I Am Defiant: Hands-on with Rift: Planes of Telara

ZAM dives into a build of Trion's upcoming fantasy MMO and experiences life as a Nightblade on the side of the Defiants. The Gods be damned.

I am Defiant.

Not only in faction, but in action. The gods mock us, and I hold no love for them. All that is holy to me resides not in the skies or in the piety of the sanctimonious, but in the steel of my blades and my resolve. I embrace all the worldly technology that will help me bring down the deceivers and save my home, my Telara, from the planar rifts and the foulspawn. I do my part by striking down my enemies from a distance, from behind, or in their face so they can see who brings their end. I am Kelari, I am a Nightblade and I am Defiant.

For me, part of playing a MMO is being able to immerse myself in the story. As good actors do, I like to uncover my motivations and drives so I can understand what my purpose is in the game. In Rift: Planes of Telara, my world is being torn apart by rifts from the different Elemental Planes. It's a world that I love, and now it needs me to help save it. As a member of the Defiants, my character has been deemed worthy to aid Telara and I have been resurrected from death using technology worshipped by my faction.  My opponents, the Guardians, also strive to save Telara, but they believe the gods will help them. Their belief is misplaced and their continued reliance on their poorly formed ideals will only hasten the demise of my beloved world.

Three races comprise the Defiants and each race comes with its own set of special abilities. My compatriots are the human Eth, the tattooed Bahmi and my own Kelari. When we become Ascended Souls for our fight, we can choose how we look in the character creation screen through a variety of sliders that adjust facial and body features, hair, colorations and numerous other features that help make each character unique. I chose the Kelari, because little is known about them yet and I prefer a little mystery as I explore the game. And I made my look as non-heroic as possible (short, stocky and relatively unattractive) since my mind and wits will be what save me and the world.

My next job, before entering the game, was to choose my Calling. Each of the four callings – Warrior, Cleric, Rogue and Mage – has its own branches (called Souls). I enjoy stealth and covert operations so I chose Rogue Nightblade, a character with both distance and in-your-face attacks that can be launched from the shadows. As I advance in levels, I can later expand to different rogue soul trees such as Ranger, Assassin and Blade Dancer (a form of rogue tank), with a maximum of three souls at any one time.

For those not interested in my type of calling, Defiants at the start will be able to choose Reaver and Champion souls from the Warrior class, Purifier and Inquisitor from the Cleric class, Warlock and Elementalist from the Mage class, and Nightblade and Ranger from the Rogue class. Guardians get a slightly different set, with Paladin swapping for Reaver, Sentinel replacing Purifier, Pyromancer instead of Warlock and Assassin interchanged with Nightblade. However, all the souls will be available further into the leveling process for each faction.

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Tags: Preview, RIFT

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well done
# Aug 29 2010 at 9:11 AM Rating: Decent
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Very well-written article. Now this game is on my radar and it is definitely on my list to take a look at when it becomes accessible.

Thank you. :)
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