 Hello everybody, how's everybody doing? Look, Lost Ark's coming out tomorrow. A lot of people keep asking me, hey, are you gonna play? Will you play, blah, blah, blah, blah. Look, this is the truth. Lost Ark is an Eastern MMO. It is entirely its own genre of game, okay? I will give Lost Ark a try, but am I really gonna play it, play it? Cause I talk about like playing, are you gonna play this, are you gonna play that? I don't consider like logging on, playing for the first couple of days or whatever, playing a game. Right, that's like streaming the game. A lot of people are playing it, but it's, there's a lot of stuff about like Korean MMOs and Eastern MMOs in general, that it's not like a normal, it's not like a normal MMO. It is its own genre of game. And we're gonna look at some stuff about it today and kind of decide, hey, how's it gonna go, whatever. But it's like its own thing. There's a lot of pay to win. It's like, oh, it's free to play, but there's all this microtransactions and those microtransactions a lot of times end up being pay to win. But I don't really know that much about Lost Ark other than just the very little bit that I visually looked at it. I wanna look at Lost Ark, honestly. I wanna look at Lost Ark and see how I really feel about it. I will probably play it tomorrow, but we'll see how it goes. So there's been a lot of hype. There's been a lot of people talking about, Espen, are you gonna play Lost Ark? Are you gonna try this out? So-and-so is playing it. This guy's playing it, that guy's playing it. Are you gonna try out Lost Ark? Lost Ark is a Korean MMO. It's been around for a couple years. Supposedly they've made some changes and they're trying to westernize it a little bit and they're releasing it here. I haven't really seen anything about it as far as the design principles of the game. What is it about? Listen, I've only just kind of visually seen it a little bit. Initially, I didn't really have a lot of interest, but I will probably give it a fair shake tomorrow. I'll probably give it a fair shake tomorrow, but also today I wanna look like is this something that I'm gonna enjoy or not? We'll see in the next couple of days, but I'll play it on launch. We'll take a look at the videos and kind of decide what we wanna do. A lot of people are saying Paladins are a PvP class, right? Paladins are a PvP class, is that true? I don't know, which is good, because that's what I like. I've always been more into PvP and that type of stuff, like arenas. I still do Burning Crusade arenas and all that stuff, so if I'm not streaming Burning Crusade on my main channel, which on my main channel I do this and I do all kinds of different stuff on the S-Fan TV channel, but then also on S-Fan radio, I'll do a lot of my late night arena streams and stuff like that, so yeah. I'm still very much into Burning Crusade, but this could be something to kind of throw into the mix for a little bit and we'll see how it goes while we wait for Elden Ring to come out on the 25th. Anyway, let's check it out. Let's check out this Lost Ark Directors trailer that just came out today. Hello, adventurers. My name is Kum Kan Son. Hello, nice to meet you. I'm the director of Lost Ark. Korean names are hard to pronounce, aren't they? So just call me Gold River. With the help of a wonderful voice actor. Hi, Gold River. Continue for me in English and this trailer. I'll show you some cool ways to enjoy Lost Ark, which is launching very soon. Hello, that was it. Say hello to our adventurers. Hello, nice to meet you, adventurers. Now, let us begin. First, let's take a look at the world of Lost Ark. Video did a good job of getting me interested, to be honest. He's all started with one. From the age when our world, Archea, was created. To the time when the moon turned red and the demons of Petrenia broke the mandates. Everyone craved the one and only light of creation, the Ark. The only Ark I care about is Noah's Ark. The hour of prophecy has come. Order and chaos have begun to encroach upon each other. In places of history established under the glorious sun and in places that were kept under the silent darkness, a new dawn is coming. The stars align to guide you to find the Ark. What does this remind me of? This reminds me of something. This reminds me of Dark Souls. The music and the, you know, not the visuals, but they're just like listening to it. You know what I mean? In this world called Archea, Sabaton February 17th. Including the powerful demon legion of Kazaros. But there's no need to worry. I will introduce you to the cool heroes that will fight against them. Classes in Lost Ark have their own unique characteristics and combat mechanics. You can progress with unique skills and your own style. So this is pretty much the extent of what I've seen in this game. It looks like illegal legends. To deal with various combat situations, some classes can burst their specialty to transform and become more powerful. Looks like a mobile game. It's a Korean MMO. I mean, that's what it seems like. There is a class. Eastern MMOs are designed to be played on mobile. There is a class that uses huge mechanical launchers and other hardened weapons to crush enemies. It's like Final Fantasy VII, like inside the reactor. Not only are there classes that deal damage, there are also classes that support and heal their allies. OK, I'm going to pause for a second. Is there a video that just shows straight up what Paladin does? I don't like playing a Paladin because that's the name of the class, right? I like playing a Paladin because of how it plays in WoW, right? I like being kind of like that support PVP, off heal, throw buffs out. Like, that's what I like with a Paladin. In Final Fantasy XIV, for example, I like playing a Dragoon. I like supporting people, but then when I want to go, I want to go. Not only are there classes that deal damage, like, he buffs everybody and then he like, boom, because I like that, but I don't know what it is. I like how it looks. There's a sense of safety with a class on the front line protecting allies. You can effectively evolve the unique skills of each class in various ways to fit different combat situations using the tripod skill tree system. Styles of skills can be changed based on the situation, and even the controls can be changed. You can find the most optimal combinations of skills by customizing. Each class has two awakening skills, the ultimate skills. With these awakening skills, you can turn a battle's direction quickly. Honestly, graphics look cool. There's a lot going on there. Once you've chosen your class, it's time to experience your progression to a set of challenges in the Chaos Dungeon, which is one of the fundamentals of this game. You will battle waves of monsters to help you create your own fighting style. It feels like P.O.E. to drag about your magnificent skills against hordes of enemies. Once you've familiarized yourself with battles, try raids or you'll face off against lethal guardians. Their variety is an imposing threat. You will be able to greatly enhance your combat skills by facing these mighty guardians. It's time for Abyssal Dungeons and Abyssal Raids, where working with allies becomes more crucial. Abyssal, I feel like mythic raiding. Here, enemies will try to confuse and trick you with their gimmicks. Sometimes you'll need to rely on your skills, and sometimes you'll need to rely on your ally's support. Once you defeat them, you will be ready for the biggest battle in Lost Ark, the Legion Raid. There, you will face the six most powerful Legion leaders. Yeah, it's like a P.O.E. or a League of Legends. Vekis. Style of MMO. Kakul Saden. Broshaza. Akhan. And Theamine. Facing them will be very interesting. Hold on. Theamine. Isn't that like caffeine drinks? There's a secret map that lets you explore hidden dungeons and a ghost ship that appears in the sea. Oh, ghost ship. Like foraging. Fishing. Is it out tomorrow? Hunting. Logging. Archeology. Mining. And crafting, you can live off the land and sell your crafted wares. If you like PvP, make your way to the Proving Ground. Okay, chat be quiet, be quiet. I gotta listen to this. There are combat skills there. Visiting certain regions and islands will enable you to enjoy various types of PvP battles. And once you start to get accustomed to these, you will find an opportunity for more challenging and massive battlegrounds. If the everyday routine isn't for you, try other activities like a sailing co-op quest. Climb spires to face challenges in the tower. Explore random rooms and cubes. Fight powerful field bosses, and so on. A variety of content awaits. If you are ready, tackle these challenges one at a time. Even with so many diverse activities to choose from, my personal favorite is the Island Token. In Lost Ark, you can sail and travel to around 100 islands. These islands have their own content and events that are completely different from the main storyline. Become a trusted consultant to the adorable Tuukis. If you're brave enough, how about exploring a horror island? Or if you're feeling sleepy... Luigi's Mansion! You might want to head to Twilight Isle. Sometimes you will encounter a weird place filled with oddities. You can explore a maze, or join a snowball fight. Fight PvP battles in a field of reeds full of treasures. If you need money, you can deliver packages on the side. Challenge others with your fishing skills. Or turn into a chicken and rally other chickens. These are just some of the fun side quests that await you on the islands. Once you've mastered them... Can I just play as a chicken and just be a chicken the whole time? I think this is going to be one of those games where I'm not really going to know if it's good, or I'm not going to know if I like it until I play it. There hasn't really been a whole lot that's really captured me. The PvP stuff seems kind of intriguing, but it's like, okay, let's see how that feels. Watch it die in two weeks. This is the thing with MMOs in general. Almost all MMOs, they come out, boom, big spike, and then they drop, and then they level out at a certain point. Nowadays, years and years and years ago, MMOs were still kind of growing, because more and more people were getting PCs, and it was very community-based. This is a whole discussion. Nowadays, you have Discord, and you have so many other online communities in order to interact with people. You still have it a little bit. On Benediction Alliance, it's great, because people are hanging out in trade chat all day. But back then, you didn't really have that at all. Back in the day, like 15 years ago, we didn't really have Discord in the online communities that we have now. People would literally log on, and they'd sit in Iron Forge all day and talk in trade chat. People would sit in Shatchrath all day and burn in Crusade and talk in trade chat. People would go in Dalaran, hang out in Dalaran all day, and talk in trade chat. That's not really a thing anymore. It still happens. It still happens a little bit on Benediction, which is cool, because it didn't happen at all on Alliance Feralina. That sort of aspect of MMOs is gone. So there was a lot more reason to play MMOs than just the gameplay itself 15 years ago. It's a common theme for RPGs. Exploring different continents and experiencing different episodes while searching for the Ark. But as your adventure continues, you will get to know the people of Arkeja and get involved in the massive lore. What begins as a small story unfolds into a complex history. The battles become a war, and a huge story surrounding the secrets of Arkeja and the Ark will unfold before you. Please, join us in this journey of epic stories. Dragon! Then, the secrets of Arkeja and the Ark will reveal themselves to you. This is sure to be fascinating. I have a problem with... This is something that is a problem with all... It's pretty much every MMO. There needs to be a distinct art style. There needs to be something that makes it stand out from the crowd. Having too realistic of graphics, for example, is a huge problem with MMOs because they end up getting dated. This was something that... I'm going to use my first MMO, one of my favorite games of all time, Dark Age of Camelot, as an example there. Dark Age of Camelot tried to be realistic. And when you try to be realistic, you're not going to be. And when you're not realistic and time goes on and graphics get better, hardware gets better, people get used to seeing things that look better, eventually, your game just looks like trash. Whereas if you take a game like Classic WoW, Classic WoW is a very distinct art style. The textures don't... There's not as many pixels or this and that. But as a distinct art style, you can look at the game and be like, oh, wow, great. Final Fantasy XIV has a very distinct art style. But whenever I look at games like Dark Age of Camelot or Guild Wars, looks a lot like Dark Age of Camelot, honestly, Ashes of Creation needs work on its art style. Animation and gameplay looks really good. Yeah, I think the stuff looks good. I think there's a lot going on on the screen, which makes it kind of hard to follow, but anyway. I won't say that Lost Ark is the greatest game ever. It would be unfair to compare us to a masterpiece in MMORPG that you, or even I, went crazy about. Such as World of Warcraft or Diablo, the title of Hacking Slash. We know that compared to all these legendary works, we're a Makoko. But that means we're bringing our own unique charm. So please, stay tuned. One thing's clear. Lost Ark will always be a better game today than it was yesterday. There is no doubt that this is a game that will continuously improve with you our adventurers. If you love MMORPGs, once love MMORPGs, but have fallen out of love, or if it's your first time playing an MMORPG, how about falling in love with Lost Ark? I am so happy and excited to greet you in Arcaja, the world that we've created. Thank you. With all RPG fans, why did the guy not say that? Did they run out of money? Did they run out of budget and they just couldn't hire the guy to say the last sentence? Okay, so let me kind of give my full thoughts after watching the trailer here. I do think that there's definitely a reason to be intrigued by this game. It is a very different style of MMO. It seems like there's a lot of actually fair reason to be intrigued by the MMO. It's the isometric style or whatever. It's very different than what I'm used to and what I like to play typically when it comes to MMOs. But also, you guys know, I do like League of Legends and I played more League of Legends than I played WoW after Burning Crusade launch. After Rathalich can launch, sorry. I just don't know if it's going to be the right feel for an MMO. We'll see. I think that the animation and stuff look cool, looks crisp. I think there's a lot going on which might make it boomerize or whatever, might make things hard to follow or maybe not look great on stream, but it's fun to play who knows. POE kind of has that same issue, but I think it's not that big of a deal in POE, so maybe it's not that big of a deal in this. I do think it's a big deal in retail WoW. I think the PvP stuff is we'll wait and see on the PvP stuff. The music seems good. It seems like they get it when it comes to music and setting the tone and trying to trigger those emotions and getting the right feeling of playing a game and really having the players get invested in it. That's one of the big things with entertainment in general that I've thought about recently. It's things that are entertaining a lot of times have as much to do with making the viewer the listener, the viewer, the whatever, the consumer of the entertainment feeling invested, right? Like how invested can you make somebody feel? So if I'm a player, I'm playing a game, can you set the tone for the entirety of this place that we're in and make me feel really invested in this game. It's a huge deal. Music is a big part of that. It's a big part of adding to the investment with the environment and all that. Let's take a look at Paladin as a subclass of Warrior. Paladin, wielders of the light and a one-handed sword. Paladins are kind of this offensive healer. They deal okay damage. It's not quite on par with the pure DPS classes, but they can definitely help out and they are the best damage dealing support. Actually, that's their main role, though, as a buff and support class. In fact, the Paladin is one of only two supports that are playable in the game. So while you're dealing damage, you are primarily there to aid your allies with shields as well as a passive heal. As a Paladin, the class identity is this piety meter. It will fill up when in combat and dealing damage. And once it's full, you've got two different abilities you can choose from. There is Sacred Executioner, which increases the attack range of basic attacks and punish skills by 30%, while also increasing the damage of those attacks and abilities. Or you can choose to activate Holy Aura, which creates this 12-metre aura around your character increasing all of your member damage by 10%. So basically your choice is a stronger buff for yourself or a buff across the board for your teammates. And that's really what you're likely to do in a group setting. So what you're telling me is there's no choice, right? That's basically what he's saying. No. I think it's okay. I don't like the idea of like builders and spenders so much, but this is a little bit different. Leveling, you know, you're certainly able to hold your own. You can clear the content. You can make it to the story and you can do a fair bit of these solo things. Your damage isn't that bad, but certainly come and game expect to be a support. That is the role of a Paladin. You were there to help out your team, helping them survive and do more damage. In PvE, Paladins are highly sought after because again, they are one of only two supports in the game, so any party is going to want either you or a bard in their group pretty much for all of the content. You're not going to be a strong damage dealer here, though. I have to reiterate that. The class just does not scale well compared to pure DPS classes. Your strength is your supporting skills, your shields, and your healing. However, in terms of PvP, with the way scaling works in Lost Ark, the Paladin is actually a real damage threat. On top of all of their powerful support skills. So in addition to your shields and your healing, you've got some strong peel. It's funny, it's the opposite of burning Gershin. Paladin scales super hard in burning Gershin. You're dealing some damage, but primarily helping your team. I think you'd be happy with the Paladin. And last but not least, we have got the Gun Lancer. Now, at first glance, this looks like a tank. Okay, I will say this. Paladin looks kind of cool. It's unfortunate that it doesn't do a lot of PvE damage. You know what's more important than dealing damage. It's keeping your party alive. And that's exactly what the Paladin does. So, let's talk Paladin in a nutshell. I mean, the animations look cool. I will say that. I think the big thing for me with a Paladin, what I like about the way my Paladin plays in Burning Crusade, which is I'm using that as an example, because Burning Crusade Paladin is the most fun I've ever had playing my Paladin ever. In Classic. Not even not vanilla, not original Burning Crusade. Burning Crusade Classic. Knowing the things I know now, having Seal of Blood, all that. Seal, twisting, everything. I like the idea of support, support, buff this guy, blessing of freedom, stun. Right, I'm talking about wow right now. Heal, heal, heal, cleanse. Okay, let's smoke this guy. Boom, wings, pin your back, clap somebody. Big burst. That's what I like. It seems like Paladin in this is somewhat similar. Do you enjoy being the backbone of your party? Being the hero in the shadows. Carrying the small brain pure DPS players. In that case, Paladin is absolutely a class that should be on your list. What exactly does the Paladin do though? You're not a tank, nor are you a DPS. You are a support. So don't be fooled into thinking that you're going to be doing damage as a Paladin, because trust me you won't. Your job is to support your party and make sure that the greedy DPS can survive even the hardest hitting mechanics. But on top of that you also got your team with juicy damage buffs across the board. As a support in Lost Ark you offer something most classes simply don't, which is healing and shielding. For every four players in a party it is expected to have one support to buff the three DPS that you are playing with. If you are more interested in knowing about the perks of a support, you should check out my Bard video where I talk more in-depth about this topic. Now let's briefly talk about Holy Night in general. As mentioned above you are the backbone of your party. If you do good damage but it won't be super bursty and pumping huge amount of numbers. You do not bring your own damage to be honest you are a bystander. But the game has a decent way of making you not feel that way with some powerful abilities the paladin has in his kit. Now a question I get asked a lot is how do supports fare in solo instances and while leveling? Just to cover it quickly, yes they are a bit slower in solo content but not in a way that is horrible or that it feels impossible to solo any content. It's just a tad slower than most DPS classes. Anyway, let's now take a closer look. This is kind of like a holy paladin in retail. PvP is equalized so you don't have to worry about grinding or even getting max level. You only need level 26 and no armor and you can kill for PvP. I'm going to be honest, I think that sounds bad. Here's why that's bad chat. A big part of the reason there's a huge gameplay opportunity. There's a whole category of gameplay that comes from building your character. Scaled PvP sucks it's terrible but maybe it fits for this game. In my experience even this is something that I'll look back on Legion. I quit WoW for a lot of years but supposedly something that a lot of the WoW PvP players wanted they asked for, they begged Blizzard for this. They said we wanted PvP scaling. We want to have more equalized gear in PvP. You queue up and then your gear doesn't matter as much and then we had that in Legion and then everybody hated it. The problem becomes there's nothing outside of just playing PvP that you can do to make your character stronger. Player power doesn't increase at all. You don't have other things to do in the game, other opportunities to do what you want to do better. Okay, so you don't have gear but you have skill points. But there's still no real progression, you just put the points in. So depending on how you want to play your class, these primary starts which are attacks. So this is something. Okay, this is something. So this is kind of how I'm feeling right now. I will play Lost Ark tomorrow on launch. I will be playing Lost Ark tomorrow on launch. We're going to check it out. We're going to give it a couple days to give it like an honest look. I'll still be raiding tomorrow night. So I'll be doing Black Temple and Hydral at night during the day. I'll do Lost Ark. I will go live a little bit early tomorrow in that case. I will live a little bit early tomorrow and we'll start Recap and everything else a little bit sooner. We'll talk about everything and I'll probably go live at like, because that'll be 11 o'clock of my time. I normally go live at noon. I will probably go live at like 10. Okay, I'll go live at like 10 a.m. CST maybe a little bit sooner, maybe like 9, 9.30. And then we'll spend the first couple hours kind of getting ready. We'll do red at Recap. We'll watch some videos. We'll talk about stuff, we'll have some fun. And then we'll hit it with Lost Ark. And then I'm going to raid in Burning Crusade at night. Maybe on my alt channel, maybe on my main channel, I don't know. Do you know what server you're playing on? I'm not sure yet. I'm not sure yet. So that's going to be the plan. So make sure to come check that out. S-Fan Radio is my alt channel. I will be live on S-Fan Radio later tonight doing some Burning Crusade arenas and I will be live on this channel, S-Fan TV Tuesday morning. So tomorrow or today, depending on what part of the world you're in.