Friday, May 15, 2009

Land of the Dead and the Crystal Skull

That is how I feel about Mythic’s new dungeon they are preparing to release next month. Completely and utterly underwhelmed…

I will start with the good. Adding Wards to your Tome is a good idea, so good in fact people have asked for this is some shape or form for the past 5 months. It’s nice that they are finally doing it. Even if I’m not thrilled about it new playing areas are always good along with an alternative route for PvE gear progression.

I’m also interested to see how this will affect the oRvR lakes. I’m really optimistic but at the same time the manner in which it is being implemented see’s like a Band-Aid. What is it with Mythic that they think just adding some sort of token or artifact to the loot table improves the game? Is it not possible to have us kill people and earn invisible currency that does not take up precious inventory space?

Now on to my personal dissatisfaction with Land of the Dead. It’s to cliché. It looks like the Mythic development team just got off a weekend marathon of Indiana Jones, Tomb Raider, and The Mummy movies before creating this content. It has every cliché encounter I have ever seen in an Egyptian action movie. Terra Cotta armies, mummies coming back from the dead, the booby traps from Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade… I mean they didn’t even try to cover that one up!

Not only is the design stolen from the silver screen but it looks as though the encounters were stolen from World of Warcraft. Every fight shown in the Games Day trailers were gimmicky mini games like nearly every one of WoW’s raid encounters, dodge fire shooting from some orb and kill the undead that spawn, dodge a giant mummy statue hand, play matador with an undead giant, run from a swarm of locust. I feel like they are pillaging WoW and pretty much every quick time event on a console for this content patch.

Over all I’m more disappointed than I am excited about the content. I’m looking forward to purge quests when the zone flips more than anything.

Monday, May 11, 2009

My best night in WAR ever

Sorry for the lack of posting. I just wasn’t into games much. More on that to come. Here is what I am passionate about now… I’m back to Warhammer Online and I’m loving it!


Last night was some of the most fun I have had in WAR. We were running a 6 man in Tier 3. The group was made up of an Iron Breaker, 2 Slayers, 2 Rune Priests, and a Warrior Priest (Me).

There was an Order Warband (raid party of 24 people) going around taking Keeps but they were full. We decided to follow them and pick off any stray Destruction along the way. After sacking the Keep and our group getting 4 of the top 6 positions on contribution we headed to the Destruction’s Warcamp to kill them after they respawned. We waited just outside and as we thought a group came out. We began fighting them but after killing a few they slowly gathered reinforcements. With a overwhelming push by Destruction we were on our heels. We lost a Slayer to a position that couldn't be rez'd and the rest of the party was at half health so we began to retreat.

As we retreated by ranks in an orderly fashion... well not really we ran like cowards. I brought out a Standard to give our group increased run speed and our other Slayer turned and fought them to slow the advancing horde of Destruction, his death gave us those precious seconds to get out of snare range. The last 4 members of our group made for the bridge outside the entrance to our Order Warcamp. This is where we met up with our two Slayers that respawned and where we held our ground.

At this point in the battle the Destruction Horde numbered at least half a Warband, versus our merry band of 6. I dropped our Standard on the ground (which gave us 15% increased renown and 15% increased toughness) and screamed YOU SHALL NOT PASS in Vent.

Four Chosen piled over the bridge and 2 were promptly knocked into the depths of the lake below. The Sorceresses and Squig Herders rained hell down upon us but we did not break... or die. Our Slayers and Iron Breaker began attacking soft targets. Downing a Disciple of Khane then a Witch Elf they moved on to a Choppa. The Warrior Priest began attacking a lone Shaman in order to pressure him into healing himself rather than his teammates. Our 2 Rune Priests healed and rez'd our group with the Warrior Priest aiding with group heals.

It seemed with every one destruction member we killed 2 more would rise from his ashes. In the face of overwhelming odds what can you do... nothing but hold your ground… And hold our ground we did. After 10 minutes of this raging battle we now estimated our enemy at a full Warband. Death was imminent for our little group if something didn't happen.

At what could be described as Divine Intervention by our all mighty lord Sigmar, the Order Warband that was taking a Battle Objective rallied to our aid. From the back side of the bridge where the forces of Destruction didn't see them coming, our allies rolled in. Thirty seconds later the battle was over. Our brave Warrior Priest reclaimed his Battle Standard and our group mounted up to aid the Warband in another Keep Assault.