Well, since preview weekend+ begins today, you can expect some more videos tonight! Until then (since like most of you I have to work for a living), here's the next installment of my Impressions of WAR.
General Gameplay
While WAR offers the possibility to level through pure pvp, I've found that the fastest and most fun way to level is to mix questing with pvp. In fact, several quests involve killing X number of enemy players, and these quests can often be re-done as many times as you like.
There are many ways to go about this, depending on your play style. One great feature of scenarios is that if you're in an RvR group out in the open world, or just with friends questing in a group, and you're the only one interested in doing a scenario, you can join when prompted, and even though the scenario puts you in a group, you do not actually leave your original group. You can still chat with them, and let them know when you'll be returning.
Once the scenario is over, you're put right back where you were. This makes scenarios much easier to do at a moments notice and with little worry that you'll be struggling to get back into your previous group.
Quests are super easy to understand, and often times I was able to do 4-5 quests in a 30minute period. Overall, I love just being part of the world and participating in the game. You really get the feeling that you're in a world that has life and movement to it. There was many a time in DAOC that I wandered too far into the middle of nowhere and there was not a soul to be found.
Realm VS. Realm
Keep sieges, keep defenses, city sieges, city defenses, open world pvp... These my friends, are the elements of a truly fun MMO. It's funny because looking back on my days in DAoC, the most fun to be had was taking keeps, and everything else was either something to do to add variety to your experience, or something that would better prepare you to take keeps etc...
Now, with WAR, we have a game that satisfies the fun requirement that DAoC once met, and also has some revolutionary non-pvp gameplay that begs to be played. The RvR element however, is still king in my book.
Siege Weapons
Siege weapons have been re-designed from their DAoC predecessors to be easily built, easily aimed and devastating when fired. This element of RvR can really make a difference during a keep raid, and it really lends to that feeling of actually attacking/defending a keep. Without siege weapons, we'd all be led to believe that the only way to take a keep is to hack the door down with your swords... which as we all know is kind of silly, even if it's possible.
Now a raiding party can construct a ram to break the doors down, and several people can use the ram to destroy the door even faster. Boiling oil, ballistae, and catapults round out the rest of the weapons, and something tells me they will implement others if they can find a use/balance for them. The only down side is that they MUST be built on the designated platforms.
I understand the reasoning behind this, but still, there was something fun about driving a ram around with 5 people hitching a ride... even if it only traveled 0.001mph.
Keeps
The keeps are very well designed. I can see elements that have crossed over from DAoC, but the art is so unique and interesting. Each race has keeps that reflect their architectural style. A nice added element to the keep system is that whenever a keep (or rvr objective) is taken over by the enemy realm (IE: the realm that did not initially own it), elements from their race begin to appear around the area. For example, when orcs take dwarven keeps, big steel cages and sharpened wood spikes start to appear around it.
Guild Claiming
Guild claiming, while nothing new, is a great feature to be included in open RvR. Now a guild can be informed about their keep being under siege. My only real concern is that years from now, a guild will claim a keep in the lower tiers, and then be unable to defend it properly due to "chicken syndrome". But I’m optimistic, so we'll see how it pans out.
Today's blog is going to be a bit short, because I've got some serious video-making to do!
WAAAGH,
MAUL0r
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