Newcomer's Guide to Rise of the Godslayer

Repost from official ROGS threads by Silirrion and Tarib

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Factions and how they reward you

Each faction offers four visual and power tier of armor sets, across two different armor types giving us a total of eighty different armor sets visually. That though is only the start of the faction armors. In order to distribute the various armor sets out over each class and create unique and interesting sets for each class you will find that every class has the ability to choose from five different possible sets.

So some classes may share a visual look from a faction tier on occasion, but they will have five sets available that are specifically designed to be useful to their class. So in effect there are actually far more armor sets (with unique names and statistics) than there are the eighty different visual sets.

At a top level each class has these five functional sets. Those sets are loosely categorized as follows:
One set that offers general increase to your DPS
One set that offers general increase to your health
Three sets that offer different class specific utility

So for example the first two sets of the five available to the Ranger class cover their two base sets (general health and general DPS) and then you have the three specialist sets. The first of which focuses on critical damage, evades and hit rating, the second set focuses on protections and immunities and a third specialist set that focuses of taps and regeneration.

Of course you will also be able to mix and match pieces from the different sets if you wish to.

The intention here is to offer players viable choices in their selections. You can use your armor choice alongside your alternate advancement abilities to further specialize your role, should you wish to do so.

So who needs to seek out which faction? Let’s take a look at each class individually
Assassin – Wolves of the Steppes, Scholars of Cheng-Ho, Scarlet Circle, Brittle Blade, Shadows of Jade
Barbarian – Hyrkanians, Tamarin Tigers, Yellow Priests of Yun, Children of Yagkosha, Brittle Blade
Bear Shaman - Hyrkanians, Tamarin Tigers, Yellow Priests of Yun, Children of Yagkosha, Shadows of Jade
Conqueror - Wolves of the Steppes (Plate), Tamarin Tigers (Heavy), Last Legion (heavy), Last Legion (Magical Plate), Last legion (Physical Plate)
Dark Templar - Wolves of the Steppes (Plate), Tamarin Tigers (Heavy), Last Legion (heavy), Last Legion (Magical Plate), Last legion (Physical Plate)
Demonologist – Wolves of the Steppes, Scholars of Cheng-Ho, Scarlet Circle, Shadows of Jade, Brittle Blade
Guardian – Wolves of the Steppes (Plate), Tamarin Tigers (Heavy), Last Legion (heavy), Last Legion (Magical Plate), Last legion (Physical Plate)
Herald of Xotli – Wolves of the Steppes, Scholars of Cheng-Ho, Scarlet Circle, Brittle Blade, Shadows of Jade
Necromancer - Wolves of the Steppes, Scholars of Cheng-Ho, Scarlet Circle, Shadows of Jade, Brittle Blade
Priest of Mitra – Hyrkanians, Scholar’s of Cheng-Ho, Yellow Priests of Yun, Children of Yagkosha, Scarlet Circle
Ranger – Hyrkanians, Tamarin Tigers, Yellow Priest of Yun, Children of Yagkosha, Shadows of Jade
Tempest of Set - Hyrkanians, Scholar’s of Cheng-Ho, Yellow Priests of Yun, Children of Yagkosha, Scarlet Circle

Remember though, this is just for the armor items! It may well be that a faction also offers you a choice of weapons or other benefits that you may want. Those factions may not always be the same as the ones who provide you with armor choices. You may to even choose between two rival factions.

Distribution

The way in which you will attain these armors is a slight variation of what you might expect if we had just approached in a traditional sense. We didn’t want these rewards to just be seen as a pure ‘grind’ through faction ranks. We didn’t want to see all of these items as simple vendor rewards just for gaining as much faction as fast as possible. We want to incentivize players to also enjoy the great encounters and group play opportunities in the expansion.

Faction armor will be available through three different ways. Buying it straight from a faction vendor, as drops from encounters and dungeon encounters and finally from a token vendor who will accept tokens as payments (these tokens are found throughout the expansion content from boss encounters)

So how are the items attained? Let’s take an example and display it visually for you.



So as you can see the system effectively distributes the sets are designed both horizontally and vertically. You can collect one set, the vertical set from the faction vendor, entirely from solo play, including two pieces of epic quality. So you can choose to either collect the sets with the same suffix or the same prefix, or any combination.

New armor statistics

The expansion also introduces new statistics in relation to critical damage. Many of the new armor pieces will have a new ‘critigation’ statistic that allows you to mitigate critical damage. This is a major new mechanic that has allowed us to create these new armor tiers without making them overpowered in the old world content.

The enemies you will face in Khitai, in particular as you progress further will be more capable of performing critical strikes and using the faction armor against these enemies will be part of your journey through Khitai.

So what does this mean?

Choice and consequence

Anyone who saw the coverage of our presentations at GDC recently knows that choice and consequence play a large role in how we built the expansion. It is also very relevant to this design. With the system described above we feel we are offering players a lot more flexibility and options in terms of their armor choices, and the functionality that it affords you.

It also means however that you will have some meaningful choices to make. It is by design that these choices exist. You won’t necessarily be able to get everything, at least not immediately, and you will have choices to make. Some of the faction rewards are in effect mutually exclusive and you will have to make choices about what suits your character best.

This was an important layer of depth that we really wanted to add with the expansion and when combined with the alternate advancement system will really offer you all a lot more options for choosing how your character will be built.

Bear in mind that the factions will have many other rewards as well, not just the armor pieces.

Also, the faction armors are not only the armor rewards in the expansion! In addition there are a number of general sets that can be found across the expansion content.

Land of Khitai

Khitai is the mysterious land to the East. It is the home of powerful sorceries, ancient mysteries and an empire that is slowly spiraling into darkness. And at the heart of the empire, Yah Chieng, the powerful God-Emperor explores a power out of time and space.

Information on the different new regions can be found on the community portal.



The Khitans

The Khitans are people who have merged into a homogeneous race over the centuries. Some regional variation exists, but the distinctions are almost invisible to Westerners. The ruling class tends to be slightly taller and have the alien caste to their features that identifies them as having some proto-stygian blood somewhere in their past.

The Khitan’s behavior is wrapped in complex ceremonies. Each member of the Khitan society has a place in the structure and codes of behavior, which must be followed. These codes do not prevent personal initiative. The Khitans believe that those who best obey the codes will be rewarded by the gods. From this, they deduce that "the winner was right," and this success-oriented approach gives them a penchant for treachery and double-dealing, which would cause a Hyborian noble to blanch.

Classes:
Guardian, Dark Templar, Bear Shaman, Assassin, Ranger, Demonologist, Herald of Xotli and Necromancer



The Alternate Advancement System

The Alternate Advancement System provides a more in-depth and customizable progression without raising the level cap. The system will allow you to push your characters in a new direction and will allow you to grow as well develop your characters further than ever before. The Alternate Advancement System gives all your characters, level 20 to 80, a new way of progressing or earning new combos, abilities, spells, and passive increases.


New Skill Trees

The Alternate Advancement System features three new character trees and dozens of new abilities that contain five ranks for all classes in Age of Conan. The Alternate Advancement System is broken down into three trees called:
General: First 3 Rows - Available to all classes starting at level 20.
Archetype: Middle 3 Rows - Available to classes of the same archetype at level 80.
Class: Last 3 Rows - Available to members of a class at level 80
.

You must spend 5 points in the General Tree in order to access the Archetype tree. You also must spend 10 points total in the General Tree and Archetype Tree to access the Class Tree.


Alternate Advancement Points (AA-XP)

In order to unlock new abilities within the Alternate Advancement System, you will need to acquire Alternate Advancement Points. The Alternate Advancement Points are broken down into 3 categories based on your gameplay experience:
Mastery: Rewarded when you gain PvE Experience from mob kills and quests. Some items also reward Mastery Points throughout your PvE Experience. Each time you fill up the Mastery bar you will be granted 3 Mastery Points and 1 Expertise Point.
Prowess: Rewarded when you gain PvP Experience from killing another player, completing a mini-game, or participating in various objectives in Shrines of Bori. Each time you fill up the Prowess bar you will be granted 3 Prowess Points and 1 Expertise Point.
Expertise: Rewarded when you gain a Mastery or Prowess level. These points can be used in place of Mastery or Prowess points for purchasing Feats and Perks.

* Note that you cannot have more than 100 of any type of point at any time.


Feats and Perks

Alternate Advancement Feats and Perks can be purchased in two different ways:
Point System: Utilizing this system uses your accrued Mastery, Prowess and Expertise points to purchase Feats and Perks.
Training Mode: Utilizing this system allows you to select a Feat or perk to be trained over time. Selecting this mode, then selecting a Feat or Perk will start a countdown to appear on the selected feat or perk. When the timer expires, the Feat or Perk is increased by one rank. Only one Feat or Perk can be trained at any one time. Training Mode is only available at level 80.

There are three different types of borders for Feats and Perks that signify the following:
Bronze: Feats with Bronze borders give passive bonuses that are always active upon purchase. These feats do not need to be equipped to the Perk Bar to gain their effects.
Silver: Perks with Silver borders give Minor Perks that must be equipped to gain their bonuses and effects. These perks occupy one Perk Bar slot and must be equipped to the corresponding section on the Perk Bar to gain their Affects -- Blue for General Perks, Red for Archetype Perks, and Grey for Class Perks.
Gold: Perks with Gold borders give Major Perks that must be equipped to gain their bonuses and effects. These perks occupy two Perk Bar slots and must be equipped to the grey colored Class Perk section of the Perk bar to gain their effects.


The Perk Bar

There are two new GUI tabs available and a new GUI element – the Perk Bar:
Perks: This tab appears on the left panel of the "Combos, Spells, and Special Abilities" window that’s divided into three sub-categories -- General, Archetype, and Class. After purchasing a Perk, it will be located in the corresponding sub-category based on which tree it was purchased from. When viewing the Perks tab, the lower left hand hot bar is automatically changed to display your Perk Bar.
AA: This tab appears on the right panel of the "Combos, Spells, and Special Abilities" window and is divided into three sub-categories -- Combos, Abilities, and Spells. After purchasing a Perk, that gives a Combo, Ability, or Spell, the new Combo, Ability, or Spell will be located in the corresponding sub-category.
Perk Bar: The Perk Bar is accessed by a new button on the left hand side of the left-most default hot bar. Clicking this button swaps this hot bar to the Perk Bar. The Perk Bar has six slots, two of each color -- Blue, Red, and Grey. These colors correspond to the different sections of the Alternate Advancement tree and signify which Perks are allowed to be equipped to which slot. General corresponds to Blue, Archetype to Red, and Class to Grey.


Using Your Perks

Once you have purchased a Perk, it must be equipped to the Perk Bar to gain the bonuses:
Open your Combos, Spells, and Abilities window (shortcut key: B).
On the left hand pane, select the Perks tab, and then select the category of Perk you wish to equip to see which Perks of this type are available.
Click and drag the Perk you wish to equip to the corresponding slot on your Perk Bar. Available slots will light up if they are empty.
Once the Perk is equipped, you now have the benefits it grants. If the Perk you have equipped enables a Combo, Ability, or Spell, you may also want to assign this new power to a location on your hot bar. To do so, continue to step 5. If the Perk you have equipped does not grant a Combo, Ability, or Spell, you are finished with the equip process and you are benefiting from the effects of your Perk.
If the Perk you have equipped enables a Combo, Ability, or Spell, and you wish to assign a hot bar location for this new power, first, you must open your Combos, Spells, and Special Abilities window (shortcut key: B).
On the right hand pane, select the AA tab, and then select the category of power you have gained, be it a Combo, Ability, or Spell.
From this new tab, you can click and drag your new power to a hot bar slot of your choosing and then activate it from there.


More about the Alternate Advancement System can also be found on the community portal.



The Factions

The expansion introduces ten new interactive factions and two secret interactive factions. You can join, work or betray factions in an ever-changing political climate. Depending on which factions you choose to align with, other factions may come hostile or friendly. Different factions also provide quests and new lines of gameplay. Completing quests with specific factions will allow you to rise within the ranks of the faction. A new graphical user interface helps track your standings and progress with each faction. As you rise in rank, each faction will also offer a series of new tier armors found on a vendor with the faction representatives.

A list of the different factions including additional information can be found on the community portal.



New Mounts

The Wolf

The new wolf mount can only be attained through a series of quests in which the wolf will grow with each completed quest. You must prove yourself to the pack in order to fully command a wolf from a cub to a fullygrown wolf. This will take some time and effort in order to train your wolf before it's strong enough to either be used as a damage pet or mount.

The Wolf mount comes with a special ability, that snares any enemy in the vicinity of the player, dismounts them if they were on a mount other than a wolf mount and makes enemies visible that were in stealth mode. Additionally, the wolf mount has the longest endurance of any mount in the game.


The Tiger

The tiger, known to the Vendhyans as the Vaaghasan, is closely linked to the Tamarin’s Tiger faction. To be eligible to ride the tiger, a player must become a member of the Tamarin's Tigers. You will also have to complete a series of tasks in order to show your worth for such a companion. Once completed, you will be given a tiger cub that you must help train into the predator they were always meant to be.

Tamarin will be the judge to see if the bond is strong enough that the Vaaghasan will consent the beast for riding. But first, there is a matter of the saddler for the Tiger that must be assembled by the one who wishes to ride it. You may also choose to keep the tiger as a damage pet or full mount. If you choose to mount the tiger, you will be given the ability to stealth around playfields without being seen. Additionally, the tiger mount holds the fastest sprint speed in the game.