MMOStrategyGuides.com

Age of Conan 1-20 level Guide

2008-05-28T17:26:11Z

This is an Age of Conan 1-20 leveling guide created by Muffin. Muffin/Pie/Chicken is an ultra hardcore gamer and I have played several games with him. He is always in the know and an incredible resource to anyone around him.

First and foremost, all quests give the same exp regardless if they are gray, green, yellow, red. Unless its something really stupid like looking for some rare spawn, you will want to do all of them because as you get higher, there will be less and less quests. At high level it becomes mixture of grinding and questing here and there, thankfully, mobs give good exp.

Secondly, make sure you buy enough food/drinks and potions for your level (updates every 10 levels). They are extremely cheap and will make big difference. I personally perfer food that gives most +hp and drinks that gives most + out of combat regen. Do not be afraid to use potions. It will mean life or death in PvE and PvP.

]]> lvl 1-20

When you first finish the beach and come to Tortage, go to the inn and start your destiny quest. This is the singleplayer part of the game. Stop when you get a quest that ask you to go to volcano to talk to the slavemaster. At this point you should be lvl 8-9. I would not recommend most classes to go on due to the difficulty of the mobs and time it takes to clear the volcano zone. Go to the dock in the night mode, find the general merchant, buy all the armor/weapon you can wear at level 10 for your class.

Switch to daytime multiplayer and collect all the quest in town. Open your map, you should have bunch quests marked with X within and outside the tortage. Do them first. Now you should hit 10 and get few more skills. Put on your new armor/weapons and you should be a lot stronger than before. Now pick up your bags, make sure you collected all the quests, then head to the ruin.

This is the only zone outside tortage thats not pvp enabled. Do the quests you have, recall back to the inn and turn in your quests. At this point you have the option of do few quests in white sand (pvp area) and underhall (pvp area) or continue your destiny quest in the night mode. If destiny quest becomes too hard, switch to the white sand / underhall / ruin, at this point you should be around 12-15 and higher than half the ppl running around in there. You will be less likely be ganked. Alternate between these zones until you are lvl 19.

You dont have to finish every quest in tortage to leave. This is the only time i would skip some of the quests cause you want to leave tortage as soon as possible. If you have trouble doing the last step of your destiny quest, level to 20 will grant you better food, potions and more skills.

AoC Demonologist Class Guide Update

2008-05-28T17:04:40Z

I updated the Age of Conan Demonologist class guide with 1-20 skills and the 3 feat trees. I'll continue to get the other class guides up to date as I get some time, I will also be updating the 20-80 skills as things settle down a little as far as patching goes. Here's the link to the updated Demonologist class guide:

http://mmostrategyguides.com/age_of_conan_-_aoc_-_the_demonologist_class_guide.html

Age of Conan Gathering Guide

2008-05-27T17:25:58Z

Gathering resources in Age of Conan is fairly simple. You obtain the quests and then start gathering resources as you locate them. The resources are used for crafting items, cities, battlekeeps, forts, and potions/elixirs. There is a crafting/gathering area in all of the different zones in AOC and you can obtain your gathering quests in the villages that surround the port into these zones. From the wildlands you can run North along the road towards the outskirts and port to Poitain to locate your gathering quests. Poitain is a resource heavy zone where guild cities also reside (all guild cities reside in these crafting zones). Although Poitain and the other resource/crafting zones are resource loaded they are mostly higher level resources and not the ones you need for the first quests. You are better of finding those resources in the wildlands.

Your first gathering quests require that you get 20 of each resource and you can get these quests at level 20. All resource nodes have a total amount of resource in them that can be harvested and they refresh preiodically, it will be rare if you ever find a completely full node. Once you have the first 20 you can turn in the quest and the next quest is for the rare versions of each resource. You have a low chance of receiving the rare versions of the resources when gathering regular resources.

Go gettem.

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Age of Conan Performance Tweak Guide

2008-05-27T16:59:02Z

Age of Conan is a very demanding game and as such there are many things you can do to tweak your performance. All of these suggestions are obviously very dependent on the particular system so they may work for you and they may not. This guide was originally posted by Lordsess of [DREAD].

]]> http://forums-us.ageofconan.com/showthr ... 189&page=7
(This thread right below is one of the more important posts in said thread)
http://forums-us.ageofconan.com/showpos ... tcount=131

Talks about the Shader Cache, and to delete it. It currupts over time, read the first page:
http://forums-us.ageofconan.com/showthread.php?t=32543

Mini map graying out(bottom of first post):
http://forums-us.ageofconan.com/showthread.php?t=4512

VRAM memory leak (This basicly shows how theres a prob with the game for everyone)
http://forums-us.ageofconan.com/showthread.php?t=20189

GUIDE: How to improve your performance and play in AoC
http://forums-us.ageofconan.com/showthread.php?t=13390

Last but not least, [Possible Solution] Crashes and Instability
http://forums.ageofconan.com/showthread.php?t=28245

Age of Conan Guild City Guide - Tier 1

2008-05-23T19:03:36Z

This is a tier 1 guild city build guide developed by Deathrifter and [DREAD]. Each building requires 4 different parts which take materials to build. They are as follows:

Joist: 10 Ash Wood
Brick: 10 Sandstone
Plain Facade: 10 Silver
Brace: 10 Copper

There are many types of buildings to be built and each building has some other building as a prerequiesite, except the Keep which is the first building to be built.

]]> Each building also requires a plan and an architect. I would urge people to refrain from obtaining the Architect profession until Funcom irons out the profession system (You can not remove your profession currently). Crafting was not in beta and is therefore new for them and us.

Requirements are in the following format:

Building (number of total structures): Required Buildings
Joist(JT):
Brick(BK):
Plain Facade(PF):
Brace(BC):

Essential Buildings

Keep: (Complete)
Joist: 15
Brick: 20
Facade: 5
Brace: 10

Trade Post: Keep
JT: 15
BK: 20
PF: 5
BC: 10

Temple: Keep, Trade post
JT: 4
BK: 5
PF: 2
BC: 3

Library: Keep, Temple
JT: 4
BK: 5
PF: 2
BC: 3

Barracks: Keep, Library
JT: 4
BK: 5
PF: 1
BC: 3

Thieve's Guild: Keep, Barracks
JT: 4
BK: 5
PF: 1
BC: 3

Weaponsmith Workshop: Keep, Thieve's Guild
JT: 4
BK: 5
PF: 1
BC: 3

Armorsmith Workshop: Keep, Weaponsmith Workshop
JT: 4
BK: 5
PF: 1
BC: 3

Alchemist Workshop: Keep, Armorsmith Workshop
JT: 5
BK: 5
PF: 2
BC: 3

Architect Workshop: Keep, Alchemist Workshop
JT: 4
BK: 5
PF: 1
BC: 3

--------------------------------------------
Total Materials required for essential buildings:
--------------------------------------------
JT: 63 - 630 Ash Wood
BK: 80 - 800 Sandstone
PF: 21 - 210 Silver
BC: 44 - 440 Copper

Defensive Structures

Gate (x2): Keep
JT: 2
BK: 2
PF: 0
BC: 1

Corner Tower (x3): Keep
JT: 1
BK: 2
PF: 0
BC: 1

Tower (x7): Keep
JT: 1
BK: 2
PF: 0
BC: 1

Ending Tower (x4): Keep
JT: 1
BK: 2
PF: 0
BC: 1

Wall (x33): Keep
JT: 1
BK: 2
PF: 0
BC: 0

Corner Wall (x14): Keep
JT: 1
BK: 2
PF: 0
BC: 0

Staired Wall (x3): Keep
JT: 2
BK: 2
PF: 0
BC: 0
-----------------------------------------------
Total Materials required for Defensive Structures:
-----------------------------------------------
JT: 71 - 710 Ash Wood
BK: 132 - 1320 Sandstone
PF: 0 - 0 Silver
BC: 16 - 160 Copper

Age of Conan In-Depth Review

2008-05-23T17:53:30Z

Age of Conan: Hybordian Adventures is the best MMORPG title I have seen in a very long time and almost my entire guild agrees with me. We are not a bunch of 16 year old CS fraggers that endorse every game that flies off the shelf at launch, we are seasoned and at an average age of around 30 and we have been around and playing MMORPGs since the very first titles in the genre hit stores. This is my in-depth review after playing since the pre-order head start and taking my toon to level 40. ]]> Graphics - Here is my graphics one liner. Vanguard meets WoW with a dash of old world detail and a side or incredibly realistic looking blood and guts. I think the overall look and feel of the game is a great balance. Age of Conan leaves little to be desired in appearance without crossing the boundary that makes a game too hard for lower end graphics cards to run. The world looks good but textures up close look borderline amazing in DX10. The animations are pretty top notch as well, from spells and to combos and jumping Age of Conan took MMORPG animation to a new level.

Audio - Great. The audio is of superb quality but most impressive is the creative quality and how well the audio fits into the overall theme of the game. The music is incredible, from Celtic chants to medieval war drum lines you feel like you have your own soundtrack throughout the entire game. In the forest there is relaxing fanciful tunes and in a dungeon the music makes you want to kill things just as it should. The grunts and battle cries as different classes complete different combos and skills are diverse and realistic, they really help immerse you in battles.

Storyline - Best ever. I am a notorious quest hater, I prefer the grind where I have more control over how fast I can level and can use our guild to full advantage. Questing for me in Age of Conan is aided by a deep and realistic storyline. MMORPG story lines are notoriously flowery and full of complete fluff, not AOC. Age of Conan delivers realistic story lines demanding the blood of prostitutes and heads on pig poles among other things. I actually read write a few of the cut scene text windows, that is a HUGE deal for me. I read Hemingway and Thoreau not game cut scene text so the fact alone that I read most of these at all speaks volumes for the AOC storyline.

Dungeons and Instances - Superb. Best ever. I have never been a fan of instances because I believe in the idea of a persistent world. That being said I am not only a fan of the Age of Conan instancing I think it could be the model for the perfect balance of persistence and instancing. You can run your class specific quests in your own instance whenever you want to. We have all run class quests and had the mobs camped for hours on end or been ganked by some tards every time you get to the spot and had to bring in guildies to clear it up the 5 on 1 noobfest. Instanced dungeons are well done and abundant from level 13 or so on. Every zone also has several instances and as the population of the server is so high there are always people in every instance. There is never a shortage of people to kill and when a guild rolls out 6 guys to kill your duo you can just jump instances and continue on. Party leaders can summon party members to their instance and when party members look at the instance drop down there is a star by the instance that the party leader is in, very functional mechanics.

PVP - Possibly the best MMORPG PVP system created, with so many things not in game yet it is impossible to make an accurate assessment of the PVP system as a whole but I will say that my first impression is amazing. Classes seem relatively balanced with the exception of a Priest of Mitra spell that can be spammed with no recharge time (will be undoubtedly nerfed very soon). The Age of Conan PVP system requires much more skill than any other system to date, the days of button spamming are gone. In Age of Conan we see thing like combos in which things must be done in a certain order and with the right timing, we see the ability to doge incoming attacks based on the direction they are coming from, we see first person shooter features in archer classes, and many other mechanical featured designed to incorporate skill into game play.

Resource Gathering - You can start gathering resources at level 20 by getting the resource quests at any number of various locations throughout the game. These quests allow you to gather the lowest level resources but you must turn in your first 20 of each to complete the quest. The next quests in the gathering lines require rare items that you have a chance of getting while you gather. Resource nodes are pretty sparse comparatively speaking but who knows how that will play out in the end game. Each node only has a certain amount or resources that can be harvested from it before it recharges so you can see how that is an issue when the entire server is trying to craft and build guild cities.

Guild Villages and Cities - Once a guild leader has reached level 40 and has 24+ members excluding himself he can reserve a plot for the guild village/city. The guild leader can choose the region the plot is place in but the game actually picks the specific plot an instance for you. To start a city a guild needs an architect, the recipe for the keep which costs about 2.5 gold, and the resources for the keep. The keep must be the first building constructed. Guild cities are huge and I will do some more in-depth articles on them later.

Overall - Age of Conan may be the first 3rd generation MMORPG to get the model right. Many have come and many have failed. I have never had this much fun in the earliest stages of any MMORPG and if the PVP and siege mechanics turn out to be as good as everyone thinks they will be Age of Conan: Hybordian Adventures is poised to be one of the greatest games of all time.

Age of Conan Assertion Failed Bug Fix

2008-05-03T05:59:24Z

This is one of the most ridiculous and wide spread bugs I have ever encountered and the fix is just as bad but it's the only way the people that consistently get the error are going to be able to play. Read this one to get the fix. Here's the fix guys.....it sucks but it does work for the assertion failed bug. And you have to do it every single time you want to play if the game crashes out. I don't have to do it when I exit without crashing usually. For most getting the assertion failed bug every time this is the only way you will be able to play.

1) Go to the IGN Beta Event/BackupRDB/0812391823098123

2) Copy the two files there - le.idx & RDBHashIndex

3) Go to IGN Beta Event/RDB and copy these two files and overwrite.

4) In the IGN Beta Event/RDB directory delete the le.idx.previous file.

5) Restart.

6) Launch the game and let it re-patch.

7) Click "Play" and then click through the Blackscreens.

8) Enter username/password and login.

I know it sucks but this is the only way that any of us experiencing the constant assertion failed bug can play. Good Luck.

]]>

IGN Fileplanet Age of Conan Beta Explodes

2008-05-02T05:27:23Z

Well after almost an entire day of debugging my rig I pretty much gave up on the beta until they do some serious patching. I played for a very brief amount of time in between blue screens and very strange errors and that time was pretty cool.....but like I said it was very short lived. So the character creation was pretty cool, lots of different hair styles and tattoos and the lot. The intro movie looked pretty cool and sometimes it wanted to play and sometimes it didn't, this bugfest has a mind of its own. The gameplay was pretty cool and didn't feel as confining as most other MMO's. But this is about all I got from about a total of 30 minutes or so of game play between blue screens and other awesome issues.

So the most wide spread bug is the "Assertion failed..." bug. Basically you click play and then here some hiccups and get the error window. It looks like the second most famous bug in this infamous first day of IGN beta was the "Failed to load rendering subsystem" bug. It comes a knockin' about the same way after you click the "play" button.

Thee errors themselves are not what actually is the most annoying or damaging, it's what they actually do to your system. From bjorking your drivers so badly you require a fresh install to forcing you to restart every time just to try something else these puppies are pretty mean. Now, I'm no Einstein but I've been around the block a few times and have worked in hardware and software my entire adult life as a professional...so trust me when I say these are real bugs, we have the power turned on and all have decent hardware that more than meets the mins.

Fanbois on the forums have been posting the ever faithful "it's just beta" line to adinfinitum but we all know the game is 2 weeks from release and girls I hope they get a good build before then. There are also people from the closed and technical betas posting in the forums talking about how this is a really old build and they have played the newer ones which are much better. Hmmmm....let's lift the NDA and then let the whole world play a crap build so they can all go talk about it.....doesn't seem like the best idea to me.

Regardless I did like the very brief bit of the game I did see and hopefully they can get it together over there at Funcom and get us a build that works....I still have very high hopes for the game and I'm not going to crucify anything on the first day of beta. So yeah, I'll wait around and see what happens hoping for the best. Good luck Funcom get us a build!

]]>

Spellborn Lames Out at RPC Convention

2008-04-30T16:09:20Z

One of the hottest looking PVP games on the horizon, The Chronicles of Spellborn, makes a lamer appearance at an RPC convention in Munster.]]> In the groups that I frequent the concensus is that there are only 3 major PVP titles on the horizon that are really promising; Age of Conan, Darkfall Online, and The Chronicles of Spellborn. Well Spellborn took a trip to lamerville and attended some RPC convention in Munster.

They talk of trading cards, table top games, and LARPs........trading cards are for Yugio and Pokemon and I hope that is not something their dev team thinks is "cool". I won't knock them for promoting their product but an RPC convention is not somewhere I expect to see one of the premier PVP titles prancing around with fairies and the knights of the round table pursuing wenches and sipping ale.

In short.....keep the D&D/Pokemon mentality out of my games please....kk thnks.

Age of Conan Fileplanet Open Beta

2008-04-29T15:23:25Z

The Age of Conan Fileplanet open beta event is about to jump off get the gory details here. We have been waiting for Age of Conan for a very long time and with the huge backlog of 3rd generation MMORPG disappointments the PVP community has very high hopes for this one.

The Fileplanet open beta event is open to Fileplanet subscribers and all you have to do is log in and get your key. The client download is a massive 12GB and if you think that's big then this might hurt your brain, it installs to a gargantuan 27GB.

The actual open beta event is said to officially open May 1st but if you try to register for an account it says on that page that registration officially opens May 2nd. The level cap for OB is 13 and here is what was said regarding the cap on the official forums by Tarib, Senior Community Manager:

"We have on purpose chosen to cap the Open Beta at level 13. As someone points out it is a quest junction in the game for the Destiny quests. It is however far enough to give you many (many) hours of entertainment, while giving access to both solo and group gameplay. How many hours is a bit up to you, and how many characters you create. If you are smart about it and team up (which we all know you will ;-P) you will also be able to access content for a tad higher levels. As you move into some quests which demands a certain level that will be the end of the experience. For now.

For those of you who are disappointed about the level cap; at Funcom we have always seen Beta PRIMARILY as a tool for development, a beta is there to test the game so it is as good as possible when we launch. Perhaps you have seen other solutions by other MMO games in the past, but by doing it this way we are able to test all we need, while hopefully also ensuring you get a great taste of all the new aspects we bring to the genre. As you can make several characters you can test out a lot before we launch, perhaps even making up your mind on your primary. This also means we get a focused testing on where we know the major load will come when we launch, which is at the instances running the start. Oh, for those of you wondering, when beta ends your character dies, and once we launch you will need to start a new."

It has also been said that general beta will continue on the Euro server parks and if you have already signed up via the beta page on the official site then you still have a slim chance of getting in on that as well.

]]>

Mythos Stress Test Today

2008-04-25T19:37:50Z

Mythos is running a stress test today read this one to get the gory details. Looks like the stress test went pretty well according to Mythos officially. They said they had 800-1000 people on for the test and they crashed the servers a couple times and they came back up as expected.

Mythos is an action heavy Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game (MMORPG) from the makers of Fate and Diablo. mythos is still in closed beta but we will keep you updated so stay tuned.

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Guild Wars 3 Year Anniversary

2008-04-25T19:02:40Z

Guild Wars turned 3 on Monday and they have a pretty cool event going on. Read the full article to get the lowdown on Guild Wars 3rd anniversary event. Thursday, April 24

After the live update, you can replay the Hell's Precipice end mission for a brand new reward.

Birthday Cupcakes begin to drop from creatures.

As an added treat, fireworks displays will start to light up the sky every hour in Lion's Arch, Shing Jea Monastery, Kamadan, and the Great Temple of Balthazar.Friday, April 25

Starting at Noon Pacific (-7 GMT), the Boardwalk will re-open in the Shing Jea Monastery.

NPCs will provide access to Rollerbeetle Racing and the Dragon Arena from Lion's Arch, Shing Jea Monastery, Kamadan, and the Great Temple of Balthazar.Monday, April 28

Starting at 12:01 AM Pacific, third year miniatures will become available. (Remember that birthday gifts are given all year round, so you will receive your gift on the personal birthday (creation date) of each character on your account.)]]>

Top 10 Ways To Become a Better Gamer

2008-03-31T01:40:33Z

In this installment we cover the top 10 ways you can become a better gamer. Read up noobs.

]]> 1. Do The Research - Information on games is everywhere. Most people log in or fire up their games and then bang their heads against the wall over and over and cry, "OMG how does he keep shooting me in the face??" He keeps shooting you in the face because he knows something you don't. Do your research and find out how the game works...there's a lot more out there besides the manual.

2. Community - Join a guild, forum, or some kind of community. There are people out there that live the games they play and you are never going to be as good as you can if you don't have some help.

3. Upgrade Your PC - If you are lagging across the map you are not going to fare well. Make sure you PC can play the game efficiently. In may cases just meeting the system requirements isn't enough. You can tell whether your PC is up to par or not....even if you are slightly lagging constantly the other guy can pull the trigger first.

4. Take a Break - If you have been playing for 4 hours straight you are not at your best. Play a couple hours at a time at the most and take some breaks. The longer you play the more careless you become.

5. Eat and Drink - Lots of the guys I know can skip several meals at a time and binge game. You body responds slower an slower as the levels of nutrition it needs drop. Keep you blood sugar up and drink some water.

6. Training and Exercise - Video games require twitch reflexes and you need to train your reflexes and keep them sharp. Jonathan "fatal1ty" Wendel plays tennis among other things to keep his response time down. There are obviously many athletic things you can do to keep sharp but sitting on your butt playing games 24/7 isn't one of them.

7. Get Rid of Distractions - If you are answering your phone, watching TV, and IMing on XFire it is obvious you are going to suck. Get rid of the distractions.

8. Comfort - Get a comfortable chair and keep your keyboard and mouse where they feel comfortable. If you back hurts and you can barely move the mouse to get the shot of then again you will not do so hot.

9. Resolution and Setting - Your resolution and video settings can make a huge difference. There is a perfect setting or every game that will give you a edge, go find it.

10. Mouse and Keyboard - There are a ton of gaming mouses and keyboards out there. Find ones that can consolidate the actions of the specific games you play and make sure they feel good. Macros can work wonders in many games.

Age of Conan Updates

2008-02-07T23:39:08Z

Although it looks like Age Of Conan was pushed back again it's still getting pretty close to the release date. Read this one to get the release date and some other updates.

]]> It looks like gamestop has some pretty cool selections for those of use that have been waiting for what seems like an eternity for a game to pull the MMORPG genre out of the toilet. They have a collecter's edition, the game with a bonus, a guide, and a Zboard key set all set to ship on 5/20/08.

Yeah we are a little disappointed in another delay but oh well......hopefully the delay will help Age of Conan: Hybordian Adventures live up to our expectations. As sad as it is this may bee the last chance I give the MMORPG's and they were always my favorite until this almost 2 year rash of crap titles.

Lineage 2 Expansion and Age of Conan Updates

2007-11-30T17:18:06Z

The new Lineage 2 expansion The 1st Throne: The Kamael has some pretty cool additions to the game and Age of Conan is ramping up it's beta preparing for the March 2008 release.

]]> The most notable things about the upcoming L2 expansion are the new race and the fortress sytem addition. The fortress system is going to be amazing and the new race is pretty cool. Click the link below to read our full article.

http://mmostrategyguides.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=15

Age of Conan announced that they sent out another round of beta keys and there are some other updates as well on this exciting upcoming title. The link below takes you to all of the Age of Conan updates.

http://mmostrategyguides.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=16