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Aion - A Brief Review of the Starter Classes.
MMOs can offer a lot of choice when creating your character. Here are my first thoughts on the starter classes of Aion.
Written by Chris Joyce, 14 November 2009
I have played MMOs for quite a number of years now, and when I get my hands on a new one I like to play to the first main levelling milestone with a character of each class before deciding which one to progress further.
With Aion, however, I've had to do things a little differently.
Aion has four starting classes - Warrior, Scout, Mage and Priest - but once you reach level 9 you can start the Ascension quest line.
This is Aion's mechanic for evolving your character and earning your wings. Once this quest line is complete you are then offered a choice of two ways to progress with your character.
Warriors can become Gladiators or Templars, Scouts can be either Rangers or Assassins, Mages have a choice of Sorceror or Spirit Master and finally Priests can be a Chanter or Cleric.
Rather than testing out all 8 combinations, I've worked my way up to the Ascension quest line with each of the 4 starter classes.
Although there are only 4 to choose from, there are lots of differences between them and each has their own individual play style, and once ascended they have a well defined role in their new class.
Warriors:
My first hour in Aion was spent with a Warrior, a powerful melee combat class and the one always stood at the front of any battle.
With medium strength melee attacks the Warrior manages to wade through enemies easily enough, but their real strength is in their defence and can withstand a lot more damage than the other classes.
Dying was not something that occurred very often, even when pulling in multiple mobs at the same time, however my main complaint with the warrior was that it was a little slow at times, with many fights spent using auto-attack while waiting for slow cooldowns to expire.
Mage:
After testing the Warrior I decided it was time to give a caster a try, so moved on to the Mage.
Mages have mastery and control over the powers of fire and ice, using these as both offensive and defensive powers, allowing you to slow or stop the mobs movement before finishing them off with fire spells before they get anywhere near you.
Although the Mage class is powerful one downside is their mana regeneration, which I found to be very slow - almost non-existent most of the time - meaning there was a lot of down-time with this character while resting to refill my mana bar.
MMOZine Issue 15
For our latest Aion coverage, click here to download MMOZine Issue 15 for free.The animation of the Mage stood out to me, and was something I found quite impressive. With each spell cast the Mage would open a book, reciting from within, while winds would cause his robes to swirl around his legs and feet.
This is a class I can see as being very powerful at later levels with a larger number of spells at your disposal, and one I may progress some day.
Scout:
The scout is your typical rogue class with stealth skills, and focus on positional attacks. Initially they are far too fragile and weak, despite picking up duel wield at level 5, but has potential to improve and, in later levels, could put out some serious damage.
The class, in the early levels, is simple enough to play, but I feel the introduction of positional attacks comes in a little too early. Although it is good to get players familiar with the play style of the character as soon as possible, things such as positional attacks need to be backed up by your other skills.
When stealth is first learnt it has a 1-minute Cooldown - this is far too long if one of your main attacks needs you to start behind the enemy.
Out of all 4 classes I have to say the Scout was the one I preferred the least, but that's not to say it's a bad class.
Priest:
I decided to leave the Priest until last, as these can often be the most difficult of classes to level.
Because they are primarily a healing class, Priests in MMOs can suffer from weaker offensive skills and spells in comparison to other classes but in Aion this isn't the case.
At level 1 Priests start with one offensive attack, Smite, and one healing spell. Smite is a powerful attack, even coming from a Priest, and can kill things fairly quickly although I have seen it resisted by mobs fairly often.
Their defences are, as to be expected, considerably lower than the other three classes so can take damage easily, but with their healing spells at disposal they still retain a respectable amount of survivability.
After playing the Mage and finding myself disappointed at the mana regeneration rate I was expecting the Priest to suffer from the same inconvenience, however I was pleased to find that the mana pool lasted much longer and I rarely needed to stop and rest.
Surprisingly, after playing all 4 characters I decided to continue with my final choice and make the Priest my main character as it had the most varied rotation during play with the mix of offensive and healing powers, and was the most fun.
Overall, the initial choices available are all interesting to play and there are no clear winners - ultimately, it's all down to personal preference.
Now that I have settled on the main class I wish to play I will be working my way through the levels, and content, in Aion and will report on my experiences over the coming weeks right here.
Aion coverage available in MMOZine Issue 15 - click here to download it for free!
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