Thursday, January 30, 2014

Ghost Recon Online (Part Three)

The Game Lobby

Ghost Recon Online - Game Lobby
True to most shooting titles, nearly all of your interactions within GRO are also limited to the game's lobby.

And while most of the features ought to be pretty intuitive, I shall attempt to brief you through some of it or at least the more important ones.
  • Storage/Loadout (Top Left, Gun Icon)
    Ghost Recon Online - Storage Loadout
    This is normally where you would go to to pick or select the kinds of equipment you would bring to your next match. Your primary weapon, secondary weapon (sidearm), armor vest (for protection), headgear (decorative only), device, squad support and grenades, namely.
    Ghost Recon Online - Upgrade OptionGhost Recon Online - Weapon Customization
    The main difference between this loadout and the one you get during respawns is that, with this one, you will gain access to a Modifications section for your equipment (can be accessed via the "Upgrade" option), as well as a Firing Range to try out those changes you've made.

    In this Modifications section, you can swap in or out modules to customize and adapt your specific equipment to various scenarios that you would likely encounter within a match. For instance, you can make one of the guns you own suited for long range purposes, one for mid range, one for CQC (quick to ready and fire) or even one fitted with a silencer for stealthy operations (backstabs).

    So effectively, what you are doing here is to prepare your character with different setups so that you can switch your equipment on the fly during matches, flexibly, for different situations. (Although I'ld have to say that for this game, it can be "pretty" expensive to do so.)

    Additionally, this is also where you will get the function to sell your unwanted stuff or simply to clear out extra storage space (via the Scrapyard). But do note that the prices you get for selling your items is very bad though.

    (Usually, storage space is not a problem if your only focusing on one class. However, if you do play the other classes as well, then all of their equipment combined would quickly fill up your storage...since they share a common one.)
  • Store (Top Left, Shopping Cart Icon)
    Ghost Recon Online - Store MainGhost Recon Online - Store Weapons
    Needless to say, the Store is where you would go to when you wish to upgrade your present equipment in exchange for better ones.

    Each of the sections and sub-sections found here merely acts as a filter to sort out the plethora of items that you can buy. And since its pretty elementary here, I doubt there's a need for too much explanations. Just note that the equipment you can buy here from the Store are automatically tailored for your current class selection. So if you wish to buy stuff for another class, you will need to change into that character class first.
    Ghost Recon Online - Changing Class
    You may do so by simply clicking on the bar underneath your name as shown above.


    Apart from that, I guess you can see for yourself that nearly every item found here in the "Store" can be bought with either RP (Requisition Points) and/or GC (Ghost Coins). The Requisition Points can be acquired by playing matches and completing daily wins, solo/fireteam challenges while Ghost Coins can only be bought via real life cash (but accomplishing the timed Monthly Events will award you with some as well).

    Even so, I might have to warn you that the "economy" of this game is seriously out of wack at the moment (my opinion, of course). Most of the items will require some serious grinding to acquire using RPs. They seem to be mostly scaled towards tempting you to buy them with GCs.
    Ghost Recon Online - Athena ArmoryGhost Recon Online - AAA Pass Subscription
    As for the "Athena Armory", "Bundles" and "Mystery Boxes", the first one's a sub-only section that sells you new or unique items (unique here just means stuff that's not accessible to the common, non-subscription players...not that its actually the one and only in the game). It requires a triple A subscription pass that you can buy using GCs.
    Ghost Recon Online - BundlesGhost Recon Online - Mystery Boxes
    The second one acts sorta like "starter" kits or something. These bundles, when opened, will give you a set of items as indicated by its description.

    Lastly, the Mystery Boxes are just as its name suggests. When opened, they would give you a random kind of reward depending on their loot tables and chances of looting. It may be some RPs, some rare weapon, armor, armor inserts, grenades, etc...
  • Class Info (Top Left, Portrait Icon)
    Ghost Recon Online - Class SummaryGhost Recon Online - Your Performance Stats
    For this part, its basically stats and data to tell you how well you've performed with your current class selection. Its a no-brainer, so need I say more? XD

    There is, however, one particular stat here that you'll need to take note of and that is "Weapon Proficiency Rating".
    Ghost Recon Online - Sniper Rifle Weapon ProficiencyGhost Recon Online - Submachine Gun Weapon Proficiency
    This stat keeps track of your usage of a specific type of weapon and increases your chances of doing critical hits with that weapon type as you continue to use them to kill your opponents.

    But there is a catch...

    To rank up this "Weapon Proficiency Rating", not only must you use that specific weapon type to kill, you must also use weapons of the appropriate tiers. And not just any tiers, mind you, but rather those regular ones that you buy from the Store that are tier-locked. Kills made from using those unique ones, which skips this tier requirement, will not count towards ranking up this rating. Or so I've heard.
  • Clan Management (Top Left, Double Flag Icon)
    Ghost Recon Online - Clan License PurchaseGhost Recon Online - Clan Creation
    The Clan Management section allows you to create/form a team of your own. But before you're able to do that, you must first purchase a "Clan License" of some sort.

    After getting it, you will get access to some basic form of which you fill to complete the creation process. Its as simple as that.
  • Chat Interface (Bottom Right, Speech Bubble Icon)
    Ghost Recon Online - Chat Interface
    The Chat Interface is where you speak and interact with other fellow players hanging around in the lobby. It basically works kindda like what you would get in an IRC chat channel.

    However, it might be interesting to take note of some of the chat commands that you can use. To learn about them, type in "/?" into the chat and it will list out all of the commands that you can use.

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