Returning Player

[Arabelle]

Hey all!

I've recently been looking for a game to sink my time and money into and I loaded up Rift just for old times sake. I haven't played since before the first xpac but I remember the raids and pvp being some of the most fun I've had in an MMO. Are the raids and pvp still amazing now? I'd like some input/feedback before I start sinking money into the game.


Thanks!

[Elayara]

It's free 2 play, so you could just start to play and see for yourself without investing money - but the game you remember from 5 years ago no longer exists. Housing and wardrobe are in a very good state, but there's also lots of complaints on raiding and PvP, and most raiding guilds have already quit the game.

[Uruketo]

HI Arabelle,

Welcome back to Rift! For the most part the game is still fun. Not as fun as it was in Storm Legion times but its got its perks. The good news is most of the irritations and bugs have been ironed out in your absence (granted news ones have been introduced). The bad news is that PvP has pretty much been killed in this game. Raiding is so-so but more good than bad. Please feel free to message me in game if you have questions about the changes. Alternately, if you are seeking a guild to learn the game with, feel free to follow the link in my signature.

[Arabelle]

That sounds disappointing I guess it’s going down the same rabbit hole as other games.... too much money grabbing fluff and not as much focus on gameplay?

[Elayara]

too much money grabbing fluff and not as much focus on gameplay?

This is basically the reason why my wife and I left a year ago.

This is what an active player said this morning:

Things like this is why I have been calling Rift a skin for a casino for months now. You have fragment roulette, LFR gear craps, essence blackjack, and the minion slots. Much like RL casinos the game relies heavily on whales who outspend the remaining 99% of the clientele by a large margin. Dang, I forgot the eternal armour lotto.

Oh there's also some raiding, apparently... somewhere at the back of the house

As I said before, you can just load down the client and start playing for free to find out for yourself; but don't expect to return to the game you remember from 5 years ago.

[Mrwidoes]

Pvp is basically dead, you only get one set of pvp gear and it's been like that since 4.0 launched. It's pretty unbalanced where certain souls are overturned making the game not fun. You either can't kill someone because they have stupid incoming heals, or you die so fast you can't react.

PVE is pretty sad too. The latest raid to be released is tomorrow (10/25) and it's 3 bosses.

They've basically had no content, considering 4.3 is one new (really ****ty) mage soul and one 10 man raid with 3 bosses. The new mage soul is pointless, it's advertised as a solo, or open world soul. Yet there is a much better soul for that. The new mage souls's dps is really, really low outside of pvp. It will be stupid in pvp because it does ethereal damage, which doesn't get nerfed in pvp. It will be released in a broken state... as in it will one shot-two shot many players. The only thing it provides is a good off soul for tanking.

The grinding in the game is ridiculous now. With the release of 4.3 the best helm and ranged weapon in the game for all classes gets two upgrade paths. It will take you 18 days to craft and upgrade the materials to get the final upgrade. Itll take over 2 million planarite to get upgrade component, 200k is planarite cap. And it will take over 20k plat to fully upgrade. The funny thing is that the new raid won't drop a helmet so you're forced to go through this grind. That and the amount of currency you need is atrocious, you need 89k Captured Intel. To put into perspective... you get 100 from zone events, 50 from Raid Rifts and 75 from each daily, there's 6 dailies and one weekly. So 89k from this will take quite a few weeks of grinding, not to mention you need the same currency to upgrade Essences, 4500 for each essence. The best trinket in the game costs 20k and takes 40k to upgrade. So that's 89k+ 27k + 20k + 40k. Oh did I mention there are 6 trinkets to buy, where 4 of them are more or less useless...

They also have things called Planar Fragments, basically balls of stat. You get secondary stars from Planar Fragments and Essences. There's 11 Fragments, each takes roughly 3500-4000 plat to upgrade. So you're looking at around 30k plat for one set. You need Fragments in order to raid or pvp, because a lot of your stats come from here. Also, the RNG with these is horrible, you can get Crit Power, with 4 tanking stats (5 stats on each frag). And some Best in Slot Fragments are so rare almost no one has seen them.

You also get raid gear that requires you 10 boss kills to upgrade. So that's 10 weeks to upgrade. (The best weapon in game for all classes takes 16 weeks of raiding to attain) Not to mention they are using a suffix system for gear. The gear goes from Preserver > Hero > Vindicator > Conquerer > Overlord. Preserver having the most hp, and Conquerer having the most main stat. The chances of overlord gear dropping are really low, I don't think there's anyone in the game with an entire set of overlord gear that's upgraded. I mean 10 weeks for a piece of gear that is technically more for tanking, yet you don't tank? That's pretty stupid if you ask me.

TL;DR
I'd recommend playing the game, get a taste for pvp and pve, among other things like dimensions, dimensions are really fun. But I don't recommend putting any money into the game, at least I wouldn't.

Edit: There will be a t2 helm in store, just got the news lol. Editing so I can't be called out.

[Arabelle]

Thank you all for your input. I really appreciate the honesty. Despite the disappointing feedback, I have decided to play for a while. Will attempt to get my rogue to lvl 70 and see what it's all about. The game is beautiful and the gameplay is still enjoyable so at the very least I'll get a few weeks of fun out of it.

I'm currently playing on Deepwood, and looking for a friendly guild if anyone has any suggestions

Characters:

Elysa -- 52 Rogue
Elysabeth (formerly known as Arabelle before server merge lost her name) - 50 Cleric

[Maaheim]

Thank you all for your input. I really appreciate the honesty. Despite the disappointing feedback, I have decided to play for a while. Will attempt to get my rogue to lvl 70 and see what it's all about. The game is beautiful and the gameplay is still enjoyable so at the very least I'll get a few weeks of fun out of it.

I'm currently playing on Deepwood, and looking for a friendly guild if anyone has any suggestions

Characters:

Elysa -- 52 Rogue
Elysabeth (formerly known as Arabelle before server merge lost her name) - 50 Cleric

Welcome back. I've just come back in the last week myself. The others are right, it's not the game it was back during SL, but not nearly as bad as some suggest. I got on the forums myself before returning and saw many posts about dead lands with no people running around to do world content with, IA's and group finder take forever to que etc. So I logged in to get a taste and I see people all over in the area's I was exploring in (not end game area's either, I'm talking Freemarch. I que'd for an IA and got into a 15 person group within 5 sec. Then used group finder for a dungeon and bam, within 1 minute I was in a dungeon in a PUG. I'm having a great time relearning this game. I have started a guild for new and returning players if your interested.