Avian Gamers Network

http://www.digitaltrends.com/gaming/sta ... d-of-2011/



That did not take very long.

This has been a poorly guarded secret since they took over. As soon as the deal was done we saw the retail price for the game immediately drop, and they were talking openly about the benefits of a F2P model. I'm excited about the move. I'll finally start playing.

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"Loose with Dignity"
Robert
Second President, Avian Gamers

DDO - Cannith - AlistairItor - Rogue/Ranger (5/3) - Main
DDO - Cannith - Guijanitor - Paladin/Rogue (4/1)
DDO - Cannith - RicochetItor - Rogue (5)

Gonna jump on that game too... I wouldn't mind playing on a Miranda class vessel throughout the game...

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1st Feb 2008

After playing the beta...I can't say I am particularly excited. Perhaps things have improved...

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Ryric Krael
Former Vice President AGN
Former Director, Section 6
Former Head of Department of the Treasury
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Ask not what your PA can do for you, but what you can do for your PA
"Gone Section Five"

Have been playing the game for about a month and a half by now and I gotta say it is entertaining.

However I do not know where to start, should I make a review for the guild...

I got plans for playing with a friend tonight and I might take it up with him...

So I ask of you to point out what you want to know.
Like basic info: Gameplay, lore, info.
More advanced to classes, skilltree, shipclasses.
Basic impressions.

I do not know how to set them up.
So if you're interested just say so and I'll spill it all. :p

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1st Feb 2008

I want to know you basic impressions. What do you think is cool, new, inventive, or just note worthy.

Thanks Azz

Basic impressions heh? This is prob gonna be a jumbled mess, but I'll try and keep it simmple.

Well as you all remember, I am a diehard Spacefighter, wheter it is in fighterships or lumbering capitalships... So this game is almost written to me.

First impression is kinda vague, but I distincly remember thikning that this game felt a little bit like SW:G turned upside down. Space first, ground second, although it is not entirely the case.
Ground based quests are just as important as the spacequests...

Let's see...
You start making your toon (as usual with any MMO). Dunno why but I thought one could not play as klingon before getting to level 25 on a federation toon. (level 25 equals to Lt. Commander 4 or 5; i'll get into level system later... maybe another post). I could choose from the start...
Anyway...
The graphics on the toon are, simply said, beautiful, though not top notch. I cannot compare with others games, since the only MMO's I've played are: SWG, Eve, WoW, WW2 Online and CoH/CoV... Suffice it to say that the amount of details one can make to the toon are almost as extensive as SWG, though maybe not as versatile. Difficult to compare since the graphics are that different.
However, the game offer a ton of basic templates, which are more than enough for the casual player.
Oddly enough all my female crewmembers (who you can customize as much as your own toon, when you get them) have a bust size that JollyJack would approve of.
Then you chose uniform. For those, you don't have as much freedom where you cannot design a uniform from bottom. However there are plenty of free uniform sets/templates, which on can change colors, mix and match with other sets, ie. Jacket from Sierra-3 with pants from Antares-2 etc... Canon uniforms from the TV-series and Movies can be bought for Cryptic Points. (Micro-transactions basically)
A small delight is in the rankingpips. It is such a small thing, but I just love seeing my too with 4 pips, once I reach Captain.

Game begins with one being a simple ensign, who is in a middle of an emergency. You are guided by the game through a groundbased senario, where you are taught the basics of the interface and so on. Small things I like is the ability to choose a FPS controlstyle on the touch of a button. While my friend play with the the RPG style, to ensure 100% accuracy and just press buttons to target and fire, I stick to the FPS-style... gives a feel of being there, but it does mean that you can miss you opponents. (Don't worry... there is autoaim, so if the curser/target reticle is red... press fire)

Once you have gotten through the basic task-completion and ground-combat guide, you are sent to the skies and you get an improptu promotion to Lieutenant (and therefore an officer) with a small cruiser under your command. (Light cruiser - will get into ship classes and designing later... it can take a whole post of it's own).

Similarily, you get a guide here, in piloting, problem solving and combat. At the same time you get your first bridge officer, which has one special ability to use in combat.
The space combat is not true 3-D combat. There is a limit to how much pitch one has with the ship. However it does not affect one in 90% of ship combat. (Mostly happen in PvE instances where enemies are all over the map in small clusters). But I would not call it 2.5D as in Starfleet command either... maybe 2.95D. Damage is measured in the 2-dimetional plane only, whether your are being fired upon from above or below. Simplistic, but funtional. Here JtLS is a far more advanced game...
Think "Star Trek: Legacy", but with more choises and a reverse throttle

I marveled on the graphics which, in the best Star Trek style, got a lot of bright colors. (Klingon side is more red-brown colors... think Quake 1 colorpalette). While not Supergraphics, one can still drool a little bit, especially, while enjoying your own ship ship.
Lastly. Once you get the ship, you can change it registy number and name (For every new ship you get there is one free change, afterwards it cost ingame money). And again... it is a delight to see
NCC-93227-E
USS Nanoq-E
written on your ship. (I know the naming scheme is not canon, but if I wanted the "pure" Nanoq name, I had to rename the former ship...)

That is just first impressions from 1½ month ago...

Tommorow I will talk about classes, split up in two, for ground then space.

Questions are encouraged.

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1st Feb 2008

If I wasn't picking up SWTOR tomorrow I'd probably be trying this out as well.

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Dr. Golga Bolg
SWTOR - Golga
Rift - Gnarlwood: Golgar Golgantua Golgate - Retired
WoW - Dalaran: Bolg Golga Virrok All Retired
SWG - Golga Bolg - Doctor (Resident) Retired
Eve - Edge Finn - Limbo
Section 2 - (Former) Director
What am I playing now?: The waiting game

Okay... was a day late but I got the writings prepared...

In the game there are three classes. Tactical (Red color), Engineer (Yellow color, Green in there forums to make it easier to read.) and Science (Blue color). The colors doesn't mean much since the player can customize appearance as seen fit.

Tactical class specializes in Dishing out damage at high rate and gets bonus on damage.
Engineer class specializes in Tanking and buffing.
Science class specializes in healing and buffing.

Note, this is where it gets complicated. So I'm gonna seperate and focus the different classes, from the players ability first, then how the bridgecrew (companions) affects the player.

Before going over that classes, one would have to look at the skill tree and inherent traits, to understand better.
The tree is basically divided up in two main groups. First Space, then ground (just how it is visibly setup by default, has no affect on abilities or bonuses).
Of those two group, it is subdivided into 3 groups. Tactical, engineering and science. Such is in both space and ground.

The XP earned in the games does not differantiate, between space or ground. (I personally am geared extremely on space, with little skill points on the ground, if any at all).
The currently cap at Level 51 (Vice admiral) and once you reach that, you no longer earn and XP (Note, that this is the first time I have ever reached endgame senarios and capped the levels of a MMO, ever.), so spend wisely, or one will have to respec the toon.

The player is not limited to one branch, and a tactical player can choose to spend skillpoints in engineering or science, to gain certain bonusses.
However, if the player reached level 6 (of 9) in a certain skill, of his/her own branch, the player can train an ability to the players NPC companions, ie. get six levels of greanade specialization and the player can train grenade abilities to the tactical bridge officers, or reach level six in Starship Beam weapons (which gives bonus for using beam weapon) and the players can train beamweapon abilities to a tactical bridge officer, such as Beam: Fire at will 3, or Beam: Overload 3.

Tactical class is the most simple class to play (personal opinion).
All buffs and abilities are geared toward buffing outgoing damage, and debuffing incomming damage. Abilities are split in buffing self, and buffing group...
Comming to weaons, there are no direct bonus inherit in the class. Say I carry a mark XI sniper rifle, which has 54 DPS, another player, all else being equal, will also give same amount of damage with the same rifle.

The differnce comes in the inherent traits given by what species the player is and what additional trait the player has chosen. (Two pre-selected and two chosen. Making an "Aline" that is, non-canon species, the player has free chois of all four traits.)

From there on it is the skill tree. The tactical player has a skill tree, that is geared toward damage, and if this is utilised (which I don't, since my focus is in space) on can get better damage in either energy damage (phasers, blasters, snipers and such), Kinetic (mines, grenades) and close combat (hand-to-hand, sword, bat'leth). There are further specialization.


Gonna take a break here and update this post later.

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1st Feb 2008