Tab and Stab

So how does Requiem actually play?

I remember reading, years ago, an article that suggested that the control layouts for this style of MMO were designed to enable players in internet cafes to grind with one hand while smoking with the other. I don't know if that's true or not, but it's not entirely inconsistent with Requiem's playstyle.

Actually that might be a bit unfair. I played Scarlet Blade once – which was without question the worst MMO I've ever experienced – and the gameplay there was click-to-auto-run-to-next-enemy, click-to-autoattack-enemy, click-to-autorun-back-to-questgiver, so compared to that Requiem is quite involved. There's autorun, but just in a straight line, not to your objective; and while autoattack is a more substantial part of your damage output than in most MMOs, if you rely on it exclusively when going up against enemies that are anywhere near your level you're going to die. A lot.

There's not many skills available. At level 29 I have a taunt, two long duration self-buffs and three attack skills in addition to autoattack. One of the attacks applies a DoT, and all them are single target. That's it. My tactical options are basically run up to the monster and hit it, or taunt the monster so it runs up to me and then hit it.

I've actually been using my taunt skill at times – more than I do in most other MMOs where I'm playing a tanky class. Oh sure, I'll use taunt in a group situation, but if I'm predominantly running solo – and I usually am – I often don't even bother adding it to my hotbar. I've been using it here though, because this is an oldschool MMO and it can be dangerous to take on multiple enemies at once.

So far – 16 hours in – I've died nine times; a couple of times from running into areas I was underlevelled for, a couple of times when I aggro'd three mobs instead of one, and the rest in a solo dungeon run, which across all the MMOs I've played may be my most common cause of death.