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Starting to play at this point, thoughts?
Hey guys, let me first ask a few things so we can then proceed to the real topic here:
1. Is the US game locked by IP, as in can I actually play in US servers from EU?
2. Is the lag going to demolish my experience or is it bearable?
2. Is the lag going to demolish my experience or is it bearable?
Now, to the real topic:
I am a former EU player that stopped playing quite a while ago, I believe it was close to 3 years ago. Somewhere around the time when SC HM was a thing. I've asked about on reddit regarding weather or not situation has changed on EU and it seems to be a general consensus that the thing that drove me to quit in the first place is still very much on the loose in EU and that would be: P2W / elitist approach.
What I mean by this is basically, unless you were Schisma +13 gear like a weak after the content was released you would not get invited to anything. It is doable if you P2W, it was also doable if you were stockpiling crap-ton of materials by playing the game for the past X years, but since I was not in that position it just made playing impossible. I couldn't join any groups, content was moving forward I was stuck in one place. Fast forward a few years I cannot even imagine how far behind I am now, it comes to being a moot point to try to represent having any progress done at all. Weather being schisma or full naked is irrelevant from a point of view of someone 5 gear tiers ahead. So since I was directed that US servers might hold a different story and are less P2W, I was wondering if you guys could give me your honest opinion on weather or not there is a point in starting to play this game now?
Things I'd like you to consider are:
a) I am from EU and would be playing on US servers, so lag could ruin it, is this a thing now-a-days?
b) How 'dead' is the game?
c) How much p2w would you rate it on a scale from 1-10 (i dont need details but you can provide some if you feel necessary)
d) How elitist is the people approach in terms of enabling new people to actually do things?
e) Is there some form of catch-up mechanic that would allow me to skip hours and hours of grinding to get from being naked to being relatively close to where others are?
f) Do I require 4 other people to play this game like it is the case with most other MMOs (EU tera included) because pick-up groups are doomed to failure and if you do not have friends to play with on a regular basis might as well not play.
I need honest opinions in order to determine will I jump and waste my time here or not.
Thanks folks.
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Comments
I can answer some questions for you, since I am playing from EU myself.
a) Aside from the servers being potatoes from time to time (US peak times), no.
a.a) Remember that your latency is always a +40 - +60 because we are not in the US, depending on your ISP and your routing, you could expect an average ping of 140ms~ (TOTALLY DECENT GAMEPLAY)
* I suggest you open a command prompt and run tracert diag.enmasse.com, to see what route your connection follows to the datacenter. It will give you a rough estimate for your ping and latency in-game.
b) It's okay. You could say it depends on what server you're on.
c) 3
d) idk, someone else might be able to answer this.
e) Level 60 scroll, allowing you to jump to level 60. (Purchaseable in the TERA Store or with in-game gold from others, idk the current gold to EMP ratio)
f) There is Instance Matching across all servers (IM) or Looking for Group (LFG) that you can use to look for players for dungeon runs, short answer, no you don't require it.
As for your question: To start playing the game now? I say yes, new class is coming in a week, Valkyrie. It's more your own personal preference really, I guess. Do you want to play MMOs that are basically tab-target and spam buttons or play an MMO that requires more than that?
a) For the lag, it depends on many things. I usually get a ping of 120-150, but sometimes it spikes to over 1500 (not for long, though).
b) Depends on what you mean by dead. There are groups for every content on pretty much every server, as far as I know. You'll just need to find people who play at the same time as you.
c) 1. The only p2w aspect would be the dragon mounts giving a bonus in PVE (if you consider that p2w, personally I don't, since PVE in co-op content).
d) Not sure what to say. I always help anyone who asks (whether it be for general questions or running dungeons), but not everyone does.
e) Yes, first is the BuddyUp system, then once you reach level 65 you get quests that will help you gear up. We'll be getting a new gear tier shortly, too, so most people will be gearing up all over again.
f) For any end game content, you'll need a group. I recommend finding a guild that has members playing at the same time as you and going with that.
I'd like to address these two points once more.
I do not feel leveling is an issue at all, I am an alt machine and do not find it tedious to grind mobs for hours if it needs to be done (and iirc it needed to be done from time to time). I am worried about gear once you do reach max, if people require, idk tier N-1 gear and you have tier N-2 you are pretty much "banned" from doing dungeon runs. Instance matching exists but at least back when I played, random groups would more often then not just be a waste of time because of how incompetent people were, or, they'd just fall apart after the first failure that happens.
I ran the CMD command you gave me, got 150 ms, hopefully that is okay to play with.
Well for endgame, I suggest LFG over IM anyway.
As for gear, well since I reached endgame for the first time ever in my life in any MMO, TERA being the first. I'll let others handle that part in answering that question.
I agree with pretty much all answers here, the game is quite receptive of new players, and specially former EU players as these are not completely new but they're new to our community, they're always a plus.
Elitism: Agreed with Devam. If you state that you're new, you'll be accepted better than if you keep silent and just die around. I prefer it that way, as I know what to expect and how much to take care and also what to explain. People do explain stuff in dungeons if you're sincere to say you're new, and also bear with your deaths better than if you hide it. Just now had a run like that (tank was new).
Of course: you'll not be accepted into groups looking specifically for skilled players (like the LFGs entitled FAST or RUSH), if you're not, but that's obvious and fair after all.
Just keep in mind: please don't blame healers! We have enough of that all around!!
Actually, nobody should blame others, I saw several healers, tanks and dpses that are so bad and they even want to kick others or blame others that are doing better than them.
From experience I'd rather say I am new than be found out I can't do the dungeon. If they kick me, so be it: It means that they can't clear dungeons in a suboptimal position and can't be bothered with new player experience. But there will be runs where randoms will teach you mechs. I personally hate it if a healer doesn't heal at all: slow(ish) heals are fine because for most content you are not supposed to facetank everything anyway, as long as you go back into healing range and let the healer actually heal you. I personally hate it when the tank doesn't even try to keep aggro up and only does basic attacks and block, and dps being lazy and spacebar everything (or fireball the tilt inducing skill). These are things that you see everyday in IMS and people do get kicked for that. I won't exactly call them "elitist" though, because it is really only sloppy and lazy plays that gets noticed all the time after all. People have higher thresholds such as gear requirements but it is dependant on the player themselves. I have seen leaders accepting floormats into parties and have no qualms carrying them and I have seen leaders only wanting the best of the best, all for the same mid-tier run.
It is not about gear when most people don't know all their skills they have ingame: I have seen priests and mystics not know what a Plague/Regress is just because most people deem it a "PvP" skill. Mid-tier is already so easy compared to years ago, and it is mostly a test of reflex and simple game knowledge. I would dare say that it is now possible to carry a pickup group alone provided you know your stuff. I only play two days a week nowadays which proves that it is not impossible to advance while playing much less. Catching up in terms of gear is easy enough: mid-tier is doable in a week of dungeon grinding regardless of how far you are before, hence I say skills and practice are still most important.
Would you say that the relevant number of each of these is high enough for people to actually be able to do content without friends that make up a static?
I do not think the issue will be with failing as much as not getting a chance to attempt, like not being invited is more of an issue then actually dying. Sure we all die when we do not know how things work but that is something that we learn and get better at. While on the subject of servers, are all of them hosted at the same place, any recommendations for EU players, if for nothing then for having "a lot of other EU players there" in order to play at "the same time"? Looking for recommendations.
You can survive alone. I have done it before, solo IMS/LFGing every content after I stopped being super active due to life affairs (To put it into perspective, I never bothered to get BiS for PvE). You will see trap runs once in a while, you have to live through it. Still having friends help massively in this game. You don't have to get a full static, having 1-2 friends makes it a whole lot easier to play this game without feeling mad about yourself or your party mates. This is because friends is the most valuable asset you can have in this game, no BiS gear can replace the experience that you get from your friends in a game focused largely on teamwork.