Saturday, August 30, 2008

Preview Weekend Update

I wrote about the preview weekend bugs and upcoming fixes, but here's a new update from Mark Jacobs here.

1) Significantly improved NPC pathing - Okay, in all fairness it wouldn't have taken much to improve on what we showed you folks during the PW. However, the NPC pathing is back to where it needs to be and while it still isn't perfect, well, it's a heck of a lot closer than it was just a short time ago. We identified a whole lot of bugs and squashed them.

2) Improved pet commands and responsivness - Well, pretty much same as above. Pets will no longer act as if obeying an order from you was the last thing in this world that they wanted to do.

3) Fixed an issue with textures blurring - Nothing like looking at textures through a blurred lens to make things look really sharp eh? Major improvements in and more OTW.

4) Enhanced Global Cooldown Mechanic - Well, for one the GCD actually shows the correct cooldown time and not the rounded up cooldown time (Hey, what a great idea, let's make it seem slower than it is. WOOT!). The slop timer is working fine right now and we'll continue to look at making the GCD and combat in general more responsive.

5) Continuing to improve Client Stability - As always, lots of fixes going in here. The client is supposed to be more stable (and looks like it so far) but until we get the masses back in...

6) Added new Graphics Settings and seeking more feedback from testers to guide future improvements. You asked for it, you got it. Well, in all fairness we were going to put these in anyway but it never hurts to nudge us a bit at times.

7) Target Nearest Target improved - Yeah! One of my pet peeves addressed.

8) Renown Gear changes and Potency of Potions increased. Tweaking, adding, subtracting, in other words (don't say "nerf", we're still in beta!) balancing.

9) Increased bonus for medal winners in PQs. PQs are supposed to be fun, joyous and not grindy. We'll continue tweaking and changing them wherever we need to do that to make it so #1. (okay, a ST reference)

10) Added more loot bags in Tier 1 PQs - Boy, it's going to be rather crowded when we launch so we just upped the loot for the Tier 1 PQs. We'll do the same to T2 as needed. And when the rush is over, we'll tweak downwards.

Preview Weekend Update - Warhammer News

Thursday, August 28, 2008

Open Beta Client Available for Download

Just announced at war-europe.com, you can now download the 12GB open beta client.

At long last, the 12GB Open Beta client is now available for download through our website. This download is open for anyone who is logged in at our website, but only Open Beta testers will be able to run the client. Open Beta testers include all current beta testers, Collector's Edition pre-order customers as well as customers who bought a Standard Edition pre-order via one of our premium partners. To download the client without Open Beta access will only slow the download for other users so we kindly ask you to respect this.

Please note: current beta testers will be able to patch their clients; no new download is needed if you already have one.
Have fun playing Warhammer!

Open beta client available for download - Warhammer Online News

Buy Warhammer Prepaid Game Time Card


Finally it's available. Amazon.com sells Warhammer Online Prepaid Game Time Cards for $29,99. If you're looking to buy one for your online adventures, now is your chance.

Also, if you haven't yet ordered Warhammer Online or your favorite store ran out of copies, Amazon comes to the rescue again!

Buy Warhammer Online Prepaid Gametime Cards - Warhammer News

Tuesday, August 26, 2008

Warhammer Issues and Upcoming Fixes

Mark Jacobs from Mythic posted this information about the various issues with Warhammer and future fixes, which tells us a bit more than yesterday's Preview Weekend Bugs & Server Stability post.

(1) Client Crashes

  • I’ve talked about this as one of the reasons why we didn’t release the NDA until recently. Here’s the current status.
  • Just a little too many currently. While we are better off than we were in beta, we must do better still before release.
  • A number of players will lower spec machines had more CTDs than higher spec machines.
  • Number of fixes already in pipeline. They are working their way through our testing servers and will be pushed to the players once they have been vetted internally.
  • Engineering time for CTD issue has remained heavily committed; our top engineers are working on the various issues.

(2) Monster Pathing and AI
  • Well, what can I say other than not even all of King Tut’s wealth could have made us feel better for messing up on this one. Well, maybe all his wealth.
  • "Yes, that monster seems to be behaving a little oddly”. Monster responsiveness was very sketchy, odd pauses and tethering issues.
  • “Oh, was I supposed to go in that direction?” Pathing sometimes wonky - mobs get stuck or go in wrong direction.
  • Utter confusion at times as both monsters and pets will engage and disengage seemingly at random
  • Internal server optimizations last week broke the pathing/AI. And I mean really, really broke it. This truly was a “Opps, we broke this code” moment for us and we don’t have many of them.
  • Going to ensure that this problem is fixed this week. As I said in my first Preview Weekend, this is a major concern for us. Fortunately we have no underwater combat in this game or some of the NPCs may have been appropriately dubbed land sharks.

(3) Pet Responsiveness
  • With similar issues to Monster Pathing and AI, this was not our finest hour.
  • Need to transfer "combat responsiveness" fixes to pets - have pet move immediately on button press.
  • “Oh no, Mr. Bill!” Pets suffer from same pathing and lack of response as general monsters. Pets hopping around like they were headed to Del Staters.


(4) Global Cooldown Timers
  • This seems to be a hot topic for players to talk about. However, things aren’t always as they seem.
  • Reality and perception are two different things, Warhammer has a GCD of 1.4s, WoW has 1.5s
  • “Ability not ready” messaging needs to be improve, a sound effect if Global Cooldown in effect, maybe more cowbell?
  • Need to improve on the feeling of sluggishness of the GCD and UI. Bug with display where our timer shows 2s when it is really 1.4. We need to improve on anything that makes the UI feel more sluggish than it is.
  • The next best thing to a queue is? We will add in better "slop timer" to allow players 0.3s extra to pre-queue a second ability followup.

(5) Better animations
  • So much more coming in the next two versions of the client. We are currently incorporating serious amounts of new animations into the game. Hopefully nobody will sneak a coneheads model into the game.
  • Look at what my XXXX does now? Over the next month we will address many class-attack specific issues across all 20 careers.
  • “U think you can dance?” Nope, but we have added new racial animations for movement, fidgets and redid some emotes.

(6) Texture Blurring
  • Textures are currently cached in a manner that results in blurriness on entering a region.
  • We will look at adding a client scalar.

(7) Client Performance
  • Need better scalers on effects, sounds, graphics, etc to help lower end machines (already lots of additions to coders)
  • This thing loves memory like Dan Aykroyd loves bass. We have already improved the memory consumption of the client and taken 100M out of current test best.

(8) Targeting, Camera
  • Currently our targeting system differs from many MMOs in terms of our features and how we go about things. We will identify and make a more standard initial setup but allow flexibility.
  • Will add additional keybinding selections to allow flexibility

(9) Renown rank gear
  • Unfortunately, a new bug (well an old bug we fixed and then managed to break again) which allowed Rank 10 RR 6 players can go to Tier 2 to get better gear and then come back to Tier 1 and own scenarios. We are currently working on a fix.
Warhammer Issues and Upcoming Fixes - Warhammer News - Warhammer Patch Notes

Monday, August 25, 2008

Preview Weekend Bugs & Server Stability

Mark stopped by on WA forum to tell us about the server stability problems during the preview weekend.

Here's a summary:
  • mob pathing severely bugged
  • pet AI still horrible
  • client crashes still happen
  • problems with some graphics cards, especially SLI
  • servers were stable, no lag and overall working good as expected

Read the full post below:

I'll be expanding this as the weekend goes by but here's where we stand right now in terms of some of the issues that have been discussed, tossed around, thrown like a spear at our heads since the Preview Weekend started:

1) We peaked last night at around 30K concurrent players across our servers, that is obviously a great number. During that time the servers performed extremely well in terms of CPU usage and we never once came close to max usage so we know that we will meet our server cap populations for launch.

2) Regarding overall server stability we've pretty much exceeded our expectations. We've only had two full server crashes across all servers since we began. Neither crash was due to player load, CPU overload, code going brain dead,etc. but due to a minor issue on our part. The same is true for region crashes of which we only had two. Unfortunately, we had more scenarios crash (20) than we like but the number is still quite low considering we've been running 15 servers for more than a day.

3) Client crashes (crashes to desktop) are down from the last stage of closed beta and thanks to all the people playing, we've already fixed two issues that have caused some of the CTDs. We're not there yet but we are in better shape than we were last month and we will be even better at launch. Even now the CTDs are lower than some games were at release but having said that, it's not good enough for us and CTDs are issue #1A for us right now.

4) Pet AI and pathing is severely broken. The Preview Weekend patch (3.3) unfortunately borked the system. This is issue #1B for us. Even though this is a beta and new bugs/issues are to be expected, we messed up on this issue. We expect a quick turnaround on this next week. So please accept my apologies for this one, it should not have happened.

5) On the subject of graphical quality, SLI, etc., the problems that some players have reported are being focused on as well. From what we've been able to gather so far (other than on SLI which is a known issue), there is something weird happening with a small percentage of graphic cards as well as a possible issue which crept into this patch. We'll know more about it this week.

6) On some targeting issues, we're looking into that as well.

7) Regarding the GCD, we are not going to remove the GCD but we are continuing to look into some of the issues that have been reported with its use. As our closed beta testers have reported, our Combat Responsiveness Code made a huge difference to the game's feel and we're going to continue to look at the GCD and see if it needs tweaking along with any bug fixes that need to be done. I'll be posting more about this as well in the coming days/weeks. While the bugs with the GCD isn't our #1 priority, making combat feel even more responsive and fun is a major issue so it will continue to get looked at and tweaked over this last month and beyond.

So, that's it for now, more to come as the PW progresses as things arise. Overall we are thrilled with the response to the game on the Web, to our in-game surveys and from our feedback/bug tools. I'm glad we still have almost a month before launch but I am also quite happy where we are other than the problem with pathing/AI for which again I offer my apologies.


Preview Weekend Bugs & Server Stability - Warhammer News

Sunday, August 24, 2008

Tome of Knowledge Achievements

Tome of Knowledge - Warhammer Online
If you're wondering what kind of stuff Tome of Knowledge tracks, here's a neat list to get you started. Hopefully it helps!

Tome of Knowledge (ToK) achievements
  • The Cutpurse - loot 10 items
  • The Pirate - loot 100 items
  • The Hoarder - loot 1,000 items
  • The Pawner - earn 1 gold
  • The Loaded - earn 50 gold
  • The Wise - 10 tome unlocks
  • The Adventurer - 50 tome unlocks
  • The Never-Rester - 100 tome unlocks
  • The Overachiever - 250 tome unlocks
  • The Omniscient - 500 tome unlocks
  • The Friendly - add 5 people to your friends list
  • The Conscript - join 10 groups
  • Ow My Eye - clicked self 100 times
  • The Vain - clicked self 5,000 times
  • The Talker - use the tell command 50 times
  • The Peon - gain 1,000 Influence
  • The Influential - gain 10,000 Influence
  • The Prominent - gain 100,000 Influence
  • Snuffed - die 10 times
  • Victim - die 100 times
  • The Green - die 10 times in RvR
  • Meat Shield - die 100 times in RvR
  • The Lucky - kill 10 players in RvR
  • The Mauler - kill 100 players in RvR
  • Spark Snuffer - kill 10 players that are more than twice your Renown Rank
  • Run Away! - died 10 times to monsters
  • The Bait - Died 100 times from a monster
  • The Wasteful - destroy 10 items
  • The Garbage Disposal - destroy 100 items
  • The Lint Looter - scavenge 50 corpses
  • The Body Searcher - Scavenged 1,000 corpses
  • The Skinner - Butcher 50 corpses

Exploration

  • The Impure - kill Keltherian Darklust, interact with Book of Innocence; around 240, 40650, west of Fortress of Korhandrid (west of Goldmead, DE Chap 9 hub), in the hills near the very edge of the map, in Ellyrion.

Heroic

  • Foe of the Cannibal - unlocked by talking to a sickly man outside a cave in Marshes of Madness, I think southwest of Oathhold
  • The Intractable: Kill any Cold One in the pit around 14323, 14564 (I think, it's the area between Rock of Galirian and Serynal), in the Shadowlands.

Killing

  • Echo Hunter - kill a Neborhest Bat in Marshes of Madness. They can be found south of Oathhold and in the marsh south of Thurarikson's Warcamp.
  • The Huntsman - walk through the mob of pigs around the Public Quest Pillage and Plunder (51613,63055), in Norsca. (possibly Destruction only)
  • The Scout - Examine Unfortunate Victim at 37683, 34796, in Nordland.

Questing

  • Once Bitten, Twice Shy - talk to Kormina Falinsodtr at the Pick and Goggles tavern in the Dwarf starting zone.
  • The Dawnbringer - interact with the Vampire Effigy next to the mountainside near the Plaguesworn Cultists southeast of the Neborhest's Vanguard PQ in Marshes of Madness
  • The Lumberjack - interact with the corpse of a Tree-kin in the are around Dark Elf Chapter 7 (on the way to the NPCs for the last part of Heads Will Roll!, above the Gate at the very south of Shadowlands)
  • The Peculiar - throw a rock on the head of the sleeping Snotling in the woods just outside and east of Tor Aendris, in The Blighted Isle
  • Skaven Splitter - interact with the Man Trap in Warpclaw Hideout, a cave near the SW corner, in The Badlands.
  • Scorp Squisher - kill Baneclaw, a Champion scorpion, at approximately 6400, 62500 (SW corner of the beach), in Chrace.
  • The Skeleton Hunter - interact with the Marked Grave in the graveyard west of Grimmenhagen Village, in Nordland.
  • The Spider Slayer - kill a Dark Hollowfang at the Suskarg Cave in Stormblighthollow, in Troll Country (around 2400, 35219).
  • The Fearless - walk inside Amund's Barrow close to at roughly 48572,44251, in Norsca (possibly Destruction only).

Unconfirmed/Rumored/Unknown or fuzzy triggers:

  • The Grounded - trigger unknown
  • Scourge of the Asur - kill 100 High Elves (possibly Dark Elf only)
  • Favored of Malekith - kill 1,000 High Elves (possibly Dark Elf only)
  • The Crusher - kill an Ogre Bull (clarification needed: which one, where is he?)
Tome of Knowledge Achievements - Warhammer News

Warhammer Careers

Warhammer Online Careers
Warhammer: Age of Reckoning uses and archetypal system for its class system. Each army (race) has three or four careers (classes), and each of those fits one archetypal role.
The different class types are:
  • tank
  • healer
  • melee DPS
  • ranged DPS

Dwarf Careers
  • Tank: Iron Breaker
  • Healer: Rune Priest
  • Ranged Dps: Engineer

High Elf Careers
  • Tank: Sword Master
  • Healer: Archmage
  • Melee Dps: White Lion
  • Ranged Dps: Shadow Warrior

Empire Careers
  • Healer: Warrior Priest
  • Melee Dps: Witch Hunter
  • Ranged Dps: Bright Wizard

Dark Elf Careers
  • Healer: Disciple of Khaine
  • Melee Dps: Witch Elf
  • Ranged Dps: Sorcerer/Sorceress

Chaos Careers
  • Tank: Chosen
  • Healer: Zealot
  • Melee Dps: Marauder
  • Ranged Dps: Magus

Greenskin Careers
  • Tank: Black Orc
  • Healer: Goblin Shaman
  • Ranged Dps: Goblin Squig Herder
Warhammer Online Careers - Warhammer Guides

Warhammer named Best Online Game

For the sixth time, the Leipziger Messe has awarded the title of “Best of GC” to the most innovative new products at the Leipzig GC – Games Convention. A total of 29 exhibitors at the GC – Games Convention had submitted 122 hardware items and software titles for the award.

Warhammer Online won in the category "Best Online Game":

Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning – GOA GOA (developed by Mythic Entertainment)

The creators of the online RPG legend “Dark Age of Camelot”, still so successful today, are back with “Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning”. GOA squares up to the alpha male “World of Warcraft” with spectacular visuals, innovative play modi, neat control and an enormous, appealing fantasy world.

If you're interested what games won in other categories, check it here.

Warhammer Online named "best online game" - Warhammer News

Friday, August 22, 2008

Warhammer Cinematic Trailer

I must admit this is one of the best game cinematics I've ever seen. It shows a few awesome career skills, and overall is a great watch.



Warhammer cinematic trailer - Warhammer Videos

Crafting in Warhammer

You can choose from several different crafts (skills, professions) in Warhammer Online:
  • Apothecary
  • Butchering
  • Cultivating
  • Magical salvaging
  • Talisman making
  • Scavenging
Keep in mind these few facts:
  • Apothecary and talisman making are crafting skills, while the other four are gathering skills
  • You can only have one crafting and one gathering profession at any given time
  • Learning these skills is easy, simply visit one of the trainers throughout the world
  • Switching skills is possible, but you will loose all progress with previous skills

Apothecary
Apothecary is basically what you might know as alchemy from other games. It enables you to make all sorts of potions, lotions and powders, which increase your character stats for a certain period of time.
For low level potions, you can get the ingredients from various merchants, but higher level potions will require items obtained with one or more of the gathering professions: cultivating, scavenging or butchering.
Apothecary works with a main ingredient which determines what kind of potion you will make (whether the potion will give you bonuses to healing, intelligence or something else), while other additional ingredients (mods) are up to you: depending on which ones you use, there can be a longer or shorter duration, greater effect, more doses, and they also affect potion stability. Basically, you get to mix your own stuff, and of course Tome of Knowledge will track it all so you don't have to remember the ingredients. More about Apothecary here.


Talisman making
Talismans are minor items of power which you can attach to other powerful and rare items obtained with RvR, PvE, quests or something else. Basic talismans give bonuses to armor, resistances or stats, while more complicated talismans will give more elaborate bonuses.
To make a talisman, you need ingredients from various crafting and gathering skills, but the main ingredient is a magical fragment obtained with magical salvaging.


Magical Salvaging
Magical salvaging is basically (dis)enchanting; it can convert magical items into component parts. You can actually choose which bonuses to extract from items, like strength or intelligence. Also, you can get different fragments which are used to make talismans.


Cultivating
With cultivating, you can grow your own plants and fungi, which are mostly used for apothecary. To grow the plants or fungi, you need various seeds or spores obtained from merchants, monsters or scavenging. When you have the ingredients, you put them in the pot and then the growth cycle starts. You can also add soil, water and nutrients to speed up the process. After it's done, you should be able to harvest the plant which will then appear in your backpack, and you can then use the pot to grow another plant.


Butchering and Scavenging
Scavenging and butchering are rather similar, since they both extract specific resources from the monsters you kill. However, scavenging can only be used on 'humanoid' type creatures, while butchering can be used on beasts (non-sentient creatures so to speak). If they got no clothes or pockets, then it's most likely you will have to butcher. The only items you can recover with butchering are meat, skin and bones; for everything else, there's scavenging.
If you're wondering, scavenging is supposedly the most profitable profession so take that into consideration also when choosing your skills. But both are pretty profitable, since you can sometimes just follow other players and scavenge/butcher the monsters they kill (you need to wait a few minutes though).

I hope this short summary explains a bit about the various skills in Warhammer Online, and helps you choose the ones you like!

Crafting skills in Warhammer Online - Warhammer Guides

Thursday, August 21, 2008

Warhammer Basic Character & Item Stats

In order to help people better understand the statistics in Warhammer, how damage is calculated, how blocking happens etc., I posted this information here which will hopefully help you. This is for version 3.3 of the Warhammer Online Client, and is subject to change.

Strength:
Strength / 5 = Increases melee ability damage DPS by result.
Strength / 10 = Increases melee auto attack damage DPS by result.
Toughness:
Toughness / 5 = Reduces damage by X DPS.
Wounds:
Wounds * 10 = Extra Health over default increase per level.
Initiative:
(Level * 7.5 + 50) / Initiative * .1 * 100 = +% to be critically hit.
Initiative / (Level * 7.5 + 50) * .075 * 100 = +% to evade.
Weapon Skill:
Weapon skill / (Level * 7.5 + 50) * .075 * 100 = +% to parry.
Weapon skill / (Level * 5 + 50) * .25 *100 = +% Armor penetration
Ballistic Skill:
Ballistic skill / 5 = Increases ranged ability damage DPS by result.
Ballistic skill / 10 = Increases ranged auto attack damage DPS by result.
Intelligence:
Intelligence / 5 = Increases ability damage DPS by result.
Willpower:
Willpower / 5 = Increases Healing Per Second.
(Level * 7.5 + 50) / Willpower * .075 * 100 = +% Disrupt spells.
Armor:
Armor / (Level * 44) * .4 * 100 = +% Damage Reduction
Resistances:
Resistance Value / (level * 3.8) * .4 * 100 = % Resistance
Block:Block rating of shield / (level*7.5+50) * .2 * 100 = Block %

Thanks to WarhammerAlliance for originally posting this!

Basic Character & Item Stats - Warhammer Age of Reckoning News

New WHO Player FAQ

Here's an awesome overview of the most important issues and questions about Warhammer Online.

  • What are public quests?

Public quests are a great way to simultaneously level, gain influence for influence rewards, contribute to your faction's control of a zone, and gain RvR reputation. Multiple public quests are located in every zone. Public quests are multi-staged quests that require cooperation from a number of players who do not necessarily need to be grouped. You wander into the area and can start contributing to whatever phase the quest is in. Once the final phase is complete, which typically involves one or more challenging "bosses", rolls are made for good to excellent loot drops. For each kill or objective, you gain inflence. The influence meter for a zone is broken into three levels. When you fill each level, you are able to obtain your choice of an influence item from the influence turn-in NPC for the zone located in the warcamp. It is the same NPC used to bind your map for rapid travel. For every kill or objective you contribute to, your faction also gains points towards control of the zone. You get good XP for kills and objectives, as well as for being involved in the completion of each phase. A number of PQ's intersect with an open PvP/RvR area. Public quests are also great places to meet new people, expand your friends list, and recruit for the guild. I really enjoy them and think they are a great way for newer players to level and get into the swing of things. In addition, it is not unusual for you to obtain quests that send you into public quest areas and get double credit towards both the public quest and your personal quest.

  • Why are healers on the front lines?

One of the things I love about WAR is the paradigm shift they made for healing classes. In WAR there are no classes that just follow their party around like a healbot. Healing classes in WAR all bring something unique to the party, and they all do both damage and healing. Most have to do damage in order to keep their points up to sustain healing. This is especially true for Warrior Priests (order) and Shamans (destro). In fact, for some classes the most powerful healing abilities only work when you are smashing on something...for every hit it heals your defensive target. For Shamans, the more damage they do the more powerful their heals become and the more healing they do the more powerful their damage becomes. What this means is that it is generally good to have two healers for a group of six, preferably two different kinds, and players should not expect their healers to stand around doing nothing but healing. Both Order and Destro have a variety of classes that can heal (one in each race).

Order: Warrior Priest, Rune Priest, Arch Mage
Destro: Shaman, Zealot, Disciple of Khain

So forget everything you learned about healing classes in other games. WAR is different, and I love what WAR has done for healers. They are in the thick of things.

Furthermore, healers get Renown Points (RP) for healing other players in RvR, rather than just for kills. These points are shared with their group mates.

  • Grouping

To invite someone to join a group, select them and then right click on their icon next to their health bar. One nice feature is that any member of a party can "refer" someone to the group leader to be added to the group in a similar manner. You can also type "/invite ". To convert a party into a warband, which will allow greater numbers of players to be invited, type "/warbandconvert". Use "/warbandconvert 0" to make a private warband.

As you travel through zones, you will see a window under your icon that tells you if there are open groups in your area that you can join. You will also see a small icon to the lower left of your avatar icon that looks like a few wood people models. Click that to get a list of groups and warbands you can join. This game strongly encourages grouping. As a rule, if you are not in a guild group and you head to a public quest or to an RvR zone, it is in your best interest to either create or join a group. These are also always good opportunities to do some recruiting for AoA and also scouting for potential members of our alliance.

You don't have to stay in the pairing you start in. To change to a different pairing, make your way to your tier's warcamp (which is always located next to an RvR lake - there is a symbol on the map for the WC but it is often easy to miss) and talk to the flight master. For a modest fee you can change to a different pairing. Reasons you may want to do this include grouping with guildies for PvE or RvR, to experience different scenarios (each pairing and each tier have their own), and to go to where the action is for RvR.

  • How does open world RvR work?

Open world RvR is broken into tiers 1 through 4 for each of the three racial pairings, with each tier being intended for a level bracket. The open world RvR areas are designated by orange-brown outlines on your map referred to as RvR lakes. As you move through the tiers, the RvR lakes become larger and larger until eventually in tier 4 almost the entire map is open RvR. In each open world RvR zone (which are generally split over two maps) you will find battlefield objectives and keeps (except in tier 1 where there are no keeps). Taking the battlefied objectives will reward you with renown points and XP, and generally requires killing off champion and potentially hero level NPCs as well as any player character defenders that may be there. Open world RvR can be very intense, with the objectives moving back and forth between the realms all day long and a lot of players on both sides. It is a good idea to purchase battering rams, and oil, and ranged siege weapons. These can be set up on pads in the vicinity of the keeps for offense or defense.

Once you get to tiers 2 and on, you will find renown trainers and merchants in the keeps - which must be in your realm's control to use them. Each pairing in Tier 4 culminates in battles for fortresses. Capturing two fortresses triggers the city siege phase, which leads to a series of RvR public quests for the contested phase. If the defenders succeed, they kick out the enemy and RvR resets. If the enemy succeeds, it leads to a sequence of PQs culminating in an attack on the king, which will open up the city for a looting phase that gives the enemy access to dungeons and quests for a period of time.

  • What are RvR scenarios

Scenarios are instanced battlegrounds, with different maps and different objectives. Each tier of each pairing has multiple scenarios. To queue up for a scenario, click the scenario queue button on the left/top of your minimap and it will open up a UI. You can select from among the scenarios available in your tier and then continue on with what you were doing. When the scenario opens up, you will be asked if you want to join. This is an amazing feature because it means either solo or as a party you could engage in questing, public questing, or open world RvR and then go into a scenario when it is ready and then keep questing and alternate between the two. Lots of fun and really lets you find some action very quickly as soon as you log into the game. You can start playing scenarios from early levels and they are available in different tiers throughout the leveling process. You get XP and renown from scenarios just as you do from open world RvR, and they contribute to Realm vs. Realm by shifting control between the realms. It is best when full parties go in so that the ratio of healers is good, but if you play a healing class everyone will always be thrilled to see you.

You can be queued for multiple scenarios at once. Best way to do this is group with some guildies and each go to a different pairing and queue up. Each person can queue for the party for the scenario in their region. Note that if a new member joins the group, you need to re-queue or they will not get the invite when the scenario starts.

  • How to get armor and gear

For armor and gear, there are five different ways to get upgrades:

1. Public Quest loot bags
2. Influence rewards
3. Renown gear
4. Quest rewards
5. Random drops

Public quest loot rewards are received by the top 10 loot rolls at the end of a public quest. At the end of a public quest, your contribution is calculated and turned into a bonus addition to your loot roll. If you win, you get a loot bag which will have a color. I believe there are four different levels of loot bag, with the level of the PQ and the loot roll determining the rarity of your bag. PQ rewards can be very good. In particular I have found that for weapon this is one of the best ways to get upgrades. Once you have done a number of PQs in a zone, you will have built up your influence for that zone. Influence gives you access to three rewards, at least one of which ("elite") will be armor. Influence rewards are often, but not always, upgrades. When you fight in RvR, either open world or scenarios, you gain renown. For every renown rank you gain (there are 80 ranks) you earn a point. These points serve two purposes. First, by visiting renown trainers you can allocate points to increase your stats, gain new tactics, and new skills. Second, you can visit renown merchants. Renown merchants give you access to better gear (especially armor) to purchase depending on what your renown rank is. You still need to spend money on it - but your choices improve the higher your renown rank. In my experience the better armor is typically available as renown gear. Quest rewards are often good at the beginning of a tier bracket, but as you level in the bracket you will typically get renown gear or influence rewards that are often better than gear you get as quest rewards. So you will sell a lot of the quest reward gear. Random drops are just that, random. They usually are not as good as the gear you get from the other four sources - but occasionally you will get a rare drop that is better.

In many situations, you will see loot that is tailored for your class, even in need/greed situations. So it is possible that three players will each see an uncommon item (armor or weapon) that is for their class and "need" it. This can lead to some animosity when players don't understand what is happening. If you see players getting confused/upset try to explain that a lot of the loot drops are tailored to your class, and spread the word among your guildies so they don't get upset when they see people needing items. Not all loot drops are tailored, however, and if you see stuff that is not for your class it is generally expected that you will pass or greed.

  • What is crafting?

The following video is very helpful:

http://mythicmktg.fileburst.com/war/us/ ... fting.html

My advice is when you first start playing, get scavenging and apothacary or cultivation. They work very well together and scavenging will get you added income. Talisman making is not yet in the game so I can't say much about it.

  • How do guilds and alliances work?

The guild and alliance tools in this game are fantastic. We have the ability to establish custom ranks for both the guild and the alliance. We have in game event calendars, bank, and other perks you gain as the guild "levels up." An interesting guild mechanic is the battle standard, which can be wielded by a member designated as a standard bearer. Standards become more powerful as the guild levels, with the guild able to purchase and apply additional tactics to the standard that provide a variety of buffs. Standards also offer a speed buff which is useful in the early game before players have mounts. Standards may be planted in the ground to allow the standard bearer to fight - but when planted they are susceptible to being stolen. Standards may also be used to capture keeps in the name of the guild.

  • What are character attributes and abilities?

Strength - Increases your melee damage and makes it harder for enemies to parry or block your attacks.
Willpower - Increases your chances to disrupt hostile spells and increases all healing you do.
Toughness - Reduces the damage you take from all sources.
Wounds - Increases your maximum hitpoints.
Initiative - Increases your chance to dodge ranged attacks and makes it more difficult for enemies to critically hit you.
Weapon - Increases your chances to parry melee attacks and allows your melee attacks to bypass a portion of the enemy's armor.
Ballistic - Increases your ranged damage and makes it harder for your enemies to block or dodge your ranged attacks.
Intelligence - Increases your magical damage and makes it harder for enemies to disrupt or block your attacks.

Base Skills: Base skills are unlocked when you achieve a specific rank then purchased at your trainer, players can choose to skip a Base skill if they desire but there is no good reason to do so.

Morale: Morale abilities are powerful effects that require you to engage in combat for a period of time as you gain Morale. When you use a Morale ability any Morale you've built up is lost. There are four ranks of Morale Abilities. Rank 4 Morale abilities require the maximum Morale possible (100%) but can be devastating to your opponents. Players unlock their first Morale ability at Rank 8

Tactics: Tactics are passive abilities that can be combined with other tactics to enhance your natural abilities. As your gain ranks you unlock more slots to use additional Tactics at the same time. In addition you can save different sets of Tactics for use in specific situations. Players unlock their first Tactic ability at Rank 11

Mastery: Supplemental skills are unlocked once you reach a certain Mastery level, once unlocked a player has to choose to spend points to purchase these skills. This is a difficult choice because the same points used to purchase Supplemental skills are used to increase Mastery level. These points are referred to as specialization points, and are earned every rank starting at rank 11. A player will never have enough Specialization points to completely Master multiple paths while purchasing Supplemental skills. It is a tough choice because every point of Mastery earned improves every action in that mastery line by a small amount this includes the Base Skills you automatically get. One level of Mastery can seem trivial however they add up and 5 or 10 points of Mastery makes a significant difference.

Renown: Talk to renown trainers at the warcamps and keeps to spend renown points on buffs to your attributes, on additional tactics, and on additional skills. Renown points play an important role in character progression, so your character progression is really a combination of your XP rank and your renown rank. Renown is earned through RvR activity. Note that RvR activity also earns you XP - so RvR is a very good way to progress your character.

Tome Unlocks: You can unlock additional tactics through achievements in the Tome of Knowledge. Hope to have a list someday.

Thanks to warhammeralliance.com forum for originally posting this!

New Warhammer Online Player FAQ - Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning News

Warhammer Basic Slash Commands

Here are some basic slash commands in Warhammer you can type and explanations about what they do.

Chat:


/chan joins your realm's (Order or Destruction) general chat channel
/chancreate creates custom channel
/ sends a message to the designated channel
/s sends a message to the say channel
/t sends a private message
/p sends a message to your party members
/g sends a message to guild chat
/as sends a message to alliance chat
/wb sends a message Warband
/aos chats in the alliance officer chat
/as chats in the alliance's main chat
/sc chats in scenario chat

General:

/friend adds the named player to your friends list
/assist allows you to target another player's target
/follow allows you to follow the targeted player
/bug submits an ingame bug report
/respec this command resets every trained ability, tactic, and morale as if you were level one and had never talked to a trainer before; note, it might not work after release
/stuck if you get stuck this will teleport you to a nearest respawn location
/help brings up a help file
/aid is like assist only for a defensive target


Grouping:

/invite invite a player to group
/warbandconvert 1 (open) /warbandconvert 0 (private) to convert a group to a warband
/w - /wb for warband chat
/warband move <#> - /warbandmove <#>
/warband swap - /warbandswap
/warband promote - /warbandpromote
/warband demote - /warbanddemote
/warband makeleader - /warbandmakeleader
/warbandban
/warbandunban
/warbandpassword
/join (allows entry to PW protected WB)
/warbandpassword (cancels PW)
/disband or /leave


Emotes:

/wave
/bow
/beg
/point
/talk
/charge
/salute
/shrug
/no
/yes
/scream
/sit
/kneel
/lie
/eat
/drink
/yawn
/burp
/cower
/mad
/bored
/cheer
/clap
/flex
/laugh
/cry
/shy
/dance
/time
/drunk
/bye
/hi
/cheers
/chicken
/pig
/rude
/yell
/stomp
/brandish
/beckon
/halt
/howl
/gloat
/belch
/katadance
/rogor
/rez
/slit
/smile
/special - each race/class does something odd
/frown
/happy
/lol
/taunt
/shout
/glare
/intimidate
/waaagh
/grumble
/weep
/think
/insult
/preen
/primp
/scratch
/pick teeth
/impatient
/smoke
/no beard
/showoff
/dropkick
/chase tail
/sing
/plot
/conspire
/dagger
/pray
/juggle
/disagree
/agree
/em allows a custom message to be sent as emote


Useful bindings:
R - reply to the last person who send you a message
- (on numeric keypad) - screenshot
Shift + "-" - high-resolution screenshot
TAB key - cycle between nearby enemies
Ctrl + TAB - cycle between nearby friendly targets
N - target nearest enemy

Warhammer Online Basic Slash Commands - Warhammer News

Warhammer Mounts

You can purchase you mount at level 20. They currently cost 30 gold, which is pretty easy to get. If you're having trouble getting gold, don't forget to check out the Warhammer Guide, it has a great chapter about making gold.

Right now there is only one mount available for each race. The mounts increase your movement speed by 50% , and you can't use them indoors, nor use any of your abilities while mounted. In order to summon your mount you need to click it in your inventory/hotbar, at which point your character will pull out a horn, and summon it after about 3 seconds.

This video will show you all in game mounts at this time of beta. That includes: Goblin, Orc, Chaos, Dark Elf, Dwarf, Empire and High Elf. Enjoy!



Types of mounts:
  • Dwarf - Helicopter
  • Empire - Brown Horse
  • High Elf - White Horse
  • Chaos - Black Horse
  • Dark Elves - Raptor
  • GreenSkin (Goblin) - Wolf
  • GreenSkin (Orc) - Warthog
Warhammer Mounts - Wowhammer

Wednesday, August 20, 2008

The Unofficial Warhammer Online Guide

Check out the Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning guide features below:
  • Discover how to level up at breath-taking speed
  • Pile up your gold with tips shared by the rich
  • Complete public quests in a blink with detailed walkthroughs
  • Find out the strengths and weaknesses of each army and race
  • Get a comprehensive list of gears and skills to optimize your character
  • Win RvR battles using rare strategies unknown to the general public

If you wish to find out a bit more about the guide, check out this lens on Squidoo.com about the Warhammer Online Age of Reckoning Guide, or subscribe to my rss feed to get updated on the guide's status.

Edit: you can now get your copy of the guide from www.killerguides.com.

Wednesday, August 6, 2008

Warhammer Release Date

Mythic officially announced today the release date for the upcoming game Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning. After three years of development, the supposed next great MMORPG will be released on September 18th.

After the release, subscriptions can be purchased online and within the game:
  • 1 month for 12.99€ (£10.31)
  • 3 months for 35.97€ (£28.55)
  • 6 months for 65.94€ (£52.34)

Alternatively, pre-paid Game Card packs for a 60-day subscription will be available through participating retailers for 29.99€ (£23.81). The prices are similar to the most popular MMO, World of Warcraft, and about $3/month cheaper than Age of Conan: Hyborian Adventures.

From the 28th August, you can preorder the regular edition of the game for 5€ (£3.97). The special preorder pack will enable you to enter the ‘Live Game Head Start’ ahead of the full commercial release on the 18th September, as well as bonus in-game items. Supposedly, US will be able to preorder the game after August 23rd.

The regular edition of the game will be priced at 49.99 € (£39.69) RRP with a 30-day subscription included. If you want to get your copy, I recommend Amazon.com.

Warhammer Release Date - Warhammer Online News

Tuesday, August 5, 2008

Warhammer Preorder FAQ

Warhammer Online and Mythic have put together an FAQ regarding the Age of Reckoning pre-order.

Below are some frequently asked questions concerning pre-order offers.

I live in Canada how can I pre-order?

You can pre-order your copy of WAR from FutureShop, EB Games Canada, the EA Store and other fine game retailers.

Where are my codes when I pre-order online?

Each retailer may do it differently, we have no control over the distribution of their codes to pre-order customers. However, you will generally receive a separate email specifically containing your codes (in some cases I've seen it take a few days). Please do not contact EA Mythic Customer Support concerning this - you must contact your retailer as we will be unable to assist you further.

What is the difference between Closed Beta and Open Beta?

The Closed Beta Test is an invite-only program protected by a Non Disclosure Agreement (NDA) in which a select portion of the community is chosen to test the beta version of Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning and offer feedback directly to the development team via in-game tools and private message boards. During our Open Beta, we open testing up to a much larger audience. However, unlike many traditional "Open Betas," WAR will only be available to a limited number of players (including pre-order customers). Stay tuned for more details concerning the WAR Open Beta and ways in which you can get in.

Do I need my CE Product Key the day the game launches?

While we encourage you to get your WAR product key as soon as possible, we will provide a reasonable grace period for players to get a hold of their copies and have uninterrupted service following the Live Game Head Start.

What if I already pre-ordered?

Prior to March 26, 2008 no pre-order programs have been supported by EA Mythic. Please check with your retailers for full details. Current pre-order offers are only valid with the Collectors Edition.

If you wish to preorder Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning, you can do so on Amazon.com.

Warhammer Preorder FAQ - Wowhammer.net

Sunday, August 3, 2008

Warhammer Cinematic Trailer

This Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning cinematic trailer was featured at Games Convention 2006 at Leipzig.



Edit: new cinematic trailer here!

Warhammer Cinematic Trailer - Warhammer News

Warhammer Online FAQ

Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning is a Realm vs. Realm (RvR) game. There are two different factions, Order and Destruction.

Each faction consists of three different armies, and each of those has 3-4 possible career choices. Do note, available career choices may even depend on your gender, so choose carefully.

Armies of Order: Dwarfs, Empire, and High Elves
Armies of Destruction: Greenskins (Orcs and Goblins), Chaos, and Dark Elves.

Careers in WHO are basically classes, broken down into four different archetypes:
  • Tank - Ironbreaker, Swordmaster, Black Orc, Chosen
  • Melee damage - Witch Hunter, White Lion, Marauder, Witch Elf
  • Ranged damage - Engineer, Bright Wizard, Shadow Warrior, Goblin Squig Herder, Magus, Sorcerer
  • Support - Rune Priest, Warrior Priest, Archmage, Goblin Shaman, Zealot, Disciple of Khaine
Warhammer Online FAQ - Warhammer News

Warhammer Online System Requirements

Unlike some other games, War Online has great graphics without the need for the latest computer technology.

PC SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS

FOR WINDOWS XP
  • 2.5 GHz P4 processor or equivalent
  • 1 Gigabyte RAM
  • A 128 MB Video Card, with support for Pixel Shader 2.0
  • At least 15 GB of hard drive space
FOR WINDOWS VISTA
  • 2.5 GHz P4 processor or equivalent
  • 2 Gigabyte RAM
  • A 128 MB Video Card, with support for Pixel Shader 2.0
  • At least 15 GB of hard drive space*

There's also a number of different graphics cards supported:

ATI Radeon(TM) series
  • 9500, 9600, 9800
  • X300, X600, X700, X800, X850
  • X1300, X1600, X1800, X1900, X1950
  • 2400, 2600, 2900,
  • 3650, 3850, 3870
  • 4850, 4870
NVIDIA GeForce series
  • FX 5900, FX 5950
  • 6600, 6800,
  • 7600, 7800, 7900, 7950
  • 8400, 8500, 8600, 8800
  • 9400, 9500, 9600, 9800
  • GTX 260, GTX 280
  • Intel(R) Extreme Graphics
  • GMA X4500

Laptop versions of these chipsets may work, but may run comparatively slowly. Standalone cards that are installed in vanilla PCI slots (not PCIe or PCIx or AGP), such as some GeForce FX variants, will perform poorly. Integrated chipsets such as the ATI Xpress and the NVIDIA TurboCache variants will have low settings selected, but should run satisfactorily.

Please note that attempting to play the game using video hardware that isn’t listed above may result in reduced performance, graphical issues or cause the game to not run at all.

The NVIDIA GeForce FX series is unsupported under Vista.

Warhammer Online System Requirements - Warhammer News

Warhammer Online Features

Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning has some specific features which make it different from any other MMO game out there.

  • Realm vs. Realm (RvR) - you can fight with an army of allied players, either to defend your own territory or conquer another. Every quest or fight can change the face of the battle.
  • Public Quests - Massive cooperative player versus environment encounters enable you to fully experience the glory of Realm versus Realm battles.
  • Tome of Knowledge - this epic quest revealing the Warhammer Online lore will unveil the story behind your character, and enable additional features such as tracking achievements, comparing it with other players and more.
  • Cities - Meet new people, get drunk in the taverns, or get lost in the vast streets of huge cities. Cities become more advanced and prosperous depending on your realm's overall performance in the war.
  • Advanced guild features - guilds are an important part of the Warhammer Online. As a guild, you can capture and claim various keeps, make unique heraldry, earn Guild Tactics and more.
Warhammer Online Features - Warhammer News