View Full Forums : DoN and faction


Megn Summer
02-22-2005, 01:44 PM
I have read the thread about 'surlyness' and will try to not be a wet blanket. I will not flame anyone personaly or attack others.

DoN and faction. 'Good' camp and 'Evil' camp. Earn crystals spendable in the appropriate camp.

HOW I WISH THIS SIMPLE FACT WAS MADE CLEAR ON DAY ONE!

I went to LS to try my hand at an expedition. My 1st one. I met a group looking for a healer and joined up. The expedition was already selected by the group leader. We entered the instance and faired pretty well. Won the event. ONLY then did I notice that I had done an EVIL faction quest! I earned Ebon Crystals and some gem thingy as my 'reward'.

Now I have bad faction with the evil side of Norrath. As this IS a role playing game I thought that battling the forces of evil was part of the genre.

Now I have ebon crystals and a gem 'reward' I CAN NEVER USE! I spent my time, and that's the time I PAY for, to 'help' the 'dark side'. This blows the entire concept of role playing to pieces.

When I asked the group leader (as did other 'light' races in the group) we were met with a /snicker, a rude comment and an insulting offer to 'take' the crystals off our hands, as they were of NO USE TO USE AT ALL!

The SOB set me up. There was NOPLACE where the 'type' of expedition was spelled out. IF I had known I was about to WASTE MY TIME I would have NEVER taken the expedition.

The offending ___hat is now a permanent fixture on my /ignore list. This player used me for his personal gain. NOw he never outright lied. I sadly have to admit this. But he used us and our inexperience.

So I sent a /petition. The answer was 'who is the offending party?'. My /petition was lengthy and the response was obvious that the responder hadn't read my entire /petition. I tried to answer them....but how can one answer someone who doesn't read the whole message? I eventually deleted the /petition.

So I go to the SoE website, where I have previously registered and have posted in the past, only to find yet ANOTHER layer of registration and email confirmation! So I turn to this forum to air this issue.

I know that nothing will come of this. It's very likely you'll all just flame me for being a newb and blah, blah, blah. Have fun. Kick me while I'm down. Enjoy yourselves.

Bottom line: SoE did NOT make the faction aspect of DoN clear. I wasted my time (money. sure, not a lot but still wasted) and was totally embarrassed! It RUINED the entire expansion for me! I cannot go back to DoN without being reminded of how badly I was USED!

All I wanted for SoE to turn the crystals I cannot use into something i CAN use! For my efforts I was ignored and 'processed' with the masses.

Less than 24 hours after the new expansion was released the entire reward system was removed, the crystals became nodrop and I was taken by a scam.

GREAT JOB SOE! WAY TO KEEP THE CUSTOMERS HAPPY!

Aelfin
02-22-2005, 01:57 PM
it is not totally ruined. at some eventual point, the crystals will again become droppable/tradeable again. you don't get the faction hit unless you turn in the dark gem thing.

i did my first mission monday, too, and it was an evil-side mission. i was very disappointed at the end when the crystals were still no-drop and just ended up logging aftwerward. i did feel rather cheated that i bought the damn game and sony still has not fixed whatever hack allowed duping and re-enabled crystal trading. it's kinda bummed me out ... that such a major bug is in the game and sony still has not fixed it, that and the purely craptacular snare spells. the real kicker was being in the temple, standing on grass, looking at beautiful trees and sky, and not being able to cast "outside" spells. ah, this expansion is to be like ldon, where all classes except the druid are welcome, again. crazy, i know, i was just really hoping they'd get it right, or at least more right.

back to WoW for a while, i guess.

Juniper
02-22-2005, 11:21 PM
Yeah, you don't get the faction unless you turn the crystal in. Also the good/evil aspect of DoN seems obvious to me. You pick a side if you want to advance. Nodrop cystals are fixable, but how about the scores of people who lost rewards due to zoning at the wrong time? That's pretty annoying.

Sucks that someone did that though =\ People get what's coming to them though, it just takes some time.

As far as Druids being welcome, I'm having plenty of fun working through my early 60's in Broodlands right now. I see plenty of places to explore and enjoy the expansion.

Remi
02-23-2005, 12:54 AM
I think what he did to you truly sucks. But, sometime soon (hopefully) you can get your revenge by exchanging those evil shards for good shards, when SoE makes them tradeable again, as advertised. The merchants were returned today!

In the meantime, I'm really enjoying this expansion. My play time recently has been divided between WoW and EQ. I've been playing WoW for the solo play and the questing. That is, the ability to log on for an hour and work on a quest and log off with no hassles of looking for groups. DoN has brought that to EQ. I don't know how long it will last with the Tasks as I'm still working on the first three, but so far, I've been able to solo them. It's been great! Log on for an hour, get some silks, and log off. I'm not a mini-maxer, so I don't mind that I might take longer to get it done. It's just enjoyable to be able to do without being always dependent on others. DoN has gotten me back to playing EQ again beyond just logging on to Raid.

As for the missions, half of those that I would normally group with have gone Evil, while the other half are Good. We just trade off on the missions, doing a good one, then an evil one. Both give experience and shards. And you can work on one of the solo tasks while doing either good/evil missions. Only real difference is, you don't get the faction improvement when doing evil because you can't turn in the charm thingie.

My only real gripe so far with DoN is the Grandmaster Tradeskill quest for wood elves. Like the other races, we have to kill 120 drakes and collect 80 claws. However, it seems the other classes get credit for drake kills and claws collected in any of the DoN zones. Wood Elves it seems are limited to the drakes and claws in the Thunderous Isle only, despite that it says ALL zones in the quest description. :p I'm sure this was an oversight (/bug) somehow, but it wasn't fun that a halfling was able to get credit toward her tradeskill quest tonight during a mission, while I was not.

guluvasea
02-23-2005, 11:01 AM
dont know if we can blame sony for lack of information... I havnt read the don manual, the info might be in there.....

I took my time a bit and read and explored other sites, such as castersrealm, to garner information.

I located the wayfarer camp in lavastorm pos 2200 0 on top of the hill and started working on evil quests for my necro. I will start soon with my druid and then try to keep them at the same level of faction.

Before I could even talk to the officers in the evil camp, i had to improve my faction by performing the little evil task you can get out of the wayfarers camp. you can do the same for good faction. I had to do them about 5 or 6 times before i was of sufficient faction to talk to the officers starting with the one on the far left. I am currently working on the 3 quest on and have completed one of those. I am currently working on the second one which is Tirranun's delve cept i have never been there before and there are a number of see invis mobs... this ought to prove interesting.

I am sorry of what happened to you and it probably happened to many that just sorta jumped right in without knowing what the consequences were.


the good thing is you can repair it.

Avendesoral
02-23-2005, 03:28 PM
The faction is stupid. There has been zero point to it as far as rewards and consequences go. It's a plot device and nothing more, which means its pointless.

noirblood
02-23-2005, 04:44 PM
I think that's a completely baseless complaint until we see what the final rewards (and consequences) are of choosing which faction you want to be aligned with. Minor faction hits have never had much reward or consequence, but it seems they have some big things in store for people who get all the way through to ally-level faction with either camp.

Also, the FV war really brought my hopes up that this thing might continue to develop into a fun faction-filled battle in the coming months.

Avendesoral
02-23-2005, 05:12 PM
The rewards to both sides have been identical and don't show any signs of divergence. That makes this faction nonsense simply a plot element/timesink.

noirblood
02-24-2005, 04:53 PM
why is a plot element a timesink? i always enjoy a deeper and richer storyline, and as part of this storyline if u dont want to participate u dont have to...

Avendesoral
02-24-2005, 09:41 PM
What about this do you not get? First off, I didn't say it was a timesink becuase it was a plot element. Simple reading comprehension. It's both, and thats all it is becuase it servers no purpose in the advancement or detriment of your character no matter which side you choose. They have the same rewards, exactly the same, the only divergence being some *slight* difference in the quests given. It doesn't make the storyline "deeper and richer," its superficial and useless. Switching factions does absolutely nothing for you since you can buy from the evil vendors even if you're kos. Combined with the abysmal communication on the importance of (or in this case, lack thereof) importance of faction has caused a large number of people to waste time factioning up the kos side in order to stay in line with the rest of their guild.

Velious had faction that meant something. This is a nothing but a stupid timesink.

Stephen51
02-25-2005, 04:31 AM
I wouldnt get too upset Megn, or try not too, just be patient. Firstly, you wont have spoiled your faction with the good side unless you hand in the token you get at the end of the mission. Even if you do this, I dont imagine you will be immediately KOS to the good side, and if you do a 'good' mission it will balance your faction up.
Secondly, bide your time with the ebon crystals, when SOE makes them tradable again you can sell them or trade them for good crystals. I am not SOE's biggest fan but remember it was the unscrupulous hackers who found and exploited this oversite, and really did they expect not to be found out? I doubt it was SOE's intention to leave a gaping gaff ready to be exploited. Actually I think they have handled it quite well. Would you prefer a 12 hour patch, or a quick stealth patch. Even when we had no merchants we could rack up crystals, even now when crystals are no drop you can hang on to them for later. Its not ideal but its not a dead loss either.
3. At the start of every expansion theres a period of learning. If we had been lead through everything by the hand, many would have found it too easy or annoying, and again in your case it was the player who done you wrong not SOE. Had you had a less unscrupulous group leader (hang on a sec he IS supposed to be evil - top marks) you may have gotten off to a better start. Not your fault really, just bad luck.

PS where can I get hold of a copy of the DoN manual if I have digitally downloaded the expansion?

yeraie
02-25-2005, 06:35 AM
Well said, Stephen51 (that's not your dru name, I'm guessing!)

Megn, for future reference, you can find out which faction the mission you're on is by looking in the Task window (alt q). If you highlight the mission, and look at the very bottom of the window below the description, it will tell you if your reward is "Dark Reign Token" or "Keeper's of Norrath Token". Also, the tone of the description is a decidedly different 'flavor'! =)

Veresz
02-25-2005, 09:42 AM
As a wood elf druid I assumed I was good. I have done 2 evil missions and turned in the items (faction hit if I remember was FV). First time I did it by mistake as I probably misunderstood a post that said you could swap it by handing in to an npc in LS who would give you the appropriate one back (the bard twins). He didn't, he just gave me a faction hit :)

My question is does it really matter ? I have never been overly concerned about faction, and someone said that 4 evil missions will get your faction with evils the same as it was with goods previously (unconfirmed).

Given that just about everyone on Zek seems to be "evil" I figured I would just tag along with the evils as last time I checked, FV faction was irrelevant to me. Am I missing something ?

Drewwe
02-26-2005, 10:47 PM
Most of the people I know of in my guild have gone evil, even the druids. My question I guess is how do I go evil too? I can't even get into the evil camp without being killed and I'd like to start doing those solo missions.

Aluaeia
02-27-2005, 05:40 AM
Talk to the wayfarer guards outside jsut north of the lava pool. The gnome and erudite on one side are evil tasks, the vah shir and human i think on the other side are for good, either way you can only use wayfarer tasks up to indifferent with the faction you want to be a part of, that's good enough to start on the first aa though. I'm up to the volkara raid for the third evil aa now. Evil FTW.

yeraie
02-28-2005, 04:59 AM
You can also go on missions with people who can request them and get faction by handing in the token to Wayfarer Limann at that camp, and can also kill guards for faction.

Lhittle
02-28-2005, 12:18 PM
The only thing to be concerned about imho about good vs. evil faction is that you will take a lot longer to reach your faction levels needed to go to the next level by picking the faction opposite to your original side. By taking longer on the faction you will not be able to get the benefits of the added stats, hit points, spells, and buff slots without a great deal more work. When it comes to doing good vs. evil missions that does not really matter other than the fact that you will not be able to use the token at the end if you are good doing an evil mission. You will still be able to use the crystals at whatever vendor accepts the crystals ( I have seen several folks doing both and buying the items from both camps). I expect that may change back to not being able to buy items once they actually make the crystals tradeable again.

But I certainly would not worry about the fact that you did an evil mission. Just don't turn in the token. (since they seem to be lore, you may just want to save the one so that you wont get any more if you do an evil mission again)

Aluaeia
02-28-2005, 06:35 PM
You can switch factions in about 2 hours from max kos to indifferent if you can charm.

Stephen51
03-03-2005, 10:12 AM
The Good v Evil thing I don’t think matters too much. The gear you can buy from each side, is apparently the same sort of stuff but different names. The reason you should make a decision early is the Progression. After a bit of mission winning and factioning, you get offered a Boss killing mission. Killing the boss gets you 2 aa’s and a + 10 max to all stats. The Chief tells you however, that should you try to then play the other side, the +10 thing will be stripped off you. Further rewards I have heard of are +250hps/Mana and 5 buff slots. So once you decide on a side, I would stick to it.

Aluaeia
03-03-2005, 11:54 AM
first aa is 10 to all stats and stat caps, second aa is 200 hp/mana, third is 1 buff slot, fourth is increased chance to crit spells and melee, fifth is a chance to completely resist nearly any detrimental effect.

I have the third aa, and only need the 42 man event for the 4th (Shogurei), then I'll have to faction again.

Aelfin
03-03-2005, 12:58 PM
wow. thanks Aluaeia. good info.

Aluaeia
03-03-2005, 09:32 PM
and in other news, my above post about switching factions if you can charm may be disregarded as Lavaspinner's silk, mottled goblin meat and frothing basilisk blood were all made no drop this patch.