Wings Over Atreia: Community Guide to Aion
by Jef Reahard 
Mar 8th 2010 at 8:00PM
Filed under: Fantasy, Aion, Wings Over Atreia
In keeping with Massively tradition, let's kick off the weekly column with a look at some of the Aion community's best and brightest. You'll find everything from developer news, to game tools, to fan sites listed below (and if you don't find what you're looking for, or we've neglected to mention a valuable resource, let us know in the comments)!
NCSoft's official Aion site is fairly useful as official sites go. In addition to the standard feaure guides, media, and video, the site hosts a wealth of statistical information about players, legions, and servers. At the very least you'll want to use the handy search feature parked front and center on the main page before you attack that red dot on your radar. Knowing someone's level, class, and gear load-out ahead of time might save your pride, keyboard, or both.
The official site also boasts server population breakdowns with regard to race, class, and level, as well as lists of legion members and Abyss (player versus player) rankings. Finally, the official site features the Aion PowerWiki, linked below, as well as the official forums.
In addition to the official forums, the North American Aion web site also houses the PowerWiki, a good jumping off point for learning the basics. When you're ready to dig a little deeper, there are several fan-developed Wikis that provide a wealth of information. In no particular order, Aion Tower, The Aion Wiki, Aion at Wikia.com, and Aion at Zam.com are updated on a semi-regular basis.
Aion's Facebook page boasts a significant fan community (currently over 70,000 strong), as well as official news tidbits, videos, and more.
Aion Community Managers are very active on Twitter. Sebastian 'Ayase' Streiffert frequently breaks important Aion news and community updates via his Twitter feed. Andrew 'Tamat' Beegle, Martin 'Amboss' Rabl, FX 'Arathaur' Labescat, and Chris 'Kinslon' Hager are also worth checking out depending upon which part of the world you call home.
Currently Aion podcasts seem to be few and far between. That said, two of the more noteworthy entries are the Aion Unofficial Podcast, hosted by Slickgreen, and the Aether Podcast hosted by Kenneth and David. Both shows offer a fun mixture of news, personal insights, and game-related banter.
Fan sites are the lifeblood of any MMORPG community, and Aion is no different. Aion Source is the 800 pound gorilla in this particular room, featuring a large, active forum community as well as ties to the Aion Armory database. If it has to do with Aion, you'll find it on this forum. Of particular interest are the game guides and the ongoing discussions regarding mechanics. Written by players for players, there are dozens of tutorials for all eight classes as well as crafting, PVE dungeons, and PVP guides. If you're interested in getting the most out of your Aion time, Aion Source is a great place to start.
Aion's player community features a sizable contingent of roleplayers, many of whom congregate on this active forum focused on storytelling. Whether you're looking to share your fiction and artwork, find a roleplay friendly legion, or learn more about the play style, Aion Roleplayers is a must visit.
While MMORPG-Life.com covers a multitude of massively multiplayer titles, their Aion section is noteworthy for a couple of reasons. While many sites feature quest guides of some sort, MMORPG-Life.com goes the extra mile and includes screen captures, a real boon for those hard-to-pinpoint quest or NPC locations. Throw in respectable item set databases as well as current news updates and a pleasing visual layout and you've got the makings of a valuable community resource.
Web-based tools are staples of many long-running MMORPGs, and though Aion is a relative newcomer, it already boasts several indispensable sites that aid in planning your character builds, locating obscure quest objectives, and even smack-talk....er, communicating with the opposing faction.
If we had to pick one tool from this list that we can't live without, it would likely come down to the Aion Armory database. Not only does the database account for just about every quest, NPC, and item in the game, it also provides a handy set of tools including stigma calculators, item comparisons, and a level-based experience grind planner. The site also feeds into the aforementioned Aion Source forums, both of which are owned and operated by the Curse Gaming Network.
Ever wondered how that annoying Asmodian manages to dance on your rotting corpse and insult your mother in a language you can understand? Want to know where that smug Elyos learned to question your fashion sensibility in your native tongue? Look no further than the guys over at darkrealm.net for all of your cross-faction communication needs. Try and keep it clean please.
Currently there are a handful of Aion character viewers for both the iPhone and Android mobile platforms. Most offer very basic functionality or are still in development, but we'll keep our eyes on all of them and bring you an opinion on the cream of the crop as they mature. In addition to the character and stat trackers, NCSoft has released the robust Aion Powerwiki for Apple's iPhone, though it is only available in Korean as of press time. While NCSoft currently has no plans to localize it in the immediate future, we'll keep you posted going forward.
That about wraps up our high level look at Aion's community. You can contact me at jef[AT]massively[dot]com with any Aion-related tips or information you'd like to share. Join us next week as we fly the unfriendly skies of the Abyss and delve deeper into the world of Atreia and as always, keep the blue side up.
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
this guys said on 8:33PM 3-08-2010
ack plz abridge, aion has officially taken over whole front page
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tw34k said on 8:55PM 3-08-2010
Just like the game its long slightly boring and takes ages to get through.....
jokes aside, that post needs a jump, way too much aion for the front page.
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Amana said on 9:04PM 3-08-2010
lol - you'd think that, after one hour (as of my comment), *someone* who works at Massively would have actually viewed the site..
Apparently not. ;)
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Ultron said on 9:06PM 3-08-2010
Long post is loooong
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Jef Reahard said on 9:09PM 3-08-2010
Fixed the jump.
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Pingles said on 9:11PM 3-08-2010
I was impressed. I don't play but was nice to see such a huge resource!
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Graill said on 12:04AM 3-09-2010
Why Aion failed in the west.
Grind in both quest and empty level content, example would be levels missing quests or half a level. If Aion wests intent was to slow down character progression they nailed it.
Quest grinding, see above, though two totaly differing aspects of the game, and just as sickeningly aggravating, examples such as 100 kills to get 1 item of a 50 item quest. and rewards that sucked balls for the time and effort.
Soul healing, though a major pain and not to my liking i have seen worse. Still expensive.
Devs leading the communities along like stupid children. Example, with final plans in placethe devs hyped the community effort in bringing Aion tolife, yet when released it was nothing but a ported over exact version of the korean model, the devs lied about the cake. I feel Lani B and Jessica M are in the same catagory here, they knew it all and yet were ignorant when it came to common sense and listening to their potential sub base, instead following their original plans.
Bots, irritating but not an issue to me if when reported they are dealt with immeadiately, especially when in a quest area.
Gold sellers, this is easily fixed. The ONLY people that would complain are ALT monkeys and twinkers.
Personal stores, the fix was simple, now the lack of population has fixed it for Aion.
PVP, there are roughly 200 folks (last 2 weeks server pops on site) on any server at any one time average, much, much less in the wee hours. Ganking is rampant and purists (those 20 or so per server that like to gank) will say thats the way pvp is, ganking. 7 days into a 30 day timecard and i have been killed 50 plus times in morheim by folks 10 levels or higher, the fix right now? let them kill you, rez and run back to what you were doing until they get bored and run off or have higher level folks run them off, which doesnt happen all the time.
The fixes in the next patch wont do it for me to even consider a sub once this timecard runs out. They are piddling with very weak attempts at addressing all these problems instead of grabbing their sacks and making fixes that are needed. NCSOFT asia needs to keep its nose out of NCSOFT wests business, they are not over here and have no clue what players here want (and neither do any devs on either side)
Out for 6 months and change, devs knew not to screw with the community and yet they didnt listen. Now they are goig to try and address things in minor ways, sad.
Once May comes around or later i will see whats up again, and see if the devs are still licking the toilet bowls for ideas and have finally merged all servers to make one that has some population.
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Macabre said on 3:14AM 3-09-2010
Your comments always make me laugh...
According to you, almost every MMO currently running has failed...
I guess the companies running them just didn't get your memo, right? Either that, or they're obviously just in the business of losing money.
Mockery aside, where are you getting your numbers? I'd love to see some actual server/subscriber numbers, as they're hard to find on most MMO's (actual, not speculative), but apparently, you've got the "inside scoop."
Care to share with the rest of us?
MrGutts said on 7:57AM 3-09-2010
A+ Graill
SleepingPanda said on 8:49AM 3-09-2010
@Macabre erm... if I'm not mistaken, I do believe Aion shows you how many people are on a given server at the server select screen when you're logging in.
Bubba said on 12:10PM 3-09-2010
Graill,
Your comments are spot on. When I played the game, it was grind-grind-grind-grind-grind ad nauseum. the graphics were pretty, I liked chained skills, but wow, do I really have to kill 1000000 turtle-like creatures in order to get even close to the next level?
From what I've read, the solution they propose for the next patch helps nothing. Rest XP isn't the solution. Greatly increasing mob XP and quest XP and/or reducing XP/level is the way to go. Otherwise, it's going to be more grind-grind-grind.
Judging from the shrinking playerbase for this loser game, only a small percentage of players like the endless grind.
starzzareblind said on 2:40AM 3-09-2010
Um..you do realize that you can't search for more then that number, right? That isn't showing how many people are on the server.
Aion has far from failed in the West, and 1.9 is addressing many of your complaints.
Thanks for the article!
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Iceballs..yum said on 7:54AM 3-09-2010
its a bad game for bad people who like bad things badly.
Seriously though that game is a steaming pile man. 1 year from now it will be sharing shelf space with the SOE line of products at the bottom of the rack in wal mart, YES I SAID WAL MART! GOOD DAY
newskooltrooper said on 8:11AM 3-09-2010
Waaaah! I hate Aion and let me tell you all about it! Waaaah!
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Electrobix said on 9:05AM 3-09-2010
I like you.
Zsazsa said on 8:59AM 3-09-2010
I have Asmos on Marchutan and Elyos on Triniel, and they're always hopping when I'm on. LFG chat is always overrun, people are always getting groups together for quests, dungeon runs and the Abyss, and you almost never hear the Whinemobile wailing like you do from peeps on outside forums/posts who don't even play the game now, lol. How odd.
And grind compared to what? Pre-Gracia Lineage II and CoX before the leveling curve adjustments were far worse. DAoC's last ten levels were always bloody murder to get through, too, and I say that with a very warm spot in my heart about DAoC.
Aion's focus on small-skirmish open PvP works out great for my lifestyle. I can't marry a guild and raid for six hours a night every night, sorry folks. I have a life, a family, and a job. Rifts keep the flow of enemies manageable, the gear in Aion rocks, and much of the content is soloable for when you don't have the time/friends online to get a big team going. But there are dungeons, elite mob areas and Abyss Forts for when you do. And you get the same Abyss Point rewards for Rift kills as you do in the Abyss, although the Abyss is worth questing in for the extra drops/XP, and open PvP there can be fun even with a simple pickup group.
The rest XP system is also better than in many other MMOs: you get over a level out of it per character, and it only takes two days to refill to 100%, which is far faster than the rest. You also get WAY more XP per kill than in games like WoW (20k per mob in the 20s levels in Aion compared with only about 1800XP per mob with rest XP in even the 70s in WoW). Yes, the XP-per-level requirements are nasty in Aion in the 40s especially, but NCsoft has already released concrete patch notes that are on public test in Korea to rectify the whole XP curve, plus a whole lot more.
If you are a carebear, you definitely aren't going to like Aion much past level 25 when you can't hide out in the PvE zones anymore, though. I'll give you that.
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Amana said on 11:18AM 3-09-2010
Zsazsa said on 8:59AM 3-09-2010
"You also get WAY more XP per kill than in games like WoW (20k per mob in the 20s levels in Aion compared with only about 1800XP per mob with rest XP in even the 70s in WoW)."
Are you seriously suggesting a comparison? 'Way more XP in Aion' is your argument?
:-o
If I may remind you, Zsazsa, that to get from L22-23 in wow is to go from 27,300 to 29,400 xp.
L22-23 in Aion is 1,600,000..
Also, if you have to resort to Lineage II to demonstrate a worse grind, then.. yah (lol)
I'm happy you enjoy playing, and would never want to take that away from you, but your post is pure comedy.
Goonja said on 9:54AM 3-09-2010
I've seen my Legion fell from 70-80 players to 15-20 and every night having more than 9 players online is a prowess.I'm on Gorgos and a lot of people with whom I used to pug are not here anymore.
I like Aion but the mindless grinding is what's killing the game for me and for many players + the money sink.Patch 1.9 is heading on the right path but I think those who left will not return because of the burnout.
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symph said on 10:29AM 3-09-2010
I like Aion and surprisingly the grind is what I like the most about it. And, no matter what time i get on there is never a shortage of players to group with. It's a good game but definitely not for people that want an easy time of it.
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Amana said on 11:32AM 3-09-2010
"It's a good game but definitely not for people that want an easy time of it. "
Symph, I think you're confusing the term 'easy' with the term 'laborious'..
Actually, perhaps what we need here is a community list!
How about I kick it off:
"The Top 10 Things That Are More Fun Than Grinding In Aion"
10. Watching grass grow
9. Watching replays of said grass growing, in slow motion
8. Sneezing in an astronaut suit
7. Moisturising your bikini wax with Deep Heat
6.
5.
4.
3.
2.
1.
Anyone? (Pls keep it mildly decent/clever)
=)