Prediction thread: Order or Destruction, who will win the population war?

[eldaec]

One post with one word is all you need in this thread.


Who is going to have the highest population by Christmas? Order or Destruction? If you are foolish enough to believe the two will be indistinguishable, you can say that.

[eldaec]

Order. Bitches.

[Azaroth]

I'll say Destruction. But I might be counting out the influence of the masses too easily.

I haven't seen many screenshots. Does one side have hot chicks and the other side not? If so, side with hot chicks wins.

[Slyfeind]

I'm gonna say Order will have the highest population, but Destruction will be better at PvP. Basically like WoW.

[ajax34i]

Destruction.

Goody two-shoes will stick with WoW.  The majority of those coming to this game looking for PVP will prefer the "badass" / evil image.  And the bikini-armor chicks.

[Fordel]

Order.


-edit-

There will be one "official" hardcore PvP server, and that server will have a massive Destruction population. Otherwise Order over all.

[Threash]

Order by a 2-1 or 3-1 ratio on regular servers, 3-2 on the open servers.

[Triforcer]

Order.  I used to be sure destruction was the answer, but I'm beginning to run into the BG2 evil alignment problem- feeling guilty about doing bad things.  All the slop and mayhem and stupidity of greenskin culture was fun, but I'm starting to get the itch to surround myself with scary Teutonic goodness. 

[UnSub]

On the face of it, Destruction. Hot half-naked bad girl elves will help pull a crowd. Chaos attracts more people than order.

However, if Order has an early lead, that could continue and grow as people like to be on the 'winning' side.

But I'll go with Destruction.

[Trippy]

On the face of it, Destruction. Hot half-naked bad girl elves will help pull a crowd. Chaos attracts more people than order.

However, if Order has an early lead, that could continue and grow as people like to be on the 'winning' side.

But I'll go with Destruction.

Because of the Scenarios, sheer numbers don't automatically determine which side will "win" most of the time. In earlier betas (haven't played recently) the side that's significantly outnumbered can still keep a zone from flipping sides even if all the objectives are held by the opposition by consistently winning the scenario(s) for that zone.

[Zetor]

Destruction.

WOW is alliance-heavy because of PVE. On PVP servers the population difference is much lower, and in many cases, horde actually outnumber alliance. WAR is a PVP game primarily, so yeah.


-- Z.

[Sjofn]

Order.

Destruction has sex-specific classes, a race with no women at all, a race with skanky women that are not actually hot (neither side's elves are good looking, imo, they're creepy and alien (which I actually like)), and the freaky looking humans. Generally speaking, that is not appealing to a majority of people, although the dark elves will probably grab a big, big slice of the mangina pie. Order has a class that every paladin secretly wishes their paladin was like (seriously, now that I've actually played the warrior priest, I know for sure that every I MUST BE A PALADIN knob is going to hop on that), witch hunters, "good" elves and normal looking humans. I don't think it will be as hugely lopsided as I initially feared, but I'm starting to suspect there are going to be like four orcs total since there's only one orc class now.

[Falwell]

Dark elves are Destro. This kind of recruitment scheme cannot be overcome.

[mutantmagnet]

Dark elves are Destro. This kind of recruitment scheme cannot be overcome.

IBT Drizztwannabes?

I'm unsure and won't comment on this. Destro gets more votes through various sites from people not in beta. Destro is the defacto larger force during closed beta. But before preview weekend started rumors were spreading that higher skilled players were reconsidering on joining Order and reading reports on this weekend leaves me with the impression Order has been kicking more ass than destro especially in scenarios.

It's been implied once that Destro still has the greater numbers and as a result they balance out in RvR but get steamrolled in the BGs. But that was one person so hardly enough to get a good feel of the populations.

Open beta will give a more of a definitive picture.

[schild]

Destro had larger numbers on the server we played on in RvR, but Order continually won - at least the areas I was in. Either the players on Destro weren't skilled or simply less skilled than Order side, or there were more on our side and I just couldn't tell since I was looking at THE ENEMY. During BG, I lost more than I won, and I was pretty decent at it.

It's still incredibly hard to pick. At this point, I may even start 2 toons on headstart, get them both to tier 2, and pick from there. I REALLY don't want to split the f13 force in half though. So I think we're gonna have to come to a conclusion on which side.

[Merusk]

I'm thinking Destro will have the population advantage.  I've thought that for a long time and still feel that way.  PVPers always seem to want that "Badass" feeling, and yes while the WH lore says both sides are scum, the lore (lol lore) isn't well-known enough to get that message across.  Order is "Good" and Destro is "Evil" and that's how decisions will be made.

[Modern Angel]

Destruction by a 1.5-1 or 2-1 margin.

[Miasma]

Destruction.  Just like beta already is and how people who have been in the beta for years have said.

[Comstar]

For a game built on RvR, not having ANY sort of population control is suicide.

Something half assed will be introduced within the first 4 months, and because it wasn't part of the original design it will suck and take another 6 months to get working.

Some servers will have an initial Order over population, some will have Destruction. The positive reinforcements of winning over and over again will cause landslides in the numbers.

It will be *the* biggest complaint.

[Azaroth]

You can't handle that any more poorly than Blizzard did.

Instanced PvP anyone?

O - and instanced PvE.

Wait a second...........................

So basically everyone in the entire game is standing beside an NPC waiting to queue or standing beside an instance waiting to raid.... /quit.

[Merusk]

No need to stand beside the NPC to PvP in war.. there isn't an NPC, its a button on your map.   

[Simond]

Destruction with a 3:2 ratio on their 'normal' servers, and 2:1 on the 'PvP' servers.

And they will start bitching about BG, er 'scenario' queues approx. two days after the game goes live but never consider rerolling.
There will also be at least one massive imbalance in the non-mirrored classes, and at least one lesser (but still noticable) imbalance in the "Mirrored-but-not-really" classes.
Oh, and all the instances will be biased to one side or the other and people will only want to play the maps where its biased in their favour.

[Abelian75]

I'm thinking Destro will have the population advantage.  I've thought that for a long time and still feel that way.  PVPers always seem to want that "Badass" feeling, and yes while the WH lore says both sides are scum, the lore (lol lore) isn't well-known enough to get that message across.  Order is "Good" and Destro is "Evil" and that's how decisions will be made.

Does it really say that both sides are scum?  I mean, reading the tome stuff I certainly am seeing that the empire isn't all happiness and roses, certainly (witch hunters and stuff), but it seems more like just a grim, somewhat less-than-wonderful kingdom, whereas most of destruction really does seem actively evil.  Order still seems like the "good guys" to me, from the in-game stuff.

But yeah, I'm unfamiliar with the lore outside of the game, so I dunno.  But just from the in-game stuff, it seems like a reasonably noble dwarf/elf/empire character is someone that might exist, whereas in the case of chaos/greenskins/dark elves they're all just completely bent on murder and death.

[Simond]

The Empire are the bad guys, and Chaos are the really bad guys. 
It's shades of grey, with the best of the bunch being a pretty dingy grey. Slight tangent: In the 40K universe (which the Warhammer world may or may not be a part of), there's an ongoing complaint about a newish race/army (the Tau) not fitting into the lore because it's "too cheerful/hopeful/bright". They are, essentially, the Stalin-era Soviet Union in power armour with a side order of eugenics. The kicker? They probably are the 'nicest' group in the lore.

One could argue that the orks are actually the closest to innocent, of course, as they don't act with any real malice - they just really like fighting. 

[Calantus]

WHFB is a little less dark than WH40k. I'd say the High Elves and Dwarves are pretty close to being good. They're not Tolkien elves who are pure and noble etc etc but they're nice enough if territorial and bit warlike. The empire are like dark ages europe though, not very nice at all.

[Trippy]

I'm thinking Destro will have the population advantage.  I've thought that for a long time and still feel that way.  PVPers always seem to want that "Badass" feeling, and yes while the WH lore says both sides are scum, the lore (lol lore) isn't well-known enough to get that message across.  Order is "Good" and Destro is "Evil" and that's how decisions will be made.

Does it really say that both sides are scum?  I mean, reading the tome stuff I certainly am seeing that the empire isn't all happiness and roses, certainly (witch hunters and stuff), but it seems more like just a grim, somewhat less-than-wonderful kingdom, whereas most of destruction really does seem actively evil.  Order still seems like the "good guys" to me, from the in-game stuff.

But yeah, I'm unfamiliar with the lore outside of the game, so I dunno.  But just from the in-game stuff, it seems like a reasonably noble dwarf/elf/empire character is someone that might exist, whereas in the case of chaos/greenskins/dark elves they're all just completely bent on murder and death.

To use D&D alignment terms the Dark Elves are definitely Evil (and in fact are the most Evil of all the WH armies), ranging the full spectrum on the ethical axis from Chaotic to Lawful.

The Greenskins are Chaotic Neutral. As Simond said their sole reason for existence is to fight things, including each other if they can't find somebody else to fight but they aren't malevolent and sadistic like the Dark Elves are.

Chaos is obviously Chaotic but they range from Evil to Neutralish depending on which of the Chaos gods a follower happens to worship. E.g. Tzeentch is, among other things, the Chaos god of Hope, which is hardly an evilish thing. On the Evil to Neutral scale Nurgle and Khorne are closer to the Evil end of the Scale while Slaanesh and Tzeentch closer to the Neutral end.

Order side the Dwarfs and the Elves are closest to "Lawful Good", though that of course didn't keep them from battling each other in the "War of the Beard" (secretly started by the Dark Elves), destroying both empires in the process.

The Empire spans the full range of alignments but would average out to somewhere around Lawful Neutral, IMO. The Empire is somewhat like the Dark Ages in Europe with the Inquistition, like Calantus said, except that everybody is suspected of harboring the taint of Chaos not just certain segments and nobody is truly innocent.

[Abelian75]

Yeah, I guess that's pretty much how I was imagining it, then.  I do really like chaos (and tzeentch in particular), and it's definitely an interesting situation since changing an empire for the better generally really DOES involve lots of war and death.

But yeah, from what I'd heard of 40k, the empire in that seemed a LOT more twisted than what I'm seeing here.  Don't they worship some immortal emperor-in-a-vat as their god or something?  I'm too lazy to look it up.

Also, to be fair to the WAR witch hunters and the empire in general, chaos agents really ARE hidden in their kingdom, presumably, right?  So I mean, at least they're not totally pulling that out of their ass.

[Draegan]

I'm going to go with Destruction.

[waylander]

Its pretty much Destruction with at least 55% of the population in a 100 different polls I've seen over the last few months.  Obviously we can't discuss known pops since that is still covered by the NDA on the beta servers, but I'd take a stab and say Destruction had the majority of peeps during the preview weekend.

[Paelos]

Destruction. Although it does have a really evil feel to it.

[Falwell]

This..

http://www.road-to-war.com/

Will give ya a rough idea. Unfortunately, it looks like the taint of Chaos is overwhelming.

[rattran]

Warhammer Fantasy really is about as dark as WH40K.
 Everything is in decay. The Elves feud over the bones of their once glorious empire. The Empire is losing territory and allies to Chaos, as it consumes itself in a futile effort to remain pure. Bretonnia is a shining, glorious beacon built on the broken backs of serfs. The dwarves are dying out, helped along by their chaos-corrupted brothers. The greenskins are being driven out of their areas by the Undead. Chaos is flooding out from the former North Pole due to an error by the now nearly extinct Slaan. Even Chaos wars among itself as each of the four primary Chaos god and their followers try for dominance over the others. Beastmen abound, and Skaven pour forth under the banner of the Horned Rat.

Not really any good guys at all.

Oh, and I think it'll be about an even population split over all, but every server will end up about 60/40 imbalanced.

[Xanthippe]

Destruction.

[mutantmagnet]

The lizard men seem to be actual good guys but they don't do shit except sit on their hands even though they have an edict handed to them by their god to eradicate evil.

[Abelian75]

The lizard men seem to be actual good guys but they don't do shit except sit on their hands even though they have an edict handed to them by their god to eradicate evil.

Sweet, good guy lizards?  Do want.