Orc 1999

So were have I been? I rolled 3 skulls and have been ko'ed by Blood Bowl. A friend bought the PC blood bowl game, so a few more of us followed. Then before I knew it I had bought myself a plastic orc blood bowl team from ebay stripped (guide here)the miniatures and repainted them in the theme of Space 1999.

Here is a picture of them before and 1 stripped.

This is what they look like now with the addition of some goblins.

A change is as good as a rest?

As well as the game and community one thing which keeps a MMO player coming back for more is routine. For over a year now my routine has been Monday, Tuesday and Thursday nights I login into War.

A blood bowl addiction has pulled me away from War to a point. Now I only login for guild RvR nights. So at the very least I login on Tuesday night for a 4-5 hour open RvR session. But with the recent Mythic announcement for European players moving servers and progression freeze for characters for a week this will probably see a further break for me.

My subscription is still running, but I am not entirely sure if I’ll be playing War for anytime this week. I don’t think I am alone, so could this mean a dent in subscriptions as people just let War slide? I for one think Mythic might need a little enticement to get people back into the routine.

Single target choppa

When there has been no set guild RvR nights happening I run some scenarios with my new choppa build. I have been running the AoE spec but these days, I am not really getting the damage or killing blows. The spec worked in a premade group with other AoE classes and healing backup, but when you’re running scenarios solo the damage just gets soaked up by AoE healing.

So I have spec’ed Hellichoppa to mostly Da’Savage tree, with strength around 950 and about 8.5k of wounds. The dilemma is what to have as my next important stat, weapon skill or toughness. It seems easier to raise my weapon skill but apparently toughness is more useful in open RvR as you face a wider range of damage. Weapon skill is most handy against melee classes, so I plan to give both a try.

The single target damage has been a fresh of air for my choppa. Jumping on the back line and actually killing people has been a revelation since my AoE build days. But I did come across a rather embarrassing defeat against a shadow warrior at the north flag in Dragon’s Bane. I was the only destruction at the flag and he rode up on his horse. I gritted my teeth to get ready for run around the flag pole, as he kited me. But to my surprise he started attacking with melee range, thinking I would win we started to dance. I left with a red face and he left with half his health.

On another note a few of my friends purchased the PC Blood Bowl game so I thought I would give it a try. So far I am completely addicted and actually thinking about buying a team of miniatures. I love the skaven but don’t really know enough at this stage to create decent plays

Would you pay to swap?

Did you ever get character to level 40 and just think meh? I would pay money to just be able to swap to a different class. I would change my chosen to a black orc. Its got nothing to do with power or mechanics I just think they look cooler. I wouldn't want gear just swap my class and ranks and I’d be happy. What toon would you pay to swap?

Packed oRvR...

So on my third night of oRvR I finally got to take part in a city siege it was an Inevitable City defence. We won the first two stages but lost stage 3. Their healer an archmage was very good. I loved the new city siege but I need to run it a few more times to write some more. Anyway with the new city siege came lots of players in open realm versus realm which was absolutely excellent so I took some pictures.

Organized fun

Saturday night was my first play session in a week as I have been in the America. I was hoping to get to see the city siege but all I got was lovely open RvR. It was slightly frustrating as I wanted to see the new content but order prevented destruction locking Riekland on more than 1 occasion.

I tend to prefer oRvR to scenario’s for the sheer range of combat. You can go from a 1v1 to 100v100 and everywhere in between. The zerg might be a powerful force but it tends to run as 1 which leads to loss of keeps and battle objectives.

This happened Saturday night, as no guild war band was running I ran with an open war band. On more than a few occasions a smaller group prevented zone locks by sneaking to Schwenderhalle Manor or Frostbeard’s Quarry in Reikland. The Manor is an excellent place to defend with a small force. Destruction mainly moved as one (aka zerg) so a lot of the night was spent with most of Reikland under destruction control but reacting to smaller more organized order forces. The classic example is when the Manor is left open or only has a few scouts. They were able to take it and defend, against a greater force. Even when they wiped, the order war camp is close to the Quarry with enough time to take and lock before destruction zerg can reach them.

If most of my time was spent running in an open war band I don’t think my perception of oRvR would be as positive. But most of my time is spent in guild war bands that can turn on a dead goblin. Player’s follow orders and stay together defending or pushing as one and co-ordinating with other war bands to cover battle objectives. Maybe this is why my views on oRvR are so positive? You hear people call War, Waithammer or say its open world PvP is more PvE.
I think a lot if these views come from open war bands or the player bases focus as a whole. If your focus is renown and you just going through the mmo motions you’ll probably spending a lot of time guarding mail boxes or waiting for a objective/keep tick. If you shift your focus to fighting and tactics the style of oRvR changes and in my opinion the fun increases.

I wonder how many zone locks have been lost while the zerg waits for a keep or battle objective tick, or when the zone is under control and hordes of players wait it out in a keep or by the mail box. I have ran with a few excellent war band leaders who seem to always come up with new ways to mess with the enemy, from ambushing just at the right spot, using terrain as an advantage and being able to extract themselves from the fight to see the flow of battle and issue orders to push just at the right spot to roll the enemy.
I am not advocating oRvR is perfect there are lots to improve, but I think the core is there. How to improve it? Would siege weapons, city siege like mechanics in keeps or an alternative to zone locking help? In the end I am not so sure as I said player focus (path of least resistance) and open war bands (disorganized zerg) will always be there to detract from those improvements. It also seems there are a lot of smaller guilds out in oRvR as well. You have an open war band run by 3 people from a guild. They work together but war band chat is none existent, so the majority is left in the dark.

How do we reach this ‘organized fun’? :) I have said it once but having in game voice chat would go a long way to help organization. State of the realm, AutoBand and WARCommander make a war bands easier to lead could these be improved upon and be part of the main game. But how do we get smaller guilds together and move those who mainly PUG into organized war bands? Could guilds have incentives to be larger and participate more in oRvR. Maybe the new player experience could be extending to a tier 4 set of tutorials? Ones that highlight the extra stuff you can gain from being in a guild and ideas of what to do once you hit the level cap. Mythic produced this team play guide does it need to be updated to cover tier 4? I think stuff like this would make excellent video grab bags.

I think giving war band leader’s extra abilities might promote more organization. I would imagine the buffs would only come into use when the war band reached a certain number. You would not want lots of war band leaders of 2 or 3 created just for buffs. Buffs which only trigger when in RvR like slight buffs to speed for the war band when riding mounts or extra renown when the war band leader issues a rally call to fight on him. I am not talking game breaking abilities just little extras to give incentive to fight with the war band.

Don't mention ze WAR!

Check out Don't mention ze WAR! They even have a video from the Squig Night (but from the dark side). The perfect banner for the sight could be an orc in a pointed helmet.