MMO Gamers

Much has been happening since my last Warhammer post.  I have reached the dizzying heights of level 8.  I have to say that leveling is a lot slower in WAR than other MMO’s I’ve played, but then there is only 40 levels, not like Age of Conan’s 80.  I haven’t minded the slow leveling and I much prefer the slower combat to, once again, Age of Conan’s faster style.  Also, since this is the Open Beta and I will have to reroll on another server come the Head Start for launch, I didn’t want to see too much of the content, since I’ll have to do it over again.

Our guild has reached level 3 already, which unlocked some guild rewards.  At level 2 we got access to the Calender.  This is much like Guild Portals calender except obviously it’s in the game.  You just bring up your guild interface and click your calender tab and you can see what events are scheduled, and it’s very easy to add events also.  At level 3 we got access to guild taxes and tithes, as well as the guild vault.  These are a great idea and you can set taxes to automatically take a percentage of members earnings.  Yeah, I’m the Taxman *does his best John Lennon*.  I’ve set it to 5% for the Open Beta, just to see how the thing works.  This will make it easier to buy the guild banner and pay for Tactics and stuff.  Beats having to come up with the 20 plat for the heraldry like in EQ2.

I also headed over with Kyrana and some other guildies to Nordland, the Destruction RvR zone for our level, for some, you guessed it, RvR.  Nordland seems to be the RvR hotspot.  And it was all-out-WAAGH.  There must have been 30 or more a side at times and the battle raged for hours.  We played for 2 hours without even realizing it.  I can’t tell you how much of a buzz it was, pushing the enemy back and gaining territory, only to have them counter and push us back.  I headed back there later at about 4am CST and the fight was still on, albeit in smaller numbers.

I’m really enjoying the Disciple of Khaine (DoK).  He isn’t too bad of a healer and I’ve managed to keep people upright in some scary situations.  The only thing is my heals are all either Heals-over-Time (HoTs) or lifetaps from melee.  And that’s probably the area where I’m coming unstuck in RvR.  I’m a melee healer and my heals cost Soul Essence (SE).  Once I run out of SE I can’t heal, and I regenerate SE by meleeing.  Each one of my strikes generates a certain amount of SE.  I do have one ranged attack that generates a very small amount of SE and it’s come in very handy.  But as a melee healer I have to run into the fray with the tanks and the melee dps’ers and fight and heal.  And a dark elf in a dress makes for a beautiful target, and I often find 3 or 4 of the enemy all over me in a heartbeat.  I’m a medium armour wearer but I really think this should have been a plate class sometimes.  I did get my first Morale ability at level 8, which is a big instant heal, a real lifesaver.  The thing with Morale though is you need to build it up in battle.  It builds up slowly as you fight and goes down slowly between fights, so you need to be in a berzerker rampage to get your Morale up.  There’s a lot to take in with combat now that I’m getting higher levels.  Definately more challenging than other MMO’s and lots of fun.  I did have a one-on-one encounter with a Dwarf Engineer.  I was level 8 and he was 10 and I very nearly kicked his butt.  I totally had this guy but he backed away and brought me within range of his NPC’s and I was toast.  So I guess the DoK isn’t too bad a melee fighter in that kind of situation.

EDIT: Crimson Starfire (see comments) reminded me of the skill “Blood Offering” which converts Action Points into Soul Essence.  You must be standing still and it takes a few seconds to cast but it is a great and useful spell.  I keep forgetting I have this spell *facepalm*.

I have to say, I’m having an absolute blast with Warhammer.  I’m impressed with the guild features.  The Public Quest’s are a fun, fast quest you can jump right in and get ph4t l00t.  You can also buy good armour using the Influence you gain from participating in PQ’s.  RvR totally r0×0rz, it’s such a buzz.  I haven’t tried my hand at crafting yet; I meant to but haven’t been able to drag myself away from all the other stuff.