By
the Lineage II Developers
Part of the notion of a quicker, more accessible and fun
style="font-style: italic;">Lineage II with the
release of Gracia doesn’t involve just faster leveling.
We’ve improved many of the skills so that playing
style="font-style: italic;">Lineage II is even
more fun and exciting than ever before. The amount of inventory items
has increased greatly—we’ve filled up the lower
tier of items so new players can get decent gear a lot sooner, added
new tier weapons to shops and even the chance of refining items into
more rare and valuable items. Finally, we’ve spruced up some
of the hunting areas in the game, like the Cruma Tower, so players can
get more use out of them.
The skill system has undergone many changes, almost all much for the
better. The idea is to let skills help players in battle a lot more,
enabling them to defeat more, tougher opponents, support each other
better in raids, and let them advance in status quicker. Generally, all
short-ranged physical skills now enjoy a boost in power along with a
reduction in MP cost. In other words, they hit harder for a lot less
mana. A couple of popular, useable skills like “Escape
Shackle” have reduced casting times as well. Kamael skills
can now be used without souls (though the more souls you use, the more
powerful they are), which is a nice boon to our newest race.
We’ve also increased the critical damage rate for magic
across the board.
Lots of class specific skills have been added, like “Steal
Mana” for the Prophet (which lets you recover MP while
striking) or “Repair Golem”, which by the way is
one of ten new skills for the Warsmith. All Kamael classes get a new
“Fast Recovery” skill at level 43 that increases
HP, MP and CP regeneration. We added some existing skills to other
classes (Phantom Summoners can now use “Death
Spike” and Bounty Hunters can use
“Crystallize”). All Knights will get a particular
boost in Gracia with the new “Vanguard” skill
(available at level 43) that offers powerful attack skills utilizing a
two-handed sword or dual-sword. Similarly all Healer classes will
benefit from the “Inquisitor” skills (available at
level 44), which bring a variety of attack-related skills to a class
that’s not totally used to being on the offensive.
We’ve somewhat altered the way items, like weapons and pieces
of armor, are organized in Lineage II with Gracia. We’ve
introduced a class of items called Common Items which are essentially
the same as what we had before, the main difference being they cannot
be enchanted, enhanced or augmented in any way. Players can purchase
them at most shops or through the usual method of collecting loot from
the corpses of dead monsters. Coupled with the reduction of shop prices
for all weapons, armor, and accessories, this will allow low-level and
new players a much better opportunity at getting decently equipped,
rather than struggling to get good equipment.
Item crafting has also received a bit of an upgrade; when crafting,
there’s a chance the player could create two items from one
set of materials. There’s also a chance that the item crafted
could be a Foundation item, a special item type that can’t be
equipped, enchanted or crystallized. However, it can be refined into a
Rare item by the Blacksmith of Mammon (you’ll need a Mammon
Polish Hardener as well). Rare items are marked in yellow text, and
they can be enchanted, refined, crystallized or subjected to other item
enhancing abilities. They typically have certain characteristics,
depending on their level, which activates as a buff of one type or
another (Rare weapons may get an increase in accuracy or critical hit
rate, and Rare armor may increase defense or resistance to shock).
Finally, in Gracia we’ve revised a couple of hunting areas so
players can get a lot more use out of them. Top of the list is the
Cruma Tower, which we’ve altered to offer some of the best
rewards for that level of difficulty. It’s optimized for
five-member parties, with level 43 required for the first level and
level 50 for the second (the max level you can have is 55). Specialized
event monsters will spawn for each level, and the rewards are again top
notch for that player level. A couple of other areas have undergone
some renovation to make them more solo friendly, including Outlaw
Forest, Garden of Beasts and Varka Silenos Outpost.
border="0">
To read the latest guides, news, and features you can visit our Lineage II Game Page.
