First Taste of ROR Merged T4 - Running Away!

More action from Return of Reckoning / Warhammer Online! This is me running away from a failed keep siege in Chaos Wastes. I am only L16 and it was my first taste of the now merged Tier 4. In order to ensure a healthy population the merged T4 includes ranks 16-40 and covers the T2, T3 and T4 zones (only a few open at any time). I only joined late on and just as the keep siege fell apart and Order poured out to sweep up the mess, I was well out my depth to be honest. Still on my starter mule and in T1 gear! Lots of fun though.

Back Playing WAR / Return to Reckoning

Yes, it's true! I am back playing Warhammer Online over on the excellent "Return of Reckoning" private server.

Quick post to say hello with an old screenshot from ROR i had from last year.. I am still just in T1 at the moment though and getting a feel for things again, plus trying out come classes I never played much before.

The game has a full download client now, plus it's own launcher, so there's plenty of effort been put in over the last year or son to continually tweak and improve the game, plus more good stuff coming soon I hear Forts will get implemented in a couple of weeks. Join Us!

From Mace to Face...

I've recoverd this from the Way Back Machine and am posting for posterity and reference..... it's not by me but by I guy called Rok. It's how damage in WAR was calculated, in 2009 at least. I am going to make an online calculator and will use this as reference.

Meet Tanky

Meet Tanky. Tanky doesn’t like to be hit with things and protects himself as much as possible. Let’s see what happens when we attack him.

Step 1: Did Tanky Block?

Tanky likes to carry around a shield that he tries to put between himself and harm’s way. If he manages to do so he Blocks and the attack is stopped. This shield has a Block Rating and the higher it is the better his chance to Block. However the stronger the attack the lower Tanky’s chance to block. If you’re attacking with a melee weapon, spell or ranged weapon you will be using your Strength, Intelligence or Ballistic Skill respectively to overcome the shields Block Rating. Any other bonuses or penalties are added after that’s worked out, for example some gear helps you block better and two-handed melee attacks reduce Tanky's chance to Block by 10%.

[defenders block rating] / [attackers damage stat] * 40 + [defenders '+ block' bonuses] - [attackers 'reduced chance to be blocked'] = Block %

Step 2: Did Tanky Parry/Dodge/Disrupt?

Tanky’s a clever fellow and has discovered that he can avoid getting hurt be getting out of the way of things. He’s learned to deflect melee attacks with his weapon (Parry) which comes from his Weapon Skill, jump out of the way of arrows (Dodge, sometimes called Evade) thanks to Initiative and shrug off magical attacks (Disrupt) due to his Willpower. If he manages to do this, the attack is stopped. As with Blocking, Tank’s chance to Parry, Dodge or Disrupt is reduced by your Strength, Ballistic Skill or Intelligence. Any other bonuses or penalties are added after that’s worked out, for example dual-weilding would give Tanky a 10% bonus to Parry and two-handed melee attacks reduce Tanky's chance to Parry by 10%.

[defenders weapon skill] / [attackers strength] * 15 + [defenders '+ parry' bonuses] - [attackers 'reduced chance to be parried'] = Parry %

[defenders willpower] / [attackers intelligence] * 15 + [defenders '+ disrupt' bonuses] - [attackers 'reduced chance to be disrupted'] = Disrupt %

[defenders initiative] / [attackers ballistic skill] * 15 + [defenders '+ dodge' bonuses] - [attackers 'reduced chance to be evaded'] = Dodge %

Step 3: What did you hit with?

If you’ve come this far then you’ve hit Tanky! How much damage you’re going to do depends on what you hit him with. Your attack has an initial damage shown on its tooltip. It will also do additional damage if you’re attacking with a Ranged or Melee weapon based on that Weapons DPS. Each attack has a unique coefficient for your weapons damage bonus, and while it is often the same as the cast time of the attack (or 1.5 for instant casts) this is not always the case. The Weapons DPS is increased by this coefficient.

Sometimes you’ll just be attacking automatically with your weapon, this is called auto-attack. Auto-attack has no tooltip damage and its coefficient is always your weapons speed.

[attacks tooltip damage] + [attackers weapon DPS] x [attacks weapon coefficient] = Base Damage

Step 4: So you’ve got two weapons hu?

So you thought you were clever did you, bring two swords to a knife fight? Well if you’ve attacked Tanky with an ability both weapons will add damage, however the off-hand weapon won’t add as much.

[attacks tooltip damage] + ([attackers main-hand weapon DPS] +[attackers off-hand weapon DPS] x 0.45 ) x [attacks weapon coefficient] = Base Damage

If you’re auto-attacking you will only hit with the main-hand weapon but every time that happens you have a 50% chance to hit with the off-hand weapon too. In this case the off-hand weapon deals its damage separately.

([attackers main-hand weapon speed] - [attackers off-hand weapon speed]) x [attackers off-hand weapon DPS] + [attackers off-hand weapon DPS] x [attackers off-hand weapon speed] x 0.9 = Off-Hand Base Damage

Step 5: How hard did you hit?

Tanky is Tough but you’re no slouch either. If you’re stronger, smarter or a better shot than Tanky is tough you’re going to do extra damage…but if he’s tougher then you’re going to do less damage. Luckily, no matter how tough Tanky is your attack’s Base Damage can’t be reduced below half by that toughness. So this time it’s your Strength (for melee), Intelligence (for spells) and Ballistic Skill (for ranged weapons) reduced by Toughness. You can also get bonus melee, magic or ranged damage on some items. These bonuses are all modified by the abilities stat coefficient which, like the attacks weapon coefficient is often the same as the cast time but with many exceptions. Again, auto-attack damage uses the weapons speed as it’s stat coefficient.

[attacks stat coefficient] x ([attackers strength, intelligence or ballistic skill] + [attackers bonus melee, magic or ranged damage] - [defenders toughness]) = Stat Bonus

[base damage] + [stat bonus] / 5 = Raw Damage (for abilities)

[base damage] + [stat bonus] / 10 = Raw Damage (for auto-attack or main-hand auto-attack)

[base damage] + [stat bonus] / 20 = Raw Damage (for off-hand auto-attacks)

Total Damage cannot be lower than half Base Damage

Step 6: How about % bonuses?

The damage you deal to Tanky is sometimes affected by % modifiers. Maybe someone is Guarding Tanky (-50%) or maybe you have a tactic like Divine Fury (+25%). These bonuses always add together before being applied.

[total damage] x (1 + [% penalties] + [% bonuses]) = Modified Damage

Step 7: Did you hit him where it hurts?

Sometimes when you attack Tanky you will hit him where it really hurts, which means you’ll do around half again more damage. This is called a crit. Your chance to crit Tanky is based on his Initiative. The more he has the less chance you have of critting. You can also get crit bonuses that add on top of that chance and he can get -crit to counter you.

([attackers level] x 7.5 + 50) / [defenders initiative] x 10 = % Crit Chance

Step 8: How much more did that crit hurt?

Ooomf! Right in the jibblies!

If you’ve crit Tanky you’re going to do more damage. The exact amount is randomised between 40% and 60% extra damage so we like to average it out to 50%. You can also get bonuses that increase your crit damage. These are added on top of that 50%.

[modified damage] x (1.5 + [attackers % crit damage bonus]) = Crit Damage

Step 9: Hang on, what’s this bubble about?

A sneaky goblin has put a bubble around Tanky and now you can’t hurt him! Luckily the bubble can only take so much, prick it enough and it will pop so keep attacking.

Damage absorb spells like this can only absorb a flat amount of damage which is listed on the tooltip. After this they are used up.

If [modified damage] or [crit damage] is less than [ spell’s absorb amount] then:

[spell’s absorb amount] - [damage] = Spell’s New Absorb Amount, no damage dealt.

Otherwise:

[damage] - [spell’s absorb amount] = Post-Absorb Damage, and the damage absorb spell is gone.

Step 10: What about all that stuff he’s wearing?

You hit Tanky and hit him good! Unfortunately he’s wearing slabs of metal from a military scrap yard. Clang!

Tanky has Armor and Resistances and they reduce the damage you do by a percentage. Armor stops physical attacks while Resistance stops magical attacks. There are three kinds of resistance: Spirit, Elemental and Corporeal. If your ability is one of these three it will say which kind on the tooltip, otherwise it’s a physical attack.

If you’re attacking with a physical attack your Weapon Skill lets you find the weak points in Tanky’s armor, this is called Armor Penetration. Tanky can also get bonuses that reduce your armor penetration. If you’re casting a spell on Tanky there is no stat to reduce his resistances. Neither Armor or Resistance can go above 75% (after all modifiers are applied) and both can be reduced by certain spells and effects. Resistances are further soft capped: After 40% they are less effective per point of resistance.

For Armor:

[defenders armor] / [attackers level] / 110 = Armor Mitigation %

[attackers weapon skill] / ([defenders level] x 30 + 200) = Armor Penetration %

[defenders armor mitigation] x (1 - [attackers armor penetration] + [defenders anti-armor penetration]) can’t be greater than 0.75

[post-absorb damage] x (1 - ([defenders armor mitigation] x (1 - [attackers armor penetration] + [defenders anti-armor penetration]))) = Final Damage

For Resistance:

If [defenders resistance] / [attackers level] is equal to or less than 16.8 then:

[defenders resistance] / [attackers level] / 42 = Resistance Mitigation %

Otherwise:

([defenders resistance] - [attackers level] x 16.8) / [attackers level] / 126 + 0.4 = Resistance Mitigation %

[resistance mitigation] can’t be greater than 0.75 (75%)

[post-absorb damage] x (1 - [defenders resistance mitigation]) = Final Damage

Step 11: Take that Tanky!

You did it! Tanky’s health bar is reduced by the damage you dealt. Lucky for Tanky he’s got plenty of health due to his high wounds.

[wounds] x 10 = Health Total

[defenders health total] - [final damage] = Defenders new health total

So there you have it, easy as that

Warhammer Online: It's Back

Have you played WAR lately? I have. There's a private server called Return of Reckoning and despite being limited to Tier 1 and some bugs and stuff the PvP/RvR is alive and well. I hope to post more soon but here's a quick screenshot of me in game now cheering away :) If you happen to be playing already then please give me a shout.

*Scenario This

Had a bit of time to play WAR last night. No one was grouped up or even talking in /guild (HELLo!) so I hit the scenario solo queue. Bad news. 4 Scs played, 3 camps against, one camp for. Sure, I should find a better group, yadda, yadda, yawn.

I don't think there is much left in WAR for someone looking for a casual hour or two of PvP. I played football last night so it was late when I logged in, I was only looking for a quick hour of play, but I don't think there is much left in WAR for me.

After the Scs I took to the RvR lakes looking for a group or to tag along on some action. No joy. Logged off.

The sourest taste in my mouth was that I basically achieved nothing in 90 mins. A handful of crests and a few thousand RP. MY renown was 79.48% when I logged in and 79.48% when I logged out. With limited playtime I am unable to hang around for zone locks and cities where big chunks of renown are to be had, and without my old guild's organised WB nights I am unable get into the large roaming battles which really get the blood flowing.

Here is my pledge - no more scenarios, just open RvR. If I wanted to play instanced PvP I would go play SWTOR and their Warzones, whose objective based setup I like better than WAR's inevitable deathmatch spawncamps. If I can't find some fun in WARS's open world RvR then it's time to finally admit the game is up.

Warhammer World

Trying to get into WAR these last few weeks, it's been a bit hard, couple main reasons...

• Scenario Imbalance
• Empty guild - few friends left

The scenario imbalance is bad, really bad - I swear 9 out of 10 scs end up in a spawn camp, and very quickly at that. Sometimes zero kills for both sids as one side sees who the opposition is and never leave camp. It in no way amounts to fun.

This would be solo-queue by the way, which leads my other point and some could argue reason for the first. My guild is empty, gone, dead, and I have few friends left. I have joined a new guild but grouping so far has been limited and it seems a bit cliquey.

I'm gonna need to stick at and make something of it myself I think, try and find some oRvR action, or call it quits for good. Whilst playing SWTOR was fun for a bit I have missed Warhammer a lot. Missed Altdorf, missed my horse, missed the Dessies, missed sieges and keeps. Missed the world. I've not had that much time to play yet so will give it another go.

Ping Pong

I'm back playing Warhammer Online. Thank fuck for that. See you soon x

Blogger Plays Game, Blogs About It

I’ve been playing The Old Republic since the official release date. Blog Shocker! I wanted to stick around in WAR but my guild and friends pretty much vanished overnight and it only took a moment of weakness and my copy of SWTOR was winging it’s way to me.

My WAR sub was still active for a few weeks after this but I guess not actually logging in again tells it’s own story. Not that I am now a WAR hater but I was right into the Star Wars storylines and learning a new class is one of the best things for me. Just messing about on some different classes in SWTOR has made me realise how much variety of play style I missed out in WAR, playing only a Swordmaster for my 3 years. I am definitely going to get a few chars rolling in Star Wars, so far got a L20 Sith Assassin , L18 Sniper, both on Tomb of Freedon Naad server . More about my PVP experience with these guys in future posts!

My server though was one of the worst hit for queues, and still has about a 15 min queue in primetime (when I play ofc). The queues were easily over an hour every day for the first few weeks. This hit my game time somewhat. My wife loved these queues though; it meant I could do some jobs around the house!

I’m in no hurry to get to 50 though and am taking it easy. The storyline have been quite fun so far, and I am into it, I cannot recall anything about the story in Warhammer whatsoever. And the way I see it, open-world PvP is a still some way off from being an actual viable PvP endgame yet so there’s no pointing rushing to get there.

Coming Soon

A Last Hurrah

I’m gonna be back playing WAR for a month or so, until the 9th Jan when my sub is up. My guild has decided to wind itself down with the vast majority of players including the leaders deciding to move to SWTOR. So for a few weeks there is to be something of a last hurrah with a few players like myself popping back on-line for a farewell Des bashing.

I have been increasingly tempted to get back into things anyway so this was all the incentive I needed. I will not be going to play SWTOR unless there is sufficent positive feedback about end game PvP so I may even stay in WAR after doomsday if there are still some people to play with, and against.

I had about 4hrs in game on Friday night. Was awesome fun, just the buzz I’ve been missing.

Fair Fights

1 Destro + 1 Order = 1 Winner + 1 Whiner. Bask in the glory of my mathematics.

I think future development of WAR needs to focus on fair fights. 2 faction RvR was never going to cut it and the campaign and introduction of Forts/Relics needs to be seriously focused to reduce the advantages of numerical superiority.

AAO and Underdog (does this still do anything?) isn't enough on it's own. Maybe it was to start with, but not anymore, not now have folks the option to reroll on the same server to play on the winning game. Crashing the client does not enable the measely 8hr lockout you know.

Karak Norn has been suffering from realm imbalance for a long time now with Destro dominating for months. And if Destro aren't dominating Order are.

The latest Destro dominance came about when a french server merged with Norn and with this came a guild called Legion de Midgaard Nord, LNM, who can regularily field 6FG of well geared players, and play well to boot. Destro was already in the ascendancy on Norn at the time but this merge cemmented it big time.

It has been politely requested via the medium of forums that Destro should stop zerging Orders for the good of the server but that's not going to happen.

Whilst I would like to say Orders should man up and adapt it just hasn't happened either and just won't happen. Success breeds success. Many Orders have rerolled Destro's to ride the renown train to Altdorf or gradually quit RvR after geting wiped one too many times.

There has been some adapataion by Order. Some Guilds and alliances have merged but this has been slow going and in the meantime, and to their great credit imo, LNM rerolled to Order and are racing back to T4 as we speak. They say they will review the situation when they reach T4 and settle on a side. It's very admirable of them but it won't change anything. One side will always dominate.

LNM's reroll has created a vacuum on Destro's side now and Order are back in the ascendcy, suddenly emerging from the warcamps/Sc queue, or returning from Dessie alts.

Allowing cross-realming was criminal to be honest. Like me you may be a pillar of rightousness ;) but the world is full of easy moders. It really is. Look outside, there's one right now!! And why not, why do things the hard way when there is an easy way? It's human nature. But it's sucks for both sides really and drives everyone towards RvE.

How can a 2 faction game ever be balanced?

My radical idea would be to allow everyone to fight each other and only Guild and Alliance members are friendly targets. Maintain some lore and RvR by not allowing Order and Detro to Guild or Alliance together but everything else is a free for all. I'd make a new map to go with this. Call it T5. A large PvP zone with hex-style territory, claimable by guilds and rewards points but split up depending in the size of the guild. This would put the cat amongst the pigeons.

I'll get my coat ;)

The Kid and the Vicar

I had an impromptu game of Warhammer 40K (tabletop) with my cousin on Christmas Day last year. Whilst he taught me a lesson in why not to drink 3 bottles of red wine and take control of an army of slavering genestealers he mentioned that he played WAR with his some of his friends. He’s 11 by the way. I am 33.

This made me think about the different type of people who play Warhammer Online and where Mythic/Bioware/EA see the market for WAR.

When I was eleven I played Warhammer tabletop too, and computer games (Dungeon Master on the Atari ST anyone?). I very much doubt my cousin played WoW before WAR . He did not seem like a grizzled DAoC veteran either.

My next door neighbour is a vicar, he’s 40, and a huge tabletop fan. He enjoys the painting and modelling aspect the most and makes some simply amazing converted armies and scenery. He had heard about WAR and asked me about it. I was very cagey to be honest. I do not see WAR as Warhammer at all. It’s a PvP MMO. Although he likes to play Guitar Hero on his Xbox he is no gamer and I don’t think there is anything for the tabletop hobbyist in T4’s endgame PvP. In short, I did not recommend it to him.

Somewhere in all last week’s goings on I picked up that Mythic are going to make this new announcement at Games Day US, Game’s Workshop’s annual tabletop fest. Game’s Workshop’s Warhammer hobby has a hugely established fanbase of all ages around the world. I’m wondering if the news will be something to try to continue tap into the ever-lasting and lucrative Warhammer hobby market. Something to make the game more accessible to Warhammer fans who are also casual gamers. One commenter on Bootae’s blog threw out the idea of the game being released on Xbox, which Mythic did demo was possible before launch. Would certainly fit the criteria some of the bloggers have mentioned (e.g. speechless). Only Sigmar knows, and his bloggers ;)

Baited

Yes, I am eagerly awaiting the July 6th news. I am checking all sources of WAR news for WAR news every few minutes.

It feels like Transfer Deadline Day for an Everton FC fan. UK football reference here, humour me :)

SkySports (1 hour before the deadline): "Yes, Argentine World Cup hero Juan Roman Riquelme has been spotted outside Goodison Park..."
(30 mins before deadline): "No, turned out it was the cleaner".

Latest snippet from Werit on Twitter is they are on their way for playtesting and presentations. Playtesting? I am sure they are not playtesting F2P, the no.1 speculation going around. And could they playtest a shakeup of the RvR campaign? Not sure how, unless they can go into a new or restyled zone or something. Maybe new keep siege interations? Ladders and stuff.

Course, they could playtest new careers but let's not go there.

Werit, Gaarawar, Mykiel and Eka are over there in the US, and Bootae and Zizlak on Skype (no.1 skype conversation EU). Maybe others???

Last time Bloggers were invited to Mythic they introduced the new City sieges and that turned out well, although a tad stale now. What will it be indeed? I can't help but get excited.

A Wink and A Smile

I have not played much of 1.4.3's Live Event yet. Didn't get the eldest to bed 'til almost 11 last night so was knackered and just inhaled vapours from an empty beer bottle and vegged my way through a couple of Scs. What little I saw of the College of Corruption I couldn't make sense of, just got farmed on the stairs.

I logged off quite down actually. I shouldn't bother logging in so late, just to catch a lock and PuG a scenario or two. Leeching locks used to be worthwhile when I was RR50 and shit, as you could get about 10% renown for it, but not so anymore.

Soloing Scs rarely turns out for the best at that hour either. In Gates of Ekrund last night the only DPS in the group, a WH, stealths up and goes missing, wants to be the man I guess. One of the healers turns out to be DPS. I actually had some fun though. Switched to my WB spec,a nd with Odjira, Quick Escape, and full defensive setup I gave the Des a good run around. Got 0 renown though.

My overall thoughts on patch 1.4.3 are that is of very little consequence to me, or the game. WAR's events aren't really events as I imagine them to be. Nothing actually happens. It's just an extra scenario with some progress/reward attached. My WAR is oRvR, not Squishies of Asqy or whatever they are called. When will they do a Live Event that actually takes place in the live world, in the lakes? They could try some new campaign ideas or something, wandering monsters, special RvR quests into the side zones to rescue supplies or something. Something!

Despite the little grumble up there I am content with the game as it is, plenty of fun to be had. Can't get enough of it in fact. It's not exactly what I want it to be, but it what it is, you know. Yadda yadda yadda. WAR has a lot to offer me when I am fully awake and there is beer in the bottle.

But what's this 6th June schizzle? I have learnt not to get carried away with my hopes and expectations for WAR but if Bootae deems it appropriate to devote a wink and a smile to it then it might be something up my street. I'll wager it's not more vanity pets. My guess is it's a joint sub for DAoC and WAR, perhaps with a levelling bonus to get people going. This is a guess. I hope it's wrong.

The Battle for Thargrim's Headwall

I took part in Grezko's event on Thursday gone. It was a Dwarf vs. Orc & Gobbo only battle in Black Crag. It was a hoot, despite loads of elves turning up. Screenshot here is us Dawi lined up ready to take on the stinkin' greenskins.

I miss this sort of thing from the game. For me this event brought Warhammer to WAR, if you know what I mean.

Lesson #341: How to Zerg

I've had a bit of an AFK lately due to the birth of my second son (:D woot!). Just getting back into things the last week or so.

My last post was soooo negative for me, I am a lover really.

Last patch was very good for the game and I am enjoying every bit of it, of course I am, and everyone around me seems to be as well.

WAR is great, you really never now what to expect, you can be fighting small scale one minute and the next thing you know the Zerg turns up. Soloing is cool, Scenarios are cool, massive RvR is cool.

Here's a video a guildie posted on our forums, made me chcuckle. Norn gets like this occasionally on Saturday nights :)

Move Along

March's Producer's Letter is out, although it's not called the Producer's Letter anymore but the March Community Update.

It's basically says nothing. They repeat what has been going on in the Dev discussions, and then some blah about Facebook.

One small ray of ...err... sunshine?.. is that patch 1.4.2 will be up on PTS soon - early April, which by my reckoning is no longer than a week away, then it's middle-April. This is really just a few small steps forward after the massive backward step that was 1.4.

I will say this though. If each of these Dev Discussion topics brings a well-considered change, even very simple ones, then it could add up to something alright in the end. Just takes so damn long though, doesn't it.



Greetings!

With the preparation of patch 1.4.2 in full swing, this month’s update is not the typical Producer’s letter. Instead it is brought to you by the WAR community team. This new monthly overview will summarize things that were going on in the past month and give you a heads up on things to look forward to. Our producers will present new features or major changes and give you and insight into the bigger picture in State of the Game updates. On the forums you have direct developer interaction at your disposal.

We’ve been using the Dev Discussion forum to give you insight into our current and future plans. It has been a busy month on the dev discussion boards with a wide range of topics. Thank you to all those who participated, your feedback is very helpful and we are looking forward to further discussions in the future.

Dev discussions from this month include:

General feedback: Campaigns

Hypothetical Discussion: Horde Scenario

Patch Feedback: Scenario Line-up

Patch Feedback: Keep Doors

General Feedback: Future Discussions

Feature Discussion: Physical Mitigation

Hypothetical Discussion: Scenario Rulesets



Facebook!
Thank you to those who have liked us in the past month. We are so close to the 5,000 like mark that we thought we would give you a little something extra for your support. In recognition of player efforts, and in acknowledgement of requests from players who have already purchased the RvR double pack, we are having a 1 week 25% off sale on server transfers. This will run from April 1st through April 7th. Check it out here.



Coming next month
In closing, we wanted to let you know we are working hard to push some changes to the power gap concerns based on the feedback and discussions we’ve been having on the forums. This should be hitting PTS early in April for testing. We also have some interesting changes to Grovod in the works as well as a surprise for the scenario lineup changes in the next patch. Finally, we’d like to encourage people to continue to talk about the game in the discussions as we will be opening up the topic of crafting soon and want to get as much input as possible for our plans.

Expectant

In 4 weeks time my wife is expecting a baby but that's ages away whilst today is the last day of March and I am expecting the Producer's Letter.

A lot has been "discussed" since the last letter, mostly within the Dev Discussions on the official forum. From February's letter and the forums the following could be on the agenda for today's (?) letter.

I hope there is a damn letter. Although it usually amounts to little, it is something. I am not going to start playing anything new, so it's WAR or bust for me, and whilst I am (thankfully) cleansed of hope for major changes, like a "new frontiers" campain, knowing that there is something going on in the background keeps me happy.

Dev Discussions
- Campaign Changes
- Keep Doors
- Physical Mitigation, maybe a reduction in how much armour is worth
- Doomflayer & Warpfored Nerfs. Post-80 gear nerfs
- Effective Level nerfs
- Scenario Line-ups
- Grovod Caverns Skaven Scenario
- Ironclad Scenario

Horde Scenarios

Live Events
- Maybe more news on Sigmartide. My idealistic hope is this will be an actual NPC War which is going on in on the side zones which we participate/RvR quest in. No chance. With Wood Elves and Beastmen as new playable races.

'Advanced Crafting'
- My fantasy here is something that can be crafted and slotted on armour and grants bonus similar to current set bonuses so you can customise your armour more. Who knows what's in store?

Dev says Nerf

In case you have not seen this already Steve Engle in his 'Physical Mitigation' thread on the offiicial forums has touched upon some planned changes to the 1.4 gear.


"Currently, the plan is to reduce your effective rank gain from one every renown rank gained to one every four renown ranks gained.

Note: This means the stat soft cap goes from 1550 at RR100 to 1175 at RR100.

Doomflayer sets will have ~ 233 less stats total on them in comparison to the current LIVE Doomflayer sets.

Warpforged sets will have ~365 less stats total on them in comparison to the current LIVE Warpforged sets.

Both sets are adjusted based on the Effective Rank they are intended for, which is now ~42.5 and 45."


He later added...

"SC weapons, any non-set Verminous Horde drops, and RVR purchased accessories will all receive attention as well."

I have put his quotes in italic to make it look like I am quoting from Joyce and not the Bioware Social Network.

WAR vs. Washing Up

Every time I log into WAR I have a great time. This could be just spending an hour putting some liniments onto the AH and tinkering with a different gear/renown/mastery setup, or full on epic RvR or City sieges.

Like the night before last, I was even more tired than is usual for me. My wife and I are trying new ways to get our 2 and half year old son to sleep better in the night in preperation for having another baby soon (very soon). This has been interesting but tiring so I logged in with the sole intention of playing some leechhammer.

Basically, I visit the AH and check liniment prices, then grab a load of ingredients, fly out to the most promising leeching spot and then alternate between roaming and making stacks of pots. I enjoy this. Do a bit of washing up. Wiggle the mouse a bit. Nice relaxing evening.

Destro however had different plans and were just locking down Eataine and an Altdotf defense was on. In the time it takes to say "Reikwald" a guild WB was up, I was tuned in and on vent, geared up and potted, and ready to go.

It was a City Siege with a twist. We spent too long getting our warband organised at the start of Stage 1 and then were outplayed as Des split up to cap multiple BOs at once. We were faced with killing Sappers for 20 mins or conceding stage 1. So we lost the stage but did manage 100+ kills to about 4 losses. Nice RP.

Stage 2 was a tie, but another 100 kills or so and a balanced fight. We were moving as single warband whilst Des were splitting up into groups and flanking us. It made for a really great fight. The stuff you pay money for.

Stage 3 was where it went weird. We got down 3 of their champs but couldn't take down the 4th, a Black Orc. His HP hardly shifted. That's when we realised we were up against 13 healers, including 10 DoKs. Shifting focus to the healers wasn't any better - we could only kill 3 or 4 before the others started rezzing up and the Black Orc would be back up at 100%.

The timer elapsed on the stage but we duked it out some more. Karl Franz and T'char went for a quiet cup of tea and wondered whatever happened to the Red Plague. We tried a few different things, like coordinating our CC and stuff, but we couldn't break through and our morale dropped a bit and people started dying. Both sides ended up with 400+ kills and 100,000+ renown for some ( for me!).

It ended on a slightly sour note for us that we could not break through their healing - lots of people blamed Doomflayer- but I really think a large part of it was losing all control of the BOs in stage 1 and giving Des the healing bonus. And of course facing so many healers.

It was an great evening though. The washing up did not get done.