Hey guys! Just wanted to pop in and heartily recommend this PW.
Couple of weeks ago, I got into the mood for some good ol' NWN, and started looking around at some of the existing PWs, and found this very thread. Gave it a read, liked what I was reading, decided to give it a shot.
I've been playing on it for 2 weeks now, and I have to say it has been a VERY fun experience! I have to give credit to the guys who've developed this PW. They've really put good, solid effort into making areas interesting and enjoyable. They've made very good use of CEP to make the setting more interesting than your standard NWN module. Some of the strong points are (keep in mind I have two chars right now, one at level 12 and one at level 17):
1. Very nice "introduction" system. The entry level quests and items are spelled out very clearly. Like literally, they give a recommended list of quests to do (and the quest givers also handy level recommendations for each quest so as you don't get your self killed). Also, one thing I really appreciate is the fact that you breeze past the really early levels (until level 5) within an hour or two. It might sound like a bit of cheese, but getting past the really early (and weak) levels helped with the next point I like.
2. There's a lot to explore. The areas have been designed beautifully, and I'm not just saying that for the sake of saying it. When these guys say this module is best enjoyed in over-the-shoulder camera, they mean it. Many times on other PWs, it was easy to look at a series of areas and think, "Oh! The past 3 areas look all the same." This module definitely doesn't give you that at all. You feel like going out and exploring the world.
3. An interesting approach to making all classes and builds viable. In many other PWs, I found out that at higher levels, you REALLY needed to be able to cast magic to do anything, while toons that couldn't generally become entirely dependent on caster classes to survive any even regular mobs. It naturally encouraged people to make hybrid builds/power gaming. For some people (eg. me), I'm not all that keen on power gaming, and sometimes just want to have fun with a single class build, for example.
What I really like is that they've introduced some custom items that really help class balancing. For example, they have these rods that cast ghostly visage at 15th level (unlike the vanilla rod of the ghost), that are affordable fairly early on. For melee chars without any magic of their own, it makes a great long duration buff they can use themselves early on, and allow for solo exploration (and of course a great buff for regular uses as well). They've also made some tweaks and changes to various classes to make them more viable at higher levels on their own (eg. barbarians get passive stat boosts at fixed levels, bards' bard song is tweaked to give more boosts and have access to have unique special arrows, etc). Many spells have also been tweaked to make them more useful and/or powerful (eg. everyone's fav Magic Missile scale up with each level to make it more powerful though I'm sure where it caps, but it does give the spell a lot more punch and therefore value at least when you're in your teens).
4. Good balance between solo and party play. So far, I've had more success than failure in exploring the areas I've seen on my own. But no matter what, all these areas have some kind of encounter that will demand party play (usually boss types). Essentially, you have access to some decent loot that allow your toon to remain viable, but if you want the really good stuff, you will have to go in a group which encourages party play (or you could just revisit them at much higher levels on your own, but odds are the loot you'll get will be under powered to your current level). Sure, this is standard to most modules, but I like the implementation of it here.
5. The in-game economy looks robust...so far. Granted, I will only get a real sense and feel for it at higher levels, but up till level 17, it's been all right so far. One thing many people might find off-putting is that "good" loot is often not sellable, which makes you wonder about the value of going for them. In a way, I think it's an attempt to keep the economy a little more stable and prices for goods more accessible. The plus side is that you can make gold at a decent clip without having to sell high end gear (mobs of your level auto-give around 30-50 gold per kill in addition to various random drops and "bounty" items that sell for a sizeable amount, and at level 17, I'm spawning around 8 odd creatures per mob in many areas). Also, the quests give a decent amount of gold as rewards (usually around 5k+), which means doing the many quests that are there are definitely worth your time. For example, there are standard bounty quests in each area where you have to get 20 of a specific item and turn them in. So on top of the 5k you'll get as the quest reward, you will also manage to get an additional money from trying to farm said item from each kill (the value varies depending on what your killing of course). You can make money quickly enough, and you'll need to money for many of the useful items available. At my current level, I'm making around 20-50k from such runs. One thing to note: these bounty quests are a one time deal and so once you turn in the bounty, you can't get the reward and XP again (though the items needed for the bounty can still be sold to vendors, sometimes for a decent price).
6. VERY well developed lore! I won't say more to not spoil thing for anyone 
'>
So overall, you won't be hampered by not being able to sell big loot. The only issue I have here is that there doesn't seem to be any consistency in what is sellable and what isn't. So far that hasn't been an issue, but let's see what happens as I reach higher levels.
There are a lot more good points I can talk about, but these are the main ones that have stood out for me and have allowed me to enjoy my time here. Of course, to be fair, there are some cons to the pros, but I would like to state that, overall, the pros have significantly out-weighed the cons and should not deter you from trying out this module. So here are the two main issues have with Alangara so far:
1. The forge system. Alangara has a crafting system of sorts of overcome the need to constantly farm for uber gear. They have done this through the use of the forge system. At level 10, you can get access to a magical forge run by a dwarf (naturally) and hilariously assisted by a chart topping pop duo called hotNcold (comprised of a red and white dragon - I'm not making this up and for some reason I found it hilarious!). This forge can be used to upgrade your gear, from improving weapon/armor enchantment levels to adding ability boosts, DR, SR, etc. It operates on needing items called forge tokens (which are used to purchase these upgrades). Depending on the power/level of the enchantment you want to add to an item and the number of existing enchantments on said item, the cost increases (ie. you will need less/more tokens). The system itself is simple enough, but one thing still needs work: pricing. I was able to give a plain, unenchanted shield a +5 shield bonus bonus for just two forge this morning (which seems hilariously cheap), but I need FAR more to add a +5 enchantment to my current weapon due to the number of existing enchantments on it. As such, I'm having a hard time figuring out what exactly it would cost me to add stuff to an item. Add to this it never tells you how much you need when you don't have enough tokens (it will only tell you if you have enough tokens already), and that leaves me a bit confused about how to go about saving up and planning my upgrades.
2. Some parts are still rough around the edges. This isn't actually a complaint, since they're constantly working on the module and tweaking and retweaking literally on a daily basis. It's just a warning to some people who might be put off initially. The main culprit here would be the language, as there are a lot of grammar/spelling mistakes. But again, let's be fair: the builder's native language isn't English, and it isn't fair to expect him to be able to use the language as a native speaker would. However, he is working on improving it, and he has said there will be improvements to the text stuff ASAP.
There are a LOT of things about this module I can't comment on currently because I haven't gotten to a point where I can experience them. eg. Apparently, there's a leveling system past 40 for another 40 levels, but I have no idea what it entails), and I haven't even touched the guild system. So sadly, I cannot say much about them.
But otherwise, I heartily, heartily recommend Alangara - New Dawn to anyone who is still interested in playing NWN online. Do give it a try. The creators clearly have put a lot of heart and soul into making this world, and it really shows. So do give it a try!
