Fellowship's time-friendly, hypercharged take on World of Warcraft dungeons springs back to life as tens of thousands of players return

Fellowship Season 2 is here, and I'm breathing a gentle sigh of relief seeing the playerbase return to action. The dungeon-driven RPG, which takes the broad World of Warcraft experience and distills it down to the singular focus of multiplayer combat encounters and gearing, had fallen tremendously quiet while developer Chief Rebel worked on its first big seasonal overhaul. That wasn't entirely unexpected given that it's explicitly not trying to be the forever game that WoW is often seen as, but I'd begun to fear that people simply wouldn't come back, and I'm glad to see those worries quashed.

Do you miss those heady days of pouring entire evenings and weekends into grinding away at your World of Warcraft toon, but simply don't have the time or energy to invest nowadays? Fellowship is the answer to that conundrum. The self-styled 'multiplayer online dungeon adventure' combines classes inspired by the likes of Diablo with the MMO holy trinity of tanks, healers, and DPS. Its encounters are challenging and involved, requiring careful teamwork and coordination to overcome. It captures the heart of what makes WoW raiding special, without demanding tons of busywork in order to get the gear you need.

Fellowship Season 2 is Chief Rebel's biggest update so far, introducing two new heroes and an open-world zone designed as a low-pressure space to get to grips with what your chosen character is capable of. The newcomers, time-manipulating healer Aeona and supportive paladin Xavian, have been designed as a "power couple". You don't need to play them together, but their abilities complement each other well if you do.

Aeona's mere presence is enough to temporarily stall 50% of incoming damage taken by anyone in the group. This is shown to the whole party, and it'll gradually tick away, giving you time to react accordingly. Aeona is able to cleanse this delayed damage before it even lands, but much of her other healing is actually generated by the damage she deals to foes. As someone who favors playing Sage among Final Fantasy 14's roster of healers, I'm already predisposed to enjoy this dynamic.

As a paladin, tank hero Xavian brings his own limited set of heals to the table. This makes him a perfect match for Aeona, as he's able to help respond to the staggered damage that builds up, lending support where and when it's needed most. He applies stacking debuffs to enemies that he can consume to regain mana. His Shining Halo places a burning pool on the ground that protects Xavian from damage, and immediately scratches the Consecration itch in a way that will make long-time WoW paladins happy.

The other big addition for Season 2 is the Woodland Glade. You can go here at any time from the Stronghold, even while you're waiting for the matchmaking queue to pop. If you aren't already a hardened raider or an MMO veteran, or just like to take time to master your rotation, this is the spot to do it. There are no timers or major bosses in this open-world zone, and the enemies you face won't demand you show up with a full complement of the holy trinity to overcome them. Fight alone or with others to sharpen your skills so that you're ready once the real action gets underway.

Community director Hamish Bode says there's been a real push to address community feedback "at a larger scale" for the Fellowship Season 2 update. "We've had a look at player progression and made amendments to make things flow much better, on top of introducing new rewards for our veteran players. We've also made sure that new players that aren't necessarily familiar with the MMO-based dungeon-crawling mechanics get a chance to ease themselves in and properly learn Fellowship's core gameplay loop without added pressure."

After reaching launch highs of more than 40,000 concurrent players on Steam, Fellowship's player count gradually trickled off, and by February there were less than 1,000 people on at any one time. Fellowship isn't designed to demand the sort of long-term time investment that the games it was inspired by do, so it makes sense that this would happen, but for a game so dependent on multiplayer it made newcomers immediately question whether the community was already dead when they couldn't find people to play with.

Seeing that playerbase spring back up into the tens of thousands with the Season 2 launch is great news. While the numbers aren't what they were on day one, they're still more than strong enough to ensure fast matchmaking, and even more impressive when you consider its spot in the calendar just a week out from the full launch of World of Warcraft Midnight. It's a reassurance that there's still enough interest in what Fellowship is doing, and gives me hope that Chief Rebel will be able to continue growing it through early access into something that stands the test of time.

Fellowship Season 2 is live now, and you can grab the game at a 25% discount through Monday March 2, meaning you'll pay just $18.74 / £15.74. Chief Rebel says it's likely to raise the price when early access ends, so if you've been contemplating picking it up, now might be a great time to do so.