Trying to ArcheAge

So, ArcheAge launched this week for the F2P folks (like me). You may have known that. Here’s where I try to play this game… try being the key word.

What’s My Number?

You’ve probably heard the stories of long, frustrating server queues. They are not an exaggeration. I’m trying to play ArcheAge, but it’s been difficult enough just to get on a server, much less make progress here.

On launch night, I waited in a 2 hour queue… which wasn’t terrible, I suppose. Not good, either. I came home last night to log in, thinking the 2 hour queue would be lessened by the slowing of the first day rush. Nope.

Last night, I faced a 6 hour queue. I don’t think I’ve ever experienced a 6 hour queue at any launch… ever. I spent more time doing webcomic art and playing Sims 4 than I did playing AA due to that. And when I did get in, I only had half an hour to play before I needed to hit bed.

This = 6 Hour Queue

I’m not writing this to complain about it (I realize I choose to sit in a 6 hour queue), but more to warn folks… this is the state of the game. And, so far, I’m not seeing any signs that new servers are being released to fix this issue. They did update servers to increase max capacity by 20%. We’ll see how this works tonight.

In fact, the community rep on the forums responded to a player by saying folks with Patron status are only seeing wait times of 60 to 120 mins on the most populous servers at peak time. As if that’s pretty acceptable. And those are the folks who paid to have a faster queue.

When I Could Play…

So I rolled a new character (Aywren) on the Tahyang sever, West faction on Tuesday night. Having a shorter queue then, I was actually able to get some stuff done. I chose Tahyang because I heard that was the unofficial RP server, and I’ve learned that when I don’t roll on the RP sever, I usually regret it later (like in GW2).

Got my horse back!

I spent most the time on Tuesday speed-running the content that I finished during beta so that I could get to something new that I hadn’t done. I was able to do this easily, and was level 11 before the first night was done. So, now I’m working through content that’s completely new to me — glad that I held some back for launch.

I also spent a long time agonizing over what skill combinations to play. I knew I wanted to try melee DPS, but wanted something that would work for a solo player. I ended up going with Blighter (hate the name), due to the ability to DPS along with the hope that invisibility will help get me out of tight spots later in the game (such as unwanted PVP). I’m open to tweaking this later, since I don’t know how comfortable I am playing rouge-like characters. For now, I just wanted to end my search for a class… because there are so many choices that it’s maddening.

I also joined a large, growing guild, who seemed to have the same gaming temperament as I do. As a F2P player, I’m hoping I might get to experience farming and such with the help of the guild — I know there’s already guild plots in world for us to use if needed. I also wanted to offer my time and skills to bettering something in the game, and joining a larger guild seems like a good move.

I managed to get my guild invite last night, so now I’m set up for gaming this weekend. Hope that the queues will be kinder and actually give me some time in world to flesh out my experience and help me decide if this is going to be an on-going game for me.

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