Albion Online Guide – albionstore

Albion Online Tips to Make the Game Feel Really Well Built

Today we will share with you some tips in Albion Online to make the game feel really well built. Here we go:

Have mobs drop a range of silver, not a static number.

Different Mouse-over icons for the various gathering materials: Axe = wood, pick = ore, etc.

Loot needs to be highlighted when behind trees/etc.
Blood splatters when Demo-ing buildings. Olly makes sense if they’re mutated zerglings
The sound for adding resources to buildings doesn’t fit, just sounds like a sword swinging at air
Volume Slider for Mount Movement/Steps would be nice as it tends to be significantly louder than everything else around and can be obnoxious.
Increased base carrying weight seems useful or a slower reduction in movement based on weight. I max out on weight pretty quickly and it just “feels” like a longer time would be helpful. Then again, the world is much emptier than it would be at launch so I’m able to gather materials a lot faster than I could in that situation and it might fit better at that time.

Variety in monster/mob attack sequences/spell casts and Variety in damage output. Hitting for 39 every time I swing on a mob that does the same sequence of attacks and spellcasts turns into an incredibly repetitive combat encounter.

A suggestion to consider, not saying I’d recommend it, just something for more game-design savvy people to think about: Reset the materials needed to make T5+ processed goods so that T5 needs no pre-requisite, just like T1/Some T2. Then T6 needs a processed T5 + raw T6, same w/ T 7 and 8 etc. It seems like it would be a nice refresher after working your way up to T4 and could help reduce some of the monotony of always having to go back to low-tier resources.

Create a purpose for the random buildings, ruins, etc placed everywhere. Give them some things to search, destroy, have them randomly spawn mobs/bosses, etc.
Add tank viability w/ swords? Just a preference by me here.
Better visibility in large-scale combat. Distinguishing between allies, enemies, PVE mobs, etc, can’t be extremely difficult. Allow me to turn off allied cast bars so I can see enemy cast bars better. A better indicator of who my target is would be nice so I don’t get lost on where it went in hectic combat. Also, an auto-target feature would be useful as when the battlefield is cluttered, I’m often unable to target an enemy because my allies are crowding it.

Designation for weapons to show if they are 1h or 2h.

Balancing Issues New Skills in Albion Online

Today I will share with you the balancing issue in Albion Online.

Great Hammer 6.3 brand new tackle skill

description: travels in straight line dealing 48 dmg and stunning for 5.7s energy cost 65 cooldown 15s

Polehammer 7.2 (same rough tier) Groundbreaker

description: travels in straight line dealing 297 dmg and stunning for 9.14s energy cost 67 cooldown 15s even the 4.2 polehammer skill is better than the great hammer

Please start posting full descriptions of potential new skills FAR prior to placing them in game. Something this obvious should have been common sense.

To put it bluntly this isn’t the first time:

Movement ability on Armor (why make it so medium is better than light and heavy when prior to this it was balanced passives are fine it is the active skills that unbalanced game)
Movement ability on Weapons (they should all be roughly the same…if you need help calculating there are a number of us capable on forums ask…please)
Aoe dmg on Bow (like really you nerf the 1 skill that was sort of “ok” and totally ignore the 3 second spammable that can hit everyone in a cone?)
Meteor being useless (i.e. remove the knockback no other aoe makes it so that it ruins everyone else’s aoe in game)

Albion Online Guide: If and When a Wipe Will Take Place

One of the most discussed topics about Albion Online is if and when a wipe will take place. In this thread, we want to give some background information. There will be a wipe at the end of closed beta. Closed beta will last at least until 1st August 2016.
We are still not able to announce when exactly the wipe during closed beta will take place. However, what we can share is the criteria that would need to be satisfied for a wipe to make sense.

The game needs to be sufficiently different than the game version we started the closed beta with almost 3 months ago.

In particular, the issues of the game relating to progression, mob and resource distribution and availability of content need to be properly fixed. This goes beyond just changing fame values for the destiny board. While we have come along way here since the start of closed beta, not all changes we have planned to this area of the game are done yet. Check our state of the game post for further info.

On top of that, we have announced the creation of a brand new, immersive game world. This will include a much improved resource distribution, more variation, more unique player cities and different biomes and climate zones. This is more than just cosmetic, as it will also have our new red zones with a crime and reputation alongside a large new continent consisting entirely of black zones. These changes will make red zone the go to zones for smaller scale PvP fights while the new black zones will be perfect for guilds duking it out on a large scale.

In order for a wipe to be meaningful, the above changes would have to be made to the game, at least in early stages. Why?

We are well aware that a lot of players are currently on break as they are waiting for a wipe. On top of that, while we are making the above improvements, we are not doing any aggressive marketing of the game, either. If and when we announce a wipe, it is extremely likely that we will see a huge inflow of players – new players trying the game for the first time, but also a lot of players coming back from their break.

In paritcular when it comes to existing players coming back, and course all players active right now waiting for a wipe, we absolutely do not want to disappoint them – and this means that a significant amount of the announced improvements need to be in the game first. After all, there is only so many times that players will go on a break before losing interest in the game, and if we wipe the game too often, without showing enough improvements between wipes, than patience could run out quite fast.

Finally, as some people are concerned with population numbers: those have been pretty constant during the past 4 weeks and are absolutely sufficient for having an active game world for a meaningful beta test. It’s also not a concern to us as there are at lot of things we could do at a moments notice to push up population – but we do not really want to do it before the above stated improvements are in the game.

As stated many times, we are developing Albion Online for the long term. This does require a degree of patience for all parties involved. There are enough games out there doing a hype, crash and burn due to short-termism, and we certainly do not want to be one of them.

We will be doing a developer video blog soon with some background information on the planned changes, and we will also keep you on in the loop regarding timelines for a wipe.

Albion Online Guide: Skills, Gear and Crafting

There is no doubt that albion online has the best skill and gearing system. It has a comprehensive deep system, which allows different combination of builds. Players have tons things to research, which will allow them to play longer.

Skills and gears are relative. There are certain skills that can only be utilized when using a specific weapon. Wherein, wearing a wand makes a character to be a spell caster, while wearing a bow allows a player to use bow skills.

Skills
The limit of using a skill only on a specific weapon is nothing new. Changing armors could add or reduce a character’s skill. Different skill could be obtained through wearing different armor and weapon. Each weapon has its own skill.

A bow has its own skill set. A wand has its own skill set. A sword has its own skills set. A character can acquire these skill set through simply wearing a wand, a bow, and a sword.

Gear
A character could wear bow, wand, and sword. However, using high level equipment requires advancement of a specific weapon on the destiny board. Example: in order to wear a high level bow, the ranger in destiny board should in par with the equipment tier. In other words, players have to invest so much time in order to become a master of all.

Crafting
If you hate crafting, humanoid monsters drop equipment. The equipment they drop varies on the monster tier. If you kill a tier 3 monster, you have a chance to obtain tier 3 weapon.

The same goes for crafting. There are a total of 8 tiers in albion online. Higher tier resources can be obtained through killing high tier monster or high level area.

Skill, gear, and crafting, talk whichever interest you with albion online gold hunters in the community of people who buy albion online gold and albion online silver!

Albion Online Guide to Build Assassin

Equipment
Let’s delve into our armor and weapon of choice.

Cloth Hood (Mage)
Leather Chest (Hunter)
Leather Shoes (Assassin)
One-handed Dagger and Torch

A plethora of poison abilities, as well as various mobility skills provides this build with both the damage and nimbleness necessary to perform effectively. It is a strong case of a slippery playstyle and couldn’t be defined better than that of an assassin archetype.

Armor

Let’s go over the skill choices that we will forge onto our armor.

Mage Cloth Hood Skill: Poison

The main skill that we will want to forge onto our Cloth Hood would be Poison. The skill itself is quite self-explanatory. It coats your weapon with poison, causing your next auto attack to poison your enemy with damage over time, lasting 5 seconds.

Poison synergizes well with the other form of poison you will want to pick up (detailed later in the build) which will essentially stack together for massive damage.

Mage Cloth Hood Passive: Aggression

Without a doubt, the right passive for our hood would be Aggression – increasing our damage by 3.5% which simply helps eliminate our enemies a bit faster. Considering that we are not using a cloth chest in this build, it is also important to take note that we won’t have the major boost in damage that Aggression on Cloth Chests provide. Nonetheless, every bit of damage boost helps.

Hunter Leather Chest Skill: Haste

Although Fury may seem as an enticing skill option for your chest for that additional damage-boost, the better of the two options in this build would be Haste. Haste increasing your movement speed by 50%, as well as your attack speed by 60%, for a whopping 8 seconds. This is a quintessential skill to have as it covers a large percentage of both your damage amplification, as well as your mobility.

Hunter Leather Chest Passive: Increased Movement Speed

An optimal choice of passive for your chest would be Increased Move Speed, which increases your base movement speed by 5%. The more mobility, the better.

Assassin Leather Shoes Skill: Dodge Roll/Refreshing Sprint

Our choice of skill on our Leather Shoes is debatable, with Dodge Roll being an excellent skill in itself. However, Vezin’s personal preference of skill here is Refreshing Sprint – increasing your movement speed by 96% for 3 seconds, as well as slightly reducing the duration of all of your cooldowns, including the sprint itself.

Refreshing Sprint naturally provides for more damage, as your poisons are on shorter cooldown, as well as more mobility considering that skills such as Haste and Dash (detailed later) used in this build receive reduced cooldowns. Not to forget that the sprint itself is a form of mobility as well. Simply put, it’s hard to pass up on!

Assassin Leather Shoes Passive: Increased Movement Speed

Just like our Leather Chest, the passive we will want to take on our shoes is Increased Move Speed. In this case, the passive will provide you with a slight 2.5% increase in movement speed, rather than the 5% that the chest provides. However, it is just as important as it is another form of mobility to get you in and out of the enemy flanks as quickly as possible.

Weapons: One-handed Dagger and Torch

Now, let’s cover our choice of weapons.

Playstyle and Combos

As mentioned above, the playstyle that this build provides is very niche and really centers upon good positioning and good timing. Vezin details the ins and outs of performing well with the build, as well as the important synergies to consider when utilizing it.

Making use of every skill in this build is important in both maximizing your damage output, as well as your mobility. Essentially, every skill synergizes nearly perfectly with one another.

Pros and Cons

The pros of the build are very clear. You have high mobility and high burst damage. With access to dash on such a short cooldown (reduced even further by Refreshing Sprint), it’s a build that is very hard to be locked down unless chain stunned or anything alike.

A few notable cons of the build are that it provides no AoE (area of effect) damage, and is strictly a single target burst build. This naturally has its shortcomings in large scale battle, however it is still capable of picking off some stragglers.

New PvP modes Needed for Solo/Casual Players

I really like this game but I want to play with some more options. Something like battlegrounds or arena or something – for solo play in a pvp sense (or maybe small group).

Right now it doesn’t seem like the game makes that possible. It seems like the model is right now to put in a thousand hours or so, and then try to join a pvp/guild zerg. I know I won’t stick around if that is all there is, and there are many more people like me I’d guess. Yes, I know there are people who can and will commit on average 4+ hours a day, but its just not possible for all of us. I hesitate to say anything because of the flaming I may get in response, but some of us can’t commit to the game in terms of a part time job – we have shit to do in our own lives.

Albion seems great with crafting, and does a good job of making a grind not seem too terrible. But to be viable in pvp there is simply too much of a time requirement, and it seems to be too zerg like once you hit that level. Some of us like to solo, like pvp, and don’t have massive amounts of time. I know, the response is probably going to be’this game isn’t for you then.

Half the fun of the game of this game is figured out the little niches to the game. Like how to avoid zergs. How to track people in game, Mechanics of combat. How to counter certain builds. How to safely farm any area. The list for this goes on and on. The only way to learn these things is by doing them. Which everytime i see someone like you complaining about it being a zergfest, or always dieing clearly don’t think about any of this and its seems like you just want a boring click button grindfest. Which is why you guys get the go back to WOW scrub comments all the time. Because the things i just mention’d really don’t take much to figure out. Once you get those basic How to’s down you can roam around solo or in small groups 2-4 people and have all sorts of fun.

Albion Online Solo PvP Video

There is a Albion Online Solo PVP video, I hope you enjoy it.

Albion Online Guides to Have Many Territories in GvG

Having many territories is a huge benefit. It also needs to have some downsides. Let us divide these challenges into internal and external challenges.

Internal challenges of controlling huge swaths of land

Upkeep cost of territories
Other things. In general, the internal downsides has to do with organization. A super well organized guild will mitigate these downsides

External challenges of controlling huge swaths of land

Due to the guild’s size, more guilds might be interested in the land. They will therefore have to fight more GvG’s (and/or contest more sieges when those are implemented)
Due to the above, they will also have to have more GvG teams, since one GvG team can’t defend a new territory 10 maps away from the first territory they defended (this is one of the counters to a big guild)

The thing I am talking about is the (2). If (1) was the only downside, then in theory, one GvG team can defend a whole lot of land if they spread their timers out properly.
When the lockout and fake attacks are in the game, the guilds controlling a ton of land have to have several functioning GvG teams. This in itself makes it easier to take their land and increases the possibility that the guild controlling a lot of land will implode under its own weight.

Don’t get me wrong. I think sending fake attacks (and attacks in general) should be much more expensive.
And I also think that a GvG team should be able to fight more GvG’s in the same area. Right now they can only “jump” 1 time. If they could jump 2 or 3 times during one lockout, it would make it possible for one GvG team to defend a bit more territory, and it’d make the lockout/fake attacks less punishing.

But removing the possibility of fake attacking altogether, or to remove the GvG lockout, would move the game is a bad direction. We need a system in place that promotes smaller guilds by making it harder to control huge swaths of land.

Suggestions to Travel Fast and Remove Tedium

I’ve played Full Loot Hardcore PvP games for a really long time and I really really love the genre. I’ve played Albion since a very early alpha when it was terrible but showed promise. The game has come an extremely long way from the tedium and restrictive game I remember and I really love what I’m seeing here.

Please keep in mind, these suggestions are to remove some of the tedium from the game and help attract a larger casual player base.

Enough about that, now Let’s turn to the point.

Recall
Description: A common skill usable even when you’re naked. This spell gives the player an opportunity to teleport from the wilderness back to safety, however it takes a very long time to cast and makes a lot of noise. If the player takes any damage during the Recall, it cancels the channeling. Recall should be able to be heard from an extremely long distance away, potentially across the entire zone (just more faintly when its further). It should also take somewhere from 2-5 minutes to cast, depending on balance. The entire point of this system is to remove some of the tedium of the game and help attract a larger casual player base.
Destinations: Players should be able to choose to recall to the nearest NPC City and nearest Clan City. You could likely even use the same GUI window for when a player dies.
Cooldown Duration: This is up to debate. It definitely should be at a minimum of 1 hour to prevent abuse. The cooldown could also be scaled with the character’s base weight on their last cast. Meaning, if normally we have a 1 hour cooldown, recalling with 200% weight would result in a 2 hour cooldown before the next cast is available. Also, obviously, this cooldown should persist through server maintenance and the character relogging.
Cast Duration: The more a player is encumbered, the longer the casting time should be. To clear things up, the spell CANNOT be cast while mounted, and it should be based off your character’s UNMODIFIED WEIGHT. This means that Food, Bags, etc all do not change the cast time.

0-100% Weight = 100% Cast Duration
>100% Weight = %weight Cast Duration (i.e. 150% Weight = 150% Cast Duration)

Restrictions: Recall cannot be used from within dungeons. This prevents players from entering dungeons and escaping from within to avoid PvP while fighting out with their loot. We also don’t want players to be able to recall from within the safety of their guild/ally territory squares. If they want to recall, they need to go into hostile territory, at least 100m or so, then start recalling. Recalling from the safe zones should not be restricted. This also applies to Castles, we wouldn’t want people being able to teleport right on top of a castle chest where people cannot get to him without breaking down walls. This could simply be fixed with a restriction radius placed on each type of area you don’t want players to be able to recall or mark runes.
Benefits: This enables more casual players to get into Albion and enjoy the game without added tedium of running back to town. If players are in a group and someone has to log out, recalling back would be very beneficial instead of having to solo your way back at a later time.
Sound Effect: The sound effect of “Recalling” should be distinctly different from “Marking” a Rune Stone. This is so players don’t confuse it with marking a rune stone.

Rune Stones
Description: Rune Stones are super rare and expensive items that are used to mark locations in the world for fast travel. After a Rune Stone is marked, it can be etched into a Rune Book from a Clan City or NPC City. They should cost millions of silver each. Their materials should be farmed through PvE loot of end game content.
Obtaining Materials: The materials to craft a Rune Stone are dropped from some of the highest tier monsters in the game, preferably end game bosses. Players will still need to take these materials and then craft them into usable rune stones (maybe through a Rune Etching system or something on the skill tree, again this should be super expensive). Only the richest players in the game will be able to afford leveling up rune etching.
Rune Marking: Players take a crafted Rune Stone out into the world and “mark” it at any location in any tile they choose. Double clicking on the Rune Stone will start the Marking process, which is a channeled spell just like everything else here. It should take from 2-5 minutes to mark and again it should make a lot of noise. Once a rune is Marked, the player must haul it back to a Clan City or a NPC City to Etch it.
Sound Effect: The sound effect of “Marking” a Rune Stone should be distinctively different from the sound effect of someone performing a “Recall”. Players who mark a stone should realize that this is an extremely risky task, as enemies who hear someone marking a stone can “blow the zerg horn” and try to kill the player or group of players marking runes before they transport them back to town. Rune Stones should be lootable (maybe not destroyable) for this purpose. This could create new PvP dynamics for players protecting zones from having others mark runes in them, etc.

Rune Books
Description: Rune Books store permanent teleport locations throughout the world, enabling players to fast travel to them for a large price, which MUST be based on their weight just like the city to city fast travel system. Rune Books store 15 or 20 “etched” Rune Stones. The Rune Book is a GUI Window, not an item able to be looted or destroyed.
Rune Etching: After a player “marks” a Rune Stone, it’s able to be etched only in the safety of a Clan City or NPC City (maybe at a vendor or a bench or something?). The player chooses a slot in their Rune Book to etch their Marked Rune Stone into, and preferably the character can type a name into it as well to give it a description. The rune is then consumed and they can now fast travel from anywhere in the world to that location for a very hefty price. This price should scale based on their inventory weight to prevent players from fast traveling with entire stockpiles of clan resources.
Rune Removal: Players should have the option to DESTROY a rune in their Rune Book, so they can always keep their book updated with their favorite hunting locations.
Teleporting: After a player has etched a marked Rune Stone into their Rune Book, they can now teleport from anywhere to that location. The teleport spell will work much like the Recall spell, being 2-5 minutes channeled, making a TON of noise and having the same restrictions applied so it can’t be exploitative. Teleporting using Rune Stones should be an EXTREME gold or silver sink, making your company more money.

The Best PvP Gear for Some Circumstances

I have bought the founder’s pack and I’m reaching the point where the wipe is becoming too much. I don’t want to gather so much or kill so many mobs that I can use T8 Gear/Tools and then have to lose it all.

So I figure I’ll just figure out the best PvP gear, slowly make my way to T5 or maybe T6 if I really feel like it, and just spend my days PvPing.
So with that in mind what would be the best PvP gear to equip for the following circumstances:

1v1 Duel’s
5v5’s in Hellgates/GvG
Red Zone surprise attacks to insta-kill someone as fast as possible and take their shit, and not give them any opportunity to run away

Just to clarify I meant what gear combinations would be best in each of the given circumstances, meaning that if Claws are best for 1v1 duels, I understand that they might not be best for 5v5’s, and that there is a different build that is best for 5v5’s.

For 5v5 the most important thing isn’t individual builds, it’s their comp and how they synergise with each other.

For Red Zone ganking, if you’re going after one or two people then claws is also pretty decent because of the suppress mechanic. Warbow is also decent, as you have good damage above T6 and can kite really well. But again, unless you want to solo (in which case I recommend warbow) then you should check with your group for which role is usually most needed.