Rift MMO

[gigapixels Veteran]

Happen to know why all those other games failed? Because they were released broken and incomplete. Look at AoC, War, etc. Rift is a polished, and complete game. It has content from level 1 through end game, including 2 raids ready to go off the bat. This game will launch and immediatly begin working on new content because they are getting all the fixing (what little there needs to be) done during beta.

100% agreed. It feels completely finished to me, with a level of polish rarely seen even in already-released MMOs. I'm also thinking of suspending my WoW subscription to pre-order and play this, at least for a while (I tend to play MMOs for a few months then take a break).

It begins this Friday.

Yay! :D

[treemonster]

it is ? how ?

it plays different, lot more customization, nicer graphics, skill trees not locked classes. and son on. and not nearly as much hand holding.

moreover, people seem to think that an MMO needs 10 Million subscribers to succeed or survive, yet, there are a LOT of MMO's surviving and succeeding with 200-500k subscribers.

yes, this game probably won't get 10 million, but I's going to do more than well enough.

i thin k it plays alot like wow but otherwise i agree. that being said riftblade? totally awesome.

100% agreed. It feels completely finished to me, with a level of polish rarely seen even in already-released MMOs. I'm also thinking of suspending my WoW subscription to pre-order and play this, at least for a while (I tend to play MMOs for a few months then take a break).

Yay! :D

i'm with you here. i don't expect much out of it, 1-3 months of fun.

[McCordRm]

I've been enjoying the hell out of it... but yea, I'm just hoping it lasts me until SW:TOR comes out.

I KNOW I'll be playing a lot of it since a good portion of my RL friends are Star Wars geeks.

[bjoswald]

Depends on the community and modding capabilities.

One of WoW's biggest problems is the community. It's terrible. It's way too large and full of every Internet stereotype we have definitions for.

Blizzard, in an everlasting quest to make more money, tries to appease all these groups of people at once, which results in a lot of controversial

changes. Stretch that out over 6 years and you end up with what WoW is today: a mess.

Rift looks like an interesting game at first glance because it flat out told Blizzard to "bring it". Even if Rift fails, Trion has enough balls to get Blizzard

out of their Lay-Z-Boys and start making interesting content again. I think it's a great marketing strategy because, for one, if Rift is successful, we'll

have another "cool" game to play for a while. On the other hand, if they fail, WoW players will that much more hungry to get back into their comfort

zone (which means more subscriptions, more revenue for Blizzard and more new content). As of right now, WoW has no competition. Every other MMO

is garbage compared to Blizzard's cash cow, and Trion knows that.

As for modding, they have to be very careful here. If they open up Rift and let people mod it like WoW, they have the ability of turning a potentially

****ty game into a great one, all on their own. In contrast, if they lock it down, they're going to push away a HUGE amount of people and subsequently

cripple the game before it even gets out of the gate.

[Tharp Daddy]

Depends on the community and modding capabilities.

One of WoW's biggest problems is the community. It's terrible. It's way too large and full of every Internet stereotype we have definitions for.

Blizzard, in an everlasting quest to make more money, tries to appease all these groups of people at once, which results in a lot of controversial

changes. Stretch that out over 6 years and you end up with what WoW is today: a mess.

Rift looks like an interesting game at first glance because it flat out told Blizzard to "bring it". Even if Rift fails, Trion has enough balls to get Blizzard

out of their Lay-Z-Boys and start making interesting content again. I think it's a great marketing strategy because, for one, if Rift is successful, we'll

have another "cool" game to play for a while. On the other hand, if they fail, WoW players will that much more hungry to get back into their comfort

zone (which means more subscriptions, more revenue for Blizzard and more new content). As of right now, WoW has no competition. Every other MMO

is garbage compared to Blizzard's cash cow, and Trion knows that.

As for modding, they have to be very careful here. If they open up Rift and let people mod it like WoW, they have the ability of turning a potentially

****ty game into a great one, all on their own. In contrast, if they lock it down, they're going to push away a HUGE amount of people and subsequently

cripple the game before it even gets out of the gate.

They have mentioned (don't have a source right now) that they will allow LUA support, but they are not sure if it will be to the extent of WoW. I think they want stuff like UI mods and what not, but not mods like DBM or Healbot.

[treemonster]

They have mentioned (don't have a source right now) that they will allow LUA support, but they are not sure if it will be to the extent of WoW. I think they want stuff like UI mods and what not, but not mods like DBM or Healbot.

there's sticky about addons here:

http://forums.riftgame.com/showthread.php?38788-RIFT-and-Add-ons

Hi, All-

There have been a lot of questions about Rift and the use of Add-ons. We'd like to clear up where we stand on this issue.

There is a lot of confusion surrounding our position on Addons and other types of UI modifications, so it is not at all surprising that a reasonable person would think that we are universally against them.

It's true that RIFT at launch does not have any API support for addons. The reason that we have chosen to go this route is the same as we publicly described when we unveiled the game in early 2010.

Whenever we consider adding a new feature to RIFT, we first and foremost want to make sure that we ship and support it at high quality. That's the primary yardstick we use. If we can't, we will tend to hold off until we can.

Supporting Addons, Skinning, and other UI Modifications in a way that is of sufficiently high quality, stability, and in a way that does not allow for the creation of automated play (e.g. bots, which are inherently a negative to the overall experience) was not a task that we could afford to take lightly. Instead, we chose to provide a robust, attractive UI that players could customize in many ways.

As we work toward the future of RIFT, we will be looking to provide new ways for users to customize their experience, through more customizations and possibly all the way through addons and skinning -- To us, the issue is primarily one of providing all features at the proper quality that RIFT players deserve.

take that as you will.

[Tharp Daddy]

there's sticky about addons here:

http://forums.riftgame.com/showthread.php?38788-RIFT-and-Add-ons

take that as you will.

I think i like the stance they are taking, it will keep the playerbase from being forced to have certain addons (such as DBM or no raiding), so if a feature is widely requested they will just make it themselves so it's universal. I think it will also make it so there is a lot better flow with addons, nothing is worse then when you install some new packs and your screen is bombarded with addon setup menus, and everything being out of place. If it's made 1st party then it will fit in well with what is already created.

[treemonster]

what i took from the post is they are hoping to avoid what happened in warhammer with addons that were basically super OP. i don't think it will necessarily stop a version of DBM or healbot in rift, both of which seem to be a misunderstood by a lot of rift players.

the biggest outcry against addons on the rift forums seems to be against DPS meters. alot of claims that they turn people into elitists magically or something, but the truth is before dps meters people still kicked people form groups for "appearing" to dps too slowly, DPS meters simply gave them hard numbers to use in this way. but the benefits outweigh the cons imho even if i tend not to use them myself except for spec and skill usage paradigm building and testing.

as well without them the end game pve mechanics are going to have to be based around something different than the typical max dps races whenever possible. idk what rift endgame pve looks like but there are hardmodes in the game at 50 so i don't think mor ehardcore raiders want to be one shotting this stuff. i don't think more casual raiders want to one shot normal modes either.

anyways i'll be trying out the riftjunkies combat log parser next beta. it has an ingame overlay so i'll be looking to see if it plays nice with the mumble overlay.

[McCordRm]

Direct2Drive is having a 20% off pre-order sale at the moment.

http://direct2drive.tellapal.com/offers/615051861/interstitial/f3bd3443-f2dc-448d-884f-01429edbb858

[Tharp Daddy]

Just got my beta 6 invite! I must say, it was damn fun planning builds with my RL buddy, deciding how best to get synergy between our souls.

[Beyond Godlike]

Happen to know why all those other games failed? Because they were released broken and incomplete. Look at AoC, War, etc. Rift is a polished, and complete game. It has content from level 1 through end game, including 2 raids ready to go off the bat. This game will launch and immediatly begin working on new content because they are getting all the fixing (what little there needs to be) done during beta.

Also, WoW clone? That's like saying that Battlefield can never do well because Call of Duty has been released, and the differences between Rift and WoW are about as large as those between CoD and battlefield, you get to choose which flavor of game you want to play. There is more than enough room in grenres for two good games. It's not always going to be WoW alone on top with a host of smaller games below.

It begins this Friday.

The next TOP MMO will be blizz's unannounced MMO. Theres no denying this that blizz's only competition is itself. Gaurantee in 6 months well hear of Rift laying off staff n stuff.

[Tharp Daddy]

The next TOP MMO will be blizz's unannounced MMO. Theres no denying this that blizz's only competition is itself. Gaurantee in 6 months well hear of Rift laying off staff n stuff.

Ha, i have no doubt at all that a polished mmo can and will compete with WoW. All the "major releases" in the past years have been trash, i still feel this is the only game i have played which has that "blizzard polish" feel, and it's only in beta!

There is a chance it will fail, yes. The trend that we have seen from the past is against the games success, but Rift has many things going for it. It's releasing in a dry spell, i know many people who are losing interest with WoW, and SWTOR is not coming till late 2011, same with Tera and GW. It has time to make a name for itself.

[McCordRm]

I have to agree... their timing is perfect for Release.

Here's to hoping they don't screw it up AFTER the Beta like Age of Conan did.

[:: Lyon ::]

Just got my VIP invite key! But I guess I have to wait for the next beta event? (Friday, Feb. 4, 2011 at 10:00 AM PST (18:00 GMT) through 10:00 AM PST (18:00 GMT) on Monday, Feb. 7, 2011)

[Nagisan]

The next TOP MMO will be blizz's unannounced MMO. Theres no denying this that blizz's only competition is itself. Gaurantee in 6 months well hear of Rift laying off staff n stuff.

I doubt it, the fact that it hasn't even been officially announced yet (and has been stated that it probably wont be ready for announcement until next year) tells us all that Blizzards new MMO is easily 3 or more years away, that gives plenty of time for Rift to become the next top MMO. And based on what I have seen, Rift is tons better than WoW ever has been, so I have no bought that it can and likely will become just as popular as WoW.

The thing about WoW is it is uber slow, it's great for people who can stand playing 4-5 hours a day, but for those who only play 1-2 hours a day you really can't get beyond a certain point (even a majority of the raids take too long for those types of people). Admittedly I have not raided yet in Rift, but one of the major lores to the game (the rifts themselves) are available from level 6 onward. From there you can start farming them to get good weapons and equipment (it takes completing 5 major rifts and on average an invasion to get enough collectibles to trade for a good weapon, on average rifts can be closed in less than 10 minutes each including travel time to each one, and an invasion can be stopped in less than 20). Overall, instead of one large objective like WoW, the rift system allows people to complete multiple smaller objectives, so someone who players for 1-2 hours a day can still get a decent item every few days without taking the time to play extra on a specific day to complete a raid.

I have no doubt that Rift will give WoW some good competition, we have already seen people canceling their WoW subscriptions in preparation of Rift, and it hasn't even release yet.

Just got my VIP invite key! But I guess I have to wait for the next beta event? (Friday, Feb. 4, 2011 at 10:00 AM PST (18:00 GMT) through 10:00 AM PST (18:00 GMT) on Monday, Feb. 7, 2011)

Yeah, the next event starts tomorrow. I have heard there will be 1 more beta event before release but who knows....I had also heard that this beta was supposed to start on Tuesday.

[treemonster]

Hi, everyone.

One of the things that got a lot of testing during the most recent beta was the amount of PvP and PvE overlap that people would be experiencing on both PvP and PvE servers. If you played through Scarlet Gorge, you know that's a great place to see how social dynamics play out.

We like the idea of PvE people being able to progress as they expect, and we also like the idea of PvP objectives for those who choose to take part.

Fortunately, both of those activities have a place in Rift.

For PvE content: We'll be implementing some changes to PvE quest areas to lower the likelihood of griefing via blocking the opposing side's PvE progression.

? Wardstones in Quest Camps aren't supposed to be attackable targets, or provide rewards for defeating them. The rewards on those were a bug that's been addressed. Those are part of the PvE land control game of rifts and invasions.

? Guard AI behavior was a little less smart than it should have been. We're improving it such that guards behave much more like an NPC bearing that name would be expected to.

? Guards in PvE areas will prove to be considerably more challenging vs. player targets. They still provide a similar challenge to PvE invasions, but now will be much harder in PvP. We'll be tuning this over time. Expect to see some first balance out during the next beta.

? The Porticulum Masters in particular have enlisted the help of the Portal Defense Force. When they're attacked in PvP, you can expect them to put out a call for help over the planar Porticulum network.

For PvP gameplay:

? Expect additional PvP takeover areas across Telara. There are differently-themed, cool-looking wardstones clearly displayed as PvP targets, down to the faction inscriptions on the side. You can see examples of these PvP objectives in Scarlet Gorge.

? To help out with the spawn camping that was occurring in the shared world, Peace of the Grave (the buff granted when choosing to respawn in a graveyard) will now protect you from PvP attacks for 30 seconds, or until you take your first offensive action.

We do enjoy being able to provide gameplay for people who are fans of both types of activities.

At the places where those interests cross over into griefing in one direction or the other, please do expect us to continue tuning to ensure that the griefing potential is kept to a minimum.

- The RIFT Development Team

http://forums.riftgame.com/showthread.php?48008-PvP-PvE-Activity-Overlap

seems pvp servers are getting nerfed to answer outcry over pve server pvp. alpha testers reporting guards currently one shot players at level 30.

what do you think?

i'm a bit annoyed. i was looking forward to small gorup player invasions both as one doing them and one fighting against them as i leveled and got to max level. now it sounds liek wow city raids with crazy guard spawn. or aion without wings.

[Shaun N.]

Got the invite for this weekend too

[Nagisan]

Just a note, you guys can update your game right now if you want, even launch it, but all the servers are down until 10 AM PST (roughly 5 hours from now).

But you can get your game updated and ready to go so you don't have to wait for slow updates when it officially opens. I updated at roughly 2 MB/s (my max), downloading the ~170MB update in around 1.5 minutes. Much better than the average 300-600KB/s I got when the servers were already open last beta weekend. So patch up early and save yourself some time when the servers launch.

[Shadrack]

I got some play time in this weekends beta and it was a lot of fun. Not sure what all I can and can't say (didn't read the ToS or NDA, lol). The gameplay was a lot like WoW, and I actually liked that aspect of it because it was easier for me to get into. Everything was where I expected it so I could focus on the differences. The variety seemed strong. The content looks pretty appealing even for just a quick solo play-through the levels (from what I could tell for the 10 levels I played). I think I may get into this game when it is released :).

[treemonster]

NDA was lifted weeks ago, say what you want.

i got to test a few things this weekend and overall i was pleased.

came across some pretty big bugs though(invincible rift bosses, high level rift bosses in freemarch, jakub's second battalion). but overall when i was in game it was pretty good.

open beta next week for anyone who hasn't tried it to take a look.

[Tharp Daddy]

NDA was lifted weeks ago, say what you want.

i got to test a few things this weekend and overall i was pleased.

came across some pretty big bugs though(invincible rift bosses, high level rift bosses in freemarch, jakub's second battalion). but overall when i was in game it was pretty good.

open beta next week for anyone who hasn't tried it to take a look.

There have been problems with some of the rift bosses, Jakub is a notoriously glitchy one. If i recall they recently took a few of the invasion bosses offline until they get them fixed.

[treemonster]

There have been problems with some of the rift bosses, Jakub is a notoriously glitchy one. If i recall they recently took a few of the invasion bosses offline until they get them fixed.

in this beta in particular yeah. had no issues in the previous beta. hopefully they'll get it sorted by OB or at least headstart.

[Tharp Daddy]

Open beta starts in about an hour! Can't wait.

Here are the Beta 7 patch notes, i removed the specific soul notes as they were way too long. View those @ the official post

2/14/2011 - The 'Be My Valentine' Edition!

=== KNOWN ISSUES ===

This may be removed in a later thread update!

*Buffing or healing friendly PvP-Flagged players in range of peacekeeping guards can cause them to aggro the buffing/healing player. This is especially noticeable on PvP servers but can occur if you have auto-flagging turned on for PvE servers. A fix is in the works.

=== FEATURED ===

* The Soul Tree screen has now become a UI window instead of fullscreen!

* A general audio volume pass has been done along with the addition of extra volume slider types.

* Twitter in Rift? You can now tweet and post screenshots from inside the game. See below under TWITTER for more details.

* Remember those Quest Hub Wardstones that were made un-attackable on PvP servers? They can now be attacked! PvE server hub Wardstones are still protected, however.

* Assigned updated soul icons to all souls.

* Have a pile of Soul changes! Your soul points probably got reset in this beta.

GENERAL GAMEPLAY

* Added a bunch of new emotes! Some hints: Tease, Bonk, Giggle, Tickle, Apologize (which you probably should after using the first four). Not all of these are hooked up to animations.

* Reduced the default size of nameplates.

* Damage from tar and lava should no longer occur while Soul Walking. It resumes if you re-enter after resurrecting, or when resurrecting still in it.

* Dead characters can no longer reveal parts of the map. You'll have to do that while alive!

* To prevent some not-so-nice effects, groups will automatically be set private if any member is inside of an instance.

* You can no longer form a raid if one of your party members is currently in a Warfront.

* Groups with members in Warfronts can no longer use the Public Group system.

* Planar currency left in the Rift Loot UI will no longer auto-convert to your currency tab on login before you can retrieve it.

* When auto-joining the next level bracket chat channel, you automatically leave the prior one.

* Fixed a crash related to trading items directly from your bank.

* If all slots are full in your equipped Planar Focus, right clicking an Essence in your bag will no longer try to auto-equip and overwrite an equipped Essence. It will still bring up the Focus window, though.

TWITTER

* Twitteriftic?

* You can now opt to set up Twitter options from within the Rift client. This is optional to use and also optional for automatic achievement tweets.

* Access Twitter options under Settings -> Interface.

* You'll need to specify account info and log in to send tweets or post screenshots.

* Additional options include hiding the UI (including character name) for screenshots, and turning on the functionality to auto-tweet Achievements. Note: if you have the UI hidden, the achievement popup will not appear in Achievement screenshots.

* You can specify a prefix and suffix to automatically append on tweets. Defaults are your current character name for prefix, and #rift for suffix.

* To tweet some text, use the command /tweet followed by text in the chat console.

* To tweet a screenshot, use the command /tweetpic followed by optional text. This will snap a screenshot and upload it to yfrog.com, and tweet the link along with any text entered.

* Screenshot posts do not currently work with Low Quality Renderer mode.

* If you attempt to use either of these commands and have not set up Twitter login, you will be prompted with the login box.

MAIL

* You cannot delete mail with attachments until all attachments have been removed.

* You will no longer be prompted to pay CoD mail charges for each item removed, only once per message.

LOOTING

* We now show up to 4 need/greed loot windows at once instead of one at a time, when multiple drops are waiting.

* Fixed more general issues with people not getting chances to roll on loot appropriately.

ASCENDED POWERS

* You should be able to upgrade a quest hub wardstone when PvP auto-flagging is turned off.

* The main planar merchants in Sanctum and Meridian now sell an Ascended Power that lets you summon a Soul Healer for 3 planar charges.

* Fixed the Invasion summon ability appearing under the General ability page instead of the Ascended Powers tab.

GUILD PERKS

* Banners: The following Guild Banners have been removed: Stalwart Banner, Skirmisher’s Banner, Defender’s Banner, Field Medic Banner, Rift Energy Banner, General’s Banner. Six new banners have been added to replace them.

* Banner of Clairvoyance: Increases maximum Mana by 200/300/400. 3 ranks.

* Banner of Fortitude: Increases maximum Health by 200/300/400. 3 ranks.

* Banner of Zeal: Increases Spell Power by 30/40/50. 3 ranks.

* Banner of Rage: Increases Attack Power by 30/40/50. 3 ranks.

* Banner of Concentration: Increases Spell Focus by 30/40/50. 3 ranks.

* Banner of Precision: Increases Hit rating by 30/40/50. 3 ranks.

* Each of these guild banners last for 3 minutes with an aura radius of 25m. They now require a new Combat Banner Reagent to cast.

* You are now allowed two Banners active in a party or raid at any one time. If a new one is cast, the oldest of the existing ones will be removed.

* Guild Perk: High Visibility: Increases the radius of your Guild Banners by 10/20/30m.

* Guild Perk: Enduring Banner: Now a 1 point Perk that doubles the duration of your guild banner.

* Whenever guild perks are refunded, we now notify guild members on login until someone spends at least one of the points!

* The Guild merchant has been updated with the following new reagents to go along with the recent combat and rally banner adjustments.

- Combat Banners: Reagent for Guild Combat Banner perks.

- Rally Banners: Reagent for Guild Rally perks (creative names are creative).

- Rally Scrolls: Consumable used to teleport to Guild Rally Banner.

- Silver Artifact: General Guild Perk consumable.

RIFTS AND INVASIONS

* For the first few minutes of a zone event, Wardstones will have additional protection to give players more time to arrive and start defending them.

* Invaders will now be more likely to spawn from different sources during zone events.

* Special voice audio has been added to several zone events.

* Rift collapse timers in progress will now reset to 15 minutes after something in a stage is killed, instead of 5.

COMBAT

* Group member portraits now show debuff-type coloring on debuff icons.

* New iteration of NPC damage. Fixed up a few level ranges.

* The ‘Planetouched’ effect now provides some effect to the recipient based on the planar type.

* Scrolling combat text no longer displays over stealthed characters.

* You can now begin selecting a ground target while moving.

* Ground target abilities will no longer cause the icon on the action bar to turn red when you have something far away targeted.

* Pets will now attack their existing target when ordered to use an ability and are unable to use it on their owner's target (i.e. owner has a friendly target during combat).

* Fixed a bug that could cause some abilities to show up in the Reactive Abilities UI after no longer having the Soul equipped that granted those abilities.

* Reactive abilities that trigger off of target health no longer appear usable when targeting corpses.

* Player auto-attack will not get 'tired' by tabbing through multiple targets (corrected the swing calculation when changing targets quickly).

* Assassin NPCs no longer use Puncture.

SOULS

* Assigned updated soul icons to all souls.

* Warriors: Reactive abilities no longer grant attack points. This change affects Frenzied Strike, Bloodthirst, Inescapable Fury, Turn the Blade, Backhanded Blow, and Flesh Rip.

* Warriors: All Interrupts are now off of global cooldown, and no longer grant attack points. This affects Bash, Face Slam, and Furious Rage.

* Warriors: Cracking Skulls, Airburst, Concussion, and Judgment now share a cooldown.

* Druid, Justicar, Shaman - Faith in Action: Now available at 0 points. This passive converts Spell Power into Attack Power, Spell Critical into Melee Critical, and Focus into Melee Hit.

DUNGEONS AND RAIDS

* Raid frames still keep the role color of player names even when greying them out due to LOS/distance.

DARKENING DEEPS

* Fixed an issue where encounter blocking for Bringhurst was not turning off.

* Swedge's Jagged Wound is now a poison.

* It's no longer possible for players to remain wrapped in a Cocoon after it has been destroyed.

DEEPSTRIKE MINES

* Fixed Overseer Markus not resetting properly after his minions have been spawned.

FOUL CASCADE

* Sparkwing is no longer able to be engaged in this mode.

REALM OF THE FAE

* Seasons buffs now end on death, zoning, and logout.

ZONES

* Tuned drop rates for Rare and Epic items in overland zones. Reduced drop rate of consumable scrolls.

* More voiceover added to NPC vignettes in general!

* Players of the opposite faction who enter Meridian and Sanctum should once again be flagged for PvP on PvE servers.

FREEMARCH

* Rognar does not fear the Rifts. He's too awesome for that.

* Fire-aligned NPCs should now correctly fight Death invaders.

* Fixed a problem that caused an item in Freemarch's zone puzzle to sometimes be unlootable.

* Reduced difficulty of the major-only event, 'Visions of Death'.

MATHOSIA

* The final Rift event dialogue now has audio!

* Rift Between Worlds: Using your item on construct corpses during this quest now requires kill ownership.

MERIDIAN

* Meridian now has a reagent vendor and a second-tier dungeon reward vendor!

SANCTUM

* An infestation of sneaky foxes has exposed some security holes in Sanctum. These have been addressed.

* Blessing of Bahralt has been replaced with something... else.

* The spell component merchant in Sanctum has opened a street-front bar until he finds a new market to go into.

SCARLET GORGE

* Rift event: Dark Fate: It should now be possible to complete the third stage of this Rift.

* Completing the Ancient Wardstone quests in Ironroot Draw will now cause faction guards to appear and defend the Wardstones.

SCARWOOD REACH

* The puzzle in this zone can now puzzle more than one puzzler by resetting itself properly.

* Bare Knuckled: The Return: Kill-stealing issues addressed. Quest no longer disabled itself and can be completed up to three times per day, per person.

* Cleaned up some quest progression/prerequisites in this zone.

SILVERWOOD

* Kongeegon: Removed AOE immunity from the saplings that spawn during the fight.

* Added more Vespid Hives in Sterling Hills, and reduced their respawn times.

* Divine Inspiration: Shortened cooldown on item used in this quest.

PVP

* PvP Titles are now awarded for each Prestige rank obtained.

* Peacekeeper guards no longer accuse you of Disturbing the Peace for walking around or playing songs, or even for fighting in Warfronts. They will, however, still be angry if you start a fight right in front of them!

* Oh hey, we were able to make it so quest hub Wardstones can be attackable on PvP servers (and still not attackable on PvE servers)!

* Guards on PvP servers should not receive a damage reduction from players or a damage increase against players.

WARFRONTS

* Joining a Warfront while polymorphed will not leave you unable to mount.

* Gaining access to the opposing side's starter area in Warfronts will now teleport you back to your own.

* Fixed a bug where you were not able to kick a player out of your party if they were in a warfront.

* When leaving a Warfront, if you should not normally be PvP flagged, you will immediately drop the flag after zone without needing to wait 5 minutes. (If you were already flagged PvP before entering, you'll still have a de-flag timer.)

* Added zone-specific drops to level 40-50 instances of the Black Garden, The Codex, Whitefall Steppes, and The Battle for Port Scion.

ITEMS

* The distribution of Toughness, Hit, and Focus on end-game gear has been updated. These stats should now be found on a more limited number of slots, and more consistently on gear for those slots.

* Collector's Satchel: Now binds on pickup.

* The Big Book of Eth Conspiracy artifact collection now rewards a rad book of conspiracies!

* Fallen Warden's Blade, Fallen Warden's Maul, Fallen Warden's Dress Sword, Fallen Warden's Ripper: These can now be equipped.

* Fae Sticker, Faesteel Warblade, Fae-Touched Oaken Staff, Satyr's Foe-Cleaver, and Fae Spell-Touched Blade: Now have valid appearances.

* Updated dyes to use new icons.

* It's no longer possible to purchase puresource from planar vendors. Added a 20% chance to get planarite as a reward from puresource.

CRAFTING

* Planar dust is now harder to acquire large piles of.

* Items used in crafting now have tooltip text hinting at how they're acquired. Harvested/core materials should say 'Crafting Material', vendor-purchased items say 'Crafting Good', and dropped items should say 'Crafting Ingredient' (such as planar dust).

* Fixed an issue where Epic, Rare, and Uncommon Crystals did not have use text and broke into 15 powders, instead of 9.

* Fixed a bug where some recipe scrolls could be taught to characters who were not appropriate crafter types.

* Apothecaries now sell Vinegar Concoctions.

* Reduced the overall amount of drops coming from Butchering mobs.

* Fixed more instantly respawning harvest nodes.

* You now hear an audio cue when successfully Runebreaking or Salvaging an item.

* Added a cast time and animation to Runebreaking.

* Salvaging now produces usable materials which can be combined to be used as recipe materials in the near future.

* Salvaged materials are now automatically looted if auto-loot is enabled.

* Fixed some text errors in Runecrafting materials.

* Applying a rune to a piece of equipment now displays a brief visual effect.

* Updated icons for Thwarting Runes.

* The following crafting augments have had their stat bonuses adjusted:

* Faerie Wings: Increases Dexterity and Valor.

* Phylactery: Increases Intelligence and Valor.

* Deep One Fang: Increases Strength and Valor.

* Mistwalker Essence: Increases Spell Power and Spell Crit.

* Golem Core: Increases Spell Power.

* Scorpion Stinger: Increases Wisdom and Valor.

* Basilisk Tail: Increases Attack Power and Melee Crit.

* Vespid Stinger: Increases Attack Power.

ACHIEVEMENTS

* Achievements with item rewards now deliver them via mail.

* From Outcast to Hero: This achievement now grants a reward upon completion.

* Added achievements for defeating each zone event colossus and one for defeating all of them. Titles can now be earned for defeating all colossi in each zone.

* Breaking and re-combining Runecrafting materials is no longer credited as 'crafting' for achievements.

* '...Something Blue' is no longer triggered by crafting an Epic item.

GRAPHICS AND AUDIO

* Male Dwarves no longer look so... weathered. Current male Dwarf characters will probably appear to have lost a few years off their face somewhere.

* Fixed a bug where character coloring could be messed up after being polymorphed.

* Character hair should be properly hidden when previewing helms.

* Cleaned up Rift appearance when viewed from a distance.

* Corrected some armors that didn't 'ghost' or 'stealth' properly.

* Channel spells will originate from the correct hand again.

* Using emotes after casting spells or jumping will play the emote animation - once you've finished whatever you're currently doing.

* Fighting and casting while underwater should now animate better.

* When sheathing weapons post-combat, they should stop randomly appearing again.

* Fixed rifts getting stuck in odd graphical modes when logging in beneath them.

* Casting spells directly from the drinking animation will now actually cast and animate the spell.

* Persistent spell effects are now hidden while a target is polymorphed.

* An ability sound effect and volume mixing pass has gone in. Things probably sound a bit different, now!

* Dwarven lady Bards should now play their instruments!

* New Bahmi male default and emote voiceovers.

* There is now an audio cue when receiving a tell.

* Enabled separate sliders for UI, Voiceover and Sound Effect volumes.

COMMANDS AND MACROS

* /ra now works to chat in Raids.

* /pvptoggle has become /pvp.

* Assigning ctrl+key to an action bar slot will stop trying to preview usable items in that slot and actually use them.

* Fixed issues with ALT+TAB when using the low quality renderer.

UI/SETTINGS

* Moved Soul Trees into a windowed UI instead of fullscreen!

* Setting a keybind to a number pad key will now differentiate it from regular number keys.

* Loot messages from parties and raids now have their own channel filter.

* Failed area quests (zone events, etc) will be removed from your quest log and quest stickies after 15 seconds.

* Party members' minimap indicators should no longer show at the top left corner while teleporting.

* Mount icons on hotbars now grey out when in no-mount areas.

* Icons will no longer display as greyed out in the abilities binder.

* Fixed pets appearing very large in the character UI.

* The quest acceptance window and guild quest window now show the quest type and repeat interval (ex: Guild, Weekly) for guild quests.

* Stat names on tooltips have been updated to match stat names on the character sheet.

* Inspecting a player will now show hidden helms and all equipped weapons. It also shows equipped Planar Focus and Essences.

* Raid pet groups are now properly labeled in Edit Layout mode.

* Raidframes can now only be dragged via the drag handle at the top of the window, or in Edit Layout mode.

* Fixed a bug causing the minimap clock to reset to showing server time on logout and zoning.

* Bonuses to your mana, power, or energy will be shown in the same place as healing effects for combat text.

* Equipment can no longer be previewed while polymorphed.

CLIENT/SERVER

* Intro movies will now only play on the first client startup, with a button at character selection to allow you to replay it later.

* Improved detection and notification of corrupted data.

* Fixed some issues with the client hanging/crashing on shutdown.

* Added a setting in rift.cfg to enable combat logging to a file by default. The setting can be found in the [Client] section, called LogCombatConsole. It will appear after you turn on the combat log for the first time.

* Failed attempts to connect to the character selection server will time out after 5 seconds, and display a progress message for each attempt.

[Magichat]

Anyone have a Direct2Drive coupon that works?

[+longgonebn Subscriber²]

Open Beta just finished, that was awesome. Hopefully can get the money to pre-order.