Appearance and homeworld areas aside, there's no difference between the Azmodians and Elyos: all character classes are open to both. Characters from both factions will "awaken" at level 10, becoming Daevas. Pronounced "Divas", this evolutionary leap does not come with big hair, a customisable NPC entourage, sequinned armour and the ability to make unreasonable rider demands; instead, you specialise your class archetype, acquire wings, and learn how to fly. Fair trade.

The class specialisation splits each archetype into two, although all of the final eight are deeply conventional designs, with no hybrids to speak of. Warriors become damage-dealing Gladiators or tanking Templars. Scouts become sneaky Assassins or bow and snare-wielding Rangers. Mages can choose between Sorcerors, and deal direct magical damage, or Spirit-Masters, and summon a range of different pets. Priests take the path of the Cleric, a straight healer, or the Chanter, a defensive caster who can create magical shields and buff team-mates' attributes and abilities.

It's hard to go wrong with these class types although you do have to worry about how easy the Chanter, say, will be to play solo, but it's also hard to get excited about them. Thankfully, this is where Aion's very interesting Stigma system comes in, offering hybridisation and easy customisation to every single class, in a nod to Guild Wars.

The Elyos at rest. Posing.

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Stigmas stones, which drop from monsters or are handed out as quest rewards, are skills from other classes, and can be equipped by any class with very few restrictions. They might allow a Warrior to equip a Mage's spellbook and cast offensive magic (spellcasting is accompanied with a neat page-flipping animation), or a Mage to wear a Warrior's plate armour. You can collect any number of Stigma stones, but you can only equip a handful at a time; these can't be hot-swapped in combat, but can be changed by visiting a trainer and paying a small in-game fee. The most powerful skills will be rare drops, equivalent to a fine weapon or piece of armour; like other loot, some can be traded, and some will bind to the character.

By the sound of it, this device turns skills into loot, and should make character customisation both easy and massively flexible, without getting bogged down in Guild Wars' technical depth. Stigma completism could easily become as punishing an addiction as improving your gear. The Stigma system is both brilliant and obvious, and that's the hardest kind of design trick to pull off; hats off to NCsoft's internal Korean development team.

There are two further twists to combat skills. The first is a Divine Power bar, alongside the regular health and mana, that charges up as you play. This can be used for hugely-powerful super-skills, but will dissipate whenever you log off. Happily, you'll be able to transfer Divine Power to other players before you do, and it can even be used in crafting.

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Resource: EuroGamer