Magical Reconstructions in Runes of Magic

Let me start with some hard truths to swallow: I think levels 50-65 in Runes of Magic felt more like a trial I needed to survive to progress. Sure, maybe the high level people that multibox accounts have an easy way to powerlevel through those levels, but I didn't.  I personally felt like I ran out of quests in that level range, had to grind the butterflies daily quests hundreds of times, and really only got to enjoy fast leveling at the beginning of the levels until about half of the way through each level when the quests ran out . . . then the last half of each level would be grinding and humbly asking for help in instances to eek out every last drop of experience I could find.

. . . And then the x1.5 experience weekend happened last week, and I once again made what felt like really meaningful progress in the game! I worked through a quest filled zone called Redhill Mountains, ending my weekend at level 67 on my Mage-half and level 66 on my Rogue-half. Perfect! Great! I loved it!

I have to be honest, at the end of the weekend, I thought I had experienced a shift in quest design philosophy for Redhill Mountains, but I don't think that was it. After counting up the quests you can play through in Redhill Mountains versus the quests you can play in the zone before it (the Land of Malevolence) it was clear that wasn't the case.

One thing is for sure, if you play Runes of Magic, you will fight a dragonfly in about every zone

I got to be honest, it really feels like the game was MEANT to be played with x1.5 experience and then because of the free-to-play model they backed off and made it more grindy to make the business model more profitable at the cost of a quality game experience.  That said, it's not impossible to play this game in its current state because you always have daily quests. They are the bread and butter of this game as far as I'm concerned.

This situation has put me in a weird post-traumatic shock mode for questing currently. I find myself not wanting to quest unless the game is running some kind of experience bonus because that feeling of being stuck is so . . . BAD. Now, that said, when I've complained in the past to my guildmates, the response was that, not to worry, it won't always be like what I'm experiencing in the 50-65 doldrums. I really really really really really really hope . . . REALLY HOPE that this is true. 

So . . . as for the game itself . . . both the Returning the Glory quest line and the Envoy of Dragons quest lines wrapped up nicely in Limo Desert. I was knighted for my service to Delanis and now I'm on a quest line that has blended the two quests into a new chain of quests called "Magical Reconstruction." 

Great to see these two standing together as their quest lines merge

Magical Reconstruction picks up in the Land of Malevolence and you begin to unravel a plot to subjugate the masses with something called Divine Fruit. The government controls the drip of Divine Fruit and uses it to inspire and motivate a migration of people from the northern part of the map down to the southern part of the map, closer to Grafu Castle. Eventually you get to a town where the NPCs are pretty much all mindless and endlessly drunk on Divine Fruit. They'll do ANYTHING for divine fruit, including participating in a kind of crazy circus.

I'm in certified carny gear . . . totally undercover . . .

That's right, in the middle of the zone, there's this kooky, totally not dark and creepy, circus, which, as you probe deeper down into the depths in full circus worker garb disguise, you find out that the drunken divine fruit people are being made into an army of monstrous, crazed freaks.

Hi everyone, this is Alice. Alice, this is everyone.

Grafu Castle itself is a wild instance that has a couple really challenging fights that seem to only be able to be accomplished by people well above its level range. I'd love to hear the stories from when this was end game content. I got dragged through the instance and died several times just standing there doing nothing. Thank you for your skills level 100 friends!

Of course it's an oversized creepy teddy bear, what else do you expect to find inside a castle?

The storyline of Magical Reconstruction then carries you onward into Redhill Mountains where now you're part of a royal envoy gathering up allies to help fight against the atrocities happening in the Land of Malevolence and what everyone suspects is a deeper problem involving the folks in Sardo Castle a zone over.

The belly has herbivore teeth and the head has carnivore teeth . . . that's fun . . .

Redhill Mountains is a war torn zone that pits the Rhino folk of the Kingdom of Kalon against the Dwarves of Fireboot Fortress. It takes a lot of helping out to get on the good side of both parties and bring them together to realize who the real enemy is and ultimately save the day and win the support of both parties toward your cause, which brings me to where I am now in the story: Tergothen Bay.

Glad they figured it out otherwise we would have had to launch the nukes . . .

I've enjoyed playing through this content and I'm really thankful to my guildies who have been helping out along the way. There are a few pinch points where I just couldn't proceed without the help of others, and they were there to assist and keep me going.  Good times!

The next big exp event happens just 3 days from now, so you know I'll be there. Before you know it I'll be out of Chapter 4 content and moved on to Chapter 5 content: Fires of the Shadowforge. As it turns out all the work that Frogster did with dwarves in Chapter 4 helped them launch their third playable race in Chapter 5. 

Thanks for reading and . . .

Happy Dueling!