Astaria

Story
The Demi-gods, Kael, Pontus and Tera gathered to create the world of Astaria. This world will share the characteristics of each plane the demi-gods reside in. Children of the gods(Elves, dwarves, humans, elementals and many others) begin to co-exist in this world. As time passes, an unknown darkness begins to creep into the world. This tenebros starts consuming and corrupting the hearts of many. Result is war and famine. The Darkness begins manifesting itself into physical forms of Demon Lords and Dark Spirits who control the corrupted and lead armies of pure chaos. The gods, unaware of what's causing this begin to turn on eachother. Kael and Pontus of the Sea clash over the skies of Astaria. They mortally wound each other and fall back to their own planes causing Astaria to begin breaking apart. With Tera being the only god left in Astaria, she uses her remaining powers to create the Yggdrasil Tree. A massive beacon of life rooted deeply into the realm and keeping it from breaking apart. Tera's powers began to wane as the Darkness begins advancing towards the Yggdrasil Tree. The only glimmer of hope resides in a group who have now awaken in the corner of Astaria. Who you are and what you are is unknown but your fate and origins are there for you to discover in Astaria.
What is Astaria?
Astaria is a hardcore fantasy MMORPG with emphasis on social communities, crafting, party combat, territory capture and player vs developer(PvD). The game's hardcore aspects focus on more weight behind combat, difficulty, item loss(on death or breaking), logistics(food, bandages, ammo, reagents, durability) and the inability to grow too powerful. The story is developed based on how players unfold major events or defeat cataclysmic bosses.
What is PvD?
Player vs Developer is where every players team up against the developers like they're the Dungeon Master of a board game. Developers will define the behavior and actions of monsters based on how players interact or react to different factions of the world. This system allows for a more living world in which player actions can affect the outcome of many factions within the game. Factions may even be discovered or extinguished permanently. The world will change based on the efforts of the players. A capital city may fall to the enemy if not properly defended during events and will only come back if players retake the city.
Party/Group Combat
Majority of combat progression is grouped based content. In order to level up efficiently or even at all in some areas, you must form parties with other players. The game features no party experience penalty to encourage group based combat. The combat mechanics feature a combo system the requires more than one player to complete the combo/rotation. Monsters will react to players accordingly making combat more dynamic as monsters won't just blindly hit who they deem has the most aggro. We plan to have monsters behave more like the archetype they reflect.
Community Focus
Astaria revolves around a community that will unite against the common enemy. The game's focus is the social aspect of working together as an entire server in order to keep the darkness at bay. Players must not only further themselves as their player but within the many communities that will form. Will you choose to be a merchant that sells wares to other players, a crafter who creates gear out of resources, a combative adventurer specializing in banishing the darkness or a leader within the community to help unite the players under a single banner. How you choose to interact with the other players is a key factor in victory against the Darkness.
Crafting
Crafting supplies and equipment is an important factor in keeping the players equipped. Crafting professions and resource gathering is a huge integral part in keeping groups of players battle ready and well supplied(potions, bandages, food).

• Armorsmithing
  
• Weaponsmithing
  
• Mining
  
• Woodcraft
  
• Leatherworking
  
• Skinning
  
• Jewelcrafting
  
• Culinary
  
• First Aid
  
• Many more planned to be added throughout early access.

Logistics
In order to travel far, players will have to manually travel to that location, eat to keep their stamina up and use bandages in between fights as potions are very expensive and rare. This will create another dynamic for groups to watch the amount of supplies they take. Weight is a factor in how much you can carry as well. Players will need to take care of their equipment or they will need to be replaced.
Liberation System and Warlord AI
Liberation system is what allows players and monsters to capture territory changing the way certain areas can be interacted with. If players capture an area, darkness monsters will not spawn anymore in that area allowing players to gather resources, freely explore and build their crafting/trade skills. Certain areas will have unique resources allowing players to strategically plan out which area is more valuable to them as different ones will provide different bonus resources, experience, questlines and more. Warlord AI is a system that controls the overall dynamics of how monsters roam the world or how many players are on at a given time. If there is enough players online, the monsters will be a lot more aggressive. If a certain amount of players are on, they will passively patrol their own areas.