Garok
Can't get enough of FH
- Joined
- Jan 23, 2004
- Messages
- 777
Taken from :- http://camelot.allakhazam.com/news/
Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning Preview Submitted by: Danalog
I had the unique opportunity last week to visit Mythic HQ and learn all about their exciting upcoming game, Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning. The inventors and master of RvR are building this game to offer a brand new type of RvR experience, which looks like a heck of a lot of fun. This is a long one, so bear with me!
Races and Classes
There will be two alliances in the game, boiling down to Order vs Chaos. On the side of Order are the human Empire, the haughty High Elves, and the ale-loving Dwarves. On the side of Chaos are the Orcs and Goblins that comprise the Greenskins, the mutated servants of Chaos, and the stealthy Dark Elves. Each race has four (or so) classes that exemplify the racial archetypes. For example, Dwarves have the Ironbreaker, which is their defensive fighter, the Hammerer, which is the offensive fighter, the healing spellcaster Rune Priest, and the Engineer, a ranged inventor and magic user.
RvR
There are RvR and non-RvR parts of every zone, so you won't have to experience load times when entering a PvP conflict. All PvP is consensual. You can gain Trophy Items from RvR to let you customize your armor for looks (and most likely not stats). For example, if you're an Orc and you kill enough Dwarves, you could get a Dwarf skull which you could place on your shoulder spikes, on your belt buckle, or perhaps on a chain around you neck.
The End-Game content is a RvR campaign to take over enemy cities. If your side is totally outnumbered, as tends to happen in these types of games there could be PvP boosts to your alliance to try and balance it out, through stat bonuses or extra NPC spawns.
Currently, they are planning on making it so that opposite alliances can't communicate, although that may change.
Zones
There are 11 zones per pair of conflicting enemies, and three sets of enemies, bringing the total to 33 zones on release.
Zone configuration:
* 1 - 4 are tiered zones
| middle 4 is a neutral zone at start
1 - 2 - 3 - 4 * are capitals
| | | \ | battlefield moves between two capitals
| | | 4 can probably go from 2 to your capital
| | | / | go from your capital to allies capitals
1 - 2 - 3 - 4 each set has same basic layout
|
*
You can gain control of the tier 4 zones and capital cities though winning Battlefields events, which are non-instanced events of various types in those zones.
There are also instanced Scenarios for random PvPing for objectives. In order to try and avoid the long queue times and realm imbalancing that plagues other games, they are planning on bringing in NPCs to balance the player teams out.
Quests
There are a few interesting new types of quests:
Automatic group quests (ie, "everyone nearby feed the ogre")
Non-PvP RvR quests (ie, "heal the hurt dwarves with ale" vs "kill the hurt dwarves and steal their beards")
Branching Quests (ie, "Deliver the note to gain exp" vs "Sell the note to a spy for some quick cash")
"Christmas" Quests (ie, wandering though the wilderness you find someone who needs quick help with a big reward... encouraging world exploration)
There are three internal quest classifications:
Green: Non PvP in PvE areas (ie, fedex quests)
Yellow: Non PvP in RvR areas (ie, gather components for an NPC in a battlefield)
Red: PvP in RvR areas (kill the dwarves!)
Each type of quest is available from level 1 on for all playstyles, allowing people to do any sort of playstyle from the beginning to the end of the game!
Finally, Mythic is making sure that you always get a useful reward... even if you're an orc doing dark elf quest, you'll be able to get something that'll help your character.
Combat
WARNING: Combat is still heavily under development, so if the game doesn't end up anything like this, don't shoot the messanger!
They are planning on having three major themes to combat, Tactics, Main Combat, and Morale Bonuses.
There is a Strategy bar where you add Tactics pre-fight to boost up your stats or abilities. For example, you can get +5 to ice spells, +5 strength, faster casting, etc. The bar has X spaces, each "Tactic" has Y slots. You will get Tactics like you get any other item, spell, or ability. You also might find ways to lower the number of slots certain Tactics take up in the Strategy bar.
There is also a Morale meter, for you to build up Morale as you fight. You can spend a little bit to use a low power ability, or build it up to use a higher power one. You also can get Morale skills like any other item. You gain Morale by fighting well (eg, if you're hitting a huge Rock Golem and not doing any damage, you certainly aren't gaining any Morale from it!), and lose it quickly when the fight ends.
They're planning on making Auto-attack weapon damage and fighting ability damage independant, the guiding metaphor for that is that an Ogre with a spoon can still kill you, midget with big magical halberd can't.
PvP vs PvE
You can go through the entire game on only PvP, only PvE, or (as they're hoping most folks do), a mix of both. The game starts 80% PvE 20% PvP, and they're planning on having it end up with the opposite ratio. There will be PvE raids for those that get bored of RvR, but RvR is the major focus of the game. You can RvR from day 1 of playing, there's no initial time where all you do is kill bats and rats.
Look+Feel
They're putting big artistic time into Facial Expressions for the game, making it so your character actually looks like the emotions he is feeling. They're putting a rear-view mirror panel into the bottom of the screen, a la Doom, to show you how your character is reacting to events.
Your character also changes as you gain power, for example Orcs get bigger, Dwarves get more fancy long beards, and al warrior classes get more beefy muscles. With the texturing in the game, it's quite obvious when this increases too, with the huge amount of detail they put into everything.
The interface will be standardized and skinnable/moddable by players. They want everyone to get the best experience they can out of the interface, so they're making it highly customizable.
Finally, the Banners, Game Looks, etc, are all extremely accurate to original Games Workshop art, since every bit of art has to pass through GW's approval system. So, Warhammer miniature and tabletop fans rejoice!
Items
WARNING 2: Items are also still heavily under development.
They're planning on having NO Bind on Pickup, and only maybe having Bind on Equip. They want a robust economy, and they're considering adding some sort of item decay to balance it out.
The Trophies are a big way to customize your character's looks, and since everyone will be getting a different set of them, you can reach into the Trophy Grab Bag and set yourself up to look truly unique.
Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning Preview Submitted by: Danalog
I had the unique opportunity last week to visit Mythic HQ and learn all about their exciting upcoming game, Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning. The inventors and master of RvR are building this game to offer a brand new type of RvR experience, which looks like a heck of a lot of fun. This is a long one, so bear with me!
Races and Classes
There will be two alliances in the game, boiling down to Order vs Chaos. On the side of Order are the human Empire, the haughty High Elves, and the ale-loving Dwarves. On the side of Chaos are the Orcs and Goblins that comprise the Greenskins, the mutated servants of Chaos, and the stealthy Dark Elves. Each race has four (or so) classes that exemplify the racial archetypes. For example, Dwarves have the Ironbreaker, which is their defensive fighter, the Hammerer, which is the offensive fighter, the healing spellcaster Rune Priest, and the Engineer, a ranged inventor and magic user.
RvR
There are RvR and non-RvR parts of every zone, so you won't have to experience load times when entering a PvP conflict. All PvP is consensual. You can gain Trophy Items from RvR to let you customize your armor for looks (and most likely not stats). For example, if you're an Orc and you kill enough Dwarves, you could get a Dwarf skull which you could place on your shoulder spikes, on your belt buckle, or perhaps on a chain around you neck.
The End-Game content is a RvR campaign to take over enemy cities. If your side is totally outnumbered, as tends to happen in these types of games there could be PvP boosts to your alliance to try and balance it out, through stat bonuses or extra NPC spawns.
Currently, they are planning on making it so that opposite alliances can't communicate, although that may change.
Zones
There are 11 zones per pair of conflicting enemies, and three sets of enemies, bringing the total to 33 zones on release.
Zone configuration:
* 1 - 4 are tiered zones
| middle 4 is a neutral zone at start
1 - 2 - 3 - 4 * are capitals
| | | \ | battlefield moves between two capitals
| | | 4 can probably go from 2 to your capital
| | | / | go from your capital to allies capitals
1 - 2 - 3 - 4 each set has same basic layout
|
*
You can gain control of the tier 4 zones and capital cities though winning Battlefields events, which are non-instanced events of various types in those zones.
There are also instanced Scenarios for random PvPing for objectives. In order to try and avoid the long queue times and realm imbalancing that plagues other games, they are planning on bringing in NPCs to balance the player teams out.
Quests
There are a few interesting new types of quests:
Automatic group quests (ie, "everyone nearby feed the ogre")
Non-PvP RvR quests (ie, "heal the hurt dwarves with ale" vs "kill the hurt dwarves and steal their beards")
Branching Quests (ie, "Deliver the note to gain exp" vs "Sell the note to a spy for some quick cash")
"Christmas" Quests (ie, wandering though the wilderness you find someone who needs quick help with a big reward... encouraging world exploration)
There are three internal quest classifications:
Green: Non PvP in PvE areas (ie, fedex quests)
Yellow: Non PvP in RvR areas (ie, gather components for an NPC in a battlefield)
Red: PvP in RvR areas (kill the dwarves!)
Each type of quest is available from level 1 on for all playstyles, allowing people to do any sort of playstyle from the beginning to the end of the game!
Finally, Mythic is making sure that you always get a useful reward... even if you're an orc doing dark elf quest, you'll be able to get something that'll help your character.
Combat
WARNING: Combat is still heavily under development, so if the game doesn't end up anything like this, don't shoot the messanger!
They are planning on having three major themes to combat, Tactics, Main Combat, and Morale Bonuses.
There is a Strategy bar where you add Tactics pre-fight to boost up your stats or abilities. For example, you can get +5 to ice spells, +5 strength, faster casting, etc. The bar has X spaces, each "Tactic" has Y slots. You will get Tactics like you get any other item, spell, or ability. You also might find ways to lower the number of slots certain Tactics take up in the Strategy bar.
There is also a Morale meter, for you to build up Morale as you fight. You can spend a little bit to use a low power ability, or build it up to use a higher power one. You also can get Morale skills like any other item. You gain Morale by fighting well (eg, if you're hitting a huge Rock Golem and not doing any damage, you certainly aren't gaining any Morale from it!), and lose it quickly when the fight ends.
They're planning on making Auto-attack weapon damage and fighting ability damage independant, the guiding metaphor for that is that an Ogre with a spoon can still kill you, midget with big magical halberd can't.
PvP vs PvE
You can go through the entire game on only PvP, only PvE, or (as they're hoping most folks do), a mix of both. The game starts 80% PvE 20% PvP, and they're planning on having it end up with the opposite ratio. There will be PvE raids for those that get bored of RvR, but RvR is the major focus of the game. You can RvR from day 1 of playing, there's no initial time where all you do is kill bats and rats.
Look+Feel
They're putting big artistic time into Facial Expressions for the game, making it so your character actually looks like the emotions he is feeling. They're putting a rear-view mirror panel into the bottom of the screen, a la Doom, to show you how your character is reacting to events.
Your character also changes as you gain power, for example Orcs get bigger, Dwarves get more fancy long beards, and al warrior classes get more beefy muscles. With the texturing in the game, it's quite obvious when this increases too, with the huge amount of detail they put into everything.
The interface will be standardized and skinnable/moddable by players. They want everyone to get the best experience they can out of the interface, so they're making it highly customizable.
Finally, the Banners, Game Looks, etc, are all extremely accurate to original Games Workshop art, since every bit of art has to pass through GW's approval system. So, Warhammer miniature and tabletop fans rejoice!
Items
WARNING 2: Items are also still heavily under development.
They're planning on having NO Bind on Pickup, and only maybe having Bind on Equip. They want a robust economy, and they're considering adding some sort of item decay to balance it out.
The Trophies are a big way to customize your character's looks, and since everyone will be getting a different set of them, you can reach into the Trophy Grab Bag and set yourself up to look truly unique.
