taranuka that had me choking on my iced tea when I read through them. Unfortunately, there's also a few too many collection quests here. After the tenth or so 'collect 15 of this item from this monster to take back so you can do another collection quest in the other end of the zone for more or less the same monster', I felt significantly less excited about the place. I know you guys are trying hard to make quest EXP viable for players to level on, but Taranuka pushes things a bit too far, in my opinion.
Taranuka also suffers greatly from the 'heterogeneous mixture of monsters' effect. I found myself purposely avoiding scores and scores of basilisks to get at the yetisaurs and sk'eels, because I had quests for yetisaurs and sk'eels and they only show up around basilisks. Then, six quests later, I needed basilisks, and not the yetisaurs or sk'eels, and repeated the process in reverse...
There are, in fact, only a couple of places in all of Taranuka that are fun to visit in terms of monster-killing: the raptor areas, and the graveyard with the wisps/ancestors, are about it. I enjoyed going through the place once, but I don't think I'd want to go back there the way it's currently set up.
Crystal Caves(44)
There's not too much to say about this place other than I really liked it. Great balance of amusing quests, fun enemies to fight, proper spacing/distribution of enemies, some backtracking but not too much, short and sweet area leading up to the dungeon, and some nice rewards. My only gripe with the questline here is [44] Relic Collection, where you have to escort the archaeologist into the caves: it's a bit difficult to position him properly to continue the quest steps at times, as he likes to jerk around and not actually stand in the proper spot.
Other than that, this place was great, and easily my favorite zone of the bunch so far. Great job!
Bochdaen Cathedral(44)
TL;DR of this area: I got turned into a human pincushion by Skeleton Archers, and it was awesome.
Bochdaen Cathedral at nighttime is an amazing experience: the systematic darkening of the sky, followed by the fog, and the spirits slowly darting around before the undead appear, is the coolest thing in Eldevin in terms of game atmosphere, bar none. Amazing job.
This place was tough with all of the snare-spamming cultists by day, and the hordes and hordes of undead at night. It was the good kind of tough though. I enjoyed this place a lot despite getting my ass kicked several times, had some eerie flashbacks to the old Kithicor Woods zone from the original Everquest. Damn spooky place to be.
Not much to say about the interior areas, other than they reminded me of Cursed Tomb, without the super-annoying demons. All in all a fun place, although I wouldn't want to come back here too often without a damn good reason!
Noxious Hollow(44)
Short and sweet zone to continue the Plagued storyline. Not really much to say here, other than I was expecting Lake Ghast to fill this section of the story instead(guess we'll be waiting to see how that place factors in later!). It took me a while to figure out what to do with the chief, and of course I forgot to bring my Plague weapons the first time, but it was a nice little place. As opposed to the next zone I'll mention...
Sirunax Void(45)
What in the name of King Hardlord possessed you to design a zone this way?! KILL IT WITH FIRE.
Seriously. The other zones have good and bad things about them, but this place is a masochistic adventure from start to finish. Not only did you decide to put two of the three most annoying enemies in all of Eldevin in the same zone, and often next to each other(Midgies and Crystal Spiders), but half of the remaining enemies have over ninety thousand hit points each. To make matters worse, the zone is so gigantic it has TWO resurrection quests, has more backtracking than modern politics, and is so dense with enemies in the first half of the zone that it could easily be renamed "Sirunax Traffic Jam."
I very nearly completed Sirunax Void solo while leveling, but after the one million HP Crystal Lord decided to one-shot my 9400 HP character a few minutes into the fight, after spending all day trying to finish the quests there, I'm giving my sanity a few days' rest before I return for another attempt.
I remember only bits and pieces of the quests there while running and screaming from all assortments of enemies click-spamming to get through the text before being fatally beaten. What little I can recall of the story there was, at least, good. So far, there is little to no incentive for coming to Sirunax Void, though: I haven't seen so much as a hint of an upgrade from either quest rewards or loot here.
If there's any upside to Sirunax Void, it's that the zone entrance is located in the middle of that spider hell known as Crystal Hills, so that most players, previously traumatized by the horrors of that zone, will know better than to enter it a second time.
Abandon all hope ye who enter here.
Conclusions
For the most part, I thoroughly enjoyed and appreciated the new content (Sirunax Void notwithstanding).
My main criticism, in terms of design philosophy, is that I believe that some of the new zones are oversaturated with enemies and repetitive quests which don't offer much to the player besides replacement EXP and coin that could be acquired easier and more efficiently by straight grinding. While I am all for zone content and monster diversity, if I wanted to run into enemies every two steps, I'd play Final Fantasy II and call it a day.
I'm not sure if this is technically possible, but just increasing the map size of current zones would go a long way to alleviating crowding issues. Just remember that, whatever you do, don't forget to keep some densely-populated areas for the AOE grinders(even if I'm not one)!
There's lots of positives to mention in this patch, too. This much additional free content put out by such a small company is nothing short of amazing, and I still have yet to explore the dungeons and get my hands on those shiny new armor sets and what have you! Some of the quests were extra cool, and some of the quest rewards truly felt like rewards(especially some of those nifty amulets! Although, with the overpoweredness of the set jewelry compared to anything else you can find, it's a shame they won't be used for very long).
All in all, I'm happy to have experienced this content update, will continue to enjoy it in the coming months, and I look forward to future updates when they happen down the road.
Cheers HCS!
(But, by all that is holy, do something about Sirunax Void, or make it VERY worth one's while to go there.)
Edited by huhbum, 14 April 2014 - 05:10.
