RateMyServer Ragnarok Community

RateMyServer.Net => Server Reviews => Topic started by: 00RXC00 on Jan 10, 2019, 09:34 AM

Title: NOVA Ragnarok Review
Post by: 00RXC00 on Jan 10, 2019, 09:34 AM
Good day,

First of all I would like to give a little background to give readers an idea what kind of player/customer I am- Middle aged working adult with responsibilties; just another one of the majority I believe. Loved RO but my schedule now classify me as a casual. now lets get to the good part:

I started Playing NovaRO only a few months before out of nostalgia- after losing interest in highly toxic and competitive games like DOTA 2, CS, LOL. I just want a relaxing game to enjoy man!

Started out testing bunch of other servers. Official and private servers listed here in RMS. I sticked at NovaRO for these reasons:

Convenience
-Most servers offer quick job change, dungeon Access, healer, warper, Etc. But first time I played with a server which allowed Quickcast/Fastcast Hotkeys. Holding down a key for Double Strafe felt fantastic. I know little about Autohotkeys, most servers Ban it but this server allowed it in form of NovaExt. Isnt that comfortable!
-The Autos> auto feed pet function / autotrade / auto homunculus feed - good to have, less worrying. Autoloot - yeah I dont like squinting and rigorously left clicking every after mob kill to checking for cards/etc.
-GRF edits are allowed - graymaps and other personal edits permitted. Damn trees and your leaves hiding my Mukas!
-Have NovaExt settings which grants players option to put Bowling Bash Gutter lines / Skill range marker / Quick cast options and more.
-NOVA forum, wiki, and market- easy access to information, they even have history record for how much an item is sold in vend.
-an ok anti KS system, MVPS are free for all, noticed some skills bypass @noks by healing / out of player screen range, etc.
-Can multi client. 

Connection
-I am currently located at middle east (UAE) and noticed that private servers connect better than official ones. I dont want to say "Low ping-no delay" (from gamer wannabees) but from experience you can party-gramps and heal bomb every member while moving quickly and comfortably(disgusting High Priest not having coloseo heal  /heh). There are no random disconnection experienced so far. Also worth noting that I can do this even using cellular data(I cannot do this from my home country).
-Noticed different languages in main chat, maybe they are from their home countries or idk.

Build Testing (This is my main reason)
-Free Stat/skill reset, build manager, Homunculus banks, quest skills, Testing Rooms, and almost free foods stimulates you to imagine different builds in different situations and enemies. I loved reading builds on the net and trying it out without the hassle of leveling back from 1 and mess up a single point.

    for example, building how can I comfortably farm crimson katars from Injustices(using only level 99 Paladin Rapid Smithing) one hitting them with minimal build cost?
   or have you tested other jobs and understand them-what is support Proffesor? and what TF are those Scholar Skills?!

-most items can be cheaply found from vending market, some can be quested, some farmed for 1 farming hour(gefenia 10m/h in my experience) to 3Hour or so.

Discovery
-This is my first Renewal Server played so I dont know most of the contents are and how to obtain them. Instances, Gramps, Enchants, Leveling, Skills new to me but made me excited for testing. Luckily the #support chat is very friendly and the information and limitations are clearly explained in their Wiki page. There are lots I have not experienced yet and enjoying it slowly.
-Quest- you can enjoy original quests if you do you so for the story, I have been doing some from time to time. Experience rewards are adjusted to the server's rate.
-Custom Item information are available in their wiki. The server say that they will be as close to official as possible; but then enter custom items. In my opinion they are customized items to balance classes-like if one class has this Item that improves one skill the other classes must have some too.
-Custom/Item quests are listed in their wiki and their difficulty is reasonable, from necessity headgears like rideword hat to costumes.
-Custom Event- Summer / Christmas / Holloween I noticed that their contents are mostly costumes which end game players demand/farm. Most events have parts that even newbies can do, but along side with it are event monsters newer players cannot experience because stronger players wont party with them. 
-Custom Currency- There are 2 widely used Gold Coin (obtainable from dailies / other players) and Nova Points (cash / convert gold coin) There are items that can be bought using only Gold Coin or only NovaPoints.
-Dice, Slot machines, automated event distributed throughout the day.
-According to the Server they are progressive and trying to put in things from official, So expect new things once in a while. Maintenance average twice a month.
-No Vote for Points, Replaced by Daily log in reward for 1 hour(rewards account bound).

Leveling
-leveling can be easily soloed up to 85 via eden quest then gramps all the way to 175 + daily instances and quest-banquet of heroes.
-Gramps is one of the best parts in this server. There are always people looking to party. If you miss party leveling back those days you can easily find one here. As long as you do something you will be welcome.

note: some party leaders will be s*** choosy, beware the ungeared! Also there are some auto follow AFKers, but if its the priest's alt char it's OK. Most DPS don't autoloot, expect loot mess.

Community
-Composed of players of all types like aggressively supportive player, trolls, bored people who give their items in chat Q&A, low ballers, high ballers, guild recruiters, haters, etc.
-I am currently not joined in a guild but you can find recruiters in main chat / eden group / prontera.
-they have discord

PVP/WOE
-Sorry not fan of PVP/WOE and I have no idea for item/class balance regarding this.
-but I read sometime that there is a draft WOE??

GM/Management
-As any business being a responsible manager must balance Strictness and openness for the making the server profitable and last long. The GMs that I encountered answered question what other players cannot / unsure of the answer. Professional in advising maintenance, ex. announcements ingame, as informative patch notes as possible. Reading the forums its safe to say that they give ample reason to why or certain feature is put into game or rejected. Some with a strict "NO' due to matter needing more review or require more information.
-No bots encountered yet.

The Negatives
Now now I don't want to jump to bandwagons of what other say or do. So here are the list of difficulties I have encountered:

-I wish they have a website for those buying autotrade chars. easier to locate and compare those who buy stuff.

-While this a reward for loyal old players for their hard work, new players cannot compete without boss cards/overuped gear. *This line is like more of a rant, but man I wish I could test having boss cards. PVP is not a place for the casual.

-RMT/P2W-While I dont see any RMT ads ingame I put this in the negative because the way I see the equivalence of Nova Points and Zeny. ingame players are willing to buy 5million Zeny for 1000 Novapoint average. People deny the game being pay to win but here it is.
Honestly I liked this, Its supports the Server and lessen the mindless farming that you do.

-Refining problem/Mindless farming. If you choose to compete/approach end game the amount of grind you will do will exponentially increase. Crimson farming, multiple instance chars, Gefenia. for example an accessory market vend cost 60m that will be equivalent to 4-6 farming hours of mindless Tele-Arrowstorming. I guess its easy for some and there is a mind note that says "youre playing on a  low rate server, what you did you expect?"
+9 Heroic Bagpack 160m average in market thats 16 Farming Hours /sob

And hey why wont I just make them? Ok lets go to cash shop 10pc Enrich Elu cost around 7$, an Nova Shop only Headgear cost 5$/piece then lets pray to RNG gods because we dont have Refine Cert. Quite a risky investment.

I understand that this is a free game and also a business which they also need money for maintenance and payment for good service. While most games are designed to have frustrating parts that will force players to pay for convenience I wish their donations would NOT be something like a gamble your 100$ for a +9 or nothing /sob

Summary: I think the server is good for now, I would recommend it. It lets old RO players experience Renewal, 3rd Job, Instances, New Items, The partying and all conveniently. I wish for better refining system but I also think that putting a big change as that would ruin NovaRo's Market equilibrium or make people loose interest- frustrated vend players or how easy / P2W the game would have totally become.


I quite enjoyed doing this review so far,
still editing for grammar and s***.
Have a good day everyone