Well, not sure which thread to post in now, but this is the latest.
I'm really liking this game. There is a heck of a lot to do outside of the typical murder-death-kill treadmill. There doesn't seem to be a level minimum on gear either... but I havn't delved into the market for that stuff yet.
Reddit post with people saying that you can get and wear end game gear as early as you can afford it. Implying that the first half of the game ain't a useless treadmill like the typical MMO.
The combat in itself is definitely different from the typical tab-targeting / highlight and hit... which is pretty damn refreshing. You can think of attacking/evading attacks as similar to an action-y game like Dynasty Warriors or Dark Souls. Enemy swings and you move/evade out of the way, they miss.
Rather then MMO fashion, where enemy has single target attack ready, they come into range and activate attack, you move out of the attack range before the animation actually hits, you get hit anyways.
Alts:
1. Max cap on Energy is shared between all characters, meaning if you've played only one character and have 100 Energy and start an alt, the alt will have 100 Energy capacity too. And the Alt can also earn Energy capacity on top of that too. Each character's Energy use is their own, not shared.
2. Its the same with Contribution points, which is like influence you spend to open up businesses/political ventures or even to borrow stuff/equipment. Doing quests gives exp for the Contribution point, so all alts can contribute to that. Contribution use is shared, but the benefits other then borrowed stuff/equipment are shared too.
3. 'Knowledge', a nebulous term, but its... map data, NPC data, enemy monster data and probably some other sort of data. That is shared between all characters.
Witch, level 15. Shank is still OP, but there are more things that survive one to the face now. Also I learned that it is kind of a cone attack and I can shank 2 guys at the same time if they line up well enough.
Getting into hostile territory with lots of ranged enemies is very dangerous... also, fighting fast-beefy things in small areas is not recommended.
EDIT: Oh right, I'm gonna try to build a huge beer industry. Mostly to feed my own workers, but I'll probably have an excess to sell.