Warhammer Alliance's NYCC WAR Write-up - Day 1

[Ariwyn-WHA]

I was lucky enough to head over to Comic Con today, not just as a guest and spectator, but as part of the Warhammer Alliance staff. While we may not have been able to get some of the great footage Ten Ton did (we don’t have the funding for that kind of stuff ) I was able to have some time with Jeff, Jess, Paul and Adam to talk about Warhammer. I highly suggest you check out Ten Ton,there's not a lot of video footage up yet, but I saw them taping. Here we’re going to have more exclusive interview material.

The panel discussion was mainly about the Valentine’s Event and the plans for the upcoming months. Paul and Jeff seemed thrilled with the inclusion of the Slayer, and Paul noted that because of the inclusion of the Slayer in the original cinematic, they "look like liars and thieves that can’t do [their] jobs.” The panel contained general details about the Choppa and Slayer, but nothing as extensive as in Adam’s demo (which I will address in a little bit).

The Land of the Dead is a new zone that resembles “Indiana Jones meet[ing] the Mummy,” according to Jeff. The area is generally for level 25+, and features a gated RvR gated dungeon. We were fortunate enough to see the general area, including the PQ area that sits right in front of the tomb. The dungeon won’t just be filled with monsters though—there will also be swinging axes and various other traps that you and your party need to navigate through safely. These traps can also be set off behind you, to hinder an approaching enemy group. This dungeon will be a slightly higher level than Lost Vale. When I asked what adjectives best describe this new area (thanks PhoenixRed for that question, they’re never going to let me live that down), it was described as “tricky, trappy, bad a**y” and several other words that they just added a –y suffix to.

Jeff and Paul then started addressing player concerns. The first was the importance of battlefield objectives, and trying to tie them to keep captures. They’re also looking into better rewards for battlefield objective defenders. Guilds will receive more incentives to capture and maintain keeps, with the possibility of keep upgrades. Because of the concern of contribution and the limited number of gold bags to gain gear, Conqueror gear may be spread to the guards in the forts.

Open RvR will have extended influence bars, to keep people fighting after an area is captured. Furthermore, there will be a new RvR section to the Tome of Knowledge, which will keep track of the people that kill you and the people you kill, providing greater incentive to kill other players.

Another concern was city capture, and how many players view it as a PvE experience. Jeff and Paul agreed that once a city is captured, it is somewhat PvE. They want to change this so that defenders can get in through the sewers possibly, and make it a more PvP experience.

Next they addressed Patch 1.2. This will be retooling itemization in places like Bastillon Stairs, cities, and the Lost Vale. As Jeff put it, it seems there’s “not enough reward for the risk.” It’s also addressing balancing issues Jeff noted, “For a PvP game our class balance is awesome […] that’s not to say there’s not problems.” 1.2 should help with the balancing and issues with crowd control. Apparently there’s also about 25 pages of bug fixes.

Around 2:30, Adam was kind enough to put on a little demo for spectators after Jeff and Paul’s poster signing. This demo included the Slayer and Choppa, and some extra tidbits that you probably haven’t heard anywhere else.

Let’s start with the Choppa/Slayer. First things first, there will be no female Slayers. They couldn’t get it past Games Workshop. Now, both classes will be able to dual wield or use great weapons, and they have different trees to accommodate different features. For example, Slayers have Giant Slayer, which utilizes skills with great weapons, Skaven Slayer, which is for AoE dual wielding, and (I believe, my notes are sloppy here) Troll Slayer, which is a balance. Slayer gets a special ability called Rip, which rips through damage absorption shields—both doing damage and eliminating the shield. This is meant to really get through to healers. The Choppa does not have this skill, and a mirror may appear on a different Destruction class. The Choppa does, however, get the infamous skill called “Get to ‘da Choppa” which not only deals damage, but has a chance to “hook” someone in melee range and pull them closer to the Choppa. So if you’re trying to run away but are still in melee range, the Choppa will pull you in.

One of the interesting techniques Mythic is using for the AoE of these classes is a randomization system. Generally, AoE attacks do less damage, but to everyone in a certain radius. Certain tactics with these classes however, will hit random players within the certain radius at random times, thus permitting a high damage output even though it’s AoE. This will keep healers on their toes, as random people will be getting hit.

Choppa/Slayer survivability depends how high their berserking rage is. When they are in their “safe zone,” they do approximately as much DPS and have around the same armor value as a White Lion or Marauder. When they berserk, however, their damage goes as high as a Witch Elf or Witch Hunter, but they also have the same armor value.

Really, really bad Slayer footage taken from a cell phone:


After the extensive Choppa/Slayer footage, Adam then talked about new guild incentives in the form of advanced mounts during Call to Arms. Advanced mounts are lightly armored, have a slight speed increase, and have a lower dismount chance. These will be offered to higher level guilds (around level 37-38 ). However, guilds around level 20 will have different color options for normal mounts, such as a black stallion for Empire. We were able to see the Dark Elf advanced mount, which was a Cold One in deep purple armor, a Chaos mount, which had spiked armor on a horse, and the Empire mount, which was a silver armored warhorse. The video footage is up now, and currently looks like this is Warhammer Alliance Exclusive Footage.

NEW MOUNTS!


Finally, I was able to score a short interview with Jeff himself. Everything was a bit crowded and a tad noisy, so I have no recordings for this unfortunately. I was able to ask him some interesting questions (and a little later, Jess) and get some great answers.

The first question I asked Jeff was about official forums. He didn’t have much to say about it since he doesn’t directly work with it, but he said the real reason behind them was so players feel they have access to the developers, something official—but he most certainly did not want to kill sites, or contract/reduce the community. He then told me to touch base with Jess in a little while.

I asked Jeff, “Based on player feedback and your own internal testing, what is the most glaring issue in RvR, and how are you remedying it?” He responded by noting how they scout out the various forums and compile 1000s of issues, so it’s hard to pick one. He added that the flow from ORvR to the zone captures is a large one, which is based off of the difficulty to get to the keep lord and the difficulty to get a group of people to drive together. One way Mythic is working on this is by retooling the rewards for capturing vs. the rewards for killing players. After patch 1.2, they will implement a “currency” system, which will allow you to gain an alternate form of “currency” for capturing keeps. Those can then be saved up to buy Conqueror gear, and possibly more.

I then asked about his recent Eurogamer interview, and his positive attitude towards the subscriber numbers, while so many others had negative reactions towards it. Jeff commented that he couldn’t really say anything about numbers (that’s MBJ’s territory), but that things are great. Mythic is expanding, and they have a bigger developer team than any other MMORPG. They work hard, and even the patch notes for 1.2 alone were 45 pages long.

Finally I asked him about the Private Test Servers. Currently they’re only open to “Core Testers,” and I was wondering if there was a plan to open them to the public, and if so, when would it be implemented. The good news is, yes, they want to open it to the public. The bad news is that there is no specific ETA for this—but Jeff did tell me that there’s a possibility that this will be implemented in 1.2.

Last but not least, I was able to ask Jess some questions about the official forums. She is optimistic about keeping community sites like Warhammer Alliance up, running, and useful. When asked if community sites would be able to gain exclusives that the official forums would not, she replied with a resounding yes. When I asked if forum names are tied to characters (resulting in multiple characters per account) or tied to accounts (resulting in a single forum character), Jess was reasonably sure that there would only be one name, but you can choose different image avatars.

Well, that’s all I have for now. I’m working on some video footage of the advanced mounts, which should be up in a little bit. I know this post is long and detailed, but I’m thrilled to share all I’ve learned with you. Jeff, Paul, Jess and crew: Thank you so much for your time, I truly appreciate it. Tomorrow I’ll be going back and covering the tournament, so you’ll get more updates tomorrow.

(P.S. Jeff, if you're reading this, go download version 99 for your phone! )

[Dylio]

I cannot elate how thrilled I am about the new content being discussed, the fixes, and the overall enthusiasm Mythic seems to have.

I'm most happy about the Conq tokens, though!

Good work, Ariwyn. You covered it well.

[PhoenixRed]

Originally Posted by Ariwyn

(P.S. Jeff, if you're reading this, go download version 99 for your phone! )

Heh. Someone is ALSO apparently getting used to the Blackberry Storm.

Good write-up. Some interesting things regarding the careers, balance, and of course, the new dungeon. It's nice that itemization will take a pass, but I also hope they look at loot distribution too.

[Ariwyn-WHA]

Jeff said he's really happy with the contribution system, that it's a great idea, but that it's getting some retooling. Didn't get many specifics.

[expansionsss]

thats a nice looking monitor.

Jeff said he's really happy with the contribution system, that it's a great idea, but that it's getting some retooling. Didn't get many specifics.

That worries me.

Were there any comments on that "currency" system being pushed to other areas ? Such as bringing back the defender's Signs ( in the game, but useless atm ) ?

[Box]

There is no slayer footage on ten ton yet...

[Ariwyn-WHA]

Originally Posted by Box

There is no slayer footage on ten ton yet...

I'm not sure if Adam gave them Slayer Footage to Ten Ton. When he did the demo for us, he only really did Slayer. Unfortunately it takes videos FOREVER to upload on youtube, trying to get the advanced mount footage up now. We caught some of the slayer on my husband's cell phone, but the quality is extremely poor.

[Lancelot-OCT]

words that describe nouns!

[Avien]

Awesome stuff. Also, /cheer @ Ariwyn one more time for getting it to us

[Ariwyn-WHA]

Originally Posted by Lancelot-OCT

words that describe nouns!

I'm never going to live that down. Ever. Even the PR guy was making fun of me, that it was the funniest question/response.

[Carathir]

You have to admit. That was the best part of the entire panel.

(ariwyn's husband)

And yes, us Storm owners need to stick together!

[PhoenixRed]

Originally Posted by Ariwyn

I'm never going to live that down. Ever. Even the PR guy was making fun of me, that it was the funniest question/response.

I claim innocence because I never submitted that question as a suggestion over MSN, oh no, not me. I'd never embarass our staff like that. Any messaging logs that are put up are obviously doctored.

[bend]

It's a shame they didn't show the new Dwarf mount. I wonder if it will just be more stuff thrown onto the gyro-copter or something new.

The random AOE damage from Slayers/Choppas is a pretty creative and interesting looking way of doing things. I can't wait to get my hands on a Slayer!

Thanks for the coverage!

[Dylio]

BlackBerry Storm > iPhone

Yeah, you heard me. Pssh....

(although I do love my older blackberry and my GF's Storm)

[Ariwyn-WHA]

Originally Posted by bend

It's a shame they didn't show the new Dwarf mount. I wonder if it will just be more stuff thrown onto the gyro-copter or something new.

The random AOE damage from Slayers/Choppas is a pretty creative and interesting looking way of doing things. I can't wait to get my hands on a Slayer!

Thanks for the coverage!

Adam told us it's still a 'copter. We then proceeded to joke about how it would just be a lot louder, have more kegs etc. But I don't remember him saying anything specific.