Welcome Back -- a guide to what's changed.

[Luteuel]

hello I was thinking about coming back to Rift but I'm worried there isn't much to do. I haven't played since around november 2011

I was raiding Hammerknell, but didn't get very far past the first boss though. I had completed all the story quests i think, I know i have the croc mount

I have all RoS and GSB gear, don't remember the names of it but I know I had the 4 piece rogue relic that makes a shot instant

I remember quitting around the time that Ember Isle came out, I remember thinking that questing on the Isle was useless since I had all that raid gear.

i read over all the what's new stuff but I didn't just see anything that made me say "wow I should sub to try that"

I'm mostly interested in the old T1 that are now T2, but i'm guessing that my gear is still better then what drops there?

thanks!

In general, Durnes (rogue DPS) gear is better than the expert dungeons.

[The Relic]

That's great! Trion MUST give you at least a year on this game for being such a good contributor to the forums!

[aXa]

thank you so much for this thread. i am a returning vet/founder who took a break right after this past xmass. coming back now, and the question of "what has changed?" was first and foremost on my mind.

[Wiking]

This is a nice thread, thanks and keep up the good work. It's an amazing game.

[anjuna]

Great thread...played for the first three or four months and am redownloading now!

[Samwell]

grr I just posted a stupid new thread when all I had to do was reply to this one
I'm looking forward to coming back to the States to play again!

[MickNico]

Let's not forget to mention that clerics are so soft at the moment (1.8) and can't kill the other 3 classes with same lv gear.
We wouldn't want to disappoint any returning clerics now would we.

If your a cleric thinking of coming back I would wait till patch 1.9 and hope they have fixed our class. I'm sure it will be posted in cleric discussion.

[AtomicUniverse]

[*] 90% mounts adjusted to level 30, not 40.

I didn't see the additional change in the notes where it was reduced again down to level 25.

That was a nice surprise when I recently started leveling a new toon!

[Primalthirst]

Let's not forget to mention that clerics are so soft at the moment (1.8) and can't kill the other 3 classes with same lv gear.
We wouldn't want to disappoint any returning clerics now would we.

If your a cleric thinking of coming back I would wait till patch 1.9 and hope they have fixed our class. I'm sure it will be posted in cleric discussion.

Ignore Mick, he makes mountains out of mole hills.

[The Witchking]

Ignore Mick, he makes mountains out of mole hills.

True, but as a p40 Cleric i can see where he's coming from.. 1v1 is Extremely hard against anyone who knows how to play their class.

We might steal some KB's by the very old BoD proc + SH for a ~4k hit in a split second, but yeah.. Clerics are pretty weak at the moment.

[Cygfa]

Ok no trolls please actually want useful feedback

Currently super fed up with Blizzard and the abuse they're dishing out to people in Diablo III (if you haven't heard of QQ should check out the forums, quite entertaining)

Need to know a few things (again, no sarcasm I have limited time)

1) Rift PVP balance - is there broken classes I need to avoid (or play, lol)

2) PVE in terms of casual play - can I get gear without putting a full time job's worth of time into the game? Suggestions?

3) Crafting - which profession is worth it? How is the AH economy?

4) Shard balance? any particualry bad ones to avoid or good ones to go to?

[TheGrinnz]

1) Rift PVP balance - is there broken classes I need to avoid (or play, lol)

All classes have some pretty fun tricks, except clerics but they still have some ownage burst damage and of course insane healing ability (which also can be used on themself).

The most "broken" class at the moment is the warrior with Planar Blade+Riftwalk.

2) PVE in terms of casual play - can I get gear without putting a full time job's worth of time into the game? Suggestions?

Sure, either join a guild that raids on a relaxed schedule (ideally, on your schedule), or join PuG raids, there are plenty on Wolfsbane for one. Or do both. Make sure to do the gear progression in order, because with limited time trying to skip from expert dungeons to T3 raids will take an eternity.

3) Crafting - which profession is worth it? How is the AH economy?

Any gathering profession is very profitable, due to people being lazy (guilty of this myself on occasion). Any profession that can make the top-end raid consumables is also profitable; artificer for burning powerstones, apothecary for brightsurge/powersurge vials, weaponsmith for whetstones/oilstones. The gathering professions however are "free" in that it only takes time to get the materials to sell.

4) Shard balance? any particualry bad ones to avoid or good ones to go to?

Can't speak for this as I've only been on Wolfsbane but as far as I've heard, Wolfsbane, Faeblight and Seastone are all well populated, with Seastone being the PvP focused shard. Ability lag during zone events can be an issue due to the population though.

[the_real_seebs]

Updated for 1.9, whee!

[barsen]

Indeed it seems a lot has changed. I left after 1.6 and I just re-subscribed after the event free to play week-end. I am really looking forward to all the new PVE but non-raid content. The instant adventure made it for me.

Thanks

[Netharie]

Thank you for this! I just resubbed after the free weekend (great marketing there, Trion!) and I'm excited to dive back into it all. Interestingly, I also left after 1.6, previous poster.