So today got me thinking... How deep a game is WAR truly? In the long run, how much longer will this game hold peoples attention?
I come from an Ultima Online background, possibly the most deep MMORPG in history (it does have well over 10 years of game as well), but just the fact that there is a whole crafting system, PvP, exploration, player economy and social interaction sets it apart from the many other MMO's out there. You can literally log into UO and do anything.
Now my time in UO has long past, but my yearning to be able to just escape from the niche of a game still remains. WAR IS a PvP based game, the whole point in it is to battle one another, however you cannot expect people to always want to do this and at least you have public quests and... urm... well that's about it really. Or is it? I'll look at a few things we can do in WAR when the RvR grind gets boring or you just want a lazy day chatting to guild mates and doing random stuff.
The Tome of Knowledge
The tome of knowledge is a great idea for improving depth and giving us something to chase after, however sometimes it's more of a long slog just trailing through newbie zones looking for something (you don't know what) to give you.. well you're not sure. Now there's addons to help you discover things but I'm never a fan of 'cheat sheet' style addons to dumb down an aspect of a game. However being able to get a 'hint' ("Discover a specific item in Saphery" doesn't really cut it) by following items and quests in game as to where to get unlocks would be great.
Lairs
Fantastic idea, love the idea of mini bosses just waiting to be found, but it's so disappointing to setup guild runs to go off and find some only to discover that every single one you visit has been killed and it could be 12+ hours before they respawn. Drop that respawn timer on lairs, add a few more in but more importantly, give us a reward that would be useful for anyone for killing them. Keep the basic little bits of loot, they're good, help many players and some are still useful once you're in the end game gear, but how about adding a single item that drops from each boss. Once used, it unlocks a trophy for you. Oh to have Stinkfang the Vomitous' head on my shoulders, a necromancers book bound to my belt or the claw marks of a dragon embedded into my armour to show off with. The little things help to make great ideas more appealing to the mass market.
Crafting
There's just something lacking in WAR here. I know one of the main design points was not to make it Warhammer: Age of Needlework, and I agree with this, but we need more crafting to the game to give us something to do in down times, and also to give the achiever and socialiser more to do. My personal favourite idea would be to add Siege Crafting into the game based a bit on DAoCs own siege craft. Have the basic siege weaponry weakened down a bit from the Warcamps, but allow players to craft siege weapons that are much more powerful (honestly, who is wary of any siege weapons other than oil?). This is an idea I actually want to expand on and write about so I probably will get something down this week or so for it to explain further what I mean.
PvE
Ghah... Player vs. Environment... The bane of a PvP niche game. But it's what drive a lot of players to play an MMO. Everquest got good because of it's PvE aspect, as did WoW with it's raids and Ultima Online with its requirement to replenish stocks from monsters. For WAR to continue to exist and to gain more than 300,000 subscribers the game needs to appeal to those people who are bored of the raid grind in WoW but still have that itch for it. Going back to my last Dat 'Urtz I mentioned that the missing cities are making WAR miss out on content, get a focus on implementing the cities and you will have more PvE content for both sides to participate in, more loot, more stuff to do... You don't need to drag people from the RvR lakes, but you need to give those people who are bored of PvE in other games something to look at WAR for.. Six dungeons for each side doesn't cut it when two of them are for lower ranks. Get the cities in and get more PvE to show off.
Sunday, 8 March 2009
Saturday, 7 March 2009
Dat 'Urtz! - review
And finally.. welcome to the Dat 'urtz review for this week. It's been a long time coming but been stuck with work, 1.2 and Empire: Total War (sadly not as good as Medieval or Rome in my opinion) This was my initial list made before 1.2 and in all fairness it's probably best I wait a few more days before adding my 1.2 opinions in anyway ;)
As will be the usual, there's no point in bitching or moaning unless you can offer something constructive, so I'll at least try and offer a solution.
1) Crowd Controlled out the game
Sorry, Warhammer: Age of Crowd Control is still getting on my nerves. Snares, roots, knockdowns, disables, knock backs, silences and disrupts. That's a LOT of crowd control for a game which preached that it would be CC light. You can literally still be CC'd out a fight leaving yourself helpless. One of the most annoying aspects is the fact that the immunity timer still seems far too short and the knock back distances are still far too out of whack with certain classes being able to punt others for absolute miles with no way for the knock backed target to get back into combat before the KB cooldown is up.
Solution: I'd like to see all CC affects halved to see exactly how that performs. Remember tier 1 with little to no CC and how getting stuck in was fun? If not halved then a 50% increase to the immunity timer would help.
2) Being hurt through walls
So I'm standing beside a keep lord and I'm taking damage from turrets/demons and aoe from the floor below. These things magically shoot through floors and boil up through the cracks... No it's just lazy coding. It's happened on our server once before where basically the mass amount of turrets and aoe casting destroyed the defending healers and then destroyed the rest of the defenders who were stuck in combat. No sword was raised in anger or jibblie was kicked... Simply taken out by something which cannot see you... *Annoyed*.
Solution: It's something which probably isn't an easy fix but really needs to be looked at to polish the game to make it accessible for new players and not a lesson in frustration.
3) Lost Vale wipe runs
Ok, which dev thought it would be a good idea to spend just over seven minutes running from lost vale beach to N'kari (using short cuts). Seriously, Seven minutes wasted doing nothing apart from talking rubbish on vent and praying no-one gets dc'd or falls of a cliff and dies meaning someone has to start running from the beginning again. Keep in mind, this seven minutes isn't including loading zones or running from Averlorn to the boat, nor buffing up when at N'kari. For a game which again prided itself on being fast paced, why put a total time sink in to make it a brutally boring experience? The actual time it takes from dying to taking on N'Kari is well over 10 minutes of literally nothing... And that's not just for her/it/him/wtf, all the bosses are like that, one long, slog run....
Solution: You see those healers that spawn in LV (why do they heal exactly? there's a healer in the camps in Averlorn you run past....) allow them to teleport you to another spawned healer for example
"I can teleport you to the remains of:
Sechar
The Dark Promise Beast
Zaar"
*click* ~teleport~ \o/ win!
4) Where's our cities?
Soooooo, we have our Guard and Knight, soon we'll have our Choppa and Slayer.. Now all we're missing is four out of the six cities. Two thirds of the end game is currently missing six months from release. The servers are being consolidated so there's plenty of people to make the cities look busy. Imagine the content that they could add when these cities are finally (if they ever will be). Six new dungeons for each side, loads of new quests and unlocks... THAT is content that should be added back before putting the new stuff in. You could have new armour sets as well, where your sentinel might focus on one tree your dwarf and greenskin set could focus on one other tree and point ear lands could focus on the third tree, you could actually have a set of armour which helps your characters spec!
Solution: Erm.. add them, or at least give us a bloody update on them, it's been nearly a year since they were cut with not a single word on them but yet they can talk about new dungeons and zones.. Give us our end game content back!
5) Bloody terrain...
Run, run, run, run, stuck... Move, stuck still, move a bit more, still stuck, backpedal and run around twig on the ground.... Run, run, run, jump over rocks, find self stuck between three rocks and have to book out. Run, run, run, get stuck on random corner of a building.. get annoyed and throw object at screen... Run, run, run down path which is at a slope and ends up making you actually take damage because the gradient is in such a way you 'fall' down it....
I have to admit, the glitchy and buggy terrain is one of these things that slowly niggles away at you and can make a game play session which is already frustrating due to bugs or glitches (like being CC'd and then blown up through a wall while in Lost Vale after a seven minute wipe run as all you want to do is use your book to get back to your Orcy home but you're stuck with the Inevitable Shitty).
Solution: I'm going to start reporting bugs for ever terrain piece I get stuck in, fall down while running down it or generally is designed in such a way that it pisses me off. Do the same...
Well that's this weeks urty things. More posts and random dribbles of brain fluid over the next few days now it's my weekend....
As will be the usual, there's no point in bitching or moaning unless you can offer something constructive, so I'll at least try and offer a solution.
1) Crowd Controlled out the game
Sorry, Warhammer: Age of Crowd Control is still getting on my nerves. Snares, roots, knockdowns, disables, knock backs, silences and disrupts. That's a LOT of crowd control for a game which preached that it would be CC light. You can literally still be CC'd out a fight leaving yourself helpless. One of the most annoying aspects is the fact that the immunity timer still seems far too short and the knock back distances are still far too out of whack with certain classes being able to punt others for absolute miles with no way for the knock backed target to get back into combat before the KB cooldown is up.
Solution: I'd like to see all CC affects halved to see exactly how that performs. Remember tier 1 with little to no CC and how getting stuck in was fun? If not halved then a 50% increase to the immunity timer would help.
2) Being hurt through walls
So I'm standing beside a keep lord and I'm taking damage from turrets/demons and aoe from the floor below. These things magically shoot through floors and boil up through the cracks... No it's just lazy coding. It's happened on our server once before where basically the mass amount of turrets and aoe casting destroyed the defending healers and then destroyed the rest of the defenders who were stuck in combat. No sword was raised in anger or jibblie was kicked... Simply taken out by something which cannot see you... *Annoyed*.
Solution: It's something which probably isn't an easy fix but really needs to be looked at to polish the game to make it accessible for new players and not a lesson in frustration.
3) Lost Vale wipe runs
Ok, which dev thought it would be a good idea to spend just over seven minutes running from lost vale beach to N'kari (using short cuts). Seriously, Seven minutes wasted doing nothing apart from talking rubbish on vent and praying no-one gets dc'd or falls of a cliff and dies meaning someone has to start running from the beginning again. Keep in mind, this seven minutes isn't including loading zones or running from Averlorn to the boat, nor buffing up when at N'kari. For a game which again prided itself on being fast paced, why put a total time sink in to make it a brutally boring experience? The actual time it takes from dying to taking on N'Kari is well over 10 minutes of literally nothing... And that's not just for her/it/him/wtf, all the bosses are like that, one long, slog run....
Solution: You see those healers that spawn in LV (why do they heal exactly? there's a healer in the camps in Averlorn you run past....) allow them to teleport you to another spawned healer for example
"I can teleport you to the remains of:
Sechar
The Dark Promise Beast
Zaar"
*click* ~teleport~ \o/ win!
4) Where's our cities?
Soooooo, we have our Guard and Knight, soon we'll have our Choppa and Slayer.. Now all we're missing is four out of the six cities. Two thirds of the end game is currently missing six months from release. The servers are being consolidated so there's plenty of people to make the cities look busy. Imagine the content that they could add when these cities are finally (if they ever will be). Six new dungeons for each side, loads of new quests and unlocks... THAT is content that should be added back before putting the new stuff in. You could have new armour sets as well, where your sentinel might focus on one tree your dwarf and greenskin set could focus on one other tree and point ear lands could focus on the third tree, you could actually have a set of armour which helps your characters spec!
Solution: Erm.. add them, or at least give us a bloody update on them, it's been nearly a year since they were cut with not a single word on them but yet they can talk about new dungeons and zones.. Give us our end game content back!
5) Bloody terrain...
Run, run, run, run, stuck... Move, stuck still, move a bit more, still stuck, backpedal and run around twig on the ground.... Run, run, run, jump over rocks, find self stuck between three rocks and have to book out. Run, run, run, get stuck on random corner of a building.. get annoyed and throw object at screen... Run, run, run down path which is at a slope and ends up making you actually take damage because the gradient is in such a way you 'fall' down it....
I have to admit, the glitchy and buggy terrain is one of these things that slowly niggles away at you and can make a game play session which is already frustrating due to bugs or glitches (like being CC'd and then blown up through a wall while in Lost Vale after a seven minute wipe run as all you want to do is use your book to get back to your Orcy home but you're stuck with the Inevitable Shitty).
Solution: I'm going to start reporting bugs for ever terrain piece I get stuck in, fall down while running down it or generally is designed in such a way that it pisses me off. Do the same...
Well that's this weeks urty things. More posts and random dribbles of brain fluid over the next few days now it's my weekend....
Tuesday, 3 March 2009
Oooh 1.2 confirmed for tomorrow for Europe
From WAR-Europe.com
"Patch 1.2 is going Live Wednesday morning and we'll be doing the usual patch process; we’ll bring our servers offline at 08:00 CET and expect it to be finished by noon. This is a behemoth of a patch and we really recommend you to have a read and see what’s in store for you. We're including the highlights below and will post the full notes tomorrow."
Gud luk ladz!
"Patch 1.2 is going Live Wednesday morning and we'll be doing the usual patch process; we’ll bring our servers offline at 08:00 CET and expect it to be finished by noon. This is a behemoth of a patch and we really recommend you to have a read and see what’s in store for you. We're including the highlights below and will post the full notes tomorrow."
Gud luk ladz!
Mmmmm Gud - review
Well onto my first review of the five things I really enjoy in WAR right now. These will change from week to week, though some might hold fond memories for a long time.
1) Fixes, tweaks and polishing in 1.2
ANY MMO that admits it has 500 bugs fixed in a patch is getting a thumbs up from me. These are the little things that just don't sit right with you, whether it's the horrible game breaking bugs (ermm... can't think of any) or the simple things that just annoy and make the game look like it's in beta (stuck animations). Anything that improves this game and establishes it firmly in the MMO world is a great start and worthy of a thank you for still polishing the game up for us rather than leaving it half broken at points.
2) WAR Darkness Falls
Now I did play DAoC for a while (Excalibur - Midgard (Savage, Thane and Bonedancer) but didn't do all that much in DF due to it being a quiet place when I was playing. But the actual concept is great, a dungeon based rvr lake with tokens to save for rewards, interesting monsters, good story lines and a back and forth mechanic. Question is, will this drag players from the ORvR lakes?
3) Continual open RvR in the lakes
A clash of arms. Destruction meeting Order in the fields of war, corpses lying, explosions going off and a stunty trying to bite yer kneecaps off as you kick him in the noggin'. Brilliant stuff. The battles featuring sides for an extended period is the stuff I live for in the game. Not RvBO or RvKeep. The proper battles that last in for hours as sides struggle to match each other and don't simply zone hop or log out when they start getting beaten back. That.. is WAR!
4) New potions in 1.2
An addition to crafting is always fun for me. I do enjoy just playing about with things when not in a particularly bashing mood or I have a bit of lag, so being able to make new potions (which last through death.. yippee!) and discover new things is good fun. Now to get them to allow us to discover new almost unique potions upon a critical success on a high end pot...
5) Exploring!
To be able to stand in places of lore, to look down upon a battle field, to just walk through a blizzard or squelch through the marshes. WAR is a great game for the explorer in you. Even better when you sometimes have to struggle past an enemy camp to see things on the other side. And of course, sometimes, you get that little ping as you unlock a new tome entry, made all the more satisfying when you do it without aid and just your own sense of exploration
So that's my top five MMmm Gud! for this week. What's yours?
1) Fixes, tweaks and polishing in 1.2
ANY MMO that admits it has 500 bugs fixed in a patch is getting a thumbs up from me. These are the little things that just don't sit right with you, whether it's the horrible game breaking bugs (ermm... can't think of any) or the simple things that just annoy and make the game look like it's in beta (stuck animations). Anything that improves this game and establishes it firmly in the MMO world is a great start and worthy of a thank you for still polishing the game up for us rather than leaving it half broken at points.
2) WAR Darkness Falls
Now I did play DAoC for a while (Excalibur - Midgard (Savage, Thane and Bonedancer) but didn't do all that much in DF due to it being a quiet place when I was playing. But the actual concept is great, a dungeon based rvr lake with tokens to save for rewards, interesting monsters, good story lines and a back and forth mechanic. Question is, will this drag players from the ORvR lakes?
3) Continual open RvR in the lakes
A clash of arms. Destruction meeting Order in the fields of war, corpses lying, explosions going off and a stunty trying to bite yer kneecaps off as you kick him in the noggin'. Brilliant stuff. The battles featuring sides for an extended period is the stuff I live for in the game. Not RvBO or RvKeep. The proper battles that last in for hours as sides struggle to match each other and don't simply zone hop or log out when they start getting beaten back. That.. is WAR!
4) New potions in 1.2
An addition to crafting is always fun for me. I do enjoy just playing about with things when not in a particularly bashing mood or I have a bit of lag, so being able to make new potions (which last through death.. yippee!) and discover new things is good fun. Now to get them to allow us to discover new almost unique potions upon a critical success on a high end pot...
5) Exploring!
To be able to stand in places of lore, to look down upon a battle field, to just walk through a blizzard or squelch through the marshes. WAR is a great game for the explorer in you. Even better when you sometimes have to struggle past an enemy camp to see things on the other side. And of course, sometimes, you get that little ping as you unlock a new tome entry, made all the more satisfying when you do it without aid and just your own sense of exploration
So that's my top five MMmm Gud! for this week. What's yours?
So.. Dis 'ere is me thinking rock?
Well welcome once again to Mmmmm Gud. If you're just new here, or more likely just discovered this a year after this first post then the reason it's a welcome again is that I managed to delete all my old posts (well all three of them) and couldn't get them back.
The website is really just an outlet for me to rant, discuss and propose things for Warhammer Online. I'm firmly of the belief that should you have an issue with a game, then propose a solution or a better method, so needless to say I will be spewing what rubbish comes from my head at any given time.
At this time I've got a few regular features planned. A review of the things I really like in WAR right now (Mmmm Gud) and then the things that are really annoying me right now (Dat 'Urtz!). I'll also be joining the community project thingy on Warhammer Alliance so hope to find a new blog each week to promote for the game.
Well that's the intro done... Onto the first post...
The website is really just an outlet for me to rant, discuss and propose things for Warhammer Online. I'm firmly of the belief that should you have an issue with a game, then propose a solution or a better method, so needless to say I will be spewing what rubbish comes from my head at any given time.
At this time I've got a few regular features planned. A review of the things I really like in WAR right now (Mmmm Gud) and then the things that are really annoying me right now (Dat 'Urtz!). I'll also be joining the community project thingy on Warhammer Alliance so hope to find a new blog each week to promote for the game.
Well that's the intro done... Onto the first post...
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