TLDR: I’ve desubbed from WoW to play Rift in the Head Start, which started today. I know this news will disappoint Paladins who have been following my PVP Guide and videos :( For me it’s time to move on. Keep in touch!
It’s still very early in the Cataclysm expansion – barely 2.5 months since it launched. In my opinion Cataclysm is WoW’s best expansion so far:
- Class re-designs have been largely well done
- PVE is challenging again (not that I really care but at least it made leveling not completely tedious)
- The PVP system is accessible and is about as skill-based as it has ever been.
Despite all this, recently I have felt restless / bored with WoW PVP. I don’t want to get into too much detail, but I will simply say I haven’t taken to Retribution as much as I had hoped, and I simply miss meaningful World PVP.
Earlier this week a gaming friend from the UK, Nathan, sent me a couple messages about Rift, a game which is launching in Head Start today.
Up until now I’ve largely ignored the Rift chatter / hype. I’ve had no reason to check it out, and I’ve been burned by hyped MMORPGs before, e.g. in 2008 with Warhammer (WAR), in 2009 with Aion, and in 2010 with Allods Online.
However, what Nathan wrote was very compelling to me, especially the following excerpts:
It is the perfect amalgam of WAR and Aion, honestly. What I like about it: customization…finding classes and roles that match something you would enjoy playing.
http://rift.zam.com/en/stc.html
I cried wolf when Blizzard ‘simplified’ talent trees, and this REALLY gets me pumped! Graphics are lovely, sound is great.
Battles are VERY Warhammer-esque (same engine I think too). I’ve played beta since the second phase, spent a couple of weeks getting feedback and to this day (beta just finished), I still have no idea what to play!
I played around with a Rift Spec Calculator. Each class can invest talent points in 3 of 9 different talent trees. The degree of customization is nuts, and this will generate a ton of fun discussion in the community. It’s clear that Rift has borrowed good mechanics from other games, such as the Guard and Hold the Line mechanics from WAR. The Guard mechanic enabled a tank to put a Guard buff on a friendly player that split damage on that player between them – so in essence tanks could protect targets when needed. HtL was a buff that tanks provided to players behind them, e.g. for mass charges or defenses. These were awesome mechanics that made tanks very relevant in WAR PVP.
The only thing that I noticed of concern is that Rift has only 2 factions – and in every game I’ve played that had concentrated server-based PVP (e.g. LOTRO, WAR), population imbalances tended to affect mass PVP outcomes. That is, the more populated side would tend to win, and this sometimes created a vicious cycle: the losing side tended to shrink as people got frustrated with losing and re-rolled, while the winning side got bored due to facerolling. I am still waiting for another game to copy Dark Age of Camelot (DAoC) which had a 3-faction system – from what I’ve heard this was very healthy for PVP and created ebbs and flows in terms of faction strength that the playerbase enjoyed.
Yesterday my best friend from high school told me the reason he hasn’t been on WoW is because he’s been playing Rift Beta with a co-worker, and they bought the Rift pre-order because they were very impressed with the Beta. Net-net, the game mechanics in Rift sounded attractive enough and I heard good things from people whose opinions I respect, so I bought the Rift pre-order and cancelled my WoW subscription – I don’t have the time to play multiple games and I plan on chronicling my experience with Rift just as I did with WAR.
I will be playing Taugrim the Warrior, Defiant faction, on the Sunrest Harrow server (RP-PVP).
P.S. my reason for making the decision to switch from WoW to Rift has nothing to do with the 4.1 Patch nerfs that were announced on Feb 24. I made the decision before that:
Of course, I hope the 4.1 WoG nerf gets revisited, I just won’t be around to see it.
P.P.S. if you are playing Warrior in Rift let me know what specs you’ve tried so far and your take on them.
Taugrim's MMO Blog 
Looking forward to watching/reading your experiences in Rift!
Rifts is fkn amazing – I’ll just say that. Enjoy!
Taugrimm, I also have bought Rift. I had the intention of just levelling a toon outside my arena times, except now that I have seen the 4.1 PTR notes I dont think I can stay with WoW, I may even be burned out all together with MMO RPG’s. I have now played WoW, WAR, Aion and then back to WoW again and truly loved my class for the first time.
I don’t think I can stomach the nerf to Word of Glory specifically, it is the only spell that keeps Prot and Ret on a level playing field and desirable with an arena partner. Without the ability to deal medium scale damage and medium off heals I just don’t know if it will even be a viable class. It amazes me though, how is it deserving of a 20 sec CD? it’s not like the top 2000 arena teams of any battle group is flooded with Prot or Ret pallies, it’s rather the opposite. It seems to me that it’s back to vanilla when Holy was the only spec that was viable for anything, but enough QQ from me, this isn’t the place for it and I truly cant be bothered.
I do however like the concept of Rift, but see that being more than a beast to try and balance as the PvP mechanics in that game for melee classes are truly terrible in regards to getting out of snares/stuns and the ranged classes being the FoTM. Any half skilled marksman/rager will eat you alive. The disappointing thing is also that the rogue class uses a 5 point combo system, and the warrior class so called “action points” is the exact same, only a 3 point system. I think some more thought could have gone into that mechanic. Its build 3 AP’s, use finisher. Build another 3 points, use finisher etc etc. seems a little unthought out.
I’ll see how I go, I may go back to just playing single player games on the PC or Playstation, at least then developers aren’t messing with your games every few months to “appease” the population.
God damn it tho, I was really starting to get good on the Prot and Ret pally. So close to 1500 rating atm I can smell it (first time we been close and maintaining a healthy above 50% win/loss).
/end longest post ever.
Paravian
Hey Taugrimm, I nearly stopped reading your posts because they were strictly WoW based, and I quit WoW about 8 months ago.
I too have just recently been looking into Rift. I plan on purchasing it as soon as I get the money and like you am looking forward to the variety in the souls- talents. I haven’t decided on a server or type of character yet, since I don’t know anyone playing MMO’s anymore the choice will be easier, with no personal conflicts.
Former Prot Paladin here. Got hooked on Rift Beta. PreOrdered. Was almost ready to quit WoW because of nerfs to R/L friends druid class.
Then I saw 4.1 nerfs to paladins…
See you guys in Rift.
I’m interested in what Warriors specs people are playing.
I initially tried Paladin, and it was similar to WAR Ironbreaker – reactives on block and such – and it was very durable with functional DPS. But I wasn’t sure what 2nd soul to take. One of the recommended ones such as Void Knight or Warlord?
I sat down and read through the souls on the talent calculator:
http://rift.zam.com/en/stc.html
And I noticed Riftblade. It has a lot of similar mechanics that remind of WAR Swordmaster (magic-based damage) but with kiting ability and anti-kiting counters.
So I rerolled to take Riftblade as my main soul. So far it has been fun! And as I’m reading the forums now it seems like a popular soul.
I chose Champion for my 2nd soul and while I like 2H DPS for leveling, but I’m not clear at what point I should invest points into Champion. I’m also not clear what to take as my 3rd soul, although in reality it won’t matter much because at level cap I’ll go Vindicator for PVP.
Vindicator?
I took Paladin, and then took the Void Knight for now. I dont think you need to re-roll to change your main soul man, you can buy alternate spec slots and once you have all 8 souls I believe you can change the combo’s around to whatever you want, including your main soul.
BTW, I made my toon on ur server incase you might want a pvp buddy. I doubt I will see you on much, as I am in australia and big timezone difference but I added you to friends anyway. My name on there will be Valkyriez (same as my WAR DoK’s name).
Plus, for 2500 favor (honor) you can buy a specific PvP soul, so you can tweak it just for pvp and keep ur pve shit seperate.
Paravian / Valkyriez
BTW, I made my toon on ur server incase you might want a pvp buddy.
Did you roll on Harrow? The server queue for Sunrest was 3 hours, so my friends and I rolled on Harrow instead.
Anyway, I’ll make sure to friend you. If I’m in-game and I don’t respond to whispers, it’s because I’m still overwhelmed by the game LOL. I haven’t been paying attention to chat with all the mechanics to learn.
Ah, I actually rolled on Sunrest, weird that it still let me add a friend called Taugrim lol. I’ll re-roll a toon on Harrow, I only got to lvl 3 anyway. The que for the server that some of my friend and workmates are rolling on (Briarcliff) was over 10 hours, I was numkber 5000+ in the que lol. Crazy stuff.
I see what you mean by Vindicator now, this must be the main warrior PvP soul, and I take it you can add whatever secondary souls….?
Shame there is no Arena functionality though, I get pretty over BG’s/Warfront spamming pretty quickly anyway.
Hope to see you on Tau, but I wont be on much though, I intend to keep arena’ing on wow anyway at least until Blizz breaks my survivability. This is my first arena season and I still find it very cool, but games are starting to get very hard at the 1550 rating, especially when the teams we get matched to never have any less than a 1700+ MMR.
Ah, I actually rolled on Sunrest, weird that it still let me add a friend called Taugrim lol
A friend that managed to get into Sunrest yesterday created a level 1 toon named Taugrim for me.
We moved to Harrow though. Waiting to login sucks :)
One thing that instantly sat well with me is the fact that there’s an actual Cleric class. I originally picked up Paladins in wow because there was no Cleric, so now reading through these abilities I’m super psyched to try it. So far I’ve been reading into the Justicar and the Templar trees and they sound amazing. I can’t wait to really dig in.
Sorry to hear this. FWIW, as you are doubtless aware the WoG and SS changes in 4.1 are pretty devastating for Prot and Ret PvP. I’m doing what you are doing – quitting WoW. I however am taking a break from MMORPGs until SW:TOR appears.
Good luck in Rift, and thank you for all your great work on Prot PvP.
Stay safe.
Sorry to hear this. FWIW, as you are doubtless aware the WoG and SS changes in 4.1 are pretty devastating for Prot and Ret PvP
I predicted that SS would have the internal cooldown increased – it was too easy to kite/bridge between cooldowns in PVP. It was objectively OP.
That being said, the WoG nerf is a real head-scratcher.
I have generally advocated wait-and-see and patience with future changes. When Protector of the Innocent was nerfed, I gutted it out. When Cata launched and people said Prot damage and healing wouldn’t scale, I waited to see for myself at 85, and I found how to make Prot still viable.
Blizzard up through 4.0.6 has made changes for Paladin that seemed sensible overall.
But I don’t get the WoG nerf. The rationale for putting a 20-sec cooldown on WoG is so that Paladins don’t feel compelled to spend HoPo on healing. This makes no sense to me. In PVP and even some PVE situations, a big part of the value we bring is our offhealing capability – especially as our group buffs are no longer potent and we have limited CC relative to other classes.
Players are quick to judge and say “Blizzard doesn’t understand this class” yada yada yada. That is something I typically do not say. But in the particular case of the WoG nerf, I don’t think Blizzard realizes the implications of the proposed change to WoG.
Ahhhhh, I’ll stop right there LOL.
Good luck in Rift, and thank you for all your great work on Prot PvP.
Thank you!
It’s been a great ride with Prot, and I hope Blizzard sorts things out in a practical way for Paladins.
WoW! I kinda suspected this with yesterday’s note on the PvP Paladin guide…
WoW is the first MMORPG I ever played, and only started it 15 months ago. For me I’d say there’s still a lot left in the game for me to have fun with and experience. Bloodniron is my only 85 toon, and I recently started a ‘Lock (named Demoniron) to maybe kinda take the opposite tack from the in your face melee thing. And ‘Lock’s have some pretty good “Tanks” themselves… This is my first Warlock, so I think I’ll still be having plenty of fun. Looking forward to Level 20 and my Succubus! (What can I say… I’m a middle-aged guy!)
Good luck with Rift. I’m interested in finding out more about it, but like most, I do not really have time for more than one game, and with subscriptions, I also don’t have money for more than one, lol…
And we can hope that Blizzard sees the error of their ways with some of this stuff… Before they seriously lose a butt-load of people
Good luck with Rift. I’m interested in finding out more about it, but like most, I do not really have time for more than one game
Yea, same here. I work full time and am married, so my gaming time has constraints, and to be honest I’d just rather focus on one game and blog about it in depth, as I did with the Prot Pally PVP Guide.
And we can hope that Blizzard sees the error of their ways with some of this stuff
The playerbase has been vocal enough that I believe the proposed 20-sec cooldown will not go live as-is. Something’s gotta give.
That being said, the fact that Blizzard would propose that kind of change – without perceiving the obvious implications – that’s a concern to me.
Paravian… I couldn’t agree with you more. My buddy and I have been playing WoW since it began on and off. I have always been a ret pally, he has tried almost all the classes.
Once I started reading Taugrim we both decided to go prot and team up in 2’s. We are currently at 1780 as our high and have had a blast… but as Taugrim said this WofG nerf will literally destroy our viability even to go as high as we have… it is the only thing that makes us competitive… and you guys are absolutely right… the nerf makes no sense… there really are very few Rets and Prot Pallies in the higher ranks.
It’s a bummer and will definitely drive me from WoW for good. I will quit immediately upon 4.1 coming out of the WofG 20 CD is in there.
Anyway, sorry for bitching but it bums me out. They finally make Prot Pallies an interesting class to play and then they ruin them 4 months later.
But a big thanks Taugrim for such great information and for the blog. It’s given me and my buddy a few months of the best pvp we’ve ever had with our Pallies. Good luck in Rift.
Anyway, sorry for bitching but it bums me out.
It’s totally understandable.
There have been changes in 4.0 that I was not excited about, e.g.:
– PotI changed to not work on self-heals. I was concerned the change was made in 4.0.1 WotLK before we got to see whether it would be an issue @ 85 in Cata
– HoPo not being generated on dodge/parry, when we only have 1 set of abilities that generate HoPo and they all share the same cooldown.
They finally make Prot Pallies an interesting class to play and then they ruin them 4 months later.
Not that it matters much but Prot was relatively stronger in 3.3.5 WotLK in PVP. Although I do prefer the current playstyle and mechanics much more – it’s nice to be able to functionally offheal.
But a big thanks Taugrim for such great information and for the blog. It’s given me and my buddy a few months of the best pvp we’ve ever had with our Pallies.
Thanks for writing that. I spend a lot of time blogging with the intention of helping people, so it’s always encouraging to hear people are getting value out of it.
Well, just to deal another blow my friend and I finally got on a good streak and had 9 wins, 2 losses (one was a /quit, holy pally was a freak and 35 mins is too long). We both got our first ever 1550 achieves and are really syncing and the off healing we do is amazing. When focused we just switch to seal of insight and every HP goes into a WoG, with 2 x HR and my partner doing 3 x HP WoG’s on me all the time aswell it takes alot of damage to worry me. The other player will generally switch then my partner and I switch also to confuse things for them.
Why is WoG nerf so bad for me personally? I run a double prot pally comp. If the nerf stands as it is, my comp will be very unviable. Our whole play is revolved around our survivability and off ehaling to each other when needed, our burst SoTR when applicable, oud the fact that we can train casters pretty well with AS proccing like stupid and chaining our HoJ.
I will try the ret/prot combo, but not until I have the PvP 2 hander (Looks so much cooler than the mace).
Oh im kinda sad to here this but im happy for u. I loved all ur Prot pala videos may u find rift a good place to pvp :)
Sorry for my spelling I ment Hear.
I’ll look into Rift when I’m home and able to think about it. I know next to nothing about it but I understand it to be a game where you can kinda mix-match various classes and abilities…?
Check out this page, for example. This is the talent calculator for Warrior class:
http://rift.zam.com/en/stc.html?t=0c___
As you can see, you can pick the 3 trees out of 9 that you want to use for your spec.
It’s crazy customizable.
I will sure miss reading the blog and will certainly keep watching the videos to try to improve my PVP.
This toon is actually the first (I am hoping) for me to get to 85, and even though my PVP stinks, I really think that it is one of the most enjoyable parts of the game.
Good luck in Rift and keep writing, you help a lot of people this way.
Thanks for that link! Looking at it now. What’s the deal with how the talents go both below and above the ‘starting point’ of the tree? Roots and Branches I guess, lol…
I’ll look more into it for sure – my questions now are “How many points do ya get” and “When do ya start getting points” and “How long does it take to get to level 10? lol” and “Can ya FLY your own mounts like in WoW?”
And “Why does it look like the game is not really out yet when I look at the official web page?”
What’s the deal with how the talents go both below and above the ‘starting point’ of the tree? Roots and Branches I guess, lol…
For each spec (Soul) tree, the points above (the branches) are for determining your spec. As you invest in a tree, you unlock abilities (the root) based on your total points investment in that tree.
my questions now are “How many points do ya get” and
The calc shows level required based on points spec. The mechanics do encourage you to spend points in multiple trees
How long does it take to get to level 10? lol and Can ya FLY your own mounts like in WoW?
Leveling speed is comparable to most Western MMOs, level cap is 50.
Not sure about flying mounts.
And “Why does it look like the game is not really out yet when I look at the official web page?”
Head Start has begun for pre-order players. Live for anyone starts next week
Oh man no way! I’ve honestly been thinking about checking out Rift. No particular reason, really, just that I haven’t had a lot of friends playing wow with me lately and the customization seems fun. Plus it seems like it might be just fun enough to tide me over until Guild Wars 2 comes out, which is what I’m really looking forward to. If I pick it up, I’ll try to join your server.
Posted on your gude 25 days ago
Me(Retally: Also, do you plan on playing that new MMO called Rift?
Taugrimm: No reason to, WoW is in the best state that it’s ever been, I’m having fun.
Absolutely I said that.
Then I got Nathan’s message, and it intrigued me enough that I started looking at the Rift Spec Calculator, and that sold me on at least trying the game out.
We’ll see how it goes. So far (level 10) so good.
Haha, im now bashing you or anything. I just knew you would play it.
It’s all good. I’ve been asked for a while about Rift, and I always gave the same message until this week.
Rift has been VERY solid so far, better than I was expecting.
I’m not a PVE player per se, but I love that mobs try to attack points on the map (e.g. camps) and players have to rally together to stop them.
The PVP has been fun so far too :)
When can we expect pvp videos? Haha i would play rift but im not going to lie. Im in college and im broke as hell, i can barely scrape up $30 every 2 months to buy my wow 60 sub :).
Wow,sad to see you go,but I am sure I will see you again somewhere.I am fed up with what they are doing to pally so I will just make my old main(warrior)my new main again.Best of luck Taugrim.It was great knowing you.
Darth,
You were one of the coolest people in our guild.
You used to call me “Yoda”. But I may not get the chance to try to redeem myself from those rather one-sided losses you handed to me in duels the other night.
C’mon now, repeat after me: “Once I was but the Learner but now I am the Master.”
:)
Got my 2’s dual Prot Pally arena team up to 1805 tonight. The play is awesome although can be long…. Mage/Rogue and Priest/Mage are our nemesis. And we NEVER bump into Prot Pallies in arena let alone a team of Prot Pallies… My buddy and I laugh that every team that sees us is like WTF?! I know Taugrim has moved on but had to post our score tonight…. Pretty excited. One thing that Taugrim mentioned which is absolutely true is the nerf on HP generation with Dodge/miss. It has hurt us a lot and we figure that in an average game we lose out on about 10-12 HP each. The 20 second CD on WofG would be a toon killer.
Got my 2′s dual Prot Pally arena team up to 1805 tonight
Grats, getting to 1800 takes coordinated, good play.
One thing that Taugrim mentioned which is absolutely true is the nerf on HP generation with Dodge/miss
Well if you are Hit-capped, and you should be, you won’t miss. But the dodge/parry hurt HoPo generation. I swapped out CS for SoT glyph for the Expertise, it’s 2.5% redux to each and worth it now.
Great tip Taugrim… we did swap out the CS glyph and it helped greatly. We also dropped a bit of crit on gear and put it into expertise.
But it’s still not like it was when we could generate holy power on a frozen mage and we do miss a lot more than we did before the patch. It was a definite nerf.
You will be much missed, and I hope other protadins can carry on the good work you started. I will never ever ever ever start an MMO in its first few months. I have done that several times and been stung every single time. If RIFT is around in a year, and going strong I may take a look. I have read lots of unbiased reviews, and there is nothing I have read that makes me want to invest time in it as of yet. Most of them sum up in different way with the following “If you are not playing an MMO at the moment, go for it, if you are and have spare cash and time TRY IT, if you only have time for one and love your current game there is nothing here to make it worth changing”. I have zero respect for another game that just wants to have a nibble at the lucrative market with terms such as ‘new, innovative, never before seen etc’ when it has clearly just borrowed from every other MMO out there.
If I am trying a new one, it will either be GW2 (maybe) or Star Wars (almost definite)
Our Arena team is doing well, and is now winning more than we lose, though rating took a dive as we are starting to introduce new members to PVP and now have a pvp roster of Enhance shaman, 3 paladins, boom-kin (experienced resto), hunter and soon another druid. So we will be dipping into 3 and 5 as well.
Good luck with Rift, I shall still follow your blog with interest.
Oh, and if the WoG nerf does come into play, I will be taking a WoW break and going back to MUD’s for a bit. This is the singular most stupid change I have read and the first to make me doubt the intelligence and fiarness of Blizz developers, ESPECIALLY when you compare to to the rogue selfhealing buff they are possibly getting.
I will never ever ever ever start an MMO in its first few months. I have done that several times and been stung every single time. If RIFT is around in a year, and going strong I may take a look
Yea, I totally understand, and after the disappointments of Aion and Allod Online I would typically wait too.
That being said, Nathan was spot on so far – Rift really does bring back the good qualities of Warhammer.
Woops.
xD
Rift is one of those bland MMOs that’s just barely competent enough to hook people who are burnt out on whatever they’re playing right now. It’s the Asheron’s Call to World of Warcraft’s EverQuest – a stopgap until something a little better comes along, which will probably end up being Guild Wars 2. I’m sitting this one out.
Rift is one of those bland MMOs that’s just barely competent enough to hook people who are burnt out on whatever they’re playing right now
And your comment is one of the bland comments that offers zero insight.
If you want to criticize Rift, at least be specific.
I can tell you from first-hand experience that the game has a lot of very promising mechanics.
My only nitpick so far is the macro’ing seems limited, but at the same time I can do stuff like this:
cast A
cast B
cast C
where A is a reactive, B is an ability with a cooldown that provides a buff/debuff, and C is the spammable.
At level 10 I already had a ton of abilities I needed to figure out how to hotkey / layout on my skill bars.
Fun fun!
I was able to get into the ‘friends and family’ portion of the closed beta because I know two people who worked on the game in minor roles. Interestingly enough, neither of them are playing the game now that it’s done even though they can play it free for life. They still play WoW with me.
Anyway, my main complaint from the beginning was the overall presentation: graphics, movement, animation, etc. It has the same clunky feel that Warhammer Online had and it has nowhere near the aesthetic polish of World of Warcraft. It has that typical dull MMO look that only Blizzard has been able to shake.
Combat is marred by stiff animation, bland graphics and generic samey looking races that aren’t easy to differentiate in battle (this is one of the larger flaws in my opinion). It plays like a cross between Warhammer Online and WoW, but combat doesn’t have the visceral feel that WoW has because of the bland graphics and animation.
I compare it to Asheron’s Call because AC was the first ‘burn-out’ MMO. EverQuest burn-outs (I was one of them) would cancel their account for a couple months to play it, but only the diehards stuck around. The main difference between AC and Rift is that AC was different enough from EverQuest to attract people who wanted an alternative. Rift isn’t different enough from any current MMO to be anything other than a stopgap for burn-outs.
Anyway, my main complaint from the beginning was the overall presentation: graphics, movement, animation, etc. It has the same clunky feel that Warhammer Online had and it has nowhere near the aesthetic polish of World of Warcraft. It has that typical dull MMO look that only Blizzard has been able to shake.
I get your comparison of Rift presentation to WAR.
That being said, I wouldn’t hold WoW as the “aesthetic polish” standard either. Other games such as Aion simply blow WoW away in terms of graphics.
Rift’s graphics less cartoony than WoW’s – whether a player likes that or not is preference IMO.
Simple things such as the block animation in Rift are really good. The actual rifts in Rift are spectacular to look at.
Combat is marred by stiff animation, bland graphics and generic samey looking races that aren’t easy to differentiate in battle (this is one of the larger flaws in my opinion).
The gameplay doesn’t feel stiff to me. Responsiveness is actually higher IMO, especially with all the abilities and reactives that are off the GDC.
At any rate, thanks for sharing your details thoughts. I appreciate it!
Taugrim
Man, I just wanted to take a few secs to thank you for the prot pally pvp guide. It has been such an amazing help. I love prot pallys and dont want to change to something else. You made that possible for me. :)
Good luck in Rift. Im a Wow addict, been there 6 years not going anywhere :) I know i know thats terribad, but hey its me :)
Man, I just wanted to take a few secs to thank you for the prot pally pvp guide. It has been such an amazing help. I love prot pallys and dont want to change to something else. You made that possible for me.
Thanks Ether!
I’m glad to have helped show other Prots that it was both fun and viable, if played correctly.
Cheers!
My buddy sent this to me tonight. He found it online regarding the 20 second CD on WofG. They are going to do it and ruin Prot Pallly and Ret for Arena and BG’s. Interested to hear your thoughts Taugrim…
Word of Glory: We want Retribution and Protection paladins to have reasonable healing on themselves or others, but we know paladins sometimes feel like they can’t use their Holy Power on anything but their heals in some situations. We’d rather these two specs spend most of their Holy Power on damage-dealing abilities, with occasional healing.
Playing out my last month of WoW since i unsubscribed due to the the changes. Its been a series of goodbyes and farewells. As for Rift, I’m going to follow this blog within the coming month but I’m not purchasing it yet. Get your snakenoil salesman suit on and start convincing me. Maybe you might have somebody else to add soon. Keep up the great research.
Get your snakenoil salesman suit on and start convincing me. Maybe you might have somebody else to add soon. Keep up the great research
I just completed the narration for my 1st PVP video and am rendering it now.
It should be up on YouTube by late tonight.
Just would like you to know my buddy chase and I found your blogs and videos very helpful. We ran prot enhance as well and had hella fun. We just recently got Into the 1550 range. Now the match ups are starting to give us a lil more problems with the conventional heal//dps. With that said my friend decided to roll war and eventually I’ll roll resto. If the interest of a DK doesnt steal my attention. Your insight will be sadly missed. Do you know of anyone that has similar guides such as yours?
Your insight will be sadly missed. Do you know of anyone that has similar guides such as yours?
I do not. That main reason I wrote the Prot PVP Guide when 4.0 launched was because there was a lack of helpful content.
If you do find any good material, please let us know.
I don’t know what’s more upsetting to me, the nerf or that I can’t look forward to anymore of your Prot videos.
You’re guide has been nothing short of amazing. And I think I speak for everyone when I say thank you for your time on that and for sharing so much with everyone.
I hope you enjoy Rift.
…that’s not true at all actually I hope it flops and you come back… :)
Good luck out there!
…that’s not true at all actually I hope it flops and you come back
LOL.
We’ll see how Rift pans out.
This is my second time desubbing WoW. My first stint with WoW lasted 1.5 years in 2006-2007. This second stint lasted almost 1 year (Mar 2010 – Feb 2011).
That being said, my expectations of a game have changed dramatically over the past 5 years. Titles such as LOTRO, WAR, Aion, and Allods Online have all influenced my thinking.
Of the 5 major titles I’ve played prior to Rift, WAR had the biggest impact in re-shaping my expectations.
WAR would have been a monster success IMO if the game itself was more stable, expectations had been managed more carefully, and the game didn’t launch with too much (buggy) content.
Rift feels to me like what WAR could have / should have been.
Agreed, this is Warhammer as it should have been. One thing worries me thiugh, there is no end game pvp bar the usual world pvp or warfronts. WaR ha the open RvR system of locking down zones with objectives and a city siege to cap it off, that’s a great system.
Plus I want to see an “arena” concept, Rift with it’s crazy customization would be very challenging, you would never know what you would end up facing, the player combinations would be endless.
One thing worries me thiugh, there is no end game pvp bar the usual world pvp or warfronts
I love World PVP! I just hope that there will be enough of it at endgame.
Plus I want to see an “arena” concept
I’m actually OK with the game not having arena, so long as the World PVP is engaging enough to create rivalries and such on the server between factions.
That’s the one thing I most miss from WAR (and LOTRO) PVP – getting to know my opponents and having some good-natured smack talk and competition.
Tau said… “I’m actually OK with the game not having arena, so long as the World PVP is engaging enough to create rivalries and such on the server between factions.
That’s the one thing I most miss from WAR (and LOTRO) PVP – getting to know my opponents and having some good-natured smack talk and competition.”
So there’s a good question for me to ask… From this, I assume that all players can speak to one another? I’ve always thought it one of the weirdest things that Alliance and Horde can’t seem to understand each other, and in fact are purposefully blocked from doing so. Makes no sense at all to me.
Can you talk smack to your opposite-faction opponent in RIFT? And in fact, can you “make friends” of people in the other faction?
Oh Haha, seems i forgot to link it, oops. Also realised i think i posted my previous Rift post in the wrong section, sorry about that :)
http://rift.zam.com/en/stc.html?t=1ctLh.V.xhsodsMGzdz.xxobRsbcbM
Here it is :)
The war front i was in today, the 15-19 one (or something) seemed promising. I was the number 2 damamge dealer, had the most kills, as well as joint least deaths, with the highest damage recieved. Seems like this meatshield barbarian build works ;)
I’ve just downloaded the catalyst application profile, and i’ll probably be back playing in a few days, so i’ll tell you how much of a difference it makes then – hopefully a decent bit, it would be so good if i could get Rift running on decent speeds and graphics settings.
http://rift.zam.com/en/stc.html?t=1ctLh.V.xhsodsMGzdz.xxobRsbcbM
In Riftblade tree:
– Drop 3/3 Elem Defl
– Drop 1/5 Stat Shock
In Paladin tree:
– I would take 2/2 Steely Resolve for PVP CC
– Drop 2/3 Graceful Under Pressure
– Max out Hardened Will
The suggestions for Paladin make sense in retrospect, as with the 30 points i’ll also get Scales of Justice, which should help with damage output.
In the Riftblade tree however, it seems 3 points need to be kept in Elemental deflection to progress up the tree (unless i’ve just not worked it out properly)
One thing i’m toying with is whether or not to keep Rift Storm. With the 3 minute cooldown its effects in PvP seem actually quite limited, compared to either, Martial Shield, Paladins Reprisal, or Reverent Protection.
As it is the build looks like this : http://rift.zam.com/en/stc.html?t=1ctLh.V.xhsodsMGzdz.xxobRsbcbM
Also, a bit of a newbie question, but whereabouts is the Vindicator trainer? ^^
How are you thinking to progress your build?
Seem to have failed at linking again. This is what i meant :)
http://rift.zam.com/en/stc.html?t=1ctLh.V.xhs0dsMGzd.xgohosbcbM
One thing i’m toying with is whether or not to keep Rift Storm. With the 3 minute cooldown its effects in PvP seem actually quite limited
Yea I have the same thought. In some games (e.g. Warhammer in the first 3 months after release), AOE bombing opponents was a viable strategy. But in most games, it’s all about single-target DPS.
One thing to seriously consider is investing enough points in Riftblade to get Blade of Elemental Affinity.
It heals the Warrior for 35% of damage done by ability crits. That sounds awesome.
For endgame I am planning on a high HP / Crit build.
And before I forget please say hi to your dad and Daturk for me. They are two of my favorite people I’ve ever met, real life or online.
“One thing to seriously consider is investing enough points in Riftblade to get Blade of Elemental Affinity.
It heals the Warrior for 35% of damage done by ability crits. That sounds awesome.”
To be honest it doesn’t seem worth it to me – i mean, it’s an ideal skill to invest for, but if you think of it in terms of what you would lose in order to get it, i think it’s outweighed.
If you freed up the 13 points needed from the Paladin tree, you’d lose Balance of Power, Tip the Balance and Karmic Resolution, the latter two of which have pretty sweet sounding healing abilities themselves. Never mind the 2 points from Paladins Devotion or Vengefull wrath, and the 4 lost soul skills
If you lose the benefits from Vindicator and 8 points from Paladin to get it, you only lose 1 soul skills from Paladin, but still lose atleast one of the healing skills in the tree, as well as Guard and the CC Breaker in Vindicator.
It seems like a nice idea, but not one that’s viable until they raise the level cap.
I’ll make sure i tell my dad and daturk you said hi :)I’ll try and remember when i go back home from uni in the Easter hols.
whereabouts is the Vindicator trainer
In the PVP quarter of your faction’s main city.
There is an arc of vendors all selling PVP-based gear.
I already have the Favor (2500) to buy Vindicator. I’m just not clear at what point I should invest in it. Probably not quite yet (I’m level 21).
[…] given that I already de-subbed from WoW due to interest in Rift, the post from Blue about not being too concerned with Prot Pally PVP, and the fact that my free […]
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