Producer's Letter is out

You can find it here.

I warn you now, if you have been keeping up with the news from the various blogs on my blog roll or the Q&A thread then this letter has nothing new in it. There are a couple of confirmations in it, but nothing new. It is however worth mentioning that only a section of any game's players read forums or blogs, where as this letter goes out to everyone, so its not that much of a shock that it doesn't have anything other than a summary of what those of us that do read everything possible would have already seen. As such it's a solid letter for a mass mailing and I don't fault Mythic at all for not giving anything new in it (wouldn't have complained if they had mind you...), but I'm not going to bother doing my usual letter review as it's rather pointless for this one.

WAR servers are back up

Yay ;)

Mythic's ISP has gone boom, but servers should be back soon

As it says above. Expect EA to be kicking the ISP's arse right now.

Chosen nudged towards using Great Weapons

Chosen got a broad sweep nerf in the 1.3.6 patch. The resist aura took a heavy hit and since almost every attack we use (certainly the ones worth having) all use spirit damage; it works out as far more than a single ability change. At first it seemed really OMFG bad, but it turned out my armour had bugged somehow and after I removed and re-equipped it all my damage went up a bit. However, having sorted my strangely bugged armour and put a load more time in I have discovered to my disappointment that it’s hit my sword and shield Chosen fairly badly.

If you are wearing lots of sovereign, or use a Great Weapon combined with top end gear to purely maximise your DPS then it’s still good, the damage is lower but not that much. But for a non sovereign shield using Chosen it’s lowered the damage just enough to blunt their edge and outside of CC and debuffs make them feel a bit puny. So much so in fact, that despite me being a huge fan of the sword & shield playstyle and the abilities and specs this allows you to use, I too have respecced and adjusted my gear for using Great Weapons. Instantly I’m back to having the same impact that I did without a Great Weapon prior to 1.3.6. Note that I’m not saying I used to hit as hard with S&B as I do now with a Great Weapon, but the damage was high enough before to feel more of a threat than you can now, it’s about overall impact in RvR.

It’s a bit of a shame really. I do think the resist nerf was a good idea, as its effect on everyone else’s damage was too high, it’s just a pity that the cost turned out to be my favourite playstyle being nerfed a step too far. There should have been something to compensate somehow. It does feel like Mythic either didn't quite get this right, or that they actually want us to be using Great Weapons.

Plus on a purely personal level it has ruined my solo roaming ability, at least until I get the hang of having less options and survivability. Still, it could be worse and I have enjoyed the change of playstyle more than I expected. Not gonna kid myself though, if we get a return to having multiple viable spec and gear options, then I’ll be respeccing shield straight away.

In other news... make sure you watch our new KF WAR vid. KILL FRENZY FRIED CHICKEN!

Let's Blorc again

Got a couple more levels on my Black Orc, hitting the heady heights of level 35! I've done a bit of RvR too, obviously at a huge disadvantage, but it's not been entirely fruitless. Mainly because I just played (a slightly psychotic) guard-bot. I've decided I'm going to be stick with the great weapon spec and just smashing things around with no real care for my own safety, because it's fun. Which I guess means I am accidently role-playing a Black Orc correctly.

Here's the look at level 35, mean green killing machine:

Anyways, building up some rest XP again at the moment and I plan on hammering his level up with some champ group farming in the near future. I will probably only level him when I have a full bar of rest XP available, since that's the most efficient when you're juggling as many alts as I am.

It shouldn't be too long before I'll discover if it's joy or pain (I suspect the latter) for a newbie 40 Blorc in the now sovereign dominated Tier 4.

Kill Frenzy Fried Chicken (the movie)

Durtbocks has one again rocked the WAR video world. Beware... THE BIRDS!


Link to youtube for higher res

What are you least and most looking forward to from 1.4 and the RvR Pack?

Now that we are starting to get a picture, albeit a limited one, of what the future of WAR holds… I would like to ask a question:

What are you least and most looking forward to from 1.4 and the RvR Pack?

Prior to the Gamescom/Gamesday Baltimore news I was most excited about the chance of playing Skaven, but afterwards I find myself not that bothered about that at all now. It might be fun, but no matter what Mythic have up their sleeves it will not be what I wanted and for me personally, to stay excited will only lead to disappointment. So unless fresh news comes out to change my mind, I’ve kinda written that off as something to get all hyped about. You may accuse me of being blinkered by the past and I shouldn’t be so limited in my desires for a MMO traditional playable race, but sorry folks, that IS what I wanted. It is ok to not be happy about everything, particularly as blind faith is, well… blind. And not really any different to blind hate.

So as a customer and devoted WAR fan, it is now up to Mythic to convince me that their new idea for Skaven is better than my (and most people’s) preconceived perception of what a true playable MMO race is. I don’t think that’s a harsh or unfair thing to say.

The thing that really has me quivering with thoughts of potential slices of awesome pie (with custard AND a raspberry coulis) is the campaign update and how the new Skaven zone(s?) links into this. We know that victory points and domination are going, we also know that Mythic want to move the campaign away from waithammer and give us something more dynamic, yet easy to understand. I don’t think we’ll move away from zone locking, as I think it was a wording issue when I was told this before and they actually meant domination, which is a shame if so, but there’s still so much potential here. Instead, I suspect we’re going to get something heavily influenced by the new city siege system.

The new city siege is in a way telling a story, a story that is built around the clear objectives that each stage provides. The sappers desperately trying to destroy the defenders siege weaponry, Warlords marching through the city looking to challenge and defeat their rivals. The Emperor Karl Franz and Tchar'zanek nominating their champions for the final battle… it’s all just a bit more melodramatic than the Victory point system before it. So imagine if there were similar things within the campaign itself? NPC warlords leading assaults, defensive/offensive goals that have a tangible effect and objectives that had more purpose than just adding a few points to a scoreboard.

I could be way off the mark with the thoughts above, but I’m rather excited about the potential of a completely revised campaign and what it could mean for WAR. The campaign is the lynch pin of WAR and a complete revision that genuinely improves it would be a monumental change. I can’t wait to see what happens.

How about you?