alts
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The Anvil of Crom: Curing the alt disease
Alas, my poor rangers. Left to rot in the aftermath of the great ranger nerf revamp of 2010. Twisting in the wind like those gruesome impaled corpses Funcom is so fond of sprinkling throughout Age of Conan's various zones. Yes, I've abandoned the class, simply because I don't have the desire to relearn it from scratch, which is what such a complete overhaul requires. To be fair, it's not so much a nerf as it is a re-imagining, and one of these days I'll get around to leveling at least one of them the rest of the way to 80. For now though, the change has prompted me to return to my original character, rolled way back on the head-start weekend in May 2008. He's an assassin, and I recently got him to 80, though he too has gone through quite a revamp since his original creation. Anyway, once I heard that final, magical ding, guess what I did? Nope, I didn't head to Khitai to partake of the new level 80 content. Nay, I didn't start grinding my perks or faction either. No, I promptly logged back to the character select screen and rolled up a guardian, planting his newbie feet on the beach at Tortage and wriggling his virtual toes in the sand before beginning the process all over again. Point and laugh after the cut.
Wasteland Diaries: Do-over
Have you ever fantasized about a second chance? To go back to some major turning point in your life and do things differently from there? Well, as far as I know that's impossible in real life. But we can do it in games. Rolling an alt (as it's referred to) is a rather common thing among many MMO players. Some will never do it, and others do it way too often. I fall somewhere in the middle. In Fallen Earth I have three max-level characters: one pistoleer, one rifleman and a melee-specialist. Two are PvP characters, and the other is my maxed-out crafter. Aside from sporadic PvP, that doesn't leave me with much to do but gather resources and stockpile chips. No thank you. I'd rather roll an alt. Now, in the many months I have played Fallen Earth, I have learned a great many things, which should improve my chances of survival in the wasteland during my seventh time (counting my beta characters) through. We shall see whether the knowledge I have amassed will keep me alive for any length of time. After the cut I'll chronicle my 12-hour rebirth.
Breakfast Topic: Way better than my first time
This Breakfast Topic has been brought to you by Seed, the Aol guest writer program that brings your words to WoW.com. I am leveling what will hopefully be my sixth level 80. It is my ninth character slot on my main server, leaving one spot for a worgen druid. I really like leveling. The term "altoholic" has been thrown around -- but once they get to 80, I stop caring about them. It's the leveling process that I really enjoy. It seems leveling gets better and better each time I attempt it. I light up every time I get level achievements, and I love that feeling of getting a mount for the first time. For this alt, I have decided to level like it's my first toon with some semi old-school restrictions. My current alt is a 27 dwarf paladin, and I cannot use the dungeon finder nor run with heirlooms. I didn't give my alt gold or bags. I am not buying or training for riding skill until level 40 and epic at 60. I am trying to stay in the natural quest progression (I did run to Elwynn Forest to kill Hogger, but I didn't take the quests) provided by the game. This is incredibly hard. At 27, I have exhausted every possible quest in Wetlands at my level, and none of the quests have sent me on to another zone.
Breakfast Topic: When your alt becomes your main
You've raided Icecrown Citadel and killed Arthas. You've got a ranked arena team. Your gear score and achievement score both push 6,000. You're officially elite. Then one day that level 15 gnome rogue you rolled two years ago on a whim starts to call your name. She's got pink pig-tails and the cutest little laugh. Before you know it your little gnome is questing in Outland. Soon you're in Northrend. All of a sudden you're running heroics, and raiding. Now your little gnome is just as leet as your old main. Back long ago I started a druid for the sole purpose of making leather kits for my guild. At the time I didn't realize that since my main was an enchanter, I made myself redundant because leather kits overwrite enchantments -- but I must have liked my druid. As I leveled that enchanter, a mage, my druid was never far behind. Now both toons are level 80, geared, and at the top of their professions. I honestly don't know which one of them is my main and which is my alt. The only difference is, as a healer, the druid has more utility in raids and heroics. Have you ever switched mains? What would cause you to switch? Guild needs? Personal preferences? Switching classes? With paid server and faction transfers, a lot of the old reasons for switching toons have gone by the wayside. We want to hear your main switching stories.
Breakfast Topic: Alt-zheimer's
This article has been brought to you by Seed, the Aol guest writer program that brings your words to WoW.com. My pally will always stay near and dear to my heart. He's my beloved main, and no other class is ever going to take that coveted position from him. Recently, however, I've found myself leveling a few alts just for the fun of it. I always used to be a one-character kind of guy, so the experience has been new and exciting for me. During these excursions into altoholism, I've learned that I find a death knight's blood DPS -- may it rest in peace -- to be extremely fun to play. I've also learned that healing isn't quite the frightening endeavor I once thought it would be. However, there are a few other things I've learned during this time, which I'd like to share with you now. Priests are not tanks, and running head on into the first pack of mobs in a dungeon will likely make one die. Death knights cannot leap from ridiculous heights with impunity because they do not have Divine Shield. Paladins cannot Death Grip loose mobs. It's dangerous to bind Divine Intervention to the same key as Power Word: Fortitude. Responding to a trade chat ad for Vault of Archavon from a level 45 character will get you ignored rather quickly. I could go on, but I'll spare you all of my stories of momentary in-game fugue. The point being, bouncing between alts can make it very easy to forget exactly what you're doing at any given time. Of course, the more alts you're leveling at once, the harder it becomes to keep track of each little difference. For many of us, World of Warcraft is full of moments like these. People jump off of cliffs because they fail to remember that their trusty epic land mount can't fly. Keybind discrepancies lead to interesting mistakes with unintentionally hilarious results. The myriad of abilities offered by the 10 classes can make even the sharpest player forget that some of them exist. As you may know, the internet is partially fueled on the most renewable resource in existence: embarrassment. So, let's do our part in keeping it powered for one more day. We want to hear your stories of alt-induced failures. While you're at it, let us know if you've got any clever tricks up your sleeve to help the rest of us avoid these symptoms of Alt-zheimer's disease. Have you ever wanted to write for WoW.com? Your chance may be right around the corner. Watch for our next call for submissions for articles via Seed, the Aol guest writer program that brings your words to WoW.com. The next byline you see here may be yours!
The Daily Grind: What makes your characters stick?
If you're anything like me, alt-itis isn't a passing fad but rather, a way of life. I've never met an MMORPG that didn't inspire me to create a minimum of four alts (and usually many more). Even the original one-character-per-server incarnation of Star Wars Galaxies couldn't reign in my need to branch out. Currently I'm rolling with a couple of rangers in Age of Conan, as well as a Demonologist that is surprisingly fun to play. In addition to my mid-40s sorcerer in Aion, I've been smitten by the alt bug there too, with time split between a chanter and a spiritmaster. I even went back to EverQuest II to check out Halas Reborn, and couldn't resist rolling a wizard, an illusionist, and a conjuror over the weekend. The question, when surveying my army of alts, is which ones will be resigned to the scrap heap to make room for more experiments, and which will survive the cut and live to journey toward the max level? I don't know that I can pin down why some of my characters make it while others don't. Occasionally there will be a roleplay reason to keep one around. Sometimes a class is just really fun to play. Often I just fall back on my old standby of ranged DPS or crowd control. What about you Massively readers? I know some of you probably stick to one toon exclusively, but for those that don't, what is the deciding factor when it comes to designating a main?
Shannon Posniewki talks level cap and mid-level content for Champions Online
There are ways that the current Champions Online Executive Producer, Shannon Posniewki, doesn't follower in the footsteps of predecessor Bill Roper. But much like Roper, Posniewki loves talking about the game, and almost always has something interesting to say as a result. In a recent interview, he talked about some of the issues of the game's present and future that are doubtlessly on the minds of many players, not the least of which is the level cap. Unfortunately for players who just can't get enough leveling, the cap is staying put for now -- the team likes it right where it is. However, they also recognize how popular it is to move a new character to max level and then start rolling up alts, and are looking into ways to make doing so more rewarding. They also want to buff out mid-range content a bit, with possibilities of something in the 20-30 range. Adventure packs, the first of which is due out in June, will help expand the content by being repeatable and runnable by any hero above Level 11. Champions Online players might not be hitting Level 70 any time soon, but it looks like they'll have plenty to make up for it.
The Daily Grind: How bad is your altitis?
It's taboo in sixteen developed countries. Mothers shriek in horror when they hear that their children suffer from it. Friendships are strained to the breaking point when it is revealed. More than $116 billion was spent on therapy fees in 2009 alone to combat it. It has been prophesied to be the leading cause of the end of the world in 2012. Of which do I speak? The MMO condition that must not be named: Altitis. Whoops, guess I named it. To the brave altoholics out there willing to acknowledge this debilitating syndrome, tell us: how bad is your altitis? Have you maxed out every character slot on your server? On all of the servers? On all of the servers of every game that you have ever played or will play? Do you delete old characters weekly to roll new ones? Just how far do the depths of your alt depravity go?
New Issue 17 details for City of Heroes
If you play City of Heroes, you're looking forward to the upcoming Issue 17. We've heard some of what can be expected from the big pre-expansion drop, but much of it was cloaked in vague terms -- improvements that didn't have any hard data attached to them, like the promise of new missions and UI revisions. But the official site has put up a page on the coming features for the update, and it helps clarify some things we didn't know about, as well as offering some excellent news besides. And it promises the end of Positron's dreaded unending task force! (It'll still be there, but it will be split into two parts and improved all around.)
Age of Conan's next update promising alt leveling and travel improvements
Not every update is going to be a cavalcade of new and awesome systems, even though it feels really satisfying when they are. Craig Morrison, Age of Conan's director, has come out and said in so many words that unlike the game's recent 1.06 update, the upcoming 1.07 will largely feature changes under the hood that might not be as obvious to players. But his most recent letter to the game's fans is hardly all doom and gloom -- even with the lack of major new systems, there are still new things players will notice. Travel concerns are one of the two major issues that the next update aims to address, allowing quicker travel to quest hubs and faster returns from the field. The transport is limited to quest hubs, allowing players easier access to where they need to return but not cutting out a sense of exploration. That's hardly the only bombshell the letter has to drop -- subscribers will now slowly accumulate extra levels that they can allocate to their characters, even while offline. The system is intended to help with alt leveling rather than speeding through content, with Morrison stating that it would take nine months for a character to reach max level from this method. It's an interesting approach to helping alts keep up, and Age of Conan's players will soon get a chance to see how well it plays out.
The Daily Grind: How do you get the energy back?
No matter how much you love a game, there comes a point where it gets... tedious. It's as true for single-player games as it is for MMOs. But in a game with no defined endpoint, it's even easier to find yourself staring at the character screen and dreading taking a step into the world, because there's just no point to all of it. But we're committed to these games, for better or worse, and so the usual reaction isn't to just stop but to try doing something different. To go for a different approach, level a different character, take on a new set of challenges. And while it takes some time to hit that perfect combination of elements, there's something for most of us that usually reignites that spark that you had when you first started the game. It went from interesting to boring and then back to interesting again. How do you get yourself back into a game that you're finding yourself more lukewarm toward? Do you play a class that's outside of your normal range? Try setting some arbitrary challenge for yourself? Go to areas you usually don't? What gives you back the energy to log in to the game?
Too late to start playing Lord of the Rings Online?
The trouble with any long-running game is that it gets top-heavy. This is especially a problem in games such as Final Fantasy XI, where you simply have to group to accomplish most things in the game, but it's really a problem even in the most solo-friendly game with an expansion or two. After all, more often than not there's an ever-raising level cap, gear curve, and expected knowledge about the game, not to mention stretches of previously endgame content that's no longer relevant. When A Casual Stroll to Mordor asks if it's too late to start playing Lord of the Rings Online, the question could be extended to many other games. Of course, it's probably not exceptionally surprising that the conclusion is "no," duly pointing out that the only time it's technically too late is when the game is shutting down soon. There are also tips about making the areas at lower levels less of a ghost town, which largely boil down to being proactive. People will almost always have alts or restarted characters, and actively trying to get your foot in the door can make up for a lot of inexperience. It's as true in Lord of the Rings Online as it is everywhere: putting forth the effort makes a lot of difference, even if it won't close the expanded level gap by itself.
AddOn Spotlight: Altoholic
AddOn Spotlight takes a look at the little bits of Lua and XML that make our interfaces special. From bar mods to unit frames and beyond, if it goes in your AddOns folder, we'll cover it here. This week we're delving into the world of alts. If you're like me, you've probably got your 10 character slots on your main server filled out with supplemental characters to help your main. I've got my enchanter/scribe warlock who is only level 65 in order to learn Northrend recipes. I've got my death knight alchemist sitting at 70 for titanium and gem transmutes as well as the occasional flasks and elixirs. After a while, it gets difficult to keep track of what you do and don't have on each character. Sometimes you want to help outfit your alts with better gear only to log them in and find out they've already got a set. What you need is Altoholic.
Creating "special purpose characters" with the XP toggle
I love this, as I seem to love most of the things that Mania does. She's just posted that she's put together a whole guild of hunters, all with XP turned off at different levels, for one purpose: testing pets as they move up the leveling ranks. She says she cheated a little bit to do it -- transferred alts from other realms, and it's Alliance-only -- but just having the idea to put something like this together is super creative. We've talked about people who've leveled up one of every class before, but I never considered just how much the XP-off option changes the game in terms of what Mania calls "special purpose characters." Of course, raiding at level 60 is one way to use it, but you can go even lower than that -- want to farm Runecloth without it getting too boring? Roll up a death knight, and leave him in Felwood to grind on Furbolgs. Really love running, really running, Scarlet Monastery with your friends? You can all roll characters to 39 (or lower, if you're looking for a regular challenge), turn XP off, and leave them camped outside the instance. Turning XP off means you can create characters for almost any purpose, and having heirloom items (especially if you buy cloth, which any alt can wear, even if it means they take an armor hit in some cases) means that leveling them up doesn't take more than a few days of free time. Lots of interesting ideas to play around with there for sure.
Breakfast Topic: Once more through the breach
You hear a lot of complaining about leveling up new alts. Having to see the same content again. And I've even said so myself from time to time and meant it. But recently, I dusted off my JC alt and decided to make a push to 80 with him, in part to have a toon to cut all these epic stam gems I need for my tank set now that I'm prot/arms... and also because, griping be damned, I missed fury. (Yeah, yeah, no one's surprised I caved and went back to Titan's Grip, not even me.) Yes, that's right. My JC alt was a level 70 warrior. And now, he's a level 76 warrior. And I'm having a blast seeing all the stuff I've already seen four or five times now (depending on if you count my Horde alts and taking into account that they have different quests to some degree) on a class I've already leveled to 80 twice. (I also leveled my draenei warrior to 76 before abandoning him.) To be honest, part of it is the fun of trying out a fury spec designed entirely around as much self healing as possible with the Glyph of Bloodthirst and Blood Craze, and part of it is just that I missed these particular questlines.
Earthrise developers seeking community input on alts
Earthrise is an indy-developed science fiction MMO on the way from Masthead Studios in Bulgaria. The developers have stated that Earthrise will be a sandbox game, with a large part of the player experience based on what guilds try to accomplish in the post-apocalyptic setting of Enterra. Given this emphasis on player-driven content, Masthead Studios has been running a Community Consensus over the past few weeks where the devs seek input from Earthrise fans on various aspects of the game's design. Today Masthead Studios wants to hear what the community thinks about alts. In most MMOs having extra character slots is expected, but alt play in a sandbox game where players will engage in espionage could get out of hand. Would the ability to easily for any player to create a cell of spy alts unbalance the game, or should there be a tight limit on character slots per account?
Alts need not apply in Freesky Online
There are a lot of games that don't necessarily make the process of having an alt a smooth road, but almost none that outright prevent you from even indulging the idea. However, Freesky Online has come out with a recent developer diary that states precisely that: no alts allowed. And while their decisions outlined therein are focused highly on the idea that as a free-to-play game there need to be certain measures in place to prevent abuse of the system, they're applicable to many of the issues that players of larger MMOs have faced. An obvious example is the longstanding practice of "bank alts", which is specifically referenced in the diary -- as far as the game's developers are concerned, it's abusing the mechanics of the game for unscrupulous means. There are certain games where it's considered standard practice to have at least one character just for banking purposes, but there's a point to be made that this is circumventing the hard-coded limitation of how much space a single character has to store items. The ramifications for other games are likely small at the moment -- it's unlikely that CCP is going to start deleting extra characters, for instance -- but the concepts are interesting to anyone who plays games where alts are frequent.
Patch 3.3 PTR: Rogues learn to stealth properly
Patch 3.3's notes are pretty sparse so far, and the rogue-centric bits are really no exception. Rogues only have three little bullet points, two of which apply strictly to the leveling game. The first is that rogues will have Dual Wield right at level 1, which only makes sense. It's quite possibly the most iconic part of the class. Waiting until level 10 to get your hands on it always felt a little off. The first ten levels is hardly indicative of the sort of combat you'll be getting into as that particular class.The second change seems to aim for that same purpose: Making the first ten levels as a rogue feel more rogue-like. Stealth: This ability no longer has multiple ranks. While active, the single rank of this ability (available at level 1) allows rogues to move at 70% movement speed. Stealth is a lot less fun when it's as slow as molasses, isn't it?
All the World's a Stage: The art of the alt
All the World's a Stage, and all the orcs and humans merely players. They have their stories and their characters; and one player in his time plays many roles.With all the talk lately about starting new characters once the Cataclysm arrives, it struck me that most roleplayers already have more than one, including myself. Like most players, I started with one, a night elf druid, and focused on playing that exclusively for quite some time. It didn't really occur to me that I would even want to play more than one.Then, I began to notice that other people played more than one character, even within the same small group of friends. I had one friend in particular who had mastered the art of roleplaying multiple characters. She never said anything out of character to anyone in our group, and it took me ages to even realize that her characters were ally played by the same person in the first place. Each one had its own personality, and each had a different relationship with all our mutual friends. Knowing her made something click inside my mind, and I began to see other possibilities for myself too, other sorts of characters I could play with different weaknesses, strengths, and entirely different stories to tell. As my roleplaying experience grew, I began to feel as though one character couldn't contain all the ideas I had jumbling about in my head, so... I started another one, then another, and ... another. Little did I know all the pitfalls I could run into with so many characters, nor the quirky little tricks that could become possible with multiple characters, a small group of friends, and a bit of creativity.
All the World's a Stage: Cataclysm's new race/class combinations
All the World's a Stage, and all the orcs and humans merely players. They have their stories and their characters; and one player in his time plays many roles.As you know, the new race and class combinations coming up in the Cataclysm will open a whole new set of doors to people who want an alternative character choice that goes against the grain of their typical racial customs, to one degree or another. With the exception of a couple combinations that feel as though they should have been there from the beginning (such as blood elf warriors, which need no discussion here), each new possibility presents roleplayers with an opportunity to play an outcast of sorts, a character who has made a significant break from the traditions his or her race usually represent.The lore behind each combination is not yet fully clear. We know tauren paladins will probably worship the sun and call themselves "Sunwalkers" for instance, but not much more than that. Some things are clear, though, and there's a lot to get the imagination going for those roleplayers who yearn to play something a little different.
