If you watch Werit’s video of the King fight from the test server, you will see a cameo by our very own Grilar! We sometimes call him the traffic cone because he often dyes his armor orange. But in Werit’s video, Grilar became one of the champions (look for the huge orange engineer). I shall call him the traffic cone…. of doom!

Watch the video in high quality also.

The fight looks a lot more fun than previous city sieges. Even if you’re getting your butts kicked at least you get to be huge for a while. Read more on Werit’s blog.

I wanted to include a top five list of things to improve because I do want Warhammer to continue to be an enjoyable game.

1. Population balance

To see corresponding Order zerg pics, click here.

The bane of every PVP MMO seems to be population balance and Warhammer is no different. It seems every other month is feast or famine in this game. We switched factions a couple of times to Destruction to allow our server to recover from the effects of too many Order.

Population problems have been around for a long time. DAOC had problems but DAOC also had three factions. If one faction was doing badly the other two usually showed them some mercy (after taking their relics of course). If another faction was doing really well, the two underdogs ganged up on them.

I think the easiest solution to this one is to add a third faction. I bet devs are really tired of hearing this. But I really think it could a) revitalize the game and create more excitement b) help the underdogs gang up on the overdog (for lack of a better word) and c) (most importantly) bring in new players.

The problem with this is how do you redo the rest of the zones? That’s a hard one. It would probably have to be some sort of underground race so they wouldn’t have to redo the surface zones. It would be a lot of new content to create if they wanted to make it as rich as the other campaigns. I also don’t think it would realistically happen.

2. Game performance

Warhammer is not the most stable game out there. Every night at least one guildie crashes — and it’s not because their computer or their ISP sucks. I can run Guild Wars all day long and never crash. Warhammer, on the other hand, is a different story. I recently built a new machine that has more than respectable components. It should run Warhammer with ease. Yet I have the same problems that most of my friends are having. I get about 10-15 frames per second at any one time. I can have settings at “fastest framerate” or “oooh shiny” and it doesn’t make a difference and I have no idea why.

Game performance is a huge issue, especially with the upcoming city sieges. If you crash to desktop in the new city siege, you automatically get lockouts for the city encounter.

3. Rewards for RVR should be a choice and not a problem

If you are unfamiliar with the principle of game design regarding choices and problems, please watch this fun video. But if you don’t have seven minutes, here’s the gist using the example of the recent scenario changes where you earn an insignia upon completion of the scenario.

You can get insignias from winning a city PQ or by taking a keep, but by far the easiest way to get insignias is by doing scenarios. It is not a choice for players to do scenarios. If you want your weapon before 2012, you need to do scenarios. I think this is a perfect example of problem vs choice.

Is the goal of the game designers to remove players from the ORVR lakes? It sure seems like it.

4-5. If we MUST PVE to get better gear, make it less frustrating

This will count as two items because it deals with PVE.

- Buggy PVE encounters

I can’t think of anything more frustrating in a PVP game other than being forced to PVE. Oh wait, I can. Being forced to PVE in a game that has buggy PVE encounters (see earlier post: A TOVL Rant: Why don’t they fix this?).

It seems the best way Mythic has addressed this problem in the past is by removing the content altogether. We all remember fortress encounters, which were so buggy that it was nigh impossible to win (or or allowed you to win, see post of Destro’s first Altdorf siege here, which was assisted by a bugged Reikwald fort lord that warped to the bottom where they easily killed him).

Do they read bug reports? I submit one every time. Do they have time to fix them? I would guess not.

- Remove luck from the equation

I cannot remember where I read this but I think I heard that the devs are going to include a system where if you have the ward for a piece of equipment then you can actually buy the piece (someone in the know please correct me if I am wrong). That would be awesome, especially if they did it for every encounter.

Anyone who has been to the Tomb of the Vulture Lord knows that the loot drops are amazing and the drop rate is abysmal. We have gone through entire clears without seeing a single piece of Tyrant gear drop. Other guilds who have been doing this much longer than Fight on the Flag can tell you they’ve never seen a breastplate drop, or have seen multiple back pieces drop for classes not in attendance. This is sooo frustrating for players! Spending five hours in a dungeon to get nothing for anyone in the group is not fun. Yet the gear is so good we can’t not try.

So there’s my list. Please let me know what you think and if you would add or remove anything.

Ugh! I hate that! Fortunately any fight dodgers will get punished in the upcoming city changes by receiving a full complement of lockout timers for stages 1-3.

Unfortunately, CTDers are caught in the crossfire:

From Gaarawarr’s recent post regarding the new city instance:

GG - So one of our fellow WAR players would like to know if there’s going to be some way around strong groups.  Like leaving and rejoining as in scenarios.

Mike - This is the one where my gut reaction was to just penalize the crap out of people for doing that…

GG - ~whispers~ Go with your gut!

Mike - …but then it screws the people who went link-dead and came back or crashed, whatever the case may be.

GG - No one crashes in WAR…

Mykiel - Get better Internet…

Mike - Yeah…call your net provider, flush your DNS cache…

~all laughing~

• GG: Gaarawarr, a blogger
• Mike = Mike Wyatt (a developer)
• Mykiel = another blogger

In a Twitter conversation, Gaarawarr assured me it was a lighthearted conversation so don’t read too much into the text.

Currently as the city stands, if you CTD (crash to desktop) you are booted outside and have to requeue. I understand why they want to do this. (I would be a fan except I would be more likely to leave an instance to FIND a fight not to leave one.)

I really, really hope they can give the CTD player a break, maybe a 5-minute grace period, before they are permanently booted from the city and given lockout timers.

Here is a list of recent posts:

• Gaarawarr: Blaaagher Invasion – The Rest of the Story
• Mykiel: Total Eclipse of the Heart. QA with Andy Belford
• ShadowWAR: I <3 Bandy Belfords
• Werit: Mythic Trip: More City Details

Mine these posts for information (but they were also told that the information could change at any time). My guess is if it’s out in the public then it’s close to ready for player consumption.

EDIT: I will add more posts as I find them.

• Werit: Mythic Trip: Interview with the producer (with Carrie Gouskos)
• ShadowWAR: The Big Q’s (with Carrie Gouskos)

If you wanted to read the massive dev thread, go here.

All will be revealed in time and I suppose there’s no use fretting about what will eventually happen. I am planning a few posts for the coming week or two:

1. Commentary on the new city mechanic
2. Why game designers should cater to guilds and players, not the player or the guild alone
3. Our reward-centered gaming culture and why it should change

I realize no game will ever be perfect, although DAOC before Trials of Atlantis and New Frontiers came awfully close.

Cleanup, aisle 5!

It’s too bad we didn’t have better attackers. I would’ve loved to have seen what our organized group could have done against organized Arsenal. We have faced them before, and whenever they lose resoundingly they tend to leave to find easier pickings. At least we know we can put up a good fight.

Order also downed the King at a fairly reasonable time Saturday night. I was so hyped up afterward that I could hardly sleep. Andora, our SM, got his final piece of Warlord gear and will be able to tank the king as soon as he gets one renown rank. Woot!

Now, in a completely unrelated rant, please inspect the following two screenshots:

See the difference? In both screens, I took a screenshot of the moment the zone was taken by Order. However, in the top version, I only got 192 renown for taking Praag, even though I had been there for both keep takes and a number of Battle Objectives (see above: I had just helped take Armory when the Scenario popped for us). It appears that after joining BFP that I had the idle hands debuff (seven seconds left before scen starts, see ss). This reduces the renown you can earn.

In the second one I was in the Maw when Chaos Wastes flipped. You will notice I got a ton of renown. So in short, there is no incentive to take a scenario when you stand to gain so much from having taken BOs and keeps earlier in the day. This is really something that Mythic ought to fix. ~13,000 renown vs ~200 rewnown? There is really no choice there.

I’ll take the larger figure, please.

Here are more pics from the same location of more Order flowing into the Manor.

• Picture 1
• Picture 2

By the way, Saturday was the worst night I’ve had in gaming in a very long time. We had double overdog points (I guess that’s what we call them) meaning that Order had attacked Inevitable City twice within 24 hours. That means it takes much longer to cap zones. We couldn’t get enough Victory Points to cap either. Sometimes we were sitting at 105% of required VP and because of the underdog mechanic we couldn’t cap. I hope this was a big reminder to Order to keep those in mind when we schedule a city push.

Long story short, we started at about 8 p.m. Pacific and didn’t get to the city until midnight (major sorrow for the Eastern timezone people). I wanted to stab myself in the face with a screwdriver. We had a good fight at the entrance to Maw. Then in the city my warband just happened to get the one with the halfway decent Destro in it. I was soo tired. Unfortunately we had a lot of random PUGs in the scenario with us. Eventually they left to make way for Irony, but the damage was done.

Fortunately we managed to take the city during the Super Bowl and down the king. Unfortunately for us those of our guildies who watch football socially did not get to join us At least it’s one step closer to getting full Warlord for Andora, who will be able to tank the king for us during our future FOTF king runs!

Five members of FOTF got into a warband with V’los Vel’drin and a few other guilds. Bangrund did a fantastic job tanking. We worked with Run Like Hell to lock down an instance. Destro bodies were everywhere.

Fighting on the flag in a city assault is truly the best thing ever!

Teamwork among Order was great! For the instances that were losing the PUGs left and they were replaced by organized Order.

I think at least two king instances of Order got nice shiny Warlord/Sovereign pieces. Both Pylith and Truncheon are decked out in full Warlord. It was my first king instance and I also got a few pieces after breaking royals down. Next time I will be in full Warlord and will then be working on Sovereign.

Grats Order on our fantastic teamwork!

We also had some really fun fights in BOs this weekend!

Here, the manor in Eataine (click to embiggen).

We were flipping zones like pros and almost made it to stage 2 on Sunday’s IC push for those of us unable to make the first king run. Unfortunately my WB was in the losing city instance. I think either a lot of Order left or a lot of Destro joined (or both) and we lost the last stage 2 event. D’oh! Maybe next time.

Destro was definitely out in force.

I was proud of how our realm did in almost defeating them during prime time. Destro must have been taking a break after beating our king Sunday morning or more would’ve shown up for that effort.

On another note, we had an honorary member of our guild return to the game.

Woot! Welcome to the guild Rugbyrat!

Now we need to get back to our previous state of pwn on this server. We’re basically handing out free crests at this point as we relearn our characters.

We definitely have a fight ahead of us though. Destro outnumbers us by a large margin. This is not the same server we left. The Destro are also more organized and higher RR than Order.

This screenshot cannot do justice. I wish I could do wide angle shots. The front of the north keep in KV was packed full of about four warbands at one point this weekend.

Destro is also in the city about three times a day. Sunday they did an alarm clock raid and pushed the city to stage 2. For those who have not been in the city during stage 2, it’s pretty boring, though there still are some Destro who remain to fight. Everyone else is in the Warlord PQs.

As a result of frequent city pushes, many of the high powered Destro are in full sets of Warlord gear.

FOTF is not the only group returning from Aion. Dooger made a post welcoming back those of us who are returning.

Do you want to return to Warhammer? I can hand out some 10-day free trials (as long as you’ve been gone for 60 days or more). Just reply in the comment using your real e-mail address. I can only send out one per day, though.