Ryzom

alphacen wrote:Hum, I dunno where the servers are hosted but I can tell you that in Paris, I still get some lag from time to time as well.

Good or bad connection? It's always the same question
You could sit right next to where the servers are, your ISP would be directing you across some countries nonetheless, no matter how fast your line is. And when and if it happens that some routers have higher priorities than letting your packets rush to where you want them to be, that's lag then.
In fact, that happens for (alternating) some of us everytime the DNS data at the routing stations is renewed. Internet working routine.

alphacen wrote:Now about the thunder.. well some friends told me they can hear it from time to time but I don't, so I guess there is something wrong with my sound card: time to get a better one (sixpack 5.1 atm)

Surprise: Thunder is there.... Even own footsteps are there (referring to other threads).
It's all about 3D positional sound, really. Mixed with Direct Sound and EAX working differently on different systems, that leaves room for testing.
Most set their speaker configuration at the system drivers at what they really have, hardware-wise, if they set it at all... Sometimes it's better to deactivate the center speaker within the drivers to get the sound else omitted.
All who think they are missing some sound and use any Dot-One speakers try setting them up as 4 or 2 speaker and listen again, might work the other way around, too Activating the software buffer InGame also helped many people getting more sound, even those with the most recent and best sound cards.

alphacen wrote: - Quest availabilities ...

OK... we have tons of missions. That really is true. Most are repetitive and a little...dull. Some give tiny amounts of Dapper, almost all give tiny amounts of fame.
Why I wouldn't call them "quests" is because they don't reward comparably to what other quest-driven games got players used to and because they are not at all advertised InGame or needed for any advancement. If it wasn't for the fame, I'd bet that 50%+ wouldn't bother here.

alphacen wrote:More questions to come soon

Keep 'em coming, I appreciate your elaborate style

Okok, thanks for the info.

Now, some questions related to Guild and Crafting :

- Why so little info about the Guilds: features, requirements and such?
I tried to find info through the manuals, the guide thread, using the search... but all I've got was extremelly partial. If I understood, a guild is a necessity if you intend to pvp, participate on Outpost battles for example. True, it seems that Guild's features are a little bit laking compared to the rest of the game's possibilities but some of its existing one are pretty nice imo, like:

- The fair price to create one: 100k (or was it 500k?) doesn't seem that huge.

- In-game Guild forum access: This feature is just GREAT.. one of the main issues in a clan is communication, it's already hard to get a guild forum sometimes and hardr to make your guildmate read it. So having one available directly ingame, well that's a huge plus.

- Guild hall existence: guild storage is an absolute necessity and you have it so that's a good point in my book... until i know more of the Guildhall additional bonuses that is.

- Outposts bonuses: this looks like the castles in L2, controling a region and getting income out of it.

Also, I think you should not underestimate the ability to chose your own side at any time (faction), coupled with the Guild system: WoW or L2, the 2 games I know of, either forces you to get a side at the begining or puts you directly in a ffa (free for all) mode. On the opposite, Ryzom offers you the opportunity to decide whether or not, you and your guild should side with a faction/race.. really cool.

- Crafting, season and written recipes.
Reading through some crafting threads, I've notice some ppl mentionned to keep track of which mats you loot and the season it occurred. So does the weather (seasons) has an impact on the craft?

Also, why some players advice us to keep a track of the recipe (mat used) to craft our items when in the same time you can get this info by right clicking on that particular item..

alphacen wrote:Okok, thanks for the info.

Now, some questions related to Guild and Crafting :

- Why so little info about the Guilds: features, requirements and such?
I tried to find info through the manuals, the guide thread, using the search... but all I've got was extremelly partial. If I understood, a guild is a necessity if you intend to pvp, participate on Outpost battles for example. True, it seems that Guild's features are a little bit laking compared to the rest of the game's possibilities but some of its existing one are pretty nice imo, like:

- The fair price to create one: 100k (or was it 500k?) doesn't seem that huge.

- In-game Guild forum access: This feature is just GREAT.. one of the main issues in a clan is communication, it's already hard to get a guild forum sometimes and hardr to make your guildmate read it. So having one available directly ingame, well that's a huge plus.

- Guild hall existence: guild storage is an absolute necessity and you have it so that's a good point in my book... until i know more of the Guildhall additional bonuses that is.

- Outposts bonuses: this looks like the castles in L2, controling a region and getting income out of it.

Also, I think you should not underestimate the ability to chose your own side at any time (faction), coupled with the Guild system: WoW or L2, the 2 games I know of, either forces you to get a side at the begining or puts you directly in a ffa (free for all) mode. On the opposite, Ryzom offers you the opportunity to decide whether or not, you and your guild should side with a faction/race.. really cool.

Well, you are absolutely right about all that. Whats more to say?
You may find infos on individual guilds in the Guild Hall Forum, down there

alphacen wrote: - Crafting, season and written recipes.
Reading through some crafting threads, I've notice some ppl mentionned to keep track of which mats you loot and the season it occurred. So does the weather (seasons) has an impact on the craft?

Also, why some players advice us to keep a track of the recipe (mat used) to craft our items when in the same time you can get this info by right clicking on that particular item..

Yep, you gotta keep track, because special excellent and supreme Materials only occur in certain places, times, sasons and weather conditions.
Its good to know wich you can dig when.

AND the materials you put into a wapon greatly influence the stats of said wapon. You can´t just throw in anything and get a supersword.
Nope, there are special recipes, keenly guarded by those who found them out by painstaking trial and error, to build very good wapons.
And don´t you think just dropping only supreme mats into the mix will result in THE wapon. No such luck. It´s the combination that does the trick.
And for me that a HUGE plus for Ryzom.

Have Fun

Acridiel

Hehe, thanks for the explanations,

Though I still would like to get more Guild (creation, management, limitations) explanations: I did spend nearly a day this week trying to get some detailed guides, none exists*.. only partial one. :/


Now few cool random features I really appreciate:

- Social mobs:
Well.. that's being social, it's not only the closest mobs to your target that will come to help, but all of those in the frigging area, haha! So basically, when you know that you have to atk these socials (mostly human) be sure to do it in a party, don't even try alone even when you melee 1shot them: their tactic is to literally surround you.

- Mob's special skills: nasty.
If a mob has some skills at its disposal.. expect to see him using them against you. One of the noob flying thingy for example will disarm you.. lol. Others puts you on slow, weaken your defenses or offenses, etc..

- The follow option: a jewel.
You know how work the "keep formation" option in space games? That's what it is all about here! As long as you keep the target selected, you will follow every moves it's doing.. you can even heal it and it won't break this follow command. Along with the "auto run/walk" option, this makes your live really easier while going to a hunt place... which leads to the next point.

- Keyboard shortcuts.
Except for looting, you have or can create a shortcut for everything you do in game: moving, targeting, atking, crafting, selecting, etc.. it's all there. the Numpad allows you to open many windows, closing them all ect.. pretty neat. There are even some shortcuts that open some of your windows in a weird way, a pre-designed HUD of some sort, like F4.

- Player's actions / identifications
- One little nice stuff is that every member of your party will see their name colored in purple, players in duel appears with an atk icon above their head. Oh and players are already subjects to all mind control skills in pvp: fear, sleep, ect.. though for fear for example, you won't run away, just stand still for few sec: so far no debuffs last more than 2-5 secs.. there are no debilitating 30 sec of paralyzed state, as far as I know!

- Like every mobs, when a player targets you, an eye icon appears next to his name! Imagine an encounter with an opposing faction or open pvp, and a full 9 man party targeting you and only you, in your party.. lol, death sentence?

- You totally configure what info you see above a player: name, title (the profession he wants ppl to show), clan name, HP, MP, Stamina and Focus.


- The rez system & Death penalty
To rez someone, you only need to.. heal him back: lol, again simplistic. Here's the trick: when you die, your HP bar is empty for you but for others it looks like partly full of a "semi-visible" hp... I'll refer to it as the "anti-hp".What a random guy has to do then is to simply heal this anti-hp bar: each heals will reduce it and once its down to zero.. that's it, you've been rezed and you Death Penalty (DP) doesn't apply.

You'll get a DP only if you chose to respawn in one of the available respawn location. Most of us use the Death + respawn as a cheap port locs atm.. since compared to L2, every DP are irrelevant.


- Healing and xp
Once again, simplistic yet so unexpected: when you heal/buff someone or yourself.. you gain xp!

For once, griefing is not the only "bonus" feature to be rewarded.. you can still chose to heal others or not but if you do, then you will find a benefit to it. That's a refreshing idea, I'm all for balance: reward both good and bad actions.

- The Outpost pvp system.
It's almost like L2 expect there are way more outposts, you can attack it whenever you see fit (validation period of 24 hours) and it looks to me way more balanced than L2.. though to the cost of the freedom in the battle: atks work by rounds.


*try a search "Guild guide or Guilld creation or guild management, you'll see..


########## EDIT ############


Oh I almost forgot, there's one thing I've found really funny: it's completely useless but it's the kind of touch that makes you think about how these Nevrax ppl focus on the details.

When you log in, after the character selection, during the load time (which can be long).. you'll see some funny stuff on the upper right corner! Haha, the first one I noticed was something like "If you see this line.. you need to get more memory".. "Placing Ninja Youbos" is one of my favorite!

Some additions/clarifications to:

- Social mobs:
Figuring out how to pull different species to not get to feel how social one animal or the other might be is part of the Atys' hunters learning process
- Keyboard shortcuts.
The F4 option really is the fourth InGame "desktop", you have four to shape to your liking. You switch between them with F1 - F4, you save the current "screen" configuration by STRG-Shift-F(number 1 -4). Very handy
Shift-F5 will clear the interface until pressed again for uncluttered screenshots.
- Player's actions / identifications
All entities' colors are configurable (Configuration/InScene/Entities), the configured colors are applied to name tags as well as in the compass display. (The target being default colored white might be distracting, too.)
- The rez system & Death penalty
The longer one's "shadowed" HP bar, the less time until respawn that Homin has and the more HP heal it will require to get this Homin out of coma. Respawn timers themselves can be stretched by healing that way, too.
There is no DP applied to PvP respawns (except Duels!).
- Healing and xp
Selfheals won't give XP.
Healing only grants XP if you're teamed with the ones you heal and the fight is succesful for the Homins healed (eg. they hit the mob successfully thus contributing to its early departure to respawnland).

Btw...if you have specific questions about guilding...ask them

alphacen wrote:Hehe, thanks for the explanations,
....
- Player's actions / identifications
- One little nice stuff is that every member of your party will see their name colored in purple, players in duel appears with an atk icon above their head. Oh and players are already subjects to all mind control skills in pvp: fear, sleep, ect.. though for fear for example, you won't run away, just stand still for few sec: so far no debuffs last more than 2-5 secs.. there are no debilitating 30 sec of paralyzed state, as far as I know!
.....

Players under Fear cannot initiate actions, which means they only have the choices of standing there, sitting down, or running away... and few will run
but its the players choice. Sleep or Stun wont even give them that choice.

And a high level afflictionist can hold a lock pretty much as long as they want to. Certainly long enough for someone else to kill the target. Madness is the only Affliction that will kill the target, and that relies on the target killing themselves ( hugely funny on nukers )

lol I wanna see this and thanks for the various clarifications