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Funcom's Age of Conan Bubble Burst?

Post by trog @ 09:04am 29/07/08 | 61 Comments

MMO site Massively has an interesting look the stock prices of Norwegian-based developer Funcom:

Funcom, makers of Age of Conan, are dealing with some serious financial flux. Since the launch of AoC, their stock has tumbled from $54 to $24 a share on the Oslo Stock Exchange (last price as of the end of the trading day on Friday). This represents the loss of over 55% of the stock value. With little news coming from the world of high finance on the subject, it seems that investors may be jumping ship from the gaming industry starlet.

The after-launch hubbub around the game has certainly died down; the initial excitement on the Australian side certainly seemed to be huge and we're seeing a lot less discussion about it these days. What's the verdict - are you still playing it or have you got back to Warcraft?

Tags: funcom / age of conan

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d0mino
Posted 09:05am 29/7/08

there is really only room for one mmo imo, not that i play them.

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reso
Posted 09:07am 29/7/08

Over it, but didn't go back to wow because thankfully I've never played it before :p

Oh and I logged in a couple of nights ago to transfer some gold back to Ath and Spete and I was the only one online from my guild - most active guys have merged with another but there was still a lot of offline players.

last edited by reso at 09:07:07 29/Jul/08

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Thundercracker
Posted 09:21am 29/7/08

It runs extremely thin of content past the initial levels. While I would say the game is pretty fun for an MMO in terms of classes and combat mechanics, no content = no interest.

It is a pretty common story to hear of people not playing past their first free month.

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Jim
Posted 09:40am 29/7/08

already rambled this in other threads but since you asked trog - I cancelled my account after the first month cos:

- I didn't wanna pay for a game that was still very much a beta in too many aspects

- funcom's actions with regards their patching/bugfixing annoyed me because they insisted on patching even their oceanic-flagged servers during our prime time, and their priorities seemed very whacked with regard what they patched. to me it felt like they were more concerned with preventing people from levelling quickly than fixing the large number of infuriating issues that fucking SHIT YOU TO TEARS CONSTANTLY while you're trying to enjoy the game

I'm going to check it out again later

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Saint
Posted 09:51am 29/7/08

Agree with what Jim said. The game should never have been released when it was, just another case of a game being rushed out and causing more harm than good.

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Tim Tibbetts
Posted 10:22am 29/7/08

It's amazing how a company can develop a game for so many years, and then release it about 6 months too early. A game that could have made a fortune post-launch has just died on it's arse. I know about 5 people at my work who got the game (myself included) and no one played it after the first month.

I've just started playing WOW again - levelled from 1 to 64 atm, and it's just amazing how much better EVERYTHING about this game is than in Age of Conan. I still like the graphics, as I'm playing with my partner it's not that tedious, and I'm enjoying the BC expansion pack.

Warhammer Online looks interesting, but I will probably try it out after I finish up with Lich King, hopefully by then post-launch release issues will have disappeared.

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Tanaka Khan
Posted 10:30am 29/7/08

Hehe, looks like the latest WoW killer has just...died.

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Tim Tibbetts
Posted 10:32am 29/7/08

The only WOW killer will be the next Blizzard MMO.

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Raisty
Posted 10:50am 29/7/08

Isn't the next WoW killer the Nokia E71?

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Midda
Posted 10:53am 29/7/08

Can't say I'm surprised. For someone other than Blizzard to take the MMO throne, they couldn't just release another fantasy game. I reckon it would have to be something not only well-done, but vastly different to what we're used to. WoW has pretty much nailed the 'generic' MMO, and until someone radically changes the formula (for the better), WoW or it's successor will remain king of the hill.

I recently started playing Eve Online on a 21 day trial. I can see the appeal, as it's pretty unique, but it's obvious why it's stayed as small as it has. It just doesn't have the mainstream appeal, there's too much shit going on. That said, I am enjoying it, but I don't know if I'll be playing it after my 21 days is up.

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Obes
Posted 11:12am 29/7/08

Midda, people used to say that about Everquest.

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Jim
Posted 11:32am 29/7/08

lol wow noobs

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Midda
Posted 11:47am 29/7/08

Midda, people used to say that about Everquest.

Yeah, I guess, but isn't the situation a little different now? I don't know. Everquest was certainly the biggest MMO for a long time, but WoW is actually the biggest PC game in general now (or close to it). People who don't even play games know about WoW, you couldn't have said that about Everquest back in the day. It's kind of set in people's minds as 'the' MMO, kind of like Google is 'the' search engine. I don't know if that changes the situation at all, I'm just thinking out loud I guess.

Maybe I'm just hoping that someone is going to come along and finally make something different. Every MMO seems to be trying to do the same things as WoW in a slightly different manner. It's kind of depressing, I've been pining for so long to play a good MMO, but it seems that WoW is pretty much the only one out there that has any depth to it. I don't think WoW is bad, I just feel I've already experienced the majority of what WoW has to offer, and I'm after something different.

last edited by Midda at 11:47:07 29/Jul/08

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deadlyf
Posted 11:57am 29/7/08

I canceled my account after 2 months but only because I forgot the game existed until it hit my bank statement.

I didn't have a problem with the bugs or constant down time, I stopped playing before I hit 40 simply because I realised I was running around from zone to zone doing boring repetitive quests for hours on end in an effort to get max level. I like the idea of MMOs but I don't seem to enjoy any of the current implementations of the genre. I hate leveling and don't really understand the point of it in an MMO setting. Leveling in an RPG is part of the natural progression of a story line, leveling in an MMO is a chore you have to complete by doing a series of grind quests with no real story or conection between them before you can see the end game.

Then you have WoW where once you finally level they release something every few months that makes everything you've achieved before hand absolutely irrelevant just to make you go through all the repetitive crap all over again.

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Khel
Posted 12:48pm 29/7/08

Then you have WoW where once you finally level they release something every few months that makes everything you've achieved before hand absolutely irrelevant just to make you go through all the repetitive crap all over again.

I've never quite understood this point of view. I guess if your only reason for playing WoW was to increase the size of your e-penis and get the best loot in your game, you might be pissed off about an expansion, but if you're playing the game because you enjoy it and its fun, then an expansion is only good news cos its more content to enjoy.

I've never really got into an mmo 'hardcore' before, but I've played wow fairly consistently since Burning Crusade came out, done most of the raid stuff extra Sunwell, got myself kitted out in Tier 6 gear, and even if the expansion came out tomorrow it wouldn't somehow negate all the fun I had doing that. I had heaps of fun going through Black Temple, Hyjal, Tempest Keep, Serpentshrine Cavern (ok, maybe not so much SerpentShrine cavern) and all the other stuff, nothing can suddenly reverse the fun I had doing all that, and even when I do replace my Tempest of Chaos or my Tier 6, it still won't take away the fun I had getting them.

The expansion and more content is nothing but good news, especially considering how awesome the new content is :)

last edited by Khel at 12:48:44 29/Jul/08

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Spook
Posted 04:33pm 29/7/08

wow is what unco people play

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Midda
Posted 04:37pm 29/7/08

I enjoy both MMOs and FPS. No point in limiting your options imo.

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JakeG
Posted 05:01pm 29/7/08

Failcom.

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deadlyf
Posted 05:31pm 29/7/08

I've never quite understood this point of view. I guess if your only reason for playing WoW was to increase the size of your e-penis and get the best loot in your game, you might be pissed off about an expansion, but if you're playing the game because you enjoy it and its fun, then an expansion is only good news cos its more content to enjoy.

Yeah that's true for PvE. In fact as long as you are on a hi Aus pop server WoW have done pretty good by PvE'ers including the casual crowd. Personally I only had time to play for maybe 3-5 hours a week and I used to have a hell of a lot of fun doing a heroic or jumping in some BGs and blowing things up. PvP is where Blizzard really leave people who don't play religiously out in the cold with their "season" crap. If you've got the time and you're terrible you can still get most of the gear. Playing specifically for gear just isn't fun but if you don't do it you can't be competitive. PvP used to be about fun, now it's about a grind for gear and I'm not going to pay them money to bore the shit out of me - that's what taxes are for.

They haven't added truly new content for PvP since 2.0 which was a few months before BC, instead they just add new gear every 3-4 months for doing the same god damned thing.

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Phooks
Posted 05:37pm 29/7/08

the next Blizzard MMO.

Hahahahahaha. They're going to keep kicking the WoW horse until it's a mush of shit.

Oh wait.

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Raider
Posted 06:15pm 29/7/08

actually phooks blizz have stated they're working on an MMO other then WoW...

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Midda
Posted 06:28pm 29/7/08

Hahahahahaha. They're going to keep kicking the WoW horse until it's a mush of shit.

They confirmed like last year that they're working on a new one.

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Konja
Posted 06:28pm 29/7/08

Hey, Im playing the game and like it. I do agree that the content is lacking and I am getting to the stage where I have to grind alot but the game has so much potential Im going to stick with it and see how it turns out. Im giving it till September to get everything sorted otherwise I'll go back to playing 360 and TF2 =/

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Konja
Posted 06:32pm 29/7/08

Oh, and also from looking at the charts on the finace report, if you wanna make some money outta funcom buy shares in march and sell them on the release date of a new game... =D

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xanatos1
Posted 06:33pm 29/7/08

Failcom Fooked it good by releasing to way to early, they should have been fixing it for a few more months at least. I'll say warhammer online will give wow a run for it money cos they way it is now it fun and you can start to pvp at lvl4 and get items/xp and money fr it to.

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shrapse
Posted 07:03pm 29/7/08

Said it during beta, said it before release, said it after release and i'll repeat it for the people who didn't get it then.

Shit game!

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Reverend Evil�
Posted 07:07pm 29/7/08

I'm so glad I didn't end up buying AoC. I even went out to Garbo one day to grab a copy but EB were all out so I guess I was lucky plus I'm still having fun playing WoW, the guild I'm in is damn cool and the new expansion coming out looks very cool indeed. Way better than BC anyway.

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nF
Posted 07:54pm 29/7/08

you're missing out though, nothing more satisfying than defeating your opponent in battle and hearing the lamentations of the shareholders

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casa
Posted 08:08pm 29/7/08

I stopped playing aoc when i sat down on a chair in some inn at level 38 and couldn't stand up.
I tried the /stuck command and just moved somewhere else still sitting.
When I moved from there, I just teleported back to the chair.
I got someone to kill me, and when I got down to 1hp I was invincible.
I tried doing the hearth thing and just teleported to the entrance of the inn, moved, went back to the seat.
Relogged, still sitting.
Appealed.
Left it for the next day, logged back in, still sitting.
Not sure how the appeal system works, got no emails, no ingame msgs, couldnt get to any of the mail merchants anyway.
Left it for a week, logged in, still sitting.
Cancelled.

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Midda
Posted 08:10pm 29/7/08

^^Hahaha, that's hilarious!

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shade
Posted 08:14pm 29/7/08

I'm glad I waited, I did like the conan demo but it seems the reports of bugs and lack of content isn't helping. I may have another look in 6 months to see if it's improved

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Jim
Posted 08:36pm 29/7/08

fail shrapse

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Saint
Posted 09:11pm 29/7/08

Casa likes sitting down

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defcon
Posted 09:34pm 29/7/08

Lack of aussie server stopped me and the bugs, I honestly dont know how you could let half of those problems slip into retail, the game felt so broken, and build out of shit from the get go, no amount of duct-tape can fix it. And every patch you'd sit there and read through the notes hopeing that they actually fixed something, but it usually reads "fixed spelling mistake in quest x". its like the actually dont know how to fix alot of the bugs. Right now, the game is unplayable for me because of lag spikes, I bought an extra 60 days, but cant touch it because of 10k lag spikes. and when its finally settled and the ping is constant, you still have to deal with playing against people on 30ms.

I love the fact australian's are leaving the game in droves. send a message to those asshat devs that think its ok for us to pay as much as an american for half the gaming experience.

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evıs
Posted 10:18pm 29/7/08

The patches were a fucking joke time and time again. I went back to wow after not playing it for 6 months just to rinse away the bad taste aoc left :/

Everyone wanted it to succeed, but it failed.

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evıs
Posted 10:20pm 29/7/08

also rev what's your character name and what server, I want to armoury you ^_^

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arclore
Posted 10:52pm 29/7/08

heres my take,

i was a pre-scruber that paid $109 or whatever it was for the average map and shitty ingame stuff altho i think they fixed the mammoth now.

had a few issues at the very start with patch/cap issues but eventually got into it a day or so later.. was really fresh considering, i had only played guildwars previous as my first mmorpherghpg... the combat system rocks in aoc better than other single player rpg games ive played.. great fun

over a period of whever it started to now, im level 59 which is halfway through a grind to 60. but i just found some new places which are looking real lush.. good incentive for later

in the last 2 weeks i got a philips 42" lcd 9700 series(lush) and a ps3 with gta4 and fifa08..

i'll eventually go bacj to aoc one day

last edited by arclore at 22:52:51 29/Jul/08

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Alt_F4
Posted 10:56pm 29/7/08

They haven't added truly new content for PvP since 2.0 which was a few months before BC, instead they just add new gear every 3-4 months for doing the same god damned thing.

I didn't find it that bad, once the latest season came out i pretty much had all the new gear on the first day. Now i just play a few hours a week for Arena pvp when i'm bored.

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Keato
Posted 06:36pm 30/7/08

lol, I got to 55, then when I got a new fatality move my guy froze, people could hit me and not kill me, I couldn't do anything.

Logged out and in overnight, still standing in a fatality pose.

/quit

re-enabled DAOC, now thats a fun game.

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Le Infidel
Posted 06:45pm 30/7/08

pretty much what jum said, i stopped playing i think 2 or 3 weeks playing it

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Jim
Posted 07:38pm 30/7/08

heh I did the same thing not long before aoc came out keato :) hadn't played it since before new frontiers so there was shitloads of new stuff for me, I spent about 2 months levelling up a few of the new classes to 50 with my shammy bot and checkin out all the new bits just in mid, haven't even seen the new alb or hib stuff yet

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Crakaveli
Posted 12:22am 31/7/08

I owned at WoW. Yeah bitches now what?

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HardCalibre
Posted 10:38am 31/7/08

Age of Conan is awesome! It looks fraking great, it plays great, it’s stable now days, bugs which all MMO’s have are being fixed. Levelling is not tedious or overly grind based. There is no "official Oceanic Server" and yes it is annoying when updates fall into prime time but so what’s new? Most MMO's do this anyway.

The World and content is engrossing and realistic. it's an Adult Game so you dont get annoying kids shitting you with their antics. The combat system is revolutionary and much more interesting that the usual dull click wait click wait MMO combat systems. Or the Tap,tap,tap,tap... on a single key. You actually need to think about how you fight!

Yes it is true, many of the wow-boys are leaving AoC. Good riddance to you! So many wow players just whinge and bitch because AoC isn’t a WoW clone, and god forbid they have to adapt to a new game.

For those of us who don’t play wow or suffer from wow bias, and don’t have a problem separating the two, this game is a breath of fresh air! Finally a interesting, atmospheric, adult MMO that isn’t full of kids and low end graphics. So it wont knock wow of it’s pedestal, well who cares? Really a lot of us don’t.

WoW is a game with mass appeal aimed at a broad market accessible to low end PC users. Good on it for doing well, kutos to wow! But wow isn’t for me, I don’t spend big $$$ to play a game aimed at old PC's.

AoC is more of a niche game, with a very specific appeal. It has High-End requirements that reward high-end users with a stunning environment. It isnt overly artsy-fartsy, just for the sake of it. It is true to the feel of Robert E Howard world on many levels that wow players just wont appreciate.

Like Cheese, you can compare wow to a pack of craft singles, yummy, but hardly a delicacy. AoC is more the Mature Cheddar you have with a nice wine. I know which I prefer.

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Saint
Posted 10:41am 31/7/08

Most people aren't leaving AOC because it isn't WoW, most people are leaving because it's buggy and it's shit.

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Jim
Posted 10:50am 31/7/08

it's an Adult Game so you dont get annoying kids shitting you with their antics

the kid factor in this game is no different to any other. easily solved for the most part by ignoring region chat tho

For those of us who don’t play wow or suffer from wow bias, and don’t have a problem separating the two, this game is a breath of fresh air! Finally a interesting, atmospheric, adult MMO that isn’t full of kids and low end graphics. So it wont knock wow of it’s pedestal, well who cares? Really a lot of us don’t.

I felt pretty much the same, most of us did. Trouble is, the issues in the game tend to overshadow the fun, at least from release to when I quit at the end of may.

Going by your comments and enthusiasm, I'd hazard a guess you haven't played a melee class higher than say about level 40. When you do, the enthusiasm gives way to frustration after a while. It'll be a lot better once they sort their shit and finish the content.

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Obes
Posted 11:52am 31/7/08

Hardcalibre ....

Suggesting AoC is better because its an "adult MMO" and your abuse of leet speak or whatever drugs your keyboard is on don't seem congruous.

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demon
Posted 11:58am 31/7/08

haha obes. that bizarro replacement of ' with ’ is some gumby windows language thingo. my new pc was doing it till i found the setting to make it type ' normally.

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rubba-chikin
Posted 12:54pm 31/7/08

I gave MMOs a go, played wow to level 40 I think got a mount and then though grind all the way up to the top for what? Gave it away.

Played AOC for about 2 weeks on a mates 2nd account, got way too grindy and there were too many bugs, res killing tards. The kid factor was massively high when I played it.

Just does not appeal to me to sit around for hours smashing random NPC critters to move my XP bar a few cm. I found 95% of the quests incredibly boring... walk all the way over there, kill 50 NPC animals and bring back a bag full of eyeballs... yeah thats exciting.

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Midda
Posted 02:33pm 31/7/08

^^ Only to find that a lot of the animals don't even seem to have the eyeballs for you to loot. That crap used to shit me to tears.

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JakeG
Posted 02:37pm 31/7/08

lol its the same with any mmo.

wastes massive amounts of time.

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rubba-chikin
Posted 02:45pm 31/7/08

Sorry I forgot the part where you get stabbed in the anus by someone 10 levels higher than you and die and have to walk all the way back to the mobs and get anally violated again 5 mins later by someone else 15 levels higher than you.

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HardCalibre
Posted 02:58pm 31/7/08

Sorry about the weird symbols, it's a work PC so I dont have much control over that. But I still stand in defence of AoC. And Obes you obviously didnt read my post which clearly states I feel AoC isnt WoW and it's unfair to compare it to WoW which is a whole differant grade of MMO.

Ive played EQ, Demo of Wow, Asherons Call, Anarchy Online, Guild Wars, SoH/V and LOTR Online and Vanguard. They Are all differant, I think in time people will get over thier wowisim and see that AoC is a step forward in a lot of very significant ways. And for me at this time it is the type of MMO i have been looking for. And as I am 42 years of age perhaps thats got somthing to do with what I like about the game. I dont know. But I love it.

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Jim
Posted 03:43pm 31/7/08

Only to find that a lot of the animals don't even seem to have the eyeballs for you to loot. That crap used to shit me to tears.

actually in aoc that didn't happen unless it was a bug. if you need the loot, every mob of that type drops it until you don't need the loot anymore

Sorry I forgot the part where you get stabbed in the anus by someone 10 levels higher than you and die and have to walk all the way back to the mobs and get anally violated again 5 mins later by someone else 15 levels higher than you.

that only happens if you suck at playing a pvp game. why would you go back to the same place again within 5 minutes?!

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rubba-chikin
Posted 04:46pm 31/7/08

because the mobs spawned there for a quest?

notice i said it was not the same tard, just another random asshat running past

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deadlyf
Posted 05:01pm 31/7/08

Levelling is not tedious or overly grind based.

That is the biggest lie since Cake. Leveling is always tedious, it wouldn't be leveling if it wasn't.

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reso
Posted 05:22pm 31/7/08

because the mobs spawned there for a quest?

notice i said it was not the same tard, just another random asshat running past

Did you ever figure out how to change instance?

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fpot
Posted 05:41pm 31/7/08

it's a work PC

Was AoC developed on this work PC because it sure sounds like it.

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rubba-chikin
Posted 05:51pm 31/7/08

Did you ever figure out how to change instance?

Yep, was broken when I played... lol

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Jim
Posted 05:51pm 31/7/08

because the mobs spawned there for a quest?

notice i said it was not the same tard, just another random asshat running past

here's some things you can do instead of being fodder for someone else repeatedly:

change instance
do another quest instead
get some friends or even some randoms
roll on a pve server

anything but cry about being killed by someone on a pvp server

besides, the point was you ran back to the same place right away :) it was just chance that it was someone else who killed you instead of the same person

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athzhr
Posted 06:44pm 31/7/08