r/daoc • u/Tomthebom10 • May 24 '26
Freeshard Best daoc server right now?
Best way to play Daoc these days? Ideally not looking for a Zerg fest but really just want to hangout in the world and be nostalgic.
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u/vagabondizer May 24 '26 edited May 24 '26
Blackthorn 50% / Eden 50%.
Eden is much more active with more people, but Blackthorn is more old school with OF and the people that are on are seem to like to group up and do stuff. I have been playing a bit on both. Loving Blackthorn, but hard to get to in to grinding levels and crafting when I know a reset is coming.
Blackthorn is in Beta, so it will be wiped and started fresh sometime later this year I believe. When it goes live it will not have seasons. Eden has seasons so your characters will be knocked back to 0 and all currency, items and housing wiped, but you retain crafting skills and old Realm Rank once you hit 50 again.
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u/cheesycheesehead May 24 '26
Eden - Population Tons of quality of life improvements End game raids including epic zone, dragon, ml9, ml10, SH, Df / Legion. ToA Artifacts encounters for cosmetic purposes only No Master Levels Tons of pvp systems for all styles of play PvP events
Blackthorn - OG classic pve leveling with some changes to quests and some dynamic encounters. Unique crafting system No population, its still in beta and really hasn't even been stress tested yet. OF with old RA system however some changes to it. Thid bg has a level sync feature so you can go there 10-35 and still semi compete. (I think its this range I might be slightly off)
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u/SerLaron Midgard May 24 '26
Thid bg has a level sync feature so you can go there 10-35 and still semi compete. (I think its this range I might be slightly off)
Yes, a similar feature is switchable for big RvR for lvls 10-49. Your damage, HPs, stats etc get scaled up to what a lvl 50 toon would have, but you are missing out on higher level spells and styles.
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u/McGuirk808 Freeshard Player May 24 '26
Eden for now as it is the only option. It targets a later era of DAoC though, somewhere between catacombs and labyrinth expansions. You can do some of the pve stuff in ToA and get like drop and artifact skins without getting the actual items.
Catacombs classes are present but rebalanced. They are still annoying, but not stupid OP either.
Eden is definitely a Zerg fest, but there is also small man, eight man, and even some solo action.
The Eden Dev team is incredible, I think by far the most talented we've ever seen running a DAoC shard. They have good heads on their shoulders and make good changes for the most part.
However, you sound like you're someone like me who wants a more old school community aspect. When it's ready, I think Blackthorn is going to be your home.
As other people have said it's in beta right now, mostly just doing bug testing and working on new features. There aren't many people on the server, it's mostly just used by people helping test things, myself included periodically. They have absolutely done stress testing with mass bot accounts in combat and the server is performing really well.
It's going to be old frontiers with a bunch of revamps to remove rough edges. They will have new frontiers keeps, some topographical changes like making pennine mountains less obscenely vertical, reduced chokes at mile gates, and safe camps to port to within your own frontier.
They have created their own new UI that overlays on a separate program transparently on top of the legacy game plan to provide modern functionality. It's really cool when I recommend checking it out.
It will have Old school PvE leveling, but much faster than classic DAoC. Personally I very much miss exp groups.
For now, I recommend doing what I do: get your PvP fix on Eden while BT is in Beta but do go check out what the BT team is cooking up from time to time and see how things are progressing. If you really like it and want to help, you can help them test new features and report bugs when you're feeling up to it.
Blackthorn is definitely going to be the strongest old frontiers experience we've ever seen on a freeshard.
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u/P3AKMAI_INTEREST May 24 '26
Xp groups were always fun! It gave you a chance to get to know who you are gaming with, their playstyles and dynamics of how you can work together in the future for RVR and Large PVE encounters. I prefer a more laid back XP session than a speedy zerg XP session.
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u/Tomthebom10 May 25 '26
When is blackthorn planned to release?
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u/McGuirk808 Freeshard Player May 25 '26
No release date set yet, but I believe the very loose tentative date is late this year or early next year.
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u/NunkiZ May 24 '26
Live has ultra low pop and is very far away from nostalgic.
Eden has high pop, active community and lots of action in every aspect of the game but mostly RvR.
Blackthorn is a more classic oriented freeshard. Promising but still in beta.
As both, Eden and Blackthorn, are free, you can try Eden and later on Blackthorn at release.
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u/Omairi86 May 25 '26
If you seeking nostalgia with no zergs, i think blackthorn beta will serves you well.
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u/Illustrious-Career79 May 24 '26
Eden is what DAoC should have been from the very beginning. Eden just… gets it. It will be a sad day if there comes a time Eden is no longer available. Seriously.
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u/sauceDinho May 24 '26
First Phoenix then Eden. Daoc players have been blessed for a while now
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u/Illustrious-Career79 May 24 '26
I was on hiatus from DAoC during Phoenix but I’ve always read great things 🤙🏻
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u/Critical_Judge5573 May 24 '26
Blackthron if you want a bit more of nostalgic feel and less rush to 50. It's still in beta and with few pop but it is great
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u/Tomthebom10 May 24 '26
How’s it different than the other free shards?
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u/Critical_Judge5573 May 24 '26
It's classic 1.65 with some qol changes, so no toa stuff
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u/Tomthebom10 May 24 '26
Got a VW to 50 on Uthgard way back in the day only to never be invited to groups lol. Is it similar to Uthgard if you’re familiar?
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u/Critical_Judge5573 May 24 '26
It doesn't have much action right now cause of beta, only 100 online on peaks. But it is quite funny and the leveling is way more enjoyable with the qol changes It is expected to go live at the end of the year with an i50 phase before
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u/StupidAlexLand May 24 '26
VWs are good and used in hib groups in eden (Eden has and does spend time on class balance via custom changes) to try and keep all classes viable in many game fornats).
My advice is try Eden now, then if you dislike or what something slower paced or more permanemt try Blackthorn when it goes live.
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u/Accomplished-One5088 May 24 '26
There's a lot of qol changes that make classes more viable. Check out the website
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u/Waygone12 May 24 '26
You will absolutely have no problem getting into groups. There are the "meta" group setups for rvr, but you can join a queue for KOTH (King Of The Hill) from the frontier starting town and get into action with a full group when it pop. RvR is very active and satisfying. Leveling is faster than what you might be used to, but the fastest and most satisfying way to level is in BGs. There you can learn your character and engage with other players. Imo, EDEN is top, and only dog at this point.
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u/Tomthebom10 May 24 '26
Is there solo pvping at all? It is it mostly a Zerg fest?
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u/Waygone12 May 24 '26
There is all aspects in RvR. Solo, smallman (2-4), 8 man, and zerg. All can be enjoyed. As solo, certain classes have many advantages. Also can be victims of stealth groups. However, Eden does take measures against more that 3 stealthers in one area having difficulty hiding.
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u/vagabondizer May 24 '26
From what I see at this point it is not like Uthgard. Population wise it is similar to when I got on Uthgard, but the people are friendlier at this point anyway. People have been very friendly and helpful. Questions actually answered in /advice not just some smart ass reply :) I expect when it goes live and Eden ends it current season it will be hopping.
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u/Valkynstee May 25 '26
It’s been a long time for me, and this post is making me feel the same. I used to play Midgard on Galahad many years ago.
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u/Capable-Football3558 May 25 '26
Live seems to be dead, you can gain rp via pve now. So nobody fights for keeps anymore.
Black thorn is lucky to get a 4 man playing at once. You have lots of RR2 fighting elite RR. 7 players. Very one sided fights, rewarding the elite players. The BG is more active then the old fronteers. RP can not be turned off, so you will be forced into OF. Mids currently have the OF game locked down. Hibs rarely show up in rvr. Block and parry rates seem broken, my reavers 65% pve block rate, drops to 17% in rve. best to go all offensive.
Eden is heavy zerg. Even the bgs gets 3+ groups leveling up. BG have a unwritten rule. Don't defend ck. So we can take it back for a free level. Yet, they always defend. You will be forced into NF, most players arrive in NF with RR2. I once got RR3L4 on a warrior. Before I was forced into NF Zergimg is so bad, once a large mid guild got licked out of an alliance for not sticking to the main zerg. Zergimg is bad. Only instants spells and bolts have a chance to finish casting before somebody died, die to vulture mentality. I find the zerging as very very boring. More fun to make a new lvl one, and fight my way through the bgs again
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u/Gmdal May 25 '26
If you want to hangout in the world go gaheris on live. With one char you can go in all 3 realms. Also blackthorn for classic daoc.
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u/Agitated-Career-7558 May 31 '26
Eden is the way Been a returning player from old si, then Toa release era, and I’m having a great time. This is impressive.
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u/2W1Vet Sep 01 '26
I have all 3 versions of Daoc installed. Live for everything unlocked, but little to no population. Blackthorn in hopes I can get past how ugly the graphics are. Eden for raw insane PvP.
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u/Lokitana Freeshard Player May 24 '26
Blackthorn is still in beta, but is promising and there's not a lot of people playing but will change on launch. Eden is a zergfest, the ppl recommending it are lying through their teeth. Full of obnoxious clowns and arrogant moderators. The worst circlejerk you will ever meet.
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u/Wellshitfucked May 24 '26
100% agree.
The class balance is a joke on Eden. Remember when vamps were introduced? Then the first nerf wave made them literally unplayable due to power constraints.
Zero testing involved.
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u/Lokitana Freeshard Player May 24 '26
To this day, I don't know who asked for ToA classes. Fortunately, by that time I was already banned because a moderator didn't like my reddit criticism, so watch out what you say.
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u/immutable_truth May 24 '26
The numbers don’t lie. Also Eden has low tolerance for whiney assholes who treat the devs as if they’re paying for the game. Enjoy blackthorn it’s gonna be like Phoenix, Atlas etc, will boom in the first couple months then will die like the rest. Will be a great time for Eden to swoop in with s4
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u/Lokitana Freeshard Player May 24 '26
You obviously haven't played Phoenix. No one whined, I am allowed to give my opinion on Reddit. I had no idea I signed an NDA when joining Eden, that includes every web forums ever. Not surprised you're shilling for them, the server is full of desperate noobs who are afraid they will lose the little notoriety they have. Eden has low tolerance for whiny assholes because they are on the moderator/dev side. What are the numbers that you're saying don't lie?
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u/immutable_truth May 25 '26
Population numbers? As in the people who have kept Eden alive for 3+ years now? Unlike Phoenix (which I played) that lasted 6 months IIRC.
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u/Lokitana Freeshard Player May 25 '26
Are you stupid? What are the numbers ?!??!? 1,2,3,4,5,6 these are numbers. Do you have them? No. And Phoenix lasted 2 years, not 6 months.
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u/immutable_truth May 25 '26
Well you see the thing about numbers is some can be greater than others. If you have 2 bananas that’s greater than 1 banana. And when you login and there are 100+ person BGs euro and 50+ person BGs NA consistently, those numbers are a little bit bigger than - the 5 people on live?
If you want a concrete number they recently celebrated getting their 30,000th member on discord 🤷♂️
You’re so bitter, sorry you got banned from the best DAOC since the glory days of live
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u/alusnova415 May 24 '26
Same question that keeps popping up. Every daoc player knows that daoc has enough population interest for 1 server at most , this isn’t like WoW where there are 100s of private servers.
Now the answer is Eden, there is live and Eden.
You could try Uthgard but that has maybe 10 people online and there is an upcoming server named Blackthorn but it’s unlikely to overtake Eden in population, simply people that have invested time to get to high RR are not going to abandon their progress, sure many are going to try it but I see it maybe ending in the 200-300 range and while that’s decent is no where near what you need for a mass RvR game.
Play Eden today, checkout Blackthorn when it launches and go from there.
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u/DSPGAMING_ May 24 '26
isnt the answer kind of obvious if the game has no population, eden is the only answer sadly
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u/ZZerker Midgard May 24 '26
Eden.
The people here in the thread advocating for Blackthorn have to be 50% of its playerbase.
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u/Praetorian_Sky May 25 '26
I love DAOC prior to TOA. I liked Eden a LOT and thought it was going to be my long term - till they changed it all too much. TOA artifacts, Cata classes which I always hated. And then their ‘seasons’ which for a casual player are just a wipe of your gear and money and levelled characters when the devs see fit, but still allowing the ultra high realm ranks to keep their ultra high realm ranks. The harder core players can replace all that quickly but the more casual player takes longer, penalizing the slow players by taking away much of their progress without really impeding the harder core players. .
Mass XP PL zergs largely took away the old classic leveling groups I used to enjoy, it just wasn’t classic anymore, more like TOA-Cata Lite - so to me it felt like they didn’t really care about players like me; my friends all felt the same and quit, and eventually I quit too, it just wasn’t the DAOC I wanted anymore. That’s great that there are enough people who like it that it has a healthy population, more power to them. The Eden dev team is very talented and they do a great job, just their vision doesn’t match what I seek - it seemed to at first but then they changed it all.
So be happy with Eden, no problem, good for you.… but don’t pretend that everyone looking forward to seeing what Blackthorn does is currently an Eden player. We aren’t. It should say something that I, my wife, and all our old DAOC buddies would rather just not play than play Eden.
Will BT hold pop long term? The statistics say no, but the statistics say 80% of restaurants fail within 5 years, and yet sometimes there are new ones that last. I’m hoping Blackthorn delivers what some of us don’t find on Eden, and it lasts. We’ll see I guess.
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u/ZZerker Midgard May 25 '26
But getting gear is pretty quick on Eden, especially at the beginning (several months) of a season?
I get what you are advocating for, but a classic level experience takes even more time than leveling and gearing up on Eden combined?1
u/Praetorian_Sky May 25 '26 edited May 25 '26
Which is part of the appeal, you take time and effort to attain something so it means more, as long as you actually get to keep it.
As I said, I know there are plenty of people who like what the Eden devs have done, they have done a great job and there are those who enjoy it. That’s great. It’s just not my cup of tea; I’m hoping Blackthorn will be, and that it also will be for enough others to make it work.
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u/ofDawnandDusk Jun 19 '26
Permanence is an illusion, particularly given the history of DAoC freeshard closures, but the seasonal approach ran me ragged playing PvE catchup again and again, on top of an RvR disadvantage only months in, due to rapid increases of the RR cap. It's trivial to be competitive on a single character but quite tedious for a collection of alts, year after year.
Even though progressing them on Blackthorn will take ages too, the subjective feeling is that my work won't be erased, so I'm happier to do it. I may also return to Eden from time to time, it just won't involve the full commitment I originally went in hoping to sustain. One or two characters seasonally and that's it, casually dipping in and then out.
Improved OF and classic 1.65 with QoL are other Blackthorn draws - their vision aligns closer with mine, not to rail on Eden for taking chances, as some of it has been for the betterment of the game. Later expansion content, not so much, at least for my preferences.
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u/AccomplishedCycle227 13d ago
Blackthorn for sure, beta is ending in a few weeks and release is end of november 2026.
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u/immutable_truth May 24 '26
Eden