Rift Stalker

Doing the 'Carlton' Dance With My Faerie!!

2011-03-04T13:09:00.000-08:00

This had me rolling on the floor. A classic forever preserved in Rift.

What is your favorite dance?

Funny Turtle Mount Glitch

2011-03-04T08:44:00.000-08:00

You must become one with the turtle!

So If you didn't apply a Collector's Edition key to your account the free ride is over - literally. All our nice free turtle mounts were taken away from us today.

The funny thing is that if you logged out while mounted on one you ended up looking like this today.

I took the chance to take some sweet turtle action shots while I have the chance. Who knew turtles could fire lasers!

The power of Vigil compels you!

Teenage Mutant Laser Turtles!

IMAFIRINMAHLAZZURZZ!!!11!

Do you have any funny screenshots of bugs/glitches in Rift? If so send them to
or post a link in the comments below.

Update 1: There are a few posts about this on the forums. Players are apparently reporting you have to buy and/or mount a different mount to make is to away. Other than that you have to put in a GM ticket. I guess I'm stuck with "turtle power" until I get more money.

Update 2: While I had originally assumed this was simply a graphical bug there are issues with pet classes. When I try to send my pet to attack something I get a "You cannot command your pet while riding a mount." error. This removes a key functionality of any pet class. Dying and swimming don't work to remove the mount either. I'm putting in a GM ticket. Hopefully they can get this resolved soon.

Rift for Beginners: How to Change Souls

2011-03-02T15:27:00.000-08:00

Resetting Souls to Allow Swapping

When you reach level 13 you can do quests in the major cities to unlock additional souls beyond your starting three. This allows you to make all new soul combinations.

In addition to gaining new souls you can also purchase new "Roles". Roles allow you to store more than one Soul Tree. This guide shows how to change the Souls in any of your Roles.

How to Change a Soul

Select Soul to Swap (Must Have 0 Points Spent)

Choose New Soul from List

Open your Soul Tree by pressing "N" (or press the icon on your game menu that looks like a tree).
Left-Click on the icon for the Soul (with 0 soul points spent) you want to change.
Select the soul you would like to swap in. (If you are level 13 and above and have done one or more quests to gain additional Souls the available souls will be shown in the "Souls (Equip)" list.)
That's it.

When Can You Swap a Soul?
You can change a Soul in a Role as long as there are zero (0) Soul Points spent in that Soul in your Soul Tree. This means you can swap out less used souls as often as you want.

Many times we have a third soul that we splash into our build simply to get the first few abilities from it. If this is the case for you then you can swap that soul as often as you want.

If you want to swap a soul out of or into a role and you have spend points in it simply head to a trainer and reset the soul points of the role you'd like to swap a soul in.

Swapping souls is quick and easy once you get the hang of it. Also swapping zero (0) point tertiary souls also gives you a bit of flexibility while in the field.

What tips and tricks have you uncovered while playing Rift? Let us know in the comments.

Old Racial Abilities Listed In the Game Manual.

2011-03-01T23:05:00.000-08:00

So I was reading the manual that came with my copy of Rift and got a bit confused while reading about the racial abilities.

How far they come.

I'm sure these may have been the racials at one point. It is interesting to see how far they have come from the time the game manual went to print and the release. I just thought I'd take a picture for posterity for posterity.

Do any of you know if these racials were ever in the game? I came into the beta right at the end.

What are some of the thing you miss from beta? What over-powered abilities or specs got nerfed into the ground? What souls combinations made you feel like a god? Let me know in the comments below.

Happy Launch Day!!

2011-03-01T07:17:00.000-08:00

FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF

Happy Launch Day everyone! I will be picking up my retail key later today and am hoping to get some really good stuff for you all.

I hope you all had as good a time during head start as I did. I'm hoping the turtle mount that mysteriously showed up in my main wasn't a mistake. (I only pre-ordered a regular edition.)

I'll leave you with a few goofy images from head start.

I thought the head start servers were coming back down a bit early.

I've been reading too much fffffffuuuuuuuuuuuu.

How has your launch day been so far?

Soul Build Library - Get Your Theorycraft On!

2011-02-28T18:26:00.000-08:00

I've got a lot of reading to catch up on!

I just wanted to make a quick post pointing to the Soul Build Library over at the Rift Junkies forums.

If you were a fan of theorycrafting sites like Elitist Jerks or Arena Junkies head on over and read all about Soul Builds for all of the callings.

Rift Sound Effects Interacting With Water. Impressive!

2011-02-25T13:49:00.000-08:00

So I noticed some pretty cool sound work while leveling my new Rogue. If you move your camera underwater the sound effects as well as the music get muffled.

It's a small detail but another indication of how Rift is trying to push the boundaries of what a modern MMORPG can be both visually and aurally.

Character Creation Impressions (We're Impressed!)

2011-02-25T01:16:00.000-08:00

Rift Dwarf

This is a screenshot of the character creation of a dwarf character. I was trying to make a dwarf a bit similar to one of my World of Warcraft characters.

While making the character I couldn't shake the feeling that this is what my WoW character would look like if rendered in real life.

We tend to grow attached to our characters. Often times recreating them over and over in various games we play.

Warcraft Dwarf

This is a screenshot of my WoW Dwarf. The resemblance is quite (striking which is fine by me). I'm excited to take an old friend on new adventures in a new world.

The detail of the Dwarf faces in Rift is pretty astounding. While it may be tiny when I'm actually playing the game just taking a few minutes to admire the detail is well worth it.

Bravo Trion. You did a fine job on the character models and customization options.

(Click for full size image.)

High Resolution Facial Textures

Have you recreated any of your favorite characters from past game in Rift?

Soul Selector Flow Chart

2011-02-24T22:31:00.000-08:00

I saw this posted over on /r/Rift/ and thought I would post it up here as well as I found it very useful.

I'm not 100% of the original origin (it is credited to "Arieste") and supposedly it is a bit dated but I found it useful for those of use who are relatively new to Rift. (If you know more about its origin please let me know in the comments.)

(Click on the image to get a larger view.)

Which Pre-order Pet Will You Choose?

2011-02-24T17:58:00.000-08:00

Decisions, decisions.

If you pre-ordered Rift you will have the choice of receiving one of three companion pets.

I thought I'd dig up what each of these pets looks like so you can make an more informed choice as to which of these beasties to take home with you.

In your mail you will receive a Companion Gift. This item begins a quest when when completed will allow you to choose one of three items. Each item gives one companion pets.

The information and images for this post were taken from Telarapedia. The entry on the Companion Gift quest gives us a sneak peak at each of the pets.

Image © Telarapedia

Stone Egg summons the The Cockatrice Chick.

Image © Telarapedia

The Pearlescent Conch summons the Deep One Spawnling.

Image © Telarapedia

The Scorched Collar summons the Hellhound Pup.

Which will you choose? I'm leaning towards the puppy. I've always wanted a flaming doggie of death!

The Rogue - Chocolate and Peanut Butter!

2011-02-24T15:15:00.000-08:00

Beauty AND the Beast.

This is the first in a series of posts dedicated to the 4 main callings (root classes) available in Rift. We are going to be describing our day-to-day play experiences with each calling.

Today we are going to be talking about our Bahmi Rogue. She is only level three at the moment but I have already come across a few things that are making me love this race/class combo.

Mobility
Two of my favorite abilities in World of Warcraft are Blink (Mage) and Heroic Leap (Warrior). With a Bahmi Rogue and a Riftstalker soul I get both of them in one character!

Chocolate

Mighty Leap is available as a Bahmi racial ability. It is handy for clasing distance while on foot. It is also great for cloasing the gap to your next enemy. It's a fantastic racial and I'm interested to see if it will be nerf in the future. Hopefully they leave it alone.

Peanut Butter

Shadow Shift is an ability learned by selecting the Rogue's Riftstalker soul. It is great for closing the gap on casters as well as a great way to escape combat when you get in over your head.

The ability to leap 30 meters ever 15 seconds out of combat and blink 15 yards every 45 in combat is about the tastiest combination since chocolate and peanut butter.

Mobility spells are a fantastic addition to any Rogues arsenal. I can't wait to see what over tastey treat away me as I add additional souls.

What racial abilities are you in love with? What Souls are you choosing for your Rogue? Let us know in the comments below.

Head Start Server Restarts

2011-02-24T14:07:00.000-08:00

Not what you want to see after waiting in the queue.

(2:00PM PST) - So I finally made it into a server and had literally ust finished my intro video when a message popped up letting me know the server was coming down for maintenance. I have the worst luck!

Players aren't afraid to speak their mind.

I did grab a screenshot of the the player reaction to the server restart. I think they speak for all of us who are trying to enjoy our Head Start time.

Having worked as a developer on two different MMO launches I feel the developer's pain. If you launch with too few server you risk long queue times for the first few days.

If you have too many servers you risk splintering the play base badly and when the initial interest dies off you end up with under populated servers which may lead to server merges which don't look good to anyone.

Head Start server's down.

The servers are currently down.While you wait (again) we want to know how your Rift Head Start experience has been so far. Let us know in the comments below.

Update 1 (2:10PM PST) - Just after posting this the servers appear to have come back up. Hop back in!

Head Start Server Wait Time List

2011-02-24T12:34:00.000-08:00

22 hours 39 minutes.

For those of you, like me, who are getting to the Heas Start party just a bit late I thought I'd make a list of the current wait times for each server here to help you all find the shorter ones.

I may update this list a few times if the queue times stay this high.

(Note: Server queues change rapidly. The Times listed below are just one snapshot and intended as a rough guide.)

New Servers

(Added 2/24/11 4:15PM PST)

Silkweb......PVE

(Added 2/24/11 3:34PM PST)

Aedraxis.....PVE

Freeholme....PVP

Emberlord....PVP

(Last updated 12:45pm PST, Feb 24, 2011.)
PVP Servers
Server.......Queue..Est.Time
Faemist......None.....None
Briarcliff...2272...7h.59m
Seastone.....985....3h.47m
Dayblind.....157.......22m
Reclaimer....473.......57m
Spitescar....337.......59m
Deepstrike...1685...9h.55m

PVE Servers
Server.......Queue..Est.Time
Gnarlwood....405....1h.39m
Rocklift.....301.......37m
Greybriar....478....3h..3m
Deepwood.....325.......55m
Dimroot......230.......23m
Keenblade....498....3h.18m
Byriel.......307........3m
Belmont......536....2h.42m
Wolfsbane...1513...4h..9m

PVE RP Servers
Server.......Queue..Est.Time
Faeblight....1103...7h.58m
Shadefallen..379....1h..4m

PVP RP
Server.......Queue..Est.Time
Sunrest......803....2h.59m
Harrow.......None.....None

What I settled on (for now).

While it looks like we all have a bit of a wait on our hands if you've been at other MMO launches you know this is pretty much par for the course.

Are you holding out for a certain server? If so let us know which server and why in the comments below.

Update 1 (1:05PM PST): Trion has posted a list of new servers as they come up. All the new ones listed were already on our list though.

Update 2 (3:34PM PST): Three new servers were just announced in-game.

Update 3 (4:15PM PST) New server Silkweb (PVE)

It All Begins Now

2011-02-24T01:00:00.000-08:00

10:00AM can't come soon enough!

We are all waiting with bated breath for the last few hours to tick away before the Rift head start begins at 10AM PST on Feb 24, 2010. For many of us this is the dawning of a fresh new world for us to explore. Rife with possibilities. Ripe with potential.

A new MMO launch is an exciting time. I always feel like a kid at the grand opening of a new amusement park. So many things to do. Do many sights to see. So many rides to ride. It fresh and new and you can still smell the paint drying.

We get excited because we love MMORPGs. We love the idea of new worlds to explore. We love the idea of new classes and spells. We love the idea of finding *just* the right combination of talent points that make us OP.

We love being able to play something that is fresh and new to us. We've been playing our favorite MMOs but even the highest quality MMO will start to wear thin at times. A new infusion of blood into the MMO genre is always a good thing.

I am fairly new to Rift. I myself was only able to play a handful of hours during Open Beta. Those hours though were enough to convince me that further exploration of Rift was definitely in order.

Who's got the key?

Over the next few weeks, months and possibly years I will be bringing you my honest appraisal of my experience with rift, up-to-date rift news as well as information and analysis on the virtual economy of Rift as it grows and develops.

I am an auction house fanatic. One of my favorite activities in MMOs is to earn money. In addition to Writing for Rift Stalker I also write for the Power Word: Gold blog as well as a few others.

My love for MMOs and the MMO genre runs deep and I hope that shows in my writing. As always I look forward to your reader comments.

I look forward to our adventure together as we all take our first steps into Telara. I hope to be able to look back at this post in the future and remember when we were all waiting outside the gates of Rift like a bunch of 10 year olds hopped up on way too much sugar!

See you all at 10:00AM (and bring the big scissors)!

(Note: I am currently building up the Rift Stalker blog roll. If you run a Rift blog and would like to be added please leave a comment with your blog info below or email us at the address listed in the "Contact" section.)