Thanks to the recent release of the RIFT free-to-play store on the PTS, players made the discovery earlier this week that Greater Token Tablets were being sold in the Boosts category of the store that gave players a 100% bonus to currency marks– including top-tier raid marks– from all sources for two hours. Quite a large stir was caused on the forums after this discovery, and the Trion team was quick to reduce that 100% bonus down to 80% as well as look into making further adjustments to the tablets. Daglar announced the main adjustment yesterday: None of the Token Tablet boosts will now apply to Frozen Eclipse Stones. Good news all around.

Daglar also had a few words to share with the raiding community regarding the F2P changes. Keep reading to take a look at his post as well as a handful of other interesting posts.

Originally posted by Daglar (Source)

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I’d also like to take a moment and talk about raiders, token tablets, and reality for monetizing RIFT.

Raiding is an important part of RIFT. Its a part of RIFT that I wish more people got to experience. I don’t want to achieve that by nerfing the content or any thing like that. I want to bring more people into the game that enjoy it and naturally want to try out that portion of the game.

There is no master tin-foil hat plan to try to super monetize the raiders in RIFT. I’m being straight up like I always try to be. If trying to /force/ raiders into paying large amounts of money were part of any plan, it would be a failing plan because to be honest guys – raiders are not in the majority.

Aspirational content like raiding is important to RIFT – that’s why we’ve continued to invest in it – and will continue to invest in it. Even if you are not a raider, I know quite a few people imagine that they could be on the bleeding edge, or would like to be on the bleeding edge. I removed the token tablet affecting top tier for a few reasons.

1. Raiders are a smaller group and I don’t want to super target them with a bonus.
2. Having it affect the top tier is skirting the edge about what I feel is acceptable.
3. For all the aspirational folks out there that can see themselves in the shoes of raiders – I don’t want you to have the perception that to take part in that section of the game you are going to be forced into buying something.

Now with all of that said, the patron perma bonus (not the daily ones), will affect the top tier of tokens. The value of that bonus is not game breaking – and really does not change the game from where every raider in RIFT sits today.

RIFT doesn’t win the race by trying to be exploitative of any given group – yes it has to make money to continue getting updates and I know everyone out there understands that.

In the PTS forum we found out about a few improvements that are currently being made to the shop. We also found out that many items will be becoming Bind on Account in 2.3.

Regarding costume items in the RIFT Store:

Originally posted by Archonix (Source)

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The Jester and Gothic sets are tintable.

All costume armor will also be Bind on Account soon.

Regarding Storm Legion rep Bind on Pickup reputation items:

Originally posted by Daglar (Source)

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I’m currently making all of the Storm Legion rep items that were bind on pickup, Bind on Account. Every last one of them.

Additionally, a pet preview tab is currently being worked on for the Item Store. The team is also working on a way to scale down the size of the store’s UI frame. The UI resizing option will be coming after the release of patch 2.3.

Since there’s so much to explore on the Player Test Shard at the moment thanks to a huge portion of RIFT 2.3 hitting the PTS this week, we’re going to be splitting our preview into two sections. Here’s the first part, which will focus primarily on The Dendrome and the content directly associated with this new zone. We’ll talk a bit about the Item Store briefly, but stay tuned for a full-length preview in the days to come.

One other thing to note– the Item Store is currently undergoing a lot of changes, which will hopefully make the game’s free-to-play system better overall. If you check it out on the PTS yourself, to bring up the store, you’ll have to press “]”. There is also a button where Deeps’ Depot used to be. The store seems to be taken offline intermittently in order to receive staff updates, so if you find the button missing and the keybind disabled, it’s probably best to wait a while and try again or check back the next day.

As with all information on the PTS, everything discussed here is subject to change at any time. As usual, we’ll do our best to shy away from story spoilers. That said, let’s take a tour of Dendrome, shall we?

The Dendrome is another one of Storm Legion‘s fairly massive zones. It’s one-part lush greenery and ruins and one-part barren wasteland that’s full of Architects hard at work around their hives. It’s an interesting mix and presents itself to be one of the most visually striking zones of the expansion. It honestly seems like Trion took their time with the zone and fleshed out more of the quest hubs and other locations. There is also a lot more to do thanks to the new and improved forms of dynamic content that have made their way into the zone.

The prologue for entering Dendrome begins in K’Rom’s Fortress in Ashora, which is where the quest you’ll receive in the mail will take you. This little hub will also be new in 2.3. Once there, you can grab a new Porticulum point, a decent amount of new dailies that are associated with Necropolis Caretakers, Qaijiri, and Eternal City Survivors Notoriety, some crafting turn-in quests, a series of quests to obtain a new Cactus Badger companion (screenshot coming soon hopefully!), and the quests to continue along the main questline to enter Dendrome.

The story quest series in The Dendrome starts out in Solstice Tower, which is the first hub in Dendrome you get sent to. It’s here you’ll start being able to unlock other story quests, daily quests, and a quest to discover all of the Porticulum points in Dendrome. There are four Porticulum points in Dendrome. Here is a work-in-progress map that shows the locations of each of the points (click to enlarge):

In Solstice Tower, you’re also introduced to a representative of Hailol, which is a sanctuary of sorts away from the bugs– er, Architects– of war. Even Hailol and Solstice Tower are not immune from invasions this time around, however, so keep that in mind while exploring. Hailol is a unique place to explore and is the party house for Atrophinius and his animal and Fae buddies. And lots of mead, of course. Hailol also has a pretty cool puppet theater that’s definitely worth checking out.

In Solstice Tower you’ll also come across your first Dendrome Notoriety faction as well as the first quartermaster. This first faction is known as the Empyreal Alliance. There are three new factions in The Dendrome: Empyreal Alliance, Hailol, and The Achyati. All three have quartermasters in their main quest hubs and a collection of nearby dailies. All three also have some nice runes that you’ll probably want to think about grabbing.

Now, before we jump in with the faction rewards, there’s one interesting addition to RIFT 2.3 that wasn’t really discovered until players were able to hop on the PTS themselves. The RIFT Item Store doesn’t have glaring ads all over our UI thankfully, but we will see hints of the store every time we open up a vendor window. The current vendor window on live shards has been replaced with a window that mirrors the Item Store interface exactly.

Not all Item Store goods will be viewable through these vendor windows, but many– and I mean many– vendor-store items are obtainable with either Plat or Credits, which means that every time we visit a quartermaster we’ll be faced with the option of multiple ways of purchasing something. This also explains why the store interface window has that handy “Sell Grey Items” button. It’s not a bad move, overall, but it is a little jarring at first.

It’s also worth noting that despite the fact that faction quartermasters sell Notoriety rewards for either Plat or Credits, this does not mean that players can pick up rewards by using Credits and bypass the reputation requirement. The rewards themselves have the Notoriety requirements which means that no matter how the item is paid for, the player must still earn the Notoriety in order to purchase the item. Daglar confirmed this yesterday.

Faction Rewards

Empyreal Alliance
Quartermaster is located at Solstice Tower.

• Wrath of the Empyreal Alliance – DPS Trinket
  Honored – 15p or 1400 Credits
  Equip: Grants a chance for your damaging abilities to deal an additional 2439 to 2981 damage.
  Upgrades w/ Empyreal Hero’s Large Cell to: 66 Endurance, 47 Crit Power, 46 Dodge plus above effect.
• Erdos – Collectable companion
  Revered – 11p, 40g or 1000 Credits
• Empyreal Rune of Minor Intelligence – Trinket Rune
  Honored – 7p, 50g or 540 Credits
  Intelligence +18, Endurance +10
• Empyreal Rune of Minor Dexterity – Trinket Rune
  Honored – 7p, 50g or 540 Credits
  Dexterity +18, Endurance +10
• Empyreal Rune of Minor Wisdom – Trinket Rune
  Honored – 7p, 50g or 540 Credits
  Wisdom +18, Endurance +10
• Empyreal Rune of Minor Strength – Trinket Rune
  Honored – 7p, 50g or 540 Credits
  Strength +18, Endurance +10
• Empyreal Rune of Wisdom – Trinket Rune
  Glorified – 10p, 50g or 820 Credits
  Wisdom +35, Endurance +20
• Empyreal Rune of Strength – Trinket Rune
  Glorified – 10p, 50g or 820 Credits
  Strength +35, Endurance +20
• Empyreal Rune of Intelligence – Trinket Rune
  Glorified – 10p, 50g or 820 Credits
  Intelligence +35, Endurance +20
• Empyreal Rune of Dexterity – Trinket Rune
  Glorified – 10p, 50g or 820 Credits
  Dexterity +35, Endurance +20

• Empyreal Assault Pad - Dimension item – Pictured first on the left above
  Decorated – 1p, 50g or 130 Credits
• Empyreal Mortar Cannon – Dimension item – Pictured second above
  Decorated – 1p, 50g or 130 Credits
• Empyreal Infantry Liquefier – Dimension item – Pictured third above
  Revered – 5p or 220 Credits
• Nexus Cannon - Dimension item - Pictured fourth above
  Glorified – ??

The Achyati
Quartermaster is located in Achyati Village.

• Blessings of the Achyati – Tank Trinket
  Honored – 15p or 1400 Credits
  Endurance +78, Equip: Grants a chance on Block and Deflect to create a barrier that absorbs half of incoming damage for up to 3252 damage for 8 seconds.
  Upgrades w/ Empyreal Hero’s Large Cell to: Endurance +78, Dodge +40, Parry +40 plus above effect.
• Derby – Collectible companion
  Revered – 11p, 40g or 1000 Credits
• Achyati Rune of Minor Intelligence – Ring Rune
  Honored – 4p or 320 Credits
  Intelligence +9, Endurance +5
• Achyati Rune of Minor Dexterity – Ring Rune
  Honored – 4p or 320 Credits
  Dexterity +9, Endurance +5
• Achyati Rune of Minor Strength – Ring Rune
  Honored – 4p or 320 Credits
  Strength +9, Endurance +5
• Achyati Rune of Minor Wisdom – Ring Rune
  Honored – 4p or 320 Credits
  Wisdom +9, Endurance +5
• Achyati Rune of Wisdom – Ring Rune
  Glorified – 7p, 50g pr 620 Credits
  Wisdom +18, Endurance +10
• Achyati Rune of Intelligence – Ring Rune
  Glorified – 7p, 50g pr 620 Credits
  Intelligence +18, Endurance +10
• Achyati Rune of Dexterity – Ring Rune
  Glorified – 7p, 50g pr 620 Credits
  Dexterity +18, Endurance +10
• Achyati Rune of Strength – Ring Rune
  Glorified – 7p, 50g pr 620 Credits
  Strength +18, Endurance +10

• Achyati Ogre Pot – Dimension item – Pictured first on the left above
  Decorated – 1p, 50g or 130 Credits
• Achyati Ogre Fireplace – Dimension item – Pictured second above
  Decorated – 1p, 50g or 130 Credits
• Achyati Ogre Well – Dimension item – Pictured third above
  Decorated – 1p, 50g or 130 Credits
• Achyati Ogre Tent – Dimension item – Pictured fourth above
  Decorated – 1p, 50g or 130 Credits

Hailol
Quartermaster is a cute little badger in Hailol, just west of the Porticulum point.

• Peace of the Hailol – Healer Trinket
  Honored – 15p or 1400 Credits
  Equip: Single target healing spells have a chance to heal for an additional 3116 health over 15 seconds.
  Upgrades w/ Empyreal Hero’s Large Cell to: Intelligence +53, Wisdom +53, Endurance +53, Spell Power +28 plus above effect.
• Bunsy – Collectible companion
  Revered – 11p, 40g or 1000 Credits
• Hailol Minor Focus Expansion Rune – Seal Rune
  Honored – 7p, 50g or 540 Credits
  Attack Power +35
• Hailol Minor Mind Expansion Rune – Seal Rune
  Honored – 7p, 50g or 540 Credits
  Spell Power +35
• Hailol Minor Endurance Expansion Rune – Seal Rune
  Honored – 7p, 50g or 540 Credits
  Endurance +15
• Hailol Focus Expansion Rune – Seal Rune
  Glorified – 10p, 50g or 820 Credits
  Endurance +10, Attack Power +45
• Hailol Mind Expansion Rune – Seal Rune
  Glorified – 10p, 50g or 820 Credits
  Spell Power +45
• Hailol Endurance Expansion Rune – Seal Rune
  Glorified – 10p, 50g or 820 Credits
  Endurance +25

• Carnation Teardrop Tree – Dimension item – Pictured first to the left above
  Decorated – 1p, 50g or 130 Credits
• Carnation Hailol Tree – Dimension item – Pictured second above
  Decorated – 1p, 50g or 130 Credits
• Carnation Love Tree – Dimension item – Pictured third above
  Decorated – 1p, 50g or 130 Credits
• Carnation Spiral Tree – Dimension item – Pictured fourth above
  Decorated – 1p, 50g or 130 Credits

More to Explore

We’ve touched briefly on some of the dynamic content in The Dendrome so far, but this post sums most of it up fairly well. There will be 17 new zone events in the zone, all of which have corresponding achievements. There are Strongholds, which are a little more group-oriented and offer plenty of achievements for taking part in. The map icon for a Stronghold looks almost like a Foothold, but slightly different. There’s also a couple of new Ascended items we can use in the zone.

We also have Hailol footholds to explore, which are interesting jumping puzzles that sometimes involve a bit of combat as well. As always, there are also plenty of rifts, invasions (that feature bosses who are a little more interesting than we’re used to), and plenty of Onslaughts with corresponding dailies.

Aside from that, there are also three world bosses in The Dendrome, Hive Kaaz’lcht to explore, and Greenscale’s Crater to poke around in while saying hello to many spiders. The zone’s a little more group-oriented than Ashora and Steppes of Infinity, but there is still plenty of do for solo players as well. Trion has added in a large chunk of achievements in 2.3, which will make achievement hounds quite happy.

There are also, of course, Dendrome Instant Adventures and Carnage quests to take part in. Carnage quests, thankfully, have been toned down a bit, and will generally only require players to kill between 5-8 mobs instead of 13 and above. There’s a new puzzle, new rares to hunt, and plenty of new artifacts to collect as well.

Inside Hive Kaaz’lcht there is also a new Chronicle called Queen’s Gambit for solo players that’s also accessible with the queue system. Although the Chronicle recommends two players, most players should have no problem taking it on solo. For completing Queen’s Gambit and doing the quests, you’ll receive 300 Notoriety in a faction of your choosing (including the new factions) as well as a chunk of 100 Empyreal Slayer’s Marks and 180 Infinity Stones (remember that all marks will be bumped up quite a bit in 2.3).

Overall, there’s a lot to explore and enjoy in The Dendrome. While it’s somewhat disappointing that Trion went the route of more new factions to work on (as well as additional tiers for some of the current factions), with any luck the factions won’t be quite as painful as many players experienced at the start of Storm Legion. The simple diversity of activities within the zone may also help add a little fun to the journey toward shinies.

Faratha shared an informative summary on the forums yesterday of how exactly dimensions will be affected when RIFT‘s transition to free-to-play takes place on June 12th. The super-short summary is that dimension enthusiasts will be getting a lot more goodies to have fun with. One look at the RIFT Store on the PTS confirms this. There are a ton of new dimension items (and some achievements finally!). Thankfully, almost all of the dimension items in the store are purchasable with Credits or Plat.

Keep reading to take a look at Faratha’s full post.

Originally posted by Faratha (Source)

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Fellow dimensioneers, we have a ton of dimension awesomeness coming your way!

I’ll give some details on the things Elrar mentioned in Friday’s live stream, and more.

Higher Item Limits
Yes, it’s true! Each dimension now has a fifth tier that doubles the existing maximum item limit of that dimension. This comes with a price tag that varies based on the dimension.

Four New Dimensions
Hailol – One word: Pink!
Temple of the Abandoned – This is a jungle-infused rotunda with stained-glass windows… and a peaceful place to return to after partying it up in Hailol.
Edge of Infinity – I’m proud to announce our first dimension in outer space! These are Crucia’s platforms above Telara. Edge of Infinity is granted at the Purple Tier of Loyalty.
Endless Eclipse - And this one is our first dimension in another plane: Regulos’ terraces in the Plane of Death. Endless Eclipse is granted at the Red Tier of Loyalty.

Buildings
We’re introducing buildings with interiors as dimension objects in 2.3. You may visit the new building vendor in Tempest Bay, or you can find Buildings under Dimensions in the Rift Store. So – if you want to live in a bogling hut or shimmersand dome in your dimension, now you can.

Modular Building Pieces
Are you finding it tedious (and item-limit-consuming) to build your dimension house board-by-board? Me too! We now have pre-made walls, stairs, doors, floors, roofs, and windows that you can use to build your dream mansion. You can find them under Dimensions –> Building Blocks in the Rift Store.

Hundreds of New Items
We’re introducing hundreds of new dimension items including fences, garden walls, magitech items, mushrooms that create clearings, Hailol floral trees, household items, and decorations. Browse the store to your heart’s content!

Achievements
We’ve added new dimension achievements you can earn by owning dimensions and by placing dimension items.

Lock Boxes
Want a chance at getting some really cool dimension items? Looking for a ‘grab bag’ that offers dimension items for cheaper* than you’d pay for them individually? Dimension item lock boxes grant three or more dimension items with at least one item of uncommon rarity.

*It usually works out this way, but it is a random box!

Don’t Stress
The vast majority of new dimension items are available for platinum as well as Credits.

To keep an eye on the discussion surrounding free-to-play and dimensioneering, check out the this forum thread.

QUESTS
* Morban: Added additional map markers for the quest Blast Away to help pinpoint the location of the cannons.

ZONES
* Morban: Reduced Draelock’s damage across most of his abilities.
* Steppes of Infinity: For the instant adventure Capture Commanders, Antapo Commanders will now despawn two minutes after being captured. Additionally, if a Commander gets stuck in the terrain, it will despawn if the player moves far enough away.
* Steppes of Infinity: Fixed an issue during The Craft of Conflict zone event that could result in players not receiving credit if their characters die fighting the Nug Battler Nug .

CALLINGS
* Shaman: Vicious Streak now increases the critical chance of all abilities.
* Inquisitor: Radical Coalescence is now removed if the Inquisitor dies.
* Sentinel: Damage from Wrathful Exuberance is now reduced in PVP.
* Sentinel: Damage procs from Wrathful Exuberance now have a 35 meter range.
* Harbinger: Lucent Slash no longer requires a target in order to use.
* Harbinger: Phantom Blades no longer requires you to be facing your target in order to cast.

ADDONS
* Fixed a problem with Dimension “add” and “remove” events for addons not always working properly.

During last Friday’s official RIFT live stream, we found out a little more about the Loyalty system that will be a major part of the new free-to-play system beginning June 12th. Yesterday Bill “Daglar” Fisher continued delving into the explanations of the system in a new developer blog. The Loyalty system will be replacing our current Veteran Rewards program, and instead of being able to purchase goodies after having been a subscriber for so long, we’ll be able to automatically pick up rewards as we reach certain Loyalty tiers.

As was discussed during the live stream, Loyalty will be granted to players who subscribe as a Patron, purchase or spend Credits, and consume REX. Veteran players will also be receiving a one-time stipend of 7000 Loyalty per past month of subscription when the F2P system goes live. This will mean that for most of us, we should log in on June 12th with some goodies to pick up right off the bat.

The title image above, which is a sampling of an in-progress Loyalty tier reward, shows an interesting variety of items available. Currently on the PTS the Loyalty tiers aren’t fully implemented, but most other parts of the item store are available for preview.

A large portion of the content headed our way in RIFT 2.3: Empyreal Assault is now on the Public Test Shard for player testing. The item store isn’t completely functional yet and is still very much in progress, which is evident by many of the items and prices, but the store itself is there for our previewing pleasures. Dendrome is also in place along with some of the zone events, new dynamic content, Strongholds, and Queen’s Gambit, which is the new Chronicle.

MikeD shared some details in a forum post as far as what to expect in the dynamic content within Dendrome. Keep reading to take a look.

Originally posted by MikeD (Source)

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Zone Event Variety
In addition to story-driven events with highly scripted objectives and encounters, you’ll also find a few more types of zone events. Hailol events focus on the serious business of playing games with the friendly fae creatures of the zone. And for those looking for an additional source of Torvan Hunter notoriety, Hunt events offer the chance to hunt down dangerous new Planarchs.

Town and Hub Invasions
We’re also bringing back zone events that target friendly towns and quest hubs. Similar to zone events in Classic Rift, invasions will focus their assault on randomly selected wardstones in the Dendrome. If they are not protected, the zone event will fail.

Friendly Invasions and Footholds
To aid in the fight against this new planar aggression, new flare items are available from merchants at the major hubs. These allow the user to direct a Hailol invasion to attack an enemy planar foothold within the Dendrome. If the Hailol invasion survives, it will build a Hailol foothold, which offers a variety of ways of dancing, drinking, and jumping for notoriety.

Meanwhile, the Empyreal Alliance utilizes friendly invasions and footholds for another form of dynamic content: strongholds.

Strongholds
Strongholds are powerful planar footholds that require a friendly Empyreal invasion to take down. Once destroyed, the Empyreal invasion will try to build its own stronghold to siphon power from the planar stronghold’s remains. During these localized events, players can build aerial platforms and other upgrades to defend against waves of enemies as they invade from both land and air. In the final wave, one of a variety of bosses will spawn, teleporting from platform to platform in an attempt to destroy the Empyreal Stronghold.

Some strongholds can be fought alone, but others are intended for groups of 10 or more. This content will also offer another way to earn notoriety with the Torvan Hunters.

As always, the team is looking for any feedback we can deliver regarding these additions. To provide feedback, check out this thread in the PTS section of the forums. Also, stay tuned for our preview of the PTS content.

The RIFT portion of yesterday’s Trion Friday live stream extravaganza was, unsurprisingly, focused on RIFT’s big move to a free-to-play system beginning on June 12th. Daglar joined Simon and Elrar and explained how some of the systems will work in greater detail as well as updated the RIFT community on some promising changes to the current Patron reward system. The team has been listening to all of our feedback and has made a few changes that, overall, make being a RIFT veteran a little more appealing.

Elrar also showed off the in-game shop in its current state and let Daglar talk a little bit about the different categories of items, the Loyalty tiers, and a whole lot more. To catch a replay of the live stream, you can see it here. Alternatively, keep reading to see our detailed highlights roundup.

Let’s dig right in and talk about the new information Daglar discussed regarding Patron bonuses, veteran rewards, and Storm Chaser edition purchasers:

• Veteran players will be receiving a one-time stipend of Credits based on how long total they have been subscribed for in the past. This amount hasn’t been disclosed yet. They’ll also be receiving a one-time stipend of 7000 Loyalty per month of past subscription time.
• Patron subscribers will receive Loyalty every month as well as access to daily stackable boosts. These boosts will stack up to 7 much like how the current Expert dungeon dailies stack.
• Patrons also receive priority when it comes to any possible login queues.
• Patron subscribers will be getting a discount on all items in the in-game store. Daglar said the team is looking for this to at least represent a 10% discount (possibly up to 15%).
• The Patron pass also, of course, grants players the summon-able banker, guild banker, trainer, etc.
• A monthly Credit stipend for Patrons is still currently not being considered.
• Trion will be giving anyone who purchased the one-year subscription Storm Chaser edition of Storm Legion $50 worth of Credits in the store. This decision was made directly based off player feedback. This is in addition to everything else we’ll be getting.
• Players with an annual or six-month subscription or a subscription that currently extends far past the June 12th date will be receiving a one-time bonus of Credits as well. The exact numbers and details for these bonuses aren’t known yet.
• All players who purchased Storm Chaser editions or hold a one-year or six-month subscription will also be receiving a special Ice Raptor mount for free.
• Trion’s Customer Service department is now willing to uphold refunds from up to 30 days of purchase (was 14 days).

Item Store Details

When the in-game store goes onto the PTS for player testing, the Credit system will actually be the same system that will be used on live. This means that players will be able to buy credits and have them transfer over to live servers. Daglar also mentioned that there will some kind of multiplier bonus for players who choose to do this. Dendrome and all of its content should be on the PTS next week.

The front page of the item store (see above– click to enlarge) will feature recommended items that look at your character’s stats, etc. as well as the standard featured items section and claim items section. The multicolored orbs on the top that we guessed might be connected to Loyalty tiers are exactly that. This section wasn’t finished during the stream, but players will be given certain mounts and items for reaching certain Loyalty tiers. There are also in-between Loyalty levels where small rewards like Experience vials are handed out. Rewards such as mounts work across every character made.

• Loyalty is earned through buying items in the shop, purchasing Credits, past subscription time, and current Patron subscription time.
• Patron Passes will be available in 3-day, 15-day, and 30-day units.
• Some store items can either be purchased with Credits or Plat (or currency marks or Valor). Other items are restricted to just Credits.
• Players will be able to use the store to gift certain items to other players.
• There will be two new bag slots added. Veteran players will have to purchase these if they would like them, but ideally our stipend should be able to cover that.
• We’ll be able to purchase additional role slots and have up to 20 total. These will be purchasable with Credits or Plat. The new role slots, again, will have to be purchased by veteran players. Wardrobe slots have also been extended out to 20 total and will be purchasable in the same fashion.

Transfiguration Baubles are the new weapon appearance customization item coming in RIFT 2.3. They will work kind of similar to Guild Wars 2‘s appearance customization where you essentially use the item, select both the weapon you want to use and the weapon you want to customize it to within the frame that pops up, and your weapon will gain the appearance of the other. Both weapons still remain in you inventory.

As far as gear in the item store goes, there is a way to see which gear is an upgrade for your character as well as a way to buy gear that doesn’t cost Credits. You can’t currently purchase anything above dungeon gear with Credits. In future tiers, this may change, but we will never see top-tier items purchasable for Credits, at least. In the interface is a handy currency counter that lets you see all of your raid/dungeon currencies. You’re able to conveniently purchase raid/dungeon gear requiring marks using the shop interface.

Now, the prices on these mark-purchased items are noticeably higher than in the current game. Trion is adding a multiplier to all mark currencies, currency bonuses, and the costs of raid/dungeon currency items in order to give the new currency/mark boosts more of an effect. The multiplier they used is even with current rewards and requirements, which means we won’t see a negative difference whatsoever. Things will cost more, but we’ll also be receiving more as rewards. Our current marks will also be affected by this multiplier when 2.3 goes live.

The shop has Supply Crates, which contain gear that’s completely randomized. While there’s a chance for the crates to contain blue items and above, the items are still not equal to raid pieces at all. There will also be some new runes in these boxes.

Rank 7 PvP gear is available for Credits (or Favor), but you still need the PvP rank in order to purchase it. Rank 8 gear is not available for Credits and is in the store for convenience only, much like raid gear.

Past world event mounts (at least some of them) are available for purchase in the store through event currency or Credits. Past world event goodies such as pets, food items, and other baubles will also be available.

Race changes, faction changes, name changes, guild name changes, and gender changes will all be available in the store. As Daglar mentioned on the forums, races and factions won’t be tied together when you make changes, which means that a Bahmi can be a Guardian, etc.

For F2P players, they will have to purchase all class slots and bag/bank slots separately for each character. Veteran players– which is essentially anyone who has purchased RIFT and has subscribed at one time– will keep everything they currently have as far as bag/bank slots and character slots across all characters. All players will either have to purchase Storm Legion (before free-to-play launches) or purchase the Storm Legion souls in order to play as those souls. Additional character slots won’t be added to the item store in 2.3, but that’s something the team is hoping to add.

For dimension lovers, there will be a couple of new keys to purchase from the store as well as a couple of keys only available through Loyalty tiers. There are some new dimension items, of course, as well as boxes that contain varieties of items. Trion is also working on letting players have more than one active dimension in the future.
 

Miscellaneous Tidbits
 

One of the new dimensions will be an area of Hailol, which is Atrophinius’ personal party town of sorts, which Elrar also previewed a bit for us. The Life plane will be taking on a new, friendlier approach in 2.3, which both explains this dimension’s origin and some of the interesting additions we previewed during the Dendrome live stream a couple weeks ago.

RIFT 2.3 will be bringing players a new set of Twisted Artifacts in Dendrome including the largest set of artifacts RIFT has seen thus far. Simon also briefly touched on the fact that players have been a little disappointed with Storm Legion‘s lack of achievement rewards and artifact achievement rewards and says that 2.3 will be bringing us a better taste of what we’ve been missing. From the sounds of it, there’s going to be a pretty awesome-looking cape rewarded from the achievement to hunt down every single rare mob in all of RIFT.

More random tidbits:

• Old-world RIFT cities will feature new guide NPCs that will help new players. Eventually, this is the goal for Storm Legion cities as well.
• As far as PvP goes, we’re going to be seeing a new season at some point. The team is not happy with Conquest decay, overall, and wants to eventually change how it works.
• More macro slots and some improvements to the Auction House are being looked at for the future.
• The new souls Daglar hinted at a while ago won’t be added until 3.0.
• If you’re a fan of this lovely outfit, Elrar previewed it in action and also showed off the back side. He also hinted about some kind of jester outfit existing in the shop.

Next week we’ll find out more about the REX and Loyalty systems during Trion’s live stream.

Daglar continued addressing a solid portion of player feedback on the forums yesterday. Among his posts, a few were especially interesting. He commented on what we’ll be seeing as far as race and faction change items in the cash shop as well as the future of server transfers and expansion content.

This first quote was regarding the possibility of additional character slots in the item store:

Originally posted by Daglar (Source)

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Character slots is on the wish list, but we cannot say for certain if it will make the launch date.

Server transfers will remain free for your normal free weekly transfer. We could potentially in the distant future charge for multiple moves per week, but I don’t really like that idea and I’d rather get us to a better place with cross shard / single shard technology.

Faction and race changes are not linked. If you change yourself to a Bahmi as a guardian, you are still a Guardian. If you are a Kelari and change faction, you are still a Kelari.

Bahmi Guardian? Now that’s an interesting change.

Regarding new races appearing in the RIFT in-game store:

Originally posted by Daglar (Source)

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We’d love to do more races some day, but there are huge amounts of work involved with our pipeline to make them function. If they came out they would come out likely at the same time as a major expansion. As the content (quests/landmass/advancement) of the expansion would be free, we’d probably charge a bundle for the classes and the races.

We also received a pretty nifty work-in-progress preview of the item store yesterday if you haven’t already checked it out.

Yesterday, Trion released a screenshot of how the in-game RIFT item shop currently looks, even though it’s still a work in progress. The screenshot tells us a few interesting things, however, and it also lets us preview a few of the items that will be available for purchase when our free-to-play system goes live. Thanks to the currencies and prices on-screen, we’re also able to take a stab at how much things may cost in real-time dollars. A pretty dapper top hat and accompanying outfit are also previewable to the side of the screenshot.

Keep reading to take a peek!

Here’s the full screenshot (click on the image to bring up the full-size version):

First off, the overall look of the item shop– unless it changes quite a bit, of course– seems to rather simple in design, which is a good sign, in my opinion. It fits with the original RIFT UI quite nicely. We’re not sure what the bar and colored orbs on the top of the window represent yet. They may be tied to some type of Loyalty rank or set of tiers. The items listed are fairly standard for most cash shops, and overall, seem decent.

It also features a “Sell Grey Items” button on the very bottom, which should mean that players will be able to sell grey items anywhere in-game, since item shops tend to be accessible everywhere. This is a pretty decent design if you ask me. It not only makes life easier for us while we’re out in the world, but it also gives players a reason to open up the item shop. While selling grey items, players may also see a cool cosmetic item to purchase. Presumably, that’s the intent behind the addition.

Either way, I’d take a feature like that over the standard use of massive shop ads everywhere in-game any day. Speaking of which, Daglar mentioned on the forums yesterday that huge in-game ads are not something the team is considering, which is definitely a step in the right direction.

We can also garner a likely pricing system for how much Credits may cost us through this screenshot. The top item listed is a 30-day Patron Pass, which is essentially one month of a subscription. We know that the subscription fee isn’t changing, so we can equate that pass to costing $15. Since it costs 2400 Credits, we can do a little math and come up with a figure of 160 Credits for $1.00. This figure may change, of course, but looking at the prices on the other items in the shop, it seems about right.

The intact preview tab is nice to see, and the previewed outfit isn’t too bad shabby either. Top hats are always in season. Elrar also showed us this lovely outfit on a female model that’s kind of an awesome mix of typical fantasy wardrobe and something a little more steampunk:

While the jury’s still out for many players on how they feel about RIFT‘s F2P move overall, it’s great to see an early preview of the in-game shop and begin to see what direction Trion is taking the model.

Since this week’s huge bombshell announcement regarding RIFT going free-to-play beginning June 12th, Daglar and the entire Trion RIFT team have been quite diligent in making sure they keep the lines of communication open with the playerbase. Daglar has set a record with the amount of posts he’s made in this official forum thread (hence “Daglar Tracker”) which has been an overall solid source for player feedback.

Keep reading to see a couple of choice quotes that Daglar made yesterday regarding the possibility of additional servers for the F2P transition and thoughts on in-game shop gear, previous raid tiers, and some possible changes we may see to tier mark systems in the future.

Originally posted by Daglar (Source)

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We’ll have some on standby to bring up as required. There is little we can do about folks clamoring onto Icewatch as it stands now other than lock the server to transfers.

We’ll continue to work at optimizing ability lag which pops up from time to time — we’ve made some pretty big strides there recently.

This quote is an answer regarding whether or not top-tier gear will ever become available in RIFT‘s cash shop:

Originally posted by Daglar (Source)

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Top tier won’t be available. When we do the shifts really depends on when we do the mark shifts we plan on doing in the future.

One of the things we feel we really screwed up on long term was creating to many types of marks – one for each tier. We want to simplify in the future, when T2 is released, we’ll be doing a multiplier on the number of raid marks and converting those into dungeon marks. Raid marks will only be earned then from the top tier raid – and potentially some quests for the non top tier raids.

The previous purchased gear will become available for sale for dungeon marks at new values based on the scale of dungeon marks. Credit pricing will then be based on the dungeon mark values – some of those items will not be cost effective to purchase with credits folks. Tier shifts won’t be happening every patch – just like today.

If you’re interested in helping Trion help us by giving them your feedback on this change, the team has also sent out surveys to subscribers who are signed up to receive RIFT emails. Check out that announcement here. The survey’s quick and gets to the point very quickly, which should help the team quite a bit when it comes to deciding on veteran/Loyalty rewards that are a little better incentive-wise than the currently-announced boosts.