f13.net

Honestly, I'm not worried about the gold sellers. It's going to go away, gold means fucking nothing - NOT A FUCKING THING - in WAR. NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOTHING.

I wonder how many will actually stick around after the first 30, though. 

majority is probably staying for the Tier 4 content promised by mythic, namely Capital City siege. Once they've done that and depends whether it's a complete lagfest or a complete deadlock or one side gets completely zerged with no chance, then people may or may not resub.

There's no way in hell world PvP works when one side is outnumbered at least two to one on all bar a couple of servers.

I almost wonder if mythic will have to "beef up" the order classes to compensate for the being outnumbered.  Would be an interesting way to counterbalance unfair population discrepencies. 

Make order classes OP to copensate for being outnumbered.  If destruction players reroll on order side, scale back order.  Would be tricky in scenarios were both sides are even numbers....

It's as simple as adding a realm wide damage or health or exp or whatever bonus directly based on population.

Something, clearly, is just not attractive about the order classes.

The imbalance might not have been so bad if empire had a tank.

Have you tried playing an order elf? Check out the white lion class. They prance around like nancy boys in dresses. The animation is cardboard, awkward, and just plain awful.

Have you tried playing an order elf? Check out the white lion class. They prance around like nancy boys in dresses. The animation is cardboard, awkward, and just plain awful.

I'm not saying the sky is falling, but the game never should have released without at least one each of the holy trinity (tank, healer, dps) from each region. 

Perhaps the old rules do not apply, why do you think you need a basic "Tank" class, I haven't played order yet, but really... A lot of the classes on the order side seem to be able to take a ton of damage.

I dunno, i think attempting to try to apply the "Tank, healer, DPS" rules to this game and its classes may be a mistake. Most of the classes in this game are a hybrids.

You (and others) say you have no tanks, whats an iron breaker? or the priest guy in full plate? (i haven't played any of them). I get that there is no stright up "Tank" on order side like on destruction.... but i bet the other classes make up for it.

Order just isn't badass looking so people just aren't as keen to play them.

You (and others) say you have no tanks, whats an iron breaker? or the priest guy in full plate? (i haven't played any of them). I get that there is no stright up "Tank" on order side like on destruction.... but i bet the other classes make up for it.

I've been playing arround with the Destruction classes lately, and visuals aside, I don't think they're that much different vs their Order mirrors.  Playing on Iron Rock, there are few, if any, healers in the scenarios at T1.  Those few that do queue up heal themselves only.  Order, on the other hand, have plenty of healers, and they heal others.  Destruction generally gets it's ass kicked in the scenarios.

I 100% believe that the destruction imbalance is due to them being "cooler" to most males between the age of 12 and 30 that play video games (and the occasional girly).

Didn't it fail in WoW  though, to the point where they had to clone night elves for the "cooler" side?

I think the point which Merusk highlighted is that WoW's and WAR's core audiences are slightly different.  WoW is more PvE focussed, with PvP tacked on.  WAR is PvP focussed, with PvE tacked on.  The slight change in focus brings a more PvP-centric crowd to WAR, who tend more towards stereotypical 14 year old boys (note - I said tend, I realise there are plenty of 65 year old grandmother gankers "Would you like a cup of tea dear?  Or a slice of cake?  Corp Por - lol azzrape").  Remember, for a long time WoW's PvE servers had a strong alliance bias, and the PvP servers were pretty even Alliance-Horde.

There were also a couple of extra points.  Alliance had a common view as being more complete early on with better quests etc.  Warhammer's style has been 'Chaos spiky pointy death is kewl' for years now.  Horde had no elves, which hurt their numbers (helped quality of players IMO - the place has gone to the dogs since they let the elves in).  Warhammer has good elves and bad elves, and everyone knows bad elves are kewler than good elves.  Except for Drizzt, who was bad before he became good.  etc etc.

If Mythic added that one lizard-man good race they might see better balance...who knows.  race/style is lacking something.

I always wanted to play a Murlock!

Arggguuuuubbblarrrrrggggggg

I really haven't clue one how to counter this within the WAR lore, but you need to offer a whole race that looks MUCH less effeminate on the Order side. (and no, the paladin-likes with the headdress wouldn't have helped)  Funny that the answer is the exact opposite of what WOW faced 4 years ago.

Why are you guys assuming people will want to play furry ratmen?

Are the rat guys in EQ2 hugely popular?

I would expect Bretonnians and Skaven to be added in an expansion pack.

Wood Elves would draw some players, IMO, solely based on these dudes:

(http://uk.games-workshop.com/woodelves/gallery/images/WE_eternalgdcmd2.jpg)

They're not as alien looking as the high elves, so more likely to capture that whole night elf/blood elf demographic, and the double sword adds a fanboy  :awesome_for_real: factor I think.

Another option is mercs, they could add Dogs of War for both sides, which would have the side effect of easing the balancing task too. Might be perceived as a lazy thing, but it could work.

I want skaven darn it

For melee dps gutter runners light armored hard hitting fast melee combatants.

For a ranged class for skaven jazail teams or poison wind globadiers

For tank storm vermin obviously enough

For caster/healer gray seers.

Hmm. From all the comments above, the solution seems obvious:  toss the lore and add Skavens on the side of order!   :drill:  Instabalance in one swell foop!

A new race of any sort won't create some magical balance. The races are flavor, the classes are where you look for balance (in WAR). Sticking Skaven on the side of Order won't do squat if they don't make good classes in terms of balance.

Just saying...

That Mythic would somehow just make a bunch of shitty unflavorful classes?

Just saying what? That skaven aren't hugely popular? That Mythic would somehow just make a bunch of shitty unflavorful classes? I think you might've missed the point. Everyone here is simply assuming the skaven classes would be skaven appropriate, and if they added them for destro, even the most boring of skaven classes would probably outnumber the most hugely OP Order class - and they're most likely right.

Lower that Skaven Fan Club defensive erection!  :drill:

What I was saying is that, in the context of the games design, a new race means squat. The balance is centered upon classes, so asking for a new race to solve balance issues is like asking for a cup of hot lava when you are in the desert and thirsty. It's not going to fix the problem even if it might be interesting in and of itself.

Skaven are cool. People like playing rats for some reason. You've been around waaaaaay too long to go fanboi and honestly think that sticking in a cool race because they can't possibly screw up the classes is a solution. Anything can be screwed up. We all know that.

I believe you are talking about balanced mechanics.

They are talking about population imbalances.  People are playing destruction over order in a 2:1 or greater ratio.  The theories presented above were ways to draw people towards playing order to balance out the population.

Skaven are cool. People like playing rats for some reason. You've been around waaaaaay too long to go fanboi and honestly think that sticking in a cool race because they can't possibly screw up the classes is a solution. Anything can be screwed up. We all know that.

I believe you are talking about balanced mechanics.

They are talking about population imbalances.  People are playing destruction over order in a 2:1 or greater ratio.  The theories presented above were ways to draw people towards playing order to balance out the population.

What I was saying is that, in the context of the games design, a new race means squat.

I think there was a per server unlocking, yes?

What I was saying is that, in the context of the games design, a new race means squat.

You all keep saying "people" when you mean "PVPers."   I predicted this imbalance a long, long time ago and you laughed, LAUGHED at me while pointing to WoW.  It's good to know I still know people's behaviors pretty well.

Now, on the point that I missed about population imbalances, you are right and I noted that I failed to grab that ball and run with it. If it turns out that there is a serious imbalance between the two sides of the game, putting in a sexy new race would convince some folks to try the other side out. You won't find me debating that.

Class balance is outweighted by population balance if population balance is overwhelmingly in one side's favor.

IE it doesn't matter how awesome Bright Wizards are, if they die 5m into setting foot in RvR land to a zerg of Black Orcs.

You guys are kidding right?

In Warhammer Online Races = Balance? Exactly what, beyond cosmetics does my race actually do for me? (Loads WAR) Hmmm, nothing. The Races themselves lend nothing to the abilities of my character. Some of them do look pretty though.

I'm not really buying the "high elves are pussies" thing, though. The dark elves aren't exactly macho either.

Lower that Skaven Fan Club defensive erection!  :drill:

What I was saying is that, in the context of the games design, a new race means squat. The balance is centered upon classes, so asking for a new race to solve balance issues is like asking for a cup of hot lava when you are in the desert and thirsty. It's not going to fix the problem even if it might be interesting in and of itself.

Skaven are cool. People like playing rats for some reason. You've been around waaaaaay too long to go fanboi and honestly think that sticking in a cool race because they can't possibly screw up the classes is a solution. Anything can be screwed up. We all know that.

The Dark Elves at least have the whole goth thing and/or skimpy outfits going for them.  The guys can also get away with being a villainous bishie.  Maybe not macho, but cool.

The High Elves though?  Androgenous at best.   That's cool for some people, but there isn't a lot of draw beyond "being an elf".

Bishie!

Pretty boy, like Sesshomaru.

Empire having no knight probably IS part of why Order is underpopulated. It's not so much "Empire needs a tank" as "Order needs a plate wearing human."

I'm not really buying the "high elves are pussies" thing, though. The dark elves aren't exactly macho either.

Anyways, the current "let's try an xp bonus!" thing doesn't work, ugh.

It must be a WoW killer.  :oh_i_see:

Noone with more than 6 brain cells thought it would be.  It's a game that fills a gap in the market.  If you don't see the value in the title, just wait and see how many aspects from it end up in Blizzard games down the road.  WAR is far from perfect, but I think it has succeeded in advancing the genre.  Even if just a little.

WAR competes with TF2. It doesn't compete with WoW.


It might start competeing with WoW when you can accomplish something in a 15 minute playsession in WoW.

WAR competes with TF2. It doesn't compete with WoW.


It might start competeing with WoW when you can accomplish something in a 15 minute playsession in WoW.

<picture of WoW: BC desktop>

Class balance is outweighted by population balance if population balance is overwhelmingly in one side's favor.

IE it doesn't matter how awesome Bright Wizards are, if they die 5m into setting foot in RvR land to a zerg of Black Orcs.

Ooo.. I love those 15 minute playsessions in WoW.  Get on Griffon to go someplace.. wait 15 minutes to arrive, then log.   :grin:

I still don't get the hate schild, considering you are now drooling over what is essentially re-packaged wow with pvp flavor!

I still don't get the hate schild, considering you are now drooling over what is essentially re-packaged wow with pvp flavor!

Nah, I played on a Zek so EQ was still pretty fun despite the many, many flaws. If I was talking about a blue server you'd have a damned good point.

Playing on a Zek in EQ wasn't as fun as playing UO pre-trammel.

Nothing was less fun than EQ, it just happened to be a lot of people's first girlfriend.

Some people liked staring at a book for hours and hours or camping spawns for DAYS to get a single drop. 

How could anyone thing that EQ at release was fun beyond the novelty factor?  If EQ released now, we'd all laugh at it.  It was a grind the likes that haven't been seen since. 

I still don't get the hate schild, considering you are now drooling over what is essentially re-packaged wow with pvp flavor!

If EQ released now, we'd all laugh at it. 

Give it a month or two. When Schild gets bored with it, WAR will be the new whipping boy.

but that doesnt make someone a catass loser for having enjoyed them when they came out.

How do you figure? AoC just melted into the background and schild was pretty frothy about that title in the beginning.  schild's WoW hate is eternal.

AoC was pretty blah except for the titties and horses kicking people off bridges.

can you honestly say going back and playing castlevania 1 would be fun?

Playing on a Zek in EQ wasn't as fun as playing UO pre-trammel.

I must say I'm a bit surprised, its been about a month since WAR launched right? I expected more.... "Meh!" responses. It being the first major MMO release I skipped since like 10 years ago, a little part of me is dying inside. Now I feel if I started playing I'd be in the ghost towns.

WAR competes with TF2. It doesn't compete with WoW.


It might start competeing with WoW when you can accomplish something in a 15 minute playsession in WoW.

It is pretty dumb to yell at someone for joining the underdog side on a server.

Slay won't like it.  There is no punishment for losing.

I would say you can accomplish more in WAR than WOW in 15 minutes.

PVP:
WAR wins with Queue anywhere anytime.  WOW you have to be in a specific spot.

PVE:
Same, except you can do a little PVE while waiting for your PVP queue to pop in WAR.

Actually, we have been discussing new battlegrounds quite a bit lately. Wrath of the Lich King will feature Strand of the Ancients (attack/defend) as well as Wintergrasp (non-instanced, world PvP).

But past that, we are exploring ideas that would involve expanding our Battleground content in future patches and beyond. We believe we have some strong ideas for improving Battlegrounds and PvP as a whole in the game and we're definitely going to focus on improvements in the future. Now, it's very early to be talking about some of this stuff but I think it's important for the community to know that it's on our minds.

Our general thought is that we could provide more BG content over time. The BG content that we could provide could be of higher quality with a higher degree of accessibility. Overall, we'd like to have more content and variety. We also want the gameplay experience in the BGs to be better directed. We're also exploring the concept of a complimentary "competitive" bg system as well. Over time, we'd like the focus of PvP to shift back to being more BG-centric and more focused on Horde versus Alliance -- the core of our game.

We're also planning on improving some Battleground and PvP features in general. For example, we want to give you the ability to queue for Battlegrounds from anywhere in the world. We're also going to explore EXP gain through the PvP system as well as low level itemization to support that.

Please don't take this post as a promise. This won't be an overnight process. Not all of these things are set in stone and guaranteed to happen. It would take us a while to shift in this direction. But these are some of the current thoughts on the development team. I think it's important for you guys to know some of our thought process in regards to PvP.

...

I would say you can accomplish more in WAR than WOW in 15 minutes.

PVP:
WAR wins with Queue anywhere anytime.  WOW you have to be in a specific spot.

PVE:
Same, except you can do a little PVE while waiting for your PVP queue to pop in WAR.

Although there are some game issues to consider, I really don't like that mobs in WAR can respawn within aggro distance of a player character.

Also, if the player character respawns in an area after a scenario, all mobs around them for a certain distance that aren't players should despawn. It's no good if you are trying to see how you did on the scenario scoreboard only to start hearing combat sounds because you've landed on top of a mob or two.

Well to me at least the problem is that when you come back if you were mid fight you don't get any hp back AND you pop back in the place where you were when the scenario popped, not where you were when you accepted it. If they just allowed you to find a safe place to click accept and then return to it would make everything a lot easier.

I'd hate HATE for the solution to be that popping out of a scenario puts me back into a camp like it would be if I respawned. I like being able to do PvE while I'm waiting for a scenario to pop and then get dropped back nearby after that ends.

I would say you can accomplish more in WAR than WOW in 15 minutes.

So... sort of back to the beginning.  Does anyone find it odd that they released week 1 numbers but none of the numbers following?  Or, is this just classic, "week 1 numbers were some sort of 'record'... once we have another we will release those numbers" kind of thing?  I was kind of hoping to see the 750k and 1M reports.

Warhammer is doing just fine in terms of sales. More than fine actually.

Is this published anywhere?

In the US, for the week ending October 2nd, gamasutra (http://www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/news_index.php?story=20497) has them at no.4 in the US and no.2 in the UK.  That chart is just from Amazon PC games sales, however.  This all-format UK chart (http://www.el33tonline.com/past/2008/10/7/uk_charts_chart_track_software_sales_for_the_week_ending_0410/) from two days ago says that Warhammer Online went from no.1 to no.13 to no.32 over three weeks.  It's doing very well amongst ze Germans (http://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/force-unleashed-maintains-dominance-of-euro-charts), a little less so amongst the Spanish, who doubtless intend to get round to buying it, but not yet.  Maybe tomorrow.

So, decent sales from the look of it.

The first hurdle of attracting an audience is behind them.  Let's see how they do with retention.  I'm optimistic that they'll do significantly better than AoC, but I don't expect greatness until I see some big fixes.  Especially with November looming on the horizon.

I probably phrased it wrong, but that is what I mean. I agree with you.
You can play TF2 for 15 minutes and get something done.
You can play WAR for 15 minutes and get something done.
You cannot play WoW for 15 minutes and get something done.
Personally, I have a lot of blocks of 15 minutes in the day. I don't have very many 120 minute blocks available. When WoW steps it up a notch and makes it something I can play for 15 minutes then walk away from, it'll be time for me to revisit it.

And what can you "get done" in WAR in 15 that doesn't apply to WoW? Serious question. Apples to apples please, though.

FAIRFAX, Va. --(Business Wire)-- Mythic Entertainment, an Electronic Arts Inc. (NASDAQ:ERTS) studio, today announced that 750,000 players have registered for the critically acclaimed fantasy MMORPG, Warhammer(R) Online: Age of Reckoning(TM) (WAR) in North America, Europe and the Oceanic territories.

If you were in the right area you could stumble on a public quest and complete all the stages including the final boss mob/s within 15 minutes, you could do a pvp scenario no matter where you logged in (at worst needing a minutes flight from one of cities). 

If there happens to be another six players there, or you're traveling with six yea. Solo? No. Maybe you can clear Stage 1 in 15min. Stage 2 is pretty much group required.

Is that why I keep reloading nowhere near where I joined from?  Ugh.

Ok, yea, that.

Here's where I pulverize the body of the dead horse: try "stumbling" on a group in a T1 zone these days  :dead_horse:

Edit:
Nevermind. 

Didn't realize your spawn points was where you were when the Scenario popped and not where you accepted.  Never realized that.

Could of sworn I got a scenario, walked to a safe spot, and came back there last night.

Here's where I pulverize the body of the dead horse: try "stumbling" on a group in a T1 zone these days  :dead_horse:

Which server are you not finding PQ groups on?  Even at T1 I'd be surprised if there weren't any at all.  If anything I think it's surprised them that the scenarios have proved such a hit, pvp leveling has the obvious side effect of reducing the number of people who are questing to level up.  Similar thing for open RVR which they intend to encourage more of by increasing realm points etc.

Does anyone now think that leveling up by pvp is a bad idea, or that getting items directly from pvp is bad?

I obviously wasn't clear enough, "stumble" as in find a group already doing the PQ.  That's the only way I have ever completed one.

True, but WAR's advantage is the queue anywhere any time and pop right back where you left off so you can do both at once.

Fewer bullshit examples, please.

On the topic of realm imbalances, how "evil" is the Evil side? In terms of the actions your character does on quests and such.

On the official Cox boards the 'how evil should villains be' topic comes up every once in a while and many people say how they skip contacts like Westin Phipps and the low level mad scientist guy because they're just too evil and they feel uncomfortable doing thier missions. Kidnapping homeless guys to be human guinea pigs and screwing over a homeless mom and her kids, etc.
 
I wonder if making the evil side uncomfortably evil would help steer some folks towards the other side or not.

Although by the time you're uncomfortable enough about having to do evil stuff you might already have enough /played time invested in your character to not want to switch.

The already announced that WoW is going to have this.

On the topic of realm imbalances, how "evil" is the Evil side? In terms of the actions your character does on quests and such.

On the official Cox boards the 'how evil should villains be' topic comes up every once in a while and many people say how they skip contacts like Westin Phipps and the low level mad scientist guy because they're just too evil and they feel uncomfortable doing thier missions. Kidnapping homeless guys to be human guinea pigs and screwing over a homeless mom and her kids, etc.
 
I wonder if making the evil side uncomfortably evil would help steer some folks towards the other side or not.

Although by the time you're uncomfortable enough about having to do evil stuff you might already have enough /played time invested in your character to not want to switch.

You said "serious question" so I attempted to answer as such.  I've completed about 20 public quests in WAR purely be "stumbling" on them, generally I'm in the PQ area on a standard quest and then get invited to or choose to join an open group.  Quite often there's only 3 or so people in the group so it's not as if I'm confident that joining will achieve anything, it's just easier to join than not.  But an open group doing a public quest attracts players like flies round shit, I've seen more end encounter hero mobs in WAR in 3 weeks than I saw in WOW in 6 months, with the added benefit of not fighting respawned trash mobs after a death or having a tank who forgets to repair his armour.  As the question is now switching to 15 minutes from level 1, in WAR I can attack or defend a keep, sure you'll only have a couple of abilities to use but you will be somewhat effective, you can even use a boiling oil siege engine at level 1, save 20 silver and you can slap a cannon down.  That's end game type activity right from the start if pvp is your thing (T1 keeps and T4 keeps aren't that different), if you prefer pve then there's always WOW but trying to pretend there's no real difference in style is the real bullshit.

If you don't like the answer, don't ask the question.

and the kind of stuff I'd expect to see on WAR's official forums or something...

Which server are you not finding PQ groups on?  Even at T1 I'd be surprised if there weren't any at all.  If anything I think it's surprised them that the scenarios have proved such a hit, pvp leveling has the obvious side effect of reducing the number of people who are questing to level up.  Similar thing for open RVR which they intend to encourage more of by increasing realm points etc.

But the whole "WoW sux, WAR is teh best" fanboism from some on this forum is more than a little retarded, and the kind of stuff I'd expect to see on WAR's official forums or something...

Ulthuan, pretty high pop from what I can tell. The problem isn't so much getting into a random PQ group. It's finding which PQ that group is actually in. I don't remember how many of them there are in Nordland (maybe eight?), but you've a bunch better chance of stumbling on an empty one than a full one. Yes, you can get lucky. But that's my point. The system doesn't really work if you're relying on luckunless that was always the (unstated) intent (keep the rewards rare)?

 :awesome_for_real: