I went into the dev chat expecting it to be unspectacular, you can't goto a chat expecting a million and one answers for a million and one questions, not to mention sneak peaks and previews. It's not going to happen. I've been following dev chats since the good ol' days (tm) of the Stratics House of Commons chats for Ultima Online and I knew what to expect.
Instead of reviewing each question I'll look at the ones that contain substance and something to get into.
[19:25:53] <@warhammeronline> Thahitia asked: I know you might not talk about classes, but are there any plans to give range dps some kinda cc, so melee will not instant kill range dps if they get close.
[19:25:53] <@warhammeronline> Nate_Mythic answers: More CC on ranged careers is always "dangerous" because of kiting concerns. In general, we try to balance CC at higher levels (i.e. realm as a whole). That being said, CC is one of those aspects of player combat which we're always monitoring for balance issues.
Wait, someone want's MORE crowd control in the game? Bugger that! Kiting and chain roots, snares etc must be abolished, well you shouldn't be forced to spend the majority of a fight with some form of crowd control to prevent player actions. Take a look at your class. In a 2 minute 1v1 fight, would you be able to keep crowd control on an opponent for more than 50% of the battle? If so then crowd control is over the top.
[19:28:50] <@warhammeronline> [EC]Steve asked: Why does Divine Assault and Rend Soul not get affected by a healing debuff what so ever
[19:28:50] <@warhammeronline> Agershowitz_Myt answers: Divine Assault and Rend Soul are lifetaps as such the amount of healing generated by them are proporitionate to the damage dealt. This means you can reduce their healing by reducing offense, Str/WS debuffs, Damage Debuffs, Taunt Etc are all effective ways of reducing damage and in turn also reducing the effectiveness of these heals
I had to look up what those were, but they do seem like very sick abilities for melee healers, especially in skirmishes and just general survival. 350% of your damage? That's pretty nuts, even with debuffs and taunts that's till grabbing a huge, huge increase. No wonder it seems that WP's and DoK's (I assume) are incredibly difficult to kill even with multiple people attacking them. Must stress though, it SEEMs that way though...
[19:31:15] <@warhammeronline> Beves asked: Faultfinder the ability that allows you do to 10% more damage to keep doors is pretty useless, are you going to improve it?
[19:31:15] <@warhammeronline> Agershowitz_Myt answers: Faultfinder as well as many of the other RvR seige specific abilities will be getting updated around the same time that the RvR team releases many of their oRvR improvments in future patches
Updated eh? Hmm, nerfed or buffed... I really don't like the idea of buffing damage done to doors. They're big huge iron gates or solid oak, not pieces of soggy cardboard. They already go down quick enough with a concentrated assault. They should bump up the door hitpoints, but put the focus on siege weapons doing more damage to the doors, rams should do the most but the ballistas and catapults should be able to damage doors as well, makes them actually semi useful and gives the defenders a reason to try to sally out to take down the siege weapons rather than tipping oil, waiting for the inevitables *Tip-splosh.....*
[19:33:38] <@warhammeronline> TfG|FiFa asked: hello, is it true that every 2h and dual wielded weapons have a 10% less chance of getting blocked/parried by the opponent? thx
[19:33:38] <@warhammeronline> Agershowitz_Myt answers: Greatweapons (2HD) are harder to block, Dual Weild (2x 1HD) get a parry bonus on incoming attacks
I never knew that. Does explain why Witch Hunters parry a bucket load of my attacks and I can't block for shit against Swordmasters and White Lions....
[19:34:15] <@warhammeronline> Zeiden asked: Do you plan on implementing new ways of capturing a keep such as for example Choppa throwing catapults or breaking the walls instead of only the door or maybe moving Siege weapons?
[19:34:15] <@warhammeronline> Josh_Mythic answers: Maybe. :)
If anything it will be the third option, can't see the walls being breakable sadly, nor being able to launch Orcs (as cool as it would be). Just not really practical to design I guess. Need more effort on looking at siege weaponry though (still need to write down my ideas for it)
[19:36:41] <@warhammeronline> Mendoras asked: PvE in Tomb Kings: you stated out that it will be a little above LV. Will we see more challanging and intelligent PvE Encounters? In ToA (DAoC) we had some tactical encounters like ML9 Phoenix ... thats somtheing I miss in WAR. Or are there plans for Warband Encounter or large Open World Encounters like tge Dragons in DAoC?
[19:36:41] <@warhammeronline> Destin_Mythic answers: Thanks, I implemented the Phoenix encounter! The Land of the Dead (our Tomb Kings dungeon) does indeed offer some incredible encounters like you describe. In fact, the team working on this dungeon is the same team that built The Lost Vale, so you can expect The Land of the Dead to represent the next level of gameplay.
For those who don't know what ML9 Phoenix is, check out the video, it's not the best to look at, or work out what's going on, but it was a fun fight. Well I'm actually looking forward to the PvE element of Tomb Kings as well, as odd as it may be, it's also the PvE content which will help this game, despite it being RvR focussed. If you can lure the PvE'rs in, get them hooked to the RvR. Oh to have things such as the Glacier Giant going through the zones... (link1) (link2) (link3)
[19:38:54] <@warhammeronline> Helird asked: I would like to know what reasons you had to implement the current Wards system when it is obviously not the best. It is based entirely on luck and can be completely frustrating when items drop for classes not even present in the instance (I have been doing Lost Vale for 6 months now and only received 3 drops on my Zealot)
[19:38:54] <@warhammeronline> Agershowitz_Myt answers: We are actively working on ways of improving the ward system so that it is less tied to loot and more through in game acheivments (beating content)
Attunement style would do me fine!
[19:45:38] <@warhammeronline> [F]Sauce asked: Hey, having seen that its not as simple as one might hope to achieve massive scale rvr, with server stability and class balance being some of the issues, do you plan on steering RvR to smaller skirmish fights or persisting with 'zerg vs zerg'?
[19:45:38] <@warhammeronline> JeffS_Mythic answers: We have a team of engineers constantly tweaking and optimizing our server and client code. We plan to cater to both smaller skirmishes (via scenarios and objective captures) while introducing new tactics for several warbands to work with to encourage them to spread around to capture zones. We'll be applying these ideas to the cities as well as we improve them.
Ah nice, I'm starting to appreciate small scale battles so much more now. Even running solo recently, but WHY does 95% of the enemy (and I am not being sarcastic) start running away the minute they are close to death. Just fight it out for Gorks sake, be an orc! But anyway, lets hope they can reduce the mass zergs this game is becoming.
[19:51:10] <@warhammeronline> Fed|Rhissa asked: AoE abilities currently seem to be a bit stronger than most players want them to be. Reading US boards it seems though only ground target AoEs (RoF, PoS) and associated tactics are going to be revamped. My personal experience is that also instant cast AoEs are to strong, yet they seem to be out of discussion. Are there any plans to change instant cast PB AoE spells along with GT AoE spells?
[19:51:10] <@warhammeronline> Agershowitz_Myt answers: AoE damage is a concern for us and we will continue to work on balance adjustments, our first focus is fixing GTAOE in a way that eases up the current choke point issues without over nerfing the careers that use them. After which we will continue to watch AoE damage in general
You know, i don't think people really mind about the actual damage AoE does, it's more the fact you can place the target where the camera can see a spot, but not where the character can. Just fix it. Seriously. 'You. Cannot. See. There.'
[19:51:13] <@warhammeronline> kynoko asked: are we ever going to see arenas in WAR ?
[19:51:13] <@warhammeronline> Josh_Mythic answers: Definitely possible.
Gork no... No arenas in the WoW style. If you want to add in 6v6 style fights (which I'm all for), then add a zone, that 6v6 teams can queue for, upon entering a fight it places you and your opponents in an instance themed on the zone (maybe an out lying farm, a village or inside a city under siege). Small bands fighting over control and resources of a town, grants tokens to spend on special items which can only be used in the zone. Have a map which shows the victory points for the individual instances and which side 'controls' more of the region. Must expand on that idea...
[19:52:15] <@warhammeronline> Wiggletphyre asked: Are you going to implement the city's of the other 4 races in the near future?
[19:52:15] <@warhammeronline> Destin_Mythic answers: Not in the near future, no. For now we are focused on bug fixing, improving RvR, improving performance and stability, and testing / refining the Call to Arms live expansion.
Argh! You dirty, dirty apes! Give us greenskins our 'omes back. I don't want to be sharing it with the pink humies that smell bad... Bah.. guess my little hope goes out the window and into the drops now *grumbles*
[20:01:02] <@warhammeronline> kynoko asked: even if 200 people go to a frortress, and u have 20 tanks healing the door. how u suggest to smack the doors down ? it's impossible for us.
[20:01:02] <@warhammeronline> Agershowitz_Myt answers: There is a hotfix due soon to help fix this issue it will only allow the door to be healed a certain number of times over a set duration by the Tank's Realm ability
Fanbloodytastic.. You can remove the ability for mass tanks to heal doors, but you can't remove the ability for mass AoE on a single spot, mass group healing, or mass shooting through the fecken walls. Oh bugger off, what are tanks supposed to add to a keep or fort now? We stand in the way and get the crap blown out of us. Last Fort fight I was in, I could have gone afk for all I done standing there just making myself an obstacle. Ah, but don't worry. They're looking to upgrade the keep abilites such as fault finding... But rest assured, they're nerfing the tank one.. Gee, thanks.
Well, that's all I'm going over for now, there was a lot more to it and a few things I haven't touched on, but they are mainly things I don't have a strong opinion on, well not enough to warrant spamming you with even more walls of text crits. So anything from the dev chat that you guys found good.. bad... or just.. meh?
Friday, 20 March 2009
Thursday, 19 March 2009
And with my bajillion gold pieces, I can buy Altdorf
OK, I'm a poor Orc I have to admit. Too much respeccing, flight paths and wipes and not enough actual earning money makes the bank balance look a little pale these days. I'm well enough off that I don't have to scrabble in the drops to find a shinie to sell to pay for a re spec (well not yet anyway) but if I don't actually occasionally grind then I find myself looking at a dipping balance.
But then apart from re specs and wipe bills what outgoing expenses do we need? Is there really a point in making money once you get your 15 gold to buy your mount at level 20? I know Mythic don't really want you worrying about gold when you can be out there smashing skulls and breaking bones but with the ever growing influx of gold into the economy (quite unlike real life really) any attempt in the future to at least balance the cash flow could be impossible.
Gold sink rewards are good (mmmmm) and gold sink punishments are bad (dat 'urtz!). Mythic wants to keep the game flowing without it being a grind so putting in a gold sink punishment such as repair bills is not really an option. So what do we have? Well naturally it leads to the gold sink rewards, but again you don't want it to become a grind to get better gear so a reward shouldn't give you an advantage over another player who is more casual or just spends his teef like a good Orc. So what could we spend our shinies on?
Weapon & Armour Models: Much as we can get rare heads in the dye slots, how about paying a bucket load of gold for very unique looking pieces of armour and weapons? Pay 150g for one, slap it in the special dye slot and it will change the model of your stick to a model of a a shiny, pointy stick. Keep the dyes unusable until rank 40 to avoid level 1's running around looking like the Emperor after a good buffing from, one of his little priests.
More mounts: Instead of a re-hue, how about an actual new model? Give Orcs a wolf or Cyboar, Dark Elves could get the dark mounts, High Elves unicorns and Dwarfs can get a donkey... Just something different to ride on would be nice, but I guess it helps the silhouette point that WAR had (you should be able to recognise the class from it's silhouette) if all classes generally have one mount.
Emotes: It might sound silly (and WAR is actually a silly game really, but good silly) but add a few more emotes but make you have to pay to learn them. Not just generic ones, but emotes that come with animation, sounds and.. uhmm. flashy lights and jingley bells. OK maybe not the lights and bells...
Bank Slots: Obvious one really, lets us buy, say six extra bank slots for a 100g or whatever, can never have enough crap taking up space in your bank.... Especially me..
Of course, there will always be the people who scream "ZOMG FIX XYZ CLASS THEY ARE OP AND I R NERFED!!!!!1111eleventyonezomgbbqlol", but a game cannot exist on fixing perceived imbalances and purely career changes. A successful game adds the little bits of content at the same time to give everyone something to benefit from (and after all WAR has a content team for live events etc).
Well that's me off to the WAR-Europe dev chat. Wonder how it will go... Determined to get my "Make black orcs da biggest again!" question in... Hur hur hur
But then apart from re specs and wipe bills what outgoing expenses do we need? Is there really a point in making money once you get your 15 gold to buy your mount at level 20? I know Mythic don't really want you worrying about gold when you can be out there smashing skulls and breaking bones but with the ever growing influx of gold into the economy (quite unlike real life really) any attempt in the future to at least balance the cash flow could be impossible.
Gold sink rewards are good (mmmmm) and gold sink punishments are bad (dat 'urtz!). Mythic wants to keep the game flowing without it being a grind so putting in a gold sink punishment such as repair bills is not really an option. So what do we have? Well naturally it leads to the gold sink rewards, but again you don't want it to become a grind to get better gear so a reward shouldn't give you an advantage over another player who is more casual or just spends his teef like a good Orc. So what could we spend our shinies on?
Weapon & Armour Models: Much as we can get rare heads in the dye slots, how about paying a bucket load of gold for very unique looking pieces of armour and weapons? Pay 150g for one, slap it in the special dye slot and it will change the model of your stick to a model of a a shiny, pointy stick. Keep the dyes unusable until rank 40 to avoid level 1's running around looking like the Emperor after a good buffing from, one of his little priests.
More mounts: Instead of a re-hue, how about an actual new model? Give Orcs a wolf or Cyboar, Dark Elves could get the dark mounts, High Elves unicorns and Dwarfs can get a donkey... Just something different to ride on would be nice, but I guess it helps the silhouette point that WAR had (you should be able to recognise the class from it's silhouette) if all classes generally have one mount.
Emotes: It might sound silly (and WAR is actually a silly game really, but good silly) but add a few more emotes but make you have to pay to learn them. Not just generic ones, but emotes that come with animation, sounds and.. uhmm. flashy lights and jingley bells. OK maybe not the lights and bells...
Bank Slots: Obvious one really, lets us buy, say six extra bank slots for a 100g or whatever, can never have enough crap taking up space in your bank.... Especially me..
Of course, there will always be the people who scream "ZOMG FIX XYZ CLASS THEY ARE OP AND I R NERFED!!!!!1111eleventyonezomgbbqlol", but a game cannot exist on fixing perceived imbalances and purely career changes. A successful game adds the little bits of content at the same time to give everyone something to benefit from (and after all WAR has a content team for live events etc).
Well that's me off to the WAR-Europe dev chat. Wonder how it will go... Determined to get my "Make black orcs da biggest again!" question in... Hur hur hur
Tuesday, 17 March 2009
Cloaks - What a shame, what a waste
I've got three tome cloaks. The spring shawl, some undead scraggly one and the one with the screamer on it but they remain in my tome unlock items, a real shame as they are very nice and distinctive items, possibly more so than the trophys.
Once you reach level 16 and start finding cloaks around the lands I'd be impressed to see anyone still using them for non role-playing or posing reasons. The reason is simple, they have no use. The loot cloaks you can get, while fairly standard and plain looking can get your heraldry put over them or dyed specific colours, but more importantly. They have stats and bonuses which make a difference in your day to day playing.
That's the problem, so here's my solution (I'm very much a player who will offer a solution rather than just bitching about it).
Use the dye mechanism you get for the special heads (collectors, limited edition slayer and choppa etc) where you put the head in the special dye slot and it will change the face for you. Add this fuctionallity to the tome unlock cloaks where you can buy a cloak pattern instead of the cloak itself. Goto your local dye merchant, pop the pattern in and it will replace the old cloak model with the unlock one allowing you to enjoy your hard discovered cloaks and show them off no matter where you are.
Sounds straight forward enough to me, but no idea if there would be coding issues with it at all.
Either way, gimme my cloak made from stunty beards!
Once you reach level 16 and start finding cloaks around the lands I'd be impressed to see anyone still using them for non role-playing or posing reasons. The reason is simple, they have no use. The loot cloaks you can get, while fairly standard and plain looking can get your heraldry put over them or dyed specific colours, but more importantly. They have stats and bonuses which make a difference in your day to day playing.
That's the problem, so here's my solution (I'm very much a player who will offer a solution rather than just bitching about it).
Use the dye mechanism you get for the special heads (collectors, limited edition slayer and choppa etc) where you put the head in the special dye slot and it will change the face for you. Add this fuctionallity to the tome unlock cloaks where you can buy a cloak pattern instead of the cloak itself. Goto your local dye merchant, pop the pattern in and it will replace the old cloak model with the unlock one allowing you to enjoy your hard discovered cloaks and show them off no matter where you are.
Sounds straight forward enough to me, but no idea if there would be coding issues with it at all.
Either way, gimme my cloak made from stunty beards!
Monday, 16 March 2009
Urgh... 10% to go....
And I'll escape tier 4 for the joys of tier 1 again.
10% until I reach my renown rank target I set myself pre 1.2 and I'll hopefully get there tomorrow. Once that's done Lokax will be sticking with PvE and cultivation for a while I think.
You can only take so many zone crashes, suffer so much lag and watch yourself get rolled constantly by war bands as your tier 4 zones are captured during off peak hours leaving yourself staring at a screen of white (or black) coloured zones as "yet another fort is under attack". Fort defences lose its appeal and novelty factor because it happens so frequently now. Is the Dominance zone system to blame? Making it too easy to get to forts whereas before sides had to really work for a good day to push to a fort and couldn't send out the night shift to cap them all at 3am when the rest of the world sleeps. I'm hearing stories about servers that basically are all but empty in tier 4 for certain sides as the city gets destroyed daily as people can't defend the zones during the awkward hours.
Put it this way, I'll give it another MMO analogy. If you joined a guild with your max level character to raid instances and dungeons. Would you stay in them once you realised that every morning, while you were at work, they'd take there own level 40's out and do the instances themselves, leaving you with either going into the dungeon on your own to face overwhelming odds, or rolling a new character to join the lower instances. That's how it's starting to feel... Make an alt or just give up in sheer frustration at tier 4.
Or maybe everything is working as intended and I'm just needing to get used to being on the losing side for once in WAR?
10% to go....
10% until I reach my renown rank target I set myself pre 1.2 and I'll hopefully get there tomorrow. Once that's done Lokax will be sticking with PvE and cultivation for a while I think.
You can only take so many zone crashes, suffer so much lag and watch yourself get rolled constantly by war bands as your tier 4 zones are captured during off peak hours leaving yourself staring at a screen of white (or black) coloured zones as "yet another fort is under attack". Fort defences lose its appeal and novelty factor because it happens so frequently now. Is the Dominance zone system to blame? Making it too easy to get to forts whereas before sides had to really work for a good day to push to a fort and couldn't send out the night shift to cap them all at 3am when the rest of the world sleeps. I'm hearing stories about servers that basically are all but empty in tier 4 for certain sides as the city gets destroyed daily as people can't defend the zones during the awkward hours.
Put it this way, I'll give it another MMO analogy. If you joined a guild with your max level character to raid instances and dungeons. Would you stay in them once you realised that every morning, while you were at work, they'd take there own level 40's out and do the instances themselves, leaving you with either going into the dungeon on your own to face overwhelming odds, or rolling a new character to join the lower instances. That's how it's starting to feel... Make an alt or just give up in sheer frustration at tier 4.
Or maybe everything is working as intended and I'm just needing to get used to being on the losing side for once in WAR?
10% to go....
The Red Coats are comi... Hang on.. The Forums are coming!
Well for us Old Worlders it's about time we get our forums, and to go with it we get a little contest to win either the Skaven Cloak (rat on your back) or the Choppa/Slayer unique heads.
Directly from GOA on the European site... http://www.war-europe.com/
Now to think of either story or a guide... or Both.. Hmmmms.. Where's me thinking rock gone.. Also there's also the dev chat coming up on Thursday which I'll be sure to be joining.
Hope you all have a good week and what would you prefer if you had to choose? The heads or the cloak? Personally I'd really like the heads the cloak while very cool has one major drawback. It's a cloak, and my opinions about fancy cloaks will be revealed tomorrow (spoooky...)
Directly from GOA on the European site... http://www.war-europe.com/
Contests
But that’s not all! We have more news for you! We will hold two contests during the launch of the Official Forums and you will be able to win exclusive items: the Skaven Cloak and a unique for the Slayer and Choppa. There are two ways to enter these contests:
Fiction Contest - Check the Roleplay boards of our forum and write your story there.
Guide Contest - Write your own personal guide to the topic you prefer (careers, general game play, modding your UI) and post it on our forum to inform your fellow allies and enemies.
Now to think of either story or a guide... or Both.. Hmmmms.. Where's me thinking rock gone.. Also there's also the dev chat coming up on Thursday which I'll be sure to be joining.
Dev chat
Talking about discussions, we have an important announcement for you: To celebrate 6 months of WAR and the launch of our forum we’ll be hosting a European IRC chat with the Developers from Mythic on the evening of Thursday 19th March. More info on this in the upcoming days so stay tuned!
Hope you all have a good week and what would you prefer if you had to choose? The heads or the cloak? Personally I'd really like the heads the cloak while very cool has one major drawback. It's a cloak, and my opinions about fancy cloaks will be revealed tomorrow (spoooky...)
Sunday, 15 March 2009
Dat 'Urtz! - Review
And here we are Gud fans, it's time for another countdown of the five things that make Lokax go "Dat 'Urtz!" when he plays. There's been a few changes to this as I've been doing a bit more RvR this week, two items have dropped out, the LV Wipe runs (simply right now because N'kari was resettable for us finally) and terrain bugs (it'd be sixth) but it hasn't bothered me as much this week. This is now the aftermath of 1.2, so without further ado.. Why don't we take a look.
1) AOE Stacking
This has become a major focus point over the last week with small teams of engineers and primarily Bright Wizards (I'm assuming of course that Sorcs and Magi can do much the same) able to just obliterate warbands by stacking aoe on a single spot, most of the time without even being in sight of the enemy, simply hiding behind a wall and dropping it. I won't waste my time with a rant about it too much, I'll just advise you to check out the post over at Stunty Stomper regarding it. Thulf has said it better than I ever could.
2) Crowd Controlled out the game
I've actually taken to looking at my "Unstoppable" buff I get once I get CC'd (not when.. 'cause I will) and I think I've realised what one of the biggest issues with the crowd control system is. The Unstoppable buff takes affect the moment you are CC'd so if you are rooted for 10 seconds and it is not broken then you will only be 10 seconds away from another root or heavy CC. Now I might be wrong, I need to check it, but I think snaring a target is on a separate immunity timer (if it has one at all) so you could then be snared from a distance making it all but impossible for melee classes to get to you. It doesn't help we (black orcs) have one CC breaker in juggernaut which is on a 60 second cool down.
Solution: All classes CC immunity timers should start the second the crowd control is broken. Also Mythic, give us a proper counter to crowd control for ALL classes. At least there is a happy ending to the story, hopefully, according to the State Of The Game post: CC will be getting a look at "Our primary focus over the next few months will be the Crowd Control concerns and we will continue to investigate and fix issues we find with this type of ability. "
3) Being hurt through walls
Don't want to go over the same ground but it's probably worse now with AoE stacking through walls. Just fecken fix this crap Mythic, it's getting very close to the top of my list.
Solution: See last weeks Dat 'Urtz
4) (Please, no) More dots!
I'm all to familiar with DOTs being a former WoW Warlock, but the rate I seem to pickup DOTs in WAR is silly, I go near a couple of Bright Wizards or Engineers and I walk away with more DOT's on me than someone suffering from the measles. With weapon procs giving off dots and the nerf in resist effectiveness you can simply be dotted to death then knocked back/snared and there is absolutely bugger all you can do about it since there's very little way to remove any hex's debuffs or ailments that you are suffering from and those that do can only remove one on a long cool down.
Solution: Implement more core abilities for classes to remove DOTs, add a proper 'cure' potion for removing them or/and remove the dot affect from certain weapons so you you will not be covered in them. Though those classes that make use of DOTs the most MUST be given a buff in return for the nerf (probably direct damage).
5) The missing content
Still waiting on any news on our missing 2/3Rd's of our End Game. How long until a website or magazine picks up that 6 months down the line and WAR still hasn't added it's end game properly yet? C'mon guys, focus should be on adding the content that was removed before adding the stuff folks didn't ask for (not to say that Darkness Falls won't be good, but I'd rather have my cities there first)
Solution:Errr.. add them? Give us an update? There's at least some concept art of Eight Peaks floating around so they must have something still left of it before it was cut.
So that's my five thingies that are 'urting me right now in WAR. Wot's yours?
1) AOE Stacking
This has become a major focus point over the last week with small teams of engineers and primarily Bright Wizards (I'm assuming of course that Sorcs and Magi can do much the same) able to just obliterate warbands by stacking aoe on a single spot, most of the time without even being in sight of the enemy, simply hiding behind a wall and dropping it. I won't waste my time with a rant about it too much, I'll just advise you to check out the post over at Stunty Stomper regarding it. Thulf has said it better than I ever could.
2) Crowd Controlled out the game
I've actually taken to looking at my "Unstoppable" buff I get once I get CC'd (not when.. 'cause I will) and I think I've realised what one of the biggest issues with the crowd control system is. The Unstoppable buff takes affect the moment you are CC'd so if you are rooted for 10 seconds and it is not broken then you will only be 10 seconds away from another root or heavy CC. Now I might be wrong, I need to check it, but I think snaring a target is on a separate immunity timer (if it has one at all) so you could then be snared from a distance making it all but impossible for melee classes to get to you. It doesn't help we (black orcs) have one CC breaker in juggernaut which is on a 60 second cool down.
Solution: All classes CC immunity timers should start the second the crowd control is broken. Also Mythic, give us a proper counter to crowd control for ALL classes. At least there is a happy ending to the story, hopefully, according to the State Of The Game post: CC will be getting a look at "Our primary focus over the next few months will be the Crowd Control concerns and we will continue to investigate and fix issues we find with this type of ability. "
3) Being hurt through walls
Don't want to go over the same ground but it's probably worse now with AoE stacking through walls. Just fecken fix this crap Mythic, it's getting very close to the top of my list.
Solution: See last weeks Dat 'Urtz
4) (Please, no) More dots!
I'm all to familiar with DOTs being a former WoW Warlock, but the rate I seem to pickup DOTs in WAR is silly, I go near a couple of Bright Wizards or Engineers and I walk away with more DOT's on me than someone suffering from the measles. With weapon procs giving off dots and the nerf in resist effectiveness you can simply be dotted to death then knocked back/snared and there is absolutely bugger all you can do about it since there's very little way to remove any hex's debuffs or ailments that you are suffering from and those that do can only remove one on a long cool down.
Solution: Implement more core abilities for classes to remove DOTs, add a proper 'cure' potion for removing them or/and remove the dot affect from certain weapons so you you will not be covered in them. Though those classes that make use of DOTs the most MUST be given a buff in return for the nerf (probably direct damage).
5) The missing content
Still waiting on any news on our missing 2/3Rd's of our End Game. How long until a website or magazine picks up that 6 months down the line and WAR still hasn't added it's end game properly yet? C'mon guys, focus should be on adding the content that was removed before adding the stuff folks didn't ask for (not to say that Darkness Falls won't be good, but I'd rather have my cities there first)
Solution:Errr.. add them? Give us an update? There's at least some concept art of Eight Peaks floating around so they must have something still left of it before it was cut.
So that's my five thingies that are 'urting me right now in WAR. Wot's yours?
Saturday, 14 March 2009
Waits jus' a minute. Us Black Orcs are smaller than dem Choppas?
It's been rumbling for a while now, but with the visual aspect of the Choppa not being the biggest Orc in the game (defeating the whole lore aspect of black orcs being the biggest, darkest and toughest greenskin) it's starting to wear a bit at us Black Orcs. There's at least two threads out there which haven't even had a dev response about something that was meant to be in the game but quietly got cut. Now that we have the choppas increasing in size, it's time for all of us Black Orcs to stand up and be counted.
Show support for the cause, and when the European forums come up I'll be putting the same issue in, as well as putting a feedback request in today. Anyone that supports us, please post on your appropriate thread and drop (just one) feedback to Mythic asking for this feature to be put in now we're the smallest Orc.
Bioware Social Discussion
Warhammer Alliance Post
LET US GROW IN SIZE AND OUR SKIN GET DARKER AS WE GAIN RENOWN RANKS AS WAS ORIGINALLY PLANNED
Show support for the cause, and when the European forums come up I'll be putting the same issue in, as well as putting a feedback request in today. Anyone that supports us, please post on your appropriate thread and drop (just one) feedback to Mythic asking for this feature to be put in now we're the smallest Orc.
Bioware Social Discussion
Warhammer Alliance Post
WCPI Blog o' da week.
Recently discovered this blog Spearhead which is a very good read. Excellent layout, design and a lot of food for thought. Well writen and one I'll be reading for a long time.
Check it out:)
Check it out:)
Will WARs darkness fail?
So I'm starting to get some reservations for the Tomb Kings version of Darkness falls.... Will it help the WAR experience or will it hurt it in the long run?
WAR is supposed to be an Open RvR game. The focus of it is to engage the enemy on the field of battle to capture zones and get to the cities to engage in a bit of looting and pillaging. Now I understand that the land of the dead will be a zone for capturing, so there will be the initial burst of activity an warfare for the capturing of the zone and once it's captured, then what?
Will the winning side go to into the dungeon and look for the new rewards and items (to make it worth the time, the rewards have to be good otherwise people will not bother), clearing out the last remains of the previous occupants if there's any about with big zergy warbands? Will the losing side just uproot and bugger off back to tier 4 and take the unprotected BO's, keeps and possibly forts since they'll be locked out until another assault on the zone can be made? In effect making tier 4 a pretty dead area for one side..
I honestly don't know, but it's just a worry I have that it will split the sides more and become more of a RvE game once a side has the tomb captured.
Still, there's a long time to go and no doubt there will be mechanics in place to encourage the continual warfare... Well I hope there is....
WAR is supposed to be an Open RvR game. The focus of it is to engage the enemy on the field of battle to capture zones and get to the cities to engage in a bit of looting and pillaging. Now I understand that the land of the dead will be a zone for capturing, so there will be the initial burst of activity an warfare for the capturing of the zone and once it's captured, then what?
Will the winning side go to into the dungeon and look for the new rewards and items (to make it worth the time, the rewards have to be good otherwise people will not bother), clearing out the last remains of the previous occupants if there's any about with big zergy warbands? Will the losing side just uproot and bugger off back to tier 4 and take the unprotected BO's, keeps and possibly forts since they'll be locked out until another assault on the zone can be made? In effect making tier 4 a pretty dead area for one side..
I honestly don't know, but it's just a worry I have that it will split the sides more and become more of a RvE game once a side has the tomb captured.
Still, there's a long time to go and no doubt there will be mechanics in place to encourage the continual warfare... Well I hope there is....
Thursday, 12 March 2009
Picking flowers on the field of battle
So there I was on Monday morning. Charging through Dragonwake, yelling Waaaaaaaaaaagh! and with the intentions of slaughter and carnage, when I realised how quiet, serene and picturesque it was. So i stopped off my boar, let him snuffle about and decided to pick a small flower... Den i crushed it under me stompas!
Why are so many of the T4 RvR lakes (I don't run any alts right now so can't remember the others) designed in such a way that they look like tranquil landscapes and not war zones? Praag is actually the only one that feels as if there is a war going on with raging fire and burnt out shells of homes with the occasional NPC in battle with another NPC to give a sense of a warfare. You can be running with a warband through an empty, desolate zone and it feels very fake. Certainly not adding to the sense that you've entered into a battle zone.
So what do I feel could be done to make the RvR lakes more of a battleground?
In my opinion, the best place to feel like there's a war going on is actually all the way back in Mount Bloodhorn at the Kron Komar PQ and camps. The ambient sounds of warfare add so much to the zone, hearing cannons blast, Orcs shouting. To see explosions and enemies dying with two sides engaged in constant warfare. It feels like you're on the front line about to charge in. Now I don't expect Mythic to fill the lakes with NPC's and explosions due to lag reasons but surely it might be possible to add a few in, certain spots in the lakes where you can have two sides of NPC's locked in eternal combat (make them invulnerable to players to avoid them being farmed). Even better, and I have no idea if this would be possible, but have a system in place that plays louder and more frequent ambient warfare sounds (explosions, sounds of steel on steel, shouts and death cries etc) the more action there is in a lake, make it feel like you can hear the battle from a mile away. There's no need for it to get louder as you get closer, but make it feel as if you're stepping into a battle zone and not a landscape painting.
Scar the landscape some more with the marks of war. Sorry a keep with a bit bashed out the wall while the rest of the landscape around it looks like a summer field such as we have just now doesn't count. Craters with corpses, more ruined buildings and items around battlefield objectives (I always remember Nordenwatch at the Destruction starting flag with the fishing huts, being able to run around and feel as if you're in a small camp). The BO's still stick out like a sore thumb, something randomly placed. spice them up with war and blood!
Now I'm not saying that the whole zones must be littered with corpses and craters, or explosions and elves but a bit of world re-design would go long way to make it feel like WAR!
Why are so many of the T4 RvR lakes (I don't run any alts right now so can't remember the others) designed in such a way that they look like tranquil landscapes and not war zones? Praag is actually the only one that feels as if there is a war going on with raging fire and burnt out shells of homes with the occasional NPC in battle with another NPC to give a sense of a warfare. You can be running with a warband through an empty, desolate zone and it feels very fake. Certainly not adding to the sense that you've entered into a battle zone.
So what do I feel could be done to make the RvR lakes more of a battleground?
In my opinion, the best place to feel like there's a war going on is actually all the way back in Mount Bloodhorn at the Kron Komar PQ and camps. The ambient sounds of warfare add so much to the zone, hearing cannons blast, Orcs shouting. To see explosions and enemies dying with two sides engaged in constant warfare. It feels like you're on the front line about to charge in. Now I don't expect Mythic to fill the lakes with NPC's and explosions due to lag reasons but surely it might be possible to add a few in, certain spots in the lakes where you can have two sides of NPC's locked in eternal combat (make them invulnerable to players to avoid them being farmed). Even better, and I have no idea if this would be possible, but have a system in place that plays louder and more frequent ambient warfare sounds (explosions, sounds of steel on steel, shouts and death cries etc) the more action there is in a lake, make it feel like you can hear the battle from a mile away. There's no need for it to get louder as you get closer, but make it feel as if you're stepping into a battle zone and not a landscape painting.
Scar the landscape some more with the marks of war. Sorry a keep with a bit bashed out the wall while the rest of the landscape around it looks like a summer field such as we have just now doesn't count. Craters with corpses, more ruined buildings and items around battlefield objectives (I always remember Nordenwatch at the Destruction starting flag with the fishing huts, being able to run around and feel as if you're in a small camp). The BO's still stick out like a sore thumb, something randomly placed. spice them up with war and blood!
Now I'm not saying that the whole zones must be littered with corpses and craters, or explosions and elves but a bit of world re-design would go long way to make it feel like WAR!
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