Storyline: DAoC vs. WoW (long)Follow

Ok here's the deal, I have been playing WoW since the 1st Stress Test and got it the day it came out. I love the game.

The graphics are very nice with lush environments, armor that looks different with each piece, and decent character models. The gameplay is fun and involving.

Fights only last a few seconds then it's off to the next one which is a good thing as it seems as though you are constantly doing something.

In the end it is still a MMORPG though, which means go kill this mob for this item, or go kill so many of this type of mob etc. What keeps me coming back for more in a MMO is the storyline. If the quests are involved with a storyline then it doesn't seem like a go kill x for y anymore, it feels like you are doing something relevent within the game world. WoW only has this for specific areas, namely the beginning areas of the Human nation Stormwind.

It starts in Northshire Abbey and carries through to Westfall and ends in the instance dungeon Deadmines. This story involves the weakening of a guild of thieves known as the Defias Brotherhood and eventually finding out that their leader Van Cleef is holding a grudge against Stormwind for various reasons, and when you bring about his demise, it feels like a HUGE accomplisment, and you are only level 20 or so at this point. I was thinking at the time "This is awesome, if the rest of the game is like this, it will be very enjoyable." So I kept playing and it never happened again, but I kept chugging along hoping that the next line of quests would involve me in the game world again.

Now at level 49 (almost 50), I am coming to realize it will not happen again in this game, at least not until Blizzard adds more content, and none of the other starting areas has anything remotely similar. It seems that Blizzard put this one epic and involving storyline in and said that one was good enough. Not for me. If I am going to go and kill x number of y mob or go kill x mob for y drops, I want it to mean something in the end, not just some xp and a reward. I want there to be a story behind it that makes my character a part of the world.

So now it comes to this. I had played DAoC in the past, but only got to level 15 at my highest, which was a Elf Void Eldritch. Now at the time I had only ever played EQ so all I knew was grinding and killing mobs over and over again. Now that I know another way to play a MMO, my question is, are there quests that involve you in deep storylines that involve your character in the game?

I looked at the main website for DAoC and there seems to be little Lore for the game there. Are there any other sites that has more lore and background for the game?

I want to come back now that Catacombs is out, but I want to know if my character will be involved in the storyline of the world. On the Catacombs box it says that it EXPANDS on the original story of DAoC. I don't remember seeing a story in the game, did I miss it somewhere? I remember vaguely some quests that involved killing a mob that was terrorizing a town or whatnot, but again it just led to xp and a reward, not an involving storlyine.

I do want to come back to DAoC and give WoW a rest until new content for WoW comes out, but I can't just switch to DAoC if it boils down to no storyline to keep my attention and keeping me interested in finding out what happens next while I am killing x mob for y drop. Please inform me as to whether there is a storyline (or several!) in DAoC. Thanks in advance for any info on this. Btw if there are websites (besides the main one) that has Lore infor please post it :)

You've got plenty of options, alot of the newer quests, SI and up, have given ALOT of storyline and such, the two new integrated ones (Gnome Away from Home, and One about a guy in love hibby one is Beauty and the Bolg') are very in depth and involving. Makes you think, use judgement based on personal choices, and you get a reward accordingly.

Many of the quests will take you all around the realms, if you're on a good server, lead you into groups with many people to do things, and such. If you really wanna live it, play an RP server and live it up.

If ya want a decent place to come back to play, I have my favorite chars on Percival and Guin, both Hibbies, on Guin there's a 20 druid, and on Perc is my 35 ranger.

Okay, well, how about this, I'm loaded with cash on Guin, I'll spot ya some sweet dough and we'll see what we can do.

Rangers are the cream of the crop in soloing. Specced accordingly (battle ranger) you can tackle reds. I find having bow at max level and melee and PF about even at 2/3 or 3/4 level helps alot. CD accordingly so you can hit, stealth sparingly for RVR with the RA of Mastery of Stealth it helps a bit. At the very least you'll have cash from me. I normally play Percival as my ranger though, Guin if I'm bored and no one's on to PL my warden.

Now onto the topic of race. Being very racist when I pick my characters I choose no b.... erm, I choose whichever race has the best stats in that field. Also I evaluate how often my weak points will come into play. For all things casting, blocking, and piercing, I generally will conceit the smaller races have the market there. For all things damaging casting, I'll say the medium races (Elves, Avalonians, and well, no way around this one, Kobolds, only exception) are good. For straight up melee, the big races and humans.

Racial bonuses also factor in, some have better resists to damage and magic types, it's minimal so it doesn't play a HUGE role, but it's still there. Bonuses to the classes too, like in Midgard, ya wanna tank, do ya wanna hit hard, or do you want to last, or even do you just wanna block alot. If you wanna hit like a mack truck, you'd pick troll, if ya wanna last, dwarf, if you want to block alot, Kobold, if you want to be average, Norseman. I'll run a Hibernian example for arguments sake, as I assume that's what you're familiar with.

Say I would like to play as a Hero. I have to decide, do I wanna hit hard, or do I want to be able to do sword and board and be able to last a while, and keep people protected? If you choose the first option, your best bet is a Firbolg (High strength, average constitution, sub-par dexterity and quickness, meaning you'll hit hard, a little less, and be able to make the fight out ok) hero, if you chose the second, you could probably make a decent Lurikeen (Low strength and constitution, high dexterity and quickness, translating to more hits for less damage, being able to take less hits, but hitting faster and blocking more) hero.

The new classes are monsters. The Bainshee and Vampiir of Hibernia are absolute terror, the Heretic is an *** whooping looking for a place to happen, and the Valkyrie and Warlock are a big ol' paddle of beat-down about to swing. I like old world classes though, they're still the heart of the game and very functional, improving with every patch too.

I hope ya found this helpful, for all things Hibernia, I am fast becoming an expert.

Derbega on Percival
Daifriun or something like that on Guinevere.